Lately, I have come to realize that when one strips away all the rhetoric and fractured history, Putin's actions are all based on negatives. Just a few seem to be: avoid NATO incursion further east; no separate Ukrainian state; no Ukrainian development of its rich fossil fuels in Crimea to compete with Russia, etc. You know them better than me; I am sure. Should Putin's current actions continue, he will be left to inherit a void that would only, in subsequent years, put further economic strains on a fragile Russian economy. The photos show the ruined remnants of war. The history of the annexation of Crimea and its costs are telling. Putin has already lost - any other outcome would still be his ruin.
This week, photos of Putin in North Korea and Vietnam seemed to me that he looked embarrassed. He does not play the supplicant well.
Professor, I look forward to the ideas you share with us. You are generous with your time and should know it is appreciated. I am sure I write for many of your subscribers.
You are on to something here. I like to think of it as “fear of loss” of status/prestige/money/influence. It is clear Russia has nothing to offer the Baltics, Nordics, Poland, Ukraine and the former Warsaw Pact countries as they all have suffered at Russia’s hands. In contrast, Russian narcissism, embodied by Putin and his proxies, see themselves as the center of the universe yet also the ultimate victim. I can think of this in only one other country…Serbia. And in reality, one one thinks about ethnic groups, Muscovy is only about as large as Serbia so maybe it is “small man’s disease”?
I think the Serbs take the grand prize for victimization. They are still fired up by the loss of the "Battle of Kosovo" around 1370. Some Serbian statelets where routed by the Ottoman Empire (excuse my rough history. ) The bizarre thing is Serbs today memorialize and *celebrate* the great defeat. It would be like Americans whipping up passions around Pearl Harbor Day the way we celebrate Independence Day. A culture built around a 1100 year old grievance is like how George Bush described Donald Trump's dark, aggrieved inauguration speech, "That was some weird shit."
You hit on exactly where I was going with the Serbia reference! Only country I know that celebrates defeat and yet screams victimhood all at once! If you listen to Putin, it sounds the same!
Maybe, but I think a more salient lesson for the Serbs might have been the 70+ days in a row that they were bombed by NATO in the 1990s. All the tonnes of depleted uranium dropped on them that still cause birth-defects there and will do so for many years to come.
Meanwhile we have England football fans continuing to chant about the IRA. Small man syndrome indeed.
What the hell are the England football fans chanting about the IRA? I'm not an avid follower but I'm surprised England fans are interested in Ireland at all as it has not (ever?) been a significant football rival. They are surely more interested in Hitler's supposed testicular deficiency given the rivalry with Germany.
At any England game you won't be too far away from the 'No surrender, no surrender, no surrender to the IRA' chant to the tune of the 'Sing Hosanna' hymn. it's not everyone, but groups do still enjoy a rendition of it after a session in the town square/fountain.
Russian society is fundamentally Nihilistic to its core. This frees them from any personal responsibility and honesty. Facts don't matter anymore, making the people to believe the most absurd ideas. Such brainwashed people are ready to commit any crime without any hesitation. They lack any inner values whatsoever. Such people are empty shells, lost in a void, free of any ethics and moral. The perfect base for imperialism, Fascism, and dictatorships.
I feel the same way about a large swath of the American public. The invasion of Iraq was equally an aggressive war against a sovereign nation. We can’t just go toppling regimes when our fancy takes us. For reasons why, look at the devastation it caused for an entire generation in Iraq. And many Americans completely accepted the lies on which that war was based (WMD).
Likewise, there is a large contingent of brainwashed Americans who fervently wish for a Trump second term.
It's certainly true that all nations in the world (the US is not the least of these - thinking of Vietnam, other wars, and Iraq as you mentioned) - have committed unjustified wars and war crimes, cruelties, racism, slavery, and injustice in their history and have blood on their hands.
That said, there is a decisive difference: There is no society in the world that committed as many atrocities and genocides as the Russian Empire under its Csar or its other dictators like Stalin and Putin in the last few hundred years, until the presence. The people of Russia have through all the centuries, through all the many generations only been living under dictatorships and never developed a democratic society with its liberties and values. And now the Russian dictator and his entourage try to destroy definitely the rule of international law globally and openly.
I had flashes of Trump running through my mind when I read your reply. There is much I can no longer understand about this country and much more that I never questioned and even did not know to question when I should have asked a lot of them — going back decades. How awful Americans must appear to the rest of the world. Surrounded by decades of stability and progress in many arenas, our society projects anger and grievances while so many in the strive to at least survive.
Paul and Richard, your discussion of Serbia and Putin, both of them small and pugnacious, who “see themselves as the center of the universe yet also the ultimate victim” and comparing both to Donald Trump is terrifying. If DJT is elected in November, Americans will find themselves traitors to their highest and best values.
Lockheed Martin currently produce around 600 Patriot missiles - not launchers or radars, just missiles - a year. In the last year the RF launched upwards of 4,000 missiles at targets in Ukraine. That's all the clarity you need regarding the prospects of Ukraine winning this war.
This is just another (long-since got tedious) example of the Professor calling for the magicing-up of weapons that don't exist in anywhere near the numbers required.
Your premise is that RU is invincible. Or as the NAZIs used to broadcast, "All resistance is futile."
Your point about the limits of Patriot batteries is legitimate. The obvious implication that UKR must be freed to attack launch sites in RU is another good point.
No the RF aren't invincible, it's just that the West's denuded military-industrial base is not currently sufficient to support the AFU to defeat them. There's enough to cause them significant losses, but not enough to win this war - especially if there are demands from Israel, the Red Sea and Taiwan to consider too.
I agree it is plausible that most countries have not expanded arms production because they are counting on a stalemate & agreement of some sort along lines of control.
It's also true that we see a moving picture that is far from complete.
Yes, but IMO that increase in military production is not, and cannot, come anywhere soon enough to make a difference to the Ukraine war - even if there was the political will to attempt to do so. The West haven't got the surge capacity any more. Four decades of Neoliberalism, exacerbated by 16 years of austerity, have done that - the Four Freedoms (capital, servies, goods & labour) in the EU have consistently favoured short-termist rentier extraction, lack of sustained investment and (crucially) a system dominated by extended JIT supply chains. Any excess capacity has been deemed inefficient and removed - something we found to our cost here in the UK under CV19.
There are all sort of bottlenecks -from technicians, to factory space, to houseing to transport and more to scupper any rapid expansion now. Headline GDP figures are almost completely irrelevant to this issue nowadays. I wish it were not so, but that's where we are now I'm afraid. We're not the ones paying the bitter price of this now - which is why we must be realistic about Ukraines prospects.
