Ukraine’s incursion into Kursk could be a turning point in history, just like the original 1943 battle
12 August 2024 •
Red Army T-34 tanks fighting in the Battle of Kursk, 1943 CREDIT: Sovfoto/Universal Images Group via Getty Images
History has long weighed heavily on the mind of Vladimir Putin. His original justification for the invasion of Ukraine was laced with false ideas about the past, including the suggestion that Ukraine did not have a legitimate claim to exist as an independent nation.
But in the exquisite Ukrainian counter-manoeuvre in Kursk, southern Russia, history has come back to bite President Putin. On much the same ground in 1943, vast Soviet forces turned back the Nazi hordes in a battle rightly considered to be one of the turning points in the Second World War. But whereas once Kursk could be assured a special place in the pantheon of Russian pride, Ukraine’s current “tactical” operation there means it may now come to be remembered as a source of Russian humiliation. And if the West allows Kyiv to exploit its successes, it may prove to be the locus of another turning point in Russian history, too.
The Ukrainian troops operating inside Russian territory are not some rag-tag force, but an army that for the first time in this conflict has demonstrated effective combined arms manoeuvre, the “Western” way of fighting. With a small force of determined and evidently well-trained soldiers, and a small number of tanks, they routed a bunch of unwilling conscripts whose shouts and screams will have rattled the windows of the Kremlin, and are now being heard in the homes of the rank and file in Russia, who hitherto have been fed a diet of Putin’s military brilliance.
This is also a harsh lesson for those armchair commentators who, without a whiff of combat experience, have sought to use the Ukraine war to condemn the art of soldiery, of tank warfare and of combined arms manoeuvre, assuring us that the future is drones and cyber and electronic warfare. Perhaps seduced by the devastatingly inept attempt by “elite” Russian forces to conduct armoured manoeuvre at the start of the war, they swallowed the idea that tanks et al are history.
But those of us with a modicum of experience of land warfare saw very quickly that the original Russian attack failed not because the idea behind it was obsolete. It was thwarted because the Russian tank crews were poorly trained and badly led, with tanks being destroyed in their thousands, often by the British NLAW anti-tank weapon.
What Ukraine has proved instead is that the Principles of War – the bible for successful warriors since time immemorial, drawing on the lessons of everyone from Carl von Clausewitz to Napoleon – are very much alive. The principles of surprise, offensive spirit and concentration of force worked for the Soviets in 1943, and are working for Ukrainian forces today. If you had listened to the drone fanatics, you would have thought it impossible to achieve surprise on today’s “transparent” battlefield. They forgot that the drone is only as smart as its operator and that both sides of a conflict have a say in the outcome.
The current Ukrainian move will harm Putin in at least three ways. First, it means that he will have to divert forces to defend against other incursions across the border, which are no doubt planned to further unbalance the Russian aggressors. Kyiv has introduced an extra element of jeopardy into Russian planning. It is now also clear that Russia possesses no mobile reserve to plug gaps in its defences, and there is certainly no sign that the locals have any desire to pick up scythes and picks to slow the Ukrainian advance.
Second, it is deeply embarrassing and might help to destabilise Putin’s rule. The Kremlin cannot defend Russia’s own territory, let alone beat Ukraine, and for the first time this appears to be getting significant airtime in mainstream media.
Third, it demonstrates that Ukraine does not need anything like the same number of men or arms as the Russians to change the military facts on the ground. Back in 1943, the Germans attacked with hundreds of thousands of men and thousands of tanks. The Ukrainians have seized a few hundred square miles with a few thousand men and a handful of tanks. In other words, victory for Ukraine is by no means unachievable.
Europe and the United States might now be looking more to the Middle East than Ukraine, but the latter is much more important to our own security. Instead of fretting about “escalation”, the West should ensure that Ukraine can reinforce its tactical successes in Kursk as a means of forcing Russia to the negotiating table. Indeed, this is an opportunity to shorten the war, one that no doubt Churchill and Roosevelt would have grasped. Sadly, we do not have their calibre today, but it is a chance for Sir Keir Starmer to make his mark and Joe Biden to leave a decent legacy.
