11:18 – Johan No.1
Partly Ukraine’s air defense umbrella is probably too good now and then we have that usual discussion about how much air they actually have, they have lost 70% of what they deployed in the special operation and there is probably a lot of aircraft with technical faults at the airfields.
Lack of pilots is probably also a contributing factor, it was old retired colonels flying for a while.
Last time it happened, HIMARS was a flytrap that took out some planes and helicopters.
Then Ukraine has probably gotten more Mig29s and there were spare parts to get more aircraft operational but I have no idea if the Russians lose planes in air duels.
Overall, you could probably say that if the Russians had a large amount of aircraft, they would be over Kherson now 🙂
I also think those attacks on the airbases in Crimea were to get rid of the planes before the offensive started.
Now they probably fly from further back and Ukraine gets warning when they are on the way.
Ukrainian SU25s are flying all the way out in Donetsk now so not even there can they maintain air superiority with either aircraft or air defense.
11:28 – Johan No.1
Below is an attempt to reason about mechanized combat, right or wrong.
Yesterday a video was posted with “mech combat,” two Turkish APCs (or whatever they are) and a tank.
They drove on a field with buildings on one side and forest on the other (I think) to engage at least one infantry group and one IFV.
It looked anything but professional, the tank had the turret at 5 o’clock at least once out of two shots, which means they had rolled past the threat and then the APCs drove in a semicircle and then spun around again, unclear if they opened fire or not but probably they did.
The only reason it didn’t become three written-off vehicles was that the Russians were even worse here.
When the Russians try this kind of thing they drive straight into minefields or man-portable anti-tank weapons and if the IFV had gotten a shot at the back of the tank it would have been written off.
It’s not a bad idea to try to shock the infantry with high speed, fire on the target and preferably drive “straight at them” through something dense where they don’t have fields of fire, like through forest (not too big trees and be careful with the gun barrel) or crash through a house. You also have tanks as fire support and indirect fire quite close when you advance.
However, this was not that, they drove past the defense and exposed their flank.
So far, Ukraine’s offensives have often been to try to take something poorly defended that the Russians want and then go on defense and get a good kill ratio when the Russians try to take it back. Good strategy.
Offensive operations have often been to take dominant terrain so attacks are not entirely logical and the lines look odd from a map perspective but on the ground they have acted rationally – it took me a while to learn.
A clear example is the line Siversk – Bakhmut and how they have held the Siversky Donets river, a natural defensive line.
How might Ukraine act in offensive operations that we will see now?
There have been some discussions about how superior mechanized combat is, what I remember was that you needed to take an area, a hill or similar, and then you allocated an armored infantry company for the task, platoon could attack group, company, a platoon etc. Pre-bombardment, tank support, or tank in the lead, and then full speed, tank combat, dismounting and run over the defense with high knees and forward march, everything is okay except stopping. There was some thread of truth among us conscripts that a company in combat had 60 seconds survival chance or something. What was clear to me at least was that mechanized combat meant enormous losses from exercises.
Now Ukraine uses “combined arms warfare,” all branches in combat in a fairly skillful way, air, army aviation, artillery and drones and not to forget direct fire with tanks.
Since Ukraine is so large in area, there are platoons or companies in dominant terrain and to advance you have to get rid of them.
What I guess Ukraine does is take one “island” at a time and tries to eliminate them with indirect fire as much as possible and then at night or under cover tries to get close enough and only in exceptional cases uses mechanized combat – I think that is very reasonable because it reduces losses and there is no decisive factor in sight here (yet).
The thought we had in Sweden was to break a beach landing or landing by rolling over them and get a decisive result, the price was worth the outcome. Of course, you also try to go around as in the case of Vysokopilia.
If Ukraine loses a brigade to take Vysokopilia they have achieved nothing.
Then there is quite a bit of discussion about Ukraine not yet mastering certain types of warfare and that the reason it’s going well is because the Russians are bad at war. I think the Russians have shown an enormous willingness to die here and that both sides are prepared to die and then there is a counterattack immediately. Now, I am also No.1 at mocking the Russians but they are a formidable enemy, at least the elite units.
In infantry combat, I would say Ukraine is as good as it gets, the artillery is slowly gaining the upper hand, SOF excels, the air force is back, etc.
This particular hobbyhorse that they don’t master mechanized combat and wouldn’t be fully trained, I think we can put behind us.
I believe the reason they use other branches of the military and then move in, push away the corpses and occupy the trench is to save lives, it takes longer but it is smart warfare.
Sometimes, of course, it doesn’t work with anything other than a frontal assault and then you have to do it but as rarely as possible.
Then it’s a bit like old cavalry, when the line starts to crack and panic spreads, it’s probably a smart idea to push forward aggressively to create more panic and there’s probably a chance we’ll see that sometime with so many drones in the air as there are now.
