La guerre en Ukraine - Au feu et à mesure
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The war in Ukraine - As we go along
War is not a linear thing, but a matter of sequences. The war in Ukraine classically began with the revelation sequence, where the real capabilities of the two opposing armies are seen. This is often the most surprising, because like two sports teams that have not played for years, it is only possible to base predictions on appearances.
Since the beginning of industrial wars, this phase of revelation is often and quickly cruel for one side, so great is the destructive capacity of modern armies. The army that has the greatest capacity, and it should be remembered that material capital is less important than men, normally wins very quickly and overwhelmingly. The affair then only lasts a few weeks, or even a few days.
It should be noted that this duel of arms won, which must be distinguished from the war itself, which involves the whole nation, only augurs Victory with a capital V if it is accompanied by acceptance by the enemy political executive. In the war in Ukraine, it was possible to imagine that, while a Russian victory in the duel of armies was generally anticipated, the war would still have been prolonged in the form of a major guerrilla war.
This anticipation did not last long, because the fighting revealed a balance of power in the first two weeks. War can sometimes stop at this stage, if the aggressor has not gained anything from his invasion and the aggressed on his side does not seek revenge or pursue him as in the 1979 war between China and Vietnam. Had the Russian forces in Ukraine been stopped at their starting line on 24 February, it might have been possible for the Russians to dress up their failure as a "lesson" for Ukraine or to claim that they had foiled a planned Ukrainian offensive in the Donbass and leave it at that, at least for a while.
This was not the case. Russia suffered a huge military defeat around Kiev and failed to take Kharkiv, but it has conquered large parts of Luhansk, Zaporizhia and Kherson provinces. It now has much more to lose if it gives up than if its army had remained on the line of 24 February. On the other hand, it still has the hope of continuing to advance by adapting its army, which remains powerful, to the new context. The war therefore continued, but it was condemned to be a long one because there were often no half measures in industrial wars. If you don't win in a few weeks, you have to count in years.
This is partly due to the violence of the fighting itself. Protecting oneself in cities and entrenchments is the best way to escape from modern firepower. Armies spontaneously resort to this as soon as they are in a defensive posture and have a little time to organise themselves. If there is no rapid military victory, we mechanically witness a progressive crystallisation of the front and a mechanical slowdown of operations. This is what is happening all over Ukraine from mid-March onwards. A continuous front was formed from the north of Kharkiv to the bridgehead of Kherson, while the Russians withdrew their decimated armies in the north of the country at the end of the month. The Belarusian and Russian borders, as far as Kharkiv, extended the front line by a barrier that the Ukrainians could not cross for fear of provoking a major escalation.
This is the beginning of the long war, the one where behind the operational zone the nations mobilise their forces to increase the capacities of their armies and even further back the one where the different external nations choose their side. The war is then global.
This long war begins with a three-month sequence. It was always initiated by the Russians, who were more at ease in this war of positions than in that of movement thanks to their powerful artillery. They also reduced their objectives to the size of their means. This time it will be a question of completely conquering the Donbass with small attacks supported by artillery. It is slow, methodical, but seems inexorable. While Sevorodonetsk and Lysychansk have fallen, one can imagine that Sloviansk and Kramatorsk will be the next captures and that if nothing changes the Russians will have reached their strategic objective in September.
But things always change in war, and if we are surprised, it is because we concentrate on the visible, such as the movements of flags on the battle map, and neglect the more discrete peripheral processes. In the duel zone of armies, the effects of conquest operations are immediately apparent, the terrain changes hands to a greater or lesser extent, whereas the effects of raid and strike operations are longer, more diffuse and often indirect. Battles are rarely won by simply hitting enemy forces, but weakening them in this way makes it easier for manoeuvre units to strike.
