Closing
- We will blink an eyelid and Kyiv will be ours! - declared in one of his programs Vladimir Soloviev, the alleged journalist, and in fact the chief Kremlin propagandist. It happened in February, several days later the Russian army entered Ukraine. I don't know how fast Solovyov and his gang blink their eyelids - for the rest of the people this action takes a third of a second. We usually blink 15-20 times per minute, which is over one million six hundred thousand repetitions over a 100-day period. This is how many times the Russians should have Kyiv, and they have...
Of course, even Solovyov did not take his words literally. He meant an effective phrase, as if the term "lightning" sounded insufficiently blunt enough. It does not change the fact that if the peasant did not get puffed up and what verbal games he did not reach, today he would be a fool anyway. Like his Kremlin boss, splendidly summed up in the satirical commentary of the Weekly NO. "Come on genius, today is the hundredth day of your three-day military operation," the profile admin mocks, illustrating the post with a picture of a troubled Putin. Karma, bastard...
A joke, no karma, but a gigantic effort of the Ukrainian army and society, supported by Western sanctions, supplies of weapons and intelligence. These are the most important factors that determine that the Russian military - instead of bragging about quickly and completely defeating Ukraine - is bleeding out today in the fight for a medium-sized district city, after having previously reduced the strategic objectives of the operation several times. Because first he was ordered to occupy the whole country, then all the east and south, then only Donbass, and finally only two of the five Donbas regions.
And to keep what has already been gained, because the enemy's army does not think to give up, and on some sections of the front it even strikes back. Looking at the situation from the outside, it is hardly surprising that the Kremlin is pressured by the Russian media to “not notice” today's symbolic date. The scale of the disgrace of the Russian army, intelligence and political authorities is shocking. And it is not at all a historical phenomenon, a diagnosis of the beginning of the invasion. This is a process that continues - a month and a half of the battle for Donbass allowed the Russians to move the front into Ukraine by as much as 32 km.
For what price? Huge. While in the first weeks of the invasion the Russian losses reported by the Ukrainians seemed to be overstated, today these reports can be accused of… restraint. I do not mean data on the equipment (although it should be noted that two-thirds of the damage reported by Ukrainians is confirmed by independent sources assessing the scale of the losses on the basis of photographic and film materials). I'm talking about human statistics. According to the command of the Ukrainian army, 31,000 have so far been killed, wounded, missing and captured. Russians. Meanwhile, the American intelligence estimates the number of killed aggressors at at least 15,000. (not counting mercenaries), and more than 40,000 wounded. As a reminder - the invasion forces on February 24 numbered between 170 and 190 thousand. people.
Of course, Ukrainians are also dying, especially civilians. Official UN figures say that less than five thousand were killed, but these are only absolutely undisputed cases. It is estimated that civil losses are 10 times higher; in Mariupol alone, 20 thousand people died as a result of hostilities. people. The occupiers make it difficult to collect data in the occupied territories, but mass graves can be seen from space, and the activities of teams equipped with mobile crematoria are recorded by Ukrainian patriots - and information on this subject is constantly posted on "our" website. As for military losses - in mid-April, Ukrainians reported that they had 3,000 dead and 10,000. wounded soldiers. Then the battle for Donbass began, as a result of which the daily Ukrainian losses increased to 60-100 soldiers killed and even half a thousand wounded. This gives us, by counting the average, another three thousand six hundred killed and over 22 thousand. injured. In total, we are talking about almost 7,000. fallen and over 30 thousand. injured and eliminated from the fight of Ukrainian military. Sources I have access to indicate that there may be several thousand more injured, and the number of people killed may reach 10,000.
For 10 thousand. - this time pieces of the highest caliber shells - estimates the daily need of own artillery, the best informed from my Ukrainian sources. The Russians shoot several times more densely, let's assume that five times (and this is a really cautious assumption...) - which gives us 60,000. cannon shells fired daily. Counting from the beginning of the battle for Donbass, 2.7 million pieces of used ammunition are released. Therefore, it is not surprising that there has been a drastic increase in the number of wounded Ukrainian soldiers, because although the Russians are not aiming specifically, some of this fire mass is still falling to the position of defenders. In this context, it is completely natural to change the relationship of losses on both sides. The trend towards leveling off is strong not only because the Russians use the artillery roller principle (according to which they start the attack only after a solid, repeatedly covering enemy defense lines with fire). Local Ukrainian counter-attacks also increase the losses - not only self-discovery (because it is impossible to secretly attack), but also the lack of sufficient air cover, works to the disadvantage of Ukrainians. Some of the counter-attacks in the south were stopped by the Russians at the exit stage, when their air force noticed and then thinned the concentrating Ukrainian troops.
This leads us to the conclusion that there will be no question of any major offensive operation of the Ukrainian army without sorting out the issue of air superiority. The Ukrainian air force is too modest for this, and the expansion of its capabilities... I will tell you a secret - I strongly believe that the Ukrainians will fly on the sixteenth, and perhaps the fifteenth. But it will not happen today, tomorrow, or even the day after tomorrow; it is a matter of many months, you will remember my words. But the defenders cannot afford such a long stalemate at the front, so the solution to this problem will probably be further deliveries of post-Soviet aircraft of "unknown origin" (see Bulgarian "but these are not our planes, such planes can be bought in any aircraft shop "- in response to press reports that fourteen Su-25s were handed over to Ukraine) and further development of anti-aircraft defense capabilities, also based on Western systems. Already today, the Russian aviation is operating much below its theoretical capabilities, cautiously and with decreasing intensity (probably someone is running out of resources and resources of properly trained pilots).
Another requirement (to increase the offensive potential of the Ukrainian army) is the expansion of artillery. A lot has happened recently in this regard, and among the positive information, the most important one concerns the American HIMARS system. These are multi-lead rocket launchers capable of hitting targets in the deep rear (up to 300 km). Mobile, precise, with high firepower, they pose a deadly threat not only to the enemy's artillery position, but also its airports, logistic bases and, above all, command centers. On the Ukrainian front, with the appropriate saturation - at the level of 150-200 launchers - the advantage of the Russians resulting from the greater number of artillery barrels will disappear (quality will exceed the quantity). And although so far the US has provided Ukraine with only four launchers - which the Ukrainians are already training on - more deliveries will follow soon.
continued in the next post (sign limit)
