Introduction

Not only did Avdeevka fall to the Russian army, but there were a lot of other very interesting events taking place, such as the death of Aleksey Navalny and the activation of the Zaporizhzhia front line by the Russians. Let’s go through them.

Resources

• Olympus has fallen: Chapter one

• Definition of the Theaters of War

Avdeevka

The situation that developed in Avdeevka shocked me. There are several reasons for this. Readers of BMA know the following: Russia can take any frontline town when it wants within a very short period of time. We learned that from several of my former military articles, so I won’t go into too much detail. What is important here is that Russia is usually driven not by the calendar but by milestones. When milestone X is achieved, operation Y can start in order to achieve Z. And operation Y lasts as long as needed to achieve Z.

This applies to almost all operations within the ongoing war. The reason behind this is to preserve the lives of their own soldiers and to encourage the enemy to defend areas that are undefendable or to assault positions that are impossible to take with Ukraine’s current capabilities. The result is the depletion of Ukrainian manpower and the development of positions favorable to the Russian army and extremely unfavorable to the Ukrainian army.

So far, nothing new.

Three weeks ago, Russia suddenly started something very interesting. A real operational combined-arms assault to take Avdeevka in short order.

I think this was the first perfectly coordinated combined-arms offensive approach in this war so far. Perfectly orchestrated and coordinated between the Army, Artillery, Air Force, and Special Forces.

Of course, this would not have been possible if Russia hadn’t breached the main defenses of Avdeevka weeks before and gained a foothold within the town. So, I think we had perhaps several trigger points that a) enabled and b) triggered the final assault on Avdeevka. Let’s go through them:

• Breach of enemy main defensive lines several days and weeks before. For example, at Tsarska Okhota.

• Appearance of Azov (3^rd (Nazi) Assault Brigade), and a unique opportunity to kill most of them.

• Munich Security (Beggars) Conference, taking place simultaneously.

• The imperialists in the US struggle to approve $60 billion for Ukraine.

• Destruction of the assigned reserves in Selidovo several days before the final storm. In this village, Russia destroyed between several hundred to two thousand (depending on the source) Azov Nazis, who were staged there to rotate into Avdeevka. All were destroyed with a triple tap operation, which lasted 2-3 hours and involved continuous hits by Iskander missiles and MLRS rockets, both with cluster warheads. It was clear to Russian intelligence that the Nazis (Azov) were staged and crowded at this place, and therefore the perfect opportunity to kill them all without the need to take prisoners. That’s why Russia made sure that the wounded could not be evacuated until they were dead. As far as I know, some of them survived. And every Nazi will get enough opportunities to go to hell and meet Hitler and Bandera there soon enough. (I’m not referring to the regular Ukrainian army here).

Perfect conditions for the final push, indeed. No reinforcements were possible, defenses were breached, and Azov was trapped within a semi-cauldron. Don’t forget that it decreased the probability that Ukraine will be able to acquire additional funds and weapons very quickly after this unexpected debacle.

What does all that mean? It means that the calendar played an important role in this particular battle, which is interesting.

In our Black Mountain Talks show, we interviewed Scott Ritter. Without going into details, he indicated that he has firsthand information that “something” will develop by May. The Russians want to collapse Ukraine this year, and whatever it is, it will apparently start in May. Since he recently was in Russia and also visited Russia’s new (old???) territories and talked to high-ranking military officers, I assume that there is “something” in preparation. I don’t want to speculate here because it wouldn’t make sense to speculate into the blue. But you can watch the interview here:

Syrskyi

Eventually, Ukraine got a new Commander of its Armed Forces. Zaluzhny is gone, and Syrskyi (which translates into “from cheese”) took over. A Soviet and Russian General has been serving in the Armed Forces of Ukraine for a long time. He is known for a lot of catastrophic defeats, with tens or even hundreds of thousands of dead Ukrainians. Which is why he has the nice title “Butcher.” There are some “Butchers” around who butchered their enemies. Not this one. He butchers his own soldiers with suicide missions.

I don’t want to go into too much detail here since he was already analyzed numerous times. It is important to note that he was chosen because he is no danger to Zelenskyi; he is highly unpopular and has no political aspirations or chances. And there is something else: most people thought Ukraine would go onto defense soon. At least, it should. With Syrskyi, this is at least off the table or far less effective. Syrskyi knows only one direction, and that is forward.

Moreover, he was the one who commanded Azov to its death, crowded in two places for perfect strikes on them. As many people already assumed, I would also assume that it was a move to get rid of as many Nazis as possible because they were a threat to Kiev politicians who don’t follow their ideas or wishes. And who controls the Nazis? Well, Zaluzhny had a good connection with them, and the West controls both the Nazis and Zaluzhny.

