1 July 2024

Ukraine Military Situation: Russian Forces Maintain Offensive Combat Operations Along Multiple Fronts – Analysis

Can Kasapoğlui

1. Battlefield Assessment

Russian forces maintained offensive combat operations along multiple axes. In eastern and northeastern Ukraine, Russian units assaulted areas near Bakhmut and in the outer rings of Kharkiv, and secured marginal advances in ground attacks around Chasiv Yar and Avdiivka. In southern Ukraine, the Kremlin’s forces scaled up offensive action around Kamianske in Zaporizhzhia Oblast.

Fierce battles raged on the Kharkiv axis, particularly near Vovchansk. Moscow continued to send inadequately equipped troops to their death in large numbers in northeastern Ukraine, where the Ukrainian Armed Forces are enveloping and isolating the invading servicemen. Several sources confirm that Ukrainian units trapped and captured hundreds of Russian soldiers attempting a river crossing near the PJSC Volchansky Chemical Plant.

Moscow has increased its use of glide bombs to advance its multifront push. This tactic has allowed Russian forces to conduct more expansive ground operations and accelerate the destruction and depopulation of critical urban combat zones, a long-standing Kremlin strategy since its wars in Chechnya in the 1990s. Last week Moscow targeted a three-story building in Kharkiv with a FAB-3000 glide bomb from a Sukhoi-34 fighter-bomber, the first documented employment of the munition in Ukraine. This giant weapon, which weighs over three tons, lacks the aerodynamics and precision of smaller smart munitions but has a massive kill radius that makes it a formidable asset.

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