Kyiv’s strategy eventually to defeat the Russian army by hollowing it out by attrition is succeeding, senior Ukrainian officials led by President Volodymyr Zelensky said in recent comments.
Zelensky in a Sunday national TV statement said the Armed Forces of Ukraine’s (AFU) southern offensive was generally proceeding according to plan, that Kremlin forces were suffering serious losses, and he hinted to viewers the pace of Ukrainian attacks would accelerate in coming days.
“We have already started preparing for the upcoming week. There will be a lot of different events that will definitely bolster Ukraine’s defense,” Zelensky said.
Brig. Gen. Oleksandr Tarnavsky, top officer of the AFU’s Tavria Operational-Strategic Group of Forces, said Ukrainian forces under his command are “systematically knocking the enemy out of their positions.”
An early June AFU attempt to break through Russian lines in Ukraine’s Tavria region, a territory sometimes also called the Kherson-Zaporizhzhia sector, was stopped nearly cold by Russian defenses near the town Mala Tokmachka, with the AFU’s 47th Mechanized Brigade losing a reported 10-11 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles and 3-5 Leopard 2 tanks in less than a day of fighting. Ukrainian personnel casualties were up to 50 dead and wounded, according to unofficial counts.
Since then, AFU’s assault strategy has become less ambitious, with smaller Ukrainian infantry-armor units advancing on a Russian position after heavy bombardment. The tactic has seen some success in the eastern Bakhmut sector but across the front reduced the pace of AFU ground gains to 100-200 meters at most locations.
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Tarnavsky in a Saturday statement said capturing ground was not as important as hollowing out the Russian army by destroying its troops and equipment. He claimed his soldiers over the past 24 hours had inflicted serious damage on Moscow’s forces, eliminating “two companies” (200-300 personnel), a single main battle tank, seven anti-aircraft systems, 12 artillery systems and mortars, military trucks, and seven Russian ammunition depots.
Colonel Serhiy Baranov, head of the AFU’s Directorate of Missile Troops, Artillery and UAV systems in a Saturday official statement said that “around 90 percent” of all Russian losses in the war are caused by AFU indirect fire systems like cannon, howitzers and precision-guided missiles.
Ukrainian long-range strikes in the future will become even more deadly because the AFU is now fielding targeting data management software, more efficient logistics chains and, in the near term, an army-wide automated fire management system, Baranov said.
Ukraine’s artillery soon will fully outclass its Russian opponent, he claimed.
“We have put together and created a long-distance fist of fire, and now will make it harder-hitting and more effective, tighter and more devastating,” Baranov said.
Images posted by the 47th Mechanized Infantry Brigade on July 22 showed infantrymen clearing a reported Russian trench heavily hit by Ukrainian artillery and mortars, and containing multiple corpses in Russian army uniforms. Russian media reported increased Ukrainian pressure to the south of Mala Tokmachka near the villages Verbove and Rabotyne. Ukrainian sources said attacks were gaining ground slowly, while Russian sources said Moscow’s troops lost no ground.
Drone video posted by the 30th Mechanized Infantry Brigade, a veteran formation fighting near the town Vasylivka, some 40 km. to the west of Verbove and Rabotyne, showed infantrymen, backed by BMP armored personnel carriers and supported by accurate mortar fire, assaulting and clearing a network of Russian trenches. Grenade-toting drones were shown to hit retreating Russian soldiers. The unconfirmed unit-produced images seemed to tally with official Ukrainian claims of progress along the operationally important Vasylivka-Melitopol highway.
Pro-Russia military blogger Aleksei Sladkov in a Monday situation estimate entitled “Zaporizhzhia – Regarding the Risk of a Breakthrough by the AFU From Vasylivka to Melitpol”, confirmed Ukrainian troops were slowly gaining ground in that sector, and warned that Russian defenses needed strengthening to avoid a potential collapse.
Mobile Ukrainian infantry operating in light vehicles are able to fire on and at times even outflank Russian fortifications in the sector by driving across the dry Dnipro River flood plain, and Russian troops defending Vasylivka are under pressure, Sladkov said.
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