re: Latest Updates: Russia-Ukraine Conflict

The one thing that Russia has laid many of that is impactful is land mines.

The dragons teeth are a joke, and can be pulled out of the way with an ATV. The trenches become graves with drones dropping grenades. The mines are the issue.

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If orders have gone out, I’d guess it has to kick off within the next couple of weeks.

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It really has to. The introduction of Storm Shadow on the battlefield has done a good deal to disrupt the Russian rear, and total fires behind Russian lines have more than doubled since then -- that's not something that can be maintained for long. The psychological shaping that's occurred with the border incursion and the Moscow drones yesterday. And with the exception of the Swedish brigade that arrived back in Ukraine the first week of this month, the other forces prepared for the offensive have been training in Ukraine with their new equipment for two months -- they're more than ready.

I really think that the ground offensive would have started this past week, if not for the rain in the south.

But besides all the operational reasons that the offensive needs to start soon, the political ones are even bigger.

Yes, the US can use Lend-Lease to send more older equipment, and yes, we can "sell" new equipment to Ukraine, but there's no way that we can continue to support Ukraine in the same way without another funding bill. And the $3 billion accounting change has provided a little bit of breathing room, but the money is going to run out soon.

In part, that's because this offensive is going to use a whole lot of ammo, rockets, etc. It's going to see a lot of equipment damaged that requires spare parts. And all that costs money. I mean, just the big missile attack on Kyiv this past week caused over 30 PAC-3 rockets to be fired from Patriot systems, and those cost over $1 million each.

Every time that we provide a new weapons system to Ukraine, the cost of continuing to provide Ukraine with ammo and maintenance goes up. What do you think is going to happen when F-16s and Abrams tanks enter the fight? Those are not known to be cheap systems to maintain.

And don't fool yourself into thinking that our European allies are going to be able to handle the logistics for F-16s -- they can't. The job is too big for them.

No, Ukraine can't win this war without another big spending authorization from the US this summer. If it doesn't happen before September, it will seriously impact their ability on the battlefield.

But the flip side of that is that Ukraine likely needs to show battlefield success to get the big authorization that it needs.

To be continued ...

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But the flip side of that is that Ukraine likely needs to show battlefield success to get the big authorization that it needs.

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Continuing this discussion, the upcoming US presidential election has the potential to disrupt long-term aid to Ukraine, as statements from Trump and DeSantis indicate a reluctance to continue our level of support.

The best solution to that, then, is to provide Ukraine with the support that it needs now.

The problem, of course, is that Speaker McCarthy has such a narrow margin in the House that can't really afford to do things that anger any of his GOP members. Another big military aid package would have already happened if either McCarthy had a bigger majority or if Democrats controlled the House.

The debt deal, though, may have provided an opening.

As soon as it is approved and signed into law, I would expect Congress to start working on the supplemental aid package to Ukraine. It wasn't included in the debt deal, because it's "emergency spending," and including it in the regular deal would have made the claims of deficit reduction look even more ridiculous. But I digress.

The critical factor is that there's no way that Ukraine is going to get the aid package that it really needs without battlefield success. I can already hear the voices saying,

"We gave them Bradleys and Strykers and they haven't even used them! Why should we give Ukraine more?"

Simply put: America loves a winner. Ukraine needs to do some winning, so that they can get what they need to keep winning.

Is the media overblowing Russias poor perrformance in this war? I dont pretent to know much about this but it seems like Russia is fighting with only one hand while Ukraine is going at it 100 percent. Russia is a massive country with a large military. Is there something I am missing or is Russia just really that bad?

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Is the media overblowing Russias poor perrformance in this war?

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There is some of this going on, yes.

However, Russia has also demonstrated that it got in over its ability in this conflict. Rather than adjusting to the reality and getting the hell out, Russia has stubbornly continued, killing tens of thousands of its own people and openly embracing genocide as a reaction to the legitimate resistance of the Ukrainians, who are fighting for their homes and lives. This has led the civilized world to turn away from Russia as a player in peaceful world commerce.

I guess the shorter answer is that when this began, Russia did not have a military that that could carry out this kind of invade and conquer operation. Now that Russia is going full war focused genocidal maniac, it has gotten more dangerous and out of control.

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However, Russia has also demonstrated that it got in over its ability in this conflict. Rather than adjusting to the reality and getting the hell out, Russia has stubbornly continued, killing tens of thousands of its own people and openly embracing genocide as a reaction to the legitimate resistance of the Ukrainians, who are fighting for their homes and lives. This has led the civilized world to turn away from Russia as a player in peaceful world commerce. I guess the shorter answer is that when this began, Russia did not have a military that that could carry out this kind of invade and conquer operation. Now that Russia is going full war focused genocidal maniac, it has gotten more dangerous and out of control.

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To be fair, Russia was about twenty miles from having the war wrapped up about 2 weeks in. If Kiev had fallen in the initial push from the North there’s a good chance that the rest of the Ukrainian army would’ve folded and an even better chance that Western material support would be near zero.

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To be fair, Russia was about twenty miles from having the war wrapped up about 2 weeks in. If Kiev had fallen in the initial push from the North there’s a good chance that the rest of the Ukrainian army would’ve folded and an even better chance that Western material support would be near zero.

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While true, they failed in their initial plan to surround Kyiv from the Chernihiv and Sumy regions, and by March 19 of 2022, less than a month after the invasion, they seemingly lost the initiative to take Kyiv itself. Do you think the US or another near peer military would have failed in their objectives one month into a similar invasion?

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But really the only point of my post was that Russia was really close to pulling it off. And they could’ve pulled it off with some better leadership on that front.

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Well, I think their authoritarian structure prevented that. The information that was funneled to Putin was always favorable, suggesting that the Ukrainians would greet the Russians as liberators. If there was an honest accounting of the situation on the ground, if that was even available to the Russians, may have led to a different attack plan. By all accounts, the Russians didn't believe that the Ukrainians had either the ability nor the will to put up a prolonged fight. It's hard to judge the Russians by what they could have done when what they did shows a key weakness in their leadership structure.

I'm not even sure it was a trap. The Russians did have the element of surprise and took the airport. The local forces put up enough of a fight that the second wave wasn't able to land. This allowed Ukraine to organize an ad hoc counterattack which was successful. Most of it was done under the initiative of on scene commanders, which is something the Russians definitely couldn't have pulled off.