RUSI on Russia Invasion of Ukraine

Notes from Preliminary Lessons in Conventional Warfighting from Russia’ Invasion of Ukraine: February–July 2022

The report is intentionally a bit problematic methodically - its purpose is rather preliminary observation useful for decision making than waiting for better evidence and more accurate data.

Acronyms

Gathered from the whole text.

Ad 1 - Russia planning and preparations

Military build-up started on March 2021 with three objectives:

1. pressure to West to push Ukraine to Minsk II
2. military pre-position
3. assess reaction of Ukraine’s international partners

Key assumptions:

1. speed is critical to prevent response from international community
2. removal of leaders would remove barrier to pro-russian support
3. controlling the economic aspects would keep at bay apathetic Ukrainians
4. russian military would prevail on battlefield

Based on the assumptions are key military-strategic plans:

1. degrade Ukrainian defense capabilities
2. defeat Ukraine’s ground forces in Donbas
3. eliminate leadership to diffuse will and capacity to resist
4. deceive Ukraine’s government in respect to invasion (time, place, scope, scale)

The build-up of AFRF forces started in autumn of 2021, assuming the operation would be over in summer 2022. Plans were detailed and offered solutions to most problems the unit would face in Ukraine. Had the plans been executed, there was good chance of success.

Problematic parts were the preparation was kept in secrecy in order to achieve surprise, leading to designers being unaware of wider intent. The plan also did not provide much decision points or alternative courses of action.

Ad 2 - Ukraine’s planning and preparations

Structure of the force

• Manoeuvre Brigades
• Special Forces
• Territorial Defense

Problems with retention and pay in UAF has also good side to create large pool of reservists.

Pre 2014 the artillery and missile forces were reduced, after 2014 UAF tried to recover the capabilities. In terms of those systems, UAF fielded second largest force after Russia. The problem was lack of ammunition supply, only made worse by Russian sabotage effort to explode the shells. Amount of ammo lost was about three times bigger than spent during five years of fighting in Donbas.

Improvements were done also in ISR area, many units received UAVs and trained with them. They also received radars as part of US military assistance.

In tanks, preference was to modernize existing tanks over buying new ones, since it allowed to get about three times more equipment that way. Still, Russia had about 3200 operational tanks against Ukraine’s 900 and usually they were of better capabilities, especially in longer range engagements.

Anti-tank weapons counted about 1000 launchers and 9000 missiles for them. Initial problems with training and maintenance were quite quickly addressed. Their main purpose was to blunt enemy armor operations and raids with light forces.

Air-defense has improved significantly as it was priority of Ukraine government. Number of upgraded radars were distributed with improved survivability. Long range systems used are variants of S-300, S-125 and Buk-M1. MANPADS are extensively used across all units.

The Air units were overmatched by Russian systems in almost every aspect, so training focused on survivability, low-level flying and good use of terrain characteristics. The main problem was with equipment, rather than with trained crews.

Ukraine expected attack over Donbas and had relatively little units in north Kyiv direction and in direction from Crimea. About week prior invasion they successfully dispersed the stockpiles to prevent long-range strikes against them. Also about 72 hours prior invasion orders for redeployment were given.

Altogether the UAF was surprised on operational level, but on tactical level the units were preparing for eight years, so they were motivated and well prepared for the fight. On the contrary Russians had initiative on operational level, but units were quite surprised what they were ordered to do.

Ad 3 - The Invasion

Initial fire strike campaign targeted industrial facilities, fuel and energy storage, air defenses, C2 sites, ammunition storage and troops concentration points according to Russian doctrine. It was accompanied by EW and aerial decoys to saturate air defense. Within first 48 hours 75% of stationary Air defense sites were engaged, contrary to 10% or mobile sites. The strikes successfully disrupted the air defense, but caused less damage to actual platforms due to relocation orders and moving targets.

Critical weak point to the campaign was damage assessment which makes AFRF forces very susceptible to deception. Satellite capabilities proved insufficient, also proved by fact that Russia started buying satellite imagery from external sources in April 2023.

Speed of north of Kyiv advance presented significant danger for UAF. It cut off many of its units behind their lines and in direction of their advance there were very little of UAF units. They reacted by committing large portion of special forces to that axis, mobilized reserve units and teaching staff from military academies to support some artillery units already located in Kyiv. Still, attacking force had about 12:1 force ratio advantage.

During this attack, the Donbas units were tied by AFRF push and they were impossible to relocate. Advances in south were largely successful. During the initial attacks Russians generally achieved surprise and succeeded in bringing favorable force ratio in important axes.

The attack seem to have problems on tactical level, where AFRF units were confused, did not expect heavy fighting, moved in administrative columns without good setup of communication using outdated maps. Engagements caused panic and often abandonment of equipment.

During first 37 days Russian units tried to seize Kyiv. In first couple days it was clear that the fast seize operation does not go according to the plan so they started adapting to real battle operations. First to adapt was air force that started providing air cover, use more jamming and improve situational awareness a lot using AWACS A-50 platform. Part of the reason for the fast improvement is that they were operating from Russia and did not suffer as much confusion as ground units.

