The Elegy for Russia
It may take some time; the West is “A day late and a dollar short”
ISW Reported (July 2, 2024) — “Russian preparations that can support multiple future branch plans suggest a more developed level of operational planning and foresight than the Russian command has proven capable of executing thus far in the war since early 2022.”
There is a caveat to the previous declaration — “The ability of this operational planning to come to fruition, however, will be bounded by the overall poor tactical-level capabilities of Russian forces currently fighting in these areas.”
In other words, after Two Years of fighting, the brass learned about a “good strategy.” However, someone forgot to prepare the troops for the “tactical” ability to execute the strategy.
A Military Strategy requires a whole package of things to execute. The Russian soldiers in the front (the only mass available for any strategy) only know to run and duck in the face of the enemy.
Based on this, the only new requirement is that they run in mass in two separate combat zones instead of one.
It sounds like when they said, “Napoleon invaded Russia, all the way to Moscow, but his troops were not prepared for the Winter in Russia.” Or Hitler doing a very similar thing. The ego of men drives bad decisions.
Ukraine has fought a reactionary war, plugging holes everywhere with Armies of willing soldiers who have a clear view of why they are there. If there is one ego in Ukraine, it’d be Mr. President, (informal), Supreme Commander–in — Chief, (military), His Excellency, (diplomatic) Volodymyr Zelenskyy. However, he knows Ukraine is fighting for its life and still works with his Army Staff.
However, Ukraine is running out of people even though the kill ratio is 4/1 in favor of Ukraine. Second, the West, most of this year, has seen fit to starve Ukraine by measuring help with eye droppers.
Third and also consequential, the US Presidential election is this November, and there is no clarity as to who is running or who may win. In addition, the US people are waging an emotional war against each other and have no thought at all about Ukraine or the long-term consequences of that war.
On the Other Hand
ISW, on their report of July 3rd, specified:
“Ukraine is addressing its manpower challenges and is forming several new brigades, but delayed and insufficient Western weapons deliveries will likely prevent Ukraine from equipping all these new brigades. Timely and appropriate Western security assistance continues to be a crucial determinant of when and at what scale Ukrainian forces can contest the battlefield initiative and conduct operationally significant counteroffensive operations in the future.”
The West is Doing the Opposite of North Korea
With friends like NATO, who needs “friends?” Shouldn’t Europe take the gloves off and at least help Ukraine with hardware in a timely fashion?
The Russian Skeleton is Starting to Show
Either way, Russia will not survive this war without fracturing and becoming something else.
Ukraine can only do what they are doing, suffer in silence, and keep working to get the help they need. In other words, keep paying with an exposed Army, short of strategic supplies; there is nothing they can do.
