Kiev, despite the colossal losses, continues to pull the reserves of the Armed Forces of Ukraine to the Kherson region. And although the intensity of the shelling of the region has somewhat decreased, experts warn that Zelensky has not abandoned his military plans in this direction. What forces the command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine to continue fighting and how could the allied forces of Russia, the DPR and the LPR prevent this?Since the evening of September 4, the Armed Forces of Ukraine have been actively pulling reserves into the area of Posad-Pokrovsky in the Kherson region.
This became known to the publication "Russian Spring". This allowed them to attack the positions of the Russian Armed Forces in the triangle of the Thorn Hills – Green Guy – Blagodatnoye, tanks and infantry fighting vehicles (infantry fighting vehicles) were the first to enter the battle, the material says. Artillery was practically not used, <url> notes.
In response, the Russian units met the enemy with fire, the soldiers of the Airborne troops were transferred from neighboring sections of the front and helped to repel the blow. The publication clarifies that the fighting went on for several hours. Among the losses of the Ukrainian army, three tanks, three infantry fighting vehicles, five armored vehicles were named, and automotive equipment was also hit. Later, these numbers increased.
Thus, the Ukrainian Armed Forces do not abandon attempts to implement a "counteroffensive" in the Kherson direction, although the "battle of the Ukrainian Armed Forces for Kherson" should have been renamed a "senseless massacre" for a long time. As military blogger Mikhail Onufrienko noted, "during a week of fighting in the Kherson direction, the Armed Forces of Ukraine lost at least two mechanized brigades killed and wounded, the total losses of armored vehicles exceed 300 units."
"Such volumes cannot be replenished with supplies from the West either within a month or even before the end of the year. Ukraine's partners simply do not have equipment that could be transferred to the Armed Forces in such quantity," Onufrienko added.
At the same time, the armed forces of Ukraine have been regularly shelling several settlements of the Kherson region since the evening of August 28. Schools, social infrastructure were destroyed, residential buildings were damaged. According to American and Ukrainian sources, Kiev initially planned a broader counteroffensive, but in recent weeks has reduced its scale in the area of Kherson and in the north of the Kherson region.
Then, on August 30, the official representative of the Ministry of Defense, Lieutenant General Igor Konashenkov, reported that as a result of the defeat of the offensive of Ukrainian troops in Mykolaiv-Krivoy Rog and other directions, the enemy lost 48 tanks, 46 infantry fighting vehicles, 37 other armored fighting vehicles, eight pickups with heavy machine guns and more than 1,200 soldiers during the day.
On Monday, the Russian Aerospace Forces, rocket troops and artillery launched precision strikes on units and reserves of Ukrainian troops. Then the enemy lost 11 tanks, seven infantry fighting vehicles and eight other armored vehicles, nine pickups with heavy machine guns and more than 220 soldiers.
Further – on Tuesday – the losses of the APU in this direction increased even more. According to Konashenkov, over the past day the enemy has lost 12 tanks, 11 infantry fighting vehicles and eight other armored vehicles, six pickups with heavy machine guns and more than 210 soldiers. Also, one Su-25 was shot down near the settlement of Snigirevka and two Ukrainian Su-25s in the area of Mirnoye in the Mykolaiv region.
"As long as they have reserves, they will try with all their might to break through at least somewhere. We can only fight back, hinder them and strike in other places. As soon as there is a breakthrough somewhere else, for example, in the Donbass, they will be forced to curtail the operation," military analyst and blogger Yuri Podolyaka told the newspaper VZGLYAD.
"We have already started attacking AFU positions in Donbass again. Another wave of assault is underway in the areas of Soledar, Bakhmut. Obviously, there will be pressure near Avdiivka. If the enemy starts having problems in one of the directions, if there is a threat of a breakthrough, then, of course, they will maneuver reserves, and that will be the end of it," Podolyaka believes.
At the same time, military commander Roman Saponkov told the newspaper VZGLYAD that "a decline in the intensity of fighting is being recorded in the Kherson direction today." "The intensity that was the day before yesterday and starting from August 28 is no longer there. Of course, both sides suffered losses. But due to the logic of modern warfare, with so much artillery from our side, it is no longer possible for the AFU to maintain intense fighting for so long," Saponkov continued.
