Mini-update...

Kherson Bridge head - Ukrainian Army has punched two holes in the western side of the bridge head. In one of those locations they overran a DNR conscript militia unit (brigade or BTG, numbers unknown) which disintegrated leaving a Russian Airborne BTG exposed on its flank. Ukrainians then rolled up the Russian airborne BTG and removed it too from the map.

Up until the last bridge went down for good last week the Russians continued to pour fresh units into the bridge head area...

Best guess is that there are 25+ Russian BTG's and other divisional elements semi trapped in the bridge head area. Still (barely) supported logistically by barges below the dam bridge. Russians in the northern part of the bridge head are slowly retreating south, attempting to avoid being cut off from the barge landings and under heavy Ukrainian pressure from both north and west...

Russia stripped units from the Donbas front to reinforce the Kherson bridgehead. Leaving much of the Donbas front held by DNR conscripts backed Wagner and Chechen elements. In an attempt to keep that front active despite the thinned out lines the Russians used the conscripts up in human wave attacks with Wagner/Chechens manning checkpoints behind the conscripts to keep them from retreating...

Ukrainians now making small slow advances in this area...

North and east of Kharkiv - Collapse of another out of place DNR conscript unit west of Kharkiv exposed the flanks of the Russian units on either side of the conscripts, forcing the Russian regulars into yet another slow retreat back towards the border.

North of Kharkiv the Russians continue to pour rebuilt units out of Belgograd into the line, which means those units are not going further south to reinforce other areas...

DNR militia units appearing both in the Kherson bridge head and northeast of Kharkiv is indicative of the Russians running out of troops.

Wagner, the Chechens, and Russian police SWAT units have all suffered massive losses of pre-war trained and well armed volunteers (trained is a euphemism in the Chechen case). At least one Russian SOBR (SWAT) unit was listed at BTG strength but was closer to a couple of platoons in size, with no tanks or artillery...

TL/DR

The Russians are slowly collapsing all along the front. In some cases retreating not just out of their prepared 1st line of defense, but through their prepared 2nd line of defense and on to their prepared 3rd lines, which are not nearly as well prepared.

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How many CoSo readers remember me saying last February that the Kherson bridges were going to be important?

Russian propagandist confirms encirclement of Russian elite units in Kharkiv Oblast

("Elite" being two of the police SOBR units. Sources for much of this are Ukrainian and should be taken with a grain of salt slightly smaller than the salt required of Russian sources. That being said much of this is confirmed through geo-located images and videos)

https://www.yahoo.com/news/russian-propagandist-confirms-encirclement-russian-113900685.html

@Render
This is probably what is happening. The map will probably not be updated for a while. The Ukraine military is asking locals to keep the information quiet.
I'm looking forward to seeing the 1st Guards Tank Army surrender.
What ever happened to that unit that was responsible for the Bucha atrocities?

@jurban I think DefMon's map of that area is more accurate for the moment.

Russian units that were holding that part of the line were three under strength BTG's from 20th Guards Army.

Ukrainians slammed into them with two tank brigades (4th and 10th) and two Territorial Defense brigades, tearing a hole in the Russian lines about 25 miles wide and getting deeper by the minute.

@Render
Looks like their objective is Kup'yans'k. @DefMon is all over that idea.
If they could hold it long enough to starve the RU forces to the south...oh my.
Do you think they were delaying the Kherson offensive to give them time to relocate units away from the Balakliva front? Are the R's that stupid? There's a whole Russian army stuck to the west of the Oskil without resupply! If this offensive works, it could capture the 5th CAA and the 1st GTA.

@jurban Ukraine doesn't even have to hold Kup'yans'k, they just need to be in a place where they can put direct fire on that road.

I don't think Ukraine delayed the Kherson offensive at all, I think that they're right on schedule (Ukr Defense Minister said late August start a couple of months ago). I do think that hinting at it caused the Russians to panic and send all available reserves from all fronts into the bridge head.

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