Ukrainian Defensive War against the Russian Invasion - Mark IV: The Partitioning of Discussion

[Fanatical Pragmatist]

Its also odd that Shoigu is getting shit canned right as they launch "Kharkiv 2, this time for sure".

Okay supposedly Shoigu got promoted.
He wasn't "you're fired", he got moved to secretary of the security council.
Belousov is the new minister of defence.

Problem is my source who tells me its a 'promotion' is a pseudo-vatnik, and I'm not a kremlin-whisperer so I don't actually know if Shoigu's new post is an actual promotion or some sort of demotion-in-effect.

The approach they are taking to get into Kharkiv is also...odd. Strilecha and Vovchansk are the ass end of nowhere, with no major roads and a fuck huge wilderness between them and anything meaningful. Probably why they've actually managed to push into Ukraine in this direction. I imagine there was not much in their way beyond some very bored territorial guards. Which is bound to change in the coming days. Vovchansk in particular will probably turn into another Mobik Meatgrinder, as its another town with a bisecting river surrounded by fucking marshlands that armored units cannot maneuver in. Meaning approach will have to be some more mass artillery and meat waves.

Maybe the thought process is it will draw off defenders from Chasiv Yar, which seems to be what Russia actually wants atm.

Yeah I've noticed this too. Not only is it Vovchansk at a weird angle and further from Kharkiv than the Russian border, its also on the other side of a major geographic boundary (a river and marshland, also from satellite it seems like some riparian sand dunes which don't bode well for armor either) from Kharkiv.

I'm wondering if the goal is to pull troops from somewhere else by attacking a more isolated settlement that is harder to reinforce than trying to gun for actually encircling Kharkiv.

 

[No. 7 cat]

Its also odd that Shoigu is getting shit canned right as they launch "Kharkiv 2, this time for sure". Its going to be interesting to see what Russia expects to do this time and how it will somehow go better then it did last time when they had full tactical surprise and the Ukrainians weren't watching their border like a hawk.

The approach they are taking to get into Kharkiv is also...odd. Strilecha and Vovchansk are the ass end of nowhere, with no major roads and a fuck huge wilderness between them and anything meaningful. Probably why they've actually managed to push into Ukraine in this direction. I imagine there was not much in their way beyond some very bored territorial guards. Which is bound to change in the coming days. Vovchansk in particular will probably turn into another Mobik Meatgrinder, as its another town with a bisecting river surrounded by fucking marshlands that armored units cannot maneuver in. Meaning approach will have to be some more mass artillery and meat waves.

Maybe the thought process is it will draw off defenders from Chasiv Yar, which seems to be what Russia actually wants atm.

Shoigu could be getting kicked upstairs but the post he's going to is that held by trusted Putin confidant and advisor Patrushev. The new Defense Minister is some economist whose expertise might be of help as Russia basically shovels soldiers and vehicles into Ukraine - a war of resources. However he seems a bit like all those Gazprom Bank execs who were murder-ssuicided about a year ago.

This and the Kharkiv efforts suggests a sort of pivot towards a more varied sort of war.

 

[World in Scarlet]

Problem is my source who tells me its a 'promotion' is a pseudo-vatnik, and I'm not a kremlin-whisperer so I don't actually know if Shoigu's new post is an actual promotion or some sort of demotion-in-effect.

This guy is recommended by some reputable account, but I can't vouch for him.

With regards to his replacement, the general idea is that the new guy is a technocrat who is skilled at economic matters.

I'm wondering if the goal is to pull troops from somewhere else by attacking a more isolated settlement that is harder to reinforce than trying to gun for actually encircling Kharkiv.

That or the idea is to compromise logistics further east and facility an advance southward. The lake and river provide some flank protection and they blew up the bridge part of the causeway (it's not a damn).

