Ukraine Blog 57 – Почалось, but Dog One is Still Closed
Dear
friends, family and colleagues,
We are steadily moving towards the main punch of the Ukrainian counteroffensive. Twitter exploded into enthusiasm yesterday when the first Ukrainian Leopard 2 tanks appeared at the front and moved into an equal level of sadness when the video of the first destroyed Leopard 2 appeared, leading to a lot of comments that the Ukrainian offensive had failed.
Fact
is that the Ukrainians are still probing and the main armored punch hasn’t
started yet. The Ukrainians gave this away themselves with two tiny details
that no analyst on Twitter picked up, but I did.
1. The Leopard II’s the Ukrainians
deployed, are earlier model 2A4’s. This is the version without the up-armored
front and still or shorter length barrel.
Guido on Twitter: "#Leopard on the hunt.... https://t.co/qNIHwouBhw" / Twitter
Besides
the earlier model. In the footage that the Russians posted, you can only see
around four Leopards and around 10 armored personnel carriers. This is not
sufficient for a breakthrough.
For me, this is a sign that the Ukrainians used the older model Leopard 2’s for a psychological effect and not as a breakthrough. Ukraine also received around 20 Leopard 2A6’s from Germany and Portugal. These are way more up-armored versions of the German beast with a modern active protection system, longer barrel and improved armor. I expect any Ukrainian breakthrough attempt to be spearheaded by these versions.
Leopard_2A6_tank_-_ILÜ_2012.jpg (1239×835) (wikimedia.org)
2. The second take-away the Ukrainians gave that the action of yesterday wasn’t the main punch, is that the support component consisted of Vietnam war era M-113’s. These are very ill-armored armored personal carriers considered obsolete by most modern NATO armies. In case of a real Ukrainian breakthrough, I would expect the Leopard 2A6’s to be supported by either 50, American Bradley, German Marder or Swedish CV-90 armored infantry fighting vehicles (AIFV’s).
So will the Ukrainian army break through the Russian lines? Absolutely. And to illustrate this I will take you through a crucial scene of the Hollywood classic “Saving Private Ryan.” For those who have never seen the movie: this is the scene you need to watch:
Saving Private Ryan (1998) - Omaha Beach HD - YouTube
The movie ironically goes back to the D-Day landings of June 6th 1944. Around the same day when the Ukrainians started the main probing actions on the southern front line. The American force in the movie faces the same challenge the Ukrainians face today: a set of massive fortifications that they need to break through. In the first 20 minutes of the movie, not a single German soldier dies and a truly massive number of American soldiers are massacred.
Commander John H. Miller, played by Tom Hanks, is assigned to break through a fortification called “Dog One.” This seems like an impossible mission. For quite a while the survivors of the beach landing are stuck on the beach and they see their comrades being slaughtered around them. At one point, the troops managed to launch a diversionary attack by punching so-called Bangalore torpedoes in the German trench line right in front of the main bunkers set-up. Only then, Miller’s small platoon has the opportunity to move into a more favorable assault location.
Still,
there’s a German machinegun nest that’s causing havoc, but it’s not being
covered by German up armored fortifications. Miller has found the weak spot!
Then Miller deploys his sniper Daniel Jackson, a charming religious character,
played by Barry Pepper to take on the machine gun nest. With just a couple of
shots, Jackson takes out the nest and after that: Dog One is open and within
minutes the troops overwhelm the German fortifications that cost millions to
build.
So
back to Ukraine. The Ukrainian army is in roughly the same situation as Miller
and his squad. Rest assured that the Ukrainians are suffering huge casualties
as well in this stage and you will see many more pictures and videos of burned
out Leopard’s and Bradley’s in the coming weeks. As a matter of fact, I do
expect that Ukraine will lose most of its Western supplied modern tanks and
AIFV’s. Just on the first day of D-Day on Omaha beach, where the movie plays
out, the American army lost 2500 men killed (KIA). However, if it enables
Ukraine to facilitate the breakthrough, it’s totally worth the price.
Where
the allies during D-Day committed the largest part of their breakthrough
assault force on the first day of the offensive, Ukraine has only committed a
maximum of three battalions (so max one brigade) on the Orikhiv axis according
to both Ukrainian and Russian sources. This is the most heavily defended part
of the Russian front line. In total Ukraine has trained more than 20 brigades
to Western standards over the past year. If the Ukrainians already managed to
cause utter panic on Russian Telegram channels and even take over some Russian
forward positions with just three battalions max, it really doesn’t look good
for the Russians.
It
might or might not be the case that the Ukrainian masterplan to break through
in Orikhiv. What I do know, is that they are now searching for their Dog One.
And it works roughly like this: Imagine a pool of water. When you start to
create waves, the levels of water rise in particular sections of the pool,
while they lower in other sections. This situation is temporary and if you want
to pick something up from the lower part of the pool, you have to be quick,
because eventually, the level will be back to normal again.
This
is what the Ukrainians are doing now. They probe the line, with the purpose of
Russia committing reserves to this area. They will do this a couple of times,
so the Russians will be exhausted. At one particular moment there will be a
lower level in the pool that is the front line. This is when the Ukrainians
will have their Jackson moment. At this moment, expect the Ukrainians to attack
with between five to ten brigades with 20 Leopard 2A6 and 50 modern AIFV’s.
They will punch the complete force through that weak section in the front line
that will just be 5 kilometers wide max all at once. And this will have to be
done in the same way as a pilot that takes off with a jet liner. At one point
at the runway he’s not allowed to break off even if the plane is on fire. Same
procedure here. Once the main punch starts, abort is no longer possible, you
have to proceed with everything you have.
Russia is now losing between 30 and 40 artillery and multiple launch rocket systems (MLRS) per day. This corresponds to roughly one percent of their deployable artillery that they lose per day. It also shows that Ukraine has finally surpassed Russia when it comes to artillery strength and counter battery effectiveness.
So what are the indications when and where the breakthrough will happen? My guess: around five days from now. When the Russian estimated casualty rates in the Ukrainian daily Russian loss reports are between 2000 to 5000 Russian KIA per day for three days straight. They have already been up for three straight days from 500 to 800 to more than a 1000 today.
But when they reach the 2000 to 5000 mark, it really means the Ukrainians start the final pre-breakthrough bombardment to finish off Russian assembly areas and command and control areas. Where will it happen? It might be Orikhiv, but I’m convinced it’s somewhere else on the Southern front. To give a hint: the Russians had some very uncomfortable encounters there a couple of months ago.
And what happens after the breakthrough? Well, it will be very fast. Trust me, sometimes real life is like in the movies.
Слава Україні!
Niels
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