A new plan for Ukraine to defeat Putin | Professor Anthony King

A new plan for Ukraine to defeat Putin | Professor Anthony King

what I see happening is a major battle developing around um the dones area um around particularly the sort of what what what in 2022 was called the Sloan pocket that area on the East Bank uh of the sorry the West Bank of the um SEO denes River and personally I might even think about withdrawing as far as crors and sloviansk or on um some of the towns that say towns that’s a little bit of an exaggeration the sort of villages the larger villages on the outskirts of those two um two larger town cities um uh so and fortifying those Urban positions I mean one of the thing that’s really noticeable in this war is defensive positions have been very powerful because of drone surveillance because of long range artillery fires so defensive the defense has been very strong and when that defense is in the urban it becomes even stronger I’m Professor Anthony King I’m chair of uh security defense studies at the University of EXA and also uh director of the strategy and security Institute the issue of the concept of a bold defense um why did I use the word bold because um one need the minute one talks about defense it sounds like it’s Retreat that it’s a negative act but the the point at which we’re out in the Ukraine war seems to me to have reached a bit of a Crux point if we look at the balance of forces on the battlefield um things have moved over the last six eight months very significantly in uh Russian favor firstly in terms of force numbers the estimates are that Russia have fielded about 400,000 troops into Ukraine which is much larger uh than the first year and indeed the first 18 months of the war whereas the ukrainians um the estimates are possibly 300,000 they have a larger militia but actually forces 300,000 but it may be less so the Russians have a numeric Personnel advantage and they also have increasing advantage in terms of air power and especially artillery um so uh the ukrainians are faring about one shell to every Russian well it depends slightly on the area but between seven and 10 shells so the ukrainians have ended up in a position where it’s very difficult to almost impossible to hold the positions they’re at and at present their forces are being quite badly decimated and ATT treed in the positions they’re holding around areas like chass and along the front in in the dbass so at this point it seems and this was the purpose of the tweet it seems important that that senior commanders allies especially allies wanting to support Ukraine perhaps um Embrace a different Bolder but alternative strategy and a strategy built on a active defense rather than a gradual attrition of the forces at the front it’s extremely easy for me as a civilian to sit back in the UK away from the dangers and and invent strategies um and it’s a it’s an easy thing and in many ways a Despicable thing to do because um one is not bearing any risks or responsibilities here and it must also be said that when we look to um develop a different Ukrainian strategy this a sort of more active uh defensive strategy what I’m talking about here is a very difficult operation so it would require Ukraine forces essentially to keep holding the front line for a while and then behind them reconstituting a force building fortified positions which I would recommend around major urban areas and then withdrawing um the force at the front now that’s called a retrograde operation and they’re the most difficult in military operations so it it is difficult you know and it’s it’s in certain way an impertinent to for a civilian to suggest such a thing but we have reached it seems to me that all of the analysis now um is pointing to a very significant operational shift on the battlefield with the opening of a new front at Kev this puts even more evidence um on the case that the battlefield um balance of power has shifted and that seems to me at this point incumbent that Ukraine are encouraged to adopt a more radical um approach rather than just persisting with the same approach and there’s another Point here Ukrainian forces are currently frankly being pushed back they are on the retreat the Russians have the initiative and what also concerns me is that Western Aid which of course the Republican party was deeply concerned about giving Aid more Aid to the ukrainians that Western Aid will actually be discouraged if all they see is slow gradual defeat in detail and that and and so for me both in terms of what might work on the battlefield and also in encouraging sustaining uh demanding increased Western support seems to me a more positive strategy needs to be put in place and ironically for me the only plausible positive strategy is a defensive one and this is where I’d say oh yeah it’s it’s can’t just be a Retreat it’s got to be a withdrawal with a view to actually defeating and inflicting damage on the Russian forces more effectively while husbanding and preserving Ukrainian forces so it’s a it’s a withdrawal not a retreat still lesser route uh that that’s that that’s that’s the position that I would promote what my position would be in terms of the lines of withdrawal where should the ukrainians withdraw to this is