Russian special military operation in Ukraine #23

i normally dont post western pro ukraine propaganda crap, But there are some insights here in how much of an nightmare it is on the battlefield for Ukrainians in Kherson.
Russia is not holding back.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/07/ukraine-kherson-offensive-casualties-ammunition/

some citations by Ukrainian's troops:

“They used everything on us,” said Denys, a 33-year-old Ukrainian soldier whose unit fell back from a Russian-held village after a lengthy barrage of cluster bombs, phosphorous munitions and mortars. “Who can survive an attack for five hours like that?” he said.

Denys and Ihor, agreed to reveal only their first names. But most spoke plainly about the disadvantages they faced.
Russia’s Orlan drones exposed Ukrainian positions from more than a kilometer above their heads, they said, an altitude that meant they never heard the buzz of the aircraft tracking their movements.


Airbornewolf: i have simmilar footage from the ukrainian side, an Drone buzzes overhead. They try to shoot it and within moments RF artillery rounds fly in at their positions.
i mean, its all fun and laughs. untill a piece of shrapnell comes at high speed into your meatsuit you call an body.
idiots. Kill the radio and run like hell before the artillery has a chance to Correct fire.



"Russian tanks emerged from newly built cement fortifications to blast infantry with large-caliber artillery, the wounded Ukrainian soldiers said. The vehicles would then shrink back beneath the concrete shelters, shielded from mortar and rocket fire.
Counter-battery radar systems automatically detected and located Ukrainians who were targeting the Russians with projectiles, unleashing a barrage of artillery fire in response."

"Russian hacking tools hijacked the drones of Ukrainian operators, who saw their aircraft drift away helplessly behind enemy lines."

Oleksandr said the Russian artillery fire was relentless. “They were just hitting us all the time,” he said. “If we fire three mortars, they fire 20 in return.”
The Ukrainian soldiers said they had to carefully ration their use of munitions but even when they did fire, they had trouble hitting targets. “When you give the coordinates, it’s supposed to be accurate but it’s not

Russian electronic warfare also posed a constant threat. Soldiers described ending their shifts and turning on their phones to call or text family members — a decision that immediately drew Russian artillery fire.
“When we turn on mobile phones or radio, they can recognize our presence immediately,” said Denys. “And then the shooting starts.”

Conclusion: RF is not holding back anything, and tearing the Ukrainian army to pieces wave after wave they send in.
There is nowhere to hide, going in means certain death. It is for the Ukrainian soldier an question of when.

PZH 2000 On the offensive in the Kharkiv region.

Belisarius wrote:
Serious casualties in the Ukrainian offensive in Kharkov
https://t.me/theRightPeople1/6017?single

Orc trash ain't seen nothing yet...

This will be a repeat of Kherson. Ukies will throw everything they have at the Russian lines, and will achieve some break thorough purely by weight of numbers, but they will expose themselves to withering counter-attacks and their advance will stall. Then they will double down, then hunker down, and then get smashed to pieces. They are throwing away men and equipment for little more than optics. Big thanks to Mr Zellie, the White-Powder Prez.

I think the Ukropis have shown themselves to be quite avid for historical reenactments. They so enjoyed reliving the Battle of Kursk down in Kherson that they decided to let their goose-stepping buddies in Kharkov give a repeat performance. One minor comment however is that they haven't paid too much attention to historical accuracy. In the Battle of Kursk the Red Army received as much punishment as it dished out, maybe more so. In Kherson and Kharkov... not nearly so much

Lets repeat this at every Ukro dungheap starting with a "K". Once Russia gets to Krivoy Rog they are more than welcome to give us all a repeat performance

Arrow wrote:PZH 2000 On the offensive in the Kharkiv region.

Good. It will soon be on show in "war trophy" section of a Russian military museum, maybe a Patriot Park. Unless it gets blown apart into a debris field of unidentifiable shrapnel...

