We’ll keep it brief today, just down to the brass tacks of ongoing on-the-ground events. In accordance with information we’ve been reporting for many months about stirrings in the north, Russia has finally launched an assault on the Kharkov region. But it’s important to clear up a lot of misconceptions about the objectives.
I wonder why would someone pose as Russian without knowing Russian language? Is it trolling? Is there some psy op at play? "Za pobiedu!", not "Za pobieda!". Any Russian speaking person would know how correctly to use cases. And you do not.
The problem is not with the correct or incorrect Romanization (a whole lot of incrorecct ones should still be understandable to a Russian). The problem is that he romanized the word in an incorrect case. It is as apparent as if I wrote "me is eating" and then said that I am a native English speaker. Any child would choose a correct case. Which shows that he has no knowledge of Russian, yet for some reasons posts "our soldiers".
I challenge a bit your 'any child' assertion when I think back on my daughters, though. Getting them off of 'brung' and back to 'brought', e.g. "I brung my lunch" was a challenge, even in the early adult years.
We are seeing either an elaborate maskirovka or what will be the start of the liberation of Kharkov.
Ukraine is going to be in an even worse situation. They simply do not have the trained military manpower to defend all of the fronts that Russia could put pressure on. If forced to put troops into Kharkov for a last ditch, desperate defense, then the Russians will simply advance somewhere else.
This is the consequences of the Ukrainian doctrine of holding every last square kilometres of ground leads to - an accelerated defeat, where men were lost on ill-advised orders to hold at all costs and in equally ill-advised offensives.
I wonder how the Western media is going to try to spin this. At this point, trying to lie to their viewers is going to be harder and harder. Everything they did, from lying to Gorbachev on NATO expansion, the Maidan Coup, signing Minsk in bad faith, and the Istanbul negotiations in March 2022 leads to this. A catastrophic strategic loss for the West due to the dishonesty and greed of their own elites. The goal of getting another Yeltsin to help them loot and ultimately Balkanize Russia has instead rallied the Russian people, exposing the weak Western military.
They've already started spinning it that Kharkiv will be the "reverse Stalingrad", where Russia will expend millions of lives assaulting a city that will never fall.
Unlikely. The AFU will cut off all supplies then give 'em the Mariupol treatment until there's annihilation or capitulation. Sickening... but that's what war looks like. Pretty medieval when you think about it.
Kharkov is a russian city only guys who will fight come from somewhere else in Ukraine as we can see at the border area they don't even fight and surrender en masse it will only increase. Don't forget that ukranians live under gestapo sbu rules 24/7, many are afraid or to be kidnapped for mobi for even to be jailed or killed.
To me, it seems the best tactic right now is to shift the pressure point around , forcing reserves - especially artillery and air defense - to move around and get attrited by long range fires. Do that for a month or two, and push for real.
At Stalingrad, once they had stabilized the defense, Zhukov launched a massive counterattack through the poorly defended northern flank where the Italian and Hungarian divisions were.
At Kursk, Zhukov had 90km depth in his defensive lines. Minefields, anti-tank ditches, minefields, anti-tank ditches, over and over. All meant to slow the blitzkrieg, bog down the armor, and rain artillery on the Germans.
It’s unbelievable: they went from Stalingrad—the greatest “all in” fight in history and six months later withstood the Germans at Kursk—on the very short list of the greatest battles in the history of the world.
Both were idiocy on the German part. Their forces were too weak for being so far forward in Stalingrad, and the way to capture a city along the west bank of a river was to take the east bank, cut it off and let it wither on the vine, which they knew they were too weak for. So therefore they never attempted to do it. Direct violation of Clausewitz - you gun for the enemy's army or at the very least critical resources, not territory. Stalingrad was worthless.
Kursk was proposed as a spoiling attack in the early spring. Instead of being given permission to bite off the salient in a quick operation while it remained unfortified, the Germans insisted on telegraphing their intentions, amassing larger forces and permitting Zhukov to prep for the attack. Hitler's quote was "It must not fail". Of course it was going to fail - it was the opposite of surprise. And if you are going to use armor for an attack in a WWII context, you need to send the armor in a direction where it can break out and exploit, disrupting logistics and threatening encirclement. Not just to bull through fortified defensive positions. Prokhorovka was the definition of failure, despite the German tactical advantages.
