Don's Weekly, 29 July 2024: Part 3
by Donald Hill
(…continued from Part 2…)
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Siversk
After attacking this area from multiple direction since April-May 2022, Russia made almost no progress. Especially not for the last 11 months. For the last three months they’ve been attacking from the south and have slowly been advancing. That was true again last week.
Three Russian bombs land in a northern suburb of Siversk.
A treeline is bombed by Russians not far from Spirne.
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Bakhmut
Russia is conducting small probing actions on selected spots along the canal but also on the flanks in the hopes of widening the front. There were no large assaults but the daily bombardments continued to burn the city down.
On a different day than the still image above, more of Chasiv Yar burns in this video. Unlike the concrete buildings of the canal district, most of the buildings in Chasiv Yar will just burn down.
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Toretsk
Russia is pressing hard in front of Toretsk but the last week has not gained any territory. At Niu York, Russia has a four kilometer long and two kilometer wide penetration that is potentially vulnerable but Ukraine hasn’t been able to cut it off and Russia grabbed three more treelines that are between 400 and 1000 meters long. Inside Niu York itself, Russia is holding on to a block of apartment buildings and fighting off strong Ukrainian attacks.
After posting a video on July 20th of a jet they shot down, the 110th Brigade posted another video on July 23rd. The pilot was rescued by Russian ground forces 8 km south of Niu York. Both shoot-downs seem to have been scored by French-made Mistral short-range air defence systems. These have a range of around 8,000m/8km - nearly double that of usual MANPADs (like Igla, Stinger, Starstreak etc.).
Ukrainian troops clear an apartment building in Pivnichne. They knew Russian soldiers had been in that block but they weren’t sure which of the buildings were occupied. They use suppressive fire though walls and doors before entering, without any idea if Russians will be on the other side. A key aspect of clearing a building is to secure the stairways so the enemy can’t move between the floors and re-enter an area that has already been cleared.
The initial collapse in the sector occurred when the 41st Brigade was assigned to the ‘quiet sector’ (also because, apparently, the GenStab-U ‘knew better’ about the Russian intentions for this year than what was obviouis). A platoon leader in the brigade claimed that they are a Territorial Defense unit with assault rifles and mortars and not a lot of other equipment, that they are short of personnel and most of their personnel are older men. His battalion deputy commander agreed, saying that these shortages are ignored and the personnel are worn out by years of combat.
Like the 47th Brigade, the 425th Special Assault Battalion is also equipped with Bradleys. Because of this, they were sent to the Toretsk sector to help contain the Russian advance. Bradleys have already been spotted near Druzhba at the other end of the Toretsk sector. Now they are fighting in downtown Niu York, 12 km away. This Bradley is pointed down the street while its turret is turned to the right to fire on Russians in a building 60 meters away. The location is noted on the map above.
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Avdiivka-Pokrovsk
Russia finally moved into Yasnobrodivka and completed their occupation of Novoselivka Persha. They also pushed out of Prohres by as much as 3500 meters. And Ukraine continued to detect and interdict vehicles assembling in the coke plant and moving towards the front, as evidenced by the trail of wrecks. A Russian reporter said that a year ago, Russians would dismount a kilometer from the front to attack Robotyne. Now they have to dismount 8-10 km from the front. Near Avdiivka, Russian vehicles are being interdicted up to 20 km from the front line.
At Lozuvatske, though, Ukrainian front line outposts of the 31st brigade were cut off as deep penetrations through Lozuvatse and Prohres allowed Russia to move behind them. If communication between all the units are working well, the front line units could be told to pull back when their flanks were threatened. That didn’t happen. In fact, there is a report that when they were surrounded, the brigade commander didn’t give the order from them to break out and didn’t take any measures to support their breakout. The battalion commanders confronted him and, with the help of the 47th Brigade, managed to break their troops out of the encirclement.
Starting with Ocheretyne, Russia continues to have success against the Ukrainian units in the northwest corner of the salient. Every Russian success in the northwest unravels the Ukrainian defenses to the south - and threatens the main supply line from Pokrovsk towards north: the Russians are now less than 19km from it.
(…to be continued…)
It looks like the Russians target weak units like the 41st mentioned above, rather than weak spots on the front.
The Avdiivka loss seems to be the greatest gain of Russian forces, since it has offered multiple avenues for breaking through Ukrainian defense lines.
We can say anything about the Russian troops and their training, but they are digging good defense lines
Thanks Don. Regarding "Both shoot-downs seem to have been scored by French-made Mistral short-range air defence systems. These have a range of around 8,000m/8km"
I was serving as a conscript in air defence battery in 2002 equipped with Mistral. We got told the range is 5km with max. 4km heights. Seems to have been an older model, but somehow I don't expect Ukrainians got the newest version or do you have information that they got those?