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Weekend Update, Battle of the Bridges, week 2 or week 8 (doesnt really matter). Ukrainian strategy now seems confirmed, the Russians have behaved as expected, and its a question now of logistics and attrition.
Though there was a great deal of discussion this week about Ukraine starting an operation, its better to say that an ongoing Ukrainian operation entered into a new stage. On August 29, the Ukrainians started pressing on the Kherson front.
Looking at the FIRMS map for the last week, there is a great deal of fire activity being registered in the Kherson area, interestingly more if it behind the Russian front line than the Ukrainian.
If this is an indication of intensity of fire (and we need to be careful) than the Ukrainians have at least matched Russian ranged fire for once (and Ukrainian fire seems more accurate and well coordinated).
At the same time, there was a ridiculous panic when the Russian front line didnt collapse right away and the Ukrainians march into Kherson--which is sadly typical of the way the war is often commented on.
Think we can say now that the Ukrainians have a clear plan, and have had one for months. It could be understood as build up, tempt in, destroy. I also tried to describe it at the start of August as accelerated attrition and others have their own phrases.
The build-up was the Ukrainian acquisition of better, NATO standard mostly, ranged fire. This seems to have reached a state where the Ukrainians are capable of running complex operations better than the Russians. THere is of course the famous HIMARS.
But they are only one part of the system. Lately the Ukrainians seem to be achieving some successes from the airs using UAVs. This is partly possible because they now can neutralize Russian anti-air and EW resources in the regions using HARM missiles.
In other words, Ukraine in the Kherson region has a qualitative edge in systems. Now the tempt. As they built up this qualitative advantage, the Ukrainians wanted to tempt the Russians to rush forces to the region so that they could take advantage of their coming superiority.
At the end of July I tried to understand why the Ukrainians were so open in their discussion of a coming Kherson counterattack. It seemed counterintuitive in a way, why tell your enemy what you are going to do.
The Ukrainians, however, had understood that Putin would be desperate to keep Kherson city and the west bank of the Dnipro, and wanted the Russians to rush force there, precisely so they could destroy it on their terms from a better location than say the Donbas.
And the Russians did as expected, as this early August @TheStudyofWar report discussed.
So having built up their own systems, and tempted the Russians to rush more forces to a vulnerable area, the Ukrainians are trying to destroy that vulnerable force. That destruction involves two elements. The first is to cut the Russians off from supplies (battle of the bridges)
For the past week the Ukrainians have even been boasting that they have all the bridges over the Dnpiro targeted. some now even seem completely broken.
If the RUssians forces on the west bank indeed have no working bridge access for resupply, they will have to rely on ferrying supplies across the river or even flying them in. That might work for a few days or weeks, but no more. Its a logistic system that is going to fail.
So we are now in the accelerated destruction phase. The Ukrainians have tempted in this large force, are trying to make it very difficult for the RUssians to resupply, and will use Ukr superiority to waste it away.
Ukraine loss claims just released this morning show once again that they believe they are inflicting debilitating losses on the Russians. 450 soldiers, 15 tanks, 27, APCs. ...
These are not sustainable. Unless the Russians can maintain efficient logistics across the Dnipro, their forces on the west bank will be whittled down and then collapse.
Until that happens, what the Ukrainians seem to be doing is probing up and down the line, looking for weak spots but not gambling on risking their forces too much. This is the single best summary Ive seen, by @IAPonomarenko
So we are probably in for a few more weeks of Ukrainian accelerated attrition, probing and modest gains. Its a winning strategy if they can keep the Russians from recovering in the Battle of the Bridges
This account is doing an excellent job tracking the uptick in Ukrainian claims of Russian losses. Quite significant in the last week.
Ukraine really hitting the Antonovski bridge a great deal these days.
There have been stories of Ukrainian advances today, Iām always a little wary of reporting them, but this looks legit.
Some interesting picture emerging from Kherson too
Turning east, look now like pretty strong indications that the Ukrainians have actually recrossed the Siverskyi-Donets and taken a village from the Russians. This used to be heavily contested. Maybe Russians have stripped it of troops to go to Kherson
Ukrainians starting to make official announcements on retaking in Kherson.
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