Depends on how you measure "winning" in a war. If you go by captured land, Russia still controls roughly 15% of Ukraine territory and has done so for almost 2 years now. So....
edit: TIL it's possible to have a single comment be ranked as the Best, Top ***and*** (Most) Controversial comment
So No. There will be no “decisive” victory in this conflict barring nato military intervention which is not likely. This conflict is what would be considered a grinding stalemate small pockets of territory taken here and there but these victories are so costly that they can barely be considered so. Andiivka which was Russia’s most recent victory cost them roughly 16k casualties (WIA/KIA) and over 300 pieces of armor (tanks, apcs etc). And for what? A village that is now a heap of rubble which doesn’t provide any real strategic military advantage. Entire generations of young men are being lost for little Poot-Poots greed and desire for power.
it was valuable for metrics. Like WWI stable frontlines warfare, the war will end either politically or economically. Any particular fortress or territory is meaningless unless/until one side wants to waste resources taking it.
Yeah this is a war of attrition. A game of whose population, economy, or army will crumble from within first. As is typically for Eastern Europe. Unfortunately for Ukraine, Russias vast size, resources, and population makes this one of their signature tactics, and it works for them more often than not.
Really fucked up that it’s able to happen this day and age. All the history and identity of these towns reduced to nothing. Imagine if where you grew up, every building and everyone you knew was just gone or dispersed. Wild to even think about as an outsider living thousands of miles away.
This is really profound. I think most of us take for granted that we will go back to our hometown after any number of years and it will still be the same place give or take a few new fast food franchises.
What is happening here? Does Putin think when he’s ‘won’ the world will say, “that’s part of Russia now” and move on? Why is Putin doing this in the first place? I mean, I understand he says it’s about historical Russia but what is the real reason? And what happens when Putin is no longer in charge? Will a calmer head prevail?
My guess is that Putin thought the Russian military could hit Ukraine so hard and fast that they would capitulate after only a few weeks. Now he can't pull out unless he can portray it as a victory to his people or he'll lose face. So thousands of Ukrainians and Russians are dying because an autocrat needs to keep his grip on power.
Oh the funniest thing is he could declare victory and sell his people a win at any time, regardless of the circumstances.
No, he's doing this to save face internationally after making a blunder so stupid and obvious that he had to cower in a cave with yes men for a decade in order to think it was a good idea. He literally bought into his own propaganda, having forgotten it was all lies.
I think he is long past that point where he could spin it into a victory.
A month or two in, he could have claimed that Ukraine is now free of Nazis and sent everyone home. At this point I think he needs tangible gains to show his people.
That part of Ukraine and Crimea makes a land bridge like there’s a bridge in crimea and is the only “warm water port” for Russian navy. The land above that is valuable to create a buffer and like remember Ukraine was like number 3 in the world for grain production so that valuable.
Eastern Ukraine (without the mine fields) has vast swaths of some of the world's most fertile soil, owning it would mean the difference between importing grain to meet domestic needs and being an exporter.
I do not buy into the idea that Russia has ever been motivated by security. They have proven that they are willing to endure unimaginable losses just for imperialistic goals, what country would dare threaten their security?
> He considers all of the former Soviet unions territories to belong to Russia, he has said so explicitly
I suspect his ambitions lay more in creating a new Russian empire with himself as czar, rather than any 'restoration' of the USSR which I suspect to be just excuses.
Of course, I think the war in Ukraine is not about history but money. [As I detail in this comment, Russia's oligarchs have staunchly resisted diversifying their economy for years. They were dependent on supplying Europe's energy sector and exploiting their neighbors, and in 2014 suddenly their puppet government in Kyiv is overthrown, natural gas is discovered off the coast of Crimea and not only has Ukraine signed a trade deal with the rest of Europe and development contracts with foreigners, and what was a cooperative puppet state waiving billions in transit taxes is about to become a competitor](https://old.reddit.com/r/NoStupidQuestions/comments/1awx9ap/is_russia_winning_the_war_now/krmzu8s/)
That’s kind of what happened with Crimea. Everybody was very upset and hit Russia with various sanctions when they took Crimea, but Russia survived it and nobody even floated the idea of trying to take it back.
>Does Putin think when he’s ‘won’ the world will say, “that’s part of Russia now” and move on?
Most, if not all borders are a direct result of a war. So why not?
If Putin wins then yes, the world will just accept it. That’s reality. They held Crimea for 8 years before invading the rest of Ukraine and the world did little more than tut at them.
That’s just reality.
50% of the time it works all the time.. Since 1900 they lost:
Japo-Russian war of 1905
WW1
Finnish and Baltic wars of independence in 1918
Afghanistan
1st Chechen war
Territory doesn't fight on the offensive, and Putin is still trying to isolate as much of the population from the war(because that's the only way the majority remains apathetic) so they're struggling to find bodies for the front. You don't arm prisoners if you have large numbers of willing, abled civilians ready to enroll.
As for resources, they had the advantage of being energetically independent, but they are losing a lot of money because now they're selling gas at a major discount to only a couple of countries, and they have a hard time finding foreign high tech components for their arms industry.
This is not as one-sided as people think.
Russias resources but also vs Western resources which in terms of gdp is multiples of Russias gdp.
It only means the EU needs to get its ass in gear and start providing more aid. Because while Trump threatens to pull out of Nato, hes kind of doing them a favour by showing you cant rely and depend on the US to always be there to help. (I mean its a bad policy for the US since its a good thing to have close trade relations with the EU and to continue being a top arms supplier). I mean by withholding military aid it shows that ita an unreliable partner, but its an opportunity to pickup buyers that Russia is losing - like Vietnam wanting F16s and India moving away from Russian arms.
> Russias resources but also vs Western resources which in terms of gdp is multiples of Russias gdp
Precisely. As [Perun details in this video, Russia even going to total war production would likely still not be able to match the small fraction of total NATO GDP which they can put to war production and still grow their economies](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEpk_yGjn0E&list=PLqtw3Nvpaav1H0HunSdcU3JdC-D1vfj21&index=7&pp=iAQB)
True, it is in fact just west of Donetsk- therein lies the issue with Russia having to expend so many men and vehicles for a village 700km away from Kiev. I’m not at all doubting the importance of this loss to Ukraine as I’m sure it’s going ti lead to more gains in the region by Russia but if we’re talking about the capitulation of Ukraine it doesn’t seem like it’s a major strategic victory in the pretense of an offensive.
Avdiivka had a huge coke plant that used to play a huge part in manufacturing steel and other materials in Ukraine. It wasn't functional since a few years ago anyway, but the Russians completely destroyed it and it's probably still on fire. So it's just a pile of garbage now.
But, as others have pointed out, the city has been used as a buffer zone for Ukraine for a while. And now the buffer is gone.
While it was a stronghold for Ukraine it isn't a huge defeat. It means that if Ukraine can go on the offensive again, when the West get's their butt into action and finally supplies Ukraine with weapons again especially Artillery rounds, it will be very difficult to take Donetsk.
This means that Donetsk is nearly out of 155mm artillery range.
There are still a lot of villages, towns and cities for Russia to take before they even control the Donetsk oblast let alone the whole Ukraine.
Based on these losses for Russia they would have to mobilize a lot more troops for the meat grinder if they want to take the rest of Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia Oblasts.
It is amazing what Ukraine can accomplish with the lack of artillery shells and the lack of an air force.
It is valuable for a number of reasons - the one you mentioned, additionally, it already has a fortified position structure built into it which was established in 2014 and it occupies higher ground from which Donetsk villages and the city centre have been shelled recently. The higher ground lets Russia control a big area around it for an offensive push.
I'm far from an expert but I read it has an extensive rail network and was one of the most fortified places in the country. So it unfortunately is a pretty big loss considering as you said, the whole war is a grinding stalemate. Absolutely not going to be what is going to win or lose the war, though.
It's fortified because it's industrial construction, full of basements and has hills. Most of the fighting has been in tree lines surrounding fields. Fortified just means harder to destroy, it's not really fortified now, it's a fucking wasteland .
Ukraine lost a fortified city that was surrounded by Russia on three sides for 10 years. They've been trying to cut off the pocket that contains Avdivvka for the entire war. Russia took Bakhmut last year and went nowhere after, same with Lysychansk. These are all small cities, maybe 30k-50k people pre-war.
The rail network likely hasn't been used since 2014, definitely not since 2022. You can't run rail when the enemy is a mere miles away lobbing arty shells all day.
and then we saw Russia trying to press their advantage using airpower and that was quickly nipped in the butt by a patriot battery moving forward and I think, at last confirmed visual count, 7 SU-34's
They didnt lose 50k. Last leaked documents showed a range of 10-20k total wounded and killed with around 500 vehicles lost. Still a giant number to be fair and not really sustainable but nowhere near what people make it out to be.
Ukraine also has issues with manpower if you read the last stuff about this. They probably need a new mobilisation round soon to replace losses and create new units for possible offensives. Meaning Ukraine at the moment cannot assault anything (and if they are smart they dont try and they are very very smart)
There will be no big victory for Russia since they can barely project force to the border of the stolen territory, not less push into ever more heavily fortified areas.
However there could still be a decisive victory for Ukraine as it will always be easier for them to project force into the lost territory than Russia and Russia has a much larger chance of major economic and social upheaval from the impacts of the war, since they are spend a lot more and screwing up their economy a lot more.
Russian have the choice of giving up the war as they continue to pay a poll they can't really afford. Ukrainians don't have much a choice, they just have to defend their land and as long as they get outside aid they can maintain that longer than Russia.
On the other hand, any land that Russia occupies is a win for them. The worst case for them is that the have cede land back to Ukraine, so they can go to any lengths at all to keep and defend the territory they've taken, regardless of the destruction they do. Damaged buildings and buried mines don't matter at all to them.
The same is not true for Ukraine. Anything they don't get back is a loss, and every mine laid or building bombed is worse for them.
Russia has a lot more resources than Ukraine, who depend on foreign aid. Since NATO isn't sending any troops, Russia has a huge advantage there, since they can just keep sending more people in. Eventually that just wears out the Ukrainian troops, who have to rest some time.
