09:43
Yes, as the blog writes, it is in the south where the advance is happening. On other fronts there are local counterattacks but it is probably in the south where there is/was a chance for a strategic decision.
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Yesterday Ukraine officially announced something that they cannot reach Mariupol at the moment but Zelensky was very offensive in his latest statement about negotiations – “Russia needs to negotiate quickly if they are not to suffer catastrophic losses”.
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We know that the 28th Mechanized Brigade is striking towards Kherson from west to east and now this morning the blog says they are also attacking from the north from Snihurivka which should mean that the 59th Mechanized is participating and the 80th Airmobile is probably also involved in the attack.
Again, these may not be intact brigades.
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There are still reports that the Russians are moving towards Kryvyi Rih which should tie up the 17th Tank Brigade and the mechanized brigades in reserve southwest; about Kyiv we know nothing.
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Somewhere around three heavy brigades are striking towards Kherson, since I don’t read anything Russian, only from Ukrainian sources, and it was a retreating everything the first day the picture looked like a total breakthrough. Now a few days have passed and the Russian resistance seems quite tough to get through and every day the Russians can bring forward reinforcements.
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Worth noting is that a couple of days ago Russian official sources declared that they “controlled the entire Kherson Oblast” so things have happened since then but not at a strategic level.
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It is not a strategic victory but a minimum outcome from this offensive is likely that Ukraine clears out the Russians west of the Dnipro and also captures a number of battalion tactical groups, how many, who knows. With that done it depends on whether Mariupol can hold out because then they can fortify Kherson and Khakovka and then roll over the upper Dnipro near Dnipro for round 2.
09:58
As I see it, we have three events that gain strategic importance – a breakthrough eastward over the Dnipro at Kherson or Khakovka, Mariupol falling, and Ukraine’s 3D warfare being completely unmanageable even for entrenched Russian units.
If Putin manages to freeze the conflict, unfortunately he has won, then he can claim victory no matter how crazy that sounds and wriggle out and build up his army into something that is a real threat within 10 years. We will all have to live in Cold War 2.0 until then, the result will be the same but he will attack more countries. The war becomes a way for him to stay in power.
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Now the West has probably put in all the “defensive” it can, Ukraine has received weapons, they have mobilized their reserves, Western SOF is operating around, drones and artillery cannot get much better and economic sanctions are maxed out. If despite all this it looks like Putin can freeze the conflict and wriggle out of this, I believe the West has nothing to lose and should activate the measure that throws Russia out of Ukrainian territory AND topples Putin, the order matters less.
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Exactly what that is, who knows, but instead of going in with NATO in Ukraine maybe one should start a colour revolution in Russia? Now the Russian army, Rosgvardia, Omon and all other oppressive units have bled heavily in Ukraine and the army is probably simmering. If one can ignite the spark there will probably be a bonfire immediately and if regions start declaring independence to “avoid sending our sons to die in Ukraine” Putin must focus on domestic politics and Ukraine becomes secondary.
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Or should one start with Belarus? There it was just on the edge that they managed to hang Lukashenko by the heels at a gas station but he barely got away and it is very significant that the Belarusian army has not yet participated in any fighting.
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Something that takes Russia’s focus away from Ukraine but does not involve an open military confrontation with Russia and the US has a black belt in colour revolutions by now, I think.
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Everything done in Asia risks provoking China but otherwise a fun thing would be to start moving a couple of carrier groups with landing ships towards Vladivostok now that Putin has emptied the Far East of military units 🙂
10:13
Yes, the reason we are in this situation is that Russia got its mysterious advance in the south already on the first day.
I guess they bribed down there and then surprised those who were supposed to blow up the bridges with SOF because around lunchtime on the first day Russian units rolled over the Dnipro at Khakovka. There were long columns of destroyed Ukrainian vehicles so they were caught off guard in their barracks and barely managed to move forward. In hindsight it is incredibly clumsy but it is too late to complain about it now.
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Mariupol was probably rather intended as a fortress protecting the southern flank of the ceasefire line and to hold the crossings over the Dnipro at Kherson and Khakovka and conduct mobile fighting at Zaporizhzhia-Tokmak-Mariupol.
