YazataMay 5, 2022 04:50 PM (This post was last modified: May 6, 2022 03:09 AM by Yazata.)
Fighting continues at Azovstal, despite Russians having entered the complex yesterday. Communications with the defenders has been restored. While the Russians did penetrate the grounds of the plant, they didn't manage to enter the underground tunnels. There are reports that the Russian attackers have been driven back to the edge of the plant where they started. But it's clear that the Azovstal situation is entering its endgame. The Russians seem to hope that they can clear out Azovstal in less than four days, by Victory Day on the 9th. Good luck with that, Vladimir.
Reports are that the Russians have moved most of their forces out of Mariupol so that they can reinforce other fronts. (This verified by "senior defense official" in the post below.) About 2000 remain, most of them Chechen mercenaries and soldiers of the separatist Donetsk People's Republic. But some of these forces must be devoted to occupying the captured city of Mariupol, so probably not all of them are taking part in the assaults on Azovstal. And about 2,000 Ukrainian fighters remain, many of them bad-ass Azov "Nazis". So the attackers might be outnumbered by the heavily dug-in defenders, except that many of the defenders are wounded and dying without adaquate medical care. The Russian side does have advantages, among them abundant supplies, food and ammunition, plus heavy air and artillery support. But given that attacks typically require more men than defense, they may be undermanned for what they are supposed to accomplish in 4 days.
Video in the link below of Ukrainians retaking the Kharkiv exurb of Ruska Lozova. Apart from some small-arms fire, the handful of Russians there don't appear to have put up much resistance. Very different from the intense urban-warfare battles in the Kyiv suburbs of Bucha, Irpin and Hostomel.
Kraken are a sub-unit of the Azov Regiment, often accused by the Russians of being "Nazis". Azov was a private all-volunteer military force formed in 2014 in Mariupol, where it got its "Azov" name. It originally was (and to some extent still is) composed of right-wing Ukrainian nationalists, some of whom affected 'Nazi' style insignia. At first they dressed in black and intended to be the Ukrainian equivalent of Russia's "little green men". They proved to be good fighters and were instrumental in preventing Mariupol from falling to the Donetsk separatists in 2014.
Very quickly the Ukrainian government moved to absorb Azov and other Ukrainian private-army forces (often associated with various oligarchs who funded them) into the formal Ukrainian military chain-of-command. So today Azov is officially part of the Ukrainian National Guard which funds and arms them, and gives them their assignments. But it retains something of its separate identity and has become something of an elite force, taking a leading role in the current Ukraine War of 2022. It's retained its original association with Mariupol, where many (by no means all) of the city's stalwart defenders are Azov fighters. That's probably one of the reasons why the defense of Mariupol has been so determined.
Azov is known for its combat effectiveness, if not for its niceties. Ukraine feels that it needs that right now. Since Mariupol and its Azov defenders were surrounded, the Ukrainian military has stood up more volunteer Azov battalions in the Kyiv area. Kraken is one of the new Azov special forces battalions.
YazataMay 5, 2022 07:14 PM (This post was last modified: May 5, 2022 08:08 PM by Yazata.)
Very informative US Department of Defense press briefing, conducted by somebody referred to as "Senior Defense Official". Lots of information here, particularly on what the Pentagon assessment is of the current state of the Ukraine War.
"On the operational side we still assess that Russian progress on the ground remains slow and uneven in the northern joint force operation area with Russian forces appearing to really sort of orient themselves around Lyman, which is as I think you all know just a wee bit southeast of Izyum, but that seems to be where they're starting to orient themselves.
As they continue to try to move south and southeast, they are continuing to meet with greater concentrations of Ukrainian forces and a stiffer resistance, so they still remained stalled in general. Again, I would say progress is very slow and uneven. They are stalled in terms of their overall momentum in the north.
In the south we haven't seen much progress by the Russians coming north out of Mariupol at all. They seem to have paused either to -- either to create better defensive positions or to refit and re-posture themselves, but they're not making -- they're not making really any progress in the south.
...We have seen some missile strikes out into the west near Lviv. Looks like they're trying to hit critical infrastructure, electricity and that kind of thing, and trying to get at the ability for the Ukrainians to use railroads in particular, but that they're -- I would just say that while we're still assessing sort of the damage, it's not clear that they've been very accurate in trying to hit that critical infrastructure, and there's been no perishable impact that we've seen to impeding or in any other way obstructing with the Ukrainians' ability to replenish and restore themselves...
