Agree w ISW. As much as the Ukrainians want to take back territory that was theirs, that is not the only measure of success.
Russia is playing a nihilistic destroy everything game. And has had the time to heavily fortify their front lines. Ukraine ought to be playing a “just keep killing Russians & destroying Russian gear until they implode” game. The minefields and other static obstacles can be cleared later when the Russians aren’t there to defend them.
I’ll reiterate my overarching philosophy of war - in the macro sense, it’s about logistics and morale, and that’s it. Ukraine has a big advantage in both, and until that changes, Ukraine will be on a path to victory. It may take another year, but the only way for that to change would be for Ukraine’s advantage in both of those factors to disappear.
I have yet to see any facts that run counter to this.
The Kremlin may have to weigh the cost of spending trillions of roubles on its war with Ukraine, and withstanding unprecedented sanctions, while maintaining prewar levels of public spending.
Russia’s military casualties are approaching 300,000, the officials claimed, with as many as 120,000 killed in action.
The other thing with minefields is that there’s a limit to how deep they can go. It’s slow to clear a corridor through the mines, but once you do get a clear corridor all the way through to the far side, you can pour a lot through that gap, and take a bunch of that land from the far side of the minefield. Which then makes clearing the remaining mines easier. So even in the simplistic measure of military progress by acreage, you could still see a long span of very slow progress, followed by a sudden, very large advance.
All true, if the minefield is undefended. If it is defended … well, the cannon-cockers know where you’re going to be for a while.
So at the press conference after the announcement of Danish F-16’s, some journalist asked Zelensky if Ukraine would ever be willing to give up territory in exchange for NATO membership. Zelensky replied that Ukraine was willing to give up Belgorod in exchange for NATO membership. This is what you get when you elect comedians to high office. The look he gets from the Danish PM is hilarious.
true - but UKR is very good with counterbattery fire …
part of the nato-weaponry just does that automatically - the rest will be done manually (drones and HIMARS)
Russia is blacklisting journalists from the “BBC and the British newspapers The Guardian and The Telegraph” because they are covering the Ukraine war without using impartial coverage “methods described by George Orwell in his novels 1984 and Animal Farm.”
Many people in Ukraine have kept diaries during the attack from Russia, some of these extracts are now appearing in print & even in English translations. The following is the start of an article in a TLS last month entitled, Writers at War. The writer had found himself from being an everyday journalist for the Kviv Independent, to becoming a war correspondent.
'At 4 am on February 24, 2022, Kyiv was shelled for the first time since the Second World War. A convoy of Russian tanks and artillery some forty miles long headed towards the Ukrainian capital. Andriy, his wife, Svitlana, and their two sons, Artem and Myroslav, fled west along the Zhytomyr highway. A Russian soldier fired into their windshield; Svitlana was driving, and her head fell against her husband in the passenger seat. The boys began screaming – their mother, who had just been with them, was now no longer there at all. As Andriy got Artem out of the car and hid him behind the hood, the Russians shot him in his right leg. Eight-year-old Myroslav looked at the hole in his father’s leg as Andriy pulled him from the car next. The Russians shot the boy, and then his father once more, this time in the left leg. Andriy told his sons to pretend they were dead. When they tired of shooting, the Russians allowed Andriy to call his parents-in-law to pick them up. Later that day Svitlana’s mother and father returned, now with a wheelbarrow to carry their daughter’s body. ’ …
Propaganda, one sided news.
Would you say “Nyet”? I mean, what is the chance the new KGB , FSB guys will find out? How secure are these polls? Are there fake polls designed to flush out naysayers?
There’s no reason to believe the polls are accurate.
This development is encouraging. Especially if it does allow Ukrainian forces to bypass a major minefield.
ISW report Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, August 21, 2023 | Institute for the Study of War
Some Russians see behind the propaganda.
This guy thinks that 70% of the people in occupied areas are anti-Russian - note that huge numbers of Ukrainians have already fled these areas to avoid living under Russian occupation:
Muscovites call Russian soldiers murderers:
So Russia’s Vietnam is Ukraine?
Ukraine is the new Afghanistan.
Hmm. “Elastic defence” - is that a new (Russian) concept?
Defenses have been selling well-fortified terrain bit by bit to offenses for vast amounts of blood and treasure since before Alexander first went out a-conquering. Not a new idea.
Like catapult, elastic defense way for Russia to launch counteroffensive!
A former senior Russian commander claimed Vladimir Putin’s troops are on the verge of abandoning their positions on the frontlines, as they grow increasingly disillusioned about the war.
Any unit with 80% killed doesn’t have much to fight with anyhow. Soon enough 80 will be 90. The troops will abandon their positions one way or the other.