Don's Weekly, 7 October 2024: Part 3 (Vuhledar)

by Donald Hill

(…continued from Part 2…)

***

Vuhledar

A couple days before Vuhledar fell, the commander of the 72nd Brigade was transferred "for the purpose of promotion and to transfer combat experience." He took command in August, 2022, and when his unit was at full strength with artillery ammo, ATGMs and mines, they were able to repel all Russian attacks. When Russia was able to make small gains they counterattacked to reestablish the front lines.

In the last nine months, the GenStab-U left the brigade increasingly short of personnel and ammo, and thus made it unable of maintaining and restoring its front-line positions. Eventually, Russia was able to partially encircle Vuhledar and mine the roads leading into it with rocket artillery. In the last 2-3 days, Ukraine lost two BMPs, two tanks and several trucks.

Reports available meanwhile are indicative of the brigade never receiving an order to withdraw, regardless how often it demanded one, and one report that it received an order on October 2nd when they were already withdrawing on their own. It was at this time that their commander was transferred for the purpose of promotion. The new commander was leading one of the 72nd battalions but had never been in charge of a brigade. Now he had to manage the withdrawal.

As a reminder, a withdrawal under enemy pressure is one of the hardest military operations to execute. The brigade had planned for a withdrawal but while waiting for the order that either never came, or came too late, the Russians were able to occupy parts of their planned withdrawal route. They had to improvise a new plan in the midst of the chaos. One concern was for the approximately 40 soldiers that were too wounded to walk since vehicles could no longer access the town. Others stayed behind to cover the retreat of the main body of troops. It is unknown how many of those last few troops were able to escape, how many were killed during fighting or whether any were killed after they surrendered, but the Russian social media is meanwhile circling photos of their bodies… and other remnants. It’s still early for all the details but so far there have been only two Ukrainian prisoners reported: they were both lying wounded in a basement.

It’s only since the fall of Vuhledar that the GenStab-U came to its senses and sent five battalions to shore up the front lines. Two were independent battalions and three were detached from an existing brigade. The reinforcements are needed but the challenge now is to establish effective command and control of these units. They must have clearly defined sectors that they are tasked to defend, and they must coordinate with the units to their left and right to make sure the territory on their flanks are covered by both units. It’s common for the enemy to identify the border between two units and attack there because of the additional difficulties in coordination. When the Russians broke through at Soledar, Ukrainian reinforcements were thrown in haphazardly without effective command and control and Ukrainian units were forced back in confusion until order was restored.

This is what the 72nd soldiers had to endure as the fought in and retreated from Vuhledar. One of many Russian flags raised in Vuhledar.

The fight continues. 1500 meters west of Mine No. 3, two Russian BMPs are abandoned and destroyed. 1500 meters northwest of Vuhledar, a Ukrainian BMP convinces a Russian crew to abandon their BMP and it is captured. A Russian ground drone was destroyed by a Ukrainian aerial drone.

This is a 25 minute video from a year ago that has interviews with 72nd soldiers both in the city and in the field. One sign of a good unit is how seriously they conduct defensive operations. It helped that a year ago they had artillery support that could hit a target 3-4 minutes after they were given a fire support mission, a fact that kept the Russians out of rifle range for weeks at a time. But at the 11:20 mark, you see manicured trenches with overhead support for camouflage nets. Shortly after, you see a well-prepared bunker with observation slits and overhead cover just 650 meters from enemy positions. At 18:30 the company commander told the reporter they had been in that position for a year. The reporter was amazed they were still digging new dugouts. The commander’s response is that they are constantly digging. “We need to strengthen. It is our security.”

That is a sign of a good unit with excellent leadership.

They travel to different locations and each of the defensive positions are well-crafted. To be sure, they have to be in those locations for quite some time to create such well-built positions, but these well-built positions help them stay in those locations for quite some time. Even the heavy machine gun is covered with an easily removed plastic bag to keep it clean when it isn’t used. This attention to even small details increases their combat power.

There were two stories told in which they were surprised when Russians reached their lines without being observed and when Russian sappers had been removing mines in front of their positions for a while without being observed. Surprises happen and observation can lapse, but those are both significant failures that show even good units need to be constantly on guard and always improving.

As the Ukrainian summer offensive wound down a year ago, Russia began its own offensive operations. The 72nd Brigade was responsible for 30 kilometers of the front. In November, Russia attacked north of Mykilske but didn’t gain any territory despite losing 12 armored vehicles. By February 11, 2024, the 72nd counterattacked and pushed the Russians back around Mykilske. Further north, the Russians were making gains towards Novomykhailivka while suffering huge losses and began attacking west of Solodke, on the 72nd’s left flank.

The first crack in the 72nd’s defensive lines happened in the middle of May when Russia advanced a kilometer. They had done that before in this location but were pushed back with a counterattack. This time there was no counterattack. The lines were fairly stable until the middle of June when Russia started a slow advance across their left flank.

Whenever they have any kind of success, the Russians are promptly bolstering the success and continue to attack. They conducted large assaults that suffered heavy casualties, but: they were able to advance. It was in this time period that the Ukrainian army should have replaced the understrength and worn out 72nd Brigade. They did not, so the Russian advance continued.

