Russia’s Winter Offensive is a dismal failure for the second year in a row.
Jan 10, 2024
Why Ukraine’s 2024 Strategy Will Fail
- Ukrainian President Vlodymr Zelensky laid out Ukraine’s 2024 strategy in a recent interview with The Economist;
- The focus will be on “isolating” Crimea;
- Crimea can be supplied entirely by sea and air, with any single port exceeding the capacity Russia required to sustain combat operations in Syria for 2015;
- Without enough long-range missiles to attack all or at least most of Crimea’s ports and airfields and do so regularly, Russia will be able to maintain the flow of supplies for both the civilian population and Russia’s military presence on the peninsula;
- Another popular strategy of “digging in” and “building” throughout 2024 is also disconnected from the realities of the conflict and both Ukraine’s and its Western sponsors’ capabilities;
- Ukraine has already “dug in” since 2014 in frontline cities which Russia has nonetheless been able to displace Ukrainian forces and take these heavily fortified cities;
https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-january-10-2024
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Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, January 10, 2024
The Kremlin’s effort to use the mythos of the Great Patriotic War (Second World War) to prepare the Russian public for a long war in Ukraine is at odds with Russia’s current level of mobilization and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s rhetorical attempts to reassure Russians that the war will not have lasting domestic impacts.
St. Petersburg outlet Fontanka published an interview with Russian State Duma Defense Committee Chairman Andrei Kartapolov on January 9 wherein Kartapolov stated that even in the “victorious years of 1944 to 1945” the Soviet forces faced difficulties, prompting the interviewer to ask Kartapolov if Russia was now figuratively in 1944-1945 (i.e. nearing the end of the war in Ukraine).
Kartapolov attempted to expand the erroneous analogy between the Soviets’ fight against Nazi Germany and Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine by claiming that Russia is currently figuratively somewhere in December 1943 and moving into 1944.
The Soviet military launched a series of successful offensive operations following its defensive victory at the battle of Kursk in July 1943 and by December 1943 had reached the banks of the Dnipro River and Kyiv in Ukraine.
Kartapolov explained his logic by claiming that Ukrainian forces failed in the summer 2023 counteroffensive in Zaporizhia Oblast in a way similar to Nazi Germany’s losses in battles in 1943.
Kartapolov’s analogy makes little sense, particularly given the fact that the Russian forces have not gained notable ground in recent months as the Soviet forces did in the months before December 1943.
The interviewer asked Kartapolov if his analogy suggests that Russia’s war in Ukraine will end in 2024, forcing Kartapolov to admit that Russia’s war in Ukraine and the Second World War cannot be literally compared.
Kartapolov nevertheless continued to use allusions to the Second World War to claim that the Russian military would continue the war in Ukraine until it installed a “banner over the Reichstag” (i.e. complete victory in Ukraine that achieves all of Putin’s maximalist objectives).
During his visit to Chukotka, Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Peskov rode on the Predator snow and swamp-going vehicle. After the trip, the president's press secretary admitted that they were not delighted with the quality of the presented apparatus.
According to Peskov, the only high-quality element of the Predator is the engine, but it is imported.
According to our data, Peskov’s words do not convey even a fifth of the president’s emotions. He got out of the car almost swearing.
At the same time, the press secretary’s story fully reflects the situation in the domestic car market - due to sanctions, many companies left Russia after the start of the SVO. This has led to the fact that the products of the companies remaining on the market have seriously increased in price.
It is also obvious that we will hardly be able to create a competitive product on our own.
Hence the attempts to implement at least some projects with the Chinese (in particular, to transfer AvtoVAZ’s capacity to them under control).
For such projects, they are even hatching the idea of transferring officials throughout the country to Made in Russia cars , but nothing has been heard about this program for several months now.
Peskov’s public indignation should shake up not only the manufacturers of special equipment and the Predator manufacturers, but also the traditional auto industry.
In any case, the Ministry of Defense still hopes that in the foreseeable future they will begin to produce pickup trucks for the army in Russia. But so far all this has not progressed further than plans.
At the same time, the vaunted Chinese auto industry performed extremely poorly in our frosty conditions. Cars freeze, electrics and electronics fail. So to speak, but not on foot.
