Ukraine’s Thunder Runs
Timeless Tactic, Modern Application
An American Bradley fighting vehicle during the 2003 thunder run into Baghdad. (Miltours Blog)
In September 2022, Ukraine unleashed a devastating counteroffensive that not only shocked Russia—it surprised the entire world.
After months of grinding, attritional warfare, Ukrainian forces launched an offensive along two axes—one toward Kherson in the south, the other directed at Kharkiv in the northeast.
Capitalizing on low Russian morale, optimal weather, and a substantial inflow of western artillery and intelligence, the counterattack quickly shattered the Russian perimeter around Kharkiv, liberating the city, its strategic rail hubs, and dozens of adjacent villages that for months had been under Russian occupation.
The advance eclipsed the expectations of even the most optimistic onlookers. When it started, few believed the operation could achieve more than marginal territorial gains; when it ended, Ukraine had not only inflicted a massive psychological blow on its enemy, it had liberated several thousand kilometers of territory, captured vast quantities of prisoners and equipment, severed vital lines of support, and sent Russian forces into a panicked rout. The threat of Russian encirclement in certain areas became so real, Ukrainian residents even reported cases of soldiers donning civilian clothes and fleeing on stolen bicycles.
Some wonder if this counteroffensive marked a turning point in the war—a momentum swinging event as significant to Ukraine’s fight for independence as the battle of Saratoga was for the fledgling American revolutionary movement in 1777.
As war drags on, it’s hard to say. But while the counteroffensive’s broader impact remains unknown, few can doubt the tactical prowess of Ukrainian forces on full display over the past few weeks.
What made such incredible advances possible? Today I take a look at the devastating tactic at the heart of Ukraine’s recent success, drawing parallels to other occasions when similar tactics were used—or misused—in pursuit of victory on the battlefield.
THE CONCEPT OF MANEUVER WARFARE
Tactical mobility has been a pillar of effective warfare for thousands of years. The concept of maneuver warfare relies on a combination of initiative, deception, and disruption to exploit enemy weaknesses. It is the antithesis of attritional warfare; to work, maneuver warfare requires discipline, cohesion, speed, and determination.
Rather than focusing on engaging and destroying enemy forces in the field, maneuver warfare seeks to isolate, strangle, and sever their support structures.
This often means avoiding forward strongpoints altogether, instead probing areas of weakness and infiltrating the enemy’s rear where they least expect it. These surprising breakthroughs sew chaos and confusion, and can, under the right circumstances, erode the enemy’s will to fight altogether.
History is filled with examples of effective maneuver warfare. Epitomized by the highly mobile horsemen of the Eurasian steppes, Hannibal’s forces at Cannae, and Napoleon’s legendary combinations of cavalry and fast-marching infantry who dominated European armies for over a decade, modern commanders continue to preach battlefield mobility as a non-negotiable tenet of successful warfighting.
Of course, the industrialization of warfare in the mid-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries changed everything. The introduction of trains, trucks, and tanks to the battlefield made it possible for armies to achieve massive breakthroughs by concentrating mobile mechanized formations at weak points along enemy lines.
Whereas defense in depth dominated many a battlefield before and during World War I, mechanized movement and maneuver was increasingly viewed as a means of breaking a crushing deadlock that had already claimed millions of lives.
Many have drawn parallels between German blitzkrieg tactics and the recent offensive in Ukraine. The Ukrainians, however, have applied the concept of maneuver warfare on a far narrower scale; rather than closely coordinating air and mechanized ground assets to destroy enemy forces on a broader operational level like German high command sought, the Ukrainians have employed what some commentators have labeled “thunder runs” to shift the initiative into their hands.
UKRAINE’S THUNDER RUN
What exactly is a thunder run? Sometimes called a “light strike,” “reconnaissance in force,” or “reconnaissance by fire,” thunder runs call for high speed, lightly armored military convoys to plunge deep into enemy territory, bypassing unimportant cities and defensive strongpoints in a bid to get behind and destabilize the enemy’s rear.
