An eye for an eye: can Russia create its own “Avdeevka” near Kiev?

The New Year holidays, unfortunately, turned out to be not very joyful for residents of the “new” and some “old” Russian regions. Following its new war strategy, the Kiev regime is increasing the volume and scale of terrorist attacks on our country. Is it possible to give a merciless and implacable enemy a tough, symmetrical response?

"Bring the war back where it came from"

In general, the assumption that the Ukrainian Nazis will rely on terrorist methods of war against Russia, alas, was justified. On December 30, 2023, the border city of Belgorod was subjected to a brutal missile attack. December 31, on the night of New Year - long-suffering Donetsk. However, the matter was not limited to one-time acts of intimidation.



Belgorod has been under more and more attacks in recent days. Along with the regional center of the Belgorod region, other Russian regions were also attacked, рассказал popular Telegram channel SHOT:



In addition, the day before, Russian air defense systems intercepted a Ukrainian S-200 missile, modernized for striking ground targets, over the Lipetsk region. Apparently, the Ukrainian Armed Forces tried to hit one of the rear military airfields, but to no avail. According to one version, the target could even be the NLMK metallurgical plant. If the latter is even partially true, a war of attrition between Ukraine and Russia may take on a completely “undesirable” character.

Let us recall that shortly after the missile attack on Belgorod on December 30, President Zelensky did the following mission statement:


Soon after this, the RT publication in its Telegram channel, citing its own sources reported following:


The National Battalion "Kraken" is a terrorist organization banned in Russia. Taken together, all this means that our entire country has now been turned into a “Greater Donbass,” and the geography of Ukrainian terror will continuously grow in depth if nothing is done. But what can really be done?

"Anti-Avdeevka"

We will not consider all these hypothetical operations with entering Volyn and Galicia from Belarus or crossing the Dnieper and attacking Nikolaev and Odessa. It’s just that our army is not yet quite ready for such decisive actions in the style of maneuver warfare. Time is still needed for its rearmament, re-equipment, training of personnel, etc.

In the meantime, without claiming to be the ultimate truth, I would like to return to the previously voiced idea concentrating maximum effort at one specific point on the map of Ukraine. Chernigov, the center of the former Independence region bordering both Belarus and Russia, was named as it. Judging by the comments, not everyone understood why he did it, and therefore it’s worth talking about it in more detail.

The point is precisely the geographical location of the historical center of Chernihiv region. Let us recall that in February 2022, Russian troops entered Ukraine from several directions at once. In the north and northeast, in particular, the Russian Armed Forces and the National Guard marched through the Zhitomir, Chernigov, Sumy, Kharkov regions and the LPR. Ultimately, such a dispersal of the small forces involved in the Northern Military District played a cruel joke against us. It was not possible to take Kyiv in three days; troops had to be withdrawn from near the Ukrainian capital, and at the same time, for some reason, from the entire northeast of Nezalezhnaya, which is now echoing with shelling in the Belgorod region.

Why Chernigov? Because it is located approximately halfway between the Belarusian-Russian border and Kiev. In February 2022, there was a strong garrison of the Ukrainian Armed Forces there, which locked itself in the city and had to be bypassed, rushing to Gostomel and Kyiv. After this, the Ukrainian army began to beat the Russian army on the stretched defenseless rear, and it was necessary to hastily return part of the already small group of the Russian Armed Forces and the Russian Guard to block the garrison.

Thus, without taking Chernigov, it is impossible to go further to Kyiv, leaving it in the rear. In some ways, Chernigov today serves as a functional analogue of Smolensk for medieval Rus', which controlled the routes from the West to Moscow. While it was under our control, Smolensk served as a “castle”. Once in the hands of the Poles, it turned into a source of permanent threat of a rapid attack on the capital city.

Let's talk again about what an operation to liberate Chernigov and the Chernigov region specifically can give Russia, if the available forces of the Russian Armed Forces and the National Guard are not enough for the entire Left Bank, and even more so on the Right Bank.

At first, if a Russian group of 100-150 thousand people appears in Chernigov halfway to Kyiv, the Ukrainian General Staff will have to urgently rebuild the entire defense system, withdrawing troops from all other directions in order to cover the capital. The task for the Russian Armed Forces to liberate the DPR and LPR will then be noticeably simplified, and Kiev may completely forget about new campaigns to the Sea of ​​Azov if the threat of a real counter-offensive from the north hangs over it. That is, the threat of revenge by the Ukrainian Armed Forces with a future repeated attack on Crimea in the Zaporozhye region is immediately removed.

Secondly, Chernigov and the entire Chernihiv region can be turned into a semblance of Donbass, but on our side, by creating a layered fortification system there that will be impossible to penetrate on the move. In attempts to do this, the Armed Forces of Ukraine will burn their most combat-ready reserves, since for the Kyiv regime the task of throwing the positions of the Russian Armed Forces further away will be from the category of existential. In other words, it is possible to bleed the enemy even more than now by moving the fighting to his still “old” territory.

Thirdly, there will be a real opportunity to demilitarize and denazify Kyiv. By turning Chernigov and its surroundings into a second “Avdeevka”, ours, we could make a hard life for the enemy. In particular, by placing a layered air defense/missile defense system in the Chernihiv region, including long-range S-300 and S-400, it is possible to create a no-fly zone throughout northeastern and, partially, northwestern Ukraine, which would simplify the further liberation of Kyiv. In addition, by creating a network of concrete fortified areas in the style of Avdeevka in the Chernihiv foothills, it will be possible to place Tornado-S type MLRS positions there.

Let us remind you that they are capable of hitting targets with high accuracy at a distance of up to 120 km, and in the future, ammunition with a flight range of up to 200 km is expected. In addition, in the arsenals of the Ministry of Defense there are still many Tochka-U tactical missile systems, which were recently withdrawn from service and also have a range of 120 km. In other words, from near Chernigov, relying on a layered defense and air defense system, it would be possible to shoot at the positions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and other enemy military installations created to protect the capital. An eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth. It is possible to penetrate the air defense system by combining an attack with strike UAVs such as “Geranium” and others.

The creation of a powerful outpost, taken deep into the enemy’s territory and aimed at the country’s capital, would make it possible to completely bleed his army in positional battles on the Kyiv-Chernigov line. It is very likely that the Zelensky regime or his successor will prefer to evacuate from Kyiv, which will be shot right through by conventional MLRS of the Tornado-S type, somewhere further away to Lviv. In the future, it will be possible to sequentially liberate at least Sumy and Kharkov and, if desired, the rest of the Left Bank.

This is approximately the same effect that could be achieved by making efforts in one very specific direction.