...Kharkiv, the Ukrainians still hold Kharkiv. They -- they -- they never actually gave Kharkiv up. And as I said the other day, we have seen indications that they were able to push the Russian forces about 20 to 30 miles to the -- to the east of Kharkiv. But, they still hold it. And the Russians have not made any progress there... And we -- we still think, though, that the Russians want Kharkiv. I mean, they haven't exactly left it alone either..."
[Regarding the Belarussian military movements the last few days]
"...I don't think we have a firm, clear assessment of the announcement of this exercise. It could just be exercises. I could tell you that we've so no indication that Belarus has shown an intention to involve themselves in Ukraine."
[On Russian use of foreign mercenaries]
"...I talked about Chechens probably being down in Mariupol. We know the Wagner Group has been operating in the Donbas and that they have recruited from places like Syria and Libya and that they use Syrian and Libyan fighters, but I couldn't give you an exact number or exactly where they're geolocated. But outside of those things we've already talked about, I don't have any additional context on foreign fighters."
[On activities of the Russian Air Force]
"...And as for the -- the sortie rate for the Russians, it -- they -- you know, it -- again, it varies every day. They're -- they were just under 250 sorties over the last 24 hours...
And again, the -- the -- the preponderance of -- of airstrikes from aircraft are -- are in the JFO and in and around Mariupol. They are still hitting Mariupol and they are stlll wary of flying into Ukrainian airspace..."
YazataMay 10, 2022 04:26 AM (This post was last modified: May 11, 2022 02:30 AM by Yazata.)
Here's the May 9th Pentagon briefing by "Senior Defense Official". It gives a good sense of the US military's official assessment of how the Ukraine War is going. The American military are in daily contact with the Ukrainian military and have very good sources. "Senior Defense Official" himself notes that there hasn't been a whole lot of change since the last briefing. As he notes, it's been "like single digit kilometer kind of progress".
Today May 9 is Russia's big Victory Day holiday, historically a day for military parades, comemorating Russia's victory over Germany in World War II. As expected there was a military parade in Moscow, but without the usual Air Force flyovers. So the whole thing was kind of restrained. Putin gave a speech.
The speech was notable mostly for what it didn't say. Putin didn't announce any big escalation of the war, nor did he declare victory and indicate that Russia is satisfied with the parts of Ukraine that it now occupies. The message was basically that the war will continue in much the way and at pretty much the same scale as it is now.
Obviously, there is no obligation for Putin to announce big changes on the holiday. He might not have wanted to take the spotlight away from the dwindling number of WWII veterans (known as "the Immortals" in Russia) and he can make Ukraine war announcements whenever he likes. But today's Kremlin-watchers had hoped to get some hints.
It looks like he can't order a nationwide mobilization like Ukraine has already done, for fear of his popularity plummeting. (Ukraine could get away with mobilizing the whole male population because they were under attack and the outskirts of the capital were being shelled. The need was obvious and visceral) But Russia didn't feel the same urgency that would justify a huge nationwide conscription. So Russia will probably continue to suffer manpower shortages.
But Putin doesn't want to settle for the small victories Russia has already won, limited mostly to almost all of Luhansk oblast, more than half of Donetsk oblast including Mariupol (with the notable exception of Azovstal which continues to resist), southern Zaporizhzhia, parts of Kharkiv oblast and most of Kherson oblast. He's trying to change the geopolitical situation on Russia's southwest border in Russia's favor and demonstrate to the world that Russia is once again a resurgent superpower.
So Putin is seemingly stuck in a quandary, unwilling to settle for what his forces have already taken, but unable to seize the minimum that he will settle for.
The original Russian motivation for the war has been transformed into fantasy. Russia wanted to seize Kyiv in 3 days, overthrow a Ukrainian government perceived as anti-Russian, rally what Moscow believed was widespread pro-Russian sentiment in Ukraine and prevent the country from tilting west. But after 75 days of war with no resolution in sight, the Ukrainian people are united in their hostility to Russia. That's not something that a simple change of government in Kyiv could possibly cure. Ukraine's people will continue to tilt more strongly westward and Ukraine's EU and even NATO membership will no longer be off the table.
Russia seems to have ironically created the very situation that they started the war to prevent.
Which leaves the question, where would Russia go from there. My guess is into a much closer alliance with China. China can replace high tech imports sanctioned by the West and Hong Kong can provide the kind of banking services Russia is denied in London. If Russia is cut off from the dollar-denominated world economy, they will slip into the rival Yuan-denominated world system that the Chinese want to create as a rival to the United States. So Europe will end at the Russian border and the East will begin.
