As a former tank commander, I can say one thing for certain: Putin’s demoralised conscripts are utterly unprepared for the shock action now hitting their lines. Ukrainian armoured formations are beginning to meet Russian forces in battle, and they are going to pulverise Russia’s defensive lines. I am confident for one simple reason: Ukraine will follow the Western ideology of manoeuvre warfare in a combined arms context, while the Russians will follow Soviet doctrine, relying on attrition and numbers. The Russians will find that the armour of Western tanks is far more resilient than flesh and bone, they will die in great numbers, and they will lose.
The core idea of manoeuvre warfare is mission command. Commanders at all levels understand the top-level end state, and are given the flexibility to conduct the battle as they see fit to achieve victory. The Ukrainians are well-versed in this style of warfare, which allows them to be agile and adapt their plan to the situation on the battlefield as it unfolds and changes. The Russians do not follow this doctrine. They are given strict roles in the execution of plans drawn up at the top, and cannot change them even when things are going badly wrong. This has been made evident time and time again in Ukraine, where Moscow’s tanks have all too often been blown to pieces without firing a round.
On top of this, we can add the simple fact that Kyiv’s forces have proved far superior in their adoption of combined arms warfare. This means using tanks, infantry, artillery and air power in harmony to achieve their objectives. Each element brings its own capabilities, and together they are far greater than the sum of their parts. The effect is devastating. Nearly 4,000 Russian tanks have been destroyed because they were not properly protected by infantry and air defence. Tens of thousands of Russian soldiers have died because they were not properly supported by artillery and tanks.
Getting this form of warfare right takes intelligence and training. You need the right equipment, and effective doctrine. The Ukrainians have this. I estimate that their tank brigades have had around eight weeks to perfect combined arms warfare, around the same time I would have allocated to train the Royal Tank Regiment under my command to be an effective combined arms fighting force. And they certainly have the right equipment. The Challenger and Leopard tanks leading the spearhead vastly outmatch what’s left of Russia’s heavy armour, while sophisticated precision artillery is providing withering fire for the advance.
Conversely, Russian recruits appear to be given a few days of training, a little ammunition and are then thrown into the meat-grinder with a life expectancy surely measured in days. They might as well be gunning them down on the training fields; it would be faster, cheaper and about as combat effective.
There will certainly be no rescue from the air. The Russian air force should be a massive operational threat, but it seems that its pilots have opted to hide in the confines of the officers’ mess rather than face the excellent Ukrainian air defences. Sometimes, cowardice is the most sensible option.
The final and perhaps the most important element of an effective armoured fighting force is morale. The Ukrainians have this in spades. The Russian conscripts have virtually none. From personal experience, having fought a number of battles, I know you need to really want to get out of the trench to fight the enemy. It’s certainly not an easy or natural act.
With Ukrainian canniness, Western intelligence and equipment and a smattering of good fortune, I expect what’s left of the Russian army to be nothing more than a speed bump on the way to liberating Crimea, pushing to the Russian border and chucking Putin’s war criminals out of Ukraine once and for all.
Much like Adolf Hitler at the end of his war, Putin appears to be holed up in his bunker, being fed lies, making the wrong decisions while the sharks circle. What’s unfolding in Ukraine now could go down in history as one of the great tank actions, alongside Cambrai, Kursk and the Arras counterattack. It will certainly go down as the end of Moscow’s illegal invasion – and perhaps the beginning of the end of Putin.
Colonel Hamish de Bretton-Gordon is former Commanding Officer of the 1st Royal Tank Regiment
