Mick Ryan, AM Profile picture
Sep 18, 2022 24 tweets 6 min read Read on X
There is a lot going on in #Ukraine at the moment. The macro story is that Russia appears to have lost the initiative at every level. But there is also an interesting story to be told about Ukrainian campaign planning. 1/24 Image
2/ The Ukrainian offensive in the north east is continuing to exploit a bumbling and incoherent Russian defensive scheme to the east of Kharkiv. Thousands of square kilometres of Ukrainian territory have been recaptured, and many towns and their inhabitants have been liberated. Image
3/ Even the Oskil Rver defensive line, rapidly established by the Russians, appears to be crumbling. Deception and operational art have been central to Ukrainian preparations for their achieving surprise against the Russians in this new phase of the war.
4/ Deception. That it was able to exploit this opportunity indicates that Ukraine had an excellent plan to deceive Russian overhead collection assets as well as their tactical reconnaissance and surveillance.
5/ As one military interlocutor in Kyiv confirmed, Russian tactical reconnaissance in the east of Ukraine has been poor. It has generally consisted of ‘advance to contact’ with infantry and armour, rather than through the use of dedicated air and ground reconnaissance assets.
6/ This means that the environment is ripe for tactical and even operational surprise, something the Ukrainians clearly recognised in their planing for the Kharkiv offensive.
7/ Operational Design. While the Russian focus was primarily on its operations to defend its holdings in the south, and conduct small scale attacks in the Donbas, #Ukraine planned and launched an operation in the north.
8/ This is not to say that Ukraine’s operations in the south were a feint. They were not, and this was recently confirmed to me by a senior Ukrainian military planner during my visit to Kyiv. The north & south are mutually supporting offensives in a larger operational design.
9/ Operational design is an important component of military professionalism. Through good operational design, military commanders and their staffs’ sequence and orchestrate tactical goals and actions to meet desired strategic and political outcomes.
10/ Ironically, it was the Russians in the early 20th who were early advocates for such operational thinking about military operations. This is not obvious with the current Russian military performance, which has demonstrated historic levels of incompetence and stupidity. Image
11/ For the Ukrainians, their operational design for the concurrent south and north eastern campaigns will have considered the desired outcomes and worked backwards from there. These outcomes would have included political aims (both domestic and international) and military.
12/ The Ukrainians will have carefully wargamed the best times to conduct their offensives. It would have been based on intelligence on Russian defensive dispositions, the location and quantities of Russian forces held in reserve, as well as logistics and key supply routes.
13/ What might this mean for the moving days or weeks?
14/ First, the concurrent Ukrainian offensives have totally compromised the Russian operations in the Donbas. It compromises Russian supply routes and introduces a larger psychological issue with Russian soldiers and commanders fighting in the east. Image
15/ Second, it will be difficult for the Russians to continue to fight in the east without responding to the threat that Ukraine now poses to their rear areas and logistics. This problem will only get worse if the Ukrainians are able to continue their advance across the Oskil.
16/ To respond, the Russians will have to reorient their forces in the east, and possibly pull troops from the south. This effectively kills any Russian offensive capability across the east and south.
17/ It also creates other opportunities for Ukraine. Because of a Russian reinforcement ‘shell game’, it is possible that we could see cascading Russian tactical withdrawals and failures in various regions as a consequence.
18/ This, and the resulting losses in equipment and personnel, compromises Russia’s capacity to dictate the pace and location of operations henceforth. The Ukrainians have seized the initiative in this war.
19/ Having surprised the Russians, the Ukrainians have generated shock among Russian troops and commanders. This period of shock is generally a productive time for those on the offensive.
20/ It during this period of shock when Ukraine can seize the most ground, and destroy the largest number of enemy troops. And it is exactly what they are doing. The Ukrainians, using mission command, are operating inside the Russian tactical and operational decision loops.
21/ While like all offensives, exhaustion and outrunning supply lines will eventually slow the Ukrainian advance, this one probably has a little way to go. The Ukrainians seem to sense the potential for a larger Russian collapse in the east.
22/ Not only has this been a stunning feat of arms, it has answered the question many of us posed several months ago about Ukrainian offensive capacity. The Ukrainian Armed Forces have demonstrated emphatically in the last few weeks their offensive mindset and capability.
23/ We will be studying this campaign for decades into the future. But for now, we need to ensure the west continues to provide the equipment and munitions for this campaign, and for those that will inevitably follow. End. Image
24/ Thank you to the following whose images I used in this thread: @UAWeapons @War_Mapper @DefenceU @IAPonomarenko @TheStudyofWar @criticalthreats

