Kharkiv is the second largest city in Ukraine and an important political, economic, and cultural center of Ukraine. Its strategic geographical location makes Kharkiv vital for Ukraine. The Russian army hopes to capture Kharkiv to create a military buffer zone, but the Russian army has a bigger battle plan behind it.
Some military experts said that Kharkiv is a key town in the eastern region of Ukraine, and the Kharkiv region is not only the gateway to Ukraine's border with Russia, but also an important link between the western and eastern regions of Ukraine. Once Kharkiv is controlled by the Russian army, it means that it can take advantage of the situation to approach western Ukraine, and Kyiv is also in danger.
In order to carry out a counteroffensive in Kharkiv, the Ukrainian army has drawn elites from major battlefields to carry out reinforcements, and even Ukrainian marines have been transferred to Kharkiv. It is reported that after withstanding the first wave of the Russian offensive, with the arrival of reinforcements, the Ukrainian army began to launch a counteroffensive in the northern region of Kharkiv. With the outbreak of fierce fighting between the two sides, the losses of the Ukrainian armed forces are increasing every day, and it is reported that the casualties of the Ukrainian army are now as high as about 1,500 per day, setting a record since the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war.
And all this is exactly what the Russian army wants to see, and some analysts have pointed out that the Russian army's attack on Kharkiv was originally a wait-and-see battle. The primary purpose of the Russian army is to attract the elite of all fronts of Ukraine to Kharkiv to carry out encirclement and suppression by besieging Kharkiv.
At the same time, the Russian army's offensive in Kharkiv is also a tentative offensive, if the Ukrainian defenders in Kharkiv are too strong in defense, then the Russian army will implement the tactics of "encirclement and reinforcement". However, once the defense of Kharkov is unable to stop the Russian offensive, then the Russian army will take the opportunity to occupy Kharkov by the way.
Sure enough, after the Russian army besieged Kharkiv, the Ukrainian army was already in disarray, and the Chasov Yar front could not afford to lose, but the Ukrainian army actually transferred a large number of elites from here in order to reinforce Kharkov, and the 98th Guards Airborne Division of the Russian army immediately found the weak point of the Ukrainian army's defense on this front, and captured most of the canal micro-area in one fell swoop.
And in the northern region of Kharkiv, the Russian army has officially launched the "meat grinder" tactic.
According to information from the Ukrainian military, the Russian offensive near Volchansk and Liptsy has reached a standstill, while the Ukrainian army is trying a counteroffensive. Some military experts believe that this is just a ploy of the Russian army, and the Russian army has only one purpose in slowing down the offensive, which is to guide the Ukrainian army to carry out a counteroffensive, and then attract more Ukrainian troops to fall into this "meat grinder".
On the Volchansk defensive line, the Russian army sent commandos to fight with the Ukrainian army at the aggregate factory, and the Ukrainian army relied on the factory to build a strong defense. It is worth noting that the Russian offensive relies on artillery fire, and the Ukrainian army needs crowd tactics to consume Russian firepower if it wants to hold its position and recapture it.
For the Russian army, this is a way of fighting with leisure. After the Ukrainian army rushed to the position, the Russian army temporarily avoided the edge, and then relied on rocket artillery and long-range artillery to strike at the Ukrainian army.
It is reported that after occupying the commanding heights in the area of Gorky Park and the eastern part of the city, the Russian army has completely occupied a favorable terrain, and everything is developing according to the script planned by the Russian army in advance.
And in the Liptsevsky direction, the Russian army also took the lead in occupying the commanding heights, and the Ukrainian army could only launch a continuous counteroffensive with the help of armored vehicles, trying to pull the Russian army down from the commanding heights. Since the Ukrainian army has no air supremacy and no air firepower cover, it can only rely on numerical superiority to make up for the shortcomings of firepower if it wants to cross the forward positions of the Russian army.
But the artillery of the Russian army can strike condescendingly, and it has begun to take advantage of its geographical advantages to continuously harvest the living combat forces of the Ukrainian army. At the same time, the same is true in the Liptsy direction, where the Ukrainian army has lost the commanding heights of its defense, and the Russian army is fighting more and more easily.