None of this takes away from Zhukov's correct handling of the situation in both cases, but the Germans offered him victory on a silver platter and he took it. As for what they might have done otherwise, pursuit of the Baku offensive was the correct and only path to any kind of successful outcome to the 1942 campaign. Even that would have resulted in a strung out southern front, but at least they'd have gotten something for their effort, petroleum. In 1943, pulling back to a more reasonable defensive line before being forced there might have been wise. Even more wise would have been negotiations. They were already destined to lose.
Maybe Zelenski sees it as a counter-offensive. First Russia occupies it, Ukraine did counter-offensive and Russians pulled back. Now Russians doing a new counter-offensive, something like that.
I don't think they will try to capture Kharkov. Look at all previous settlements en towns, they have been raised to the ground. I can't see them fighting from building to building in Kharkov, that city is too large and casualties will be sky high. Trying to encircle might be better. But keep grinding them down will remain the current strategy and soon or later there will be a breakthrough that can liberate a very large area. It only gets worse for Ukraine, the casualties are stacking up and there's no new mobilisation. Have they giving up and just trying to pock a few billions more before defeat?
We saw back in February the video footage of bumper-to-bumper one-way traffic out of Kharkiv, even in some cases 'reversing' a lane of the normally eastbound side of the double highway in order to push west, civilians fleeing
Hundred of thousands of people from Kharkov city and oblast are in Russia many since feb march 22. Maybe they should take part as well for the liberation of their city but many will never come back they have a better life in Russia, full employment, much higher salaries and social benefits etc...can speak russian freely and move where they want including overseas in holidays, borders are not closed, no gestapo.
Kharkov alike Odessa expects some kind of liberation. Partisans already pin point targets to the RF. I’m very skeptical of a door to door Fallujah like combat if they enter the inner city.
Exactly. Russia sees Odessa as a Russian city, for good reason, and won't employ scorched-earth tactics there (literally, in the case of Fallujah, lest we forget).
Thank you simplicius for this update detail and maps - helpful for clarity. Interesting that it's motorised not mechanised. Putin stays in SMO constraints while closing post Crocus Center backdoor. Can this be seen as extending the contact line? - further stretching depleted assets - and forcing some pieces to be moved around aiding aerial spotters? My military knowledge bike has training wheels!
I think flexibility would be high in their requirements list. Committing loads of troops to a static op (like a siege) would limit their options. Unless their is a large contingent of partisans embedded in the city.
Their strategic aims seem to be a) keep enough force in reserve to counter any NATO ambition in the Baltics or Poland ala Steadfast Offender or the Arctic wargames in the new NATO acquisitions. b) keep upping the force level on the current LOC and c) expand the frontline where logistics are available.
For a modern seige no need for very many static soldiers, just a LOC further into Ukraine, plus control of access routes, what the RF would be doing anyway if they were concerned to advance LOC
OK, so scouts found out that there is no one on the border and they were able to capture some villages with only light vehicles. This proves that entire Belgorod "affair" was a distraction, if you can call a series of terrorist attacks a distraction.
IMO Russia should qualify this as a counter-terrorist operation, not as a special military operation.
Except NATO is supplying terrorists with long-range weapons.
The most interesting time are ahead! If RF can get into Vovchansk after that their forces close the Kupiansk corridor then we have a giant "kessel" with UF trapped behind that Donets-reservoir. If then RF, manage to take Chasiv Yar and get through to Konstantinovka and further to Kramatorsk...wow!
I cant imagine Russians are so ignorant that they try to take Charkov head on. Better to let it fall with forces coming from the direction of the under-belly, Chuguyev. If they want a pincer then an attack from the direction of Sumy or nearer, Grayvoron, is probable. There are not much roads and logistic lines of communication on the Russian side so there are a limited set of options.
