Key Points – Drawing on a long history of resistance, Ukraine is effectively using asymmetric and guerrilla warfare tactics to counter Russia’s larger conventional military.
-Ukrainian Special Operations groups are conducting sabotage, disrupting supply lines, and assassinating collaborators in Russian-occupied territories.
-These modern irregular tactics, which include the use of sea drones to sink warships and long-range aerial drones for attacks like “Operation Spiderweb,” demonstrate Ukraine’s ingenuity.
-An expert from the CIA’s paramilitary branch suggests that for long-term success, these operations should now increasingly focus on intelligence-gathering behind enemy lines to support larger conventional military objectives and further erode Russian morale.
Guerrilla Warfare In Ukraine Will Increase Against Russia
The Ukrainian military has fought a very imaginative war against the Russian invasion for the past three-plus years. Far outnumbered, with fewer tanks and armored vehicles, artillery, helicopters, and aircraft, they’ve fought Russia to a standstill.
Fighting has shifted to an attritional war. And while Russia can (and has) afford to lose more people, tanks, and equipment, the Ukrainians have struck back using asymmetrical, guerrilla-type tactics in many areas of Russian-held territory.
Expect even more of this as they further erode Russian morale and tie down more combat divisions by interdicting supply routes and lines of communication. Ukraine has extensive experience in guerrilla warfare over the past century.
Ukrainian Resistance Against Enemies In the Last Century
In 1917, following the Russian Revolution, Ukrainian guerrilla groups opposed both the German occupation and the newly established Bolshevik army.
During the ensuing Russian Civil War, guerrillas supported the short-lived Ukrainian People’s Republic, engaging in a shifting series of alliances with the Bolsheviks and the White Russians, neither of whom was sympathetic to Ukrainian national aspirations.
As the Bolsheviks attempted to consolidate their control, hundreds of peasant revolts occurred in 1920, and an estimated forty thousand guerrillas were active. After brutal reprisals against the people, the Bolsheviks finally crushed the insurgency by November 1921.
After Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, guerrilla warfare broke out again, with Ukrainian participants espousing a variety of ideologies: anti-Nazi, anti-Soviet, or both, often nationalist and antisemitic.
According to a 2012 study by Ukrainian Armed Forces Major Pavlo Savchenko on the insurgency, the nationalist guerrillas of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) maintained their strength by avoiding battles with regular German forces while ambushing convoys carrying equipment and taking action to protect local populations from punitive measures by the occupying regime.
They conducted 2,526 mostly small-scale actions through 1943, which caused some 17,000 German casualties. By 1944, the Nazis were in retreat; but the UPA continued to conduct sabotage, ambushes, and assassinations.
After the Russians pushed the Germans back through Ukraine, the UPA had a much tougher time fighting the Soviets. The NKVD employed many more troops than the Germans, forcing UPA units to break down into smaller units to avoid detection.
Between 1944 and 1953, the NKVD killed an estimated 476,000 guerrillas and insurgents, although that number probably included many civilians. Following the uprisings in Hungary and Poland in 1956-1957, there were smaller outbreaks of unrest against the Soviets.
However, the Ukrainian guerrilla wars suffered from a lack of outside (Western) support. Ukraine was much more prepared in 2022 and had plans to establish guerrilla warfare against any Russian-occupied territory.
Ukraine’s Asymmetric Warfare Against Russia
Guerrilla warfare is being waged in Ukraine, primarily by Ukrainian Special Operations Groups operating in Russian-occupied territories, which have been highly effective in conducting operations behind enemy lines.
This includes sabotage, attacks on logistics and infrastructure, and the disruption of Russian military advances. Ukraine’s use of asymmetric tactics, including guerrilla warfare, has been effective in hindering Russia’s military progress.
Ukraine conducted small raids in the Kursk Oblast to probe for Russian vulnerabilities with the 80th and 82nd Air Assault Brigades and then exploited them with mechanized forces.
Ukrainian guerrillas have conducted numerous sabotage operations, targeting railways, infrastructure, and Russian military installations, especially in Crimea. They also have focused on disrupting Russian logistics and supply lines, hindering their ability to advance.
Civilians joined the resistance to the Russian occupation. One woman says she learned about being a partisan from childhood.
“I often listened to stories about World War II. My grandfather joined the partisans with his friends when he was 18 or 19 years old. He fought, and my grandmother made grenades. Even though it was Soviet Ukraine, it is in my blood to love my homeland. I mean my country, not Russia,” she said.
Ukraine’s Special Operations Groups have employed asymmetric and imaginative tactics. Sea drones sink modern warships in the Black Sea. Aerial drones evade Russia’s best air defenses to strike oil facilities in St. Petersburg.
Saboteurs blow up trains and paralyze Russia’s longest rail tunnel in the Far East. Officials and turncoats in Russian-occupied areas are routinely assassinated. On June 1, Ukrainian forces came up with a devastating plan of infiltrating drones in trucks to travel all over Russia to attack airfields where Russia held irreplaceable long-range bombers.
Guerrilla Warfare Tactics Will Shift
While Ukraine has been very successful at striking Russian forces in the rear of their lines, now is the time to shift to gathering more intelligence, says Philip Wasielewski, a 31-year veteran of the CIA’s paramilitary branch.
“Dismantling Russian air defenses and logistics requires intelligence gathered behind enemy lines. Ukraine has shown that even with limited resources, it can conduct intelligence-based deep strikes in Crimea and elsewhere. The keys to scaling this up are increased on-the-ground human and technical intelligence, as well as secure communications.
“Ukrainian irregular warfare should resemble stealthy Cold War intelligence and counterintelligence work rather than large-scale paramilitary operations.”
“A strategy to attrit Russian army logistics and undermine morale is optimal for indirect, irregular warfare. It will support the more substantial conventional offensive operations needed to expel Russian forces from Ukraine,” he said.
This is an area that Ukraine can leverage to force Russia to withdraw from the conflict in the long run.
About the Author:
Steve Balestrieri is a National Security Columnist. He served as a US Army Special Forces NCO and Warrant Officer. In addition to writing on defense, he covers the NFL for PatsFans.com and is a member of the Pro Football Writers of America (PFWA). His work was regularly featured in many military publications.
Iran War
B-2 Bomber: How America Would Strike Iran
