10:00 – Johan No.1
The war –
Everyone was waiting for the ”big offensive” two weeks ago but now it seems to have sunk in that what we are seeing NOW IS the offensive.
I maintain that around May 4th the intensity was high enough that the window for the offensive had opened – we’ll get the exact date when history is written – they started at Bakhmut, then came the diversion up north and then offensive operations began at the southern front – all according to the grand campaign plan.
I am of the opinion that UA started a bit late due to the weather, the units had been deployed for a long time and we have poor coverage on the ground from around late September (if it’s a normal year…).
They needed that extra time but it is what it is.
The attacks at the southern front started badly when UA tried to fight according to NATO doctrine. If you remember earlier discussions about exercises when Johan did his military service and fields full of juice mixers and that ”you can lose a brigade in a morning if you are unlucky” it is high risk to push armor forward according to our doctrine against decent defense.
ANDERS12023-06-28 15:10 – 15:10 – wrote a very good comment about that.
Now Ukraine tried that and failed so they reverted to what they are very good at, an anthill of infantry with armored support along the entire front pushing everywhere – that works very well and I think especially RU’s lack of effective artillery makes it work as well as it does.
It’s a ”numbers game” and UA attacks while outnumbered and inflicts higher losses on RU than they themselves take (5 times more according to UA themselves) and they strike at the reaction forces as soon as they start moving forward – many examples of that.
RU’s defense of the southern front is better than I thought I must admit, at the first attacks we wrote that they had drones, artillery, very boring minefields and enough ATGM.
At Bakhmut they have not had these capabilities nor the AHKP as at the southern front so one hoped it would be the same everywhere, especially since the country Russia was indefensible.
Simply put, it probably means that the best they have left go and die at the southern front now because this capability does not exist in Russia, Bakhmut, Donetsk or northern Luhansk (I think…).
Before I went on ”vacation” (Budanov is not much for small talk or long lunches…) we wrote that it was time for the crossing of the Dnieper and about a week ago it seems UA has established a bridgehead at the Antonovsky bridge which is many kilometers deep and has several waterways as protection.
A few months ago when I tried to pitch the crossing of the Dnieper we went through how it could look and the whole area around the Antonovsky bridge a good way in depth is suitable as a bridgehead.
If you cross over into Khakovka, it is a city and then fields, but down by Antonovsky there is a lot of cover.
In the big campaign plan, it was about UA overrunning infantry that was defending in various suitable communities and opening a threat on the flank behind the southern front before or at the same time as attacking at the southern front – this now seems to have happened.
There is every reason to believe that UA will try to expand this bridgehead as only poor units remain defending there.
https://twitter.com/pstyle0ne1/status/1675021067679674368?s=46&t=8u03yFyPXX6ygwKSOzNt7w
Then a possible opportunity has opened up, near the city of Donetsk Kadyrovites and DPR rebels have retreated when UA pressed, and then there is reason to continue.
RU has carried out its attacks against the UA offensive and all have failed, both the diversionary attacks at quieter front sections that came late and counterattacks at Bakhmut and the southern front.
The most significant piece of information we have received in the last month is that the 810th Marine Infantry is now fighting at the southern front.
https://twitter.com/secretsqrl123/status/1673202740401524737?s=46&t=c4gA2KeGynYT-21K9aXOog
This means that they first exhausted the reserves at the southern front, then pulled units from the Dnepr front as an offensive reserve, and now they are in combat at the southern front – they are simply running out of their reserves at the southern front.
Then they fight with Spetsnaz at the active front and not as a task force – this is completely against how they fought in Kherson where VDV was pressing behind army brigades and DPR/LPR and then broke the breakthroughs – now the last offensive reserve fights in the front line – Gregg below.
“01.07.2023 update. We continue where we left off yesterday, namely with the good news. We have good successes at Robotyne which has forced the tourists to throw in 3 special units at the eastern flank; 417th Separate Reconnaissance Battalion, 3 squad BARS and 45th Separate Purpose Brigade. This, as well as their previous attempts with all sorts of things to hold us back, shows that they DO NOT want us at the main defense line. Why? Their tactics cost them enormous manpower and materiel.”
