Map: Hostilities in Novorossiya, August 6-15, 2014
Link to Novorossiya Military Briefing, July 15, 2014
Original: Colonel Cassad, August 16, 2014, 02:27
Translated from Russian by Gleb Bazov
Briefly about the situation in Donbass as at the beginning of August 16, 2014
In the last two days, just as was announced earlier, the Militia was finally able to enter into battle the reserves that were freed up following the rout of the Southern Cauldron, as well as some of the trophies that were obtained there. This immediately improved the situation at the front – the breakthrough to Krasniy Luch was localized and isolated, the Junta grouping in the area of Snezhnoye and Miusinsk was defeated, and the breakthrough to Marinovka was effected, leading to the formation of a new mini-cauldron, which have now become commonplace. At the same time, the Junta’s offensive against Enakievo and Gorlovka was stopped in its tracks, and fighting began on the outskirts of Debaltsevo. Overall, Zakharchenko’s counteroffensive appears to be more effective than the counteroffensive previously announced by Bolotov. Truth be told, however, it still manifests more as local counterstrikes that stabilize the front lines than a full-fledge counterattack.
The consequences are undeniable – there is clear evidence of substantial losses incurred by the Junta in manpower and military hardware, new mini-cauldrons (to the east of Marinovka and near Miusinsk), the retention of control over the key highway from the LPR to Donetsk, the preservation of communications with Gorlovka, and the success in repulsing the attacks on Ilovaisk. Overall, over the last several days, the Junta’s offensive clearly has begun to run out of steam, which is not surprising, given the serious losses sustained by the Ukrainian army. The Militia’s arriving reserves have facilitated obvious strikes aimed at wedging into the Junta’s forces.
Nevertheless, to the north of Donetsk, the Junta retains sufficient troops to maintain the initiative. Shielding itself from the Alchevsk grouping of the DPR Army with barrier groups, the Junta continues to concentrate forces in the area of Debaltsevo, with the intention of retaining this key centre and developing its attempt to flank Donetsk from the north. At the time, it is certain that the Ukrainian army will make an attempt to push through Uglegorsk, aiming thereby to encircle Gorlovka. This is the most obvious next step.
The Junta’s problem is in the fact that practically all the reserves have already been entered into battle. Moreover, instead of a concentrated strike on Donetsk, these reserves ended up being spread across multiple sections of the front – whether for the purpose of tactical strikes or to save the encircled brigades. High losses and the lack of reserves will gradually force the Junta into taking an operational pause, whereas political considerations will continue to compel it to pursue the operation at all costs.
Overall, over the past two days, the situation on the territory of the DPR has improved. However, it should be understood that, despite all the losses, the Junta continues to retain the initiative in certain areas and still maintains an overall superiority in manpower and military hardware. Accordingly, wearing rose-coloured glasses is not recommended. The struggle here will be difficult and bloody.
On the territory of the LPR, using the troops of the group that was located at the Lugansk airport, the enemy stretched a long and narrow intestine from the airfield to Novosvetlovka. At the same time, in an effort to support this line, it attempted to take control of Khryashevatoye. It appears that the motivation for this strange operation conducted using clearly insufficient forces was to try to impede the passage of the Russian humanitarian convoy. Equally predictably, the Junta forces that burst into Novosvetlovka was already in the afternoon of August 15, 2014 surrounded on three sides and sustained serious losses in attempts to retain Novosvetlovka.
From the operational standpoint this was a manifest gamble, considering that the southern flank of the enemy grouping advancing on Khryashevatoye and Novosvetlovka was left almost entirely unprotected. As the breakout stretched to the east, an intestine squeezed on three sides was formed, which simply cries out for being severed and completely encircled.
Moreover, in the evening of August 15, 2014, the Junta forces entered into battles in the suburbs of Lugansk, and the fighting continued until nightfall. If the original plan consisted of breaking through to the Lugansk-Krasnodon highway and holding it as long as possible, while other troops moved in to assault Lugansk, then, considering the nature of urban warfare, and provided the LPR Army acts competently, then the defeat at Novosvetlovka will come about a lot sooner than any appreciable advance into Lugansk. Essentially, here we have to wait for the outcome of the battles.
Overall, the situation remains difficult; however, in the past couple of days it has improved somewhat for the Militia.
Commentary from John Kochang
Debaltsevo and Gorlovka I still think are the key. If the SDF [Note: Novorossiya Self-Defence Forces] can utilize the ‘1200’ troops trained in Russia, who it is claimed joined the ranks the other day, along with all the trophies from the Southern Cauldron, this could be the foundation for a brigade that would go on the offensive, using the 1200 men as NCOs for the Militia and a Spearhead Battalion made up of the most combat experienced men.
It would still only be on a small scale as offensive operations require a cohesive C&C and experienced staff. If they could push Ukrainian army back out of Debaltsevo, the Ukrainian forces will have to pull troops from around Donetsk, as they seem to have no reserves, which is evidenced by the 3rd mobilization call up and training.
The shock and panic I believe this would create will spread through the demoralized Ukrainian troops. There is also talk now of Right Sector [Note: Praviy Sector] issuing a 48 hour warning to the Kiev Junta [Note: Confirmed], that they will stop fighting and march on Kiev if their demands are not met! I hope Poreshenko fails to deliver, as the SDF could do with all the good luck!
SLAVYANGRAD.org 
I just want to say this regular update of the military situation is very useful, the only source of reliable comment on the war on Russia’s western borders. Thank you!
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Posted by jimsresearchnotes | Aug 17, 2014, 09:39Reblogged this on EU: Ramshackle Empire and commented:
The only source of honest regular reports on the war in its wider context on the internet.