IF it were the case that Ukraine has 45,000 men and a lot of mechanized forces near Kherson and the Russians can put up 15,000 men say, then a full mechanized assault with enormous pre-combat suppression ala WW2 or Russian doctrine would have been fully possible but the losses would have been very high. Would it have been worth the price to take all terrain west of the Dnieper against 4-5 brigades rendered combat ineffective? I think this strategy is better.
I wonder if the man-portable air defense has put a stop to Russian/WW2 doctrine here and that it already started to show the end of WW2 when the Bazooka and Panzerfaust/Panzerschreck came.
Now maybe the Russian equivalents are a bit worse and if Ukraine had Western tanks it might have looked different, who knows.
In Sweden, we still had a purpose with that kind of combat, to strike an enemy before they had time to dig in sufficiently and at an early stage, so that doctrine has been useful and then the Russians believed in that doctrine but now it has shown to go so-so both in Armenia and now in Ukraine. Then you can argue that they should have fought differently but that’s how it has looked with the practical application.
Just some thoughts as I think sometimes we talk down Ukraine quite harshly just because we haven’t seen mechanized combat but I’m starting to wonder if this type of combat isn’t more suitable and that they fight in a very effective way that saves lives.
11:39 – Johan No.1
With Izumi, do you mean Izyum or some other place?
Yes exactly, obviously the Russians are weakening the southern front now to move units over to Kherson.
The next logical step is absolutely to press at the southern front and Ukraine has at least loaded for a small one over by Volnovakha.
I think they have been trying to steal Polohy for quite a while and then many people’s money is on Tokmak – Melitopol.
But as you write, there was some Russian group that left Tokmak that I can never find again the settlement.
Between Tokmak and then Polohy which is a kind of natural defense, there are fields with only small defended settlements and a bit down is Chernivka so a pretty good area to take settlement by settlement and work downwards.
12:45 – Johan No.1
I think the bingo/chess move just as you write is – “But if the UAF has taken the Kherson area west of the Dnipro, and managed to cut off the land corridor between Donbas and Crimea before New Year’s, it’s still bingo”.
-When you get there then you have shown that you can and basically have the same negotiating position as the Russians would have had if they had managed to encompass the entire ceasefire line up to the Dnieper with 50,000 Ukrainian soldiers trapped inside (which they didn’t).
Especially after the Russians pushed in 60% of their available units and all elite units there.
And then the somewhat incredible thing that the Russians attack along oblast borders and that it would be worth anything, that old “potato field” we used to say. You probably hit the nail on the head there because they can have taken up to an oblast border as much as they want but if they can’t defend it with force it’s worth nothing, at all.
Two mistakes recently in a whole sea of mistakes.
-They should have completely bypassed the Siversk – Bakhmut defense and pushed on the northern flank with the 3rd Army Corps and south of that at the southern front.
-They should have retreated from west of the Dnieper and gone on defense on the eastern bank and then pushed north.
They probably still believe there is some kind of negotiated solution here but that went up in smoke months ago, I’m starting to suspect they are a couple of steps behind which is perfect and when that knowledge hits like an ice bolt eventually it will be fun to see. The gas weapon is used up, the West will not negotiate and Ukraine can throw the Russians out on their own.
16:12 – Johan No.1
Now it’s damn full speed everywhere, according to Gregg, who someone skillfully posted above, there is now a bridgehead with heavy equipment south of Yampil and that area seems to be a seriously deprioritized area now for the Russians…
Then we have the old Kupiansk offensive that has been dusted off with Balakliia which would deny the Russians crossing the Oskil river at Borova straight east from there, no prize for guessing that they are heading towards the city of Oskil pretty soon straight from the south.
Probably there will also be news north of Kharkiv pretty soon, feels like a natural conflict hotspot going forward, both north and east 🙂
They have even started to push the Russians back a few miles east from the Siversk-Bakhmut line in places. A mile is no small distance, the Russians took 500m of potato field per week…
At Kherson it’s moving fast now in the area “inside” Inhulets, it will probably break quite soon.
I see no reason why Ukraine should let more units cross the Dnieper intact now, they will HIMARS them to pieces in the ferry camps instead. The air force is doing 40 strike missions per day, the artillery is wreaking havoc to the max and the maneuver brigades are pressing on. Since Vysokopilia fell it has gone very fast in the direction of Khakovka.
What will of course happen next is that it breaks at Davyidiv Brid as well and then it’s game over and sour VDV lined up on the field.
What the hell is happening, the Russians wonder, we who have known that the critical mass has been in Ukraine’s favor for several months and that they have built up a solid offensive reserve for this and have followed all the heavy equipment delivered know exactly what is happening – the country is being retaken by force by rested and well-equipped maneuver brigades 🙂
The timeline was almost exactly what they themselves said and what we guessed, Solros2022 said quite early that as soon as HIMARS arrive and during the summer it kicks off, almost matches the CVs there.
Very encouraging that Ukraine has not put everything into Kherson but has tied up maneuver units across all front sectors and is going on the offensive. The last time this happened, there were local offensives within one front sector while the Russians attacked elsewhere. Now the Russians are on the defensive everywhere at the same time.
