Near Kharkov, the Ukrainians again managed to liberate several villages, the invaders are slowly being pushed back to the north. The 72nd Mechanized Brigade them. Czornych Zaporozhye and the 113th Territorial Defense Brigade from Kharkiv.

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Where does the engineer under Izium come from?

On the other hand, under Izium, no change. And this is the great hope of the Russians. Therefore, according to Ukrainian sources, Army General Valery Gerasimov himself appeared here. Of course, there is no confirmation, but there is circumstantial evidence: on April 29, Major General Andrei Simonov, deputy head of the electronic warfare forces of the Russian Federation, died near Izium . Let’s look at his function: neither a commander nor even a staff member – an electronics engineer. Why the hell was he hanging around Izium? There is only one explanation – he was accompanying the Chief of Staff and was probably supposed to explain why Russian communications are so effectively disrupted.

By the way, I wonder why this issue is not addressed by the leader of these troops, Lieutenant General Yuriy Lastochkin himself. Or maybe after successes in the field of electronic warfare, such as the jamming of Ukrainian communications, which work best, the recognition of Ukrainian electronic means, which the Russians cannot follow, after all, on radio stations Russians, you can hear the famous “good evening, we from Ukraine” more often than your own commander – maybe after all these achievements, Lieutenant General Lastochkin is no longer the boss?

Meanwhile, despite renewed artillery fire and repeated attack attempts, as reported by the reliable Mateusz Lachowski traveling in these regions (this man is not afraid of anything, we appreciate it!), the Russians did not haven’t won anything yet. They made little headway through the village of Jampiła towards Ozerne, east of Słowiańsk, but soon a surprise awaits them here – the Donets River. And breaking it will be a challenge.

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The Battle of Donbass resembles the Battle of Kursk

It so happened that in the spring of 1943, Soviet troops occupied the Kursk and Kharkiv region. The Eagle, southwest of Moscow, east of Bryansk, was in German hands, but to the south began a deep cut in the German defenses, a wide arc extending to the southwest corner from Sumy, Ukraine, ending just north of Belgorod. In the center of this arch, in the center of the Soviet break-in, was Kursk, hence its name – Kurski Arch.

It so happened that in the spring of 2022 a deep arc appeared on the front line in Ukraine, this time directed to the east. It begins south of Izium, which is in Russian hands, reaches Severodonetsk in the east, and ends in Donetsk in the south, which is also in enemy hands. In the center of this arc are Sloviansk and Kramatorsk, although no one has yet called it the Slavic Arc.

In 1943 the Germans saw an opportunity to eliminate much of the Soviet forces in the arc by striking from Orel in the north and from Belgorod in the south towards Kursk. In 2022, the Russians saw an opportunity to eliminate a significant portion of Ukrainian troops in the arc by converging strikes from Izium in the north and Donetsk in the south towards Sloviansk and Kramatorsk.

In 1943, it took the Germans more than three months to build up their forces, and they did not begin the operation until July 1943. During this time, the Soviets solidly built up defenses in the planned directions of attack , as the German plan was too obvious and easy to read. There were no surprises.

In 2022, it took more than three weeks for the Russians to gather their forces, and they only started the operation in the last decade of April. At this time, the Ukrainians solidly built defenses in the planned directions of attack, since the Russian plan was too obvious and easy to read. There were no surprises.

In 1943, the German attack in the north was – after heavy fighting – stopped quite quickly, the Germans made little progress from Orel to the south. In the south, however, Germany’s finest WWII commander, Field Marshal Erich von Manstein, created a dangerous situation by ramming into the Soviet defences.

In 2022, the Russian advance in the south was – after heavy fighting – stopped quite quickly, the Russians did not move north at all from Avdyivka near Donetsk. In the north, however, Major General Ivan Shkanov, the rising star of the Russian military, created a dangerous situation by ramming into Ukrainian defences. The whole picture looks like a mirror image of Kursk, if you turn everything 180 degrees – then the arc bent to the west will bend to the east, and the north will become south.

In 1943, even in the south, the Germans were having difficulty breaking through the determined Soviet defence, so Manstein ordered the elite II SS Panzer Corps to bypass them from the right, through Prokhorovka. But here, too, he was stopped by a counterattack of the 5th Guards Tank Army. The advance has stopped.

In 2022, even in the north, the Russians struggled to break through the determined Ukrainian defenses, so Shkanov led the elite 4th Guards Kantemirovsky Tank Division and the 106th Tula Airborne Division to the right bypass, via Barwinkowo. But here, too, they were stopped by a counterattack of the 3rd Armored Brigade and the 81st Ukrainian Airborne Brigade. The advance has stopped.