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Posted by jimsresearchnotes | Aug 17, 2014, 09:47I worry about that chemical plant in Gorlovke…Don’t know why they’re still trying to encircle it, let alone bomb it if a leak will affect as far as Belarus – Do those debily really want another Chernobyl…? My husband escaped from Gorlovka a day or 2 after the Malay plane went down because as soon as it happened, the ukrainazi army suddenly bombarded into his town and the others. A week later, and no one can escape now. He would call his family back home, and his brother said he saw “soldiers that looked to be dressed as rebels shooting at the blockhouses”. He said he recorded it on his phone as he was right in the vicinity of this happening outside his window which was shattered by bullets. My husband says he can’t trust anything or anyone after hearing that account. But it reminds me of something I read a while back (can’t remember if it was from here or elsewhere) that the Junta proposed to “stage” a shooting between their army and the Militia, so they would pretend to be rebels and confuse the people? Can someone please fill me in on this, because if what my brother-in-law saw was real, then…who were they? I don’t know why the militia would shoot at their own people. It’s the same as saying why would the Militia shoot down that plane – it’s counter productive! Apart from being desperate to get the upper hand in this, Kiev has been lying and committing a lot of unforgivable shit – I wouldn’t be surprised if this was another set-up to frame the good guys again.
Anyway, thanks for all the updates, I rely on this site for it. I feel the guys here are calm and collected, know who is right in this mess of a war.
On a side note (and I’m sure everyone’s asking), any word about Strelkov’s resigning..?
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Posted by Ariel | Aug 17, 2014, 09:52Ariel, yes, we have a fairly good understanding of Strelkov’s resignation. However, time has not yet come to discuss this issue. We will be providing context very soon, to be followed by my own analysis of the situation. With respect to your other questions, it has been a common tactic of the Ukrainian authorities to disguise their operators with markings of the resistance movement (see Odessa, for instance, where Ukrainian government’s/Kolomoiskiy’s provocateurs that started the violence wore ribbons of St. George). I am glad your relatives are safe, and thank you for the kind words!
Kind regards, GB
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Posted by Gleb Bazov | Aug 17, 2014, 10:09You wrote “..it has been a common tactic of the Ukrainian authorities to disguise their operators with markings of the resistance movement (see Odessa, for instance, where Ukrainian government’s/Kolomoiskiy’s provocateurs that started the violence wore ribbons of St. George)’
yes and this is huge problem in these days of ‘social media’ and minute attention spans as so much of the masses get the disinfo the status quo wants out there and often discourages the people from believing we can and WILL defeat the kievmonsters.
It is our BELIEFS that can send the aggressive energies to those guys we may not be able to give money or food but energies can make it all go our way because they will feel it and money and food will get there form many sources but the energies will be the big force so getting truth out ion social media is urgent.
Ariel I send prayers all your relatives are safe there or have got to Russia and second your kudos to this site and these great and knowledgeable people who get truth and forward it here THANKS!
yes there is almost no other place we can get really reliable info
Strong heart to all as the masses are learning truth ailbeit so slowly and world opinion is out ally.
jusa/eu have made tooo many enemies so disenfranchised nations are willing to hear and see reality now.
this IS the final stage that will either bring on ww3 or a nervous world peace.
sharing true info is the anti dote to that planned ww3
`
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Posted by sophiaheidler | Aug 17, 2014, 11:56Thank you Gleb for the insight, and oh yes, you’re right about Odessa.. (Now It seems the locals really despise seeing St George’s ribbons being worn by supporters.)
Looking forward to more posts, I very much appreciate your work and support to all the anti-maidan fighters!
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Posted by Ariel | Aug 17, 2014, 15:15Reblogged this on keesened's Blog.
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Posted by keesened | Aug 17, 2014, 10:31Thank you very much for the information!!!
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Posted by keesened | Aug 17, 2014, 10:33GB – Thanks for your great work. I would like to point out (I think you made reference to this recently) we DESPERATELY need a map showing the place names in E. Ukraine in English. It’s difficult if not impossible to understand textual commentary on the military situation, when the text place names are in English and the map places names are in Cyrillic.
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Posted by Ken Bolles | Aug 17, 2014, 12:45Ken, thank you! Working on it 😉 – hopefully we’ll have a map soon. Kind regards, Gleb Bazov
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Posted by Gleb Bazov | Aug 17, 2014, 12:47Great work as always GB. Your work has been a huge help, and I should have thanked you sooner.
Like Ken Bolles I am very Cyrillic-impaired. What I do is paste the Engish spellings into an online English to Russian translator to see what the English place name looks like in Cyrillic. This helps about 80% of the time.
There are places like Uglegorsk and Khryashevatoye whose Cyrillic names do not appear on this map, to the best of my belief. But reading these names in the context of the narrative gives me a pretty good idea where they might be located.
If I may add to the wish list, I’d love to know the English translation of the map symbols in the map’s legend at the lower right hand corner of the map.
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Posted by SingingSam | Aug 17, 2014, 19:41@SingingSam – You are very kind. Thank you! It’s because of readers like you that we do this work!
We are working on the map issue, and hope to have an equivalent map in English soon. It’s interesting that these places do not appear on Google Maps. I will check. As a matter of policy here, we spell the names of settlements using the pronunciation used by the locals of Donbass (i.e. the Russian-language versions of the names). Usually, however, Google Maps picks up both versions equally well. I will check and report.
Kind regards, GB
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Posted by Gleb Bazov | Aug 17, 2014, 20:56