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Some observers say surprise attacks are almost impossible due to extensive surveillance.
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Ukraine’s invasion of Kursk surprised Russia and followed a time-honored tactic.
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The question for Ukraine is whether Kursk will fare better than the German-led Battle of the Bulge.
When Ukraine launched its Kursk offensive in August, it wasn’t just the Russians who were surprised.
Some experts have argued that large-scale attacks are no longer possible in modern warfare. Any attempt to consolidate forces for penetration would be quickly detected by dronesspy planes or satellites, it was thought, allowing the defender to strengthen its defenses.
“The proliferation of unmanned aerial systems (UAS) in the Ukraine-Russia war has created a transparent battlefield marked by near-persistent surveillance, making it difficult to achieve operational surprise,” according to a report . blog by the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command.
But despite hordes of Russian drones monitoring Ukrainian movements, Ukraine managed to concentrate your best brigades for an attack that stunned the Kremlin and seized 500 square miles at the height of the offensive.
How did Ukraine do it? Using the same traditional techniques as those employed by Germany during its surprise attack on the Battle of the Bulge in December 1944.
First there was careful preparation by identifying weak points in the Russian defenses. By massing forces for offensives in eastern Ukraine, it reduced the rest of the 600-mile front line, including the Kursk region. Open source intelligence “indicates that up to 75 percent of Russian ground forces, airborne units, and naval infantry are deployed in or near eastern Ukraine,” TRADOC noted. And as Russian drones and other ISR – intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance – systems were concentrated in areas where Russia was on attack, this meant lighter coverage of Kursk.
Similarly, in late 1944 – even as Germany was reeling from massive defeats at Normandy and Russia’s advance on the Eastern Front – Hitler and his top advisors identified the Ardennes region in Belgium as a weak point in the center of the Allied lines. While American and British forces were concentrated to the north and south for a final offensive into Germany, the Allies viewed the hilly, wooded terrain of the Ardennes as a quiet sector to be safely defended with a few exhausted or inexperienced divisions. The thick forests could provide cover for German infantry and Panzer armored forces as they advanced.
Before the August assault, the Ukrainian high command had also taken care to keep information about the operation from as few people as possible. “Once the intelligence was collected and analyzed, the Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, General Oleksandr Syrskyi, led the planning in the presence of only a few senior officers,” TRADOC said. “The planning sessions were likely conducted face-to-face to avoid Russian cyber actors or signals intelligence discovering the plan. Press interviews with Ukrainian soldiers indicate that the incursion forces did not were informed only a few hours before the operation.”
To conceal its preparations, Ukraine has also resorted to disinformation, including reporting that the Ukrainian military would not be able to launch an offensive before spring 2025. Ukrainian troops, unwittingly, participated in this deception. For example, “the Ukrainian army announced that the 61st mechanized brigade would be transferred to Vovchansk, a city located in the northern sector of the fighting in eastern Ukraine,” TRADOC said. “Even after the 61st was informed it would be going to Russia, the unit’s senior officers thought it was a bluff.”
Likewise, knowledge of the Ardennes offensive – codenamed Operation Wacht am Rhein – was confined to a small circle of officers sworn to secrecy on pain of death. Allied cryptographers had broken high-level German radio codes (the “Ultra” program), but German forces used radio silence and orders were transmitted by mail and telephone. Even the name Wacht am Rhein (“Watch on the Rhine”) was intended to convince Allied intelligence that it was a defensive plan to prevent the Allied crossing of the Rhine into Germany.
Ukraine prepared for its offensive by blinding Russian ISR with strikes on Russian airfields, as well as using Ukrainian drones to destroy Russian drones. To delay a Russian response, Ukraine used rockets, drones and artillery mines against air bases and command and control centers, and also interdicted Russian reinforcements.
It also echoed Nazi Germany’s final offensive. She had timed the operation in the Ardennes to coincide with a long period of bad weather, which grounded Allied reconnaissance planes. At the foggy dawn of December 16, 1944, a massive German artillery barrage disrupted American communications, while German commandos – dressed in American uniforms – infiltrated American lines to sow confusion and panic.
The question for Ukraine is whether Operation Kursk will do better than the Bulge. Instead of a breakthrough that changed the course of World War II, the German offensive ultimately bogged down due to poor terrain, lack of fuel, and fierce American resistance.
While seizing part of Russian territory and causing consternation in Moscow, the Ukrainian offensive has failed to divert Russian forces from eastern Ukraine, and Russian counterattacks are reducing the Ukrainian salient.
Nevertheless, Ukraine has shown that surprise attacks are possible even in the The era of drones. “The Ukrainian incursion into the Kursk region demonstrated that operational surprise is still possible in the Ukrainian conflict by avoiding and degrading ISR – a lesson that could also be widely applied to future large-scale combat operations on other theaters”, concluded TRADOC.
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