Ukrainian Armed Forces success in Lyman opens gates for the liberation of Donbas.  Serhiy Zgurets column

The number of Russian troops in Lyman was approximately 4.5–5 thousand fighters, the losses of the enemy will be known in a short period of time.

Ukrainian Armed Forces completely liberated Lyman. President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi told it, and the command of the Eastern group of Ukrainian troops commented on the situation: demining is currently underway in the city, conditions are being created for the restoration of life in Lyman. Some units remain in the city, and the rest move on to further liberate our territories.

The battle for Lyman was a continuation of the north-eastern offensive of the Ukrainian army

Lloyd Austin, the head of the Pentagon, already congratulated the efforts of the Ukrainian soldiers and called their success inspiring. The battle for Lyman was a continuation of the northeastern offensive of the Ukrainian army, which began in September, when Balaklia, Kupyansk, Izyum, as well as dozens of settlements and villages and thousands of square kilometers of Ukrainian land were liberated. Of course, this victory has a military and political-psychological component. Russians declare the annexation of Ukrainian lands, and the Ukrainian army returns these territories under the control of Ukraine very quickly.  The Ministry of Defense of Russia announces the withdrawal of Russian troops from Lyman to more advantageous positions to avoid, as the enemy says, the threat of encirclement. This is a new version of the "gesture of goodwill", which, I think, will only multiply in the future.

Also in Russia, they began to look for those responsible for the escape from Lyman, there both Kadyrov and Prigozhin began to find out who was to blame, they looked for the extremists and found there in the person of the same commander of the central military district, Colonel Oleksandr Lapin. I think this story will continue. And there is also the question of Russian losses in this zone. There were about 5,000 live enemy forces there since the beginning of the operation, but this number is more likely to be lower due to losses and the enemy's attempts to escape from the cauldron in small groups.

As for the military component of the Lyman operation, I think that it is of operational importance for the further advancement of the Armed Forces, because it actually opens the gates for the liberation of Donbas. This is a movement either to Svatove or to Kreminna, and then pushing the enemy out of the Luhansk region as one of the options for the development of this situation.  Actually, these are opportunities that our General Staff can take advantage of in view of the available forces, means and reserves, and, of course, to understand the situation with all the necessary data, which we lack in this volume.

I asked Reserve Colonel and Defense Strategy Center expert Viktor Kevlyuk about the aspects related to the Lyman operation, what opportunities this success opens up for the Ukrainian army in the future

First of all, it is worth paying attention to the fact that the General Staff conducts the operation, while operating with an interdepartmental grouping of troops.  This is aerobatics, it is an extremely difficult task, because various forces and means belonging to different departments are concentrated under a single leadership. Apparently, Ukraine is currently the only country that has practical experience of conducting such operations.  It is very difficult from an organizational point of view, in terms of coordination, but at the same time, the Armed Forces, the National Guard, units of the National Police perform their tasks in the same area without interfering with each other, even to the point that Ukrtelecom and the post office are also present in areas where combat operations are conducted  actions are over and normal civilized life is being restored for people.

Regarding the military aspect

We see that the development of events in Kharkiv Oblast has led to certain changes in the north of Donetsk Oblast, and all this results in the fact that, most likely, in the next week, maybe two, the Armed Forces of Ukraine will enter the administrative border of Kharkiv and Luhansk regions. The state border has been reached: the state border service returns to guarding the designated areas.  The conditions are certainly taken into account, that shelling and provocations continue from that side.  The other day, the 138th Brigade of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation tried to stage something like an offensive in the area of ​​the Hoptivka checkpoint - they did not succeed.

We see that the supply route of the Donetsk group through Urazovo, Kupyansk and further to the South has been cut.  Gradually, thanks to the successful operation in the Lyman area, we are advancing in the direction of the second route from North to South: Troitske, Svatove, Rubizhne, Severodonetsk and further to the South, that is, the second supply line will be cut.  Under these conditions, the Russian group in the Luhansk and Donetsk regions will remain exclusively with logistics through the Rostov region.  This is quite far, although in principle it will still allow to supply all the necessary troops, which the enemy managed to withdraw.

