Ukraine - Russia Conflict

L’infanterie, les chars et la guerre en Ukraine (1ère partie- Du design de l'acier)

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

Infantry, tanks and the war in Ukraine (Part 1 - From the design of steel)

To try to understand how melee troops - infantry, tanks - are employed on both sides in the war in Ukraine, one must go back to the way the fighting was envisaged. The Russian ground force engaged in Ukraine is the direct heir to Soviet conceptions of industrial operational art. Almost entirely motorised and under armour, its objective is to provoke an 'operative shock' by dislocating the adversary's devices through rapid deep penetrations in order to seize or destroy key points or objectives as quickly as possible. Thus pierced, cut off from the flow of logistics and command and crushed in front by fire, the device can only break up, in the manner of operations Bagration in June-August 1944 in Belarus or August Storm in August-September in Manchuria, which remain the pure and perfect models to be reproduced.

A brief look at the concept of the armoured division

The primary instrument of these 'high-speed offensives' is the large armoured unit, the contours of which were established at the end of the Second World War. The spearhead is the battle tank battalions, but powerful as they are, they cannot do everything. They are not necessarily comfortable in some dense terrain and have to deal with multiple threats, such as enemy tanks of course, but also, and perhaps more importantly, a whole range of 'antibodies' that have emerged since the origin of tanks: field guns, anti-tank rifles, towed or carried anti-tank guns, shoulder-launched or aircraft-launched shaped charge rockets, recoilless guns, and then of course missiles, single-charge, then tandem, piloted then guided then 'fire and forget', all advertised as having to 'kill the tank'.

In fact, if there are great scares, as after the destruction of the first French tank force at Berry-au-Bac in April 1917 or after the October 1973 fighting in the Sinai, the tank has always survived. It has survived through its own adaptations first: improvement and weight of steel armour, composite armour, reactive, active defence (proximity radar and neutralisation of projectiles), main gun up to 120-125 mm calibre in the 1980s, secondary anti-personnel weapons, better fire control, etc.

It then survived thanks to the cooperation of the other weapons. As early as 1917 in France, there was a regiment - the 262nd RI - dedicated to helping tanks, which themselves were supposed to pave the way for infantry battalions. In 1918, tanks and infantrymen, all of whom moved at the same pace as men on foot on the battlefield, were closely associated with artillery batteries and even infantry aircraft. It was then imagined that in 1919 all these people would be put under steel and on tracks to form heavy, slow but irresistible armoured divisions. The cavalry, which understood how more mobile and therefore light armoured vehicles could help it to carry out its missions in an industrial setting, developed the concept of the mechanical light division.

The tank is necessarily, as in classic wargame counters, a trade-off between attack, defence and movement. The "battle tanks" that appeared during the Second World War, such as the T-34, Panther, Panzer IV long gun or the M4-Sherman, then the M-26 Pershing, constituted a good compromise of an all-purpose machine that erased pre-war distinctions. The same characteristics can be found in the large units of which they are a part, alongside an equally armoured and often tracked infantry and artillery, surrounded by small complementary reconnaissance units of fast wheeled vehicles or engineers.

The armoured division (AD), with great firepower, protected by steel and cooperation of arms, and with great mobility both on the battlefield (tactical mobility) and on the roads (operational mobility), seems then the optimum of the end of the industrial military revolution started in the middle of the 19th century. This DB 1945 was often divided into two regiments or joint brigades, which were themselves divided into kampgruppen or battalions, which were themselves joint during combat.

In this context, the mechanised infantry, motorised according to the Soviet designation, or simply armoured, with their vehicles and their main on-board weaponry - heavy machine gun or machine gun - and their men on foot provide many small weapon systems intended for precision combat at a distance less than that of the tank tubes. Infantrymen can protect, reconnoitre delicate positions in front of or to the sides of tanks, organise an anti-tank defence line as they inherited the rocket and light missile launchers, seize and occupy positions, and in fact do many things that others cannot do, such as take prisoners. Armoured infantry is the oil in a machine that would otherwise break down quickly.

