Russia, US, Ukraine, and the Future

[conon394]

This "grand Ukrainian offensive" had mixed results. They did managed to capture large areas in the region of Kharkiv but failed elsewhere. If you asked me i would prefer to swap the areas of Kharkiv with the areas of kherson but obviously Kherson is guarded rather well. The next Ukrainian offensive will happen in 6 months

Next? The offensive in the south is not over. You are quick to construct defeat out of what by definition has to be a more cautious advance.

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The Times claimed in early May that the dead are more than 11.000 and this article was written before the siege of Mariupol and the capture of Severodonetsk that were quite costly for the Ukrainian army

The number and your logic still get you any credible way to you first claims of 100,000 dead or Ukrainian army destroyed etc.

[Papay]

Next? The offensive in the south is not over. You are quick to construct defeat out of what by definition has to be a more cautious advance.

They already claim that the Kherson couter offensive was "a divertion trap" so we can conclude it was a failure

[Mithradates]

Ukraine Is in Worse Shape than You Think | Time

The Times claimed in early May that the dead are more than 11.000 and this article was written before the siege of Mariupol and the capture of Severodonetsk that were quite costly for the Ukrainian army

It says "up to 11,000"

Ukraine and Russia have each had steep military losses, though their governments have not given specific figures. In mid-April, U.S. intelligence agencies estimated that 5,500 to 11,000 Ukrainian troops had been killed, and more than 18,000 wounded. Western intelligence agencies estimate that Russian military losses range from 7,000 to 10,000 killed and 20,000 to 30,000 wounded.

[conon394]

They already claim that the Kherson couter offensive was "a divertion trap" so we can conclude it was a failure

They do where?

[Papay]

They do where?

Ukraine Pulled Off a Masterstroke - The Atlantic


Wounded Ukrainian soldiers tell of heavy losses in push to retake Kherson - The Washington Post

Based on the second article(written 8 days ago) the Kherson offensive occured. Based on the first article(written yesterday) this offensive never happened but it was all part of the plan. You can draw your own conclusions

[conon394]

Based on the second article(written 8 days ago) the Kherson offensive occured. Based on the first article(written yesterday) this offensive never happened but it was all part of the plan. You can draw your own conclusion

Based on the first article - the Atlantic is now part of the general staff of the Ukrainian military?
Personally I rather perferr the more balanced opinion of Koffman at War on the Rocks.

On the second its a good eyes on the ground story but it says nothing really about the offensive in the south or its time table. Yes the Ukraine is faced with having to a use a mix of forces and is still likely feeding often ill equipped troops into not good situations. But to be clear the WaPO is not offering a survey of the entire front.

ISW report for the 13th show the Ukrainians are pushing in the South

https://www.understandingwar.org/bac...t-september-13

Again your definition is off. It was no feint but simply the telegraphed portion of what was clearly supposed to be two offensives. Just one was necessarily accepted to be costly and slow. The WaPo article is not wrong but simply captures what the effort in the south was always going to be fixing whats left of Russian assets - ugly. In reality Ukraine will not wait 6 months it can't right now it has blood to spend as long as Putin makes no call for mobilization.

[conon394]

@Septentrionalis

Surely the Russians have satellite data.

Perhaps not as much as you think.

"In Russia's War On Ukraine, Effective Satellites Are Few And Far Between"

https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-satel.../31797618.html

Note compare Russia launches just a quick google says US space force and NRO have tossed up at least 7 satellites in 2022 so far.

https://www.nro.gov/News-and-Media/P...s-Fact-Sheets/
https://spaceflightnow.com/2022/07/0...llion-mission/


Also not there not much you can do to move a satellite while in orbit. Your fuel budget is limited so you can't shuffle them willy nilly about.

