[Korrespondent] Zaluzhny’s statements continue to be discussed in Ukraine
On the front, “there will be no deep and beautiful breakthrough,” a deadlock has arrived that can only be overcome by a technological breakthrough, notes Valery Zaluzhny.
For the second day, Ukraine is discussing the resonant publications of Valery Zaluzhny in The Economist. The commander-in-chief admitted that there would be no breakthrough at the front; the parties had reached a technological dead end. Meanwhile, the Russians continue to attack Avdeevka in the hope of capturing it.
THE COUNTEROFFENSIVE WAS UNSUCCESSFUL
The progress of the counteroffensive, Zaluzhny explained, undermined Western hopes that Ukraine could use its advance to show the Kremlin that the war cannot be won, and thus change Putin's calculations, forcing him to the negotiating table.
It also undermined Zaluzhny's assumption that he could stop Russia by bleeding its troops dry. "That was my fault. Russia suffered at least 150,000 dead. In any other country, such losses would have stopped the war,” said the commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. But not in Russia, he added, where life is cheap and where Putin is guided by the First and Second World Wars, in which Russia lost tens of millions of people.
During the counteroffensive, the Ukrainian army had to advance at a speed of 30 km per day, breaking through the Russian defense lines. This is stated in NATO textbooks and can be calculated mathematically. Four months should have been enough for the Ukrainian Armed Forces to reach Crimea and fight there.
But the commander-in-chief watched as troops got stuck in minefields and equipment was destroyed by Russian artillery and drones. At first he believed that the cause of the malfunction lay in the shortcomings of the commanders, so he made personnel changes. Later it became more obvious that this may be due to the inability of the fighters to perform their duties in accordance with real conditions. And after visiting Avdeevka, Zaluzhny came to the conclusion that the problem lies in technological development.
“On the day when I was there (in Avdeevka), on our monitor screens we watched as 140 Russian vehicles were on fire - they were destroyed four hours after they came into the zone of fire from our artillery. Those who ran away were pursued by FPV drones,” the general said. The same picture unfolded during the attempts of the Ukrainian troops to advance.
“In order to break the deadlock, we need something new, such as gunpowder, which the Chinese invented and which we still use to kill each other,” Zaluzhny noted.
SITUATION AT THE FRONT
The occupiers unsuccessfully tried to restore the lost position near Khromovoy, Kleshcheevka and Andreevka in the Bakhmut direction, where the Defense Forces repulsed 15 enemy attacks.
Also in the Avdeevka direction, the enemy, with the support of aviation, does not abandon attempts to encircle Avdeevka, but the Ukrainian Armed Forces, according to the General Staff, are staunchly holding the defense, inflicting significant losses on the Russian Army.
Ukrainian defense forces continue to advance in the Melitopol direction. And in the Kherson direction, the Ukrainian Armed Forces are conducting a counter-battery fight, inflicting fire on the enemy’s rear.
THE SITUATION IN AVDEEVKA
According to military observer Yuri Butusov, near Avdeevka, Russian infantry has entrenched itself behind the railway and is preparing to attack the Avdeevka coke plant, a key complex of structures that controls the approaches to Avdeevka.
“The capture of the plant will mean a gradual but inevitable collapse of the defense and the capture of the city. Suddenly it turned out that during the war in Avdeevka not a single leader had built a rear line of defense, and we had to dig in now, there were no ready-made positions.
“Russian assault operations continue south of Avdeevka, where they are expanding a breakthrough in the area of a sand quarry near the village of Opytnoye, which is the second direction of coverage of Avdeevka. Here the threat also intensifies. In combat operations directly in the city of Avdeevka, Ukrainian troops are successful. The 110th Mechanized Brigade skillfully repelled all Russian attacks, completely restored several positions that the enemy captured during massive assaults on October 10-19, and even improved its positions in some directions. There is no threat of the enemy entering the city at the moment,” Butusov asserts.
