MILITARY & STRATEGIC:
POKROVSK OFFENSIVE IS RUSSIAS BIGGEST EFFORT YET - A STEP TOO FAR?
The Russian offensive against Pokrovsk is the largest operation they have conducted so far. The scale of attacks and the repetition of those attacks is unlike anything yet seen. Clearly the Russians are in make or break mode.
Attacks by 200 or so troops with armoured vehicles numbering as many as 12-20, backed up by heavy artillery are common. On top of that there are massed FPV drone attacks and the Russians have started using tear gas and chlorine gas canisters dropped from drones - attacks have risen from just a handful a month to as many as 4,000 in August. Chlorine makes it impossible to breathe and Russia is a signatory to the ban on chemical warfare: just another example of their willingness to ignore their own rules and ensure nothing they say can ever be believed.
The Russians have a reserve force of some 50-70,000 men they are collecting from anywhere and everywhere to push the Pokrovsk front forward.
However the scale of losses they are suffering are vast, with Ukraine wiping out attack after attack in men and machines. It’s estimated the Ukrainians are outnumbered roughly four to one if not five to one in some sectors.
The Russians have become so determined to force this front now because time is running out. It’s using up everything they can spare and the rains are not far off which will make the frontlines impossible in thick mud, then winter will come. Nobody knows how severe that might be this year after two relatively mild ones.
Ukraine has it seems finally stopped the advances but not until after issues have come to light that I didn’t discuss before.
I was reluctant to mention them because it just added more negativity to an already critical discussion of Kursk. I still see that operation as a long term problem.
In the past weeks the Ukrainian 11th Brigade was forced to withdraw after a heroic fight against Russian forces that had lasted weeks in southern Pokrovsk sector. The commander was fired for doing so even though he had no choice.
His men were infuriated because they blamed the Pokrovsk command overall, which consists of three groups, north, south and centre, all of which have demonstrated rather poor coordination and communication with each other during the whole defence operation. This was backed up by yet more testimony from other sectors, implying lack of coordination, lack of judgement, unwillingness to believe field commanders, inflexibility of thinking and so on. The accusations of ‘soviet era thinking’ were rife and clearly evident if you look deeply enough. This old school command approach sits completely contrary to the training and initiative based operations Ukraine’s young officers and newly trained troops use, to maintain their edge against the barbarity of Russian meat attacks and relentless repetition.
Some blamed Syrski for getting so caught up in the Kursk excitement he let lesser officers do their own thing at Pokrovsk.
Either way if anything changed the Ukrainian side kept it in house. But it was notable that just after this the Russians started facing a reduction in the speed of their advances and Ukrainian coordination markedly improved, so something happened, as well as units being brought in from other parts of the front.
Pokrovsk is still and will remain immensely challenging but overall it’s looking like it’s becoming less likely the Russians will reach it and take it this year as their resources are expended. They cannot keep this pace up indefinitely and they know it. It’s starting to look increasingly desperate.
Meanwhile at Kursk, Russian units have continued to resist in Kornevo, Ukraine appears to be trying outmanoeuvre them. They need to cut the road north of the town to cut the Russians off. Elsewhere there are indications the Russians are starting to create points of resistance and slowly a front is being established by both sides.
Ukraine must then determine if its mobile assault groups are what’s needed for the eventual defence of what they’ve taken.
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Ukrainian channels continue to insist that Kursk hasn’t made any difference to the situation in Pokrovsk and it has pulled in Russian troops that could have been used there instead. It’s an argument. Saying that Ukraine’s assault troops would have made no difference at Pokrovsk is also an argument but one easily dismissed. They could have been used in a counter attack if commanders in Pokrovsk had not been lacking in imagination.
But if’s and buts and maybes don’t make any difference now, it’s entirely academic and one for the history books.
The situation is what it is and dealing with realities is now all that matters.
As we close on 1,000 days of war Russia has won what? Not one major city. It has wrecked its economy, expanded NATO, slaughtered its men and caused an already perilous demographic crisis to become a long term national disaster with multi-decade consequences.
It has unified Ukraine in a way nothing else could and failed to prove any of its equipment is worth buying. They are where they are only because of the trillions of dollars worth of soviet era arms spending. Without it they would never have sustained this war. And it’s nearly all gone. Equipment analysts say there’s under 24 months of repairable and refurbished equipment left and that’s being generous.
Pokrovsk may prove to be the over reach that breaks Russian forces irretrievably.
‘The Analyst’ MilStratOnX
Slava Ukraine !
