Why does Moscow not want Kyiv to get tanks, planes and missile defense systems at all? Let’s try to understand the reason for an opposition that is not only political and not only aimed at “winning easier”.
The troops involved in the war of aggression against Ukraine, which only Russia and its closest “clients now refer to as “military special operations, are fighting on a 2,500 kilometers ago:
► From the South Ben estuary to the Don estuary, with Crimea, Donetsk and RostovonDon as departure hubs and aiming to head for the southeastern part of Ukraine
► From Luhans’k to Sumy Oblast, behind which are the centralsouthern military districts of the Russian Federation and which is mainly concentrated in Kharkiv and Sumy Oblasts
► From Katerynivka to the Belarusian border and then to the “radioecological” i.e. contaminated Park of Palieski within the territory of Belarus with Belarus itself and the centralnorthern Russian military districts behind it and with a focus on Chernihiv and Kyiv.
To understand each other is the only comparison for such an extensive front between Germany and the Soviet Union in 1941 and 1945. On this front, however, Hitler and Stalin used Dai (annually). over 6 million of men in uniform from year one through 11 million of the penultimate.
Before we continue, the first in a series of questions is:
But some “analysts of the RussoUkrainian war have considered the frontline on which Putin — including Donbass fighters, Wagner and “volunteers from the Middle East and the Caucasus — has drawn since February 24 measured at around 250,000 men?
We’re talking a hundred men for every kilometer up front. A pittance. If the Russian Federation also decided to mobilize its entire reserves, they would be numerically equal to those that Ukraine could more easily deploy.
But isn’t it the case that Russia already occupies a fifth of Ukraine?
If you look closely at the map, from a territorial control perspective, Ukraine has jumped back to exactly where Russian lines could have stretched like crazy: the distance between bases with supplies and hospitals military and the front lines of the Russian advance exceeds 200 kilometers in some places. Given the Russian armed forces’ chronic “bulimia” of fuel, spare parts and food, and the Ukrainians’ ability to beat them out of thin air and beyond every kilometer of advance costs a fortune in terms of drained vehicles, soldiers who use them suffer from the cold and hunger and last but not least the morale of the Russian fighters. It is no coincidence that the Moscow generals have to face the shooting of Ukrainians in order to repel and lead the troops at the front.
What about the distance between the battlefields and Russian medical supplies? If it takes you more than an hour to transport an injured person from the floor to the operating table, you must take them to the morgue upon arrival. After all, the Russians often attack hospitals to deprive the “enemy” of the exceptional advantage of fighting with doctors and nurses ready behind them?
What about the Donbass? Nobody talks about it anymore.
But where the Russians theoretically have at least 50,000 men in good spirits after eight years of war, they haven’t made a step forward. Since February 24, they’ve been pinned to their positions for one simple reason: they face a force equivalent to a quarter or maybe a third of Ukraine’s troops, which they can push back or worse if they stick their noses out . But they are not attacked precisely because Libra has agreed with both so far.
On the eve of the war, the newspapers spoke of the danger of “encirclement” and the consequent “sacking” of this “Ukrainian hammer” in front of the Donbass. Why didn’t any of this happen?
Apart from the fact that Moscow has deployed its forces on a very broad front, even someone who has never attended the school of war understands that one must have reliable, agile and rapid means of encircling them, in order to move quickly in move in multiple directions to put the Ukrainians under pressure in a vise. The Russians don’t benefit: even their most modern wagons feel fragile, padded and fuelhungry, unsuitable for fast maneuvering off the rails. The dismantling of rails and tracks turned out to be one of the most important steps taken by the Ukrainians to allow them to do so, and one of the most crucial mistakes made by the Russians.
Doesn’t Moscow have the best tanks and artillery in the world?
But the Ukrainians know their territory (and know how to move), they have acquired excellent antitank weapons and have the advantage of having the civilian population stationed compactly next to the resistance fighters. The Russians gathered only hatred, resistance and resentment: wiretapping the communications between the commandos and the troops of Moscow, all analog and discovered, only paints a picture of disappointment in receiving enemies instead of liberators. That Ukrainian propaganda alludes to this is an aggravating circumstance, not an excuse. After all, the Russians often have very well designed vehicles, but they are loosely produced and made with poor materials.
Yes, but Mariupol is about to fall. Or not?
Maybe yes, maybe no. There appear to be no more than 20,000 Russian soldiers plus a few “volunteers” stationed in the outskirts, in some less defensible neighborhoods and around the city. But with around 5,000 defenders including 3,000 from the notorious Azov Battalion, who can only fight and have no hope of rescue and 160,000 residents still present, mostly adult males, the scenario is not one of impending fall, even if anything can happen. As I said in a previous article, you defend better in the rubble and the tanks don’t move easily.
That said, it doesn’t seem like the perfect scenario for the Russians to do nonsense like using chemical or nuclear weapons?
Do you really think that the military and political leaders of the Russian Federation want to launch a nuclear war for… Donbass? They, too, do not stop saying that they are ready to use it only for the survival of the Russian Federation.
The nuclear threat unleashed on the world on February 27 is not the first step towards escalation, but the last: either the Kremlin lord is ready to destroy the world at this point, or he has played his last good cards too soon. In the event of a nuclear attack, it would have the first strike as a chance, but hardly the second. And the hypothesis that he wants to play the First Strike, which since the days of the Soviets Moscow has always been held as a choice, in the sense of a geographically limited attack is almost certain and he wants to hit the whole free world first nonsense, also because he would be the first victim of the immediate counterattack. Indeed, let’s not forget that in such a scenario, Russia should hit the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Germany, and Turkey, while Washington and its allies…just Russia.
So why do Russians get the urge for Ukrainians to be equipped with planes, missile defense systems and other conveniences?
But it is a consequence of what has been said so far: the Russians can hope to wear Ukraine down in a long war under the current conditions, but if Kyiv gets the tools to launch more missiles, and also more effectively and deeper from the air to beat , it’s game over for Moscow. And even if they sent the Belarusians, all the Chechen militiamen, the 16,000 Syrian “volunteers and all their best reserves to Ukraine, in the presence of these tools they would have the same effect as the RussoJapanese War: the destruction of two forces instead only one.
Ultimately, Putin has already lost for the writer. Sooner or later he will have to negotiate with own employees the terms of his withdrawal from the scene.
Photo: MoD Ukraine