The second Russian offensive campaign. The end of the conflict or a race towards its expansion?

End of May 2024. Two years and three months after the start of the invasion, the spring offensive of Russian forces, which began in April, has regained great momentum.

The analysis carried out starts from the consideration of the temporal phasing of the ongoing conflict, according to the following functional criterion:

• start of invasion, first Russian winter offensive and first stalemate (24 Feb. – 7 Apr. 2022);

• Russian repositioning on the south-eastern front (8 Apr. – 28 Aug. 2022);

• Ukrainian counteroffensives on Kherson and Kharkiv (29 Aug. – 11 Nov. 2022);

• second stalemate ed escalation of the Battle of Bakhmut (12 Nov. 2022 – 7 June 2023)

• Ukrainian counteroffensive in summer 2023 (8 June 2023 – 31 Aug. 2023);

• continuation of the Ukrainian counteroffensive in autumn 2023 (1 Sep. – 30 Nov. 2023);

• second Russian winter offensive 2023-2024 (1 Dec. 2023 – 31 Mar. 2024);

• continuation of the Russian offensive with the spring campaign (1 April 2024 – present).

It all began at the height of the seventh phase of the campaign conducted by Moscow on Ukrainian soil, the so-called "second Russian winter offensive". Up to that point, the war of position had significantly worn out the Kremlin's troops, which had to invest a lot of resources in continuous bombardments with artillery and air force to try to break through the enormous defensive structure created by the Ukrainians along a contact line that extends for approximately 1.200 kilometers.

We remind you that Kiev has deployed minefields up to 15 kilometers deep, with a density of up to 1.500 mines per square kilometer in the Avdijvka area and in the Donetsk sector.¹

Russian troops continued the offensive effort, however without achieving significant successes. On the opposite front, the Ukrainians reacted by regularly counterattacking where the limited room for maneuver allowed.

For months the impression was that the hysteresis on the front was destined to continue; in reality, with the fall of the defense lines in the suburbs of Bakhmut and Avdijvka, with the Ukrainian army weakened by the lack of men and equipment, the conditions for the attempted new advance by the Russians have increased. Signs of renewed momentum were clearly visible.

After the transition from the “second winter offensive” to the “spring offensive”, evidently parts of a continuum operational, the only sector in which the Ukrainian forces have managed, in turn, to maintain an aggressive profile is the western coast of Crimea, where using unmanned maritime systems (USVs) they have achieved some significant results.

This is what happened on February 1st, when the missile corvette Ivanovets class Tarantul-II was sunk (photo) in Donuzlav Bay² or February 14, when the Tsezar Kunikov, a class landing ship Ropucha, was sunk off the coast of Alupka by the special forces of the Ukrainian Navy of the "13 Group", with the use of USVs of the type Magura V5.³

Let's see, then, how the Russian offensive developed at the three traditional combat levels.

First, let's consider the strategic level. As happened during the “first winter offensive”, in parallel with ground operations, the Russian Air Force conducted an intense campaign aimed at destroying Ukraine's critical air infrastructure.

First, it's notable that if we had conducted this analysis last fall, we would have talked about how the Russians were targeting critical infrastructure. We are certainly seeing attacks on these infrastructures now, however, starting in January 2024,⁴ the effort was concentrated on those connected to the Ukrainian defense industrial base, without interruption.⁵

The weapons predominantly used for this purpose are cruise missiles Kalibr e Onyx 3M-55 (both from naval platforms), Kh-101, Kh-555, Kh-32, Kh-69, air-to-surface missiles Kh-22 (following photo) and ballistic missiles Kh-47M2 Khinzal (all from air carriers), as well as a high number of circulating munitions Shahed 131 and 136, better known as "kamikaze drones".

To understand the scope of these actions and the type of objectives we are talking about, let's think about the massive attack on the night of April 11 on structures located in the regions of Kharkiv, Kiev, Zaporozhye, Odessa and Lviv.

