Thread by @DefMon3

Ukraine update🧵 May 20th

It's been a while since I made an update, but I think it's time to have a look at what has happened the last 2 months.

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Visit interactive map for more details and explanations. (Legend available)
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Overview images

Weather by @davidhelms570
A rainy period could have an impact on UA plans for an offensive

https://twitter.com/davidhelms570/status/1659901863435575297

Red line = RU Lines today
Orange line = RU lines March 1st
Blue line = UA lines today

Kupyansk - Svatove
Just some minor changes the last few months. No settlements changed hands and the Russian winter offensive was fruitless. This area is held by units of the RU Western Military district .

The 7th Guards Mountain Air Assault Division is most likely held in reserve along with the higher quality units of the 1st GTA while other units like 6th CAA, 3rd AC, and 11th AC have been fighting.

Svatove-Kreminna
Minor changes, despite the efforts of 76th GAAD during the winter, they only managed to push back the AFU a few km in the forest south of Kreminna. After that the frontline has remained largely unchanged.

I believe this section is held by RU Central MDs 41st CAA, 2nd CAA and with Western MDs 20th CAA held partially in reserve. I also believe 76th GAAD has been replaced with 98th GAD. In the Kreminna forest we have 90th Tank Division.

BARS-13 who was fighting in Lyman and Kreminna has been sent to Bakhmut to die.

Siversk
RuAF made minor gains SE of Bilohorivka, south of Spirne and the gas pumping station east of Spine changed hands a few times and is most likely in RuAF hands at the moment.

ON the Sivers'k front we have BARS, Akhmat and a mixture of 1st and 2nd AC (123rd bde, 2nd bde, 6th bde, 7th bde). It's unclear to me if there parts of 4th brigade still there, I know some of it was sent to Bakhmut to die.
bde = brigade

Avdiivka
In an attempt to divert UA forces from Bakhmut, units from mostly RU 1st Army Corps attempted to encircle Avdiivka during March - April. AFU lost Krasnohorivka and Kamyanka in the north but managed to hold on to the sentiments in the south.

RU 8th CAA, which includes 1st Army Corps are doing most of the fighting around Avdiivka.

Marinka
RuAF made some minor progress in the town, RuAF claimed to have "almost" captured it last fall but has not managed to this day.
RU Units fighting around Marinka are among others 150th motor rifle division (8CAA) and 127th motor rifle division (5CAA) and 5th bde 1AC.

Vuhledar
After some epic failures by RuAF in the Vuhledar direction this winter, the frontline has remained fairly static for the last couple of months.

Units fighting in this direction are among others 155th, 40th Naval infantry brigade, 95, 113th rgt 1AC. 71, 78th rgt 58th CAA. 36th, 37th, 60th bde from Eastern MD. 14th Special Purpose Brigade which was rewarded by Shoigu yesterday in Mariupol.

Zaporizhzhia
This part of the frontline have remained fairly static since last year. Some back and forth have been noted but no major changes. We have RU Southern MDs 58th CAA in charge here with some elements of Eastern MD.

Kherson
As you can guess, not a lot happened here. There has been some fighting in the delta and AFU have presence on some of the islands in the delta. It seems RuAF have focused on keeping out of AFU artillery range.

Bakhmut
It's taken RuAF about 2 month to capture the last 60% or so of Bakhmut. Back in Jan/Feb RuAF managed to form an envelopment around Bakhmut which made it hard for AFU to use counter battery and Air defense in Bakhmut.

The result of the envelopment was also RuAF gaining fire control over AFU ground lines of communications. These are some of the reasons I did not think it was a good idea to stay in Bakhmut.

Ukraine's attrition rate dropped significantly at this point, possibly as low as 1:2 - 1:1 in Ukraine's favor at some point during February-March. I do suspect these numbers apply for the fighting in the city, and not surrounding areas.

The envelopment of Bakhmut was preformed by Wagner and RU VDV units which are considered "storm" units which RuAF use for attacks. These units are better trained than the regular mechanized infantry.

Ukraine attempted some what could be summarized as unsuccessful counter attacks against the VDV units on the Bakhmut flanks in March and did not managed to reverse the RU progress.

At some point during this point, most likely after RuAF attacks stagnated on the flanks, RuAF moved Wagner from the flanks in to the city and replaced the VDV on the flanks with poorly trained units from the 3rd Army Corps, 200th MRB and 4th MRB.

This was noticed by the AFU who a few weeks saw their chance to do a local counter attack using 3rd Assault Brigade. AFU has managed to push RuAF behind down from the T0504 road and to the east of the water canal and are closing in on Klishchiivka.

While Bakhmut city is certainly lost (more or less), I think AFU could be in a good position if they regained some more ground in the north and a little bit of ground in the south.

With a straightened frontline like this, they could utilize counter battery and start shooting fish in the Bakhmut barrel. Something like this is what I thought they should do back in February.

RuAF keep committing units to Bakhmut and it's possible we will see them withdraw Wagner units and send in regular infantry, BARS etc. in Bakhmut. This is also why continued attacks on the flanks are needed from the AFU to force RuAF to commit troop.

This will enable the AFU to set up for an offensive in other directions with the units dedicated for the purposes. Ukraine should at this point have somewhere between 20-25 mech/infantry/assault Brigades dedicated for this.

They should have 9 bde equipped with western equipment, 3 equipped by them self. There is another 9 brigades in offensive guard. Ukraine have additionally 8 or so units forming. Plus there are a bunch of TD brigade and regular brigades which could support the offensive.

That is it for now.
Glory to The Peoples Republic of Bilhorod