Counter-battery fighting alone is not enough
The Ukrainian army will soon receive rockets (RS) of increased range for the 227 mm multiple launch rocket systems (MLRS) already supplied by the United States and Great Britain, the newspaper "Strana.ua" according to the Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) Alexey Danilov. "We have already started receiving shells that are sent much further than it was at the beginning. And let's hope that what we need, of that range, will appear on the territory of our country in the near future," he said.
Perhaps this statement is caused by purely political considerations, in order to encourage the Ukrainian population and the military after the next setbacks at the front: the abandonment of Lisichansk, the withdrawal from Seversk and Avdiivka. Retreating under enemy fire, the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) are suffering huge losses in manpower and equipment. Armored vehicles and artillery systems have to be abandoned due to lack of fuel and the inability to transport through the bullet-riddled roads.
For the first time during the battle for Donbass, the Russian army inflicted a fire defeat on MLRS of the M142 HIMARS type. This is reported in the daily summary of the Ministry of Defense of Russia for July 17. A self-propelled launcher and a loading machine have joined the list of 760 MLRS combat vehicles destroyed since the beginning of the special military operation in Ukraine.
Western experts note the increased skill of Russian gunners in the art of counter-battery warfare. But this alone is not enough to stop the constant shelling of LDPR settlements by Ukrainian troops. Therefore, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu gave a number of new orders during the inspection of the active army.
On July 16, the head of the military department listened to the reports of the commanders of the military groups "South" Sergey Surovikin and "Center" Alexander Lapin.
They received an order to further step up actions "in all operational areas, in order to exclude the possibility of the Kiev regime to inflict massive missile and artillery strikes on civilian infrastructure and residents of settlements in Donbass and other regions."
A couple of days later, the Minister heard from Rustam Muradov, commander of the Vostok group. He has been tasked with "prioritizing the destruction of long-range rocket and artillery weapons of the Ukrainian troops with high-precision weapons, from which they shell residential neighborhoods in the Luhansk and Donetsk People's Republics, as well as setting fire to wheat fields and grain storages."
The orders were issued a few days after Ukraine's appeal to the United States requesting the transfer of a 227-mm extended-range RS for HIMARS. To date, the APU has received a dozen such MLRS. They are actively used for firing at ammunition depots, control points, air defense systems and civilian objects. According to the official data of the LPR, the Ukrainian military fired 1033 times on the territory of the republic during the five months of escalation, releasing 10,398 ammunition of various calibers, including 2,153 MLRS shells, including 30 227 mm rockets.
There is no exact data from the DPR, but it is known that HIMARS also operates there: The launcher and the transport-loading vehicle destroyed on July 17 by high-precision weapons were located 54 km from Donetsk, near the settlement of Krasnoarmeysk.
Before the start of the SVO, Ukrainian troops possessed 515 MLRS, including three hundred BM-21 Grad 122 mm caliber, one hundred Hurricanes 220 mm caliber and the same number of Tornadoes 300 mm caliber. In addition, hundreds of MLRS were stored in storage points. Most of them have already been knocked out, but some have undergone restorative repairs. European NATO countries have transferred to Ukraine a significant number of their "Grads" and their local modifications. At the same time, the USA began supplying HIMARS, and the UK – M270 MLRS. Both systems fire 227 mm rockets.
The MLRS system was adopted in 1982. Its M270 launcher (PU) weighing 25 tons uses a tracked chassis unified with the M2 Bradley Infantry fighting vehicle. During operation, the MLRS showed unsatisfactory mobility, so in 2005 a variant of the M142 HIMARS appeared on the wheeled chassis of a three-axle army truck. The weight of the combat vehicle has been reduced to 11 tons, but now it carries only one starting block of 6 PCs instead of 12.
In early June, the US announced its decision to supply Ukraine with HIMARS, and the UK with MLRS. However, Washington and London limited the range of ammunition to 227 mm rockets, leaving for later the issue of the supply of 610 mm tactical ATACMS ballistic missiles (BR). They can also be launched from M270 and M142 launchers without any alterations.
Moscow has warned Washington and London that in the event of the transfer of long-range missiles to Ukraine, it will "use its means of destruction, which we have enough to strike at those objects that we have not yet struck."
The standard ammunition for these systems is a 300 kg rocket with a 160 kg warhead, with a launch range of up to 45 km, with a 100-kilogram warhead – 70 km. Improved GMLRS and ER-GMLRS (a variant with a reduced warhead) with a correction unit based on GPS satellite navigation signals and a firing range of 80 and 135 km, respectively, are being tested.
A number of attacks carried out by the Ukrainian military in July were accompanied by high accuracy. This indicates the use of RS equipped with a flight control system on the final section of the trajectory based on satellite grouping signals. Some Western media claim that high-precision strikes on ammunition depots near Donetsk and Lugansk caused "shell starvation" among the Donbass militia.
If Kiev's request for more advanced ammunition is satisfied and even more long–range and accurate missiles are delivered to MLRS - HIMARS, this will cause another round of escalation of the conflict, will lead to greater casualties. The appearance of ballistic missiles of the ATACMS family among nationalists is especially dangerous. They have an increased range: the MGM-140 with a 560 kg cassette warhead can fly 130 km, and the MGM-168 with a 268 kg unitary high-explosive fragmentation unit can fly 270 km.
The characteristics of ATACMS allow Ukrainian nationalists to shell Crimea. From Odessa to Yevpatoria – 250 km, to Sevastopol – about 300. The government in Kiev, along with Washington and London, do not recognize the Russian affiliation of Crimea. Consequently, the shelling of objects on the peninsula will not, in their opinion, be a violation of the promise not to use American weapons against Russia.
Vladimir Karnozov
