I think there is something very interesting happening.
There seem to be quite a lot of reports that Russia is not getting as far ahead as it would have hoped in its invasion.
If you look at the soviet deep strike doctrine, this this attack appears to be based on, it is about fast moving columns advancing on different axes in order to QUICKLY encircle enemy forces. It’s about deep fires, and about having multiple echelons of troops
… so that successive waves can move forward and exploit any axes of advance that look promising.
The key to this is moving fast. And keeping your logistics protected - your armour is going to be out on a limb.
But it seems that the Russians are a bit surprised that the Ukrainians have fought back. And fought back well.
The Russians are taking casualties, which it seems they weren’t expecting.
The Russian ministry of health had just effectively mobilised civilian doctors in Russia. One assumes to deal with the level of casualties being sustained.
This makes sense in the following way.
Putin basically assumed that the Ukrainians would collapse so all they would have to do is a thunder run to Kyiv. Don’t worry about the logistics - we’ll sort that out once we’ve toppled their government.
But if you’re the Ukrainians and you know that the Russians are gonna use some variant of deep strike doctrine what do you do?
You let the armoured columns pass and then destroy the log tail using stay behind parties armed with anti tank weapons, or using helicopters, whilst keeping them out of the cities
(Incredibly stupid by the way that the Russians didn’t wipe out the Ukrainian Air Force before they started - a real sign of their hubris)
So I would guess that a lot of the Russian casualties are the logistic elements that are following up.
So far the Russians seem to have committed about 50k forces or a third of what they have. So maybe there are more echelons coming, and maybe the Russians will still overwhelm Kyiv. Or maybe they won’t. It seems in the balance.
And the longer the Ukrainians can hold on, the less the Russians will be able to continue.
Amateurs talk tactics and professionals talk logistics.
It’s also really unclear what putin’s political objectives are for this war. And as the west learnt over the last two decades, deploying military force without clearly understanding the political aims is stupid and leads to failure.
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Let’s take a look at the economic side of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
A 🧵
Once wars go beyond a couple of months, they tend to become a battle of the economies—that is, who is will to turn a bigger part of their economy into a machine that produces arms and munitions.
Obviously, if you have two sides that are both willing to turn as much as possible of their economies over to the war, then the side with the bigger economy will tend to win (all other things being equal).
The US has decided to allow Ukraine to use longer-range missiles in Russia.
This brings to a close a pretty feckless period of US policy towards Ukraine.
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It’s quite hard to even work out what the White House is trying to do these days, apart from vainly responding to events.
Let’s dig into it.
This permissions - that Ukraine be allowed to use the longer range US supplied ATACAMS missiles (range 300km) inside Russia - is all of a piece with a series of decisions stretching right back to 2014.
There is a lot going on in the news at the moment, but there is a story that is consistently being underreported: Russia.
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(potentially with 🖍️)
And in the UK - we have to recognise that Russia, and her actions, are the NUMBER ONE strategic threat that we face.
(You wouldn’t know this from the House of Commons where a lot more time is spent debating the Middle East - which - although it is important, is an order of magnitude less important to the UK in strategic terms than the Russia story)