If Mariupol falls, the entire Donbass ceasefire line can be rolled up but it was probably not intended that they would be encircled in this way.
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Unfortunately it may take time before they get relief unless there is a miracle at Kherson and one can only hope they have enough ammunition and combat value to hold out so the ceasefire line at Donbass is not threatened in the rear.
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A worst-case scenario that has been forgotten is that Mariupol falls and the Russians gain such a large advance northwards that they can encircle the units in the Ukrainian ceasefire line and then demand eastern Ukraine in negotiations.
11:27
When the Russians fled like car thieves from Kherson airport and I hoped Ukraine would deploy 5-6 brigades, the idea was probably that they had overrun the Russians and would thunder over the Dnipro at Kherson by momentum alone.
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Now after a couple of days they have really only come halfway to Kherson and a crossing over the Dnipro there is becoming increasingly unlikely. There is probably a chance they can cross at Khakovka but the Russians are probably not complete idiots and are also fortifying that bridge, or blowing up both.
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The likely outcome will probably be that they clear the terrain west of the Dnipro, fortify Kherson and Khakovka and then roll over the Dnipro up at Dnipro but it will be the long way and no flank fighting.
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With that, western Ukraine is saved but the fight must continue so that Russia does not take eastern Ukraine and the risk of Mariupol falling increases.
11:40
Since the Russians have not yet started digging in along the southern front, there is probably a straw to grasp if it starts to calm down on the northern and eastern front sections – they go all in with 3D warfare, SOF, drones, artillery and infiltrate exactly everything they can in the Kherson – Zaporizhzhia – Volnovakha – Mariupol – start Crimea area and start hitting wildly with the hope of creating a collapse as someone wrote above. Then maybe they can roll over the Dnipro with the heavy brigades when west of the Dnipro is cleared.
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This has worked up at Kyiv and Kharkiv but they probably have not had enough to disrupt the southern offensive and have had to fight more conventionally.
15:31
Yes, Mariupol is holding out. The attack on Kherson has at least slowed down considerably, and north of Mariupol there is probably not much to seize.
There is only one thing that can save the defenders, how good the soldiers are. They must conduct mobile group and platoon combat over the entire area continuously day and night and replenish ammunition from fallen Russians. As soon as they start losing momentum, they will no longer be able to be a slippery eel but will be trapped in a geographic area and defeated.
The mayor spoke of 20,000 dead a week ago and it has been ongoing since then.
It seems, as said, to be fighting in central Mariupol and one can only hope that the defenders are fighting over the entire area and are not trapped in a small circle in the center.
15:35
So, 20,000 dead were civilians.
15:49
Now liveuamap.com has marked the area north of Mariupol in red, which probably means that the Russians have taken and secured more terrain and seem to have a solid link to the Donbass rebels. If so, there is no value in cutting off the land bridge to Crimea because resources can be brought through Donbass.
Then the only option left is probably to unleash 3D warfare in the south instead of mechanized combat since it is not possible to achieve a strategic goal, and the goal of the Kherson offensive should then be to drive the Russians west of the Dnipro and force as many as possible to surrender. One should also blow up the bridges and roll their mechanized brigades towards Dnipro when the clearing is done.
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The only way to liberate Mariupol is probably to expand the 3D combat to the max in the southern area to reduce the combat value of the besiegers and put pressure on Russia in other ways, a color revolution in Belarus… A rescue operation from Ukraine seems impossible and they have confirmed that themselves. Food and ammunition probably cannot be parachuted in either, but ammunition can be taken from fallen Russians.
https://liveuamap.com/en/time/19.03.2022
15:55
If this had been Odessa, the US could have slid in with a couple of destroyers and evacuated the city, but Mariupol is inaccessible, it is the worst possible situation and makes Western intervention impossible without massive losses.
It really boils down to the individual soldier’s combat readiness and endurance and will become the Ukrainians’ own Taipale.
00:01
Mariupol is this war’s Srebrenica…
I don’t like Russian sources but they report that fighting is now taking place inside Mariupol city centre. If Mariupol falls, it is a high bargaining chip for Putin so hopefully they can hold out a couple more weeks.
All the cities in the north seem to have fared surprisingly well and west of the Dnipro is well on its way to being cleared.