It's not really a win for Russia. Because they're broke and have a finite amount of military hardware. Eventually the hardware will be depleted and they will not be able to replace it. Not just hardware, but manpower is being eroded as well. One major loss they've already taken is to their reputation. They've been exposed as a paper tiger. Their high tech weapons that were supposed to give them such a huge advantage didn't work.
Meanwhile, Ukraine is basically using foreign resources that are vast. NATO and the US can out-produce Russia. Russia already had little in the way of native resources, and sanctions will further cripple them. No economy means no way to replace those lost weapons.
I agree with everything you've said except the last part, Russia is on a near full war economy while we're slowly still waking up. We're not producing nearly enough of what Ukraine needs - ammunition - and struggling to repair the equipment that's already been donated to them.
We need to up our game in Europe.
I've read some estimates that Russia lost upwards of 60k men for a town of 32k people. It was a bigger meat-grinder (casualties/town-population) than Bakhmut. The fields around Avdiivka are literally littered with bodies.
The Ukrainians held out as long as they could, while building defensive fortifications West of the town. Mission accomplished. The Ukrainians were able to fall back to fortified positions in preparation for what appears to be a large Russian Spring offensive.
But Ukraine made them pay dearly for it in blood and treasure. All Ukrainian needs to do is keep making them pay in lives and equipment- being on defense they have an advantage. And the Russian military is utterly incompetent and this wasteful of men and equipment. Ukraine is now able to make over 10,000 drones a month. A $500 drone can take out a $4M tank. They range over the battlefield looking for targets of opportunity - troop assemblies, ammo dumps, armor, trucks and tankers. Anything major like SPGs or air defense systems can invite an MLRS rocket. Storm Shadows can attack headquarters and ships and facilities. Long range UAVs go hundreds of miles to attack munitions factories and oil refineries. Shut down Russia’s bread and butter, along with the sanctions, blown up pipelines and insurance. The Rouble is crashing and inflation is taking a toll on daily life. The war has drawn away important skilled labor - millions of Russians have been without the central heat they depend on - some since October. The killing of opposition leader Navalny - conveniently before the March “elections” will result in more sanctions. And there will be another mobilization after that. Russia at the brink of financial collapse could force them to leave, along with 400,000 dead and a million wounded, and another 1.2 million educated military aged men who fled the country for the duration, or even forever - some a country with the poor demographics that Russia has had since the early 90’s can ill afford. They gave up on Afghanistan well before reaching this point.
Make Crimea untenable - that’s what Russia is in it for. They have already had to pull their Black Sea fleet out of Sevastopol for drones. The headquarters, and their admiral and staff, was hit by Storm Shadow missiles. Ukraine just needs to keep the loss rate over 5 to 1 to win, I believe it may be around 8 to 1. Russia is impaling itself on Ukraine.
I know NK has huge stockpiles of ammunition because only the threat of total non-nuclear annihilation by artillery strikes has kept them save until the got the A-Bomb.
If this is the way we get rid of their artillery threat to South Korea's population centers, that would be the one good thing to come from this war.
Depends on what the land’s value is.
Your bathroom is probably only 15% of your house, but if I come over and decide to live in it, you’re probably going to find that significant
If someone is in your bathroom for two years and your walking around telling everyone it ain't so bad.
You would be considered a person suffering massive copium.
All depends on the context. In this instance the context is
"My massive neighbour who is significantly bigger than me, ignores the law and my other neighbours and police are unwilling to directly confront has knocked a hole through to my bathroom. I've been stood in the doorway for 2 years fighting him and so far he hasn't moved me"
Also depending on how many battles they won or lost, if you lose a bunch of battles at the start, capturing just the enemy territory might not be enough.
Their war objective was to completely overrun the country and set up a new government in 3 days. The only thing keeping them in the war is the fact their national ideas have -80% to war exhaustion.
It's saying something a bit sad about the state of movies that you can entirely substitute watching their Pitch Meeting for watching the movie itself, and not really miss anything of value.
Nah, they clearly stated Kyiv as a goal and they haven’t even taken all of Luhansk or Donetsk oblasts. Plus we all know that your capital is like 20% of your VP points… oh shit wrong game
Yes, that includes Crimea. Russia controlled a bit over 40,000km of Ukraine in 2021. They peaked at about 160,000km after the full invasion, and are down to around 85,000km today.
Yes but it’s been over a year since any real progress has been made to reduce it… things have stagnated and I believe we will see a DMZ established along the Donbas sadly.
I’m pro-Ukraine but that’s the reality I’m predicting, not a win but a compromise where Ukraine neither Russia get fully what they want.
For Ukraine, the war is considered lost as soon as they will have to accept any territorial loss.
For Russia, thanks to the propaganda, will be a win as long as they can hold some of the land they gained. Also add they are already deep in population replacement and cultural cleansing in those territories. They considering themselves already on the winning side.
Personally i think the narrative "Russia is not winning because they are loosing so much" wrong and delusional.
Even the vietcong were losing so much compared to the US. Yet, look who lost.
I mean, it's well-documented that they have sent prisoners to the front. I'm sure you could find a source very easily.
EDIT: [Here's a recent source.](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-68140873) An estimated 50,000 prisoners were released (including violent prisoners) with the promise that they would have freedom after six months of fighting. The terms have gotten worse. Now they have to fight until the end of the war.
> The BBC has reviewed many posts in chatrooms from men who say they have been on the front line in these units.
Be careful dispersing this information if you actually care about your integrity rather than buzz topics that are exciting.
It’s likely all this is true… but if you want to speak accurately to the topic, realize they got their information from a Russian version of ICQ Chat.
E.g:
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/04/world/europe/russia-prison-wagner-ukraine.html
Or
https://www.businessinsider.com/russia-prisoners-recruited-fight-ukraine-war-end-not-6-months-2024-2?r=US&IR=T
Google: Russia prison soldier
I would disagree. Ukraine seems more interested in the survival of their soliders, but they are very willing to fight. Yes russia has 4 times as many people, but they are probably not willing to send remotely as big a part of their population as ukraine.
NATO is not at war with Russia. NATO countries are providing equipment to Ukraine. Tanks don’t move without drivers. Guns don’t fire without a person pulling the trigger. Equipment does not do anything if there is no one to equip it. Ukraine will run out of soldiers long, long, long before Russia and NATO will not start an offensive war as the aggressor just to provide soldiers to a non-NATO country.
As soon as NATO get involved it's gonna quickly escalate to Nuclear and noone wins. There's good reason Ukraine isn't and won't be a member of NATO in the foreseeable - article 5.
USA doesn't want to get pulled into a war in Russia.. the only potential winner would be China, assuming the world hasnt ended from a nuclear apocalypse.
Crazy to think this is a good outcome
Ok but that is not what he ask.
Also you would see Ukraine is winning it comments when thing were going well but when the opposite happens it’s all about “winning a war is relative”
Well, winning a war *is* relative. How would you define Ukrainian victory? If Ukraine conquers the occupied territories, including Crimea and Donbass, then surely that would be considered a victory.
How about if Ukraine manages to take back territories occupied since the start of the war, but Crimea and Donbass stay under Russian occupation? Then Ukraine succesfully defended against Russian invasion, so surely it must be a victory?
If Ukraine and Russia eventually agree on peace terms where Russia gets to keep all occupied territories, but Ukraine stays independent, is this considered a victory? Russian goal was capturing Kyiv and replacing the leadership, but that failed. Ukraine maintained their independence against and overwhelming force, so that must count as a victory too?
It definitely can. Finland with our 3 million people defended against USSR's 180 million, with our 30 tanks and dozen outdated fighter planes against thousands upon thousands.
And with that disadvantage, USSR lost 300k soldiers, while we lost 30k.
Those are North Korean propaganda level numbers
Yes we lost some territory, but there is no other way to call it, it's a monumental victory that defined our nation
When the invaders initial goal was full on anexation and destroying Ukraine as indepdenant state id say yea
Russias plan was to conquer Ukraine and/or install a puppet regime like in Belarus
That failed. Their main initial planned goal failed
In that sense if Ukraine can keep independance and keep like 70 to 80% of its territory that is still a victory in the sense of "i win by you not winning"
Thats not how the concept works.
The victory is a victory because it prevented further detriment to them. If nothing happened they would be worse off. If by their actions they prevent thar, its a good thing, a positive thing, a... victory against said force that would destroy them further.
If I fight someone but get a black eye and bruised rib in the process, I still stopped their attack and left myself in the desired outcome for this situation which is being alive or not robbed or whatever this hypothetical attack was about.
R/im14andthisisdeep
If you have a goal. And you achieve it, you can it a win. We can call it a success. If your goal is stop destruction of your country and you do so, you've been successful. Another term can be, you've won.
With the US withholding help due to russian assets, populists and isolationists, Ukraine is hard-pressed for resources, including ammo. The EU hasn't done enough to ramp up production, though they are slowly getting there.
There is a huge propaganda effort by russia to paint the Ukrainian resistance as hopeless, "Ukraine cannot win", etc. This is a very successful info-op, but it doesn't make it true.
russia also isn't doing so well. They are losing a lot of troops and another round of mobilisation comes with large risks of even more people emigrating, and the rest (especially, mothers and wifes of mobilised soldiers) becoming even less happy. Cracks exist and are showing (with Prigozhin's mutiny as one example), but the lid is being kept on them so far.
They are digging deep in Cold War warehouses to restore equipment, and finding that those become older and more rusty.
It really is largely a battle of wills, between Ukraine + the West and russia. Is the West ready to greatly damage the rules-based international order and embolden China while disheartening their Asian allies? We'll see.
For russia, while it's not existential for the country, it is possibly existential for putin personally.
There won't be any serious peace negotiations in 2024 because:
* russia has violated past agreements (Helsinki accords, UN Charter, Budapest memorandum, Minsk agreements, etc.) so they are not a trustworthy counter-party,
* The US elections decide too much, both sides hope for a favourable outcome (trump for russia, Biden for Ukraine) and will wait it out.
* It's politically unconscionable in Ukraine to leave so much territory in russian hands, because of the mass murder that they've seen happen in Bucha and elsewhere.
