When the Russian government announced to the world that they were withdrawing from Kherson,
no one took them seriously. Everyone thought it was an attempt at a disinformation campaign.
After all, the Ukrainians had done the same thing just a few months before when they announced their
Kherson offensive but struck north by Kharkiv with the bulk of their army. While optimistic,
Ukrainian leaders and the world figured that Russia was still digging in for a long fight. But
to everyone's surprise, they actually left. But why would withdrawing from Kherson benefit Russia?
Before understanding how it would benefit Russia, it’s essential to understand just how big of
a deal Kherson was to the Russians. Before the war, Kherson was home to several hundred
thousand people and was the only regional capital to fall to the invaders. Being the
biggest city under Russian occupation, Kherson served as a symbol of the new administration.
The Russian army had decided to make Kherson into a fortress. Over the past several months,
Putin had his generals move the bulk of his forces to Kherson. Reliable estimates placed
the number of troops in the Kherson oblast at 40,000 while the attacking Ukrainian
army could muster just 23,000 soldiers. These 40,000 troops also included some of the best
remaining units left in the Russian army, like the remaining paratroopers and air assault brigades.
Russian troops had been defending Kherson for the past several months. But slowly and surely,
Ukrainian forces made their way closer to the city. By the time Russia announced its withdrawal,
Ukraine had surrounded the city on three sides and was about ten kilometers from
the city center. With a battle practically inevitable, Russian forces had been forcibly
depopulating Kherson over the past several months. Tens of thousands of civilians were forced across
the Dnipro River into Russian captivity. Some children were even forced to relocated to Russia,
and Ukrainian men were enlisted into the Russian army at gunpoint. Replacing
these civilians were thousands more troops, including tons of recently drafted Russian
men who were instantly thrown into battle. Because of all these military preparations
and statements Putin made, like "Kherson is Russia forever," show
just how important the city was to Russia. Abandoning it was no easy choice for Putin,
but why he did so was one of the few times Putin favored a military objective over a political one.
Crossing rivers is one of the most dangerous things an army can do. Often, troops get bunched
up on one side as weight restrictions limit the number of people and vehicles crossing
at one time. These large concentrations of troops are vulnerable to artillery, rocket,
and air strikes. The Dnipro River is the main physical feature of the area, and it is a
massive river that flows from southwestern Ukraine into the heart of the country. Any
fight over Kherson would involve having to get troops and material across that river reliably.
As previous operations have shown, Russia is notoriously bad at river crossing operations.
Back in May, near Kharkiv, Russia repeatedly tried to force a river crossing of the Siverskyi
Donets River. Here, Russian forces were trying to outflank Ukrainian defenders around Kharkiv.
Crossing this river meant that they could encircle and bypass strong defensive positions on the
southern flank of Kharkiv. However, Ukrainian drone strikes and merciless artillery barrages
stopped the operation in its tracks. For weeks, Russian forces tried to cross the
river with no success. Ukraine kept destroying each pontoon bridge Russian engineers built,
and Ukrainian forces decimated troop formations waiting to cross. Because of this painful memory,
it was clear to Russian commanders that crossing rivers under fire was
not something their army could do well. As Ukrainian troops inched closer to the
city center, they could move their artillery and rocket batteries into better firing positions on
Kherson and its river crossings. Among these weapons is the infamous American
HIMARS system. With the capability to fire a rocket up to 45 miles away, the HIMARS system
is deadly accurate and powerful. The Russians in Kherson clearly feared its devastating fire.
In the months leading up to the Russian retreat, satellite images revealed that
the Kherson International airport was still a bustling base. Helicopters, tanks,
and armored vehicles filled the runway. However, as Ukrainian forces made their way closer to the
city, Russia pulled its equipment, moving it away from the airport and closer to the
Dnipro river or across it. Russia attempted to use the infamous Antonivskyi Bridge to
resupply its forces. The Antonivskyi Bridge is the main artery that connects Kherson to
the other side of the Dnipro river. Though out of range of Ukrainian strikes before,
Ukrainian artillery forces used the deadly accurate HIMARS to make the bridge unusable.
While the HIMARS rockets are not strong enough to take down a bridge of that size, they were
able to blow up the roads on the bridge because of how accurate it is. After HIMARS destroyed the
roads over the bridge, Russian troops decided to use another supply route further north. Spanning
across the Kakhovka Dam, this was Russia’s second attempt at resupplying its forces by
land. However, HIMARS strikes once again blew up the road. It’s important to note here that the
strikes only destroyed the road on top of the dam, not the dam itself, as Russian media reported.
With the two major river crossings knocked out, Russian engineers tried to build a pontoon bridge
to ferry troops and equipment across. Ukrainian forces put this crossing under a murderous
barrage of artillery and rocket fire day and night. After knocking out the pontoon bridge,
the Russians gave up trying to build a major supply route across the Dnipro river.
But even if Russia could resupply its troops, they faced another enemy: the weather. Ukraine
gets notoriously cold. With temperatures often dropping in the single digits or below freezing,
combined with snow and windchill, Ukraine becomes a soldier's worst enemy in the winter.
