About Army Group South--Larry Johnson's Reminder
I’m seeing a lot of “conservatives” crowing—I think that’s the right word—that the Russian offensive into Ukraine has bogged down. There are “reports” from supposed intel sources that the Russians are running out of ammunition, for example.
What’s clear through the fog of war is that the Russians were counting on most Ukrainian forces to simply put down their weapons. Clearly that hasn’t happened. The Russians have been at pains to try to convince Ukrainians that the Russian offensive is targeting the “putschist” regime—meaning, the regime installed by the US in 2014—rather than the Ukrainian people who are, after all, closely related both ethnically and linguistically to Russians. For that reason the Russians have clearly avoided damaging civilian infrastructure of the type that US offensives target.
To that end, most Western military analysts concede that the Russians have been pulling their punches—have committed a small fraction of the manpower and military resources at their disposal. In that situation, it’s foolish to suppose that the Russians lack resolve or are running out of military resources. We’ll have to see how this plays out.
Another common meme is to compare the Russian offensive to the Nazi blitzkrieg offensive of Army Group South across Ukraine in WW2. Supposedly, the Nazis’ “lightning offensive” puts the Russians to shame.
In fact, the Russians have essentially reached Kiev in about three days. Their offensive, beginning in Belarus, covered a much shorter distance than the Nazi offensive, which started from the capital of Western Ukraine, Lviv. On the other hand, the Ukrainian forces have been preparing for a Russian assault for a long time and were neither taken by surprise nor subjected to total warfare.
Larry Johnson, a former CIA analyst, writes in this regard:
We are at the dawn of day four of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and I have heard many media news readers and pundits suggesting things are going badly for the Russians and the operation is bogged down. This led me to ask, “how long did it take the Nazis to capture Ukraine following the launch of Operation Barbarossa on June 21, 1941?
The Nazis entered the 1941 version of Ukraine on the 21st of June. Note, the Nazis already controlled the city of Lvov (now Lviv), which was part of Poland at the time. Remember the Nazis launched a blitzkreig. They did nothing to avoid inflicting civilian casualties. The German’s Army Group South, which included the First Panzer Group (Gen. Kleist) and the German Sixth (Gen. Reichenau), Seventeenth (Gen. Stülpnagel) and Eleventh Armies (Gen. Schobert), Luftlotte 1 (Keller) and the Romanian Third and Fourth Armies, had the mission of conquering Ukraine.
It took Army Group South six weeks to reach Kiev (August 7) and another seven weeks to secure its surrender (26 September 1941). There was no holding back. Cities and civilian strongholds were bombed mercilessly.
I think this is an interesting benchmark for comparing Putin’s progress in defanging the Ukrainian military. In contrast to the Nazis of 1941, the Putin’s forces are focused on hitting military targets. Yes, they have killed and wounded some civilians. But Putin has not authorized a massive attack on civilians. Worth recalling that Churchill and Roosevelt authorized devastating bombing missions on civilian population centers in Germany during WW II.
While it took the Nazis almost two months to surround Kiev, Putins troops appear to have done it in four days. Remains to be seen whether this will be a prolonged war of attrition and suffering or if a political solution will become tenable once Kiev is sealed.
Here’s a current situation map—as far as can be determined, since hard information is rather scarce. As has appeared to be the case pretty much from the start, the Russians appear focused on isolating pockets of Ukrainian forces quickly, and dealing with them systematically later. Pressuring the Ukrainian government in Kiev appears to be a major focus, and the westward advance from Kursk appears to made some major advances:
The overriding point is: it’s early days. It took the US Army three weeks or so to reach Baghdad, in a campaign of “shock and awe” to which Ukraine has, so far, not been subjected.
The best series of books on the WWII Stalingrad campaign by Army Group South I've read is 'Armageddon In Stalingrad - The Stalingrad Trilogy' by David M. Glantz with Jonathan M. House. Other than the Russians, the logistics problem of fuel and ammunition shortages repeatedly slowed the Wehrmacht's advance across otherwise easily traversed terrain with the exception of some major rivers, requiring army staff to constantly reassess and provide new timelines; all while Hitler was demanding progress. The Germans also faced a major partisan/guerrilla problem in the thousands of kilometers of bypassed areas, a result of the Blitzkrieg concept, which became a major headache when these guerillas began disabling rail lines that carried much, if not most, of the supplies to railheads for further transport to the front by truck. These same partisans became more brazen as the Germans withdrew which is evidenced in the second volume of a book written by a German soldier who survived the war: 'Mortar Gunner on the Eastern Front.' Highly recommended for those interested in the German soldier's perspective of combat on the Eastern Front.
I go with Trump, who is a genius, and it takes genius to recognize genius. The goal of Putin is regime change, and he is more honest in the way he goes about it than our Democrats who steal elections. The last thing Putin wants is to sow panic. Russia is very concerned with NATO encroaching on its border, as the late Stephen Cohen warned, and all the more so as through Hunter the corrupt Ukraine regime can buy the US. President Trump was roundly criticized for recognizing Putin's master stroke, but moral posturing against a crafty enemy instead of giving him his due guarantees the enemy will be successful now and in the future.