By Robert Burns
Associated Press
The one in kyiv is a defeat of historic proportions for the Russians.
The campaign started badly and went from bad to worse.
When Russian leader Vladimir Putin launched his attack on Ukraine on February 24 after months of preparation at the border, he sent hundreds of elite soldiers - the best of his special forces - by helicopter to capture a poorly defended airfield in Ukraine. the gates of kyiv, the country's capital.
Other units advanced through different sectors of Ukraine, including the eastern city of Kharkiv, the disputed Donbas region and sectors on the Black Sea.
The big prize, however, was kyiv, the seat of power.
For this reason they dispatched special forces from the aeronautics in the first hours of the offensive.
Putin, however, did not achieve his objective of promptly annihilating a much weaker Ukrainian army, without weapons or troops comparable to those of the Russians.
The invading forces were unprepared for Ukraine's resistance and failed to adapt, failed to coordinate their ground and air operations, failed to anticipate Ukraine's ability to defend its airspace, and failed in basic military functions such as planning and implementation. of the replenishment chain.
A Ukrainian soldier raises a flag of his country in Bucha, on the outskirts of kyiv, on April 3, 2022. Rodrigo Abd / AP
"It's a very bad combination if you want to conquer a country," said Peter Mansoor, a retired US Army general and professor of military history at Ohio State University.
At least for now, the Russians are moving forces from kyiv to the eastern region.
In the long run, Putin may achieve some of his goals.
The kyiv fiasco, however, will be remembered for a long time, especially for the shortcomings that he highlighted in what is supposed to be one of the most powerful military forces.
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"It's amazing," said military historian Frederick Kagan of the United States Institute for War Studies, who says he knows of no parallel in which a military power like Russia invades another country when it thinks it has everything ready and fails to subdue it.
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On the first morning of the war, Russian Mi-8 combat helicopters flew over kyiv with the mission of capturing the Hostomel airfield, on the outskirts of the capital, to the northwest.
The capture of the small airport, also known as Antonov, would have allowed them to have a base for the transfer of soldiers and vehicles to the entrance of the largest city in the country.
But things didn't go as planned.
It is said that several Russian helicopters were hit by missiles before reaching Hostomel and that when they finally landed on their runways, they suffered heavy losses from artillery fire.
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Another attack to seize the Vasylkiv air base, south of kyiv, also met strong resistance.
Several Il-76s carrying paratroopers were said to have been shot down by the Ukrainians.
Although the Russians ended up taking Hostomel airfield, fierce resistance from kyiv forced them to reconsider a plan that assumed Ukraine would fall quickly, the West would accept it, and the Russian forces would not meet strong resistance.
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Air strikes behind enemy lines, like the one on Hostomel, are risky and complicated, as became clear when the United States sent 30 Apache helicopters to Iraq from Kuwait in 2003 to attack an Iraqi Republican Guard division.
Along the way, the helicopters came under fire from small arms and anti-aircraft equipment.
One Apache was shot down and others were damaged, so the mission was aborted.
Still, US forces quickly captured Baghdad.
The failure of the Russian special forces 45th Air Brigade to fulfill its entry mission might have gone unnoticed if things improved.
But it was not like that.
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The Russians made some unsuccessful efforts to penetrate the heart of kyiv and then tried to encircle the capital, venturing further west.
Against all odds, the Ukrainians stood firm and held off the Russians, using Western-supplied weaponry to great effect, including man-portable anti-tank equipment, shoulder-fired Stinger anti-aircraft missiles and much more.
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Last week the Russians left Hostomel as part of a much broader withdrawal.
A memorable aspect of the battle for kyiv was the presence of a publicized Russian resupply caravan several kilometers long on one of the main routes to the capital.
He initially frightened the Ukrainians, but his forces managed to launch attacks and disperse the caravan to such an extent that it did not affect the war.
"At no time did they offer resupply to the forces that were deployed around kyiv, they never contributed anything," Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said. agility," he added.
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Mansoor says the Russians underestimated the number of troops they would need and demonstrated a "shocking inability" to perform basic military functions.
They miscalculated what they needed to capture kyiv, he said.
"It was going to be tough even if the Russian military had been competent," he said, "but it proved incapable of waging modern warfare."
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Putin is not the only one surprised by the initial stumbles of his army.
Western experts predicted that, if there was an invasion, Ukraine would fall in a short time and the Russians would take the capital in a matter of days and the country in a few weeks.
Some analysts did question whether Putin had properly weighed the level of training Ukrainians received from the West, especially after Russia's capture of Crimea and his incursion into Donbas.
On March 25, a month after the invasion began, the Russians said they had achieved their goals in the kyiv region and would focus on the breakaway area of Donbas in eastern Ukraine.
Some speculated that Putin wanted to buy time without giving up his goal, but within days the withdrawal from kyiv was impossible to disguise.
Putin could consider simpler goals, such as securing control of Donbas and perhaps creating a land passage between this region and the Crimean peninsula.
The kyiv fiasco and the deficiencies of the Russian military apparatus, however, suggest that they are unlikely to try to capture kyiv in the short term.
"I think they learned their lesson," Mansoor said.