The highland direction, or rather the Battle of Chasov Yar, was actually an extension of the Battle of Artemsk, or it itself was an unfinished part of the Battle of Acheng.
The reason why it was not completed was due to the problems of the Russian army itself, which has to mention the view of Wagner and the gateway of the genuine Russian army.
First of all, the existence of Wagner is essentially a derivative of Russia's national interests and the extension of the Russian army's strength, and most of the professional mercenaries it attracts are problem personnel who have retired from the Russian army, but the problem of these people is not their loyalty to Russia, and the military group formed by them exists as a "shadow army" for the expansion of Russia's overseas interests.
To put it bluntly, Russia needs to project military influence in many overseas hot spots, but in many cases it is inconvenient for the genuine Russian army to come forward, and Wagner's task is to serve the Russian army with the actual composition of the Russian army, but it does not have to be as simple as putting on the skin of the Russian army.
In Wagner's view, it is true that he makes money, but he also serves Russia's national interests, but in the eyes of the Russian army, Wagner is just a bunch of miscellaneous servants doing dirty work, and he can drive it at will, but he does not have to respect this gang of "thieves and soldiers" too much.
In this context, there will be a contradiction between the two after all, and it is only a matter of time.
The first core conflict between Wagner and the real Russian army occurred during the Syrian war, when the Wagner detachment was hit by a large-scale attack by US air and artillery fire while performing its mission, and the damage was quite serious.
Before the incident, the United States had asked the Russian side whether it was Russian troops in the relevant area, but the Russian army responded that it was not its own troops, and the US military let go of the attack.
The genuine Russian army didn't take this matter too seriously, after all, Wagner is a gang of "thieves with the army", even if they die, will it affect their own political strategy in Syria?
But the Wagner Group is not satisfied: I came to Syria to do dirty, hard, and tiring work for your Russian army, and I could have been safe with your words, but in the end I was asked to eat American shells, you have fun?
However, at that time, Wagner was not qualified to wrestle with the Russian Ministry of Defense at all, and for more "business", Prigogin could only suppress his anger in his heart and suffer this dumb loss.
And when the Russian-Ukrainian war broke out in 2022, the Russian army did not intend to use Wagner at the beginning, after all, the original idea was that the army would be dispatched on all fronts, and the Ukrainians would eat pot pulp to welcome the king!
As a result, the war situation after the start of the war was far less smooth than expected, the Kremlin resolutely did not mobilize out of political considerations, and the Russian Ministry of Defense, which lacked troops, grabbed all the forces that could go to the front line, and then remembered that Wagner was coming.
So in March of that year, Wagner returned to Ukraine from Africa and formed a commando team of about several thousand people to participate in the war.
The scale of the force of thousands of people is naturally not large, but the Wagner troops at that time were almost all composed of veteran backbones, with strong combat experience and combat effectiveness, especially in the battle of Popasnaya, which was well performed in the attack on Popasnaya, and gnawed this point in early May, making the first contribution to the victory of the Russian army in the Battle of Beidon.
As soon as the Russian army saw that this Wagner could not only be used, but also very useful, and there was no need to count people in the list of Russian soldiers after they died, so under the premise of continuing to not mobilize at home, they gave Wagner the privilege of recruiting prisoners and retired volunteers, and the latter snowballed bigger and bigger, with tens of thousands of soldiers, and has been fighting in the Artemsk direction.
Therefore, when the Ukrainian army launched an autumn counteroffensive, only Wagner of the Russian army had the strength to launch a campaign offensive, and after receiving the privileges of conscription and ammunition, the department gave full play to its mobile and flexible infantry tactics, and was able to inflict heavy losses on the main force of the Ukrainian army in Acheng, and occupied Suledar in early 2023, opening a breakthrough in the campaign.
At this time, the main Russian army has been preparing for several months, and the training of the mobilized troops has been basically completed, while the old Ukrainian army is broken and the new army has yet to be formed.
However, at this time, Prigogin, the boss of Wagner, who had made great contributions and had a strong military appearance, floated away, and broke hands with Shoigu and Gerasimov and talked about the merits.
In the eyes of Shao, Ge and others, you Wagner is just a dog, and it is only a coincidence that you are allowed to eat two bites on the table, which is a great achievement, but this is the capital that a dog can bark at the master?
Therefore, Shoigu and Gerasimov put small shoes on Prigogin to limit the supply of his soldiers and ammunition, and the Russian army did not take advantage of the situation to attack, but watched from the sidelines.
In this way, in the subsequent Battle of Artemsk, the Ukrainian army faced only the Wagner group, which had been fighting for several months, and the new army of the Ukrainian army was steadily formed, and the old army could also concentrate on fighting against Wagner.
The final result was that although Wagner reluctantly took the city of Artemsk, it was unable to develop an offensive to the periphery, and although the Ukrainian army lost the city, the high ground and Seversk were safe, which further stimulated the further intensification of the contradictions in the Russian army and added a fire to Wagner's subsequent mutiny.
The Wagner mutiny was not a simple mutiny, otherwise Prigogin would not have easily compromised and ended up with a "grenade bomber blowing up and dying".
But this incident also made Wagner history as an independent and powerful offensive corps.
After Wagner left the Artemsk front, it was defended by the 1st Luhansk 2nd Army, the main force of the 3rd Volunteer Army, the 1st Russian Army, and the 1st Airborne Army.
From June to September 2023, the Ukrainian army concentrated mobile forces on the Eastern Front, launched a fierce offensive here for several months in a row, and made progress in the direction of the southern flank, driving the Russian army off the heights and taking control of the two settlements of Klishivka and Andriivka.
However, the progress of the Ukrainian army is nothing more than that.
As the offensive and defensive positions of the Russian and Ukrainian armies change hands, and the Russian army must complete the political task of taking the entire territory of Donbass, the Russian army will definitely attack the high ground west of Artemsk to complete the unfinished battle of the Battle of Azerbas.