re: Latest Updates: Russia-Ukraine Conflict

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Good thread from Michael Kofman: Director, Russia Studies at CNA. Senior Adjunct Fellow, CNAS.

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Long story short… it’s a freaking stalemate with no end in sight.

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pretty much since November its been a strategic stalemate. neither side has gained much as line have only moved a few km.

The wait is to see who tries to regain the initiative first once ground conditions improve in mid/late spring.

and then can that side maintain the initiative or will it give the other side energy for a counter offensive, and then the questions is are we back to a stalemate if neither can maintain pressure.

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Agree. Longterm, time is not on the side of Ukraine. Russia can sustain losses on the scale seen in this war longer than Ukraine can. Ukraine’s best hope is to (1) stop the upcoming Russian offensive and then (2) immediately launch a successful offensive that inflicts a massive defeat on the Russians. Basically what the Ukrainians have to do is make the Russian people lose heart in the continuation of the war.

That’s the path to Ukraine ending this war on favorable terms. What they cannot do is allow the war to go on for another year in the manner it’s gone for the the past year. Russia can afford the losses longterm from a continuation of the stalemate as it stands today, Ukraine cannot. Yes, Ukraine has seen great battlefield success that has bolstered its morale and stopped Russin momentum. But what Ukraine hasn’t done is inflict a strategic blow. Its successes, while impressive have bot been sufficiently large to seriously threaten Russia with a strategic battlefield defeat. They’ve bloodied Russia’s nose. But up until now they have lacked the means to land a knockout blow. They have to land that blow sooner rather than later.

If Ukraine fails to do so, the stalemate that favors Russia in the longterm will drag on. The eventual result will be either Ukraine sues for peace on unfavorable terms; or if they go long enough, will see the collapse of Ukrainian forces in the field followed by Russia overrunning however much of Ukraine they want.

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Is it possible for Ukraine to deliver a knockout blow? Would Putin ever give up? Is it possible for public pressure to force his hand? I doubt it.

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All that remains to be seen. I’m skeptical though. I think Ukraine is putting its hopes in military aid from the West, particularly more modern tanks, APCs, and artillery tipping the scales.

The key to all this will be the two things I pointed out above:

1. Ukraine has to hold the line when Russia launches its upcoming offensive.

2. Ukraine has to follow this up with a counteroffensive strong enough to inflict a serious battlefield defeat on a strategic level. I’m not talking merely taking a city or town; I mean they need to cutoff, encircle, and destroy at least a corps size Russian force.

ETA: and this is where Russia has the real advantage in this war. Whereas Ukraine has to do something neither side has been capable of doing so far in order to win this war, all Russia has to do is (1) not allow its front to collapse and (2) continue to bleed Ukraine on a steady pace as they are doing today.

As things stand today, unless something changes soon in the nature of this war, the inevitable conclusion of this war will be a Ukrainian capitulation of some degree later this year or possibly in 2024.

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Does Ukraine even have the manpower to eliminate a corps size Russian force?

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I honestly do not know.

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Russia has no problem throwing conscripted manpower into the meat grinder and will continue to do so, which in time, will become problematic for Ukraine.

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Exactly. And that’s why Ukraine needs to find an off-ramp from this war sooner rather than later. Time is not on Ukraine’s side.

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Does Ukraine even have the manpower to eliminate a corps size Russian force? Russia has no problem throwing conscripted manpower into the meat grinder and will continue to do so, which in time, will become problematic for Ukraine.

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What, in others opinions, would be considered a sufficiently large enough force to achieve this in manpower terms given current conditions?

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Agree. Longterm, time is not on the side of Ukraine. Russia can sustain losses on the scale seen in this war longer than Ukraine can.

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a number of things to look at with respect to time.

1) how long will western allies continue to support ukraine if we still see a stalemate
2) the onus is on ukraine to regain territory. the old adage "possession is 9/10th the law" if they cant force them out a protracted stalemate allows a sense of ownership to creep in....IE, look at how Crimea is viewed since 2014
3) russia seems to have weathered the public support window, but will protracted imbargo, high losses, and a bad economy, they dont have an unlimited timeframe wither.

Ukraine, views this war not starting in feb 22, but ongoing since 2014. they view this as one in the same with things drastically ramping up. if the west pulls out they are still determined to fight, so i believe they are looking at the long game.

should they push back to '22 borders, i dont see them stopping there....

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Good thread from Michael Kofman: Director, Russia Studies at CNA. Senior Adjunct Fellow, CNAS.

Long story short… it’s a freaking stalemate with no end in sight.

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That assessment was a good read, and at least sounds correct to me.

Hard for me to decide if the current “stalemate” is truly that or just an inevitable pause and regroup during winter. The Ukrainian kherson counter offensive wasn’t that long ago, and since then winter has set in and the crawl to bakhmut has been the only action.

I personally thought early on wherever the lines were at the end of 2022 is where the lines stay. I’ve been wrong about nearly everything with this war, but I think that’s still largely my take.

I don’t see effective Russian offensives outside of Luhansk and Donetsk at this point. I’m also not sure Ukraine can dislodge Russia from where they are in Luhansk and Donetsk.

I do think Ukrainian drive to melitopol and west from there is possible this summer.

From a ground forces standpoint, Russia struggles immensely because they simply don't do combined arms well. So they are assigned areas and the military leaders just hope for the best. Combined arms training and execution is where our military and NATO thrive. Hence, ISAF coordination during OEF. The ability to communicate with other branches and other countries through the weapons is second to logistics in importance. NATO has very strict rules when it comes to interoperability of equipment and the coordination of ground forces. They know how important it is. Russia just simply can't coordinate forces well. In the Early days of the invasion they were using cell phones to talk. That was clue #1 they were gonna struggle. Adding more troops doesn't help Putin. It exacerbates his problems, due to not possessing an NCO corps.

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