Talk:Battle of Donbas (2022)/Archive 2

Requested move 31 August 2023

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) BilledMammal (talk) 02:05, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

Battle of Donbas (2022–present) → Battle of Donbas (2022) – This article started out in a pretty reasonable state, after officials on both sides of the war announced a “Battle of Donbas” in spring-summer 2022. However, since then, the article has quietly, unreasonably ballooned in scope to cover every single thing that happens in the Donbas in the war from then on, despite there being zero sources that still call ongoing activities the “battle of (the) Donbas”, or the “battle for (the) Donbas” in a more than figurative way.

To the contrary, I will prove in this nomination that reliable sources actually consider the “battle” - or “offensive” or whatever you want to call it - to have ended in late summer 2022, at some point after Russia captured the twin cities Sievierodonetsk and Lysychansk and before Ukraine started its twin counteroffensives in the autumn of that year.

There are not many sources to draw on here - mostly because the terminology “battle of Donbas” completely fell off in usage almost immediately after the announcements - but the ones that are available are pretty clear about the scope. AXIOS wrote in late August that the 2022 Kherson counteroffensive “likely marks the start of a third phase of the war, following Russia’s initial three-pronged assault and the grinding battle in the Donbas.” The “battle in the donbas” is clearly considered to have ended as a “phase” of the war with the beginning of the counteroffensives. This is, in fact, the same grouping of events Wikipedia already uses to separate sections of the war at Russian invasion of Ukraine and Timeline of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and this very wiki article calls it the “second phase” already.

Military experts and commentators also use the terminology to describe a specific phase and offensive of the war which has since ended, rather than as all activity in Donbas since summer 2022. Rob Lee and Michael Kofman, writing for the Foreign Policy Research Institute in an article titled “How the Battle for the Donbas Shaped Ukraine’s Successes”, state: “Ukraine’s successes in Kherson and Kharkiv were largely a result of the losses it inflicted on the Russian military in the Battle for the Donbas in the spring and early summer.” They describe the ending of the campaign, saying “Russia’s advances in the Donbas, from April to July, proved to be a pyrrhic victory, tactical successes at the expense of strategic vision. Russia expended valuable manpower and artillery ammunition, while Ukraine pursued a defense-in-depth strategy. By September, NATO arms deliveries had reduced Russia’s critical advantage in artillery and Moscow didn’t have sufficient forces or ammunition to hold the territory occupied, which set the stage for Ukraine’s successful offensives.” The Institute for the Study of War also puts the ending roughly in Summer 2022, stating: “Russia lost the initiative in summer 2022 after its offensive in Donbas culminated.”

These bounds are a bit rough and imprecise, I admit, but we are covering an ongoing war, and the specifics are going to be a little bit blurry. My tentative proposal is to place the end date immediately before the beginning of Ukraine’s 2022 counteroffensives, but this is something that editors can decide in further discussion threads. I think from the evidence I’ve showed, it is clear that the campaign is not ongoing and did indeed end in mid-2022, and so should be moved. I should also note: This proposal is formatted as an RM, but will also necessitate a significant downsizing and rewriting of the article, with all out-of-scope material either transferred to higher-scope articles like Eastern Ukraine campaign or deleted if it’s already covered in relevant places. There will also need to be a lot of links removed from pages that will now be out of the scope of the article. I think this is a manageable amount of refactoring. HappyWith (talk) 19:43, 31 August 2023 (UTC)