The large armoured unit seems indispensable to modern armies, at least for fighting in Europe on rather open terrain full of roads or railways and under skies that are not completely in enemy hands. There are a few problems, however.

The first is that all this equipment is very expensive. From the M4 Sherman to the M1 Abrams, the cost of acquiring a US tank has risen by 10% per year in constant currency. It is likely that all other armies have experienced a similar phenomenon, which necessarily applies to all other equipment in the unit as well. As equipment budgets for land forces are not increasing at this rate, and armoured units are considered indispensable, this has inevitably eliminated all others, reducing them to niche specialities. The French army in 1989 had only 15 small divisions after mobilisation, compared to 105 forty years earlier, six of which were armoured and six of which were almost entirely wheeled. The Soviet Union did not escape this phenomenon of melting, but thanks to a colossal effort it had at the end of the Cold War a potential of 165 divisions, all under steel and often tracked, from armoured divisions to motorised divisions, including naval and airborne infantry units. The end of the Cold War, the general disarmament, the professionalization of the armies and the expeditionary orientation add a strong slimming down while paralyzing the technical innovations. The armies of the 21st century are still equipped with major equipment designed between 1970 and 1990.

The second problem is that a large armoured unit, even more than other units, requires, in addition to material capital, a rich human capital. The value of an armoured division is first and foremost that of the men who make it up. The material capital, C to use economic terms, is multiplied by a human capital T (as in work) which combines the skills and motivation of the men. If C or T are close to zero, the tactical value of the unit will also be close to zero. It should be remembered that while in modern combat the volume of force ratios count at the operational level, i.e. for the entire military campaign, they do not exceed 2 to 1 locally. The results of battalion battles do not depend on the number of men, but on the way they use weapons, and these results are often unbalanced. On a point of contact, the very good 'wins all' against the very bad, and it can even happen very quickly if the very good, which as a matter of principle happens most often, strikes first.

With these operational design issues in mind, let us now turn to the design of the forces manoeuvring in Ukraine (to be continued).

The design of Russian armoured units

The Russian and Ukrainian armies have also shrunk considerably in volume compared to 1991, but they have at least had the wisdom to keep some equipment in stock. Their human capital collapsed even faster before recovering with a series of reforms, starting in 2008 in Russia and Ukraine after the failures of the 2014-2015 war.

The Russian army committed to Ukraine in February 2022 thus resembles in size, equipment and methods the Soviet Group of Forces in Germany (SGFG), which NATO forces wondered how it would manage to reach the Rhine in a matter of days. The first difference, however, was that the ASGF with its five armies was the spearhead of a much larger force whose armies would reinforce it. This time, the 'Russian Force Group in Ukraine' (RFGU) has nine armies plus the two from the separatist republics of Donbass. Each of these armies, however, is smaller than those of 1989, with 15-20,000 men each, equivalent to a single large division or armoured corps of 1945, and above all they constitute the whole spear whereas the GFSA was only the iron. Another difference was that the Soviet army was better organised.

The manoeuvre units of the GFRU are the autonomous brigades or regiments of the armoured and motorised divisions. And here there is a new problem. The Russian Army and Air Assault Forces, two different armies, wanted to retain mass while becoming more professional. So the Russians never had enough volunteers to arm all the posts and kept conscription to arm a third of them. However, conscripts cannot be engaged abroad outside of an officially declared war, which is not the case here. A brigade or regiment is therefore obliged to reorganise itself in order to be engaged in combat with between 20 and 40 per cent fewer personnel. In concrete terms, they are asked to form two battle groups (BGs). In February 2022, there were 128 such groups. A battle group consists of 700 to 900 men, at least at the beginning. It is in fact the combination of a manoeuvre battalion and a diversified artillery battalion under one command.

The typical manoeuvre battalion comprises one or two tank companies, two or three companies of motorised infantry on BMP (tracked) or BTR (wheeled) vehicles and a company with four or five anti-tank vehicles. The design of the vehicles and the organisation of the units were conceived in the Soviet era to combine a good capacity to overcome any resistance encountered and operational speed, i.e. the possibility of advancing 10 to 20 km/day inside enemy territory.