But it is also a big signal to the UK’s new Strategic Defence Review that warfare has not been fundamentally changed by cheap drones. The officials running the review should not listen too much to the brilliant academics who seem to know every inch of every battle but little of fighting in one. They should canvass the opinions of those of us who have actually won a few.
Colonel (Retd) Hamish de Bretton-Gordon OBE is a former commander of UK & NATO CBRN Forces
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Comment from :
John Polenski
It’s more than embarrassing, it’s utterly humiliating.
Just consider – Russia, which for years has held territory belonging to three of its neighbours by military force, and regularly terrorized several others (no wonder they all want to join NATO) now finds a small but significant chunk of its own territory under similar military occupation. Massive.
Not only will it last for some time (forget those who say Russia will recapture the territories quickly) but if they can press on further, and capture Kursk itself, this will become absolutely monumental.
One other point that’s been missed. Russia has committed so many of its troops to Ukraine that it’s left its own borders virtually undefended. Just as Prigozhin discovered last year.
Which means… Finland could roll across the border and retake Karelia. Japan could have a decent stab at the Kuriles…
And then there’s China. Recently issued Chinese maps have been renaming Russian border villages with their Chinese names…..
Could be fun. Could be absolutely frightening.
monte nabors
Good article. According to Gen Patton, you concentrate your forces at weak points. Draftees with low morale- not volunteers and professionals looks like a weak point to me.
Reasonable Comment
I suppose when a Ukranian tanker sees a Russian tank they recall seeing a video of a Russian tank in the early days firing at a harmless old couple in a car at point blank range or driving over a car with occupants in it. Just because they could. There is probably very little hesitation on the part of the Ukrainians when it comes to tank conflict. That must be worth an awful lot in terms of outcomes.
David R Crawford
To all those of a pro-Putin persuasion, who usually descend in droves onto a Hamish article, let me please remind you of one crucial fact:
This week was the first time Russia has been invaded from Europe since 1941 and it happened on Putin’s watch. VERY embarrassing for the Gollum of the Kremlin.
Carpe Jugulum
There is a critical element to this story. Russia is no longer a governed nation. It is far closer to a gang controlling a neighbourhood, a completely mature kleptocracy that functions entirely on corruption and nepotism.
There is not one Russian weapons system that does not have a superior Western equivalent. Why? Russia’s highly skilled engineers have left. Why work in a society when those remembered as being in the lower sets at school outearn those with hard won skills?
Where are the skilled aviators of the Russian airforce? Their places have been taken by idiot nephews of oligarchs who can’t even avoid crashing into a drone flying straight and level, much less fly close support requiring skill and courage.
Where are the brilliant tacticians? They are left behind by the ‘connected’ who are promoted.
Russia is no longer a conventional superpower, it is a gang of thugs relying on the basic application of mass in a war requiring ever more adaptability, ingenuity, intellect and sophistication. Putin epitomises the utter lack of all four.
Russia is f’d.
Here is putler’s latest bullshit. From a news item in the DT:
“It is clear now why the Kiyv regime rejected our proposals to return to a peace plan, as well as the proposals of interested and neutral mediators,” he added.
“The West is fighting us with the hands of Ukrainians.”
He went on: “Apparently, the enemy is striving to improve its negotiating positions in the future.
“But what kind of negotiations? How do we even talk with people who indiscriminately strike at civilians, at civilian infrastructure and try to create threats to nuclear energy? What can we even talk about with them?”
Like the true nazi vermin that he is, he goes straight for the Goebbells “accusation in a mirror” strategy.
The scaffold is calling putler ….
You must have a strong stomach to read such putrid vomit.
Putin failed to understand Stalin’s lesson of quantity over quality. He built a smaller military, which has neither quantity nor quality due to corruption, and he and his cronies diverted/stole upgrades money. In an act of incalculable magnitude of stupidity, he then sent this worm-eaten army into a sustained conflict and destroyed it. Bluffing with it would have been one thing, but sending it into a real fight was pointless from the starting bell. Putin and his whole crew know it, and the failures of the Russian military against a weaker opponent fall squarely in his ineptly micromanaging lap.