Pay close attention to the Rail line at the upper right on this map.🧵
Ukraine cutting it by occupation, or by artillery fire will, cause a huge "Stalingrad side-step" in terms of the Russian Army having to use more eastern rail lines to supply the Donbas offensive.
1/
The Ukrainians are big believers in "Shaping Operations," that is, small military operations that open up options of further military operations later.
For example, the destruction of Moskva and it's S-300F long range surface to air missiles by a Neptun cruise missile strike
2/
...was a gambit to opened up Snake Island to Bayraktar TB2 drone raids.
With the Moskva gone, Ukrainian TB2's proceeded to destroy Russian SAM's on Snake Island.
The Russians reinforced with more SAM's & men on landing craft, which TB2's destroyed during the landing.
3/
Then Ukrainian Air Force Su-24 light bombers made a low-level run on Snake Island which destroyed all the fixed structures the Russians occupied on the island and knocked out radio communications.
Then, finally, the Russians sent a Wagner group mercenary search &
4/
...rescue detachment in a Mi-8 helicopter at night to find out what happened. It was swiftly destroyed by a TB2 drone with Russia finally abandoning Snake island.
The local offensive North-East of Kharkiv looks like a Ukrainian "Shaping Operation" to me.
5/
The knock on effect of the Russian Army having to do all the administrative changes necessary for that side-step will cause a logistical pause.
This pause will utterly disrupt the Russian Donbas offensive in terms of immediately available artillery ammunition tonnage.
6/
Russian Artillery munitions having to move by more easterly rail lines will cause a supply chain disruption simply because the just-in-time deliveries take longer.
And more artillery tonnage, on more railcar rolling stock, will have to be committed on the rails to fill
7/
...the supply chain to the Donbas just to maintain planned Russian offensive usage rates.
Given the low administrative skills of the corrupt & centralized Russian state. This opens an opportunity for a Ukrainian operational level counter-stroke
8/
...somewhere in Ukraine.
Given the Russian build up in Belgorod, I expect any such counterstroke to be in the south near Kherson.
Whether Ukraine has sufficient truck based logistics to execute a major counter-stroke remains to be seen.
9/
Share this Scrolly Tale with your friends.
A Scrolly Tale is a new way to read Twitter threads with a more visually immersive experience.
Discover more beautiful Scrolly Tales like this.