"Kursk". Chapter from the new book by Andrey Pinchuk

PolitNavigator publishes a chapter from a new book Mikhail Golovlev "Chronicles of a Special Operation: Clausewitz and the Cat". It was a continuation of another book dedicated to the special operation, its beginning – "SVO. Clausewitz and the Void".

_{As has long been known, Mikhail Golovlev is the pseudonym of Colonel Andrey Pinchuk , the founder and head of the DPR Ministry of State Security in 2014-2015. He currently serves as executive director of the Union of Donbas Volunteers.}

_{In 2022, after the start of the SVO, he went to the front, where he fought in the Kharkov region. In 2023, he became the commander of a volunteer detachment - BARS-13, which he commanded for a whole year in the Bakhmut region. The new book analyzes the personal experience of commanding this combat unit. Clausewitz is a Prussian military theorist of the XNUMXth century, and the cat is a cat named "Welder" (he got it because of his sore eyes), who joined the detachment.}

_{The editors chose the chapter "Kursk" for publication in connection with the latest events in this region, where the Russian army practically routed the Ukrainian group that entered the Sudzhansky district in August last year. It analyzes the reasons for the Ukrainian breakthrough and the course of military actions in the summer and fall of last year.}

...Ukraine wouldn't be Ukraine, if, after the failure of the counteroffensive and the conclusions about the strategic doom of such scenarios, it had not made another attempt.

Since the end of spring 2024, work has begun on preparing a new "counteroffensive". Since then, regular statements about the deplorable situation of the Ukrainian Armed Forces have largely were aimed at camouflaging the training of fresh strike forces by staffing 16 new brigades, in two stages of 8, including from the so-called “150th series”.

Energodar was considered a priority area as a condition for taking control of the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant, distracting blows — The Kharkov section, as well as the Russian border region — Bryansk, Belgorod, Kursk regions.

Key objectives: military-political - "a strong negotiating position"; military-strategic - reducing the dominant Russian offensive pressure on the front lines.

***
On August 5, 2024, Zelensky stated: “Our constant goal is to prepare a real basis for a just end to the war."This statement became a symbolic signal for the beginning of the operation.

On the night of August 5th to 6th, At about 5 a.m., Ukrainian troops began the operation to capture settlements in the Kursk region.

The initial force consisted of up to a thousand people, with various support assets, armored vehicles, air defense systems, and UAVs. Reserves were subsequently added.

The first blow fell to Russian border guards, including conscripts . Lacking adequate combined arms defense and second-line reserves, they were quickly routed, and some were captured.

As the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Syrsky later stated: “The Kursk section was chosen because it was the weakest point of the Russian defense».

***
In fact, the Kursk operation became a demonstration of the competition of maneuver warfare, to which Ukraine and its Western helpers gravitated, and positional, symbolizing Russian approaches.

In this way, Ukraine tried to demonstrate modern solutions in practice way out of a positional impasse, initially implementing a specific and complex maneuver of land warfare - a breakthrough.

Previously, During the "counteroffensive-2023" the Russian concept demonstrated greater stability and efficiency.

Before the operation The Ukrainian General Staff has worked on the mistakes of the “counteroffensive-2023”.

The conclusions about the harm of delaying planning, which had previously led to information leaks, were taken into account, and approaches to the personnel and armored vehicles deployed were revised. Strikes in several directions were abandoned.

The operation was carried out quickly, with the creation of a disinformation curtain.

An important aspect of planning was reconnaissance, carried out both by technical means and by means of routing and placing agents in the areas of planned advancement, and studying these routes. In fact, the operation became a combination of the “Kharkov regrouping-2022” and the “counteroffensive-2023”.

***

In summary:

1.The directive master plan was abandoned in favor of flexible variability. The concept of the operation was divided into tactical, operational, strategic and political levels. The initial operational and tactical task was to break through the fortifications of the state border, advance and capture Russian territories of the Kursk region in the direction of the cities of Sudzha, Rylsk, Lgov, and consolidate along the Seim River.