---

Situation on the Russian offensive in Kharkiv region as of 5.00 a.m. on 13 May

During the day, the enemy started fighting in the border villages of Hlyboke and Starytsia in the Kharkiv direction. However, the villages have not been completely occupied, and infantry contact battles are ongoing.
The enemy is trying to advance on the village of Liptsy, but has not been able to reach the village.
In the direction of Vovchansk, the enemy entered the outskirts of Vovchansk on the outer streets and the Vovchansk meat processing plant. But the city remains almost entirely under our control, and the enemy was not allowed to advance deeper. Near Vovchansk, our artillery and drones are effectively targeting infantry, and the enemy's losses are significant. I am here, so I can see the situation with my own eyes. The city's defences are being strengthened. The enemy is active, infantry groups are trying to break through our combat formations in different areas.
On 12 May, the Russians attacked Vovchansk for the first time with several tanks with mine trawls, but the attack was repelled.
On 12 May, the Russians tried to advance in almost all directions, but met resistance from Ukrainian troops everywhere, and now the enemy is forced to conduct assaults.
Faced with the tightening of our combat formations and the need to attack strongholds that hinder further advance, the enemy lost the ability to manoeuvre. And now Russian casualties began to rise sharply.
On the first day of the offensive, the command of the Kharkiv military unit was changed due to certain problems. The new commander is a man with experience and competence. Command and control and awareness are improving, but not as fast as we would like. Management and organisation at the highest level is our first and foremost problem.
In terms of ammunition: our troops are provided with artillery shells.
In terms of people: there are problems with the low complexity of the units, but the enemy does not have a multiple advantage.
As for the fortifications: they are built in the Kharkiv direction, but the enemy has not reached these borders. For some reason, the defensive lines are not tied to tactically advantageous heights, the main battles are taking place where the positions are not equipped, and we need to dig in now. That's why the troops don't understand that there are no fortifications where they are needed, and why they have to dig in again.
In the direction of Vovchansk, the city is not prepared for defence. There are no details yet, but it's no secret to the enemy, as local residents have not been resettled and enemy drones often make overflights.
As for the actions of our troops: we have experienced commanders and units, defence organisation, defining the front line, and interaction is emerging and improving. The chaos on the broad front has not been completely overcome, but the situation is improving.
The situation remains difficult, with Russian troops holding the initiative due to their overall numerical superiority and pre-planned actions on a wide front, but there are no prerequisites for a breakthrough of our front at the moment.
Forecast for the enemy's actions for the day: the Russians will try to move further into the residential area of Vovchansk, advance in the direction of Starytsia, and take hold of the buildings of Lyptsi and Ternova.
The battle continues, the enemy continues to be active, so the situation is very tense.
All units in the area are in desperate need of drones.

link
tl;dr: Russians captured the largely undefended territory and are now running into first defenses ahead of the main line, so advances slowed while combat is intensifying

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The terror campaign of the Muscovites against the people of Belgorod continues.
As though having "air defense missiles" raining on the city day and night wasn't bad enough.

The building was hit from the north-east, the video captures the impact from the south-west. The incident happened 40km from the Ukrainian border.
It's uncertain what exactly hit, people speculate one of the glide bombs aimed at Ukraine "failed" yet again and hit the city, while the Russian military claimed they successfully intercepted Ukrainian Tochka-U missiles that night.
An illustration of the Russian claim:

All of this started when images of stacks of voting slips for an independence referendum for the region were leaked online in 2022...

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See Pyongyang and be dumbfounded
What North Korea is like for Russian tourists

Spoiler: text

This private information is unavailable to guests due to policies enforced by third-parties.

link

tl;dr: She describes North Korea as "socialism with a human face", and that poverty and starvation are just prejudices against this wonderful country. Pyongyang is pretty much the same as Moscow, except with better traffic and there's no litter at all! North Koreans love their system, as they are virtuous by nature, and adore their glorious leaders very much.

The main aftertaste left after a visit to the DPRK is the flavour of "happy Soviet childhood". The kind that, obviously, was portrayed to the builders of socialism and communism in the best years of the USSR.

I can't wait for Putin to achieve the North Korean standard of living for Russians.

 

[Ghostse]

I'm going to speculate that removing Shoigu is not what winning looks like. I know the Vatniks will disagree. But it is a bit of a bombshell. I saw Konstantin saying that this looks to be the KGB crowd moving to take control of the Military. Their historical rivals.

This is probably Putin's only smart move this entire war. I don't think anyone can do worse than Shoigu has been doing. Terrible news for Ukraine.

I think bringing in an economist, speculating being that I don't know the dudes exact pedigree, is Putin wanting to unfuck military supply and procurement. This could be indications of greater supply problems/soviet stockpiles running low and sanctions having an effect. But who knows.

Its also odd that Shoigu is getting shit canned right as they launch "Kharkiv 2, this time for sure". Its going to be interesting to see what Russia expects to do this time and how it will somehow go better then it did last time when they had full tactical surprise and the Ukrainians weren't watching their border like a hawk.

I'm curious if the forces doing Operation "We need to at least look to be doing something" brought fuel with them this time or if this a just a new armor donation to Ukraine.

Problem is my source who tells me its a 'promotion' is a pseudo-vatnik, and I'm not a kremlin-whisperer so I don't actually know if Shoigu's new post is an actual promotion or some sort of demotion-in-effect.

