According to military experts, this new wave of soldiers, for inexperienced as they are, would be difficult to contain. Despite enormous losses, Moscow is increasingly adopting a human compressor roller strategy to break Ukrainian lines.
by Cédric Pietéturunga
For a few weeks, the questioning has been insistently returned to Western military circles: what would happen if Russia managed to send several hundred thousands of additional men to Ukraine? Even poorly equipped and poorly trained, could these new soldiers overwhelm the Ukrainian lines of defense, tested by almost a year of war? “It is clear that we are going to return to a moment of massification, during which the Russians will throw all their strength in the battle,” was worried, on January 2, on LCI, the Minister of the French Armed Forces, Sébastien Lecornu, of Back to a visit to kyiv.
stopped in their offensive by Ukrainians more resistant than they had planned, the Russians have not progressed since the taking of the cities of Lyssytchansk and Severodonetsk, in Donbass, in the east of the country, at the start of In the summer of 2022. In September, Moscow troops had all the sorrows of the world to stop the counter-offensive launched by kyiv in the Kharkiv region. In November, they had to abandon the right bank of the Dniepr river and the city of Kherson, in the south, after their supply lines were cut by the Ukrainians. Since then, this is the status quo, even if the Russian mercenaries of the Wagner group have just taken Soledar, a town in Donbass near Bakhmout, a city of 70,000 inhabitants where the fighting has been raging for four months.
These clashes were deadly for Moscow’s army. The Ukrainian staff claims to have killed more than 112,000 Russian soldiers since February 24, 2022, the equivalent of half of the contingent sent by the Kremlin. A figure impossible to verify, but partly validated by the Western soldiers. “According to our most credible estimates, at least 60,000 Russian fighters were killed, for three times more injured, which means that around 250,000 Russian fighters are” out of service “, said November 16 The vice-admiral Hervé Bléjean, director of the European Union staff, during a hearing at the National Assembly, held behind closed doors but whose report was published in early January.
Enray the hemorrhage
To stop this hemorrhage and re -reversing his troops, Vladimir Putin signed on September 21, 2022 a decree ordering the “partial mobilization” of some 300,000 men. This recruitment was chaotic, the Russian army no longer having the officers or the infrastructure to train and equip as many people at the same time. However, it seems to have effects. “It is estimated that 80,000 men were hired very quickly in Ukraine, including 50,000 directly on the battlefield. This made it possible to stabilize the workforce of the Russian army,” says Vincent Tourret, associate researcher at the Foundation for the Strategic research (FRS) and specialist in the Russian army. “The Kremlin has mobilized a lot of reservists and conscripts. It is starting to produce effects, by mass,” recognizes Sébastien Lecornu.
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