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Strategic Analysis
In military operations, we often speak about ‘seizing the initiative’. It is a term used in doctrinal publications, and heavily emphasised in leadership & operations. Today, an examination of whether there may be a pending shift in the initiative in #Ukraine. 1/25 🧵
2/ The essence of seizing the initiative is gaining a position of advantage relative to an enemy & denying the enemy their objectives. Military leaders seek to disrupt enemy decision making, make their plans irrelevant, generate surprise & get the enemy on the back foot.
3/ Since the beginning of the war, the Russians have largely held the tactical & operational initiative. Despite the extraordinary courage of Ukraine’s defenders, Russian Army forces have retained the ability to conduct offensive thrusts at a time and place of their choosing.
4/ Russia did so in the first phase of the war at Kyiv and Kharkiv & in the south. The Russians as the aggressors again held the initiative in the next phase of the war in the east, where they concentrated their offensive capabilities in the Donbas for an eastern campaign.
5/ Recently, however, there have been indications that this dynamic has changed.
6/ In the east, the Ukrainians have made the Russians bleed for every metre of ground gained. While the Russians may have seized Luhansk Oblast recently, they did so at a cost in humans and advanced weapons that hardly justified the small amount of territory gained.
7/ The exhaustion of Russian forces that resulted from this eastern campaign, and the introduction of the long-range strike capabilities of HIMARS & MLRS, has seen the initiative slowly bleed away from the Russian Army.
8/ Concurrently, the Ukrainians have been conducting a rolling series of small-scale counter attacks across the south. These have demonstrated how precarious the Russian position is in the south & how important the return of the south is to #Ukraine.
9/ For some time, the Ukrainians have beaten Russians in strategic influence & diplomacy. But the change in situation on the ground is different. The Ukrainians are almost at the point where they may be able to dictate where the fighting will occur, and what will be fought over.
10/ There is still work to be done by the Ukrainians, however. They have suffered grievous losses in many of their regular units, which are the ones most likely to conduct large scale offensive operations.
11/ More precision weapons will be required, as will more mechanised infantry fighting vehicles, tactical logistics designed for offensive ops & combined arms training at all levels. But Ukraine has demonstrated throughout the war they are quick studies & highly adaptive.
12/ If #Ukraine can address these shortfalls - and current battlefield trends continue - we may see a shift in the tactical and operational initiative to Ukraine. This will have a significant impact for both sides.
13/ For the Ukrainians, it means that they get to fight how and where they want and their soldiers can fight knowing that they have the Russians on the back foot. This has inestimable morale benefits and will have an impact on casualties.
14/ At the strategic level, President Zelensky will be able to demonstrate to the world that not only can Ukraine defend their nation, but they can also take their nation back (albeit with western support). This is a crucial message. president.gov.ua
15/ Demonstrating Ukrainian battlefield success will be the boost that Europeans citizens need so they appreciate that their small sacrifices in higher energy costs can and does have profound meaning for a nation that is defending its very existence.
16/ For the Russians, losing the initiative would be another disaster in a campaign that that has been catastrophic for the Ukrainian people & corrosive for Russian military institutions. The Russians have already been forced to rush reinforcements to the south.
17/ The Ukrainians are compelling the Russians into difficult decisions about the deployment of forces across the south and east of the country.
18/ Once the Russians transition to only responding to Ukrainians offensives, morale and tactical effectiveness can very quickly degrade. Added to the challenge is the attacks by partisans in the south against Russian soldiers, officials and transport infrastructure.
19/ While not predicting this as an outcome here, military forces under such pressure can collapse catastrophically in the absence of excellent leadership. Russian military leadership in this war has hardly been a model for others to emulate.
20/ The possibility of images of large numbers of retreating and captured Russian troops will be a strategic calamity for President Putin. His narratives about the greatness of Russia, and the effectiveness of its wonder weapons, will lay in ruins.
21/ We can be assured that the legion of social media commentators will be sharing such images as widely as they have the numerous #HIMARS strikes on Russian supply dumps of the past month. Is there a more well-known acronym in the world today than HIMARS?
22/ And despite the formation of new volunteer battalions for service in Ukraine, these are poorly trained & equipped reinforcements against a Ukrainian Army that is armed with western munitions and weapons, and starting to make the Russians dance to the tune of Ukrainian guns.
23/ For much of the Russo-Ukraine War, we have observed the Ukrainians defending their land and responding to the thrusts of the Russian Army into the north, east and south of their country. That situation may be about to change. kyivindependent.com
24/ And, if the Ukrainians are able to seize the tactical and operational initiative from the Russians, it will be very difficult for the Russians to change that dynamic. End.
25/ Thanks to @IAPonomarenko @thestudyofwar @UAweapons @MilitaryLandNet @TDF_UA @criticalthreats @defmon3 @Blue_Sauron, whose images I used in this thread.
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