Russia’s ill fated offensive in Ukraine in February 2022 is now in the third year. With no change in the war aims of the two warring parties, the battles have run the course where adversaries have not been able to achieve their respective objectives given lack of a conventional over match.
Russia’s offensive in 2022 ran its course achieving territorial gains mainly in the South and the East adjacent to the areas where Moscow has had control prior to launch of operations since 2024. The Russian gains with political consolidation included major portions of the Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson Oblasts. Russia controlled the whole of Crimea secured in 2014.
Despite Russian gains, several assessments saw the first year of the War ending in Ukraine’s favour mainly in terms of checking the overall Russian design of gaining control of Kyiv amidst other parts of Ukrainian territory and creating a bridgehead in Kherson.
Ukraine’s relative success led to an optimistic view of a counter offensive by the armed forces duly reinforced by large number of tanks, guns, drones, air defence systems from the West mainly US and Europe succeeding in rolling back at least part of the gains made by Russia in 2023.
However, having faced reverses in terms of implementation of operations as planned in 2022, Russia adopted a layered defensive posture with a series of lines in depth each reinforced with mines and obstacles and covered by combat elements to deny penetration in depth.
Thus, the Ukraine counter offensive in 2023 can best be described as a stalemate which failed to achieve the objective the principal reason being operations driven by optimism rather than harsh realities of the well defended front line.
Ukrainian counter offensive also followed the pattern of Soviet era attrition operations replicating that of their enemy the Russians in 2022. All arms manouvre was not possible due to nature of defences undertaken by the Russians and the mass available to achieve a fighting breakthrough.
That the Ukrainian armed forces chief Valeriy Zaluzhny was eased out of command prior to beginning of a new campaign in 2024 year was wrought in political controversy but the principal reason could be over optimistic plans and possible projections of success of a counter offensive.
Having adopted the defensive, the Russian armed forces used 2023 to reform and regroup forces and increase the level of guns, missiles, munitions and drones through activation of the industrial base and also unlikely allies as Iran and North Korea.
Russia also tapped into the considerable manpower base through mobilisation which also included mercenaries from countries across the World including India and Nepal, the numbers in the latter may be substantial.
Ukraine on the other hand is facing considerable mobilisation challenges with many of the armed forces personnel in the front line having fought through most of the past two years.
Russia was thus poised to launch a general offensive which may be multifront as the Russian Armed Forces may attempt to seek another opportunity at a breakthrough beyond Eastern and Southern Ukraine with ambitions in Kharkiv if not Kyiv.
Given the run of military affairs so far a clean breakthrough for the Russian armed forces is unlikely in 2024 and it would have to be satisfied with an expansion of limited territorial gains.
On viewing Ukraine’s plans and operations so far, the projections on Russian progress in 2024 may be substantiated.
Ukraine is at the end of the offensive tethers figuratively as well as quantitively particularly in terms of trained and fresh manpower and artillery ammunition so essential in battles of attrition that has been the run in the War so far.
With the chain of supplies for this critical commodity [artillery ammunition] having dried up and budgetary challenges in approval for US military aid by the Congress in that country, the portends for Ukraine in 2024 appeared grim.
The fall of Avdiivka and change of command of the Ukraine Armed Forces was perhaps the turning point as Kyiv has turned to the conventional defensive and asymmetric offensive.
Defensive rings are being formed around key objectives to engage Russian forces in attritional battles where the defender has an obvious advantage conserving manpower and munitions.
There is some success in the asymmetric and this does not include the terrorist attack in Crocus City Hall which has resulted in the unfortunate loss of many civilians in which it is assessed that Ukraine has no hand. Though it may serve Moscow well to denote so to the Russian public while providing a reason for sustained targeting of Ukraine civilians in turn.
Ukraine’s drone campaign against Russian military logistics and oil infrastructure has been fairly successful disrupting over 10 percent of the production capabilities as per some estimates [need verification] creating a challenge not only for supply of the armed forces but also exports which has been one of the main stays of income for Moscow.
Another notable success is crippling of the Russian Black Sea fleet. A lesson for navies across the board is that to defeat a navy in the littoral, there is no requirement of a conventional naval fleet as Ukraine demonstrates having no Navy.
Ukrainian partisans operating in Russian occupied territories are another dimension of the same matrix.
For success asymmetric campaigns must be waged in the long term and thus an immediate outcome in 2024 cannot be anticipated but for supplementing conventional operations and denting Russian operational capability.
The main impact of these in the current year will be on morale – this will give the Ukrainian leadership as well as the people a degree of hope while correspondingly lowering that of the Russians.
Conversely, this may lead to unleashing of vicious missile and drone strikes by Russia on Ukrainian civilian targets. Will this impact Ukraine people’s determination and resoluteness to pursue the war remains to be seen, while so far there is no denting of the same, exhaustion can set in if this is waged over a period.
Conclusion
In conclusion it could be said that the War in Ukraine may continue in a stalemate in 2024, which will be a marked success for Ukraine while not so for Russia.
How the two sides prepare for the battles ahead, will public morale wilt in Ukraine, will there be sustained support to Kyiv in the wake of a possible change in the US administration, will Europe if left on its own be able to buttress Kyiv to fight another year and how Russia will respond to the asymmetric threats being posed on multiple fronts will determine the war beyond 2024.
And yet Black Swan events cannot be predicted.