Further note Russia seems to use its launch budget more lately to threaten US eyes in the sky than maintain its own:

https://www.space.com/russia-spacecr...-spy-satellite

[PointOfViewGun]

Ukraine Is in Worse Shape than You Think | Time
The Times claimed in early May that the dead are more than 11.000 and this article was written before the siege of Mariupol and the capture of Severodonetsk that were quite costly for the Ukrainian army

That link actually refutes your earlier claim. It's written on May 14 and talks about Ukraine losing 10% of its fighting force while your earlier links talks about 80% figure on July 6. Supposedly, Ukraine lost 70% of its fighting force within 2 months?

[Ludicus]

Some conservatives are not always wrong.
1- Winners and Losers in the Ukraine War -American Conservative

Perhaps we ought to invest as much time and energy trying to end this war as we do to defeat and humiliate Russia, which will not bring us peace

2- Robert Kagan's Selective Memory - The American Conservative

According to the journalist, Russia invaded Ukraine because the U.S. didn't get involved in enough global conflicts. In the pages of Foreign Affairs, the indefatigable Robert Kagan recently weighed in with yet another fervent appeal on behalf of empire. Ever the true-blue American, Kagan avoids using the offensive E-word, of course. He favors the term hegemony, which, he explains, is benign, involving neither domination nor exploitation but willing submission— “more a condition than a purpose.” Scratch the surface, however, and “The Price of Hegemony” offers a variation on Kagan’s standard theme: the imperative of militarized U.S. global primacy, whatever the price and with little regard for who pays.

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In this article, Harold Kujat (served as Chief of Staff of the German Army from 2000 to 2002, and as Chairman of the NATO Military Committee from 2002 to 2005) questions the purpose of the war in Ukraine and criticizes the position of the Germany's government Kriegsführung ohne Ziel - Preußische Allgemeine Zeitung
As early as 2014, General H.K. criticized NATO's flagrant failure in Ukraine

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Ex-general: NATO has failed blatantly in Ukraine

This is a view that is becoming more entrenched in academic circles in the West and Eurasia, not to mention the global south. While acknowledging Ukraine's efforts to defend its sovereignty, H.Kujat urges not to lose sight of the main strategic reality at stake: the Ukrainian people are fighting for US geostrategic interests, in rivalry with Russia and China. In his article, the German General quotes Lloyd Austin: "According to President Biden, Russian President Putin must be deposed; Russia's armed forces permanently weakened in a war of attrition."

In the Allgemeine Zeitung, Kujat asks: what exactly are the goals of the countries providing military support to Ukraine? and for how long?
He comments that the reality facing Germany and Europe is that the US will not be able to eliminate Russia as its geopolitical rival when "Russia will not even come close to a military defeat in this proxy war (sic) without direct US and NATO intervention."
It must also be assumed that a military defeat of Russia is not in China's interest either, he states, as "the US is aware (sic) that China will relieve Russia and to advance its own interests."
Referring to the German government, Kujat questions whether Berlin promotes the security of Germany's interests and defends the economic well-being of its citizens and industry due to the “irreversible damage” (sic) to the German economy caused by sanctions when the Bundeswehr's capabilities are already extremely limited. He also cites Pope Francis' position that the war in Ukraine "was perhaps in some way provoked or not prevented” (sic).
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OPEC+ snubs Biden with oil production cuts

The production drop — which comes just two months after President Joe Biden personally asked Saudi leaders to increase oil output — highlights the difficulties that the United States has faced in rallying Middle East partners to support Western efforts to isolate Russia.

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About the war. In military terms, the recapture of much of the Russian-occupied territory in Kharkiv is unlikely to change anything in the war. Now, the US/Zelensky has put a new proposal on table. Long-term military guarantees from west would protect Ukraine

Ukraine’s allies should commit to legally binding large-scale weapons transfers and multi-decade investment in the country’s defences, according to a report that looked at alternatives to Kyiv’s long-term aspirations to join the Nato alliance.
The report was commissioned by the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and co-authored by the former Nato secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen.

The guarantees, the report suggests, should not require Ukraine to limit the size or strength of its armed forces, or to adopt a position of neutrality.