Its interesting how different people prefer the different mediums. Some people love the podcast, others much prefer the updates. Will try to keep doing both!
I like both, but the podcast is indeed time consuming, as I work from home and hardly drive anywhere, so I listen to it on the PC. I haven't listened to the latest one yet, but will - later today.
Me too. I’ll listen today at home. Meant to listen yesterday when driving but didn’t. The written updates, I read pretty much immediately after seeing them; the podcasts, I almost have to schedule.
Thank you for the update. A question and a point: Do you read the Kyiv Independent daily reports and especially, the reporter's weekly update from the front lines? Their reports from the front lines are more pessimistic than yours as they reflect the statements from the exhausted troops who've been on the front line for months or even more than a year. The latest report, like others, state the frontline troops think they are slowly losing ground and not doing well. Of course, they don't have a strategic overview like you do, but I think it's worthwhile to keep abreast of these reports because they might indicate the state of on-the-ground morale and the actual availabillity of new Western supplies and weaponry. Thank you for listening.
I agree. I’ve been reading the Kyiv Independent since the war began and their interviews with the front-line troops always seem to reveal a ‘hanging on’ attitude. I genuinely hope they are getting scheduled rotations off the line.
Good perspective, Robert. It is hard to see the bigger picture when one is down in the deep weeds like frontline troops are. Good way overcome this is to show how what the frontline troops are doing fits into the bigger strategic picture and how it is still all one team.
I think they are useful as a piece of journalism in showing what life is like for troops, and giving some other details such as how often they are getting rotated, etc.
However, I also agree with Mr. O. Brien's points in earlier updates that they only tell you so much if you aren't getting the perspective from the Russian side. I've read and listened to quite a few of those, and they tend to be even worse than the Ukrainian ones. War is hell, so of course things are going to feel terrible after you've spent a year on the front, and I'm certain a lot could be done better on the Ukrainian side when it comes to rotation, training and flexibility. However, the reporting will be heavily biased if you only hear one perspective, no matter which side it is. When it comes to strategic analysis, numbers are more useful.
I think such stories have a place in the strategic picture. Whilst anecdotal they are examples of some of the ‘intangibles’ in war namely morale and to a lesser existent logistics and training (if they highlight deficiencies in these areas).
To Don’s point if troops are not getting rotations off the line that will affect morale which in turn will affect the quality and effectiveness of the force which in turn impacts the war at a strategic level.
For Ukraine to win this war it will, eventually, have to push forces into the Russian borderlands. A successful Ukrainian offensive in the Kharkiv theatre, for example, could enable amoured spearheads to drive southwards, behind Russian defensive positions in Ukraine, thereby cutting off logistical support and communication nodes to forward Russian units. It would force redeployment of Russian forces in Ukraine proper, potentially cut off the newly built rail line supplying Crimea and de-stabilize the Russian front in general. Of course, this pre-supposes adequate Ukrainian reserves and logistical capabilities, establishment of at least localized air superiority, pushing Russian air support further eastwards and adequate mobile air defenses to protect forward deployed armoured "spearpoints". This also pre-supposes western political support or, at least, neutrality for such an operation. (This might be more difficult to attain than the actual operation itself!). Yes, to date, this might seem to be a nigh impossible plan of action for Ukraine with the stagnant front lines of today. But, the Russian positions are "hollow"and their command ability to respond to fast-moving operational fronts is lacking. If the West truly wants to see Russia defeated...and militarily emasculated for the forseeable future...then this type of strategic plan might be necessary. Simply forcing a withdrawal of Russian forces to the Russian border will not ensure long-lasting Ukrainian peace and stability so they must be completely and convincingly defeated. As things stand right now this might seem to be "pie-in-the-sky" thinking, but if adequately prepared and supplied in the coming year, Ukrainian forces could be in a position to mount such an operation (and, yes, it will be another "red line" crossed).
I don't think that sort of breakthrough is possible any longer. Russia has a lot more troops now than in 2022, and UAVs are all over the place. It might make sense for the Ukrainians to push in the Kharkiv region, but I agree with OBrien that long range logistics attacks on Russian supply lines are much more effective in the long term. I also think that forcing a withdrawal to the Russian border is enough to achieve stability as long as Ukraine is granted full NATO membership.
This war is very different from WWII, and the battlefield is more saturated with defenses which are difficult to get through with conventional offensive equipment. I fully agree that Ukraine needs to be equipped much better, and will have to make decisions which will make some allies queasy, but I think Ukraine should continue their more realistic tactic of weakening Russian lines rather than focusing much effort on a bigger breakthrough which I don't think are likely to succeed.
Clear eyed and broken down simply. Even with all the advantages Russia could not capitalize. Ukraine, now with ranged weapons is making Crimean untenable. But Ukraine does not have enough ranged weaponry nor the kind of fixed wing aircraft needed to out and out win.
So elections in the US in November not only determine the US course, but also the Ukrainian course and possibility of finally being fully armed…I hope
It's heartbreaking to think of all the bloodshed and destruction that could have been spared had Ukraine been armed and aided to reclaim the Donbas in 2014.
Many thanks for this clear assessment, optimistic but also sobering. While it is clearly true that the Russia has not made great advances in the front line over the past six months. it has taken huge losses of manpower and equipment in the process . What is more to the point, given that Ukraine has been suffering this unprovoked aggression for two and half years now, it has also taken huge losses. And unlike Putin, who can throw countless, inadequately trained and equipped soldiers into the "meat grinder" with impunity (at least for now), Ukraine is constrained by more limited manpower and is dependent on Western support. An"Economist" panel last week considered that Ukraine would continue to need support at the level it was promised by the US in April of $60 billion... every year! Will it get it ? And will the Europeans not only do more but a lot more ? We can't be certain of either at this stage.
So the question that then arises is how long will Ukraine need to win and what exactly does winning mean ? "The Economist" panel referred to above seemed pretty certain that at some point, to stop the carnage and the destruction, Ukraine would have to give up some territory (i.e the Donbas) in exchange for cast-iron security guarantees, the return of thousands of Ukrainian adults and children illegally held in Russia, and the liberty for those whose territory (largely destroyed by the fighting anyway) will remain occupied, to cross the border to freedom. The fate of Crimea would be in the balance too but it seems clear that to Zelensky, reflecting the view of the vast majority of Ukrainians, Crimea is and must remain Ukrainian.
Would be very interested at some point in the future in your own definition of Ukrainian victory and whether you believe, all other things being equal, that it can be achieved solely on the battlefield. Nobody can predict what will happen in Russia of course, but assuming that Putin remains in power for some time yet, can the Ukrainian military realistically fight on until it has has recovered all of the lost territory or must Zelensky and his government accept at some point that a purely military solution is out of reach and sell a political compromise to the Ukrainian people ?