The speed of the Russian advance increased, and after weeks of bombardments, Russia began their advancing on the 72nd’s right flank and in the 58th’s defensive positions, as well. Mine No.1 and Vodiane fall. At this point, Vuhledar cannot be saved without a determined counterattack, but: new units have not been committed and the 72nd was doing all they can - the essence of which was: just to hang on.

Russian bombardments were nothing new to this sector but now they pick up in intensity. They know the 72nd is reeling and they want to knock them out. The 58th Brigade is also having trouble stopping the Russian advance, and Russia’s advances in the 72nd’s sector threatens the right flank of the 79th Brigade further north.

Over the last two years several Russian brigades at Vuhledar were smashed, restored, and smashed again. New brigades were rotated in and suffered the same fate. In the end, Ukraine could not or would not provide the 72nd Brigade with the men and ammo they needed to operate an effective defense. The soldiers of the 72nd kept fighting as their capabilities were being degraded until less than a quarter of them were left.

A member of one of the 72nd Brigades battalion headquarters staff discussed their situation. It was similar to other brigades in other locations. They were fighting for two years without rest, they were running out of personnel, the replacements were mostly over 50 and untrained, and they only had time to train them for a week. Two years ago they had plenty of artillery and could fire as needed. Now they have hardly any artillery support. The Russians used artillery to remotely mine the roads they used to bring supplies and replacements.

He said they received 25 untrained replacements every three months, and that their battalion of 350 people were reduced to only 30. That included mechanics, drivers and other support personnel used as infantry. This means they were losing an average of 21 soldiers per month and received 8 per month as replacements. My guess is that the losses were actually lower initially but rose over time as veterans were replaced by untrained soldiers, the artillery support became scarce and they had increasingly fewer people to do the same job.

Losses of 21 killed and wounded a month aren’t a high figure and a net loss of 13 soldiers per month is still lower. But over 24 months that loss rate reduced the unit’s size to less than 10% of its authorized strength, greatly reducing its combat power. That was just one of the brigade’s three battalions. The entire brigade started with around 2000 men. It might have 500 men left.

He also said they had 14-18 people to hold a 2-3 kilometer defensive line. That range of numbers means that each person had to cover 100-200 meters of ground all by themselves. Going back to Bakhmut, there have been quotes from soldiers saying that the density of the front line was one soldier per 100 meters. Given enough resources, there should be 5-10 soldiers per 100 meters. You can imagine if there’s only one soldier guarding the length of a football field/pitch that it would be difficult to stop 3-4 Russian soldiers walking across the field. It would be harder still to stop ten Russian soldiers being transported in an armored vehicle.

You can also understand why the 72nd wouldn’t have a reserve or the capacity for a counterattack. For the first 16 months, they not only defended their territory, they also conducted limited counterattacks to restore their defensive positions when pushed back. This prolonged the stability of the front lines. But in the last eight months they didn’t have the resources to conduct an effective defense, which includes that ability to counterattack. Other units have said that when they have enough people they counterattack. When they don’t, they just sit in their defensive positions until they’re pushed out of them.

As they lost personnel over time, they lost their ability to counterattack. They still had that ability in February and March, but by May it was gone. By the middle of June, Russia started their slow and steady advance at a heavy cost in personnel and equipment, but the speed of the advance picked up in August.

None of these issues could have been solved by the 72nd Brigade. They were told to hold the front lines and they did that to the best of their ability and quite a few Russians are dead because of it. Sustainment is an important part of combat operations and that is the responsibility of senior leadership.

My presumption is that the 72nd informed their superiors of their personnel issues. The soldier from the 72nd said if they had been replaced by a competent brigade in July or August then Vuhledar would still be in Ukrainian hands. That didn’t happen, of course.

Manpower is a difficult situation for Ukraine under any circumstances, and demographics is an issue that’s plagued them since independence. But there are some decisions that are in their control. Zelensky has said several times that they have formed brigades that don’t have equipment. What puzzles me is why they formed brigades without the supporting artillery, mortars, vehicles and other equipment when there are existing brigades that are severely short on personnel.

Having formed these brigades, why do the front line brigades have to send logistical, artillery and other support personnel to the zero line as infantry, when they haven’t been trained as infantry, while these unequipped brigades have personnel sitting around that presumably have been training all this time as infantry?

And why, when they do send 25 replacements every three months, do they arrive untrained? How, after 32 months of full scale war, is there not a national standard for minimum basic combat skills?

All of these issues fall under the category of sustainment, which is an operational imperative for any army. In the face of these Ukrainian shortcomings, Russia has still only managed a slow advance despite their numerical advantages in personnel and equipment. This is an indication that the Russian levels of combat capabilities are much lower at both the tactical and operational levels.

There are many details known only to Ukrainian leadership and it’s possible they have a reasonable answer for some or all the questions an outside observer might have. The ratio of Russian to Ukrainian casualties at Vuhledar over the last year is very favorable to Ukraine and unsustainable for Russia, but every army that’s ever fought could improve its performance. Ukraine needs to address its shortcomings that are within its control to increase its combat power even further.

(…to be continued…)