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Ukraine: What’s Happening, What Might Be Next
This post is intended to be descriptive, rather than prescriptive, as for instance BDB’s poll on support for weapons/troops for Ukraine.
What’s Happened
The MSM has been saturated with news of a hurricane that might be blamed on Republicans somehow, and a pipeline explosion that might be blamed on anyone, or sheer incompetence, depending on your favorite theory. So the operational details of what’s been happening in Ukraine after the big breakthrough East of Kharkiv may have disappeared unless you’ve been specifically tracking them (I have). So, a quick recap of the last couple of weeks:
Ukraine went into a short operational pause in the Kharkiv / north Luhansk area, presumably to resupply and reorganize.
Russia kept banging away on the Donetsk front, making little progress and continuing to lose troops and equipment.
Ukraine kept banging away in the Kherson area west of Dnipro, also making little apparent progress and expending a lot of HIMARS and other ammo blowing up bridges and Russian supply dumps and headquarters.
Things started moving quickly again last week. In the northeast, the Ukrainians managed to surround the town of Lyman, a rail and road hub. There were between 500 and 5,000 Russians and proxy troops trapped there, depending on who you believe. Some or most of the Russians may have made it out, losing a lot of equipment. The final retreat, mostly by LPR proxy troops, apparently became a slaughter by Ukrainian artillery, mines, and light recon forces. There’s plenty of video evidence of the latter out there, don’t go looking unless you’re ready for it. I’ll drop a link to a text-only report by an American volunteer in one of the recon teams, but you still don’t want to read it near meal or bedtime.
After the Lyman episode, the Russian front north of there is being pushed back daily. Some of this may be planned/controlled withdrawal, some seems to be a collapse. The Ukrainians now appear to control the important road between the towns of Svatove and Kreminna in Luhansk oblast.
Over the weekend, the Kherson front suddenly erupted. The Ukrainians punched in between several towns in the northeast of the oblast, west of a large reservoir on Dnipro, and have pushed the Russians back some tens of kilometers. The advance appears to be continuing. As of today, the Russians abandoned another portion of that front (Davydiv Brid) to avoid a possible envelopment. Again, this appears to be some combination of collapse and planned withdrawal.
Both of these fronts are moving daily, best followed in real time. A sampling of reporting sites: Most speculative, kinda conservative, really conservative. These are all more-or-less the Ukrainian view. For Russian side reports, try here.
Some of the ‘mobiks’ from the chaotic Russian mobilization have appeared at the front. Mobik prisoners have been taken, and the dead recovered. There are video reports and call intercepts reporting mobiks being dropped off along the front with little or no supplies or communications.
What Might Happen
A pattern of Ukrainian operations is emerging. They are pushing recon/sabotage teams in between Russian-occupied towns and strongpoints, followed by light mechanized forces heavily armed with anti-armor weapons and backed with artillery and rocket fire. These threaten to envelop a major position, leading the Russians to fall back to protect their flanks, or potentially become surrounded. For what it looks like from the POV of the scouts, this series of reports from the same volunteer I linked above gives a sample.
The UA is managing this because the Russians can no longer man a continuous line at the front. This implies that the larger numbers of casualty reports for Russia are credible. It’s also visible that some of Russia’s most elite formations have been shredded (‘heavily degraded’ is apparently the term of art) in the process. It also makes some ‘sense’ of the reports of untrained mobiks being dropped off with little support along the front. These poor [CoC] are being used as human trip wires to slow down the penetration by Ukrainian scouts and light forces.
The Russians left the mobilization too late to assemble a credible, trained, and equipped reserve force. They are being used as cannon fodder to delay Ukraine. Local Russian reserves have apparently been committed and defeated in Kharkiv/Luhansk and Kherson. This suggests Ukraine can continue to advance.
On the other hand, the fall mud season (rasputitsa) is beginning, which will slow everything down. Recent videos have shown muddy but still firm secondary roads in the north (Kharkiv/Luhansk), but there’s been enough rain that it’s likely armor would now bog down off-road. Roads in the south (Kherson) appear to be dry still.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see a Ukrainian attempt to punch much deeper into Luhansk, probably towards the key logistics center of Starobilsk, before the mud really sets in.
There are recurrent rumors of Ukraine preparing a third offensive, this one to punch South towards Melitopol and then Crimea. I haven’t seen any actual evidence of such, including from those who are buying up satellite photos. And it’s just what I’d spread around if I were the Ukrainians, to convince the Russians to keep reserves there while the other fronts collapse. But I could be wrong…
Published in Foreign Policy
Sure, sure . . . you’re absolutely impervious to it, aren’t you?
Shame on me for being interested in what people actually say and not what the propagandists tell us.
Zelensky said that he was calling for preemptive economic sanctions on Russia.
You said, incorrectly, that Zelensky was asking NATO to bomb Russia.
Will you admit that you were incorrect?
Zelensky has been saying this before the Russian invasion. He said it at the Nato meeting just prior. And was talking about nukes. Zelensky is both crazy and evil.
You are incorrect. Zelensky never advocated that NATO bomb Russia.
Do you have your fingers in your ears and hum while you’re typing your nonsense?
I could easily ask you the same question.
I am enjoying the deconstruction of “preemptive strikes” to make it mean “economic sanctions.”
Here is the story.
https://www.politico.eu/article/no-nuclear-hysteria-ukraine-rows-back-on-zelenskyys-preemptive-strike-remarks/
There is a national leader who is dangerous: Putin.