Let me put it this way: some interesting developments must be observed before we can reach any conclusions.

There are now more and more reports, which I can’t verify, that the war in Ukraine might actually be in its final stages. Of course, there is Scott Ritter's report about something looming in May. But above that, there are also more rumors that Washington might be eager to end all of this before the hot phase of the presidential elections this year. I wrote about that almost a year ago in “Olympus Has Fallen: Chapter One.” Here is the passage:

 

Is that possible? It is possible! Is it likely? Is it Syrskyi’s task to get rid of the remaining Ukrainian “patriots” and Nazis to then be able to surrender Ukraine without these guys around which would force the rest of the country to fight until the last Ukrainian?

I do not know. We need to observe the situation a little longer. All indications show that all fronts are crumbling and the final collapse is near. So, it is one possible scenario out of many other equally or even more likely ones.

What was very interesting was the welcome gift by the Russians for Syrskyi. Several brigades were destroyed in and around Avdeevka several days after he took over. I think that it contributes further to the problems in Kyiv between the political and military elites. It could contribute further to the final collapse from within.

Navalny

Navalny died in a Russian prison. Only several days after a video had been released where he was fit and reported about his health etc. This leads us to the conclusion that he is not being tortured like Julian Assange in the Western prison. He was doing well. And then he suddenly died because of a blood clot? Caused by a Western Corona vaccine?

To be honest, I have no idea what happened, and I cannot know it, but I refuse to believe solely in this one scenario. Let me explain my thoughts on this.

First: Very few prisoners die in prison—almost none. Now we have a VIP prisoner whom the whole West watches, just waiting for him to die to make use of his death. And then he dies… really? I’m not motivated enough to find the actual number of average prisoner deaths and calculate the probability that a) a prisoner dies and b) a VIP prisoner dies. I would assume that the probability is so low that it is more likely to go to Vegas, gamble, and win several million at the first game. Maybe Navalny should not have chosen to be a CIA prostitute but rather go to Vegas during his time in the USA. Too late.

Even though it is highly unlikely, I still won’t rule this scenario out.

Corona vaccine? Well, I assume that’s some world-class trolling here Even IF it actually is the case.

But what happened then? Again, I don’t know, but here are some thoughts.

How could you kill a prisoner?

• You could infiltrate the prison with an agent who would kill him somehow. Extremely unlikely James Bond / Prison Break stuff. It is not impossible but unlikely, because it would be far too expensive for a zero-value target. Navalny.

• You could manage that a visitor (Wife/Lawyer/Prosecutor/etc.) smuggles some substance in and make him with his own agreement (he’s done anyway) to take it to die and thereby trigger the wanted shitstorm by the West. Maybe… But also unlikely because all visitors are registered and would be found pretty quickly after an abduction. No one wants this.

• A prison ward/employee killed/poisoned him. Because Russia wanted him dead? Nope, him rotting in some of the worst prisons is a far better deterrence against other traitors than his quick death. Because the West wanted to kill him? They could potentially have bribed or blackmailed a warden outside of the prison to smuggle in a substance that would cause the described condition. (This scenario is my favorite for the time being).

• Prisoner inmates could have killed him. The worst thing you can do in Russia is to betray Russia. Navalny is one of the biggest Russian traitors. BTW: What is Skripal doing? Such traitors could easily be “unplanned” killed in prison by other prisoners. Russian prisoners are mostly patriots.

• Blood clot because of his numerous vaccines? Possible. My research showed that he apparently was a drug addict, a vaccine (???) addict, and he was imprisoned in a very cold region. If he was forced to work in the cold (digging snow), thrombosis could also be triggered after this massive injection of the Western (???) vaccines.

We will never know what happened, but we have gone through several possible scenarios. In case someone triggered his death, the question would be, who? Let’s go through this question (qui Bono):

• Russia:

  As already described, Navalny’s slow decay in prison would be far more beneficial to Russia in deterring further traitors than simply killing him. Most likely, he was lucky to die quickly. At least he would have been treated like a human in Russia. Which Western political prisoners like Assange can’t say…

• The West:

  Very likely, because he lost all his relevance. A) He is in prison and will never ever be able to prostitute himself for the West in public. B) His imprisonment can’t be used any longer to trigger a public uprising because the Russian society is so consolidated through the NATO war against Russia (incl. Ukraine) that even his imprisonment is worthless. C) The only use for the West is his death. And it is also only of use for one event. Most likely to either support the American vote for the $60bn or to be used by German politicians as a justification to approve the shipment of the Taurus missiles to Ukraine. That is the value of his life.

