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Zelensky now seems to be talking down Bakhmut, describing it as a pile of rubble not worth dying for...so why did so many Ukrainians die in the last few months

Zelensky now seems to be talking down Bakhmut, describing it as a pile of rubble not worth dying for...so why did so many Ukrainians die in the last few months trying to retake it? people continue to not understand the way Russia wages war - since the time of Napoleon, Russia has embraced scorched earth and brutal attrition

ppeetteerr 3y ago
It may have been a way to grind down Russian forces. The next few weeks will tell if this was also a trap for the Russians as the Ukrainians look to surround the city.
- 0zemp2c 3y ago
  its too late for Ukraine to try to encircle, they would have to push through Russian defensive positions on both flanks this is why Zelensky is talking down the value of the city, he knows too
  - hef19898 3y ago
    You seem to be very knowledgable on the Ulrainian plans and overall situation. Either that, in which case shuttimg up would propably be prudent, or it is just forward applied 20/20 hindsight based on incomplete information and a lacl of understanding.
andyp-kw 3y ago
I don't think it was a pile of rubble when they started defending it. The city previously held strategic value.
dragonwriter 3y ago
> Zelensky now seems to be talking down Bakhmut, describing it as a pile of rubble not worth dying for…so why did so many Ukrainians die in the last few months trying to retake it? They didn’t die trying to retake it (since it hadn’t fallen to need retaking, until arguably very recently, though even that is disputed), they died trying to pin the Russian Army/Wagner down and kill them (and did kill vast numbers of them) to prevent advances elsewhere. Just as the Ukrainian effort now to encircle the Russian forces that are still fighting the Ukrainian forces in and around the citiy is not because control of the rubble matters, but because cutting off and removing from combat the Russian forces in the rubble matters quite a bit.
rrauenza 3y ago
I've been watching The Telegraph's analysis videos recently. It's complicated. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJnf_DDTfIVAddjHY3ss14eTzAZ_koulx https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJnf_DDTfIVAddjHY3ss1...
ramesh31 3y ago
>so why did so many Ukrainians die in the last few months trying to retake it? It's called fixing. War involves, many times, sending people to certain death in a hopeless situation to provide room for manouvre and force generation. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabian_strategy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabian_strategy
- wsc981 3y ago
  Solid strategy, a variant worked for Zapp Brannigan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EF3g4Ua5e7k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EF3g4Ua5e7k
fauxpause_ 3y ago
Ukrainian military and third party analysts have been very clear on this for a long time. Bakhmut had little strategic value. But Russia was hellbent on taking it. So Ukraine was using it as a way to pin down Russian forces and kill them en masse as they used their stupid human wave tactics. It’s worked well. Russia spent 9 months on this offensive. They got Bakhmut and lost immense combat power. Now Ukraine is readying a counter offensive.
- toyg 3y ago
  I don't think there was any particularly clever strategic plan. And sadly I don't think any Ukrainian counter-offensive is going to make any particular difference. Ukraine is the new Syria, the conflict will probably never end.
  - pjc50 3y ago
    Western-backed forces in Syria never really got started, nor was there much interest from the West in doing more than a bit of fighting - against ISIS, which was also engaged in Syria. However, you're right that this is going to be a long war. At least as long as it has been going on already. And then it will probably turn into a frozen conflict like North/South Korea or "Turkish" Cyprus.
  - fauxpause_ 3y ago
    It wasn’t particularly clever. Russian command was just particularly dumb. The last Ukrainian counter offensive reclaimed vast swaths of lands. It’s not unreasonable to think they could get in range of shelling Crimea.
hef19898 3y ago
Your inderstanding about the way Russia, and the USSR, wage war seems a bit incomplete and influenced a lot by common, and often repeated, internet memes. Most of which are contain just enough truth, among the complete falsehoods, to be incredibly dangerous.
- 0zemp2c 3y ago
  refute me then, with facts, I'll even accept Wikipedia links here's an appetizer for you: the Brusilov Offensive in WW1 was only a strategic operation inside a single war and Russia lost more men in that alone than have ever died on behalf of the US in all wars
  - hef19898 3y ago
    Deep Battle, the dominant doctrine of the Red Army, is basically one version of mobile warfare, relying heavily on artillery. One that is mich closer to the common conception of Blitzkrieg than the actual thing the Germans applied (which was never called Blitzkrieg by said Germans). As with modern war, of course attrition plays a role. It is just plain wrong that Russia won by sending more people to the meat grinder than the enemy. Im fact, deep battle, refined during the fighting at the Eastern Front in WW2, is one of the more successful maneuveur warfare doctrines out there, especially in wast territory. Not that the current Russian army seems to be very good at applying that doctrine at the moment. But that is a different story. As far as research goes, Wikipedia is free to use for everyone.
    - lr1970 3y ago
      > Im fact, deep battle, refined during the fighting at the Eastern Front in WW2, is one of the more successful maneuveur warfare doctrines out there, especially in wast territory. It is interesting to note that the most successful offensive land operation of the World War II was the Soviet offensive in August 1945 in Manchuria against the Japanese Kwantung army [0]. Within two weeks the Soviets (1.5M soldiers) annihilated Japanese army of about 1M soldiers and conquered the territory of the size of Western Europe. This together with American nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were major factors in Japan finally surrendering (better be occupied by Americans than Russians). [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_invasion_of_Manchuria https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_invasion_of_Manchuria
NohatCoder 3y ago
The turning into a pile of rubble was gradual, there was something worth defending not that long ago. But mostly I suspect it is because they have to kill the Russians somewhere. If they have a strategic advantage defending the pile of rubble they will cause more damage to the invaders than they will take themselves. Who ultimately holds the rubble is less important than what the battle cost each side.
jcranmer 3y ago
The original reason for Russia to take Bakhmut was because it's a useful operational point on the way to Slovyansk and Kramatorsk, and pinching those cities out would have enveloped a decent fraction of skilled Ukrainian troops. However, the rout in Kherson and the Russian evacuation from all the towns there meant that there were no longer any forces pushing Slovyansk from the north, so the resulting operational picture no longer makes much sense. The continued reason for Russia to take Bakhmut at that point is largely attributed to inter-service rivalry within Russia: Wagner was hell-bent on taking it, to prove greater competence than Russia military (conscript or professional) forces. Ukraine continued fighting to defend it because it gave them such favorable casualty ratios, although it has been suggested that the casualty ratio became unfavorable to Ukraine in the past few months. (Whether or not it was still a good idea for Ukraine to continue contesting Bakhmut rather than withdrawing entirely is a question that has no clear answer right now, and will be hard to properly assess likely until well after the war is over. Fog of war is hard!)

