#Lysychansk

[stop-war-ukraine]

Aftermath of the “Russian world”.

The Ukrainian cities of Mariupol, Bakhmut, Sievierodonetsk, Lysychansk, Vuhledar, Lyman, Vovchansk, Volnovakha, Marinka, Kreminna... Toretsk has now joined this far from complete list of cities turned into ruins after the start of t🇷🇺 invasion

[unhonestlymirror]

On my way to work, there is a mini memorial to the victims of Lukashenko's regime - and recently, I've noticed there a new frame. It was my mom's old friend.

Thousands of hundreds of people like me have to watch their friends dying because of russia - but of course, people in hetalia fandom couldn't care less about that. To them, we are just characters. To them, our families, our parents, kids and siblings, our best friends and loved ones, our acquaintances whom we barely know but who, nevertheless, make our lives a little less grey - all these people are just characters, and our pain is just another excuse to make fun of.

I just want to add a couple of photos of other "just characters" - Belaruthians who recently were repressed by lukashists for different excuses, from wearing something with red&white colours to supporting Ukraine:

This is the photo of a family of a Kalinoŭski regiment fighter who died fighting for Ukraine under Lysychansk. His wife has been volunteering since 2014.

"[...], таму я ўхваліла гэтае цяжкае рашэнне, бо вельмі люблю дзяцей, але ў нас ні ў каго не будзе жыцця, калі мы не пераможам. Ані мяне, ані дзяцей не будзе ўвогуле. [...] — адзначыла Алена Гергель."

The belief that Belarus loves russia is like the belief that Jews love hitler.

May anyone who draws Belarus and russia together as siblings or lovers be cursed 7000 times forever and ever, and let such people have bad food on their table.

[kamogryadeshi]

In the Donetsk direction, a house and power lines were damaged in Ocheretyne — Regional Military Administration

Avdiyivka was subjected to Russian artillery and tank fire — without casualties.

1 person was injured in the Horlivka direction and 3 houses were damaged in Kostyantynivka. Another 1 house was damaged in Ivanopillya.

In the Lysychansk direction, 2 houses and an administrative building in Siversk were damaged, and 3 houses were damaged in Kryva Luka of the Lyman community.

[stele3]

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/canada-extends-ban-foreign-ownership-housing-by-two-years-2024-02-04/

[colonna-durruti]

Alessandro Gilioli

"A perdere è sicuramente Zelensky. L'Ucraina non recupererà i territori ed è uno Stato fallito: ha perso un terzo degli abitanti, molti dei quali non torneranno. La ricostruzione avrà dei costi economici stimati dalla Banca mondiale in 500 miliardi di dollari che ricadranno in buona parte sell'Europa. (...)

Questa guerra era evitabile dagli Usa, che a partire dagli anni 2000 hanno finanziato forze antirusse in Ucraina. Gli americani hanno scommesso sull'Ucraina nella Nato e sulla caduta di Putin. Hanno usato gli ucraini per dissanguare i russi.

Gli ucraini hanno sbagliato a rinunciare alla mediazione turca su pressione degli angloamericani".

L'analisi è di Lucio Caracciolo, questa mattina intervistato su La Stampa.

Sul fallimento dell'Ucraina e sul costo politico ed economico che avrà per la disgraziata Ue, si è già detto molto.

Sottolineo in questa analisi, piuttosto, l'ultima frase che ho riportato: quella sulle trattative di Istanbul, a fine marzo del 2022, che oggi si sono dimenticati tutti.

L'invasione russa era iniziata da poco più di un mese, le delegazioni ad altissimo livello russa e ucraina si incontravano nella città turca. Il 30 marzo (basta riprendere le agenzie) sembrava di essere a un passo dall'accordo: Ucraina nella Ue ma non nella Nato, riconoscimento da parte di Kiev che la Crimea e una parte da definire del Donbass passavano definitivamente ai russi.

Quale parte del Donbass? Sicuramente una più piccola di quella attualmente occupata da Mosca: in quei giorni i russi non avevano ancora occupato diverse città come Sievierdonetsk, Lysychansk, Bakhmut; perfino Mariupol stava ancora resistendo.

Tutto cambiò il giorno dopo, quando le forze ucraine entrarono a Bucha, città a nordest di Kiev, e trovarono i segni di una mattanza di civili operata dai russi nei giorni dell'occupazione

Il giorno dopo ancora ci fu il primo attacco ucraino nel territorio russo, a Belgorod.

Da allora, non ci fu più nessuna trattativa (se non per il grano e per lo scambio di prigionieri).

Nell'ottobre del 2022, Zelensky ha firmato una legge che impedisce qualsiasi negoziato.

Caracciolo fa capire, nemmeno velatamente, che il massacro di Bucha non fu l'unica causa che a fine marzo del 2022 bloccò la trattativa: che ci furono pressioni in questo senso da parte dell'Occidente, in particolare Usa e Uk.

Se l'ipotesi di Caracciolo è fondata, quelle pressioni per interrompere il negoziato sono costate agli ucraini centinaia di migliaia di vite umane e diverse città poi finite in mano all'invasore.

[sorrynoroomsavailable]

Сашко Долгий учасник резиденції Вибачте Номерів Немає у лютому-квітні 2024 року

Сашко Долгий Лисичанськ – Часів Яр – Суми – Київ – Дослідник, митець, документаліст.

Куратор виставок сучасного мистецтва. Організатор музичних подій. Учасник національних та міжнародних виставок, проектів, резиденцій, бієнале. Дослідник теми соціальної еволюції через утопічні візії, та впливу публічних просторів на рівень напруженості суспільства.

Statement

Він все ще вірить у силу мистецтва як інструмента соціальних змін, хоча і знає, що це безнадійний самообман, він все ще осмислює сучасний світ через різні медіа, його наївна мета все ще — створити діалог між мистецтвом та глядачем, розширюючи межі звичного сприйняття та залучаючи людину до обговорення актуальних соціальних питань.

Резиденцію Вибачте Номерів Немає підтримано в рамках програми (re)connection UA 2023/24, що реалізується ГО “Музей сучасного мистецтва” та Ukrainian Emergency Art Fund (UEAF) у партнерстві з UNESCO і фінансується через Надзвичайний фонд спадщини UNESCO.

Програма (re)connection UA 2023/24 спрямована на відновлення зв’язків між митцями та їх аудиторіями, підтримку художників/иць як áкторів у збереженні культурної ідентичності України, втілення нових підходів до культури пам’яті, посилення стійкості та адаптивності інституцій, громад, митців до викликів воєнного часу

(eng)

Sashko Dolhyi participant of the residence Sorry No Rooms Available in February-April 2024

Sashko Dolhyi Lysychansk – Chasiv Yar – Sumy – Kyiv – Researcher, artist, documentarian.

