Russia acknowledges defeat in Kharkiv, ultranationalists start to turn on Putin, Lyman is the new battleground, and unconfirmed reports of Russian troops abandoning Melitopol.
Let’s dig in.
- The Kremlin has recognized its defeat in Kharkiv Oblast, the first defeat Russia has acknowledged in this war. The Kremlin is deflecting blame from Russian President Vladimir Putin and attributing it instead to his military advisors.
- The Kremlin is likely seeking to use the defeat in Kharkiv to facilitate crypto mobilization efforts by intensifying patriotic rhetoric and discussions about fuller mobilization while revisiting a Russian State Duma bill allowing the military to send call-ups for the regular semiannual conscription by mail. Nothing in the Duma bill suggests that Putin is preparing to order general mobilization, and it is far from clear that he could do so quickly in any case.
- The successful Ukrainian counter-offensive around Kharkiv Oblast is prompting Russian servicemen, occupation authorities, and milbloggers to panic.
- Russia’s military failures in Ukraine are likely continuing to weaken Russia’s leverage in the former Soviet Union as Russia appears unwilling to enforce a violated ceasefire it brokered between Armenia and Azerbaijan or to allow Armenia to invoke provisions of the Russia-dominated Collective Security Treaty Organization in its defense.
- Ukrainian troops likely continued ground attacks along the Lyman-Yampil-Bilohorivka line in northern Donetsk Oblast and may be conducting limited ground attacks across the Oskil River in Kharkiv Oblast.
- Russian and Ukrainian sources indicated that Ukrainian forces are continuing ground maneuvers in three areas of Kherson Oblast as part of the ongoing southern counter-offensive.
- Russian troops made incremental gains south of Bakhmut and continued ground attacks throughout Donetsk Oblast.
- Ukrainian forces provided the first visual evidence of Russian forces using an Iranian-made drone in Ukraine on September 13.
Oleksiy Arestovych, an adviser to Zelenskiy, said Ukrainian troops were now trying to retake the Russian-held town of Lyman in Ukraine’s Donetsk region and were eyeing territorial gains in the neighbouring Luhansk region which is under Russian control.
“There is now an assault on Lyman,” Arestovych said in a video posted on YouTube.
“And that is what they fear most – that we take Lyman and then advance on Lysychansk and Sievierodonetsk,” he said, referring to twin cities in the Luhansk region taken by Russia after fierce fighting in June and July.
I'm hearing more & more reports that Russians are evacing Melitopol. This remains UNCONFIRMED. If true, Ukr can reach the Black Sea, blow the Kerch bridge, & utterly destroy every Russia military unit in southern Ukraine and Crimea. And THAT would be a nation-ending event. pic.twitter.com/8cCDnDEbVl
— Peter Zeihan (@PeterZeihan) September 14, 2022
DEEP STRIKE: Major explosions rocked the RU air station at Taganrog, followed by a number of secondaries & fires. Russian AWACs, including the including the newest A-100 platforms, are forward deployed at Taganrog. This strike will negatively affect RU air defense in the region. pic.twitter.com/iKPeaIW5w8
— Chuck Pfarrer | Indications & Warnings | (@ChuckPfarrer) September 12, 2022
Taganrog, Russia now pic.twitter.com/m3ZDPoJ3Nq
— Paul Jawin (@PaulJawin) September 12, 2022
In the newly-liberated areas, relief and sorrow are intertwined – as accounts emerge of torture and killings during the long months of Russian occupation.
Artem, who lives in the city of Balakliya in the Kharkiv region, told the BBC he was held by Russians for more than 40 days, and was tortured with electrocution.
Balakliya was liberated on 8 September after being occupied for more than six months. The epicentre of the brutality was the city’s police station, which Russian forces used as their headquarters.
Artem said he could hear screams of pain and terror coming from other cells.
The occupiers made sure the cries could be heard, he said, by turning off the building’s noisy ventilation system.
“They turned it off so everyone could hear how people scream when they are shocked with electricity,” he told us. “They did this to some of the prisoners every other day… They even did this to the women”.
