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烏克蘭即將再度發動攻勢 – A. E. Kramer
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再度對烏國人民的團結一致，烏國士兵的英勇奮戰，和澤倫斯基以下各級官員、將領、軍官的運籌帷幄和同心同德表達敬意。
我了解NATO以及其它歐、美國家借這個機會打擊俄國。但這個「機會」是普丁自己雙手打造的；此之謂「玩火自焚」，「咎由自取」。
留下這篇報導存檔，留個歷史紀錄；以警來者。
New Weapons Aren’t Enough: The Challenges of Ukraine’s Coming Assault
With powerful Western weapons, newly formed assault units and even a reconstituted Azov battalion, Ukraine is poised for a critical spring counteroffensive. But overcoming casualties and keeping war-weary troops motivated will be stern tests.
Andrew E. Kramer, 04/03/23
In vicious but mostly static fighting in snowy, artillery-cratered fields and ruined cities, Ukraine rebuffed a Russian offensive over the winter. Now, it is Ukraine’s turn to go on the attack.
Signs are everywhere that it is coming in the next month or so.
New Western weapons that could prove critical in assaults, like German Leopard 2 tanks and American mine-clearing vehicles, are arriving in Ukraine. Thousands of recruits are training in newly constituted units tailored for offensives. And the military command is holding back elite soldiers from the worst of the fighting in the east, in and around the city of Bakhmut, to throw them instead into the coming campaign.
After more than a year of war, Ukraine is battle hardened. “We are covered in three centimeters of stone,” one fighter, Lt. Ilya Samoilenko, said in a recent interview.
But that toughness has come at a steep cost. Ukraine has lost thousands of its most experienced fighters. Now Lieutenant Samoilenko, a veteran commander and survivor of the siege of the city of Mariupol, is using his experience to train new recruits.
The new Ukrainian campaign, when it comes, will be a test of its army’s ability to re-arm and reconstitute battalions while maintaining the motivation and maneuvering skills that gave it an edge in three previous counteroffensives.
The timing is critical. Success for Ukraine in the battles on the southeastern plains would drive home to the world the declining military might of Russia, ease concerns that the war has settled into a quagmire and most likely encourage Ukraine’s allies to further arm and finance Kyiv in the war.
Western support has been solid so far but is not guaranteed. The U.S. budget for military assistance, for example, is now expected to run out by around September, and a senior American defense official recently described the latest tranche of artillery rounds and rockets sent to Ukraine as a “last-ditch effort.”
“The key point in the eyes of Washington elites — and Washington elites are the judge and jury on this — is that Ukraine has to be seen as having gained significant land in the coming offensive,” Cliff Kupchan, chairman of the Eurasia Group, a political risk assessment firm in Washington, said in an interview.
The challenges are daunting.
Ukrainian officers will have to choreograph artillery, infantry and armored vehicle assaults that crash through Russian trenches, tank traps and minefields. In the south, Russian units have been building defensive positions since they were pushed out of the Kherson region in November. Sophisticated Western tanks, with better survivability and firepower, will be critical in uprooting those positions.
Ukraine had a standing army of about 260,000 soldiers before Russia invaded last year, and it quickly swelled to about a million people bearing arms in various branches of the security services and military. Over the past year, about 100,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed or wounded, according to Western estimates. Ukraine has not revealed how large a force it will commit to the counteroffensive.
Ukraine is seen as planning to drive a wedge through Russian occupied territory along the southern coasts of the Black and Azov Seas, near Crimea, or to seek a humiliating turnabout in the fighting in the eastern Donbas region — or both.
The State of the War
* Counteroffensive Challenges: With powerful Western weapons and newly formed assault units, Ukraine is poised for a critical spring campaign. But overcoming casualties and keeping troops motivated will be stern tests.
* A High-Profile Attack: An influential Russian military blogger was killed when a bomb exploded in a cafe in St. Petersburg on April 2. Russian authorities have detained a suspect in the killing.
