Hello everybody!

My impression is that there is (at least) a ‘sizable bunch’ of people who would love to fall all over me; perhaps outright kill me - alone for the title of this feature. At least as long as the same is connected to ‘Ukrainian Armed Forces’. However, that is a ‘collection’ of ‘fitting expressions’, or ‘summaries’, coming to my mind. Thus… sor… erm… no, I’m not sorry: fact is that you all will have to live with these words. You’ll have to learn not only to accept them, but also to use them. Frequently. And, the way things are - and remain - in Kyiv: ever more often.

Not my words. Thus, don’t ‘blame the messenger’…

Point is: when ‘even’ the Ukrainian media starts explaining how the ‘window closes’ - and the ZSU troops defending the Myrnohrad are short of getting entrapped - then one has to accept the fact that the proverbial sh!t has not only ‘hit the fan’: it is flying all over the place.

At any such point in time, one should keep at least the following in mind:

a) based on experiences from battles like those for Mariupol, Volnovakha, Popasna, Sieverodonetsk, Lysychansk, Bakhmut, Avdiivka, Vuhledar, Kurakhov… sigh… that list is going on and on, and actually starting with places like Ilovaisk, back in August 2014… the ZSU is always suffering heaviest losses precisely during ‘extractions’, ‘evacuations’, ‘retreats’ and/or ‘withdrawals’ from such cauldrons,

b) usually because the troops of the surrounded, entrapped units fikrst have to figure on their own that they’ve not only been cut off, but literally left down by their superior commanders - which, in all the above-listed cases was the Glavcom Syrsky, who’s, miserably, failed to plan, organise, and then order a (organised) withdrawal on time - and

c) the units in question then start breaking out on their own, usually in small, disorganised groups, left without a choice but to run over open fields through the gauntlet of the Russian mines (nowadays frequently deployed by UAVs), artillery- and machine-gun fire. Finally,

d) when the Ukrainian media reports this yesterday, 5 November 2025, early in the morning, then it means this was actually happening already 48-60 hours before, if not earlier.

With other words:

• while the official Kyiv continues boasting with UAV-strikes into Russia, ‘turning the tide of the battle’, and ‘measures have been taken to block the enemy’, and
• ‘faithful’ online-ignorants are meanwhile bashing almost anybody explaining what is actually going on around the battlefield, definitely anybody criticising the Zele/Yermak admin and their Syrsky/Budannov military illiterates,
• troops of the 25th Mechanised Brigade and the 37th Naval Infantry Brigade are in the process of withdrawing from the cauldron south and east of Pokrovsk, and east of Myrhnohrad.

One must hope the local commanders have found the ways to coordinate with the 92nd and 155th Brigades, so these can provide at least some cover for the survivors streaming in north-western direction. Because, Glavcom Syrsky is not going to do that.

Ah yes: for your easier orientation regarding what am I talking about, permit me to (mis)use Don’s map from this Monday.

…because that map is clearly showing the severity of the crisis.

When checking it, please, be so kind and mind: that map was drawn on last Sunday, 2 November. And was ‘already’ some 24-48 hours ‘behind developments’. ‘And still’: the 25th Mech was de-facto cut off by the Russian infiltrations in its back already around that point in time.

One week ago.

All of this because: one can be 1000% sure, that the Glavcom didn’t care to act on time, and order a withdrawal, while the super-cool boss of the NKVD… erm.. sorry: the HUR - didn’t do his job (which is ‘collecting intelligence and providing timely information’), but was busy scoring PR-points in the social media through organising a mass-suicide of about 20 of his special forces operators through that ‘heliborne assault on Pokrovsk’ of the last weekend…

(…for anybody who might have a problem with me being so particularly bitter today: imagine yourself organising the death of 20 people - sons, husbands, fathers - for the purpose of attracting yet more ‘likes’ and ‘followers’…)

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As directly and frankly as always: I wouldn’t even go into commenting this affair. Not because I wouldn’t care, but because it’s a logical consequence of all the leadership failures in Ukraine. It’s something I’ve covered, extensively, already the last year; something I obviously cannot influence, and thus something I ceased paying attention about. And because I’ve got better things to do: as much as a ‘historian’, actually, I’m always ‘forwards-oriented’, and thus for me in this situation it’s much more important to care about such ‘things’ like taking care of results through coordinating collections for the Rickshaws and resulting acquisition efforts.