This offensive reserve was well over 50,000 left around the end of April sometime (I don’t remember exactly) and now they are running it out. After that, newly mobilized troops will face the world’s best infantry.
https://twitter.com/pstyle0ne1/status/1675515897107165193?s=46&t=n4vPj6azkiGEsvmETs-VsA
My guess is that RU is doing what they always have – all in and more violence and hoping that UA gives up first after too high early losses because RU knows they cannot win this over time.
Instead of letting the units be shot away in their defense, they attack with everything they have and hope that UA will blink first.
There is quite a bit of kamikaze pilot about this right now, the Japanese would have been completely teary-eyed to see this honorable tradition carried on.
Then I think everyone can agree that there are no reserves in Russia, partly in the Belgorod raids but then with Wagner’s advance there was very little resistance. The army is probably largely in Ukraine.
David D is, however, of the opinion that RU is setting up a new army corps with new materiel but that it would go better than the pensioner ensemble is incredible.
T62 has been used in attacks – they are not infantry fighting vehicles for defense as everyone claims they would be used for. Shortage of armor is very likely, which has been my assessment for quite some time.
https://twitter.com/partizan_oleg/status/1672175954947612673?s=46&t=ET2iUo0BgkQ5I3NkLN9Waw
We should not be fooled into thinking that UA does not take losses, the link below shows about 24 tanks in five days. What they do, however, is repair vehicles and crews that survive can still fight. There are fewer total losses than the Russian side.
https://twitter.com/naalsio26/status/1674901725285695495?s=46&t=6M_a6VArDCompRKNCDJFpg
Then we received information that RU is dropping Russian JDAMS in Kherson – that means they can move, if not relatively unhindered, then at least move with their air force.
We have now seen quite a few examples of how Russian JDAMS do not hit exactly what they are intended for but are an unpleasant weapon with a big bang that comes too close.
That the West has dragged its feet with weapons is and will be this war’s great tragedy but there is a reality to relate to which UA handles very well.
10:01 – Johan No.1
At the end of June a biggie kicked in on the bubble list – revolution. That it failed is another matter but there are huge strains in the country Russia now.
According to the big campaign plan, they are supposed to plug the entrance to Crimea and then swing up into the darkest Donbass east of the cities Donetsk and Horlivka.
The southern front is only a matter of time now.
Northern Luhansk will be retaken over time.
Then we have the Donbass rebels laying down arms and the struggling piñata – both bubbles.
However, you have to give the Russians that they have an ability to convince soldiers to die. They never stop pouring forward and the oppression is extremely dark but it works. The number of desertions is low and support for Prigozhin was not total.
The war is not over and the summer will be long, my assessment was that UA would win the war this summer and we have probably felt that since the West turned with heavy vehicles. It is not unreasonable considering everything that has happened in the last two weeks. Offensive operations can reasonably continue until the end of September (and summer is not over until the last leaf has fallen according to Wikipedia).
What would make Putin withdraw?
Nothing is the reasonable assumption after this chaos so Putin must fall and UA and certain channels in the West are probably at their best trying to find someone who wants to end the war?
At least Girkin was not worried by Prigozhin’s failure and is more than happy to air his opinions about revolution.
https://twitter.com/officejjsmart/status/1675244110159007745?s=20
How it will go no one knows (except maybe Dengamle who had some meeting with them yesterday) but that this will become some kind of compromise peace for UA we can forget, it is going far too well for them.
I still get that UA has only committed 25% of its offensive reserve at the southern front and that they are far from fighting with their entire offensive reserve at Bakhmut.
They obviously have plenty of ammunition, the air force is weak but they get heavy vehicles continuously.
Now UA has carried out its amplifiers – drones against Moscow, the Belgorod raids and so on and now the West’s remain.
We will see where future meetings will lead but large weapon packages and promises of membership are not unreasonable.
Do you remember the discussion about JEF moving forward positions a bit?