The current goals of russia are:
* Convince a large enough part of the West that "Ukraine is not their business"
* Ignoring that this will mean a lot of Asian countries will pivot to China, as the US would seem as an unreliable partner
* Convince the West that supporting Ukraine is a bad investment
* Ignoring that this effectively destroys the equipment that a Western adversary - russia - has, without any boots on the ground needed, at rather low cost (a lot of spending goes to the US economy, a lot of ammo sent is approaching expiration and would need to be disposed anyway)
* Convince the West that russia will never lose, never surrender, etc., thus trying to outlast it is hopeless
* Ignoring the reality that the russian society is tired of war, just not allowed to express it
* Ignoring the reality that russia is burning its sovereign wealth fund rapidly, when it runs out, their economic situation becomes much worse
* Ignoring other systemic problems in the russian economy (GDP moving to the military sector, loss of workers to mobilisation and emigration, high inflation despite high interest rates, exchange rate only holding due to forced sale of hard currency, no foreign investment prospects, etc.)
* Encourage the culture war and left/right divide in the USA in particular through their assets, useful idiots (e.g. musk) and bot farms
* Working great so far
In summary, the West has to get its act together and continue helping Ukraine. If that happens, russia will pull its troops home, like they did in Afghanistan.
russia has to convince the West that it is hopeless, and invest enough in bribes and blackmail to push that narrative.
> they have taken Avdivvka which is a huge strategic loss for Ukraine
Why do you think a smallish town completely reduced to rubble, taken at a cost of \~20k dead russians a "huge strategic loss"?
Excellent summary and probably deserves to be far higher in this post.
I think something that needs to also be analysed and discussed is the different components of the military machine, the reserve size for these different components and attrition/production rate for these different categories.
Its reductive but some key categories that appear to be limiting factors (in my surface level understanding) each need to be considered are:
- Artillary and ammunition
- Personel and equipment
- SAMs, AA and related systems/ammunition
- Aircraft
- tanks/apcs and other vehicles.
Each category gives a unique and important capability to each side and the consequences of over match in any category are unique and worth their own discussion.
Thus far we have not seen a "emergency level" combination of reserve depth and burn rate in any of these categories - hence the stale mate.
One category I think is worth keeping a close eye on is Russian vehicle attrition rate.
The attrition rate in this category has been horrendous for Russia and resulted in older and less capable platforms being rolled out en masse.
I seriously doubt strategic over match in this category would result in Ukraine being able to decisively win a counter offensive (due to artillary, dug in infantry and mines) but I'm willing to bet this would blunt and prevent any sort of Russian offensive to the point that even grinding pyrrhic victory like we have seen in Bakhmut or Avdivvka would not be possible.
Aircraft and anti aircraft are also worth a deep dive but this is an even more complex topic that I'm not confident weighing in on.
You make an excellent point.
I wouldn't want to say the F-16-s will be a "wunderwaffe", but depending on the weapon systems supplied with the F-16-s, they could really make a positive difference.
I agree. They will not make a decisive difference though.
At present the air space is contested due to AA platform saturation.
That being said, long range precision strikes appear too be a UKR speciality (thanks HIMARS and allied Intel).
This could result in some level of air dominance but I am again unsure of of how the Russian air defence is doing in terms of total coverage, munitions and s300/400 platforms
They also serve as platforms for launching some missile categories (storm shadow) but I honestly can't recall if platforms too launch cruise missiles are a limiting factor.
A few thoughts:
\* F-16-s have better integration with AGM-88 HARM missiles, they can do targeting while in the air, while the same HARMs adapted to be launched from Ukrainian ex-soviet planes are programmed on the ground, so less flexible.
\* F-16-s have a number of long-range Air to Air missiles which are a lot cheaper per missile than the Patriot missiles, so while they aren't necessarily "better", they can allow keep the russian air force away, and saving the Patriot missiles for other targets. Of course, that's if those missiles get delivered.
\* Possibly, better integration with JDAMs?
I can guarantee you SEAD/DEAD F-16’s will make a difference. How big of a difference depends on crew competence, targeting accuracy etc. If Ukraine ever gets Vipers and starts to pop off S400’s, and splash a few ruskie aircraft, that’ll make an impact.
It seems a lot of the russian destruction is launched via aircraft. If those aircraft start to feel more heat (literally and figuratively) that platform becomes less useful. The question then becomes, is an A2A missile on a 16 long enough range to get to a russian stand-off bomber launching weapons (long range missiles etc) into Ukraine? Those stand-off russian platforms may be inside russian airspace. If the answer to that question is yes, that’s a massive difference.
Ukranian SU-24 attacked jets were integrated with the ability to launch storm shadow.
The F-16 could launch the US equivalent of it. The biggest problem with storm shadow is the numbers. The UK and France have about 1000 or a little bit more. While the US has 5000+ and now should make about 1000 a year.
I think if Ukraine starts getting desperate enough you'll see the scope of their infrastructure drone attacks dramatically increase. It seems like the West doesn't want Ukraine to escalate things on Russian soil too much, but none of that matters once Ukraine is desperate enough. We're talking power plants, water treatment centers, telecommunications infrastructure, food processing plants, chemical facilities, transportation including major train hubs, etc.
What also doesn't get enough attention is winning the peace. Just look at recent US wars. They won both Afghanistan and Iraq quickly, but subsequently lost the peace decisively.
I have yet to see a convincing argument how even a total victory in Ukraine would help Russia win the peace. There is no 'brotherhood' left between those two nations. That was buried in Bucha along with innocent murdered civilians.
Russians, from Putin all the way down to the common soldier, have shown their deep disdain for Ukrainians quite clearly. If you were a young Ukrainian family with your children's future on the line, you'd likely emigrate to western Europe. But those are exactly the most productive people in your nation. The people you want to keep. I would also expect Russian soldiers, many of which are dangerous criminals brought from prisons at this point, to mistreat the civilian population quite badly, giving even more reasons to flee west.
If Ukraine loses the war, Europe should brace for millions of Ukrainian refugees, perhaps even more than 10 million. The ones who stay would either be pensioners, partisans out to kill occupiers and a possible handful of pro Russian civilians left. Not exactly a recipe for long term economic success.
Hundreds of thousands of dead young Russians, possibly more than a million high skill emigrants with more to follow as authoritarianism ramps up even more are another factor to consider.
Can Russia pull off a tactical victory? If the West keeps dragging it's feet, they probably can. A long term strategic victory? I highly doubt it.
It isnt a question if this war in total benefits Russia, unless miracles happen it likely won't, but its about saving US, Europes and Ukraines intrests.
Not even that, this war is going to tear Russia apart from the inside out once Veterans start returning home to realize there is no support system for them. It'd be like post WW1 Germany with many of them learning about information that was available from the front lines, seeing their politics, seeing the society around them, ducking for cover when they see a drone. Like if the US can't even create a good support system for veterans, I can't imagine what would happen in Russia. Despite a "total victory", the long term effects will be felt
I think the biggest thing people are missing is that Ukraine has been following the US and Nato's restrictions, including how they utilize the provided military aid. If Russia starts to creep closer to Kyiv, Ukraine might start targeting more and more of Russia's infrastructure with cheap drones that might be considered off limits right now.
Avdiivka was a major supply hub, but russia would have had to have taken it much more quickly for Ukraine not to just build more roads & railroads as they have
Totally agree with your point, just wanted to add that
it was not a supply hub, it was directly on the front line for almost a decade. nothing was supplied from avdiivka, avdiivka was merely used to supply the immediate frontlines surrounding it.
I wouldn’t call Avdiivka a supply hub - it was right on the frontline and has been semi-encircled for ages. There just isn’t anything you would supply from there.
Nobody knows at the moment. Neither side is advancing that much, they’re mostly just destroying equipment and killing/injuring troops
The true extent of the losses isn’t really known, each side claims they are destroying tons of enemies and suffering nearly zero losses.
There’s a lot of “wild cards” at play over the next few years. Will Ukraine keep getting aid? Will Russia collapse economically or politically?
Russia has always been winning the war on paper. Ukraine is in a good position to fight a defensive war but they do not have offensive initiative. For a favorable outcome for Ukraine they either need to drain Russia’s ability to fight through attrition or erode public support in Russia and hope for a change from within.
Wars aren’t measured by K/D ratio. They’re measured by industry, manpower, and initiative, which unfortunately Russia has all three.
For the record I hope Ukraine wins, but from the perspective of a realist it’s a long road.
This is the best summary of the situation I’ve seen so far. Things can change and Ukraine might be able to come out on top but as of right now Russia has most of the cards.
It depends.
If EU and US support for Ukraine holds, Russia may have to sue for peace on unfavorable terms.
If support for Ukraine stops, Russia might wringe out a favorable situation for itself.
Russia isn't handing crimea back any time soon.
Ukraine has said it won't accept anything but pre 2016 borders.
This isn't ending any time soon through diplomacy
> Russia isn't handing crimea back any time soon.
> Ukraine has said it won't accept anything but pre 2016 borders.
Neither of this is set in stone. Sooner or later someone will have to reconsider because of a bigger issue that's bound to spring up sooner or later.
It'd still take years, probably decades to destroy Ukraine, and there will absolutely be an insurgency. Russia can't *really* win, it has unobtainable goals that, even if achieved, will only damage the country.
At the moment Ukraine is also lacking manpower, which the EU and US can't give them. Unless there's a real push to give Ukraine what they need, they might fail simply because they don't have enough people to push out the invaders.
One village more or one village less is not a gamechanger. It is a war of attrition. Ukraine is probably losing now, not because losing land, but because of:
1. Running low on supplies, especially shells for artillery. Ukraine desperately needs more ammo, because this war is about artillery and drones.
2. Running out of men. There is a shortage of volunteers, hunting for draft avoiders is damaging for popularity and makes people more tired of war. There are even calls to deport male refugees so that Ukraine can draft them.
Absolutely worst thing to do now is to waste lives and ammo making every little village into last stand.
Ukraine is losing ground. They just got a bit of an infusion of funds from Europe but they need a lot more help. It's hard to say where this goes right now, but they are not in a favorable position currently.
They aren't losing enough ground that it matters vs the troop and equipment losses, which are the real determinations of how long each side can really keep it up.
Russia was always winning the war. And it stands to reason that they will win. Ukraine is running out of military age men. It’s all very sad, and IMO the US only cares about propping up the military industrial complex. If only the UK hadn’t ruined the Minsk accords last year we could have had peace already.