To sum up, the US intends, from a military point of view, to turn Ukraine into the Israel of Europe (Israel is the most powerful state in the middle east) a proposal that I hope will never be accepted by Germany and France or even Europe as a whole. Obviously,and I quote,

Critics of the report will question the enforceability of the proposed legal guarantees, the scale of financial support required, and the threat that such a powerful army might not only act in self-defence.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Slams Germany Over Refusal To Provide Tanks, Vehicles

Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba has slammed Germany for refusing to provide it with Leopard tanks and Marder infantry fighting vehicles. “Not a single rational argument on why these weapons cannot be supplied, only abstract fears and excuses," he said in a an unusually blunt comment on Twitter on September 13. "What is Berlin afraid of that Kyiv is not?" he added.

Germany, sick of being insulted almost daily is getting a little fed up with Ukrainian verbal aggression. German Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht said on September 12 that...

Germany has a leading role in Europe and must ensure it can defend itself. It's not so simple just to say: I'll just risk that we won't be able to act, the defense of the country, by giving everything away. No, I won't do that," she said.

France is starting to get slightly irritated, Macron defends Russia dialogue and slams 'mistaken morality’ seeking to stop him
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Everything indicates that the war will continue, until the total devastation of Ukraine,which has so far spared Kiev and prevented the massive bombing of most urban centers (just as Harris did in Europe, or the US did in Japan, during WW2). In the end, it is the Ukraine which will pay the heaviest price. The country is being destroyed. Its cities and infrastructure are in ruins, all because the US want to fight Russia to the last Ukrainian. According to John Kerry, "war in Ukraine is set to be a “defining moment” for this century”. Today, the grim geostrategic situation of the war in Ukraine is becoming increasingly apparent, representing a new 30-year war-starting in 1991, continuing in 2014, reaching its paroxysm right now, in 2022.It’s a war aimed at the balkanization and disintegration of Russia, the first step to the US definitive global hegemony.
Decolonize Russia - The Atlantic

Decolonizing Russia wouldn’t necessarily require fully dismantling it, as Cheney proposed...To avoid the risk of further wars and more senseless bloodshed, the Kremlin must lose what empire it still retains. The project of Russian decolonization must finally be finished.

Decolonizing Russia | CSCE - Helsinki Commission
break up Russia in name of ‘decolonization’

Titled “Decolonizing Russia: A Moral and Strategic Imperative,” the June 23 briefing was organized by the U.S. Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), known more commonly as the Helsinki Commission. This commission claims to be “independent,” but it is a U.S. government agency created and overseen by Congress. The event was introduced by Congressman Steve Cohen, a Democrat from Tennessee who co-chairs the commission. Representative Cohen claimed Russians “have in essence colonized their own country,” and argued that Russia is “not a strict nation, in the sense that we’ve known in the past.

Lets go back in time. take some time to read Mackinder's paper, written in 1904 The geographical pivot of history (1904)
And,
Democratic Ideals and Reality (1019)
Halford Mackinder's Last View of the Round World

Some wrongly claim that Mackinder's theory is outdated. It’s not. Sir Halford Mackinder and His Critics a Hundred Years On

An enlightening article. The New Geopolitics of Empire - Monthly Review

(…) Responding to Mackinder, Spykman wrote: “If there is to be a slogan for the power politics of the Old World, it must be ‘Who controls the rimland rules Eurasia; who rules Eurasia controls the destinies of the world.’”¹⁴
(…) Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter’s national security adviser, emerged in this period as one of the most avid proponents of the geopolitics of U.S. empire…The goal, he argued, was to create a “hegemony of a new type,” which he called “global supremacy,” establishing the United States indefinitely as “the first and only truly global power.”²⁹
U.S. geopolitical strategy accepts no bounds short of Brzezinski’s “global supremacy.” It thus reflects what Mackinder called the tendency to a “single World-Empire.”

