The 80th Air Assault Brigade is equipped for tough, swift attacks.
David Axe
Forbes
Aug 8, 2024
A column of armored vehicles rolling into southern Russia’s Kursk Oblast on the third day of Ukraine’s surprise attack into Russia confirms the involvement of one of Ukraine’s best-equipped and fastest-moving brigades: the 80th Air Assault Brigade. A video that circulated on social media on Thursday depicts a T-64BV or T-80BV tank, a UR-77 mine-clearing vehicle, an IMR-2 engineering vehicle plus BTR-80 and U.S.-made Stryker wheeled armored personnel carriers rolling past a busy Ukrainian mortar crew. All the vehicles are up-armored with anti-drone cages. Infantry crowd the top of the BTR-80. An 82-millimeter mortar lobs a bomb at most a couple of miles. It’s clear from the context that the video captures the early moments of a serious Ukrainian assault on Russian positions.
Only the 80th Air Assault Brigade operates that mix of ex-Soviet and ex-American vehicles. Further confirmation is found in a separate video—shot by a Russian drone—depicting strikes on ex-German Marder tracked fighting vehicles in Kursk Oblast. The 80th Air Assault Brigade, like its sister unit the 82nd Air Assault Brigade, apparently operates Marders alongside its Strykers. The Marders are heavy. The Strykers are fast. They suit the Ukrainian air assault forces’ preference for swift but powerful attacks.
The participation of the 80th Air Assault Brigade—one of the better Ukrainian brigades—underscores the scale of the Ukrainian operation just north of Ukraine’s northern border with Russia. In the 29 months since Russia widened its war on Ukraine, pro-Ukrainian fighters have launched many raids across the border into southern Russia. But these raids have been small in scale and limited in scope—and have never lasted more than a few days. More than anything, they’ve been meant to embarrass Russian leaders.
The Ukrainian operation that kicked off on Tuesday is different. At least three brigades, each with up to 2,000 troops, are involved: the 22nd and 88th Mechanized Brigades and the 80th Air Assault Brigade. Artillery, drones and air defenses are playing critical supporting roles. It’s more clear by the hour that what’s happening in Kursk isn’t a raid: it really is an invasion. That the Ukrainians are pouring significant resources into this invasion doesn’t guarantee its success, of course. There might be 10,000 Ukrainian troops in and around in the invasion zone. The Russian Northern Grouping of Forces, which fights along the border zone, has around 48,000 troops.
But the Northern Grouping of Forces is bogged down in Vovchansk, a Ukrainian border town 90 miles southeast of Sudzha, the Russian border town that’s the locus of the Ukrainian invasion.
It’s apparent Ukrainian brigades deliberately crossed the border where the Northern Grouping of Forces was thinnest. “The Ukrainian defense forces’ command has successfully achieved operational surprise,” the Ukrainian Center for Defense Strategies noted.
Whether, and how quickly, the Northern Grouping of Forces can shift forces toward Sudzha could be the deciding factor in the outcome of the three-day-old Ukrainian invasion. If the Russians move fast, they could blunt or even reverse the Ukrainians’ gains. If they move slowly, they could lose much more of Kursk Oblast to advancing Ukrainian columns.
There’s still a significant chance the Ukrainian operation backfires on its planners. If the Ukrainian brigades outrun their artillery, air defenses and logistics, they could find themselves alone and outgunned deep inside Kursk Oblast. Kyiv is risking thousands of troops it can’t easily replace. But the Ukrainians aren’t just advancing fast, they’re advancing fast with serious firepower—in the form of the 80th Air Assault Brigade.
To the Ukrainian commanders’ credit, the pace and mass of their attack has startled and befuddled Russian commanders. “A noticeable delay in decision-making by the command of the enemy’s [northern] operational grouping indicates a misjudgment of the likely nature of the Ukrainian defense forces’ actions,” CDS concluded.