Which confirms that he called for “preemptive strikes” and his spokeman had to walk it back. Just like they always have to walk back Biden’s statements, now they have to walk back Zelenskyy’s statements.
So thank you for confirming that I was right again.
There are dozens of national leaders who are dangerous. Putin, Zelenskyy, and Biden are among them.
You said that Zelensky said, “NATO should bomb Russia.” But Zelensky never said any such thing.
You were wrong.
I agree with one-third of that.
Putin is dangerous.
Nope. Biden. But then, he’s your guy.
You like all those CIA, FBI criminals and thugs.
The President of France, Emmanuel Macron, announced that France will create fund, beginning with a 100 billion Euro investment, to support the Ukrainian war effort.
So what? Macron is another one of those dangerous national leaders you mentioned.
The paranoia is entertaining.
I don’t know. It’s not terribly clear from the article, but from the way it’s written it looks like the interpreter immediately corrected themself to say “preventative action,” which supports HeavyWater’s point. Not Zelenskyy’s fault if the interpreter screwed it up. That point is further supported by Zelenskyy’s subsequent remarks about reviewing the way “the pressure is being exerted,” which sounds more like sanctions.
Not that I’d blame him if he were calling for preventative strikes anyway. We shouldn’t do that, of course, but I can certainly see why he would be calling for them. I might, too, if I were him, facing the prospect of nuclear attacks.
You are facing the prospect of nuclear attacks.
So what? Why should we care that Macron is sending his citizens’ money to Ukraine? Are Macron’s actions supposed to shame me into doing the same? Why do you think “Macron did X” is supposed to spur me into action? That’s how propagandists talk.
My comment wasn’t directed towards you. You should just go on and continue reading propaganda.
Ignore actual news and facts as you have been.
Because I refuse to be a victim of your pro-WWIII propaganda campaign.
That AEI chick was right, you know. The U.S. thinks it can keeps its hands clean by “just” pouring billions in money and materiel into Ukraine. Putin’s not stupid.
And you’re all in favor of blowing up the world. When the mushroom clouds start blooming over American cities, will you admit that maybe we should be seeking peace instead of escalating toward Armageddon?
Seeking peace would be possible if Putin weren’t interested in aggression, conquest and genocide.
Yeah, but that’s been the case all my life. The ICBM strategic nuclear threat is far less subject to preventative strikes.
The threat against Ukraine is the relatively immediate use of tactical nukes, against which preventative strikes might, as least theoretically, be possible and effective. As I said, we shouldn’t do that, as it could well drag us into the war. But I’m certainly willing to cut Zelenskyy some slack in his comments. He’s fighting against a brutal invasion, so I understand how ill-considered comments like that might slip out.
I have to hand it to you. You come across as the most uber-Neocon that I’ve ever encountered.
You know, I don’t think that there was any history of what you call the MacGregor ideology on the conservative side, from the Birchers until Trump. Well, Pat Buchanan, I guess, and Ross Perot. They were voices in the wilderness. Interestingly, they were saying what George Washington said.
I just don’t think that there’s any significant history of an America First foreign policy on the conservative side over the past 50-70 years. It’s not something with a hold on the conservative mind in recent years. It’s the Neocon ideology that, strangely, has dominated on the political right. This is strange because, if you look into it, our country’s traditional approach from Washington until, well, pretty much Taft, has been noninterventionist.
Your foreign policy is Wilsonian. Woodrow Wilson, I mean.
You can believe whatever you want. Why in the world do you claim to be a conservative, though? What are you conserving? Progressivism?
HW, in your case, I know that this is the case on foreign policy, and on homosexuality. Oh, and you seem to dislike religion quite a bit, though maybe it’s just the Christian faith.
If you’re on the side of the Leftists on both foreign policy and social issues, why don’t you just join their party?
He is immune to facts and logic….
I agree that in the aftermath of World War II, there was a debate within conservative circles regarding America’s foreign policy. Taft had one view while Arthur Vandenberg took another view. It was the Vandenberg side that persuaded most people.
I support representative government, freedom of the press and freedom of speech. Putin is really the opposite of those ideals/principles.
I don’t think it is “progressivism” to support representative government, freedom of speech and freedom of the press. One could call these ideals/principles the foundations of societies that promote human wellbeing.
At this point in history I think the Islamic faith is more dangerous than the Christian faith.
The Christian faith has many variants. Some promote human wellbeing while others do not. With Islam it seems more heavily tilted against human wellbeing.
I don’t know how the homosexuality issue has much bearing on this Ukraine-Russia issue. I do support some semblance of rights for homosexuals, including same sex marriage. Many Christians also support same sex marriage.
On economic issues, I disagree with the Democrats. Also, on issues like affirmative action, critical race theory, I disagree with the Democrats. On judicial activism and “the living constitution,” I disagree with the Democrats.
But on foreign policy, I am in agreement with both a majority in both political parties. Back in May of this year, Congress passed 40 billion dollars of aid to Ukraine and the vote was 368-57 in the House and the Senate passed it 86-11.
Recent polls show that lopsided majorities of both Republican and Democrat rank and file voters support military aid to Ukraine.
Zafar, this seems disingenuous. You are bombarded with answers and you simply reject them. That’s fine. We all do it. Your pretense at logic here is all in the context of your views, which is simply special pleading.
You may have different axioms; different values. You definitely have different friends, a different preferred side. You will never be talked out of one view and into the other.
You’re one of the friendlier logitarians, but no less tiresome than most.