Russia is doing … something near Kyiv. Russia claims it is withdrawing forces as a gesture of peace, even as it continues shelling civilians in several other cities around Ukraine. Everyone knows the real situation—Russia has lost the battle of Kyiv, and Russia wants to move those troops to the east, where Russia has had more success. (I explained why in this weekend piece.)
The troops arrayed in northwest Kyiv are some of Russia’s best—elite airborne VDV troops. They’ve also suffered some of the highest death rates in the war. It is their presence in this region that proves that Russia truly wanted to take Kyiv. They sent their best. Those poor VDV troopers were simply so poorly supported that they never stood a chance, and never even reached the city’s gates.
Still, Russia can’t fully pull out if it wants to pin down Ukrainian forces around Kyiv. So what are its options?
1. Hold the current line
Why waste their best VDV soldier on entrenched defensive emplacements, since those could be replaced by lower-quality soldiers and conscripts. There’s no training required for “stay in this ditch and shoot at anything that approaches.” Well, maybe there is some training required, but I can’t imagine what. No one is asking them to engage in complex coordinated military maneuvers.
The problem is that the tip of the Russian forces are in an untenable salient in Bucha and Hostomel, which means they are surrounded on multiple sides, and subject to assault from all of them. And Ukraine has zero interest in allowing any Russians that close to their capital.
There were reportedly fierce clashes in Borodyanska yesterday, and Russian twitter ran pictures that claimed to show destroyed Ukrainian equipment and dead Ukrainians in that town. It would make sense that Ukraine is assaulting the place, as it would block a key road supplying the Russian spearhead in that salient and bring Ukraine one step closer to encircling Hostomel and Bucha.
Ukraine will take this territory eventually. Does Russia really want to try and rotate new troops in under heavy fire, only to rotate out their best VDV soldiers, also under fire? On the other hand, retaining a military presence this close to Kyiv would keep a great deal of combat power tied to the capital.
2. Pull back to more defensible lines
Something like this:
We’ve looked at the importance of rivers for defensive operations, and what’s good for Ukraine is also good for Russia. Setting up lines behind a river, especially given Ukraine’s lack of pontoon bridges and close-air support, would allow Russia to prepare new defensive lines, protected by water, and manned by greener conscripts. Ukraine could bedevil them with artillery and drone strikes, but … why? Those resources would be better used breaking the siege of Chernihiv, or out east reinforcing the Donbas front.
The problem for Russia is that the line in this tweet isn’t entirely Russian-held. Ukraine holds a town southwest of Invankiv, on the north side of the river. They would have to clear that Ukrainian “beachhead” north of the river. Also, their flanks to the west aren’t secure, allowing Ukrainian troops to loop around them and attempt to cut off their supply lines to the north.
Still, if you’re Ukraine, would you bother even trying? Why not let Russia’s second- and third-rate troops rot up there in the mud, where they are out of range of anything of military significance. In fact, Ukraine could equally build their own fortifications south of the river and man them with territorial defense forces, while shipping off their regular army units to the Chernihiv front or out east.
3. Retreat back to Belarus
That territory northwest of Kyiv is … kind of insignificant in any real military sense. Much of it is empty because, you know, Chernobyl. On the map, the top of Radynka has a population of 834. Chernobyl somehow has 500 residents. Prip’yat, north of Chernobyl, has a population of zero. It’s literally a ghost town. Ivankiv is the “big city” with around 10,000 residents. Why stick around, knowing that Ukraine isn’t going to actually try and enter Belarus? If Russia wants to pin units down in the region, they can keep the pressure on Chernihiv.
But even Russia knows that there’s zero reason for Ukraine to keep any of their regular army maneuver troops (armor and armored personnel carriers) in the area if Russia leaves behind a half-assed garrison. Either Russia commits with a dangerous force, or everyone packs up to face off in the open terrain of Eastern Ukraine, where the terrain better favors offensive action, and Russia’s air force might eventually decide to make a serious appearance.
4. Status quo
Russia lies, and its strategy is a mess, and its logistical lines are a disaster, and there doesn’t appear to be a theater commander coordinating the war effort. That’s all to say, Russia may decide to stick around, but is playing to International audiences pretending to want to move. Some video of some units moving out aren’t proof of anything. Russia showed videos of units heading “back east” right before their invasion. Those units showed up on the battlefield a week later. And remember, when a unit becomes so depleted as to become combat ineffective, it is removed to the rear for reconstitution. For all we know, those units seen heading north are the shattered remnants of some larger, now defunct unit.
Russia may also want to move those troops out, but might be logistically incapable of doing so. There are tens of thousands of troops in the area, moving them out, through chewed up roads, flooded fields, and artillery barrages requires the kind of deft choreography that has been utterly absent from the Russian side. That’s assuming a complete retreat. If Russia tries to move in new troops on a new defensive line, multiply the challenges exponentially. It might just be easier, in the end, to leave things be.
If I was the Russians, I’d fully pull out of northwest Kyiv and loop around to the other side of the Kyiv reservoir, finishing the encirclement of Chernihiv, dig in on the outskirts, facing outward, and then dare Ukraine to break the siege. Rain artillery on any approaching units. That would keep Ukraine from reinforcing the east with its Kyiv-based regular army units.
Scratch that. I’d get on the first flight to Istanbul and start my new life in Istanbul, as far away from the brutality and evil of Vladimir Putin and the Russian people who love him so.
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An ongoing coda to the battle of Trostyanets, which finished off the famed “elite” 4th Guards Tank Division as a fighting force and sent its remnants fleeing across the Russian border: the lost tank count is now at least 98 of its roughly 220 main battle tanks. When I wrote about this dramatic Ukrainian victory on Tuesday, the confirmed T-80 kill count was at 78. Yet pictures of dead tanks (and other equipment) keep flooding in. The destruction is just epic, and we still don’t know what Ukraine did to cause all this damage.
Well, with these four (at least), we know what Ukraine did: Nothing. The mud did all the work.
Ukraine now has a fresh new platoon of the most modern battle tanks in Russia’s active arsenal, courtesy of Russia.
Wednesday, Mar 30, 2022 · 1:28:11 PM +00:00 · Mark Sumner
One big vote that the talks currently underway in Istanbul won’t be successful comes from the people who are voting with their feet. As ABC News reports, there are now more than 4 million Ukrainian refugees, and most of them are not expecting to be home again any time soon.
With Russia claiming to be stepping back, but actually increasing shelling in cities like Chernihiv, refugees are convinced that Putin is determined to continue the war, no matter what he says. And they seem to have agreement from Kyiv.
“We can call those signals that we hear at the negotiations positive,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address to the Ukrainian people. “But those signals don’t silence the explosions of Russian shells.”
