Posted on 10/04/2022 6:53:43 AM PDT by marcusmaximus
Reasons for the retreat near Kherson. Of the units I am acquainted with, almost all of them reached out, losses are small. The men fought like lions, but this time fortune was not in their favor.
The reasons I see are:
1. No unit rotation. Units of the 126th Brigade have been fighting since March. Soldiers would go on leave for five days at best. Seven months on the front line without rotation. Constant battles, wounds, experienced and seasoned men were bombarded for seven months in a row.
End of August, these same guys knocked out the AFU’s 128th Transcarpathian brigade so badly that they declared mourning. Our men were left at their positions. The Ukrainians rotated out the 128th, brought in additional tank units and a month later knocked us out of our positions.
Miracles do not happen, no matter how heroic our soldiers may be, if the village is defended by 15 people, and the enemy hammers them with attacks and artillery fire for seven months in a row, sooner or later the unit will lose combat effectiveness.
2. Judging by the nature of the losses, the enemy used a tactic of wedging themselves between our strongpoints. Wildly short on infantry, ours sat at the strongholds, i.e. in the villages and plantations.
After months of reconnaissance, the enemy found places to infiltrate between the strongholds. Then came the insertion of mobile units into the gaps that were wedged open.
Our troops were severely strained, the strongpoints held, but the mobile reserves needed to stop the breakthroughs either did not exist, or were insufficient.
The strongholds would stay intact, but instantly, in the first few hours, would find themselves surrounded, fight until they ran out of ammunition and break out under fire.
By the way, the Ukrainians would have so little strength that they weren't even really trying to catch the encircled men, most of them made it back to us.
Weather was bad, neither side used artillery. So it's logical to suppose if we had some BTGs equipped with heavy copters, capable of seeing several kms, the breakthrough would have been stopped. But I have no info that the tankers fought to the last man, please excuse me if so.
3. Guys from the field report en masse that our tactical insignia, i.e. Z and V, was applied to enemy equipment, causing confusion in the first hours of the battle as the front collapsed.
If this is true, it means the enemy has an American network-centric battle management system, where all units on the battlefield are net-linked and marked on computers, even at company level, let alone at battalion-regiment level.
Thus, even a company sergeant in a Humvee, BMP, or T-64 can see on the screen where his own are and where the others are, and he doesn't care what marks are on the armor.
If this is case, then that's very bad news, since that's a qualitatively new level of troop control, and our retreat would be a consequence of losing parity.
“Losses are small?”
There sure were a lot of “losses” found littered along the road stinking up the landscape after the liberation of Lyman.
Putin “remains a brilliant strategist.”
Sounds like the Russians really are outmatched by Ukraine due to Western support. If they are decisively defeated in the field, what will Russia do next?
In terms of military theory, Ukraine is so far inside Russia's OODA loop that the Russians are combat ineffective on anything above the company level. Hit them head-on, and they can still fight. But that's why Ukraine generally isn't doing that.
Been saying this for almost a month now, but the lack of Russian armored counter attacks is a gigantic red flag to those rooting for a Russian victory. As this source rightly pointed out, these type of Ukrainian advances would be vulnerable to strong armored counter attacks. But the Russians simply aren't capable of mounting them.
He’s talking about Kherson in this report. Not Lyman.
Well, it means Ukrainian forces are "secretly" under NATO command and control - which Russia should have anticipated once the war dragged on.
The inability to fight in bad weather is what sank the Moskva. We’ve discovered a weakness.
True that... just putting to the lie to the Russians’ standard “losses were small.”
Losses WILL be big for the Russians at Putin’s upcoming last stand at Nova Kakhovka.
I think in reference to what is happening in Kherson, that is probably correct to this point. It appears the Russian units are fleeing quickly enough that they're not going to get caught in the same kind of cauldron in which they've been caught multiple times in the east.
The Great Reset crowd that wants to exterminate 90% of the global population is winning!
Yay!
Not trying to catch those that are encircled is not necessarily an indication of little strength. It is much more likely a case of "haul-ass and bypass". That is typical of mobile warfare!
Taking Nova Kakhovka will open the floodgates, hopefully!
It’s been almost entirely downhill for Russia militarily since HIMARS started taking out Russian ammo dumps, HQ, etc. Anything close to an even fight reveals the Russian military for what it is: corrupt and fake.
I don’t think the Ukrainians have a network-centric battle management system. They are still using mostly Soviet equipment and that has not been adapted for western battle management systems yet. But if they have been indoctrinated to haul ass and bypass the effects could be about the same to a much more primitive military system.
Yep.. they're oh-so-formidible when looting homes, killing old people and raping children. Face up to them with equal force and they run like the chickensh*ts they are.
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