* Arrest of American Reporter: With the arrest of Evan Gershkovich, a Wall Street Journal correspondent, President Vladimir Putin signaled to the world that he was doubling down on Russia’s isolation from the West.
If weapons and trained troops fall into place in time, Ukraine is capable of inflicting losses on the Russian Army that could have far-reaching geopolitical consequences, Evelyn Farkas, the director of the McCain Institute, said in a telephone interview.
She posited a once-unthinkable outcome: that Ukraine could render Russia a weakened military power in Eastern Europe with little leverage in negotiations to end the war.
“People lack imagination,’’ Ms. Farkas said. “They only envision what they see now.”
But much could change, she said, with the influx to the front lines of the new Western weaponry and the tens of thousands of Ukrainian soldiers who have been training for the operation at home and in Europe.
Still, success is hardly assured. Allies have dragged their feet in sending weaponry, and soldiers have had to make do with crash courses in assault tactics.
“It’s a lot to learn in a short time,” said Rob Lee, a military analyst at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. And, he noted, “they will have to go before they get all the equipment.”
The weaponry and equipment for breaching trench lines and crossing minefields is falling into place, though it remains unclear if in sufficient quantity.
The Ukrainian military has posted photographs on Twitter of Stryker and Cougar armored personnel carriers from the United States, Marder armored vehicles from Germany and Challenger tanks from Britain. Last week, Ukrainian crews for Patriot air defense missiles wrapped up training in the United States, the Pentagon said.
The counteroffensive, at least in its opening stages, could well hinge on crossing sprawling minefields, military analysts say. To do so, Ukraine will be relying on the unglamorous but crucial mine-clearing machines it has in its Soviet-era arsenal. It has captured some from retreating Russians and is now also receiving mine-clearing devices from the West.
The Russian military has a vast arsenal of anti-tank and anti-personnel mines, with colorful nicknames like the Black Widow and the Leaf, some specifically designed to complicate demining with booby traps.
The demining can be done manually, with specially trained soldiers probing the soil and keeping a close eye for trip wires as they walk in front of assault units, or with specialized mine-clearing machinery. These vehicles fire a rocket that tows a long line of explosives. Draping the line over a minefield, then detonating it, clears a path for soldiers or armored vehicles.
If the engineers do not say “it’s done, the route is clear,” the infantry will not attack, said Markian, a lieutenant who commands a Ukrainian mine-clearing unit. He asked to be identified only by his first name and rank.
Preparing for the counteroffensive has come at a cost.
Russia has used convicts and mercenaries to wear down the enemy in the monthslong fight at Bakhmut, stretching Ukraine’s exhausted, battered soldiers to the limit. Ukraine has tried to avoid taking the bait, deploying volunteer Territorial Defense units and delaying rotations.
The village of Oleksandro-Shultyne, on one of the flanks in the battle for Bakhmut, for example, is defended now by the Ukrainian Volunteer Army, a unit that blends civilian volunteers with enlisted soldiers.
The village is a tableau of ruins, mud and snow. For months, seemingly endless waves of Russian soldiers waged assaults and the local commander, who goes by the nickname Sokil, or Falcon, conceded that his soldiers had been killed and forced to give ground in the months while Ukraine was fighting defensively.
But he hardly seemed disheartened.
“They concentrated their forces here,” he said of the Russian Army. “What does that mean? That we will attack somewhere else. And we have every possibility to do that now.”
In the counteroffensive, Ukraine is likely to launch intensive artillery bombardments along a narrow stretch of frontline, military analysts say, followed by demining teams and tank assaults.
Ukraine is widely expected to strike in the south, where the terrain ranges from wide-open farm fields, with only sparse tree lines for cover, to towns and villages. A thrust of about 50 miles over the steppe from the current front lines to the Russian-occupied city of Melitopol would split Russian-held territory into two zones, sever supply lines and put Ukrainian artillery within range of Russian bases on the Crimean Peninsula.
