As many are aware, the Kakhovka Dam was seriously breeched Tuesday, 6 June, flooding the Dnipro River to its west. This is almost a 60 mile (97 km) stretch of river. The dam holds back a large 150 mile (241 km) reservoir. Description is here: Destruction of the Kakhovka Dam – Wikipedia
Of course, the Ukrainians blame the Russians and the Russians blame the Ukrainians. The Russian claims don’t carry much water.
It appears that the dam was destroyed to either help the Russian defense of this area or as an act of revenge for drone attacks on Moscow. Not sure which.
I never considered the area along the Dnipro River to be an effective line of attack for the Ukrainians, as the river was crossed by only three bridges, and two were down. The road across the dam was the only open road. It is now down. The Russians struggled in the fall of last year to maintain forces of up to 20,000 on the north side of the river and were forced to withdraw. If the Ukrainian attacked across this river, they would be suffering similar problems. Therefore, I assume that any Ukrainian attack across the river would be a diversion, and the real attack would occur elsewhere.
Certainly the flooding of the river temporarily shuts down any major operations in that area, but I don’t think the Ukrainians were yet conducting any major operations anywhere. For example, see: Update from Ukraine | Is it the start of the Ukrainian Counterattack? New Achievements – YouTube.
Therefore, the collapsing of the dam does not seem to be directly related to any major military operations, unless Ukraine was planning one in the area and Russian flooded the river to stop it. So unless there was a major Ukrainian operation in the area about to start, I do question the military value of this. It is something that can only be done one time, and the current campaign season is still like six months long. Flooding the Dnipro will certainly shut down operations there for weeks, but… the waters do subside. So, there just doesn’t seem to be a strong military reason for this.
Maybe it was an act of revenge. If so, it was poorly considered. It just adds the narrative of Russians as brutal orc-like creatures and further diminishes their international reputation and standing. Furthermore, in the U.S., neither of the two leading contenders for the Republican Party presidential nomination are supporters of Ukraine. The image of the destroyed dam and of the places downstream being deliberately flooded are making the arguments put forward by their opponents. As has been the case since the start of the war, the Russians are their own worse PR. They complain about Russo-phobia, yet they are going out of their way to create it. This is just incompetent, and that is not addressing the inhumane nature of some of their actions.
Anyhow, I think the military advantages gained from this are limited. I am mystified how they came to the conclusion that this was a good idea.
This is really, really bad for Crimea, and eliminates one of the main Russian reasons for the war, water supply to the peninsula.
I’m not convinced that it was Russia yet, to be honest. It mostly is flooding the Russian controlled bank, clearing out numerous defensive positions. It also takes attention away from a much announced counter offensive that managed to wait until the rainy season started back up.
Maybe I’m a fool though.
C.A.L: “The Russian claims don’t carry much water.”
-Ugh. A hit team is heading your way for that one. Death by drowning…
C.A.L: “It appears that the dam was destroyed to either help the Russian defense of this area or as an act of revenge for drone attacks on Moscow. Not sure which.”
-The two motives are not mutually exclusive.
C.A.L: “I never considered the area along the Dnipro River to be an effective line of attack for the Ukrainians, as the river was crossed by only three bridges, and two were down…”
-The Ukrainians have new bridging equipment:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/craighooper/2023/03/03/armored-bridges-to-ukraine-last-pieces-for-a-counter-attack-coming-into-place/?sh=22a1a7a52efe
…Better safe, than sorry?
C.A.L: “Flooding the Dnipro will certainly shut down operations there for weeks, but… the waters do subside…”
-Better safe, than sorry, for at least a few weeks?
Launching a large scale offensive across the lower Dnieper isn’t going to be done with standard bridging equipment. They either need a bridge or enormous amphibious capability, as over the beach operations are a nightmare and nobody is going to use cargo ships to supply across the Dnieper.
Sorry. Wrote the sentence first. Only on the re-read did I realize that it made a pun, but… I really couldn’t think of a better way to express what I was thinking.
On the other hand, the title of the piece was deliberate.
Cui bono?
This benefits nobody. I have seen scattered reports of damage bult up previous to the breaching, and I suppose it could be a coincidence to have it crash a few days after Ukraine starts hitting Russian positions.
Agriculture in the whole Region is going to be FUBAR until the fighting stops and another dam goes in. Irrigation is the underpinning of civilian, but without water…
It is possible that it could be accidental. On the other hand, Zelenskyy did state that it started with a large explosion. Now that explosion could have been accidental, except the dam was a large Soviet-style construction and would have required a significant explosion. So possible, not sure how likely.
More statements that explosions were used (although no evidence provided): https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukraine-s-defence-intelligence-has-evidence-that-explosives-were-used-to-blow-up-kakhovka-power-plant/ar-AA1cd8VG?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=6e9a7665a4194429bd3f592971313d7e&ei=23
What is the water table like in the area around the river ? A high water table implies that the flood will generate muddy flats that will remain sticky for some time, and essentially unusable for military advances.
The UKR lost the last remaining bridge in the area and are unlikely to be a threat in this sector for some time to come. They are also spending resources in civilian damage control. I also cannot think of how they would manage to destroy the dam given that its under RU control, and I have yet to see any claims of UKR air or missile activity in the area at the time of the destruction.
While we cannot discount the dam failing after damage and neglect, the pattern to date of RU not caring about infrastructure leads me to give the greater weight to this being a RU action.
There are also claims of a new Russian order (http://publication.pravo.gov.ru/document/0001202305310067?index=6) that prohibits investigations into (among several things) dam failures. Now, I cant read RU, but this is what others claim. if true, the timing is rather…..curious.
It was an odd time to breach the dam. Breaching the dam during a downstream crossing by the enemies of the saboteurs would have made sense, but transforming the upstream defensive terrain from a broad reservoir into a muddy floodplain . . . ? How did that significantly change the usefulness of the upstream defensive terrain (or usefulness for offensive operations)? The downstream defensive landscape changes include temporary flooding followed by having a “permanently” broader river to cross, but a mid-operation change to the battlefield would have been more disruptive.
Pharaoh’s attacking army would have preferred the Reed Sea phenomena of the collapsing/crashing/crushing walls of waters to have occurred prior to pursuing the Hebrews through the miraculous trough in the Reed Sea rather than in the middle of that crossing/pursuing operation. An earlier timing of the miraculous event still would have been impressive, but the later timing decisively disrupted the pursuit!
So, Russian thinking (if it was the Russians and if they were thinking) probably had to do with attacking the economy rather than attacking the military of the Ukrainians.