Perhaps this will be helpful - some time ago I prepared myself a cheat-sheet of visual identification for new AFU units in case the leaks proved genuine.
Deleted pictures of the Discord leaks. Please refrain from posting them since they haven’t been declassified, and any potential or current US government employee will be in significant trouble if they view them
I assume that because of the composition the brigades will fight as listed, not as individual battalions as it used to be earlier in the war. AFU brigades had battalions of mixed composition - each tank battalion had three companies of tanks and one company of mechanised infantry, each battalion of mechanised infantry had three companies of mechanised infantry and one company of tanks. Such formations when backed by artillery were in theory capable of individual combined arms operations on battalion level to match Russian BTG deployment. These new brigades have simpler structure, similar to Russian structure of 3x10 per battalion. In some cases there's likely 2x14 but they no longer have mixed composition and the use of 10-vehicle companies limits their tactical flexibility. That implies that they will have optimal effectiveness when deployed as brigades and because of that the equipment spotted on the front should match the unit which allows to infer the rest.
The 82nd is the new Airborne brigade and per list above it has four rather than three maneuver battalions (3x Stryker, 1x Marder).
Artillery table for the new units:
Only the first three on the list (?5/??, 44 and 118) have 155mm arty in large amount including self-propelled systems. The rest have just the basic 2x6 or 3x4 "division" (battalion-equivalent for arty in UA/RU TOE). 82nd is Airborne so it has 24 towed light guns per standard TOE.
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Just so that we acknowledge existing in the same reality:
I expect most Leopards to be destroyed during the offensive. Their loss doesn't matter as long as tactical and operational success is achieved.
In comparison: how many T-90Ms has Russia lost so far? Oryx counts 22. They probably would have lost a T-14 already if they were capable of putting a company of them in working condition. How is killing a Leopard a big win? Is Russia aspiring to be only as good as Kurdish rebels?
That's not how an operation would be conducted. I don't see how Ukraine can achieve surprise in the current conditions so they have to set themselves up for a decisive blow that will come at a location known to Russia. Because of that they need to ensure that the conditions at that location are as advantageous to them as possible.
Ukraine has the advantage of position and logistics. They can pivot while Russia can't. They operate from a limited area that can be approximated by a triangle with vertices in Kharkiv, Horlivka and Zaporizhia. Each side of this triangle is approximately 300km and there are several logistical arteries that can be easily established inside that area. The depth of the front is the rest of the country.
Russia operates from a long, stretched-out front that is sustained by one or two logistical arteries usually along a railway line. They need that logistical line to be sustained for any quick troop redeployments and that maneuver will occur along predictable routes as for example the depth of the front between Zaporozhia and Donetsk is between 100-150km. The area around Starobilsk is poorly developed and similarly any troop movements are difficult.
So the correct solution for Ukraine would be to put pressure along the entire front, especially in key locations that could disrupt communication and logistics, to force the current force disposition to remain static and then use the advantage of space to execute maneuver at the rear of their own forces and strike at the desirable position with concentrated mass.
It's the same logic as a boxer taking the center of the ring and forcing the opponent to circle him around or be forces into a corner. Sometimes the circling works if the opponent is fast enough but Russia is currently even less mobile than Ukraine so Ukraine has the advantage of both position (center ring) and speed.
Contrary to what you may imagine it is a very bad decision to concentrate mass too early as modern weapons are absolutely lethal. The offensive would be over before it started unless Ukraine could suppress Russian fires which it can't. The losses in such short engagement would be much greater than "bloody" fighting along a largely static front. I think it may be why so much of this new force is wheeled - it allows Ukraine to execute maneuver along the roads at their rear while Russia is using primarily tracked equipment and lacks dedicated wheeled units because of the decision to equip a battalion in each motor rifle brigade with BTR-82A. If they had wheeled brigades they could counter AFU maneuver but their rapid reaction force is VDV which uses tracked BMDs which are bad at long-range (100+ km) operational maneuver or helicopters which have availability problems. So Ukraine has the advantage of space and mobility and from what I've seen so far this is the most logical solution to the offensive.
Hit in one or two places where a Russian loss will be painful, draw reinforcements then quickly withdraw and hit where decisive success can be achieved which is somewhere around Melitopol in my view because geographically it cuts off all of southern front and threatens Crimea. Anything else will be a surprise.
