LongLeftFlank

Martin anticipates an eventual third Ukrainian counteroffensive, one that launches from Zaporizhia—midway between Kherson and Donbas—toward Mariupol, an historic port city that the Russians destroyed and occupied this spring. The idea, Martin explained, is Ukraine “using its strategic reserve to sever the Russian armed forces in Ukraine into two pieces that cannot mutually reinforce.” I dunno mate, at this point it seems like the UA is simply dismantling the RA opportunistically wherever it encounters them, kind of like the Red Army during the Lvov-Sandomierz operations that culminated in the Brody pocket (Steve @Battlefront.com, that being one pocket the Germans did *not* break out of in any good order). Whether the Ivans attack, hedgehog, dig in or fall back simply doesn't seem to make a difference. Collapse?

T.E. Lawrence, Orde Wingate, Popski, and all the other oddballs are giving UA a cheer from Valhalla! And Guderian nods (although Schneller Heinz still has some time to serve in Hell).

Sorry to be so bloodthirsty, but the VDV units north of the Dnepr need to be aggressively cut off and destroyed -- as in KIA or prisoners -- not allowed to escape, even weaponless, across the river. Is mining the Dnipr -- letting a steady stream of magnetic mines drift down -- fair play? The paras will likely sell their lives dearly, like cornered animals, but it is best that they do not furnish veteran cadre for new formations, whether for purposes of a future war, or for internal repression on behalf of the next set of thugs who take control in Moscow.

Russian blogger 'Sladkov', quoted at length on Pat Lang's blog. https://turcopolier.com/combined-arms-tactics-ttg/ Ukrainians do not take Liman and other villages head-on. There are forests and swamps around [them]. They operate in maneuverable groups, up to a platoon, three jeeps, one “Kozak” (something in between our “Typhoon” and “Tiger”). That’s it. And there are many such groups going forward. There is no big collective goal, they do not accumulate in one place. Their comms are reliable (stable closed communication between groups and headquarters, use of large and small UAVs). They inspire fear with their appearance (who knows, maybe it’s a regiment of the Armed Forces of Ukraine coming towards you). These groups envelop the villages, block them. The same way the militants in August 1996 took Grozny. Everything from the fact that we [Russians] lock ourselves in our bases, do not pierce the entire space around with tentacles, do not have the active defense initiative, give it to the enemy.... If there is a city in front of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and operational space around, they will go the same way, in front of the “Cossack patrol” then large groups, but also enveloping the city. And then, figuratively speaking, the bend of the arm behind the back, followed by strangulation. **** From the comments “In the war with Ruin, the bureaucracy wins." Serdyukov laid a mine under the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation”. It includes a quoted passage from a DPR commander complaining that he is drowning in paperwork (machine translation): “I don’t see or hear any personnel. Organized the shooting — couldn’t attend. I prepare bottled “forms”, personnel security clearances, a patient record book, an evening verification log, training plans, platoon logs. I don’t have any company equipment — there are reports on fuel and lubricants, receiving and writing off ammunition… There is a war going on, and I don’t see people: meetings, papers, reports, offices.” The author ends with this staggering claim: During the Great Patriotic War, a combat order took up half a page and was often issued after the fact, to avoid wasting time and losing operational understanding of the situation. Now the order is 10-20 A4 sheets for the simplest task and is issued before its oral delivery. And, God forbid, it will not comply with the governing documents invented by Serdyukov. And there is always someone to report “inconsistencies” in the actions of real commanders https/katyusha.org/vojna/v-vojne-s-ruinoj-pobezhdaet-byurokratiya.-minu-pod-mo-rf-zalozhil-serdyukov.html (in Russian) ...I dunno, sounds to me like Serdyukov actually had some fairly sound ideas, even though he and his Amazon girlfriend took a nice slice for themselves. Paying off the greater thief at least protects you from the lesser thieves ... a pattern of corruption as old as human civilisation.