Ispan wrote:My analysis of the Kherson offensive , I spent a lot of time giving it some thought so I think might be interesting, critique welcome

https://guerraenucrania.wordpress.com/2022/09/07/analisis-sobre-la-ofensiva-ucraniana-en-kherson/

MAPS MISSING

Analysis on the Ukrainian offensive in Kherson
7 September, 2022 Zhukov

MAPS

Spanish



English



русский



Summary of the week:

https://kot-ivanov.livejournal.com/

Despite the losses, the Ukrainian Armed Forces continue the Kherson operation. The first stage of hindering the supply of the Russian troop group by disabling existing bridges and attacking ferry crossings is generally successful. The second stage is to create a threat of encirclement of our troops located upstream from Berislav. After that, it is planned to force our troops to retreat to Kherson at the same time as the enemy presses from Krivoy Rog. The success of these goals depends on the number of reserves accumulated by the Armed Forces of Ukraine and the level of supply of our troops on the right bank of the Dnieper (that is, the bridgehead west of the river). So far, the scoreboard is in our favor.
The Ukrainian Armed Forces are being driven out of their positions in the Donetsk, Bakhmut and Seversky directions.
The shelling of the nuclear power plant and adjacent settlements continues.



My personal analysis of the Battle of the Ingulets River:

Despite the rejection of the first attacks, the Ukrainian army has continued to commit more and more troops and reserves in trying to expand the bridgehead, the new waves overwhelm by the weight of the number the small Russian garrisons of the outposts in some villages that must be withdrawn or fenced, but the salient thus formed has become a trap, a "zone of annihilation" in which the Ukrainians did not stop getting reinforcements that become an easy target for the Russian artillery. Subsequent Russian counterattacks regain almost all the lost ground.

The Ukrainian stubbornness to fuel a battle that began with a defeat is surprising and can only be explained because the Kiev regime needs, if not a victory, at least a demonstration of activity to convince its Western sponsors to continue supporting their puppet with weapons and money.

The offensive towards Kherson or battle of the Ingulets River is perhaps the bloodiest of the entire war, surpassing the encirclement battles of the "Southern Cauldron" (or Izvarino pocket) and that of Ilovaisk in the summer of 2014. It is estimated that the Ukrainian losses already reach ten thousand casualties, including about three thousand dead and dozens of tanks and armored personnel carriers. That is, Ukraine has lost troops equivalent to an armored division. There is abundant graphic confirmation of corpses and armor destroyed on the battlefield, and most eloquently - the flood of wounded arriving at hospitals of rear cities from Odessa to Dnipetrovsk, in a pattern already observed many times during this war

It should be borne in mind that the evacuation of wounded to the rear is difficult because they have to pass over the same pontoon bridges necessary to feed the attack with reinforcements and accoutrements, and these bridges are soon destroyed by artillery and Russian aviation.

To the skeptical reader about the number of dead I refer to previous analyzes. To summarize once again: Most of the casualties are caused by artillery and in this battle also by aviation bombs, the power of Moderna-nament produces a very high ratio of dead to wounded, and for practical purposes, the Ukrainians in the bridgehead have got into a bag, so the evacuation of wounded is difficult, which inevitably leads to the death by bleeding of many wounded who could be saved if they received prompt attention.

American sources (the Washington Post) cite Ukrainian fighters who admit that the offensive is a disaster and that the ratio of their own losses to Russian losses is 5 to 1. That, in the worst case scenario, would give us about 2,000 casualties for the Russians, which is within the plausible given the scale of the fighting, that the garrisons of the Russian outposts, when enduring the onslaught, fight in numerical inferiority and their defense, although heroic, takes its toll, that the Ukrainians do not give quarter (the Russians do not take many prisoners either, although for other reasons) and the losses inflicted by the Ukrainian artillery. I think that as the battle has been more a target shooting exercise than anything else the Russian losses will be lower and the ratio of Russian losses will be between 1 to 5 and 1 to 10.

Faced with such a defeat, one wonders what the Ukrainian command and its American advisers or controllers intended. In short, given the length of the front and how widespread the Russian forces are along the river, it was possible to achieve a breakout and then a maneuver battle, in which the Ukrainian forces, thanks to the advantages of intelligence, communications and command provided by American satellites, would be able to defeat separately the Russian forces, more clumsy and slower reactions and thus achieve operational success.

If this has indeed been the case, it would be a symptom that Americans have also lost touch with reality, or rather, they prefer their preconceived ideas to facts. True, the southern front, even with the dangers and complications inherent in crossing a river, is the most appropriate place for an offensive. But if the American satellites and other means of reconnaissance are omniscient, which is doubtful, then they should necessarily know about the presence of important Russian reserves. For months now, columns of armored vehicles and war materiel have been passing over the Crimean bridge and even through the streets of Kherson, and this accumulation of forces has not participated in attacks against Nikolayev or reinforced the front.