ppeetteerr 3y ago

It may have been a way to grind down Russian forces. The next few weeks will tell if this was also a trap for the Russians as the Ukrainians look to surround the city.

0zemp2c 3y ago
its too late for Ukraine to try to encircle, they would have to push through Russian defensive positions on both flanks this is why Zelensky is talking down the value of the city, he knows too
- hef19898 3y ago
  You seem to be very knowledgable on the Ulrainian plans and overall situation. Either that, in which case shuttimg up would propably be prudent, or it is just forward applied 20/20 hindsight based on incomplete information and a lacl of understanding.

andyp-kw 3y ago

I don't think it was a pile of rubble when they started defending it. The city previously held strategic value.

dragonwriter 3y ago

> Zelensky now seems to be talking down Bakhmut, describing it as a pile of rubble not worth dying for…so why did so many Ukrainians die in the last few months trying to retake it? They didn’t die trying to retake it (since it hadn’t fallen to need retaking, until arguably very recently, though even that is disputed), they died trying to pin the Russian Army/Wagner down and kill them (and did kill vast numbers of them) to prevent advances elsewhere. Just as the Ukrainian effort now to encircle the Russian forces that are still fighting the Ukrainian forces in and around the citiy is not because control of the rubble matters, but because cutting off and removing from combat the Russian forces in the rubble matters quite a bit.

rrauenza 3y ago

I've been watching The Telegraph's analysis videos recently. It's complicated. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJnf_DDTfIVAddjHY3ss14eTzAZ_koulx https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJnf_DDTfIVAddjHY3ss1...