I don't know what the panel was thinking. For Russia, the goal has always been not territory but subjugation of Ukraine. Before 2022 Putin was perfectly willing to return Donbas to Ukraine, but only on the condition of "federalization", meaning that his puppets there would have veto over Ukrainian trade and foreign policy (i.e. could prevent Ukraine's entrance into the EU and NATO). That's what he's really after. The "Economist" panel somehow expects Putin to agree to the exact opposite, i.e. that Putin will agree to let Ukraine join the EU and NATO in exchange for Donbas. That simply does not make sense. It's like Germany offering Britain Helgoland in exchange for Zanzibar, rather than the other way around. Ukraine in the Russia's orbit is central to Russian (imperial) national identity. And, of course, Ukraine outside the Russia's orbit is central to Ukrainian national identity. This conflict cannot end (rather than be paused) without one of the nations giving up its national identity (although the Russian one is easier to modify, as Russian nation state can exist and thrive even without Ukraine). And neither will agree to that absent a catastrophic military defeat.
Well expressed. I still find it astonishing that so many people on these panels who should know better don’t understand this basic logic. It’s almost as if they never even asked themselves what are Russia’s and Ukraine’s war aims before coming up with their peace proposals. Which is why they come up with bogus solutions like “Donbas for Ukraine’s full automomy and security” as if it made any sense and was on the table.
It is sometimes too terrifying to admit the truth. So many people instead engage in self-deception. Of course, many others are genuinely ignorant. It is not easy for many Westerners to understand that imperialism is still alive and well outside the West, and it is even harder to understand that there's a big white nominally Christian nation that is still so not over imperial ambitions. After all, no Western nation has fought to keep an empire for half a century (since the fall of the Portuguese dictatorship).
You are so spot on! The commentariat in the West still fail to understand Putin and fail to believe what he tells us all of his intentions. They try in vain to imbue Putin with intentions that do not exist.
I can only add that the Russians have a particular aversion to ending wars in a negotiated settlement (and I mean, real end, not a ceasefire), having done it only once in the last 100 years, with Finland in 1944, under American pressure (at a time the USSR desperately needed US support for conquest of Eastern Europe under the guise of fighting Hitler), and on very harsh terms (with Finland agreeing to become a vassal state) that would not even be acceptable to the Ukrainians (as their nationhood might not survive Russian imposed censorship - luckily for Finns, the Soviets did not see their national identity as inherently anti-Soviet).
I follow Freedman and also found this essay exceptional.
He skillfully debunks "all wars end in negotiations" in the first half dozen paragraphs, excellent. The extended details of the Falklands War example did get a bit much so I downgraded for viewing by those of us in the unwashed masses. So glad you shared it, it is well worth the journey.
I found those details interesting. At the time I was only able to follow that crisis in Pravda. Here's what Biden was saying at the time about those negotiations: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3C9hxsRO7pI Interestingly, 4 years ago some people in the UK were calling Biden anti-British. But then, Brexiteers did not have a very strong connection to reality in general.
One of the more amusing aspects of Substack is the way that they include links to previous articles from the author - some often from a couple of years previously with single line summaries of their content.
Here's one from that Freedman page - linking to an article he wrote in 2022:
"Space and Time
With the costs of war mounting and his army in disarray Putin is running out of options."
How's that going two years later?
Here's one from this very substack from Professor O'Brien:
"Weekend Update #35
The counteroffensive: Its not slow, its not fast, it is what it is; This phase seems to show the dominance of Artillery/MLRS and UAVs; Always remember domestic politics."
That was when movements on maps didn't matter so much I suppose.
Before that it was being beaten back by the Poles and Baltics and defeated, though that did not last long. Then one has to go back to 1905 when the end of the disastrous war with Japan was “negotiated” because Russia had been humiliated and was one cusp of a civil war.
Yes, if you expand the timeline from 100 to 120 years, you suddenly see a bunch of negotiated settlements (all quite unfavorable to Russia, with the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk taking the cake). All of them came after Russian defeats. The moral of the story is that if you beat the crap out of the Russians, they become very flexible. In fact Stalin also wanted to negotiate in September 1941, but Hitler was not interested.
Fascinating piece, but the Falklands war is something of a cherry-picked. Yes, wars don't end with negotiations, but there are more, recent examples that could lead to the equally valid conclusion that wars only end once desperate people are filmed clinging to the undercarriage of fleeing US aircraft.
I’m not entirely convinced either by the “Economist” panel’s arguments, but they do have the merit of being articulated by intelligent and long-standing observers of the international scene who have no particular axe to grind. Over and above their merits, or lack of them, the question remains how long it will take Ukraine to triumph militarily, and whether it will continue to have the resources and outside support to do so.
On Russia, Andrew, you clearly know more about it than most of us here. But I do wonder whether it is entirely accurate to equate Russia with Putin. Ukraine, a free country, is fighting an existential war. Russia, a victim of its leaders’ constant paranoia about being threatened by a hostile West, is not . Surely ordinary Russians, pitilessly repressed politically, economically and socially would prefer, if they had the choice, more freedom and a higher standard of living than being forced to share the imperial dreams of Putin and his sinister clique. Is their national identity so dependent on subjugating Ukraine?
One problem with intelligent observers is that often they tend to think that other intelligent people share their assumptions, and it's hard for them to imagine many other people being strongly motivated by factors not seen as very important by those intelligent people. E.g. they may view acting on strong religious beliefs against economic self-interest irrational, but it actually happens all the time. Yes, it's still a question whether Ukraine will be supported long enough and strongly enough to survive. But it is a fight for national survival, not for control of some ruins.
It is not entirely accurate to equate Russia with Putin (although it is entirely possible that Russia in its current form won't outlive Putin, even regardless of the current war - unlike in the Russian Empire and the USSR there's simply no clear mechanism for succession, and Russia is being run as Putin's personal fiefdom). Yes, many Russians would prefer more freedom and a higher standard of living, and I personally know a lot of them. But many others do not actually care about freedom. They equate it with LGBTQ+ (of which they are terrified, courtesy of Russian propaganda) and other bad stuff. In fact early in this war the Moscow Patriarch said something like "we have to fight in Ukraine lest we are forced to hold gay parades on the Red Square" (which made me think that one of the terms for ending the war should be requiring the Patriarch to lead a gay pride parade on the Red Square - I mean, we've got to make an honest man of him). More generally, the problem with people in the West understanding Russia (or not) is that Western cultures are individualistic, while the Russian culture is collectivist (like Eastern cultures in general tend to be). Of course, not entirely, and there are plenty individualists there, but like myself, they often tend to flee to the West where they are much more comfortable, being surrounded by like-minded people. In collectivist cultures people care about the glory of the state much more than in the West. So many Russians actually don't mind some deprivations for the greater glory of the Russian state. After all, they feel themselves part of it, and that glory reflects on them too. They actually like it when the whole world fears their might and they people of Miami cower in fear when a Russian frigate passes by on its way to Cuba (yes, that's what many Russians believe actually happened). Being a mighty empire (and the biggest country on the planet) is an integral part of their national identity. But there's no Russian Empire without Ukraine. If a junior branch of the Russian nation (that's how many Russians see the Ukrainians) can defy mighty Russia and join the perfidious West, there's really no mighty Russian Empire, is there?
