{"id":4192,"date":"2023-02-05T15:32:43","date_gmt":"2023-02-05T15:32:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/?p=4192"},"modified":"2023-12-16T11:53:52","modified_gmt":"2023-12-16T11:53:52","slug":"symbolism-and-artillery-the-duel-over-donbass","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/2023\/02\/05\/symbolism-and-artillery-the-duel-over-donbass\/","title":{"rendered":"Symbolism and Artillery, the Duel over Donbass"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Shayan Fallahi, August 2022<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article will contend that Russia’s failure to take Kyiv and neutralise the Ukrainian state in February 2022 led directly to the Russian military undertaking an offensive in the Donbas region in April. It will explain why the war shifted to Donbas and illustrate how the land itself was irrelevant to Russia’s strategic ends. Indeed, its efforts to seize the areas were only to achieve a symbolic victory, as the land that constitutes Donbas is of little strategic value. Instead, Russia wished to use the battle in Donbas to wear the Ukrainian military down in a war of attrition where Russia held a decisive advantage due to its superior artillery. The article analyses the military clash and ultimately concludes that though strategically sound on paper, in practice, the plan was only partially successful and failed to weaken Ukraine’s military cost-effectively.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the 24th<\/sup> of February 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine, anticipating a decisive victory. By April, however, the only remains of Russia’s special military operation in northern Ukraine were the rusting remnants of vehicles and devastated towns. The Russian army had been laid low due to a series of miscalculations and strategic mistakes that compelled a poorly supplied and relatively small Russian force to attempt a task far beyond its actual capabilities. The Russian military took severe losses in its initial invasion of Ukraine, the numbers of which are difficult to ascertain. However, certainly, thousands of soldiers were killed or injured, and losses of valuable armoured vehicles were also catastrophic. What Russia had hoped to be a swift neutralisation of the Ukrainian state had turned into a military disaster, leaving Russia with no clear path to victory in the war it found itself in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, the Russians were not prepared to withdraw from Ukraine. Moscow had already sacrificed too much to abandon the conflict with nothing. Moreover, standing down offered no clear solutions to Russia’s problems, considering the inevitable political humiliation and economic penalties. Consequently, Russia required a new strategy to win the war in Ukraine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Russia faced several key problems. Moscow based its military plan on a rapid strike at Ukraine’s political centres, enabling an immediate victory. Consequently, strategies had not been devised to tackle Ukraine’s entire military, especially once it had been reinforced by a mobilised population brimming with advanced Western weaponry. As Russia had marketed its plan as a special military operation rather than a war, it also couldn’t immediately mobilise its population. For the time being, Russia had to defeat the Ukrainian military with only its professional forces and whatever else it could muster from mercenary groups and allies. Considering that a three-to-one numerical superiority is generally regarded as necessary to attack successfully, Russia’s lack of soldiers was particularly problematic, as Moscow would now have to devise a plan that could enable them to defeat a military of over 300,000 and growing with a force of under 200,000 men.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To achieve this, Russia would have to maximise the power of its machinery and firepower to defeat Ukraine’s numbers. Russia outnumbered Ukraine in artillery and tank systems despite its early losses. Moreover, Ukraine lacked the industrial capacity to supply its armed forces and relied on Western funding and equipment, leaving Ukraine with two critical weaknesses Russia had to exploit. The first was Ukraine’s lack of heavy weapons, and the second was Ukraine’s reliance on foreign support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Accordingly, Russia would make the war as economically untenable for Ukraine supporters as possible. Russia’s primary weapon in this economic skirmish is its energy supplies, denying cheap energy to states that are particularly determined to aid Ukraine in the hopes that such financial punishment would compel these states to reduce their support for Kyiv. Russian misinformation would also undermine public support for the war in the West over the long term. These steps aimed to reduce Western support for Ukraine while the Russian military destroyed Ukraine’s army with its superior heavy weaponry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Russia planned to harness its firepower to counteract Ukraine’s numerical advantage by conducting battles which best suited Russian artillery. Though the Russian air force is supposedly superbly equipped, it is primarily designed to achieve air superiority and complete interception missions and so has failed to contend with Ukraine’s air defences. Artillery remains Russia’s primary tool in this war and the only prospect for military success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Donbass<\/u><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The key to this strategy was forcing the Ukrainian military into a small area where they could be annihilated by artillery. Russia viewed the Luhansk region as the best location to force such an engagement. This region was surrounded by Russian forces on three sides and was also part of the primary political goal of liberating Donbas, announced by Russia at the outset of the conflict. Though Russia claimed that this liberation was their main aim, this is a lie as such an extensive invasion across Ukraine clearly anticipated broader gains than only removing Kyiv’s sovereignty over the Donbas. In any case, it offered Russia’s army a tactical advantage while supporting its political justification for the invasion. However, the political aspect was entirely artificial. Donbas represented nothing more than a symbol. Without the destruction of significant Ukrainian forces, its capture would do nothing to improve Russia’s strategic position. Moscow only aimed to bait Kyiv into wasting its military resources on an indefensible position.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Russian offensive in Donbas commenced in late April but was a tediously lethargic and bloody affair. The losses Russia took early in the war were clearly illustrated by the lack of armoured vehicles and, consequently, slow progress. Russia focused its strategy on encircling the main urban centres of Sevrodonetsk and Lysychansk before destroying the trapped defenders. Though a seemingly practical plan, Russia failed to gain a significant numerical advantage and relied almost entirely on clearing Ukrainian defenders with artillery, an effective but prolonged method. By late May, Russia achieved a breakthrough but was then drawn into street fighting in Sievierodonetsk city as the Ukrainians fainted a withdrawal before counterattacking, wasting \u00a0Russian resources. Russia subsequently refocused its efforts on encircling the cities and was eventually successful. Both cities had been taken by late June, and Moscow had achieved a belated victory. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, a war-torn city. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Conclusion<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though victorious, it is unclear if Russia destroyed a significant proportion of the Ukrainian units defending Luhansk. Russia’s losses were also ambiguous, but the time it took to take the areas and the heavy street fighting in Sievierodonetsk suggest they were substantial. If this is the case, though the clash was a tactical victory, the battle in Luhansk was likely another strategic failure for the Russian military. Politically, however, it did boost Moscow’s cause somewhat as it enabled Russia to portray the capture of Luhansk as progress towards its claimed objective of liberating Donbas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In any case, the battle illustrated how Russia aimed to conduct the war: small advances in critical areas that could destroy disproportionately large Ukrainian forces while its international political efforts slowly curbed Western military support to Ukraine. Eventually, through these twin activities, Russia hopes to force Kyiv to an acceptable peace by sufficiently weakening its military forces. Paradoxically, however, each military clash seems only to reinforce Ukrainian and Western willingness to carry on the war, casting doubt over the efficacy of this plan. Nevertheless, this plan remains Russia’s only feasible strategy to end the war without mass mobilising the nation’s population and resources. Accordingly, Moscow will have to utilise its current strategy to its fullest and hope the world’s geopolitical climate shifts favourably for Russia in future.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shayan Fallahi, August 2022 This article will contend that Russia’s failure to take Kyiv and neutralise the Ukrainian state in February 2022 led directly to the Russian military undertaking an offensive in the Donbas region in April. It will explain why the war shifted to Donbas and illustrate how the land itself was irrelevant to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":4200,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,32,30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4192","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-geopolitics","category-military","category-russia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4192"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4192\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4345,"href":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4192\/revisions\/4345"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4200"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.consecon.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}