Yes, that's the most straightforward line, and is more or less necessary to eventually recover territory RF has declared actual interest in, I.e. back down into Izyum/Slavyansk from the North, which for whatever reason seems to be the favorable direction
Great article. Death by a thousand cuts has had its day I believe. Russia has severly weakened the UAF now and it's time to have the biggest battle of the war to finish them off. Putin knows he has the full support of his people for this and also knows that the people want an end to this war soon.
Likewise, he has the same support from the rest of the world, the sane part, for this final battle.
The west has been warned to stay out or risk tactical nukes raining down on their capitals.
We're all set I believe for an encirclement of Kharkov and a push for Kiev while at the same time the Russians will continue to push on at the rest of the front.
Victory will be costly for the Russians, many men will die and be maimed.
This seems like perhaps the first buds of spring before it bursts forth in a summer of victory. Our glorious soldiers are advancing. Za pobieda!
I wonder why would someone pose as Russian without knowing Russian language? Is it trolling? Is there some psy op at play? "Za pobiedu!", not "Za pobieda!". Any Russian speaking person would know how correctly to use cases. And you do not.
Is 'correct' Romanization a common trait amongst people familiar with a Cyrillic alphabet?
The problem is not with the correct or incorrect Romanization (a whole lot of incrorecct ones should still be understandable to a Russian). The problem is that he romanized the word in an incorrect case. It is as apparent as if I wrote "me is eating" and then said that I am a native English speaker. Any child would choose a correct case. Which shows that he has no knowledge of Russian, yet for some reasons posts "our soldiers".
Understood, thank you.
I challenge a bit your 'any child' assertion when I think back on my daughters, though. Getting them off of 'brung' and back to 'brought', e.g. "I brung my lunch" was a challenge, even in the early adult years.
They are fighting for more than just Russia, pedant.
Who is pising as a Russian? You, however, are most certainly a pedant.
https://rickycook21.substack.com/p/globalists-plot-worldwide-genocide?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1395434&post_id=144518218&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=false&r=emrlc&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
Thanks for update - will these now be daily?
LPR1 is reporting air-launched missiles and glide bombs (French and/or British) being fired at Belgorod.
https://t.me/treugolniklpr/32742
Not confirmed yet, but if true, this has escalated past one of those red lines very seriously....
Can Le Plessis-Robinson, France glow--?!!?
HQ of MBDA, the British-French weapons manufacturer, a soul-less multinational corporation of death
We are seeing either an elaborate maskirovka or what will be the start of the liberation of Kharkov.
Ukraine is going to be in an even worse situation. They simply do not have the trained military manpower to defend all of the fronts that Russia could put pressure on. If forced to put troops into Kharkov for a last ditch, desperate defense, then the Russians will simply advance somewhere else.
This is the consequences of the Ukrainian doctrine of holding every last square kilometres of ground leads to - an accelerated defeat, where men were lost on ill-advised orders to hold at all costs and in equally ill-advised offensives.
I wonder how the Western media is going to try to spin this. At this point, trying to lie to their viewers is going to be harder and harder. Everything they did, from lying to Gorbachev on NATO expansion, the Maidan Coup, signing Minsk in bad faith, and the Istanbul negotiations in March 2022 leads to this. A catastrophic strategic loss for the West due to the dishonesty and greed of their own elites. The goal of getting another Yeltsin to help them loot and ultimately Balkanize Russia has instead rallied the Russian people, exposing the weak Western military.
Dude the corrupt Western msm don’t even try to spin it anymore, they just stop talking about it.
That woke rag Wapo (dEMOraCy dIEs iN dArKNeSs) took the Ukraine War section off their main nav bar.
Witnessing the impotent rage of globoh0mo grow every day about the Ukraine situation is truly a wonderful thing. What a time to be alive :D
The Germans have a noun for that; schadenfreude.
I love the smell of schadenfreude in the morning....
I thought the word was lugenpresse.
They've already started spinning it that Kharkiv will be the "reverse Stalingrad", where Russia will expend millions of lives assaulting a city that will never fall.
