For those of us who are fans of the almost non-stop fast paced full body contact sport of ice hockey, a “Face off” is a fundamental play in the contest. It is a heart-pounding moment used to restart the game and is a key signature play. It involves two opposing players, the center men, lining up at a designated face-off spot on the ice as an official drops the puck between them. The goal for each side is to win possession of the puck by either hitting it to a teammate or gaining control themselves. Properly executed the side which wins the face-off could gain an advantage and race down ice with a good shot at scoring a goal, especially on a “power play” when the other side is already a man or two down, locked up in the penalty box for infringements like “high sticking”(dangerous use of the hockey stick around an opponent’s face).
But the beauty of the game is that occasionally the short-handed team, forced to play wall-to-wall defense or into “killing the penalty” gets a lucky break or somehow skillfully maneuvers the side with the manpower advantage to turn over the puck, take a hold of it and race down ice to score what is known as a “short-handed goal”. It is an amazing play that usually lifts up the spirits of the undermanned team(and their fans !!). In many a game I have seen with my beloved St. Louis Blues National Hockey League team, it completely shifts the momentum of the game. And sometimes in the third and final period or in overtime , such a play can win the game. The short-handed team can thus come out victorious.
At the risk of making light of the tremendously dangerous moment Ukraine is facing right now in Pokrovsk, the map above shows that in spite of the seemingly insurmountable odds the Ukrainians are facing, they’re maneuvering and changing the tenor of the fight … blocking off Russian armored mechanized forces in the Northeast above the city and in the South getting in between and around the Russian Infiltration/Sabotage Reconnaissance Groups. The urban street fight that Russian commanders long sought to avoid at Pokrovsk by sliding sideways to create pincers is now here .. a mix up - mash up of a fight …. where the under-manned underdogs, especially fighting on their own turf(or home ice) can bring skill and precise execution to bear on the outcome.
According to an analysis by Illia Kabachynskyi of united24media(I highly recommend this read.It’s excellent):
Russia Sends 170,000 Troops—More Than Most European Armies—to Capture One Ukrainian City
Pokrovsk is the Kremlin’s top military objective through the end of the year. Nearly a third of all Russian forces stationed in Ukraine have been redeployed to this front.
The Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region has been under siege by Russian forces for over a year. Moscow has concentrated a massive force on the city and its surrounding areas. The Russian military group in the area numbers approximately 170,000 troops, reported Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Russia’s objective: to seize the city by year’s end.
To grasp the magnitude of Russia’s offensive, comparisons are essential: just how large is 170,000 troops?
Ahead of the full-scale invasion in 2022, Moscow had deployed between 160,000 and 200,000 soldiers to Ukraine’s borders. In other words, Russia is now attempting to take a single city with an army comparable in size to the one originally intended to seize all of Right-Bank Ukraine.
united24media.com/…
It all makes for some frightening and daunting odds the Ukrainians are facing in Pokrovsk. But what is heartening(at least to me) is that President Zelenskyy, General Syrskyi, the theater commanders and the soldiers in the fight don’t seem to be asceered at all. Contrary to what many are advising that they do … retreat … they don’t seem to be in a hurry to do any such thing. They’re busy restoring their GLOCs and bringing in reinforcements. They’ve seen this before … “ahead of the full-scale invasion in 2022, Moscow had deployed between 160,000 and 200,000 soldiers to Ukraine’s borders”.
In the Spring of February 2022 there was barely a real Ukrainian army to speak of. The army of largely civilian volunteers(some of whom are now commanders at Pokrovsk) faced up to the Russian Leviathan then and pushed it back.
Now in the Fall/Winter of 2025, ADAPTIVE INDOMITABLE UKRAINE, now a much more creditable armed force, will do it again. Pokrovsk may yet fall but it will be so only when the Ukrainians have gotten their pound of flesh and then some. I have no way of knowing it for sure but I am absolutely convinced that now that Russia is fully committed in the field at Pokrovsk and environs, the Ukrainians intend to exact such a toll on the Russian army as to hobble it and render it effectively unable for any major future offensives. I think the Russians know this, too.
SLAVA UKRAINI ! PEREMOHA(Victory) !!
