Free Republic

There are just two roads out of Bakhmut for Ukrainian troops. Russian forces are within rocket range of both of them. And that means that, after nine months of brutal fighting, the battle for Bakhmut is entering what could be its decisive phase. In the coming hours or days, it’s possible one of two things will happen. The Russians advance so close to the two roads that the Ukrainians retreat in order to avoid encirclement. Or the Ukrainians counterattack and push back the Russians. The former would resolve the long, awful fight over Bakhmut. The latter would prolong it. In...

Russia’s widely-anticipated winter offensive has begun. Aiming to extend its control over eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region, Russian troops are attacking north and south of Donetsk city. In the northern sector, around the city of Bakhmut, the Russians slowly are advancing—albeit at staggering cost. In the south, around Vuhledar, the Russians’ losses are just as steep—but they’ve made no clear gains that could justify the casualties. Vuhledar is turning into a meatgrinder for the Russian army, with enormous implications for the wider offensive. The latest Russian attack on Vuhledar—a town with a pre-war population of just 14,000 that lies a mile...

As the Russian army barreled toward Kyiv in the early days of Russia's wider war on Ukraine last February, the call went out for volunteers in the besieged capital city. These volunteers—thousands of them—formed a new territorial-defense unit. A year later, that unit—the 241st Territorial Defense Brigade—is in the thick of the fighting in what is, at present, the bloodiest sector of the wider war. The snowy hills and ruined city blocks in and around Bakhmut, 30 miles north of Donetsk, the seat of the separatist Donetsk People’s Republic in eastern Ukraine's Donbas region. The Russian army and its allies...

he United Kingdom isn’t just sending Ukraine a small batch of surplus Challenger 2 tanks. It’s planning to donate hundreds of armored vehicles and self-propelled howitzers. Enough equipment for a whole brigade. But the Russian government knows this—and it’s planning to spoil the Ukrainian offensive with an offensive of its own.

In the space of a few days this week, France, the United States and Germany all announced they would donate to Ukraine powerful armored vehicles: French AMX-10RC scout vehicles, American M-2 infantry fighting vehicles and German Marder IFVs. So which of Ukraine’s allies is going to be the first to pledge Leopard 2 tanks? There are several candidates, and it might be only a matter of time—and not much time—before one of them opens up its arsenals and turns the engines of long-stored, surplus Leopards.

The first video has appeared online depicting the Ukrainian army’s ex-Slovenian M-55S tanks. The video depicts what appears to be a four-person M-55S crew training on its new-old vehicle. The thick mud—a sticky hallmark of Ukraine’s wet early winter—might confirm the video is recent. The M-55S despite its age could represent a glimpse at the Ukrainian army’s tank future. It’s all about the gun. The M-55S is a deeply modernized Soviet T-55, a tank type that first entered service in the late 1950s. In the 1990s, the Slovenian army paid Israeli firm Elbit and STO RAVNE in Slovenia to modify...

The Ukrainian army’s newest howitzers also are among its oldest. On Sunday, the first video appeared online depicting ex-Lithuanian M101 howitzers in front-line use by Ukrainian forces, apparently somewhere in eastern Ukraine. The 105-millimeter M101 was the standard light howitzer for U.S. and allied forces ... in World War II. But the design’s age belies its effectiveness. The 2.5-ton M101 is a classic—an artillery piece that nearly perfectly balances weight, range and accuracy. The M101 was a battle-winner 80 years ago. In the hands of experienced, motivated gunners, it still can win battles today. Especially as those gunners combine the...

The Ukrainian army has deployed some of its best brigades to eastern Ukraine, including the 92nd and 93rd Mechanized Brigades and the 1st Presidential Brigade. But these elite Ukrainian formations might not be the biggest killer of Russian troops in the east. Under-trained, under-supplied and ambivalently led, Russians in the region are freezing to death by the dozen. Shocking videos that have circulated online in recent weeks tell a tragic story. The videos, shot by the Ukrainian brigades’ hovering drones, depict Russians in the late stages of hypothermia, so cold and sick that they barely react when the drones drop...

In nine months of brutal fighting, the army of the pro-Russian Donetsk People’s Republic in eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region has buried or sent to the hospital as many men as it had in its entire pre-war army. The separatist DPR began Russia’s wider war on Ukraine in February with around 20,000 men in six light infantry brigades. By November, the army had lost 3,746 killed in action and 15,794 wounded in action, according to the DPR’s ombudsman. That’s 19,540 KIAs or WIAs. While many of the wounded undoubtedly returned to front-line service, many didn’t. And yes, the DPR army has...

The Russian air force had deployed three times as many fighters and attack planes as the Ukrainian air force had in its entire inventory. Ukraine’s air defenses were disorganized and, in the case of certain key long-range radars, sitting out in the open where the Russians easily could target them. The Russians had a firepower advantage. The Ukrainians had the same advantages every defender possesses over an invader: motivation, simpler logistics, familiar terrain. Either side might’ve prevailed—the Russians by dominating the air, the Ukrainians by preventing the Russians from dominating the air. We know how it turned out. The Russian...