When the area “inside” Inhulets surrenders, 5-6 brigades will be freed up to do other things, so there is certainly no shortage of reserves. Around the city of Kherson, a ring of 2-3 brigades at most should be enough, I think, and they don’t have to be the best ones defending there. The southern front is probably in danger.
It is probably a very bad week for the Russian command, and as we have discussed quite often, how will the Russian army behave with rapid changes and being reactive – probably even worse than so far.
The videos of captured soldiers look more like homeless people than soldiers in the imperialist Russian army.
Almost time for a somersault 🙂
Now all that’s missing is heavy armor; it still hasn’t been confirmed what model the Russians don’t know about up near Kherson, but it doesn’t seem to be a large quantity. CV90 and Archer really need to be delivered now so Ukraine gets maximum offensive capability.
16:21 – Johan No.1
Yes, today one really got excited as the extent of what is happening began to become clear 🙂
Every time Ukraine has launched an offensive this spring, one has hoped it would be this one and felt equally positive-negative each time. Then anticlimax after weeks of pre-bombardment when one started to think it was time for the Russians to attack more at Kherson and south.
Right now the Russians are like a fly on Ukraine’s shoulder that doesn’t bother them more than buzzing.
16:24 – Johan No.1
A week with sky-high Russian losses and it won’t decrease next week, the question is how many more weeks they can endure before it hurts too much?
During the offensives they could always choose to stop attacking but now they don’t have that luxury, it’s continued losses or retreat that applies.
16:29 – Johan No.1
I give it a week and then various opinion makers in Europe will start writing articles about how important it is to end the war to protect Ukrainian children.
Then it will slide over into Russia having offered a unilateral ceasefire out of concern for Ukrainian children and that Ukraine is the aggressor.
The last Kremlin-positives will reveal themselves, I think we’ve already seen some new names, and quite a few old favorites will start sitting and quietly crying on TV demanding an end to the war to protect Ukrainian children.
All of this is just a fly on Ukraine’s shoulder now.
16:41 – Johan No.1
Yes exactly that, they have taken enormous risks because they have refused to accept the inevitable.
Since last winter, we have felt that Ukraine was holding back 6-8 brigades and guessed it was for an offensive.
At Kherson, the Russians were apparently completely caught off guard and that offensive is just what we have been waiting for.
It must be something like that, a Russian self-image clashing with reality and it hurts enormously.
Dien Bien Phu is a good analogy.
16:51 – MatsExtrude
I agree that more weapons must be sent to Ukraine. I don’t understand why much more wasn’t given already this spring (applies to all countries supporting Ukraine). Partly to get a quicker end to the war and partly because every decimation of the Russian army reduces the threat from it.
Now there is talk of “electric support” of up to 100 billion just here in Sweden. That is more than our defense budget.
That probably could have been avoided if Russia had already lost the war.
17:18 – Johan No.1
Now this is WarMonitor but it was probably expected so likely correct.
https://twitter.com/WarMonitor3/status/1567160091303940096?s=20&t=SAT8RKodivnu4vFncRSmrg
21:46 – Johan No.1
This cliffhanger…
https://twitter.com/dim0kq/status/1567171380524863494?s=20&t=zL7WjXDD_Id_a1Je0-StEg
10:22 – Johan No.1
Yesterday the Twitter gods started posting satellite and map images of Russian convoys, partly west of the Dnieper, which is likely rear units now being moved up to the front as the special forces have been depleted, and partly from the southern front towards the eastern bank of the Dnieper. Either they are trying to get them across or they are going on the defense on the eastern bank.
First of all, these are rolling targets, especially those trying to move up to Davyidiv Brid and towards Krivoy Rog, they are within range of all long-range and aerial fire.
Of course, the best would have been to go into a deep defense in several lines, but the order is probably to repel all attacks, so that’s what they do?
What will happen is that they will be exposed partly on the road, then when they enter UFA, and finally they will have to attack Ukrainians in defense who may still be there.
“Inside” the pocket there aren’t many BTGs left alive now, around 10 has been guessed, so if they move up a couple more that are consumed in the following days, it could go really fast here.
Now this might be a bit beyond Ukraine’s capacity, but if they start moving up reserves from Crimea and then pull units from the southern front, those would be excellent targets for SU25s while they are on the move.
Then they can HIMARS them as soon as they gather, and now there are several reports that they are shelling the ferry camps and bridgeheads, and of course they do that because they gather there in long queues.
There are reasons not to sink the ferries and pontoon bridges yet and let them be flytraps 😊
Down at Crimea, the units that have now arrived by train will be driven to bases and prepare for transport north – HIMARS.
I suddenly see a very strong reason not to cut the Kerch Bridge yet because everything they bring into Crimea is within range of Ukrainian long-range weapons and then they have to move north on the road.
Imagine if all these units had gone into deep defense in Donbas or Mariupol, instead of having to uproot them, the Russians have voluntarily driven them away, incredibly positive – positive.