Igor FedykThe situation at the front
First, we should say a few words about what is the reason for the current situation on the front, namely, the failure of the winter campaign of the Russian army. The “big Russian offensive”, which everyone expected, actually reduced to the fact that the “second army of the world” unsuccessfully stormed small settlements in eastern Ukraine. It was especially stubborn in the Bakhmut area, the capture of which was a real point of honor for both the Russian military and the Wagner Group operating there.
For its part, organizing successful defensive actions, the Ukrainian command, at the same time, had the opportunity to man its units, conduct their training and combat coordination, as well as their equipping with weapons and military equipment received from Western partners. Concurrently, all this time, the Ukrainian forces destroyed important objects in the rear of the Russian groups operating in the Donetsk, Luhansk, and Zaporizhzhia regions, thereby paralyzing their logistics system. That is, the Ukrainian military command was actively preparing for the spring-summer offensive campaign.
And as of today, we see that in some sectors of the front, Ukrainian forces started to move.
Bakhmut
Thanks to the control of the Ukrainian forces over the dominant heights near Bakhmut, the city is under their fire control. Any advance of the Russians is being recorded by Ukrainian intelligence, and artillery immediately begins to work on them. The result of this situation is that the Russian military operating in Bakhmut is not even trying to advance to the outskirts of the city to move Ukrainian units away from its southwestern part.
At the same time, the advance of Ukrainian forces on the flanks of Bakhmut continues. According to the latest information, in some areas, this advance is 8-10 km.
One of the reasons for the situation described above is that the Russian command was confident that it could hold the captured (not completely) Bakhmut and was already planning further offensive actions in the area. However, the misjudgment of the situation and the fact that it overlooked the short-term and limited regrouping of Ukrainian troops there, has led to the fact that today the Russians, instead of stabilization near Bakhmut, have active offensive operations of Ukrainian forces on its flanks and an uncontrolled (albeit small) part of the city.
As a result of the advance, the Ukrainian units to the north of the city could reach not only the Berkhivka reservoir but also Berkhivka itself, which creates a direct threat to the so-called Krasnogorsk ledge of the Russians. The advance on the southern flank towards Klishchiivka and Kurdyumivka threaten the Russian-held section between the southern part of the “Ivanivske forest” and Andriivka.
The abovementioned creates the Russian command conditions in which, instead of launching offensive actions towards the Sloviansk-Kramatorsk agglomeration, it must hastily solve the problem of stabilizing the situation near Bakhmut.
Luhansk direction
In the Luhansk direction, the Russians are trying in every possible way to improve the tactical position of their troops. Trying to move from north to south along the Oskol River, in the area between Kupiansk and Dvorichna, they thus want to deprive the Ukrainian forces of a convenient foothold for further actions in the direction of Svatove-Starobilsk and a line for an offensive in the direction of Nyzhnia Duvanka and Svatove. To solve this problem, the Russians concentrated a large number of troops and military equipment there, especially in Kreminna and Svatove. That is, the quantitative advantage is on the side of the Russians so far. And this may be the main obstacle to the active offensive operations of Ukrainian forces in the Luhansk direction.
However, for such a large number of troops, a well-coordinated and effective operation of the command and control system is necessary. But it is not there. Therefore, it should not be ruled out that the same developments may occur in the Luhansk direction, as we could see last year in the Kharkiv region, when the Russian grouping operating there, having the largest armored group in the combat zone, hastily retreated, leaving a large number of weapons and military equipment.
Zaporizhzhia direction
So far, the General Staff of Ukraine in its reports does not detail information about the events in the Zaporizhzhia direction. Although active “probing” operations of Ukrainian forces are already taking place there, in particular, in the Velyka Novosilka area.
The activation of Ukrainian forces in several sectors of the Zaporizhzhia direction created the impression in the Russian command of the beginning of the so-called big Ukrainian offensive. This forced him to use the defense, reserve, and rear resources he had there, thereby revealing his potential, on which the Ukrainian artillery began to work immediately.
As a result of such “probing” actions, Ukrainian forces were able to take control of several positions and liberate several locations. The Ukrainian command received enough information about the enemy, who was forced to reveal his positions, use the field arsenal, and start moving in the rear, thereby betraying his objects.
Simultaneously with the activation of Ukrainian forces in the Zaporizhzhia region, the Russians brisked up their Psychological Operations (PSYOP), the purpose of which is to show that the Ukrainian offensive operation has already begun and failed. Photo and video evidence of damaged and destroyed Ukrainian equipment is being shown (which is inevitable for military operations and, especially, offensive ones). Separate emphasis is placed on statements about “colossal” losses among the Ukrainian military. For greater credibility of the information disseminated within the framework of the PSYOP, “competent” speakers are being used. So, instead of General Konashenkov, the reports from the front are being voiced personally by Defense Minister Shoigu. Even Vladimir Putin joined the PSYOP, saying that the Ukrainian offensive had begun, but the Ukrainian troops had not achieved their goals in any sector. Thus, the Russians are trying to demoralize the population of Ukraine and the Ukrainian military, and at the same time provide moral support to their troops.
Blasting the Kakhovka Dam by Russians
The news: On Tuesday, June 6, the Russian military blasted the dam of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station. As a result of this, the dam was destroyed. About 16 thousand people found themselves in the disaster zone, and about 80 settlements were completely or partially flooded.