Preparing new recruits to replace dead, wounded and exhausted soldiers has been taking place for months. Tens of thousands of new recruits have undergone training in Europe and inside Ukraine, including in newly formed Offensive Guard units. About 35,000 Ukrainians have signed up for the assault units.
But morale, an area in which Ukrainian fighters held an edge for much of the war, is becoming more of a challenge. In a dozen or so recent interviews, soldiers at positions near Bakhmut or emerging from the crucible of street fighting for short breaks expressed dismay at the scale of violence and death.
“It’s never a calm sea,” Masik, a sergeant who was manning a position south of Bakhmut, said of his state of mind. “It goes up and down. I want to see my family, my kids.”
In one of the most striking examples of military rebuilding, the Interior Ministry is reconstituting the decimated Azov unit, all of whose active-duty soldiers were killed, wounded or captured in the siege of Mariupol and the holdout at the Azovstal steel last spring. Others died in an explosion at a Russian prisoner of war barracks in Olenivka.
One recent day, at a base in a pine forest, new Azov recruits marched, stood at attention and dropped for push-ups. They were learning basic soldiering skills in five weeks.
“We will train new people, to raise them up to our level,” said Lieutenant Samoilenko, who was freed from Russian captivity in a prisoner exchange.
To ensure that only the most motivated soldiers wind up in its assault unit, recruits are given a choice. At the end of the training course, they can choose to remain at the base, rather than deploy to combat. To do so, they ring a bell indicating they prefer to stay.
“We know how Russia fights, and we know how to counter it,” Lieutenant Samoilenko said. “Resilience is the ability to find new people, to move forward.”
Maria Varenikova contributed reporting from Kramatorsk, Ukraine.
Andrew E. Kramer is the Times bureau chief in Kyiv. He was part of a team that won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize in International Reporting for a series on Russia’s covert projection of power. @AndrewKramerNYT
A Year of War in Ukraine
* The Future of Ukraine: The European Union and NATO have promised a path to membership for the country. But real partnership will hold risks and benefits.
* Western Companies: Hundreds of Western businesses are still in Russia. Some say Moscow has tied their hands, while others have chosen to stay put.
* Defying Isolation: After the invasion of Ukraine, the West tried to cut Russia off from the rest of the world. Here is why it didn’t work.
* A Wartime Partnership: The alliance between President Biden and President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine has become critical to the world order.
* Zelensky’s Rise: The Ukrainian president, once brushed off as a political lightweight, has become a household name, representing his country’s tenacity.
* Ukrainians’ Texts: The messages that Ukrainians wrote to loved ones as Russia invaded on Feb. 24, 2022, are a snapshot of a turning point in modern history.
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烏克蘭戰局前景困境--Daniel Davis
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戴維斯中校這篇文章持續發揮他《立即結束俄烏戰爭》一文中的觀點 -- 烏克蘭兵源不足將是這場戰爭中烏國的軟肋。我完全同意他的分析。
不過，戴維斯中校沒有提及的是：普丁並沒有顧盼自雄的本錢和空間。後顧之憂對他所具有的殺傷力和立即威脅，可能遠遠超過「兵源不足」對烏國的負面影響。從而，如果烏克蘭的「春季攻勢」取得輝煌戰果，普丁可能不得不簽訂「北京協議」來結束戰爭。上面引用的「超連結」可能是西方國家挑撥離間的伎倆，但普丁陷入「四面楚歌」的窘態也是眾所皆知。
保留克里米亞但全面撤出2022烏克蘭國境；加上芬蘭、瑞典兩國撤回「『入北』申請」；將是他能夠換到的最有利條件。最新消息：芬蘭已經於04/04成為成為第31個北約會員國。或許中國「保證」俄國「領土完整」可以做為議和條件。
Will Ukraine’s Spring Offensive Bring Kyiv Victory – Or Set The Stage For Defeat?
