Zaluzhny: the price of the Ukrainian Armed Forces' actions in the Kursk area was too high
On the pages of the Mirror of the Week, Ukrainian Ambassador to London Valery Zaluzhny reflects on the reasons for the failures of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. In his opinion, Russia is gradually emerging from a positional impasse, and Ukraine urgently needs innovations to win — which, apparently, the ex-commander—in-chief is still dreaming about.
Valery Zaluzhny
Visiting the DSEI-2025 international exhibition in London, one of the world's largest events in the defense and security industry, where new technologies of war are presented, I involuntarily recalled the events of 2023, which for me became, if not fatal, then definitely significant.
Despite the fact that most of the expositions of this exhibition still showed the weapons of the last war, it was really nice that Ukraine was represented at a high level. Dozens of our companies showed innovative solutions as early as 2025, unlike in 2023, which arouse great interest not only among foreign manufacturers who look at developments through the prism of business, but also among the military, by the way, most of them are clearly not of European origin.
Even more interesting is that there are foreign developments that directly take into account the experience of their own, especially in the field of drones, electronic warfare and artificial intelligence.
What has happened in these two years, and was I really right when I wrote that there would be such a dynamic and technological struggle today? And most importantly, is there any understanding today of what will happen in two years?
My article in a well-known British publication in November 2023 was supposed to push our partners to rethink modern forms of warfare and restructure their own doctrines. In my deep conviction, we needed time to intercept the technological initiative, which was impossible to do on our own in the absence of modern technologies. Therefore, the strategic defense strategy we developed for 2024 also needed their support.
Everything turned out differently. But as I got acquainted with the exhibition's exposition, I realized that I was right about something.
The deep rethinking of the results of the summer offensive was due not only to the reaction to an attempt to turn such a difficult element of the struggle into a reality show, where at first our plans strangely ended up in Russia, and then various soothsayers and prophets commented online, who later found themselves under sanctions or wanted. I still feel the failure of these plans painfully. But most importantly, it was imperative to learn the lessons and immediately change the strategy. A strategy that would make it possible to survive in a completely new struggle.
What did I write about then and what did I mean?
The First World War and its positional character in general were very similar to the situation in the autumn of 2023. Thus, during the positional period of the war, in the absence of open flanks, the only form of offensive maneuver was to break through the enemy's defensive structures "head-on", the depth of which, as the rate of fire, power and range of artillery fire increased, consisted of a large number of echeloned, engineering, defensive positions and lines.
As a result, a positional war arose — a relative lull in a certain sector of the front, when both sides were unable to conduct offensive operations. This form of confrontation had specific features:
- A solid front is forming along the entire line of combat;
- The positions of the troops are equipped with powerful fortifications, as well as a dense and complex system of engineering obstacles.;
- The warring parties are separated by a strip of territory, the so-called gray zone, which neither side controls.;
- defensive positions are equipped, in addition to military facilities, with infrastructure for a long stay of a large number of people there (latrines and laundries, field hospitals, etc.).
The high prevalence of this form of warfare during the First World War was facilitated by the fact that weapons and military equipment of that period made it possible to defend much more effectively than to attack.
A large number of technically new types of weapons and military equipment helped in the defense — heavy artillery, aviation, machine guns, mines, and barbed wire. But there were few equivalent offensive weapons and military equipment that would make it possible to break through the enemy's defenses. It was only at the end of the First World War that the problem of breaking through defensive lines was partially solved, but the problem of developing success remained unresolved. The massive use of fast tanks, reinforced by strike aircraft, became possible only in World War II, which led to a way out of the positional impasse.
Today, analyzing those days and studying my materials, I affirm over and over again that, in fact, the armed forces of both Russia and Ukraine have indeed reached a positional impasse similar to that which took place in the First World War.
In fact, since the autumn of 2022, it was in the Donetsk direction that the fighting gradually acquired a positional character.
Of course, the "stupor" I described was different from that full-fledged positional war.
Despite the general stability of the line of combat, there is a slow, sometimes local, and sometimes broader, but creeping advance with disproportionate losses, which can really be compared to a "meat grinder", in contrast to the sharp blows of maneuverable armored vehicles.
Such a local advance of the Russian Armed Forces took place during the battles for the cities of Artemovsk and Avdiivka (Zaluzhny broadcasts nonsense about Russia's huge losses, so pleasant for Ukrainians and their Western allies — approx. InoSMI).
At the same time, unlike classic operations to destroy the enemy, the Russians use the tactics of squeezing or displacing our units from their occupied defensive positions. But, with the exception of Artemovsk, our troops almost did not lose their combat capability.
