A year and a half in, the war in Ukraine is at a crossroads
Jamie McIntyre
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It’s been a year and a half since Vladimir Putin launched his planned three-day “special military operation” aimed at toppling Ukraine’s government and bringing the former Soviet state under his thumb. And the war, which is giving every indication it will stretch into a third year, is at a crossroads.
Putin’s strategy is clear: dig in, hold on, and wait for the world to give up on the expensive task of supporting Ukraine.
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The mantra of the U.S. and NATO remains that they will support Ukraine “as long as it takes.” But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is worried.
He can feel the resolve of the West starting to flag. Just as Putin is banking on.
Zelensky told the Economist in a recent interview he can sense this when he talks to partners who insist “we’ll be always with you.”
“I have this intuition, reading, hearing and seeing their eyes … I see that he or she is not here, not with us.”
In the U.S. Congress, where there is wide bipartisan support for Ukraine, hard-right House Republicans are fighting to cut $24 billion in military and economic support President Joe Biden has requested in an emergency supplemental appropriation for the coming year.
Zelensky was hoping for another dramatic victory over Russian troops to galvanize support and boost morale. But the spring offensive slipped to summer when he didn’t get the weapons he needed in time.
“We waited too long. It’s true,” he told CNN this month. “I’m thankful to partners, to the United States, EU, other partners. I’m thankful very much to President Biden and to Congress, but we have to understand, we waited too long.”
In the months leading up to Ukraine’s summer counteroffensive, the U.S. worked closely with Kyiv’s military leaders planning a campaign based on sophisticated maneuver warfare, designed to quickly pierce Russia’s multilayered defenses and hopefully spark a panicked retreat by its poorly trained, ill-equipped, largely-conscript army.
The Pentagon provided exquisite battlefield intelligence, and along with its allies, it trained 17 brigades, more than 60,000 soldiers, in Western-style combined arms tactics. And equipped them with modern tanks, precision artillery, and mine-clearing equipment.
Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was in constant contact with Valery Zaluzhny, the top officer in Ukraine’s armed forces, giving advice on the American way of waging war.
The Americans had war-gamed the plan and believed there were weak spots in the miles of trenches, minefields, and tank traps where Ukraine could break through, splitting and then outflanking Russian troops.
Ukraine was in for “brutal and bloody battles to reclaim their homeland,” Milley said in July. But the Pentagon insisted Ukrainian forces had what they needed to be successful.
Except, it turned out, they didn’t.
When Ukraine first tried to breach Russian lines in early June, its forces took heavy casualties.
Slowed by heavily-mined buffer zones, their armor became sitting ducks for Russia’s attack helicopters armed with new, long-range anti-tank missiles, and artillery barrages.
In an interview with the Washington Post at the end of June, Zaluzhny expressed deep frustration over his inability to effectively counter Russia’s advantage in artillery and air power. And for being asked to do something U.S. forces would never do, namely mount a major offensive without close air support for troops on the ground.
Denied U.S. F-16s, Zaluzhny had no way to keep helicopters and Russia’s modern Su-35 fighter jets at bay.
“I do not need 120 planes … a very limited number would be enough,” Zaluzhny said. “But they are needed. Because there is no other way. … It’s like we’d go on the offensive with bows and arrows.”
Ukraine quickly became disenchanted with the Western way of war and switched to more cautious tactics, probing Russian lines with smaller groups trying to keep casualties to a minimum while fighting on two fronts, Bakhmut in the east and Zaporizhia in the south.
The shift has produced modest gains in the south, where Ukrainian forces have carved a wedge into Russia’s first line of defense, and is putting pressure on the second line. But progress has been much slower than the U.S. predicted.
“That’s the difference between war on paper and real war,” Milley said. “These are real people, in real vehicles, that are fighting through real minefields, and there’s real death and destruction.”
Ukraine’s more casualty-averse approach prompted second-guessing from unnamed American strategists who told the New York Times that Ukrainian commanders had “misallocated” their troops, spreading them too thin along too many axes.
That prompted retired Gen. Jack Keane, former Army vice chief of staff, to call that advice “military malpractice.”
“No one in the American military today has designed large-scale mechanized operations against a serious and capable enemy that is employing a comprehensive defense,” Keane wrote in the Wall Street Journal. “The last time was the Metz campaign in France in 1944, led by Gen. George S. Patton.”
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba had an even more colorful rebuke.
“I would recommend all critics to shut up, come to Ukraine, and try to liberate one square centimeter by themselves,” he said.
The next month or so will be crucial to the war effort because once Ukraine’s rainy season starts, the ground will become soft and muddy, making maneuver warfare increasingly difficult. And when the snow comes and the canopy of leaves is gone hiding from enemy shells and missiles is tougher.
While the war has been going on for a year and a half, this will be Ukraine’s third winter at war.
Last winter was a stalemate, but Zelensky knows he can’t afford to lose momentum, or he will not only give Russia time to rest and resupply, but it will send the wrong message to nervous allies and partners.
Zelensky insists there can be no end to war other than pushing Russia off every inch of Ukrainian territory because he says Putin can’t be trusted to abide by any peace agreement.
Just look what happened to Yevgeny Prigozhin.
“He killed him. But before he killed him, he gave him promises … a lot of different things,” Zelensky told CNN. “When you want to have compromises or dialogue with somebody, you can do it with a lie.”
Nevertheless, the toll of the war has been staggering, with large areas of Ukraine, including several cities, reduced to rubble and casualties on both sides nearing 500,000.
Ukraine is estimated to have suffered close to 70,000 killed and between 100,000 and 120,000 wounded, while Russian casualties are approaching 300,000, with 120,000 deaths and 170,000 to 180,000 wounded.
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The war will end when one side gives in, and the problem, says Zelensky, is that for Putin, “life is nothing.”
“Neither side at this point in time has achieved their political objectives through military means, and the war will continue until one side or the other has achieved those means, or both sides have determined it’s time to go to a negotiating table — that they can’t meet their objectives through military means,” Milley told CBS Sunday Morning. “That time is not yet here.”