US intelligence officers have determined that Vladimir Putin is being misinformed by his advisers about his forces’ poor performance in Ukraine, according to an official.
The source said the recently declassified intelligence suggests the Russian president is aware of the situation and there is now persistent tension between him and senior Russian military officials.
The Biden administration is hopeful that divulging the finding could help prod Mr Putin to reconsider his options in Ukraine.
The war has ground to a bloody stalemate in much of the country, with heavy casualties and Russian troop morale sinking as Ukrainian forces and volunteers put up an unexpectedly stout defence.
But the publicity could also risk further isolating Mr Putin, who US officials have said seems at least in part driven by a desire to win back Russian prestige lost by the fall of the Soviet Union.
The intelligence community has concluded the Russian leader was unaware that his military had been using and losing conscripts in Ukraine.
They also have determined he is not fully aware of the extent to which the Russian economy is being damaged by economic sanctions imposed by the West.
The findings demonstrate a “clear breakdown in the flow of accurate information” to Mr Putin, and show that his senior advisers are “afraid to tell him the truth”, the official said.
The new intelligence comes after the White House on Tuesday expressed scepticism about Russia’s public announcement that it would dial back operations near Kyiv in an effort to increase trust in talks between Ukrainian and Russian officials in Turkey.
“We’ll see,” President Joe Biden said about that announcement. “I don’t read anything into it until I see what their actions are.”
Russian forces pounded areas around Ukraine’s capital and another city overnight, regional leaders said on Wednesday.
White House communications director Kate Bedingfield said the administration views any movement of Russian forces as a “redeployment and not a withdrawal” and “no one should be fooled by Russia’s announcement”.
Mr Biden spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday to discuss the latest developments in the war.
Mr Putin has long been seen outside Russia as insular and surrounded by officials who do not always tell him the truth.
US officials have said publicly they believe that limited flow of information – possibly exacerbated by his heightened isolation during the Covid-19 pandemic – may have given him unrealistic views of how quickly he could overrun Ukraine.
The Biden administration before the war launched an unprecedented effort to publicise what it believed were Mr Putin’s invasion plans, drawing on intelligence findings.
While Russia still invaded, the White House was widely credited with drawing attention to Ukraine and pushing initially reluctant allies to back tough sanctions that have hammered the Russian economy.
But underscoring the limits of intelligence, the US also underestimated Ukraine’s will to fight before the invasion, said Lieutenant General Scott Berrier, head of the Defence Intelligence Agency, in recent evidence to Congress.
