Today, there are a lot of interesting updates from the Kursk direction.
Here, Russians launched a new offensive into Ukrainian territory, trying to cut off the remaining Ukrainian forces in Kursk. However, as there are fallen soldiers piled up along the border, it quickly became clear that any hope for the Russians to launch their own incursion was too farfetched.
Initially, Russian forces attempted to overrun Ukrainian troops by directly assaulting the contingent as they withdrew from Kursk. However, the Ukrainians had established solid fallback lines at the villages of Gogolevka and Rubanshchina to secure their withdrawal, forcing the Russians into a three-day battle for the small settlement of Rubanshchina, which massively delayed Russian advances.
As it became clear that attempting to overrun the Ukrainians directly would lead to further failure, the Russians decided on an entirely different approach. Despite the larger part of the force having already successfully pulled back, the Russians still aimed to encircle and eliminate the remaining Ukrainian contingent in Kursk and Sumy.
Russia’s Sumy gambit collapses
To still claim victory, the Russians decided to launch an offensive into Sumy Oblast itself. The main focus of the Russian effort became capturing Novenke and Basivka and gaining direct fire control over the Sumy-Sudzha Highway, which remains the primary Ukrainian supply line for their efforts to the northeast. Securing the road would trap Ukrainian defenders and finally set conditions to capture at least some of the withdrawing Ukrainian forces. However, the Russians suffered from a massive drawback: catastrophic losses sustained in Kursk severely undermined their ability to launch a follow-up offensive into Ukrainian territories.
According to various estimates, Russian forces suffered up to 55,000 casualties during 7,5 months of intense fighting and multiple failed counteroffensive attempts in Kursk. Notably, these losses far exceed the initial deployment of 50,000 soldiers Russians had initially moved to Kursk to repulse the Ukrainian incursion. It means that Russians had to move an increasingly large number of reserves from other sectors of the front—amongst them even wounded soldiers—as well as rely on the North Koreans to push the Ukrainians out finally. Ukrainian sources also report that the Russians have lost up to 2,100 vehicles in Kursk, including over 750 armored personnel carriers, infantry fighting vehicles, and tanks, resulting in a significant deficit in the Russian forces’ armored reserve at Kursk.
Scooters and civilian vehicles expose Russian desperation
While the exact number of Russian forces still present and combat-ready in this sector is unknown, it is clear they do not have the ability to launch their follow-up offensive to encircle even a part of the Ukrainian Kursk forces. As a result, geolocated footage shows that also here, Russian soldiers were forced to cross open fields to assault Ukrainian positions on foot, in civilian vehicles, and even on electric scooters.
Despite the lack of proper vehicles, Russians sent forth a continuous wave of assaults, hoping to overwhelm Ukrainians and accomplish their objectives through sheer numbers. Unfortunately for the Russians, the unarmored nature of the vehicles they used allowed the Ukrainians to leverage their artillery to inflict even more devastating losses on the Russian attacks. Additionally, Ukrainian drone operators, by this point, had time to completely relocate to the rear in Sumy, launching waves of drones at the constant Russian assault.
The evolving nature of Russian military capabilities in one of their most important sectors, that is, Kursk, highlights the desperate conditions the Russian military finds itself in. Additionally, the Ukrainian incursion into Belgorod only made the situation worse for the Russians, as the already dwindling number of reserves had to be urgently redirected to hold the second Ukrainian advance into Russian territory. With the active frontline now increasing by over a third, Russian forces quickly lost their ability to send continuous waves of soldiers into their flanking operation, as their efforts ultimately stalled.
Overall, the Russians attempted to achieve a breakthrough in Sumy Oblast of Ukraine and cut off the Ukrainian forces withdrawing from Kursk, but their lack of proper equipment ultimately doomed their offensive plans. With the Ukrainians having pulled most of their troops out already, the soldiers stand ready to repulse any future reintensified Russian efforts into Ukraine. However, dead Russian infantry piling up on the approaches and forests leading into Sumy make the prospect of any large-scale Russian offensive into Ukrainian territory increasingly unfeasible.
In our regular frontline report, we pair up with the military blogger Reporting from Ukraine to keep you informed about what is happening on the battlefield in the Russo-Ukrainian war.
