‘Rotting’ Ukrainian Command May Have Sent Troops To Pointlessly Die

Reportedly taking advantage of the temporary confusion resulting from a rotation of Russian troops, a small Ukrainian force advanced into Kamyanske, a village on the Russian side of the front line in southern Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia Oblast.

The village with a pre-war population of just 2,000, surrounded on the north and west by the swamps adjacent to the Dnipro River, is one of the few places where Ukrainian forces have advanced in recent weeks.

But Ukrainian gains may be fleeting—and could also be indicative of some serious problems within the Ukrainian command structure.

Why are the Ukrainians risking lives and resources on a comparatively meaningless action in a sector that’s a relative backwater, when critical Ukrainian strongpoints in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk Oblast are under relentless Russian assault? Shouldn’t every available soldier and weapon be heading east? Why aren’t the Ukrainian regional commands prioritizing the right brigades in the right sectors?

Maryana Bezuhla, a member of the Ukrainian parliament, is among the most vocal critics of Ukrainian military planning—and she’s had enough.

“We are no different from the Russians, [conducting] ‘meat assaults,’ restoring positions in the lowlands, often without additional intelligence and cooperation of units, et cetera,” Bezuhla wrote on Sunday, as the tiny Ukrainian force cowering in Kamyanske was under attack from Russian drones.

One Russian blogger expected the platoon of Ukrainians who infiltrated Kamyanske to retreat, surrender or die before too long. “The enemy’s presence zone has been localized—they are currently being cleared,” Romanov wrote, attributing the Ukrainians’ isolation to the hard-to-navigate swampy terrain. “The enemy is dispersed in groups of three and hiding in houses. The houses are being dismantled.”

The likely outcome is that the Ukrainian units north of Kamyanske, anchored by the new 141st Mechanized Brigade, are going to bury tens of soldiers without making any lasting gains.

Bezuhla blamed the army’s senior officers. “The army is collapsing and rotting precisely because of the quality of management and decisions made at the top.”