The Battle for Donbas Will Be Protracted and Bloody

Battles in Bulges
These forces are pitched against Ukrainian defenders deployed in several salients or “bulges” – areas surrounded on three sides by Russian-backed separatists. Throughout military history these have offered the possibility of trapping enemy forces in “pockets”. Military historians will recall the Ypres Salient (1914-1918), Verdun (1916), Kursk (1943) and of course the Battle of the Bulge (1944-45) as the most prominent examples of this.

The Russians will seek to probe and break through Ukrainian defenses, surround those salients, trap the Ukrainians and annihilate them using their advantages in air and artillery power, or at the very least force them to retreat. Russian-backed separatist troops successfully conducted such an operation on a relatively small scale at the Battle of Debaltseve in February 2015, where artillery was used to devastating effect.

US military analysts report they expect Ukrainian positions in the Severodonetsk Salient, and especially around the town of Sloviansk to be the initial targets for a Russian attempt at encirclement, with an eventual strike at the city of Dnipro – a major communications and road hub – to secure the entire region east of the Dneieper River. All of this this is very well known by the Ukrainian commander, General Valerii Zaluzhnyi and his staff. The Russians want quick battles of annihilation. What they will get is a war of attrition.

Ukrainian commanders fully and completely understand from bitter experience the risks of being surrounded. They have demonstrated the qualities of agility and tactical innovation required for this kind of battle. Even better, they know what is coming. NATO air and space reconnaissance and surveillance as well as Ukraine’s own intelligence capabilities will ensure that there will be no surprise attacks.

Long War?
With continued and increased western assistance, Ukraine should be able to sustain a long war better than the Russians. NATO assistance will be vital in firming up the defenders’ armoured units giving them a far greater chance to counterattack and retake ground. Retaining some level of control of the air, though, is the single most important factor, which is why retaining and strengthening anti-aircraft missile defenses is an absolute priority.

Despite Russia’s advantages in technology and equipment, Ukrainian forces will continue to exploit Russia’s chronic and acute weaknesses in logistics and supply.

Finally, it is one of the firmest rules of warfare that a successful attacker should enjoy a three-to-one preponderance. Russia’s depleted force has nowhere near that preponderance. There are exceptions to this general three-to-one rule – such as the Gulf War of 1991 where a well-led and equipped US-led coalition annihilated a larger and combat-experienced Iraqi army. In such cases, the attackers more than made up for a relative lack of quantity with quality in training, planning and the crucial moral components of cohesion and motivation.

In the spring battles of 2022 it is the defenders, not the attackers who are in abundant possession of those factors against a Russian army beset by chronic issues of endemic corruption  professionalism and training which has rendered them apparently incapable of conducting complex operations. These problems are not going away, and will not be solved by a change in command or operational focus.

Above all the ravages inflicted upon them by the Ukrainian armed forces have cut away at theirmanpower, equipment and morale. The next battle will begin within the next two weeks. Attempting to predict its precise course is ultimately futile, not even the opposing generals know that. It may well be that the Russian army’s fate has already been sealed in what is likely to be a long war.

The single qualification to this may be that Russia could default to escalation using “weapons of mass destruction” of one form or another – whether tactical nuclear warheads or chemical weapons. Reports from Mariupol that the Russians may already have resorted to the latter would, if proved, show that Russia is prepared to resort to something even more serious if they fear a complete military humiliation in Ukraine.

Frank Ledwidge isSenior Lecturer in Military Strategy and Law, University of Portsmouth. This article is published courtesy of The Conversation.