I only understand the kind of history that starts w/ Chamberlain & ends w/ Churchill
Unlikely. The AFU will cut off all supplies then give 'em the Mariupol treatment until there's annihilation or capitulation. Sickening... but that's what war looks like. Pretty medieval when you think about it.
Kharkov is a russian city only guys who will fight come from somewhere else in Ukraine as we can see at the border area they don't even fight and surrender en masse it will only increase. Don't forget that ukranians live under gestapo sbu rules 24/7, many are afraid or to be kidnapped for mobi for even to be jailed or killed.
the best maskirovkas are elaborate
I like a little lace on my maskirovka
>We are seeing either an elaborate maskirovka or what will be the start of the liberation of Kharkov.
both
Things are heating up a bit. Thanks for the report Simplicius! I have shared the link.
A Skeptic War Reports
https://askeptic.substack.com/p/war-reports-2024-05-11
To me, it seems the best tactic right now is to shift the pressure point around , forcing reserves - especially artillery and air defense - to move around and get attrited by long range fires. Do that for a month or two, and push for real.
Isn’t this what Zhukov did—draw the German reserves to counter apparent penetration events and then start the real attack elsewhere?
At Stalingrad, once they had stabilized the defense, Zhukov launched a massive counterattack through the poorly defended northern flank where the Italian and Hungarian divisions were.
At Kursk, Zhukov had 90km depth in his defensive lines. Minefields, anti-tank ditches, minefields, anti-tank ditches, over and over. All meant to slow the blitzkrieg, bog down the armor, and rain artillery on the Germans.
I was thinking of Operation Mars.
It’s unbelievable: they went from Stalingrad—the greatest “all in” fight in history and six months later withstood the Germans at Kursk—on the very short list of the greatest battles in the history of the world.
Both were idiocy on the German part. Their forces were too weak for being so far forward in Stalingrad, and the way to capture a city along the west bank of a river was to take the east bank, cut it off and let it wither on the vine, which they knew they were too weak for. So therefore they never attempted to do it. Direct violation of Clausewitz - you gun for the enemy's army or at the very least critical resources, not territory. Stalingrad was worthless.
Kursk was proposed as a spoiling attack in the early spring. Instead of being given permission to bite off the salient in a quick operation while it remained unfortified, the Germans insisted on telegraphing their intentions, amassing larger forces and permitting Zhukov to prep for the attack. Hitler's quote was "It must not fail". Of course it was going to fail - it was the opposite of surprise. And if you are going to use armor for an attack in a WWII context, you need to send the armor in a direction where it can break out and exploit, disrupting logistics and threatening encirclement. Not just to bull through fortified defensive positions. Prokhorovka was the definition of failure, despite the German tactical advantages.
None of this takes away from Zhukov's correct handling of the situation in both cases, but the Germans offered him victory on a silver platter and he took it. As for what they might have done otherwise, pursuit of the Baku offensive was the correct and only path to any kind of successful outcome to the 1942 campaign. Even that would have resulted in a strung out southern front, but at least they'd have gotten something for their effort, petroleum. In 1943, pulling back to a more reasonable defensive line before being forced there might have been wise. Even more wise would have been negotiations. They were already destined to lose.
Maybe Zelenski sees it as a counter-offensive. First Russia occupies it, Ukraine did counter-offensive and Russians pulled back. Now Russians doing a new counter-offensive, something like that.
I don't think they will try to capture Kharkov. Look at all previous settlements en towns, they have been raised to the ground. I can't see them fighting from building to building in Kharkov, that city is too large and casualties will be sky high. Trying to encircle might be better. But keep grinding them down will remain the current strategy and soon or later there will be a breakthrough that can liberate a very large area. It only gets worse for Ukraine, the casualties are stacking up and there's no new mobilisation. Have they giving up and just trying to pock a few billions more before defeat?