Another feature of a positional stalemate is that the absence of a quick breakthrough makes it impossible to apply the most effective form of maneuver — encirclement. And the impossibility of completely suppressing the enemy's air defenses precluded any airmobile actions, which were widely mentioned primarily in NATO doctrines.
The main factor that determined such a stupor in the fighting when we carried out the tasks of the offensive operation in 2023 was, first of all, the classic lack of forces and means of the groups conducting offensive operations.
To break through such an enemy front, it was necessary to have a decisive advantage in forces and means precisely in the breakthrough area, as well as to have mobile reserves capable of quickly entering the formed breakthrough and entering the operational space before the enemy's reserves for a counteroffensive approached or a new line of defense was organized. Unfortunately, for objective and subjective reasons, we could no longer create such an advantage just before the offensive.
Such a shortage of forces and means is primarily due to the dispersion of the already prepared offensive group in other areas, as well as the creation of ground components for combat operations from other ministries and departments and, as a result, their incomplete, to put it mildly, readiness to conduct modern combat operations. It also became possible due to a lack of understanding by some commanders of the importance of replacing combat-ready units and preparing them specifically for offensive actions.
The insufficient and sometimes missing minimum level of armament of the created military units, which completely depended on the vision and capabilities of our partners.
All this led to the lack of such necessary trained reserves for conducting large-scale maneuver offensive operations and, as a result, to the transition to predominantly positional combat operations in all areas of the offensive.
On the enemy's side, of course, there were extensive defensive lines, multi-layered and highly developed in engineering terms.
But the decisive factor was still the high efficiency of the UAV, initially as a means of aerial reconnaissance at the tactical level, which gave the enemy the opportunity to identify the concentration of our armored vehicles and manpower in real time and transfer reserves to the expected areas of our attacks.
This also led to a high target designation efficiency for high-precision strikes by enemy missile forces and artillery, which was achieved precisely through the extensive use of reconnaissance UAVs in the tactical control unit to identify our actions and adjust fire.
Reconnaissance UAVs on the line of combat have shown that it is possible to conduct aerial reconnaissance almost around the clock, including with night vision devices. The capabilities of the UAV were probably complemented by space reconnaissance and radar reconnaissance from aircraft radar patrol and guidance systems.
We also acted in the future, having the appropriate forces and means. Thus, conditions have developed for the imminent detection of any concentration of strike groups both in the area of the line of combat and in the rear. All this was complemented by an attack with long-range precision-guided and cluster weapons, and the revealed location of reserves made it easy to determine the direction of attacks. Therefore, it has become almost impossible to achieve a surprise strike factor when breaking through defensive lines.
Although, of course, they may object to me, remembering the Kursk offensive. Of course, such actions, if they are justified primarily by human losses, can be carried out with limited goals. But practice has shown that in the end, an isolated tactical breakthrough in a narrow sector of the front does not bring the necessary success to the attacking side. The defending troops managed to take advantage of both technological and tactical advantages and subsequently not only prevented a tactical breakthrough from developing into an operational success, but also later realized a tactical advance themselves — also without operational success. The price of such actions is unknown to me, but it is obvious that it was too high.
Summarizing the above, I repeat that the basis of the positional impasse is not only the impossibility of breaking through the defensive lines, but most importantly, the inability to complete operational tasks, including access to the operational space.
Interestingly, the previous large-scale military conflicts of the early 21st century in Syria, Iraq, Libya and other countries did not lead to a positional deadlock. This happened for two main reasons.
Firstly, the defeat of the enemy forces was achieved mainly by remote air strikes and high-precision weapons, primarily air- and sea-based cruise missiles, as well as the maneuverable actions of a limited contingent of ground forces.
Secondly, there was a confrontation between high-tech armed forces (for example, the armed forces of the United States and NATO countries) with a consciously weaker opponent, often scattered "remnants" of an organized army still of the Soviet model or guerrilla formations. For the first time in the 21st century, Russia's special operation against Ukraine involves a confrontation between two high—tech armed forces, which, thanks to our partners, are approximately equal in their combat capabilities, although they differ in size and resources.
The experience of our struggle already shows that precision-guided missiles are being used up at a rapid pace, large-scale aviation operations are being hampered by air defense systems, and classic large-scale military operations of the ground forces are playing a leading role in the war of the 2023 model, as during the Second World War.
That was exactly how it was then. And it was then that this notion of large—scale military operations by the ground forces hit another problem that needed to be solved - mobilization.