The vehicles are tailor-made. Ex-Soviet battle tanks are about 20 tonnes lighter than their Western counterparts. Life inside a T-72 or a T-80 is therefore also difficult, better not to be taller than 1.60m, and even very dangerous with shells placed directly under the feet of the gunner and the tank commander. The BMP 2/3 or BTR 82 infantry fighting vehicles are not much better in terms of ergonomics. Due to the small size of the vehicles and the small number of support vehicles, which were not protected, the battle group had little logistical autonomy and could not fight for long without being supplied.

The units are organised at a minimum with tank or infantry combat companies of 10 vehicles. Tank companies have only 30 men, as crews are reduced to 3 men. Infantry companies are commanded by a lieutenant or captain in his vehicle. Each of the three sections is reduced to three vehicles and 29 men, of whom only 23 disembark to form three small groups of seven. The group is not articulated for manoeuvre, but simply serves as a base for anti-personnel and anti-tank fire. Generally speaking, there is a gap between the Russian army and the Western armies. We ask of a Russian platoon leader what we ask of a group leader in France. The manoeuvre of the Russian section is limited and on a small area. Here again, as the tactical cells are reduced, a few losses are enough to weaken the whole very quickly.

With only nine such weak and rigid infantry platoons in a BG averaging 120 vehicles, they are relatively fast and powerful at long range with all the direct and indirect shells they can throw, but quickly exhausted and broken down, especially when they penetrate dense spaces. And again, this is considered to be when human capital is at its maximum, although it seems that this is not always the case, except perhaps in naval infantry forces and especially in air assault forces, and this is not by chance, as these elite forces also attract the best.

These more versatile units, since they can be engaged by sea or by helicopter, are in fact also armoured units equipped with BMD-type combat vehicles. In short, it is an armoured infantry unit further reduced to be air transportable. A 72-man Air Assault Company (VDV) thus has three sections on three BMD-4M vehicles with only 21 men. The battalion includes its own support with a 2S5 light tank platoon and a 2S9 120mm mounted mortar platoon. Provided they have the means of transport, heavy helicopters and transport aircraft, and local air superiority, the 12 Russian air assault brigades or regiments (about 2,500 men each), together with the 4 rather similar naval infantry brigades, are interesting units. Their mission is normally to further accelerate the high-speed offensive by seizing key points, either in a light helicopter-borne version or a heavy vehicle-borne version in front of armoured columns.

For the sake of completeness, each army also often has a brigade of 1,500 spetsnaz in charge of reconnaissance and deep sabotage and the 45th Special Forces brigade is supposed to do the same at the operational level from the north-west of Kiev. One will also find quickly some units of the National Guard (Rosgvardia) under the Ministry of the Interior, normally dedicated to the maintenance of order in the rear and conquered areas, but some of which, like the Chechens, participate in the fight as light infantry, as well as groups of Wagner mercenaries.

Meanwhile in Ukraine

Ukrainian structures are slightly different, despite similar major equipment. There are 38 active or reserve brigades, very diverse (armoured, mechanised, motorised, mountain, air assault, airborne) depending on the mix of tank battalions or infantry of 300 to 400 men. The Ukrainian artillery is much less voluminous than that of the Russian army, so the Ukrainians did not form manoeuvre-artillery associations like the Russian BGs but more classically tank-infantry battalions with some limited support, often mortars. The infantry density was also higher than in the Russian BGs. The vehicles being the same as those of the Russians, the Ukrainian companies, as far as we know, also have the same characteristics.

Unlike the Russians, however, these manoeuvre battalions are more coherent since they are directly engaged in combat and not restructured by separating from the conscripts. A considerable effort was also made with the help of the Anglo-Saxon countries to build up a more solid corps of non-commissioned officers than the Russians and to set up different command methods, less focused on the strict application of orders and schemes and more on decentralised operation by missions. With a solid training effort for reservists, who are systematically sent to the Donbass front, and many more officers having taken part in the 2014-2015 fighting than on the Russian side, one can add an undeniable general motivation and consider a human capital that is undoubtedly rather heterogeneous, but on average superior to that of equivalent Russian units.