Because Russia has constantly been attacking the nation's infrastructure, few houses here
likely had running water, gas, or electricity. Trying to motivate soldiers to fight in dark,
cold homes on city blocks where they could not see anything is something
Russian generals thought was too much to ask. Another motivation factor was that the troops in
Kherson were demoralized and defeated mentally. Most units bottled up in the Kherson had been
in constant combat for nine months. After Putin started mobilizing reservists, the first troops
brought into service went straight to Kherson. But it was not only high casualties that broke
down unit cohesion that was concerning for the Russian forces; it was Ukrainian partisans.
Kherson is noted to have one of the most active partisan movements in all the occupied regions
of Ukraine. Ukrainian citizens quickly made their dislike of Russian occupation
known early on in the war. They openly defied Russian troops within days when they assembled
in the city center and carried Ukrainian flags. Since then, the resistance movement has grown.
Partisans in Kherson regularly carried out attacks, and no one was safe. Ukrainian
collaborators and Russian servicemembers were targeted with near impunity. Partisans conducted
a series of car bombings throughout the summer and early fall against pro-Russian officials. They
also assassinated others with mobile hit squads. Partisans also ran their own psychological warfare
campaign by constantly putting up anti-Russian fliers that threatened death to Russian soldiers
and rewards for destroying Russian equipment. Partisan farmers also resisted the Russian
administration by refusing to harvest wheat. Because wheat is one of the country’s main
cash crops, the locals in Kherson did not want to feed or aid the Russian war machine in any way.
But Kherson partisans not only conducted covert hits on Russian collaborators, they directly aided
the Ukrainian military. As the regular army got closer to Kherson, partisans were quite
active in helping identify targets for Ukrainian artillery and air strikes. In one famous example,
partisans gave the army the coordinates of a Russian base. Soon afterward, a Ukrainian
artillery barrage leveled it, killing up to two hundred soldiers and two high-ranking officers.
The partisan problem in Kherson was so bad that Russia admitted it in a rare public admission.
The Russian government had to divert troops away from the front line to carry out counter-insurgent
operations. Federal police officers from the St. Petersburg area and Spetsnaz operatives were
also brought in to quash the partisans. All these efforts failed. Even as late as five days before
the Russian withdrawal, Ukrainian collaborators were still dying under mysterious circumstances.
On November 6, the deputy head of Kherson oblast died in a car accident. However, many suspect he
fell victim to yet another partisan car bombing. Even with all of Russia's best efforts at keeping
the partisan problem under wraps, it clearly had no hope of keeping the situation under control.
Pulling out of Kherson rid them of having to deal with fighting a regular army and an
insurgent army who showed no signs of stopping. Pulling out of Kherson also had operational
benefits. It appears that Russia is shifting focus back to the east and south for its own major
offensive. Over the past several weeks, Russian forces have launched a ferocious counterattack
against Bakhmut. The town of Bakhmut lies in the middle of a major crossroads, and taking
control of that city denies Russia the use of the highways for faster troop movement and resupply.
In the Zaporizhia region, Russian forces have recently launched a series of minor
offensives that have made some gains. However, outside observers have noted that despite the
massive disparity in numbers, the Russians are making dumb tactical errors. For example,
they are not allow newly mobilized troops to acclimate or train, and instead, these
soldiers are thrown directly into combat. Why seasoned military officers would do such things
in recent weeks only makes sense politically. After Russia's new supreme Ukraine commander
took over, he was very adamant that Kherson be abandoned. However, as stated earlier,
evacuating Kherson was a huge political pill for Putin to swallow. Western and Ukrainian
intelligence believe that Putin only allowed Russian commanders to pull out of Kherson with
the promise of a renewed offensive in the east and south. With this understanding, the haphazard
attacks in those areas make sense because these same commanders wanted to show Putin they were
making a good-faith effort for that promise. Because of this Russian generals will likely
try to quickly transfer the tens of thousands of troops evacuated east to the new front.
Though many people have speculated that Putin did this as a good faith measure toward negotiations,
this is unlikely. For their part, Ukraine has explicitly said that it will continue
its offensive. Stopping now would only benefit Russia. Putin and his cronies understand the
Ukrainian position and know that a ceasefire now is even less likely than before. Instead,
Putin may have wanted the evacuation from Kherson as a reason for general mobilization.
Western observers noted that for the longest time, Putin wanted to mobilize his country
to fight the war when it was clear that Ukraine would not lay over and submit to Russia. However,
his cronies advised against this since they still wanted to keep up the façade that the
"special military operation" was a limited war. It was not until Ukraine's lighting
blitz in the northeast that Putin was forced to mobilize 300,000 Russians to shore up his lines.
Hardliners in Russia's media and political circles are already calling for general
mobilization. Putin likely still desires this route since it will best guarantee his victory.
Though he may not do it right away, pulling out of Kherson gives him the justification needed
to bring the rest of his country into this war. Now watch “Why Putin's Invasion of Ukraine is a
Failure.” Or check out “Insane Ways Vladimir Putin Survived Assassination Attempts.”