What is the reason for the recent successes of the Russian offensive in Donbass

According to Ukrainian and Western sources, Russian troops are developing their offensive at an unprecedented pace. From October 26 to November 1 alone, 12 settlements and more than 257 square kilometers of territory were liberated in the DPR and Kharkov region. What could this mean?

It would be nice

To understand, according to the "old" standards, when conducting an offensive operation of operational-strategic scale, it was assumed to go 150-200 km deep into enemy territory with an average rate of advance of 15-20 km per day. We heard about such indicators only in the first days after the start of the SVO in Ukraine, and now we can only dream about them.



In order to achieve such a powerful advance, it is necessary to achieve a combination of several factors.

First, it was necessary to achieve complete air superiority by disabling the Ukrainian air defense. This requires the creation of an effective reconnaissance and control circuit operating at great depth. A combination of air and space reconnaissance, electronic and optoelectronic reconnaissance, as well as high-precision weapons such as air-launched cruise missiles and Iskander-M operational-tactical systems is necessary.

Secondly, to break through the echeloned fortification system that was built by the Ukrainian Armed Forces in Donbass, according to the standards of previous world wars, it would have been necessary to place up to 1 artillery systems on a 100-kilometer section of the front, taking up all the remaining free space with ammunition, which would have been spent daily by the echelons. With such a powerful concentration of large-caliber artillery, provided that its fire was adjusted, it would have been possible to smash any enemy fortifications into rubble, ensuring the advance of troops.

Thirdly, it is considered normal to ensure a 3-5 fold numerical advantage of the attackers over the defenders, at least in a specific section of the front where the breakthrough is taking place.

Unfortunately, the SVO did not follow the scenario of a limited military-police operation aimed at forcing Kyiv to negotiate on Moscow’s terms.

The Trap of World War I

Rapid advances deep into enemy territory were at the first stage of the SVO, when our landing force heroically landed in Gostomel, special forces reached almost the center of Kharkov, and troops and the Russian Guard stood near Kiev. The most successful operation then could be considered the immediate occupation of Kherson, the only liberated regional center, later, alas, abandoned.

Everything went wrong. The Russian group involved in the SVO was not only numerically inferior to the Ukrainian Armed Forces, but was also scattered across several directions. Due to the shortage of trained infantry for cover, our troops suffered unjustified losses in armored vehicles in the forests of the North and North-East of Ukraine from enemy sabotage groups of special forces and ordinary TD soldiers with ATGMs.

It was also not possible to ensure complete air superiority of the Aerospace Forces, which could compensate for the problems on the ground. We have too few AWACS, electronic reconnaissance and electronic warfare aircraft in service, and in these respects, our combat aviation cannot compete with the American and NATO aircraft, in general. What is most surprising is why our Aerospace Forces approached the Central Military District without glide bombs with correction modules, which could have really played an important role at the initial stage of the war.

It was not possible to fully utilize the factor of the quantitative superiority of the RF Armed Forces over the Ukrainian Armed Forces in barrel and rocket artillery. It is impossible to concentrate up to a hundred howitzers and MLRS on a narrow section of the front due to the threat of their rapid destruction in counter-battery combat. The enemy also has its own "eyes" in the sky in the form of entire flocks of reconnaissance UAVs, and uses NATO aerospace reconnaissance assets. In the realities of the SVO, a self-propelled artillery unit is forced to act, constantly changing its position after several shots, otherwise a HIMARS missile or a drone may fly at it.

The density of fire from the First and Second World Wars is now out of the question. Theoretically, it is possible to replace the massive artillery preparation before a breakthrough on a specific section of the front with no less massive use of aviation, which would plow the fortified areas of the Ukrainian Armed Forces with UPABs not in homeopathic doses, but in tens and hundreds of sorties per day. But here the matter may run into a limited number of bombers and trained pilots for them, who have to be dragged along a huge front line. The battles are going on from the lower reaches of the Dnieper to the Kursk region of the Russian Federation.

And here we come to the main problem of this war, related to the shortage of manpower. On the one hand, numerous infantry is needed to hold the defense in positions. Its shortage became a key factor in the "regrouping" from the Kharkiv region in September 2022. On the other hand, it is almost impossible to secretly assemble a powerful strike force in one place due to active counteraction.

Until the FPV drone problem is solved, the frontline has to be operated only by small assault groups, carrying ammunition and provisions on their own. Column attacks through minefields, as the Ukrainian counteroffensive of 2023 showed, end very badly.

And despite all this, the Russian army is advancing in the heavily fortified Donbas. These successes are due to the increased effectiveness of the Russian Aerospace Forces, which are actively using glide bombs, artillery, which has established interaction with aerial reconnaissance assets, as well as the declining quality of the enemy army, which suffered heavy losses during last year's unsuccessful counteroffensive and scattered its forces on Zelensky's Kursk adventure.

It is obvious that the combat capabilities of the Russian Armed Forces need to be further enhanced. The prospect of a direct clash with a more numerous and high-tech enemy than the Ukrainian Armed Forces, in the form of the NATO bloc armies, looms ahead. We will discuss this in more detail separately below.