It is estimated that on the Kherson front the Russians have about 30 battalion tactical groups, or about 30,000 men. An offensive with only 10 thousand men is doomed to failure even taking into account that the attacker can temporarily achieve a local superiority in the sector chosen for the attack.

The only explanation I can think of for this suicide offensive is that it was a pre-emptive strike to delay the future Russian offensive for which those troops are accumulating.

It is said that the Ukrainians have attacked in successive waves with 45,000 men, it seems to me a somewhat exaggerated figure, but it is within the plausible, given the number of casualties, about 10,000 or 20% of the force used, that would indicate that the first waves have been annihilated and the rest have not been committed thoroughly because they could not pass the river when the bridges were destroyed.

The source is this article which is very interesting and comes to the same conclusions. I think the troop numbers are somewhat exaggerated, for example, for the first attack it gives about 5,000 men and it does not seem that they were more than 3,000, but the composition of the attack waves seems to be well founded by the testimonies of prisoners or the heavy losses suffered by the 128th Transcarpathian Mountain Brigade, where official mourning was decreed.

Reasons for the failure of the offensive

https://cont.ws/@sonofcont/2370314

I improve the translation and quote the relevant fragments:

In general, the offensive in the Kherson direction of the Armed Forces of Ukraine is very difficult, and this despite the fact that the first shock waves included only special forces and trained elite groups that were preparing all this time in Poland, the Czech Republic and Great Britain.

- first wave: attack of special forces groups. The task is to break through the "trenches" to entrench themselves in the defensive positions of the Russians. Approximately 5,000 men participated.

- the second wave: followed immediately after the first, consisting of regular units, veterans of the spring campaign and have a good combat experience. The task is to gain a foothold in the occupied territories. Approximately 10,000 men participated.

- third and fourth wave: currently today 7 September) is underway and consists of additional special forces units deployed from other regions, as well as troops with at least four months of combat experience.

The task is to try to deepen the penetration, getting at least some achievement of conquering territory that the Zelensky government can present to its backers. Approximate number of participants: 10,000.

– the fifth wave, now brought from the rear: it consists of army troops and the teroborona (militias). The task is to crush the enemy by the weight of the number. Approximate amount: 20,000.

According to the source, the fighters of the first and second waves were divided into 4 sectors. Only at one point of crossing the river did they succeed in achieving a deep advance, but due to the failure in the other sectors they could not join the bridgeheads but they got into a bag.

….

"The media are full of reports about the offensive of the Ukrainian army. Ukrainians report some imaginary victories. Americans and Europeans are more reserved and say that it is necessary to see the results. Our media write about the failure of the offensive. What really happened? The only thing I have almost no doubts about is the huge losses of the enemy.

Launching an attack in the steppe, on open ground, without having air superiority, without suppressing enemy artillery, and we have overwhelming superiority in artillery in these areas, without destroying the command and control system of the troops - this is suicide. Deliberate destruction of your own army. For such actions, commanders are tried by a military court.

I read about some NATO strategic innovations that were used by the Ukrainian Armed Forces. I wonder which ones. Launch a diversionary attack, and then launch the main offensive on a completely different sector of the front? Well, read the history of the First World War. There are several such operations described there.

…

Only for the successful conduct of such operations it is necessary to be able to quickly maneuver the troops, move stealthily and deploy. Do the Armed Forces of Ukraine have such capabilities? No! Another problem is that the favorable ratio of forces of three to one. Does the Ukrainian army have the necessary advantage in personnel and firepower? Also. And I've already mentioned air supremacy.

Use of tanks and armored vehicles? How are they different from infantry? Both of them are "in the palm of the hand" of the Russian defense, they are simply beaten with other weapons. According to the Russian Defense Ministry, Ukrainian armored vehicles were almost completely eliminated in some areas of the offensive. I can imagine the hell that the Ukrainian crew members got into.

And one more thing that I still don't quite understand. Some of my interlocutors report "crazed attacks" by soldiers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. They get off the line and go on the attack like Chapayev's Kappelevs

Historical note: The author alludes to a famous Soviet film about Chapayev, hero of the Soviet civil war. In the quoted scene a regiment of white Russians makes a suicide bayonet charge in close formation.

The losses are simply huge, and after a while they return to the attack and get into this meat grinder..."

