Stymied by New Ukrainian 'Drone Wall', Russia Fights to Innovate Offensive Approach
In our ongoing series to examine the current frontline dynamics, we will turn once more toward current developments to examine how combat has been changing on the front.
There have been several main narratives developing over the course of the past few months related to the perceived ‘deadlock’ of the war, with the Ukrainian side claiming that Russia has for the first time begun losing due to some major ‘breakthrough’ the Ukrainian side is said to have exhibited in the field of drone warfare and its attendant tactics.
The reality is far more nuanced than this, so let us examine the claims and details.
First, there is the interesting new interview with the deputy commander of the 3rd battalion of the 82nd Air Assault Brigade of the AFU.
This is another source which claims that initiative is now ‘on Ukraine’s side’. The 82nd Brigade in question is the one which participated in the recent Ukrainian ‘counter-offensive’ which regained major territory on the east Zaporozhye axis, north of Gulyaipole.
Given that it was Ukraine’s most successful retaking of land since probably the Kursk op of 2024, it provides good insight to hear one of the commander’s thoughts on precisely how Ukraine was able to do what it hadn’t done in nearly two years.
From the above:
One of the key factors behind the success was surprise.
“What helped us? Deception — that’s number one. Second — keeping all movements and the start of assault actions secret. Third — switching off Starlink. That also helped us a lot,” says “Lev,” a battalion commander.Air Assault units managed to redeploy from Donetsk region without being detected and caught the enemy off guard.
Small groups were even sent in different directions to confuse Russian forces.
“The enemy knew the 82nd brigade was moving somewhere —but not where,” says Lawyer.
The first bit of insight you can see is that the operation was not done willy-nilly but required extensively planned maskirovka to fool Russian forces. One of the key factors of the current frontline this touches on, which will be elaborated on more later, is the fact that forces along the front are not all equal. Some ask, how can Russian units give up ground when they may outnumber Ukrainians: the key is that not all Russian units are alike. The vast majority of units on both sides are lower quality defense units, as differentiated specifically from assault units.
Assault units have particular training, are selected more rigorously, have specialized and better equipment, etc.—at least in most cases. There are certain fronts that have specialized and more elite units, whether they be assault or just a kind of elite rapid reaction force which is used to plug gaps in breakthroughs. Russia often uses VDV Airborne units for this purpose along the front, as well as Marines.
On many areas of the front that are not particularly active, lower quality “basic grunt” units—for lack of a better term—would be stationed and these are vulnerable to being overrun by a highly-concentrated force of more elite units, like in this case the Ukrainian 82nd Air Assault Brigade, which is one of Ukraine’s top most elite combat formations.
Why did the breakthrough occur in a zone where Russia is meant to be active? As can be seen, the most active front was Russia’s western wall of the Gulyaipole front, which had salients of the ‘Eastern Express’ pushing westward. The northernmost line was mostly static and being kept defensively for the most part, likely by lower-tier units which were overrun by this highly concentrated elite strike-fist that had been quietly put together by Ukraine:
Continuing, we see the Ukrainian commander confirms precisely this—read the bolded portion:
After relocating south, Ukrainian troops launched assault operations immediately.
During the first month, the advance was rapid. Instead of elite Russian naval infantry or airborne units, they encountered weaker motorized rifle units.“At first, the enemy didn’t even realize we were launching a counteroffensive. They hadn’t prepared positions, and the advance was very fast.”
“Now the enemy understands what forces are operating here. They’re preparing positions, reinforcing troops, bringing in reserves, and increasing fire support and reconnaissance.”
“In the first weeks, they barely used artillery,” Lawyer notes.The pace has now slowed.
He admits that now Russia has reinforced the zone and Ukrainian advances have mostly come to a standstill:
Ukrainian units are advancing in small groups, but facing much stronger resistance compared to January–February when the operation began.
Despite stabilizing the frontline, small Russian groups still infiltrate the rear.
“Forward elements have already penetrated deep beyond the initial line. Recently, our drone operators captured enemy soldiers at a depth of about 10 km.”
Seguing from that, RWA made a good explainer post on the current battlefield dynamics. Ukraine adapted—to an extent—in countering Russia’s innovative “mosaic strategy” by using smaller specialized assault units as a type of rapid reaction force against the ‘trickle’-style infiltration tactics:
