Don's Weekly, 3 February 2025: Part 1

by Donald Hill, with Tom Cooper

Hello everybody!

Another week of this war is over, and the time is for Don’s weekly review. Instead of the usual - ‘longer’ - introduction, this time I’ll ‘limit’ my involvement to adding comments related to backgrounds and context of specific developments to his text: considering their scope, it’s unsurprising that all the inadequacies in the Ukrainian leadership we’ve been reporting about in recent weeks continue dominating the flow of fighting.

Right now, there are ‘only’ two ‘details’ I think I can add. The first is that in the aftermath of the ‘155th Mechanised Brigade-’, ‘the 152nd Jäger Brigade-’, and the ‘156th Mechanised Brigade’-affairs, meanwhile almost exactly the same set of failures by top Ukrainian military commanders became known in the case of the 157th Mechanised Brigade. Which, of course, is no surprise: rather the logical consequence of the ‘System Zelensky & Syrsky’, the effects of which I’ve attempted to describe in this interview with Ljudmila Nemyria, of the UkrLife TV-channel, two weeks ago:

(in English)

(in Russian)

Unsurprisingly, all the possible promises about the contrary have proven lies, and not only the mobilisation of the technical personnel of the Ukrainian Air Force & Air Defence Force (PSZSU; I’m usually abbreviating with ‘PSU’) to serve as ‘infantry’, is continued, but now also there is mobilisation of people manufacturing long-range-UAVs…

Theoretically: ‘no problem’ - all provided the people in question would receive quality training. Or, if the ‘System Zelensky’ has taken care to mobilise all of the Ukrainian society, through mobilising all of the population (for example: in order to bolster the production capacity through adding thousands of people to it). However, with the current Ukrainian leadership not only still in its position, but stubbornly refusing to reform anything it does - not only the ZSU (the system including the doctrine and, therefore, training) - that’s simply not going to happen…

Atop of that (and that’s the second point), Zelensky & Yermak are busy taking over the control over the Defence Acquisition Agency (and its budget of several billion US$). This, atop of them already assuming control over several other, similar, institutions, every time with exactly the same effects: rendering these ineffective, leaving them without any executive powers, and entirely useless (yet costly).

…with other words: after systematically ruining mobilisation efforts, and (just for example) the medical care in the ZSU, the Zelensky-administration - the same instance that’s happy to brag with achievements of the Ukrainian UAV-industry, the mass of which came into being without its involvement - is now determined to ruin the acquisition and production of arms in Ukraine, too.

…which, BTW, is why one is free to conclude that the establishment of additional new (and useless) brigades is going to be continued, and/or that Zelensky’s announcement of an end to the ‘no step back policy’ was just another lie, too (we’re going to see a ‘brilliant’ example in confirmation of this conclusion in the reviews below).

***

Kursk

Russian infantry is hunted on the road 3 km north of Novoivanovka.

One of a couple of airstrikes on Pogrebki. The village was also hit by multiple artillery and drone attacks.

Three Russian bombs drop on Cherkasskoe.

A Ukrainian tank shells Russians at close range on the eastern edge of Makhnovka. Nearby, a Ukrainian drone is intercepted.

A Ukrainian vehicle north of Kurilovka is attacked. A Russian soldier is attacked by a drone just east of the village.

A Ukrainian armored vehicle is destroyed 4 km west of Guyevo. The village itself was bombarded several times by Russian artillery and MRLs.

Another Russian command post in Rylsk was hit but details haven’t been published.

Overall, there were lots of smaller Russian assaults the last week, but no big counteroffensive: this has petered out the week before. Reasons are two-fold: both the Russians and North Koreans run ‘out of steam’, and Ukrainians are receiving ever more artillery shells. We’re going to discuss the latter point in further parts of this Don’s Weekly.

Instead, lets take a look back - for example to see why the Russians and North Koreans run out of steam: the Ukrainian 22nd Mechanised Brigade claims to have destroyed a battalion of North Korean forces in the heavy fighting west of Malaya Loknya two weeks ago. Among the dead were documents of three lieutenant colonels that had the roles of company commanders. The soldiers only had ammo and chocolate. None had water bottles because the plan was to take Ukrainian positions and use their supplies. When they did take positions, the Russians that were supposed to be following them failed to exploit the breakthrough, and language issues resulted in North Koreans firing on Russians. They had better equipment than the Russians but always moved on foot. The only vehicles they used were golf carts to transport ammo. For over two weeks, North Korean soldiers have not been observed in some sectors but Ukraine says they are still fighting in other locations.

Considering claims of the 22nd are thus well-substantiated, it wouldn’t be surprising if ‘even’ the North Koreans have concluded that the GenStab in Moscow is rather interested in pointlessly squandering some of their best troops, than in deploying these effectively.

For those who might have doubts about this: yeah, considering how much we’ve all became used to our own leaders being entirely unaccountable and thus behaving irrationally, who would have thought the North Korean leaders (or at least: military commanders) behaving in a different fashion, right…?

***

Kharkiv

Six kilometers east of Vovchansk, the Russians destroy a house. 3.5 km east of the town, Ukrainians destroy four of the five attacking vehicles. In most of the wasteland of Vovchansk itself there is, meanwhile, very little cover left.

***

(…to be continued…)