Curator of contemporary art exhibitions. Organizer of musical events. Participant of national and international exhibitions, projects, residencies, biennials. Researcher of the topic of social evolution through utopian visions and the influence of public spaces on the level of tension in society.

Statement

He still believes in the power of art as a tool for social change, although he knows it is a hopeless self-delusion, he still makes sense of the modern world through various media, his naive goal is still to create a dialogue between art and the viewer, expanding the limits of usual perception and attracting person to discuss current social issues.

Sorry No Rooms Available Residence is supported as part of the (re)connection UA 2023/24 program, implemented by the NGO "Museum of Contemporary Art" and the Ukrainian Emergency Art Fund (UEAF) in partnership with UNESCO and financed through the UNESCO Emergency Heritage Fund.

The (re)connection UA 2023/24 program is aimed at restoring ties between artists and their audiences, supporting artists as actors in preserving the cultural identity of Ukraine, implementing new approaches to the culture of memory, strengthening the stability and adaptability of institutions, communities, artists to the challenges of wartime

#reconnectionua

[otthonzulles]

How Russia seizes Ukrainian businesses on occupied territories

Thousands of companies in Mariupol, Melitopol, and other occupied cities have been re-registered in Russia. Novaya-Europe investigates

A massive redistribution of assets is ongoing in the Ukrainian territories occupied by Russia: agricultural holding companies, factories, and mining plants are being taken over by Russians. Novaya-Europe has found over a thousand companies in Melitopol, Berdiansk, Mariupol, Lysychansk, and Sievierodonetsk that are now registered as Russian entities. 

Here is our insight into how Russian businessmen, with the help of the military, use pillage, racketeering and theft in order to seize valuable assets.

– mindent visznek az oroszok

[theculturedmarxist]

On May 20th, PMC Wagner forced Ukrainian troops out of their last remaining position within the city limits of Bakhmut, consequentially bringing about the nominal end of the largest battle of the 21st century (so far). Bakhmut has been the most substantial locus of military operations in Ukraine for most of the past nine months. Combat there took on a frustrating tempo, with progress often measured in single city blocks. This was a battle that was extremely violent and bloody, but at times agonizingly slow and seemingly indecisive. After countless updates in which nothing of note seemed to have happen, many people were surely beginning to roll their eyes at the very mention of Bakhmut. Consequentially, the abrupt capture of the city by Wagner in May (rather predictably, the final 25% of the city fell very quickly relative to the rest) seemed a bit surreal. To many it likely seemed that Bakhmut would never end - and then, suddenly, it did.

Bakhmut, like most high-intensity urban battles, exemplifies the apocalyptic potential of modern combat. Intense bombardment reduced large portions of the city to rubble, lending the impression that Wagner and the AFU were not so much fighting over the city as its carcass.

The slow pace and extreme destruction has made this battle a rather difficult one to parse out. It all seems so senseless - even within the unique paradigm of war-making. In the absence of an obvious operational logic, observers on both sides have been eager to construct theories of how the battle was actually a brilliant example of four-dimensional chess. In particular, you can easily find arguments from both pro-Ukrainian and pro-Russian commentators claiming that Bakhmut was used as a trap to draw in the other side’s manpower and material for destruction, while buying time to accumulate fighting power.

Pro-Ukrainian sources are adamant that a huge amount of Russian combat power was destroyed in Bakhmut, while the AFU received western armor and training to build out a mechanized package to go back on the offensive. Pro-Russian writers similarly seem convinced that the AFU burned a huge amount of manpower, while the Russian army preserved its strength by letting Wagner do most of the fighting.

Clearly, they cannot both be correct.

In this article, I would like to take a holistic survey of the Battle of Bakhmut and adjudicate the evidence. Which army was really destroyed in this “strategically insignificant” city? Which army was being profligately wasteful of its manpower? And most importantly - why did this middling city become the site of the largest battle of the century? Homicide was committed, but nobody can agree on who murdered whom. So, let us conduct an autopsy.

The Road to the Death Pit

The Battle of Bakhmut lasted for so long that it can be easy to forget how the front ended up there, and how Bakhmut fits into the operations in the summer of 2022. Russian operations in the summer were focused on the reduction of the Ukrainian salient around Lysychansk and Severodonetsk, and came to a climactic head when Russian forces broke open the heavy defended Ukrainian stronghold of Popasna, encircled a pocket of Ukrainian forces around Zolote, and approached the Bakhmut-Lysychansk highway. The actual fall of the Lysychansk-Severodonetsk urban agglomeration came relatively quickly, with Russian forces threatening to encircle the entire bag and forcing a Ukrainian withdrawal.

Just for reference, here is what the frontline in the central Donbas looked like on May 1, 2022, courtesy of MilitaryLand:

In this context, Bakhmut already threatened to become a major battleground. It lay at a literal crossroad directly in the center of the Ukrainian salient. As Ukrainian positions in Lysychansk, Popasna, and Svitlodarsk were broken open, the axes of Russian advance converged on Bakhmut.

Ukrainian forces greatly needed to stabilize the front, and establish a stable blocking position, and there was really nowhere else to do this except at Bakhmut. Between Lysychansk and Bakhmut there are no sufficiently robust urban areas to anchor the defense, and there was absolutely no question of failing to adequately defend Bakhmut, for a few reasons that we can enumerate:

Bakhmut is in the central position in this sector of front, and its loss would both threaten Siversk with envelopment and allow Russian forces to bypass the well fortified and strongly held defenses at Toretsk.

The Russian strategic objective at Slavyansk-Kramatorsk cannot be successfully defended if the Russian army controls both the heights to the east (in the Bakhmut area) and Izyum.

Bakhmut itself, meanwhile, was a defensible urban area with dominating heights in its rear, multiple routes of supply, good linkages to other sectors of front, and a peripheral belt of smaller urban areas protecting its flanks.

This set up a rather obvious operational decision for Ukrainian forces. The choice was, all things considered, to either commit reserves to stabilize the front at Bakhmut (a strong and operational vital defensive anchor) or risk letting Russia bypass and sweep away an entire belt of defenses in places like Siversk and Toretsk. Asked to choose between a reasonably good option and an extremely bad option, there was no great controversy in the deciding.

Falling back from the loss of their eastern defensive belt, Ukraine needed to stabilize the front somewhere, and the only suitable place was Bakhmut - so this is where Ukrainian reserves were sent in force, and the AFU chose to fight. Operational logic, indifferent to those things that normally recommend cities to us as “important”, decreed that the Styx should flow through Bakhmut.

