Војна во Украина (исклучиво воена перспектива)

[Dexter26]

Зељо ги барал машкиве бегалците назад да му ги екстрадирале Западниве земји.

Ако му ги вратат тоа ќе биде животна лекција за сите тие кои избегале на запад во потрага по засолниште, и поука за тие кои сеуште се во Украина, а планираат да бегаат.

 

[vouager]

Imashe mnogu pati od povejcemina pishuvano kako za edno selo kako Bahmut tolku mnogu ginat i ednite i drugite.
Sega go vidov videovo i mislam ima shto da se vidi zoshto tolku im bil vazhen bash Bahmut

Nećete Verovati Šta se to Krije u Moskvi - Početak KRAJA?!

Sta se to KRIJE ISPOD Bahmuta? Da li znate da ispod dva grada u Ukrajini postoji podzemni grad preko 300 kilometara mreze koji u sebi ima crkvu, skolu, kao i...

www.youtube.com

 

[AntonT12]

Imashe mnogu pati od povejcemina pishuvano kako za edno selo kako Bahmut tolku mnogu ginat i ednite i drugite.
Sega go vidov videovo i mislam ima shto da se vidi zoshto tolku im bil vazhen bash Bahmut

Nećete Verovati Šta se to Krije u Moskvi - Početak KRAJA?!

Sta se to KRIJE ISPOD Bahmuta? Da li znate da ispod dva grada u Ukrajini postoji podzemni grad preko 300 kilometara mreze koji u sebi ima crkvu, skolu, kao i...

www.youtube.com

Пропагандите постирајте ги во другата тема, не ја труј оваа.

 

[Schwarzenegger]

Лепи Челенџери, лепо горат...

 

[Gags]

Situation on Luhansk front: Russian Army managed to recapture some positions southeast of Novojehorivka.



Situation on Luhansk front: Russian Army advanced from different axis in Kreminna forest taking a series of positions from Ukrainian Army.



Situation on Bilohorivka axis: during the last weeks Ukrainian Army managed to enter in the filtration plant which is currently disputed by both sides.



Situation on Zaporizhia front: Recent video footage which shows Russian artillery shelling Ukrainian positions within Kam'yans'ke allowed to correct the frontline showing Ukrainian Army controlling about 70% of the town.



Situation on Zaporizhia front: during the last five days Ukrainian Army managed to recapture the southern part of Robotyne following the capture of important hill adjacent to the town. In addition troops managed to recapture more territory east of the main Russian defense line west and northwest of Verbove.



Situation at Ugledar front: recent video footage showing Russian attack to Ukrainian trenches allowed confirms Ukrainian Army has control over the industrial area north of Pavlivka on the northern shore of Kashlahach river.



Situation south of Bakhmut: Ukrainian Army continue advancing within Klishchiivka and control most of the town (very fluid frontline). On the other hand Russian Army managed to recover some positions north of it following a counterattack.

Автоматски споено мислење: 5 септември 2023

Лепи Челенџери, лепо горат...

 

[Schwarzenegger]

Друже Хамише, де стапни малку на земја да видиш колку е убаво. За тревата пак да не ти зборам, милина да ти е да одиш по неа. Ај стапни, макар на кратко, не е убаво цело време во облаци.

 

[Ron Burgundy]

читам нешто украинциве што биле на обука таму кај нив, викаат дека овие немаат допир со реалноста. Не ги обучувале за околностите у кои ќе се најдат него за нивна замисла како било на фронт.

 

[Gags]

Situation southwest of Donetsk: Despite Ukrainian Army consolidated its positions in Urozhaine the news about the beginning of the battle for Zavitne Bazhannya are not correct. In spite of going south, Ukrainian forces are attacking Russian Army positions in the eastern high ground in addition with the resumption of combat towards Novodonets'ke and Novomaiors'ke. So far all the attacks were repelled by Russian forces.

 

[jamajka]

Кој сака да чита,

Escaping Attrition: Ukraine Rolls the Dice

The Zaporizhia Summer Blockbuster

bigserge.substack.com

Ова е извадок.

The Misfire

So now we come to the operational minutia. For a variety of reasons, Ukraine has chosen to attempt a frontal assault on Russia’s fortified Zaporizhia front, with the intention of breaching towards the sea of Azov. How can this be accomplished?

We had a few clues early on, accruing from a variety of geographic features and alleged intelligence leaks. In May, the Dreizin Report published what was purported to be a Russian synthesis of Ukraine’s OPORD (Operational Order). An OPORD functions as a broad sketch of an operation’s intended progression, and the document shared by Dreizin was billed as a summary of Russia’s expectation for Ukraine’s offensive (that is, it is not a leak of Ukraine’s internal planning documents, but a leak of Russia’s best guess at Ukraine’s plans).