If they do not succeed in getting UA into NATO, it is likely that we will hear more about JEF in the future.
All I see is that it is going well for UA and that they fight as we have really seen throughout the war and it works, wizard level all the way.
The West stands relatively united and this tale that if UA does not win the war this summer there must be peace where they might have to give up something, I wonder where that comes from, Russian psyops?
I rather think that the West is preparing for the next round of materiel if needed and that our production has been ramped up significantly – the West is taking this very seriously as it should.
The Dnieper front is already lost for the Russians and the “Azov push” is only a matter of time.
10:29 – MatsExtrude
+++++
Thank you! A formidable comeback, now we are finally back on the right track again!
Repeating, welcome back, you have been missed!
09:59 – Johan No.1
My last post before vacation was – ”Flagging for a short break, there were no gasoline protests strangely enough and our panic buying ahead of weeks in isolation was completely unnecessary – a colleague bought cheese for 800 SEK and I a bottle of rum. So the trip will go as planned and we all know that these will be the most important weeks of the war to miss.”
I have to thank Dengamle for playing along in the entire ostracism of Budanov, ”Loose mouth” was admittedly a bit off script but overall a wholehearted effort 👍
The idea was not really that Prigozin would rush straight to Moscow but drive to Georgia and become their standing army. A rather unpredictable guy who decided on Midsummer’s Eve after “a few glasses of Absolut and good advice” (however he got hold of that bottle) and then he did a 180-degree turn the next day – completely uncontrollable.
There was some concern when the only sign of life from Dengamle was a WhatsApp on Midsummer’s Eve with a beer stein emoji and the words “na moskva” but I thought he would probably show up in the comments and pretend nothing happened.
Even greater concern has been reading up on Matsextrude’s rising analytical brilliance and I had to polish this comeback a bit extra to not completely embarrass myself.
I know I am two weeks behind but that’s how my whole life has been, some thoughts on Prigozin.
The FSB seemed caught off guard but he was sitting having coffee with a high-ranking GRU chief and the deputy defense minister down in Rostov. Previously, at least I had connected him and Girkin with the FSB so there are definitely more layers to the Russian onion.
It was surely planned a long time ago, they had to take Bakhmut first to give him the best possible reputation and then it had to happen during the UA counteroffensive.
The first battle around Bakhmut around Midsummer’s Eve was probably so that the Wagner units there could escape the army – that was the first sign after Prigozin’s speech that it wasn’t an ordinary day.
Did you also see that the heavy transports were brand new and that the tanks looked like they had everything extra plus some air defense – that’s no Russian army brigade that fought in Afghanistan.
Then the big question is – was there nothing that could stop them or were the units in the way suggested that the best thing was not to stop them.
Some star in the thread said long ago that there are probably ”coup makers” in all different agencies rather than an entire agency opposing the current regime in discussions about a palace coup – there are definitely insiders in this comment section.
Why Prigozin chose to abort and threw all his helpers under the bus who now are getting their throats cut only Dengamle and Budanov really know because I missed that meeting but I guess it failed and that was not the original idea with the actual outcome.
The above has been discussed a thousand times already but I take from this that 25,000 Wagner soldiers who were somewhat of an elite are now in various stages of no longer fighting against Ukraine.
Then there were 7-8 different units, most notably a VDV regiment, who took Wagner’s side and they are probably under surveillance or sent to the rear with other units that must watch them?
Then Putin got the century’s most painful wedgie when it became clear to everyone that the country Russia is indefensible, one had suspected it with the Belgorod raids. That the entire leadership fled Moscow when Wagner was a day away was directly embarrassing and something you won’t recover from anyway.
And the big kicker – the country Russia has started to turn inward, that process has begun and it is indisputable.
We said not to underestimate the Belgorod raid, Prigozin probably watched with surprise how poorly defended Russia was and reasonably felt there was a chance to succeed?
The bubble list has been boiling as known but Prigozin went a bit further than pulling out his hard core and becoming a bodyguard somewhere as we thought. He bet everything on red and lost (or did he lose, that meeting I missed…).