But, a reader was so kind to inspire and motivate me through asking such questions like:

• could you write a short article (when you have time) to explain why for the love of God the Ukraine General staff keep making and repeating the same mistakes over and over and over again? …Why oh why they persist to hold on to ashes, rubble and dust for what? …Is the general staff really that useless that all they know best is just make same mistakes over and over and over like a broken record until Ukraine exists no more…(?)

Oh, my dear… that’s a 60,000-dwt-sized-container-ship-can of worms. So much so, I’ll make it easier for myself and point you at specific earlier features:

Dreamland

17 October 2024

There you have the principal set of answers (even recommendations for what to do): military incompetence - indeed: military illiteracy - of the president, his holy presidential advisor, his boss of the intel service and especially his Glavcom; illusions; distorted reality; refusal to learn from mistakes; conviction that they are the only who are right and know how to do their job… and a lots of ‘social-media-inducted'-behaviour.

Evanescence

15 Jauary 2025

There you have the next collection of answers: a president that’s claiming he would stop issuing ‘no step back’-orders, but continues doing that - i.e. a liar; a Glavcom obsessed with the idea that the retreat from the massacre at Ilovaisk was his biggest professional achievement; both of them resisting to learn anything at all from all their own failures and so many mistakes, etc., etc., etc.

The Saga of Ukraine and F-16s: Procedures (a.k.a. ‘Part 2’)

There you have the whys and hows is the entire political- and military top of Ukraine failing - failing upon Ukraine, all Ukrainians, and especially the Ukrainian Armed Forces (ZSU). To paraphrase Hamlet, i.e. certain William Shakespeare: that’s the very essence of all the things ‘rotten in the state of Ukraine’.

And, if one needs the specifics of Glavcom Syrsky’s failures, the recommended read would be this one:

Don's Weekly, 9 June 2025: Part 4 (Syrsky's Continued Command Dysfunction)

9 June 2025

Overall, sorry, but my impression is that I have ‘written myself to death’ in this regards (and not only me: Don, too). We’ve ‘killed that topic’, several times, ‘already a year and more ago’. Nothing additional is coming to my mind about this any more. Except the following conclusions:

• Zele/Yermak’s failures are resulting in the failure to fire the military-illiterates in charge of the ZSU and the NKVD (i.e. HUR); in the failure to mobilise all of the country and its population; in the failure to reform the force; in the failure to re-train the force; in the failure to make it more combat effective. Moreover, they are actively spreading corruption instead of combating it, resulting in the failure to properly equip the ZSU, to make it more combat effective, and in the failure to improve the protection of the rest of the country and its population.
• Syrsky/Budannov are the worst thing that could ever happen to the ZSU & NKVD (erm… sorry: HUR) - and thus to Ukraine. They are entirely unable of self-assessment, and of learning from their own mistakes (just for the start; for the two, learning from somebody else’s mistakes would be something like ‘Urgently Necessary Step No.2’) . In certain other countries, both would have been not only sacked but (seriously) investigated for treachery and mass-murder - together with a number of other ‘heroic’ generals, colonels etc., and that already long ago (the latter, if not for their own failures, then because they’ve refused to quit and decided to continue tolerating, and to keep silent about failures by Syrsky & Budannov).

As far as I can say, Ukraine - and the ZSU - are beyond the ‘critical point’ at which ‘something’ could have been done in this regards. Something like one year beyond that critical point. The ‘last ditch defence’ in this regards was the appointment of General Drapaty as the CO Ground Forces, last year: as is well-known, he’s meanwhile quit in frustration.

Correspondingly, I’ve got to update my assessment of the situation: from, ‘if Ukraine does not do this, it’s going to lose that war’, to ‘having failed to do that on time, now Ukraine is certain to lose this war’ (where ‘Ukraine’ = Zele/Yermak admin and Syrsky/Budannov combo).

I know: this is an extremely unpleasant thought, not to talk about ‘unpleasant realisation’. I am also perfectly aware of ‘millions of reasons’ why the situation is perceived in entirely different fashion by so many others. But, the fact is also: if I start self-censoring my assessments and conclusions because they’re unpleasant, I’m going to end like so many others, and start publishing (paid or unpaid) advertisement.

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This text is published with the permission of the author. First published here.

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