Interesting thought experiment if we flip that around. Will take Russia a long time to win militarily…will they continue to get support from, in order of importance, China, Western companies which continue to legally sell dual use equipment, North Korea, and Iran? And if not?
Ukraine will have to drive Russia out of Crimea/1991 Ukraine and become so well and prepared to defend that the war will end similar to how the Korean War ended.
“However that comes, it will almost certainly present an opportunity for RU to rearm. This argument is only relevant if your goal is for RU to undergo some sort of collapse or revolutionary”
To me, the Ukrainians, Europe and the US are stronger than the Russians and their
The Ukrainians, Europe, the US, South Korea, and to some extent, Japan are stronger than Russia and its allies.
For peace to occur, the Ukrainians with weapons from their allies will have to drive the Russians back into Russia in a stinging defeat and then set up impenetrable and costly defenses ( to an invading Russia) and keep their defenses set.
I would say it's informally in place in some ways. Military support. Behind the scenes letting russia know.that any nuclear discharge would be met with a NATO response. The growing desire of many in NATO to make it official. Training of the Ukr military by Nato countries, and to operate Nato equipment. Movement by Nato countries to openly operate in Ukraine.
It's only a matter of time before that happens officially. But unofficially it's happening now.
At what point does Ukraine sense they can use the ATACMs on the Russian airfields inside Russia to stop the jets delivering the devastating glide bombs?
And the Ukrainians expanding the utility of their own Neptune missiles too.
Great as always! Isn't it possible to summarize that victory for Ukraine means building conventional deterrence or UAV-based deterrence by analogy to nuclear deterrence? This implies that the costs are so high for any potential aggressor that the deterrent effect is similarly robust.
As always, your wisdom is much appreciated. It would be helpful when you mention the word ‘win’ if you defined that in a simple sentence eg (driving all Russian troops to 2014 borders) or whatever you regard winning to mean.
Thanks again for this article! The slow drip of arms deliveries to Ukrain and the reluctance from the West to send modern weapon systems seem part of a greater strategy of not poking the Russian Bear into chemical or nuclear warfare. The unwritten rules of engagement are there for the world to see. But these restrictions apply only to Ukraine it seems, and not to Russia.
There Russian assaults are not fast, they are not slow, they are what they are. Every one of the problems you identified about attacking here were blindingly obvious last Summer, but still you urged the AFU onwards. Even a chump like me could see them. You’ll likely find a number of times in your comments from 2022/3 where I used the cricketing metaphor of how we couldn’t possibly know how well the RF were doing until the AFU ‘had batted on this pitch’. Back then that was when all the chat centred around the incompetence displayed by the Russians in pretty much everything they did.
What the RF are doing is pretty much all any force can do now – make small, incremental gains under the the umbrella of strong AD and artillery. Gain a field, a tree-line, a village, then dig-in, flatten the counter-attack and repeat. They have the (relative) luxury of being able to do this along a huge line-of-contact that currently favours their advantages in materiel and personnel. Bulges don’t need to be snipped off if they serve the purpose of extending those lines for the defenders, or require the defenders to use tenuous and exposed supply-lines. This situation is, at present, helped by the rivers and their bridges – with the RF in no hurry to make great advances in places where the AFU have to travel many tens of extra miles to reach functional bridges.
And all of those AFU problems are exacerbated by the fact that any Western supplied kit needs to be dragged back to Poland to be fixed – that won’t change, that can’t change – and that’s just one of the many reasons why Ukraine simply can not win this war.
Strange and obviously + verifiably false to say all Western kits is repaired in Poland. Perhaps you meant “very specific pieces of Western kit” and “usually” instead of the implied “always”.
We can have a good sense of how well the Russian army is doing by the hundreds of Russian dead per day and Ukrainian success + targeting choice in the air domain. Of course, you’ll claim that Russia doesn’t really have $1k+ casualties & hundreds dead per day, it’s all made up. So consider this Mediazona/BBC data on Wagner in Bakhmut (19k dead from Wagner alone, which is multiples higher than Ukrainian dead in the same time frame across I think the entire line), which, like the broader dataset covering the whole war, shows that Russian loss figures from British MoD, France, and Ukraine are not wildly inflated.
Yes the RF lost a load in Bakhmut, but that MediaZona piece also confirmed that most of those losses came straight from RF prisons. That was in a theatre that had drawn in units from all sorts of AFU sources - some of them the most highly trained and resourced. Every death was it's own tragedy, but the trade-off of prisoners to trained personnel clearly favoured the Russians there. The BBC and Mediazona do no such similar analysis for Ukraine losses - no trawling of social media, no collations of records from cemetaries - this rather tells it's own story I think.
Again, the data is for Wagner only. And there is reference to Ukrainian losses - with partial data I’d guess 4 or 4.5 Russian dead : 1 Ukrainian dead. That’s without mentioning the resulting mutiny and dissolution of Wagner.
Lately, I have come to realize that when one strips away all the rhetoric and fractured history, Putin's actions are all based on negatives. Just a few seem to be: avoid NATO incursion further east; no separate Ukrainian state; no Ukrainian development of its rich fossil fuels in Crimea to compete with Russia, etc. You know them better than me; I am sure. Should Putin's current actions continue, he will be left to inherit a void that would only, in subsequent years, put further economic strains on a fragile Russian economy. The photos show the ruined remnants of war. The history of the annexation of Crimea and its costs are telling. Putin has already lost - any other outcome would still be his ruin.
This week, photos of Putin in North Korea and Vietnam seemed to me that he looked embarrassed. He does not play the supplicant well.
Professor, I look forward to the ideas you share with us. You are generous with your time and should know it is appreciated. I am sure I write for many of your subscribers.