The manoeuvre army can also rely on a network of several dozen brigades of the territorial army, the National Guard of the Ministry of the Interior, including the 4th Rapid Reaction (armoured) and a certain number of militias (Azov, DUK, Donbass, etc.), i.e. a disparate group of light infantry battalions of very unequal value, capable of supplementing the action of the heavier manoeuvre units and holding dense areas.

All these Ukrainian forces are organised by regional commands and employed according to a strategy that is necessarily defensive. Ukrainians remember the destruction of an open mechanised battalion in a few minutes on 11 July 2014 by Russian rocket launchers, then the defeats of Ilovaisk in August 2014 and especially Debaltseve in January-February 2015 against Russian battle groups reinforced by separatist militias and when, at the time, the Russian air force and attack helicopters did not intervene. They were afraid to engage their forces under the envelopes of Russian long-range fire, but hoped to slow, stop and wear down enemy columns in dense, fortified, forested and especially urban terrain.

Let's see how this worked out. (to be continued)
 
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Picdelamirand-oil said:
L’infanterie, les chars et la guerre en Ukraine (1ère partie- Du design de l'acier)

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

Infantry, tanks and the war in Ukraine (Part 1 - From the design of steel)

To try to understand how melee troops - infantry, tanks - are employed on both sides in the war in Ukraine, one must go back to the way the fighting was envisaged. The Russian ground force engaged in Ukraine is the direct heir to Soviet conceptions of industrial operational art. Almost entirely motorised and under armour, its objective is to provoke an 'operative shock' by dislocating the adversary's devices through rapid deep penetrations in order to seize or destroy key points or objectives as quickly as possible. Thus pierced, cut off from the flow of logistics and command and crushed in front by fire, the device can only break up, in the manner of operations Bagration in June-August 1944 in Belarus or August Storm in August-September in Manchuria, which remain the pure and perfect models to be reproduced.

A brief look at the concept of the armoured division

The primary instrument of these 'high-speed offensives' is the large armoured unit, the contours of which were established at the end of the Second World War. The spearhead is the battle tank battalions, but powerful as they are, they cannot do everything. They are not necessarily comfortable in some dense terrain and have to deal with multiple threats, such as enemy tanks of course, but also, and perhaps more importantly, a whole range of 'antibodies' that have emerged since the origin of tanks: field guns, anti-tank rifles, towed or carried anti-tank guns, shoulder-launched or aircraft-launched shaped charge rockets, recoilless guns, and then of course missiles, single-charge, then tandem, piloted then guided then 'fire and forget', all advertised as having to 'kill the tank'.

In fact, if there are great scares, as after the destruction of the first French tank force at Berry-au-Bac in April 1917 or after the October 1973 fighting in the Sinai, the tank has always survived. It has survived through its own adaptations first: improvement and weight of steel armour, composite armour, reactive, active defence (proximity radar and neutralisation of projectiles), main gun up to 120-125 mm calibre in the 1980s, secondary anti-personnel weapons, better fire control, etc.

It then survived thanks to the cooperation of the other weapons. As early as 1917 in France, there was a regiment - the 262nd RI - dedicated to helping tanks, which themselves were supposed to pave the way for infantry battalions. In 1918, tanks and infantrymen, all of whom moved at the same pace as men on foot on the battlefield, were closely associated with artillery batteries and even infantry aircraft. It was then imagined that in 1919 all these people would be put under steel and on tracks to form heavy, slow but irresistible armoured divisions. The cavalry, which understood how more mobile and therefore light armoured vehicles could help it to carry out its missions in an industrial setting, developed the concept of the mechanical light division.

