The War in the Ukraine

HighGround said:

That's a significant commitment.

At this point, a commitment of RuAF reserves is probably justified, but it's only been 2 weeks or so. There is plenty of ground to give, a good opportunity will likely present itself at some point.

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i dont see the need to commit any reserves at this point for the russians. if there were reserves commited, i imagine those are simply reserve battalion of a brigade or something. at the operational level, i cant see russia committing reserves unless their last or second last line of defense is breached, or the commander sees an opening to exploit against the attackers.

on the ukrainian side, i have been hearing some people suggesting that they have committed their second echelon, because the units that initiated the attack are different from the ones that have captured some of the towns recently. rumor has it that NATO countries were not happy seeing their equipment all over the internet in pieces, and ukraine had to pull back a bit and commit non-western equipped units instead. my suspicion is that these units were tasked to slug it out with the russians in urban areas anyways, while the western-equipped units were supposed to steamroll the russian defense out in the open. so to use the former to capture small villages actually makes sense.

Temstar said:

I'm pretty sure that list is inaccurate, for one 47th Mechanized Brigade has been in the fight for some time now, the Leo 2 and Bradley captured on film to be lost mostly belong to them. Rumour on pro-Russian telegram is saying 47th has already been made combat ineffective and in the process of with drawing.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1668174635374899202

At the most active area of the front AFU already have 5 mechanized brigades in the fight.

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most of this is from russian mod's claims these past few days, the last 8 units is from the 'leaks'. So perhaps it is 7 armored brigades?

It appears Russia's decision to slow down taking ground and fortify was the right decision. Ukraine's counteroffensive has began in earnest. Despite the tactical difficulties this is inevitable due to politics. The questions then becomes "what is next?" Ukraine will continue to commit large assault on Russian position regardless of success. Once the attacking force has exhausted, will Russia resume their advance but at greater pace?

^
That puzzles me as well.

What exactly are the Russian reserves and are they prepared to do anything offensively? Or will they continue the 'long war' of attrition (political, military (limited offensive ops + air, drone and missile strikes), and economic) and let Ukraine degrade itself on its own fumes?

Wagner PMC is supposed to come back in 1- 1.5 months if Prizoghin's claim is correct.

If Ukraine realizes that they are too incompetent to break multiple lines of defense then would they just call of the offensive and send the units back for more training? or change the location of the offensive to a more reasonable goal, for a 'small solution' and a propaganda victory. Then Zelensky goes around another world tour for weapons, this time to cannibalize the US military. Or will Zelensky step up to peace talks?

Or if Ukraine goes for broke and commits until they lose 80% of their AFV, would the Russians then escalate their offensive against a weakened Ukrainian army?

This interactive map has the fortifications plotted next to natural terrain obstacles. There are also satellite images being passed around, the Russians did a gigantic quantity of work creating them.


Or, suddenly Ukraine's performance massively improves for some reason?

If Ukraine stops attacking, then the Russians will start pushing again in Marinka and Avdiivka like they were doing a couple weeks ago.

It is stunning to me that Marinka is constantly active but the 150th Motor-rifle division and its supporting units are never able to fully take it. 150's nemesis is the 79th brigade and its supporting units. These two units are in a never-ending struggle.

I suspect that Avdiivka will be taken by Wagner PMC after it finishes its refit.

Cult Icon said:

It is stunning to me that Marinka is constantly active but the 150th Motor-rifle division and its supporting units are never able to fully take it. 150's nemesis is the 79th brigade and its supporting units. These two units are in a never-ending struggle.

I suspect that Avdiivka will be taken by Wagner PMC after it finishes its refit.

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Marinka is almost done. Whatever left is being hit hard by thermobaric weapons. There are videos of TOS being used and the rubble won't protect those trying to escape from.

That sector has been reinforced by the Akhmat-Kadyrov special forces unit.

Cult Icon said:

^
That puzzles me as well.

What exactly are the Russian reserves and are they prepared to do anything offensively? Or will they continue the 'long war' of attrition (political, military (limited offensive ops + air, drone and missile strikes), and economic) and let Ukraine degrade itself on its own fumes?