• The Grim Reaper:

  Yes, his time could have simply been over. If it is true that he received four or more vaccinations and then worked in a cold and heavy environment, thrombosis is also likely, according to my research.

Again, we will never know. The only interesting thing now is whether some German politicians will use it to ship Taurus missiles. They will be shipped anyway; the question is only when and under which excuse

Zaporozhye

Right after the fall of Avdeevka, we received reports that Russia activated its southern front in Zaporozhye. During Ukraine’s “counter” offensive in 2023, it managed to capture two big villages right at the front line of the Russian defenses. They paid with some 100.000 dead soldiers for this. Not only on this front but most of the casualties were suffered there. We are talking about Rabotino and Verbovoje.

In fact, Russia assembled large troop concentrations in this area. Larger than those that took Avdeevka. And they started to storm the first lines of Ukrainian defenses around these villages. What does it mean?

Does it mean that we might experience a larger breaching operation to exploit the strategic defeat of the Ukrainians of several brigades in Avdeevka? Maybe. Maybe it is the right time/milestone to trigger this event. Maybe not? We will see. The point is that this area is heavily mined and fortified by other means. The accumulated Russian divisions, which are a huge striking force, are still insufficient to roll up the front without full CAS (Close Air Support). They could, but they would suffer considerable casualties, which is unacceptable. The Air Force could support with glide bombs, but there are by far not enough kits available for enough glide bombs each day to support a breaching operation on a frontline of approximately 100 miles.

I would rather say that this front line will be manned with these fresh battalions and used to roll up the front line slowly, thereby stressing the Ukrainians; stressing their logistics and reserves, which are just shy of collapsing. Suppose similar approaches are used on other front lines or theatres of war. In that case, we might experience a breach/collapse of the enemy along the front line with a subsequent quick exploitive move by prepositioned penetration formations. It could happen in Zaporozhye or somewhere else. Bottom line, it WILL happen. When and where? We will see.

Theaters of War

In the second referenced article under resources I defined the five theatres of war for applying pressure on Ukrainian resources until Ukraine collapses as a country. I won’t repeat these five theatres here, so it is better if you re-read the article if you missed it. The point is that I wrote that article a year ago, and we are almost on the same front lines as one year ago with little differences.

Why is this important? It underlines my assumption that Ukraine will be defeated in the Donbas and the rest will fall because no one will be alive or willing to defend it after the fall of the Donbas.

Again, why is it important? It is important because the frontlines are almost the same, but Ukraine has 200.000 additional dead and 200.000 additional heavily wounded soldiers who won’t be able to return to the fight. Russia’s army suffered some 15.000 – 20.000 (which is still incredibly high) dead during this time, but the army grew by several hundreds of thousands of soldiers.

And all willing Ukrainians are already dead or in the army and in the process of dying. Almost every Ukrainian who is now mobilized is kidnapped off the streets. You can’t train these people. They would kill their own on the training field. What you can’t do is transport them by force to Western countries and train them there by force. They are only recruited to fulfill the scorched-earth policy of the West, to achieve as many dead Ukrainians until Ukraine goes back to Russia to put a strain on Russia and reduce its competitiveness on world markets. Why? Because the macroeconomic impact on Russia to rebuild Ukraine and to somehow take care of millions of wounded, widows, orphans, old people, resistance fighter etc. is significant.

I expect that the five theaters of war will be activated again, now that Ukraine’s offensive potential is literally dead and gone, until full collapse occurs, followed by exploitation of collapsing regions by breaching and penetration formations. I would not forget theater number 4 (see the article), which consists of Kiev and Sumy. This will be exploited when everything else goes down the drain. But again, read the article; NOTHING changed in my assessment from one year ago.

Storming a town

To be clear, I’m not from the military. Nevertheless, I know a lot of people personally who have served. Considering the interest of many people about how villages or towns are usually taken, I’ve decided to write what I’ve learned from people who were intensively involved in assault operations.

As we all know from Carl von Clausewitz: “War is a continuation of politics by other means.”

What does it have to do with storming a town? A lot. There are many ways to capture a town held by the enemy, like siege, destruction, invasion, political pressure, etc.

The chosen method is determined by the available means and political objectives. This leads us back to Clausewitz’s quote.

I will use a fictional scenario. Nevertheless, this scenario is derived from actual operations of which my acquaintances fully know because they participated in them.

Let’s assume that the political leadership set a goal to capture a given area by date X for a reason Y. In other words, we are under heavy time pressure. Why? For example, we want to defeat the enemy before NATO manages to rearm, retrain, and reinforce them with mercenaries *wink wink*.

