I think the Russians were overly ambitious in the armored pushes in the Northeast. The expectation was Kharkov would have turned to the Russian side and that failed. The previous pro-Russian civilian leadership in Kharkov had been purged two years before and no longer held control. But it worked in the south. Kherson turned. So it was basically a gamble and some of it paid off.
While there was resistance in Sumy and Chernihiv, had Kharkov folded, the Russian right flank would have been secured and those cities were encircled already. There were continuous but sparse attacks on the Russian supply lines but it would have been a matter of sending Rosgvardiya and cleaning the rear up. It would have been a matter of time until those cities broke down under encirclement. However I think this was never going to happen even if the civilian government in Kharkov was on Russia's side, since one of the largest contingents of armored units in Ukraine is stationed in Kharkov, together with Kraken, a unit similar to Azov, and the SVD. Civilian rebellion against those units is not achievable. In Kherson it happened because it was lightly equipped territorial defense units composed of people who actually live in the area.
Given that the Ukrainian forces did not leave the Donbass area to go back and defend Kiev, which I think was the Russian expectation, getting those troops to leave then picking them out in the open field with aviation, rolling Russian forces up all the way to the Dnieper, well, when Kharkov did not fold, and the Ukrainian government did not leave the Donbass area and increased shelling of Donbass republics, Russia had to fallback to alternative plans. Rollback their forces in the North and focus on dealing with the Ukrainian forces in Donbass first.
You can call this a "failure" of Russian war planning, but the simple fact is achieving such maximalist gains was always going to be hard to happen, and Russia had plenty of backup plans, and I think the current backup plan they are following is quite far from their worst case scenario. I actually think their worst case scenario was NATO invoking Article 4 and them having to strike NATO decision centers with Kinzhal.
While there was resistance in Sumy and Chernihiv, had Kharkov folded, the Russian right flank would have been secured and those cities were encircled already. There were continuous but sparse attacks on the Russian supply lines but it would have been a matter of sending Rosgvardiya and cleaning the rear up. It would have been a matter of time until those cities broke down under encirclement. However I think this was never going to happen even if the civilian government in Kharkov was on Russia's side, since one of the largest contingents of armored units in Ukraine is stationed in Kharkov, together with Kraken, a unit similar to Azov, and the SVD. Civilian rebellion against those units is not achievable. In Kherson it happened because it was lightly equipped territorial defense units composed of people who actually live in the area.
Given that the Ukrainian forces did not leave the Donbass area to go back and defend Kiev, which I think was the Russian expectation, getting those troops to leave then picking them out in the open field with aviation, rolling Russian forces up all the way to the Dnieper, well, when Kharkov did not fold, and the Ukrainian government did not leave the Donbass area and increased shelling of Donbass republics, Russia had to fallback to alternative plans. Rollback their forces in the North and focus on dealing with the Ukrainian forces in Donbass first.
You can call this a "failure" of Russian war planning, but the simple fact is achieving such maximalist gains was always going to be hard to happen, and Russia had plenty of backup plans, and I think the current backup plan they are following is quite far from their worst case scenario. I actually think their worst case scenario was NATO invoking Article 4 and them having to strike NATO decision centers with Kinzhal.
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