And they did it to Artem, though in his case only once.
“They made me hold two wires,” he said.
“There was an electric generator. The faster it went, the higher the voltage. They said, ‘if you let it go, you are finished’. Then they started asking questions. They said I was lying, and they started spinning it even more and the voltage increased.”
Artem told us he was detained because the Russians found a picture of his brother, a soldier, in uniform. Another man from Balakliya was held for 25 days because he had the Ukrainian flag, Artem said.
A school principal called Tatiana told us she was held in the police station for three days and also heard screams from other cells.
Life comes at you fast: pundits on Russian TV realize that their military is failing and their country is in trouble. They are starting to play the blame game. Some of them finally understand that their genocidal denial of the Ukrainian identity isn't working in Russia's favor. pic.twitter.com/jNNn5xifI5
— Julia Davis (@JuliaDavisNews) September 11, 2022
Their criticism is that Putin is not doing enough. That the special military operation is insufficient, and that Putin should declare full mobilization. These ultranationalists are largely represented by those Russian military bloggers that have become quite famous during the war. The most famous one is probably Igor Girkin. These bloggers make sometimes very good military analyses, and they clearly have a network of sources that provide information about the situation on the frontlines. And we also know that their views are shared by many of the soldiers. For example, there have been studies that show that these ultranationalist views are pretty common in spetsnaz units. And these ultranationalist voices are a real challenge for the Putin regime. Because obviously he can’t dismiss them as being unpatriotic or foreign agents or something like that. And what is happening now is that these ultranationalists are turning against Putin. And that is dangerous for him.
The shift has been from “If you support the troops, you have to support Putin” to “If you support the troops, you have to blame Putin for fucking things up so badly.”
Tags: artillery, Ben Hedges, Crimea, Dmitry Medvedev, Foreign Policy, Igor Girkin, Izyum, Kharkiv, Krab self-propelled artillery, Lyman, Lysychansk, Media Watch, Melitopol, Military, Oleksiy Arestovych, Russia, Russo-Ukrainian War, Severodonetsk, Taganrog, torture, Ukraine, war crimes
Watching this self-inflicted disaster happen to the Russians is the very definition of Schadenfreude…
Can’t say it isn’t deserved, either. Russia has been a suppurating sore on the world since the time of the Tsars, constantly serving as a self-declared “enemy” of whoever was in power, whether it made sense or not. Chiseling bastards since day one–They caused or enabled so much destruction in Central Asia and the Balkans that it isn’t even funny, and then lit the fuse for WWI via their support for Serbian extremists that assassinated Franz Ferdinand. Which led indirectly to the Tsar winding up dead in a basement with his family, in Siberia. Karma, she’s a bitch.
Don’t even get me started on the Soviets. The Russians are that perpetual spoiled brat, constantly in opposition to everything, just because it wasn’t them or their ideas. Anyone who gets on board with them winds up screwed, and screwed good and hard. Look at Armenia, for a sad example; absent Russian “encouragement”, the Armenians would have likely continued on as useful vassals for the Ottomans, but once they were “persuaded” to take up the cause of independence for the chunks of Turkey where they were kinda-sorta in majority-minority status, well… Yeah. Then, of course, the Russians did nothing for them, not even allowing refugees to cross into their territory.
I can’t think of a single positive thing that the Russians or Soviets have contributed to the world. They like to claim that they did the majority of the dying in WWII, to defeat Hitler, but they always leave out that Hitler couldn’t have won in the West without the constant trainloads of Soviet-sourced raw materials and oil that Stalin sent westwards to aid in their conquests. That that bit the Soviets in the ass? Poetic justice; Hitler was their boy, and he turned on them. Too bad, so sad. They whinge on and on and on about 20 million dead in the war, but the raw fact is, most of that came because they enabled Hitler in the first damn place, and then fought with incredible ineptitude during most of ’41 and ’42. Absent OJT from the Germans, they’d have never gotten their own act together on their own, despite what everyone claims about Soviet military theory.