Lyman operation has been completed, it is about 50 km from Lyman directly to Severodonetsk, about 40 km from Kupyansk to Nizhnaya Duvanka, about 30 km from Borova to Svatovo.  That is, this is such a tactical perspective that within 3-5 days it is quite possible that our troops will appear both in Svatovo and in Rubizhny.  Therefore, the development of events is very favorable for us, and extremely unfavorable for the right flank of the enemy's Donetsk group.

I asked reserve colonel Viktor Kevlyuk to give an estimate of the number of enemy troops defending in the Lyman area

This is such military accounting, everyone wants to know the last soldier, and what happened there. It is impossible to do this in view of the following. There was a clear number of units of the armed forces of the Russian Federation: if I am not mistaken, there were 252 and 752 motorized rifle regiments, units of 21 separate motorized rifle brigades, which have a distinct staff and number. There were approximately two battalion tactical groups of incomplete composition from each of them.  Artillery units of the 147th Self-Propelled Artillery Regiment were not numerous, there were reports that the "Uragan" jet division went there, although only 7 launchers instead of 12. The other forces are the 13th and 16th Bars units of the active combat reserve of the country. The 13th detachment is the "Russian Legion", the 16th is the "Kuban" detachment - their numbers cannot be estimated, we will assume that there were 300-500 of them. There were units of the 2nd separate motorized rifle brigade - this is an illegal armed formation of separatists of the Luhansk region. In the same way, groups of Russian servicemen defeated near Izyum retreated there, but it is unlikely that anyone counted them there. The estimate of 4.5–5 thousand fighters is probably close to the truth.

Will there be a split in the management system of the Russian army?

Formally, the Chief of the General Staff, General Gerasimov, has been removed from the leadership, although he is still in office.  Accordingly, whether he bears any responsibility for this is not entirely clear, because the General Staff of the Russian Federation is excluded from the chain of command of military operations in Ukraine.  The commanders of four commands, including Colonel-General Lapin, commander of the troops of the Central Military District of the Russian Federation, are one step lower.  He was in principle in charge of the defense in this direction, he was defeated and he is currently the most convenient figure to hang all the dogs on.  Mr. Kadyrov's indignation surprises me personally.  Tiktok-General is in a parallel reality and considers himself equal to a colonel-general with a school education somewhere in the backyard of the Russian Empire.  Surprisingly, I would not have paid attention to it at all.  Mr. Prigozhin is a businessman, he lost money together with the recruited soldiers, although he may have saved, or even earned, but he is also not the kind of figure who should be evaluating anything at the front.  He performs a completely different task, he created a private military company with no idea about military affairs.  It should be assumed that in a totalitarian state, which is formally dictatorial, the culprits of some miscalculations are appointed, instead of trying to understand and look for real reasons.  Therefore, I think that most likely the scapegoat will be General Lapin.

Are there signs of a decrease in the capabilities of the Russian army to maintain the Kherson and Zaporozhye bridgeheads?

We have seen the development of events in the Kharkiv region, when the enemy, by timely introduction of operational reserves into the operation, could, if not stop, then make the advance of the Armed Forces extremely difficult.  But that did not happen.  In the Donetsk direction, we see that individual units of the battalions of the tactical group are withdrawn from here and transferred to the Zaporizhia direction.  The situation is also interesting.  We see that reinforcements are not arriving at the Kherson-Beryslav bridgehead.  One gets the impression that the troops on this bridgehead have been thrown to our terrier as something to occupy himself with.

