Insane in the Ukraine
- Mongrel
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Re: Insane in the Ukraine
Not much today, the only real update being that the Ukrainian counterattack in the south was revealed to be more a spoiling effort rather than a large scale operation. Instead, the Ukrainians are carrying out mobile attacks to force the Russians to defend themselves instead of allowing them to freely continue to construct defensive works. While the intention is not yet to capture territory, the Ukrainians did recapture a number of villages yesterday and any Russian attempts to recapture these have been very feeble.
Due to the very low quality of Russian troops stationed in the southwest, there may also be the hope that the obligation to actively defend themselves may pull Russians from elsewhere to reinforce these defences.
Due to the very low quality of Russian troops stationed in the southwest, there may also be the hope that the obligation to actively defend themselves may pull Russians from elsewhere to reinforce these defences.

- Mongrel
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Re: Insane in the Ukraine
Based Javelin Help Desk

- Mongrel
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Re: Insane in the Ukraine
"Hey that's MY couch, you son of a bitch!"

- Mongrel
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Re: Insane in the Ukraine
As far as general updates go ("General Update? Never heard of him."), it's the same grindy attritional stuff in the east. It's still probable that the Ukrainians will abandon Sverodonetsk if need be, since it's the only city east of the the Siversky Donetsk river (which is the same one the Russians had... trouble crossing a while back) and they can fall back on that river as their main defensive line in the east, but for the time being they're fighting over the city as much as they can to bleed the Russians, while trying to keep Ukrainian losses down.
Down south, the Ukrainians haven't full on committed to a large-scale counter-offensive towards Kherson, but their attempts to fuck with the Russians are having quite a bit of success, liberating a bunch of villages and pushing the Russians entirely back across a river along that front. Control of that area also puts the Ukrainians less than a kilometre away from a major highway the Russians are using for their logistics in that area.
The threat of partisan activity seems to really be growing. The Russians have been observed stationing groups of troops in otherwise weird locations way behind the lines in the east and have cut off all telecommunications service in the Kherson region to try and suppress partisan activity which is also threatening the Russians in the south. A lot of claimed Russian administration of occupied areas basically only exists on paper, so substantial organized partisan activity is a huge danger which clearly terrifies any occupation authorities, whose only solution is to try and massacre their way out of the problem.
Apart from that, I'm just gonna post this section of the June 2 ISW daily report verbatim.
Note that video appeals directly to Putin by desperate press-ganged Donbas militiamen is starting to become A Thing. Unfortunately, as I mentioned before, the Kremlin doesn't have to mark DNR deaths on any of its cost sheets, so I doubt Putin would have a problem with exterminating every man woman and child in the DNR if it brought him even a tiny measure of victory. To paraphrase Patrick McGoohan as Longshanks "Send in the Donbas militias. They cost nothing!"
Oh and Russian military bloggers and even some big TV chyrons are flipping their shit over this. They'd be happy to kill every Ukrainian too, but the virtually unprecedented level of incompetence being shown by the Russian army (even by the standards of the Russian army...), is making them froth at the mouth.
Down south, the Ukrainians haven't full on committed to a large-scale counter-offensive towards Kherson, but their attempts to fuck with the Russians are having quite a bit of success, liberating a bunch of villages and pushing the Russians entirely back across a river along that front. Control of that area also puts the Ukrainians less than a kilometre away from a major highway the Russians are using for their logistics in that area.
The threat of partisan activity seems to really be growing. The Russians have been observed stationing groups of troops in otherwise weird locations way behind the lines in the east and have cut off all telecommunications service in the Kherson region to try and suppress partisan activity which is also threatening the Russians in the south. A lot of claimed Russian administration of occupied areas basically only exists on paper, so substantial organized partisan activity is a huge danger which clearly terrifies any occupation authorities, whose only solution is to try and massacre their way out of the problem.
Apart from that, I'm just gonna post this section of the June 2 ISW daily report verbatim.
Russian military leadership continues to experience complications with sufficient force generation and maintaining the morale of mobilized personnel. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that the Donetsk People’s Republic’s (DNR) 1st Army Corps, under Russia’s 8th Combined Arms Army, is conducting forced mobilization in occupied areas of Donetsk Oblast.[2]
Russian forced mobilization is highly unlikely to generate meaningful combat power and will exacerbate low morale and poor discipline in Russian and proxy units. The 113th Regiment of the DNR posted a video appeal to Russian President Vladimir Putin on June 2 wherein forcibly-mobilized soldiers complain they have spent the entire war on the frontline in Kherson without food or medicine, and that mobilization committees did not conduct requisite medical screenings and admitted individuals whose medical conditions should have disqualified them from service.[3] Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate additionally released an intercepted phone conversation wherein DNR soldiers similarly complained that physically unfit individuals were forced into service and that mobilized units are experiencing mass drunkenness and general disorder.[4]
Russian forces are additionally struggling to successfully rotate servicemen in and out of combat. Spokesperson for the Odesa Military Administration Maksym Marchenko stated that 30 to 40% of Russian personnel that rotated out of Ukraine refused to return, forcing Russian commanders to send unprepared and unmotivated units back into combat.[5] This is consistent with complaints made by DNR servicemen that rotation practices are contributing to poor morale and dissatisfaction within units that have been forcibly mobilized.[6]
Note that video appeals directly to Putin by desperate press-ganged Donbas militiamen is starting to become A Thing. Unfortunately, as I mentioned before, the Kremlin doesn't have to mark DNR deaths on any of its cost sheets, so I doubt Putin would have a problem with exterminating every man woman and child in the DNR if it brought him even a tiny measure of victory. To paraphrase Patrick McGoohan as Longshanks "Send in the Donbas militias. They cost nothing!"
Oh and Russian military bloggers and even some big TV chyrons are flipping their shit over this. They'd be happy to kill every Ukrainian too, but the virtually unprecedented level of incompetence being shown by the Russian army (even by the standards of the Russian army...), is making them froth at the mouth.