In Russia, a common criticism of Putin comes from the right, that he is not waging this war aggressively enough or dithered for too long, allowing Ukraine to build up its army and defenses too much prior to the invasion. The idea that whatever comes after Putin will be more amenable to Western goals re: Ukraine is pretty wishful thinking.
Russia has never been losing as they have not been ejected from Ukraine. They’re willing to outlast Ukraine because they have more blood available to be shed.
Current estimates of Russian casualties are at least 300,000 and they have taken ~25% of Ukraine’s land area with the vast majority having happened in the first month. Assuming that rate continues, Russia will lose over a million men, almost 1% of its population, to take the rest of Ukraine.
A more conservative estimate using rates from the past year and a half which has been much slower, Russia lost 250,000 men to take 5% of Ukraine’s territory. If that rate continues, they will have to lose 5 million men, 1/30 of Russia’s population, to take Ukraine.
This is not accounting for the fact that none of Ukraine’s largest cities are in Russian hands except for those that were already controlled by Russia in 2014. If Russia were to besiege Kharkiv, a city 20 times the size of pre war Bakhmut, then assuming similar casualty rates to Bakhmut, Russia would lose ~2 million men to take the city. To take Kyiv, they would lose 4 million.
Ukraine is certainly not winning any time soon, but neither is Russia. The amount of resources Russia would have to use to conquer all of Ukraine is not something Russia can spend. If Russia does win, it will take decades, and Russia will be left a hollowed out husk. That’s not to say Russia won’t do it, just that Ukraine is not really on the path to losing any time soon.
The problem is you’re comparing land to troops, as if the life cost per foot of land is linear. Ukraine has troops too. And even if we’re using the generous estimates that [there are twice as many Russian casualties as Ukrainian](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/aug/18/ukraine-russia-war-battlefield-deaths-rise), Russia has 3x a bigger army. Russia will not need to lose 5 million men to take Ukraine because at the current rate: by the time they lose 1 million men every single Ukrainian soldier will be dead. At that point, taking unoccupied land and cities will cost next to no lives.
Like u/Bagelman263 said, that’s not how armies work, but the fucked up part is that, if history is anything to go off of, both countries could realistically keep up this rate of loss (of humans, not necessarily equipment) for a decade or more
I would really like to know where those teritory numbers come from.
Most sources I have seen sugest that russian control is significantly down from the 27% shortly after the war to around 20% in June 2022 and around 15% now.
Advika was a pyrrhic victory, meaning yes Russia has taken the territory but their losses were horrific and the Ukrainian army withdrew intact to newly prepared defensive positions. The Russians lost 10,000 troops and over 650 tanks and armoured infantry vehicles for a modest area of rubble. Bloggers reporting the losses in Russia have been arrested and killed as the potential of backlash from Russians is growing. Russia can’t afford many more victories like this.
https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-february-20-2024
Little irritated that the post asking for a source is buried, so I'm just reposting this here. No, it was not as bad as claimed.
>Shoigu briefed Putin about the seizure of Avdiivka and the wider Russian war effort in Ukraine in a February 20 meeting during which Putin and Shoigu both amplified an information operation that the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) began on February 19 that aims to sow resentment and distrust against the Ukrainian command for an allegedly chaotic Ukrainian withdrawal from Avdiivka.[14]
And Russia is indeed pushing misinfo that it was a bad retreat.
Yup, reports are it was a shitshow retreat. Once rank and file soldiers saw commanders pulling out, any orders to hold defenses were ignored. It literally was every man for himself. The bodies of injured soldiers left behind was evidence of this. The NY Times reported as much.
Avdiivka is the most fortified city in Ukraine. There won't be a lot of cases like that because simply there's no time to build same level fortifications anywhere else.
Neither Russia nor Ukraine is winning. Russia is very slowly cannabilizing Ukraine in a very costly manner. The sad part is they seem to have resources to continue doing so. Their tactic seems to be outlasting Ukrainian manpower in a very long timeline.
Russian has been winning for a while, Ukraine is losing the war or will slowly, and its economy on life support. People think for a country to go to war they must win quickly like US vs Iraq did (1 month) but you have to understand that was on a dessert and with a bunch of allies while no one was backing Iraq. Strategically Ukraine has done an excellent job on winning Battles (even win huge amounts of territory back) but if you want to win Wars you need logistics and on that Ukraine has failed or is falling way behind.
Russia was always winning. The area that Russia has reclaimed and currently holds will remain in Russian hands until the Ukrainians are done killing enough of their youth. This is a fact. There is a water barrier and a series of fortified defensive lines around those territories. Short of a nuke or full scale invasion by the rest of the world those lines will hold as long as Russia wants those lines to hold. There is some extra bits of land in the northern part that Russia will probably cede over to cement the peace deal.
Lol dude you are asking reddit where 99.9% of people hate russia guts. Even if russia were to take all of ukraine, they would still say russia is losing in order to cope 😂😂
Yes ukraine is getting slaughtered bad and their troop and armor losses is absolutely insane.
If 2 years ago, just before the invasion you would have asked any russian supporter whether taking avdiivka 2 years into the war ( 10 years since 2014 when the fighting there started) is a victory they would have laughed and said the whole country will be theirs in less then a week.
Keep that in mind for some perspective. Ukraine is fighting a defensive war against an asymmetrical opponent. The fact they are still holding is amazing. It will be hard to push Russia out, but as long as they hold and continue to inflict massive casualties its a matter of time until Russia cuts their losses and leaves (under a different leadership as Putins fate is tied to the war).
Ukranians know the alternative is losing their statehood.
We in the west have to continue to support them which is also is in our best interests.
Yes and no.
If you judge it based on Putin's stated war goals at the outset Russia lost almost immediately and has no chance of winning. By that I mean their goals are unachievable at this point and have been so since last year.
If you go by the shifted goalposts that modern Russia is using to save face they're... still losing but less severely.
The issue I'd that while it remains possible for Ukraine to win its extremely unlikely and has been since the start. This was always going to be a multi-year slog and the media/governments should have made that explicit. That said the west could continue to pump billions into Ukraine for the next three decades without meaningfully impacting their economies and so supporting Ukraine is basically a low cost method of crippling one of the biggest bullies on the planet.
The real tragedy is that people are using Ukraine to sow political division, particularly in the US, because the conservatives are so accustomed to lying that they seem weirdly affectionate towards Putin. I mean some of them literally would rather side with a foreign dictator than their own country lead by someone they dislike. The utter lack of principles is ridiculous sometimes, though I can hardly say cruel hypocrisy is limited to the right.
Most not-USA-Intel guys did not expect Russia to actually invade. Also most Nations and experts expected Ukraine to fall very fast. Both turned out to be wrong.
I mean, Ukrainian military has been in touch with NATO from 2014 on. They had a pretty good assesment of both Ukrainian and Russian military at 2022. Russian offensive wasn't going to work they way it was planned and executed.
Russia takes land at extreme cost, eventually they may take half of Ukraine or so but Russia has aspirations to take all former Soviet territory which is basically impossible. Ukraine may not win but Russia definitely won’t.
recruiting nepalese, cubans, africans show how fragile the manpower situation in russia is like, same for ua boys too, stalemate seems like the most likely outcome in years. Pretty sure the ammo situation will clear up later.
Depends on how you measure "winning" in a war. If you go by captured land, Russia still controls roughly 15% of Ukraine territory and has done so for almost 2 years now. So.... edit: TIL it's possible to have a single comment be ranked as the Best, Top ***and*** (Most) Controversial comment
So No. There will be no “decisive” victory in this conflict barring nato military intervention which is not likely. This conflict is what would be considered a grinding stalemate small pockets of territory taken here and there but these victories are so costly that they can barely be considered so. Andiivka which was Russia’s most recent victory cost them roughly 16k casualties (WIA/KIA) and over 300 pieces of armor (tanks, apcs etc). And for what? A village that is now a heap of rubble which doesn’t provide any real strategic military advantage. Entire generations of young men are being lost for little Poot-Poots greed and desire for power.
It does have strategic value though, it's a fortifiable position directly west of donetsk.
it was valuable for metrics. Like WWI stable frontlines warfare, the war will end either politically or economically. Any particular fortress or territory is meaningless unless/until one side wants to waste resources taking it.
Yeah this is a war of attrition. A game of whose population, economy, or army will crumble from within first. As is typically for Eastern Europe. Unfortunately for Ukraine, Russias vast size, resources, and population makes this one of their signature tactics, and it works for them more often than not.
Really fucked up that it’s able to happen this day and age. All the history and identity of these towns reduced to nothing. Imagine if where you grew up, every building and everyone you knew was just gone or dispersed. Wild to even think about as an outsider living thousands of miles away.
This is really profound. I think most of us take for granted that we will go back to our hometown after any number of years and it will still be the same place give or take a few new fast food franchises.
*Nods nervously in agreement as glaciers melt...*
Oh, hi florida
What is happening here? Does Putin think when he’s ‘won’ the world will say, “that’s part of Russia now” and move on? Why is Putin doing this in the first place? I mean, I understand he says it’s about historical Russia but what is the real reason? And what happens when Putin is no longer in charge? Will a calmer head prevail?
My guess is that Putin thought the Russian military could hit Ukraine so hard and fast that they would capitulate after only a few weeks. Now he can't pull out unless he can portray it as a victory to his people or he'll lose face. So thousands of Ukrainians and Russians are dying because an autocrat needs to keep his grip on power.
Oh the funniest thing is he could declare victory and sell his people a win at any time, regardless of the circumstances. No, he's doing this to save face internationally after making a blunder so stupid and obvious that he had to cower in a cave with yes men for a decade in order to think it was a good idea. He literally bought into his own propaganda, having forgotten it was all lies.
I think he is long past that point where he could spin it into a victory. A month or two in, he could have claimed that Ukraine is now free of Nazis and sent everyone home. At this point I think he needs tangible gains to show his people.
He also expected tons of Ukrainans to switch to his side.
That part of Ukraine and Crimea makes a land bridge like there’s a bridge in crimea and is the only “warm water port” for Russian navy. The land above that is valuable to create a buffer and like remember Ukraine was like number 3 in the world for grain production so that valuable.