In any case, in a vacuum it was anybody’s guess as to whether Dreizin’s OPORD was authentic, but we’ve subsequently been able to cross-check it. This is because of the other, even more infamous leak from earlier this spring, which included the Pentagon’s combat power build plan for Ukraine.

NATO was very generous and built Ukraine a mechanized strike package from scratch. However, because this mechanized force was cobbled together with a variety of different systems from all corners of the NATO Cinematic Universe, Ukraine formations are uniquely identifiable by their particular combination of vehicles and equipment. So, for example, the presence of Strykers, Marders, and Challengers indicates the presence of the 82nd Brigade in the field, and so forth.

Thus, despite Ukrainian pretensions of operational security, it’s actually been trivially easy for observers to know which Ukrainian formations are in the field. There have been a few deviations from the script - for example, the 47th Brigade was supposed to field the Frankenstein Slovenian M55 tanks, but in the end the decision was made to send the underpowered M55’s to the northern front and the 47th was deployed with a contingent of Leopard Tanks originally operated by the 33rd Brigade. But these are minor details, and on the whole we’ve had a good sense of when and where specific AFU formations get on the field.

Based on identifiable units, the Dreizin OPORD looks very close to what we actually saw at the onset of the Ukrainian offensive. The Dreizin OPORD called for an assault by the 47th and 65th Brigades on the Russian lines south or Orikhiv, in the sector bounded by Nesterianka and Novoprokopivka. Directly in the middle of this sector is the town of Robotyne, and sure enough that’s where the first big AFU assault came overnight on June 7-8, spearheaded by the 47th Brigade.

Now, from this point it becomes difficult to evaluate the Dreizin OPORD simply because Ukraine’s attack became instantaneously derailed, but one thing we can say is that Dreizin’s source was correct about the order that Ukrainian units would be introduced into battle. Based on this, we can flesh out the OPORD and feel pretty safe wagering that this is what the Ukrainians were hoping to achieve:


Ukraine’s Dream: The Drive to the Sea
The intention seems to have been to force a breach in the Russian line using a concentrated armored assault by the 47th and 65th Brigades, after which a follow on force of the 116th, 117th, and 118th would begin the exploitation phase, driving for the Azov Coast and the towns of Mikhailivka and Vesele to the west. The objective was clearly not to get bogged down in urban fighting attempting to capture places like Tokmak, Berdyansk, or Melitopol, but to bypass them and cut them off by taking up blocking positions on the main roads.

Simultaneously, a lesser - but no less critical - thrust would come out of the Gulyaipole area and drive along the Bilmak axis. This would have the effect of both screening the main advance to the west and wedging the Russian front open, splintering the integrity of the Russian forces caught in the middle. Overall, this is a fairly sensible, if ambitious and uncreative plan. In many ways, this was really the only option.

So what went wrong? Well, conceptually it’s easy. There is no breach. The bulk of the maneuver scheme is dedicated to exploitation - reaching such and such a line, taking up this blocking position, masking that city, and so forth. But what happens when there’s no breach at all? How can such a catastrophe occur, and how can the operation be salvaged when it comes untracked in the opening phase?

Indeed, this is precisely what has happened. Ukraine finds itself stuck on the edge of Russia’s outermost screening line, spending substantial resources trying to capture the small village of Robotyne, and/or bypass it to the east by infiltrating the gap between it and the neighboring village of Verbove. So instead of that rapid breach and turning maneuver towards Melitopol, we get something like this:

=
We could be generous and say that Robotyne is the last village before the Ukrainian attack reaches the main Russian defensive belt, but we’d be lying - they will also have to clear the larger town of Novoprokopivka, two kilometers to the south. Just for reference, here’s a closer look at the mapped Russian defenses in the battlespace, based on the excellent work of Brady Africk.


Russian defenses in the Robotyne Sector
The discussion about these emplacements can get a little muddled, simply because it’s not always clear what is meant by that popular phrase “first line of defense.” Clearly there are some defensive works around and in Robotyne, and the Russians chose to fight for the village, so in some sense Robotyne is part of the “first line” - but it is more proper to speak of it as part of what we would call a “screening line”. The first line of continuous fortifications across the front is several kilometers further south, and this is the belt that Ukraine has yet to even reach, let alone breach.

