The press service of the Ukrainian Joint Forces Operation reported the acquisition of enemy secret documents from the battlefield regarding operation plans of the Russian Army. Among them there are work cards, combat mission, call sign table, control signal tables, hidden control tables, staff lists.
This discovery is very important because makes us recreate the Russian strategy of the war with Ukraine. Based on the information received, now we know that the final plans of Russian attack were approved on the 18th of February, six days before the attack, which took place on the first hours of Thursday the 24th.
Moreover, the operation to conquer Ukraine was supposed to be completed within 15 days, originally from the 20th of February till the 6th of March.
This information is particularly relevant, because it explains some of the present difficulties of the Russian military operation. This plans reveal the expectations by the Russian generals to defeat Ukraine in few days. These main big cities close to the Russian-Belarusian border had to be surrounded and conquered in the first 3-4 days of attack:
- Kyiv, the political capital, to neutralise the Ukrainian government
- Kharkov, the second Ukrainian city, important centre for airspace and aviation industry
- Mariupol, the largest port of Azov Sea, necessary to connect Russian territory with Crimea
The achievement of those goals would have lowered the will of resistance by the Ukrainian defenders and confirm the invincibility of the Russian Army.
Unfortunately for the Russian blitzkrieg, after 8 days, these cities are still controlled by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, which showed an unexpected combat efficiency and high determination to resist.
Due to this initial failure, today the Russians face a serious logistic problem. If the length of the offensive was planned for two weeks, the supply reserves of fuel for tanks and vehicles, ammunition and food for soldiers are going to run out in few days.
As a term of comparison, this mistake in planning happened to the German Army in WWII, when they attacked Soviet Union. The got wrong in the estimate of the operation, because they expected to conquer Moscow before the beginning of winter. When they approached the Soviet capital, they were already lacking of fuel and German soldiers had no winter equipment.
Therefore, due to the delay of their military achievements the Russian logistics is today in need of replenishing their stocks. For instance, they already used almost the entire stock of Kalibr missiles allocated for the offensive operation in Ukraine.
As far as the origin of the secret documents is concerned, they belong to one of the units of the battalion tactical group of the 810th brigade of marines of the Black Sea Fleet, based in Sevastopol.
The documents shows that Russian unit’s orders were to disembark in the area of the town of Stepanovka on the Azov Sea, between Crime and Berdyansk and further act with the military units of the Russian 58th Army, namely with the 177th Regiment of Marines of the Black Sea Fleet. The ultimate goal of these forces was the blockade and occupation of Melitopol.
