Ukraine's big new strategy to relieve its manpower crunch isn't working, top war analyst says
Diego Herrera Carcedo/Anadolu via Getty Images
- A top analyst said Ukraine's decision to create new brigades instead of bolstering existing ones isn't working.
- Many of the new units are now being divided up and sent to existing brigades that need replenishment.
- It's turning out to be "one of the more puzzling force management choices" Kyiv has made, the analyst said.
Ukraine's 2024 strategy for solving a shortage of soldiers — its biggest challenge thus far — by forming new brigades instead of reinforcing old ones is performing poorly, said a top analyst on the war.
Michael Kofman, a senior fellow for the Russia and Eurasia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, wrote in a social media thread on Saturday that Kyiv's decision was "one of the more puzzling force management choices" it has made.
"Expanding the force with new brigades, when men are desperately needed to replace losses among experienced formations deployed on the front lines, had visible tradeoffs," Kofman wrote.
With little experience, the new units have been "generally combat ineffective," he added.
'"As was seen in 2023, new formations perform poorly in offensive and defensive roles. Requiring considerable time to gain experience, cohesion, confidence, etc.," Kofman wrote.
The result is that the strategy has at least partially disintegrated, with battalions from the new brigades eventually sent to shore up losses in units that were already fighting, Kofman wrote.
Ukrainian leadership said in May that it aimed to create 10 new brigades, each of which typically consists of several thousand men. In doing so, its leaders hoped to provide fresh units that could rotate into combat or fill gaps on the front line.
"There is simply no other effective way to counteract the overwhelming enemy," a spokesperson for Ukraine's armed forces said in November. "After all, today we have a 1,300 km-long front with active combat clashes."
Some elements of these brigades were aided by training from Western forces, such as the 155th Mechanized Brigade. About half of its recruits drilled in France.
But the 155th's debut late last year created a crisis for Ukraine as reports emerged that it suffered from high rates of desertion and was being picked apart to siphon resources to other brigades.
Local journalist Yuriy Butusov reported just before the New Year that the new brigade, often finding itself whittled down, had to juggle specialists such as drone jamming operators into infantry roles. The backlash to the news was severe, with Ukrainian figures voicing questions about the new strategy as a whole.
"Perhaps it's sheer idiocy to create new brigades and equip them with new technology while existing ones are undermanned," wrote Lt. Col. Bohdan Krotevych, who serves as chief of staff in the Azov Brigade. The 155th is supplied with dozens of French-made armored vehicles, howitzers, and personnel carriers.
Kofman wrote that the 155th's scandal was "just the most egregious case" of Ukraine's force management problems.
Divvying up new units has led to a "steady fragmentation of the defensive effort and loss of cohesion," he said.
"This patchwork groupings of forces must hold the front," he added.
Ukraine has, over the last year, faced a slow but persistent Russian assault in the eastern regions of the Donbas, where Moscow has been throwing a steady supply of men and equipment at Kyiv's outnumbered and exhausted defensive lines. Russia's gains have been incremental and its reported losses are staggering, but it is advancing nonetheless.
Another pain point has been a lack of Western military aid to go around. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in September that Kyiv had sought to arm 14 of its brigades with Western weapons, but that arms packages in 2024 couldn't even supply four of them.
It's turned to domestic production to fill some of its needs, and Zelenskyy said on New Year's Eve that 30% of the weapons Ukraine used in 2024 were created locally.
Amid the manpower and equipment shortages, Ukrainian units have also been developing new drones at breakneck speed, often cobbled together from commercial parts.
Kofman said these drones have proven to be "force multipliers," letting troops lay mines safely and harassing Russian units before they can reach the front.
"However, tech innovation, tactical adaptation, and better integration are insufficient to compensate for failure to address the fundamentals," Kofman added. "Russian gains may appear unimpressive, but UA needs to address manpower, training, and force management issues to sustain this fight."
Kofman and the Ukrainian Defense Ministry did not respond to requests for comment sent outside regular business hours by Business Insider.
The last year has increasingly turned the war into a conflict of attrition, not just in manpower but also in resources. Russia is now entering a third year of sustaining its economy in the face of the West's sweeping sanctions, relying heavily on defense manufacturing and offering large bonuses to new recruits.
Some in Ukraine hope that if it can solve its manpower issues and maintain its defensive lines, it will eventually exhaust Russia's ability to funnel money and men into the war.
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