The Russians launched airstrikes in three waves: in the first they employed 40 attack drones; at around half past two in the morning, nine Russian Tu-95MS strategic bombers took off from the Murmansk region; at 4 a.m., they maneuvered near the launch area and launched their missile payload Kh-101 e Kh-555. Then, around six in the morning, four Russian Mig-31Ks took off and hit their targets with missiles. Kinzhal e Kh-69.⁶

In total, the Russians used 82 air attack weapons. Ukrainian air defense forces managed to destroy 57 air targets: 39 drones and 18 missiles. The rest, due to air defense overload and an insufficient number of systems, reached their targets and caused significant damage.⁷

The thermoelectric power plant was completely destroyed in the attack Trypilska, in the Kiev region, part of the power plants controlled by the group Centrenergo major electricity and thermal energy producing company in central and eastern Ukraine. In addition to Trypilska, the organization includes two other thermoelectric power plants: the Zmiivska in the Kharkiv region, destroyed on March 22, 2024 and the Vuhlehirska, in the Donetsk region, occupied by the Russians since 25 July 2022. Following the repeated attacks, the company has practically lost 100% of its production capacity.⁸

To get a more complete idea of ​​the strategic choices made by the Russians on the battlefield, the targets destroyed on April 11 include a gas distribution infrastructure in the Stryi district and an electricity substation in the Chervonohrad district. The society NaftogazFurthermore, he reported that two gas storage plants had suffered damage, specifying that, however, their operation was restored quickly.⁹ Iranian drones and ballistic missiles were also used during the heavy attack conducted in early May Khinzal, as well as cruise missiles Kh-101 (following photo), Kh-555 e Kalibr, throughout the Ukrainian territory.¹⁰

Beyond the high rate of consumption of this ammunition, which is objectively detectable, it is interesting to understand what its production level could be, in order to be able to evaluate the extent of the threat it represents in the medium to long term.

An estimate from the end of 2023 saw a certain reduction in the quantity available to the Russians of some of the missiles of the type reported.¹¹ It is not easy, however, to establish the production capacity of the Russian war industry, which is almost totally oriented towards the war economy planned by Putin.

It is no coincidence that the new Defense Minister does not hold a military rank like the outgoing Sergei Shoigu, but is a distinguished economist like Andrej Belousov. In the context of the Kremlin's constant propaganda narrative, he is a highly qualified figure to support the reasons for the sacrifices resulting from the reduction of welfare, in favor of investments in weapons for the maintenance of momentum in the war effort.

To give credit to normally reliable open sources, the numbers on the quantity of these weapons for use on strategic objectives are around 115 and 130 long-range missiles and between 300 and 350 drones produced on a monthly basis. attack, based on models provided by Tehran. Although before the war Russia had a stockpile of thousands of long-range missiles in its arsenal, today it would be around 700.¹²

Regardless of how many missiles it actually has to continue its 2024 strategic campaign, Moscow will continue to have the capability to build missiles and drones and will continue to launch them against Ukraine. This reality will not change for the duration of the conflict. Meanwhile, active air defense remains the most reliable counter to Russian missile attacks, requiring continuous support and supplies from the Partner internationals of Ukraine.

Let's now look at the operational level. The Russians employ six groupings that bring together all the units deployed along the front line: Sever (North), established in April 2024,¹³ Zapad (West), Tsentr (Center), age (South), Vostok (East), e Dnepr.¹⁴ The attacks conducted by these groupings, in addition to developing the close battle of the tactical level, aim to force the Ukrainians to use reserves and wear them down to destruction.

For the Russians, it is important to prevent the Ukrainians from being able to form future reserves, to maintain momentum in the coming months. At the dawn of the continuation of the war effort in what can be glimpsed as the "2024 summer offensive", a logical continuation of the previous ones, the Russians organize their groupings so as not to interrupt the attacks on the Ukrainian positions along the entire front line, approximately 510.000 strong soldiers.¹⁵ And the moment is favorable for them, as the problems relating to the recruitment of new forces to send into combat have brought out strong tensions between President Vladimir Zelensky and the former chief of staff Valery Zaluzhny, who was later dismissed. To Zaluzhny's positions, insistent on the need to increase the recruitment of soldiers, were added those of Kyrylo Budanov - head of the military service intelligence military - essentially on the same positions.

Still at the operational level, Russians can not only use their weapons along the entire line of contact in a close battle, but are also able to attack several weapons systems of the Ukrainian side in depth, conducting the so-called deep battle. He high value targets for the Russians they then become multiple rocket launcher systems Himars (following photo) and the batteries of the air defense systems Patriots, the latter being the main "thorn in the side" for their incursions with missiles and drones.

