US intelligence says Ukraine’s offensive a failure

The US intelligence community says Ukraine’s offensive has failed by not reaching its stated objective, to take the city of Melitopol.

According to a report in the Washington Post, Ukraine has sought to cut off Crimea from Russia’s army in southern Ukraine. In parallel to that, Ukraine, with US and British help, has been attacking the Kerch Strait bridge that connects Russia to Crimea. While these attacks have damaged the roadway of the bridge, it is still in use.

In fact, the critical fighting is around the village of Robotyne, which is more than 5o miles (80.5 kilometers) from Melitopol. Here the Ukrainians have committed their best-trained strategic reserve forces, including the Ukrainian 82nd Airborne.

Using Western equipment – British Challenger II tanks, Marder (Schützenpanzer Marder 1) infantry fighting vehicles, US Stryker eight-wheeled tanks, Bradley Infantry fighting vehicles and US-built Mine Resistant Ambush Protected heavily armed transports (MRAPs) – the objective was to break through Russian defenses and race to Melitopol.

While the Ukrainians made some temporary gains, these attacks have been extremely costly in men and material. For the most part, the Russians have rolled back the attacking forces.

(If you want to amuse yourself, there are countless stories online that say the Challenger tanks will roll right through the Russians. It hasn’t happened.)

Committing reserves to the battle is a desperate move by Ukraine’s army. Should the reserves take heavy losses, as now seems to be the case, they won’t remain effective fighting units. This could doom Ukrainian plans to continue the war.