While launching an attack on Russia on the front line, Ukraine is also opening up a potentially more critical second battlefield: destroying the enemy's command center, ammunition depots, and logistics lines on which the Russian army relies to continue operations.
Just as the Ukrainian army is striving to tear open Russia's defense lines in southern and eastern Ukraine, Kiev is also using ammunition provided by the West to target the Russian supply line behind it. Ukraine hopes to cooperate with this to significantly weaken the Russian military and thus cut off the occupying forces.
The attack on these essential materials on the battlefield depends on the level of advancement of Ukrainian ground forces and must be sufficient to bring Russian military equipment into the strike range. Ukraine is using artillery, rockets, drones, and missiles to strike the enemy, but most of these weapons have limited range, which means that apart from a few Ukrainian weapons, a significant portion of Russia's logistics operations are still outside the range of the Ukrainian side. The Russian military is also embarking on attacking Ukraine's logistics.
However, soon, Ukraine may have a new type of weapon with a longer range to strike Russian logistics lines at even greater distances. US President Joe Biden recently told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that the US will provide a limited number of ATACMS ground launched ballistic missiles. The range of this missile is between 100 and 190 miles, depending on the model.
Russia has started building new railway lines in the occupied territories to prevent Ukraine from disrupting the railway lines currently used by Moscow to transport supplies to the troops, indicating that Russia attaches great importance to the risks faced by logistics infrastructure.
What complicates Ukraine's efforts is that bringing Russian logistics routes within range is only the beginning. The troops in Kiev also need to understand the location of the best target or the location they are going to, which poses a huge challenge to intelligence work.
Last year, Ukraine achieved significant results in combat by attacking Russia's warehouses, supply transportation, and command centers, which are important nodes and links in the ground transportation line referred to by tacticians. Kiev did not attempt to strike every tank and unit formation, but instead adopted a more efficient method of destroying necessary supplies, typically using precision weapons provided by Western allies.
Now, Ukraine's goal is to replicate this success on land at least 50 miles wide, extending eastward from the Crimean Peninsula to the coast of the Russian Sea of Azov; Russia seized Crimea from Ukraine in 2014. Ukraine's goal is to cut off what Moscow calls this land corridor and separate the Russian military.
Breaking through this Russian occupied area will weaken Russia's ability to support frontline forces and utilize Crimean operations. Russia uses the Crimean Peninsula as a naval base, attacking Ukraine from there and threatening ships transporting Ukrainian exports on the Black Sea.
Russia also provides support to its troops through the land corridors of Crimea. An assistant to the mayor of Mariupol, who is in exile, said that Russia is building a new railway to Mariupol. If successful, it will reduce the pressure on supplies through Crimea, posing a threat to the Ukrainian army. Mariupol is a Black Sea port city on the land corridor.
However, even achieving these limited goals of attacking Russian logistics may be difficult for Ukraine as it requires a large number of artillery. Rob Lee, a senior researcher at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, a think tank, said that Russia has also adjusted its actions to disrupt Ukraine's tactics and may have increased troops near the front line. Lee visited the Ukrainian front line in July.
A challenge faced by Ukraine is that Ukrainian troops are at least 45 miles away from a coastal highway used by Russia, and most Ukrainian weapon systems must be several miles away from the front line to reduce the possibility of being attacked. Only a small portion of Ukraine's weapons can be used near the front line or strike targets 50 miles away.
This means that the southern section of the aforementioned continental bridge will largely not be attacked by Ukraine. Kyrylo Budanov, the director of the Ukrainian Military Intelligence Agency, recently told a military website that the country needs weapons with longer ranges to strike Russian command posts, logistics bases, and similar targets.
The city of Tokmak, occupied by Russia, is about 15 miles away from the Ukrainian front line and is now a large logistics hub in Russia. It is closer to Ukraine's target range, but the Russian army has built defensive fortifications around Tokmak.
The arrival of the ATACMS missile system in the United States may change this balance. This system has precise guidance capability and can perform precise strikes. Some types of rockets can also eject small bombs, projecting the explosive power of the rocket over a wider area, potentially causing greater damage than a single explosion. These rockets are launched by the highly flexible truck type high mobility rocket launcher system (Himars); As for when Ukraine will receive these rockets and the quantity delivered, it has not yet been announced to the public.
At present, Ukraine's highly mobile rocket launcher system fires rockets with shorter ranges, including each rocket that can eject approximately 180000 small tungsten beads that do not explode but can penetrate armor. Ukraine also has cluster munitions with shorter range and lower accuracy.
Although the Russian military is equivalent to having a shelter in the Russian occupied areas that the Ukrainian army cannot reach, the Ukrainian army is working to increase the difficulty of Russia providing supplies to frontline troops.
For Ukraine, determining the location of important targets and implementing strikes is a challenge that requires reliable intelligence on relevant coordinates or supply routes. Ukraine relies on drones and other sources of information. Implementing strikes may require a large number of artillery, especially targeting moving targets or targets with only a rough understanding of their location.
Retired Army Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt said, "It's best to target static locations such as storage areas and warehouses
The Russian military has long relied on railway lines to transport a large amount of heavy equipment and supplies. A train loaded with goods is a very tempting target, but if the train is in motion, it is difficult to locate and requires precise targeting. Even long trains are very narrow, making it difficult to hit.
The picture shows an explosion accident that occurred last year on a bridge connecting the occupied Crimean Peninsula with the Russian mainland. The accident cut off the supply arteries of the Russian military.
Rails may be more difficult to target and require weapons that can accurately target, while Russia excels at repairing rails in combat.
Retired US Army Lieutenant Colonel John Nagl, who teaches combat courses at the US Army War College, said, "Traditional ammunition is difficult to break the rails
Pushing closer to railway lines and other logistics assets makes it easier to target. Nagl said, "Every meter on the battlefield is important
Lee said that Russia no longer uses large warehouses, but instead disperses supplies to many transit points, which undermines Ukraine's momentum of progress on the battlefield after bitter battles. He said that Moscow only uses one truck to transport supplies at a time, including the use of civilian trucks, roundabout transportation, and the use of bait to thwart Ukrainian attacks.
Lee said, "Russia's logistics are already different from the spring of 2022," when Ukraine could easily find an opportunity to attack. Lee said, "Using a large number of trucks is inefficient, but the goal is also small
Just hitting a supply truck could potentially change the situation of a local battle, so Ukraine may still want to give it a try. Kimmitt said, but doing so will face the challenge of "intelligence sustainability," which is whether one can focus on a moving target.
The ultimate test Ukraine faces is to what extent it can weaken Russia's ability to defend supply lines, combat, and launch a new round of attacks. Strategic experts say that ATACMS may be able to hit targets farther away than the Russian targets that Ukraine can currently hit, but its value mainly lies in whether it can weaken Russian forces and change the situation.