Russia came to meet this challenge - bringing as their spearhead a mercenary group, staffed by convicts, wielding shovels, run by a bald caterer. What could go wrong?

Operational Progression

Because the general impression of Bakhmut is characterized by urban combat, it can be easy to forget that most of the battle took place outside the city itself, in the exurbs and fields around the urban center. The approach to Bakhmut is cluttered with a ring of smaller villages (places like Klynove, Pokrovs’ke, and Zaitseve) from which the AFU was able to fight a tenacious defense with the support of artillery in the city itself.

While Russian forces nominally reached the approach to Bakhmut late in June (even before Lysychansk was captured) and the city came under the extremes of shelling range, they did not immediately begin a concerted push to reach it. On August 1, the first assaults on the outer belt of villages began, and the Russian Ministry of Defense stated in its briefings that “battles for Bakhmut” had begun. This date is the most logical starting date for historiographical purposes, so we may firmly say that the Battle of Bakhmut was fought from August 1, 2022 to May 20, 2023 - a total of 293 days.

The first two months of the battle saw the Russian capture of most of the settlements east of the T0513 highway south of the city and the T1302 highway to the north, stripping Bakhmut and Soledar of most of their eastern buffer zones and pushing the line of contact right up to the edge of the urban areas proper.

At this point, the frontlines largely froze up for the remainder of the year, before Wagner set the stage for further advances with the capture of the small village of Yakovlivka, to the north of Soledar. This success can be construed as the first domino in a chain of events which led to Ukrainian defeat in Bakhmut.

Soledar itself serves a unique and critical role in the operational geography of Bakhmut. Laid out in a relatively long and thin strip, Soledar and its suburbs form a continuous urban shield stretching from the T0513 highway (which runs north to Siversk) all the way to the T0504 road (running east to Popasna). This makes Soledar a natural satellite stronghold which defends Bakhmut across nearly ninety degrees of approach. Soledar is also liberally gifted with industrial build, including the salt mine for which it is named, which makes it a relatively friendly place to wage a static defense, full of deep places and strong walls.

Wagner’s capture of Yakovlivka on December 16, however, marked the first sign that the defense of Soledar was in trouble. Yakovlikva sits on an elevated position to the northeast of Soledar, and its capture gave Wagner a powerful position atop Soledar’s flank. The Ukrainians recognized this, and Soledar was powerfully reinforced in response to the loss of Yakovlivka and the anticipated oncoming assault. The capture of Bakhmutske on December 27 (a suburb of Soledar directly on its southern approach) set the stage for a successful assault.

The attack on Soledar ended up being relatively fast and extremely violent, characterized by intense levels of Russian artillery support. The assault began almost immediately after the loss of Bakhmutske on December 27th, and by January 10th Ukraine’s cohesive defense had been shattered. Ukrainian leadership, of course, denied losing the town and wove a story about glorious counterattacks, but even the Institute for the Study of War (a propaganda arm of the US State Department) later admitted that Russia had captured Soledar by January 11th.

The loss of Soledar, in combination with the early January capture of Klischiivka to the south, put Wagner in a position to begin a partial envelopment of Bakhmut.

It was at this point that the discussion shifted towards a potential Russian encirclement of Bakhmut. To be sure, the Russian wings did expand rapidly around the city, placing it in a firebag, but there was never a concerted effort to take the city into a proper encirclement. The Russian advance subsided on the approach to Ivanivske in the south, and over the vital M03 highway in the north.

A genuine encirclement was probably never in the cards, mainly because of the complication of Chasiv Yar - a strongly held rear area stronghold. To fully encircle Bakhmut, Russian forces would have been forced to choose between two difficult options: either blockade the road from Chasiv Yar to Bakhmut, or flare the envelopment wide enough to take Chasiv Yar into the pocket as well. Either option would have greatly complicated the operation, and so Bakhmut was never genuinely encircled.

What the Russians did succeed in doing, however, was establish dominant position on the flanks which accrued three significant advantages. First, they were able to direct fire on Bakhmut’s remaining supply lines. Secondly, they were able to pummel Bakhmut itself with intense artillery fire from a variety of axes. Third - and perhaps most importantly - they were able to assault the Bakhmut urban center itself from three different directions. This, in the end, greatly hastened the fall of the city. By April, it was clear that the focus had shifted from expanding the envelopment on the flanks to assaulting Bakhmut itself, and it was reported that Russian regular units had taken custody of the flanks so that Wagner could clear the city.

Fighting throughout April and early May at last shifted to the struggle in the urban center. AFU units in the city ultimately proved incapable of stopping Wagner’s advance, largely due to tight Russian fires coordination and the cramped confines of the Ukrainian defense - with Wagner advancing into the city from three axes, the firing grids for Russian artillery became very narrow, and the AFU’s static defense - while bravely contested - was slowly ground down.

By early May, it was clear that the city would fall soon, with the AFU desperately holding on to the western edge of the city. Attention soon shifted, however, to a Ukrainian counterattack on the flanks.

This became a rather classic instance of events on the ground being outrun by the narrative. There had been rumors of an impending Ukrainian counterattack circulating for quite some time, advanced by both Ukrainian and Russian sources. Ukrainian channels were predicated on the idea that General Oleksandr Syrskyi (commander of AFU ground forces) had hatched a scheme to draw the Russians into Bakhmut before launching a counterattack on the wings. This idea was seemingly corroborated frantic warnings from Wagner head Yevgeny Prigozhin that the Ukrainians had massed enormous forces in the rear areas behind Bakhmut which would be unleashed to counter-encircle the city.

In any case, the spring months came and went without any astonishing AFU counterattack, and all manner of material shortages and weather delays were blamed. Then, on May 15, all hell seemed to be breaking loose. The AFU finally attacked, and Prigozhin screeched that the situation on the flanks was approaching the worst case scenario.

In fact, what happened was rather anticlimactic. The AFU did bring a hefty grouping of units to play, including several of their best and most veteran formations. These included units from:

The 56th Brigade

The 57th Mechanized Brigade

The 67th Mechanized Brigade

The 92nd Mechanized Brigade

The 3rd Assault Brigade (Azov)

The 80th Air Assault Brigade

The 5th Assault Brigade

This sizeable strike package attacked a handful of mediocre Russian Motor Rifle brigades, achieved a bit of initial success, and culminated with heavy losses. Despite Prigozhin’s assertion that the Russian regulars abandoned their posts and left the Russian wings undefended, we later learned that these forces - including mobilized motor rifle units - doggedly defended their positions and only withdrew under orders from above. These withdrawals (distances of a few hundred meters at most) brought the Russian defensive line to strongly held positions along a series of canals and reservoirs, which the AFU was unable to push through.

