The only reason we didn’t want to get directly involved in Ukraine was because we feared that Russia might go nuclear over that. If Russia goes nuclear first, well, then, the worst has already happened, so we might as well unleash all of NATO’s conventional forces on Russia and see what happens. And Putin is smart enough to know that. He’ll only use nukes if he thinks he’s going to lose anyways, and he’s still far from that point.
The military effect of the population disparity between Russia and Ukraine is increasingly less important. Ukraine is rapidly moving to a battlefield in which their soldiers stay well to the rear and use air, sea, and ground drones to conduct operations. Russia seems to be still trying to move away from their traditional “overwhelming mass of troops” tactics but with little success. Ukraine has made a deliberate choice NOT to send their young men to be slaughtered en mass - Russia seems to be doing the opposite.
The population of Russia has a larger percentage of elderly people (with state pensions a significant and politically touchy part of the budget), and the economy also needs workers as well as soldiers and is already having problems in that respect. North Korean mercenaries and foreigners enticed into the country then press-ganged are signs of desperation that do little to make up combat losses.
Wars often end not because one side achieves its maximal goals, but because the marginal cost of continued offensive action exceeds likely gains. The battlefield in Ukraine increasingly resembles an ultra-lethal surveillance zone where offensive maneuver is extraordinarily expensive for both sides, so increasingly favours defence. Russia’s loss of armoured vehicles, and Ukraine’s reduced manpower mean an increase in marginal cost for both sides.
That suggests a long attritional contest in which Russia probably has the stronger raw endurance capacity, while Ukraine retains adaptive efficiency and technological innovation. Absent either Putin’s position being threatened or somehow NATO becoming directly involved, an effective stalemate looks increasingly likely, IMHO.
And defense, on that battlefield, is fine for Ukraine. Because their offense on other battlefields is phenomenally effective.
Another (now obsolete) thread on end of war predictions. Obsolete I say because in 2022 we had Biden, and now we have Trump 2.0, so any assumption of good faith on the USA’s part is … highly suspect in terms of ending the conflict. But it may be a useful comparison at least!
Right.
I feel like this war isn’t going to be decided on the battlefield, but rather on the home front. Something is going to make the Russians decide that the fight isn’t worth it any more- economic issues, manpower issues, or something else.
My guess is that what they’ll do is pull back to the borders of the oblasts in the Donbas region they already claim to have annexed and that have been in contention since 2014, and defend them. That’ll put the Ukrainians in the position of having to choose between stopping fighting, or trying to go on the offensive to retake those areas.
Of course, this could change if one side or the other comes up with the Russo-Ukrainian War equivalent of the invention of the tank and breaks the stalemate. I don’t know what/how that might happen, but it could I suppose.