Situation at front reaches stalemate, hopes for Russian exhaustion turns to be mistake – Ukraine’s Commander-in-Chief

by HarakenQQ

10 comments

  1. The war is a stalemate it would appear. However, we knew winter was coming. Let Russia relax. Russian corruption, infighting, and economic pressures will only increase.

  2. The fact that this interview with the top Ukraine military commander has no comments and is downvoted tells everything about this subreddit. Oh, who knows, maybe the Commander-in-Chief has been bought by the Russians, right? RIGHT?

  3. I wonder what kind of new development could possibly tip the scales.

  4. Dig in, fortifying positions and wait for Russia to eat itself.

  5. Anybody who watched the developments of this Spring with a half-open eye knew this was a strong possibility. The mild winter kept Russia from being able to advance meaningfully or freeze Europe into dropping their support of Ukraine, but it also meant that mud season effectively lasted more than six months which then kept both sides immobilised well into summer. Russia used that time to plant minefields which are, simply put, the largest and densest in history. I’ve seen density figures of up to four anti-personnel mines *per square meter* in some parts of the southern front. The other defensive works are problematic, yes, but what makes this system of fortification work so damned well are those eye-watering minefields. Combine this with the fact that Ukraine has lacked the weapons to suppress the artillery and aviation forces which are the hammer to the minefields’ anvil, and you have a recipe for stalemate.

    None of this was a secret, and switched-on commentators were already worried about this exact sequence of events as far back as late last winter- particularly after Vuhledar showed what a modern defensive minefield could do to an armoured attack- and getting shat on for it all over pro-Ukraine spaces. NATO field manuels make it clear that advancing through a stop-and-splatter minefield of even standard density is one of the hardest offensive problems there is, probably on the same level as an amphibious landing against entrenched defenses- and the Russian minefields in southern Ukraine are many times denser than the known RUF or NATO standard for that type of emplacement.

    Nobody is happy about this, but what worries me is that so many people in the West with minimal knowledge and maximal emotional investment were expecting the Summer Offensive to be a repeat of Desert Storm, and as that hasn’t happened they’re becoming disengaged. It honestly reminds me of the first wave of foreign volunteers, half or more of whom deserted after they realised that, as Joe McDonald put it, “nobody gets the Call Of Duty experience.”

  6. The hopes for Russian *manpower* exhaustion were alwais optimistic – it’s hard to attrit 140M country with a conscript army (and, so, about 40M mobilization resourse) by causing them 0.2M losses per year. Yes, you can destroy the best of, leaving the opponent with chmobiks, yet even chmobiks are able to fight being dug in and supported by artillery.

    What is *possible and necessary* – is to attrit it’s Soviet legacy combat vehicles stocks, wich are huge too, yet actually exhaustible: about half of it is already destroyed, and the remaining half is in much worse state and quality, while the Russian industry has no ability to manufacture these things in such numbers, like the Soviet one has until mid 1980s (when it’s metal cutting machines park became dangerously worn out and Gorbachov launched his Perestroyka project to find a way out).

    After the severe combat vehicles attrition (combined with significant degradation of the artillery and ATGM/ATGL stocks), wich can be expected in 2024, it will be possible to expect that Armed Forces of Ukraine will have manoeuvrability advantage, wich is the key to break the stalemate.

    As for now, AFU already has the effective fire power advantage (thanks to better recon drones and more experienced spotting operators, better modern radios, excellent homemade C2 software and several hundreds of modern Western artillery pieces), yet to make an operational breakthrough you have also to gain an advantage in mobility, wich is possible in two ways: a. to pin the opponent’s reserves down by your massive long range missile and aerial strikes – wich is NATO warfare standard, yet Ukraine was denied to be provided with correspondent means in anywere like sufficient numbers; and b. to massively build up your combat vehicles park and/or to degrade the opponent’s combat vehicles park, before starting your advance, to the level when you are able to promptly move much more reserves in a breakthrough area comparing to your opponent – and so the tactical breakthrough became an operational one despite the low level of operational area isolation.

    Judging by the article we are discussing, general Zaluzhnyi is no more laying his account with NATO supplies of combat vehicles (he doesn’t even mention it as possible in his list, wich means he got some resolute signals there would be no massive supplies of combat vehicles in any near future), and indeed shifted his calculations completely on an ability of his forces to attrit the Russian combat vehicles stocks and then make breakthrougs.

  7. Then we need to attack Russia on another front and push even more sanctions and restrictions? They might have the weapons, but their economy is tiny compared to the west.

    The USSR collapsed, Russia will do so too. If not on the battlefield, then as a country.

  9. There is a path to Ukrainian victory. Despite the minefields.

    Expand the current Kherson region bridge heads further south.
    Just enough for artillery to cut the “land bridge” along the Black Sea corridor, that keeps the southern forces and Crimea supplied.

    Use ATACMS to take pot shots at supply trains using the Kerch railroad bridge. Cut off Crimea from supplies from its south.

    The Russians will then have to resupply by air, which is expensive and limited.
    Plus, the eventual F16s will have a field day against slow cargo planes.

    Cut off the fresh water supply to Crimea from Dnipro river area.
    (Rome finally fell, not from n’th invasion, but from its fresh water viaducts knocked down)

    Logistics, logistics, logistics wins wars.

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