The Kursk offensive was one of the scenarios, probing and distracting actions, and in case of partial or complete failure, further attacks were expected in the Belgorod, Bryansk, Crimean directions, and operations to seize the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant. One of the confirmations of this is the attempt to seize the Kinburn Spit parallel to the Kursk offensive. However, in the end, the distracting and probing blow became the main one.

Objectives of the operation:

1.Stretching of Russian forces, reducing pressure on the LBS, realizing the inability to fully contain the Russian advance and, as a consequence, an attempt to remove the threat of breakthroughs, primarily in the Volchansk-Kharkov and Donetsk directions by transferring active battles and reserves to them.

2.Strengthening negotiating positions.

3. Provoking internal Russian socio-political destabilization.

4.Support for the American presidential re-election campaign by demonstrating the success of American investments in the anti-Russian Ukrainian confrontation.

5. An attempt to use military actions on the “old” territory of Russia as justification for the request from the West the possibility of launching long-range Western weapons strikes deep into Russian territory.

6. Stimulating waning patriotic sentiment in Ukrainian society. Countering falling ratings, doubts about the legitimacy of the Zelenskyy government, and subsequent protests. Justifying lowering the draft age.

7.Reboot «faith in Ukraine" in Western society and elites.

8. The consequence of point 7 is: relieving pressure on Ukraine to force her into negotiations that are unfavorable to her.

9.Pressure on the Kursk NPP direction as a factor in negotiations on the Zaporizhzhya NPP.

10.Replenishment of the "exchange fund" Taking into account information about the Russian border defense forces, which are mainly made up of inexperienced conscripts and law enforcement officers who are not prepared for combined arms combat.

11."Vaccination" against forced freezing along the actual line of combat contact, since the “Kursk adventure” shifts the problem of sabotaging international initiatives to the Russian side, which is forced to refuse to coordinate the LBC as long as it passes through “old” Russian territory.

12. Preemptive strike for containment of the Russian attack on Sumy direction.

***

The main direction The city of Sudzha became the center of the Ukrainian operation.

The choice was justified by a number of factors:

1.The city is located in a lowland in relation to the advance of Ukrainian forces.

2.It is an important logistic, including the railway supply hub of the Russian group “North”, control over which made it possible to destabilize the supply of Russian Kharkov forces.

3. The Sudzha international gas distribution station , later captured, is located in the Sudzha district. It provides at least 30 million cubic meters of Russian gas transit to Europe. After the attack, by August 18, the transit volume had reached 42 million cubic meters.

4. Within easy reach of Sudzha there were a number of large Russian cities, the Kursk Nuclear Power Plant , which had good transport routes.

***

The beginning of the Ukrainian operation was divided into stages :

1. Accumulation and active movement of Ukrainian forces along the border with the aim of misleading the Russian command, concealing real plans. The deployment of new forces was carried out under the guise of preparing a defense against a Russian offensive on Sumy. It was probably this disinformation that was perceived by the Russian command as a reason for calm. The rotation of fresh offensive forces began approximately two weeks before the start of the operation and continued for the next ten days.

At this time, targeted training sessions were conducted with the personnel to study the terrain of the Kursk region, directions of movement, division into independent groups, and development of communication systems.

2. Strengthening work with respect to Russian UAVs, gradual increase in the Ukrainian air presence of various types of drones.

3. At the same time, strengthening advanced electronic warfare stations.

4. Striking Russian fortifications with artillery, missile systems, and tank guns.

5. Assault infantry charge.

6. Approaching the LBS of mobile air defense systems, which allowed to reduce the activity of Russian aviation. In the first two weeks after the start of the operation, three Ukrainian HIMARS, IRIS-T MLRS, and elements of the Patriot launcher were destroyed near the border. At the same time, they played their supporting role. For example, a Russian Ka-52 helicopter was shot down on the very first day.

7. Preliminary “feeling out” of the territory by sabotage and reconnaissance groups.

8. An important component of the tactics became the bypassing of fortified Russian positions, division into mobile autonomous groups, forward detachments with subsequent pulling up of the main forces

Features of the operation:

1.It was carried out by military units, unlike previous attempts to attack the Belgorod region on behalf of “Russian rebels.”

