re: Latest Updates: Russia-Ukraine Conflict

Questions for the thread (just looking for a brief update on the status of this conflict). Thank you

1. Which side, if any, is making territorial gains recently?

2. Is there any prospect of a resolution in the coming months?

3. Is it still unlikely that the conflict expands to include NATO members?

So why, lately, have we seen a sudden rush of Ukrainian strikes on Russian barracks, with the killing of hundreds of Russian soldiers?

We can give the credit to Ukrainian intelligence (likely with NATO help), to HIMARS, to Russian stupidity. But I think that General Winter deserves the most credit.

As it gets cold, Russian soldiers simply cannot sleep in trenches. These men are not equipped with sleeping bags, spare boots (and the boots that they do have probably leak), etc.

Even when properly equipped, there's lots of evidence that, in cold conditions, soldiers must be very disciplined to avoid frostbite, trench foot, and hypothermia. These just-mobilized soldiers are not disciplined, nor do they have competent NCOs to enforce discipline.

The Russian answer to those problems would seem to be to regularly get soldiers out of trenches to sleep in barracks not too far from the front lines.

That's why Ukraine has recently been able to hit large groups of Russian soldiers in barracks with HIMARS.

quote:

---

GOP, I think another factor is that newly mobilized troops are now beginning to show up at the front. As they arrive they have to stage somewhere before being deployed to the actual front lines. The Ukes are hitting them in these staging locations before they can be deployed.

---

Not just staging but where they can be controlled from deserting.

quote:

---

Not just staging but where they can be controlled from deserting.

---

Yes, and this is not unrelated to the problems I mentioned of being underequipped, undisciplined, and without competent NCOs.

quote:

---

Desert Storm's shock and awe campaign was near flawless.

---

The air war was nearly flawless and from the ground troops' perspective almost too good. We had tons of contingency plans for not making certain points in the battle plan on time but not so much for being way ahead of schedule. We outran our battle plan from the second we went over the berm. The biggest clusterfrick was processing prisoners we didn't have the depth of training to have the "muscle memory" to deal with the numbers we had to and we were outrunning our logistical support. I wanted to avoid contact not because we took fire (which we did) but because of all those surrendering.

Desert Storm was a masterclass in modern warfare and showed what the US and other coalition forces could so in an actual "war". We still had a fairly restrictive ROE for "war" but nothing like what the military has had in so many other conflicts that are fought more like police actions. No army does well in those conditions.

The number is 616.

isw update

quote:

---

Russian President Vladimir Putin approved a series of instructions for Russian agencies and high-level officials on January 2 likely to address criticisms of the Kremlin’s treatment of military personnel and portray the Kremlin as an involved war-time apparatus.[1] These instructions are ostensibly an effort to address grievances voiced by mothers of servicemen during a highly staged November 25 meeting with Putin.[2] The 11 instructions direct several high-ranking members of the Russian government—including Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, and Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin—and government agencies (including the Russian Ministry of Defense) to collaborate with other agencies and non-government organizations to generate a list of recommendations for addressing and improving supply, benefits, and healthcare processes for military personnel.[3] Putin instructed the Ministry of Culture to assist the nongovernmental organization “Committee of the Fatherland Warrior’s Families” to help create documentaries and other material to showcase the “courage and heroism” of Russian forces in Ukraine and to screen domestic documentaries to “fight against the spread of neo-Nazi and neo-fascist ideology.”

---

quote:

---

Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed that Russia is using a variety of social schemes to justify the transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia. In his annual New Year's speech, Putin thanked Russians for their efforts to send children from occupied Ukrainian territory on “holidays.”[4] ISW has previously reported instances of Russian officials using the guise of “holidays” and vacation schemes to justify the transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia and Russian-occupied Crimea.[5] Putin’s list of instructions also directs Russian Commissioner for the Rights of the Child Maria Lvova-Belova and the occupation heads of Kherson, Zaporizhia, Donetsk, and Luhansk oblasts to "take additional measures to identify minors...left without parental care” in occupied areas to provide them with ”state social assistance” and ”social support.”

---

quote:

---

Systemic failures in Russia’s force generation apparatus continue to plague personnel capabilities to the detriment of Russian operational capacity in Ukraine. Russian milbloggers claimed on January 3 that the Russian military has sent recently mobilized personnel trained as artillerymen and tankers following their mobilizations to infantry divisions in Ukraine with no formal infantry training.

Russian forces have suffered significant losses of artillery systems and armored vehicles in operations in Ukraine since the start of partial mobilization in September of 2022, and, therefore, likely have excess personnel trained in the use of specific military equipment.[9] Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces Spokesperson Colonel Serhii Cherevaty reported that Russian forces in eastern Ukraine are currently firing artillery shells at roughly one-third the rate of the summer of 2022.[10] The reduced rate of Russian artillery fire is likely a result of the depletion of ammunition stocks, given reports that Russian forces are deliberately transferring ammunition from one sector of the front to another.[11] Putting poorly-trained artillerymen into infantry units without training them for infantry combat operations will likely make them little more than cannon fodder.