As of this moment, it appears that Russian troops have lost total control of Robotyne but continue to hold the southern half of the village, while Ukrainian troops in the northern half of the village remain subject to heavy Russian shelling. We should probably at this point consider the village to be continuously contested and a feature of the gray zone.
https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/c8ae5648-ee77-4194-aba1-061fb327deb8_3516x1970.jpeg
Now, a quick note about Robotyne itself and why both sides are so determined to fight for it. It seems rather odd on the surface, given that the Russian preference in 2022 was to make tactical withdrawals under their fires umbrella. This time though, they are fiercely counterattacking to contest Robotyne. The value of the village lies not only in its location on the T-0408 Highway, but also its excellent perch on top of a ridge. Both Robotyne and Novoprokopivka lie on a ridge of elevated ground which is as much as 70 meters higher than the low-lying plain to the east.

What this means is fairly simple; if the AFU presses forward in attempts to bypass the Robotyne-Novoprokopivka position by pushing into the gap between Robotyne and Verbove, it will be vulnerable to fire on the flanks (particularly by ATGMs) by Russian troops on the high ground. We already have seen footage of this, with Ukrainian vehicles being taken in the flank by fire from Robotyne. I am highly skeptical that Ukraine can even attempt an earnest assault on the first defensive belt until they have captured both Robotyne and Novoprokopivka.

This would all be a tough nut to crack under ideal circumstances, with a variety of engineering problems to mediate, obstacles designed to funnel the attacker into firing lanes, perpendicular trenches to allow enfilade fire on advancing Ukrainian columns, and robust defenses on all the major roadways. But these are not the best of circumstances. This is a tired force that has exhausted much of its indigenous combat power, which is attempting to organize the attack using a piecemeal and understrength assault package.

Several factors conspired against the Ukrainian offensive, and synergistically they have created a bona fide military catastrophe for Kiev. Let us enumerate them.

Problem 1: The Hidden Defensive Layer

At this point, we need to acknowledge something that everybody missed about Russia’s defense. I previously expressed high confidence that Ukraine’s forces would be unable to breach the Russian defenses, but I mistakenly believed that the Russian defense would function according to the classic Soviet defense-in-depth principles (elucidated in great detail by the writings of David Glantz, for example).


Idealized Defense in Depth by a Motor Rifle Brigade
Such a defense, put simply, is open to the idea that the enemy will breach the first or even second lines of defense. The purpose of the multilayered (or “echeloned” in the classic terminology) defense is to ensure that the enemy force gets stuck as it tries to break through. It may penetrate the first layer, but as it goes it is continually chewed up by the subsequent belts. The classic example is the Battle of Kursk, where powerful German panzers broke into the Soviet defensive belts but subsequently became stuck as they were ground down. You can think of this as being analogically similar to a Kevlar vest, which uses a web of fibers to stop projectiles: rather than bouncing off, the bullet is caught and its energy is absorbed by the layered fibers.

I was actually quite open to the idea that Ukraine would generate some penetration, but I anticipated them getting stuck in the subsequent belts and sputtering out.

What was missing from this picture - and this is a credit to Russian planning - was an unseen defensive belt forward of the proper trenches and fortifications. This forward belt consisted of extremely dense minefields and strongly held forward positions in the screening line, which the Russians evidently intended to fight for fiercely. Rather than breaking through the first belt and getting stuck in the interstitial areas, the Ukrainians have been repeatedly mauled in the security zone, and the Russians have consistently counterattacked to knock them back when they do manage to get footholds.

In other words, while we expected Russia to fight a defense in depth that absorbed the Ukrainian spearheads and shredded them in the heart of the defense, the Russians have actually shown a strong commitment to defending their forwardmost positions, of which Robotyne is the most famous.

On paper, Robotyne was expected to function as part of a so-called “crumple zone”, or “security zone” - a sort of lightly held buffer that puts the enemy through pre-registered fires before they bump into the first belt of continuous and strongly held defenses. Indeed, a variety of aerial and satellite surveys of the area taken before Ukraine went on the attack showed Robotyne laying well forward of the first solid and continuous Russian fortification belt.

What was missed, it seemed, was the extent to which the Russian defenders had mined the areas on the approach to Robotyne and were committed to defending within the security zone. The scale of the mining certainly seems to have surprised the Ukrainians, and creates a strain on Ukraine’s limited combat engineering capabilities. Even more importantly, the dense mines have created predictable avenues of approach for the Ukrainian forces, which force them to repeatedly run through the same gauntlet of fires and Russian standoff weaponry.

Problem 2: Insufficient Suppression

The signature image of the first great assaults on the Zapo Line has been columns of unsupported maneuver assets, being raked with Russian fires, both ground based (rocketry, ATGMs, and tube artillery) and from air platforms like the Ka-52 Alligator attack helicopter. One of the more startling aspects of these scenes was the way Ukrainian forces would come under heavy fire while still in their marching columns, taking losses before they ever deployed into firing lines to begin their assault proper.