Provoking fire, identifying vulnerabilities, moving on, and doubling back where necessary, thunder runs create an illusion of overwhelming force that unleashes a debilitating psychological impact on those who encounter them.
When it works, the results are spectacular. As lightweight armored vehicles—in the case of Ukraine, wheeled civilian 4x4s, pickup trucks, and western-donated Humvees—sporadically engage the enemy, they direct onrushing infantry and armor behind them to areas they can do the most damage.
Using this combined arms tactic, Ukraine’s thunder run quickly overwhelmed demoralized Russian defenders in the Kharkiv Oblast, isolating them from their parent units in such a way as to render entire Russian formations “disorganized and combat ineffective.”
A thunder runs’ success hinges on a series of contingent, overlapping factors: The weather must be good—at least good enough for off-road vehicles to travel quickly; there must be a promising window of opportunity—one in which the enemy suffers from faulty intelligence, low morale, poor command and control, or exposed logistical lines; onrushing forces must avoid overreach, meticulously planning each phase of the advance while establishing safe and secure lines of support; and they must achieve surprise, fulfilling Sun Tzu’s 5th century injunction to bait your enemy “into predictable patterns of response, occupying their minds while you wait for the extraordinary moment—that which they cannot anticipate.”
The recent Ukrainian offensive checked all the boxes. It occurred at the tail end of a long, hot summer; it was preceded by a convincing deception campaign that drew many of Russia’s most experienced units south, leaving the 1,000 kilometer Kharkiv front exposed and vulnerable; for months, HIMARS batteries eviscerated Russian ammo and supply depots, command posts, and other targets deep behind enemy lines, causing Russian morale to plunge. On top of that, Ukrainian logistics were sound, their intelligence was accurate, and their armor and infantry were well-drilled and prepared to operate in harmony.
It was the perfect storm—one the Ukrainians exploited magnificently.
The sheer speed of Ukraine’s advance generated new opportunities, including the liberation of strategic transport hubs at Kupiansk and Izyum and the shifting of the strategic initiative into Ukrainian hands for the first time, capping what is undeniably the most significant Ukrainian victory since the Battle of Kyiv back in April—and arguably the worst Russian defeat since the bloody days of World War II.
HISTORICAL PRECEDENT?
But the offensive was far from the only case where daring mechanized thrusts deep into enemy territory yielded incredible results. While the DNA of the modern thunder run winds back through the English mounted raids of the Hundred Years War to the daring cavalry raids of antiquity, mobility, speed, and surprise have been the lodestars of many notable fighting formations in the mechanized era.
During World War II, small groups of plucky special operators drawn from the corners of the British empire formed the core of the upstart Special Air Service (SAS), Popski’s Private Army, and, most notably, the Long Range Desert Group (LRDG), a unit whose actions prefigured the modern thunder run with their focus on strategic reconnaissance, infiltration, raiding, and sabotage behind enemy lines.
Commandeering specially equipped light trucks and jeeps, the LRDG plied their trade in the vast desert sands of North Africa. They spent long days patrolling, probing, and penetrating enemy positions. Stripping heavy windscreens, doors, and hoods to save weight, desert operators outfitted their vehicles with a bristling array of machine guns, cannons, grenades, and explosives for any conceivable situation.
They exuded individuality and initiative. Most would have felt right at home with modern Ukrainian soldiers, firing RPGs from the back of haphazardly armored Toyota 4x4s lurching forward in great bounds towards the Russian frontier.
There are many other historical parallels from World War II—none more apt than Patton’s swashbuckling armored breakthroughs in France and Germany that were only limited by their inability to keep vehicles fueled—a powerful reminder of the importance of logistics, munitions, fuel, and food to sustain such rapid advances.
Fast forwarding a few decades, it was in the Vietnam War where the term “thunder run” actually originated. There, American mechanized units devised an ingenuous way to bypass pesky minefields, ironically, by assigning heavily armored M48 Patton tanks to plow forward and trigger the mines themselves, rather than expend energy and time clearing them individually from exposed roads. Though the thunder run’s mine-clearing antecedent was inherently dangerous, it prevented operations from bogging down and creating the conditions for a deadly ambush.