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Mick Ryan, AM

Mick Ryan, AM Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @WarintheFuture

Jul 10
In the past 24 hours we have seen again the brutality of the Putin regime, and the murderous band of barbarians called the Russian military. The deliberate attack by a Russian precision missile on the Okhmatdyt hospital, despite its horror, is part of a wider Russian campaign to terrorise the people of #Ukraine. 1/10 🧵🇺🇦Image
2/ This was not the action of a few bad apples. It is the outcome of a systemic, command-led campaign to terrorise and brutalise Ukrainians, just as the Russians did with Syrians and Chechens.
3/ Russian political and military leaders have nurtured a culture of indiscriminate killing in Ukraine and set the conditions for it to flourish. They bear full responsibility for the killings at Okhmatdyt hospital, Bucha and other atrocities across Ukraine in the past two and half years.
Read 10 tweets
Jul 8
In the next 48 hours, NATO will hold its annual summit. This time it will be hosted by the U.S. in Washington DC. There will be a range of topics discussed, including the war in #Ukraine. But, China's role in supporting Russia may also be a subject of some discussion. 1/11 🧵 Image
2/In June, the U.S. Permanent Representative to NATO described how “China has taken a side; China has opted to support Russia through the provision of these dual-use components; and that if it opted to stop doing that, we believe it would have a major impact on Russia’s ability to conduct the war on the ground inside Ukraine.”
3/ But how does China benefit from supporting Russia, and indeed, benefit from a continuation of the war? I think there are three key areas where it does so: strategic, economic and ideological.
Read 11 tweets
Jul 2
Back in May, I explored the likely Russian objectives for its military operations in 2024, and how it was progressing towards them. Russia has built strategic momentum with its assaults on Ukraine in the past six months. However, they have largely failed to exploit their opportunties. 1/12 🧵 🇺🇦Image
2/ Russia has made some progress on the ground and yet even this has come at massive costs. For the gain of around 513 square km, they have lost around 180 thousand personnel. Losing 360 people for every km is a poor return on investment - in any war.
3/ And, as this graph from @ragnarbjartur shows, Russian casualties have only increased in the past six months during its 2024 offensives. Image
Read 12 tweets
Jun 26
There are many aspects of the war in #Ukraine from which we might learn lessons. Strategy, tactics, equipment, technology and organisations are all worthy of study. But there is another aspect of the war also requiring study: #leadership. 1/7 🧵 🇺🇦 Image
2/ In studying these lessons, we should understand the elements of leadership that are changing because of new technologies and different threats. Clausewitz called this the changing character of war.
3/ At the same time we need to learn - or re-learn - the timeless lessons of leadership in war. Generally this involves the uncertainty, the fog and friction of war. Clausewitz described this element of war as its enduring nature. People need to be led in this environment.
Read 7 tweets
Jun 21
There are many lessons from the war in #Ukraine. But to be most useful, these lessons need to be considered through the context of different regions and political environments beyond eastern Europe. 1/7 🧵🇺🇦 Image
2/ Sir Michael Howard wrote in The Use and Abuse of Military History, "without some such knowledge of the broader background to military operations one is likely to reach totally erroneous conclusions about their nature, and the reasons for their failure and success." Context matters.
3/ As such, I am starting a new series to translate the lessons from #Ukraine for application in the #Pacific. The method I will use in this study includes consideration of three key elements.
Read 7 tweets
Jun 19
For a little while now I have wanted to write about the Russian turtle tanks. These weird and unwieldy beasts provide a discrete solution to a contemporary battlefield problem - generating successful offensive operations. 1/10 🧵🇺🇦🇺🇦 Image
2/ On the weekend, the Ukrainian ground forces were able to capture one of these Russian turtle tanks. It will be a useful source of intelligence, particularly the EW suite that it is equipped with. But it will also provide insights into weaknesses that can be attacked with FPV.
3/ These turtle tanks have already appeared in several 'generations': Gen 1: tank with metal tortise shell; Gen 2: tank with metal tortise shell and EW suite; and, Gen 3: tank with metal tortise shell, EW suite, additional cages and mine roller.
Read 10 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

:(