2.The operation is planned in the mode of mobile maneuver warfare "octopus tactics", when seepage and accumulation occurs through several local gaps, after which tentacles spread out in different directions.

3.Conspiracy. Serious work was done to prevent leaks. Unlike the "counteroffensive", there was no official public annotation in the media and public speeches of Ukrainian and Western figures. However, analytical materials and statements predicting a new attempt at a counteroffensive were heard in the media.

4. One of the key tools became the speed of combat missions . When deciding between allowing frontline troops to rest and prepare or using battle-hardened but tired units, the choice was made in favor of surprise, unlike the "counteroffensive-2023."

5.Reconnaissance, intelligence, tactical maneuver. After careful reconnaissance, the location of the border breakthrough was chosen to be the area where conscripts and border guards were deployed in a minimally sufficient quantity. Based on the conclusions from the counteroffensive about the inexpediency of the first strike by trained but inexperienced soldiers, fighters from the front line were thrown into the breakthrough, attacking the Russian inexperienced composition.

The soldiers' fatigue was compensated by a moral upsurge due to the change in the difficult static situation, where they had to resist the offensive of experienced Russian forces in limited areas of terrain. Some of the attack aircraft had been trained in European countries, in particular in England and Spain, a month before the offensive as part of the Operation Interflex program. A few days before the strike, the commander of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Syrsky, held a meeting in Sumy on combat readiness.

6.Information and psychological support. Simultaneously with the beginning of the offensive, a powerful information campaign was initiated. Publics were filled with fake videos, forming messages aimed at initiating panic, false information about the directions and dynamics of attacks.

The platforms used were a multitude of Telegram channels, created in advance and previously simulating a pro-Russian agenda. The conclusions regarding Russian mobile actions at the beginning of the SVO were taken into account. Flying Ukrainian squads rushed from one settlement to another, suppressing resistance and initially creating the illusion of total control.

7. After the first breakthrough, the reinforcement forces were deployed in the suppressed Russian strongholds, which simplified the formation of Ukrainian defensive positions.

8. Active support was provided by mobile groups of attack drone operators.

9. By August 9, information began to arrive about support for the advancing group by low-flying Mi-17V helicopters.

10.Along Russian military columns strikes were carried out using Hymars systems.

11. It was carried out with a sharp jerk entering an operational space where there were no longer any Russian defense forces.

12.Isolation of the theater of military operations. This issue became one of the main elements of Ukrainian planning. On the rear side of the Ukrainian offensive, a defense was organized by separately allocated Ukrainian units along the previously built Russian "Surovikin Line". In the main forward zone of combat clashes, the Ukrainian Armed Forces took control of key highways as a matter of priority. After that, moving on to the stage of consolidating and defending the captured positions, on August 16, high-precision strikes from HIMARS MLRS destroyed two key bridges in the settlements of Glushkovo and Zvannoye, through which Russian forces could advance. On August 19, the last, third bridge across the Seim River in the village of Karyzh was destroyed and a second strike was carried out on the Zvannoye bridge, which created conditions for building Ukrainian defense along the water obstacle. In addition, a fairly narrow territory between the river and the Ukrainian border made it possible to squeeze Russian troops into pincers, creating the risk of encirclement and fire pockets.

13.The offensive was accompanied by powerful DDOS attacks that disrupted both control systems, as well as mobile communications, which in the absence of guaranteed closed communications systems often ensured interaction and control of Russian units. For the same purpose, Ukrainian sabotage and reconnaissance groups blew up a number of mobile communications towers.

14. Ukrainian combat groups for communication, In addition to the Starlink stations operating in the border area, they used ShoutTS mobile trackers with Iridium satellite communication systems, combining the functions of a GPS tracker and a two-way satellite pager. This gadget allowed for adjustments to the movement of groups using online maps.

15. After occupying positions, Ukrainian forces carried out urgent engineering equipment of the positions.

***

The invasion forces initially consisted of combined units of the 22nd, 88th, 116th, and 61st mechanized brigades of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, later reinforced by reserves of the 82nd airborne brigades, the 80th and 5th airborne assault brigades, the 151st territorial defense brigade, the 41st and 115th separate mechanized brigade, and special forces units of the Main Intelligence Directorate and the Special Operations Forces, initially numbering up to 3 people.