I don't know if I'd view it terms of Promotion or Demotion. Its a face-saving move that gets someone incompetent out of the way. Most likely its getting him away from fucking up running military affairs while clearly telegraphing that despite his abject failure he's still got the backing of Putin and lets him be a valid ally in the power games inside Moscow; I think Putin still trusts Shoigu to have his back in the political infighting.
We'll have to see if Shoigu takes a leap out of some city's only 5 story building to know for sure.

 

[Pedophobe]

Tube-Launched, Optically-Tracked, Wire-Guided (TOW) missiles;

Is that to restock their museum of ancient history?

 

[Astro Galactic Megalul]

I think every nation on Earth that has nuclear weapons wants to get rid of them for good, but can't because there's no way they can be certain everyone else has done the same. You can't win a nuclear war.

For the same reason you can't stop gun violence by taking guns from law-abiding citizens. Been the case ever since our monkey ancestor realized that you can bash another monkey's brains out with a boulder. Deterrence is the only solution that works.

 

[Red Frida]

It's an interesting strategy making a post so long it can't be replied to but there's basically zero indication given the current situation that China wants to nuke Taiwan regardless of what Russia does. China has also a no first use policy.

 

[teriyakiburns]

It's an interesting strategy making a post so long it can't be replied to

Highlight the part of the text you want to reply to, then tap the reply popup that appears.

 

[MG-34]

Is that to restock their museum of ancient history?

TOW missiles are pretty decent. The dazzle system the Russians claimed could defeat them or cause them to veer off target on the T-90A failed miserably in Syria.

 

[T O X I C S L U D G E]

TOW missiles are pretty decent. The dazzle system the Russians claimed could defeat them or cause them to veer off target on the T-90A failed miserably in Syria.

That's more so because Shtora was meant to defeat ITOWs and Konkurs/Fagots not TOW-2s which have an additional wavelength tracker in order to counteract such systems and improve environmental reliability, but yeah Shtora is obsolete

 

[mindlessobserver]

I'm curious if the forces doing Operation "We need to at least look to be doing something" brought fuel with them this time or if this a just a new armor donation to Ukraine.

If the other thread is too be believed, Russia advancing 2 kilometers into the howling wilderness already has Ukrainian command back biting each other and the war will be over by Christmas.

Of course they didn't specify which Christmas, but I assume they meant the Russian one.

 

[Useful_Mistake]

and the war will be over by Christmas.

Oh, come now, one guy said that. Hardly representative.

 

[mindlessobserver]

Looks like Russia is lighting up the entire front to see if they can make a break in the Ukrainian lines somewhere. The question is with a general push from Zaporizhia all the way up to Kharkiv, will they have any reserves in place if a breakthrough materializes? Unlike Russia, Ukraine has a much easier internal line of reinforcement and resupply to the various sectors of the front. If shit goes south in one spot, it can take less then a day to move forces from a less afflicted area to the other. Russia on the other hand can't do this because of the geometry of the campaign. The Kharkiv front might as well be on the surface of the moon for all the good the troops in Zaporizhia could do for it.

This is probably lots of noise to mask where they actually intend to make their major push.

As usual, Al Jazeera has the best breakdown. Qatar certainly have their axes to grind. But one thing they most definitely don't give a shit about is Ukraine, so their coverage tends to be the best. The opening introduction of the fighting is pretty jarring. With the front largely being static for almost a year now that it sort of implies not much is going on. Its easy to forget that this is a fully industrialized war with two relatively modern armies in a death grip with each other.

 

[Fatsuit Shinji]

@Ghostse Putin before this shitshow started did had an economist trying to unfuck the Russian military. Up til the part he noticed only way to do so is to heavily trimmed the extremely bloated officer corp running the military. Leading to him getting shitcanned for saying the quiet part out loud and actually trying to do so.

Which to give the devil his due, he certainly better than any American reformer who never touched the Pentagon and always thought the best way to fix the U.S. military is by fucking over the enlisted and NCOs in new creatively destructive ways.

 

[mindlessobserver]

@Ghostse Putin before this shitshow started did had an economist trying to unfuck the Russian military. Up til the part he noticed only way to do so is to heavily trimmed the extremely bloated officer corp running the military. Leading to him getting shitcanned for saying the quiet part out loud and actually trying to do so.

Which to give the devil his due, he certainly better than any American reformer who never touched the Pentagon and always thought the best way to fix the U.S. military is by fucking over the enlisted and NCOs in new creatively destructive ways.

The word from Russia is they are setting the stage for a protracted war. The shakeup at the MoD is the open admission that they expect this war to go on for several more years. Which is utter madness from a practical standpoint but makes perfect sense when you consider the insane cult of personality and religious/historical justification the Kremlin has whipped up to justify this conflict.