The Russians are too proud to settle for the role of client-state to the Chinese Middle Kingdom for very long and one could argue that their natural future lies with being an ally of the West, but that won't happen as long as Vladimir Putin remains in power. He's far too much of an old-style Cold-warrior, as is much of today's Western leadership.
Big news today is that Belarus is moving its forces towards the Ukrainian border. There is video on the internet of trains loaded with armored vehicles. There's concern that they might open a new front north of western Ukraine.
And there's lots of photos of war material from Europe in Ukraine. The Dutch have recently retired a particular model of armored personnel carrier and had hundreds in storage and seem to be donating many of them to Ukraine. There are Czech rocket launchers and Polish tanks as well. Since the Ukrainians demonstrated that they can fight the Russians and win, support for them has really picked up.
The Ukrainian counteroffensive north of Kharkiv is having some success pushing the Russians back from the outskirts of Kharkiv (Ukraine's second largest city). The goal seems to push them out of artillery range so that shelling of the city stops and they have had success doing that.
Video of Kraken retaking semi-rural town of Pytomnyk not far north of Kharkiv. They seem to have met more resistance here than in Ruska Luzova just to the south of Pytomnyk (whose liberation was shown in a video in an earlier post).
Video from BBC correspondent with the Ukrainian counteroffensive north of Kharkiv. There's a Starlink terminal on the truck at the beginning of the video. Unclear if it's being used by the soldiers or by the BBC correspondents.
There has been little Russian movement in the Izium area, and there's speculation among American observers that the Russians may have given up on their stalled Izium offensive. But further east Russian pressure is increasing. There have been some Russian advances in the rural area towards Lyman. And Russia completed the capture of Rubizhne and Vojevodivka in the industrial area further east. The Ukrainians have blown some bridges in that area to slow the Russian advance into Severodonetsk. Pryvillia looks increasingly threatened and the Russians are pushing on Bilhorivka. So it increasingly looks like the Russians might have abandoned a large encirclement south from Izium in favor of attempting a smaller encirclement only of Severodonetsk and Lysychansk.
In Azovstal, Russians penetrated partway into the plant but defenders fought them off and pushed them out. The Russians still haven't penetrated the maze of tunnels where the defenders are sheltering. But the defenders are running short of ammunition and have many wounded, and their ability to resist forever is doubtful. The battle for the tunnels will be the last act, but given that the Ukrainians know every nook and cranny while the Russians would be going in blind, the Russian casualties would be heavy. There's evidence that the Russian forces fighting there now are largely Chechen mercenaries who the Russian Army might consider more expendible.
Positions seem pretty static on the Kherson front line but there are reports of fighting there. There may be some kind of Ukrainian counter attack there. Unclear how big it is.
They think that the Russians might be withdrawing from their positions north of Kharkiv. This is based on how little resistance they've offered to the Ukrainian counteroffensive in that area. It's consistent with information that the Ukrainians have advanced to within 1.75 miles of the Russian border at one point.
ISW says that Ukraine has essentially won the battle of Kharkiv. The Russians rolled into the center of the city (Ukraine's second largest) in the first days of the war but instead of taking over almost bloodlessly, the Ukrainians fought back fiercely and the Russian columns were forced to pull back to Kharkiv's northern outskirts from which they shelled the city mercilessly. Then the Russians tried to surround Kharkiv and that failed. Recently the Ukrainians have been forcing the Russians out of the northern outskirts and have been retaking nearby towns as the Russians are pushed back out of artillery range. And the Russians now appear to be withdrawing additional forces from the Kharkiv area.
There is talk that the Ukrainians might be planning to push east from the Kharkiv area when they are done there and try to cut the supply lines from Russia to Ixium. The anticipated large Russian offensive from Ixium has never really materialized on the scale that was expected and the Ukrainians have successfully contained it so far.
The Russians have instead been moving forces east from Ixium towards the Lyman area, where their advance, while slow, has been a bit more effective. But yesterday those forces suffered a huge debacle trying to cross the Siverskyi Donets river on a pontoon bridge. Russian vehicles and troops were foolishly bunched up at both ends of the bridge providing Ukrainian artillery with inviting targets. The Ukrainians promptly took advantage and reportedly killed hundreds of Russians and destroyed dozens of vehicles. It appears that a whole Russian motorized rifle brigade was rendered ineffective. The Russians still haven't been able to perform a crossing of the river in the 24 hours after the massacre. Until they can do this, their presumed plan to encircle Severodonetsk and Lysychansk is effectively stalled.
Further east around Severodonetsk the Russians are at the northern and eastern edge of the city but appear to want no part of a Mariupol-style urban street fighting battle. The encirclement was presumably the way to avoid that.
