MILITARY & STRATEGIC:
BATTLE FOR POKROVSK ENTERS NEW STAGE

Russian assaults on a wide front designed to push their lines closer to Pokrovsk have increased to as many as 28 per day in many parts of the front. The war here is intense with some of the most demanding fighting so far encountered. Russian desperation to break the lines here is palpable.
Pokrovsk is the centre of six major highways that supply the frontlines over a wide area as well as a major rail junction. Its loss would be a strategic blow of some significance. It is the domino that should it fall, has the potential to take down so many others along the front. This is why Russia is expending so much effort on it.
Ukraine’s defence in the centre hangs on two villages currently in the heat of the battle - these are the last urban areas before open land and Pokrovsk itself.
The Russians are also trying to force their way south of the salient to widen it because they’re aware it’s become too extended and risks counter attacks and spoiling operations.
Their fear is that if the salient remains too narrow the Ukrainians will have too easy a time of hitting their artillery as they move it forward for the assault on Pokrovsk itself. Widening the salient is just as important as moving it forward.
They’re already trying to move artillery up but it’s quickly spotted and destroyed by FPV drones.
Moving south from the salient and west from the front below it also puts pressure on the important town or Kurakov.
The problem the Russians are facing is that months of repair and refurbishment work on hundreds of soviet era BMP type armoured vehicles has largely disappeared- the loss rate has been phenomenal during these offensives and there’s clearly a lack of vehicles to support secondary operations if the main Pokrovsk front is to proceed.
The result of the level of intensity the Russians have maintained is rapidly increasing exhaustion of its fast dwindling armour reserves. It’s becoming difficult to find any of the many Russian stockpiled armour bases with anything but dregs left in them.
Their own pace of operations in trying to do too much is undermining their ability to achieve their primary goal.
Part of Ukraine’s problem has been its own commanders from the regional to the three tactical commands.
This became such an issue that Syrski and his staff - obsessed with the Kursk operation had to down tools and head for the Pokrovsk command to sort it out. This resulted in some changes in structure and after banging a few heads together a new vigour and sense of purpose was created. This had reasonably rapid results and Ukrainian coordination and defence capabilities rose noticeably.
Russian manpower losses just in the Pokrovsk front are close to 1,200 per day, let alone the rest of the frontline. It simply isn’t sustainable.
Ukraine has placed rested combat ready formations into the line and recommenced counter attacks against weaker areas of the Russian lines - actually halting the Russian advance for almost eight days now. One inventive Ukrainian tank commander used his vehicle to drag destroyed Russian armour under a railway bridge so that the Russians couldn’t get through.
It’s a little early to declare the Russian offensive culminated but it’s certainly looking like they have no chance of reaching Pokrovsk this year - and maybe they never will. The vast expenditure of men and material is finally sapping their capacity to attack.
Russia is likely reorganising accepting that the Pokrovsk target is unviable. They will therefore have to carry on trying the southern expansion of the salient because it’s vital to Russia to prevent Ukrainian counter attacks. Ukraine knows this and isn’t going to make it easy for them.
The fact it took Syrski and the General Staff weeks to identify what was happening at Pokrovsk because they were so caught up in the Kursk offensive, and that it took their personal intervention to put it right - and then only after a wave of complaints publicly aired by frontline troops, is not an encouraging sign.