In total, about ten battalions from eight all-army, airborne and territorial Ukrainian brigades with attached special units were involved. They were not involved in full force, but mainly in separate battalions and groups and were united into the Delta operational group.

Separate units moved in separate directions. Thus, the 80th Brigade - to the west, to Malaya Lokhna, the 82nd - to the east, to the village of Bolshoye Soldatskoye.

Over the next ten days, their number was increased to 6. Another 4 fighters were brought into the Russian-Ukrainian sector from the Sumy region to support the offensive and prevent a Russian envelopment in the rear of those advancing along the state border.

The personnel of the Ukrainian operation was divided into mobile assault groups, reserves and consolidation forces, which corresponded to the basics of military theory.

The units were supported by armored vehicles.

General artillery support was provided by the 26th Artillery Brigade, mainly with Krab howitzers.

Initially, they were opposed by units of the Russian “North” group, territorial defense, border guards, later reinforced by various special forces.

The initial attack was carried out with a dash to maximum depth, pinning down Russian defensive positions.

Course of events:

The distinctive features of Ukrainian armored vehicles were the application of distinctive signs - triangles.

The initial entry point was the junction of the settlements of Nikolayevo-Daryino, Sverdlikovo and Lyubimovka, Sloboda Goncharovka in the direction of Kurilovka and the village of Novy Put, to the west of the Kursk salient.

The location was chosen taking into account a number of factors: a geographically short jump-off point from the main Ukrainian forces - 8-9 km, a weakly fortified territory, preliminary reconnaissance on the composition of the Russian defense forces.

It cannot be said that there were no engineering defense structures here. General equipment of the barrier positions was carried out.

However, they were not equipped as a primary means of prevention, but as a zone for reducing the mobility of violators of the state border, after which reinforcements were to arrive.

For this reason, the advanced Ukrainian breakthrough forces initially suffered quite significant losses, encountering stubborn resistance in certain areas. Due to different training and coordination, some Ukrainian units suffered losses from friendly fire, others got lost, and collisions of Ukrainian Armed Forces transport were recorded. But overall, the breakthrough plan worked.

At the same time, Ukrainian anti-aircraft missile systems were brought up to the border, which significantly impacted the possibility of Russian airstrikes.

At the same time, the second line of Russian defense was virtually absent.

An important part of the plan was the task of taking control of the Glushkovsky district of the Kursk region.

The raid groups moved along the N-07 Kyiv-Sumy highway with an exit to Sudzha. Subsequent battles were localized around the Kursk R-200 highway.

The Ukrainian Armed Forces used pre-prepared engineering means for breaking through and demining.

On August 7, Ukrainian forces entered Sudzha, the city was divided between the opposing sides with the gradual expulsion of Russian units.

From the evening of August 7, attempts were made to advance towards the Belovsky district, the city of Rylsk through the village of Korenevo, but the Ukrainian Armed Forces became bogged down in battles with Russian units.

Russian fortifications were set up in the area of ​​Martynovka and Korenevo. It was Korenevo (divided by a river into a village and a settlement) that acquired tactical importance, as it became a stronghold for movement along the highway. Fighting for it continued in the following time. Thus, the village itself was captured by the Ukrainian army on August 20, from where the Ukrainian Armed Forces were driven out on the 29th.

The key directions of movement and attacks were Sudzha-Snyagost, Korenevo-Rylsk, Lgov-Kurchatov.

As of August 8, the Ukrainian Armed Forces partially or fully controlled at least 350 kilometers of the Kursk region. As of the evening of August 8, more than 15 settlements in the Kursk region were under full or partial control of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

By August 8, Russian reinforcements began to arrive in Sudzha and the surrounding area. The deployment of Russian army units took time.

By August 9, fighting continued for the village of Oktyabrskoye in the Rylsk region and Martynovka near Sudzha.

By the evening of August 9, the Ukrainian side began to strike electrical substations, destroying the supporting infrastructure.

