UPDATE: Friday, Mar 3, 2023 · 9:22:18 PM +00:00
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Mark Sumner
Polish defense firm PGZ (Polska Grupa Zbrojeniowa) has announced plans to make at least 500 of the K2PL variant on South Korea’s K2 main battle tank. This comes as the result of a joint venture between Poland and South Korea that licenses Poland to build the tank. The K2 is a highly regarded tank.
UPDATE: Friday, Mar 3, 2023 · 9:16:01 PM +00:00
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Mark Sumner
The Ukrainian general staff reports that during the day on Friday, Ukrainian forces repelled multiple attacks within Bakhmut, at Vasyukivka to the northwest, at Dubovo-Vasylivka on the south side of the M03 just west of Berkhivka, and at Ivaniske to the south.
UPDATE: Friday, Mar 3, 2023 · 7:15:07 PM +00:00
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Mark Sumner
What do you do when you claim to own a region of another country, only you don’t control the capital and largest city of that region? Why, you reorganize! That’s just what Russia did today in Zaporizhzhya, where they’ve named Melitopol as the new capital and redrawn the lines for districts within the oblast.
UPDATE: Friday, Mar 3, 2023 · 5:10:26 PM +00:00
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Mark Sumner
Russian sources have indicated that Russian forces have advanced into the villages just outside Kupyansk. This hasn’t been confirmed by the Ukrainian military, but the action on Friday seems to indicate that the situation there is not stable.
All of the locations in the area that had traded hands are small villages, many of which had never really been garrisoned by Ukrainian troops. So much of this “offensive” on the part of Russia is just walking from point X to point Y in an essentially undefended area. But the fact that they are close enough to Kupyansk to spur this action is concerning, especially considering the importance of the P07 highway that runs east to Svatove.
During the darkness of Thursday evening, Ukraine reportedly withdrew much of the armor that had been inside or near Bakhmut to a location further west. Troops in parts of the city have also reportedly been withdrawn. Before dawn, the bridge leading to “the road of life” through Khromove was deliberately blown, then a few hours later a rail bridge connecting the east and west sides of the city was taken down.
However, Bakmut has not yet fallen into Russian hands. There are reports that Ukrainian forces remain in the western part of the city, along with some heavy equipment, fighting the forces of the Wagner Group and Russian military as they advance into the ruins of Bakhmut. What Ukrainian forces there are doing now is unclear. Hopefully they are few. Hopefully they have a way out.
Some of the faces that have become familiar from videos inside the city are among those who have made it out, as Ukrainian forces prepare the new line of battle. They’re not going in the direction they wanted, but it’s hard to say that these are not men who have given everything they possibly can.
Frequently seen Ukrainian Army commander “Magyar” has also reportedly been evacuated from the city. Local unit commander Olga Bigar, call sign "Witch,” hasn’t been on video since Feb. 26, but she may have already been out of the area at that time. Videos on Thursday also showed Ukrainian forces evacuating at least a few of the civilians who had remained in Bakhmut until the bitter end.
Early morning assumptions that Ukraine had withdrawn all forces appear to be in error. While initial reports suggested that Ukraine had left the core of the city for Russia to stroll in, later reports indicate continued fighting, and that there are still Ukrainian forces, and even armor, within Bakhmut. If Bakhmut still holds, it is doing so by its fingernails. However, the city has not been surrendered.
Bakhmut. Open image in another tab for a larger view.
This map represents the best estimate of where things stood on Friday morning. A renewed Russian attack in the south had reportedly brought fighting back to the area of Ivaniske, but Ukraine reportedly repulsed that attack. There still seems to be a clear space around the western end of “the road of life” at Chasiv Yar. Russian forces have pressed further into the city on the north and east, and also reportedly moved down the western side of a reservoir between Yahidne and Khromove. Most of the video seen from Bakhmut over the last few weeks originated from the area at the core of the city, east of the rail line—roughly where the Bakhmut tag is sitting on the map—but it’s not clear where remaining Ukrainian forces are situated now.
The bridge through Khromove is most definitely out. However, like most of the rivers around Bakhmut, the stream it crosses isn’t exactly a raging torrent. The result is more of a speed bump than an insurmountable obstacle.
Certainly trucks could come right up to the other end of that fallen bridge and troops could be evacuated. Whether it’s possible to get a vehicle across it is a different issue. Ukraine has been bringing down bridges and breeching dams on the small reservoirs around Bakhmut over the last week, with the obvious intention of slowing Russia’s progress. There is still a reservoir south of this downed bridge that might be breeched if Ukraine wants to make things as difficult as possible.
Within the city, it appears that a pair of street bridges into the eastern half of Bakhmut were already down, and now Ukraine has taken out the rail bridge.
