Although Hitler’s Reich hovered on the verge of total collapse, with its cities in ruins from Allied bombing raids and Soviet forces crashing in from the east, Germany’s defenses along the Rhine River still held strong. That remained the case in the first months of 1945. Since the days of the Roman Empire it has served as central Germany’s traditional defense against invasion from the west. About 766 miles in length, with an average width of about 1,300 feet, the generally north-flowing waterway also is exceptionally swift and deep. Ukrainian generals clearly aim to starve the 49th CAA and block reinforcements in order to weaken Russian defenses north of Kherson-and tilt the battlefield in favor of Ukrainian brigades that, since May, slowly have been fighting their way south toward Kherson.The Rhine is no ordinary river. They too count on bridges to reach the front. The Kremlin is rushing reinforcements to Kherson. Most of them are north of Kherson-and dependent on bridges for resupply. The Russian 49th Combined Arms Army, the main Russian force in southern Ukraine, oversees around 10 battalion tactical groups.

The Russian army traditionally builds back-up bridgeheads alongside all strategic bridges on terrain it controls, so that pontoon troops have easy access to lodgements on both banks. The unit could join two existing pontoon formations maintaining crossings around Kherson. Konstantin Mashovets, a Ukrainian analyst and army officer, reported a fresh Russian army pontoon unit heading toward Kherson via Melitopol. It’s for that reason Russian forces are doubling down on their pontoons. It wouldn’t be all that difficult for Ukrainian gunners to strike the bridge again. Social-media users on Sunday spotted a construction crane on the Antonovsky Bridge-clear evidence the Russians are working to repair the span.īut the repairs might not last. But a pontoon ferry near the damaged Antonovsky span-basically, a portion of a floating bridge that a boat pushes back and forth-remains the only way for vehicles to cross the Dnipro into Kherson. Russian engineers quickly erected a pontoon bridge alongside the damaged P47 bridge, then removed the pontoons after repairing the bridge.

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