Meatgrinder: Russian Tactics in the Second Year of Its Invasion of Ukraine

The Ukrainians had spent lots of time money and resources fortifying the contact-line in the Donbas area. They had fortifications that had taken 8 years to build and expected them to hold out against wave after wave of Russian attacks.

Except the Russians didn't do what was expected. They held back and plastered one area after another with lots of artillery. Once most of the defenders were wiped out from the artillery, the Ukrainians had a choice: Send in more defenders to make the most of those expensive fortifications, or pull back into the open terrain where they would be more vulnerable and could be plastered even more so.

Pretty easy choice actually, send in more defenders.

So the Russians had an easy task. Bump off the defenders, wait for more defenders to be sent in, and bump off that next lot too.Rinse, repeat. Rinse, repeat.

Why chase after the Ukrainians? Let them keep coming into the killing fields to be slaughtered.

There is nothing new under the sun. These are pretty much World War One tactics. They worked back then, they work today.

And all on the cheap. At least much cheaper than NATO. The era of having a lot of high dollar fancy toys as a show of brute force has sunsetted. But what can be done? I spent a couple decades in combat arms knowing US tactics needed a lot of changes but the changes never manifested because contractors can't make money with cheap shells and flimsy drones.

Active discussion of The Economist article about this report: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36030231