---

quote:

---

Degraded Russian military personnel capabilities will likely further exacerbate Russian milblogger criticism of Russian force generation efforts and the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD). One Russian milblogger argued that Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu’s proposals to create five new artillery divisions and the recent creation of an artillery division in the Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) 2nd Army Corps will be a waste of personnel and artillery munitions if the Russian MoD continues to train these personnel in just an artillery capacity without infantry training.[12] Another Russian milblogger argued inaccurately that putting a tanker or an artilleryman in service as a simple infantryman is a war crime that even Soviet commanders did not commit in the most difficult months of the Second World War in 1941

---

quote:

---

Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin attempted to justify the Wagner Group’s lack of progress in Bakhmut, partially supporting ISW’s assessment that Russian forces in Bakhmut are culminating.[15] Russian state media outlet RIA Novosti amplified a December 31 interview with Prigozhin on January 3 in which Prigozhin stated that Wagner Group forces in Bakhmut are unable to break through Ukrainian defenses in Bakhmut.[16] Prigozhin stated that Wagner's offensive operations in Bakhmut are highly attritional because each house in Bakhmut is a “fortress,” that Ukrainians have defensive lines every 10 meters, and that Russian forces must clear building-by-building.[17] This is a significant inflection for Prigozhin and the first time he has framed Wagner forces in Bakhmut as making effectively no gains

Prigozhin is likely setting information conditions to blame Wagner Group's failure to take Bakhmut on the Russian Ministry of Defense or the Russian industrial base. Wagner Group soldiers told Prigozhin that they were unable to break through Ukrainian lines in Bakhmut due to insufficient armored vehicles, ammunition, and 100mm shell supplies during a likely scripted segment in the clip. This statement seeks to absolve the Wagner Group and Prigozhin of personal responsibility by attributing their failure to capture Bakhmut to the larger Russian resource allocation problems that Russian and Ukrainian sources have been increasingly discussing since late December

---

quote:

---

Key Takeaways

Russian President Vladimir Putin approved a series of instructions for Russian agencies and high-level officials likely aimed at appeasing widespread criticisms of the provisioning and payment of benefits to Russian military personnel and propagandizing the war.

Putin confirmed that Russia is using a variety of social schemes to justify the transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia.

Systemic failures in Russia’s force generation efforts continue to plague Russian personnel capabilities to the detriment of Russian operational capacity in Ukraine.

Degraded Russian military personnel capabilities will likely further exacerbate Russian milblogger criticism of Russian force generation efforts and the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD).

Wagner Group financier Yevgeny Prigozhin attempted to justify the Wagner Group’s lack of progress in Bakhmut, partially supporting ISW’s assessment that Russian forces in Bakhmut are culminating.

Russian forces continued limited counterattacks along the Svatove-Kreminna line as Ukrainian forces continued to strike Russian military logistics in Luhansk Oblast.

Russian forces continued offensive operations near Bakhmut and Avdiivka and may be reinforcing their grouping in western Donetsk Oblast.

Ukrainian forces have reportedly established positions on the Velikiy Potemkinsky Island in the Dnipro River delta as of January 2.

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree that promises additional benefits to Russian forces personnel and Russian National Guard (Rosgvardia) who defend the Russian-Ukrainian border.

---

British Defence Intelligence
UPDATE ON UKRAINE 04 January 2023
INTELLIGENCE UPDATE

On 31 December 2022, Ukraine struck a school building in the Russian-held town of Makiyivka near Donetsk city, which Russia had almost certainly taken over for military use. The building was completely destroyed and, as the Russian MoD confirmed, 89 Russian personnel were killed.

Given the extent of the damage, there is a realistic possibility that ammunition was being stored near to troop accommodation, which detonated during the strike creating secondary explosions.

The building was only 12.5km from the Avdiivka sector of front line, one of the most intensely contested areas of the conflict. The Russian military has a record of unsafe ammunition storage from well before the current war, but this incident highlights how unprofessional practices contribute to Russia's high casualty rate.

quote:

---

I wonder when the next mobilization gets announced. Russia cannot continue to have 1000 KIA and WIA every single day for long without calling up more cannon fodder.

---

It may be just as likely that the next large scale mobilization won't be announced. They will just do it mostly outside of the big cities and hope that no one notices.

quote:

---

the “military commandant’s office” in occupied Vasylivka

---

Wow, did a number on that building. For some reason the line "you can't close the door when the wall's caved in" comes to mind.