The Washington Post and others write that Ukraine is moving to a defensive strategy and is not planning any offensive operations in 2024. All efforts will be aimed at building a defense line.
I talk with the military. They share observations about how Kherson is being made into a fortress city before their eyes. Concrete trucks are constantly arriving, they don’t spare concrete, they pour out new fortifications. I found out where concrete is delivered from - mainly from the Nikolaev region. Sometimes from Odessa.
The situation is the same on all other fronts. The AFUs dig into the ground and are heavily concreted.
Obviously, such a grandiose construction requires a lot of concrete, and concrete requires a lot of cement. Cement plants are complex, expensive to manufacture and construct, and energy-intensive. In Ukraine they can be counted on one hand. In conditions of trench warfare, having your own cement in the required quantities becomes of utmost importance. If these plants are taken out of service, this will seriously complicate the possibility of constructing protective structures for the Armed Forces of Ukraine. The list of factories and their addresses is publicly available, you can see here. (
https://ua.orgpage.ru/ukraina/цементные_% D0%B7%D0%B0%D0%B2%D0%BE%D0%B4%D1%8B/)
If you let the AFU dig in properly, it will be very difficult to pick them out.