Don's Weekly, 18 December 2023, Part 1

Hello everybody!

Three notes before I go on with this week’s Don’s Weekly.

1.) Today is the first day into two weeks during which - at least ‘here’ in the West - everybody is going to celebrate Christmas. That is: some are celebrating it on the 24th, others on the 25th December; and hardly anybody is working on the 25th and 26th. With the calendar the way it is this year, in many countries it’s going to be so that entire societies, and thus governments too, are going to shut down on Friday, 22 December, and re-open only on Wednesday, 27th December.

Means: there is going to be something like a ‘public shut-down’ of some three to four days, comparable to that during the lock-downs of the pandemic in the last three years, in large parts of the ‘Western Hemisphere’. Mind, this is going to be the case nearly everywhere between Honolulu to Warsaw, and from Anchorage in Alaska to Almirante Brown in Argentina, and from Svaerholt in Norway, all the way down to Cape Town.

Why am I pointing this out? Not to ruin your celebrations, but to remind you that, ‘traditionally’ - since the times of the Cold War - people like me here in Western Europe, we’ve always been expecting the ‘Soviets’ to, if they want to do ‘something’, do that ‘something’ exactly during these days. Because that’s the times when the Western reaction was at it slowest, and, be sure: remains at its slowest until this very day. Just think about the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, in 1979 as a good example: it took place during the ‘Christmas season’ in the West, too..

When it comes to Ukraine - where Christmas is traditionally celebrated two weeks later than in the West, but meanwhile increasingly on 24-26 December, and where this year there is going to be the second ‘major’ Christmas season in this war - I think one must expect the Russians to try ‘something’, too. At least a bigger missile strike on the power grid: something like we’ve seen a year ago - and this even more so because of the onset of the coldest period of the year.

2.) Don’s description about modern-day Russian practices of ‘digging’ field fortifications in his account of the Battle of Avidiivka, prompted a lively discussion between visitors and a number of reader’s e-mails. Me thinks it was Phil who described it the best: yes, actually, this is nothing new. Back during the Second World War, it was the essence of the Soviet Army’s combat doctrine: it just became forgotten after all the years - especially so in the West.

To re-phrase the content of Phil’s e-mail: back then, every company of Soviet Army had a wagon full of tools for digging field fortifications. And the overriding reason for this was not so much the ‘protection of troops’, as much as preventing Germans from knowing what were they facing and where.

Associated practices also included sudden re-shuffles of units along the frontline. Over the night, a battalion would be bolstered to a regiment, or reduced to a company, and the Germans wouldn’t know - except if vigorously scouting, ‘24/7’.

With other words: a lots of tactics we see the Russians using nowadays, are directly descending from the Second World War: the conflict that is still exercising the strongest influence upon military thinking of the Keystone Cops in Moscow, and thus their instructors at various military educational facilities until this very day. Some of tactics and ideas have proven awfully unviable in this conflict, and resulted in horrendous losses, but: others have proven to be very viable, especially if adjusted to the circumstances. One of this is the massive deployment of artillery to protect poorly- or unoccupied flanks of units on advance or in defence, just for example.

3.) Another point where I cannot but agree - with Phil, with Don, and with few others - is that yes: the Russians are meanwhile clearly on top of the drone warfare in this war. That, indeed, the situation in this regards is reaching a critical point.

The Ukrainians are manufacturing qualitatively better drones and training better drone-pilots, no doubt, but: the Russians are both learning and flooding the battlefield with small killing machines. And, while the West is still snoring in deep sleep in this regards, the Russians can reach back not only on their own production, but also that of multiple countries supporting them.

Until there is a fundamental change in the way not only the GenStab-U in Kyiv (Ukraine’s General Staff), but also all the similar instances in the West (see the Pentagon, NATO HQ in Brussels, or the Beschaffungsbehörde in Germany and similar), comprehend the gravity of this fact, the ZSU (Ukrainian Armed Forces) are on the best way of being, literally, overwhelmed by the Russian capability to manufacture and deploy immense numbers of mini-drones.

That much for the ‘intro’…now permit me to let Don take over…

*****

Western Luhansk

There is constant fighting in this region but this week there was a lot of video capturing the fighting at Synkivka, 8 km northeast of Kupiansk.