You are on to something here. I like to think of it as “fear of loss” of status/prestige/money/influence. It is clear Russia has nothing to offer the Baltics, Nordics, Poland, Ukraine and the former Warsaw Pact countries as they all have suffered at Russia’s hands. In contrast, Russian narcissism, embodied by Putin and his proxies, see themselves as the center of the universe yet also the ultimate victim. I can think of this in only one other country…Serbia. And in reality, one one thinks about ethnic groups, Muscovy is only about as large as Serbia so maybe it is “small man’s disease”?
I think the Serbs take the grand prize for victimization. They are still fired up by the loss of the "Battle of Kosovo" around 1370. Some Serbian statelets where routed by the Ottoman Empire (excuse my rough history. ) The bizarre thing is Serbs today memorialize and *celebrate* the great defeat. It would be like Americans whipping up passions around Pearl Harbor Day the way we celebrate Independence Day. A culture built around a 1100 year old grievance is like how George Bush described Donald Trump's dark, aggrieved inauguration speech, "That was some weird shit."
You hit on exactly where I was going with the Serbia reference! Only country I know that celebrates defeat and yet screams victimhood all at once! If you listen to Putin, it sounds the same!
Maybe, but I think a more salient lesson for the Serbs might have been the 70+ days in a row that they were bombed by NATO in the 1990s. All the tonnes of depleted uranium dropped on them that still cause birth-defects there and will do so for many years to come.
Meanwhile we have England football fans continuing to chant about the IRA. Small man syndrome indeed.
What the hell are the England football fans chanting about the IRA? I'm not an avid follower but I'm surprised England fans are interested in Ireland at all as it has not (ever?) been a significant football rival. They are surely more interested in Hitler's supposed testicular deficiency given the rivalry with Germany.
At any England game you won't be too far away from the 'No surrender, no surrender, no surrender to the IRA' chant to the tune of the 'Sing Hosanna' hymn. it's not everyone, but groups do still enjoy a rendition of it after a session in the town square/fountain.
Russian society is fundamentally Nihilistic to its core. This frees them from any personal responsibility and honesty. Facts don't matter anymore, making the people to believe the most absurd ideas. Such brainwashed people are ready to commit any crime without any hesitation. They lack any inner values whatsoever. Such people are empty shells, lost in a void, free of any ethics and moral. The perfect base for imperialism, Fascism, and dictatorships.
I feel the same way about a large swath of the American public. The invasion of Iraq was equally an aggressive war against a sovereign nation. We can’t just go toppling regimes when our fancy takes us. For reasons why, look at the devastation it caused for an entire generation in Iraq. And many Americans completely accepted the lies on which that war was based (WMD).
Likewise, there is a large contingent of brainwashed Americans who fervently wish for a Trump second term.
What I’m trying to say is that I’m a little less judgemental of the Russian people, given that I saw it happen in this country, to my eternal disgust.
It's certainly true that all nations in the world (the US is not the least of these - thinking of Vietnam, other wars, and Iraq as you mentioned) - have committed unjustified wars and war crimes, cruelties, racism, slavery, and injustice in their history and have blood on their hands.
That said, there is a decisive difference: There is no society in the world that committed as many atrocities and genocides as the Russian Empire under its Csar or its other dictators like Stalin and Putin in the last few hundred years, until the presence. The people of Russia have through all the centuries, through all the many generations only been living under dictatorships and never developed a democratic society with its liberties and values. And now the Russian dictator and his entourage try to destroy definitely the rule of international law globally and openly.
Ah.. we had the same reaction.
I had flashes of Trump running through my mind when I read your reply. There is much I can no longer understand about this country and much more that I never questioned and even did not know to question when I should have asked a lot of them — going back decades. How awful Americans must appear to the rest of the world. Surrounded by decades of stability and progress in many arenas, our society projects anger and grievances while so many in the strive to at least survive.
Sounds like a definition of Trump and his followers
Paul and Richard, your discussion of Serbia and Putin, both of them small and pugnacious, who “see themselves as the center of the universe yet also the ultimate victim” and comparing both to Donald Trump is terrifying. If DJT is elected in November, Americans will find themselves traitors to their highest and best values.
The clarity and simplicity of this piece is beautiful.
I so wish this understandable distillation could appear in a mainstream publication.
Very kind of you to say Richard!
I echo Richard’s assessment!
Lockheed Martin currently produce around 600 Patriot missiles - not launchers or radars, just missiles - a year. In the last year the RF launched upwards of 4,000 missiles at targets in Ukraine. That's all the clarity you need regarding the prospects of Ukraine winning this war.
This is just another (long-since got tedious) example of the Professor calling for the magicing-up of weapons that don't exist in anywhere near the numbers required.
Your premise is that RU is invincible. Or as the NAZIs used to broadcast, "All resistance is futile."
Your point about the limits of Patriot batteries is legitimate. The obvious implication that UKR must be freed to attack launch sites in RU is another good point.
No the RF aren't invincible, it's just that the West's denuded military-industrial base is not currently sufficient to support the AFU to defeat them. There's enough to cause them significant losses, but not enough to win this war - especially if there are demands from Israel, the Red Sea and Taiwan to consider too.
I agree it is plausible that most countries have not expanded arms production because they are counting on a stalemate & agreement of some sort along lines of control.
It's also true that we see a moving picture that is far from complete.
Yes, but IMO that increase in military production is not, and cannot, come anywhere soon enough to make a difference to the Ukraine war - even if there was the political will to attempt to do so. The West haven't got the surge capacity any more. Four decades of Neoliberalism, exacerbated by 16 years of austerity, have done that - the Four Freedoms (capital, servies, goods & labour) in the EU have consistently favoured short-termist rentier extraction, lack of sustained investment and (crucially) a system dominated by extended JIT supply chains. Any excess capacity has been deemed inefficient and removed - something we found to our cost here in the UK under CV19.
There are all sort of bottlenecks -from technicians, to factory space, to houseing to transport and more to scupper any rapid expansion now. Headline GDP figures are almost completely irrelevant to this issue nowadays. I wish it were not so, but that's where we are now I'm afraid. We're not the ones paying the bitter price of this now - which is why we must be realistic about Ukraines prospects.
This summary form is great.
Podcasts are so very time-consuming by contrast - for the consumer; exactly the opposite for the producer I suppose.
Its interesting how different people prefer the different mediums. Some people love the podcast, others much prefer the updates. Will try to keep doing both!
Please do! Each format offers a different richness!
I like both, but the podcast is indeed time consuming, as I work from home and hardly drive anywhere, so I listen to it on the PC. I haven't listened to the latest one yet, but will - later today.
Me too. I’ll listen today at home. Meant to listen yesterday when driving but didn’t. The written updates, I read pretty much immediately after seeing them; the podcasts, I almost have to schedule.
I am in the same boat, Andrew!
