by The Editorial Board for Reaction Life.
The Kherson Counter-Offensive has been so much talked about in recent weeks as to have acquired the resonance of an historical conflict that has already taken place. Now, at last, it is a reality. Its eventual purpose is to retake Kherson, the only Ukrainian provincial capital in Russian hands and the gateway to Odesa, representing the danger of Russia converting Ukraine into a land-locked country. A further motive is to show the West that its military support is a worthwhile investment, as we enter a winter of fuel poverty, by gaining a significant victory.
Ukraine has been exceptionally successful in keeping its movements and objectives secret. One Western commentator this week remarked ruefully that we know more about the Russians’ dispositions than the Ukrainians’. So, piecing together information from a variety of open sources to try to get an overall picture of events carries a large caveat; but, so far as can be ascertained, the situation is as follows.
Ukraine opened its counter-offensive with a three-pronged attack: the southernmost from Mikolaiv directly towards Kherson city; the second in the rural north-west; and the third from the north. These two latter attacks appear to have converged, trapping enemy units and gaining the surrender of some forces from the Donetsk pseudo-republic, as well as Russian troops.
Contrary to the Western media focus on Kherson city, the fiercest fighting has been in the north of the Kherson oblast, in the area furthest removed from the capital, centred on Velyka Kostromka. The very intelligible purpose of this northern offensive is to win a road to Nova Kokhovka, with its dam, controlling the water supply to occupied Crimea.
This is not a textbook counter-offensive, since the Ukrainians have committed approximately 20,000 troops to attack an equivalent number of Russians, when military doctrine demands a three-to-one superiority (some cautious commanders say five-to-one) for offensive operations. Ukraine does not have that kind of superiority, so all the signs are that it is imaginatively creating a new style of pragmatic offensive.
Any thought of Ukrainian armour and infantry racing to Kherson city and storming it should be dismissed. The Ukrainians do not want to kill their own citizens in Kherson or destroy yet another of their cities. Their plan is to isolate Kherson and force the surrender of the garrison or its retreat across the Dnipro river.
The Dnipro is key to the military situation. In a series of “shaping operations”, the Ukrainians have progressively destroyed all but the pedestrian bridges across the river. The Antonivskiy, Dariivskiy, Kakhovskiy bridges, including the railway crossing (vital for Russian military movements), and the Dimitryivskiy bridge across the Ingulets river have all been put out of commission.
By Monday, the Russians’ pontoon bridges and slow-moving barge ferries had largely been destroyed. Only pedestrian bridges remain and that is no coincidence: some Russians may escape, in the event of a collapse, but they will not be able to take their equipment with them.
The situation for the Russians is beyond dramatic. Some 20,000 soldiers who cannot be resupplied or reinforced (except by riflemen) are facing a counter-offensive along a 160km front. Before them is a hostile country and its advancing, vengeful army; behind them a broad and impassable river. Fighting with one’s back to a river is the ultimate military nightmare: as long ago as 312, it did for Maxentius at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge – indeed, Constantine employed exactly the same tactics as the Ukrainians.
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Bumble Dee / Alamy Stock Photo
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