Don's Weekly, 29 January 2024: Part 1

Hello everybody!
Some say that Januaries tend to be ‘endless’. Probably because of the cold. Must admit, this year even I tend to agree with this impression: this is already the fifth issue of Don’s Weekly this month.

As for the situation in Ukraine: it’s tense, to put it mildly. Yes, air defences of Kyiv and Odesa are largely OK, but those east of Dnipro not so much - as can be seen from ‘results’ of the Russian missile offensive: this is meanwhile primarily targeting Kharkiv, Dnipro and Zaporizhzhya, and causing lots of damage and casualties. Kherson, Nikopol, and Sumy are suffering from constant Russian rocketing and artillery strikes, too: the impression there is that nobody even cares any more how often and what has been hit…

The situation on the ground is far from ‘satisfactory’, too: the Russians are pressing hard almost everywhere. Sure, in most of places, they’re still foremost excelling at suffering losses for nothing in return, but: some of their efforts are ‘unpleasant’ to say the least, and the outcome of battles in question is, really, anything else than ‘certain’.

This is especially valid for Avidiivka, where nobody dares predicting the outcome any more. Essentially, the Zenit position has been squeezed by the Russians from both flanks; the Russians have recovered some of their positions on approach to Stepove; they’ve had some tactical success south and west of Kamianka; and the situation in the Pervomaiske area, and south of Avidiivka, is anything else than ‘rosy’, too. Foremost, they are retaining significant advantages in regards of how much artillery ammunition they can deploy here, and significant quantitative advantages in terms of personnel.

Western Luhansk

West of Svatove, an immobilized tank has its turret removed by a drone (yes, these are packing ever more punch!)…

https://twitter.com/DefenceU/status/1751301795190890993

Various drone attacks southwest of Kreminna…

https://twitter.com/DefenceU/status/1751274364635627937

Ukrainian tanks attack Russian positions west of Kreminna…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1749869102775030101

A Russian tank records its path from Kreminna to the front, where it is knocked out while taking part in an assault…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1751286393404330287

Ukraine lost Krokhmalne last week in the Kupiansk area. It was the first village they lost in months. 2.5 km to the northwest of that village Russia conducted airstrikes…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1750985631142903914

12 km southeast of Synkivka, Russian drones hit Ukrainian positions…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1749078146865922441

A Russian night assault on Synkivka is betrayed by their thermal signature. In the morning, the survivors collect ammo from the dead…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1750467371972604257

Avidiivka

Again, with the caveat that not all attacks are recorded, there seems to be a huge number of Ukrainian drone attacks when compared with recorded Russian drone attacks. Ukrainian drones tend to target equipment and personnel. Russian drones do that as well, but Andrew Perpetua observed that they also expend a lot of drones to degrade and destroy Ukrainian defensive positions. What is unknown is how many Russian drones are being used in this manner as very few of those actions are both recorded and released.

Avdiivka was hit hard by airstrikes. Indeed, for the first time since the start of this battle even Ukrainian positions south of Kamianke were hit by airstrikes. There are still civilians in Avdiivka, most of them located in the southwest corner. That’s also where most of the Russian artillery and airstrikes land in the city.

On the northern flank, near Stepove, there were several small Russian assaults that were met with Ukrainian drones and gunfire. There were few recorded instances of Ukrainian shelling, probably because of the shortage of artillery ammo and the ability to handle these assaults by other means. Russia didn’t gain any additional footholds and Ukrainian tanks just east of the railroad treelines shelled Krasnohorivka.

On the southern flank, Russia wasn’t able to advance but lost 7 MT-LB’s and 3 BMP’s in one day.

The biggest movement of the last week has been just southeast of Avdiivka, where Ukraine has held the line since 2014. One reason why the position has been held so long is that there are at least 2 kilometers of flat, open space between the highway and the woods held by the Ukrainians…https://www.google.com/maps/@48.1042354,37.7893123,3a,60y,341.75h,82.39t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1soNKvZ_nV3dQqn2dsXUOcSQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656?entry=ttu

1500 meters behind those woods, along a road leading into southern Avdiivka, is the Tsarskaya Okhota restaurant. It turned into a Ukrainian defensive strongpoint for years. A Ukrainian reporter talks about his visit to the position in 2017…

https://twitter.com/IAPonomarenko/status/1714247333024498042

But a few months ago, south of the east-west highway, Russia started digging a tunnel. To cover the noise of digging and clearing the tunnel, artillery and mortar fire was used.They had to keep the entrance from being detected and they had to conceal the dirt being carried away from the tunnel. All this, and they had to avoid the activity at the entrance being detected by drones and satellite imagery.

A little more than a week ago, 150 men emerged from the tunnel behind the restaurant and took the position. It took a very bitter battle to force them out of there. Of course, the Russians combined this attack with an overland mechanised advance and lost 5 tanks, 3 BMPs and an MT-LB on the road…https://t.me/Ukraine_365News/70786?fbclid=IwAR0AVK7ZBeQauxQzY-lsqDD7-QtCazPtNWON0Bst5zlC5wFUjZ2aONd5bTo

Other Russian forces continued north and took a few houses in southern Avdiivka until they were met by a pair of Ukrainian tanks...

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1750536069752266873

Then a Bradley and M113 approached from the east and dropped off some infantry that recaptured the restaurant and threatened to cut off the Russians in that small section of Avdiivka…

https://twitter.com/moklasen/status/1751634269947015284

This is the third tunnel the Russians have dug and successfully used to advance over difficult ground. This is the Russian emerging from another tunnel back in November. It is possible more tunnels are being built and remain undetected…

A Ukrainian from the 47th Brigade describes the tactic that Russia originated at Bakhmut: Small groups of 2-3 Russians move forward with just shovels. If they survive a couple days and manage to dig positions then assault groups of around 15 people arrive to press forward…

https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1749559973690896743

Small Russian assault groups near Stepove are eliminated…

https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1750434861616165312

North of Stepove, a Ukrainian tank engages the Russian front line…

https://twitter.com/Thomas_dupes/status/1751536216548217013

I have no idea how widespread Russian battlefield suicides are but these videos are not uncommon. His method of suicide is thorough. Not extremely graphic. For me, it’s just puzzling…

https://twitter.com/GirkinGirkin/status/1750465531168141587

This is graffic and you don’t have to watch it. I only include it to show that there’s a growing number of videos showing Russian troops committing a suicide:

https://twitter.com/JayinKyiv/status/1751535390375248099

In Russian-occupied Donetsk the commander of a Russian drone group gave away the location of their training area. 150 drone operators were present. After a HIMARS/MLRS attack, 24 were killed and 4 wounded…

https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1750618405780988241

https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1750488042329051441

Since October 20th, Russia lost 574 vehicles at Avdiivka and Ukraine lost 44…

https://twitter.com/naalsio26/status/1751037692521980174

Marinka

Just outside Marinka, Ukrainian positions are shelled…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1750894045876896255

Just north or Marinka, Krasnohorivka is shelled…

https://twitter.com/EjShahid/status/1750571973711646910