Ukraine's top general may be on borrowed time given the political and counteroffensive concerns being raised by the US and Zelensky.
He seems to be very well respected internationally but I think some concerns were raised that he didn't adhere to enough US military tactics on the counteroffensive.
Maybe a scenario where they are trying to gauge reaction.
Ukraine's top general may be on borrowed time given the political and counteroffensive concerns being raised by the US and Zelensky.
He seems to be very well respected internationally but I think some concerns were raised that he didn't adhere to enough US military tactics on the counteroffensive.
Maybe a scenario where they are trying to gauge reaction.
The actual Russian casualties could be way more than 383.000.
In long battles and wars, losses from things other than enemy action can be really significant. In conditions like a winter trench battle, there's going to be quite a few losses due to various sicknesses. In prolonged battles with daily artillery attacks, mental breakdowns are common. If your equipment and/or training is poor, things like losing body parts to hypothermia can become an issue. If your logistics are poor, bad food can create all kinds of problems. If your discipline is poor, you can lose quite a few people to general stupidity, fights and drunkedness, especially when troops get mentally exhausted.
(You can btw fudge your own casualty numbers by excluding some or all of the stuff from above.)
Historically in long battles or wars, casualties were mostly things other than enemy action. Modern militaries tend to be a lot better about that stuff, but I would suspect that in this war, there's still a lot of that "other stuff" happening. (Russian men are incredibly accident prone even when they don't spend all their time around equipment that is specifically meant to kill people, and their logistics don't seem to be very good.)
We don't really know how that one casualty number is tracked, but I would imagine that it's probably really hard to even estimate how many Russians are lost to things other than enemy action, so my guess is that that's the Ukrainian estimate of thei own military action.
(On the other hand, people can get counted as casualties multiple times if they get injured and go back to the front.)
(Each military is also going to have their own guideline on what's "a casualty" in which statistic.)
Last edited by Itse; 01-31-2024 at 02:34 AM.
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Ukraine's top general may be on borrowed time given the political and counteroffensive concerns being raised by the US and Zelensky.
He seems to be very well respected internationally but I think some concerns were raised that he didn't adhere to enough US military tactics on the counteroffensive.
Maybe a scenario where they are trying to gauge reaction.
“Personally I think this is a bad idea. There are not fundamental issues between them but Zelenskiy’s office has been concerned that Zaluzhnyi has been making political not military statements,” Goncharenko said.
Quote:
A Ukrainian counteroffensive that began in June has failed to break through Russian lines amid criticism the attack was spread across too many axes – but the real dispute between the president and his top general appear to be political.
The Ukrainian general is the most popular figure in the country other than the president and his high standing has irritated Zelenskiy’s office, particularly as the politician has been considering whether to hold fresh elections, currently suspended under martial law.
Quote:
Speculation has also swirled in Ukrainian media for months that Zaluzhnyi would be the only viable challenger to Zelenskiy for the presidency if fresh elections were to be called while the war continues and the general were to run.
This article is all about the political tensions between the two. The driving reason cited for asking him to step down is political, a desire to reduce the General's public profile and tarnish his ability to potentially enter politics.
Which isn't to say that there hasn't been critics of the summer campaign, but that's not what this article is about.
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back to the war...
Ukraine flies drones into Nevsky Oil Plant in St Pete. The Ukrainian drone originated from the Kharkiv area. It flew over 700 MILES through Russia's Bryansk, Smolensk, Tver and Novgorod regions and crashed at Russia's largest oil export port in St. Petersburg. https://twitter.com/user/status/1752588721705431441
This article is all about the political tensions between the two. The driving reason cited for asking him to step down is political, a desire to reduce the General's public profile and tarnish his ability to potentially enter politics.
Which isn't to say that there hasn't been critics of the summer campaign, but that's not what this article is about.
I have read a lot of articles regarding the counteroffensive, the one above is one where he was asked to step down. I think we may be reaching an inflection point between the two guys in a lot of ways.
I am by no means a military man, but with US stockpiles of weapons slowly going away, a counteroffensive that has not materialized noticeable gains and what seems a long, drawn out war, The Zeleneky may want to try someone else for war and political purposes.
Here is an article I read a few weeks ago suggesting serious differences of opinion within the US/NATO and Ukrainian tactics during their offensive. An interesting quote from the start.
"On June 15, in a conference room at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, flanked by top U.S. commanders, sat around a table with his
Ukrainian counterpart, who was joined by aides from Kyiv. The room was heavy with an air of frustration.