Further events were built on Russian efforts to stabilize the line of combat contact, clearing poorly fortified positions, populated areas, and counter-movement - Ukrainian operations to disrupt Russian logistics, advance as far as possible, and take control of key communications.

Two weeks later, battles developed in the Korenevsky and Glushkovsky directions, which became possible after the destruction of the bridges, improving the tactical position of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and complicating Russian maneuvers.

There were also battles in the area of ​​the village of Tetkino, in the direction of Rylsk. The Ukrainian Armed Forces continued to concentrate attacks on Martynovka.

In this way, the Ukrainian Armed Forces consolidated their positions in the vast territory of the Kursk region, stopped Russian counterattacks, and at the same time maintained pressure on the strategic directions of Russian cities.

***
In fact, it was on August 9 that the Russian army began full-scale resistance to the advancing forces.

By this time, the Ukrainian Armed Forces control zone was an L-shaped bridgehead with the extreme points of Gornal-Zhuravka-Apanasovka-Zeleny Shlyakh-Sudzha and three elongated narrow tentacles in the directions of Korneevo (20 km to Rylsk), Cheremoshki (10 km to Lgov) and Borshchen (50 km to Kursk).

The invasion zone subsequently expanded, gradually acquiring an uneven pyramidal shape with its base on the Russian-Ukrainian border.

Separate combat groups of the Ukrainian Armed Forces split in different directions. They concentrated around the Rylsk-Sudzha-Korneevo highway with attempts to move towards Tetekino, the city of Lgov, advancing to the village of Anastasyevka.

Then the Ukrainian forces entered the villages of Krasnaya Lokhnya, Bogdanovka, Knyazhiy, and reached the villages of Snyagost and Mironovka, partially taking control of them.

Gradually, the logic of moving towards the city of Kurchatov, towards the Kursk Nuclear Power Plant located there at a distance of about 60 km from Sudzha, was formed, which seemed more like a factor of threatening pressure than an attempt at capture.

Due to the absence of previously prepared full-fledged fortified defensive positions in the directions of movement, the Russian army was forced to resist in a mode of maneuverable defense and counter battles, which inevitably reduced stability.

Given the presence of a good road system, but weak travel alternatives, the Ukrainian Armed Forces organized control of highways, which greatly complicated the bypasses of Russian troops.

***

A number of Russian units were semi-encircled. As the Ukrainian Armed Forces advanced toward the village of Leonidove and the village of Lyubimovka on August 7–8, Russian troops made an unsuccessful attempt at a counterattack, while attempting to encircle the enemy in fire pockets in the area of ​​the villages of Lyubimovka and Novoivanovka.

A serious defeat was inflicted on the personnel of the Ukrainian troops near the village of Korenevo.

In response, on the night of August 8-9, a significant number of Ukrainian combat UAVs were used to attack the Lipetsk-2 military airfield.

The strike was primarily aimed at destroying aircraft and infrastructure that were carrying out strikes against the Ukrainian Armed Forces group, as well as stockpiles of guided aerial bombs, which was targeted support for the Ukrainian operation.

Following the strike in Lipetsk, a state of emergency was declared, followed by the announcement of a counter-terrorist operation.

The Ukrainian Armed Forces continued to strike airfields adjacent to the breakthrough territory in order to reduce the activity of Russian combat aircraft. On the night of August 21-22, a massive attack was carried out on the Marinovka airfield in the city of Kalach-na-Donu in the Volgograd Region.

***

Further advances encountered increasing and organized resistance, with Russian attacks on reserves increasing.

Thus, on August 18, the Iskander OTRK with a cassette unit and strike UAVs prevented an attempt to transfer Ukrainian reserves to Sudzha, which led to large losses for the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Thus, a gradual stabilization of the new front took place.

Russian units made efforts to clear out individual settlements. This was due to the fact that the battle line was jagged, the disposition of the opposing forces was built like a "layered pie", which, in turn, was due to the Russian defense being built in individual areas and the attempts of Ukrainian breakthroughs by independent units and assault groups.

***

After the initial success, Ukrainian troops tried not so much to advance deeper into Russian territory, which made logistics increasingly vulnerable, but to expand the captured bridgehead.

