Here is an update for the military situation on October 20th. I will not write about any possible future attacks from the territory of Belarus and will focus on Kharkiv, Luhansk, Donetsk, and Zaporizhzhia oblasts.
Russia is hitting the border towns of Kharkiv with artillery, rockets, mortars, tanks, and aviation. In addition, they have launched several small attacks on the border town of Ohirtseve (1).
Ukraine held a bridgehead north of Kupyansk, but in recent days Russia has counterattacked and claimed to have pushed Ukraine out of the towns of Horobivka and Dvorichne (2).
In Dvorichne, Russia claims to have taken control of the train station in the middle of the town (yellow). Unfortunately, I have not been able to verify this claim, but it is plausible.
East of Kupyansk, Ukraine is steadily applying pressure to the east (3,4,5). Ukraine is heavily shelling the string of towns between Pershotravneve and Kotlyarivka, and in return, Russia is heavily shelling the area near Kyslivka and Kotlyarivka.
Near Lyman, Russia seems to have stopped their main attack west toward Torske, Terny, and Novosadove, but they are heavily shelling them.
The pink arrows represent recent attacks that are no longer known to be ongoing. The same applies to pale blue arrows. The meaning of “ongoing” is not a set-in-stone rule, and I am using it somewhat arbitrarily, so don’t read into it too much.
Near Siversk, Russia attacks Bilohorivka (6) and Spirne (7) to slow the Ukrainian advance. Unfortunately, I have very little news about either of these Russian attacks.
However, Ukrainian and Russian sources suggest Ukraine may be nearing the Lysychansk Oil Refinery, so maybe the Russian attacks near Spirne are not going well.
Russian forces are trying to find a way around Soledar after having been soundly defeated in the town.
To the northeast of Soledar, Russians are trying to go around Yakovlivka (8). Still, as I have written previously, it is difficult for Russia to go around this town because Ukraine controls all of the dominant heights in Yakovlivka itself and in Vesele behind it.
To the south of Soledar, Russians are also trying to push south toward Bakhmutske (9), but they do not seem to have had much success.
Russians proudly describe the fighting as “southeast” of Soledar. Emphasis on the east. The only thing southeast of Soledar is Pokrovske, implying that Russia does not fully control that town.
Here is a general overview of Bakhmut.
In Bakhmut, Russia is attacking Patrisa Lumumby Street (10), and they seem to have had some success. They claim to have captured the furniture factory (A) and the ceramic factory (B). Neither capture is confirmed. Ukraine controls the drywall factory (C) and the winery (D).
The fighting in this area is brutal for both sides, and there are a lot of casualties. Russia is pounding the area with heavy artillery.
On October 19th, Ukraine counterattacked in the direction of the asphalt factory (11), which Russia claimed failed. But today, October 20th, Russia attacked the asphalt factory (12).
In addition, there is ongoing fighting near the garbage dump (13).
South of Bakhmut, there is brutal fighting around Opytne (14). I do not have an update regarding the status of Ivanhrad expressly, so I assume nothing has changed.
But regardless of Ivanhrad (which is 1 street), the fighting in Opytne is brutal, and the situation is not great for Ukraine. There are a lot of casualties for both sides, primarily due to heavy artillery fire.
Russia is pushing west toward Klishiivka (15) and north toward Odradivka (16). Unfortunately, I do not have news about either of these areas.
In the New York area, Russia attacked the fortified train station in Mayorsk (17), New York (18), and, well, the Novokalynove area (19).
Mayorsk and New York have been on the front line for eight years, and I don’t have more to add.
Novokalynove, though, is a newer development. On October 18th and 19th, Ukraine claimed to repel attacks on Novokalynove.
On the 20th, Wargonzo, who is (no matter how much I hate admitting it) a somewhat reliable Russian source, claimed that Russia was assaulting Keramik, which is a tiny appendix on the rear of Novokalynove.
This assault implies Russia captured Novokalynove, which I have seen no confirmation of from any reputable source. I am skeptical, and I am trying to confirm the status of this area.
South of Avdiivka, Russia is attacking Opytne (20), where they claim to make little incremental progress “one meter at a time.”
To put it bluntly, Russia controlled a section of the town at one point, only to be driven back out in a counterattack. And that was weeks ago, and I don’t think they have gotten close to that level of success since.
Russia heavily shelled the southern part of Pervomaiske, leveling every existing structure (they were, at best, empty husks to begin with). The artillery forced Ukraine to withdraw from this southern section, and Russia at least superficially controls it (21).
Russia is also attacking Nevelske (22), Krasnohorivka (23), Marinka (24), and Novomykhailivka (25) without notable changes.
Here is an image of what I call “the southeast corner,” the area between Donetsk and Velyka Novosilka. Lots of artillery fire.
South of Hulyaipole, Ukraine is attacking Kostyantynivka (26). Ukraine is making progress in this direction, but it is slow. Hulyaipole is heavily shelled and targeted with S-300 missiles, one of which destroyed a school.
Orikhiv is suffering from withering artillery fire. Russia is shelling it for 5-7 hours per day. Ukraine is attacking south toward Robotyne (27), Nerserianka (28), and Pyatykhatky (29). Ukraine is progressing in all three areas, especially Pyatykhatky, but the progress is slow.
Zooming out, Russia is firing missiles and suicide fronts into Zaporizhzhia and the surrounding towns. On October 20th, Russia destroyed a school in Komyshuvakha with a missile strike.
South of Zaporizhzhia, Russia is adding reinforcements and building extra defenses in Orlyanske and between Mykhailivka and Pryshyb (the two highlighted areas). In Orlyanske the Russian soldiers were seen looting local houses, reportedly looking for food.