Deleted pictures of the Discord leaks. Please refrain from posting them since they haven’t been declassified, and any potential or current US government employee will be in significant trouble if they view them
I assume that because of the composition the brigades will fight as listed, not as individual battalions as it used to be earlier in the war. AFU brigades had battalions of mixed composition - each tank battalion had three companies of tanks and one company of mechanised infantry, each battalion of mechanised infantry had three companies of mechanised infantry and one company of tanks. Such formations when backed by artillery were in theory capable of individual combined arms operations on battalion level to match Russian BTG deployment. These new brigades have simpler structure, similar to Russian structure of 3x10 per battalion. In some cases there's likely 2x14 but they no longer have mixed composition and the use of 10-vehicle companies limits their tactical flexibility. That implies that they will have optimal effectiveness when deployed as brigades and because of that the equipment spotted on the front should match the unit which allows to infer the rest.
The 82nd is the new Airborne brigade and per list above it has four rather than three maneuver battalions (3x Stryker, 1x Marder).
Artillery table for the new units:
Only the first three on the list (?5/??, 44 and 118) have 155mm arty in large amount including self-propelled systems. The rest have just the basic 2x6 or 3x4 "division" (battalion-equivalent for arty in UA/RU TOE). 82nd is Airborne so it has 24 towed light guns per standard TOE.
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Just so that we acknowledge existing in the same reality:
- Leopard 2A4 was produced from 1985 to 1992 - that's 38 years ago to 31 years ago.
- Leopard 2A6 was produced from 2001 to 2005 - that's 22 years ago to 18 years ago.
- Kurdish rebels in Syria knocked out ~10 Turkish Leopard 2A4s in 2016.
I expect most Leopards to be destroyed during the offensive. Their loss doesn't matter as long as tactical and operational success is achieved.
In comparison: how many T-90Ms has Russia lost so far? Oryx counts 22. They probably would have lost a T-14 already if they were capable of putting a company of them in working condition. How is killing a Leopard a big win? Is Russia aspiring to be only as good as Kurdish rebels?
That's not how an operation would be conducted. I don't see how Ukraine can achieve surprise in the current conditions so they have to set themselves up for a decisive blow that will come at a location known to Russia. Because of that they need to ensure that the conditions at that location are as advantageous to them as possible.
Ukraine has the advantage of position and logistics. They can pivot while Russia can't. They operate from a limited area that can be approximated by a triangle with vertices in Kharkiv, Horlivka and Zaporizhia. Each side of this triangle is approximately 300km and there are several logistical arteries that can be easily established inside that area. The depth of the front is the rest of the country.
Russia operates from a long, stretched-out front that is sustained by one or two logistical arteries usually along a railway line. They need that logistical line to be sustained for any quick troop redeployments and that maneuver will occur along predictable routes as for example the depth of the front between Zaporozhia and Donetsk is between 100-150km. The area around Starobilsk is poorly developed and similarly any troop movements are difficult.
So the correct solution for Ukraine would be to put pressure along the entire front, especially in key locations that could disrupt communication and logistics, to force the current force disposition to remain static and then use the advantage of space to execute maneuver at the rear of their own forces and strike at the desirable position with concentrated mass.
It's the same logic as a boxer taking the center of the ring and forcing the opponent to circle him around or be forces into a corner. Sometimes the circling works if the opponent is fast enough but Russia is currently even less mobile than Ukraine so Ukraine has the advantage of both position (center ring) and speed.
Contrary to what you may imagine it is a very bad decision to concentrate mass too early as modern weapons are absolutely lethal. The offensive would be over before it started unless Ukraine could suppress Russian fires which it can't. The losses in such short engagement would be much greater than "bloody" fighting along a largely static front. I think it may be why so much of this new force is wheeled - it allows Ukraine to execute maneuver along the roads at their rear while Russia is using primarily tracked equipment and lacks dedicated wheeled units because of the decision to equip a battalion in each motor rifle brigade with BTR-82A. If they had wheeled brigades they could counter AFU maneuver but their rapid reaction force is VDV which uses tracked BMDs which are bad at long-range (100+ km) operational maneuver or helicopters which have availability problems. So Ukraine has the advantage of space and mobility and from what I've seen so far this is the most logical solution to the offensive.
Hit in one or two places where a Russian loss will be painful, draw reinforcements then quickly withdraw and hit where decisive success can be achieved which is somewhere around Melitopol in my view because geographically it cuts off all of southern front and threatens Crimea. Anything else will be a surprise.
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