The Kharkiv Counteroffensive: Another Epic Putin Fail
At long last, the world has indisputable public proof that Russia’s war on Ukraine has totally failed.
NOTE 1/23/2023: Originally published on Medium, September 12, 2022.
But the real surprise in seeing Ukrainian forces kick Russia in the teeth like this?
That Russia didn’t see this coming!
Anyone with the slightest bit of military training should have been able to look at the map of the fighting in eastern Ukraine and know that Ukraine has wanted — no, desperately needed — to cut off Russian forces operating around Izium for months.
Back when the media was hyping Ukraine’s first counterattacks in March and April, I remember writing briefly in one of my analysis that a push from Kharkiv to Kupiansk was a Ukrainian commander’s dream.
Even before Putin launched his “special operation” it was clear that Russian forces had an opportunity to punch south from Belgorod to come down on the Ukrainian forces defending Donbas from their rear.
And that’s exactly what Russia tried east of Kharkiv. Ukraine responded the best way it could — conduct a fighting retreat to the Siverski Donets river.
There they made a stand, and hundreds of lives were likely lost stalling the Russian onslaught. In fact Russia tried to cross the river not far from where Ukraine just punched back but failed. And Ukraine itself launched at least one local counterattack across the river towards Izium in early summer.
While the media was fixated on Russia’s failure to take or surround Kyiv, Ukrainian fighters were being pushed back east of Kharkiv. Kupiansk fell quickly, and after a couple months of intense combat Izium went too, almost certainly forcing Ukraine to deploy reserves to stop a breakout that would have destroyed their defense in Donbas.
Thankfully Kharkiv did not fall, despite being in artillery range of the border, which let Ukraine establish a defensive line running all the way down to Sloviansk. Russia was not able to pierce it despite committing some of its (allegedly) best units, including the 1st Guards Tank Army, to the Izium bridgehead.
As the war became more static and logistics started to drive engagements, this right shoulder of the Russian war effort became more and more vulnerable because of its proximity to Kharkiv.
Why? Because Ukraine couldn’t afford to lose the city, and had to keep plenty of troops there to be ready to stop any new Russian assault.
That very concentration of personnel and supplies, along with the counteroffensive in Kherson, created an opportunity Ukraine proved able to ruthlessly exploit.
Gullible western media sources like The Guardian have started to push the claim that operations in Kherson are just a diversion, but this can’t be strictly true given the resources invested on shaping that front.
What is really happening is a dual offensive, something made possible by Ukraine carefully husbanding its resources over the summer.
Some time back, I ran across an analyst who predicted that whichever side mustered sufficient reserves first would break the stalemate that has defined the war since spring. It was reasonable to expect that Russia would win that race or at least score a tie, because it has a far larger population and military to work with.
And that is why Ukraine’s splendid victory has come as such a shock to so many.
Many, particularly American think-tankers in D.C. desperate for the media spotlight and ultimately a gig in some a future administration, made a clean switch back in March from hyping Russia’s military to insisting it was on the verge of collapse.
They never presented any real hard evidence to back up their claims, rendering them propaganda designed to shape public opinion, not reliable analysis.
Truth is, they didn’t have any. Personnel matters are generally not visible to the public, and intelligence agencies are notoriously bad at making accurate predictions. Think tanks also generally rely on publicly available information, simply adding their spin and calling it analysis.
Too often they start to believe their own nonsense, leading to epic mistakes like the US invading Iraq to get rid of nonexistent WMDs — or Putin’s Russia trying to pull off regime change on the cheap in Ukraine.
Both thought they would be greeted as liberators. Boy were they wrong — too bad the people responsible rarely get held accountable.
But losing entire units along such a vital sector of the front — now that, folks, constitutes compelling scientific evidence you can bank on.
As I said before, anyone with even a modicum of military training would have known how absolutely vital it was to keep well-trained and equipped forces along that part of the front line.
Russia’s efforts south of Izium were critical to its overall plan from day one. Russia has also generally only achieved battlefield successes where it dramatically outnumbered Ukrainian forces, could nearly or completely surround them, and then pummel them with artillery and air strikes until Kyiv ordered a retreat.
But Kupiansk being a short tank drive from Kharkiv meant it would always be a prime target in the event Ukraine was able to mount any kind of major counterattack.
This sector had to be held. Yet it now clear that Russia really did move its best forces to deal with Ukraine’s counteroffensive in Kherson and/or try to break through at Bakhmut or Pisky in Donetsk.
What this implies is a severe and worsening personnel crisis in the Russian Army. Finally it is safe to say that the Russian military effort has culminated — it lacks the gumption to go on the attack and win.
The importance of this revelation cannot be overstated.
For months Russia has worked hard to generate replacements for its battered forces without mobilizing. By all outward appearances it was having trouble, yet coping well enough to maintain its slow grind in Ukraine.
But it is clear that Russia has in fact failed. Anecdotal reports from the Russian side of new replacements being 55 year old men with no meaningful experience now have substantial credibility.