Cooper can be a bit hit or miss (or his own sources are) when it comes to situation reports, but I agree this is pretty good synthesis, many thanks. Whether motorised or airborne, the Russian infantry is ‘vehicle tied’. Its troops rarely venture more than 100 metres away from their vehicles. Because these vehicles are easy to detect and track — whether by radars, by infra-red or low-light TV systems — the Russian infantry is quite easy to find, too. On the contrary, Ukrainian infantry is frequently operating ‘miles away’ from its supporting vehicles. I.e. ZSU infantry is much harder to find.

Kreminna Remember 1200 pages back when we were all counting Russian BTGs?

I guess if I were an LPR soldier, I'd be looking for some chemical escape too.

Gonna be a mainly infantry operation. Hydrological reserve of local importance in Ukraine. Area: 3900 hectares.... a unique underground water deposit in the Pishchany Yeryk stream (Krasna River valley). It is of karst origin, in the Upper Cretaceous zone, in which there is a system of karst cavities. Many water sources come to the surface as lakes, among which the largest is Lyman (1.5 km in diameter). It is the source of water supply for the city of Kreminna. Water supply: 9,300 m³ per day. Here are also the forest massif (mainly pine) and large meadow-swamp areas.

Formation locations, as of 1 Oct (MilitaryLand.net) RUMINT Amazon special delivery....

I challenge you to back up this assertion with credible documentary sources beyond your 'chat' group. If not, you are entirely sh*tposting at this point.

Source? I got a dressing down from @The_Capt a while back when I dared suggest UA ought to use AP mines, since the RU clearly wasn't observing the treaty (to be fair, they never signed). BTW, I listened to the first 8 minutes of the McGregor podcast with Napolitano, which was about all I could take. The Colonel is... sane acting and appearing. He also seems tired. Evidently 80% of the Russian army is still in Russia, thanks to the forbearance of dear, kind Mr. Putin. No, he didn't want to cause excessive local hardship by having too many Russian soldiers come in in February. Against the advice of his own general staff. But after Ukronazis murderously shelled thousands of freedom loving future Russian referendum voters queued in front of polling stations, Good Saint Vlad reluctantly changed his mind. The gloves are off now. Oh, and all those middle aged drunken mobiks are merely relieving the 'Laaarge Number of Combat Ready Professional Soldiers In The Greater Niagara Falls Area' that will now be free to redeploy to Ukraine. ...Yeah, that's 8 minutes I will never have back again. But I reckoned I'd give him a listen, once, in case there was something to learn. So you don't have to (You're welcome). Nope.

1. Good question. 2. What air defense doing? Just wait and see, b*txhez.... (My bet is behind the Dnipro front, waiting for RU jets from Millerovo)

For the future scenario design files.

I was just thinking about that. Great Helmsman Xi could probably use a hundred billion in USD denominated overseas assets right now, although only a fraction of that would likely be practically recoverable.

Exactly. Bottom line: it ain't their motherland, no matter how much the keyboard warriors say it is. So why the hell should they dig? If it turns out the 'hohols' have you zeroed (again), you run the hell away.

Yup. Our revels now are ended. 1. Decapitation, or near as dammit.... Thread shows how all the targets were selected. This is an *urban area*, and well behind enemy lines. Just amazing C4ISR! I am the eye in the sky, looking at you.... 2. French media is chuckling about General 'Lapin', Russia's fearsome 'Killer Rabbit.' ...There's a double entendre around lapin: cuckold / complaisant / clueless / feckless, etc., but I'll leave that to an actual Frenchman to explain. 3. Looks like some TikTok fedayeen finally ran across some traffic lights that shot back... Run through the jungle.... 4. Good old American snark

Hoom haroom! Also, the Entwives didn't go far....

Looks like others have noticed the half-assed nature of Russian defences in this war. I think back to 'Suvorov' (Razun) rhapsodizing about how each Soviet soldier's most important weapon was a little green spade, or the +1 modifier the Squad Leader Russians got to entrenchment attempts. Nope, sometime in the 1960s the Russian soldier became wedded to his BTR or BMP and decided that was all the entrenchment he needed. To hell with digging or wiring in, or perimeter patrolling, or infiltration. Cuts into the sergeant's drinking time. Leave the mining to the pioneers. Even the mujahideen noticed in Afghanistan how the Russians just wouldn't come away from their vehicles. ....And seriously, if there's anything all those mobiks ought to be good for, it's digging holes. Except for all those over-40 guys with bad backs and shot knees.

