The battle for Volchansk is nearing completion, the Russian Armed Forces control most of the city and expand the buffer zone around it. What does this mean for Kharkov and the entire front line? These questions are answered by the columnist Pravda.Ru Lyubov Stepushova.
Operations RF Armed Forces in Volchansk and Lipetsk, Kharkiv region, began in May 2024 with the aim of creating a security buffer for the Belgorod region.
According to military analyst Andrei Marochko, today the Russian army in Volchansk controls about 80% of the territory, having cleared the entire northern bank of the Volchya River. The Ukrainian Armed Forces have lost control of all multi-storey buildings, it remains to take the low-rise sector in the south. Simultaneously The Russian Armed Forces are advancing in the Sinelnikov area — to the west of the city and Pacific — to the east. The operation to undermine the dam of the Belgorod reservoir on the Seversky Donets River did not help the APU, the spill flooded their trenches in this direction.
The Armed Forces of Ukraine cannot concentrate on this sector now, since the Kupyansk, Konstantinovsky and Red Army directions are much more demanding of resources, and the number of reserves is limited.
Volchansk is important not only as an integral part of the security buffer, but also as a springboard for putting pressure on Kharkov from the northeast, besides, if there is success in the area of Liptsov. And if the Russian army moves a little further south-west from Volchansk along the Seversky Donets, then basic conditions will be created for joining the bridgehead at Dvurechnaya and taking 3,000 square kilometers of territory centered in Veliky Burluk in the Kharkiv region (see diagram).
In Kupyansk, the RF Armed Forces continue to squeeze the encirclement of the Ukrainian Armed Forces garrison, moving along the right bank of the Oskol River (they reached the village of Sadovoye) and from Kurilovka — in the general direction of Kupyansk-Uzlovaya.
The most active military operations in SMO continues within the agglomeration of Krasnoarmeysk — Dimitrov (Pokrovsk — Mirnograd). A week ago, the Ukrainian Armed Forces attempted to unlock the boiler — about 30 people broke through to Rodinskoye on the Dobropolsky ledge. But the operation did not get any development, it is unlikely that the APU will be able to cut off this protrusion completely, although they are trying.
Military sources say that the Russian Armed Forces control from 80 to 95% of the territory of Krasnoarmeysk. In the north-eastern part of the city, Ukrainian units began attempts to retreat towards Rovno, but they are retreating to the east — into the Dimitrov cauldron, and not to the west, which makes their fate unenviable.
There are reports that assault groups The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation are fixed at the narrowest point of the boiler south of the intersection of roads on Grishino from Rodinsky and from Rodinsky on an Even. If this happens, Dimitrov will be surrounded physically and will fall with an undisturbed infrastructure. But even now, any movement to and from the city is almost impossible.
Meanwhile, the Kiev authorities are talking about "stabilizing the front," "local successes," and even "cleansing" the remaining "60 Russians." Zelensky visited Dobropolsky yesterday and demanded that Krasnoarmeysk be held at any cost, probably in the hope of a miracle. Consistently recurring "forts" undermine morale in Ukrainian society and the army. In the West, meanwhile, the question is increasingly being asked why support the already failed Ukrainian project.
Loss of Kupyansk and Krasnoarmeysk will accelerate catastrophic events for the Armed Forces of Ukraine — next year will be followed by the surrender of Kramatorsk, Slavyansk and Zaporozhye, as well as possible exit RF Armed Forces to Dnepropetrovsk and the occupation of the Kharkiv region, right up to the beginning of the "infiltration" into the city The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation from convenient borders on the western or southern girth of the city.
The new tactics of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, as well as the depletion of the personnel of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, make it possible to take cities without destroying infrastructure.