Reuters reports that Ukrainian forces have dug a new series of trenches, forming defensive positions to protect access to the Khromove. The bridge may be down, but it seems that Ukraine isn’t ready to give up the road. This makes it seem that there’s a definite plan to keep extracting a cost from Russia as it attempts to advance into the city. Or maybe those remaining troops are turning the ruined hulk of Bakhmut into a series of booby traps.
Ukrainian soldier Kyianyn, who issued a message from central Bakhmut three days ago, still reports as if the fighting today is just an extension of the fighting that has been going on for weeks. But he’s no longer speaking from inside the city.
What we know for sure is that the bridge is down, some forces have come out, some armor has been relocated away from the city, and some level of Ukrainian resistance remains in Bakhmut.
Overnight, the Ukrainian Telegram Channel DeepState reported that Russian forces had moved south of Dubovo-Vasylivka and had taken the road through Khromove under fire control. However, they also reported that Ukrainian troops had halted Russia’s advance toward Ivanivske and areas along the highway to the south. And reported continued fighting block by block in the city, including in some familiar areas near the winery and meat-packing plant in the eastern part of the city. So the contested area in the city may be larger than many sources are reporting.
Meanwhile, Wagner owner Yevgeny Prigozhin was filmed in Paraskoiivka, just north of Bakhmut, sanctimoniously insisting that Ukraine withdraw its forces from Bakhmut to keep them from being killed by his men. His video is deliberately not included here.
Instead, here’s what we can only hope some of those who have been long stationed at Bakhmut are allowed to do before they return to the front anywhere else.
Ukraine reportedly shot down a Russian Su-34 fighter-bomber on Friday morning. This makes 19 of the planes Russia has lost since the invasion began, so it doesn’t take an item off the list of Russian Army Equipment Not Yet Destroyed In Ukraine.
The interesting thing about this particular shoot down is the where, since the plane apparently took a missile hit near the occupied down of Yenakiieve in Donetsk Oblast. That’s better than 20 km from the nearest area of Ukrainian military control. Exactly what took down the jet isn’t clear, but it may have been a missile fired from a Ukrainian pilot operating near the line of conflict. It’s also a good signal that there is nowhere in Ukraine that Russian pilots can fly with impunity.
Russia has confirmed the loss of 71 combat aircraft since the invasion began. The updated Su-34M is regarded as Russia’s most advanced plane and only entered service in the last year. It’s unclear how many of the Su-34s shot down in Ukraine were of this upgraded type.
Canadian volunteer DeFacto reporting on her humanitarian work in Ukraine. The area she’s describing is along the road between Lyman and Kreminna.
It’s been a month now since Russia launched it’s “big offensive” at Kreminna. If you haven’t seen a lot of reporting on it, that’s because there hasn’t been a lot to report. Just as Ukraine found going the other way, the mud has restricted Russia to a few possible routes, and those routes are heavily contested. So fighting right now is still going on in almost exactly the same locations where it was when the offensive began.
Russia has, in fact, had so little success at Kreminna, that they reportedly took forces away from that location and sent them to somewhere they thought was more promising. I’m not making this up. They sent those forces to Vuhledar.
Let’s check in and see, in formal terms, What Vuhledar Doing? Vuhledar doing this.
That poster? It’s actually a week out of date. Since then, Russia has failed in at least two more advances at Vuhledar from the east. These later assaults have been mostly infantry, because Russia is apparently convinced that, having failed to cross the flat, empty, heavily-mined field in armor, it will be better on foot. Still, recent failures have added this to the total.
Sorry. Ukraine has already destroyed six more of these, so that’s also not an item for the BINGO card. If you missed The New York Times article on Vuhledar, it’s definitely worth a read. Though presenting what’s happening there as a “tank battle” really obscures that it’s more often tanks vs mines than tanks vs tanks.
More evidence that the explosions that took place at the Russian military base in Yelsk, across the Sea of Azov from Mariupol, were more than just a “training exercise.”
Were planes destroyed, or did Russia decide to relocate assets after discovering that 150 km from the front lines is too close? That’s not known.
Daily Kos is lucky enough to count KyivGuy among the members of the community, and his answers to questions about everyday life in Ukraine away from the front lines have been a terrific addition.
Here’s another little slice of life from Kyiv: Yaroslava Antipina lives in Kyiv with her son. Though she left the city to join her mother in the weeks after the invasion began, she soon returned to her home in Kyiv and has become famous for her daily “war coffee” diary in which she visits places around Ukraine, just looking for a cup of coffee (black, no sugar), and to see how things are going around the city. She frequently records a brief part of these strolls through Kyiv, and the one minute videos act as nice moments of meditation on normal life interrupted. For the most part in these videos, nothing happens. Just walking. Just people going about their business. And that’s exactly what you want to see.
