Kherson a bit more indeed, but it look now that's mostly technical for taking and probably armored for holding. You can hold nothing with technicals. Against an enemy relying mostly on artillery, using technicals to capture and encircle make sense if you charge full speed with it. The speed of advance is fast and artillery need to pull back asap to not get in contact. The tanks can move on without being hammered behind while the artillery stop working. Way better than walking behind tanks like in the first big Kherson counter offensive.
The War in the Ukraine
- Thread starter SampanViking
- Start date
In the latest arms shipment the US is promising another 200 MRAPs, that's not a insignificant amount of vechicles that are basically APC lite. They can probably afford to send thousands more without breaking a sweat.
If they concentrated those light vehicles in their pushes, that is not a bad way at all to counteract the Russian artillery advantage since the communication between ground recon and artillery landing is lackluster on the Russian side.
How much of AFU's forces in this offensive are technicals vs how much are MRAPs?
I wouldn't discount MRAP being used as ersatz wheeled IFV against Russians. Previous joint exercises between PLA and Russians have shown that Russian forces can't really handle medium combined arms brigade or SBCTs or similar wheeled medium armour formations running circles around them and striking where there they are weak. Didn't a PLA medium combined arms battalion wipe out a whole Russian mechanized infantry regiment during Vostok 2018?
Although MRAP are far from being equivalent to a Type 08, it still at least equivalent if not heavier than jeep equipped light combined arms brigades and not to be underestimated due to their speed. In fact this known Russian weakness to highly mobile units may explain their recent failure against AFU formations being used this way.
I wouldn't discount MRAP being used as ersatz wheeled IFV against Russians. Previous joint exercises between PLA and Russians have shown that Russian forces can't really handle medium combined arms brigade or SBCTs or similar wheeled medium armour formations running circles around them and striking where there they are weak. Didn't a PLA medium combined arms battalion wipe out a whole Russian mechanized infantry regiment during Vostok 2018?
Although MRAP are far from being equivalent to a Type 08, it still at least equivalent if not heavier than jeep equipped light combined arms brigades and not to be underestimated due to their speed. In fact this known Russian weakness to highly mobile units may explain their recent failure against AFU formations being used this way.
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While not as heavily armed so that it should not be used in a IFV role, the fact that MRAPs are more resistant to mines compared to Soviet era troop transport really does help it in the Ukrainian strategy of infantry centric mobile warfare. Since troops from a disabled MRAP can just hop on to another one in the convoy to minimise slowdown, instead of getting turned into a meat paste within older troop transports.
They get way better results using them than tanks and they get way better mileage. Wheeled vehicules have usualy less maintenances problems on long distance on roads than tracked ones. We will see how they will works in the mud and snow but for now, faster mobility is good on the map. MRAP have some survivability against shrapnels too.
Ukraine can exploit the fact that the Russians can’t are collapsing faster than Ukraine can move. But once their is a stabilized frontline you are going to need heavy equipment again.
According to the US, Ukraine faces critical battle in the south before winter. Western allies point to muddy conditions that will soon make fighting treacherous in crucial regions.
Financial Times:
US officials and lawmakers have warned that Ukraine faces a critical battle to reclaim territory in the south of the country before winter brings treacherous fighting conditions if it is to deny Russia a chance to solidify its hold on the region.
“The fighting season is drawing short. The Ukrainians have gained the upper hand and need to continue to press their advantage,” said Chris Murphy, a Democrat on the Senate foreign relations committee.
“The true long-term disaster for Ukraine is for Russia to cut off Ukraine’s access to the water from Mariupol to Odesa. Ukraine’s lifeblood is its access to Odesa and so it’s important for them to be in an offensive posture, not just a defensive posture in the south,” he added.
Ukrainians agree that the coming weeks will be critical to their campaign to reclaim land in the south.
“Certainly it is crucial to advance swiftly in liberating occupied territory because there is a sense that changes in the weather will limit further active military actions in this region,” said Ihor Romanenko, a former deputy head of Ukraine’s general staff.
“They need to do something about Kherson, and sometime soon,” said a western diplomat.
Officials say there is an urgency for Ukrainian forces to recapture the south before the winter because the ground in the region hasn’t frozen in the past three years, meaning that terrain will soon become extremely muddy.
These conditions make it hard for both sides to manoeuvre, forcing them to stay on main roads and expose themselves to being targeted. The mud also hands an advantage to those defending territory, since they do not have to move across land, officials and analysts said.
US officials and lawmakers say winning back more terrain in the south will be essential to giving Ukraine a better bargaining position when and if some kind of ceasefire negotiations begin with Russia.
“The ultimate settlement would be six, eight months from now. Putin controls somewhat more acreage than he did in February . . . and then we reach a ceasefire. But I think Ukraine needs to take some more territory back before that happens.”