- Mongrel
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Re: Insane in the Ukraine
Interactive map's gone up, using resources from a half-dozen major observing military institutes & orgs. Updates daily: https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/36 ... 1cf64bd375
Russian milbloggers are howling with rage because supposedly that nearly the entire Russian 5th Combined Arms Army has been destroyed so completely due to poor support while forest-fighting in areas around Izyum, that it may have fewer than 100 active personnel left ALL TOLD. An entire ARMY. Obviously not all yesterday or even this week, but still crazy.
Russian forces are increasingly providing basically no medical care to front line troops. You saw the 70's-era First Aid kits a while-back, well, only regular army infantry units even get those (or training to use them). It's pure barbarism. Nobody deserves that, even the Russians. Considering the main source of replacement Russian manpower right now is press-ganged Donbas residents, which we know are increasingly older men or those who aren't really physically capable of military service, and who also absolutely get sweet fuck all equipment, this is a problem which is only going to get worse. Unsurprisingly, this is also contributing heavily to increasing refusals to fight, by both Donbas conscripts and the shredded remains of regular Russian formations.
Meanwhile Kadryov (who has somehow been allowed to speak again, or is just doing so anyway, Putin be damned) and Shoigu announced they had a Great Plan to speed up progress on the front lines. Can't wait to see what sort of comedy that produces, since manpower constraints have now completely halted all Russian offensive operations outside the assault on Sverodonetsk.
That's right. As of the past 2-3 days, all Russian forces along the entire 1000 km front line are now only defending, or digging in by creating fortifications. Their only offensive tool left is the heavy shelling but that's mainly spent to try and disrupt Ukrainian counterattack planning and organization.
Russian milbloggers are howling with rage because supposedly that nearly the entire Russian 5th Combined Arms Army has been destroyed so completely due to poor support while forest-fighting in areas around Izyum, that it may have fewer than 100 active personnel left ALL TOLD. An entire ARMY. Obviously not all yesterday or even this week, but still crazy.
Russian forces are increasingly providing basically no medical care to front line troops. You saw the 70's-era First Aid kits a while-back, well, only regular army infantry units even get those (or training to use them). It's pure barbarism. Nobody deserves that, even the Russians. Considering the main source of replacement Russian manpower right now is press-ganged Donbas residents, which we know are increasingly older men or those who aren't really physically capable of military service, and who also absolutely get sweet fuck all equipment, this is a problem which is only going to get worse. Unsurprisingly, this is also contributing heavily to increasing refusals to fight, by both Donbas conscripts and the shredded remains of regular Russian formations.
Meanwhile Kadryov (who has somehow been allowed to speak again, or is just doing so anyway, Putin be damned) and Shoigu announced they had a Great Plan to speed up progress on the front lines. Can't wait to see what sort of comedy that produces, since manpower constraints have now completely halted all Russian offensive operations outside the assault on Sverodonetsk.
That's right. As of the past 2-3 days, all Russian forces along the entire 1000 km front line are now only defending, or digging in by creating fortifications. Their only offensive tool left is the heavy shelling but that's mainly spent to try and disrupt Ukrainian counterattack planning and organization.

