It Never Was "If"...

 ... it always was "when", against the background of Russian Army full "economy of force" mode of SMO. So, Soledar is now in mopping up mode. 

Units of Wagner Group have taken control of the “entire territory” of Soledar, the head of the private military company Yevgeny Prigozhin claimed on Tuesday evening. Fighting is still going on in the center of town, where an unknown number of Ukrainian soldiers has been encircled. “There is a cauldron in the center of town, where urban fighting is taking place,” Prigozhin said in a statement released to the media. “We’ll announce the number of prisoners tomorrow.” He added that only Wagner “and no other units” had taken part in the storming of Soledar.

What is known about VSU losses in Soledar alone, even Ukie sources admit that they are catastrophic. If to believe Ukie sources--they lost 14 battalions in Soledar. 

So, we are talking around  9,000-10,000 (average battalion is usually between 500-700 to even 1,000 personnel) KIAs. Bakhmut (Artemovsk) is next. There are also large numbers of POWs taken in and around Soledar. We'll get more accurate numbers fairly soon, but chief of the police of one of the West Ukrainian oblasts reports today massive number of funerals for KIAs in her (she is a woman) jurisdiction. She laments that it is de facto depopulation. Well, what can I say, at least they can look at the bright side of the deal--unlike civilians in Donbass who have been shelled relentlessly by Nazis, including from her jurisdiction--Russia hits only military and war-supporting infrastructure. Ah, those high-precision stand-off weapons, which Russia is running out for the last 9 months. Russians may be primitive and backward people, who have to cannibalize washing machines for chips and do not know what modern indoor plumbing is, but boy, these uncivilized brutes are really good at producing top of the line stand off weapons and providing targeting for them, if you know what I mean, wink, wink.