Borova looks like it's being vacated soon, before it becomes another pocket. More from that thread.... Move over, snow-eating-fog, and meet flesh-eating-tungsten!

Great, cheers, you can clearly see all those stream cuts. And they are deeply eroded (no wonder 'Board 5' in ASL Cross of Iron prominently featured 'gullies') .... It seems clear that Zherebets river is already a dead letter as a defensive line, even with RU forces supposedly still clinging to the Oskil at Borova. It looks like we can 'bank' the Lyman pocket as a win, ignoring RU hopium about 'relief thrusts' and look ahead to the next push. Strong probes into Kreminna from the forests are great, keeps them tied down, but it's hard to approach from the W/NW (very boggy ground). So a left hook into north Luhansk oblast centered around Krasnorichenske (?) looks like it's the logical next phase. Already being set up?

Great work, thanks for sharing! HeliosRunner is also back on task, and I am studying the NE quadrant of his latest topo together with your map here to try to visualise a credible Russian defensive line along the Krasna river (Svatove-Kreminna). But all I can see are yet more isolated village hedgehogs, dominated by higher ground on the west bank, and readily bypassed / infiltrated via the ubiquitous ravines and gullies. Others speak up, please, but the only way you make this kind of defence work, even temporarily, is with firebases (efficient medium artillery) backstopped by air strikes. And even then, you lose eventually if you don't have your own infantry platoons out there aggressively contesting the infiltration. Otherwise, it just gets chopped systematically into pieces and the next fallback river line is at Misky. Same bloody thing. FWIW, I dislike maps visually dominated by big red and blue front lines and giant Arrows of Doom. It all implies some kind of contiguous trench line or front which has nothing at all to do with the tactical realities of this war since Day 1 except maybe on the 2014 Donetsk line. @Grigb does a much better job IMHO of showing the realities of the situation, with controlled/contested towns and roads uppermost. Even worse are the Giant Red Zone vs Giant Blue Zone maps, as if total acreage under 'control' is some kind of relevant scorecard of 'who's winning' (looking at you, ISW and sometimes DefMon3).

1. So a dear but wiseass American friend, taking the piss (as ya do), once described Canada to me as "America's hat". So what is America to Canada? I asked. Unwisely. "Canada's pants." Ouch. 2. Another Yanqui friend shut some Brits up good and proper when they pompously razzed him about 'improper' American spelling. He pointed out that the original Latin words 'labor' and 'color' did not in fact contain 'u' and that all they were really doing was advertising that a thousand years ago they lost a war.... to the French. Touché. (yes, fine, Normans, but it was rather clever)

Dry on Likes again, but many thanks for this, again. They are really only left with a defensive capability set.... So as we are presently seeing in the Kherson bridgehead, their defensive capability appears to rest mainly on heavy artillery on call, just as it did when they were still on the offence in the summer. And if the UA (or air force, hint hint) can find a way to disrupt that 'on call' part, the scheme largely collapses into isolated and doomed redoubts. While they've indeed made broad use of mines, the famed (historical) Russian ability to dig in deeply and strongly without any special instruction to do so, and to stubbornly defend to the last man has been AWOL in this war* (Lyman/Yampil may be a recent exception). They seem to act like a few hull down AFVs at the edge of a village equal a fortified position. They should have been pouring cement like madmen all along the 'land bridge,' especially where the Dniepr doesn't present a barrier. But I'd think satellite imagery and OSINT mavens would pick it up were it happening. I periodically search 'Volnovakha' and 'Polohy' and there's bupkis. * Except on the Ukrainian side! P.S. If you stroll around Wikimapia in these steppelands, you frequently run across Курганы Могилы Рясные.... Scythian kurgan burial mounds, with the farm fields skirting arouund them. Ancient history, visible from space.

Plus ça change....