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Whole thing's a good read. But I find the end of this last paragraph interesting.
https://www.iiss.org/online-analysis...ry-for-ukraine
The most recent offensive raises the question of whether the West should emphasise a combined-arms, manoeuvre-based approach, or focus instead on helping Ukraine attain advantage via a destruction-based approach, especially given what is likely to be a prolonged attritional phase. The course of the war illustrates that manoeuvre will have to be earned, and that integration and simultaneity – basically, the key virtues of combined-arms operations – are not only difficult to achieve but also unlikely to produce breakthroughs under the conditions prevailing in Ukraine. Rather, the focus needs to be first and foremost on the attritional destruction of Russia’s forces by firepower in both the close and deep battles to pave the way for manoeuvre. Ukraine, in short, needs to embrace a destruction-centred approach for the next stage of the war, which may in time enable manoeuvre to be more successful.
Attrition is a more dependable approach in part because the force quality required to execute combined-arms operations at scale is often difficult to maintain and reconstitute later in a conventional war. The Ukrainian armed forces have had to undergo cycles of reconstituting and rebuilding formations, often after losing more experienced soldiers and leaders to attrition. New units often consist of mobilised personnel, officers from other formations, and those who were promoted in grade, most without any professional military education. The emphasis therefore has to be on the fundamentals to build planning capacity within battalion and brigade staffs. This is required before higher levels of coordination are possible and instilling a major doctrinal evolution into a traditionally fires-centred military is feasible.
Furthermore, Ukraine’s principal problem in the 2023 offensive was not an inability to conduct combined-arms manoeuvre. While it is true the new brigades trained by Western countries struggled to coordinate combat arms, this was ancillary rather than central to the offensive’s failure. Accordingly, it is incorrect to conclude that Ukrainian forces could not succeed because they could not fight like a Western military, or that fighting like a Western military doctrinally requires air superiority, without which success is impossible. In fact, Ukraine made progress by trying to gain better positions, fighting for relative fires advantage that reduced overall losses, and made Russia pay a high price to defend terrain. Fighting like a Western military is not necessarily a recipe for success in this war. As many Ukrainian soldiers have suggested, the operating environment is such that some Western tactics and techniques appear unsuitable or dated.
https://www.iiss.org/online-analysis...ry-for-ukraine
Making attrition work
The most recent offensive raises the question of whether the West should emphasise a combined-arms, manoeuvre-based approach, or focus instead on helping Ukraine attain advantage via a destruction-based approach, especially given what is likely to be a prolonged attritional phase. The course of the war illustrates that manoeuvre will have to be earned, and that integration and simultaneity – basically, the key virtues of combined-arms operations – are not only difficult to achieve but also unlikely to produce breakthroughs under the conditions prevailing in Ukraine. Rather, the focus needs to be first and foremost on the attritional destruction of Russia’s forces by firepower in both the close and deep battles to pave the way for manoeuvre. Ukraine, in short, needs to embrace a destruction-centred approach for the next stage of the war, which may in time enable manoeuvre to be more successful.
Attrition is a more dependable approach in part because the force quality required to execute combined-arms operations at scale is often difficult to maintain and reconstitute later in a conventional war. The Ukrainian armed forces have had to undergo cycles of reconstituting and rebuilding formations, often after losing more experienced soldiers and leaders to attrition. New units often consist of mobilised personnel, officers from other formations, and those who were promoted in grade, most without any professional military education. The emphasis therefore has to be on the fundamentals to build planning capacity within battalion and brigade staffs. This is required before higher levels of coordination are possible and instilling a major doctrinal evolution into a traditionally fires-centred military is feasible.
Furthermore, Ukraine’s principal problem in the 2023 offensive was not an inability to conduct combined-arms manoeuvre. While it is true the new brigades trained by Western countries struggled to coordinate combat arms, this was ancillary rather than central to the offensive’s failure. Accordingly, it is incorrect to conclude that Ukrainian forces could not succeed because they could not fight like a Western military, or that fighting like a Western military doctrinally requires air superiority, without which success is impossible. In fact, Ukraine made progress by trying to gain better positions, fighting for relative fires advantage that reduced overall losses, and made Russia pay a high price to defend terrain. Fighting like a Western military is not necessarily a recipe for success in this war. As many Ukrainian soldiers have suggested, the operating environment is such that some Western tactics and techniques appear unsuitable or dated.
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