Its concerning. The long hoped for white elephant of the western powers has been to keep Ukraine going long enough to convince Russia to come to terms. Not getting everything it wants, but at least getting something. Total Ukraine Victory was never in the cards of NATO strategic thinking here. Hence the slow roll of aid. Ukraine punching way above its weight class can probably be blamed here too. Nobody expected the Russian Military to be this bad, let alone for Ukraine to still maintain Air Space control over its territory 3 years into the conflict AND render the Russian Black Sea Fleet a military non-entity. This was never in the cards and as the third year drags on shit its actually going to get more dangerous.

Simply put, Ukraine probably would be willing to come to terms with Russia at this point. But Russia CAN'T come to terms. The astronomical cost Putin has incurred in his 2 week special military operation, two years and counting now exceeds even what Russia expended to gain small slices of Finland. Just the other day a country Putin triumphantly declared to be "not real" two years ago shelled a Russian city in retaliation for Russia shelling its own cities. Putin cannot negotiate because he's trapped in his own deceit. He has to win big, or not at all.

NATO is slowly starting to realize this. The Ukrainian Air force will start receiving F-16's next month.

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraine-get-its-first-f-16-jets-june-july-says-kyiv-military-source-2024-05-10/

The supply bottlenecks are also being shaken out. The glaring issues with the western Military Industrial Complex are being addressed. I see this current push by Russia now not as some sort of calculated effort but desperation. The clock is ticking. That same clock I banged on long and loud about in the very first thread discussing the conflict. Where I said Russia had mere months to wrap this up before it became a fucking nightmare quagmire for them. This is the third year of war. Russia is now the second best Army in Ukraine relying solely on overwhelming numbers to make minimal gains. Tick. Tock. As the realization settles in to the EU and USA that Russia is no longer a rational actor, the further the push towards greater involvement will become. F-16's are quite literally the last gasp of "hostile neutrality" left in the NATO arsenal, and with France threatening to go off the reservation entirely, Russia is running out of time to score a decisive victory and bring the war to some sort of conclusion that Putin can bring to the Russian people and say "it was worth it".

 

[Fatsuit Shinji]

Forcing Ukraine to negotiate salami slicing its territory away to Russia isn't flying with Ukrainians, England, France and Eastern Europeans as they know Russia is a bad faith actor.

 

[Least Concern]

It's an interesting strategy making a post so long it can't be replied to but there's basically zero indication given the current situation that China wants to nuke Taiwan regardless of what Russia does. China has also a no first use policy.

More relevantly the CCP sees Taiwan as its own territory and the people there as citizens under an occupying rebel government, so nuking it would be nuking its own land and people. For that matter it would be silly for Russia to use nukes in Ukraine if it would have to use them in the territory which is now constitutionally Russian. That being said I definitely think the Chinese leadership is capable of far more rationality and compassion than the Russian leadership at this point.

 

[mindlessobserver]

Forcing Ukraine to negotiate salami slicing its territory away to Russia isn't flying with Ukrainians, England, France and Eastern Europeans as they know Russia is a bad faith actor.

Not disagreeing. I think however the hope in western circles was that they could legitimize Ukraine's losses from the 2014 invasion, in exchange for halting the 2022 invasion. Hence the slow grind up the escalation chain in weapons given to Ukraine.

That hope has sadly started to fade. Putin is not interested in a negotiated settlement. I think he legitimately believes he can carry this conflict all the way to Kiev again and force terms in the Presidential palace there. There are lots of finger pointing to be made here about the failure of deterrence. But the simple truth is NATO should probably start preparing for an intervention in this war, because after the F-16s are delivered its essentially the end of the road up the escalation ladder. If Ukraine cannot end the war decisively and Russia does not stop the only alternative left will be direct conflict.

As I have stated before, the one thing NATO and by extension the EU cannot accept is Russia, by force of arms, pushing its border west of the Dneiper. It cannot be tolerated, but it seems to be what Putin wants and if that is what he wants war between Russia and Europe will be inevitable unless somehow he can be stopped short of the disaster line. Putin will never get to march down Kievs streets, because the moment the Russian Army gets into striking range of Kiev again, World War 3 will definitely erupt.

So everyone should pray for the victory of the Ukrainian Army in the coming campaign season. Including the Russians incidentally.

 

[Melmac_Knight]

I'm going to speculate that removing Shoigu is not what winning looks like. I know the Vatniks will disagree. But it is a bit of a bombshell. I saw Konstantin saying that this looks to be the KGB crowd moving to take control of the Military. Their historical rivals.

Putin just wants to save his boyfriend from embarrassment if they lose

 

[Vince McMahon]

Okay supposedly Shoigu got promoted.

He was shitcanned upwards. That new position of his is of no real value. Anyone who's like "Shoigu was promoted, this time the ass is in the ass" is coping.