This is what I wrote about the day the Ukrainian "counteroffensive" began. At that time, I considered it inappropriate to publish the material. The commanders of the Armed Forces of Ukraine looked too stupid and unprofessional. And the "heroism" of the Ukrainian soldiers seemed unnatural. I don't think Ukrainians are bad fighters, just walking through a full and cleared field under fire from the enemy's a is not heroism, but cretinism.





Comments to the article

-Drug

The most interesting thing about the article for me is the tactical observations, but let's first comment on the main topic of the article is that this suicidal bravery of the Ukrainians is an effect of the use of combat drugs, variants of amphetamines, it is a topic already dealt with since the beginning of the war.

When the first testimonies of the use of combat drugs appeared in 2014, I accepted it with many reservations, such as the employment of "political commissars" and "barrier detachments". It is a recurring theme of war propaganda to extol one's own courage and to belittle the bravery of the enemy. Enemies cannot be brave, if they fight with fury it is that they are fanatics, or they are drunk, or drugged. There have always been cases of substance abuse.

In recent decades, knowledge has spread about the use of amphetamines in World War II, something that is obvious in the stories about the conflict, and that historians used to overlook even when it came to Hitler and his drug use, due to ignorance.

Drug use is a fact and it is quite widespread in this war. I'm not saying that every Ukrainian soldier is on drugs. Many do not need drugs and fight with fanatical desperation because they do not expect quarter, either because they will not receive it, in the case of the Nazis, or because they are indoctrinated that if they surrender they will be tortured and killed, quite logical belief considering the atrocities perpetrated against Russian prisoners.

- Failures of the Ukrainian tactics and plan:

What is striking is the small size of the first wave, between 3,000 and 5,000 men and in five points of passage. In my opinion based on the study of military history and similar operations both failed and successful, this was not going to work. Either he crosses with force at one point, or two, plus some feint, or he crosses with a large force at multiple points to saturate the defense and reinforce those that succeed.

I am aware that the crossing points of the river are limited and that there is another limitation that is the availability of means of crossing: bridges and boats. Anyway it seems the initial force too small, considering the possibilities of the defender and too scattered.

Secondly, the use of waves. This was a tactic developed by the British in the First World War (although surely other contenders also used it) to get to take the trench lines. Since the attacking infantry always suffered many casualties and was disorganized and weakened to continue the attack against the second and successive trench lines, and that the lack of radios made the commanders lose all control over the battle, the solution was a phased attack with successive waves. The first was followed by a second that crossed the conquered position and attacked the next objective, followed by other waves with other tasks such as the cleaning of enemies hidden in the shelters and trenches, which could surface and regain their position, or consolidate the position taken and prepare the trenches to resist the inevitable enemy counterattack.

In the experience of the Second World War, the waves were limited to two, in the case of the Blitzkrieg campaigns, a first infantry assault to break through the front and eliminate obstacles, the anti-tank guns and artillery that could stop the armored and the second wave of the Panzer passing through the gap for the exploitation of success. The Soviet experience of the war was codified in the Soviet manuals with the break in two steps.

I do not judge whether this is an appropriate tactic for the current conditions, which perhaps it is, given the resemblance of this war to the trench warfare of a century ago in many respects. But it is surprising the contradiction between the supposed American inspiration of the offensive, which sought a quick rupture and a maneuver battle, in which the Ukrainians supposedly would have an advantage since they would have better intelligence and communications thanks to the Americans which would allow them to outmaneuver the Russians, and that would force the Russians to retreat on the entire front before the threat of encirclement, and the real plan that paradoxically takes for granted the lack of control and command, assuming that the participating forces must follow a rigid plan and that seeks a methodical and limited advance, and with forces of decreasing quality that are only expected to consolidate the advance achieved by the breakout units and defeat the enemy by the weight of the number.

Not that it's a bad plan, probably appropriate to the forces and means available, but it's clear that even if everything goes well it would not be able to advance far enough to conquer Kherson, or achieve operational success.

I am not a professional military man, but the study as a simple amateur of military history shows that worse than attacking without any plan at all, or abandoning the plan and improvising, the worst thing is to go ahead with a plan that no longer corresponds to the situation. The first assault with the best troops failed, what's the point of continuing to insist? As the Russians say, a "simulation of intense activity." For the Spanish reader who is fond of history, it will not be the first time that he will find similarities with the Spanish Civil War, and this battle of the Ingulets River has obvious parallels with the battle of the Ebro: an offensive launched in desperation with the sole objective of prolonging the war. But it also looks a lot like the 1917 Nivelle offensive on the Chemin des Dames (Aisne River), both in the previous publicity that canceled the surprise, and in the obstinacy of continuing with an attack that should have been canceled on the first day.