The tank is necessarily, as in classic wargame counters, a trade-off between attack, defence and movement. The "battle tanks" that appeared during the Second World War, such as the T-34, Panther, Panzer IV long gun or the M4-Sherman, then the M-26 Pershing, constituted a good compromise of an all-purpose machine that erased pre-war distinctions. The same characteristics can be found in the large units of which they are a part, alongside an equally armoured and often tracked infantry and artillery, surrounded by small complementary reconnaissance units of fast wheeled vehicles or engineers.

The armoured division (AD), with great firepower, protected by steel and cooperation of arms, and with great mobility both on the battlefield (tactical mobility) and on the roads (operational mobility), seems then the optimum of the end of the industrial military revolution started in the middle of the 19th century. This DB 1945 was often divided into two regiments or joint brigades, which were themselves divided into kampgruppen or battalions, which were themselves joint during combat.

In this context, the mechanised infantry, motorised according to the Soviet designation, or simply armoured, with their vehicles and their main on-board weaponry - heavy machine gun or machine gun - and their men on foot provide many small weapon systems intended for precision combat at a distance less than that of the tank tubes. Infantrymen can protect, reconnoitre delicate positions in front of or to the sides of tanks, organise an anti-tank defence line as they inherited the rocket and light missile launchers, seize and occupy positions, and in fact do many things that others cannot do, such as take prisoners. Armoured infantry is the oil in a machine that would otherwise break down quickly.

The large armoured unit seems indispensable to modern armies, at least for fighting in Europe on rather open terrain full of roads or railways and under skies that are not completely in enemy hands. There are a few problems, however.

The first is that all this equipment is very expensive. From the M4 Sherman to the M1 Abrams, the cost of acquiring a US tank has risen by 10% per year in constant currency. It is likely that all other armies have experienced a similar phenomenon, which necessarily applies to all other equipment in the unit as well. As equipment budgets for land forces are not increasing at this rate, and armoured units are considered indispensable, this has inevitably eliminated all others, reducing them to niche specialities. The French army in 1989 had only 15 small divisions after mobilisation, compared to 105 forty years earlier, six of which were armoured and six of which were almost entirely wheeled. The Soviet Union did not escape this phenomenon of melting, but thanks to a colossal effort it had at the end of the Cold War a potential of 165 divisions, all under steel and often tracked, from armoured divisions to motorised divisions, including naval and airborne infantry units. The end of the Cold War, the general disarmament, the professionalization of the armies and the expeditionary orientation add a strong slimming down while paralyzing the technical innovations. The armies of the 21st century are still equipped with major equipment designed between 1970 and 1990.

The second problem is that a large armoured unit, even more than other units, requires, in addition to material capital, a rich human capital. The value of an armoured division is first and foremost that of the men who make it up. The material capital, C to use economic terms, is multiplied by a human capital T (as in work) which combines the skills and motivation of the men. If C or T are close to zero, the tactical value of the unit will also be close to zero. It should be remembered that while in modern combat the volume of force ratios count at the operational level, i.e. for the entire military campaign, they do not exceed 2 to 1 locally. The results of battalion battles do not depend on the number of men, but on the way they use weapons, and these results are often unbalanced. On a point of contact, the very good 'wins all' against the very bad, and it can even happen very quickly if the very good, which as a matter of principle happens most often, strikes first.

With these operational design issues in mind, let us now turn to the design of the forces manoeuvring in Ukraine (to be continued).

The design of Russian armoured units

The Russian and Ukrainian armies have also shrunk considerably in volume compared to 1991, but they have at least had the wisdom to keep some equipment in stock. Their human capital collapsed even faster before recovering with a series of reforms, starting in 2008 in Russia and Ukraine after the failures of the 2014-2015 war.

The Russian army committed to Ukraine in February 2022 thus resembles in size, equipment and methods the Soviet Group of Forces in Germany (SGFG), which NATO forces wondered how it would manage to reach the Rhine in a matter of days. The first difference, however, was that the ASGF with its five armies was the spearhead of a much larger force whose armies would reinforce it. This time, the 'Russian Force Group in Ukraine' (RFGU) has nine armies plus the two from the separatist republics of Donbass. Each of these armies, however, is smaller than those of 1989, with 15-20,000 men each, equivalent to a single large division or armoured corps of 1945, and above all they constitute the whole spear whereas the GFSA was only the iron. Another difference was that the Soviet army was better organised.

