Ukraine update: The story of Russia's 4th Armored division, and Ukraine's biggest victory to date
Mar 29, 2022 3:01pm by kos, Daily Kos Staff
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Russia’s
4th Guards Tank Division (GTD) was considered one of it’s “elite” units, headquartered near Moscow.
The division's units participated in the First Chechen War of 1994-1996, and personnel took part in peacekeeping operations in South Ossetia during 1997, in Kosovo in 1998 to 2002, later participating in the Second Chechen War of 1999-2009. During this period, it was one of the Russian Army's "constant readiness" divisions, with at least 80% manpower and 100% equipment holdings at all times.
In other words, this unit was kept at maximum readiness, unlike other army units pilfered and plundered for dachas and vodka. It 2008, it had 12,000 soldiers, 320 tanks, armored personnel carriers, 130 howitzer artillery, and 12 GRAD rocket artillery. In 2012, Russia did away with the divisions as its main maneuver unit, replaced with Battalion Tactical Groups, in large part, because of the great grift opportunities they offered. (They have proven
woefully inadequate for their task.) Still, for whatever reason, Russia rebuilt the division in 2015, outfitting it with 228 battle tanks, 300 armored personnel carriers, 90 artillery guns, and 19 MLRS GRAD rocket artillery.
This was one of the best funded and equipped units in the entire Russian Army, with their latest generation armor. The structure of the division would theoretically render it more resistant to the kind of rampant grift that affected BTGs. This thing was fearful, designed to punch through enemy lines and wreak havoc in the enemy’s rear. And that’s exactly what 4 GTD tried to do just this past weekend.
Deployed in the Sumy axis, in between that city and Kharkiv, the 4th GTD punched deep, getting as far as Myrhorod:
Status of Russian advances, March 22, 2022.
The first contact with Myrhorod was March 9, with Ukrainian forces repelling the attack. It was the first sighting of Russia’s most modern tanks on the Ukrainian battlefield. At least three abandoned T80Us are seen abandoned in this video.
The tweet says “more abandoned ...” which means Ukraine captured or destroyed even more of them. Over the next two days, Ukrainian forces hacked away at the division, forcing its retreat back toward the direction it came. In just two days, the division lost around 50 of its tanks. It was easy to track because 4th GTD was the only unit in the entire Russian Army to have T80Us. And to add insult to Russia’s injury, most of these were
abandoned, not destroyed. Of the 46 T-80Us in Oryx’s database of visually verified Russian equipment losses,
38 were captured, and only
four seemed destroyed in combat. (The rest were abandoned and destroyed by locals.) Other T-80 variants in the Oryx database show similar rates of captured-to-destroyed.
Regardless, the division had lost around 50 of its tanks out of 228, so things got quiet for the 4th GTD. From all indications, they set up shop in Trostyanets, where their howitzer and rocket artillery could pummel Sumy. And so it was until this weekend, when Ukrainian forces swept into town, essentially wiping the division off the face of the map.
I wrote about the attack on Saturday, still not quite understanding how monumental the victory was. Initial reports said “dozens” of Russian vehicles had been captured or destroyed, but you always account for a little hyperbole in these matters. Well, visual confirmation has been streaming out over the last few days, and it’s …
voluminous.
Here are links to captured and destroyed equipment:
here,
here,
here,
here,
here,
here (ammo cache),
here (GRAD ammo),
here,
here,
here,
here (pontoon bridge layer),
here,
here,
here,
here,
here,
here,
here, and
here. The claims of “dozens” of vehicles might actually be true. In all, Oryx has documented
77 destroyed T-80 variants, which is a third of the entire divisions. And remember, these are just
visually confirmed losses. That’s the baseline number. And on top of that, dozens of Russians surrendered.
