Ukraine SitRep: Kurakhove Cauldron, Broken Deals
October 30, 2024
Emil Kastehelmi of the Black Bird Group gives a good overview of the current situation in south-east Ukraine.
Since the Ukrainian command had sent its best units to die in the senseless incursion of the Russian Kursk oblast, the Ukrainian frontline in the south-east deteriorated significantly. Russian forces progressed along the whole frontline.
There are simply too few Ukrainian soldiers to hold the defensive positions. The increased use of Russian FAB bombs destroy Ukrainian positions and let the Russians proceed.
The most recent Russian progress from the south and the east show the formation of another cauldron which could capture Ukrainian units in and around Kurakhove.
Russian troops from the east and the south will likely aim at the towns of Andrivka and Konstantinopyl where the T-05-15 road joins the H-15 highway.
This would block the supply lines to Kurakhove and all Ukrainian units positioned around it.
There is a gap in the Ukrainian defense positions left (blue lines) through which such an attack can proceed.
In this situation the best possible move for the Ukrainian side is an immediate retreat of some 30 kilometers west where forests, another river and the agglomeration around the city of Ivanivka allow for better defenses.
That however is not what the Ukrainian command will order its troops to do. It will rather continue to waste its infantry in another senseless hold-to-the-last-men postion.
There are interesting new details about renewal of a deal to stop attacks on infrastructure in Russia and Ukraine. Previously negotiations about such a deal were stopped when Ukraine had launched its Kursk incursion.
The Financial Times reports today that the talks are being renewed (archived):
Ukraine and Russia are in preliminary discussions about halting strikes on each other’s energy infrastructure, according to people familiar with the matter.
The FT however agrees that any progress is unlikely unless the Ukraine retreats from Kursk.
The real news from the FT is that there had been - which was unknown so far - a previous deal in place:
Four Ukrainian officials told the Financial Times that Kyiv and Moscow had come to a “tacit agreement” last autumn to not strike each other’s energy facilities.As a result, Russia that winter refrained from the type of large-scale attacks it had conducted on Ukraine’s power infrastructure in 2022-23, according to two Ukrainian officials and a person in Washington with knowledge of the situation.
That agreement was meant to pave the way towards a formal deal, the people said.
However, Kyiv restarted drone attacks on Russia’s oil facilities in February and March this year, as it sought to increase pressure on Moscow after its failed 2023 counteroffensive.
Despite a warning from the White House to stop the strikes, Kyiv pressed ahead, and Moscow viewed the tacit agreement as having been broken, people familiar with the situation said.
Russia then escalated, unleashing barrages of long-range missiles aimed at power plants across Ukraine, including the Trypilska thermal power plant 40km from Kyiv, which was completely destroyed.
...
Russia’s response to Kyiv’s attacks plunged much of Ukraine into temporary darkness and cut 9GW of power generation capacity — half of what Ukraine needed last year to get through winter. Kyiv has proved unable to fully restore this capacity.
The fact that Ukraine had broken a previous deal, and that it attacked in Kursk while negotiations on a renewal were ongoing, makes it unlikely that Russia will agree to anything but a surrender of the Ukrainian side.
Posted by b on October 30, 2024 at 12:44 UTC | Permalink