 * Support: Only a few RS who use "Battle of Donbas" say the battle is over. The current title violates WP:OR and causes WP:OR violations not only in this article but in other articles. Parham wiki (talk) 11:24, 1 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Comment. My general understanding is that the Russian Donbas offensive has made little or no progress in months and Russian forces have been forced to go to on the defensive. But the capture of the Donbas oblasts remains a top Russian objective and continues to influence Russian actions (e.g., devoting significant resources to holding Bakhmut, symbol of the only Russian “success” of 2023). —Michael Z. 16:21, 1 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Combat is still taking place in the Donbas now, yes - but fighting was also taking place before officials announced the "battle for the Donbas" had started in April 2022. It makes a lot more sense to have "Battle of Donbas" refer to that specific summer offensive, which was followed by the 2022 Kharkiv counteroffensive and later the abortive Russian winter campaign, and now the eastern sector of the 2023 Ukrainian counteroffensive. My argument in the RM is that most sources agree with my interpretation, using "Battle of Donbas" in a limited sense to refer to that specific offensive later than all fighting in Donbas since April '22. Fighting before and after the summer 2022 offensive can, and is covered in Eastern Ukraine campaign. HappyWith (talk) 16:28, 1 September 2023 (UTC)
 * The Russian 2022 winter campaign still aimed at taking the Donbas, including Bakhmut and Vuhledar. When I hear “battle of the Donbas” I think of this too. I believe it’s a synonym for Eastern Ukraine campaign, whether we choose to differentiate the two or not. —Michael Z. 18:37, 1 September 2023 (UTC)


 * Comment This is part of the eastern Ukraine campaign; whether it is a distinct part is another question (per Michael). It was marked by the Russian redeployment of troops from the northern areas and a patriotic war cry that was taken by the press but this has petered out in usage with no distinct end. We should certainly not suggest that it does have a distinct end. Like most of our articles in this area, it is constructed as an agglomeration of NEWSORG (or similar) bulletins and therefore substantially fails to be an encyclopedic article. If a concerted effort were made to bash this into shape, I suspect it would be very much reduced. Whether that would be sufficient to justify a stand-alone article or whether it should just be subsumed back into the eastern Ukraine campaign is a very reasonable question. The same might be said for the other articles that are "phases" of the overall campaign. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:54, 2 September 2023 (UTC)


 * Support change of scope. This would finally differentiate this article with Eastern Ukraine campaign. I am thinking that we could make this article cover the second phase of the war, and Eastern Ukraine campaign, Southern Ukraine campaign, Northeastern Ukraine campaign and Kyiv offensive (2022) (these last two should be merged) could cover the initial Russian blitzes of the first phase. Then the two 2022 counteroffensives could cover the third phase, maybe this thing along with Battle of Bakhmut and Battle of Vuhledar the fourth, and the 2023 counteroffensive the fifth. Because current analysis on the war seems to divide it into five phases. We have a lot of overlapping articles right now. My only issue would be the title. "Battle of Donbas" is barely used and the use of 2022 in the title overlaps with the Russian offensives following Ukraine's counteroffensives. But it's better than keeping the article as is. Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 10:25, 2 September 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Post-move cleanup
I've already merged most of the out-of-scope material to Eastern Ukraine campaign, but there's still some stuff that needs to be done. The stats in "Casualties" include stuff after September, for instance, which I've marked. It would also be really good to have some sort of conclusion or "Aftermath" section to wrap the article up, rather than it just ending abruptly at the end of August like it does now. HappyWith (talk) 00:01, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

Is it really over though?
Battles of Donetsk suburbs were merged in, but they had lot of stuff happening AFTER Kharkiv counteroffensive. when you look at some winter offensive battles (like Bakhmut and Vuhledar), it says that they are part of the battle of donbass.

Main offensive probably ended, but they are still fighting for Dobass Slimebor (talk) 07:32, 1 October 2023 (UTC)
 * This article is about the so-called "second phase" of the war, from the Russian retreat from the north of Ukraine to Ukraine's counteroffensives. Russian advance slowed down after taking Lysychansk and started focusing mainly on the Bakhmut direction. It only started gaining traction after Ukraine's two counteroffensives had ended, accordingly they are defined by some as the "third phase" and the battle for Bakhmut (among others) as the "fourth phase". It makes sense from an organizational and historiographic point of view. Also worth noting that fighting was also taking place in Donbas before the start date here anyway. Perhaps another title could make the article's scope more evident. After the fall of Lysychansk I don't think we could say Russia pulled any offensive aimed at taking the whole of Donbas. Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 12:16, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

