Thread by @legal0ve

🧵/ The fourth day of fighting in the Kursk region. During this time, the fighting has spread to more than 600 square kilometers of Russian territory. I give a detailed account of the fighting and publish an English-language interactive map.

1/ I'll give a link to the map right away if you don't have time to read the whole thread - it's more or less regularly updated.

svoboda.org/a/33072559.html

2/ The breakthrough began on August 6: UA troops shelled the Sudzha district in the early morning, after which advanced groups of armored vehicles, supported by air defense and electronic warfare equipment, entered Russian territory.

https://x.com/cepmak/status/1820732313946206283

3/ Russian servicemen have recorded the advance of Ukrainian columns of armored vehicles near the locality of Nikolaevo-Dar'ino.

4/ Stryker armored personnel carriers equipped for engineering purposes cleared the way of mines, after which the main column moved on.

5/ Russian troops could only record the movement of equipment from high altitudes due to the constant operation of Ukrainian electronic warfare equipment.

6/ In addition to the Stryker, Russian pro-war bloggers claim that tanks, American Bradley BMPs, and German Marders were involved in the attack.

7/ The AFU most likely managed to enter small groups of armored vehicles on the outskirts of the district center of Sudzha.

8/ The Ukrainian Defense Ministry has not commented on the breakthrough in any way, so the presence of Ukrainian military in the Kursk region can only be judged from videos published by Russian "war correspondents".

9/ Thus, in particular, Russian servicemen destroyed at least two Ukrainian Kozak armored vehicles, two Buk surface-to-air missile systems and several armored vehicles during the breakthrough.

10/ The Russian army, for its part, lost at least two civilian haulers loaded with T-62 tanks and a Ka-52 helicopter. Mi-28 was damaged by an FPV drone strike (according to another version, the Ka-52 was also shot down by a drone).

https://x.com/GeoRaccoon/status/1821333895347921096

11/ In addition, a group of several dozen Russian soldiers, most likely among them conscripts, surrendered.

https://x.com/Maks_NAFO_FELLA/status/1820848217828798950

12/ The Russian Defense Ministry announced in the evening of the same day that the Ukrainian DRG, which consisted of three hundred men, 11 tanks and 20 armored vehicles, had retreated back with losses.

13/ Even Russian "war correspondents" were skeptical of the Defense Ministry's statements and said that such a large number of forces does not look like a DRG at all, describing the Ukrainian offensive forces as a "general military group covered by air defense" but not a DRG.

14/ The pro-war channel Rybar wrote that as of the night of August 7, Ukrainian formations numbering 400 people had managed to gain a foothold in several settlements at once. It also reported fighting in the suburbs of Sudzha.

15/ At the same time, the Ukrainian army continued to storm the Sudzha Automobile Checkpoint. The Russian Telegram channel "Two Majors" wrote that the Russian group on the border "fought all night, after which they called fire on themselves" and stopped contacting each other.

16/ It is impossible to verify this information, but later the Ukrainian military published a video allegedly showing a group of about 50 Russian border guards marching with a raised white flag and surrendering.

https://x.com/Danspiun/status/1821218979811119558

17/ By the end of the first day of fighting, it had already become clear that this operation by the AFU differed from previous raids on Russian territory at least in the scale of the forces involved and the absence of any official confirmation of the attack.

18/ There was no mention of pro-Ukrainian formations consisting of Russian volunteers entering Russian territory either. It was clear that it was the regular units of the AFU that were operating on Russian territory.

19/ UA military expert Vladyslav Seleznyov notes that the operation was carefully worked out and the moment was not chosen by chance. According to him, the attack took place exactly at the time when the Russian army in the Kursk direction was maximally weakened.

20/ "For ten months, since mid-October last year, the Russian army has been in a de facto state of offensive. Russia's border territories are now maximally weakened due to lack of manpower and unprepared fortifications," Seleznyov said.

21/ By the morning of August 7, ten Russian settlements were already under the control of the Ukrainian army, the Russian pro-war Telegram channel "Two Majors" wrote.

22/ According to its data, Ukrainian troops advanced 15 kilometers deep into the Kursk region, and the width of the front was 10-11 kilometers.

23/ According to Russian blogger Yuri Podolyaka, the AFU continued to introduce more and more units into the battle, and the AFU's 22nd Mechanized Brigade has "already fully" entered Russian territory.

24/ Ukrainian vehicles were also seen on the outskirts of Sudzha. In the afternoon of the same day, there was unconfirmed information that the district center had come under the full control of the AFU. According to other information, the city was in an operational encirclement.

25/ The Ukrainian army also took control of the Sudzha gas metering station, which transits gas to Europe through Ukraine.

26/ According to the telegram channel "Two Majors" the Ukrainian army has used EW means to suppress the frequencies of the Russian army's combat control signals.

27/ In the afternoon of the same day, Russian President Vladimir Putin made his first statement since the beginning of fighting in Kursk Region. He called the actions of the Ukrainian army a "large-scale provocation".

28/ The "Agentstvo" noted that Putin has been trying to avoid calling the invasion an invasion all these four days, preferring the words "provocation," "situation" and "circumstances."

29/ The head of the General Staff, Valery Gerasimov, made a further statement. He said that the AFU's advance deep into Kursk Region had allegedly been stopped.