Behind the combat zone, the zone of operational strategy, there is also the zone where means (or organic) strategy is exercised. This is an archipelago of camps or training/reflection centres where efforts are made to increase or at least restore the capabilities of forces. This archipelago is automatically activated at the start of combat, but often in a fragmented and improvised manner. At first one learns on the job and tinkers with the means immediately available. And then, as the war lengthened, the process became more complex and organised. It was necessary to synthesise feedback, teach everyone the best practices, instruct new recruits, rest the old ones, combine the two, learn to use the equipment received, train the staffs, etc.
Overlaying this area of restoration/manufacturing of combat capabilities is the society that provides the human or material resources. This society is itself under strong pressure, from economic sanctions to air strikes, cyber attacks or propaganda, to stop providing resources and suffering. On the periphery of the countries at war are the allied countries that intervene and that are themselves subject to the same pressure on their societies, apart from the pressure of combat and strikes.
In short, behind the combat zone, where things are most predictable, there is a whole network of political, economic, diplomatic, military and logistical processes that are often interconnected. The surprises at the front come from these flows, of things, ideas or feelings, which come from behind.
In July 2022, the surprise comes from the sudden stop of the Russian flags on the map. In retrospect, this can be explained by a combination of wear and tear on Russian manoeuvre troops that was not compensated for by a very imperfect 'soldier production structure', as opposed to a Ukrainian structure that managed to increase its online capabilities. The effects of the new Ukrainian artillery supplied by the West were also seen, which, through an intelligent campaign of strikes, made it possible to stop the enemy's artillery logistics or to partition the forces on the Kherson bridgehead. The Russians could not find a tactical response and were unable to reinforce themselves.
The result was a balance in which nothing moved in July and August, to the point where the trend suggested that it would remain so for many months. This is obviously not the case, as the rear processes are still at work and the rise in power of the Ukrainian army continues while the Russian army is still stagnating or even weakening.
The new break, and thus the beginning of a new phase, came at the beginning of September with a spectacular Ukrainian victory in the province of Kharkiv and north of Sloviansk. Far from the Russian nibbling of the previous phase or even the "dynamic wear and tear" of the battle of Kiev, the Ukrainians proved capable of producing offensive shocks, a first in this war. The conquest of territory is clear and perhaps above all the blow to the Russian army, and therefore to society and the political regime, is violent. The Ukrainian military superiority is then obvious, which forces Russia to come out of its torpor by activating the rear processes differently.
On the front, it was now a question of forming what could be called a 'Surovikin line', named after the new commander-in-chief of the 'special operation', just as there had been the 'Hindendurg line' in 1917 and according to the same principles: to resist the enemy's military superiority behind a solid line of defence until enough forces could be mobilised in the rear to be able to take the initiative again. The new operational strategy was accompanied by a political move, the annexation by Russia of the conquered Ukrainian zones, and a mobilisation of reservists, the first wave of which had to be used urgently and at the cost of heavy losses to reinforce the Surovikin line, while the second, 200,000 men, i.e. a complete new army, had to come in after more solid training to change the balance of forces on the ground. If this is not enough, a new mobilisation will take place or conscripts will be drafted. At the same time, the strikes on the cities are becoming more targeted, the energy infrastructures, in order to "better" make the Ukrainian population suffer in the hope of indirectly influencing the military operations and above all making this population capitulate. On the peripheral front, Russia is at least looking for suppliers that will allow it to continue its war effort, Iran, Belarus, North Korea perhaps, and of course to undermine support for Ukraine within Western public opinion.
Will these new lines of Russian effort be enough to break the new trend? It always takes time for otherwise ambivalent effects to emerge.
The Russian mobilisation, perfectly unorganised, may have helped to strengthen the Surovikin line on the Donbass, but it is a slow poison. The mobilisation is not popular, causes massive leakages abroad or inside the country, and provokes multiple incidents and complaints from the first wave sent directly to the front without preparation. Once a certain critical mass is reached, these complaints and refusals, combined with zinc coffins without an associated victory, can turn into a protest against the war.