Except for destruction of Mariupol, where fierce resistance was anticipated, the Russian forces were largely unprepared for heavy fighting. Most of the communication accounted for information about location of the units and only very minor portion to actual combat management. The lack of situational awareness led to use same locations and routes, making it easy to ambush and harass those units. So called Gomel route was unable to bring enough support, suffered large casualties and eventually decided to withdraw and recover the troops. Chernihiv route (east of Kyiv) with densely forested terrain made it easier for UAF to prevent the movement forward.

After the retreat from Kyiv AFRF focused on Donbas. This phase is roughly day 38 to day 91. At this point, both forces had significant casualties, the uniformity of units (BTG or companies) was lost. Russia had discussion about needs for mobilization and at this time decided against it. UAF needed to develop techniques for troops rotations to prevent fatigue and concussion from artillery fire. Still the success was mostly with UAF, leading to good morale and confidence on their side and also low morale on AFRF side stemming from lack of success on almost all axes.

The war became artillery confrontation at this stage. Due to reduced stockpiles this was mostly dominated by AFRF, often leading to spending 6000 rounds per day on some 3 km frontage. UAV became very important for target acquisition on both sides. The types used were ranging from commercial quadcopters to fixed-wing medium altitude types like SKIF or Orlan-10.

During the offensive on Donbas the Russians relied more on obsolete systems. For instance, after first two weeks, use of Iskander missiles dropped from salvo to single strikes. Similar transition occurred with naval fires. Reasons might be shortage of missiles. Consequence was reduced accuracy and in many cases strikes of civilian structures.

The volume of fires inflicted casualties and took ground from UAF, but it had problems with sustainment. Large volume of transportation on railways occurred. Since the amount of ammo delivery was much larger than expected, Russians setup “field artillery depots” (basically a industrial building adapted to storage of ammunition) that could supply units within radius 30-50 km. Other solution was to store ammo directly in units. The depots were placed about 50 km behind the lines and initially they were frequently attacked by MLRS or other missiles. Only after the end of April the concentration was moved further so they are out of range of UAF weapons.

Ad 4 - Assessing Russian Military Performance in Ukraine

Before invasion there was common overestimation of AFRF capabilities, usually because observed best performance in small scale conflicts was expected to be a standard. After the invasion there was overcorrection to incompetency, corruption, ineffective weapons and inability to adapt to new conditions. This is dangerous, as it is inaccurate and encourages complacency.

Despite all problems observed the AFRF already demonstrated ability to learn and adapt. In future assessment an attention should be paid to improvement of key weaknesses. Had they been able to make progress there, gap between the potential and actual capabilities may narrow considerably.

1. Air and naval forces were assigned under ground forces command, relegating them to a support for ground forces. One problem was failure to achieve and keep air superiority
2. BTG construct lack cohesion of leadership (people does not know each other) and is often unable to absorb losses
3. Tendency to reinforce failure by repeating unsuccessful course of action until command is revoked from higher command
4. Vulnerability to Deception because of lack of experienced tactical commanders and not distributing enough situational awareness. There are other contributing factors like not encouraging honest reporting, shortage of damage assessment, or single mission assignments with lack of fusion of data
5. Fratricides - attack to friendly forces, conflicts between the devices (e.g. radar vs. EW), reporting culture or caring about the troops

Ad 5 - Lessons Identified for the British Military

1. It is unlikely to conceal/protect important places from long-range strike. Only means to survivability is to disperse and frequent moves. Large footprint is not viable on the modern battlefield. Russian missile systems are reliable and accurate. They can be intercepted, but the flight routes were routinely adapted for every mission and there were up to 80 changes of course on their way to target. It is not economical to maintain enough coverage to guarantee defense against such threats.
2. Warfighting demands significant stock capacity and ability to replenish them. At Ukrainian rates of consumption, British stockpiles would potentially last a week. This problem is present for almost all kind of weapons, be it air defense, tube artillery, missiles, etc. Same capacity is needed for training staff to address preparation of second echelon of army.
3. UAS/CUAS has to be available across all branches of the force. Many NATO systems are relatively old, expensive and require complex training, so specialized units were created for them. Lessons from Ukraine show that UAS should be classified rather as ammunition than an aircraft and speed up deployment of them (at the moment there are fewer administrative restrictions to fire live 155-mm shell than to fly UAS to monitor the target). Means to defeat UAS are there to deny it to achieve its mission - typically dazzling of sensors or denial of navigation or control (using EW). In some cases is kinetic elimination needed, usually for loitering ammunition or target acquisition drones.
4. With a lot of EW in place, some kind of synchronization and deconflicting is needed to properly allocate time, place and frequencies. UAF setup special command for this activities. This also include detection of enemy systems and finding places which can be exploited. Better allocation of Electromagnetic spectrum (EMS) can provide signification tactical advantages.
5. Related to point 1. the dispersion of forces is needed. As a consequence, the battalion is usually occupying similar area as before a brigade would. This puts more strain on commanders that are not as staffed. Developing tools for C2 to allow beyond the sight operation is critical. For battle operations, force need to concentrate and then survivability is achieved mostly through mobility to prevent effective fires against them. When unit stays for longer time, hardened shelters are very important.

Ad Conclusion

Suggestions for policy makers.

1. Have capacity to build new units, produce spare parts and ammunition. Have stockpiles to remain competitive in initial phases of fighting
2. Improve adaptability on all levels and rapid development
3. Think about how new capabilities and weapons integrate with legacy systems and how they enable/magnify their effects in modern battlefield. The modernization should not be just deciding what to procure and what to discard