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If you were holding out hope that the media and military analysts predicting the imminent collapse of Russia because of the failed invasion of Ukraine would get a grip on reality, think again. I take the New York Times as the leading indicator of the establishment mindset and the Times published a piece that reveals the delusion and confusion about the war in Ukraine that infects the Washington/New York Swamps.
Put simply, the article–Ukraine’s Demands for More Weapons Clash With U.S. Concerns–tacitly concedes Russia is winning but holds out hope for a dramatic Ukrainian come back. Here are the highlights (and lowlights) of the piece tapped out by CIA mouthpiece, Eric Schmitt, and Julian Barnes:
The Ukrainians say they need faster shipments of long-range artillery and other sophisticated weapons to blunt Russia’s steady advance. The United States and the Europeans insist more are on the way but are wary of sending too much equipment before Ukrainian soldiers can be trained. The Pentagon is concerned about potentially depleting its stockpiles in the coming months.
Got that? Russia is advancing steadily. The weapon systems the US and NATO want to send outnumbers the Ukrainians trained to operate them. And the trillion dollar U.S. defense budget is running out of missiles and shells and cannot keep pace with the anemically funded Russians. Hilarious.
Now for the delusional parts of the Schmitt/Barnes article:
U.S. officials say Ukraine could mount a counterattack and claw back some — though not all — of the territory it has lost if it can continue to exact a bloody toll on Russia until new weapons can flow in from the West.
And if a frog had wings it could fly. The reason Ukraine is begging for new tanks, planes, artillery units and multiple launch rocket systems is because Russia has destroyed over 80% of Ukraine’s assets. And in the process of destroying tanks and planes and artillery pieces, Russia also has killed the best of Ukraine’s troops.
But that fact escapes Schmitt and Barnes. They happily peddle the DOD/CIA bullshit that Russia has suffered staggering losses and is scraping the bottom of the barrel to fill ostensibly depleted military units:
The nearly five-month war is at a critical moment, U.S. officials and others familiar with the intelligence assessments say. As many as 100 to 200 Ukrainian soldiers have died every day since Russia shifted its military campaign in the spring to focus on eastern Ukraine. But overall, about 20,000 Russians have been killed. Injuries have taken about 60,000 more off the battlefield. Nearly a third of Russia’s equipment has been destroyed in the war, according to Western officials, including several who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive information.
To replenish its military, Russia would have to mobilize more of its population, by making a declaration of war — officially the conflict remains a “special military operation” — or by moving troops and equipment from Russia’s Far North or Far East to Ukraine.
Let me do the math for you. Russia started Phase 2–i.e., focusing on Donbass–on 1 April 2022. As of today, that is 104 days. If Ukraine was losing 100 a day that means only 10,400 have died. If the number is 200, that means 20,800. So let me get this straight. Ukraine, which is in a defensive crouch since April 1, has lost the Luhansk Republic and is being methodically pushed out of Donetsk, and has, under the worse case presented by US intelligence, suffered the same number of casualties as Russia?
If the Russian army actually suffered the kinds of losses claimed by Ukraine and the New York Times and anonymous US officials, then how in the hell did those sneaky Russians beat the crap out of the well entrenched Ukrainians? Russia started the “Special Military Operation” with approximately 200,000 troops. Yet the folks talking to Schmitt and Barnes insist that 80,000 Russians are casualties. In other words, 40% of the Russian force has been lost.
So, if that is true, those Russians must be incredible warriors. Ukraine has not taken back and defended a single hectare of territory it once held. This despite having a three to one numerical advantage over Russia. What the hell? Ukraine started the war with 600,000 soldiers against Russia’s paltry 200,000 and it is Russia that is, according to the Times, “steadily advancing.”
The real question that Schmitt and Barnes should have asked, how long can US officials continue to bullshit themselves and pour expensive weapon systems into a rat hole? The speed of Russia’s advance appears to be accelerating. There are reports today that Russian forces are entering the outskirts of Seversk, one of the key strong points of the new Ukrainian defensive line. If true, the Russians are likely to achieve a strategic breakthrough in the Donetsk.
What the gullible reporters and the morons who staff the CIA and DIA fail to comprehend is that Russia’s tactic of systematically destroying the air, armor and artillery assets over the past three months appears to have achieved Clausewitz’s culminating point–i.e., the point at which a military force is no longer able to perform its operations.
Ukraine, notwithstanding it numerical advantage in personnel, has yet to mount a significant offensive that has pushed the Russians back and kept them at bay. That is reality. The reality for Ukrainian troops is a nightmare. Here is a video of Russia attacking three columns of Ukrainian troops trying to launch an attack on Kherson in southern Ukraine:
At some point, the American public will awaken to this reality and realize they have supported a program of unilateral disarmament. We sent many of our best weapons to Ukraine and the Russians are blowing them to hell.
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