The manoeuvre units of the GFRU are the autonomous brigades or regiments of the armoured and motorised divisions. And here there is a new problem. The Russian Army and Air Assault Forces, two different armies, wanted to retain mass while becoming more professional. So the Russians never had enough volunteers to arm all the posts and kept conscription to arm a third of them. However, conscripts cannot be engaged abroad outside of an officially declared war, which is not the case here. A brigade or regiment is therefore obliged to reorganise itself in order to be engaged in combat with between 20 and 40 per cent fewer personnel. In concrete terms, they are asked to form two battle groups (BGs). In February 2022, there were 128 such groups. A battle group consists of 700 to 900 men, at least at the beginning. It is in fact the combination of a manoeuvre battalion and a diversified artillery battalion under one command.

The typical manoeuvre battalion comprises one or two tank companies, two or three companies of motorised infantry on BMP (tracked) or BTR (wheeled) vehicles and a company with four or five anti-tank vehicles. The design of the vehicles and the organisation of the units were conceived in the Soviet era to combine a good capacity to overcome any resistance encountered and operational speed, i.e. the possibility of advancing 10 to 20 km/day inside enemy territory.

The vehicles are tailor-made. Ex-Soviet battle tanks are about 20 tonnes lighter than their Western counterparts. Life inside a T-72 or a T-80 is therefore also difficult, better not to be taller than 1.60m, and even very dangerous with shells placed directly under the feet of the gunner and the tank commander. The BMP 2/3 or BTR 82 infantry fighting vehicles are not much better in terms of ergonomics. Due to the small size of the vehicles and the small number of support vehicles, which were not protected, the battle group had little logistical autonomy and could not fight for long without being supplied.

The units are organised at a minimum with tank or infantry combat companies of 10 vehicles. Tank companies have only 30 men, as crews are reduced to 3 men. Infantry companies are commanded by a lieutenant or captain in his vehicle. Each of the three sections is reduced to three vehicles and 29 men, of whom only 23 disembark to form three small groups of seven. The group is not articulated for manoeuvre, but simply serves as a base for anti-personnel and anti-tank fire. Generally speaking, there is a gap between the Russian army and the Western armies. We ask of a Russian platoon leader what we ask of a group leader in France. The manoeuvre of the Russian section is limited and on a small area. Here again, as the tactical cells are reduced, a few losses are enough to weaken the whole very quickly.

With only nine such weak and rigid infantry platoons in a BG averaging 120 vehicles, they are relatively fast and powerful at long range with all the direct and indirect shells they can throw, but quickly exhausted and broken down, especially when they penetrate dense spaces. And again, this is considered to be when human capital is at its maximum, although it seems that this is not always the case, except perhaps in naval infantry forces and especially in air assault forces, and this is not by chance, as these elite forces also attract the best.

These more versatile units, since they can be engaged by sea or by helicopter, are in fact also armoured units equipped with BMD-type combat vehicles. In short, it is an armoured infantry unit further reduced to be air transportable. A 72-man Air Assault Company (VDV) thus has three sections on three BMD-4M vehicles with only 21 men. The battalion includes its own support with a 2S5 light tank platoon and a 2S9 120mm mounted mortar platoon. Provided they have the means of transport, heavy helicopters and transport aircraft, and local air superiority, the 12 Russian air assault brigades or regiments (about 2,500 men each), together with the 4 rather similar naval infantry brigades, are interesting units. Their mission is normally to further accelerate the high-speed offensive by seizing key points, either in a light helicopter-borne version or a heavy vehicle-borne version in front of armoured columns.