Now, this is not to say that Russia did not suffer losses defending against a tenacious Ukrainian attack. The 4th Motor Rifle Brigade, which was largely responsible for the successful defense outside Klishchiivka, was badly chewed up, its commander was killed, and it had to be promptly rotated out. However, the offensive potential of the Ukrainian assault package was exhausted, and there have been no follow on attempts in the past two weeks.

In the end, the vaunted Syrskyi plan looked rather lame. The counterattack did successfully unblock a few key roads out of Bakhmut, but it did nothing to prevent Wagner from finalizing the capture of the city, it burned through the combat power of several premier brigades, and on May 20th the last Ukrainian positions in the city were liquidated.

So. This was a strange battle. An agonizingly slow creep around the flanks of the city, a materializing threat of encirclement, and a sudden concentration of Wagner’s combat energy in the city itself - all taking place under threats of an enormous counteroffensive by the AFU, which turned out to be ineffective and ephemeral.

It’s not obvious, then, how this battle suited the operational logic of either army, nor that anyone would come away fully satisfied. Ukraine obviously lost the battle in nominal terms, but the Russian advance seemed so slow and Bakhmut so strategically random (at least superficially) that Wagner’s success can be portrayed as a pyrrhic victory. To fully adjudicate the Battle of Bakhmut, we need to contemplate relative losses and expenditure of combat power.

The Butcher’s Bill

Estimating combat losses in Ukraine is a difficult task, largely because “official” casualty estimates are often patently absurd. This leaves us with a need to fumble for reasonable figures using proxies and ancillary information. One such important source of knowledge is deployments data - we can get a general sense of the burn rate by the scale and frequency of unit allocation. In this particular case, however, we find that unit deployments are somewhat difficult to work with. Let’s parse through this.

First and foremost, we need to grapple with the incontrovertible fact that a huge share of the Ukrainian military was deployed at Bakhmut at one point or another. The Telegram Channel Grey Zone compiled a list of all the Ukrainian units that were positively identified (usually by social media posts or AFU updates) as being deployed in Bakhmut throughout the nine month battle (that is, they were not there all at once):

This is an absolutely enormous commitment (37 brigades, 2 regiments, and 18 separate battalions (plus irregular formations like the Georgian Legion) which indicates obviously severe losses (for what it’s worth, the pro-Ukrainian MilitaryLand Deployment Map admits a similarly titanic Ukrainian deployment in Bakhmut). However, this does not really get us close to accurately assessing losses, largely because Ukraine’s Order of Battle (ORBAT) is a bit confused. Ukraine frequently parcels out units below the brigade level (for example, their artillery brigades never deploy as such) and they have a bad habit of unit cannibalization.

Doing some extremely rough back of the envelop math, minimal scratching off of just the 37 brigades could easily have pushed Ukraine past 25,000 casualties, but there are all manner of shaky assumptions here. First, this assumes that Ukraine withdraws its brigades when they reach combat ineffective loss levels (15% would be a placeholder number here), which isn’t necessarily true - there is precedent for the AFU leaving troops in place to die, especially from lower quality units like Territorial Defense. In fact, an Australian volunteer (interview linked later on) claimed that the 24th mechanized brigade suffered 80% casualties in Bakhmut, so it’s possible that a great many of these brigades were chewed up beyond task ineffectiveness levels (that is, they were not correctly rotated out) but were instead destroyed entirely. A recent article in the New Yorker, for example, interviewed survivors of a battalion that was almost entirely wiped out. In another instance, a retired Marine Colonel said that units at the frontline routinely suffer 70% casualties.

We can say a few things for certain. First, that Ukraine had an extremely high burn rate which forced it to commit nearly a third of its total ORBAT. Secondly, we know that at least some of these formations were left at the front until they were destroyed. Finally, we can definitively say that pro-Ukrainian accounts are incorrect (or maybe lying) when they say that the defense at Bakhmut was conducted to buy time for Ukraine to build up strength in the rear. We know this first and foremost because Bakhmut insatiably sucked in additional units, and secondly because this burn included a large number of Ukraine’s premier and veteran forces, including fully a dozen assault, airborne, and armored brigades.

There’s another problem with the ORBAT approach to casualties, however, and this concerns Wagner. You see, one of our objectives here is to try to get a sense of the comparative rates of loss, and ORBAT simply isn’t a good way to do this in the particular case of Bakhmut. This is because the battle was mostly fought from the Russian side by the Wagner Group, which is a huge formation with an opaque internal structure.

Whereas on the Ukrainian side we can enumerate a long list of formations that fought at Bakhmut, on the Russian side we just put the 50,000 strong Wagner Group. Wagner of course has internal sub-formations and rotations, but these are not visible to those of us on the outside, and so we cannot get a sense of Wagner’s internal ORBAT or force commitment. We understand generally that Wagner has a structure of assault detachments (probably a battalion equivalent), platoons, and squads, but we do not have a sense of where these units are deployed in real time or how quickly they are rotated or burned through. Sadly, when Prigozhin went in front of cameras he brought maps without unit dispositions on them, leaving ORBAT nerds squinting in vain trying to extract useful information. So, lacking good insight into Wagner’s deployments, we are unable to make an adequate comparison to the bloated Ukrainian ORBAT in Bakhmut.

There are other ways that we can get at the casualties, however. The Russian dissident (that is, anti-Putin) organization Mediazona tracks Russian losses by tabulating obituaries, death announcements on social media, and official announcements. For the entire period of the Battle of Bakhmut (August 1 - May 20), they counted 6,184 total deaths among PMC personnel, inmates, and airborne forces (these three categories accounting for most of the Russian force in Bakhmut).

Meanwhile, Prigozhin claimed that Wagner had suffered 20,000 KIA in Bakhmut while inflicting 50,000 KIA on the Ukrainians. Concerning the first number - the context of this claim was an interview in which he was lambasting the Russian Ministry of Defense (as is his habit), and he has an incentive to overstate Wagner’s losses (since he is trying to play up Wagner’s sacrifice for the Russian people).

So, here is where we are at with Wagner losses. We have a “floor”, or absolute minimum of a little over 6,000 KIA (these being positively identified by name) with a significant upward margin of error , and something like a ceiling of 20,000. The number that I have been working with is approximately 17,000 total Wagner KIA in the Bakhmut operation (with a min-max range of 14,000 and 20,000, respectively).