Proposed merge of Sloviansk offensive into Battle of Donbas (2022)
(Proposed after discussion at Talk:Sloviansk offensive)

There isn't much of significance in the Sloviansk offensive article that can't be effectively covered in Battle of Donbas (2022). It mostly consisted of Russia repeatedly bashing infantrymen against Ukrainian fortifications south of Izium over and over until the 2022 Kharkiv counteroffensive - which is covered just fine in other articles. Even though it's been over a year since the events, large amount of the material is also just not independently confirmed, leaving even less notable events in the Sloviansk offensive article. It makes most sense to cover the notable stuff in the Donbas battle article, since it was one of the prongs of that offensive. HappyWith (talk) 22:40, 20 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Support per nom and per discussion at the talk page of the article proposed to be merged. Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 22:51, 20 September 2023 (UTC)


 * Support per nom and discussion at Talk:Sloviansk offensive Cinderella157 (talk) 01:12, 21 September 2023 (UTC)


 * Support per nom and discussion at Talk:Sloviansk offensive Parham wiki (talk) 09:29, 21 September 2023 (UTC)


 * Support per nom and discussion at Talk:Sloviansk offensive. Jebiguess (talk) 03:18, 23 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Oppose As ISW and others have discussed, the operation was pretty notable/decisive precisely because the Russians failed, both initially and later on. A successful drive and exploitation could have had very serious consequences. Instead, the Russians ended up having to take a more frontal approach, leading to limited and Pyrrhic gains.
 * The main Battle of Donbas article has a far larger scope, and any weaknesses in the current article don’t reflect on the topic. In fact, the current revision doesn’t contain a lot of the substantive discussion found in sources, probably because it was only recently moved to its current title.
 * I would also suggest that the skirmishing around Velyka Komyshuvakha and Husarivka be covered, as well as the Russian mistakes in troop dispositions and force-to-space ratios that set the stage for the Ukrainian counterblow, which is fairly extensively discussed by sources.
 * Unfortunately I completely missed out on that previous, closed, discussion which others have linked to.
 * RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 10:55, 24 September 2023 (UTC)
 * We could divide this campaign into many several subcampaigns. If Russia took Siversk it could have also been bad. Also if they took Avdiivka, or Vuhledar. We can't give articles to every subaxes of this campaign, and I am not convinced the fighting north of Sloviansk was particularly more notable than the others. Plus, A successful drive and exploitation could have had very serious consequences. is speculation. Instead, the Russians ended up having to take a more frontal approach, leading to limited and Pyrrhic gains. can apply for the whole campaign, or for the whole invasion itself. If this article got into a better shape and became longer, we could discuss a split in the future. But currently both the proposed merged article and the proposed target article do not cover the fighting north of Sloviansk in great detail. In my view having everything neatly packed into one article will make expansion easier, at least in this one case. Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 12:22, 2 October 2023 (UTC)
 * I agree with this argument - the Sloviansk offensive page could hypothetically be its own thing, but the article as of now doesn’t have enough to stand on its own. We could re-split later if needed; not like there's much there in the Sloviansk offensive page now anyway. HappyWith (talk) 05:40, 7 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Support per nom and discussion at Talk:Sloviansk offensive. Also in favor of what User:Super Dromaeosaurus is suggesting, regarding some sort of geographical (rather than purely chronological) division of the information this article, if it can be reasonably implemented. SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 05:21, 4 November 2023 (UTC)