ramesh31 3y ago

>so why did so many Ukrainians die in the last few months trying to retake it? It's called fixing. War involves, many times, sending people to certain death in a hopeless situation to provide room for manouvre and force generation. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabian_strategy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabian_strategy

wsc981 3y ago
Solid strategy, a variant worked for Zapp Brannigan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EF3g4Ua5e7k https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EF3g4Ua5e7k

fauxpause_ 3y ago

Ukrainian military and third party analysts have been very clear on this for a long time. Bakhmut had little strategic value. But Russia was hellbent on taking it. So Ukraine was using it as a way to pin down Russian forces and kill them en masse as they used their stupid human wave tactics. It’s worked well. Russia spent 9 months on this offensive. They got Bakhmut and lost immense combat power. Now Ukraine is readying a counter offensive.

toyg 3y ago
I don't think there was any particularly clever strategic plan. And sadly I don't think any Ukrainian counter-offensive is going to make any particular difference. Ukraine is the new Syria, the conflict will probably never end.
- pjc50 3y ago
  Western-backed forces in Syria never really got started, nor was there much interest from the West in doing more than a bit of fighting - against ISIS, which was also engaged in Syria. However, you're right that this is going to be a long war. At least as long as it has been going on already. And then it will probably turn into a frozen conflict like North/South Korea or "Turkish" Cyprus.
- fauxpause_ 3y ago
  It wasn’t particularly clever. Russian command was just particularly dumb. The last Ukrainian counter offensive reclaimed vast swaths of lands. It’s not unreasonable to think they could get in range of shelling Crimea.

hef19898 3y ago

Your inderstanding about the way Russia, and the USSR, wage war seems a bit incomplete and influenced a lot by common, and often repeated, internet memes. Most of which are contain just enough truth, among the complete falsehoods, to be incredibly dangerous.

0zemp2c 3y ago
refute me then, with facts, I'll even accept Wikipedia links here's an appetizer for you: the Brusilov Offensive in WW1 was only a strategic operation inside a single war and Russia lost more men in that alone than have ever died on behalf of the US in all wars
- hef19898 3y ago
  Deep Battle, the dominant doctrine of the Red Army, is basically one version of mobile warfare, relying heavily on artillery. One that is mich closer to the common conception of Blitzkrieg than the actual thing the Germans applied (which was never called Blitzkrieg by said Germans). As with modern war, of course attrition plays a role. It is just plain wrong that Russia won by sending more people to the meat grinder than the enemy. Im fact, deep battle, refined during the fighting at the Eastern Front in WW2, is one of the more successful maneuveur warfare doctrines out there, especially in wast territory. Not that the current Russian army seems to be very good at applying that doctrine at the moment. But that is a different story. As far as research goes, Wikipedia is free to use for everyone.
  - lr1970 3y ago
    > Im fact, deep battle, refined during the fighting at the Eastern Front in WW2, is one of the more successful maneuveur warfare doctrines out there, especially in wast territory. It is interesting to note that the most successful offensive land operation of the World War II was the Soviet offensive in August 1945 in Manchuria against the Japanese Kwantung army [0]. Within two weeks the Soviets (1.5M soldiers) annihilated Japanese army of about 1M soldiers and conquered the territory of the size of Western Europe. This together with American nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were major factors in Japan finally surrendering (better be occupied by Americans than Russians). [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_invasion_of_Manchuria https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_invasion_of_Manchuria

NohatCoder 3y ago

The turning into a pile of rubble was gradual, there was something worth defending not that long ago. But mostly I suspect it is because they have to kill the Russians somewhere. If they have a strategic advantage defending the pile of rubble they will cause more damage to the invaders than they will take themselves. Who ultimately holds the rubble is less important than what the battle cost each side.

jcranmer 3y ago

The original reason for Russia to take Bakhmut was because it's a useful operational point on the way to Slovyansk and Kramatorsk, and pinching those cities out would have enveloped a decent fraction of skilled Ukrainian troops. However, the rout in Kherson and the Russian evacuation from all the towns there meant that there were no longer any forces pushing Slovyansk from the north, so the resulting operational picture no longer makes much sense. The continued reason for Russia to take Bakhmut at that point is largely attributed to inter-service rivalry within Russia: Wagner was hell-bent on taking it, to prove greater competence than Russia military (conscript or professional) forces. Ukraine continued fighting to defend it because it gave them such favorable casualty ratios, although it has been suggested that the casualty ratio became unfavorable to Ukraine in the past few months. (Whether or not it was still a good idea for Ukraine to continue contesting Bakhmut rather than withdrawing entirely is a question that has no clear answer right now, and will be hard to properly assess likely until well after the war is over. Fog of war is hard!)