Lawrence Freedman has a good post on what Russia, having lost the first stage of the war, will attempt next:
Taking Slovyansk would be a first step to a more ambitious objective of cutting off Ukrainian forces in eastern Ukraine, but to encircle the Ukrainian forces they will still need to meet up with Russian forces advancing from the South. Slovyansk is preparing for the battle, and many of its civilians have been evacuated. As the ISW note:
If Russian forces are unable to take Slovyansk at all, Russian frontal assaults in Donbas are unlikely to independently breakthrough Ukrainian defences and Russia’s campaign to capture the entirety of Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts will likely fail.
If this analysis is correct this new stage of the war could be critical. Another Ukrainian victory will not see the Russians pushed out of Ukraine but will make their position more difficult for the stage after that. . . .
Yet even if Russia does acquire the territory it seeks in the Donbas and prepares for a climactic defensive battle, there still remains the perplexing question about the nature of Putin’s end game. From the start the most baffling aspect of this war has been the incoherence of Russian strategy. The gap between stated aims and available capabilities was wide enough when it started but it has now widened even further, especially after being defeated in the war’s first round.
Putin no doubt wishes to avoid being seen as a loser. It is possible that the ideas developed by the Ukrainian government for it to abandon NATO but rely instead on security guarantees might provide some consolation, but it would not be much. He is left with the worst of both worlds….Taking over the Donbas now would mean oppressing a hostile population, reconstructing shattered towns and cities, and guarding against future Ukrainian military action.
Maybe he will soon lose interest in a land grab but satisfy himself with a de-industrialised and impoverished Ukraine, its people traumatised and its infrastructure broken.