I leave the taste for the end – both battles took place on the same route: Orel-Kursk-Belgorod-Kharkiv-Izium-Sloviansk-Kramatorsk-Donetsk. Yes then, yes now it is one of the main roads in this region.

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How are the Russian commanders?

During the Battle of Kursk, the Red Army was commanded by the cream of Soviet generals. In the north, Marshal Walter Model was arrested by Marshal Konstanty Rokossowski, who has Polish roots. Interesting, but also controversial, figure as Polish post-war defense minister, he has both faults against us and merits, but he was undoubtedly a brilliant commander, he had to his credit really well done operations. To this day, American textbooks cite Operation “Bagration” in Belarus in June and July 1944 as an example, when Rokossovsky acted not with force and mass, but with quick concentration, efficient maneuver and effective reaction to the evolution of the situation on the battlefield.

As a Polish minister, he stubbornly learned Polish. Once he called his secretary, handed her a document and said: please take your clothes off with this and come back to me. Rokossovsky was a tall, handsome, rather cultured man by Soviet standards, and women liked him, but the secretary blushed slightly with fear. Little did she know that the marshal was confused by the apparent similarity of the words. “Rozbiratsja” does not mean “to undress”, but to understand what is happening, to understand it. Rokossovsky did not understand what the document was talking about in Polish and asked for help.

Do the Russians today have commanders like Rokossovsky? The famous marshal received a secondary education, he graduated from the Gymnasium of the Assembly of Merchants at ul. Twarda in Warsaw. Most Soviet commanders didn’t even have that, they were usually finishing a few years of primary school when World War I broke out.

Commanders today are slightly better educated. For example, Lieutenant General Sergey Kisiel, born in a Russian family in Kazakhstan. He graduated from the Higher School of Armored Forces named after Marshal Rybałka in Tashkent at the end of the USSR and after the collapse of the USSR, in the years 1989-1993. Maybe the military school located in Uzbekistan was not too elitist, but Kisiel completed his studies. In 2003, he followed an operational course at the Military Academy. Mikhail Frunze in Moscow, and in 2016 the famous “Voroshilovka” – Academy of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces.

They graduated from this school Army General Wojciech Jaruzelski, Army General Florian Siwicki or General Czesław Piątas, as well as many commanders in the People’s Republic of Poland and at the beginning of the Third Republic of Poland. I have known many Polish graduates from Russian academies and I can say that they were well prepared in terms of content. Those who wanted to learn something from the Soviets had conditions. Although everyone, as one man, mentioned Lenin’s quote provided two more points. At the Yuri Gagarin Aviation Academy in Monino near Moscow, the course participants were even assured that they were sober, alcohol was prohibited, so they bought vodka in their own embassies, where you could buy native liquors.

A friend of mine told me that once in the morning in the dormitory, a KGB officer who took care of the academy was sitting at the duty officer’s desk, and the cleaners brought him some garbage cans. The brave counterintelligence officer placed empty vodka bottles on the desk, grouping them by nationality: here Czech Becherovka, here Polish Żytnia, and there East German schnapps. This is how he determined who drank how much against the ban…

Of course, Lieutenant General Kisiel could have had a decent education, but his main school was the mafia-robber-corruption system that prevailed in the army of the Russian Federation. Under his command, the 1st Guards Tank Army at Bakowka near Moscow was badly beaten near Brovary, east of kyiv. The 13th Guards Tank Regiment Szepietowski was destroyed near Trościaniec – the unit practically ceased to exist. When they wanted to recreate it with the tanks stored in Naro-Forminsk, it turned out that they were unusable because their equipment had been stolen.

His command did not impress the Russian leadership. According to the Ukrainian Intelligence Directorate, the GUR was dismissed “for incompetence in the command of troops, personal indecisiveness and cowardice, which led to the loss of control of the situation and the massive enslavement of conscripts”. Incidentally those conscripts who were not officially sent to Ukraine… However, in the opinion of the soldier and the commander, there is no more crushing accusation than that of cowardice. For such a thing, there is a court-martial and a very severe punishment.

The commander of the 1st Guards Tank Army, who always ends up being considered the best, turned out to be an indecisive, incompetent and cowardly general. So who are these worst Russian commanders?

He was replaced by Major General Ivan Shkanov, born in Ulyanovsk in the Far East. In 2021, he was a colonel. Where does the jump to army commander come from? Was it impossible to find among the senior generals someone who was decisive, competent and yet not a coward?

Bryc: The enigma of the impotence of the Russian army? Corruption