30/ At the same time, the AFU advanced 25 kilometers deep into Russia, breaking through to the village of Korenevo. By the evening of August 7, the Russian army had lost control over an area of up to 350 square kilometers.

31/ On the evening of August 7, information about the death of one of the largest Russian "war correspondents" and VGTRK correspondent Yevgeny Poddubny appeared in major Russian tg channels.

32/ His car was attacked by an FPV drone. Later it became known that Poddubnyy survived. According to the latest information, the "war correspondent" was transferred from the shock room to the intensive care unit, he is "contactable, communicates with doctors and eats well".

33/ According to Radio Liberty's calculations, the Ukrainian army managed to enter 22 settlements over the two days of August 6 and 7. This does not mean, however, that they managed to gain a foothold in all of them.

34/ As of the morning of August 8, the AFU occupied the village of Malaya Loknya and moved further towards L'gov. Telegram channel "Two Majors" characterized the situation for the Russian Armed Forces as difficult.

35/ The Russian Defense Ministry issued a statement in which it said that units of the "North" troop group together with the Russian Federal Security Service "continue to destroy" armed formations of the AFU in the Sudzhensky and Korenevsky districts of Kursk Region.

36/ It also claimed that the AFU had lost up to 400 servicemen and 32 units of armored vehicles over the day.

37/ The Ukrainian armed forces did not abandon their attempts to take Korenevo. In addition, there were reports of small-arms fire in Anastas'evka and later "fierce fighting" in the village of Kromskie Byki, 15 kilometers from L'gov.

38/ The AFU also took full control of Sudzha and Martynovka, and individual DRGs advanced along the R-200 highway toward Kursk: the distance to the regional center was 50 kilometers.

39/ The DRGs subsequently withdrew, and the Russian army pulled up reserves and began to counterattack, although no significant successes have been achieved to date.

40/ Tg channel Rybar noted that the combat potential of the AFU grouping is far from being exhausted. According to his information, the input of the second and third echelons is expected in the near future.

41/ On the same day, the first photos of Ukrainian servicemen appeared near the settlements of Novoivanovka and Lyubimivka.

42/ According to Radio Liberty's calculations, the Ukrainian army could have entered 30 more settlements during that day.

43/ On the night of August 9, there were reports of an AFU strike on a convoy of RU army. RFE/RL has mapped the location of burned and damaged military trucks from the convoy.

44/ A total of 14 trucks can be counted on the video of an eyewitness who filmed the aftermath of the impact. The bodies of dead military personnel can be seen in the backs of some of them.

45/ @kromark made perfect interactive map with the location of destroyed vehicles

https://x.com/kromark/status/1821831356227158466

46/ On the morning of August 9, the Russian Defense Ministry reported that the AFU had lost up to 945 servicemen and 102 armored vehicles during the fighting in the Kursk direction. There is no independent confirmation of this information.

47/ At the same time, according to unconfirmed information, the number of captured Russian servicemen alone may reach three hundred during the first two days of fighting. There is no data on the deaths of servicemen of the Russian Armed Forces.

48/ There is no objective information about the number of troops on the part of the AFU involved in the Kursk operation. The UA General Staff is not commenting on the situation, and the CIT notes that the AFU has an effective OPSEC.

49/ A sample list of units involved or will be involved in the operation, on both sides. Important🚩🚩🚩: only parts of the named brigades and units may be used.

50/ What are the reasons for AFU's success? In addition to good preparation and planning📃

51/ The RU Army lack manpower and fortifications. o some reports, there were practically no fortifications at all in Kursk Oblast, although three billion rubles were allocated for them. One of the companies that was supposed to build them failed to fulfill the contract.

52/ Many Russian "war correspondents" also blame the failures of the Russian army on Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov, who knew of the impending attack but ignored intelligence signals and failed to report them to Putin.

53/ In particular, intelligence about the impending offensive allegedly fell into the hands of Russian military commanders as early as two weeks before the offensive began.

54/ A number of Russian bloggers and "war correspondents" accuse Chechen units defending the border of surrendering their positions. They allegedly took part in the defense, but then "scattered" during the first AFU strikes.

55/ According to Apti Alaudinov, commander of the Akhmat special forces, Chechen units were unable to prevent the UA offensive because AFU's units simply "passed by their positions" (!!!!!!! direct quote).

56/ A brief summary of the main goals that the AFU may pursue.✅✅✅

57/ Forcing the Russian army to move reserves from important directions - so far this has not been observed.

58/ Seize Kursk NPP and blackmail Russia/force the return of Zaporizhzhya NPP. Also very unlikely: it would be difficult for the AFU to cover such a long distance without suffering heavy losses + there is no guarantee that Russia would really go for such an "exchange".

59/ Blackmail Russia by seizing a gas plant - a Ukrainian unnamed official in a conversation with @washingtonpost dismissed this version.

60/ to improve the position in negotiations - it is possible, but so far there is no talk of negotiations (and probably will not be until at least the elections in the USA), and it will be extremely difficult for the AFU to hold such a large pladzarm until winter.

61/ However, the real plans of the Ukrainian army remain unknown. So far, the Ukrainian troops are trying to advance as far as possible and gain a foothold on the occupied borders, so there is no talk of stopping the operation.

Full article: smarturl.click/Ad6YM