Institute for the Study of War &
AEI’s Critical Threats Project 2022
Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, October 11
Karolina Hird, George Barros, Kateryna Stepanenko, Grace Mappes, Riley Bailey, and
Frederick W. Kagan
October 11, 8:15 pm ET
Click here to see ISW’s interactive map of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This map is
updated daily alongside the static maps present in this report.
Russian forces conducted massive missile strikes across Ukraine for the second day in a
row on October 11. The Ukrainian General Staff stated that Russian forces fired nearly 30 Kh-101
and Kh-55 cruise missiles from Tu-95 and Tu-160 strategic bombers and damaged critical
infrastructure in Lviv, Vinnytsia, Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, and Zaporizhia oblasts.
Ukrainian air
defense reportedly destroyed 21 cruise missiles and 11 unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
Social media
footage shows the aftermath of strikes throughout Ukraine.
Russian forces additionally continued to
launch attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure with Iranian-made Shahed-136 drones.
The Ukrainian
General Staff reported that Ukrainian air defense destroyed eight Shahed-136 drones in Mykolaiv
Oblast on the night of October 10 and 11.
Army General Sergey Surovikin’s previous experience as commander of Russian Armed
Forces in Syria likely does not explain the massive wave of missile strikes across Ukraine
over the past few days, nor does it signal a change in the trajectory of Russian capabilities
or strategy in Ukraine. Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate (GUR) representative, Andriy
Yusov, linked the recent strikes to Surovikin’s appointment as theatre commander and stated on
October 11 that “throwing rockets at civilian infrastructure objects” is consistent with Surovikin’s tactics
in Syria.
However, Surovikin has been serving in Ukraine (as the Commander of the Russian Aerospace
Forces and then reportedly of the southern grouping of Russian forces) since the beginning of the war,
as have many senior Russian commanders similarly associated with Russian operations in Syria.
Army
General Aleksandr Dvornikov, who was appointed in April to the role that Surovikin now holds,
similarly commanded Russian forces in Syria between 2015-2016 and became known for deliberately
and brutally targeting civilians.
Colonel General Aleksandr Chayko, the former commander of the
Eastern Military District who took an active part in the first stages of the war in Ukraine, also served as
Chief of Staff of Russian forces in Syria from 2015 and into 2016.
As ISW noted in April, all Russian
military district, aerospace, and airborne commanders served at least one tour in Syria as either chief
of staff or commander of Russian forces, and Russian forces deliberately targeted civilian infrastructure
including hospitals and breadlines throughout the period of Russia’s active engagement in that war.
Disregard for international law and an enthusiasm for brutalizing civilian populations was standard
operating procedure for Russian forces in Syria before, during, and after Surovikin’s tenure. It has
become part of the Russian way of war.
Surovikin’s appointment will not lead to further “Syrianization” of Russian operations
in Ukraine because the battlespace in Ukraine is fundamentally different from the
battlespace in Syria, and direct comparisons to Surovikin’s Syrian “playbook” obfuscate
the fact that Russia faces very different challenges in Ukraine. Russia cannot further
“Syrianize” the war largely because of its failure to gain air superiority, which precludes its ability to
launch the kind of massive carpet-bombing campaigns across Ukraine that it could, and did, conduct
in Syria. ISW has previously assessed that Russian air operations would have been markedly different
if conducted in contested airspace or a more challenging air-defense environment, as is the case in