Ukraine is already critically low of available manpower and having difficulty mobilizing additional troops. It seems very unlikely that, after the losses they would incur conducting a spring or summer offensive, they would be able to muster another massive force with which to force Russia out of the remainder of their lands.
Daniel Davis, 04/04/23
In remarks made last weekend, Ukrainian Minister of Defense Oleskii Reznikov implied that a Ukrainian spring offensive could be imminent. Zelensky said the weapons, ammunition, and training provided to his troops from the West was crucial to enabling his country to continue resisting, but also cautioned that without more, Ukraine might lose the war. The bigger question: might even a successful spring offensive set the stage for a Ukrainian defeat?
At the moment, the Ukrainian Armed Forces (UAF) are reported to be up to 700,000 strong. The Russian army in Ukraine could be up to 300,000. But that numerical advantage for Ukraine is deceiving. As of today, the UAF has to put meaningful numbers of troops to defend the northwest quadrant of its country opposite the Belarus border. The lifeline for the entire Ukraine society and army is dependent on keeping the western corridor open from Poland through which NATO supplies and arms flow.
If that path is cut off, the war is all but over for Ukraine. Since Russian troops stationed in Belarus might launch a surprise attack south, Kyiv is required to keep a strong defense there. Likewise, Zelensky must keep a strong defensive border manned against a new Russian incursion in the Sumy and Kharkiv border regions. Large numbers of troops are also assigned duty to defend Kyiv.
Meanwhile, there is an approximate 1,000 km long frontline that absorbs the lion’s share of all Ukrainian troops and supplies. There are three main directions that are in round-the-clock defensive battles with Russian troops: Svatovo-Kreminna in the northeast, Bakhmut/Donbas in the central east, and Avdiivka in the south. Positioned in a safe zone in central Ukraine is approximately 80,000 UAF troops who are reportedly equipped with mostly NATO-supplied kit, have received some training from NATO countries, and are well-rested.
Beyond the frontlines to the east, Russia continues to build elaborate defensive works. One of Russia’s biggest failures in the first year of war was their failure to prepare any defensive positions behind the frontlines. In September, Zaluzhny launched a surprise counterattack in the Kharkiv region that caught Russia completely unaware, and routed them, pushing Russia back more than 100 km to the east.
Putin’s forces had only a small number of troops in the north and had built no defensive positions in case of a counterattack. That lesson appears to have been learned. Attacking in open terrain, into well-constructed defensive positions, is a very costly affair for any attacker. Russia found out the hard way how expensive such operations are (as Wagner in Bakhmut), and Ukraine would likewise face the same challenges if it attacks Russia’s defense lines.
But as the Washington Post pointed out in a recent analysis, the majority of the Ukrainian army that had been trained by the West from 2014-2022 has been killed or wounded, leaving a largely conscript army to do the fighting. The Ukrainians have fought ferociously and bravely thus far, which is why Wagner has yet to completely take Bakhmut. But defending trench lines and bunkers requires far less skill than an offensive. We should not be surprised if Ukraine turns out to be less effective in the offensive and to suffer more casualties than they have in the defense.
What May Come Next
Russia is in the process of seeking to expand its active force by 400,000 by year’s end. Ukraine, in contrast, as the Wall Street Journal reported, has nearly exhausted its effective pool of military manpower. It simply does not have hundreds of thousands more capable fighters to mobilize. The painful reality is clear: even if Ukraine conducts a successful offensive this spring or summer, they have likely used the last major offensive capacity. Czech President Petr Pavel appears to have reached the same conclusion.
On March 19, Pavel said Ukraine will have, “only one attempt to carry out a major counteroffensive… (i)f (Ukraine) decides to launch a counteroffensive and it fails,” the Czech president warned, “it will be extremely difficult to get funding for the next one.” An unnamed NATO official seemed to echo that concern, adding that the “next six months will be a key period in the war.”