Six years ago, the Russian navy formed a new army corps whose job it would be to defend Kaliningrad, Russia’s geographically separate outpost on the Baltic Sea between Poland and Lithuania. This year, when the war in Ukraine began to go badly for Russia, the Kremlin yanked the 11th Army Corps from Kaliningrad and sent it into Ukraine. Where the Ukrainian army quickly destroyed it. The formation, deployment and destruction of the 11th Army Corps tell a story that’s bigger than the tragic tale of Russia’s war in Ukraine. The corps, sandwiched between two NATO countries along a strategic sea,...

Three weeks ago, the Ukrainian army’s northeastern counteroffensive dismantled one of the Russian army’s elite units: the 1st Guards Tank Army. Now the same counteroffensive reportedly has wrecked a new motorized infantry division the Kremlin stood up a few years ago in order to help protect the 1st GTA. After suffering steep losses around Bakhmut in recent days, it’s possible the 144th Guards Motor Rifle Division no longer is combat-effective. These losses are unsustainable for the Russian army—and explain why the Kremlin is willing to risk widespread unrest as it forcibly drafts 300,000 men and speeds them to the Ukrainian...

The Kremlin this summer scrambled to form a new army corps, seeking replacements for 80,000 troops injured or killed in Ukraine and 5,000 wrecked or captured vehicles. ...As Russian casualties exceeded 50,000 this spring, the Kremlin began scraping together fresh battalions by raiding the training and garrison establishment of existing brigades. At the same time, the army announced an initiative to form scores of new regional volunteer battalions—and even offered elevated salaries of up to $5,000 a month. This should come as no surprise. The recruitment drive behind the 3rd AC collided with Russia’s unhappy demographics and conscription practices. Roughly...

May 27 was a dark day for Ukraine. That was the day Lyman, the last free town north of the Donets River in eastern Ukraine’s Donbas River, finally fell to Russian forces. Capturing Lyman helped the Russian army to consolidate its position in Donbas and secure supply lines across the region. Lyman was a domino. As it fell, it knocked down Severodonetsk, the last free city east of the Donets. And as Severodonetsk fell, it toppled Lysychansk, its twin city on the opposite side of the river. Nearly four months later, the dominos are falling in the opposite direction. A...

The Ukrainian army’s counteroffensive around the city of Kharkiv in northeastern Ukraine starting on Sept. 6 destroyed half of the best tank division in the best tank army in the Russian armed forces. A hundred wrecked or captured tanks in a hundred furious hours. That’s how much destruction the Ukrainians inflicted on the Russian 4th Guards Tank Division, part of the elite 1st Guards Tank Army, the Russian army’s best armor formation. Now the 1st GTA is retreating north in order to preserve what remains of its front-line divisions. But the damage the tank army has suffered could have lasting...

The Russian army is losing at least a battalion’s worth of vehicles and men daily as twin Ukrainian counteroffensives roll back Russian territorial gains in eastern and southern Ukraine. That’s hundreds of casualties and scores of vehicle write-offs every day. These losses catastrophic for Russia. Russian army barely was sustaining a little over 100 under-strength battalions in Ukraine before Kyiv’s forces counterattacked in south on Aug. 30 and in the east eight days later. In under two weeks of brutal fighting, the Ukrainians have destroyed, badly damaged or captured 1,200 Russian tanks, fighting vehicles, trucks, helicopters, warplanes and drones, according...

Photos that appeared online over the weekend, depicting Russian army armored vehicles on trains rolling out of the army training base Mulino, 200 miles east of Moscow, are a potentially ominous sign. The Russian army’s newest grouping, the 3rd Army Corps, is on the move–toward eastern Ukraine. The 3rd Army Corps is the first big new formation to take shape as a result of the Kremlin’s urgent initiative, beginning this summer, to recruit new soldiers and stand up new units in order to replace the tens of thousands of troops it has lost in the six months since it widened...

Russian air-defense troops just shot down one of the most sophisticated warplanes involved in Russia’s wider war in Ukraine. One problem. It was a Russian warplane. A brand-new Sukhoi Su-34M fighter-bomber. Russian propagandist Yevgeny Poddubny apparently captured on video the Sunday shoot-down over the city of Alchevsk in Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine. “Last night, the air-defense crew of the allied forces destroyed a target in the sky over Alchevsk,” Poddubny wrote Monday. “The nature of the target is not clear. The burning ball fell to the ground for more than a minute.” A video of the wreckage confirmed the plane’s identity:...

Ukraine continues to escalate its bombardment of Russian supply lines in southern Ukraine. But it might not matter that much in the end. Emphasis on might. Before dawn on Sunday, Ukrainian forces—perhaps a battery of American-made High-Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems—reportedly struck a 40-car train carrying ammunition from supply dumps in occupied Crimea to Russian forces in Kherson Oblast. The train exploded, killing as many as 80 Russians. Video reportedly depicting the blaze circulated online on Wednesday. The artillery raid in Brylivka, 20 miles southeast of Kherson, reportedly wrecked the train and the rails. It was the fourth time the Ukrainians...

The latest subvariant of the novel coronavirus to become dominant in Europe, the United States, and other places is also, in many ways, the worst so far. The BA.5 subvariant of the basic Omicron variant appears to be more contagious than any previous form of the virus. It’s apparently better at dodging our antibodies, too - meaning it might be more likely to cause breakthrough and repeat infections. Vaccines and boosters are still the best defense. There are even Omicron-specific booster jabs in development that, in coming months, could make the best vaccines more effective against BA.5 and its genetic...