2024-08-14
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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on August 13 that the Ukrainian army's offensive in Russia's Kursk Oblast is still continuing. He had a video call with Ukrainian Armed Forces Commander-in-Chief Sersky on the same day, and then posted on social media that despite the difficult and fierce fighting, the Ukrainian army is still advancing in the Kursk region, and Ukraine's "bargaining chips" are increasing.
Since the Ukrainian army launched a cross-border attack on Russia's Kursk Oblast on August 6, it has advanced dozens of kilometers into Russian territory. The Ukrainian army has also tried to advance to the west and northwest of Kursk Oblast to control more areas, and may dig trenches and build fortifications in the controlled areas to prepare for the next long-term trench warfare. In order to cooperate with the Kursk offensive, the Ukrainian army also launched large-scale drone attacks in Russia's Belgorod Oblast, Lipetsk Oblast, Bryansk Oblast, and Oryol Oblast.
But Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Tikhi said Ukraine was not interested in "occupying" Russian territory and stressed that if Moscow agreed to a "just peace", Ukrainian military attacks on Russia would stop as soon as possible.
Facing the fierce offensive of the Ukrainian army, on August 7, Russian President Vladimir Putin convened an emergency meeting of the Minister of Defense, the Secretary of the Security Council, the Director of the Federal Security Service, and the Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Army to discuss how to deal with the situation in Kursk Oblast. Then, the Acting Governor of Kursk Oblast, Smirnov, declared a state of emergency. As the situation further deteriorated, on August 9, the federal emergency response mechanism was activated in the entire Kursk Oblast.
On August 13, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced that the Russian army "continued to repel" the Ukrainian offensive and "thwarted" the attack of "mobile troops in armored vehicles". On the 12th, the Russian side said that the Ukrainian attack had killed 12 civilians and injured 121 people in Kursk Oblast, and the state urgently evacuated 121,000 residents; the Krasnoyarsk District of Belgorod Oblast, which is adjacent to Kursk, has also urgently evacuated 11,000 residents. On the same day, Putin said that Russia will resolutely respond to a series of provocations from Ukraine in the border area.
The Ukrainian army's cross-border raid was swift and powerful, but how much change it can bring to the Russia-Ukraine war situation remains a question.
Judging from the overall situation of the current Russian-Ukrainian war, the Ukrainian army's surprise attack on Kursk has a certain intention of "encircling Wei to save Zhao". Since July, the Russian army has been preparing for large-scale battles on multiple fronts, which has further put tremendous pressure on the Ukrainian army's increasingly stretched defense forces.
On the Kharkov front, whether in Lipzig or Volchansk, there was not much change in the control areas of both sides. However, the fierce fighting here firmly tied down many elite troops such as the 82nd Airborne Assault Brigade of Ukraine, thus creating conditions for the Russian army to launch larger-scale battles on multiple fronts in Luhansk and Donetsk.
After entering the summer of 2024, the large-scale battles launched by the Russian army on multiple fronts in Kharkiv, Luhantsk and Donetsk pushed the Russia-Ukraine conflict to a new climax. Under the tremendous pressure of the Russian offensive, the Ukrainian army will inevitably think about how to break the deadlock.
As the Russian army put more and more troops into the front-line operations, the emptiness of its rear created the possibility for the Ukrainian army to break into the rear of the Russian army from the direction of Sumy Oblast. The Ukrainian army's attack on Kursk was different from the Russian army's assembly of a large number of troops and careful preparations before the May 2024 raid on Kharkov. The Ukrainian army's initial raid on Kursk was extremely small, and most of them were members of the reserve. Therefore, the Ukrainian army's intention here was more like a tentative fire reconnaissance at the beginning. Because the small number of Russian Chechen troops stationed in Kursk collapsed at the first touch, this small group of Ukrainian troops was able to quickly break into the depth of the Russian side, which created the possibility for the Ukrainian army to expand the Kursk offensive.
According to the Russian Ministry of Defense, after the initial victory, the Ukrainian army successively deployed more than 2,000 combatants on the Kursk Front and entered the Kursk Oblast around August 11 to fight (different sources have reported on the specific forces currently deployed by the Ukrainian army on the Kursk Front. Western media such as the Austrian "News" said that the Ukrainian army currently has 10,000 or 12,000 troops deployed on the Kursk Front; the US "Forbes" magazine also said that the Ukrainian army's participating forces on the Kursk Front are about 10,000, equipped with 600 armored vehicles and tanks). Among them are veterans from the 49th Mechanized Brigade, the 32nd Mechanized Brigade, the 72nd Independent Mechanized Brigade, the 82nd Airborne Assault Brigade and other main Ukrainian army units. In addition, the Ukrainian army has assembled more than 20,000 reserves and a large amount of heavy equipment in Sumy Oblast, ready to reinforce at any time.
In order to cope with the tense situation in Kursk, the Russian 18th Infantry Division, 128th Independent Motorized Infantry Brigade, 45th Independent Guards Special Brigade and other troops began to return to Kursk from the front lines in Kharkov and other places, which will undoubtedly disperse the Russian forces on various fronts and ease the defensive pressure on the Ukrainian army on the front lines. But at the same time, the Ukrainian army will put more troops into the Kursk offensive, which will also weaken its defensive strength on the front battlefield.
