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bne March 2023
Ukraine also has a window of opportunity, but a much smaller one that will close much faster – and soon.
Tanks are a game changer as they are the first offensive weapons to be sent to Ukraine. Javelins, HIMARS and Patriots missiles are all deadly and very sophisticated systems, but they are not good at killing lots of infantry. Russia doesn’t have many smart missiles left but what it does have in spades is dumb artillery that is good at killing infantry.
And it is using it to good effect. Ukrainian forces on-the- ground are of high quality and easily killing the Russian ex-convicts they meet on the streets of Bakhmut, according to reports, but they are sitting under a barrage of Russian shelling that is slowly killing them off.
Manpower
The war has become a grinding war of attrition, fought for the most part with 155mm artillery shells, grenades dropped from toy drones and Kalashnikovs, as well as some Soviet era tanks that are being used as artillery and the occasional high precision HIMAR rocket that takes out a Russian command post or large bomb dropped by Russia on schools and apartment buildings full of refugees. Amongst Russia’s most effective tactics has been to blow up power stations and flatten towns with its artillery.
It doesn’t have many other alternatives in its playbook and has shown itself unable to even capture relatively unimportant towns.
It’s become a brutal fight. And it's ground down to a stalemate. Russia has been assaulting Bakhmut for about six months and in that time its gains can be measured in the metres.
Without the West’s sophisticated powerful weapons raw manpower is a key factor in winning the war.
Both sides are keeping the number of dead a closely guarded secret. The official count from both sides is not to be believed. However, from the various reported leaks, including a slip
up in a speech by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Ukraine seems to have lost 100,000-130,000 men whereas the toll on Russia is probably around 150,000 according to some reports.
That improves Russia’s hand, says military analyst Michal Kofman in a recent thread, as Russia has at least three times the population Ukraine does. Even if Ukraine kills two Russians for every one Ukrainian, that strengthens Russia’s hand as Ukraine will run out of men before Russia does. A long war plays to Russia’s manpower advantage, even if that is offset by the poor quality of its fighters. Russia won the war against the Nazis with similar tactics: 25mn Soviet citizens died vs about 10mn German, while the US and the UK lost about half a million men each.
Russia started the war with some 300,000 soldiers but has lost about half that number. Since then thanks to the partial mobilisation that started on September 21 it has replaced the
Opinion 77 fallen and brought its forces up to some 450,000 that has
stabilised its frontline.
Russian General Sergey Surovikin decision in September to abandon Kherson has also improved Russia’s position as it has shortened the line, allowed Russia to withdraw the 20-30 BTGs bottled up in the city and retreated behind the easier to defend Dnipro river. At the same time Surovikin ordered his men to dig in and set up multi-layered defences and
has given up the costly assaults, according to Kofman. The battle for Bakhmut is being fought almost exclusively by the expendable Wagner PMC ex-convicts. Russia is preserving its manpower for the widely anticipated big push in the spring.
Ukraine has a similar number of men in the field. It started out with some 250,000 professional soldiers, according to various reports, but since then the ranks have swollen to as many as one million soldiers, according to reports, but like Russia, the majority of these are green fighters and of less use in an assault. Indeed, Politico recently reported that there
are discipline issues in the Ukrainian army after Zelenskiy increased the severity of punishments for desertion after inexperienced soldiers fled the battlefield in fear of their lives. Reports from Bakhmut say the soldiers there are being worn down physically and mentally. The lack of effective manpower and supplies mean that unlike the Russian soldiers defending the frontline, they can be rotated less often and Russia’s tactic in Bakhmut increasing appears to be not to take the city per se, but simply to wear down the Ukrainian resistance and force it to use up its ammo.
By the summer the issue of how long Ukraine can keep this up without game changing armament will increasingly become an issue, especially if Russia becomes even more organised and starts a regular flow of fresh men and materiel into the battle.
Few have faith in Russia’s ability to organise this major long- term campaign, as it began the war so disastrously. However, we should be cautious as WWII started the same way when Stalin went into meltdown after Hitler invaded the Soviet Union during Operation Barbarossa. Stalin went into shock and simply locked himself away for the first few crucial days as hundreds of thousands of Russian troops were easily captured and the Nazi tore through Soviet lands.
However, eventually the Soviets reorganised themselves, moved their military production to beyond the Ural mountains and Mashal Gregory Zhukov was put in charge who turned the campaign around. Surovikin may not be a Zhukov, but if he is half competent and makes use of Russia’s superior manpower he could still at least achieve Putin’s minimalist war goal of capturing the Donbas. Without western modern weapons Ukraine will have its work cut out for it to prevent that even if the Russian military is poorly led simply because of the number of men it can throw into the field and its ongoing overwhelming advantage in artillery.
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