Financial Times:
US officials and lawmakers have warned that Ukraine faces a critical battle to reclaim territory in the south of the country before winter brings treacherous fighting conditions if it is to deny Russia a chance to solidify its hold on the region.
“The fighting season is drawing short. The Ukrainians have gained the upper hand and need to continue to press their advantage,” said Chris Murphy, a Democrat on the Senate foreign relations committee.
“The true long-term disaster for Ukraine is for Russia to cut off Ukraine’s access to the water from Mariupol to Odesa. Ukraine’s lifeblood is its access to Odesa and so it’s important for them to be in an offensive posture, not just a defensive posture in the south,” he added.
Ukrainians agree that the coming weeks will be critical to their campaign to reclaim land in the south.
“Certainly it is crucial to advance swiftly in liberating occupied territory because there is a sense that changes in the weather will limit further active military actions in this region,” said Ihor Romanenko, a former deputy head of Ukraine’s general staff.
“They need to do something about Kherson, and sometime soon,” said a western diplomat.
Officials say there is an urgency for Ukrainian forces to recapture the south before the winter because the ground in the region hasn’t frozen in the past three years, meaning that terrain will soon become extremely muddy.
These conditions make it hard for both sides to manoeuvre, forcing them to stay on main roads and expose themselves to being targeted. The mud also hands an advantage to those defending territory, since they do not have to move across land, officials and analysts said.
US officials and lawmakers say winning back more terrain in the south will be essential to giving Ukraine a better bargaining position when and if some kind of ceasefire negotiations begin with Russia.
“The ultimate settlement would be six, eight months from now. Putin controls somewhat more acreage than he did in February . . . and then we reach a ceasefire. But I think Ukraine needs to take some more territory back before that happens.”
Better to keep them for that moment than losing them like lemmings...It look like they learned from it tho. With cover dropping in winter and IR signature blooming, it will be a huge test for Ukraine. They need to keep their main forces hidden in big cities. All these small villages taken is a pain for Russian troops but are not viable wintering places for Ukrainian forces. They need to have time to dig themselves in good or all these is for nothing. I don't see enough bulldozer and engineering equipments on the front from both sides. Farm tractors are not enough for that kind of job.
To counter this sort of high mobility wheel based/road based warfare ideally you want your own wheel based and highly informationized medium combined arms brigade or SBCT or similar. They can keep up with the speed and have the combination of protection and firepower to go toe to toe. A few battalions of Bumerang IFV would come real handy by now but alas it's too late for that.
Failing that, even infantry armed with ATGM or failing that RPGs motorized by civilian vehicles could do the job. It's not like AFU are deploying actual medium combined arms brigade filled with 8x8 assault guns. What's more important than firepower or protection is informationization. We know that's something Russians are bad at, but incidentally this is one area that could in fact be fixed relatively quickly.
Where as PLA informationization focuses on top down systems, early in the war during the initial Russian offensive phase US put into service a smart phone based app that allowed a bottom up approach to informationization. It's conceptually very similar to a ride share app, only instead of drivers and cars and people looking to go somewhere it's friendly assets and enemy targets identified by NATO ISR. AFU troops could look on their phone and see what targets around them have been marked and take order. This system has been hilariously nicknamed "滴滴打人" and attracted enough attention that PLA has people looking into it to see what could be learnt from it for themselves
This rudimentary system allowed AFU to have some degree of informationization that far exceed what was expected of them and we saw the results in the early days of war. Now that the shoe is on the other foot it would be wise for Russians to clone this system and use it similarly. Particularly for LPR and DPR troops who might have better local knowledge and have easier access to civilian cars in the area.
Failing that, even infantry armed with ATGM or failing that RPGs motorized by civilian vehicles could do the job. It's not like AFU are deploying actual medium combined arms brigade filled with 8x8 assault guns. What's more important than firepower or protection is informationization. We know that's something Russians are bad at, but incidentally this is one area that could in fact be fixed relatively quickly.
Where as PLA informationization focuses on top down systems, early in the war during the initial Russian offensive phase US put into service a smart phone based app that allowed a bottom up approach to informationization. It's conceptually very similar to a ride share app, only instead of drivers and cars and people looking to go somewhere it's friendly assets and enemy targets identified by NATO ISR. AFU troops could look on their phone and see what targets around them have been marked and take order. This system has been hilariously nicknamed "滴滴打人" and attracted enough attention that PLA has people looking into it to see what could be learnt from it for themselves
This rudimentary system allowed AFU to have some degree of informationization that far exceed what was expected of them and we saw the results in the early days of war. Now that the shoe is on the other foot it would be wise for Russians to clone this system and use it similarly. Particularly for LPR and DPR troops who might have better local knowledge and have easier access to civilian cars in the area.