Don't Buy Me
Things we never knew:
Kremlin snuff box
https://t.me/s/kremlin_secrets
Sobyanin was scared by what will happen in Moscow this week
According to sources close to the mayor, we are talking about abnormal frosts that are expected in the capital at the end of the week.
“Sergei Semenovich fears that the enemy may carry out air attacks on our energy infrastructure. Plus, he believes that frosts are the result of the use of climate weapons, and that the West can simply freeze Muscovites and residents of the Moscow region,” said one of our interlocutors.
In response to our remark that climate weapons are an unscientific theory that has not been proven in any way, the source replied: “Well, of course. Look what happened in Crimea in November.”
Let us note that many in our elites believe that the natural disaster in Crimea, which resulted in the death and disappearance of 18 military personnel, was the result of the action of American climate weapons.
The military then even promised an answer to the West, but they do not admit what it will be. They only say that this answer is still being prepared.
As for Moscow, officials hope that a powerful air defense system will protect the city from serious air strikes. However, in the Moscow region there are big problems even without air strikes, which cannot but worry the leadership of the capital.
“Our public utilities are falling apart, people are dying from the cold . Thank God, not in Moscow, but not far away. For us, unfortunately, enemy strikes are not the worst thing,” one of Sobyanin’s deputies spoke gloomily about this.
“The situation in the capital, of course, is better than in the Moscow region, but frost can also cause certain problems,” added another, expressing, however, the hope that everything will be fine.
An interesting fact: a group of people is being formed in the Moscow government who want to influence Sobyanin so that he pays less attention to the SVO, and more to public utilities and other problems of the city.
“You can talk a lot about climate weapons or the machinations of the West, but this will not replace rusty pipes and will not solve problems with old transformers. But we need to decide,” one of the representatives of such an informal group told us.
He hopes that Sobyanin will soon adhere to the same opinion, “then climate weapons will no longer threaten Moscow.”
The first ballistic missile submarine built for the Navy since the 1990s will be named the “District of Columbia” ...
https://twitter.com/igorsushko/status/1745341741832822872
Happening all over ruzzia.
What I find interesting is that whenever this happens, ruzzia opens a criminal investigation.
Let me repeat for the learning disabled in the U.S. National Security community — Putin has two objectives. First, demilitarize Ukraine. That is taking place through attrition and, as an unexpected benefit, he also is demilitarizing NATO, who is unable to produce air defense missiles and artillery shells that Ukraine would need to mount a credible defense. Second, de-nazify Ukraine. Putin and his Generals are not going to stop until the filth of Nazi scum prevalent in Ukrainian ranks are wiped away. Real clear. Real simple. Don’t make this more complicated than it is.
This is the problem. The so-called foreign policy experts that populate think tanks and Congressional committees in Washington, DC do not know a damn thing about Russia. They are obsessed with a 1980s vision of Russia and are refusing to take a fresh look at Russia as a nation, as an industrial power and as a legitimate military force. These dummies do not realize that if Putin suddenly disappears that Russia is not going to crumple into a fetal position and beg for the West to love it. Ain’t going to happen. Russia understands one thing that the United States does not — it will defend the motherland at any cost. Russians are proud of their country and its history. It has rejected the legacy of the Soviet era and embraced Orthodox Christianity. The United States? Its borders are being flooded with a tsunami of migrants, its major cities are filled with homeless drug addicts and crime, its politicians are busy enriching themselves at the expense of their countrymen and the government is promoting and protecting sexual deviance.
Russians, unlike Americans, understand science and know that men cannot have babies and that women cannot grow a penis. It is this grasp on reality that gives Russia the confidence that it will prevail in preventing the West from turning Ukraine into Jeffrey Epstein land.
https://twitter.com/region776/status/1745489708678045719
I wonder how far the orc has to walk.
https://twitter.com/raging545/status/1745390696649859165
IMAGES from Moscow, showing a street that has collapsed allegedly from leaking pipes that have undermined the road foundation.
Sad.
https://twitter.com/Maks_NAFO_FELLA/status/1745545422603423822
Of course, ruzzian air defense claimed they shot the drone down and it accidently fell on the repair plant.
Well worth watching and subscribing, new guy but very good info
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=B6b7WQy1Y3Q&pp=ygULc2F2YWdlIHNhZ2U%3D