Probably the RF will lay seige to Kharkov, unless their aim is for a more general collapse across a large part of Ukraine
Cut the electricity, cut internet, cut phones
Control food supplies
Encourage internal resistance
Encourage civilian evacuation
We saw back in February the video footage of bumper-to-bumper one-way traffic out of Kharkiv, even in some cases 'reversing' a lane of the normally eastbound side of the double highway in order to push west, civilians fleeing
Hundred of thousands of people from Kharkov city and oblast are in Russia many since feb march 22. Maybe they should take part as well for the liberation of their city but many will never come back they have a better life in Russia, full employment, much higher salaries and social benefits etc...can speak russian freely and move where they want including overseas in holidays, borders are not closed, no gestapo.
Kharkov alike Odessa expects some kind of liberation. Partisans already pin point targets to the RF. I’m very skeptical of a door to door Fallujah like combat if they enter the inner city.
Exactly. Russia sees Odessa as a Russian city, for good reason, and won't employ scorched-earth tactics there (literally, in the case of Fallujah, lest we forget).
“…they have been raised to the ground”. razed, I think
Thanks for the update!
Thank you simplicius for this update detail and maps - helpful for clarity. Interesting that it's motorised not mechanised. Putin stays in SMO constraints while closing post Crocus Center backdoor. Can this be seen as extending the contact line? - further stretching depleted assets - and forcing some pieces to be moved around aiding aerial spotters? My military knowledge bike has training wheels!
I think flexibility would be high in their requirements list. Committing loads of troops to a static op (like a siege) would limit their options. Unless their is a large contingent of partisans embedded in the city.
Their strategic aims seem to be a) keep enough force in reserve to counter any NATO ambition in the Baltics or Poland ala Steadfast Offender or the Arctic wargames in the new NATO acquisitions. b) keep upping the force level on the current LOC and c) expand the frontline where logistics are available.
For a modern seige no need for very many static soldiers, just a LOC further into Ukraine, plus control of access routes, what the RF would be doing anyway if they were concerned to advance LOC
OK, so scouts found out that there is no one on the border and they were able to capture some villages with only light vehicles. This proves that entire Belgorod "affair" was a distraction, if you can call a series of terrorist attacks a distraction.
IMO Russia should qualify this as a counter-terrorist operation, not as a special military operation.
Except NATO is supplying terrorists with long-range weapons.
The most interesting time are ahead! If RF can get into Vovchansk after that their forces close the Kupiansk corridor then we have a giant "kessel" with UF trapped behind that Donets-reservoir. If then RF, manage to take Chasiv Yar and get through to Konstantinovka and further to Kramatorsk...wow!
I cant imagine Russians are so ignorant that they try to take Charkov head on. Better to let it fall with forces coming from the direction of the under-belly, Chuguyev. If they want a pincer then an attack from the direction of Sumy or nearer, Grayvoron, is probable. There are not much roads and logistic lines of communication on the Russian side so there are a limited set of options.
How far have the allies got in the northern front relative to the advances of the US-Ukronazis last year? ;O)
Yes, that's the most straightforward line, and is more or less necessary to eventually recover territory RF has declared actual interest in, I.e. back down into Izyum/Slavyansk from the North, which for whatever reason seems to be the favorable direction
In Chess (or Go) you know exactly the forces your enemy has, you have full knowledge of the territory. Does this mean, no surprise is possible?
If in such simple situations full recon doesn't take away the element of surprise, how one can entertain this thought for real war?
Rumors and Ukrainian sources — no facts.
Great article. Death by a thousand cuts has had its day I believe. Russia has severly weakened the UAF now and it's time to have the biggest battle of the war to finish them off. Putin knows he has the full support of his people for this and also knows that the people want an end to this war soon.
Likewise, he has the same support from the rest of the world, the sane part, for this final battle.
The west has been warned to stay out or risk tactical nukes raining down on their capitals.
We're all set I believe for an encirclement of Kharkov and a push for Kiev while at the same time the Russians will continue to push on at the rest of the front.
Victory will be costly for the Russians, many men will die and be maimed.
No, they will continue as they are. Slow and steady, minimise casualties and allow ZioNAZIs to keep chancing their arm.