Of course they need these specialized vehicles, as the Antonovsky bridge is unable to be used to transfer heavy equipment, this doesn't work even if Russia sinks the sections, all the bridge sections would need to be reinforced with the specialized vehicles to be able to successfully crossing of military equipment and materials would be unusable without reinforcement even if barriers were placed in the most affected sections so as not to apply pressure points in the affected places, as the entire structure and sections are no longer transferable to military equipment.Mobile bridge vehicles are offensive, we are talking about defensive. They dont need those specialized vehicles, just set the sections and anchor them as appropriate, anchor them to the existing bridge pier (which is what they eventually did). You dont even really need floating sections, Just start sinking concrete caissons as piers for the shallow depths and use floating sections in the middle. When you are on the defensive and had over 6 month these are options that should have been tried within weeks.
Look:
It is noted that the two main road bridges leading to the Russian-occupied territory on the west bank of the Dnipro in Kherson region “are now probably out of use for the purposes of substantial military resupply”.
They are using pontoon ferry. Something quite different from what you claim as a "bridge" that was your initial argument.
Another thing, engineering vehicles are not only used in offensive cases, but also in defensive cases, as tactical bridges are the first to be targets of an enemy artillery campaign, this you can find in any manual of any army in the world, because they know that there will be the main crossing point and there will be a huge concentration of enemy artillery fire and even air bombs if there are not adequate air defense resources in the area.
hahahahaYou're acting like this is Anzio, the Russians had 40km to the river in most places and the beachhead wouldnt be so limited if they had extra bridges and backup bridges. This is complicity and incompetence
Take the map, young man. See the most likely locations to be used as crossing points, creating a crossing point is not something to be stipulated as simply as you believe, it takes three field commanders to complete a course crossing of water retracting and various other operational needs to be worked out to create the best spots. One example, do you really think they will create crossing points between Berislav and L'vove, points so hardly usable as crossing points and so close to where the Ukrainian troops are? Of course not.
Them coming out is a delaying action.There isnt a delaying action, this is just them leaving. Ukrainian would be forced to fight in urban Kherson, the best terrain for a defender if this is a delaying action.
Trading space for time is just that, a trade. Forcing Ukrainians to 3v1 a defensive position is a good trade, forcing them to spend 130k missiles on a 12k pontoon section is a good trade, downing a SU24 and losing one bridge-layer destroyed is a good trade. Leaving the entire western bank is not a good trade.
Russia in this war tried in every way to avoid urban warfare, either in offensive mode and, now we are seeing them avoiding being in defensive mode, this is clearly because they know they will have huge casualties and if they employ small troops in the city, they will be quickly eliminated because they are completely outnumbered. Can they inflict casualties on the enemy? Undoubtedly, but at the cost of their own strength.
Russia is a federation, the name of the country defines it, Russian Federation.I realized that the Russian military almost looks like a European military from the times before European kings managed to assert their authority over regional lords. Before then kings had a little part of their country under their direct control. Even though they were the sovereigns of the other parts of their countries, they weren't actually managing the lands. When they needed soldiers, most of the army was mobilized, sent and, sometimes, even led by the local lords and nobilities. To give a popular culture reference to describe how armies were raised, think of the Seven Kingdoms from the Game of Thrones.
The concentration of martial power under central governments happened mostly after the Thirty Years' War and then the French Revolution. Nowadays, almost every national government holds a monopoly over martial power and has a standing national military. That national military commands a vast majority of the country's martial power. You don't see modern nations clumping together a lot of different regional armed organizations to wage war.
Now let's look at the Russian forces in Ukraine:
- Russian Armed Forces. The standing national military of Russia.
- Rosgvardiya. It is like a gendarmerie but is uniquely independent of the national military and ministries. It is effectively a second military.
- LPR and DNR armies. The militaries of recently annexed de-facto republics. Separate from the Russian Armed Forces.
- Various police forces from Russia. I have no idea who is commanding them.
- Militias from various parts of Ukraine. Again, I have no idea who is commanding them.
- Chechen forces. Another military force from Russia that is independent from the Russian national military. But this time, it is raised, trained, and commanded by a local governor.
- Wagner and a lot of other mercenaries. Largely independent from the Russian Armed Forces.
Russophiles here, I am sorry but this is not how a modern nation wages war. This is a widely inefficient organization. It makes coordinated action and uniformity impossible. This is how military forces looked until the late-1700s. I am not sure how Russian Federation ended up like this. The results are easily observable, though.
Also, I don't know why use the earlier European example when Russia itself at the time of the Empire was also in the same kind of military organization as the Europe you mentioned. An example, Suvorov was under a Russian army that differed little from other European monarchies, the weapons were the same and the organization identical.
The fact is that Russia has always used irregular troops to wage its wars, at the time of the Empire, the cavalry was composed of irregulars, the traditional Cossacks who are also in Ukraine now, the most famous Cossack knights were those of the Don who could muster in the order of 15,000, he used it for reconnaissance and rearguard security, with a few incursions on the enemy's lines of communication to unsettle him. There were other irregular units that imprinted the Russian Army with its most striking originality composed of Tatars, Kalmyks, Bachkirs, Muslims (today Chechnya) among others, all used in 1812 against Napoleon as extreme resources, in World War II and other wars.
Coming back to the present, most of what you mentioned is already under the command and control of Russian forces, so coordinated action is not a case to be applied here, the 1st (Donetsk) and 2nd (Luhansk) Army Corps are under the command of the 8th CAA since the beginning of the war, for example, General Andrey Mordvichev was personally with Kadyrov in Mariupol, noting that he was in operational command of all units stationed there, from the regular Russian forces, Chechens and the 1st (Donetsk ) Army Corps. The only evidence here is that the mobilized LDNR forces which are the second largest force after the regular Russian forces are underequipped and had the highest death rate during the war.
Speaking of uniformity, what is being achieved with the mobilization, whether due to the number of casualties of irregulars or regulars, this will certainly bring more uniform national character, in addition, the amount mobilized totally triples the forces employed pre-invasion and covers comfortably the total irregular forces used. Obviously they will still count on the participation of irregulars in missions, but the demand for certain types of missions will clearly change with the arrival of newly mobilized troops.
Also, if you think that modern wars only occur from the perspective of uniformity, look at the case of the Gulf War, where Coalition Arab troops were used with their own general, Khalid bin Sultan Al Saud who was the equivalent of the Norman Schwarzkopf and was on an equal footing with the American general being responsible for +150,000 of the coalition forces.