When listing their successes, Russian propaganda videos list destroyed Ukrainian vehicles that were not of Soviet origin, making spelling strictly in English, as if to underline their origin from NATO countries. This is the case with howitzers FH70 indicated in a video examined, armament probably of Italian origin.¹⁶ Remaining on the propaganda level, even Western combat vehicles captured or destroyed and exhibited at public events, such as the annual "Victory Day" parade (9 May),¹⁷ contributes to raising the morale of the troops and Russian citizens.

The last level to consider is the level tactical, with its preferential objectives. Along the contact line the Russians attack the Ukrainians using various means. Among these, circuit ammunition stands out Lancet-1(Izdeliye-51 / X-51) to Lancet-3 (Izdeliye-52 / X-52), used above all against command posts, transmission vehicles, logistics centers. These kamikaze drones they are literally revolutionizing Russian doctrine for conventional warfare, especially regarding the use of artillery.¹⁸ In addition to these drones, extensive use is made of free-fall bombs (FAB- OFAB- ODAB-250/-500/-1500), transformed with Kit type UMPK (Unified guidance and correction module) to give them the accuracy needed to strike the fortified positions on which the Ukrainian defense is centered. For example, in a single day, from 16 to 17 February, 151 were used FAB with UMPK, of which 94 are in the Avdijvka area.

According to many analysts, the appearance of UMPK in the arsenal of the Russian Aerospace Forces represents a turning point in the use of air power during the current Russian-Ukrainian conflict.¹⁹ If the battle of Avdijvka is the one that has had the greatest resonance, that of Ocheretyne (Donetsk region), north-west of Avdijvka is peculiar for the textbook application of what the Russians define as "flower tactics": in practice, once the main urban center has been occupied and based on the direction of origin, the units open up in other directions to occupy the villages and smaller centers located in the suburbs, thus configuring the "petals" of an imaginary geographical corolla.²⁰ The Russians themselves claimed that “the Ocheretyne flower was beginning to bloom”:²¹ in April, in that sector the Russian units managed to break through the Ukrainians' second defensive line, in an effort to extend the penetration along the aforementioned line and gain ground increasingly towards the west.

A completely new situation was then created north of Kharkiv, the second largest city in Ukraine. This is where the new named grouping comes into play Sever, whose units moved along the north-south routes that lead from Belgorod to Karkhiv, quickly consolidating on positions north of the Ukrainian city. Let's see, then, what the goals to be achieved with this attack are.

• The first is to form a buffer zone north of Kharkiv, which guarantees the security of the areas near Belgorod, a potential target of Ukrainian actions.
• The second is to force the Ukrainians to deploy new reserves north of Kharkiv, in an already understaffed situation.
• The third, establish the baseline for future future operations against the city.

There are all the indicators to predict the transition to the Russian "summer offensive". If the momentum remains so favorable, it is possible that this new offensive is not limited to Donbass, but extends to the Sumy region, along a route that goes from Belgorod towards Kiev. If so, the front line will extend another 400-500 kilometers.

Despite the renewed impetus on the Russian side mentioned above and the progressive Ukrainian failures along the front, the length of the same - destined to expand with the fighting conducted along the northern routes leading to Karkhiv - still prefigures the characteristics of the war of attrition that , by its nature, is more resource-oriented than land-oriented. So it is critical to understand that in this type of warfare you need to have sufficient resources to sustain sustained efforts.

The intensive use of artillery, which has supported all Russian attacks since the beginning of the invasion, can help us understand this principle. According to estimates by theintelligence of NATO Russia produces about 250.000 artillery ammunition per month, or about 3 million per year.²²

Moscow's forces are firing around 10.000 shells a day in the period under review, compared to just 2.000 a day fired by the Ukrainians, and in some sectors along the front the ratio is said to be even worse.²³ Despite the sophisticated armaments provided in support of Ukraine, it is the view of several military analysts that the war will likely be won or lost based on who fires the most artillery shells.²⁴ Russia staffs munitions factories “24/24” on rotating 7-hour shifts. About 7 million Russians work in the defense sector today, compared to 12-3,5 million before the war.²⁵ Furthermore, there are the huge imports from countries that support the cause: last year Iran sent at least 300.000 artillery shells and North Korea supplied at least 6.700 containers with millions of shells.²⁶