There are myriad reasons for this. One is the now blasé issue of Ukrainian munition shortages. Consider the following items of interest. In the runup to Ukraine’s counteroffensive, Russia waged a heavy counter-preparatory air campaign that knocked out large AFU ammunition dumps. Ukraine’s initial assaults collapse in the face of heavy and unsuppressed Russian fires. The United States decides to transfer cluster munitions to Ukraine because, in the words of the president, “they’re running out of ammunition.” Add in the degradation of Ukrainian air defense, which allows Russian helicopters to operate with great effect along the contact line, and you have a recipe for disaster. Lacking the tubes to suppress Russian fires or the air defense to chase away Russian aircraft, the AFU opened their offensive by disastrously pushing forward unsupported maneuver elements into a hail of fire.

Problem 3: Russian Standoff Weapons

It’s crucial to understand that the Russian toolbox is fundamentally different than it was during the battle for Kherson last year, due to the rapidly expanding production of a variety of Russian standoff weapons - most notably the Lancet and the UMPK glide modifications for gravity bombs.

The Lancet in particular has been a star performer - there are claims that the trusty little loitering munition is responsible for nearly half of Russia’s artillery kills - and has filled a crucial capability gap that troubled the Russian army episodically throughout the first year of the war. Contrary to some western assessments that Russia simply could not manufacture drones in sufficient quantities, production of the Lancet has been successfully ramped up in a short period of time, and mass production of other systems like the Geran are coming online as well.

The proliferation of the Lancet and similar systems means, in a nutshell, that nothing within 30km of the contact line is safe, and this in turn disrupts the AFU’s deployment of critical support assets like air defense and engineering, magnifying their vulnerability to Russian mines and fires. In fact, we’ve increasingly seen Ukrainian artillery use decline in the Robotyne area due to the threat of lancets (they seem to be transferring tubes to other fronts), and the AFU is favoring the use of HIMARS in the suppressive role.

 

[Klinton]

читам нешто украинциве што биле на обука таму кај нив, викаат дека овие немаат допир со реалноста. Не ги обучувале за околностите у кои ќе се најдат него за нивна замисла како било на фронт.

Очекувано. Доктрина на британците и америте е да имаат воздушна надмоќ и да имаат силна воздушна поддршка на терен.
Тоа во Украина никој го нема. Е јебига

 

[Ron Burgundy]

Очекувано. Доктрина на британците и америте е да имаат воздушна надмоќ и да имаат силна воздушна поддршка на терен.
Тоа во Украина никој го нема. Е јебига

тоа е тешка делузија која сами си ја наметнале. Да не знае војска да води рововска војна. Можам да замислам кое фијаско би им се десило они да се на место на украинците.

 

[Klinton]

тоа е тешка делузија која сами си ја наметнале. Да не знае војска да води рововска војна. Можам да замислам кое фијаско би им се десило они да се на место на украинците.

Ова е муабет за друга тема, а и доста паушален од твоја страна.
Никој никогаш не ја освоил Британија. Цезар прв почнал, ама до ден денес никој не ја освоил во целост. Ниту римските императори, ниту викинзите, ниту норманите, ниту Наполеон, Хитлер, а камо ли Путин да проба. Со што ќе плови со Москва?

 

[jamajka]

Очекувано. Доктрина на британците и америте е да имаат воздушна надмоќ и да имаат силна воздушна поддршка на терен.
Тоа во Украина никој го нема. Е јебига

Не е само тоа, главниот проблем им е дека поаѓаат од мајндсетот дека Русите се глупи и неспособни. (зборам за западот воопшто)

 

[Ron Burgundy]

Ова е муабет за друга тема, а и доста паушален од твоја страна.
Никој никогаш не ја освоил Британија. Цезар прв почнал, ама до ден денес никој не ја освоил во целост. Ниту римските императори, ниту викинзите, ниту норманите, ниту Наполеон, Хитлер, а камо ли Путин да проба. Со што ќе плови со Москва?

Во прва светска енглезите доктори за рововска борба беа, сега не знаеле и никој не ја освоилпа не морале тоа да работат.

Иначе не се само они цело нато со таа тактика е. Промашено е све, и ова башка Русија што прави се некои лесни утврдувања. Да се водеше некоја војна од поголеми размери цело Запорожје ќе беше лавиринти.

 

[Gr-er]

Ова е муабет за друга тема, а и доста паушален од твоја страна.
Никој никогаш не ја освоил Британија. Цезар прв почнал, ама до ден денес никој не ја освоил во целост. Ниту римските императори, ниту викинзите, ниту норманите, ниту Наполеон, Хитлер, а камо ли Путин да проба. Со што ќе плови со Москва?

Со Сармат ќе плови ...