Zelensky has been adamant, from the outset, that he will not negotiate any Ukrainian land for a peace deal. As recently as last Monday, the Ukrainian president declared “we will liberate every city, every village of our state,” and defiantly vowed he would drive Russia out of Crimea as well. If Ukraine continues to push its men to make offensive strikes and refuses to consider any negotiated settlement that results in some territory remaining in Russian control, there exists the possibility that the Ukrainian Army, as an institution, could collapse, putting Kyiv again at risk of Russian attack.
Best Case Scenario for Ukraine’s Spring Offensive
Zelensky’s spring offensive could succeed in punching a hole in the Russian lines, potentially driving a deep wedge into the current Russian lines in the direction of Melitopol. The intent would be cut the Russian supply lines in half, cutting off the land bridge to Crimea. Attaining that objective would also trap considerable numbers of Russian troops in the south between Melitopol and Kherson.
While that end state sounds impressive and positive for Kyiv, few analysts consider the “what next” aspect of the war. Russia still has at least 100,000 troops that have not yet been deployed to the lines, and are attempting to add hundreds of thousands more troops to their army before the end of the year. In the event Ukraine were to successfully plow through the current Russian lines to capture Melitopol, the UAF would have depleted their offensive strength and have little more than a small theater reserve and the territorial border troops available for future operations.
Kyiv would need to immediately begin digging in against the expected Russian counterattack, which would pit fresh troops against a spent Ukrainian force. It is uncertain Ukraine could hold the lines against a concerted counterattack. But the bigger problem: Ukraine will have spent its last theater-level offensive force and would have to create yet another offensive force to have any hopes of driving Russia out of the remainder of the Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporezhia, and Kherson oblasts.
As the Wall Street Journal reported in late March, Ukraine is already critically low of available manpower and having difficulty mobilizing additional troops. It seems very unlikely that, after the losses they would incur conducting a spring or summer offensive, they would be able to muster another massive force with which to force Russia out of the remainder of their lands.
Moreover, in the event its forces were driven back to Melitopol, Putin could finally choose to declare martial law and full mobilization to bolster his army, not waiting for 400,000 volunteers to sign up. There would be too few Ukrainian troops left to even defend their gains, much less to be able to offensively force yet more Russian troops out of Ukrainian lands. In the event of a Ukrainian successful drive to Melitopol, it is unclear where Kyiv would ever find the manpower to drive the remainder – and growing – Russian army out of Kyiv in any subsequent phases of the war.
And that may represent a best-case scenario. If the Ukrainian offensive sputters or doesn’t gain much traction, Ukraine may not be able to inflict a severe enough wound on Russia and could then be in danger of a strong enemy counterattack. Either way, whether successful or unsuccessful, there is no clear path to Ukraine winning its war and driving Russia out of its land.
Unpalatable Conclusion
Nothing in life is ever guaranteed, and at least theoretically, it’s possible Ukraine, with support from the West, could somehow have a very successful spring or summer offensive and shove Russian troops back to the west. Yet as this analysis has revealed, the fundamentals that would exist even in the aftermath of a Ukrainian success could leave Zelensky’s army so weakened that it cannot defend even the new frontline, let alone muster the future manpower necessary to drive the remainder of the Russian army out of Ukraine.
A future analysis will examine the prospects for a Russian offensive in 2023, but Putin’s forces will also face steep challenges to try and achieve a military victory. Yet it should be clear to all by now that short of a direct intervention by NATO ground forces, Ukraine almost certainly lacks the capacity (especially in human resources) to ever drive Russia from its territory.
Given that probability, it seems unwise to continue trying seek an outcome that is likely militarily unattainable and instead seek the best diplomatic end that ends the pointless death of Ukrainian people, stops the needless destruction of Ukrainian cities, and preserves as much Ukrainian sovereignty as possible. Ignoring the balance of power that strongly favors Russia while hoping that Ukraine can muster the required strength to win a decisive victory on the battlefield – while refusing any consideration of a negotiated settlement – could ultimately lay the foundation for a much steeper cost to Kyiv to end the fighting, and on terms more favorable to Moscow.
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