The greatest defect of the plan is that the tactic of attack by successive waves does not contemplate the obstacle of a river. The bottleneck that the bridges pose slows the expansion of the bridgehead and that the waves follow one after another without giving the enemy time to react. It was highly doubtful that an already very deficient army, which has only suffered defeats for eight years and worn out by the last six months of war with Russia, would be capable of such a complex and difficult operation as the crossing of a river.

The biggest mistake is that by dividing the force into waves, the Russians have had plenty of time to react, bring reserves, and destroy "in detail", that is, separately and successively the Ukrainian forces, despite their numerical superiority.

The Russian command has allowed the Ukrainians to cross the river so that they get into a trap, leave them isolated by shelling the pontoon bridges and annihilate the troops thus isolated at the bridgehead. In favor of this hypothesis is the favorable end result of the battle.

Personally I think the truth is somewhere in between. There is criticism in the Russian media (Russians complain about everything, everything and everyone), that the fact that the Ukrainians were able to move forces for this offensive in broad daylight shows the weakness of tactical aerial reconnaissance due to the lack of drones, and aviation due to the lack of precision weapons with which to attack columns on roads, which cannot be attacked with salvos of unguided bombs. That even if the plane has satellite guidance and the trajectory of the bombs is calculated by the sight and the ballistic calculator, the accuracy is not enough to reach a target as narrow as a highway. I am not convinced by the argument because I think that the margin of error of a glider bomb with GPS guidance, such as the JDAM, is not enough to get it right either. It's ironic but the jets are less accurate than the SGM dive bombers. What is true is that something similar to the strafing and rocket passes of the Shturmovik and Typhoon is missed. That the Ukros had the nerve to move in broad daylight is not such, but simply that night belongs to helicopters. They cannot be exposed to machine guns and portable anti-aircraft missiles in daylight, but they do carry out interdiction missions at night.



It may be that there was confusion and indecision in the Russian command due to lack of reports, and not believing that the enemy was so stupid to repeat the attack, but once the fog of war dissipated, they decided to apply the maxim "never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake"

PostScript:

- About the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant: the attacks are a form of blackmail so that Russia continues to supply Ukraine with electricity or worse, force an international intervention to achieve a demilitarized zone around the plant and bring it back under Ukrainian control. The idea is nonsense, but it is a worrying symptom that Western intervention in the war is being planned under any pretext.



- About the other Ukrainian offensive in Kharkov. It was planned and I don't think it took the Russian command by surprise. Balakleya resists and that is why the enemy has had to avoid her and tries to surround the population that is not completely fenced although the road is beaten. It is a major attack, even if the figure given of 9,000 enemy soldiers seems exaggerated to me, three Ukrainian brigades participate but I doubt that they are full of troops. The fact that the Balakleya garrison, formed by special forces of the Rosgvardia, withstands indicates that the attack is serious but not worrying. By tomorrow, when the reserves and aviation intervene, the enemy attack will surely be stopped.

For more information about the fights of the day, see the summary of Cassad

https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/7847840.html

You lazy little fucks!
Trim your posts!

Arkanghelsk wrote:The bulk of Russian army is currently east

WTF?

Sheeesh... take yer meds. The bulk of Russian army is stationed in West Russia and Belarus to show the gutless NATO mudders not to fck with the Bear while she busy is showing them just what Russia can do with no more than 10% of her army in the field at any time.

NATO is shitting itself. They are watching an expeditiory force from a peacetime Russia take down the vast Ukro military even after NATO has spent 8 years building them up, and the Ukro have been busy digging themselves into the Donbass lanscape and preparing a vast defense-in-depth. Ukro losses are CATASTROPHIC and they must LIE to their enslaved peons to forestall mass civil unrest, while Russia has taken light losses in both men and material, and have their (much larger) population solidly behind the need to destroy the Bandera nazi menace once and for all.

You need to relax more. Kherson is a bust, and the Ukrops have paid for it with lakes of blood. Kharkov will be no different. Ignore Ukro squeals as they announce non-existent victories or temporary withdrawals of Russian defenders. Land can always be retaken once the Ukie attack is defetaed and rolled back, but dead troops stay dead, and I'd rather that Russia protect her heroes than force then to fight and ie on a line in the sand simply to please their masters in Kiev.