The engines start to warm up.
Washington Must Prepare for War With Both Russia and China
The skeptics are wrong: The U.S. can confront both China and Russia

[Lord Thesaurian]

If the rather subdued copium from Russia shills in the wake of stunning Ukrainian success thus far proves anything, it’s that Russian propaganda is struggling even more than the Russian military to contain the fallout of what looks to be a near complete rout on multiple fronts. Hopefully this will also discredit naysayers in the west who insist that military and economic support for Ukraine is a waste.

About the war. In military terms, the recapture of much of the Russian-occupied territory in Kharkiv is unlikely to change anything in the war.

The success of the Ukrainian offensive thus far indicates the Russian Army will be incapable of further offensives of any scale without some form of mass mobilization. They will be primarily on the defensive from here on out, trying to hold onto captured territory as the momentum of western support and the morale boost to Ukrainian forces continues to build.

[Ludicus]

Some conservatives are not always wrong.
1- Winners and Losers in the Ukraine War -American Conservative
2- Robert Kagan's Selective Memory - The American Conservative

In fact, as I said, there are some things that the left and the conservative right almost entirely agree on, 'Flight 93' conservative warns national security state risking ...

Former Trump official Michael Anton tells National Conservatism conference that Ukraine and China strategies are not in the US interest.
“I find this regime hard to understand. Who is in charge? Who’s to say? Who gets to make the final decisions?” he charged. Whatever the answer, it would seem that this auto pilot is wired to promote the existing internationalist order, and at this point it’s resulted in “squandered resources.”
“Twenty years in the Middle East and we have nothing to show for it,” he said, except trillions in sunk taxpayer funds and untold numbers of civilian Iraqi and and Afghan lives.
When the establishment is pressured on this, they will “try to explain to you why this is so important; they will give speeches on the international order or rules-based order. They aren’t very convincing, but what it comes down to is that the entire world order is a vital U.S. interest. There is no alternative.”
I don’t think it matters whether they are being cynical or they are true believers, but they pursue the same politics every day.”
In the meantime, “we are sending billions in dollars in lethal aid (to Ukraine)” and depleting our own military stocks, he added. “That causes a problem.”
We’re playing a pretty dangerous game in Ukraine,” Anton pressed. “Think about what we are doing from Putin’s perspective – we are his enemy. But where is the core U.S. interest?” He warned that our policies toward China, too, were ignoring the very real risk of war.
“It worries me that we’re playing this dangerous game that we don’t know what we’re getting into, and we may end up in a real dangerous fall.”

Russian Army will be incapable of further offensives of any scale without some form of mass mobilization

So it seems. But I have pointed out in my post the strong possibility of Russia resorting to massive bombing of Ukraine, which may happen. And the general winter is coming.What happens and will continue to happen is the prolongation of the Ukrainian people's suffering, and the medium/long term destruction of Ukraine, making it an nonviable state.
For now, Russia 'Not Discussing' Mass Military Mobilization, Kremlin Says

Lawmaker Mikhail Sheremet, a member of the State Duma’s Security Committee and the ruling United Russia party, spoke out in favor of general mobilization on Monday, according to the URA.ru news agency “Without full mobilization, [without] switching to the war mode, including the economy, we will not achieve the desired results,” the agency quoted Sheremet as saying.

[Lord Thesaurian]

We’ve already seen Russian attempts to shell Ukrainian territory to death in order to capture it. Evidently it will not bring them victory any time soon. If they had sufficient air superiority to conduct a massive bombing campaign, we would have seen it by now. But in fact the Russian Air Force has been conspicuously AWOL throughout most of this conflict. I don’t know how many ballistic missiles Russia can deploy against Ukraine, but probably not enough to be any more effective than they have been. Ukrainian success proves western aid can deliver tangible results, rendering comparisons to the Middle East irrelevant outside of isolationist echo chambers.

[Papay]

That link actually refutes your earlier claim. It's written on May 14 and talks about Ukraine losing 10% of its fighting force while your earlier links talks about 80% figure on July 6. Supposedly, Ukraine lost 70% of its fighting force within 2 months?

