Just what I was thinking, why did it take Russia this long?
“why did it take Russia this long?”
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Because this “war” has actually been two entirely different “wars.”
Unfortunately most freepers do not understand that Putin’s original mission for the “special military operation” was rather limited to the exact things he publicly specified. Independence for the Donbass (though still being in Ukraine) demilitarization (getting rid of the NATO equipment) denazification (despite ignorant freepers confusing some of the public in many countries being Nazis...including ours...with Ukraine’s government and MILITARY being controlled by NAZIs.) And, of course an agreement to never join NATO.
Most freepers do not even know that when early in Zelensky’s administration he tried to push back on them they openly threatened to kill him...he backed down. Most freepers also don’t know that we deliberately chose the Nazi’s (nationalists, Azov, etc.) to train and to send to the front in the Donbass because they were the most brutal and most likely to get the job done.
Any country that has Nazi brigades (and Ukraine has a lot of them) is a Nazi administration.
So, Russia planned a minimal kinetic action and openly made clear they would leave Ukraine once the mission was accomplished. Russia began negotiations with Zelensky, they reached a tentative agreement in March and Boris Johnson and Lloyd Austin paid visits to Zelensky to tell him that if he went through with the agreement they would no longer support Ukraine. But, if they stayed in the “war” NATO would provide all the weapons and money he needed. He chose their offer over Russia’s.
Russia continued the “operation” making slow gains with few casualties, killed an enormously large amount of Ukrainian soldiers and destroyed an enormous amount of military equipment.
When that happened NATO (read: the United States) realized Russia would win, couldn’t let that happen and escalated their monetary and equipment support, even bringing Ukrainians into NATO countries for training to NATO standards. Ukraine engaged in 7 mobilizations. And developing high paid mercenary programs to enlarge the force. And Mi-6 worked with Ukraine to go on a large counter offensive at multiple points. (They planned and trained for this for 3 months.) At that point Russia had 150,000 troops in Ukraine and Ukraine forces were up to 400,000.
Russia came to the realization that this wasn’t a Russia vs. Ukraine war. This was a Russia vs. NATO war. Since that point they have been readjusting to the new reality.
If they were able to take 20% of Ukrainian territory with very minimal forces, obviously their advantage is likely to be much greater when they have approximately 500,000 troops involved. They have expanded their arsenal extensively including the items I mentioned earlier...and brought in 800 new tanks, 11 strategic bombers. 800 planes and helos. They are planning for a big campaign.
And the nonsense about Russia’s mobilized troops being so inferior is wrong. These newly mobilized troops are all former troops who were on Reserve classification. And, even more important than that is that Ukraine forces have been decimated. The kill ratio throughout this “war” has been 10 Ukrainians for every one Russian. Ukraine is down to conscripting 16 yr. olds and 65 year olds and they are in the process of registering women.
If you have been following this saga I am sure you realize that just in the last week Russia has knocked out much of Ukraine’s energy system.
The foreigners who are “getting out of Dodge” are making the right call. Ukraine is not someplace anyone will want to be when the ground freezes in November.