Absent the aid they got, and all the stuff they stole through espionage, the Soviet Union/Russia would be exactly what they’re currently winding down into: A Third-World statelet with delusions of grandeur.
Gonna be ugly, for a lot of Russians. And, whoever they lash out at, going down. But, go down they will…
“Mobilization” is a word I’m hearing a lot. Crypto mobilization, fuller mobilization, general mobilization, etc.
I’d like to learn what mobilization means, what different levels there are, why choose one level vs another (i.e. pros & cons) and what our own leaders might deduce from a given choice.
Richard Fernandez said he’ll start worrying when Russia goes into full mobilization mode – that will be an indicator they intend to take on NATO directly and soon.
Any truth to this?
I am hardly an expert on Russian law, but my understanding is that Putin cannot legally declare a full mobilization unless there is actually a declared war going on. Since the Russo-Ukrainian War is officially a “Special Military Operation,” it doesn’t qualify for “full mobilization.” And most experts agree that a full mobilization would be extraordinarily unpopular among Russians.
Also, it might not actually gain them anything, since the Russian military is obviously struggling to equip and train the conscripts that it has already scrounged up.
Watching the Russian Media Monitor videos, as someone on Twitter wisely put it, the Ruskies seem to be having a “Are we the baddies?” moment.
@LP – thanks!
Not sure of the validity, but here’s a twitter video of Wagner Group recruiter at a penal colony. “Nobody goes back behind bars. If you serve six months, you are free. If you arrive in Ukraine and decide it’s not for you, we execute you.”
https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1570123353331011586
Full mobilization will conscript everyone including the white middle and upper class kids from Moscow and St Petersburg (unless they buy their way out, which will just create another problem) As long as the cannon fodder are Asian minorities from the poorest provinces, and people from the lowest class desperate for the good pay, it’s all good.
The Taganrog attack is significant, means there’s now even less air protection for the (single?) railroad line supplying Kherson. The only other supply/escape route through Crimea would be the Kerch Bridge. It seems economical to interdict transport near Mariupol, prompting Russian exodus south over Kerch Bridge.
If the Ukrainians still have the ability, they should drive on Mariopul, cutting off the exit to the East, then blow the Kerch Bridge, stranding all remaining Russians in Crimea. Let them starve for a month and they’ll surrender.
Richard Fernandez sometimes been interesting in the past, but this talk of Russia taking on NATO directly is beyond ludicrous. Ukraine is the poorest country in Europe, they had already seized a substantial chunk of its most productive regions, and they’re *still* getting their butts kicked.
That said, I kind of wish they’d try. We won’t get a denuclearized Russia from a Ukrainian solo victory, but if they took on NATO and lost that would be inevitably be part of the terms imposed by the victors.
[…] Lots of updates at Battleswarm Blog on the situation in Ukraine. This looks like a complete rout. An Ukrainian[-Jewish] friend of mine, […]
That map of Ukraine would be more be more believable if: 1. It could decide whether it wanted to use Ukrainian or Russian spelling for Ukrainian cities; and B. It had not misidentified the Southern Bug River (a lot of “Bug” rivers in that part of the world) as the “Dnepr”.
As much as I’d like to see AFU reach the Sea of Azov between Mariupol and Kherson and effectively sever land lines of communication between Russia proper and Crimea, I don’t think it’s likely just yet. The Ukrainian offensive in the Kharkiv and Donbas areas will run out of steam unless fresh units can be rotated in and supply lines maintained. And even then, I don’t see the logic of it just yet. The Donetsk area is the teeth of the Russian defenses in the Donbas. Ukraine has been successful so far because of careful preparation, misdirection, and striking where the Russians are weakest (often contributing to Russian weakness in the objective sector, as we’ve seen in Kharkiv). Rushing forward to attack a Russian position that is entrenched and has warning and leaving themselves overextended in the process does not fit their pattern.
But AFU has surprised everyone so far. Maybe they can pull it off right now. I’d prefer to think so.
@esr – where do you write the most these days? Big fan of your blog.