Hastily to supplement
What kind of abbreviated piece of crap is this article? What kind of artificial piquancy is this? Who says the battle for Donbas ended in September 2022? Who are you making crazy? What about the Battle of Soledar and the Battle of Bakhmut? Soledar and Bakhmut are not located in Donbass? This is hard core cretinism that it is unrepeatable to watch, let alone read. I have never seen so many cavities and malicious oversights in my life. There is more neutrality in the current Israel—Hamas War 2023 than a single battle related to the Russia-Ukraine War. I had to write this or I was going to explode with rage. How rude of you to leave out Soledar and Bahmut battles. This is a crime by moderators and admins. My stomach hurt from nervousness. I no longer have the energy to look up anything related to the Russian invasion of Ukraine on the English Wikipedia. Trunke has no objectivity and all are ordinary hairstyles of piquantery wrapped in very low-quality wafers. The horror. — Baba Mica (talk) 21:51, 20 October 2023 (UTC)


 * It was either this or deleting the article. As the "hard core cretin" who initiated the scope-changing discussion myself, I put forward the argument that the idea of the "battle of Donbas" in its former form was largely invented by Wikipedia editors and not a concept actually well-defined in sources - and that the only actual defined scope for an article with this title would be the summer 2022 offensive, as referred to by a couple of military analysts. ("Summer 2022 Donbas offensive", or something along those lines, might be a better name for this article in the long run, IMO, but I doubt that could get consensus.)
 * For events in Donbas after Sep. 2022, see eastern Ukraine campaign. HappyWith (talk) 22:58, 20 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Also, this is a massive insane overreaction to a simple transfer of content from one page to another. HappyWith (talk) 23:11, 20 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Better that this piece of garbage be removed from the article like many of my articles that have been deleted, edited or redirected than to look this disgustingly hollow, illegible and artificially shortened to the point of unbearableness. I literally feel sick. The Sloviansk offensive never existed because the Russian forces could not get closer than 20-30 km to it, but from a bunch of my local articles related to the battles for nearby places, someone simply put everything in one bag and made the Sloviansk offensive article. I understood this as a kind of simplification of the archival material of the fighting after the Russian victory after the Battle of Izium, until the heavy defeat in the Kharkov counter-offensive. Essentially, the Russians never or still did not launch an offensive on Sloviansk not because they did not want to but because they could not because they were stopped at the places of Krasnopillia and Bogorodichnoe and at the city of Seversk. The Donbas offensive was officially announced by Sergei Lavrov on April 19 last year that it had officially begun, which happened the day before with the rapid Russian capture of the city of Kreminna. That is all known. The fact that the Russian side slowed down the advance by no means means that the offensive was stopped in July after the battle of Lysychansk nor after the Ukrainian Kharkov counter-offensive, as evidenced by the Russian offensive operations in the battles for the places of Avdiyivka, Marinka, Soledar, Bakhmut, Bilohorivka and Vuhledar, where the casualties are huge on both sides. This Russian offensive was stopped, but not by the Ukrainian Kharkov counter-offensive in September and October last year, but after the takeover of Bakhmut by members of the Wagner Group and the Ukrainian summer counter-offensive that began on June 4. The result is tied because Russian forces captured the cities of Soledar and Bakhmut this year, but they lost Lyman, Svyatogorsk and Bilohorivka last year, and this year Ukrainian forces recovered many lost settlements around the city of Bakhmut and soon regained some lost positions in the city of Bakhmut itself on its western periphery. The offensive was stopped either on May 20 after the Russian capture of Bakhmut or on June 1 after the retreat of the Wagner group or on June 4 at the beginning of the 2023 Ukrainian counteroffensive. There is no fourth, and it was certainly not stopped before May and June of this year. It is so obvious and the article must be updated until that period or better removed and deleted. It looks so amateurishly hollow that it's unbearable to look at, let alone read. A simple pamphlet. — Baba Mica (talk) 06:01, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * This article was always unnecessary duplicated trash. I had advocated for its deletion many times. Finally it was given a proper scope, the Russian offensive that ended after the capture of Lysychansk and Sievierodonetsk. This article extends a bit after that because it still makes sense to group the info here.
