Media: Ukraine’s black hole

By Richard North - April 28, 2024

While we’ve noted the media reluctance to report in detail the conduct of ground operations in Ukraine, one might think that, after the flush of publicity over the grant of funding for military, that there might be a new-found interest in what is going on.

Yet, while there has been a belated and rather grudging interest in the prospect of a major assault on the Chasiv Yar, that front has been fairly quiet for a few days and, with that, media interest has also subsided – presumably on the basis that there is nothing much to report as yet.

Appearances, though, can be deceptive. Elsewhere is the northern sector in the Donbass region it has been relatively quiet but, things can change very rapidly.

According to this narrative Russian activity on the Kupyansk front, in the Kharkiv oblast, had been “paused” in early April to allow for rotation of units which had suffered “significant losses”.

Renewed localised assaults on 18 April had had limited effects and a resumption of the offensive on 24 April had been unsuccessful. Serhii Melnyk, head of the Kharkiv military garrison, confidently reported: “Ukrainian soldiers are professionally fulfilling the tasks of defending [this] direction and causing the enemy to lose manpower and equipment”.

Without warning, however, the Russians have made a concerted push for the town of Kyslivka, less than 20Km to the southeast of Kupyansk.

Fighting was said by Ukrainian sources to be “very fierce” with another source saying that the town has been taken along with the “local tactical heights” in what is being called a massive breakthrough.

Full capture of the village has not been confirmed but its fall is expected within the next 24-48 hours, the sudden collapse of the defence in part attributed to the lack of heavy weapons at this defence line, after they had been transferred to other fronts during the lull in this sector.

The defence of the adjoining village of Kotlyarivka, to the south, is thought likely be compromised at this juncture and the Ukrainians are expected to withdraw, leaving the way open for a further Russian assault.

Further south, in the northern part of the Avdiivka sector, we see what is described as another “breakthrough” as the Russians have pushed into the village of Semenivka which they now control. The advance has driven the AFU to retreat with claims that hundreds of prisoners have been taken.

The loss of Semenivka is said to be a significant setback, affording the Russians a foothold to the west of the Durna River, which was intended to be the geographical pillar supporting the defence of the area.

About 40Km further south, also in the Avdiivka operational sector, we see the fighting continue in the village of Ocheretyn. There, a few days ago an assault had the village partially captured by the Russians. Now, it is claimed by one source that the Russians are blocked by the Ukrainian defenders and have deployed additional reserves.

But another source says the village is already under the control of the Russians. But even before they had secured full control of the village, the Russians were using it as a jump-off point to push southeast into the adjoining village of Novobakhmutovka.

What makes this battle particularly significant is that, from there, the Russians have pushed westwards to take the village of Soloviove, creating the northern shoulder of a Ukrainian salient.

This combines with a thrust from the recently captured village of Berdychi, a few kilometres to the south, which is forming a southern shoulder to the salient, threatening to entrap substantial numbers of Ukrainian troops within what is described as a “cauldron” which the Russians can saturate with fire from three directions.

Although fighting continues to the west of Berdychi, a report talks of Ukrainian forces engaged in a “rearguard action”. Says the analytical website “Deep State”, “It is impossible to hold the contact line in its current form, so withdrawal from the northern outskirts of the village is a forced measure. But the most important thing is to save [the lives of] personnel”.

The envelopment process which is thus developing is an operation we see replicated elsewhere. Where the Russians have recently captured Semenivja, they have also captured to the north the village of Soloviove, once again forming the makings of a salient to entrap Ukrainian troops.

By so doing, the Russians are by-passing hard points in the traditional Blitzkrieg style, outflanking and surrounding the defenders and forcing them to evacuate or surrender.

Carried out at operational level across the front, what makes the difference is that this sequence is carried out on a relatively small scale. The envelopments are only taking “bite-sized” chunks of the Ukrainian front, enabling to the Russians to keep their troops within their protective electronic and surveillance bubble, and always able to call up supporting artillery.

By pushing at multiple points, and varying the frequency and intensity of the assaults, the Russians can also disguise their schwerpunkt and keep the Ukranians off-balance as they juggle equipment and reserves to meet the most dangerous threats, without the resources to defend in strength the whole of the 1,000Km front.

Thus we saw the Ukrainians caught out when the Russians unexpectedly attacked the town of Kyslivka, while at the same time they are having to keep substantial forces in place to meet an expected assault on Chasiv Yar, which may not even happen if the Russians decide to by-pass the defences.

With ongoing attacks on infrastructure targets, the Russians have forced to Ukrainians to deploy their air-defence assets away from the battle area and deplete missile and ammunition stocks. This has enabled Russians aviation the freedom to operate in direct support of ground offensives.

But while the sporadic nature of the attacks, the varying intensity and the constant switching of the assault targets, makes following the battle extremely difficult and time-consuming, it should not be allowed to obscure that fact that the Russians are continuing to make real progress in the east of Ukraine.

Undoubtedly, it is easier for the media to cover the political aspects of the war – and its multinational dimensions – from the London offices, and there are plenty of soft-focus, human-interest stories which can be written from the relative safety of Kiev. But the thing about war that the media seem to forget these days is that it is primarily about fighting. Therefore, to cover the war properly, the actual fighting must be covered.

If, for instance, the BBC had covered WWII in the same way that it covers Ukraine (and Gaza), most of coverage in June 1944 would have been about the hardship of the German people after the bombing raids, and the suffering of wounded soldiers in military hospitals. The D-Day landings would hardly have got a mention.

Unless the media up their game, they could find the Russians advancing to the banks of the Dnieper, waving to the Ukrainians in Kiev from the other side of the bridge, before they even notice. By then it will be too late to do anything other than wonder how it happened.