Telegraph via Archive.ph
Excerpts below, read at links provided for entire article
The war in Ukraine is now one of attrition, (now one?) fought on terms that increasingly favour Moscow. Kyiv has dealt admirably with shortages of Western equipment so far, but a shortage of manpower – which it is already having to confront – may prove fatal.
Broadly speaking, Kyiv’s highly anticipated counter-offensive has gathered much-needed momentum in recent weeks, with hard-fought gains around the strategically important village of Robotyne. If this falls, the road to the Azov sea will be in sight. If Ukrainian forces can reach the coast, they will split the land-bridge connecting Russia with Crimea, potentially routing Moscow’s troops.
Made advances around an important village, that has yet to fall, will put the road to Azov sea in sight. Not the sea, just the road to it.
Ukraine’s forces, however, are not just fighting massed defences and artillery fire. They are also fighting against time. Having first penetrated the formidable Russian minefields four weeks ago, Kyiv is desperate to exploit its early successes before mounting casualties and autumn rains destroy its fighting capability.
The summer has been wet, and the autumn months traditionally bring heavy rains which turn the soft ground of eastern Europe into a thick mud as tanks, armour and artillery churn the battlefield. This can all but halt meaningful advances, locking armies into place and buying the Russians time to add to the deeply dug trench networks and multi-layered minefields that have made retaking lost territory such hard going.
Ukraine, meanwhile, had a pre-war population of 44 million. By the end of the first year of the war, some six million had fled abroad. The armed forces number around 200,000 active personnel, roughly the same again in reserve, and can draw on another 1.5 million fighting-age males.
Many of whom have fled as well. I’ve seen numbers around 50,000
Let’s catch the disinfo okay?
Kyiv is running out of men. US sources have calculated that its armed forces have lost as many as 70,000 killed in action, with another 100,000 injured.
How could Ukraine be running out of men to fight with such a low, US sourced, casualty count? According to official figures, provided by the US? The Ukraine should still have more than a million military aged men to draw on.
The last casualty figure I’ve come across that seems more credible was 400,000 plus dead, not including injured. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s half a million dead at this point. And an unknown number of injured. This more sensibly explains that shortage of men to fight. Not the nonsensical figures provided by the US.
For all the difficulties the Kremlin has faced in its forced conscriptions, it still has hundreds of thousands of men to draw upon. This is a resource Ukraine simply cannot match, and one that the West cannot supply.
Zelensky used Ukrainians as fodder to fight Russia on behalf of the US. He did it knowing full well this was the case. As the Polish President said..the Ukrainians were doing it on the cheap!
“Right now, Russian imperialism can be stopped cheaply, because American soldiers are not dying.”