Don's Weekly, 28 October 2024: Part1

by Donald Hill

Hello everybody!

Somewhere, it’s meanwhile nothing else but grotesque watching this war unfold and still trying to think about ‘writing something new’ - where there is simply nothing new to write. Only a few geographic designations have changed.

For example: Selydove has fallen.

The flow of that battle is so typical for this war, can’t say. Enter all the troop movements on a map, on day-by-day basis, and then watch the results accelerated by at least the factor four.

Start with, for example, mid-August. At the time, everybody was happy to conclude that the Russian advance on Pokrovsk was ‘stopped’. With hindsight, it’s obvious that the command of the Group Tsenter was merely searching for a way to widen its advance on Pokrovsk - through finding a solution around the heavily fortified and skillfully defended Selydove.

They’ve found it in early October: while isolating the ZSU garrison in Tsukuryne by air strikes, have assaulted it from two directions. There was no reaction from the General of Good News nor any of his Buddies in Kyiv: why should they have done anything if their hopelessly obsolete doctrine envisages no withdrawals, not even thinking and thus no planning for any? Or because their actual job would be to write a new doctrine, based on combat experiences from the last 10,5 years - but they’re stubbornly refusing to do so?

Instead, though as usual, the garrison of Tsukuryne was left on its own. What spoiled the brilliant planning by the General of Good News and his Buddies then was the nifty commander of that garrison who violated the doctrine by deciding to save his unit and fight a way out (of course, as meanwhile a tradition in such cases, at least since Popasna of early May 2022, the ZSU suffered highest losses in that battle while actually breaking out of the resulting cauldron).

….and, once again, not one of involved holly generals of the ZSU learned an atom of a lesson. Doing so would require admitting own failure - foremost to the President of Wonderful News. Therefore, and instead, the commander of the garrison who violated the doctrine is going to be investigated and punished, so that everything’s going to remain great in the Dreamland.

Meanwhile, the public was distracted by dozens of flashy videos showing massive VSRF casualties, ‘air combats’ between UAVs and other games and toys. Only the incompetent Russians didn’t follow the plan. They took the ZSU by surprise, and ‘instead’ of continuing in southern direction (to ‘encircle Kurakhivka’ for example), they’ve pushed west: around the southern flank of Selydove. And they’ve grinded themselves around it until reaching Vyshenve.

Those using more than 1 brain cell for thinking might now come to such blasphemic conclusions like asking: who needs to assault a well-fortified and -defended town if one can force its garrison to withdraw - by encircling it?

Be sure, the General of Good News and his Buddies are never going to ask themselves such questions. Instead, they’re going to continue spreading the mythology like that the Russians are stupid, and Ukrainians simply brilliant. And the Keystone Cops in Moscow can afford wasting thousands of troops for this kind of operations, right?

Because it is so hard to comprehend that while, yes, the Keystone Cops care even less about their losses than the Buddies do, they have also reformed the VSRF from completely mechanised army centred on artillery, into an infantry force supported by UMPKs and FPVs.

Gauging by few recent chats with people who used to have an excellent grip of the Soviet- and then the Russian military doctrine: yes, it is. De-facto, it’s unimaginable. Which is why they’re all still gauging current VSRF ops in Ukraine by ‘Zhukov’ and ‘Soviet doctrine’…

If not, then they’re arguing (to the length) that the Keystone Cops and the VSRF have been ‘degenerated’. So much so, you could’ve heard this from me too, time and again.

However, the darn fact is: in Ukraine, this ‘degeneration of the Russian military power’ works.

What’s more: it’s quite likely that it would work ‘even’ against NATO. Simply because just like the ZSU, the mass of NATO forces has no response to UMPKs, even less so to FPVs, and the least of all to the Russian tactics of dozens of infiltrations and infantry assaults run around the clock.

….and so, and because Ukrainians are so super-smart and adaptable, and their ‘Western allies’ even more so, and both are so much more skilled, and noble, and courageous, and civilised than the Russians, all of that ‘the West’ - but especially the General of Good News and his Buddies were watching and did nothing when the VSRF repeated exactly the same exercise in Hirnyk. Indeed, there a - theoretically - highly experienced ZSU brigade left down a battalion of the Territorial Defence, and then did nothing when this was encircled and forced to fight its way out. Didn’t matter: videos of sustained defensive successes by the 46th Airborne, further south east, were much more spectacular to watch; and, if there were no reports about what happened in Hirnyk, then nothing happened there at all.

…rather surprising to realise that now Kurakhivka is encircled from three sides, and the ZSU about to be forced to withdraw from yet another cauldron.

How could that happen…?

Ah yes, the Russians are assaulting regardless their losses…

I’m always frank, but this time I’ll emphasise: wouldn’t it be for the poor ZSU troops that have to suffer from all of this arrogance and idiocies, every single hour, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 28-31 days a month, and 365 days a year, and now 2,5 years, too - it would be funny to conclude that when the ZSU is forced to withdraw from Kurakhivka, this is going to happen at the discretion of exactly the same commander who has left that TD battalion in Hirnyk at its own.

Free along the motto: when one is digging a hole for the other fellow, one is liable to fall into it, too…

Of course, nothing of this matters, and who am I to say? And how can I dare coming to the idea to draw conclusions of this kind in a matter of 15 minutes? And I should stop dooming, stop expressing well-substantiated critique, and spread positivity, milk and honey. Because drawing logical conclusions is outright unwanted, if not verboten, dear readers. Thus, please, be careful: do not venture into trying this at home.

Instead, here’s Don’s review of the last week.

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Kursk: Western Sector

Lets start with President of Wonderful News’ success story of this summer…where, ah sorry: there are no good news. The ZSU has abandoned its ‘western bulge’ - the one from the border towards Glushkove.

Of course, the 47th Brigade is still making its presence felt, but it lost a Bradley that was captured east of Veseloye.

West of Lubimovka, a Ukrainian drone homes in on a Russian BTR when the vehicle's jammer successfully disrupts the radio signal between the drone and the operator. When another drone arrived on the scene, the BTR was burning, indicating that AI on the previous drone was able to successfully hit the target after being jammed.

Over Lubimovka, a Ukrainian Vampire drone is intercepted at night.

In between Lubimovka and Zelenyi Shlyakh, a battalion of the 36th Marine Brigade engages several Russian vehicles and hits a Russian infantry platoon with artillery and DPICM.

Control over Zelenyi Shlyakh switched at least two times. This is a Russian assault on the small village.

East of Kremyanoe, several Russian vehicles were destroyed.

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Kursk- Eastern Sector

Ukraine conducts an airstrike a kilometer inside the Russian border.

The Russians use artillery to hit Ukrainian support elements 3 km west of Sudzha.

Russian drones attack a pair of Ukrainian trucks north of Sudzha but the videos never show the impact.

For some reason, Ukraine attacked a burning Russian MRAP with another drone.

***

(….to be continued…)