Ministry of Defense of Ukraine The Dnipro River is the largest natural barrier in all of Ukraine. Running north to south through major cities, including the capital Kiev, the river – which is up to 10 miles wide in places – curves right into southern Ukraine, flowing past the port of Kherson before emptying into the Black Sea. The river is an opportunity for Russians and Ukrainians. But there are strong indications that the Ukrainians are in the best position to exploit it. Ukrainian armed forces in May used their new American-made rockets and European-made howitzers to target the Dnipro bridges near Russian-held Kherson. The fall of the bridges cut off the supply of Russian troops occupying the northern half of Kherson Oblast. When starved Russian forces finally retreated from northern Kherson last week, they crossed the Dnipro on bridges and dug in on the river’s left bank. Where the Dnipro was once a problem for the Russians, it is now an asset – a natural defensive barrier. How and how well the Ukrainians cross the Dnipro could dictate when, and with what effect, the Ukrainian military resumes its so far highly successful counteroffensives, which began in late August and early September. The counterattacks liberated all of Kharkiv Oblast in the east and most of Kherson Oblast in the south. The Ukrainian push south has mostly stalled on the right bank of the Dnipro, although there are indications that Ukrainian special operations forces have used small boats to cross the Dnipro estuary and reconnoitre the Kinburn Spit, a sandy strip that juts out in the sea just south of the mouth of the river. Yes, the Russian army in Ukraine is worn out, tired and starving – and bleeding fighting strength by the day as untrained and unhappy conscripts rush to the front lines to partially replace the 100,000 good Russian soldiers who have been killed or wounded in nine months of war. But the Russians are still in the race. Tens of thousands of soldiers and hundreds of armored vehicles belonging to the 8th and 49th Combined Armies are on the left bank of the Dnipro. The Russian armed forces still have more and better attack helicopters and warplanes than the Ukrainian armed forces. Google Maps If the Ukrainians try to cross the river against these defenses, they could suffer heavy casualties – and may fail. Consider how long it took and how much it cost in men and equipment for Ukrainian brigades this summer to cross the much narrower Inhulets River that runs through northern Kherson. That’s why Mike Martin, a fellow at the Department of War Studies at King’s College London, suggested they shouldn’t even try. Instead, Ukrainian forces could launch a new counterattack from areas where they’ve already crossed the Dnipro. That is, from the Zaporizhzhia region, east of the Kherson region. “They could drive an axis south and try to cut Russian forces in two,” he tweeted. Much of the Zaporizhzhia region in the east is under Russian occupation, but not the northern part – and not the city of Zaporizhzhia, which lies along the Dnipro River 150 miles northeast of the city of Kherson. The Ukrainian forces around Zaporizhzhia could attack to the south and, assuming they can breach the Russian defenses on the periphery, turn east and roll along the left bank of the Dnipro to the mouth of the river. A successful left hook, to borrow boxing terminology, would force the Russians out of all of southern Ukraine except for the strategic Crimean peninsula, which Russia seized in 2014. It is no exaggeration to say that a left hook would he was setting up the Ukrainians to push their way into Crimea and begin to reverse eight years of Russian expansion. “Crimea is their strategic target here,” Martin explained. Martin lands a left hook on Zaporizhia because it’s an obvious move. But it’s so obvious that Russian commanders have been waiting for it… in August. Noting Ukrainian concentrations around Kharkiv to the east and Kherson to the south, Russian commanders began reinforcing the dozen or so battalions belonging to the 58th Combined Arms Army south of Zaporizhia. The problem, for the Russians, is that the reinforcements are not large. They include many of the hundreds of 1980s – or earlier – T-62 tanks that the Kremlin pulled out of long-term storage to replace some of its losses in Ukraine. The T-62s have proven less than useless: the Ukrainians are capturing them by the dozens. But it is not clear that Ukrainian forces have the manpower and firepower they would need to pull the left hook. Ukraine’s best and most experienced formations, including the 92nd and 93rd Mechanized Brigades and the 128th Mountain Brigade, are leading the eastern and southern counterattacks, respectively. If Kyiv has a surprise in store for the Zaporizhzhia front, it may come in the form of two Ukrainian tank brigades that exist on paper but have yet to appear on the front lines. The 5th and 14th tank brigades may be in reserve somewhere around Zaporizhia. Then again, it might not be. If the Ukrainians have two tank brigades at their disposal along with a few hundred T-72 tanks, they may have the mass needed for a successful left hook. “I guess that will happen in the winter,” thought Martin.