Other than that, nothing really dramatic anywhere else.
Speculation is turning to the possibility that Russia might acknowledge that their offensive has no future and instead decide to annex the parts of Ukraine that they currently occupy, then extend their 'any attack on Russia will bring about a nuclear response' doctrine to those areas. It would be an explicit warning to Ukraine that any attempt to retake the occupied areas would run the risk of getting Ukraine nuked.
And the Ukrainian counteroffensive north of Kharkiv has reached the Russian border. It looks peaceful and beautiful, without any Russian soldiers to be seen.
And both Sweden and Finland have indicated their intention to join NATO, thus winning Vladimir Putin the coveted 'NATO Salesman of the Year' award for 2022!
YazataMay 16, 2022 11:51 PM (This post was last modified: May 17, 2022 03:09 AM by Yazata.)
From the Ukrainian Deputy Minister of Defense -
53 seriously wounded Ukrainian soldiers were evacuated from Azovstal to hospitals in the separatist Donetsk People's Republic. Plus 211 Ukrainian soldiers were evacuated to POW camps in the separatist areas. They say that the rest remain in the tunnels. It isn't clear how many Ukrainian fighters remain.
I've seen estimates of ~600 who remain alive in Azovstal, including wounded, so there may be as many as 350 still there.
My speculation is that it might be the Azov fighters who remain, since the Russians consider them "nazis" and they might not be treated humanely as POWs.
"We hope that we will be able to save the lives of our guys," Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address. "There are severely wounded ones among them. They're receiving care. Ukraine needs Ukrainian heroes alive."
Edit - It does appear to be a surrender at Azovstal. Early Tuesday (Ukraine time) the Ukrainian General Staff announced:
"The Mariupol garrison has fulfilled its combat mission... The Supreme Military Command ordered the commanders of the units stationed at Azovstal to save the lives of their personnel."
(May 16, 2022 09:37 PM)Yazata Wrote: Reports today that Azovstal in Mariupol has finally surrendered to the Russians, thus ending their heroic defense.
And both Sweden and Finland have indicated their intention to join NATO, thus winning Vladimir Putin the coveted 'NATO Salesman of the Year' award for 2022!
Satire aside, I guess Mariupol is a victory for the Russians. Up until then, detaining an American female basketball star was their biggest prize.
Sounds as if Putin never considered losing the war. Does a guy like Putin take advice or does he enlist the aid of close advisors, people too afraid to tell him the war won’t be easily won and that bordering countries will eventually join NATO out of fear of being next Ukraine? Surely there had to be some head shakers who knew better. How much of this war is the dictator’s personality?
C CMay 17, 2022 02:09 PM (This post was last modified: May 17, 2022 02:32 PM by C C.)
(May 17, 2022 12:02 PM)Zinjanthropos Wrote: Satire aside, I guess Mariupol is a victory for the Russians. Up until then, detaining an American female basketball star was their biggest prize.
Sounds as if Putin never considered losing the war. Does a guy like Putin take advice or does he enlist the aid of close advisors, people too afraid to tell him the war won’t be easily won and that bordering countries will eventually join NATO out of fear of being next Ukraine? Surely there had to be some head shakers who knew better. How much of this war is the dictator’s personality?
Due to the Cold War decades of the USSR simply having its way with satellite states, there was little reason to believe that NATO-less European countries even have a guerrilla war backbone like Afghanistan (1979-1989), if that was quickly the only resistance remaining in one.
And the West didn't believe the Ukrainian military had any fortitude for long-term engagement, either, not deciding until late to appease Zelensky's criticism and demand for equipment and other help.
I guess we didn't take into account how 30+ years of independence -- of not being an abject footstool of a Marxist empire and parts at times belonging to neighboring governments -- could change a population's resolve to stay liberated. The spirit of Ukrainian nationalism actually goes back a few centuries, but the long numbness of vassal mentality was still a work in progress to shake off.
Much of Russia, and its former occupied countries, still have nostalgia for the USSR. Due to that hive-mind addiction to adult daycare (welfare/nanny state) that all Marxist offshoots leave engraved in the minds of their dependent sycophants. Which feeds into Putin's own longings for past glory and the humiliating stain stemming from the "Evil Empire's" collapse.
"Levada Center sociologist Karina Pipiya says [...] a strong majority of Russians 'regret that there used to be more social justice and that the government worked for the people and that it was better in terms of care for citizens and paternalistic expectations.'"
May 5, 2022 04:50 PM
(This post was last modified: May 6, 2022 03:09 AM by Yazata.)
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