However, something we need to consider is the composition of these forces. Among the positively identified KIA, convicts outnumber professional PMC operators by about 2.6 to 1 (that is, Wagner’s dead would be about 73% convicts). According to the Pentagon, however (taken with a large grain of salt), nearly 90% of Wagner’s losses are convicts. Taking a conservative 75/25 split and rounding the numbers to make them pretty, my estimate is that Wagner lost about 13,000 convicts and 4,000 professional operators. Adding in VDV losses and motorized rifle units fighting on the flanks, and total Russian KIA in Bakhmut are likely on the order of 20-22,000.

So, what about Ukrainian losses? The major outstanding question remains: who is on the right end of the loss ratios?

Ukrainian commentators consistently ask us to believe that Russian losses were far worse due to their use of “human wave” attacks. There are several reasons why this can be dismissed.

First, we have to acknowledge that after nine months of combat we have not yet seen a single video showing one of these purported human waves (that is, Wagner convicts attacking in a massed formation). Keeping in mind that Ukraine loves to share footage of embarrassing Russian mistakes, that they have no qualms about sharing gory war porn, and that this is a war being fought with thousands of eyes in the sky in the form of reconnaissance drones, it must strike us as curious that not one of these alleged human wave attacks has yet been caught on camera. When videos are shared purporting to show human waves, they invariably show small groups of 6-8 infantry (we call this a squad, not a human wave).

However, the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. That being said, the “human wave” narrative has been contradicted on multiple occasions. Just for starters, General Syrskyi himself contradicted the human wave narrative and said that Wagner’s methodology is to push small assault groups forward under intense artillery cover. Witnesses from the front concur. An Australian Army Veteran volunteering in Ukraine gave a very interesting interview in which he downplayed Wagner casualties and instead emphasized that “Ukraine is taking way too many casualties” - he later adds that the 24th brigade suffered 80% casualties in Bakhmut. He also notes that Wagner favors infiltration groups and small units - the veritable opposite of massed human waves.

I found this article from the Wall Street Journal to be nicely emblematic of the human wave issue. It contains the obligatory claim of human wave tactics - “The enemy pays no attention to huge losses of its personnel and continues the active assault. The approaches to our positions are simply littered with the bodies of the adversary’s dead soldiers.” This description, however, comes from the bureaucratic apparatus at the Ministry of Defense. What about people on the ground? A Ukrainian officer at the front says: “So far, the exchange rate of trading our lives for theirs favors the Russians. If this goes on like this, we could run out.”

Ultimately, it’s difficult to believe that the kill ratio favors Ukraine for the simple reason that the Russians have enjoyed a tremendous advantage in firepower. Ukrainian soldiers speak freely about Russia’s enormous superiority in artillery, and at one point it was suggested that the AFU was outgunned by ten to one. The New Yorker’s interview subjects claimed that their battalion’s mortar section had a ration of a mere five shells per day!

The enormous Russian advantage in artillery and standoff weaponry suggests the a-priori assumption that the AFU would be taking horrific casualties, and indeed that’s what we hear from myriad sources at the front. Then, of course, there was the shocking February claim by a former US Marine in Bakhmut that the life expectancy at the front line was a mere four hours.

All of this is really ancillary to the larger point. The enormous inventory of AFU units that were churned through Bakhmut included something on the order of 160,000 total personnel. Taking loss rates of between 25 and 30% (roughly on par with Wagner’s burn rate), it’s clear that Ukraine’s losses were extreme. I believe total irretrievable losses for Ukraine in Bakhmut were approximately 45,000, with some +/- 7,000 margin of error.

So, my current working estimates for losses in the Battle of Bakhmut are some 45,000 for Ukraine, 17,0000 for Wagner, and 5,000 for other Russian forces.

But perhaps even this misses the point.

Ukraine was losing its army, Russia was losing its prison population.

Adjudicating the Battle of Bakhmut is relatively easy when one looks at what units were brought to the table. Bakhmut burned through an enormous portion of the AFU’s inventory, including many of its veteran assault brigades, while virtually none of Russia’s conventional forces were damaged (with the notable exception of the Motor Rifle brigades that defeated the Ukrainian counterattack). Even the Pentagon has admitted that the vast majority of Russian casualties in Ukraine were convicts.

Now, this is all rather cynical - nobody can deny it. But from the unsentimental calculus of strategic logic, Russia churned through its single most disposable military asset, leaving its regular ORBAT not only completely intact, but actually larger than it was last year.

Meanwhile, Ukraine was left with virtually no indigenous offensive power - the only way it can conduct offensive operations is with a mechanized package built from scratch by NATO. For all Ukraine’s bluster, the force commitment at Bakhmut left it unable to undertake any proactive operations all through the winter and spring, its multi-brigade counterattack at Bakhmut lamely fizzled out, and it left its supporters grasping at straws about an immanent counteroffensive to encircle Wagner by a reserve army that doesn’t exist. It was even reduced to sending small flying columns into Belgorod Oblast to launch terror raids, only to have them blown up - discovering that the Russian border is in fact crawling with forces of the very much intact Russian army.

———

I think that ultimately, neither army anticipated that Bakhmut would become the focal point of such high intensity combat, but the arrival of Ukrainian reserves in force created a unique situation. Russia was beginning a process of major force generation (with mobilization beginning in September), and the gridlocked, slow moving, Verdun-like environs of Bakhmut offered a good place for Wagner to bear the combat load while much of the regular Russian forces underwent expansion and refitting.

Ukraine, meanwhile, fell into the sunk cost fallacy and began to believe its own propaganda about “Fortress Bakhmut”, and allowed brigade after brigade to be sucked in, turning the city and its environs into a killing zone.

Now that Bakhmut is lost (or as Zelensky put it, exists “only in our hearts”), Ukraine faces an operational impasse. Bakhmut was after all a very good place to fight a static defense. If the AFU could not hold it, or even produce a favorable loss exchange, can a strategy of holding static fortified belts really be deemed viable? Meanwhile, the failure of the Syrskyi plan and the defeat of a multi-brigade counterattack by Russian motor rifle brigades casts serious doubt on Ukraine’s ability to advance on strongly held Russian positions.

Ultimately, both Ukraine and Russia traded for time in Bakhmut, but whereas Russia put up a PMC which primarily lost convicts, Ukraine bought time by chewing up a significant amount of its combat power. They bought time - but time to do what? Can Ukraine do anything that will be worth the lives it spent in Bakhmut, or was it all just blood for the blood god?

[cyberbenb]

EU announces additional $143 million in humanitarian aid for Ukraine

The European Union is allocating an additional 140 million euros ($143 million) in humanitarian assistance for Ukraine, the European Commission said in a statement on Jan. 13.

