Ukraine’s losses in the Donbas these past four weeks have signaled the end of Ukraine’s fifth army. Bohoyavlenka, Kateryniwka, Ismailiwka, Oleksandropil, Hirnyk, Selydowe, Wyschnewe, Schachtarske, and Novoukrainsk have fallen in the past few weeks.

Based on the battles in which Ukraine’s military failed to continue offense after the achievement of a significant military objective, Ukraine has reconstituted its own army more than five times already. Here the term ‘army’ does not denote a group of Ukrainian brigades or Kampfgruppen, which were assembled for the Kursk operation but the sum of Ukraine’s available means of trained, organized, equipped units of manpower in combined arms formations, the vast majority of which are formed into brigades.

The first reconstitution of its army occurred before Ukraine’s Kharkiv offensive on September 6th, 2022; Ukraine’s first army fought the Russians from Kyiv to the outskirts of Donetsk, securing a major victory against the Russians in Kharkiv without continued offensive action; the Kharkiv offensive ended on September 11th, 2022. Ukraine’s first army disintegrated shortly before the appointment of the Russian General, Sergey Surovikin, called for a withdrawal from Kherson on November 9th, 2022.

Ukraine’s second army disintegrated after the Kharkiv offensive but before Russia’s withdrawal from Kherson. In the battle for Bakhmut-Artemovsk, which began immediately prior to Russia’s withdrawal from Kherson, Ukraine’s third army disintegrated. During the battle, two important developments occurred. One of Jack Texeira’s leaked secret documents on Discord demonstrated that Ukraine sought to prepare 12 new brigades for a 2023 ‘Spring’ counteroffensive; nine of these 12 brigades NATO sought to train. Alongside these leaked documents, Sergey Surovikin implemented a plan for the construction of a no man’s land of complex WWI defenses.

In the Jack Texeira document entitled, “US. Allied & PARTNER UAF Combat Power Build,” whose right aligned subtitle states, “SECRET//REL TO FIN. UKR. FVEY. NATO,” nine out of the 12 brigades NATO sought to train are listed on the right hand side of the page with notes on their respective force structure. The brigades listed are: 35th, 47th, 33rd, 21st, 32nd, 37th, 118th, 117th, 82nd.

Alongside the NATO trained brigades for Ukraine’s 2023 ‘Spring’ counteroffensive, Ukraine trained three brigades internally. These are unnamed in the document but they may be Azov, Kara Dag (a mountain in Crimea), Border of Steel, Hurricane, Spartan, Chervona Kalyna, Frontier and Rage.[6] At least, as far as is reported, these brigades began reconstitution during the battle of Bakhmut-Artemovsk.

During the Ukrainian 2023 ‘Spring’ counteroffensive, many of these brigades went “missing in action,” as Forbes describes the 117th, 37th, 33rd, and 47th brigades on June 22nd, 2023.[5] Their fate would become clear later. According to Ukrainian sources, the following brigades participated in Ukraine’s 2023 ‘Spring’ counteroffensive: 3rd, 28th, 82nd, 10th, 73rd, Kraken, 37th, 47th, 92nd.[7]

The battle for Bakhmut-Artemovsk ended on May 23rd, 2023, Sergey Shoigu’s birthday. In the period from Russia’s withdrawal from the right bank of the Dnipro in Kherson to the conclusion of Bakhmut-Artemovsk, Ukraine’s third army disintegrated. It built its fourth army during this battle.

With the 12 brigades leaked in Jack Texeira’s secret documents, Ukraine launched the 2023 ‘Spring’ counteroffensive, which occurred in two waves; the initial wave began after the fall of Bakhmut-Artemovsk; a significant ‘mechanized‘ ‘main thrust’ began on July 24th, the phase in which Ukraine deployed its previously un-deployed brigades. The Ukrainian 2023 ‘Spring’ counteroffensive ended definitively with the fall of Marinka in southeastern Donetsk on December 25th, 2023; the Ukrainian 2023 ‘Spring’ counteroffensive rendered multiple Ukrainian brigades combat ineffective; the 57th Mechanized Brigade, for instance, ceased to be combat effective. The NYT noted how “some brigades suffered heavy losses in the initial stages of this summer’s counteroffensive, struggling to advance against the formidable Russian defenses. At least one new brigade was so badly debilitated from casualties that it was withdrawn from the battlefield to rebuild.”[1] Consequently, the fourth Ukrainian army disintegrated during the Ukrainian 2023 ‘Spring’ counteroffensive.

Given the extreme levels of corruption embedded within the post-Stalinist structures of Ukraine’s existing government, there are several brigades composed of so-called Dead Souls. In a reference to Gogol’s famous novel, Dead Souls, these Ukrainian brigades are composed of soldiers who exists on paper, much like dead serfs existed in property registers for landowners. The so-called 58th Ukrainian brigade is allegedly a brigade of dead souls. Due to NATO’s affection for the Zelensky regime, American centers of research, study, or analysis are prohibited from exposing Chichikov brigades so there is little to no information published on Ukrainian Chichikov brigades. In much the same way that Gogol burnt his novels, American journalists or analysts have covered up Ukraine’s corruption or, at least, remained silent about the country’s exploits.