Wagner PMC is supposed to come back in 1- 1.5 months if Prizoghin's claim is correct.

If Ukraine realizes that they are too incompetent to break multiple lines of defense then would they just call of the offensive and send the units back for more training? or change the location of the offensive to a more reasonable goal, for a 'small solution' and a propaganda victory. Then Zelensky goes around another world tour for weapons, this time to cannibalize the US military. Or will Zelensky step up to peace talks?

Or if Ukraine goes for broke and commits until they lose 80% of their AFV, would the Russians then escalate their offensive against a weakened Ukrainian army?

This interactive map has the fortifications plotted next to natural terrain obstacles. There are also satellite images being passed around, the Russians did a gigantic quantity of work creating them.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Or, suddenly Ukraine's performance massively improves for some reason?

Click to expand...

in the short term the offensive has to go on, for political reasons. as for the russian reserves, they for sure exist in zaporozhia. but they are unlikely to be committed offensively until the bulk of ukrainian offensive forces pushed deep into russian held territory. some people hypthesize about a push into ukrainian held territory now that their offensive struggled, this is not the way. because russian units are clearly not readied and drilled for that contingency. it is best for russia to simply stick with their plan, let the defensive battle attrite the ukrainian army then finish it off in a counter attack in pre-selected kill zones. kursk and prokorovka is certainly in the mind of russian planners here.

Cult Icon said:

^
That puzzles me as well.

What exactly are the Russian reserves and are they prepared to do anything offensively? Or will they continue the 'long war' of attrition (political, military (limited offensive ops + air, drone and missile strikes), and economic) and let Ukraine degrade itself on its own fumes?

Wagner PMC is supposed to come back in 1- 1.5 months if Prizoghin's claim is correct.

If Ukraine realizes that they are too incompetent to break multiple lines of defense then would they just call of the offensive and send the units back for more training? or change the location of the offensive to a more reasonable goal, for a 'small solution' and a propaganda victory. Then Zelensky goes around another world tour for weapons, this time to cannibalize the US military. Or will Zelensky step up to peace talks?

Or if Ukraine goes for broke and commits until they lose 80% of their AFV, would the Russians then escalate their offensive against a weakened Ukrainian army?

This interactive map has the fortifications plotted next to natural terrain obstacles. There are also satellite images being passed around, the Russians did a gigantic quantity of work creating them.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Or, suddenly Ukraine's performance massively improves for some reason?

Click to expand...

I think Russians are incapable of doing maneuver warfare at large scale, unless there’s some major collapse un Ukrainian lines (unlikely). Russian reserves at this point and a portion of many deployed units are filled by mobiks. It seems these guys have varying levels of experience and training, but for guys with no combat experience it might be as little as 2-3 months. (Anecdotal experience: ).

This amount of training is only sufficient for basic combat and small unit tactics training, something useful in storming another Bakhmut but not good for maneuver warfare. For that, they would need much more combat coordination training and training with equipment, which would take 6 months or more.

Aegis21 said:

I think Russians are incapable of doing maneuver warfare at large scale, unless there’s some major collapse un Ukrainian lines (unlikely). Russian reserves at this point and a portion of many deployed units are filled by mobiks. It seems these guys have varying levels of experience and training, but for guys with no combat experience it might be as little as 2-3 months. (Anecdotal experience:

).

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This is a bold assumption to make. I personally don't think it's true. Rather, lack of large-scale maneuver warfare is most likely due to risk-aversion, and high costs in the event of a failure. Some of Ukraine's first echelon units suffered the same fate as Russia's ill-fated 155 Marine Brigade in Vuhledar. And those troops had NATO training, NATO armor, and presumably executed orders in the way they were trained.

In my opinion, Russian junior and senior officer staff is simply extremely risk-averse because they've seen what happened to offensive units in the last 2 years. They are not interested in either getting killed while executing a bold maneuver, or getting sacked for getting their men/equipment destroyed.

Any large-scale offensives are likely to be centrally planned, and decided on by consensus rather than individual commanders.