The more Russian commanders casually attrit their men, the more vulnerable the Russian army will be to a Ukrainian counterattack.
Even for an army long known for how casually it values the lives of its soldiers, the Russians seem to be taking things to a new level.
In the midst of the long-rumored Russian winter offensive — yes, it’s here, despite its underwhelming nature — the Russians have resorted to shockingly unimaginative tactics: They’re throwing mobilized conscripts at prepared Ukrainian defensive positions. When that doesn’t work, the Russian commanders throw more conscripts at the trenches.
The New York Times‘ Andrew Kramer, reporting from Lyman, Ukraine, writes:
A year into the war in Ukraine, the Russian military has suffered staggering losses — as many as 200,000 troops killed or wounded, Western officials say, and thousands of tanks and armored vehicles destroyed or captured by Ukraine. Russia is running low on artillery shells and cruise missiles, and is having trouble replenishing its stocks because of Western sanctions. Many of its most elite, best-trained and experienced units have been decimated, left in a shambles that experts say will probably take years, rather than months, to recover from.
In their places, Russia is being forced to rely on tens of thousands of newly conscripted soldiers rushed to the front with little time for instruction. Their inexperience was evident to Diesel from what he saw on the battlefield. “By how they move,” he said, “I see they are not professional.”
The problem for the Russians can be boiled down to leadership.
The Russians never had much of it at the small-unit level, and what little they did have was attrited during the disastrous early lunges into Ukraine. As I have written before, the post-Soviet Russian army has always lacked a professional NCO corps, which meant that small-unit leadership roles that would be owned by NCOs in a Western army were filled by junior officers. Unfortunately for the average Russian conscript, many of the best trained young Russian officers didn’t survive 2022.
A good military officer or NCO must always be ready to order his men to their deaths. It’s part of the job, and that burden of command rests heavily on anyone placed in a position of military leadership. American officers are tutored to respond to that burden by holding their soldiers’ lives second only to the mission. Preparation, hard training, and a brotherly commitment to each other is the salve that may in some measure absolve the commander of the weight he must bear in knowing that his men died or were wounded on his watch. But this is a very hard thing to endure. As Michael Shaara had Robert E. Lee say in the novel The Killer Angels, “To be a good soldier you must love the army. But to be a good officer you must be willing to order the death of the thing you love.”
It’s hard to argue, however, after watching the way in which they’re operating, that the Russian commanders love their men. As Kramer writes in a second report from the front lines, describing a criminally amateurish mechanized assault by the Russians up a road:
[Ukranian] anti-tank teams hiding in tree lines along the fields, and armed with American infrared-guided Javelins and Ukrainian laser-guided Stugna-P missiles, powered up their weapons. Farther away, artillery batteries were ready. The dirt road had been left free of mines, while the fields all about were seeded with them, so as to entice the Russians to advance while preventing tanks from turning around once the trap was sprung.
The column of tanks becomes most vulnerable, Lieutenant Bayak said, after the shooting starts and drivers panic and try to turn around — by driving onto the mine-laden shoulder of the road. Blown-up vehicles then act as impediments, slowing or stalling the column. At that point, Ukrainian artillery opens fire, blowing up more armor and killing soldiers who clamber out of disabled machines. A scene of chaos and explosions ensues, the lieutenant said.
In the parlance of the U.S. Marine Corps, these Russians have chosen “comfort-based decisions” — the path of least resistance. Again, this is far more a leadership failure than a tactical one. A good leader — a leader who knew what he was doing and loved his men — would have found another way.
It’s hard to see how any of this will get better for the Russians. Last fall’s mobilization appears to have largely failed in its strategic objectives. Yes, the Russian high command has managed to pull a couple of hundred thousand civilians into the army and push them into Ukraine. But there is scant evidence that the average conscript received the training that would be commensurate with the task at hand.
PHOTOS: Russian-Ukraine War
Good training for modern war is, as any veteran will tell you, incredibly difficult to achieve. For well-planned and -executed training, the logistical, ammunition, and cognitive requirements are immense. Hard, realistic military exercises require that units be put into incredibly demanding tactical scenarios in which leaders at all levels are forced to make decisions.
Critically, a cadre of experienced soldiers and instructors must be present to evaluate a unit or a leader’s performance and correct and instruct it into better practices. Units and commanders must be allowed to fail.
A failure to correct bad habits only reinforces them — and those habits are often the hallmark of inexperienced troops and the type of things that get them killed.
It shouldn’t be any surprise that this type of training didn’t happen late last fall and winter in the Russian interior. As the days grew short and cold, most conscripts called to duty do not appear to have received much training beyond weapons familiarization. There were likely very few experienced instructors and evaluators around. After all, with a shortage to begin with and a dire need for experience at the front, where would they have come from?
The Russian winter offensive, such as it is, will likely go on for a few more weeks, throwing thousands of men at Ukrainian positions. Their mass will likely win a few crossroads and villages. But the Russian army is in no shape to exploit a breakout.
Worse, the more they casually attrit their men, the more vulnerable the Russian army will be to a Ukrainian counterattack.
Unfortunately for the Russians, if last year’s counterattacks are to be the model, the Ukrainians are not going to be very casual about things at all.