Ukraine may have deployed 3rd Assault Brigade to save Avdiivka — Forbes
Ukraine is strengthening its defenses in Avdiivka, possibly deploying the elite Third Separate Assault Brigade, Forbes reported on Feb. 11.
“Fresh effective forces” will be deployed there, Brig. Gen. Oleksandr Tarnavskyi, commander of the Tavria group of forces in Avdiivka wrote on Telegram.
Read also: Ukrainian defense analyst expects Russians to mount third major push into Avdiivka within weeks
The publication wrote that it was “not clear” that the Ukrainians would reinforce Avdiivka. In apparently choosing to stay and fight, “Ukrainian forces are accepting enormous risk.”
After four months of hard fighting, Russian troops from the 2nd and 41st Combined Arms Armies finally breached Avdiivka at the beginning of this month, the article said.
At that point Tarnavskyi had two options. Pull back the 110th Brigade’s survivors from the exposed eastern part of the city and consolidate the Ukrainian line in central Avdiivka or just outside the city, to the west. Or: reinforce the 110th Brigade and try to push the much larger Russian force away from the garrison’s supply lines. Tarnavskyi may not have made the decision, however.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy dismissed popular, charismatic Commander-in-Chief Valerii Zaluzhnyi and replaced him with Oleksandr Syrskyi last week.
In any case, it seems fresh Ukrainian forces have arrived in the now-lifeless ruins of the once thriving industrial city with a pre-war population of 30,000. Their first and most obvious task is to relieve pressure on the main paved east-west road into central Avdiivka, Hrushevsky Street. There are other, less passable roads to Avdiivka, but Hrushevsky is critical.
The 2000-person 3rd Assault Brigade led one of the victorious battles as part of the Ukrainian offensive in 2023 and liberated the town of Andriivka. The victory allowed the one-year-old brigade to rest, retrain, recruit new soldiers and, if rumors are true, re-arm with American-made M-2 fighting vehicles, the publication wrote.
The Russians would not occupy Avdiivka, Donetsk Oblast, in the coming weeks, British intelligence suggested on Jan. 27, as the main supply route to the city was still under Ukrainian control and Defense Forces counterattacks were holding back the Russian advance.
The geolocation footage showed the advance of Russian troops through the streets of Avdiivka, U.S. Institute for the Study of War (ISW) wrote on Jan. 29.
Russian troops stepped up their offensive on Avdiivka in October 2023, simultaneously with massive strikes on the city.
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