Thread by @PhillipsPOBrien

As we await for the great Russian breakout in the Donbas and the encirclement of the Ukrainian forces, thought I would expand on this statement as some ground force people didn’t like it.

https://twitter.com/phillipspobrien/status/1517402785926557696

The picture of those who see the Russians doing well is that they will soon break through Ukrainian lines in the Donbas and encircle, kettle, fix etc, all Ukrainian forces to the east. bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

On the map this looks eminently possible, and I’m sure many analysts have war games with it happening. It harkens back to the large armored breakouts and encirclements of WW2. Head down from Izyum and trap the Ukrainians.

However what seems to be missing from all this talk is that the great armor break out, encirclements we’re based on air dominance as much as anything else, it was not just tanks. Starting with the German conquest of France, and really reaching its peak in the…

Soviet and US/U.K. breakthroughs in 1944, all these military events were based on having AirPower control over the battlefield, pinning defensive forces down while allowing your forces to advance while protected.

You want to see an attempt to advance without air superiority? I give you the Battle of the Bulge. German forces moved ahead only because the bad weather kept allied aircraft out of the skies for a few days in December 1944. Skies cleared, advance stopped.

So all those talking about some lighting Russian breakthrough and advance in the Donbas without air dominance being operated by the Russians over the battlefield are basically speaking of a kind of warfare that has never existed and probably never will.

Why? Because defensive firepower is now far more effective in range and destructiveness against armor columns than at any time in history. Don’t know if you saw this, but a Ukrainian Javelin unit took out a Russian tank at more than 4 km away.

https://twitter.com/MrKovalenko/status/1517644618980073472

Ukraine has been flooded with these hand held anti tank weapons, that will attrit Russian armored columns that are operating advancing along unsecured roads. It’s not going to be Guiderian, Patton or Zhukov.

Any Russian breakthrough without air dominance providing constant patrol protection will most likely result in halting, slow advances as the Ukrainians can still halt the vehicles at a distance.

So people discussing any Russian breakthrough and encirclement operation as occurring without Russian having active air control over the battlefield are making up a historical scenario that has never existed.

Perhaps this Russian army is so skilled, motivated and well equipped that it can make history without air supremacy. Or perhaps it’s not.

Update on the Russian blitzkrieg encirclement.

https://twitter.com/jackdetsch/status/1517814496349335552