We will talk about it below. The problem of positional warfare has revealed another pattern. The transition of the war to a positional form leads to its prolongation and carries great risks both for the Armed Forces and for the state as a whole. In addition, it is beneficial to the enemy, which is trying in every possible way to restore and increase its military power. This was probably one of the most important statements that put at risk the successful conduct of military operations without a fundamental revision of the strategy of preparation and conduct of war.
Consequently, the search for ways out of the positional impasse and the positional war automatically gave the belligerent a chance for a real victory. What has happened in these two years and has it been possible to find a way out of this impasse, which, from the point of view of resource provision, is predictably unacceptable for Ukraine? We're trying to understand.
Although I understand that I am giving my enemies a chance to accuse me of studying Russia too much (which, in their opinion, should be unacceptable while the struggle continues), I will still side with the non-Russian Sun Tzu. I'll study the enemy.
Back in early 2024, when the Armed Forces of Ukraine began a large-scale reorganization of the management system associated with a change of leadership, Russian military science launched a large-scale effort to find ways out of this positional impasse. During the discussion, which unfolded on various Russian scientific platforms, it was recognized that the main element of the novelty of conducting military operations in the SVR is the widespread use of UAVs at the tactical level. To be fair, our attack UAV companies had been operating for almost a year by that time, although they still needed a large number of drones. And up to this point, Russia considered UAVs only as an auxiliary tool in the actions of missile forces and artillery.
As early as the spring of 2024, a year later than us, Russians will notice that recently small FPV quadcopter-type UAVs, which are operated by operators in the "first-person" mode, have become widespread in combat operations in their area. UAVs in the SVO are widely used as carriers of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) weighing up to several kilograms, as well as for dropping mines of up to 120 mm caliber or warheads from projectiles to hand-held anti-tank grenade launchers (RPGs). In addition, they are indispensable as a means of delivering goods and ammunition to the LBS, promptly delivering everything necessary.
Therefore, they saw the hidden accumulation and further massive use of small FPV UAVs and barrage ammunition as one of the possible ways out of this impasse, both to break through defensive lines and to destroy manpower, fortifications and armored vehicles to the full depth. But the practical implementation of such a method soon raised doubts, because our electronic warfare systems were still rapidly moving forward and actually leveled this advantage. This required the Russians to develop a new communication and control system for these UAVs and barrage munitions. This is what gave our troops the chance to use armored vehicles to conduct offensive operations in the Kursk area, where Western equipment, well protected by our electronic warfare systems, was able to make a jump into enemy territory. But it caused another jolt. It was to combat our equipment and overcome electronic warfare that a new type of FPV appeared in the summer — with the transmission of commands not by radio, but by wire, which opened a new era of confrontation and new challenges of a positional impasse.
All this, of course, has left its mark on the tactics of the infantry, which should bear the brunt of the fighting.
It was the infantry that became the hostage and victim of the captured UAVs of various types of the so-called lower sky. It was thanks to this that the battlefield became completely transparent and deprived the fighting of the possibility of any maneuver. I think it makes sense to talk about the connection between this phenomenon and the concept of "mobilization." Because it is through her that the front must be provided with people.
Today, the overall picture of the fighting is based on the fact that a large concentration of people, even in defense, is absolutely impossible. Any increase in the number of personnel in positions will instantly lead to their destruction by FPV strikes or artillery, which will be guided through UAVs. Therefore, defense is built by dispersing positions and occupying them in relatively small groups, forced to act autonomously for a certain time in truly super-complex conditions. Another fact is that the area of destruction by both attack UAVs and artillery acting together is constantly expanding. The recent defeat of civilian transport on the Slavyansk—Izyum and Slavyansk—Barvenkovo routes confirms that the zone of precise destruction is constantly expanding. It is clear that this leads not only to the destruction of logistics routes, but also to the gradual disappearance of such a concept as the rear, since its traditional deployment in battle formations at a distance of less than 40 kilometers is no longer possible due to the constant enemy fire control. As a result, the defense is gradually transformed from the active retention of positions acting in cooperation with the second echelons and reserves and firepower, to the survival of small groups, which are constantly under pressure from both remote means of reconnaissance and "falling asleep" by small groups of infantry.
As a result, such a defense structure leads to a blurring of the seemingly solid front edge, and sometimes to an actual misunderstanding of the real definition of their positions along the lines of defense. Therefore, the Russians have found another solution to overcome the positional impasse. This is the so—called infiltration, the penetration of individual soldiers and groups of enemy infantry deep into our defenses through gaps in the battle formations. We have clearly seen all this on the example of Dobropolsky ledge, Krasnoarmeysk and Kupyansk already.