this is a slightly complicated issue and certainly one which a a military commander in Ukraine would have the best um understanding of what plausible lines of Defense um uh uh uh would be would be available because the line of defense that’s best will be also determined by the condition of the Ukrainian forces which of course is some information which only they would know but I would certainly I mean I wouldn’t in any way contemplate relinquishing Dones where the key for me that is the key theater that’s the key area at this point um what I see happening is a major battle developing around um the dones area um around particularly the sort of what what what in 2022 was called the Sloan pocket that area on the East Bank uh of the sorry the West Bank of the um SEO denes River and personally I might even think about withdrawing as far as cremators and sloviansk or on um some of the towns the when I say towns that’s a little bit of an exaggeration the sort of villages the larger villages on the outskirts of those two um two larger town cities um uh so and fortifying those Urban positions I mean one of the thing that’s really noticeable in this war is defensive positions have been very powerful because of drone surveillance because of long range artillery fires so defensive the defense has been very strong and when that defense is in the urban it becomes even stronger so if we look at battles like the Battle of B mut the Battle of marapole or of course the Battle of keev um in each case the powers of the defender were multiplied by being in urban areas because they’re difficult to get into as an attacker they’re difficult to maneuver into um the buildings offer multiple opportunities for fortification for concealment um for defense uh and so urban areas offer a an amplified defensive capability so for me that’s why I might recommend even thinking about a concentration of Ukrainian forces in cremor and sloviansk even though it would effectively relinquish quite a lot of terrain to the Russians but here’s the thing that terrain is relinquished so that effectively becomes what the military call a Killing Zone um targeting boxes in which artillery fire can be um directed so in order to take those towns deeper into dunesque uh namely crors and Sloans the Russians will have to treat a long will have to attack a long way they’ll have to attack across large areas which opens them up up um to attrition intense attrition by artillery fire and that is exactly what happened in 2022 so in the battles of keev and the subsequent attacks they made uh into the dbass area this is exactly what happened that they got terribly um ated as they tried to go around or go into urban areas with the result that a Counterattack was possible and in a sense I would suggest is that maybe by withdrawing into some Urban Fortress with a view to maximizing the damage that Ukrainian artillery air power drones can do that a Counterattack might be possible back end of 2024 early 2025 I mean I don’t think we’re talking about a a complete counter offensive in any way I I think that’s probably improbable certainly in this year uh but but essentially what I would argue for is is it worth thinking about a significant organized withdrawal and concentration of forces to create the conditions for inflicting very serious damage on the advancing Russians I mean certainly at the moment the the attempt to just hold a line which is what the ukrainians are nobly and very bravely trying to do with the balance of forces that they’ve got at their disposal it doesn’t seem to be working brilliantly for them at the moment uh the the troops sort of the the front lines are very thinly held but the distance between the Russian troops and the Ukrainian troops is not is not very much uh and they’re effectively fighting ACR in certain urban areas like uh chazar but across Fields uh across these um not very densely held fronts which are re rolent of the sort of first world war or the second world war but they’re not they’re not the same in the sense they’re not as densely held but if you withdraw let us say you withdraw 10 kilometers or 20 kilometers and you concentrate your Force so you put an infantry Force into a town which lays across through which major roads go so Russia has to advance along those roads through that town in order to take more territory the Infantry hold that territory that town be it crors be at sloviansk the Russians have got to advance to drive them out as they advance to drive them out they form up they must form up into columns Advanced columns uh of vehicles trucks tanks armed Personnel Vehicles etc etc you have to you know to be an organized attack it has to form an attack column well what we know from 22 and indeed 2023 those attack columns are deeply vulnerable to artillery strike because there’s ubiquitous drone coverage so that the ukrainians can see whenever there’s a concentration of Russian forces they it’s very easy to see and simil Sim simultaneously whenever there’s a concentration of Ukrainian forces it’s it’s very easy to see so but if if Ukrainian forces infantry are in towns they’re difficult to see but the Russians are easy to see in the open and the Russians are potentially vulnerable to these um artillery and air strikes