Russian invasion of Ukraine

From "The Analyst":

RUSSIANS TANK THEIR TANKS IN MAJOR ATTACK

Russian forces have been trying to breach the new Ukrainian defence line northwest of Avdivka, and cross the Dernov river which forms part of it.
While it is some distance away, the next real target is Pokrovsk. This serves as a major repair and maintenance site and general support town for front line forces and is of huge importance to the Ukrainians. There is very little in the way of settlements between the front and the town. However defence lines have or are being built in depth.
The Dernow river is too wide to cross easily without significant control over both banks. Without local maintenance because of the war, much has reverted back to swampland in many places.
The defence line runs like a reversed L shape and the Russians have made contact along the vertical axis, where their main objective is to capture the crossing points. However the Ukrainian forces have unobstructed access to the bottom of the reversed L and a crossing that allows them to outflank Russian attacks.
Geolocation shows that this is what happened. Ukrainian forces counterattacked the Russian effort towards the village of Umansk which the Russians control.
Bothered by the Ukrainian attack undermining their efforts to seize the vital crossing points, the Russians launched a counter attack against the Ukrainian offensive.
The Russians used some seriously large units - as many as three battalions of mechanised troops with tanks - some of the largest combined forces used other than during the attack on Avdivka.
The first wave began early morning, with heavy use of smoke shells fired from supporting artillery. The Russians were up against the well equipped and NATO trained 25th Airborne - and the first wave fell to their superior capability quickly. Ukrainian T-80’s and supporting artillery devastated the Russian advance.
The second and third waves came in groups of four and were eliminated by supporting ATGM’s and drones with tank fire.
Despite it all, as Russian tactics continue to be that they sacrifice ridiculous amounts of equipment just to get 10% of it to the target, this happened again, with troops establishing themselves inside a tree line. The Ukrainian counter attack was rapid and fierce - there was no way they were allowing the Russians to establish themselves in these positions. The strike was devastating and the Russians were killed and their entire armoured force wiped out.
Russian APC reinforcements declined to advance far enough to reach the line they’d taken because of the opposition and the infantry were being dropped off and expected to fight their way forward to support the line. This simply failed. Ukrainian forces pushed the Russians all the way back to their start line.
The Russians had used no less than 36 tanks and 12 IFV’s during the first part of this attack. 12 of the tanks were verified losses as were 8 of the IFV’s.
Russian forces complained online that they lacked air and artillery support. This often happens when the Russian command suspects there are air defences behind the Ukrainian lines and HIMARS or other artillery is able to operate counter-battery fire. Like it or not the Russians may have plenty of ammunition, but their SPG’s are hugely diminished in number and even towed artillery isn’t available in the quantity it used to be.
Having had their nose blooded, the Russians risked an air strike on the crossing point used by the Ukrainians, over the dam, and made it unusable. However the more westerly crossing points between the lakes and further south can’t be taken out by a couple of bombs.
The next attack came with Russian tanks, this time some carrying the new EW system on their turrets designed to stop drones by cutting them off from their controllers. The Ukrainians have been expecting this development for some time. They were ready with a new kind of drone that uses an ‘intelligent’ warhead with infrared sensing in its terminal phase and doesn’t require the connection
to the operator.Overall the Russians made a slight advance but its position is tenuous.

The Ukrainian forces have certainly shown that they have learnt defence in depth and while they may not have the artillery that would make their lives so much easier, they have developed tactics and techniques that enable them to crush these Russian armoured assaults.
Conversely the Russians may themselves now have to rethink the way they conduct them. They lack coordination, discipline and integrity- largely because of the way the treat their men and don’t train them especially well - they don’t live long enough to justify it using the Russian strategy of ‘throw enough mud and eventually some of it sticks’.

Overall a great day for the brave Ukrainian defenders!

Slava Ukraini !
 
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