Some points on weather in Ukraine...
Weather is a concrete effect of temporal and local conditions, not a videogame-like global status effect (-25% movement). Too often when I see discussion of mud effects in Ukraine it is being treated as the latter, as though one moment Ukraine is frozen or dry and the next a 10-foot wall of mud covers everything for weeks.
Ukraine's mud effects usually manifest around March-April and October-December. There is mud before and after these months, but less of it in aggregate. Ukraine is muddier overall during these months not necessarily because they are wetter months - Ukraine is rainiest in May through July, and precipitation trends vary by region - but because they are very *cloudy* months. To simplify, if we can think of Ukraine's solsticial days as being 16 and 8 hours long respectively, around these benchmarks the days are 50% clear or overcast, respectively. Soil and air retains more moisture under cloud cover, and skies are clearest during summer (besides warm).
Ukraine is warmer now than it was during those famous years of WW2. That should be no surprise. See the image: average annual temps are up by 2-3 degrees Celsius. While the climate has brought somewhat more precipitation in the long run since the 40s, the trend has been declining since the late 20th century, and climate disruption should also have reduced cloud coverage and will allegedly increase the frequency of both droughts and extreme precipitation events. (I'll just mention that I have seen passing comments that Ukraine is set to become climatically wetter in its marshy north & sub-Carpathian west and drier in its south.) There are also many more roads and urbanities scattered about than in the bygone peasant-dirt era, and it's super-important to foreground the well-chronicled German difficulties with mud in the macroregion against their reliance on horses, foot infantry, and more primitive motor vehicles on paths through hundreds of miles of sheer dirt.
https://climateknowledgeportal.world...ity-historical
I discussed some of this at the beginning of the war. At the time, I predicted a limited mud effect because that winter was
reportedly warm and dry. Indeed, visual and primary accounts indicated that both sides had little trouble moving off-road, and Russia's mission-killed vehicles were usually lost to crew abandonment and inadequate fueling rather than terrain. Of terrain effects, driving into water might even have been comparably common to bogging down. Although part of the Russian strategy at the time, pushing large armored columns through towns without preparation, relied more on road-bound movement than normal, I don't believe this was an intended adaptation to mud since GSRU didn't really plan the invasion as such, rather a triumphant march or a crude shock and awe rush. Indeed, we saw more off-road action from late March through April as the Russians began to fight seriously, when mud ought to have been peaking.
So... Ukraine's summer was also
warm and dry, as it was throughout Europe; *most* days in the area of Lysychansk were in the 80s or 90s! This
fall and winter may promise to be
as well. It has, to reiterate, been a warm and dry year for Ukraine. You can see where this is leading. Or I did, and so checked the monthly forecasts when the counteroffensives began in late summer and again recently. While the Ukrainian and Russian commands no doubt pay more attention to weather than I do, I could already sense the limits of the autumn weather effect.
According to the extended weather forecasts I checked, key proxy towns like Kupyansk/Svatove would primarily see rain in late September, late October, and mid-November. Recall how the recent breakthrough and mobile phase around Lyman occurred in the last week of September and the first week of October, when the ground should have been relatively muddy. Kherson, IIRC the most arid and canalized region in Ukraine other than Crimea, has been and is forecast to just be pretty dry and even partly or fully sunny most of the time. Moreover, I've read that the soil of Kherson is more sandy than clay-like and therefore inherently less susceptible to muddiness than soil in the east, although I don't know how much confidence to place in this or how it interacts with the canal architecture. Kherson should experience wet weather in late November through early December this year however.
NB. Because the root of seasonal mud is insufficient evaporation by solar radiation, the level of muddiness can be cumulative over time before freezing temperatures predominate (thus spring tends to be muddier than fall).
Now, winter will come before long. On the home front, the months of January and February will be the hardest for Ukraine and the people of Europe, and there will likely be at least one major offensive on each side during this period. But don't be all like 'huehuenhue deep freeze endless tundra Mother Russia General Winter plbplvpfdfp.' The climate of the foreseeably-contested parts of Ukraine - Kherson, Donetsk, Luhansk - is, from my point of view, well comparable to New York City, downstate NY, and Albany, maybe. Winter temperatures will usually range from high teens to low 30s, and many if not most days will see afternoons above freezing. Ground often won't have a chance to freeze thoroughly, especially not in the South, but it will be cold, damp, and compact. Depending on localized temperatures and rain/snowfall levels, compact will sometimes transition to loose. This should continue to not be enough to disrupt planned offensives, though it will be taken into account both downrange and as it comes up.
In summary, climate variation, climate change, modern infrastructure, technology, and techniques are all things, and weather effects on terrain are temporal and local rather than comprehensive and uniform. Don't digest a video clip of a tracked vehicle with unsoiled road wheels driving over mild mud to conclude that 'a curtain has descended across the country.' None of this is to dismissively contend that mud in Ukraine has no tactical or strategic implications. It has and it will. Vehicles will be slower off-road and will require more maintenance. But it's less than many seem to imagine, and it will manifest at different times in different places and with varying levels, which commanders on both sides will anticipate and react to as it comes up. It will often be surmountable, especially since neither side is liable to be attempting sweeping coordinated maneuvers across many kilometers of open ground.
For reading on the effects of cold weather on materiel and personnel, see MilitaryLand's
recent primer.
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