In addition to this sum, the EU will allocate 8 million euros ($8.16 million) to Moldova to support Ukrainian refugees and their host communities. This will bring the overall humanitarian aid provided by the EU to the two countries since 2022 to over 1.1 billion euros ($1.12 billion).

“The funding will be directed towards emergency assistance, including food, shelter, clean water, healthcare, and winter protection… supporting vulnerable populations in the heavily war impacted regions of eastern and southern Ukraine,” the statement read.

The announcement coincides with European Commissioner for Crisis Management Hadja Lahbib’s visit to Ukraine.

“As Russia continues its cruelty in the dead of winter, the EU is intensifying its support to keep the lights on and homes warm,” the commissioner said in the statement.

Russia’s war has resulted in a humanitarian crisis in Ukraine, driving millions from their homes while dealing heavy damage to residential and energy infrastructure.

Amid Russia’s invasion, the EU has stepped up support for Ukraine in response to Ukraine’s EU aspirations.

Ukraine applied for EU membership days after Russia launched its full-scale war in February 2022 and received candidate status in June of that year. In December 2023, EU leaders agreed to open accession negotiations with Ukraine, which officially began in June 2024.

Previously, Katarina Mathernova, the EU ambassador to Ukraine, said 2030 is a very real date for Ukraine to join the European Union.

As government cuts support, some internally displaced Ukrainians return home — to Russian occupation

Last winter as Olena Morozova braced for a long and arduous trip to Ukrainian-controlled territory from her Russian-occupied home in Lysychansk in Luhansk Oblast, her friends were traveling in the opposite direction. The friends — a family with two sons — came back to their house in Lysychansk beca…

The Kyiv IndependentNatalia Yermak

[mokhosz-nafo]

⚡️ In the north of Mali, Tuareg rebels defeated a convoy of Russian mercenaries from the Wagner PMC.

Russian telegram channels report that at least over 50 Wagnerians were killed. Among those killed were the author of the Russian propaganda channel GreyZone with 500,000 subscribers, codenamed “Bilyi,” and the commander of Russian mercenaries in Mali, Anton Elizarov, codenamed “Lotus.” Elizarov took part in the invasion of Ukraine and led the assaults near Popasna, Severodonetsk, Lysychansk, Vuhlehirsk thermal power plant, and Soledar.

@liveukraine_media

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 6.25 (after 1950)

1950 – The Korean War begins with the invasion of South Korea by North Korea. 1960 – Cold War: Two cryptographers working for the United States National Security Agency left for vacation to Mexico, and from there defected to the Soviet Union. 1975 – Mozambique achieves independence from Portugal. 1975 – Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declares a state of internal emergency in India. 1976 – Missouri Governor Kit Bond issues an executive order rescinding the Extermination Order, formally apologizing on behalf of the state of Missouri for the suffering it had caused to members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 1978 – The rainbow flag representing gay pride is flown for the first time during the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade. 1981 – Microsoft is restructured to become an incorporated business in its home state of Washington. 1991 – The breakup of Yugoslavia begins when Slovenia and Croatia declare their independence from Yugoslavia. 1992 – Space Shuttle Columbia launches on STS-50, the first shuttle mission to carry Extended Duration Orbiter hardware. 1993 – Kim Campbell is sworn in as the first female Prime Minister of Canada. 1996 – The Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia kills 19 U.S. servicemen. 1997 – An uncrewed Progress spacecraft collides with the Russian space station Mir. 1997 – The National Hockey League approved expansion franchises for Nashville (1998), Atlanta (1999), Columbus (2000), and Minneapolis-Saint Paul (2000). 1998 – In Clinton v. City of New York, the United States Supreme Court decides that the Line Item Veto Act of 1996 is unconstitutional. 2007 – PMTair Flight 241 crashes in the Dâmrei Mountains in Kampot Province, Cambodia, killing all 22 people on board. 2022 – The prime minister of Bangladesh, Sheikh Hasina inaugurates the longest bridge of Bangladesh, Padma Bridge. 2022 – Russo-Ukrainian War: The Battle of Sievierodonetsk ends after weeks of heavy fighting with the Russian capture of the city, leading to the Battle of Lysychansk. 2022 – Two people are killed and 21 more injured after a gunman opens fire at three sites in Oslo in a suspected Islamist anti-LGBTQ+ attack.

[xoheisse]

a thread on twitter with other cities such as :

Bakhmut (73,212), Mariupol (446,103), Nova Kakhovka (45,422), Severodonetsk (106,513), Volnovakha (21,678), Lysychansk (99,598), Kramatorsk (157,175), Kharkiv (1.419 million), Mykolaiv (486,267), Kherson (289,697), Chernihiv (285,821)

This is Avdiivka, Donetsk region, in October 2023.

Pre-war population: 32,000. Residents remaining now: ~1,000.

russia is a terrorist state.

[kamogryadeshi]

The Russians continue to destroy Donetsk region: a missile attack on Slovyansk, aerial bombs on Vugledar

"At dawn, the Russians fired missiles at Slovyansk - 1 building was destroyed, 9 more were damaged. On the Volnovakha direction, Vugledar was hit by an airstrike and 21 artillery shells. 2 houses were damaged in Bogoyavlenka. Prechystivka came under artillery fire 4 times, Novoukrayinka — twice," wrote the head of the Donetsk Regional Military Administration, Pavlo Kyrylenko.

On the Horlivka direction, two people died in the Chasovoyarsk community. In Toretsk, one person was injured, 4 houses and an infrastructure object were damaged. 13 houses were damaged in Nykyforivka, Soledar community. Poltavka of the Illinivska community was hit by a rocket, where the utility room was damaged. In addition, in the Lysychansk direction, a house in Zvanivka and two houses in Torske and Zarichne of the Lyman community were damaged.

[ultrajaphunter]

THE PARTY IS OVER:

Informed by local partisans, a Ukrainian HIMARS strike targeted the LPR Emergencies Minister A. Poteleschenko.

He and other senior collaborators from the prosecutor's office and Ministry of Emergency Situations were attending a birthday party in Lysychansk.

[mariacallous]

On February 8, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky dismissed Commander-in-Chief of Ukraine’s Armed Forces (AFU) Valerii Zaluzhnyi, with whom the president reportedly had a long-standing conflict. Zelensky appointed Oleksandr Syrskyi, the commander of Ukraine’s Ground Forces, as his replacement. While Zelensky’s team explained the decision as part of an effort to “renew the leadership” of the military, exactly how they expect Syrskyi’s approach to differ from that of his predecessor is unclear. In their rare statements over the past year, the two generals have said largely similar things. Their reputations, however, couldn’t be more opposite. Zaluzhnyi is widely associated with positive attributes such as tactical flexibility, care for soldiers’ lives, and prioritization of military needs over political demands; Syrskyi, on the other hand, is seen as someone who blindly follows orders, no matter the cost. Meduza explains what distinguishes the two on the battlefield, what goals they share, and how Syrskyi came to earn his reputation.