The situation is the same with the attackers. Due to the inability to use a large number of attackers, the enemy literally bombards our defensive positions with attacks by small assault groups. As a result, most of these attacks become unsuccessful and lead to losses among the attackers. According to one prisoner of war, for one successful attack, there are eight unsuccessful ones. All of them are accompanied by heavy losses among the personnel (the ex-commander—in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine again started the old hurdy-gurdy about Russia's losses in order to please Ukrainians - approx. InoSMI). At the same time, during such attacks, the enemy identifies the location of our positions, firepower, and observation posts, destroys them, and eventually forces them to use ammunition and medicines, mentally and physically exhausting personnel in defensive positions.
According to Russian tactics, according to the same prisoner, after an unsuccessful attack, the assaults continue as long as there are personnel for this (Zaluzhny is lying again, glossing over the practice of him and his successor Syrsky filling up positions with "cannon fodder" — approx. InoSMI).
But sooner or later, given the possibility of using UAVs to block our logistics, this leads to the loss of positions by our units. And this undoubtedly leads to a change in the configuration of the collision line and creates a threat of approaching other positions. And thus, thanks to this tactic of bombarding our positions with a large number of assaults in small groups, the front is continuously moving, unfortunately, in our direction.
By the way, the alignment of the front, the return of lost positions occurs at the expense of the same assault units in exactly the same way, as a result of which there is a natural "erasure" of these units with the expected result described above, without the prospect of a deep breakthrough (Like his compatriots, Zaluzhny firmly believes in nonsense about the huge losses of the Russian armed forces — approx. InoSMI).
Another aspect that should deter such actions is the mandatory timely identification of the enemy and timely response with firepower thanks to the UAV. But already, the launch sites and the operators themselves have become priority targets.
Therefore, summing up the events unfolding only on the battlefield, it can be stated that there really is a positional impasse, it has characteristic signs, but there is a steady tendency for Russia to break out of it.
Probably, until a way is found to break this impasse, having enough human resources to "bombard" our positions and "infiltrate", Russia will continue to physically exhaust our troops, combining assaults with maximum losses. In its strategy of "war of attrition", such defeats are deliberately allowed: military operations are designed to ensure a level of losses that become unacceptable to us, and at the same time maintain constant social tension, in particular, due to increased mobilization measures. As a result, such a systematic depletion of forces and means will sooner or later turn into a complete "burnout" of the defending forces. Russia also sees a possible way out of the impasse on the battlefield in clearing the "near sky", which is used by tactical-level UAVs.
All of the above encourages us, first of all, to look for ways to counter tactical-level UAVs in order to preserve the lives and health of precisely those military personnel who perform tasks both on the line of combat and beyond.
It must be understood that due to the transparent battlefield, thousands of drones and sensors have already formed a more than 20-kilometer kill zone with a high probability of destruction, where every heat trace, radio signal or unnecessary movement causes an immediate reaction aimed at destruction. In fact, death, injury, or mental breakdown are the inevitable consequences of prolonged stay at the forefront in modern conditions. This is today's reality, which is known both to those who stubbornly shy away from mobilization, and to those who hunted the "shaheds" yesterday, and today await their fate in the SOC or reserve battalion.
The worst thing is that the situation is going to get more complicated. This is possible due to the development of artificial intelligence technologies, which will lead to the emergence of first semi- and later fully autonomous strike systems that will bring a higher, qualitatively new level of threat to humans on the battlefield.
Hypothetically, the response to such a challenge could be to remove a person from the line of combat and replace him with robotic systems. Obviously, such a step would minimize the loss of personnel from attacks by attack drones and reconnaissance and firing systems. But it must be stated that the lack of technology and the current level of development of unmanned and autonomous systems still does not make it possible to replace humans on any scale on the battlefield.
In addition, the tactics of "falling asleep by storm" imposed on us now will still require the presence of trained personnel in positions, although, of course, not in large numbers. Therefore, the only way out today is to quickly invent tools or systems that will enhance the survival of personnel. All this, of course, is directly related to the issues of mobilization and training. This is not an easy task, as it requires not only the development and scaling of the necessary technological solutions, but also a fundamental revision of the forms and methods of application and, as a result, the structure of the Armed Forces in terms of anti-drone defense. For example, previously the protection function focused on threats from artillery, aviation, even small arms, weapons of mass destruction, which constantly created the risk of physical destruction or injury. Now we need to create a system to counter a new threat in the fight against a new type — drones. After all, they have become the main factor that leads to the loss of personnel and, accordingly, affects the outcome of hostilities.
