It was just after dawn on the Kherson delta when the Ukrainian armoured personal carrier began subjecting Russian positions to a barrage of fire with its mounted cannon. A torrent of high-explosive tracer rounds pulsed across the Dnipro river, shattering the early morning calm. Moments later, further down the dusty riverside road, a Ukrainian heavy machine gunner opened covering fire.
The surprise attack continued for a few minutes, the sound of a blast echoing somewhere in Russian-held territory before the Ukrainian special operation forces sped back towards their base. The Russians did not return fire. “There’s nothing up there,” said Serhiy, as he monitored the skies for drones on a hand-held electronic device.
#Ukraine: The first confirmed loss of a Ukrainian CAESAR 8×8 155mm self-propelled howitzer – this one was destroyed in #Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
In total 19 of these CAESAR variants on the Tatra chassis were donated to Ukraine by Denmark. pic.twitter.com/fWBTVIfheM
— 🇺🇦 Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) September 1, 2023
Why Russian tanks are falling short of their Western counterparts
The three main attributes of the tank are firepower protection and mobility.
The Russians very much focus on firepower and mobility whereas Western tanks favour protection, that is physical protection of the crew. A lot of us who’ve been looking at this closely, we’re very interested in data coming out of Ukraine this week that of the 71 Leopard 2 German tanks that have been operating right at the front, in Ukraine, only five have been destroyed and no tank crew have been killed, which is quite phenomenal.
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