Reports state that the remnants of Russia’s forces in the region have retreated to
the other side of their border. Likely, they’ll try and salvage what survived, and “reconstitute” the unit, either by reinforcing it with conscripts and remnants of other shattered units, or raw conscripts. Either way, the divisions most effective days are behind it. As a result, Russia has lost one of its most capable units, with its most modern equipment. Furthermore, it lost a base of attack to rain death and misery from above on Sumy. And it opened roads from Sumy to Poltava to its south, breaking the siege of that city, allowing it to be resupplied. And for added satisfaction, here’s what its destruction means on the map:
All that red territory between Sumy and Kharkiv, in the map above, is gone. That big chunk of land south of Sumy has been cleansed, as Russia’s best could not take these two cities
on Russia’s own border. How pathetic is that? Ukrainian forces are likely conducting mop-up operations in that remaining orange territory, but given that Russia doesn’t hold any cities in that area, odds are good that Sumy’s supply lines to Poltava are secure for the time being.
The scope of 4th GTD’s destruction is so massive, the evisceration so complete, that you’d think Ukraine massed a considerable force to take it out. Yet no details have been forthcoming. Ukrainian General Staff doesn’t seem to be in any hurry to detail its successful strategies to Russian generals. Even in the video above, we only see small snippets of what had to have been a larger operation. Given the proliferation of drone footage of even small activities, we’ll no doubt get a clear picture of the battle after the war concludes. I’m certainly eager to learn how these scrappy Ukrainians pulled off a coup of this magnitude,
Postscript: The commander of one of the division’s regiments reportedly
died of suicide when it was discovered that only one in 10 of its tanks in deep storage were usable. Many had engines missing. You know, for dachas and vodka. So much for resupply. Meanwhile, the commander of Russia’s 1st Tank Army, of which the 4th GTD was part of,
was relieved of his command.
Tuesday, Mar 29, 2022 · 6:42:15 PM · Barbara Morrill
Continuing coverage can be found
here.
Tuesday, Mar 29, 2022 · 3:25:26 PM · Mark Sumner
Russia has been saying since Saturday that capturing Kyiv was no longer an objective. However, hard fighting continued in the area, and even on Tuesday morning the areas “recaptured” both west and east of the city remain unsafe, with periods of heavy shelling and rocket fire from nearby Russian forces.
Everything that had been retaken around Kyiv though Tuesday was won through fighting, not marched into after a Russia withdrawal.
But at midday on Tuesday in Kyiv, the Ukrainian defense ministry indicated that Russia had in fact begun to shift its troops away from Kyiv. Most surprisingly, the ministry also indicated that Russia had shifted some units away from Chernihiv.
Last week, Russia blew up bridges between Chernihiv and Kyiv, cutting the city off from supply. By Sunday, also completed what seemed to be a near encirclement of Chernihiv. All indications were that this city, northeast of Kyiv and only 30 miles from the border with Belarus, was set to be the next Mariupol, facing a combination of heavy bombardments and an intentional cut-off of humanitarian aid.
So while Russian forces shifting away from Kyiv to regroup after losing ground on both east and west of the city might be understandable, shifting units away from Chernihiv — assuming these reports are correct — may be more indicative that Russia is actually shifting away from its attempts to capture cities in northern Ukraine.
Russia does have an explanation for why this forces are in motion.
However, the more likely reason is the one that caused the 4th Guards Division to end up nursing its wounds back in Russia — these are units that have simply suffered too many losses to continue operating without a chance to withdraw and reorganize.
Russia is capable of ending this war in a day, any time it wants. It only has to leave. If it genuinely intends to walk away from Kyiv and Chernihiv, it can do that. These minor moves seem more like posturing to coverup losses.
Tuesday, Mar 29, 2022 · 4:02:50 PM · Mark Sumner
U.S. intelligence is also reporting Russia’s shift away from Kyiv. This is being reported as a “major shift” with the U.S. tying it directly to Russia’s failure to capture Kyiv and meet other strategic objectives in northern Ukraine. Expectations are that these forces will be redeployed in the Donbas region.
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