Thank you for the update. A question and a point: Do you read the Kyiv Independent daily reports and especially, the reporter's weekly update from the front lines? Their reports from the front lines are more pessimistic than yours as they reflect the statements from the exhausted troops who've been on the front line for months or even more than a year. The latest report, like others, state the frontline troops think they are slowly losing ground and not doing well. Of course, they don't have a strategic overview like you do, but I think it's worthwhile to keep abreast of these reports because they might indicate the state of on-the-ground morale and the actual availabillity of new Western supplies and weaponry. Thank you for listening.
I agree. I’ve been reading the Kyiv Independent since the war began and their interviews with the front-line troops always seem to reveal a ‘hanging on’ attitude. I genuinely hope they are getting scheduled rotations off the line.
Good perspective, Robert. It is hard to see the bigger picture when one is down in the deep weeds like frontline troops are. Good way overcome this is to show how what the frontline troops are doing fits into the bigger strategic picture and how it is still all one team.
I think they are useful as a piece of journalism in showing what life is like for troops, and giving some other details such as how often they are getting rotated, etc.
However, I also agree with Mr. O. Brien's points in earlier updates that they only tell you so much if you aren't getting the perspective from the Russian side. I've read and listened to quite a few of those, and they tend to be even worse than the Ukrainian ones. War is hell, so of course things are going to feel terrible after you've spent a year on the front, and I'm certain a lot could be done better on the Ukrainian side when it comes to rotation, training and flexibility. However, the reporting will be heavily biased if you only hear one perspective, no matter which side it is. When it comes to strategic analysis, numbers are more useful.
I think such stories have a place in the strategic picture. Whilst anecdotal they are examples of some of the ‘intangibles’ in war namely morale and to a lesser existent logistics and training (if they highlight deficiencies in these areas).
To Don’s point if troops are not getting rotations off the line that will affect morale which in turn will affect the quality and effectiveness of the force which in turn impacts the war at a strategic level.
For Ukraine to win this war it will, eventually, have to push forces into the Russian borderlands. A successful Ukrainian offensive in the Kharkiv theatre, for example, could enable amoured spearheads to drive southwards, behind Russian defensive positions in Ukraine, thereby cutting off logistical support and communication nodes to forward Russian units. It would force redeployment of Russian forces in Ukraine proper, potentially cut off the newly built rail line supplying Crimea and de-stabilize the Russian front in general. Of course, this pre-supposes adequate Ukrainian reserves and logistical capabilities, establishment of at least localized air superiority, pushing Russian air support further eastwards and adequate mobile air defenses to protect forward deployed armoured "spearpoints". This also pre-supposes western political support or, at least, neutrality for such an operation. (This might be more difficult to attain than the actual operation itself!). Yes, to date, this might seem to be a nigh impossible plan of action for Ukraine with the stagnant front lines of today. But, the Russian positions are "hollow"and their command ability to respond to fast-moving operational fronts is lacking. If the West truly wants to see Russia defeated...and militarily emasculated for the forseeable future...then this type of strategic plan might be necessary. Simply forcing a withdrawal of Russian forces to the Russian border will not ensure long-lasting Ukrainian peace and stability so they must be completely and convincingly defeated. As things stand right now this might seem to be "pie-in-the-sky" thinking, but if adequately prepared and supplied in the coming year, Ukrainian forces could be in a position to mount such an operation (and, yes, it will be another "red line" crossed).
I don't think that sort of breakthrough is possible any longer. Russia has a lot more troops now than in 2022, and UAVs are all over the place. It might make sense for the Ukrainians to push in the Kharkiv region, but I agree with OBrien that long range logistics attacks on Russian supply lines are much more effective in the long term. I also think that forcing a withdrawal to the Russian border is enough to achieve stability as long as Ukraine is granted full NATO membership.
This war is very different from WWII, and the battlefield is more saturated with defenses which are difficult to get through with conventional offensive equipment. I fully agree that Ukraine needs to be equipped much better, and will have to make decisions which will make some allies queasy, but I think Ukraine should continue their more realistic tactic of weakening Russian lines rather than focusing much effort on a bigger breakthrough which I don't think are likely to succeed.
Clear eyed and broken down simply. Even with all the advantages Russia could not capitalize. Ukraine, now with ranged weapons is making Crimean untenable. But Ukraine does not have enough ranged weaponry nor the kind of fixed wing aircraft needed to out and out win.
So elections in the US in November not only determine the US course, but also the Ukrainian course and possibility of finally being fully armed…I hope
It's heartbreaking to think of all the bloodshed and destruction that could have been spared had Ukraine been armed and aided to reclaim the Donbas in 2014.
Many thanks for this clear assessment, optimistic but also sobering. While it is clearly true that the Russia has not made great advances in the front line over the past six months. it has taken huge losses of manpower and equipment in the process . What is more to the point, given that Ukraine has been suffering this unprovoked aggression for two and half years now, it has also taken huge losses. And unlike Putin, who can throw countless, inadequately trained and equipped soldiers into the "meat grinder" with impunity (at least for now), Ukraine is constrained by more limited manpower and is dependent on Western support. An"Economist" panel last week considered that Ukraine would continue to need support at the level it was promised by the US in April of $60 billion... every year! Will it get it ? And will the Europeans not only do more but a lot more ? We can't be certain of either at this stage.
So the question that then arises is how long will Ukraine need to win and what exactly does winning mean ? "The Economist" panel referred to above seemed pretty certain that at some point, to stop the carnage and the destruction, Ukraine would have to give up some territory (i.e the Donbas) in exchange for cast-iron security guarantees, the return of thousands of Ukrainian adults and children illegally held in Russia, and the liberty for those whose territory (largely destroyed by the fighting anyway) will remain occupied, to cross the border to freedom. The fate of Crimea would be in the balance too but it seems clear that to Zelensky, reflecting the view of the vast majority of Ukrainians, Crimea is and must remain Ukrainian.
Would be very interested at some point in the future in your own definition of Ukrainian victory and whether you believe, all other things being equal, that it can be achieved solely on the battlefield. Nobody can predict what will happen in Russia of course, but assuming that Putin remains in power for some time yet, can the Ukrainian military realistically fight on until it has has recovered all of the lost territory or must Zelensky and his government accept at some point that a purely military solution is out of reach and sell a political compromise to the Ukrainian people ?