It means there is no time for trench or attrition warfare or sieges. It needs to go fast, very fast. And fast means cruel in this regard. Nothing I’m going to write is against the law of war.

In the first months or the first year of a war, there is more or less total carnage on both sides. People are not used to war, and many nationalists on both sides try to inflict maximum pain on the enemy through, for example, volunteer battalions. During this time, most atrocities taking place are NOT legal. I’m not going to go into them. Just look at what the Ukrainians are doing to Russian civilians and POWs to understand what I mean.

Usually there is communication at the commander level of the responsible formations of the defender and the attacker. And usually, they try to negotiate the evacuation of the civilians out of the town or even the surrender of the town by one or the other side. Again, at the beginning of a war all are concrete heads and agreements are not reached. Later this changes. It is possible to agree to the evacuation of civilians in advance, but the problem is WHICH civilians are in the town—the civilians of the attacker or the defender. The defender is far more eager to evacuate his own civilians than those of the attacker.

And here is where the problems begin…

If the civilians are evacuated, “everything is fine.” If they are not evacuated, you need time to free this town without huge civilian casualties. See the SMO, where Russia is sparing civilians. In political circumstances, things become ugly when a given objective needs to be fulfilled by time X.

Usually, a quick storming operation of a town goes down in four phases:

1. Intensive artillery and aerial (bombing) preparation. Everything of military value is destroyed. And approaches to the town as well, through which supplies could be delivered. Usually, this means that all buildings within the towns are at least damaged or, more likely, destroyed. At the end of the preparation, approaches are being prepared by artillery or engineering means to clear certain roads through the town from mines.

2. Infantry detachments enter the demined approaches to reach pre-determined positions quickly. After securing certain areas, mechanized units follow. There is no door-kicking or clearing of buildings if not necessary. This continues until the assault detachments reach predetermined blocking posts (approaches for enemy reinforcements/supplies). At this point, usually, one declares that a town has been fully taken and that the “mopping up operation” can start, which takes several days. Step two is completed before step three starts, depending on the town's size. If the town is bigger, then steps 2, 3, and 4 proceed in parallel.

3. Usually, through actions during steps 1 and 2, there is a “secured” path through the town for reinforcements, and the assault detachments, both infantry and mechanized, continue to the next town. The logistics and supply chain troops use this secured path to follow the assault detachments. They must be reinforced and provided with food, ammunition, and weapons. Moreover, the dead, wounded, and POWs (highly unlikely in such operations) on the way are collected and organized.

4. The town is still not secured. It is highly likely that enemy soldiers are still hiding in some buildings or basements. Now, the pioneers and other assault units are clearing the remaining buildings, looking for civilians and hiding enemy soldiers. If an enemy is found and does not surrender, the building usually collapses over him if he can’t be reached with a simple grenade. This is the most awful job, to “mop up” a town after an assault. Usually, you are walking over mountains of dead bodies, both friendly and enemy soldiers and civilians. Since there is no time or possibility to storm each building during an assault, if in doubt, every building gets destroyed, including everyone inside. There is no other way to protect the storming assault detachments. If one wanted to storm every house on a 300-mile strip, one would need years and would sustain horrendous casualties in the assault troops.

These assault units are usually highly focused people. They have a pre-determined way/road through the town, which they go very quickly since this road has been prepared by artillery and other means in advance to clear it. The goal is to cut off the town ASAP from outside supply. The mopping up, again, is being conducted by other units.

These “other units” are often the ones with heavy psychological issues after the war, especially because of everything they see, what the artillery and the storm units leave behind. Still, the storm units are those with the highest casualty rates. Obviously.

It is important to understand that I outlined an ideal storming operation. Of course, things don’t always work ideally. In fact, there can be many setbacks and retreats. Whole storming units can be ambushed and annihilated within seconds. And so on.

Moreover, such an operation can last one day or several weeks/months in which case the abovementioned steps can be done in parallel and follow the progress of the assault teams.

I want to highlight here that it isn’t necessarily the case within the SMO. Russians have other political objectives and doctrines than the people I talked to. Moreover, the above was the description of one specific scenario. Of course in real combat situations, there are a number of diverting or special situations where the local commanders choose different approaches.

Still, I think that parallels to the last days of Avdeevka are evident, so I have chosen to describe it.

I want to highlight especially the human part of such operations:

-        The situation of the civilians.

-        The special focus (survival) of the assault detachments.

-        The incredible experiences that the “cleaning” teams are experiencing when going through the left-behind buildings and basements. They are suffering from heavy psychological issues.