Personally, I have a picture that the Kremlin is betting on maintaining the land corridor to Crimea and is ready to cede part of the Luhansk region, has already forgotten about the Kharkiv region, and will leave the troops on the right bank of the Dnieper.  But the battle to maintain the land corridor between Mariupol through Berdyansk, Melitopol to Crimea - this will be a very difficult struggle.  The number of troops currently amassed there, the creation of a command there in the theater of military operations are all signs that the Kremlin has concentrated its main efforts there.

At the same time, mobilization is also taking place. I asked Viktor Kevlyuk to estimate when Ukraine will feel the results of Russian mobilization?

The other day, in one of the interviews, an expert used the very good term "fatalism", the vast majority of those drafted for mobilization are fatalists.  They, between a very bad life inside the pseudo-empire and an equally terrible life with the prospect of a tragic finale, do not choose anything.  They just go with the flow.  And from what is happening, it is known that about 30,000 conscripts are undergoing training for further staffing of elite military units.  It is not entirely clear which units we are talking about, although we can see that the special forces brigade, units of the airborne troops of the marines are actively training the mobilized at the training grounds.

Of course, the quality is not the same, there is no mention of the standards of the New Course Special Operations Preparation Course (SOPC), according to which, for example, the Ukrainian special forces are trained, but these people receive some kind of more or less conscious training.  About 60,000 more will be recruited for longer periods of training.  Somewhere closer to the new year, we will be able to see them in military units.  We see that personnel are arriving at the points of permanent deployment of motorized rifle brigades.  Apparently, we will see 30,000 and 60,000 on Ukrainian territory after the new year.  Everything else - even near Liman, they were already captured, when a tank company was raised for reinforcement in the amount of 7 tanks, of which 2 did not make it at all, it is not a fact that for technical reasons, perhaps also due to the reluctance of tank crews to participate in combat operations.  That is, preparation during the day is considered sufficient by some.

The split between 100,000 and 200,000 can be explained by the fact that the capacity of training centers, the availability of the material and technical base, and the availability of the number of instructors do not allow training a large number of military personnel at the same time.  Therefore, 100,000 receive more or less acceptable training, the rest will be trained, as they say, on a pre-war training and material base.  And in an accelerated manner, he will be in the position of marching reinforcements literally in the near future on the front line.

 How will it affect combat operations

Due to the fact that there is practically no training period for mastering modern weapons, these will be ordinary infantrymen who are trained in basic things and a little survival on the battlefield.  Their number of 300,000 is a lot, but delivering them at once and putting them into operation in one place is an absolutely unrealistic task.  Replenishment will enter the battle gradually, accordingly, our machine gunners will have time to change barrels, drink coffee, take aim and continue their defense.  These additions are unable to significantly influence the development of events at the front, not only because of low qualifications and motivation, but also because the units are not being trained.  So far, we have not observed that any of the brigades was withdrawn to the rear, was reequipped, went through a full cycle of combat coordination and was returned to the front.  So far, all manipulations take place in the battalion at most.

Viktor Kevlyuk told me whether the threat of using nuclear weapons by the enemy is real

 In order to determine whether it is a fake or not, the US Air Force took to the air RC-135 aircraft, whose task is to detect secondary signs of the movement of nuclear weapons.  They work more on strategic media that will not be applied, but this is a worrying sign.  These planes, as a rule, take turns on the ground.  If they are already on round-the-clock duty in the air, then everything is not so good, the USA has concerns.  As for tactical nuclear weapons, the Russian Armed Forces do not have artillery ammunition, they were decommissioned in the early 2000s and disposed of.

Today, the Russian armed forces have tactical nuclear charges with a capacity of 10 to 100 kilotons, which can be used either by Iskander missile units or from air cruise missile carriers of the Kh-101, Kh-55 type.

 Today, there are long-range bombers ready to use cruise missiles on duty at the Shaykovka and Engels airfields, whose combat units are connected to carrier rockets, I do not know whether the combat units are nuclear.  Therefore, such a development of events is possible, but it is extremely unlikely.