The WSJ has published an update this afternoon with some interesting bits. General Ben Hodges is quoted as saying that some of the lines of attack are intended to confuse the Russians about where the main objective will be (I've bolded that part).
Ukraine’s Offensive Begins With Ground Gained, Tanks Lost - Kyiv’s forces, armed with potent Western weaponry, probe Russian lines for weak spots
Updated June 11, 2023 3:48 pm ET
ORIKHIV, Ukraine — In the first days of their big offensive, Ukrainian troops thrust their new Western tanks at several points along the Russians’ defensive lines.
Some assaults went better than others.
“There were more of them than we expected,” said a 35-year-old platoon commander with Ukraine’s 21st Mechanized Brigade, who took part in an assault near Orikhiv in the southern Zaporizhzhia region.
His German-made Leopard II tank cut down Russian infantry, but another line of soldiers stepped in to replace them, and then another, he said. Rocket-propelled grenades whistled past. Some bounced off the tank. The fields were covered in mines. Gains were smaller than hoped for.
Other units made more progress further east, taking villages near the town of Velyka Novosilka. “It’s just the beginning,” said the platoon commander.
Ukraine’s summer offensive could decide whether the country succeeds in casting Russian forces out of some of the nearly 20% of Ukrainian territory they currently occupy. A successful offensive could encourage the U.S.-led West to continue to supply Kyiv with arms and money.
A failure could intensify international calls to freeze the fighting and negotiate with Russian President Vladimir Putin—a scenario that Ukraine fears could end hopes of ever restoring its borders.
Ukrainian forces, including brigades newly trained by Western countries and armed with sophisticated Western weapons, are attempting a feat of arms that could go a long way toward deciding the fate of the biggest conflict in Europe since World War II: to break through the formidable lines of a Russian army that knows the Ukrainians are coming.
Russia has had months to fortify its positions in eastern and southern Ukraine, while Kyiv awaited the formation and training of fresh forces and the arrival of German Leopards, U.S.-made Bradley Fighting Vehicles and other weapons from its allies.
So far, Ukrainian forces are only probing the outer limits of Russia’s defenses in the southeastern Zaporizhzhia and eastern Donetsk regions, looking for the most promising places to attack the more formidable fortifications that lie a few miles beyond.
The Russians’ first lines of defense are designed to hold up the Ukrainians long enough so that Moscow can identify where Kyiv is planning its main thrust and deploy reserves, say military analysts.
The flooding of the Kherson region after the destruction of a dam at Nova Kakhovka last week may allow Russia to use more reserves from that area, where Ukrainian troops are unlikely to be able to cross the river Dnipro, for now.
Ukrainian forces are trying to make it hard for Russia’s reserves to join the fight by targeting logistics, command points and troop concentrations with longer-range strikes.
“Ukrainian forces are attempting to do something no other European military is currently capable of: conducting sustained combined-arms operations at scale against a peer-adversary in a state-on-state, high-intensity war,” said Franz-Stefan Gady, a London-based defense analyst.
Among Western militaries, only the U.S. is capable of the sort of complex offensive Kyiv is attempting—but Ukraine lacks the U.S.’s air power, Gady said.
Ukraine’s first probes near Orikhiv, south of Zaporizhzhia city, suffered an early setback when an armored column ran into a minefield and was then hit by incoming fire.
Russian military bloggers gloated over footage appearing to show the destruction of numerous vehicles. But videos posted online mostly showed hits on the same tanks from different angles, according to Western military analysts.
Two Leopards and four Bradleys were destroyed, and a French armored personnel carrier and U.S.-made Oshkosh combat vehicle were abandoned, according to the Oryx independent team of analysts tracking both sides’ losses in the war.
The Russians used aircraft including a helicopter and drones to strike the column and direct artillery fire. They flew with impunity as the Ukrainians had limited air-defense weapons to target them.
Around Velyka Novosilka in the Donetsk region, however, a Ukrainian push appeared to gather momentum over the weekend. In a small town behind the front line, soldiers returning from combat were tired but quietly satisfied, reporting a steady advance with the taking of villages and Russian prisoners.
Ukraine’s armed forces posted a video showing troops of the 68th Jaeger Brigade raising a Ukrainian flag outside a ruined building in the village of Blahodatne, south of Velyka Novosilka.
The Ukrainian probes are aimed at finding vulnerabilities, said Col. Serhiy Cherevaty, spokesman for Ukraine’s eastern military command. “Everything is focused on weakening them to the max, and attriting their forces,” he said.
Thus far, the Ukrainians are using only limited forces, and Kyiv isn’t yet showing its hand, said retired Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, a former commander of the U.S. Army in Europe.
“Some of what we are seeing is intended, perhaps, to confuse the Russians as to where the main attack is going to be,” he said. When the main thrust of the Ukrainian offensive comes, he said, it will likely include formations with several hundreds of tanks and infantry fighting vehicles.
Some of the initial assaults last week appeared to lack support air defenses, which left tanks and other vehicles vulnerable to attacks from Russian drones and helicopter gunships.
“Ukraine doesn’t control the air. That’s just the reality of the situation,” said Phillips O’Brien, professor of strategic studies at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. It has been decades since any military tried to attack established defensive positions without air supremacy, he said.
“People forget how hard this is, what Ukraine is trying to do,” he said.
A tank mechanic with the Ukrainian 21st brigade said further tanks had sustained significant damage but had been safely removed from the battlefield, including at least one that was towed out.
The crew escaped safely from one of the tanks that was left behind, he added. At least one soldier from another unit was severely injured while trying to help recover a Leopard tank.
The platoon commander with the 21st brigade said the Leopards were performing well, even though a few had been lost. Small ordinance bounced off the German tanks, and their fire is far more accurate than the Soviet-era tanks he was used to, he said—especially at night, thanks to their thermal vision mode.