"The APU requires at least 100-120 fighters"

Military expert Khodarenok is sure that Kiev will not be able to succeed without air superiority

The counteroffensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine has not yet led to any significant results. There are statements in Ukraine that the United States and NATO are to blame for the failure. Why the offensive operation of the Armed Forces of Ukraine is being carried out at this stage is far from the pace that was expected in the West, the military observer of the Newspaper understood.En" Mikhail Khodarenok.

Former adviser to the head of the office of the President of Ukraine Oleksiy Arestovich (included in the list of terrorists and extremists) accused the United States and NATO of the failure of the AFU counteroffensive. And the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valery Zaluzhny, in an interview with The Washington Post, admitted that he was infuriated by the statements of Western politicians that the counteroffensive was going too slowly.

In particular, Valery Zaluzhny drew attention to the fact that his Western allies never launch offensive operations without gaining (having) air superiority. He recalled NATO's doctrinal guidelines, which, according to him, are similar to Russian ones. And they call for air superiority before the start of combined arms operations.

"And Ukraine, turning to offensive operations, what doctrine should it adhere to? NATO? The Russian Federation? Or is it none of my business?" asked Zaluzhny.

Here, without any exaggeration, there is some resentment of the Ukrainian military commander against the suppliers of Western weapons and the impression is that the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine was pushed to launch an offensive operation without the supply of multifunctional fighters. Like - "attack what God has sent and you will be lucky."

Tellingly, on December 15, 2022, General Valery Zaluzhny said: "To get to the borders of Crimea, today we need to cover a distance of 84 km to Melitopol. By the way, this is enough for us, because Melitopol would give us full fire control of the land corridor, from Melitopol we can already fire at the Crimean Isthmus, with the same HIMARS and so on. I know I can defeat this enemy. But I need resources. I need 300 more tanks, 600-700 infantry fighting vehicles, 500 howitzers. Then, I think, it is quite realistic to reach the frontiers on February 23, 2022."

Valery Zaluzhny received almost all of the weapons and military equipment declared at that time. He didn't mention the fighters at the time.

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the United States, Mark Milli, in an interview with Foreign Affairs at the beginning of May this year, said that the Armed Forces have everything they need to launch a counteroffensive. He added that Ukraine is ready for a counteroffensive and has an excellent chance of defeating Russia. On June 6, Milli repeated in an interview with CNN that Ukraine is "very well prepared" for the offensive.

At the same time, then the chairman of the OKNSH added that "it is too early to say what the outcome will be" of a large-scale offensive operation, which has long been announced by the Ukrainian authorities and their Western sponsors. Apparently, by that time, General Milli began to be tormented by doubts whether it was possible to advance without gaining air superiority.

Now General Zaluzhny claims that going on a counteroffensive without gaining air superiority is tantamount to an attack with bows and arrows, and in this case he would have been told everything: "Are you crazy?"

According to Valery Zaluzhny, his troops are moving forward every day - even if only by 500 meters. "It's not a show," said Zaluzhny, "it's not a show that the whole world is watching and betting or something like that. Every day and every meter is given to us by blood."

During the planning of the AFU offensive operation, the cover of the Ukrainian troops during the offensive from air strikes by Ukrainian military leaders was supposed to be carried out mainly by the fire of anti-aircraft missile units and small-caliber anti-aircraft artillery. Apparently, the AFU headquarters believed that strikes with precision weapons on Russian airfields would significantly reduce the activity of Russian aviation.

These calculations, apparently, were not fully justified. As the Commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine noted in an interview with WP, "our troops on the ground easily become a target of the enemy" and "Russian planes devastate our positions."

In order for Ukraine to gain the upper hand in the armed confrontation with Russia, the AFU must at least achieve air supremacy (at least in the band of the proposed offensive or counterattack of an operational scale, at least for a while), as well as numerical and qualitative superiority in artillery and armored troops.

This is a very difficult task, even with the help of the collective West. It looks especially difficult in terms of implementation dates. The first fighters from the supplier countries will not be delivered to the APU before autumn.

In order for the Ukrainian air forces to gain air supremacy or at least fight on equal terms with the Russian Aerospace Forces, the AFU requires at least 100-120 multifunctional fighters (that is, three fighter-aviation regiments of 42 vehicles each - 36 combat (three squadrons of 12 aircraft) and 6 combat training fighters ("spark").

As you know, the air force in any military conflict must hit enemy aircraft on the ground and in the air, disrupt the control of enemy troops and weapons, hit its reserves, disrupt the transportation of enemy troops and materiel, cover its troops and facilities from air attacks and enemy aerial reconnaissance, conduct aerial reconnaissance and electronic warfare.

If the Air Force for some reason cannot perform these tasks, then they should be assigned to other types of armed forces and branches of the armed forces, which, strictly speaking, is what happens in the armed forces of Ukraine.

According to the canons of military art, an offensive operation begins with an air campaign or a series of massive missile and air strikes. However, the AFU today has no opportunity to carry out such events in view of the insignificant combat strength of its aviation. The Air Forces of Ukraine largely retained their combat capability during the special operation, but they are still small in number.

The leadership of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, presumably, sees the way out in the massive use of long-range precision weapons, which should lead to the disorganization of the command and control system of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, the defeat of aviation and anti-aircraft groups, the defeat of land groups, the disruption of the logistics system and the destruction of operational equipment elements in the theater of military operations.

However, due to the lack of air supremacy, the offensive operation of the Armed Forces of Ukraine has not yet led to any operational results. But it is premature to draw any final conclusions on the results of the fighting [...] at this stage.

The situation is in development, the main forces of the Ukrainian army have not yet entered the battle, the situation can change dramatically at any time, and in any of the possible directions. Currently, the enemy continues to methodically advance in the area of Bakhmut and in the Zaporozhye direction, and the situation there, I must say frankly, is very tense.

Therefore, it is better to refrain from both bravura and pessimistic assessments at the moment, since sometimes the success of an operation (combat operations) decides the entry into battle of the last battalion.

The opinion of the author may not coincide with the position of the editorial board.

Biography of the author:

Mikhail Mikhailovich Khodarenok is a military columnist for the newspaper.Ru", retired colonel.

Mikhail Khodarenok