- Mongrel
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Re: Insane in the Ukraine
So with 70% of Severodonetsk captured on Friday, including the city centre, the Russian forces there started to believe the hype and uh... weren't prepared for a Ukrainian counterattack at all.
Ukrainian forces did indeed counterattack and between yesterday and today have recaptured most of the city. Russian losses were particularly high among Chechen units who were particularly convinced of their own awesomeness. Unclear if these were the newer Chechen recruits or if any of the more experienced and hardened Chechen units were among the ones who were caught with their pants down. I guess if anyone ever gets to ask Kadryov about it, just watch to see what colour his face changes to.
One wonders if last week's rumblings by the Ukrainian general staff that they might withdraw from the city to avoid encirclement were just them setting expectations low or active disinformation (or both).
Anyway, not only are the Ukrainians actually holding or possibly even winning outright in the battle which Russia has prioritized at the expense of literally everything else in this war, Ukrainian counterattacks are growing and gaining momentum in both the south towards Kherson, but also north, resuming the eastward push from Kharkiv.
Oh and partisan activity is bad enough in Kherson Oblast that the Russian occupation authorities have begun wearing bulletproof vests and driving only in armored vehicles.
Ukrainian forces did indeed counterattack and between yesterday and today have recaptured most of the city. Russian losses were particularly high among Chechen units who were particularly convinced of their own awesomeness. Unclear if these were the newer Chechen recruits or if any of the more experienced and hardened Chechen units were among the ones who were caught with their pants down. I guess if anyone ever gets to ask Kadryov about it, just watch to see what colour his face changes to.
One wonders if last week's rumblings by the Ukrainian general staff that they might withdraw from the city to avoid encirclement were just them setting expectations low or active disinformation (or both).
Anyway, not only are the Ukrainians actually holding or possibly even winning outright in the battle which Russia has prioritized at the expense of literally everything else in this war, Ukrainian counterattacks are growing and gaining momentum in both the south towards Kherson, but also north, resuming the eastward push from Kharkiv.
Oh and partisan activity is bad enough in Kherson Oblast that the Russian occupation authorities have begun wearing bulletproof vests and driving only in armored vehicles.

Re: Insane in the Ukraine
I don't know anything about military history or practice, but losing a city you had mostly captured feels like a real "whoopsie doo" to me.
- Mongrel
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Re: Insane in the Ukraine
I mean, there's been plenty of real grinding nasty urban battles in history, where a city (or parts of one) repeatedly changes hands over the course of a battle or war - WWII was full of these.
But the Russians have been putting EVERYTHING they have into taking the city, absolutely bleeding themselves white to capture the 70% they managed to get, and then Ukraine almost casually just retakes almost the entire city (the Russians remain in only northeast outskirts of town) in barely two days. I can't imagine the Russians are gonna be all pumped up after this.
All this while Ukraine has began serious pushback on almost every other relevant front. If we're lucky, June 4th might just have marked the biggest turning point of the entire war.
But the Russians have been putting EVERYTHING they have into taking the city, absolutely bleeding themselves white to capture the 70% they managed to get, and then Ukraine almost casually just retakes almost the entire city (the Russians remain in only northeast outskirts of town) in barely two days. I can't imagine the Russians are gonna be all pumped up after this.
All this while Ukraine has began serious pushback on almost every other relevant front. If we're lucky, June 4th might just have marked the biggest turning point of the entire war.

- Mongrel
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Re: Insane in the Ukraine
Oh and another Russian general got whacked, lol. Guess we were due, LMAO.
This one was even named Kutuzov! AHAHAHA
EDIT:
This one was even named Kutuzov! AHAHAHA
EDIT:
Reminder that the first Civil War was extremely weird by world standards in that anyone who could roll up with fifty guys and twenty bucks could get a brevet promotion to General.