Reportedly, Russia moved a large column into Mala Bilozerka on the 20th and put the equipment near the wide part of the ravine in town. As the story goes, Ukraine struck this area with two volleys of MLRS (unknown type), and the surviving Russians fled south. This is unconfirmed.
There is heavy shelling on both sides of the Dnipro river near Nikopol and Enerhodar.
In the northern part of the Kherson region, there are many rumors about large Ukrainian attacks. I am skeptical that they are occurring. However, I know there is heavy shelling and a lot of Russian aviation.
Russia repeatedly hits Mykolaiv with suicide drones and missile attacks. Russia is heavily shelling the M14 highway and just east of the highway in the southern part of Myrne. They are also heavily shelling the area around Ternovi Pody.
That is all I have for today, and to make it easier to find #ukrdailyupdate
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The news coming from the Velyka Novosilka area is very bad. There is no way to sugar coat it, the area has reached crisis and needs immediate intervention.
In short, Velyka Novosilka is the anchor of the southern defensive line. The line that runs from the Dnipro river to the east towards Donetsk. The Zaporizhzhia line. This west to east defensive line effectively ends in Velyka Novosilka. (note my map hasn't updated for the changes today)
Velyka Novosilka itself should have very good defenses, but the defenses are meant to stop attacks from the south, not the north and east.
Russia paying soldiers lump sums is not a method to get people to join the military, paying them is a way to make people not care about how many soldiers die.
Everyone knows soldiers are dying in huge numbers. But the money makes people think it is a gamble, not a tragedy. Nobody cares about a guy who signed up for quick money and died. They see it as quick easy money coming with huge risks and shrug. It is their own fault for joining.
It is simultaneously a lot of money and very little money. It is so much money that if you spent it wisely, you'd be set for life. But it is so little money most people will spend it all in a few weeks.
I just posted a map update, and many parts of the update have been written about by others already. But one interesting tidbit is the advance of Ukraine in Bilohorivka.
Here you see a Russian FPV Drone strike hitting a Ukrainian trench. You see that the trench crosses a road and has a hook shape. The trench is of relatively new construction, and cannot be seen on google map, nor other public high resolution images of the area. However, on google earth you can see the relative shape of the terrain (the Z axis is magnified 300% to exaggerate terrain features to make them easier to see. You can see that the trench runs along the crest of a hill. You can see the road it crosses, which is slightly lower than the ridge of the hill, on the reverse slope.
On sentinel, which is 10 meter resolution (a very low resolution image with few details), you can see the hook shape of this trench. This image is from October 24th, 2024, which is about 2 weeks ago.
The war in Ukraine took a turn in June of 2023 when Ukraine launched a counter-offensive south in an attempt to break through toward Tokmak. This decision has influenced every event that has followed, leading to disastrous consequences for Ukraine. I will not go into depth about the offensive south, but in short, Ukraine burned through its ammo stockpile and 12 of its best brigades. The offensive badly weakened these brigades and eliminated Ukraine's already limited flexibility regarding rotating troops and responding to threats.
Immediately upon the conclusion of this offensive, Russia launched a large offensive on Avdiivka and Novomykhailivka. Avdiivka is a small suburb northwest of Donetsk city, and Novomykhailivka is a small village south of Donetsk. Russia's ultimate goal was to break through to the city of Kurakhove, which is a small city west of Donetsk and is the westernmost significant defensive position constructed by Ukraine on the Donetsk front. In essence, Russia's goal was to break through the Donetsk defensive line and force Ukraine to defend weakly defended territory.
Ukraine's Donetsk defensive line was well-constructed and relatively strong. As such, it required fewer soldiers to successfully defend and more soldiers to successfully assault. This created a defensive advantage for Ukraine, which helped ease its relative manpower limitations compared to Russia. Once Ukraine is removed from these strong defensive lines, it requires more men to defend the same amount of area and also fewer men to successfully assault, which gives Russia the advantage due to its superior manpower.
To succeed, Russia would have to create a large manpower advantage in a localized area to break through the hardened defensive lines. Once broken, Russia could then splinter its manpower into many smaller attacks and attack many places simultaneously.
I could review the timeline and list the settlements attacked, and my initial draft of this post included this information. But instead, I will cut to the chase. After capturing Aviivka, Russia simultaneously attacked many locations along the entire eastern front. At first, Ukraine could withstand the attacks, but with each lost position, Ukraine became increasingly weaker. Finally, the fall of Ocheretyne, the next railway stop northwest of Avdiivka, fell. This loss opened the floodgates that allowed Russia to flow across the Donbas and capture many settlements in a short time.
Ukraine has now reached a point where it has insufficient manpower to mount a proper defense. Even after shortening the length of its defensive line to increase the density of its troops, it still lacks the strength to stop the Russian advance.
Russians have effectively broken through the line of defense that was behind Vuhledar by getting into the middle of Bohoyavlenka. This defense line I was hoping could last at least 2-3 months, but was lost in 1. Largely due to extremely heavy bombing and horribly insufficient preparation by ukriane.
In essence, Ukraine spent 2 years defending their forward positions to buy time, and used that time doing nothing to prepare the next line of defense.
There really is no excuse Ukraine has for this failure. You have to point the finger at Zelensky. He is personally responsible for this. It was his job to defend Ukraine. You cannot blame "western partners" for failing to make the most basic defenses in your most critical areas.
Yesterday a bunch of Russian trolls were trying to tell me Russia doesn’t strike schools, so here is an example of such a thing. It is the most memorable strike to me, the videos of wounded educators being pulled out of the destroyed school is etched into my memory.