Thread by @J_JHelin

While I do agree that Ukraine's ultimate victory is dependent on continued and increased Western support, I still think that the hyperfocus on technology and equipment is problematic.

Ukraine has a lot of training and command issues that hamper the effective use of material.

1/

https://twitter.com/TheStudyofWar/status/1724849825319924034

If it was simply a question of material, Ukraine should have achieved more during this year's offensives. In fact, many Western commentators hyped up the aid received and expected a quick breakout with the equipment that had already been donated to Ukraine before June.

2/

In fact, the narrative of "not enough was given" only appeared after the summer offensive visibly started to struggle. Often by the same actors who hyped up the chances of the operation throughout the spring.

This feels dishonest.

3/

While Ukraine needs more material, could've used more materiel, and is continually hampered by reactive Western policies, we should also be able to admit that many of the problems of this summers offensive are to do with the Ukrainian armed forces themselves.

4/

In August I wrote a piece titled "We haven't been able to handle Ukraine's mistakes".

That seems to still be the case in popular discourse.

Lacklustre coordination of ground operations and long-range fires is not fixed by simply dumping more long-range fires into Ukraine.

5/

Failures to act as a unified force on a brigade, even battalion level are not simply fixed by giving Ukraine more tanks and infantry fighting vehicles.

Failures to coordinate and concentrate artillery to support ground assaults are not fixed by the addition of more shells.

6/

We can say that the Ukrainian forces were not properly trained, and needed more time, but that ignores the fact that the timeline for the summer offensive was, at least according to my sources, set as much by the Ukrainians as it was by Western partners, if not more so.

7/

In short, we didn't force Ukraine to attack when it did. If someone has hard evidence to the contrary, I'll be glad to be proven wrong here.

We certainly didn't force Ukraine to give the Western equipment to green units and attrit their experienced ones in Bakmut.

8/

And we most certainly didn't force Ukraine to split their forces between the Bakhmut and southern axes, nor was it our hand that made the Ukrainian offensive bereft of any operational surprise.

9/

My argument is still the same it was in August. Ukraine needs material, but it also desperately needs Western training and willingness to enact widespread change in its institutions together with Western trainers.

Meanwhile, the West can't just give off-the-shelf solutions

10/

We have to come together with the Ukrainians, and figure out what kind of reforms and training they need, what kind of doctrinal training they need, what kind of staff-officer training they need to fix the total lack of army-corps/division level organisation...

11/

In short, we need to figure out, together with the Ukrainians, what kind of immaterial, as well as material, tools they need to win this war.

This won't be an easy discussion. It certainly needs both sides of the partnership to make compromises and be humble.

12/

It definitely requires everyone to swallow a lot of their pride, and Ukrainian politicians really need to be more straightforward about their own failures and limit the hype and propaganda, while Western ones need to start actually cobbling together a unified response.

13/

It's hard, and focusing on tanks or air-defence systems, or artillery production might be easier to count and handle and concretize to western populations while keeping up Ukraine-hype.

But it's the only way forward if we truly want Ukraine to win this war.

14/14

The text I wrote in August can be found here. It's, sadly, in Finnish.



15/14hs.fi/ulkomaat/art-2…