The capture of Mariupal is as planned and is what is in store for the rest of Ukraine.
Those who think Russia is struggling or losing this conflict are insane and falling for the Western propaganda. This is not a “Shock and Awe” campaign, as is the strategy of the US military. If Putin had elected to use that strategy, this would have been over in a week with 100,000 plus dead Ukrainians and cities razed to the ground... the Western results. (And BTW, how did shock and all work out for everybody... Iraq is still a mess 20 years later).
Putin wishes to capture, not destroy. Russians fight with a different strategy. They capture ground, surround a city and cut it off from reinforcement. Notice how they allow electricity, water, and communication to remain for the citizens, not like the West who destroy every service to the population, leaving internal devastation when the bombing stop stops.
They consider this a “cauldron”, and allow those captured inside The cauldron to reach a boiling point where they either surrender or fight to the end. They allow a humanitarian corridor for those wishing to evacuate or surrender, like they did at Aleppo in Syria.
The Russians have now surrounded every key City they wish. And they have yet to use their A-team, still in reserve. The Ukraine army in the East, 70,000 troops, including the neo-Nazi group, is totally surrounded. Zelevsky is doing his soldiers great harm by encouraging them to fight with a false narrative that they are winning. He is sending them to their death warrant.
The recent use of the hypersonic missiles had two purposes... To destroy the target and to send a message to the West and NATO. Russia is capable of hitting any Target without notice on the European continent. This had to have sent chills through the defense departments of NATO.
This is going as planned for Russia. For the west, only a false flag operation will escalate the war.
It’s over, by the end of April. And like it or not, Putin will be stronger and more popular in Russia than prior to this action. Russians have lived without the West in the past, and no doubt now are determined to do so in the future.
So, he’s a vicious bastard, just like many of us have been saying?
(And you’ll forgive me if I don’t buy your penultimate sentence. A captive population living under threat of imprisonment or worse doesn’t love its captor.)
I know who I think is insane
“Russians fight with a different strategy. “
Indeed.
As well as being a major source of materials for electric vehicle batteries, tiny Lithuania is also the world's major supplier of Unobtanium ore, which is used in the production of the skin of hypersonic missiles.