“Quiet mutiny”
Russia has many newly-hardened troops, at least until the rigor mortis wears off.
It was rather brilliant to keep pushing the narrative that their move was in the south while secretly preparing for the attack in the east. The US helped by releasing “leaks” that they had done war games showing a limited approach was superior to explain the lack of oooph.
A note of caution in all of this. We are only getting limited information so we don’t know all the facts.
There is a lot of exuberance on how much further the Ukrainians can go on, but they have done a damn job of keeping the actual conditions hidden.
Whatever else happens, these last couple of weeks have been a game changer.
It’s rather like the misdirection that was done prior to the D-day invasion of Normandy.
What’s interesting about this is the “openness” of the misdirection. A lot of the talking heads were analyzing the move south and the tactics.
At the time, there were people posting in this thread about how silly it was for the Ukrainians to telegraph their next move, but apparently the Russians bought it as well.
Military feints are fascinating. You have to bring enough resources to make them credible but without weakening your main attack. They obviously used enough HIMARS and other systems to take our bridges and attack supplies, making the Russians over commit there, but had the rest ready for the main offense.
Very well played.
What will happen next?
It will all make a very good book when it’s finished.
Under normal circumstances I’d guess it will be harder going for Ukraine at this point. Separatists have had years to develop hardened and reinforced positions in occupied pre-2022 Donbas and Luhansk, and terrain will definitely favor the defenders. Taking those areas will be much costlier than the run across Kharkiv.
Of course there are many wildcards here. News reports that Russia has decided to stop reinforcing Ukraine for now (only time will tell whether that’s fake news, or was a strategic decision, or is the consequence of internal revolt or mutiny). The price of gas in Europe is thankfully stabilized for now, but will it remain so through the whole winter?
And of course the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, the largest nuke plant in Europe… Russia can cause a disaster there, and semi-credibly redirect blame to Ukraine. This is a powerful lever of blackmail and revenge, so I think the chances are 100% that Russia attempts some brinksmanship here, and the odds are better than even that they follow through. On paper, it’s an Article 5 attack if Russia causes radiological contamination to enter neighbor countries, but there’s huge scope for Russia to muddy the waters as to who is responsible for such an attack. So I’m kind of dreading to see how that plays out.
without paying for it?
no
.
i read that as: we soon will have a mobilization
but then again, if they have trouble keeping 50.000 troops supplied, putting another 100.000 slapstick-figures with guns into Ukraine will resolve all those problems 
I think Ukraine will try to get Severodonetsk back. Maybe by negotiation. Otherwise they can hit key targets with artillery and HIMARS.
It’s already bombed out. There’s no reason Ukraine needs to hold back on cutting it off and striking the Russian asssets.
Conflicts are great times for intelligence analysts. All sorts of weapons and combat-related gizmos fall into enemy hands for analysis. Yesterday, Ukraine managed to recover one of Russia’s most state of the art electronic warfare pods mounted to a downed fighter.
Ukraine Just Captured One Of Russia’s Most Capable Aerial Electronic Warfare Pods (msn.com)
It’ll be interesting to see if there are any surprises. Lately it seems the Russian hardware captured reveals itself to be decades old tech held together with string and sealing wax.
I’m seeing the same information on Reddit. I think Ukrainian forces will shell the city in the next few days.
From the article (their bolding):
asked for its powerful ally Russia’s help.
Is there another Russia somewhere that is actually powerful?
Thing is, the southern counter-offensive towards Kherson is not a feint. It’s a real offensive. The Russians heavily reinforced their lines there and are still being pushed back. Without those reinforcements, it’s entirely likely that the entire north bank of the Dnipro would already be in Ukrainian hands.
The misdirection was merely that Kherson was their only target.
To an extent, however, reinforcing the south just compounds the mistakes the Russians have made, because the north bank of the Dnipro is virtually cut off from re-supply, and the Russians knew it would be virtually cut off from re-supply. This makes it indefensible against any prolonged attack, and worse, next to impossible to retreat from.
IMO it remains likely that the Russian positions north of the river will collapse rapidly at some point in the fairly near future. If that happens, the Russians stand to lose almost as much territory as they just lost around Kharkiv, and a significantly greater amount of their forces.
And that wouldn’t even be the end of it. Their strategic position would just keep getting worse. If the Ukrainians take the entire north bank, sure, that gives the Russians an easy strong line of defense in that sector. But it also gives the Ukrainians the same thing, which would enable them to pull the bulk of their forces around to the other side of the reservoir and launch a major offensive towards Melitopol. It’s not clear to me that the Russians at that point could feasibly defend anything north of Crimea outside of their more established territory in Donetsk and Luhansk.
Maybe I’m getting carried away with optimism.
The opposite: That sentence can be rough-translated as ““Regarding possible mobilization, talk isn’t going on now”, said from the Kremlin”.
I think he meant that cynically, as in, “If Moscow say X, I hear Not-X”, that is, it’s all a lie.
DNR troops left Kherson. 
ISW Sept 12 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, September 12 | Institute for the Study of War
Russians absolutely compounded their mistakes by reinforcing like they did around Kherson. Their forces on the opposite shore of the Dnieper are estimated to be receiving maybe a third of the supplies via ferries they would otherwise be receiving with functioning rail and highway supply lines. Perhaps worse is that they removed their most experienced and most mobile troops from the Kharkiv oblast where they were most desperately needed to counter breakthroughs. Instead these same forces are now used in a relatively static defense role in a combat environment where Ukraine has most of the advantages.
Brilliant generalship on the part of Ukraine. I’ve shied away up to now from using the word ‘incompetent’ in describing Russian military leadership, but I see no reason not to at this point.
As reported in The Guardian:
In the Russian-occupied regions of the Crimea and southern Ukraine, Russian proxies, intelligence officers and military commanders have begun to evacuate and “urgently resettle their families” back into Russian territory, the defence intelligence of Ukraine’s military of defence said.
The Russians have a word for it: maskirovka
The 1944 Soviet Military Encyclopedia refers to “means of securing combat operations and the daily activities of forces; a complexity of measures, directed to mislead the enemy regarding the presence and disposition of forces…” Later versions of the doctrine also include strategic, political, and diplomatic means including manipulation of “the facts”, situation, and perceptions to affect the media and opinion around the world, so as to achieve or facilitate tactical, strategic, national and international goals.
I am confused by too many Breaking News reports. It seems outlets are reporting the same thing over and over. Sometimes, intelligence is a dribble. Sometimes it is a fire hose.
In other news, my spell-checker has turned itself off somehow. I find my typing speed much reduced.
Schadenfreude is fun. This Twitterer gained a sizeable following through posting a curious combination of hard-nosed military analysis, from a pro-Russian perspective, and anime cartoons, in particular very young-looking girls in suspenders. Having been absent for a few months, they returned for the Kherson Offensive, triumphantly predicting a Battle of the Bulge-style defeat for the Ukrainians. Having been extensively ridiculed, especially by NAFO operatives, for getting it so wrong, they have now left Twitter.