Austin, in his deliberate baritone, asked Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov about Ukraine’s decision-making in the opening days of its long-awaited counteroffensive, pressing him on why his forces weren’t using Western-supplied mine-clearing equipment to enable a larger, mechanized assault, or using smoke to conceal their advances. Despite Russia’s thick defensive lines, Austin said, the Kremlin’s troops weren’t invincible"
I also think the US blame game is also ramping up as it does appear they miscalculated the level of support and the type of equipment they offered earlier. If Ukraine was given and trained on more equipment earlier, it would have had a more profound effect. After billions and billions of dollars spent, American's may be wondering what they are getting for their money and that is having a chilled affect on new money going to Ukraine.
This article is all about the political tensions between the two. The driving reason cited for asking him to step down is political, a desire to reduce the General's public profile and tarnish his ability to potentially enter politics.
Which isn't to say that there hasn't been critics of the summer campaign, but that's not what this article is about.
As a personal opinion, while the article is interesting and well worth sharing because it speculates on interesting stuff, and there is certainly some basis for the speculation... ...it's still mostly just speculation, much of it seemingl based on stuff opposition politicians are saying.
Keep your pinches of salt nearby.
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I have read a lot of articles regarding the counteroffensive, the one above is one where he was asked to step down. I think we may be reaching an inflection point between the two guys in a lot of ways.
I am by no means a military man, but with US stockpiles of weapons slowly going away, a counteroffensive that has not materialized noticeable gains and what seems a long, drawn out war, The Zeleneky may want to try someone else for war and political purposes.
Here is an article I read a few weeks ago suggesting serious differences of opinion within the US/NATO and Ukrainian tactics during their offensive. An interesting quote from the start.
"On June 15, in a conference room at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, flanked by top U.S. commanders, sat around a table with his
Ukrainian counterpart, who was joined by aides from Kyiv. The room was heavy with an air of frustration.
Austin, in his deliberate baritone, asked Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov about Ukraine’s decision-making in the opening days of its long-awaited counteroffensive, pressing him on why his forces weren’t using Western-supplied mine-clearing equipment to enable a larger, mechanized assault, or using smoke to conceal their advances. Despite Russia’s thick defensive lines, Austin said, the Kremlin’s troops weren’t invincible"
I also think the US blame game is also ramping up as it does appear they miscalculated the level of support and the type of equipment they offered earlier. If Ukraine was given and trained on more equipment earlier, it would have had a more profound effect. After billions and billions of dollars spent, American's may be wondering what they are getting for their money and that is having a chilled affect on new money going to Ukraine.
My opinion/understanding of this:
They did try some NATO tactics to begin with, and it was a disaster that only lead to a ton of lost equipment very quickly. NATO military strategy is completely built around air superiority and combined arms offensives, and Ukraine just doesn't have the equipment for that. NATO doctrines were also created in the pre-drone era. It's being updated, but it's not there yet.
To me it also looks like most inside NATO have already accepted this, but there's some who are too proud to accept that much of their training and experience is either irrelevant or obsolete for this war.
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Someone already posted something about the infastructure problems inside Russia, and this video has a lot more about that. It's good but long (1.25x speed recommended, their pace is a bit on the slow side).
To sum that part of the video up basically Russia has started to have serious problems with their centralized heating systems, leaving lots of people all over the country without heat in the middle of the winter.
(Central heating is a system which apparently isn't that familiar to people everywhere and needs explaining to some people; essentially it's a system where water heated in one power plant is used to heat thousands or tens of thousands of homes at once. It's a great system (cheap, effective, reliable, safe) when it works. When you have a country like Russia and things start failing, it means very large groups of people can lose their heating all at once.)
This winter this has become somewhat of an epidemic, for multiple reasons:
- government is short on money
- shortage of trained personnel (municipal technicians were apparently pretty much the first group to get drafted... which kind of makes sense as a short term move)
- lack of spare parts as most of those power plants use western built machinery
Last edited by Itse; 01-31-2024 at 03:39 PM.
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The EDA gifts to Greece sweeten a larger arms package that includes 40 Lockheed F-35 stealth fighters, which Greece is buying for $8.6 billion. The Biden administration previously approved, in 2022 and 2023, $60 million in financing for arms-purchases by Athens.
In exchange for this largess, the Americans want the Greeks to donate more weapons to the Ukrainians. “We continue to be interested in the defense capabilities that Greece could transfer or sell to Ukraine,” Blinken wrote.