 * The fact that the Russian side slowed down the advance by no means means that the offensive was stopped in July after the battle of Lysychansk they explicitly announced an "operational pause" right after it. nor after the Ukrainian Kharkov counter-offensive we've never seen any regional-scale offensive aimed at taking the whole of Donbas after it, only focused and localised efforts at Bakhmut and Soledar, Avdiivka, Marinka or Lyman, or at small villages in Luhansk Oblast, these not having taken place at the same time being part of one single coordinated effort, rather an intermittent Russian try of their luck in different parts of the front every once in a while. Even smaller in scope articles like Battle of Avdiivka (2022–present) feel like they make little sense because fighting keeps stopping and re-erupting. Effectively the Kharkiv counteroffensive put an end to the strategy of taking the whole of Donbas at once as encircling it was not possible anymore. I believe the shortening of the article's scope was a very good idea. Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 14:53, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * @Super Dromaeosaurus Finally it was given a proper scope, the Russian offensive that ended after the capture of Lysychansk and Sievierodonetsk.
 * Considering that scope, would you be open to the prospect of moving the majority of the post-Lysychansk (July–September) information to either the background or early sections of the Battle of Bakhmut article? I'm suggesting this split because nearly all of the content in that timeframe takes place within the environs of Bakhmut, and much of it involves the Wagner Group. Geographically, I'm talking about places west of Popasna and north of Horlivka, like the Vuhlehirska Power Station, Berestove, Novoluhanske, Pokrovske, Soledar, Vershyna, Kodema, Travneve and the like.
 * I know you said This article extends a bit after that because it still makes sense to group the info here, but considering the "operational pause" and the different geographical focus, I think adding that info to Battle of Bakhmut makes more sense than retaining it here. I also want to ping @HappyWithWhatYouHaveToBeHappyWith since I know you've been closely involved in defining the scope here. Lastly, apologies to all for replying to such an old comment.
 * SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 23:17, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't think it should be done. The logic here is that this Russian offensive was the second phase of the war, between the first (from the full-scale invasion to the withdrawal from the north) and the third (Ukrainian counteroffensives, starting in September) phases. Between July and September took place engagements that I do not believe should be included in the Battle of Bakhmut article, such as the Battle of Pisky. I think it makes more sense to keep pre- and post-July Russian advances in the same place as they have in common that Russia still had the initiative at that moment. Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 23:44, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Super Dromaeosaurus: First of all, apologies for my lack of clarity. I am not suggesting that the entire section, including Avdiivka–Pisky, be added to the Battle of Bakhmut article – only the relevant portions. The remainder should be removed and integrated into Eastern Ukraine campaign and/or location-specific articles like Battle of Pisky.
 * I think it's a fallacy to say that Russia lost initiative country-wide on the entire front line during September 2022. Wagner was still conducting offensive operations in the Bakhmut region before, during, and after the Ukrainian counteroffensive. I'd argue that in the Bakhmut sector, Wagner/Russia had "the initiative" the entire time. The post-Lysychansk engagements in that region are a prelude/opening phase to the Battle of Bakhmut; there is already some overlapping information, since that article begins on 1 August 2022.
 * But I think the key disagreement is whether or not the scope of this article should be a "phase" or an "offensive." You say this Russian offensive was the second phase of the war, but I don't see them as one and the same - the "offensive" ended at Lysychansk, but the "phase" ended with the Ukrainian counteroffensive. It seems unreasonable to consider the April–July Severodonetsk–Lysychansk operation to be part of the same offensive as some later clashes much further south, which followed an operational pause.
 * If this necessitates a consensus to change the scope to refer strictly to a April–July "offensive," I am prepared to propose that. We don't have articles on First phase of the Russian invasion of Ukraine or the Third phase of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, because phases encompass a number of offensives in different geographical regions which are better understood when separated.
 * My best regards SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 07:05, 23 January 2024 (UTC)