The Russian Army now bears all the markings of an organization entering systemic collapse. It doesn’t mean Russia is defeated by any means, but the war in Ukraine has entered a new phase.
For the record, I served on active duty in the US Army while it was trying to subdue Iraq. Didn’t deploy, thank the gods, but did spent many weeks working with people who were about to and many months being intensively trained by others who actually did.
I saw firsthand, as an enlisted soldier who went in after completing college (I’m weird like that, yet it gave me a perspective almost no one else alive can match in the US), just how badly keeping 1/3 of the Army in Iraq had strained and degraded the force.
Maintaining an army at war without the entire national population getting involved is not easy. It also doesn’t help keep morale up among the troops.
Neither does being sent to invade and occupy a country where everyone was supposed to be little brothers but it turned out to want to murder you in your sleep.
Big reason Russian forces commit so many atrocities. Same dynamics that produced Haditha and Collateral Murder in Iraq.
Morale is a tricky thing. It is rarely much affected by propaganda in official or meme form, and it doesn’t care one whit what a bunch of yahoos on Twitter think.
What impacts it the most is basic stuff — having enough food and ammo, being able to rely on the people beside you, confidence your chain of command.
A mission you can understand, agree with, and work to achieve in your small way to the best of your efforts also helps.
After six months of constant fighting, too many Russian troops clearly lack all of these things.
Not every Russian unit is on the verge of collapse. Most likely aren’t.
But the failure of Russian forces to hold in Kharkiv, just a short distance from their home bases, bodes very poorly for the average quality of Russian forces in Ukraine.
The biggest unknown over the past few months in the entire Ukraine war has been whether Russia has been building up a powerful reserve capable of breaking the deadlock it’s gotten stuck in.
Ukraine has proven this reserve doesn’t exist.
Barring a sudden reversal in fortunes, Russia not only faces defeat on the Kharkiv front but others as well because it lacks the forces it requires to either advance or defend.
Putin has made the classic error virtually every political leader who goes to war makes, no matter how many times history teaches the lesson: underestimating just how much the conflict will cost in blood.
International sanctions he was ready for. A long guerilla struggle powered by NATO he’d priced in. There is no other explanation for an invasion launched with too few troops to take or hold the country.
So now Putin is stuck. His army apparently deceived him about how effective it was.
His Intelligence services failed to appreciate the simple truth that any people who come under attack as a people will unite and fight back even if they don’t much like their government.
And, of course, he himself over-estimated how willing the average Russian was to die for empire.
Which is what this war is all about, deep down. Russia and America, each constantly trying to match and one-up each other, both now well aware that if they can’t divide the world in two and play Cold War again neither will survive this decade intact.
Ukraine’s war for freedom is, I sincerely hope, the very last of the decolonial era — the final open war waged by colonized people against a historic oppressor.
Make no mistake — Russia’s war is a classic imperial struggle. It’s always been about NATO, with Ukraine a territory Putin claims as his very own as part of his forever war with the mythical West.
That’s why Putin has had the measure of NATO from day one—fear of nuclear escalation is why NATO remains afraid to give Ukraine heavy arms —yet absolutely failed to appreciate Ukraine’s hostility to Russian rule.
Imperialists always treat their subjects like children and make this kind of mistake. Heck, Britain did it with the American colonies back in 1775, starting the long dissolution of their own empire.
The fact that Americans, like Russians, are expected to simply salute their flag and leave matters of defense and foreign policy to “experts” with no proven track record of being right about anything is a primary indicator of the virus of empire.
This paternalistic blindness is why violent resistance against colonization is usually successful in the long run, if it can be sustained.
Putin is allegedly interfering in military operations down to the tactical level. So perhaps it should come as no surprise that he actually pulled troops from a more vital sector to reinforce Kherson, which at this point has only political relevance, not military.
Frankly, I have to wonder whether much of the Russian military is just going through the motions at this point. Lack of personnel probably means that line units have not been properly rotated over the past six months, and from the ground level on up it is entirely possible whole units are basically faking it.
People often fail to realize that rest is one of the most important aspects of battlefield planning. War wears people out mentally and physically — peacetime operations in the field are stressful enough, and when you add bullets and bombs to the equation it’s honestly a miracle anything happens at all.
Active combat operations tend to turn 1% of personnel into casualties every day. At 20% most units are effectively crippled, at 30% they’re non-functional.
Lower-intensity combat reduces the burn rate, but by the time units are in the field for three, four, or six months, they’re just not battle-worthy anymore.
By only committing perhaps 150,000 regular and as many support troops to the “special operation” Putin has given Ukraine a chance to actually outnumber Russian forces in the field overall, and particularly in certain sectors.
Since February national conscription has boosted Ukraine’s troop numbers to well over half a million, and if Ukraine has properly trained them before committing them to fighting by now they’re solid fighters.