Zaluzhnyi and Syrskyi on the battlefield

Valerii Zaluzhnyi has become a symbol of the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ (AFU) successes in the war with Russia. He led the AFU from the first day of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and under his leadership, a “miracle” happened: in 2022, the Ukrainian army not only didn’t collapse but also managed to recapture a significant part of the territory lost in the initial attack.

However, the AFU lost a significant portion of southern Ukraine under his leadership — in the first days of the war, resistance there crumbed, Ukrainian troops lost their combat effectiveness, and some forces were surrounded in Mariupol. Ukraine’s Prosecutor’s Office is investigating the breakdown, but no charges have yet been brought against Zaluzhnyi (who formally bears responsibility for the training and movements of the troops).

Meanwhile, Oleksandr Syrskyi, as theater commander, led Ukrainian troops in the two most successful operations of the war’s first year: the defense of Kyiv and the offensive in the Kharkiv region. Near Kyiv, the AFU was able to halt the Russian army’s advance by using a flexible defense that combined infantry, tank, and artillery units. They attacked communications, which hindered the delivery of reinforcements and supplies to the Russian side, and displayed superior reconnaissance (using drones, among other things). In Ukraine’s Kharkiv region, Syrskyi was able to covertly concentrate troops, predominantly light infantry, and break through the Russian line. Due to this maneuver, the AFU, which had inferior firepower, were able to defeat a large Russian formation.

It was shortly before Syrskyi’s Kharkiv offensive that the first — then not yet explicit — conflict arose between Zaluzhnyi and Ukrainian politicians. Russian troops tried to surround the AFU in Sievierodonetsk and Lysychansk, and Zaluzhnyi allegedly (this was reported by pro-Russian and anonymous Ukrainian channels) was in favor of abandoning these cities to minimize losses. However, in the midst of the battle in Lysychansk, Mariana Bezuhla, a member of parliament from the pro-presidential Servant of the People party, reportedly went to Lysychansk and practically took over the operation. The battle continued for another month, and Ukrainian troops in the almost surrounded Sievierodonetsk were left without supplies. Both cities had to be abandoned in early July. Following the battle (and the subsequent counteroffensive in the Kharkiv region), the Ukrainian authorities concluded that dragging out the doomed defense of Sievierodonetsk and Lysychansk was justified as it inflicted heavy casualties on Russian troops.

After Ukraine’s victory around Balakliya and Kupiansk in the Kharkiv region, Syrskyi was sent to the only front where Russia was continuing its offensive: Bakhmut. Wagner Group was fighting there, reinforced by pardoned Russian prisoners. On January 9, 2023, Wagner mercenaries broke through near Soledar, north of Bakhmut, putting the Ukrainian defense in this direction in a critical position. Bakhmut sits in a lowland, and the elevated positions to the north of the city were captured by Wagner Group — but 10 kilometers (about 6.2 miles) west of the city, the AFU had a favorable position on the hills near the village of Chasiv Yar.

According to rumors spread by pro-Russian channels, Zaluzhnyi urged Zelensky at this point to give the order to withdraw troops from Bakhmut, but Zelensky refused — and Syrskyi was sent reserves to continue the defense. Since then, Zelensky has often appeared on the Bakhmut front accompanied by Syrskyi. However, there’s no independent corroboration that Zaluzhnyi was against continuing the defense. A month before Soledar fell, he told The Economist that the AFU’s main objective was to hold off the next Russian offensive and to not surrender an inch of territory as “liberating it will be much more difficult.” Already then, at the end of 2022, rumors began spreading that Zelensky’s entourage wanted to replace Zaluzhnyi, who was popular among both civilians and troops, with Syrskyi.

It wasn’t possible to hold Bakhmut. However, a few days before its fall, in early May 2023, the AFU began launching counterattacks on the flanks of Wagner Group’s formation. Syrskyi announced that Bakhmut would be liberated. The attack on the city was led by experienced Ukrainian brigades, including ones that had defended Bakhmut in the spring as well as fresh ones specifically placed under Syrskyi’s command. Concurrently, the AFU launched an offensive in the south, toward Tokmak and Melitopol, using newly formed and inexperienced brigades. Western military leaders consider the decision to disperse military forces in two unrelated directions like this to have been a mistake by the Ukrainian command. Bakhmut was never liberated, and the southern offensive also failed. It’s not entirely clear who came up with the idea to divide the troops — Zaluzhnyi, Zelensky, or Syrskyi.

It’s generally believed that after the offensive’s initial failures, Zaluzhnyi altered the operational plan: reserves, which were originally meant to come in as reinforcements after a breakthrough, were brought into the battle before any such breakthroughs occurred. Additionally, the AFU switched from large-scale armored attacks to assaults with small infantry units. This yielded only minor tactical successes; for instance, the village of Robotyne, a few kilometers from the original front line, was liberated. It’s worth noting that the tactic of using small assault groups was not Zaluzhnyi’s invention for operations in Ukraine’s south. Syrskyi employed the same approach near Bakhmut, and, prior to that, Wagner Group (which generally preferred not to use armored vehicles on the contact line) used the same strategy.

In November, when it was already obvious that the offensive had failed, and the Russian Armed Forces began launching attacks across the entire front, Zaluzhnyi wrote an essay for The Economist. Despite its title (“The commander-in-chief of Ukraine’s armed forces on how to win the war”), he didn’t provide any clear plan for victory — instead, he mainly wrote a routine analysis of military technology and expressed his hope for some new resources in critical areas. However, the general did give his opinion of what would happen if the new resources didn’t appear: the war would ultimately become a war of attrition, and in this type of conflict, Ukraine would eventually lose.

To the president’s team, this sounded like a political statement — if victory on the battlefield isn’t attainable, then the war’s objectives must be changed. Meanwhile, Zelensky’s office kept insisting that the only acceptable outcome for Ukraine would be the liberation of all of its occupied territory, including Crimea.

In late January of this year, the German outlet Bild wrote that Zaluzhnyi had asked Zelensky to withdraw troops from the semi-encircled Avdiivka but that Zelensky had refused, despite the critical situation there. Still, there was no actual evidence showing that Zaluzhnyi had, or had expressed, a dissenting opinion. Earlier, he’d said that Avdiivka could be lost within a few months.