Again, I also want to highlight the SMO's emphasis on sparing their own soldiers and civilians by NOT proceeding like I just described. Still, the Russians have different technological means to deal with such situations.

Resistance

What is especially interesting these days is that more information is appearing about “Ukrainian resistance” fighters in the Ukrainian hinterland. I want to highlight one case. On February 2nd in Lviv, there was a raid by a “resistance” group into an industrial factory that produced a huge number of drones for the military. This group managed to burn this factory to the ground and kill all guards.

This is very interesting.

Why didn’t it happen earlier?

The Ukrainian Army has been very mobile for some time, especially with the availability of huge transport helicopters like the Mi-8. If an ambush or a raid takes place somewhere, the Ukrainian army can react quickly. To set up a search perimeter, find and eliminate the cells. With the collapse of the Ukrainian army and state in full swing, these capabilities are no longer in place to such a degree to deter such actions. Remember, “Everything to the front and for the front!”

Who carried out the raid?

-        I doubt that we are talking about Russian operatives here. Their capturing or killing is not worth a factory. To train such special forces is far more expensive and valuable than such objects.

-        Most likely, we are talking about actual resistance groups of Russian patriots (unlike the artificial “Ukrainians”), who are trained, equipped, and organized by Russian services, and who work behind enemy lines in secret. The Russians would never participate in such actions, only train and organize the partisans.

I expect far more such attacks to happen over time. Maybe even on “recruitment officers” and “recruitment offices” to collapse the mass disposal of the Ukrainian (Russian!) people. In fact, I’m sure such attacks have happened already but are kept in secret. But the burning of a huge factory was not possible to hide.

Weapons and Ammunition

A lot of what is currently going on in Ukraine is connected to persuading the West to supply more weapons and ammunition to Ukraine. For example, there is the attempt to hold Avdeevka by all means, which has failed.

The question is, would it change anything if the West would supply Ukraine with everything in abundance? This is a difficult question. But in its current state, it would not change a lot. And here is why:

• Most of the professional Ukrainian officers are dead or wounded. Using sophisticated equipment as it is meant to be used requires a very well-trained, disciplined, and EXPERIENCED leadership. The few remaining officers are being held in the rear. This further diminishes the Ukrainian army's ability to use Western equipment efficiently. I think you get the point. Everyone can perhaps set up an artillery cannon and fire random shots here and there. This is not the point. The point is to use the artillery within a higher framework of defensive or offensive operations in a way that won’t be detected by the enemy and destroyed by counter-battery fire.

• Most highly motivated Ukrainian soldiers are already dead. You can’t expect good performance, even with good leadership, from people who have been kidnapped off the streets.

• The supply chain in the rear is also under stress due to ever-increasing Russian strikes in the rear. Warehouses full of ammunition or equipment are being destroyed and will never see the front lines.

• Russian capabilities, leadership, motivated soldiers, training, hardware, and technology are increasing daily.

• With the remaining resources, Ukraine is now forced to fight at places where Russia chooses through escalation. Since very few artillery pieces, operators, and commanders are left, they must concentrate them in places of Russia’s choosing. Which will decimate them further.

I expect “Ukraine” will be supplied with Taurus missiles and maybe even some fighter jets. Maybe. And ATACMS rockets as well. These are respectable weapons. A year ago, they would have inflicted some pain on Russia. Now that Ukraine is about to fall, these weapons will not cause pain but only disrupt an hour or two of operations here or there. Ukraine should rather look to hold itself together politically (See the game of Kiev) and militarily (the military is fed up with numerous meatgrinders). This will fail.

Europe

Europe is reaping what it (the West) sowed by cultivating Navalny. They will use his death, as described above, for one purpose. To get approval for this or that weapon delivery. Maybe Navalny will realize in hell what his life was worth for the West—one vote out of millions in some Western parliament.

Maxim Kuzminov, the traitor who deserted with a helicopter to the Ukrainians months ago and caused the death of two crew members, has been killed now as well in Spain. This and the death of Navalny will certainly help the West to approve further funds and weapons to Ukraine. Nothing unexpected. The last throws before the end. To manage to kill a few more Russians and Ukrainians before Ukraine falls. Disgusting. Well… In fact, it will not be a “few” more. Judging by the situation, we can expect at least another 100.000 dead before the war completely ends. Like in 1945, when there were numerous additional casualties even though the war was essentially already lost for the Axis powers.

Every traitor to Russia dies somehow. Either killed by Russian services (yes, indeed) or killed by Western services to blame Russia… Honestly, whoever decides these days to betray Russia is a moron, no matter what money or treasures are promised.