Another close call for Volodymyr Zelenskiy. The SBU is doing a good job watching for threats and keeping him alive.
The Guardian live feed
Ref the damaged ship …
This is where having air power or NATO quality cruise missiles would come in handy. Along with the willingness to directly attack the Russian Navy’s base in Crimea.
Be easy enough to make a pile of wrecked auxiliary ships and take that pier out of action for a year too. At the same time, given the willingness to attack in force, the entire base and everything tied up to the wharves would all be trashed.
As to the plot(s) on Zelenskyy …
One of the bigger strategic wildcards IMO is what happens to UKR if Zelenskyy dies or is killed. He’s not single-handedly responsible for their success to date, but he plays a large role. His replacement might not be nearly as effective.
I think Zelenskyy’s role was absolutely crucial early on in the war, but maybe not so much anymore (although still plenty important). I think if Zelenskyy died now, the Ukrainians would keep fighting much the same, with an added revengive motivation.
Supplies through Crimea into Kherson is Russia’s biggest weakness. Ukraine has a good strategy to force the withdrawal of Russian troops from Kherson.
Link has more analysis of cutting off Supplies. Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, August 6, 2023 | Institute for the Study of War
Patience is starting to run short. I’m not sure what can be done if Russia is willing to accept a stalemate.
I linked the CNN article. There’s much more information. Ukraine’s losses are bad.
The Guardian feed
https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/08/politics/ukraine-counteroffensive-us-briefings/index.html
The Russians are well-dug in. Dislodging them without utterly scorching the earth the Ukrainians hope to reuse soon is not going to be easy.
And yes, Russia is totally planning for, and playing, for a stalemate. Eastern Ukraine as another “frozen conflict” of wreckage is Putin’s idea of a win.
Even as the sanction screws on a rogue nation are ever tighter?
Because Russia has nuclear weapons and sits on enormous amounts of natural resources, they’ll continue to maintain relevance on the world stage, but this war with Ukraine has already greatly reduced their ability to project military power outside their own borders. NATO/Europe can breathe easier from fear of a Russian invasion for at least a generation.
I have the feeling that the UKR are still in the “learning and adapting” stage of an offensive … they seem to have been burned quite ugly at the beginning of it and are “regrouping and comparing notes”…
… but they really need to get this wedge in there, somewhere between Mariopol and the peninsula - if they do not manage to get this done (and expanding from there) they will have the RU sitting there like dug in ticks for many years.
Territory isn’t the only way to measure the progress of a war. Personnel, material, supply lines, morale, and money all matter. I mean, yeah, eventually, if you have those, you’ll get the territory, too, but it’s an effect, not a cause, of how the war is going.
A nation we still permit to sell billions of dollars of oil to the rest of the world every month?
A nation that is decently self-sufficient in everything they need to slowly grind eastern Ukraine to rubble: cheap men and cheap artillery?
A nation we can’t directly attack or decapitate due to their nuclear weapons?
Hell yes a nation like that can fight to a stalemate and just sit there creating expense and bother for democracies with famously short attention spans and famously peace-oriented (or populist-oriented) populaces and hence politicians.
Setting aside nukes, could NATO topple the criminal Russian regime and drive a long ways into their territory? Sure. Will they? Nope. A long slow festering cesspool of vandalism suits Putin just fine. And is not something the West is well-disposed to counteract continuously for the next 5 to 25 years.
To be sure, 25 years from now Putin won’t be in charge. Maybe not even in 5 years. But his successor(s) may well be of similar mindset. If anything in Russia today, the lesson being learned at all levels of society is that greater nationalism, greater war-making, and greater crushing of internal dissent are the right way forward. Indeed the only way forward.
See here, probably paywalled for most: Putin’s Age of Chaos: The Dangers of Russian Disorder (foreignaffairs.com)
That Russia is able to sell billions in oil every month demonstrates the screws are not as tight as they could be, yet.
Just as the NATO nations had to get serious about sending aid, they – and non-aligned but friendly – nations need to get serious about not trading with Russia. Let them stew in their own oil.
Unfortunately nominally “friendly” nations (or at least have cordial relations with the U.S.) like India are quite happy to buy ever more Russian oil. Like China, India couldn’t give two shits about Ukraine or Western sanctions, but they do care about nicely discounted Russian oil. Money talks. They’re too big and important to risk alienating in any way other than making their financial transactions slightly tricky.
Link to a Business Insider article reporting on UK intel report. It asserts that the Russian air force is struggling to operate outside of Russian-controlled territory:
“Over the summer, Russian tactical combat aircraft have typically carried out over 100 sorties a day, but these are almost always restricted to operating over Russian-controlled territory due to the threat from Ukrainian air defenses,” the update said.
This may be carelessness. They’re ramping up production and probably have imposed quotas.
I think the damage in video and a photo looks too extensive for drone strikes.
Anyone have links to more photos of the damage?
Link Dozens injured in explosion at factory near Moscow said to hold fireworks | Russia | The Guardian
Seems like an odd combination. Maybe they are making flares for the military? Still an odd mix.
Lots of companies make odd combinations of products. I can easily see a progression of “We’re making a lot of stuff on government contracts; let’s make a bunch more stuff on government contracts”. And it’s probably even more likely in a kleptocratic society like Russia.
here’s a good thread on that factory and what was under the roof …
quite impressive, indeed
.
one might only guess how cruel war really is