In the immediate aftermath of the fall of Marinka, Russia’s winter offensive campaign began with an assault on five separate axes throughout the Donbas; on the south eastern Donetsk axes, Russia advanced significantly first in Avdiivka on February 17th, 2024 and later in Vuhledar, two of the most highly contested villages in the Donbas and of the entire Ukraine war. After the fall of Vuhledar, the Ukrainian front in that area of the Donbas began to collapse until the fall of Selydove on October 16th, 2024. During these battles, Ukraine’s 47th Separate Mechanized Brigade, the recipient of 31 Abrams tanks from the United States, lost more than half of its tanks, rendering its tank company combat ineffective. Against the backdrop of Ukraine’s decision to launch an offensive in Kursk, Ukraine’s territorial losses in the southeastern Donbas averaged more than 470 square kilometers per month (i.e., August, September, October). The decision, which AlArabiya described as a failure, proved to be disastrous with the full scale of its effect on the war still a subject of study. More than 100,000 Ukrainian servicemen have abandoned or deserted Ukraine’s armed forces.[2] It is clear that during Russia’s successful winter offensive, Ukraine’s fifth army disintegrated. Prior to its disintegration, Ukraine passed a law lowering the age of conscription to the age of 25.[4]

In the face of Ukraine’s collapsed front in southeastern Donetsk, Ukraine immediately raised the call for the enlistment of more than 160,000 Ukrainians and the creation of more than 14 new Ukrainian brigades with 2,000 men.[3] The Ukraine’s 155th Separate Mechanized Brigade, whose 2,000 Ukrainian soldiers France trained, is constituted with 31 Leopard tanks. The majority of the new 14 brigades are numbered in the 150s.

Army	Beginning	End	Famous Brigades	Famous Battles
1st	February 2nd, 2022	September 6th, 2022	Avoz	Hostomel
2nd	September 6th, 2022	November 9th, 2022	92nd	Kharkiv
3rd	September 11th, 2022 / November 9th, 2022	May 23rd, 2023	57th	Kherson Withdrawal, Bakhmut-Artemovsk
4th	May 23, 2023	December 25th, 2023	57th, 3rd Assault	Ukraine’s 2023 ‘Spring’ Counteroffensive, Marinka
5th	December 25th, 2023	October 16th, 2024	47th, 72nd	Avdiivka, Vuhledar, Selydove
6th	October 16th, 2024	~ Summer 2025	150s	Dnipro, Dnipropetrovsk
7th	~ Summer 2025	~ February, 2026	?	Chasiv Yar, Kupyansk, Kharkiv

Ukraine’s decision to erect a sixth army occurs amidst discussions to decrease the age of conscription from 25 to 18. Since this erection has occurred without a decrease in the age of conscription, Ukraine is in a position to erect a seventh army, should the sixth army disintegrate. It is easy to predict that Ukraine’s sixth army is expected to disintegrate.

With Ukraine preparing the Dnipro for defense, Russian gains in the Dnipro direction after the fall of Pokrovsk are likely to lead to the disintegration of Ukraine’s sixth army around the summer of 2025. Ukraine’s armies average six to nine months. Should the sixth army began to disintegrate by the time summer comes next year, there is a likelihood that Ukraine’s seventh army will be erected on the souls of conscripts under the age of 25 before summer 2025. Consequently, Zelensky, whose presidency ended a long time ago, is expected to pass a new law on mobilization, lowering the age of conscription from 25 to 18 before summer 2025.

In contrast to Ukraine’s armies, Russia has created army groups. These army groups have remained relatively in tact during the course of the past two years of warfare; with these army groups Russia has been able to incorporate its reserves in new companies, battalions or regiments so that primarily experienced Donbas front soldiers are able to pass down their experience in Ukraine on these reserves, easing their transition into the army groups. Since the structure of its forces have largely remained almost entirely in tact, Russian reserves or new conscripts have been able to inherit this experience, allowing for a solid continuum to arise in the overall Russian experience of the war.

Ukraine’s erection of sixth army for brigades who disintegrate just as rapidly as they integrate demonstrates that Ukraine’s military formations have not been able to benefit from experiential inheritance; they have not been able to establish a continuum from the first brigade to the last.

[1] – [“Ukraine’s Troops View Offensive as a Marathon,” New York Times, August 8th, 2023]

[2] – [“Ukraine admits number of deserted soldiers from Armed Forces of Ukraine surpasses 100,000,” TASS, October 29th, 2024]

[3] – [“160,000 people planned to be drafted into Ukrainian forces, National Security and Defense Council head says,” Kyiv Independent, October 29th, 2024]

[4] – [“Zelensky signs mobilization bill,” Kyiv Independent, April 16th, 2024]

[5] – [“Several Powerful Ukrainian Brigades Are Missing In Action,” Forbes, June 22nd, 2023]

[6] – [“Who are the forces involved in Ukraine’s counteroffensive?,” Reuters, June 19th, 2023]

[7th] – [“Ukraine’s Counteroffensive, Units to Watch #3 – 82nd Air Assault Brigade,” Kyiv Post, May 14th, 2023]