The Military Encyclopedia of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation divides types of artillery fire into: fire on a single target, concentrated fire, sequential concentration of fire, barrage (moving and stationary), saturation fire (on non-predesignated objectives), “fire pit” (support fire delivered in front of one's attacking troops), mobile fire zone.²⁷ As can be seen, the Russian doctrine for the use of artillery is varied and complex, this is because it is believed that the key to success is fire: it is fire that causes damage and inflicts losses on the enemy, reducing their strength, capabilities, number and the will to resist. It's very simple: maneuver is necessary to acquire an advantageous position for shooting, and fire is necessary to defeat the enemy. According to this principle, precision ammunition cannot replace the effectiveness of a huge volume of fire. It would be like wanting to fight a war only with sniper rifles, when intense preparatory fire (in attack) or barrage fire (in defense) is necessary for infantry units to maneuver. This is what the Russians have been doing since the beginning, supplementing artillery with circuit munitions; in the "spring offensive", thanks to the enormous productivity of the war economy - where investments in the military-industrial sector exceeded 8% of GDP -²⁸ we can observe that they simply intensified the bombing, diligently exploiting the momentum.

In close battle Ukrainians try to use drones with direct remote observation to repel Russian attacks. The problem is that these drones only have a limited range of up to five, sometimes ten kilometers, while the artillery is positioned at distances of at least 20 kilometers even further. But that's not all, in this offensive the Russian artillery is decidedly overwhelming compared to the Ukrainian artillery and the counter-battery capabilities of the Kiev forces. The increase in artillery attacks conducted by the Russians can be seen, for example, in a video shot in the Biloforivka area (Luhans'k region), where dozens of rockets launched with BM-21 Grad e TOS-1A Buratino.²⁹ This increase was not matched by a reaction capacity, especially an effective one, on the Ukrainian side.

The weapons systems that have been delivered from the West no longer have the accuracy they had at the beginning of the war. For example, bombs equipped with the system JDAM, ammunition similar to the aforementioned UMPK Russians, capable of hitting targets in depth, are largely neutralized by their adversaries' electronic warfare equipment. The same happens with French cruise missiles Scalp and for their British version, the Storm Shadow. The activity of jamming conducted by means such as R-330Zh Zhitel it is also responsible for reducing the effectiveness of grenades Excalibur and rockets GMLRS extension, fired from US-supplied and US-supplied M777 howitzers respectively Himars.

In the United States, in a statement to Congress in March it was reported that the artillery grenade Excalibur 155 mm GPS-guided rifle “had a 70% effectiveness rate in hitting targets when it was first used in Ukraine,” but that “after six weeks, the effectiveness dropped to 6% because the Russians adapted their electronic warfare systems to counter it.”³⁰ Furthermore, the peak efficiency of a new weapons system is only about 2 weeks before countermeasures are adopted.³¹ This is precious data that demonstrates the continuous progress and attention paid by the Russian army also in the electronic warfare sector.

As if that were not enough, in the background of the outlined scenario, the specter of the nuclear threat, so dear to Russian propaganda, always looms. So the question is: What can/will the countries supporting Ukraine do?

The supplies of weapons and the related support to train personnel in their use, despite a thousand hesitations also due to the delicate situation in the Middle East, have somehow resumed. The United States and Europe are supplying sophisticated weapons systems, such as, for example, ATACMS surface-to-surface missile systems.

Attacks conducted with these systems can have a devastating effect, but must respect the "saturation" principle. In other words, these attacks must be conducted daily, over a specific period of time, so that we can actually see measurable effects on the battlefield, such as, for example, the cessation of the Russian offensive. And yet these measurable effects are not visible.

In 2022 we were able to witness the so-called “effect Himars”; currently an "ATACMS effect" is not yet detectable. Nonetheless, Russia can count on the support of China, Iran and North Korea both on a political level and in terms of supplies of weapons and equipment.

Ukrainian President Zelensky struggles every day to explain very clearly and directly what the unsustainable situation his country finds itself in and why it is so important to receive help from the West, underlining the need to strike Russian forces and their military infrastructures even on their territory. This aspect has long been the subject of controversy among Western countries, although authorization to this effect has been given, at least by some. After all, war is done in two and, from a strictly military point of view, it seems beyond all logic not to hit your opponent in his crucial points, when you have the possibility. The rest is politics.