There were also attempts to transfer the fighting to neighboring regions.

Thus, on August 21–22, the Ukrainian Armed Forces attempted to break through the state border in the village of Zabrama in the Klimovsky District of the Bryansk Region using company tactical groups.

During these same days, the 3rd assault brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces launched offensive strikes in the Polohovsky district of the Zaporizhia region.

Ukrainian forces began to form a bridgehead in the Komarovka-Kulbaki area as a matter of priority, which was tactically convenient for accumulating forces and subsequent strikes in the direction of Russian positions in Glushkovka.

Russian troops, realizing the key nature of this position, focused on defense and counterattacks.

The situation increasingly began to gravitate toward positional warfare, although Ukrainian forces continued to attempt maneuvering. However, the task of holding the captured territories dictated its own logic of actions. The increased need for artillery, delivery of ammunition, fuel, and deployment of engineering defenses narrowed the possibilities for maneuver.

Reasons and prerequisites for the development of the operation:

1. Low density of Russian troops. This is due to the fact that some of the military formations that were part of the tactical direction "Kursk" were previously redeployed to the offensive direction of Volchansk-Liptsy and the defense of Belgorod. This, in turn, was explained by the limited resource of personnel and their demand for offensive operations. No engineering defense systems will give a complete result in countering an attack by military means in the absence of sufficient manning.

2. Disadvantages of the border defense system and engineering structures.

3. The "tail wagging the dog" effect. The media campaign promoting the practically accomplished Russian victory created an atmosphere of complacency and loss of vigilance.

4. The release of a certain portion of Ukrainian units from the Belarusian direction. Thus, a month before the attack, on July 13, 2024, Belarusian President Lukashenko stated that, quote, "tension on the border with Ukraine has been eliminated... 'Following our specific work, the Ukrainians withdrew their armed forces and the additional troops they had transferred to our border from the border and withdrawn them altogether from the Belarusian-Ukrainian border zone,' Lukashenko said. According to him, Belarus currently has no complications with Ukraine." It's likely that the behind-the-scenes negotiations with Belarus also served as an operation to exploit it "in the dark," and initially had as one of their goals the release of offensive reserves.

5. Weak intelligence organization. According to information circulating in information resources, two weeks before the invasion, the command received some reports about the enemy's forces building up in the border area. It should be noted here that external signs of the enemy's forces building up are not exhaustive intelligence information. The question is how regularly similar information was received earlier. If the Ukrainian location was used as a hub and a fortification zone against the Russian offensive, then such reports should have been received regularly and are not a reliable source. The intelligence system involves preemptive acquisition of plans from headquarters, the political and military elite, from foreign centers, and technical channels.

Although Western sources claimed the opposite. For example, in September 2024, the Guardian published an article entitled “Russia foresaw the Kursk invasion months in advance, captured documents show,” which claimed that the Ukrainian Armed Forces had captured trophies that showed the Russian army was aware of Ukrainian preparations for an attack, describing specific Ukrainian actions such as blowing up a bridge over the Seim River, breaking through the Yunakovka-Sudzha section, etc., which is what happened later. If this is true, and not an information campaign with specific goals, then, of course, questions arise about the reaction algorithms.

6. The first editions of "KiP" pointed out the key factor of military efficiency in the form of communication systems. Organizational solutions were proposed. The unresolved nature of this issue also played its role, naturally disrupting the stability of defense and control.

7. Lack of work to resettle residents of border settlements after the start of Ukrainian provocations since 2023.

8. Excessive depth of the rollback to the state border line during the "Kharkiv redeployment - 2022". In fact, the state border line was defined as a demarcation zone without taking into account the fact of a full-fledged military clash with Ukraine. Otherwise, the sanitary zone would have been built along the forced rollback lines, adjusted for the advantageousness of the positions, and would have been located significantly deeper than the borders of Ukrainian territories.

9. The isolated nature of the activities of Russian government agencies in the border area, without a clear legal status for the frontline territory and the inadequacy of appropriate approaches in this regard, which created unfilled gaps that the enemy took advantage of.

