Militias say Ukrainian offensive in Donetsk begins this week
2014-10-08
Posted by: badanov
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By Chris Covert
Rantburg.com
Pro Russian militias say that a new Ukrainian offensive is set to begin Tuesday north of Donetsk city, according to various Russian language sources.
Meanwhile, the fighting at the Donetsk airport enters its ninth day without a clear resolution.
Pro Russian propaganda websites claim that the militias have taken the airport outright, while others say a small, determined force of Ukrainians are holed up in nuclear bomb resistant bunkers on the airport grounds.
One of the tactical issues at the airport is primarily the air control tower. According to pro Russian sources, Ukrainians have been using the tower to direct artillery strikes into Donetsk city. Photos from the area have emerged which show severe damage to the control tower. Sources in Russia militias have been firing on the control tower with mortars and antitank gun fire.
A news item/opinion piece published recently in Kosmolskaya Pravda by a Russian journalist said that the airport is an "extremely advantageous" position, perhaps in all of Donetsk because the airport sits atop a plateau which overlooks Donetsk city. He also wrote that approaches to the control tower are covered by snipers and mortar observation teams, which ensures militia forces can't get close enough to force a decision. A number of underground tunnels totaling 64 kilometers wend their way around the airport, including drainage tunnels beneath the tarmac and runways, some of them said to be six feet (2 meters) in diameter.
According to the military blogger Colonel Cassad, militias made two other attempts to capture the airport earlier in the year, both failures with a heavy butcher's bill for the militias.
The losses for the militias in the current assault in the last nine days total 80 dead, or about a rifle company, and several times that in wounded. A report in the Russian language Vesti news outlet said that 11 militia tanks were destroyed.
Losses for the Ukrainian forces because of militias shelling the airport cumulatively are said to be eight dead and 208 wounded, with four armored vehicles destroyed, but it should be noted those Ukrainian losses are estimates only by militia sources. Another six Ukrainian armored vehicles were lost by militia direct gunfire, including three tanks.
Militias have lost tanks and other heavy equipment in the assault, which some Russian sources say is, at this point, a Pyrrhic victory.
One town near to the airport said to be a marshaling area for Ukrainian support of the airport is reportedly Avdeyevka, north of Donetsk city. A number of rocket and tube artillery units are emplaced at the town to help cover Ukrainian positions with artillery fire support, and it also is a suspected springboard for a new Ukrainian offensive.
Both sides are under a ceasefire, which both sides claim the other has violated. The new demarcation line to be set under the Minsk accord runs just north and northwest of Donetsk city, which has both sides, but especially the militias angry. At the time of the truce the militias claimed that their forces were moving to capture large areas of Donetsk oblast since significant Ukrainian forces were tied down in Ilovaisk, Lugansk and near Mariupol on the coast of the sea of Azov in August, and now all those gains will not only be lost, they will also give the Ukrainian military better firing positions for their artillery.
This issue alone threatens the ceasefire, such as it is.
Some Russians in Donetsk claim that the rebel governments of Donetsk and Lugansk were not consulted before the September 19th truce was signed, and it was pushed to go into effect at the urging of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Two days ago Ukrainian military commander in Donetsk offered to leave the airport in exchange for six undisclosed towns, an offer the militias have seen as insulting, especially since the militias believe they are on the verge of taking the airport without negotiations.
Despite that, pro Russian militias are suffering from a lack of ammunition and support for repair and maintenance of heavy equipment such as tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and armored personnel carriers.
According to a Vesti news source, it has been "weeks" since ammunition has been delivered to militias forces by Russia. It also was reported that a close adviser to President Putin advised the militias not to attempt to force a decision at the Donetsk airport, advice which the militias promptly ignored.
Even though a Ukrainian assault under the best of conditions is expected to fail, the lack of ammunition for the militias will be a factor in the coming fighting.
Chris Covert writes about foreign military issues for Rantburg.com. He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com
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