96 Russian Armored Vehicles Launched 2 Attacks On Kurakhove. Both Failed

The Russians' profligate waste of manpower and weaponry is affecting their ability to attack all across the front. 

It is increasingly apparent that the Kremlin realizes it only has about a year's worth of men and materiel to gain whatever it can in Ukraine so is trying desperately to add territory before then. But so far, that does not seem to be working. JL

David Axe reports in Forbes:

On Sept. 12, the Russians attacked with 46 vehicles—a record for that sector. Exactly a week later on Thursday, they broke their own record—and attacked with 52 vehicles. Both attacks failed.  The Ukrainian 46th Air Mobile Brigade fought back with thermite-spewing drones, artillery, tanks and infantry—and destroyed, disabled or damaged 44 of the 98 attacking vehicles while killing 72 Russians on Thursday alone. This staggering wastage of people and equipment is weighing on the Russian offensive in the east at Pokrovsk (where they are still six miles from the city), in the south at Zaporizhzhia and in the north at Kursk. 

The Russians are determined to break through Ukrainian lines outside Kurakhove, just west of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine. On Sept. 12, the Russians attacked with 46 vehicles—a record for that sector. Exactly a week later on Thursday, they broke their own record—and attacked with 52 vehicles.

 

Both attacks failed. The Ukrainian 46th Air Mobile Brigade, holding the line between Donetsk in the east and Kurakhove in the west, fought back with thermite-spewing drones, artillery, tanks and infantry—and destroyed, disabled or damaged 44 of the 98 attacking vehicles while killing 72 Russians on Thursday alone.

“Whoever of the enemies managed to turn their heels in time, consider them lucky,” the 46th Air Mobile Brigade quipped on social media. “They will live longer.”

This staggering wastage of people and equipment is weighing on the Russian offensive in the east, which is mainly focused on capturing the Ukrainian stronghold of Pokrovsk, 20 miles northwest of Kurakhove. The Russian offensive made steady progress starting late last year—rolling over the fortress city of Avdiivka and toward Pokrovsk in violent fits and starts until last month, when Russian troops were just six or so miles outside Pokrovsk.

Weeks later, those same troops are still six miles outside Pokrovsk. “The Russian advance on the Pokrovsk direction has slowed,” the Ukrainian Center for Defense Strategies noted last week.

It’s not an isolated development. Russian attacks in Zaporizhzhia, in southern Ukraine, have also slowed—as has the Russian counterattack targeting the Ukrainian salient in Russia’s Kursk Oblast. “A lack of resources for conducting simultaneous offensive actions on multiple fronts” is the main reason for the offensive slowdown, CDS concluded.

 

But the Russians aren’t the only ones who are overstretched as Russia’s wider war on Ukraine grinds toward its 31st month. The Ukrainians are struggling to mobilize enough people and equipment for their defensive operations in southern and eastern Ukraine and their simultaneous offensive in Kursk.

The arrival of fresh brigades from the Ukrainian national guard helped to stabilize the eastern front last month, but there are only a few fully-equipped offensive brigades in the national guard—and it’s possible they’re all deployed now.

The Ukrainian army is standing up 14 new brigades, and could send them east to relieve older brigades that have been fighting for more than a year straight and are badly in need of rest. Perhaps most notably, the elite 47th Mechanized Brigade finally left the line of contact in the east early this month, after fighting for 15 months without a break.

But Ukraine has enough modern armored vehicles for just four of the 14 new brigades, Ukrainian Pres. Volodymyr Zelensky told CNN. These brigades are undamaged … but also fragile.

Haphazardly hurling people and equipment at Ukrainian defenses west of Donetsk, the Russian military is like a bloodied boxer whose strength is fading, but who refuses to tap out. This might be an opportunity for the Ukrainian military to hit back with some powerful blows—if it weren’t equally exhausted.