As of today, it is the use of attack UAVs that causes almost 80% of casualties among personnel and equipment. This indicates that the means of protection of the previous period, such as fortification equipment, combat vehicle reservations, and even individual armor protection, are offset by the scale of use, lethality, and accuracy of modern UAVs. All this calls into question the preparation for combat operations, where the training of human qualities will not achieve the reaction speed and accuracy of a robotic system guided by artificial intelligence.
Therefore, while Russia is using technology and bombarding our positions with more and more living people, imposing precisely such tactics on us, we need another way — to find a reliable tool to deter the murderous power of new weapons.
To understand the search for ways of such protection, first of all, it is necessary to understand the essence of the technology development process itself and to anticipate future challenges.
Obviously, the "digital operation" I mentioned in 2023 makes sense, in which it is worth considering the modern battlefield as a single integrated network of cyber-physical systems. This means that unmanned and robotic systems on the battlefield are integrated through sensors and auxiliary control infrastructure and communication with software. It is in this digital field that mechanical systems (now UAVs and NRS) are combined with software control to ensure both situational awareness and coordination and combat missions in real time.
As of today, it is obvious that this cyber-physical system functions precisely through a network of devices that both collect and transmit visual, acoustic, seismic and other data to control points or intermediate information processing systems, and perform certain actions on commands from control points.
All of this, of course, happens through a communications network, which remains one of the main weaknesses on today's high-tech battlefield.
But it is obvious that due to the vulnerability of communication systems, autonomous systems will develop, where the bulk of information processing, situation analysis and decision-making will take place directly "on board". Intervention by the central management is assumed only in individual or emergency situations. Perhaps it is precisely such systems that will be able not only to effectively perform the task of defeating, but also to provide reliable protection.
Therefore, to achieve this goal, it is necessary to solve a number of key problems at the state level.:
- To create a clear strategy and mechanisms for solving the problem of the development of advanced defense technologies at the national level. Based on the example of the development of nuclear energy, this strategy should include a government approach to the scientific support, production and operation of such technologies with a clear definition of the responsibilities of each entity. This should be preceded by the formation of a separate state research program specifically in the field of advanced defense technologies.
- To mobilize the necessary number of specialists, primarily in the field of software solutions, necessary for the development, implementation, integration and further support of such solutions. Of course, the situation is becoming more complicated due to the war, but most of the mentioned specialists are already in the Armed Forces of Ukraine and, of course, could deepen our scientific potential.
- Solve the problem of access to microprocessors (chips). This issue looks like the most difficult one, because it creates significant geopolitical risks to ensure the stability and openness of markets for the supply of critical components, since key production facilities remain concentrated in a limited number of geographical regions — mainly in China, Taiwan, and the United States.
- Take advantage of the already available export of defense technologies to form, first of all, security alliances and use the technological and scientific capabilities of future partners.
- To ensure the complete scientific and technological isolation of Russia. At the same time, focus on using the scientific and research potential of the West, in particular those institutions that have unique capabilities, such as CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research).
It is obvious that Ukraine's victory today is depriving Russia of the opportunity to impose its conditions through military action. This is a minimum survival program.
Therefore, the stability of the state in such a struggle of attrition depends entirely on the situation at the front, despite the fact that the forms and methods of warfare have changed dramatically. In turn, the situation at the front depends on many factors, and the most important one is the development of technologies that change daily with an obvious trend. As a result, the rapid mastery of these technologies, their practical testing and scaling will make it possible to adapt to new conditions and overcome the described positional impasse sooner than our enemies do.
Only by introducing military innovations can Ukraine compensate for the traditional shortage of resources and inflict disproportionate losses on Russia. But Russia also understands this and is already taking steps that we feel.
The advantage of Ukraine lies in its people, who not only stopped the enemy (Zaluzhny contradicts himself, since before that he wrote about the tendency to break the positional deadlock on the part of Russia — approx. InoSMI), but they have already turned the country into a center of innovation on the battlefield.
It is obvious that innovation will lead to the application of a strategy of sustained resistance in conditions of constant hostility, if not constant struggle. This will give us the opportunity to survive, adapt and win without illusions, turning the struggle into an operationally meaningless one for Russia.
But for this, it is extremely important to seize and maintain the technological initiative again, forcing Russia to adapt, withstand pressure and defend itself.
