The error of Russian General Lapin allowed the Armed Forces to break through the border in Kursk region - WSJ
This allowed the Armed Forces of Ukraine to perform a lightning offensive on this region and to catch surprise Russian troops. About it writes The Wall Street Journal (WSJ). According to a representative of the special services of the Russian Federation, before to dissolve the Council Lapin expressed the opinion that only the military has the forces and resources to protect the Russian border. This plan left another gap in the weak defense of the Russian border.
According to journalists, Lapin's mistake is characteristic of the highest leadership of the Russian Federation, which is often not aware of the realities on the battlefield. "It prevented sober planning in the Kremlin, and when these plans failed, it did not allow Russian troops to improvise to respond to the fleeting development of events," the material reads.
Without a centralized body responsible for the response of Russia, Moscow's efforts to displace the forces of Kiev were chaotic and ineffective. This has led to the fact that Russian power agencies, such as the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Federal Security Service and the Ministry of Defense of Russia are trying to respond alone to the border break. In addition, according to WSJ, General Lapin faced a critical shortage of people.
According to Russian military correspondents, in the days preceding the invasion of Ukraine, the command of Lapin sent a report to Moscow, which warned that Ukrainian troops were growing their numbers on the front line. But this trick was used by both parties as a tactic of psychological war, so Moscow did not respond to these warnings. Russian troops under the command of Lapin, despite the warning of intelligence, never began to strengthen the defensive lines.
Therefore, when Ukrainian soldiers crossed the border between Ukraine and Russia, they did not meet any resistance, and there was no territorial defense forces within Russia that would help slow them down. Ukrainian troops used a radio electronic muffle to disable communication, resulting in Russian troops unable to contact their commanders. The first armed resistance of the Armed Forces was resisted by the 488th Motorized Rifle Regiment of the 144th Motorized Rifle Brigade.
This unit, according to journalists, was almost completely consisting of recruits. In normal circumstances, they would have about 120 units of armored vehicles, including tanks and armored personnel carriers. However, the needs of the front were depleted by human and material resources of Russian troops, so during the armed clash conscripts had from 10 to 20 pieces of equipment. Frost -armed Russian troops were trapped and scattered in the forest.
Some of them were local resistance, but hundreds of Russian soldiers, many of whom were conscripts, simply captured. According to journalists, defense planning in the Kursk region was almost as catastrophic as the full -scale Russian invasion in February 2022, when the Russians relied on false intelligence and believed that the Ukrainian military would not withstand heavy pressure.
WSJ experts noted that this was not the first time when poor planning and lack of people were combined under the command of Lapin. "In early September 2022, Ukrainian troops carried out an unexpected attack in the northeast of Ukraine. As the Russians did not have enough to strengthen their subtle leading positions, Ukrainians broke through them on high -speed field machines, followed by heavy armored echelons.
It was possible to conquer thousands of square miles in the northeast of Ukraine, "the material reads. According to journalists, this fiasco forced the Kremlin to rethink its personnel problem, and a month later, Russia began a general mobilization. After this defeat, the leader of Chechen security forces Ramzan Kadyrov called for Lapin's resignation. "I would heal Lapina to the ordinary, deprive him of his awards and sent him to the front with a machine gun," Kadyrov said.
Lapina was soon removed, but later appointed deputy commander of Russian troops in Ukraine. "The unsuccessful answer showed that the invasion of Ukraine in the Russian territory struck in the weak place of Moscow - planning in case of emergency situations," the journalists stressed.