A First Analysis of the Ukranian Offensive

In the Naval Gazing Discord, John Schilling shared this analysis of the Ukrainian offensive of the past few days, and I asked him if I could post it here:

OK, I've had a chance to go through my usual sources, and I'm beginning to get a coherent picture of what's going on in Kursk:

Map not endorsed by John, but ISW has been a standard source throughout the war

It’s pretty solidly confirmed that Ukraine is digging in around Sudzha, about 10 km inside Russia proper. This is the site of a major natural gas pipeline junction & terminal, but I don’t think that’s actually very important – if the Ukrainians wanted to shut that down, they could have done it with their own artillery pretty much any time since March 2022. There are also reports of Ukraine defending against counterattacks in Kurenevo, NW of Sudzha and about 25 km inside the border. Credible reports of Ukrainian forces in Molyivtina(sp?), 35 km north of the border, and credible but unconfirmed about 50 km NE along the R-200 highway – more than halfway to the city of Kursk.

Those last, if true, are at the tips of narrow salients and probably raids rather than attempts to clear and secure territory. There are many reports of Ukraine bypassing and isolating Russian strongpoints; I’m going to tentatively guess that they are clearing and securing most everything inside the Sudzha/Kurenevo perimeter, and just raiding outside that. But their raiding parties may be just 25 km from the Kursk nuclear power station, and 30 km from the E-105 highway from Kursk to Belgorod, and Russia still doesn’t seem to have a firm defense in place.

Ukraine has pretty clearly achieved tactical and operational surprise in this operation, which is an impressive achievement in a world of ubiquitous satellites, drones, and social media. I’m leaning towards the theory that Putin pulled a Stalin, looking at reports of German, er, Ukrainian troops massing along a weakly-defended border and doing nothing because invasion was literally unthinkable, he’s the guy who does invasions, and there’s no place for something like this in the Master Plan.

Ukraine appears to be bringing their A-team to this one, the 22nd and 116th mechanized brigades and 82nd air assault (really another mech brigade), among others. These aren’t the light infantry and motorized cavalry raiders we’ve seen before. On the Russian side, confirmed reports of the 488th Guards motor rifle regiment taking losses, but also T-62s and MT-LB technicals being brought up. So more of a “whatever’s available” stopgap defense rather than a coordinated counterattack. This does suggest that Ukraine is drawing relatively more of its own forces away from the Donbas than Russia is, so Ukraine seems to value this operation for its own sake rather than just to relieve pressure elsewhere.

There have been concurrent amphibious raids on the Kinburn Spit in southern Kherson, which may be intended to prevent Russia from redeploying from Kherson to Kursk. Also substantial drone strikes at the Lipetsk and Morozovsk airfields, fairly deep inside Russia, reportedly destroying stockpiled munitions. The Lipetsk strike came after the initial Kursk assault, and may have taken advantage of disrupted EW coverage – the Russians will eventually reconstitute that, not sure how long it will take. For now, Russia will be handicapped in using air power to block the Ukrainian advance.

The Ukrainians have been taking POWs by the hundreds, at least, and mostly conscripts. This matters, because conscript POWs are a much bigger deal in Russian civil society than misplaced “contract soldiers”. Hence Moscow generally keeping the conscripts inside Russia and pushing the contract regulars into Ukraine. A hefty batch of conscript POWs could be a substantial bargaining chip in, e.g., a future prisoner exchange.

How logistically sustainable all this is, is an open question. I expect Ukraine can keep brigades just over the border in Sudzha supplied almost as well as they can the brigades playing defense in the Donbas, but that problem gets exponentially harder the deeper they advance into Russia. One key indicator will be any attempt to repair rail links across the border and establish Sudzha as a railhead.

Ukraine has been using Marders on Russian soil, and HIMARS in more than a counterbattery role, which I think would have been a no-no a few months ago, but the US and NATO are now apparently OK with that and the US has explicitly said so. Ukraine is reportedly asking permission to use ATACMs in support of this offensive, but hasn’t done so yet. No F-16s, Leopards, or Abrams that anyone has seen. Which is a pity, because I really want the Second Battle of Kursk to involve M1A2s going up against hastily-demothballized T-34/85s.

Suggests that there’s a political dimension to this, and it may not be a coincidence that this comes about a month after Biden dropped his bid for a second term. Possibly Biden is trying to lock in his legacy with a foreign-policy win, taking the gloves off Ukraine, or possibly Biden has just lost interest in the whole thing and his national security team is responsible for the new posture. I’m skeptical of the latter, but who knows. On the Ukrainian side, Zelenskyy et al may feel they need a game-changing victory before November, lest the next POTUS decide to quietly forget about Ukraine.

Also on the political dimension, there’s been a lot of pressure on the Western side to treat the conflict as an irredeemable stalemate and push for a ceasefire along current lines. And increasingly rumors that Russia was pushing for the same thing, at least for now. Redefining “current lines” to include a big chunk of Russian territory under Ukrainian control, pretty much takes that off the table. And if there’s going to be a ceasefire with exchange of territory, the Schelling point is pretty obviously “all of yours for all of ours, back to prewar borders”, though I think 2022 borders are more realistic than 2014 in that regard.

Also also on the political front, the “Oh noes, we can’t have Russia lose this war or they’ll throw a nuclear temper tantrum and kill us all!” faction has taken a big hit. A Moscow that demonstrably won’t go nuclear against an invading army taking and holding significant territory inside Russia, is a Moscow that is highly unlikely to go nuclear just because it was forced out of the Donbas. That wasn’t absolutely knowable in advance, which makes this a particularly ballsy move for Kyiv, but it looks like a winning play now.

As for why the Ukrainians are doing all of this, several possible concrete motives have been alluded to above. But this is war, and war is more than a concrete physical exercise. This offensive changes the narrative, from “slow grinding Ukrainian defeat” to “anything can happen”. And the narrative matters. Morale, definitely matters, and this is going to be a big boost on the Ukrainian side as well as a downer in Russia.