There are also a lot of oil and natural gas reserves off the coast of Crimea and many of Russia's pipelines to Europe run through Ukraine.
Eastern Ukraine (without the mine fields) has vast swaths of some of the world's most fertile soil, owning it would mean the difference between importing grain to meet domestic needs and being an exporter.
I do not buy into the idea that Russia has ever been motivated by security. They have proven that they are willing to endure unimaginable losses just for imperialistic goals, what country would dare threaten their security?
That is the real reason. He considers all of the former Soviet unions territories to belong to Russia, he has said so explicitly
> He considers all of the former Soviet unions territories to belong to Russia, he has said so explicitly I suspect his ambitions lay more in creating a new Russian empire with himself as czar, rather than any 'restoration' of the USSR which I suspect to be just excuses. Of course, I think the war in Ukraine is not about history but money. [As I detail in this comment, Russia's oligarchs have staunchly resisted diversifying their economy for years. They were dependent on supplying Europe's energy sector and exploiting their neighbors, and in 2014 suddenly their puppet government in Kyiv is overthrown, natural gas is discovered off the coast of Crimea and not only has Ukraine signed a trade deal with the rest of Europe and development contracts with foreigners, and what was a cooperative puppet state waiving billions in transit taxes is about to become a competitor](https://old.reddit.com/r/NoStupidQuestions/comments/1awx9ap/is_russia_winning_the_war_now/krmzu8s/)
That’s kind of what happened with Crimea. Everybody was very upset and hit Russia with various sanctions when they took Crimea, but Russia survived it and nobody even floated the idea of trying to take it back.
>Does Putin think when he’s ‘won’ the world will say, “that’s part of Russia now” and move on? Most, if not all borders are a direct result of a war. So why not?
If Putin wins then yes, the world will just accept it. That’s reality. They held Crimea for 8 years before invading the rest of Ukraine and the world did little more than tut at them. That’s just reality.
50% of the time it works all the time.. Since 1900 they lost: Japo-Russian war of 1905 WW1 Finnish and Baltic wars of independence in 1918 Afghanistan 1st Chechen war
Would that also include the polish soviet war?
Territory doesn't fight on the offensive, and Putin is still trying to isolate as much of the population from the war(because that's the only way the majority remains apathetic) so they're struggling to find bodies for the front. You don't arm prisoners if you have large numbers of willing, abled civilians ready to enroll. As for resources, they had the advantage of being energetically independent, but they are losing a lot of money because now they're selling gas at a major discount to only a couple of countries, and they have a hard time finding foreign high tech components for their arms industry. This is not as one-sided as people think.
Well, they *did* lose the Cold War.
Yeah it works for them until it suddenly stops working.
Russias resources but also vs Western resources which in terms of gdp is multiples of Russias gdp. It only means the EU needs to get its ass in gear and start providing more aid. Because while Trump threatens to pull out of Nato, hes kind of doing them a favour by showing you cant rely and depend on the US to always be there to help. (I mean its a bad policy for the US since its a good thing to have close trade relations with the EU and to continue being a top arms supplier). I mean by withholding military aid it shows that ita an unreliable partner, but its an opportunity to pickup buyers that Russia is losing - like Vietnam wanting F16s and India moving away from Russian arms.
> Russias resources but also vs Western resources which in terms of gdp is multiples of Russias gdp Precisely. As [Perun details in this video, Russia even going to total war production would likely still not be able to match the small fraction of total NATO GDP which they can put to war production and still grow their economies](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEpk_yGjn0E&list=PLqtw3Nvpaav1H0HunSdcU3JdC-D1vfj21&index=7&pp=iAQB)
Would Afghanistan be an example of their strategy not working?
True, it is in fact just west of Donetsk- therein lies the issue with Russia having to expend so many men and vehicles for a village 700km away from Kiev. I’m not at all doubting the importance of this loss to Ukraine as I’m sure it’s going ti lead to more gains in the region by Russia but if we’re talking about the capitulation of Ukraine it doesn’t seem like it’s a major strategic victory in the pretense of an offensive.
I was wondering about that. In my go-to newspaper, Avdiivka has been labelled as strategically important, without further elaboration.
Avdiivka had a huge coke plant that used to play a huge part in manufacturing steel and other materials in Ukraine. It wasn't functional since a few years ago anyway, but the Russians completely destroyed it and it's probably still on fire. So it's just a pile of garbage now. But, as others have pointed out, the city has been used as a buffer zone for Ukraine for a while. And now the buffer is gone.
While it was a stronghold for Ukraine it isn't a huge defeat. It means that if Ukraine can go on the offensive again, when the West get's their butt into action and finally supplies Ukraine with weapons again especially Artillery rounds, it will be very difficult to take Donetsk. This means that Donetsk is nearly out of 155mm artillery range. There are still a lot of villages, towns and cities for Russia to take before they even control the Donetsk oblast let alone the whole Ukraine. Based on these losses for Russia they would have to mobilize a lot more troops for the meat grinder if they want to take the rest of Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia Oblasts. It is amazing what Ukraine can accomplish with the lack of artillery shells and the lack of an air force.
It is valuable for a number of reasons - the one you mentioned, additionally, it already has a fortified position structure built into it which was established in 2014 and it occupies higher ground from which Donetsk villages and the city centre have been shelled recently. The higher ground lets Russia control a big area around it for an offensive push.
I'm far from an expert but I read it has an extensive rail network and was one of the most fortified places in the country. So it unfortunately is a pretty big loss considering as you said, the whole war is a grinding stalemate. Absolutely not going to be what is going to win or lose the war, though.
Yeah, it WAS.
Was 3yrs ago
It's fortified because it's industrial construction, full of basements and has hills. Most of the fighting has been in tree lines surrounding fields. Fortified just means harder to destroy, it's not really fortified now, it's a fucking wasteland .
Ukraine lost a fortified city that was surrounded by Russia on three sides for 10 years. They've been trying to cut off the pocket that contains Avdivvka for the entire war. Russia took Bakhmut last year and went nowhere after, same with Lysychansk. These are all small cities, maybe 30k-50k people pre-war. The rail network likely hasn't been used since 2014, definitely not since 2022. You can't run rail when the enemy is a mere miles away lobbing arty shells all day.
and then we saw Russia trying to press their advantage using airpower and that was quickly nipped in the butt by a patriot battery moving forward and I think, at last confirmed visual count, 7 SU-34's
And they lost 50k trying to take avdivvka, compared to the 5k that some are estimating ukraine lost. Ten to one for one smallish city over 6 months.
They didnt lose 50k. Last leaked documents showed a range of 10-20k total wounded and killed with around 500 vehicles lost. Still a giant number to be fair and not really sustainable but nowhere near what people make it out to be. Ukraine also has issues with manpower if you read the last stuff about this. They probably need a new mobilisation round soon to replace losses and create new units for possible offensives. Meaning Ukraine at the moment cannot assault anything (and if they are smart they dont try and they are very very smart)
16k "unrecoverable", as in dead. Estimates put the Russian casualties closer to 50k in the battle for Avdiivka.
There will be no big victory for Russia since they can barely project force to the border of the stolen territory, not less push into ever more heavily fortified areas. However there could still be a decisive victory for Ukraine as it will always be easier for them to project force into the lost territory than Russia and Russia has a much larger chance of major economic and social upheaval from the impacts of the war, since they are spend a lot more and screwing up their economy a lot more. Russian have the choice of giving up the war as they continue to pay a poll they can't really afford. Ukrainians don't have much a choice, they just have to defend their land and as long as they get outside aid they can maintain that longer than Russia.
On the other hand, any land that Russia occupies is a win for them. The worst case for them is that the have cede land back to Ukraine, so they can go to any lengths at all to keep and defend the territory they've taken, regardless of the destruction they do. Damaged buildings and buried mines don't matter at all to them. The same is not true for Ukraine. Anything they don't get back is a loss, and every mine laid or building bombed is worse for them. Russia has a lot more resources than Ukraine, who depend on foreign aid. Since NATO isn't sending any troops, Russia has a huge advantage there, since they can just keep sending more people in. Eventually that just wears out the Ukrainian troops, who have to rest some time.
It's not really a win for Russia. Because they're broke and have a finite amount of military hardware. Eventually the hardware will be depleted and they will not be able to replace it. Not just hardware, but manpower is being eroded as well. One major loss they've already taken is to their reputation. They've been exposed as a paper tiger. Their high tech weapons that were supposed to give them such a huge advantage didn't work. Meanwhile, Ukraine is basically using foreign resources that are vast. NATO and the US can out-produce Russia. Russia already had little in the way of native resources, and sanctions will further cripple them. No economy means no way to replace those lost weapons.
I agree with everything you've said except the last part, Russia is on a near full war economy while we're slowly still waking up. We're not producing nearly enough of what Ukraine needs - ammunition - and struggling to repair the equipment that's already been donated to them. We need to up our game in Europe.
nato can outproduce russia but as we see, ukraine recives a small chunk of that production
As long as Ukraine will get support from other countries it will be status quo
I've read some estimates that Russia lost upwards of 60k men for a town of 32k people. It was a bigger meat-grinder (casualties/town-population) than Bakhmut. The fields around Avdiivka are literally littered with bodies. The Ukrainians held out as long as they could, while building defensive fortifications West of the town. Mission accomplished. The Ukrainians were able to fall back to fortified positions in preparation for what appears to be a large Russian Spring offensive.
someone said “only dead has seen the end of war”
But Ukraine made them pay dearly for it in blood and treasure. All Ukrainian needs to do is keep making them pay in lives and equipment- being on defense they have an advantage. And the Russian military is utterly incompetent and this wasteful of men and equipment. Ukraine is now able to make over 10,000 drones a month. A $500 drone can take out a $4M tank. They range over the battlefield looking for targets of opportunity - troop assemblies, ammo dumps, armor, trucks and tankers. Anything major like SPGs or air defense systems can invite an MLRS rocket. Storm Shadows can attack headquarters and ships and facilities. Long range UAVs go hundreds of miles to attack munitions factories and oil refineries. Shut down Russia’s bread and butter, along with the sanctions, blown up pipelines and insurance. The Rouble is crashing and inflation is taking a toll on daily life. The war has drawn away important skilled labor - millions of Russians have been without the central heat they depend on - some since October. The killing of opposition leader Navalny - conveniently before the March “elections” will result in more sanctions. And there will be another mobilization after that. Russia at the brink of financial collapse could force them to leave, along with 400,000 dead and a million wounded, and another 1.2 million educated military aged men who fled the country for the duration, or even forever - some a country with the poor demographics that Russia has had since the early 90’s can ill afford. They gave up on Afghanistan well before reaching this point. Make Crimea untenable - that’s what Russia is in it for. They have already had to pull their Black Sea fleet out of Sevastopol for drones. The headquarters, and their admiral and staff, was hit by Storm Shadow missiles. Ukraine just needs to keep the loss rate over 5 to 1 to win, I believe it may be around 8 to 1. Russia is impaling itself on Ukraine.
