The Commander -in -Chief of the Armed Forces wrote an article on the prospects of war in 2023. Its conclusion - Ukraine needs long -range weapons so that the Russians “feel more acutely” by the war

The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine General Valery Zaluzhny and the deputy head of the Verkhovna Rada, Lieutenant General Mikhail Zabrodsky published the article “Prospects for ensuring the military campaign of 2023: Ukrainian view” on the platform of the Ukrainian outrage of Ukrinform-you can read it in several languages. The article was published on the eve of the meeting at the Ramstein air base in Germany to coordinate military assistance to Ukraine - and is probably designed to publicly publicly indicate the need of the Ukrainian military for Western weapons.

At the beginning of the article, Zaluzhny and Zabrodsky stated that there is “all reason” to wait for the continuation of the war of Russia and Ukraine after 2022 - and therefore it makes sense to answer questions about the scale of Ukrainian military ambitions in 2023 and what Ukraine needs help from partners.

In 2023, in 2023, according to the authors of the article, there may be an access to the administrative border of the Donetsk region (Russia has repeatedly called this goal of “special operations” openly), as well as promotion in the Zaporizhzhya direction and in the south of Ukraine. The possible seizure of Zaporozhye and the Dnieper would mean a significant part of the left -bank Ukraine in Kiev, and in case of success in the south - the capture of Nikolaev, Odessa, the creation of a threat to the crooked horn, the central and western regions of the country - Russia could ensure the “logical (albeit belated) completion of the so -called special operation”, the publication said.

In the APU position in 2023, according to the commander in chief, "everything seems not so unambiguous." The article mentions the “extremely unprofitable” contours of the clash line in Izyum and Bakhmut directions, where a “double set of forces” is required to contain the enemy, as well as “lack of fire defeat and air defense systems”. “The situation in the south and east looks no better,” the authors of the article write.

Further, they move on to key reasoning - about the "Center for the gravity of the Russian Federation in this war", the impact on which could change the situation.

First, Zaluzhny and Zabrodsky analyze the premise that such a center is Crimea. In their opinion, it is not difficult to conclude that the reliable defense of Crimea would be the basis for Russia's success in 2023, since the peninsula is, in particular, the place of deployment of “significant groups of troops and stocks of material resources”; The Black Sea Fleet is also based there and there is a network of airfields from where Russia can strike throughout Ukraine.

The authors of the article write that if the Crimea is considered the “center of gravity” of Russia in the war, then Ukraine should plan a campaign to master the peninsula for 2023. For her, according to the generals, it will not be possible to use the existing formations of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and it will be necessary to create “one or more operational (operational-strategic) groups consisting of ten to twenty combined arms brigades”. In the process, it will be necessary to provide existing formations with modern weapons from partners of Ukraine. All this is claimed in the article, “absolutely real”, although it requires political will and good planning, as well as the use of the “production base and reserves of leading countries”.

Nevertheless, Zaluzhny and Zabrodsky call this approach "too one -sided." In particular, they note, even in the case of the loss of Crimea (““ extremely positive political and informational significance of such strategic success is difficult to overestimate ”) Russia will be able to relocate the Black Sea Fleet and aviation to the Krasnodar Territory, and fill the losses over time. All this means continuing the conflict in the future.

The real “center of gravity” of Russia, Zaluzhny and Zabrodsky, is called the “remote nature” of war for most Russians and “impunity ensured by physical remoteness”. “Thanks to this remoteness, citizens of the Russian Federation do not so painfully perceive losses, failures, and most importantly - the price of this war in all its senses,” the article says.

The generals state that Russia has the opportunity to “impunity” to strike throughout Ukraine, while Ukraine is only “to the depth of the enemy’s operational rear”. In their opinion, Russia will not be able to deprive this advantage, but Ukraine could contrast it with "its opportunity to act in this way and at a similar range." For this, the Armed Forces of Ukraine must, with the help of foreign supplies, re-equip artillery, missile troops, aviation and naval forces.

Zaluzhny and Zabrodsky called a “convincing example of the correctness of this approach” a series of missile attacks on Russian air base in Crimea, including Saki airfield on August 9. Earlier, the Ukrainian authorities openly did not take responsibility for these attacks.

“The task of the Armed Forces of Ukraine for 2023 is to make for Russians and other occupied territories [in addition to Crimea] these sensations are more acute, natural and quite tangible, despite a considerable distance to the goals. <...> The presence of even the most dangerous use of the Ukrainian Armed Forces of the means of lesions of appropriate reach will be forced to consider the Russian Federation in the other way of nature, the course, and the result of our confrontation, ”the Ukrainian generals write.

In conclusion, Zaluzhny and Zabrodsky emphasized that the help of the Allies should remain the "material basis of Ukrainian resistance" in 2023. In their opinion, the dates and volumes of assistance are affected by the non-understanding of the world community of the true scale of the conflict, associated with the fact that the realities of the war in Ukraine are sirens of air anxiety, missile and bombing through the cities, forcing rivers and tank breakthroughs-remain for the "absolute majority of people in the world ... only the ghostly reality of the world wars of the last century."