The_MonkeyKing

Soldiers of 47th brigade check conditions of damaged and abandoned equipmnet in the start point of offensive. Now this is relatively safe rear. Russian TG is angry, why nobody cares to strike again at this immobilized vehicles in order to the enemy can't repair anything. 
According to Orix UKR already lost 32 M2A2 (15 of them destroyed completely) and 8 Leo2 (3 destroyed)

 

Bad but definitely not as bad as a month ago. Cannot tell right away that the operation failed or failed to a minefield 

Geolocation - about 1 km NE from Robotyne. Presumably video of 2-3 days ago, when there were Russian TG messages that UKR forces outflank Robotyne and seized several positions of 70th or 71st regiments. At the same time they reported about destroyed western armor. 

Today press-service of 47th mech.brigade claimed UKR troops captured some "command heights"

 

So I've played through and have beaten Charge of the Stryker Brigade. I took a lot of casualties and lost a lot of Strykers. Is there any way to switch the strikers with Bradleys?

Bad but definitely not as bad as a month ago. Cannot tell right away that the operation failed or failed to a minefield 

Here are some daily loss roundups from: https://twitter.com/lost_warinua
Generally, you can see Ukraine is leading in volume and in value. Russia is losing artillery, enables and armor of various, while Ukraine is mainly losing armor of various kinds. 

Interesting data points from Oryx loss data over time that are relevant to Ukraines offensive. Still, most chards don't show changes. operations: https://github.com/leedrake5/Russia-Ukraine
 
comparing abandoned equipment to the Russian winter offensive:

Russian artillery losses have accelerated while no change on the Ukrainian side

 
As a whole no major change:
o

This is such a nothing burger. Comments were taken out of context. From a video interview by Admiral Rob Bauer, chairman of the military committee of NATO. So the guy is not even "the guy" to ask about this.
 This guy loosely quoting states that F-16 is such a big and slow undertaking it will likely come in time for the current offensive. Absolutely nothing controversial here...
"The discussion on the fighters is an important one, but it will not be solved in the short term for this counter-offensive."
"Training those pilots, training the technicians, making sure there is a logistic organization that can actually sustain these aircraft will not be available before this counter-offensive."
"We shouldn’t mix the two discussions – I think it’s important and understandable that Ukraine asks for these fighter aircraft – but we should not mix it with the counter-offensive discussion now."

Interesting data points from Oryx loss data over time that are relevant to Ukraines offensive. Still, most chards don't show changes. operations: https://github.com/leedrake5/Russia-Ukraine
 
comparing abandoned equipment to the Russian winter offensive:

Russian artillery losses have accelerated while no change on the Ukrainian side

 
As a whole no major change:
o

Here are some daily loss roundups from: https://twitter.com/lost_warinua
Generally, you can see Ukraine is leading in volume and in value. Russia is losing artillery, enables and armor of various, while Ukraine is mainly losing armor of various kinds. 

Interesting data points from Oryx loss data over time that are relevant to Ukraines offensive. Still, most chards don't show changes. operations: https://github.com/leedrake5/Russia-Ukraine
 
comparing abandoned equipment to the Russian winter offensive:

Russian artillery losses have accelerated while no change on the Ukrainian side

 
As a whole no major change:
o

Here are some daily loss roundups from: https://twitter.com/lost_warinua
Generally, you can see Ukraine is leading in volume and in value. Russia is losing artillery, enables and armor of various, while Ukraine is mainly losing armor of various kinds. 

https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-military-deaths-facd75c2311ed7be660342698cf6a409
"According to their analysis, 25,000 more inheritance cases were opened in 2022 for males aged 15 to 49 than expected. By May 27, 2023, the number of excess cases had shot up to 47,000."
Nice "low bar" estimate of Russian casualties.

https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-military-deaths-facd75c2311ed7be660342698cf6a409
"According to their analysis, 25,000 more inheritance cases were opened in 2022 for males aged 15 to 49 than expected. By May 27, 2023, the number of excess cases had shot up to 47,000."
Nice "low bar" estimate of Russian casualties.

Here are some daily loss roundups from: https://twitter.com/lost_warinua
Generally, you can see Ukraine is leading in volume and in value. Russia is losing artillery, enables and armor of various, while Ukraine is mainly losing armor of various kinds. 

Interesting data points from Oryx loss data over time that are relevant to Ukraines offensive. Still, most chards don't show changes. operations: https://github.com/leedrake5/Russia-Ukraine
 
comparing abandoned equipment to the Russian winter offensive:

Russian artillery losses have accelerated while no change on the Ukrainian side

 
As a whole no major change:
o

As always, primary sort stuff from Tatarigami. Analysis of Russian document regarding their AFU tactics. Russians clearly doctrinally try to catch up with developments, curious how this war will influence their military theories taught at academies in long run.
Also folks, if you don't wanna sign a blood pact with Elon, remember of this useful and simple tool: https://nitter.net/
 

A little bit too optimized for counter insurgency, but a good example of what is coming down road now that Ukraine has proved beyond all doubt how valuable small drones are.

The line Nesterianka - Kopani - Robotyne and next village to south - Novoprokopivka lay on highest points of the ridge. Robotyne - 145 m, Novoprokopivka - 158 m. Starting line of attack for UKR troops was on the mark about 95-105 m. Zaporizhzhia oblast in this place is not flat steppe - but further to south - Tokmak and Melitopol - yes. Seizing this ridge will get advantage  

comments from yesterday: 
The Offensive clearly progressing slower than expected. This is stated also by the Ukrainian president. the initial assaults failed to achieve their objectives. For example, creating conditions to commit reserves to breach the main lines and exploit now we are in an attritional phase and we are likely to see alternating phases of attrition and attempts to advance, enabled by the attrition. both sides use artillery decisively and then exploit artillery ammunition as "the sand it the hourglass". it is significant how much artillery ammo Ukrainian use to achieve any given goal artillery production rates are going to become more and more important seems like this is going to towards equality between the sides in the long run

So how are we defining “gains”?  If it is by ground re-taken, yes, very limited.  If they are measured by strain and erosion of the RA I suspect they are doing a lot better.  The question is “will the erosion be enough to force collapse?”  And right now we do not know.  In fact we do not even know if offensive warfare still works as we knew it.  We could be at stalemate or this could just be a how offensive warfare works now.  
If it is stalemate, well ok then the conflict will likely freeze and have to end by other means.  Everyone will point fingers as to why the thing has gone stalemate but the most likely reason will be that we have entered into an era of Defensive Primacy - not the first time this has happened.

This afternoon, there was another short briefing at the Pentagon where Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Dr. Colin Kahl answered a few questions:

https://www.defense.gov/News/Transcripts/Transcript/Article/3452000/under-secretary-of-defense-for-policy-dr-colin-kahl-holds-press-briefing/

Here are some quotes:
On Ukraine's counter-offensive:

On the delivery of cluster munitions:
 

If you hate twitter:
 

not surprising 

To add, later in the Q&A section:
Kofman states provision of cluster munitions is the single most decisive thing the US can do in the short term and will have a significant effect on the battlefield. 
It is not necessary to take the efficiency of the DPICM into account for their significance. The significance comes from the million(s) of new shells being available for the Ukrainians. This takes them off from the "shell hourglass" and enables Ukraine to approach these offensives with more freedom.
Of course, he included a snarky comment on how Europe was the main obstacle to this provision and also the main reason for the need to make this provision, given the Europeans made the needed artillery production decisions only 13 months into this war.