“I wouldn’t say that progress is fast at all. A rapid advance is something we imagine when we think of the German blitzkrieg during World War II or Operation Desert Storm,” Mikulecký said of the Russian advance.
“This was a rapid advance, i.e. a situation where enemy lines are broken through and mechanized corps, tanks accompanied by motorized infantry, head towards the rear of the enemy, which they disrupt, and the fighting armies close in encirclement cauldrons,” he pointed out.
“The Russian advance is fast from the point of view of what we have been used to, i.e. a static front and shifts by tens, or when there has been significant interference, by hundreds of meters,” added Mikulecký.
He also added that although Russia advanced about five kilometers deeper into the Ukrainian defense in one relatively narrow area, on the other hand, this did not lead to the disintegration of the front line either.
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But the analyst did not embellish the situation. “Russia has a strategic initiative at the moment. Russia is the one who determines where to attack and where to advance – there is no dispute about that. At the moment, unlike the Ukrainians, the Russians have relatively large reserves, they are able to rotate and supplement their soldiers,” he said.
“If there is a weak point somewhere, they are able to attack there and quickly concentrate their forces. We saw it ten days ago, when the Russians succeeded in this truly significant step,” continued Mikulecký.
The analyst alluded to the fall of Ocheretyne, when the Russians managed to create a salient. “Fortunately, no strategic position fell, but the problem is that the Russians managed to penetrate the relative depth of the Ukrainian defense and the Ukrainians do not have the strength to eliminate this salient,” he added.
He also described the nature of the threat. “It’s a danger to the Ukrainian defenders who are on the flanks of the Russian penetration, because they may now be at risk of encirclement.”
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The Ukrainians have already announced that they will withdraw from the Berdychi-Semenivka line. “It’s a shame because it was a line that was fairly well defended. The same mistake is repeated several times – an unmanaged rotation of units that are in direct combat contact, that are under fire,” Mikulecký admitted.
“This is something soldiers must have practiced. The Russians were lucky, they were there at the right time, they had enough forces, and they managed to create a salient on the front, which they are now expanding and consolidating,” he added.
The months-long wrangling over the approval of the next package of American aid and the inability of the West to quickly and drastically increase the production of ammunition contributed to Ukraine’s bad situation.
“We in the West do not take the war seriously, we still see it as a problem for Ukraine. Russia, on the other hand, quite openly says that it is a war against us, not only against Ukraine, but against us as the West,” said Mikulecký.
Failure to start production
He also described problems with aid to Ukraine. “We keep coming back to one thing, the inability to start war production in the West. In America it’s not so obvious, but in Europe it’s much more to cry about. We are unable to start a larger production of ammunition because we are closing our steel mills and we have expensive energy,” said Mikulecký.
“If anyone thinks that we will import these items from Southeast Asia in case of any crisis, they are wrong. We are not able to increase the production of gunpowder and other key segments for the production of ammunition and weapons by leaps and bounds,” he pointed out.
“What was possible seventy years ago, when countries threatened by Nazi expansion were able to say, now our lives are at stake. Maybe it’s because we still don’t realize or don’t want to admit that our lives are at stake,” he added.
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According to him, it is significant that the American Congress succeeded in approving extensive aid to Ukraine. “It is a great success, it is a large sum of money, but the question is whether such a large sum of money from the American side will ever happen again,” warned Mikulecký.
The United States has its own problems, for example, on its southern border with Mexico. Mikulecký is convinced that Polish President Andrzej Duda during his visit to the USA could have contributed to the change in the position of former President Donald Trump, who refused to help Ukraine for a long time.
“We will see where America will move after the presidential elections, but America is right to let us know that Ukraine is primarily a European problem,” he admitted.
ATACMS is a tactical missile
The Ukrainians have already received deliveries of ATACMS missiles with a range of 300 kilometers. However, the West delayed their delivery for a long time.
“Our aid is insufficient and constantly artificially limited. We constantly refer to the Russian red lines that the Russians will announce. When we cross the line after some time, we find out that nothing happened anyway. If we had crossed the artificial lines we set for ourselves in the very first year of the war, we could have been somewhere completely different,” said Mikulecký.
Although Russia would not be completely expelled from Ukraine, it would control a smaller territory.
Novinek editor Alex Švamberk pointed out that ATACMS are not long-range missiles, but short-range tactical ballistic missiles, which include all missiles with a range of less than 500 km.
The Russian Iskander can fly this distance, and their North Korean derivatives have a range of 400 km. At the same time, Russia also fires missiles with a flat flight trajectory Ch-101, Ch-555 or caliber with a range of several thousand kilometers at Ukraine.
Ukraine is attacking Russian refineries with the help of drones, but this is insufficient, according to the analyst. Russia already has to import gasoline and diesel, but its army does not feel it. “There is less gasoline for civilians. Deliveries for the army still have priority,” said Mikulecký.
It will not work without mobilization
However, the analyst also sees problems on the side of the Kyiv leadership. “What is happening on the Ukrainian side is also not entirely happy. The Ukrainian command and the country’s political leadership did not want and still do not want to proceed with a massive mobilization. It is not the first time in the history of military conflicts that political interventions complicate the work of soldiers,” said Mikulecký.
He thus mentioned the fate of the dismissed commander of the Ukrainian forces Valery Zaluzhny, who already wanted to mobilize half a million soldiers last year.
“If Ukraine is determined to do so, it is already too late for this summer anyway, because it will take at least six months, rather more, to take those people away and train them. We are already getting into winter, when there is no thought of offensive actions,” he added.
However, Mikulecký sees one solution even without widespread mobilization. “If you go to the west of Ukraine, there are still a huge number of policemen, customs officers, etc. If Ukraine is obviously fighting for its life now, then it would be logical to withdraw these people and deploy them on the front.”
However, he praises Zelensky. “It’s not really questioning his role, he’s done an amazing job. Ukraine was lucky to have him at its head at the time of the Russian attack, because perhaps thanks to his previous profession he was able to provide the world with credible information that Ukraine wants to fight, wants to defend itself and wants to be independent and needs our help,” said Mikulecký.
“The way he traveled the world, how he was able to communicate with statesmen and the public, whether domestic or foreign, is amazing,” he added.
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He therefore understands the complex situation. “The war is long, tiring, not only for us here, who don’t really care about anything. She is tiring even for Ukrainians, who have to bury their dead,” he noted.
The problem is that anti-missile defenses do not reach Western air defense systems, making it easier for the Russians to attack energy facilities and shell Kharkiv to drive out residents.
“Even if there is no threat of winter for the residents, power outages can have an impact on rail transport and the functioning of factories,” he added.
Anti-missiles are also expensive. “Wars are not won by supplying defensive means, but by destroying the enemy’s offensive means,” Mikulecký pointed out.
“Until the Ukrainians are allowed to operate in the depth of Russian territory, to destroy the bases from which the strategic bombers launch their missiles, we will always pull the short end of the stick, because it is not always possible to shoot down everything that flies. And in the long term, we have no chance to withstand such a war even economically,” he added.
He sees a big problem in the inconsistent enforcement of sanctions, when some Western banks that continue to operate in Russia, on the contrary, block payments to our European arms manufacturers.
An irregular podcast that offers a variety of perspectives on the war conflict in Ukraine and other current conflicts. You can also listen to the debates of the editors of the Novinky.cz foreign section and selected experts on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or the Podcasty.cz platform.
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