For the sake of completeness, each army also often has a brigade of 1,500 spetsnaz in charge of reconnaissance and deep sabotage and the 45th Special Forces brigade is supposed to do the same at the operational level from the north-west of Kiev. One will also find quickly some units of the National Guard (Rosgvardia) under the Ministry of the Interior, normally dedicated to the maintenance of order in the rear and conquered areas, but some of which, like the Chechens, participate in the fight as light infantry, as well as groups of Wagner mercenaries.

Meanwhile in Ukraine

Ukrainian structures are slightly different, despite similar major equipment. There are 38 active or reserve brigades, very diverse (armoured, mechanised, motorised, mountain, air assault, airborne) depending on the mix of tank battalions or infantry of 300 to 400 men. The Ukrainian artillery is much less voluminous than that of the Russian army, so the Ukrainians did not form manoeuvre-artillery associations like the Russian BGs but more classically tank-infantry battalions with some limited support, often mortars. The infantry density was also higher than in the Russian BGs. The vehicles being the same as those of the Russians, the Ukrainian companies, as far as we know, also have the same characteristics.

Unlike the Russians, however, these manoeuvre battalions are more coherent since they are directly engaged in combat and not restructured by separating from the conscripts. A considerable effort was also made with the help of the Anglo-Saxon countries to build up a more solid corps of non-commissioned officers than the Russians and to set up different command methods, less focused on the strict application of orders and schemes and more on decentralised operation by missions. With a solid training effort for reservists, who are systematically sent to the Donbass front, and many more officers having taken part in the 2014-2015 fighting than on the Russian side, one can add an undeniable general motivation and consider a human capital that is undoubtedly rather heterogeneous, but on average superior to that of equivalent Russian units.

The manoeuvre army can also rely on a network of several dozen brigades of the territorial army, the National Guard of the Ministry of the Interior, including the 4th Rapid Reaction (armoured) and a certain number of militias (Azov, DUK, Donbass, etc.), i.e. a disparate group of light infantry battalions of very unequal value, capable of supplementing the action of the heavier manoeuvre units and holding dense areas.

All these Ukrainian forces are organised by regional commands and employed according to a strategy that is necessarily defensive. Ukrainians remember the destruction of an open mechanised battalion in a few minutes on 11 July 2014 by Russian rocket launchers, then the defeats of Ilovaisk in August 2014 and especially Debaltseve in January-February 2015 against Russian battle groups reinforced by separatist militias and when, at the time, the Russian air force and attack helicopters did not intervene. They were afraid to engage their forces under the envelopes of Russian long-range fire, but hoped to slow, stop and wear down enemy columns in dense, fortified, forested and especially urban terrain.

Let's see how this worked out. (to be continued)
Click to expand...
This is exactly what I had written in my analysis of first phase of this war.
 
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Russian troops hit Kiev. A large-scale missile strike was carried out by six X-101 missiles fired by Russian strategic bombers. On the outskirts of Kiev, T-72 tanks supplied by Eastern European countries and other armored vehicles located in the buildings of the Darnitsky wagon repair company were destroyed.


The attack of the soldiers of the Russian special forces of Chechnya in Ukraine. The Ukrainian soldier ignored the offer to surrender, after which he was destroyed in battle by soldiers of the Russian special forces.


Servicemen of the 45th artillery brigade of Ukraine, published an episode of the video of the destruction of the Ukrainian UAV. The drone corrected the artillery fire of Ukraine but was destroyed by the Russian SAM.


The US Department of Defense has published footage showing M113 armored personnel carriers preparing to be sent to Ukraine. In total, Kiev will receive 200 armored personnel carriers, which have been in service with the United States since the 1960s. The American M113 APC turned out to be successful and became the most massive armored personnel carrier in history. The armored personnel carrier can carry 11 infantrymen. The body of the APC is made of aluminum armor, with the addition of manganese and magnesium. One of the unsuccessful decisions of the APC, the lack of loopholes for shooters. A large-caliber 12.7 mm Browning M2NV machine gun was installed as the main armament on the M113 APC. The range of the car is up to 480 kilometers, in new versions.

 
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