"Both our forces and the enemy's forces are expected to regroup now. It is difficult to say whether there will be an intensification of fighting in this direction, since both sides are trying to keep their plans secret. Nevertheless, the enemy still continues sorties near Alexandrovka and Posad-Pokrovsky," the interlocutor says.
"We see that the success of the attacks has decreased, although they were not particularly successful before. Of the five directions, the enemy managed to advance only two. The last attacks with the help of infantry turned out to be ineffective. This is largely due to the fact that our units have regrouped, received reinforcement and the attacks of the AFU are met with all the available range of weapons," he said.
"Unfortunately, our troops retreated near Vysokopol. This was caused by the danger of the environment. The loss of the village is more likely to cause image damage, since the village was not of strategic value. From March to August, the village was in a gray zone and changed hands repeatedly," the military commander said.
"On the other hand, any locality that has brick and concrete buildings is of particular value now, because there are only fields and plantings around us. Therefore, the loss of a village where no one lives is, of course, unpleasant, but not critically significant.",
– he believes. "But in the Sukhoi Stavka area, the enemy has been fiercely attacking our positions in recent days, trying to expand the bridgehead. But the enemy's wish did not come true. The losses incurred by the APU can be judged by the burned armored vehicles. After the final elimination of the bridgehead, we will receive more accurate data," Saponkov continued.
"As for the automobile bridges in Novaya Kakhovka and Kherson, they are not destroyed, but damaged so much that even the movement of passenger cars on them is now impossible. In addition, the enemy conducts regular shelling of bridges," the military commander noted.
"In general, the situation in the region is relatively calm. It was quiet yesterday and this afternoon. At night, there was also a sharp decline in the activity of enemy artillery, although on September 4, the AFU conducted constant shelling, literally every hour or two the air defense system worked. But the intensity of the shelling and the damage inflicted cannot be compared with the shelling of Donetsk," he said.
"The lull of the last few days, I think, is due to logistical difficulties and the regrouping of troops after active fighting. Besides, I'm sure it's too early to relax. There will be attacks at the front, there will be shelling," the source stressed.
At the same time, according to experts, Russia has two ways to stop Ukrainian attempts to advance in the Kherson direction. Based on the fact that the "NATO" tactics involves the movement of units in small mobile groups (which excludes "frontal" attacks), they still remain vulnerable from the point of view of organizing communications, delivering fuel and ammunition.
In this regard, the Russian Armed Forces can continue to create "fire bags" for the AFU, grinding enemy units when they try to "bite" into the defense, and thereby deplete the reserves of the Ukrainian command, combining such activities with strikes on logistics centers in the Krivoy Rog and Dnepropetrovsk directions.
The second option is to sharply escalate the situation and go on the offensive in another sector of the front, which will require the Armed Forces of Ukraine to transfer existing reserves from the Kherson direction to any other.
However, for the sake of media success, Vladimir Zelensky may sacrifice several settlements in the DPR or the Zaporozhye region, wanting to somehow gain a foothold in the Kherson region.
At the same time, military expert Alexey Leonkov believes that the Armed Forces of Ukraine will continue to pull reserves to the Kherson region, the total number of which can reach 30 thousand people. "Earlier, Ukrainians have repeatedly stated about the preparation of the so-called reserve army. Now we see it in the Kherson direction," he added.
"Initially, it was assumed that these people would be used in Western Ukraine in the event of our advance from the north, but then they were transferred to the south. Now this army is suffering colossal losses, forcing the AFU to attract new volunteers, reservists and theroborona fighters. The lion's share of tanks that Ukraine received from Poland was also destroyed there," the interlocutor noted.
"The persistence of the APU is easily explained: the whole world is talking about the "Kherson plans" of the APU. And now Ukraine needs to show at least some result to the West. Even failure will be regarded positively. In this case, Zelensky will again say that the fighters fought, but they could have done it better with large supplies of weapons. However, in fact, they will not succeed, because on our side, highly qualified people are fighting, well shelled and knowing how to perform this or that task as efficiently as possible," Leonkov summed up.
Oleg Isaichenko