I don't know what the panel was thinking. For Russia, the goal has always been not territory but subjugation of Ukraine. Before 2022 Putin was perfectly willing to return Donbas to Ukraine, but only on the condition of "federalization", meaning that his puppets there would have veto over Ukrainian trade and foreign policy (i.e. could prevent Ukraine's entrance into the EU and NATO). That's what he's really after. The "Economist" panel somehow expects Putin to agree to the exact opposite, i.e. that Putin will agree to let Ukraine join the EU and NATO in exchange for Donbas. That simply does not make sense. It's like Germany offering Britain Helgoland in exchange for Zanzibar, rather than the other way around. Ukraine in the Russia's orbit is central to Russian (imperial) national identity. And, of course, Ukraine outside the Russia's orbit is central to Ukrainian national identity. This conflict cannot end (rather than be paused) without one of the nations giving up its national identity (although the Russian one is easier to modify, as Russian nation state can exist and thrive even without Ukraine). And neither will agree to that absent a catastrophic military defeat.
Well expressed. I still find it astonishing that so many people on these panels who should know better don’t understand this basic logic. It’s almost as if they never even asked themselves what are Russia’s and Ukraine’s war aims before coming up with their peace proposals. Which is why they come up with bogus solutions like “Donbas for Ukraine’s full automomy and security” as if it made any sense and was on the table.
It is sometimes too terrifying to admit the truth. So many people instead engage in self-deception. Of course, many others are genuinely ignorant. It is not easy for many Westerners to understand that imperialism is still alive and well outside the West, and it is even harder to understand that there's a big white nominally Christian nation that is still so not over imperial ambitions. After all, no Western nation has fought to keep an empire for half a century (since the fall of the Portuguese dictatorship).
You are so spot on! The commentariat in the West still fail to understand Putin and fail to believe what he tells us all of his intentions. They try in vain to imbue Putin with intentions that do not exist.
Mick Ryan just linked to a great post by Lawrence Freedman: https://samf.substack.com/p/why-wars-dont-always-end-with-negotiations
I can only add that the Russians have a particular aversion to ending wars in a negotiated settlement (and I mean, real end, not a ceasefire), having done it only once in the last 100 years, with Finland in 1944, under American pressure (at a time the USSR desperately needed US support for conquest of Eastern Europe under the guise of fighting Hitler), and on very harsh terms (with Finland agreeing to become a vassal state) that would not even be acceptable to the Ukrainians (as their nationhood might not survive Russian imposed censorship - luckily for Finns, the Soviets did not see their national identity as inherently anti-Soviet).
I follow Freedman and also found this essay exceptional.
He skillfully debunks "all wars end in negotiations" in the first half dozen paragraphs, excellent. The extended details of the Falklands War example did get a bit much so I downgraded for viewing by those of us in the unwashed masses. So glad you shared it, it is well worth the journey.
I found those details interesting. At the time I was only able to follow that crisis in Pravda. Here's what Biden was saying at the time about those negotiations: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3C9hxsRO7pI Interestingly, 4 years ago some people in the UK were calling Biden anti-British. But then, Brexiteers did not have a very strong connection to reality in general.
One of the more amusing aspects of Substack is the way that they include links to previous articles from the author - some often from a couple of years previously with single line summaries of their content.
Here's one from that Freedman page - linking to an article he wrote in 2022:
"Space and Time
With the costs of war mounting and his army in disarray Putin is running out of options."
How's that going two years later?
Here's one from this very substack from Professor O'Brien:
"Weekend Update #35
The counteroffensive: Its not slow, its not fast, it is what it is; This phase seems to show the dominance of Artillery/MLRS and UAVs; Always remember domestic politics."
That was when movements on maps didn't matter so much I suppose.
Before that it was being beaten back by the Poles and Baltics and defeated, though that did not last long. Then one has to go back to 1905 when the end of the disastrous war with Japan was “negotiated” because Russia had been humiliated and was one cusp of a civil war.
Yes, if you expand the timeline from 100 to 120 years, you suddenly see a bunch of negotiated settlements (all quite unfavorable to Russia, with the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk taking the cake). All of them came after Russian defeats. The moral of the story is that if you beat the crap out of the Russians, they become very flexible. In fact Stalin also wanted to negotiate in September 1941, but Hitler was not interested.
Fascinating piece, but the Falklands war is something of a cherry-picked. Yes, wars don't end with negotiations, but there are more, recent examples that could lead to the equally valid conclusion that wars only end once desperate people are filmed clinging to the undercarriage of fleeing US aircraft.
I’m not entirely convinced either by the “Economist” panel’s arguments, but they do have the merit of being articulated by intelligent and long-standing observers of the international scene who have no particular axe to grind. Over and above their merits, or lack of them, the question remains how long it will take Ukraine to triumph militarily, and whether it will continue to have the resources and outside support to do so.
On Russia, Andrew, you clearly know more about it than most of us here. But I do wonder whether it is entirely accurate to equate Russia with Putin. Ukraine, a free country, is fighting an existential war. Russia, a victim of its leaders’ constant paranoia about being threatened by a hostile West, is not . Surely ordinary Russians, pitilessly repressed politically, economically and socially would prefer, if they had the choice, more freedom and a higher standard of living than being forced to share the imperial dreams of Putin and his sinister clique. Is their national identity so dependent on subjugating Ukraine?
One problem with intelligent observers is that often they tend to think that other intelligent people share their assumptions, and it's hard for them to imagine many other people being strongly motivated by factors not seen as very important by those intelligent people. E.g. they may view acting on strong religious beliefs against economic self-interest irrational, but it actually happens all the time. Yes, it's still a question whether Ukraine will be supported long enough and strongly enough to survive. But it is a fight for national survival, not for control of some ruins.
It is not entirely accurate to equate Russia with Putin (although it is entirely possible that Russia in its current form won't outlive Putin, even regardless of the current war - unlike in the Russian Empire and the USSR there's simply no clear mechanism for succession, and Russia is being run as Putin's personal fiefdom). Yes, many Russians would prefer more freedom and a higher standard of living, and I personally know a lot of them. But many others do not actually care about freedom. They equate it with LGBTQ+ (of which they are terrified, courtesy of Russian propaganda) and other bad stuff. In fact early in this war the Moscow Patriarch said something like "we have to fight in Ukraine lest we are forced to hold gay parades on the Red Square" (which made me think that one of the terms for ending the war should be requiring the Patriarch to lead a gay pride parade on the Red Square - I mean, we've got to make an honest man of him). More generally, the problem with people in the West understanding Russia (or not) is that Western cultures are individualistic, while the Russian culture is collectivist (like Eastern cultures in general tend to be). Of course, not entirely, and there are plenty individualists there, but like myself, they often tend to flee to the West where they are much more comfortable, being surrounded by like-minded people. In collectivist cultures people care about the glory of the state much more than in the West. So many Russians actually don't mind some deprivations for the greater glory of the Russian state. After all, they feel themselves part of it, and that glory reflects on them too. They actually like it when the whole world fears their might and they people of Miami cower in fear when a Russian frigate passes by on its way to Cuba (yes, that's what many Russians believe actually happened). Being a mighty empire (and the biggest country on the planet) is an integral part of their national identity. But there's no Russian Empire without Ukraine. If a junior branch of the Russian nation (that's how many Russians see the Ukrainians) can defy mighty Russia and join the perfidious West, there's really no mighty Russian Empire, is there?
