https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2024/10/11/the-russian-steamroller-in-donbas/

The Russian ‘Steamroller’ in Donbas

In yesterday’s discussion with Judge Andrew Napolitano on his youtube channel ‘Judging Freedom’, I was asked to comment on the status of the fighting on the ground in Kursk and in the Donbas.

I did this, making it clear that the Russians are mopping up the remaining stragglers among Ukrainian and NATO forces there now. The main Ukrainian force has been killed and that is why the daily ‘kill’ of the Russians has now dropped from 400 Ukrainians a day to just 100 yesterday.

The Russians put the figure of killed and maimed UkrNazis in Kursk at 21,000 and claim to have destroyed 136 tanks within Kursk apart from other mechanized units and artillery. The border with Ukraine at Kursk province is largely sealed so that no reinforcements or relief can reach those relatively few who have remained.

The Russians claim to have taken back many of the hamlets in Kursk overrun by the Kievan troops at the start of their incursion/invasion. The only substantial town in the Russian territory held by Kiev, Sudzha, best known as the home of the metering station for the gas pipelines running from Russia, across Ukraine, to Europe – Sudzha is now coming under Russian attack and surely will be retaken soon.

As for Donbas, the Russians are advancing along the whole front day by day, taking additional settlements as they pass through. I believe they have captured about 500 square kilometers of Ukrainian held Donbas over the last month, including the critically important fortified city of Uhledar, which is a logistical nexus for Ukrainian supplies to their front line troops. The still bigger logistical hub of Pokrovsk is now within reach and will surely be captured by the Russians in the next few weeks, leaving open to them the largely unfortified lands to the west stretching straight to the Dniepr river.

In reporting all of this, I was saying little more than what you otherwise can hear or read from nearly all of my peers in the Alternative Media, or even on such mainstream media as the internet platforms of the Times of India or the Indian broadcaster WION.

Now I would like to present what no one seems to be saying about the Russian ‘steamroller’ but which is freely available information if you bother to go to Russian state television’s main news programs each day or to the most authoritative political talk show, The Great Game, hosted by Vyacheslav Nikonov. What you see there is the war correspondents’ interviews with Russian soldiers in the field. These reporters are covering all the terrain along the front each day. What you will hear from their interviewees is that the battles are intense as the Russian army moves from settlement to settlement. They storm them after massive artillery and bomb attacks. Then they enter and clear them of Ukrainian mines and lurking snipers. Notwithstanding the preparatory destructive open work, the soldiers tell you that the fighting is fierce in some settlements, proceeding street by street, and house by house.

For their part, the correspondents in their vehicles are on constant lookout for attack drones sent over by the Ukrainians. The Russian artillery and rapid-fire rocket launchers are being moving around all the time to escape counter fire by the Ukrainians.

In a word, this is not a steamroller that any of the cheerleaders in the Alternative Media would be keen to ride. The Russians are not advancing in parade uniforms but in heavily armored fatigues and with greatest caution.

Similarly, a word is essential about what Russian television is showing in the ‘recaptured’ Kursk settlements. They have been largely demolished by artillery fire and Russia’s heavy glide bombs. What I was saying at the start of the Ukrainian invasion when Russia ordered the full evacuation of civilians from the territory occupied by Kievan forces has been proven true. They were evacuated because the entire territory was made a free fire zone by the Russian army in order to ensure that the invaders would have no possibility of defending themselves in houses or other infrastructure as they do systematically in the Donbas towns that the Russians are now storming. The objective in Kursk was clearly to reduce to a bare minimum any losses of life among the Russians in the reconquest.

I have at times made it clear that official Russian television is my main source of information and for this, as should be clear from the above, I make no apologies. Quite the contrary…I ask why my peers are not consulting the same open sources.