Perhaps the bear isn't as healthy as had been supposed.
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2022/03/the-universa...
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2022/03/the-universa...
In 2010 or 2012 a large gas supply was found and Crimea was at the center of it.
Putin doesn't like the alternative solution for Europe and moved in to occupy Crimea as fast as possible.
Ukraine cut off water supply to the invaders. They were getting dry. And now he is looking for an excuse to invade a country.
NATO is a defensive measure, not an offensive one.
Putin is a bully that wants to keep his hold over Europe. Nothing more, nothing less.
It might be that the slow-rolled advance on Kyiv is meant to draw units away from the southern front Putin actually cares about.
The Russian’s also wouldn’t park themselves like that. They don’t have air dominance and from the numerous Ukrainian air strikes, it doesn’t seem like they have much idea of what’s above them at any given time. (They’re parked close together to stay under the umbrella of anti-aircraft weaponry.) The longer the convoy waits, the more time the Ukrainians have to prep to shell the convoy or hit it from the air.
This goes for other questions about the campaign. As a large conscript force still basically using the Soviet model, weak troops are often thrown into the fire early on to soften opposition. Likewise, reliance on artillery is a byproduct of the air force being stretched thin and not reinvesting in new equipment: air dominance and precision bombing missions are expensive, and Russia's military primarily focuses on maintaining its own sovereignty, thus most of the allocation is towards a defensive air war with support provided by ground-based rockets and shelling.
However, there are severe challenges still to be reckoned with, which support the idea of Russia remaining on the back foot. The reports of abandoned vehicles, disorganized troops and stretched supplies hold some credence; again, as a conscript army it's harder to pursue delegation of responsibility like a professional force. You are getting relatively less out of more troops simply due to lack of coordination. As well, Ukraine has a smaller force but has been spurred to rearm with the assistance of foreign aid and equipment since the 2014 invasion, getting access to some of the best technologies and training of NATO forces. So Ukraine has some significant battlefield advantages, and with the cutoffs to supply chains on Russia's end, from my viewpoint, while a Russian victory could still occur if they rout the forces in major cities, a slow, protracted conflict will definitely end in Russian defeat at significant cost to civilians. The next weeks will be critical.
That is statement begging for a source. Do you have one? What is Russia's "known doctrine"?
"The Russian army does not have enough trucks to meet its logistic requirement more than 90 miles beyond supply dumps. To reach a 180-mile range, the Russian army would have to double truck allocation to 400 trucks for each of the material-technical support brigades."
Task and Purpose has been doing some videos on the war in Ukraine, and they use that article to evaluate Russia's progress against those supply limitations[2], and basically it all lines up that Russian progress has been constrained by supply, and that the current pause is likely because of the next actions they will take[3].
[1] https://warontherocks.com/2021/11/feeding-the-bear-a-closer-...
They tried to take Hostomel and airports SE and SW of Kyiva and failed. They were going for fast strikes.
The failed to get the other airports (tried to land a cargo plane and it was destroyed) - thought they go to Hostomel it was only by landing literally 100 assault helicopters with 1000 soldiers.
That is literally 1/2 of their entire rotary fleet for a single, risky operation.
Since then, they've been mauled over and over around the airport and have actually made negative or neutral progress for 5 days.
So it remains to be seen if the balance of force can move in one direction or the other, I really wish the West would do more to make it more decisive.
In the meantime, the USA can pay $100-200K (i.e. per javelin/stinger/mlaw etc.) to have a large chunk of Russian Amour sent to the dustbin with not much risk, that's not such a bad deal at all.
It's costs nearly a million dollars to train, prepare and support a lowly US soldier. Then multiply that by the fact every fighter has 5 admins somewhere in the chain backing him up i.e. commanders, support, communications, intelligence etc..
Especially given that it is basically 'riskless' i.e. no US soldiers will die.
$4B to wipe out the Russian Army? Deal of the Century.