Siege of Mariupol and the capture of Severodonetsk happened in the meantime

Ukraine suffering up to 1,000 casualties per day in Donbas, (axios.com)

Early June Ukraine was loosing 1000 a day. This was said by a Kiev official not by Russia

[Sar1n]

Siege of Mariupol and the capture of Severodonetsk happened in the meantime

Ukraine suffering up to 1,000 casualties per day in Donbas, (axios.com)

Early June Ukraine was loosing 1000 a day. This was said by a Kiev official not by Russia

Even if it was true (and honestly, it doesn't match what we've seen, as such casualties would result in routs and many more confirmed lost vehicles), it would still be loss of only 30% of fighting force, not 70%.

[Cyclops]

Any truth to the rumours Russian officers are leaving Crimea without orders? Serious stuff indeed, maybe the Kherson advance is creating another opportunity.

Once again, its a crisis so surely Putin mobilises now?

[PointOfViewGun]

Siege of Mariupol and the capture of Severodonetsk happened in the meantime
Ukraine suffering up to 1,000 casualties per day in Donbas, (axios.com)
Early June Ukraine was loosing 1000 a day. This was said by a Kiev official not by Russia

Per your source that would make Ukraıne losing about 20% of their fighting force in that time frame which puts their loss at 30% in total. Quite far away from the 80% figure. If you insist on the 80% figure, however, basically you're arguing that Ukraine managed to crush Russians in the Kharkiv offensive using mostly newly conscripted civilians. Is that what you're pointing at?

[Sar1n]

Any truth to the rumours Russian officers are leaving Crimea without orders? Serious stuff indeed, maybe the Kherson advance is creating another opportunity.

Once again, its a crisis so surely Putin mobilises now?

I've seen news about businessmen and politicians pulling their families and property from Crimea.

If Ukraine liberates Kherson soon, it will become a perfect artillery base to cover advance from Zaporizhzhia city along the left bank of Dnieper toward Zaporizhzhia NPP, Nova Kakhovka dam (both immensely important strategic targets), then toward the coast, and straight south-east across Crimea toward Kerch. Units from Kherson will use pontoon bridges to cross behind the advancing units to secure the flank.

If that happens, I expect that Putin's head will roll. Russian army might tolerate warmonger despots, but they won't tolerate warmonger despot failures.

[AqD]

Some conservatives are not always wrong.
1- Winners and Losers in the Ukraine War -American Conservative

Perhaps we ought to invest as much time and energy trying to end this war as we do to defeat and humiliate Russia, which will not bring us peace

The war is going to end soon, with all their commanders and soldiers advanced back to home.

Our top concern should not be the war, but how to prevent it in future. An aggression is never born without reason. So long as the underlying cause exist, Ukraine and Europe are never safe. Even now their aggressions are still showing everywhere: https://www.trendsmap.com/twitter/tw...67647672328193

Putin is merely a front of that cause. To wipe out the seed its government must be taken over with ultra-nationalists cleansed, like Nazi Germany or Imperial Japan after WW2, or the isolation has to be kept at the cost of condemning average Russians to extreme poverty.

Which one would you prefer?

[Papay]

Per your source that would make Ukraıne losing about 20% of their fighting force in that time frame which puts their loss at 30% in total. Quite far away from the 80% figure. If you insist on the 80% figure, however, basically you're arguing that Ukraine managed to crush Russians in the Kharkiv offensive using mostly newly conscripted civilians. Is that what you're pointing at?

The Kharkiv offensive was lead by professional soldiers trained by NATO

[Papay]

Even if it was true (and honestly, it doesn't match what we've seen, as such casualties would result in routs and many more confirmed lost vehicles), it would still be loss of only 30% of fighting force, not 70%.

So you assume that Russians captured Mariupol, Severodonetsk and Licihansk(with a combined population of 700.000 people)with Ukrainians suffering minor losses? Just because the west tries to hide them for propaganda purposes, doesnt mean they dont exist

(83) Ukraine war: 80% of troops killed or injured in elite military unit, says commander - YouTube