***

After the unexpected Ukrainian breakthrough, Russia actually had a choice: urgent transfer of significantly superior forces to force them out of Russian territory. Which is what Ukraine was trying to achieve by provoking the withdrawal of forces from the LBS. Or try to stop the breakthrough zone, continuing the offensive.

The Russian leadership chose the second scenario. It was probably assumed that the use of Ukrainian reserves in Kursk would deprive the Ukrainian Armed Forces of the opportunity for sustainable resistance in the main areas of conflict.

This created conditions for maintaining the pace of the offensive towards a major logistics centre, the city of Pokrovsk, which opens the way to Dnepropetrovsk and Zaporozhye, Toretsk, located on a strategic height, the village of New York, Ugledar, the Kupyansk direction, but at the same time, for a certain time, it allowed the Armed Forces of Ukraine to take control of part of Russian territory.

***

On September 10, Russian troops launched counterattacks with concentration in the Sudzhaksky (Pokrovsky farmstead) and Korenevsky (Krasnooktyabrskoye settlement) districts.

The 115th Marine Brigade, the 51st Airborne Regiment with attached units, with air support, launched flank attacks on the western part of the Ukrainian group - in the Pushkin direction, driving the Ukrainian Armed Forces out of about a dozen villages, including Gordeyevka, Viktorovka, etc.

A certain element of surprise in Russian actions was ensured, which made it possible to achieve tactical advancement.

However, the Ukrainian side as a whole turned out to be ready for this, and, having regrouped and retreated, switched to maneuverable defense, counter and flank attacks. For this purpose, the moment of Russian advance, stretching of positions and resources was recorded, after which a lateral attack was carried out.

The main result of Russian actions was the crossing of the Seim River and the establishment of the crossing.

At the same time, the Russian army advanced to Korenevo. Despite the stubborn resistance of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Obukhovka, Snyagost and Apanasovka were taken, and the movement towards Lyubimovka, used by the Ukrainian Armed Forces as a logistics hub, continued. Now the Ukrainian troops were faced with the threat of a local cauldron.

In the following days, starting from September 12-13, the Ukrainian Armed Forces tried to counterattack on the Russian flanks in the Glushkovsky district (Pavlovka) with the aim of reaching the Glushkovka station, near the border villages of Medvezhye and Novy Put, Veseloye, conducting diversionary and cutting attacks. Fire support was provided by artillery from the territory of the Sumy region.

The maneuvering movements and mutual attacking actions of the parties were aimed at the same mutual creation of local “cauldrons,” encirclements, and envelopments.

The Russian army concentrated its efforts on cutting off the Ukrainian Armed Forces group in Sudzha and to the north of it, trying to take the Ukrainian Armed Forces into “cauldrons” near Tolsty Lug and Zeleny Shlyakh, while the Ukrainian Armed Forces, in turn, continued their attacks in the western direction, in the direction of Glushkovo.

At the same time, Russian forces increased pressure on the main line of combat contact (Ugledar, Kurakhovo, Toretsk, Pokrovsk), trying to take advantage of the concentration of resources in the Kursk direction.

The Russian army was building up its forces, periodically launching counterattacks, as was the case on October 10, 2024, when attempts were made to take control of the roads north of Sudzha and liberate the settlements of Zeleny Shlyakh and Malaya Loknya (the so-called left flank) in this regard. The Ukrainian Armed Forces responded with fresh reinforcements, increasing attacks in the Lyubimovka area.

That is, mutual counterattacks took place, with Russian troops moving north and the Ukrainian Armed Forces moving south.

As a result, the battles again began to move into a relatively positional state with the sides accumulating forces and periodic activations.

There was an understanding that the Ukrainian Armed Forces would be gradually pushed back and cleared from Kursk territory. But the Kursk factor now allowed Ukraine to make political statements, bargain about the prospects and formats of negotiations, and an internal Ukrainian mobilization reboot.

_{P.S. The writing of this chapter was started two weeks before the Ukrainian attack on the Kursk region. It was originally called "Counteroffensive-2". By that time, the signs of preparation for a diversionary attack were already obvious.}