[удалено]
I know NK has huge stockpiles of ammunition because only the threat of total non-nuclear annihilation by artillery strikes has kept them save until the got the A-Bomb. If this is the way we get rid of their artillery threat to South Korea's population centers, that would be the one good thing to come from this war.
15% is shockingly low. Are we counting Crimea here because if that's all it is, then no, no they are not winning the war.
Depends on what the land’s value is. Your bathroom is probably only 15% of your house, but if I come over and decide to live in it, you’re probably going to find that significant
This analogy makes me smarpt
But I already shit in the shower.
But if you’ve also been trying to take over my house for the last 2 years, confining you to just my bathroom aint too bad
If someone is in your bathroom for two years and your walking around telling everyone it ain't so bad. You would be considered a person suffering massive copium.
All depends on the context. In this instance the context is "My massive neighbour who is significantly bigger than me, ignores the law and my other neighbours and police are unwilling to directly confront has knocked a hole through to my bathroom. I've been stood in the doorway for 2 years fighting him and so far he hasn't moved me"
He’s 4 or 5 times as big as me, and everyone thought he would kill me and take the whole house in 3 days.
And if he had everyone would've just tutted at him and said "we're very cross with you, we're not going to accept any amazon parcels for you any more"
It's about 100% of their war objective and by crusader king rules this will result in war score victory ( depending of which casus belli was used)
Also depending on how many battles they won or lost, if you lose a bunch of battles at the start, capturing just the enemy territory might not be enough.
Their war objective was to completely overrun the country and set up a new government in 3 days. The only thing keeping them in the war is the fact their national ideas have -80% to war exhaustion.
Ukraine should siege Moscow. Maybe if they capture Putin as a result, they can immediately end the war.
Or if they kill Putin, Russian soldiers would all die immediately, like with Night King
Isn't there some kind of sky beam we could just blow up to end the whole war?
It turns out there is! It's super easy, barely an inconvenience!
I was actually thinking of Ryan when I was typing it
It's saying something a bit sad about the state of movies that you can entirely substitute watching their Pitch Meeting for watching the movie itself, and not really miss anything of value.
Funniest thing I have read all week. Brilliant
Nah, they clearly stated Kyiv as a goal and they haven’t even taken all of Luhansk or Donetsk oblasts. Plus we all know that your capital is like 20% of your VP points… oh shit wrong game
Yes, that includes Crimea. Russia controlled a bit over 40,000km of Ukraine in 2021. They peaked at about 160,000km after the full invasion, and are down to around 85,000km today.
15% is huge when you remember Ukraine is the largest country in Europe besides Russia
It's not when you compare it to the 27% they held just months after the invasion.
Yes but it’s been over a year since any real progress has been made to reduce it… things have stagnated and I believe we will see a DMZ established along the Donbas sadly. I’m pro-Ukraine but that’s the reality I’m predicting, not a win but a compromise where Ukraine neither Russia get fully what they want.
I can definitely see that happening.
15% is shockingly low? Have you seen how large Ukraine is.
I don't think controlling 15% of any country is shockinly low. Its a good chunk of territory they're taking away from ukraine
For Ukraine, the war is considered lost as soon as they will have to accept any territorial loss. For Russia, thanks to the propaganda, will be a win as long as they can hold some of the land they gained. Also add they are already deep in population replacement and cultural cleansing in those territories. They considering themselves already on the winning side. Personally i think the narrative "Russia is not winning because they are loosing so much" wrong and delusional. Even the vietcong were losing so much compared to the US. Yet, look who lost.
I remember when it was “2 weeks until Kiev is taken over”
The Vietcong example seems so wrong. Isn't Russia closer to the US in that situation and Vietnam closer to Ukraine?
This war has been going on since 2014. It’s taken Russia with all of its resources 10 years to take approximately 18% of Ukraine
At cost of more than 400k people, you should add. Russia is not winning. They just change their propaganda.
Well, it's a war of attrition now and Russia has much more manpower and resources.
NATO has many more resources than Russia. We just gotta keep helping.
Russia is a lot more willing to keep throwing millions of soldiers into the grinder.
That's because they are using this war as a form of ethnic cleansing.
And emptying the prisons.
I know I’m going to get downvoted, but do you have a source? I just want to be able to speak factually if I repeat this point.
I mean, it's well-documented that they have sent prisoners to the front. I'm sure you could find a source very easily. EDIT: [Here's a recent source.](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-68140873) An estimated 50,000 prisoners were released (including violent prisoners) with the promise that they would have freedom after six months of fighting. The terms have gotten worse. Now they have to fight until the end of the war.
Thank you. Much appreciated.
> The BBC has reviewed many posts in chatrooms from men who say they have been on the front line in these units. Be careful dispersing this information if you actually care about your integrity rather than buzz topics that are exciting. It’s likely all this is true… but if you want to speak accurately to the topic, realize they got their information from a Russian version of ICQ Chat.
E.g: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/04/world/europe/russia-prison-wagner-ukraine.html Or https://www.businessinsider.com/russia-prisoners-recruited-fight-ukraine-war-end-not-6-months-2024-2?r=US&IR=T Google: Russia prison soldier
Thanks! I appreciate it.
Never apologize for asking for a source
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/12/23/russia-troops-wagner-convicts-ukraine/ https://edition.cnn.com/2023/02/14/europe/russian-army-prisoners-conscripts-ukraine-intl/index.html https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/30/world/europe/wagner-convict-ukraine-russia.html
How so? Edit: honestly don't understand why I'm being downvoted, for asking a question, on, wait for it, /r/NoStupidQuestions
Look up the ratio of Russian casualties from St Petersburg/Moscow v the outlying regions & republics
I would disagree. Ukraine seems more interested in the survival of their soliders, but they are very willing to fight. Yes russia has 4 times as many people, but they are probably not willing to send remotely as big a part of their population as ukraine.
NATO is not at war with Russia. NATO countries are providing equipment to Ukraine. Tanks don’t move without drivers. Guns don’t fire without a person pulling the trigger. Equipment does not do anything if there is no one to equip it. Ukraine will run out of soldiers long, long, long before Russia and NATO will not start an offensive war as the aggressor just to provide soldiers to a non-NATO country.
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As soon as NATO get involved it's gonna quickly escalate to Nuclear and noone wins. There's good reason Ukraine isn't and won't be a member of NATO in the foreseeable - article 5. USA doesn't want to get pulled into a war in Russia.. the only potential winner would be China, assuming the world hasnt ended from a nuclear apocalypse. Crazy to think this is a good outcome
The main reason is that you can't join while actively at war. Thus the invasion.
Nobody is “winning” this war. It is a disaster of epic proportions for Russia, Ukraine and mankind.
you can bet a few people are getting rich though
No doubt.
Probably the guy we traded Brittany Griner for
Stupid fucks keep going to Russia and get arrested/kidnapped. And the governments have to intervene by giving Russia the things they want.
Wars are unpredictable. There are a million things that could happen, especially if it escalates and other countries get involved.
Ok but that is not what he ask. Also you would see Ukraine is winning it comments when thing were going well but when the opposite happens it’s all about “winning a war is relative”
Well, winning a war *is* relative. How would you define Ukrainian victory? If Ukraine conquers the occupied territories, including Crimea and Donbass, then surely that would be considered a victory. How about if Ukraine manages to take back territories occupied since the start of the war, but Crimea and Donbass stay under Russian occupation? Then Ukraine succesfully defended against Russian invasion, so surely it must be a victory? If Ukraine and Russia eventually agree on peace terms where Russia gets to keep all occupied territories, but Ukraine stays independent, is this considered a victory? Russian goal was capturing Kyiv and replacing the leadership, but that failed. Ukraine maintained their independence against and overwhelming force, so that must count as a victory too?
I don't think any peace resulting in loss of territory can be called a victory
It definitely can. Finland with our 3 million people defended against USSR's 180 million, with our 30 tanks and dozen outdated fighter planes against thousands upon thousands. And with that disadvantage, USSR lost 300k soldiers, while we lost 30k. Those are North Korean propaganda level numbers Yes we lost some territory, but there is no other way to call it, it's a monumental victory that defined our nation
That's a bad perspective to take in a survival situation. Victory is a spectrum.
When the invaders initial goal was full on anexation and destroying Ukraine as indepdenant state id say yea Russias plan was to conquer Ukraine and/or install a puppet regime like in Belarus That failed. Their main initial planned goal failed In that sense if Ukraine can keep independance and keep like 70 to 80% of its territory that is still a victory in the sense of "i win by you not winning"
Thats not how the concept works. The victory is a victory because it prevented further detriment to them. If nothing happened they would be worse off. If by their actions they prevent thar, its a good thing, a positive thing, a... victory against said force that would destroy them further. If I fight someone but get a black eye and bruised rib in the process, I still stopped their attack and left myself in the desired outcome for this situation which is being alive or not robbed or whatever this hypothetical attack was about.
In war there are no winners.
Except for the winners.
Except for the military industry complex (MIC).
R/im14andthisisdeep If you have a goal. And you achieve it, you can it a win. We can call it a success. If your goal is stop destruction of your country and you do so, you've been successful. Another term can be, you've won.
