Putin sought a short and glorious war that paraded through Ukraine. That would have been great for him. How long and humiliating does the war he got have to get before Russians start to wonder why Putin launched this bloody and destructive war that sends their scarce money and men into a meat grinder?
Russian President Vladimir Putin was so worried about a conflict with the West that he basically wound up creating one by proxy through his unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, a former US Army general said.
Putin is Russia's worst enemy. I kind of feel sorry for the Russian people:
I feel sorry for Russians who must endure a vodka-addled paranoid leadership determined to create a military threat on Russia's western border where none existed. Even as time runs out in Russia's east. ...
Putin sees himself as restoring Russian/Soviet territory and glory. But he doesn't have the power to cash the check he has written. The West should not make concessions to Putin that let him cover that check.
How much more will the Russian people endure before they conclude Putin himself is Russia's problem?
Seriously, what would a Manchurian Candidate sent to sabotage Russia do differently than what Putin is doing to Russia? And how long before the paranoid Russians come to that conclusion and string Putin up by his heels in Red Square?
Is Putin getting the time he needs to rebuild his partially shattered ground forces and provide that victory? Ukraine says the spring and summer will be decisive. I feel like I'm chasing a wallet on a string. The fall would be decisive. The winter would be decisive. Now spring ... or summer. This is plausible:
ISW previously assessed that the West has contributed to Ukraine’s inability to take advantage of having pinned Russian forces in Bakhmut by slow-rolling or withholding weapons systems and supplies essential for large-scale counteroffensive operations.
I do wonder if this consensus--bolstered by the high profile discussion of the time needed to get a small number of Western tanks to Ukraine--is a "when near, appear far" thing, with a Ukrainian winter counteroffensive still planned. My view is that existing Ukrainian tanks are adequate if handled well.
Of course, I also wonder if talk about a Russian renewed offensive in the next couple months is a ploy to get Ukraine to hold off a winter counteroffensive lest they be vulnerable to a mythical Russian spring offensive.
The Russians are thus very unlikely to achieve operationally decisive successes in their current and likely upcoming offensive operations, although they are likely to make tactically and possibly even operationally significant gains. Ukraine will very likely find itself in a good position from which to conduct successful counteroffensive operations following the culmination of Russian offensives before or during the spring rainy season—always assuming that the Ukrainians do not preempt or disrupt the Russian offensives with a counter-offensive of their own.
There will be a big campaign. Whether soon or later. Whether initiated by Ukraine or Russia. Russians know they aren't in a special military operation. But Putin keeps promising glorious victory over the Satan-led, NATO-proxy, Nazis in Kiev.
Will Russians keep showing up to stand in line for their turn inside the meat grinder? So far the Russians have accepted their lot more than I thought they would.
Putin seemingly expects the Russian people to keep marching forward into the machine guns:
Russian officials, Kremlin advisors, and other unspecified knowledgeable figures who spoke on condition of anonymity reportedly told Bloomberg that Putin seeks to conduct a new major offensive and that he believes that Russia’s tolerance to accept causalities [sic] will allow Russia to win the war in the long run despite Russian failures so far.
Surely there are limits? Right?
UPDATE (Monday): ISW says the delays in Ukraine's counteroffensive is due to delays in Western weapons. I find it hard to believe 100 Western tanks are necessary when Ukraine has a lot of its own tanks. But I'll have to think about the charge.
UPDATE (Tuesday): A useful tour of the factors involved in how the war unfolds.
UPDATE (Wednesday): Ukraine may end up retreating from Bakhmut:
The ISW December 27 forecast that the Russian offensive against Bakhmut was culminating was inaccurate. The Wagner Group offensive culminated, as ISW assessed on January 28, but the Russian command has committed sufficient conventional Russian forces to the effort to reinvigorate it, thus forestalling the overall culmination of the offensive on Bakhmut, which continues.
Is this paratrooper commitment the leading edge of a renewed Russian offensive in the Donbas? And does that mean Putin is trying to capture all of Donbas to let him declare victory and demand a ceasefire-in-place to hold his conquests?
UPDATE (Thursday): Russians may not like the war Putin started but those who haven't fled have largely hunkered down, internalized the propaganda hate for the enemy, and kept quiet.
My view is that while we can't expect a mass revolt any time soon, the foundation for a mass acceptance of a coup that ends the war is being built.
UPDATE: I wrote I'd have to think about the Ukrainian tank shortage issue. Ah, even though Ukraine captured and pressed into service hundreds of Russian tanks, Ukraine doesn't have all the spare parts for the tanks that are similar but not identical to Ukraine's.
On the other hand, the Russians are finding their tank barrels wearing out. So a lot of Russia's tanks are out of action.
UPDATE: Is Russia's renewed "Big Push" about to go over the top? It has numbers. It has had some training. Its leadership is likely to be thin and weak. My big question is whether it is well equipped. I suspect not. But I fear that Russia has done better than I hope in refurbishing stored equipment and making new equipment.
Still, the last country with 3 times the population than the defender that was convinced the next attack would be the "final offensive" is the country whose ground forces broke and refused to go over the top any more. Of course, nobody wants a 8-year war in Europe.
UPDATE (Friday): Russia is disabling cell phone service in occupied-Donbas, in an apparent effort to deny Ukraine signals intelligence for a pending Russian offensive.
Is Russia really going to be cooperative and launch a premature offensive that fails, weakening its ground forces for a subsequent decisive Ukrainian counter-offensive? That would be nice. It seems like a highly convenient prediction. Fingers crossed.
But I continue to worry that Russia is just trying to delay a Ukrainian winter counter-offensive until spring mud, buying Russia even more time to rebuild its ground forces.
NOTE: ISW updates continue here.