Interesting thought experiment if we flip that around. Will take Russia a long time to win militarily…will they continue to get support from, in order of importance, China, Western companies which continue to legally sell dual use equipment, North Korea, and Iran? And if not?
There are no “cast iron security guarantees.”None.
NATO membership or nuclear weapons have been demonstrated to be the only deterrents worth a damn.
I hate when experts attempt to convince themselves and others that easier choices will work by good intentions.
Agree. Also, if NATO will only extend an invitation to Ukraine to join once the war has ended, then Putin will never end the war.
Ukraine will have to drive Russia out of Crimea/1991 Ukraine and become so well and prepared to defend that the war will end similar to how the Korean War ended.
Yes, I would agree. NATO membership is what comes closest but the western allies are clearly not yet ready to grant it to Ukraine.
I supect being a part of NATO would be
“However that comes, it will almost certainly present an opportunity for RU to rearm. This argument is only relevant if your goal is for RU to undergo some sort of collapse or revolutionary”
To me, the Ukrainians, Europe and the US are stronger than the Russians and their
The Ukrainians, Europe, the US, South Korea, and to some extent, Japan are stronger than Russia and its allies.
For peace to occur, the Ukrainians with weapons from their allies will have to drive the Russians back into Russia in a stinging defeat and then set up impenetrable and costly defenses ( to an invading Russia) and keep their defenses set.
What ever happens in Russia, happens.
Only after the current war is ‘resolved.’
I would say it's informally in place in some ways. Military support. Behind the scenes letting russia know.that any nuclear discharge would be met with a NATO response. The growing desire of many in NATO to make it official. Training of the Ukr military by Nato countries, and to operate Nato equipment. Movement by Nato countries to openly operate in Ukraine.
It's only a matter of time before that happens officially. But unofficially it's happening now.
At what point does Ukraine sense they can use the ATACMs on the Russian airfields inside Russia to stop the jets delivering the devastating glide bombs?
And the Ukrainians expanding the utility of their own Neptune missiles too.
Aready happening. Google it. Review past posts by the professor.
An armistice with a six year wait for NATO membership ought to be plenty of "resolved."
Putin won't do it, so that leave the Western allies to cave.
It is hard to imagine any decent armistice being signed. Just indecent ones that leave UKR vulnerable.
Ukraine will not give Russia 6 years to re-arm.
If there are NATO allies at the end of that 6 year tunnel they might go for it.
I do take your point. But it also gives UKR 6 years to repair their infrastructure, build up an air force. Breathe.
It looks to me like this war will continue for at least another couple of years, and possibly longer.
Great as always! Isn't it possible to summarize that victory for Ukraine means building conventional deterrence or UAV-based deterrence by analogy to nuclear deterrence? This implies that the costs are so high for any potential aggressor that the deterrent effect is similarly robust.
As always, your wisdom is much appreciated. It would be helpful when you mention the word ‘win’ if you defined that in a simple sentence eg (driving all Russian troops to 2014 borders) or whatever you regard winning to mean.
Thanks again for this article! The slow drip of arms deliveries to Ukrain and the reluctance from the West to send modern weapon systems seem part of a greater strategy of not poking the Russian Bear into chemical or nuclear warfare. The unwritten rules of engagement are there for the world to see. But these restrictions apply only to Ukraine it seems, and not to Russia.
Much appreciated summary of recent events. Thanks.
A sober report.
There Russian assaults are not fast, they are not slow, they are what they are. Every one of the problems you identified about attacking here were blindingly obvious last Summer, but still you urged the AFU onwards. Even a chump like me could see them. You’ll likely find a number of times in your comments from 2022/3 where I used the cricketing metaphor of how we couldn’t possibly know how well the RF were doing until the AFU ‘had batted on this pitch’. Back then that was when all the chat centred around the incompetence displayed by the Russians in pretty much everything they did.
What the RF are doing is pretty much all any force can do now – make small, incremental gains under the the umbrella of strong AD and artillery. Gain a field, a tree-line, a village, then dig-in, flatten the counter-attack and repeat. They have the (relative) luxury of being able to do this along a huge line-of-contact that currently favours their advantages in materiel and personnel. Bulges don’t need to be snipped off if they serve the purpose of extending those lines for the defenders, or require the defenders to use tenuous and exposed supply-lines. This situation is, at present, helped by the rivers and their bridges – with the RF in no hurry to make great advances in places where the AFU have to travel many tens of extra miles to reach functional bridges.
And all of those AFU problems are exacerbated by the fact that any Western supplied kit needs to be dragged back to Poland to be fixed – that won’t change, that can’t change – and that’s just one of the many reasons why Ukraine simply can not win this war.
Strange and obviously + verifiably false to say all Western kits is repaired in Poland. Perhaps you meant “very specific pieces of Western kit” and “usually” instead of the implied “always”.
Point taken - I should have said something like 'most complicated kit", but my point stands regarding the long supply lines.
We can have a good sense of how well the Russian army is doing by the hundreds of Russian dead per day and Ukrainian success + targeting choice in the air domain. Of course, you’ll claim that Russia doesn’t really have $1k+ casualties & hundreds dead per day, it’s all made up. So consider this Mediazona/BBC data on Wagner in Bakhmut (19k dead from Wagner alone, which is multiples higher than Ukrainian dead in the same time frame across I think the entire line), which, like the broader dataset covering the whole war, shows that Russian loss figures from British MoD, France, and Ukraine are not wildly inflated.
https://en.zona.media/article/2024/06/10/wagner
Yes the RF lost a load in Bakhmut, but that MediaZona piece also confirmed that most of those losses came straight from RF prisons. That was in a theatre that had drawn in units from all sorts of AFU sources - some of them the most highly trained and resourced. Every death was it's own tragedy, but the trade-off of prisoners to trained personnel clearly favoured the Russians there. The BBC and Mediazona do no such similar analysis for Ukraine losses - no trawling of social media, no collations of records from cemetaries - this rather tells it's own story I think.
Again, the data is for Wagner only. And there is reference to Ukrainian losses - with partial data I’d guess 4 or 4.5 Russian dead : 1 Ukrainian dead. That’s without mentioning the resulting mutiny and dissolution of Wagner.