as they approach and as they enter um towns and and of course to emphasize and to repeat if we look back to 2022 this is precisely what repeatedly happened to the Russians so they approached the initial attack on keev the airport failed they tried a ground offensive into the North North West and the northeast of Kei both at appalling cost because their March columns were identified by the ukrainians and ATT treed with artillery uh with artillery fire sometimes with javelin and you know anti-tank weapons but often most often with artillery fire similarly around K in the summer of 2022 similar in marip pole similarly at the Battle of rabis similarly at the Battle of bakut so the the IDE idea of a withdrawal to an urbanized Fortress creates an open space a very vulnerable open space across which the Russians if they want to win if they want to attack they’ve got a cross and the thing here is that we know from past operations the Russians are not particularly sophisticated in their military operations and Crossing those areas of dead ground where you are open to artillery fire would require really really extensive SK skill suppressing the artillery covering and camouflaging your assault the Russians have repeatedly shown themselves not capable of doing that so for me um as I say it’s up to Ukrainian commanders what they decide to do it’s their responsibility I totally defer and respect them but I what I would anticipate is we’re approaching a Crux point in this war and that just continuing with the techniques and the tactics and the sort of operational design that ukrainians have and which has served them reasonably well I think you know I might suggest that would be suboptimal and maybe unwise I think uh as I say a bolder strategy might be necessary though I fully recognize implementing it enacting it is going to be difficult both politically and militarily urban areas are incredibly complicated uh and it’s very easy for Defenders to hide in them um and uh and in contemporary military thinking contemporary military Doctrine essentially um uh the armies like the US Army or the British army reckon that in an urban area if you’re on the defense it’s the ratio the combat ratios required to take an urban area is 1 to six or 1 to 10 so if you got 50,000 troops attacking K and one has 5,000 troops in K you might be able to rep repel that offensive so and it’s such a large city it’s very easy for Ukrainian Defenders to hide in it and to fortify certain bits of it which make it extremely difficult for the Russians to take a force of 50,000 is quite a large Force but it’s you you’ve got a very large city of 1 million um so it’s extremely that that those 50,000 troops and when you say 50,000 troops then you talking about you you actually take the combat troops the combat troops is a much smaller element it’s probably 20,000 then they’ve got to rest they can’t be fighting all the time so the actual combat element of a 50,000 Force becomes actually about 10,000 and the minute you got 10,000 a a city of 1 million is a huge objective for that Force to take and if we look at previous battles for instance Battle of mosul which the Iraqi us Coalition fought the Iraqi Army had 94,000 troops um against a similar sized city but there are only 6,000 lightly armed Isis fighters in KV you’ve got a population that absolutely does not want the Russians there and you’ve got significant forces with artillery with drones with air power determined to hold that objective so 50,000 troops for a million for a city of Milli a million is actually you know a bare minimum probably less and the Russians obviously in ke were totally incapable of taking keev with a force of 15,000 it was smaller but the th this is why when you get a large urban area it it requires for for a successful clearance operation it requires prodigious numbers of troops if the Defenders really want to hold on to it and it’s so obvious the Ukraine ukrainians do so then the question is so what’s the threat to K well the threat to K I think and I my own prediction is this is why the Russians have done it it draws forces and it draws Ukrainian commanders attention away from the dones from away from that slovan pocket where operations now are starting to develop in my view so that’s that’s where I that that’s that’s where I am with the K Keef I mean of course I could be to proved totally wrong but I must say I I think that if the Russians really want to take k they need a far larger Force than they’ve currently deployed and so I suspect it’s it’s it’s a it’s a it’s a it’s a way of deviating resources but that’s very serious because it exposes the dbass I think very seriously and and that to me gives even more weight to thinking through an a new operational design for the dombas and an operational design as I’ve said of a operational withdrawal for a bold more effective concentrated defense

“All the analysis points towards an operational shift in the battlefield. Ukraine are encouraged to adopt a more radical approach.”

Ukraine must adopt a “bold defensive operation” by withdrawing to urban towns Kramatorsk and Slovyansk to “inflict damage on the Russian forces more effectively”, says Professor Anthony King.

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