A Ukrainian drone seconds before striking Russian infantry outside Robotyne.
65th Mechanized Brigade capture
After a brutal, four-month defense against a Russian force 10 times its size, the Ukrainian army’s 110th Mechanized Brigade on Friday finally quit the ruins of Avdiivka, in eastern Ukraine just northwest of Russian-occupied Donetsk.
Avdiivka, with its once thriving heavy industry and pre-war population of 30,000, is the first significant Ukrainian city to fall to the Russians in nearly a year—and it’s no secret why. Russia-aligned Republicans in the U.S. Congress began blocking further U.S. aid to Ukraine starting in October.
The 110th Brigade fought until it ran out of ammunition. Ammunition the Americans once provided.
Sensing weakness as the 110th Brigade retreated, the Russian army attacked in several sectors along the 600-mile front of Russia’s two-year wider war on Ukraine.
But not every Ukrainian brigade is as tired, outnumbered and ammo-starved as the 110th is. Ukrainian forces not only held the line this weekend, they inflicted heavy casualties on the over-confident Russian brigades and regiments, including at least one unit that tried to assault Ukrainian positions in the south in un-upgraded, 70-year-old T-55 tanks.
That unit—apparently from the 42nd Motor Rifle Division—got wrecked as it crossed, from west to east, a mile of flat terrain separating Russian lines from positions held by the Ukrainian army’s 65th Mechanized Brigade in Robotyne, one of the larger settlements the Ukrainians liberated last summer.
The 65th Brigade threw everything it had at the Russian assault group, which numbered dozens of 41-ton, four-person T-55s, 13-ton MT-LB armored tractors with room for 13 people and 13-ton BMP fighting vehicles with space for 11.
Firing cluster shells and anti-tank missiles and flinging explosive first-person-view drones, the 65th Brigade defeated the attack—and exacted some revenge for the men and women of the 110th Brigade who died defending Avdiivka.
One Ukrainian drone struck the top of a BMP as several Russian soldiers rode on top of the vehicle. Another drone hit an MT-LB right behind the driver’s head, poking from the hatch. A T-55 ate an anti-tank missile. A few Russian infantry made it into a trench, only to come under fire from cluster shells dispensing scores of grenade-size submunitions.
As the dust settled on Monday, open-source analyst Andrew Perpetua counted—all along the front line—28 damaged, destroyed and abandoned Russian tanks and fighting vehicles. He counted just six damaged, destroyed and abandoned Ukrainian tanks and fighting vehicles.
The failed attack on Robotyne accounted for most of the Russians’ losses. That assault group reportedly lost 18 vehicles and 70 people.
That the Russians largely failed to press their firepower advantage after rolling over Avdiivka should come as no surprise. The Russian military initially sent 40,000 troops to attack Avdiivka’s garrison with its few thousand troops.
After 13,000 Russian fell dead or wounded through early December, the Kremlin reinforced the 2nd and 41st Combined Arms Armies around Avdiivka. Thousands more died, including 1,300 in a single day as the Russian campaign culminated.
The Russian force in Ukraine numbers 470,000 troops, perhaps a quarter of whom are infantry and vehicle crews. Potentially six percent of the total force, and one out of every four combat troops, fell in Avdiivka.
The Kremlin is mobilizing more troops and restoring more long-stored vehicles—MT-LBs and T-55s, among them—in order to make good its losses. Analysts have concluded the Russians have enough people and equipment to keep fighting through 2025.
But that doesn’t mean the Russian army can sustain, for two years, the kind of effort it took to capture Avdiivka. Expect Russia’s winter offensive to slow as battered field armies reset and the Kremlin rebuilds its offensive combat power.
Slow, but not halt. The Ukrainians are desperately low on ammunition as Russia-aligned Republicans continue to block U.S. aid. As long as Ukrainian brigades must count every missile, shell and drone, Russian regiments—flush with ammo from Iran and North Korea—will have the momentum.
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