The current Ukrainian army's desperate move to launch the Kursk Offensive is also related to the resurgence of rumors of a change of leadership in the Ukrainian army and the fact that Commander-in-Chief Sersky is not trusted by political leaders.
Since June 2024, Zelensky's confidant, Sergey's party member of the Servant of the People party group in the Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada, and deputy chairman of the National Security and Defense Committee Mariana Bezuglaya has been constantly criticizing Sergey's poor command and his "capitulationist" tendencies toward Russia. The dismissal of the former Ukrainian Army Commander-in-Chief Zaluzhny in February this year was also related to Bezuglaya's severe criticism. On November 26, 2023, Bezuglaya publicly accused Zaluzhny of having major problems in his command and condemned him for failing to submit a detailed combat plan for the Ukrainian Army in the next year.
The official explanation given by the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense for Zaluzhny's final resignation was that his command did not allow the Ukrainian army to achieve the expected results: Zaluzhny consumed a large number of elite troops in the 223-day Battle of Bakhmut, but failed to stop the Russian army's advance; the Ukrainian army's high-profile counterattack in 2023 had little effect. However, Western media such as The Guardian believe that Zelensky's dissatisfaction with the counterattack is only one of the reasons, and more importantly, he is afraid of Zaluzhny's military prestige that has been continuously established during the war and suspects that he has ulterior political ambitions.
Zelensky appointed Serski to replace Zaluzhny and had high hopes for him to recover lost territory. In the first year of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, Serski made outstanding military achievements. The two key battles of the Battle of Kiev in February 2022 and the Kharkiv counter-offensive in September were both commanded by Serski. Although Serski's command performance was excellent before, his style was not sympathetic to the soldiers. He was known as the "butcher" in the Ukrainian army. In addition, his Russian identity made him less prestigious than Zaluzhny. Even so, Zelensky still could not give full trust to Serski. When he appointed him as the supreme commander of the front line, Zelensky also specially promoted a group of "young" officers to Serski's command.
Since May 2024, the Russian army has once again launched a full-scale force, making the Ukrainian army's front-line defense even more precarious. Coupled with the distrust of political leaders and the constraints of factional forces in the army, it is inevitable that Serski will have difficulty in the full-scale counterattack that Zelensky expects. The deteriorating situation on the front line has put Serski under greater pressure of questioning.
The Ukrainian army is taking a risky move in Kursk. Perhaps it is a desperate attempt by Serskii, who is in a political dilemma, to save himself. His ideal attack target is Belgorod, Kursk and other places where the Russian defense is relatively empty.F-16 fighterA batch of Western aid weapons began to be delivered to the Ukrainian army at the end of July, which also provided the necessary confidence for his military adventure.
After a small group of Ukrainian troops successfully raided the border of Kursk Oblast, Russia, the Ukrainian army began to quickly deploy more military forces here in order to expand the results of the war. At present, the Ukrainian army wants to go deep into the hinterland of Kursk Oblast, aiming to directly capture the Kursk Nuclear Power Plant. On August 12, at a meeting of the Ukrainian Supreme Command, Serski reported to Zelensky that the Ukrainian army had controlled about 1,000 square kilometers of Russian territory. Putin also admitted that the Ukrainian army's acquisition of Kursk territory will bring bargaining chips to peace talks.
However, the Ukrainian army faces great challenges in fighting deep into Russian territory. The Russian army responded quickly to the Ukrainian army's surprise attack on Kursk. First, it used the air force and missile forces to use thermobaric bombs and Iskander missiles to launch long-range strikes against the Ukrainian army. The reserve troops stationed in the hinterland began to be dispatched, and some elite combat troops on the front lines in Kharkiv and other places also returned to support. The Russian Ministry of Defense stated on August 10 that about 15 commanders of the 22nd Mechanized Brigade of the Ukrainian Army were killed, and 1,120 combatants and 140 weapons and equipment, including 22 tanks and 20 armored personnel carriers, were also lost. During this period, the Russian army also carried out air strikes on the Ukrainian army's reserve forces stationed in Sumy Oblast. Ukrainian soldiers interviewed by Western media also admitted that they suffered heavy casualties in this operation.
The sudden launch of the Kursk Offensive by the Ukrainian army was undoubtedly a huge military adventure under the influence of high-level political struggles. Although some progress was made in this adventure, and the defensive pressure of the Ukrainian army in Kharkov, Donetsk and other places was slightly eased, the Ukrainian army suffered heavy losses under the fierce counterattack of the Russian army. Some troops were broken up into small pieces under the powerful attack and launched guerrilla warfare with the Russian army. The direction of the Ukrainian army's Kursk Offensive remains to be observed.
In short, the political struggle among the Ukrainian high-level officials has affected military command, and will ultimately waste the Ukrainian army's precious manpower in unrealistic strategic goals.
(Li Shuqi, PhD candidate in the Department of Sociology, Peking University)
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