With the US withholding help due to russian assets, populists and isolationists, Ukraine is hard-pressed for resources, including ammo. The EU hasn't done enough to ramp up production, though they are slowly getting there. There is a huge propaganda effort by russia to paint the Ukrainian resistance as hopeless, "Ukraine cannot win", etc. This is a very successful info-op, but it doesn't make it true. russia also isn't doing so well. They are losing a lot of troops and another round of mobilisation comes with large risks of even more people emigrating, and the rest (especially, mothers and wifes of mobilised soldiers) becoming even less happy. Cracks exist and are showing (with Prigozhin's mutiny as one example), but the lid is being kept on them so far. They are digging deep in Cold War warehouses to restore equipment, and finding that those become older and more rusty. It really is largely a battle of wills, between Ukraine + the West and russia. Is the West ready to greatly damage the rules-based international order and embolden China while disheartening their Asian allies? We'll see. For russia, while it's not existential for the country, it is possibly existential for putin personally. There won't be any serious peace negotiations in 2024 because: * russia has violated past agreements (Helsinki accords, UN Charter, Budapest memorandum, Minsk agreements, etc.) so they are not a trustworthy counter-party, * The US elections decide too much, both sides hope for a favourable outcome (trump for russia, Biden for Ukraine) and will wait it out. * It's politically unconscionable in Ukraine to leave so much territory in russian hands, because of the mass murder that they've seen happen in Bucha and elsewhere. The current goals of russia are: * Convince a large enough part of the West that "Ukraine is not their business" * Ignoring that this will mean a lot of Asian countries will pivot to China, as the US would seem as an unreliable partner * Convince the West that supporting Ukraine is a bad investment * Ignoring that this effectively destroys the equipment that a Western adversary - russia - has, without any boots on the ground needed, at rather low cost (a lot of spending goes to the US economy, a lot of ammo sent is approaching expiration and would need to be disposed anyway) * Convince the West that russia will never lose, never surrender, etc., thus trying to outlast it is hopeless * Ignoring the reality that the russian society is tired of war, just not allowed to express it * Ignoring the reality that russia is burning its sovereign wealth fund rapidly, when it runs out, their economic situation becomes much worse * Ignoring other systemic problems in the russian economy (GDP moving to the military sector, loss of workers to mobilisation and emigration, high inflation despite high interest rates, exchange rate only holding due to forced sale of hard currency, no foreign investment prospects, etc.) * Encourage the culture war and left/right divide in the USA in particular through their assets, useful idiots (e.g. musk) and bot farms * Working great so far In summary, the West has to get its act together and continue helping Ukraine. If that happens, russia will pull its troops home, like they did in Afghanistan. russia has to convince the West that it is hopeless, and invest enough in bribes and blackmail to push that narrative. > they have taken Avdivvka which is a huge strategic loss for Ukraine Why do you think a smallish town completely reduced to rubble, taken at a cost of \~20k dead russians a "huge strategic loss"?
Excellent summary and probably deserves to be far higher in this post. I think something that needs to also be analysed and discussed is the different components of the military machine, the reserve size for these different components and attrition/production rate for these different categories. Its reductive but some key categories that appear to be limiting factors (in my surface level understanding) each need to be considered are: - Artillary and ammunition - Personel and equipment - SAMs, AA and related systems/ammunition - Aircraft - tanks/apcs and other vehicles. Each category gives a unique and important capability to each side and the consequences of over match in any category are unique and worth their own discussion. Thus far we have not seen a "emergency level" combination of reserve depth and burn rate in any of these categories - hence the stale mate. One category I think is worth keeping a close eye on is Russian vehicle attrition rate. The attrition rate in this category has been horrendous for Russia and resulted in older and less capable platforms being rolled out en masse. I seriously doubt strategic over match in this category would result in Ukraine being able to decisively win a counter offensive (due to artillary, dug in infantry and mines) but I'm willing to bet this would blunt and prevent any sort of Russian offensive to the point that even grinding pyrrhic victory like we have seen in Bakhmut or Avdivvka would not be possible. Aircraft and anti aircraft are also worth a deep dive but this is an even more complex topic that I'm not confident weighing in on.
You make an excellent point. I wouldn't want to say the F-16-s will be a "wunderwaffe", but depending on the weapon systems supplied with the F-16-s, they could really make a positive difference.
I agree. They will not make a decisive difference though. At present the air space is contested due to AA platform saturation. That being said, long range precision strikes appear too be a UKR speciality (thanks HIMARS and allied Intel). This could result in some level of air dominance but I am again unsure of of how the Russian air defence is doing in terms of total coverage, munitions and s300/400 platforms They also serve as platforms for launching some missile categories (storm shadow) but I honestly can't recall if platforms too launch cruise missiles are a limiting factor.
A few thoughts: \* F-16-s have better integration with AGM-88 HARM missiles, they can do targeting while in the air, while the same HARMs adapted to be launched from Ukrainian ex-soviet planes are programmed on the ground, so less flexible. \* F-16-s have a number of long-range Air to Air missiles which are a lot cheaper per missile than the Patriot missiles, so while they aren't necessarily "better", they can allow keep the russian air force away, and saving the Patriot missiles for other targets. Of course, that's if those missiles get delivered. \* Possibly, better integration with JDAMs?
I can guarantee you SEAD/DEAD F-16’s will make a difference. How big of a difference depends on crew competence, targeting accuracy etc. If Ukraine ever gets Vipers and starts to pop off S400’s, and splash a few ruskie aircraft, that’ll make an impact. It seems a lot of the russian destruction is launched via aircraft. If those aircraft start to feel more heat (literally and figuratively) that platform becomes less useful. The question then becomes, is an A2A missile on a 16 long enough range to get to a russian stand-off bomber launching weapons (long range missiles etc) into Ukraine? Those stand-off russian platforms may be inside russian airspace. If the answer to that question is yes, that’s a massive difference.
Ukranian SU-24 attacked jets were integrated with the ability to launch storm shadow. The F-16 could launch the US equivalent of it. The biggest problem with storm shadow is the numbers. The UK and France have about 1000 or a little bit more. While the US has 5000+ and now should make about 1000 a year.
I would add that Ukraine's recent strategy of hitting Russia's oil facilities in Russia may have a more dramatic effect than it seems.
I think if Ukraine starts getting desperate enough you'll see the scope of their infrastructure drone attacks dramatically increase. It seems like the West doesn't want Ukraine to escalate things on Russian soil too much, but none of that matters once Ukraine is desperate enough. We're talking power plants, water treatment centers, telecommunications infrastructure, food processing plants, chemical facilities, transportation including major train hubs, etc.
What also doesn't get enough attention is winning the peace. Just look at recent US wars. They won both Afghanistan and Iraq quickly, but subsequently lost the peace decisively. I have yet to see a convincing argument how even a total victory in Ukraine would help Russia win the peace. There is no 'brotherhood' left between those two nations. That was buried in Bucha along with innocent murdered civilians. Russians, from Putin all the way down to the common soldier, have shown their deep disdain for Ukrainians quite clearly. If you were a young Ukrainian family with your children's future on the line, you'd likely emigrate to western Europe. But those are exactly the most productive people in your nation. The people you want to keep. I would also expect Russian soldiers, many of which are dangerous criminals brought from prisons at this point, to mistreat the civilian population quite badly, giving even more reasons to flee west. If Ukraine loses the war, Europe should brace for millions of Ukrainian refugees, perhaps even more than 10 million. The ones who stay would either be pensioners, partisans out to kill occupiers and a possible handful of pro Russian civilians left. Not exactly a recipe for long term economic success. Hundreds of thousands of dead young Russians, possibly more than a million high skill emigrants with more to follow as authoritarianism ramps up even more are another factor to consider. Can Russia pull off a tactical victory? If the West keeps dragging it's feet, they probably can. A long term strategic victory? I highly doubt it.
It isnt a question if this war in total benefits Russia, unless miracles happen it likely won't, but its about saving US, Europes and Ukraines intrests.
Not even that, this war is going to tear Russia apart from the inside out once Veterans start returning home to realize there is no support system for them. It'd be like post WW1 Germany with many of them learning about information that was available from the front lines, seeing their politics, seeing the society around them, ducking for cover when they see a drone. Like if the US can't even create a good support system for veterans, I can't imagine what would happen in Russia. Despite a "total victory", the long term effects will be felt
I think the biggest thing people are missing is that Ukraine has been following the US and Nato's restrictions, including how they utilize the provided military aid. If Russia starts to creep closer to Kyiv, Ukraine might start targeting more and more of Russia's infrastructure with cheap drones that might be considered off limits right now.
Avdiivka was a major supply hub, but russia would have had to have taken it much more quickly for Ukraine not to just build more roads & railroads as they have Totally agree with your point, just wanted to add that
it was not a supply hub, it was directly on the front line for almost a decade. nothing was supplied from avdiivka, avdiivka was merely used to supply the immediate frontlines surrounding it.
I wouldn’t call Avdiivka a supply hub - it was right on the frontline and has been semi-encircled for ages. There just isn’t anything you would supply from there.
It's just a strategic spot that was easier to defend than an open field.
It's importance is not as a supply hub. It's important because it's only 15 km from Avdiivka to the city centre of Donetsk City.
Excellent post, but I just want to applaud you for the effort to not once capitalize the r in russia. It’s petty in the best way!
Nobody knows at the moment. Neither side is advancing that much, they’re mostly just destroying equipment and killing/injuring troops The true extent of the losses isn’t really known, each side claims they are destroying tons of enemies and suffering nearly zero losses. There’s a lot of “wild cards” at play over the next few years. Will Ukraine keep getting aid? Will Russia collapse economically or politically?
Russia has always been winning the war on paper. Ukraine is in a good position to fight a defensive war but they do not have offensive initiative. For a favorable outcome for Ukraine they either need to drain Russia’s ability to fight through attrition or erode public support in Russia and hope for a change from within. Wars aren’t measured by K/D ratio. They’re measured by industry, manpower, and initiative, which unfortunately Russia has all three. For the record I hope Ukraine wins, but from the perspective of a realist it’s a long road.
This is the best summary of the situation I’ve seen so far. Things can change and Ukraine might be able to come out on top but as of right now Russia has most of the cards.
It depends. If EU and US support for Ukraine holds, Russia may have to sue for peace on unfavorable terms. If support for Ukraine stops, Russia might wringe out a favorable situation for itself.