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This Warographics video from 3 weeks back has some very interesting stuff about the (possibly) shifting focus of the war. (The latter part of the video is about other stuff, it's only the first half that's about the Russo-Ukrainian war.)
To sum up, Ukraine has been bringing the war to Russia more openly (without it causing any real escalation from the Russian side outside of some revenge strikes), and both sides are now focusing more on hitting each others war production.
Personal thoughts:
Especially if the land war slows down, I think at this point a shift in focus might be favorable for Ukraine. Just to begin with, you can very well beat quantity with quality when it comes to air strikes, and while Russians have massively improved their strategies, Ukraine seems to hold a significant advantage in quality of intelligence, which matters a lot in this type of war. (Probably a combination of western support and anti-Putinist support from within Russia.) Plus, western weapons tend to be more accurate and reliable, and Ukraine is on schedule to add western fighters with even better western weapons to their side of the table.
Ukraine doesn't seem to be in a huge hurry to end the war, as they have the better motivation, much stronger support from the population, and international financing. Their military strength is probably under some strain and their ability to take land by force seems limited at best, but economically and politically their situation seems fairly stable. So a waiting pattern at this point is probably a good thing. Let's see what the western fighter jets bring to the table etc.
Russia's financial strength on the other hand looks like it's on a downward slide and possibly on borrowed time already... and they keep wasting huge amounts of men and equipment with basically nothing to show for it, which is not going to help Russian support for the war. However, they've put tons of resources into producing new material while western military support is in a bit of a lull at this point.
I'm still feeling pretty good about Ukraine's chances of winning this war, and I still think if they win, it's going to be either because Russia's economy crashes or because Russian support for the war crashes to untolerable lows. Ukraine is obviously not going to beat them militarily. (The military pressure does still matter though, since that creates the costs that Russia struggles to deal with.)
If neither those things show signs of happening in 2024, then it's unlikely Ukraine will ever get it's land back. Or obviously if Russia can bring together enough military force to start breaking through Ukrainian defenses.
In any case, I think 2024 is going to be a pretty decisive year for this war. Even if nothing much changes, it's going to tell us a lot about how the war is likely to end. (Obviously the US stupidity contest called "presidential election" is also going to make a huge difference in how things will go.)
Last edited by Itse; 02-01-2024 at 11:00 AM.
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This Warographics video from 3 weeks back has some very interesting stuff about the (possibly) shifting focus of the war. (The latter part of the video is about other stuff, it's only the first half that's about the Russo-Ukrainian war.)
To sum up, Ukraine has been bringing the war to Russia more openly (without it causing any real escalation from the Russian side outside of some revenge strikes), and both sides are now focusing more on hitting each others war production.
Personal thoughts:
Especially if the land war slows down, I think at this point a shift in focus might be favorable for Ukraine. Just to begin with, you can very well beat quantity with quality when it comes to air strikes, and while Russians have massively improved their strategies, Ukraine seems to hold a significant advantage in quality of intelligence, which matters a lot in this type of war. (Probably a combination of western support and anti-Putinist support from within Russia.) Plus, western weapons tend to be more accurate and reliable, and Ukraine is on schedule to add western fighters with even better western weapons to their side of the table.
Ukraine doesn't seem to be in a huge hurry to end the war, as they have the better motivation, much stronger support from the population, and international financing. Their military strength is probably under some strain and their ability to take land by force seems limited at best, but economically and politically their situation seems fairly stable. So a waiting pattern at this point is probably a good thing. Let's see what the western fighter jets bring to the table etc.
Russia's financial strength on the other hand looks like it's on a downward slide and possibly on borrowed time already... and they keep wasting huge amounts of men and equipment with basically nothing to show for it, which is not going to help Russian support for the war. However, they've put tons of resources into producing new material while western military support is in a bit of a lull at this point.
I'm still feeling pretty good about Ukraine's chances of winning this war, and I still think if they win, it's going to be either because Russia's economy crashes or because Russian support for the war crashes to untolerable lows.
If neither those things show signs of happening in 2024, then it's unlikely Ukraine will ever get it's land back. Or obviously if Russia can bring together enough military force to start breaking through Ukrainian defenses.
In any case, I think 2024 is going to be a pretty decisive year for this war. Even if nothing much changes, it's going to tell us a lot about how the war is likely to end.
Ukrainian Air Power will make a huge difference when it finally comes on line.
Air Power when used correctly is devastating. It is one of the main items missing from their arsenal.
Couple that with deterioration of the Russian Defensive line (I doubt they do much trench maintenance) and this spring could look a lot different.
Ukrainian Forces has some a great ability to learn.
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