Failing to plan for a Ukrainian effort to break through from Kharkiv to Kupiansk is military malpractice, pure and simple.
It’s the kind of mistake only a rank amateur like Putin could make, thinking that you can treat battlefield dispositions like a spreadsheet, ignoring your opponent’s ability — and need — to muck up your plans.
Side note: In any strategic plan, it is essential to figure out the worst thing that could go wrong, assume it will, and create the best hedge possible. When things shake out, that pool of stashed resources can often translate a near debacle to an epic win.
Dealing with the ultimate idiot boss, Russian officers might be following Putin’s orders to the letter while not bothering to point out just how stupid they might be.
The ultimate result of that kind of dysfunction is effective paralysis across the organization.
It is still very premature to anticipate a total collapse of Russia’s military effort — remember that the front line is so long that there are multiple commands involved — but you can be sure that Russian officers everywhere will be second guessing their choices and plans from this point on, becoming extremely conservative.
And they’ll have to, because already the breakthrough in Kharkiv has had knock-on effects. There are reports that well behind the lines Russian troops are panicking and retreating.
Russia’s lack of reserves now revealed, Ukrainian troops in other areas have an incentive to make their own pushes to see what shakes out.
I do not expect Ukraine to try to push far into Luhansk even if it chooses to cross the river that runs through Kupiansk, however. It is enough to have simply eliminated the northern wing of Russia’s attack into Donbas and removed the threat to Sloviansk, which will free up troops to reinforce or counterattack in other sectors.
So far Ukraine has been smart enough not to make the mistake Russia obviously has — push an offensive so far forward you can’t hold the line against a counter. A better option is to intensify the fight for Kherson, where too many resources have been committed to pass off those battles as mere diversions.
They aren’t — and now that Russia clearly has pushed troops across the Dnieper in force, despite the constant shelling of their supply lines, Ukraine has a golden opportunity to isolate and perhaps neutralize over 10,000 Russian troops.
Whatever come next, this much is now certain: Putin’s war on Ukraine has entered a new phase.
It might be even more dangerous than the last.
Russian history is defined by militant leaders who lose a war, throwing Russia into civil strife.
Empires survive on bluff and illusion, always ending up too large to defend themselves properly. And when the bluff is called, the illusion dispelled, entire national systems can tremble and collapse — this is most true in dictatorships.
Unfortunately, Putin probably does represent the true beliefs of a plurality of Russians, and they, like the hard right in America, are desperate to take control of their country.
Amid this defeat, prominent Russian nationalists are calling for even further intensification of the fighting in Ukraine — for them, and likely Putin, victory has become an existential matter.
They dream of a national mobilization because they think it will give them power. Like their counterparts in the USA they want their domestic enemies to go out into the streets so they can crush them.
Sadly, history shows that the losing side in a war usually fights on long after the ultimate outcome of the thing is no longer in doubt.
This is because regimes and leaders are not their country, yet remain difficult to separate from it, existing as a kind of social tumor that does all it can to survive and thrive, consuming its host in the process.
As many people or more typically die after the turning point in the war as before.
Putin is now trapped in a cage of his own making. Escalating in Ukraine in any way admits defeat, but trying to pretend nothing has changed leads to real defeat on the battlefield sooner or later.
The majority of Russian units are not going to lay down their arms anytime soon — yet eventually, if not adequately supported, they will.
Probably when winter comes and, like their grandparents back in January of 1942, the fight from the soldier’s perspective becomes all about securing a warm place to sleep.
And that’s damn difficult to do when living in hostile territory where anyone and everyone could be looking for a way to help kill you.
Putin will likely have to do something drastic before winter, which itself counts as another Ukrainian win, because he was counting on waiting Europe out and weaponizing energy supplies to cut support to Ukraine.
Drastic could mean escalating in some way that NATO is forced to increase its material support (get with the program, Germany!), but it could also mean actively trying to destroy Ukraine’s infrastructure to punish its people while clinging on in the face of constant Ukrainian counterattacks.
If and when Putin feels at risk of losing territory stolen in 2014, use of tactical nuclear weapons becomes a viable option, the ultimate game of chicken, one that might force Russia’s people to support Putin out of pure fear.
A very hard winter is finally coming for Russia and Vladimir Putin — but until it arrives, Ukraine’s defenders still have their work cut out for them.
The Russian Army is not defeated — yet. It would go down a lot faster if Ukraine’s partners would increase their military support in the proper way, and a lot fewer Ukrainians would have do sacrifice their lives and limbs.
But now, for the first time, Ukraine has proven itself capable of waging a successful mechanized counteroffensive that does their grandparents’ proud.
As a result, Vladimir Putin’s days are numbered — and quite likely, barring a military coup, Russia’s too.
The question now is how much damage this flailing empire does to the world on its way into the dustbin of history.
Will Putin destroy the world to save himself? Only time will tell.
Until then — roll on, defenders of Ukraine!
This victory for the ages, this well-earned glory, belongs to you alone.