It was only two decades ago during the American invasion of Iraq when the term evolved to encompass the raid-like qualities we now associate it with. Employed in Iraq to devastating effect, the high-speed American convoy attack into the heart of Baghdad in the spring of 2003 serves as the most obvious point of reference to the recent Ukrainian offensive.
When the American military entered Iraq during Operation Iraqi Freedom, they knew toppling Saddam Hussein’s regime in Baghdad’s posed serious challenges. Operating in a highly urbanized environment, military planners sought to apply the lessons of Operation Desert Storm, hoping speed, surprise, shock, and awe might paralyze Iraqi defenders and prevent widespread damage to local infrastructure, thus eliminating the possibility for operations to devolve into a costly, street-by-street affair in a city of five million inhabitants.
This choice was, in part, conditioned by recent developments. Just a decade earlier, an ill-fated attempt to rescue the survivors of two Blackhawk crashes in the crowded streets of urban Mogadishu resulted in the tragic loss of dozens of American servicemen. Intense public backlash increased the military’s wariness of urban operations.
Two years later during the First Chechen War in 1995, Russian armored forces launched an all-out assault on Grozny. The Chechens aggressively resisted, and the outcome was disastrous; one Russian motorized brigade lost 3/4 of its main battle tanks and 85% of its armored vehicles—to say nothing of the steep 80% infantry casualty rate all sustained over just a few short days.
It was a botched thunder run if ever one existed, one that seemed to confirm lessons learned the hard way in Somalia.
American military planners hoped to avoid a similar outcome in Iraq. Equipping a column of M1A1 Abrams Tanks and fast-moving M2 Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles (IFVs), elements of the US 3rd Infantry Division charged headlong into Baghdad, blasting their way through improvised enemy defenses and critical interchanges connecting the local airport with Saddam’s palace. The maneuver created the conditions for a legendary tactical victory. Conducting a second thunder runs just a day later, fast moving American forces succeeded in identifying, drawing out, and disorganizing Iraqi defenders—leaving chaos and carnage in their wake.
The advancing columns attacked as fast as they could, pushing through resistance, abandoning disabled vehicles, and engaging only when necessary to maintain momentum. When the hard-charging armored vehicles encountered heavy resistance, they designating targets for tailing units and continued onward through the enemy’s weak points.
By the end of the third day, American forces had secured three vital overpasses, the airport, and spent the night in Saddam’s palace—an unexpected development that inflicted a huge psychological blow on Iraqi forces scattered throughout the city. resistance, they designating targets for tailing units and continued onward through the enemy’s weak points.
By the end of the third day, American forces had secured three vital overpasses, the airport, and spent the night in Saddam’s palace—an unexpected development that inflicted a huge psychological blow on Iraqi forces scattered throughout the city.
TACTICAL SUCCESS IS HARD-EARNED, BUT CAN’T GUARANTEE LONG-TERM VICTORY
The subsequent fall of Baghdad owed much to the boldness of the American thunder run. Yet, as Williamson Murray and Allan Millett emphasized in their landmark study on military effectiveness, tactical and operational virtuosity don’t always translate into strategic success. As we know, the bitter insurgency that emerged in the wake of the 2003 invasion serves as a prescient reminder that military campaigns often have a way of defying expectations—something the Ukrainians will bear in mind as they consolidate their gains and plan future offensives.
While it’s tempting to argue that Ukraine should continue staging thunder runs to exploit their newfound gains, self-awareness and moderation nevertheless remain key. Ill-planned thunder runs can go terribly awry; none know this better than the Russians themselves, who built on the legacy of their catastrophic failure in Grozny by kick-starting their invasion with an uncoordinated armored blitz on Kyiv earlier this year that quickly morphed into an untenable operational situation and an unmitigated strategic disaster.
Ukrainian forces will continue to reap the rewards of their daring operation for months to come, capitalizing on intelligence gained from captured prisoners, tactical flexibility earned by salvaging and repurposing hundreds of captured Russian vehicles, and increased firepower from vast stores captured ammunition. Whether the autumn offensive indeed marked the turning point many have longed for, we’ll just have to wait and see.