A large-scale ecological catastrophe caused by the deliberate destruction of a dam is an act of ecocide. Under international law (The Geneva Conventions) this is a war crime since the destruction of dams is expressly prohibited even if they are military objects.
There is information that a group of field engineers from the 205th Motorized Rifle Brigade of the 49th Army of the Southern Military District of the Russian Armed Forces may be involved in the blasting.
What they said: Russian government officials and Russian media accused Ukraine of destroying the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station with either a missile attack or “sabotage.” In particular, the press secretary of the Russian president, Dmitry Peskov, said that this “sabotage” allegedly had the goal of “depriving Crimea of water.”
For his part, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky said that the destruction of the dam by the Russians only confirms for the whole world that the Russians need to be “expelled from every corner of the Ukrainian land”, because “they use its every meter for terror.” And Oleksiy Danilov, the Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, noted that the blowing up of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station by the Russians is “a fundamentally new stage of Russian aggression” and that “Russia has entered the stage of openly declaring its real goal – the destruction of Ukraine, the killing of Ukrainians, the destruction of the economy and the life support structures of the population.”
Why it’s important: Several points indicate that it was Russia that was behind the destruction of the dam of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station.
1. Nova Kakhovka, like the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station, has been under the complete control of the Russian military since the end of February 2022. According to Ukrainian intelligence, in April of the same year, the hydroelectric station was mined by them. Later in the autumn, information appeared about their intentions to blast its dam to interfere with the summer-autumn campaign of Ukrainian forces in southern Ukraine.
At the same time, Ukrainian state officials began to draw the maximum attention of the world community to this threat and its possible consequences. In particular, President Zelensky emphasized that “Russia wants to arrange another operation under a “false” flag – to carry out a terrorist attack and blame Ukraine for this.”
On March 28 of this year, it became known that the Russians began to accumulate water in the Kakhovka reservoir. And a month ago, the Russians withdrew their troops and equipment deep into the left-bank part of the Kherson region, and even left the prepared defense lines. That is, they deliberately and in advance prepared to undermine the dam.
2. The dam is a fairly solid structure for the destruction of which requires a large amount of explosives. The warhead of the missiles for the Vilkha or HIMARS systems, which the Ukrainian army uses, has only about 100-200 kg of them. That is, the theoretical use of Ukrainian missile weapons could only lead to partial damage to the dam, but not to its destruction. It needs hundreds of times more to destroy such a strong structure as a dam. Such a quantity could only be delivered there by those who controlled it. That is, by the Russian military.
3. From a military point of view, advancing forces do not blow up dams to block their path to advance. They are undermined by the retreating troops to slow down the advance of the enemy. At the moment, Ukraine was advancing and Russia was retreating.
4. The Russians themselves testify that this is “their work.” So, for example, in the Telegram channel of the aforementioned 205th Motorized Rifle Brigade, back in October last year, they wrote about the mining of the dam and the readiness to blast it in case of the advance of the Ukrainian units. In particular, the author of the message indicates that, according to his assessment, the dam will be blown up with a probability of 70%.
After the explosion, one of the Russian soldiers fighting in the Kherson region openly says on his Telegram channel that it was the Russian army that blew up the dam, and calls for other dams on the Dnipro to be blasted as well. And Russian propagandists have been talking for a long time about the fact that the Ukrainian dams on the Dnipro River should be blasted.
For his part, Vladimir Saldo, the head of the occupation administration of the Kherson region, noted that due to the destruction of the dam of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station, the Russian army received a military-tactical advantage.
5. There is already an example in history when the Russians resorted to such actions. In 1941, on the orders of Stalin to stop the German offensive, they blew up The Dnipro Hydroelectric Station. Then, by the way, to undermine several spans of its dam, the Soviet troops had to use about 20 tons of explosives. As a result, not a single German soldier was hurt, but several thousand civilians and military personnel of the Red Army died. The Kremlin hid the scale of the tragedy for a long time and blamed the Germans for undermining it.
There may be several reasons why the Russians took such a barbaric step.
The most obvious is their desire to minimize any risks of possible actions by Ukrainian troops to force the Dnipro into its lower current. The Russians hoped that the flood of the Dnipro would secure the left flank of their southern group from the threat of a Ukrainian attack. This also shortens their line of defense and allows them to move forces to more threatening areas, in particular, to Zaporizhzhia.
Also in the plans of the Russians was not only the prevention of a hypothetical forcing of the Dnipro but also the disruption of the entire offensive operation of the Ukrainian forces by creating a humanitarian catastrophe in the south of Ukraine.
In addition, the blowing up of the dam of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station may be another raising of the stakes in the war by the Kremlin. His message may be as follows: “We blew up the hydroelectric dam and we think nothing of doing something similar at another – more “serious” – facility we control.” That is, at the Zaporizhzia nuclear power plant, which is their latest trump card in raising the stakes.
Nevertheless, such a desperate and barbarous act of the Russians as blasting the dam of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station, in fact, will have little effect on the actions of the Ukrainian army, because the scenario of forcing the Dnipro river, which the Russian command was so afraid of, was hardly one of the priorities in the framework of the Ukrainian offensive operation.