It has been a week since the Ukrainian army launched the Kharkiv offensive, and it is reported that the weapons and ammunition captured by the Ukrainian army have exceeded the number of weapons aided by Britain, Germany, and the United States.
The self-propelled guns alone include the 2S19 Type 152 self-propelled gun, the 2S7 Type 203 self-propelled gun, and the 2S1 Type 122 self-propelled gun. Even captured the Russian army’s most advanced national treasure-level weapon 2S19M2 type 152 mm self-propelled howitzer, which is very expensive and rare in number, even the entire Russian army has only a few dozen.
There are also hundreds of T-72B3 tanks, T-80BV tanks, BMP-2 infantry fighting vehicles, anti-artillery radar, Tor anti-aircraft missile launchers, armored vehicles and towed artillery, trucks, and much more. In the ammunition depot of Izyum-Kupiyansk, a large quantity of ammunition and supplies was obtained.
Even in Izyum, the Ukrainian army also got 8 brand-new tanks thrown away by the 26th Tank Regiment of the 1st Army of the Russian Guards Tanks, all of which were 80% new, original newly painted tanks.
In addition to the tank and armored vehicles, a large number of weapons and equipment such as small arms, anti-tank missile launchers, mortars, and machine guns can also be seen in the videos released by the Ukrainian army.
Some question why the Udon Armed Forces and the Russian 20th Army Guards in Kharkiv did not carry guns and withdraw in tanks and armoured vehicles. The very straightforward explanation is that it cannot be revoked. The railway line was indeed shut down after the Ukrainian lightning attack on Kupiyansk. Ukraine also demolished the majority of bridges before to the Kharkiv attack.
For several months, a lot of weaponry, ammunition, and supplies were transported by rail since the Russian army arrived by train. The Russians couldn’t draw it away again quickly because they didn’t have enough trucks, and more significantly because there were tens of kilometres of swamp and jungle behind the Oskol River that were impossible for large vehicles to cross.
The front-line cover infantry all ran again, and the artillery could not counterattack with fire alone, so they could only discard the equipment and run together, and the most important thing was that the psychology collapsed.
In the direction of Donbas, the Ukrainian army is assembling reserves in the direction of Fleda and at the same time begins to dismantle the mined area, with trains filled with more than 150 tanks and armored vehicles in the rear. The target of the Ukrainian army is probably Volnovaha, 60 kilometers from the city of Donetsk, and once the Ukrainian army crossed Volnovaha, it will cut off the highway between Mariupol and Donetsk. Well, ahead is Mariupol.
On the northern line of Donbas, the Ukrainian army was crossing the river to attack Dividendman, and the Russian army old Karawan-Brussifka-Dibrova built a defensive line to block the Ukrainian army. In other words, the Ukrainian army launched a counterattack operation on both flanks in the Donbas region. North of Donbas, the Ukrainians seized most of the Russian-controlled area of Kharkiv, seizing more than 8,300 square kilometers. Further north is Belgorod on Russian soil.
Now that Kharkiv has lost ground towards the Russian-controlled zone, the biggest threat to the Russian army in the Russian-controlled area of Donbas is that the Ukrainian army has begun to condescend, and at the same time, the HIMARS launch position has advanced more than 100 kilometers. Most of the important bridges, ammunition depots and railway stations of the Russian Army in Donbas are already under the cover of HIMARS. The Ukrainian army is likely to repeat the same trick again, with HIMARS constantly attacking the logistical targets of the Russian Army in Donbas.
With only a few battalion-level battle groups of the 6th Army in Belgorod to the north and the majority of the heavy weapons dumped by the 20th Guards Army in the south, which regrouped twice in half a year and was also targeted to clear the headquarters once, the Pocket Formation of the Russian Army was essentially impossible.
Therefore, the pocket array that many people on the Internet say is simply impossible, and the current strength of the Russian army in the north and south is not enough to block the 70-kilometer gap. However, after the Russian army withdrew to Donbas, it could continue to nibble on the small town of Avdeevka-Malinka.
The Russian army has been engaged in combat in Donbas for over seven months, during which time it has progressed less than 20 kilometres and been stalled in the cities of Malinka and Avdevka. Only after its withdrawal to Kharkiv will the Russian army be able to continue fighting in these two towns.