In the operational area, Ukraine got another shock by reducing the bridgehead at Kherson and capturing the city evacuated without a fight by Russian forces. While the effects on the Russian army of this victory are probably less significant than in Kharkiv, the political effects are considerable. They contradict the Russian efforts. Declared "Russian forever" just 41 days earlier, Kherson was abandoned without a fight or even any escalation except in the doses of missiles launched on Ukrainian cities. Contrary to what was proclaimed at the time of the annexation, one can thus enter the sacred soil of the Russian homeland and seize a major city without provoking a reaction. Going to bed after crossing a red line that was loudly proclaimed only a few days earlier is the surest way to lose credibility for the future.
This new shock also weakens the already slim possibility of making the Ukrainian population crack up with fear and cold. This kind of strategy can only work if this pressure is accompanied by defeats on the ground, thus killing any hope that things will improve. But Ukrainians under the bombs hear about victories, and they also hear about the abuses perpetrated by the Russians in the territories that have just been liberated. There is nothing to encourage them to ask for a "white peace", but on the contrary, everything that pushes them to finish as quickly as possible by chasing away the occupiers. The same is true of Western public opinion, which also realises that the aid provided and the possible sacrifices, which are modest compared to those of the Ukrainians, at least serve a purpose. On the contrary, everything is pushing for even more aid to the Ukrainians, while on the contrary, supporting a Russian regime of not even magnificent losers is becoming more difficult.
In war, everything begins and ends with battles. Victories on the ground, even if they are defensive or symbolic, feed the hopes of the rear and the resources of the rear feed the victories. The current phase in favour of the Ukrainians is almost three months old, which is already a bit old for a modern war sequence. The Ukrainians have every interest in pushing their advantage while it is still possible. The Dnieper forbids manoeuvring, but allowing long-range batteries, including anti-ship batteries, to advance to the Kherson area further expands the area that can be beaten by accurate fire or perhaps infiltration raids.
For the rest, the displacement of forces from Kherson may feed into the other fronts. Retreating Russian units are already reported in the Kreminna area, which tends to show the importance of this Luhansk front for them. The Ukrainians can also focus their efforts there in order to bring a new shock, as they can also do in the Zaporizhia area, the other possible manoeuvre area. They can attack from Vuhledar south-east of Donetsk city. The area is also sensitive for the Russians as it threatens one of the two railway lines, the other being the Kerch Bridge, that feed the conquered areas of Zaporizhia, Kherson and Crimea provinces. They could also attack closer to the Dnieper opposite Tokmak for example. It doesn't matter in the end, the main thing is to go fast and hit hard, despite the autumn weather - another changing process that affects operations - before the sequence ends.
When and how will this sequence end? Admittedly, no one knows. War is more a matter of chaos theory than of the determinism of the sciences of matter. Things are too human, with intelligent and highly motivated enemies who inevitably react to each other's changes, and the political, economic, diplomatic and societal parameters are too numerous to be able to grasp them all in their interactions.
We can thus imagine, as in July, but in reverse, that the Ukrainians have finally been more worn out than we thought in the previous fights or that they have no more ammunition stocks, the omega point, and that they can no longer carry out offensives against the strengthened Russians. We would then see a new phase of static equilibrium for the winter, before perhaps even a resumption of the Russian offensive in the spring in the Donbass.
But one can also imagine clusters of innovations on either side, most likely on the clearly more imaginative Ukrainian side, with new tactical structures, processes or even new equipment. Can the American supply of ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System) with a range of 300 km or the local manufacture of new ballistic missiles or more powerful drones change the situation? Can Russia, for its part, finally implement a real "soldier building" structure? Can it find a way to better exploit its 750 manned aircraft based around Ukraine by resisting the Ukrainian air defence system?
The changes may also be internal political, especially on the Moscow side, but also in Kiev. Everyone is thinking of replacing Vladimir Putin, but when and for whose benefit and policy? If he does not change his policy, can this new power, tomorrow, in six months or never, be overthrown by another who will admit failure?
No one knows, the analysis of wars during war is done by torchlight in a darkness filled with monsters. One moves forward and then one sees until one realises that one side cannot and will not continue.
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