Air-bust shells – how dangerous are they? Here is a short but very educational video of how not to conduct a ground operation. What you can see on your screen is russian infantry trying to advance onto Ukrainian positions in the town of Vuhledar. As far as we know, this infantry belongs to the infamous Wagner group. They are known to care very little about the survivability of their infantry companies.
We can see a World War One style of advance – open ground, little to no artillery and air support, and insufficient amount of heavy weapons and vehicles.
The result is natural and disastrous – dozens of dead bodies across the open field.
Another thing to notice is the use of air-burst shells by the Ukrainian artillery. These are ridiculously effective against infantry, as hiding behind terrain features will not help. In turn, the use of armored vehicles would prevent casualties from such shells. However, due to the incredibly heavy vehicle losses that russians forces suffered in 2022, it is now hard to equip infantry regiments with what they are supposed to have.