Russia assaults a Ukrainian trench south of Kreminna. The trees used to have branches before the thousands of artillery shells…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1733978190308110797

A Russian assault into Synkivka…

https://twitter.com/moklasen/status/1735317583316816198

At 12 seconds you see a Javelin gain altitude in the foreground. At 14 seconds you see the second BMP being hit by something. At 15 seconds you see the Javelin descend and hit the first BMP…

https://twitter.com/Tendar/status/1736320923400077657

Ukrainian drones bomb Russians on the edge of the forest near Synkivka…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1736459032867553355

The Russians advanced 300 m in the forest near Synkivka. Ukrainians push the last of the Russians out of the village. There there are no anti-tank weapons, tanks can be a dominant force on the battlefield…

https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1734939173377757199

Bakhmut

Russia is making limited gains at various points near Bakhmut and losing a lot of troops.

Ukrainian drones south of Bakhmut are active…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1734263304925712866

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1734334097990857008

Russian positions in southwest Bakhmut was bombarded by drones in a snowstorm…

https://twitter.com/Teoyaomiquu/status/1734657968459645151

A very personal war between a Russian soldier and a Ukrainian drone operator west of Bakhmut…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1736059962231595405

Avdiivka

The Russian attacks are ongoing but with reduced intensity this week. There are fewer waves. Each wave used to consist of 15 to 20 soldiers but they now have as few as six. Russia’s biggest push was from the industrial park southeast of Avdiivka and they managed to advance 2-300 m on a 600 m front. They’ve made smaller gains east of the factory and north of Stepove. While some vehicles support attacks on Stepove, Russia is still dropping a lot of infantry at Krasnohorivka or the Slagheap but there are reports that one column doing this lost half of their 15 vehicles. The current estimation of Russian casualties is 13,000.

Activity near Stepove…

https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1736091488352657903

A Bradley destroys three Russian MT-LBs near Stepove…

https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1735038221942202390

A Bradley engages a Russian IFV…

https://twitter.com/war_crimes_uk/status/1735435063200711152

Tartarigami’s team identified 211 Russian vehicle losses in the Avdiivka sector from October 10th to November 28th. 50% of these losses occurred in October, reflecting the later shift to infantry-only assaults. There are more Russian vehicular losses in Avdiivka than any other battle, including Vuhledar last winter.

As with Ukrainian vehicles that were knocked out, kamikaze drone footage that were confirmed knockouts of Russian vehicles were not all confirmed by satellite imagery, meaning they were subsequently recovered because they could be repaired. Vehicles that are immobilized but not destroyed and not yet recovered is one indicator that the territory is not sufficiently controlled by either side. It’s possible that one side might inhabit a nearby treeline but the enemy has fire control of the open ground making recovery efforts too dangerous.

Not counted were scorch marks or craters from catastrophic explosions that left no traces of the vehicle on the satellite images. Some vehicles 5 km behind Russian lines were counted but Andrew Perpetua’ map lists another 20 vehicles as destroyed up to 20 km behind the Russian front line, although that was based on video evidence. What is not known is the number of those vehicles that were recovered for repair.

Within this article is a “heat map” that shows the heaviest vehicular losses by far is at Krasnohorikva and the roads to its east, and the road east of the slagheap. Destroying many of the Russian vehicles before they were able to reach the front lines was a great help to the Ukrainian defenders facing the surviving vehicles…

A Russian BMP hits a mine at the edge of Stepove…

https://twitter.com/JagdBandera/status/1735420232154390900

Russians in ruins of a house in Stepove are hit by a drone…

https://twitter.com/moklasen/status/1734267314621599851

A high-altitude drone survey of the northern flank reveals 113 Russian bodies…

https://twitter.com/Danspiun/status/1734880054654521484

Another survey, this time just around the coke plant…

https://twitter.com/GloOouD/status/1735638799198146697

Three Russian MTLBs move west of, and parallel to, the railroads by Stepove. A Bradley engages them…

https://twitter.com/WT3ll/status/1735034458166718777

North of Stepove, Ukrainian drones attack Russian infantry. The strong interference on the FPV screen is jamming but the drone flies the last few meters blind…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1735266585776910750

Ukrainian snipers at work…

https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1736384752893018289

(To be continued….)