In the 'long game' of attrition warfare, the West would actually win, that is actually the State Dept. Assessment - that Russia 'wins' in Ukraine but is ground down over 15-20 years and eventually loses.
Meanwhile, the US and West have more advanced, much more wealthy economies, and can send relatively cheap weapons to help grind Russia down.
Frankly, if we could have a 'super weapon' it would be something that allows something resembling 'real' information into Russia so at very least regular Russians can see a bit of reality.
1) Objectives were a rapid decapitation strike, air supremacy, and major incursions on several fronts, grabbing several cities.
2) His own forces are getting drawn out and mauled. Ukranians are just not losing units at the same rate.
3) Either way, momentum matters and Russians don't have it.
That said, they do have a lot of fodder to throw at Ukraine.
It seems likely that Ukraine can defend themselves if they are very effectively supported by the West on many fronts, but otherwise the Bear will just slowly suffocate them even as it looses a lot of blood itself.
Every anyone with military experience sees that column they have to be salivating. Has there ever been a time in history when there has been several divisions of units just sitting there, out in the open, waiting to be attacked. My gosh.
There is a public source that lists all publicly available sourced vehicles destroyed (i.e. images via Twitter) and it's very lopsided, that said, we are aware the Russian may not be posting vids of of their wins.
Specifically, the Russians need and want propaganda badly, and what they are showing in their own propaganda is minimal.
It's the 'fog of war' surely, and it's possible Ukranian losses are worse than we think ... but not matter what the reality is, Ukranian 'wins' are unprecedented. We know for sure what the 'minimum' looks like and even that is bad for Russia.
It is absolutely possible to get high on your own supply (of authoritarianism, propaganda, and shooting messengers). So it is entirely possible upper echelons of the Russian Military tell Putin what he wants to hear because anyone who doesn't gets an unscheduled dose of Polonium.
It is also possible they are deliberately slow-rolling for various reasons: legitimate supply line issues, testing the waters, being able to pull back if the west responds too strongly, they really just wanted to steal some territory, etc. Being an opportunist is hardly unique.
Perhaps the plan was to invade. If you take the capital within a few days yay: you annexed Ukraine and you'll be done and it will be old news before the west can really respond. If the west sends aircraft carriers and troops you claim you were just protecting ethnic Russians in the border areas. If the invasion bogs down or the economic cost gets too high sign a peace treaty that contains as much as you can get away with and play nice neighbor for a bit while you send in the undercover agents to try another regime change in 5-10 years when everyone has stopped paying attention.
Russia, much like the US, hasn't really faced off against a reasonably modern military with good training and decent weapons systems anytime in the recent past. Even though Ukraine has a smaller military they've been pouring a lot of effort into training, arming, and modernizing since the last time Russian decided to invade and take some territory in 2014. And it wasn't like they were rag-tag religious extremists or a guerrilla force prior to that - they weren't starting from zero.
If Putin and his cronies really did overestimated Russian military capabilities it is still entirely possible for Russia to win the same way the Soviets survived the Wehrmacht: Massive mobilization, throw bodies into the fire, then slowly slog it out for as many years as it takes. That is an option Ukraine doesn't really have. They can't mobilize the same level of industrial production and they can't sustain as many dead sons. No one really knows if top of the line western weapons would level the playing field vs what Russia's defense industry can make.
In the end it might come down to will: does Putin have the will to kill as many Russian soldiers as it takes? Would the rest of his cronies let him if he tried? Will the Russian military accept that? On the Ukrainian side how far are they willing to go? How many citizens will volunteer? How many modern western weapons can they get ahold of? Can they continue disrupting Russian communications and logistics?
As far as I know this is the closest to a true military faceoff using modern weapons and tactics as we've seen. Most recent conflicts have been very asymmetric at every level which doesn't make for apt comparisons.
https://twitter.com/LostWeapons/status/1499040883865391107
, somewhat corroborated by idiotic Lukashenko presentation now, entire operation was supposed to be completed in 15 days.