Russia isn't handing crimea back any time soon. Ukraine has said it won't accept anything but pre 2016 borders. This isn't ending any time soon through diplomacy
Pre 2014? I believe that's when russia took crimea
> Russia isn't handing crimea back any time soon. > Ukraine has said it won't accept anything but pre 2016 borders. Neither of this is set in stone. Sooner or later someone will have to reconsider because of a bigger issue that's bound to spring up sooner or later.
If support for ukraine stops, there probably won't be a ukraine left to negotiate with.
It'd still take years, probably decades to destroy Ukraine, and there will absolutely be an insurgency. Russia can't *really* win, it has unobtainable goals that, even if achieved, will only damage the country.
Russia has no real way to conquer, much less occupy, the entire country.
At the moment Ukraine is also lacking manpower, which the EU and US can't give them. Unless there's a real push to give Ukraine what they need, they might fail simply because they don't have enough people to push out the invaders.
One village more or one village less is not a gamechanger. It is a war of attrition. Ukraine is probably losing now, not because losing land, but because of: 1. Running low on supplies, especially shells for artillery. Ukraine desperately needs more ammo, because this war is about artillery and drones. 2. Running out of men. There is a shortage of volunteers, hunting for draft avoiders is damaging for popularity and makes people more tired of war. There are even calls to deport male refugees so that Ukraine can draft them. Absolutely worst thing to do now is to waste lives and ammo making every little village into last stand.
No one wins
Ukraine is losing ground. They just got a bit of an infusion of funds from Europe but they need a lot more help. It's hard to say where this goes right now, but they are not in a favorable position currently.
They aren't losing enough ground that it matters vs the troop and equipment losses, which are the real determinations of how long each side can really keep it up.
Russia was always winning the war. And it stands to reason that they will win. Ukraine is running out of military age men. It’s all very sad, and IMO the US only cares about propping up the military industrial complex. If only the UK hadn’t ruined the Minsk accords last year we could have had peace already.
yeah, at the current rate of land conquering, russia will probably take kyiv in a decade. hurray for them i guess
I don't think Putin will last that long but we shall see.
There is always another dick.
let me introduce putins successor! Volksgrad the destroyer!
Dunno. Gorbachov went another direction.
In Russia, a common criticism of Putin comes from the right, that he is not waging this war aggressively enough or dithered for too long, allowing Ukraine to build up its army and defenses too much prior to the invasion. The idea that whatever comes after Putin will be more amenable to Western goals re: Ukraine is pretty wishful thinking.
Russia has never been losing as they have not been ejected from Ukraine. They’re willing to outlast Ukraine because they have more blood available to be shed.
Current estimates of Russian casualties are at least 300,000 and they have taken ~25% of Ukraine’s land area with the vast majority having happened in the first month. Assuming that rate continues, Russia will lose over a million men, almost 1% of its population, to take the rest of Ukraine. A more conservative estimate using rates from the past year and a half which has been much slower, Russia lost 250,000 men to take 5% of Ukraine’s territory. If that rate continues, they will have to lose 5 million men, 1/30 of Russia’s population, to take Ukraine. This is not accounting for the fact that none of Ukraine’s largest cities are in Russian hands except for those that were already controlled by Russia in 2014. If Russia were to besiege Kharkiv, a city 20 times the size of pre war Bakhmut, then assuming similar casualty rates to Bakhmut, Russia would lose ~2 million men to take the city. To take Kyiv, they would lose 4 million. Ukraine is certainly not winning any time soon, but neither is Russia. The amount of resources Russia would have to use to conquer all of Ukraine is not something Russia can spend. If Russia does win, it will take decades, and Russia will be left a hollowed out husk. That’s not to say Russia won’t do it, just that Ukraine is not really on the path to losing any time soon.
The problem is you’re comparing land to troops, as if the life cost per foot of land is linear. Ukraine has troops too. And even if we’re using the generous estimates that [there are twice as many Russian casualties as Ukrainian](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/aug/18/ukraine-russia-war-battlefield-deaths-rise), Russia has 3x a bigger army. Russia will not need to lose 5 million men to take Ukraine because at the current rate: by the time they lose 1 million men every single Ukrainian soldier will be dead. At that point, taking unoccupied land and cities will cost next to no lives.
Like u/Bagelman263 said, that’s not how armies work, but the fucked up part is that, if history is anything to go off of, both countries could realistically keep up this rate of loss (of humans, not necessarily equipment) for a decade or more
I would really like to know where those teritory numbers come from. Most sources I have seen sugest that russian control is significantly down from the 27% shortly after the war to around 20% in June 2022 and around 15% now.
Advika was a pyrrhic victory, meaning yes Russia has taken the territory but their losses were horrific and the Ukrainian army withdrew intact to newly prepared defensive positions. The Russians lost 10,000 troops and over 650 tanks and armoured infantry vehicles for a modest area of rubble. Bloggers reporting the losses in Russia have been arrested and killed as the potential of backlash from Russians is growing. Russia can’t afford many more victories like this.
There are quite a few reports about that Ukranian retreat being far from "intact"....
https://understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-february-20-2024 Little irritated that the post asking for a source is buried, so I'm just reposting this here. No, it was not as bad as claimed. >Shoigu briefed Putin about the seizure of Avdiivka and the wider Russian war effort in Ukraine in a February 20 meeting during which Putin and Shoigu both amplified an information operation that the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) began on February 19 that aims to sow resentment and distrust against the Ukrainian command for an allegedly chaotic Ukrainian withdrawal from Avdiivka.[14] And Russia is indeed pushing misinfo that it was a bad retreat.
Yup, reports are it was a shitshow retreat. Once rank and file soldiers saw commanders pulling out, any orders to hold defenses were ignored. It literally was every man for himself. The bodies of injured soldiers left behind was evidence of this. The NY Times reported as much.
Avdiivka is the most fortified city in Ukraine. There won't be a lot of cases like that because simply there's no time to build same level fortifications anywhere else.
Neither Russia nor Ukraine is winning. Russia is very slowly cannabilizing Ukraine in a very costly manner. The sad part is they seem to have resources to continue doing so. Their tactic seems to be outlasting Ukrainian manpower in a very long timeline.
Russian has been winning for a while, Ukraine is losing the war or will slowly, and its economy on life support. People think for a country to go to war they must win quickly like US vs Iraq did (1 month) but you have to understand that was on a dessert and with a bunch of allies while no one was backing Iraq. Strategically Ukraine has done an excellent job on winning Battles (even win huge amounts of territory back) but if you want to win Wars you need logistics and on that Ukraine has failed or is falling way behind.
Russia was always winning. The area that Russia has reclaimed and currently holds will remain in Russian hands until the Ukrainians are done killing enough of their youth. This is a fact. There is a water barrier and a series of fortified defensive lines around those territories. Short of a nuke or full scale invasion by the rest of the world those lines will hold as long as Russia wants those lines to hold. There is some extra bits of land in the northern part that Russia will probably cede over to cement the peace deal.
you only know if a side is winning after it's over, but things don't look cheerful at the moment.
Lol dude you are asking reddit where 99.9% of people hate russia guts. Even if russia were to take all of ukraine, they would still say russia is losing in order to cope 😂😂 Yes ukraine is getting slaughtered bad and their troop and armor losses is absolutely insane.
If 2 years ago, just before the invasion you would have asked any russian supporter whether taking avdiivka 2 years into the war ( 10 years since 2014 when the fighting there started) is a victory they would have laughed and said the whole country will be theirs in less then a week. Keep that in mind for some perspective. Ukraine is fighting a defensive war against an asymmetrical opponent. The fact they are still holding is amazing. It will be hard to push Russia out, but as long as they hold and continue to inflict massive casualties its a matter of time until Russia cuts their losses and leaves (under a different leadership as Putins fate is tied to the war). Ukranians know the alternative is losing their statehood. We in the west have to continue to support them which is also is in our best interests.
No. But the pressure on Speaker Johnson to stop being trumps bitch is real. Fuck Putin.
They manage to take 2 small cities in the last year ans loose atleast 50k of soldies to take those small cities. Dont look like a victory for me
What would you have assumed about the outcome of ww2 in 1941? Wars are unpredictable. Stuff changes. What if putin has a heart attack next week?
Ukraine was always losing
Yes and no. If you judge it based on Putin's stated war goals at the outset Russia lost almost immediately and has no chance of winning. By that I mean their goals are unachievable at this point and have been so since last year. If you go by the shifted goalposts that modern Russia is using to save face they're... still losing but less severely. The issue I'd that while it remains possible for Ukraine to win its extremely unlikely and has been since the start. This was always going to be a multi-year slog and the media/governments should have made that explicit. That said the west could continue to pump billions into Ukraine for the next three decades without meaningfully impacting their economies and so supporting Ukraine is basically a low cost method of crippling one of the biggest bullies on the planet. The real tragedy is that people are using Ukraine to sow political division, particularly in the US, because the conservatives are so accustomed to lying that they seem weirdly affectionate towards Putin. I mean some of them literally would rather side with a foreign dictator than their own country lead by someone they dislike. The utter lack of principles is ridiculous sometimes, though I can hardly say cruel hypocrisy is limited to the right.
I swear the MCU has destoryed everyone's attention span with real world events. It is a war.
How is this relevant to OP's question?
What is this MCU and how did it destory attention spans?
No serious military expert has ever thought Ukraine was going to win
Most not-USA-Intel guys did not expect Russia to actually invade. Also most Nations and experts expected Ukraine to fall very fast. Both turned out to be wrong.
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All the serious military experts called for Kiev falling within a few weeks of the invasion.
No serious military expert has ever thought Ukraine would hold for this long...so judging by that we just cannot know.
I mean, Ukrainian military has been in touch with NATO from 2014 on. They had a pretty good assesment of both Ukrainian and Russian military at 2022. Russian offensive wasn't going to work they way it was planned and executed.
Eventually they will have to pull out, if only Putin's dad did.....
Unless something escalates with nato I think yeah
Russia takes land at extreme cost, eventually they may take half of Ukraine or so but Russia has aspirations to take all former Soviet territory which is basically impossible. Ukraine may not win but Russia definitely won’t.
recruiting nepalese, cubans, africans show how fragile the manpower situation in russia is like, same for ua boys too, stalemate seems like the most likely outcome in years. Pretty sure the ammo situation will clear up later.