Zaluzhnyi and Syrskyi’s methods

Both generals, according to political and military leaders in Ukraine, share similar views on war and the military. They both advocate for moving away from “Soviet legacies” by decentralizing command structures, placing trust in lower-ranking commanders as an alternative to rigid hierarchies, and adopting NATO-style command structures where politicians, including those in the Defense Ministry, focus on policy while military personnel lead combat operations.

Zaluzhnyi has put more emphasis on the need for commanders to possess leadership qualities and to be “father figures to their soldiers.” Meanwhile, Syrskyi, as described by his associates, is particularly “meticulous in planning operations and sees warfare as mathematics.”

Both have gone from being optimistic about the prospects for Ukraine’s summer offensive to realizing that the AFU must now put up a steadfast defense. Shortly before Zaluzhnyi left his post, he told CNN that the AFU should rely on kamikaze drones, which can be produced domestically, as a replacement for artillery. Syrskyi echoed the sentiment upon succeeding Zaluzhnyi.

Despite their similar approaches and rhetoric, as well as their shared victories and setbacks, the generals have one significant difference: their reputations. Judging by public opinion polls and statements from military personnel, Zaluzhnyi remains a symbol of all Ukrainian victories. Syrskyi, on the other hand, has a reputation among the military as a cold-hearted executor who will be loyal to any governing authority and has little regard for his personnel.

A Ukrainian general told Meduza the following about the country’s new army chief:

I won’t comment on Syrskyi. It’s clear he’s not just anyone off the street. Ideally, his methods would be more technologically advanced, rather than just carrying out the orders of the office [of the president] at any cost. That’s exactly why he was appointed — because he executes the office’s orders at any cost. There were no logical reasons for Zaluzhnyi’s dismissal. It’s the result of ‘political jealousy,’ which certainly doesn’t unite society in difficult times. We usually say: ‘We know our problems; we’ll sort them out after the war.’ But here, I’m afraid, we won’t win the war without solving these problems.

A source within the Ukrainian military said Syrskyi was callous:

The soldiers and I are a little shocked. Because many see Syrskyi as a ‘butcher.’ He doesn’t care about losses. When he arrives at some front, reserves, including untrained ones, start being brought in — and they push, push, push. Zaluzhnyi is known in the army as someone who always tries to carry out orders with minimal casualties. Yes, he could lose territory, regroup, request other units. But Syrskyi doesn’t care about losses at all. He only cares about following the [president’s] orders. And they say he never challenges the directives he gets from above. And this is why Zaluzhnyi was inconvenient — according to what the infantry says in the trenches. Because he always had his own opinion, and, as a military man, he often spoke up against various operations.

However, Zelensky’s team believes that these ideas were artificially introduced into public opinion and that Syrskyi is the victim of slander, if not Russian psychological warfare. Here’s how a source in Kyiv who’s familiar with the situation characterized it to Meduza:

Half of this information [about Syrskyi’s indifference to troop losses] is a well-executed psychological operation. Infantrymen are the main target of all Russian psy-ops. [Few know about his actual qualities as a commander because] the army as a whole didn’t serve under Syrskyi’s command. Only a certain section of people did, and a fairly small one. But now, this image will disintegrate on its own, because he will simply stop planning operations in this way — for objective reasons.

Syrskyi’s reputation

Oleksandr Syrskyi first entered the public’s awareness in the spring of 2015 as major general and chief-of-staff of Sector “C” in Ukraine’s “Anti-Terrorist Operation” in the Donbas. Shortly before that, from late January to February 20 of the same year, he directly oversaw Ukrainian combat operations in the so-called Debaltseve pocket.

General Valerii Zaluzhnyi (as deputy commander of the sector) and Serhiy Shaptala, a future loyal ally of Zaluzhnyi’s, served under Syrskyi’s command there. Shaptala was in charge of the 128th Mountain Assault Brigade, which formed the basis of the defense at Debaltseve. Zaluzhnyi would later recall how he led the 25th Territorial Defense Battalion “Kyivska Rus” in Debaltseve “with a heavy heart.” Debaltseve was already partially surrounded before the “LNR/DNR militias” attacked, and there was only one supply road.

In mid-February, the Debaltseve garrison was surrounded (the road was reportedly cut off by regular Russian troops from Russia’s 5th Guards Tank Brigade). On February 12, under the pressure of these circumstances, then-President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko signed the Minsk II agreement, which was considered a humiliation for Ukraine. On February 18, the majority of Ukrainian troops in Debaltseve, including the 128th Brigade and the 25th Battalion, fought their way back to Ukrainian-controlled territory through the fields and hills north of the city. Kyiv recognized the operation as a success and gave awards to the participants, including Syrskyi and Shaptala.

Afterward, one of the 25th Battalion officers, Yevheniy Bekrenev, took a letter signed by various soldiers to the Military Prosecutor’s Office in Kyiv, accusing Poroshenko and his “faithful executor” Syrskyi of critical mistakes (or even deliberate betrayal) when leading the operation in Debaltseve. The letter was signed by Shaptala, who later denied having signed anything. Bekrenev was accused by Ukraine’s Security Service of assisting Russia and working for its special services, but the case didn’t lead to his arrest.

After this, Syrskyi became a popular target for Poroshenko’s opponents. Bekrenev became a commentator and continued to “expose” the general, outlining in more and more detail his “crimes” in Debaltseve. Perhaps due to this reputation, Syrskyi’s military career advancement stalled after Zelensky came to power, and it was ultimately not him but his former subordinate Zaluzhnyi who was appointed commander-in-chief of Ukraine’s Armed Forces in 2021.

Since then, the type of defense used in Debaltseve has firmly taken root in Ukrainian tactical planning: holding disadvantageous positions at all costs, with the belief that the troops will manage to inflict losses on the enemy and then break through to get back to Ukrainian-controlled territory. This type of strategic defense was used in Mariupol, near Sievierodonetsk and Lysychansk, and in Bakhmut — and is now being employed again in Avdiivka. Naturally, its effectiveness remains a matter of debate: troops have to fight with limited supplies (or without them at all, as in Mariupol), which likely reduces their combat capability. Additionally, what happened at Bakhmut shows that such operations do not always yield political dividends. Heroic defense followed by defeat may not be enough for society; what’s really necessary are lasting victories.

Zelensky’s team is taking a risk by appointing a person who, while a master of unwavering defense (which is precisely what Ukraine needs now), has (deservedly or not) a reputation as someone who puts the leadership’s political interests over military considerations. The president’s office and its not-so-popular appointee could easily find themselves magnets for all the negativity that will inevitably arise during the difficult times promised to Ukraine in 2024 — a particularly important consideration given the looming need for expanded mobilization.