Phase Two: American-backed corporations make billions rebuilding.
It's a "win-win" except for the Iraqis.
Posted on 01/02/2023 3:54:03 AM PST by tlozo
Scrambling for a strategy, Russia has resorted to targeting infrastructure in the winter with the sole purpose of making Ukrainians cold.
Russia is increasingly relying on missiles and drones to attack Ukraine, apparently abandoning any real war aims
This is a new kind of tactic and it relies on lobbing missiles and drones at civilians and civilian infrastructure with no pretense that the targets are military in nature. One of the features of this campaign can be seen in the use of Iranian drones, resulting in it resembling how Saddam Hussein’s Iraq waged war more than previous wars in Europe.
Russia carried out more missile attacks against Ukraine on New Year's Eve, with reports saying that "shortly after midnight, air raid alerts sounded in the capital, followed by a barrage of missiles that interrupted Ukrainians' small celebrations at home."
Russia’s war lacks strategy, only aim is to bring suffering - analysis
According to news source CBS, "Ukrainian officials say Russia is now deliberately targeting civilians, seeking to create a climate of fear and destroy morale.”
However, Russia’s attacks don’t seem to be reducing Ukraine’s morale, and in fact, Ukraine is as staunch in its defense as it was at the beginning of the war and has only strengthened its resolve throughout the year.
Russia likely knows that its invasion of Ukraine has had the opposite effect of what it intended in the beginning.
Moscow believed it could decapitate Kyiv in the first weeks of the war, using surprise helicopter assaults and a massive line of armored vehicles staging from Belarus. Disappointed when it failed to take Kyiv, Moscow shifted strategy to a southern strategy, destroying Mariupol and linking up Crimea to the Donbas front. Then it began annexing territory and settled in for a long war. As winter approached, Russia switched strategy again, and, suffering blows from Ukraine’s counteroffensives, decided to rely on Iranian drones and its own stocks of missiles, to target civilians in Ukraine. The historical context and beyond
It's important to look at the historical context here. Do countries usually wage war like this? Terrorizing civilians, driving them from their homes and laying waste their lands is certainly one of the archetypes of historic warfare in the medieval period or the period of Rome and other empires.
Rome destroyed Carthage by reputedly sowing salt into the land. Ancient warfare was full of examples of mass destruction, such as what Alexander the Great did to Persepolis or Tyre. Cities would be razed and the inhabitants sold into slavery.
Russia’s initial campaigns did lead to destruction, and the claims that Russia has transferred thousands of Ukrainian children to Russia could be seen as an attempt to lay waste to Ukraine and transfer its inhabitants. However, Moscow has largely been stopped by Ukraine’s army and shifted strategy.
Can Moscow’s war then be compared to other examples of sieges and wars of attrition?
Israel and Egypt fought a war of attrition between 1967 and 1973. Iran and Iraq bludgeoned each other to exhaustion in the 1980s. In the Uruguayan civil war, the siege of Montevideo lasted almost ten years from 1843 to 1851. When the Western powers fought Nazi Germany and Japan, they subjected both countries to massive bombing. The US also ordered Operation Linebacker II, the Christmas bombing of Hanoi, in 1972, to bring Vietnam back to the “peace” table. So does Moscow’s strategy have parallels with these examples?
Similar to the “war of the cities” between Iraq and Iran, when Iraq used its air force to terrorize Iran’s cities in the Iran-Iraq war, Russia is trying to terrorize Ukraine’s civilians. Iraq likely knew it wouldn’t win the war by harassing Iran’s civilians, it merely wanted to inflict suffering on them.
Russia also seems intent merely on inflicting suffering. This isn’t “strategic” or “precision” bombing. Russia is targeting infrastructure in the winter purposely to make Ukrainians cold. Moscow is using drones that don’t have a large warhead to terrorize people more than “win” a war.
This means Russia’s policy today lacks strategy. It’s plausible Moscow may be planning a new offensive in February or that it could be searching for some kind of strategy and tactic, but Russia also knows that Ukraine is continuing to receive western arms.
With each passing day, Ukraine receives better weapons and Russia remains the same. Russia can’t outproduce the West and doesn't even appear to be trying to attrition the West in Ukraine. For instance, it doesn’t appear Russia is going after Himars or other ordnance the Ukrainians possess. Iranian drones are not being used in complex swarms. Russia seems to prefer to strike at soft targets, not trying to defeat Ukraine’s forces. Putin's Happy New Year
Russia’s New Year’s message was partly about normalcy and partly about the war. Russian President Vladimir Putin appeared alongside soldiers. His was a message of defiance and conspiracy in which he portrayed the West as waging a conflict against Russia. This is a new kind of interpretation for Moscow.
It invaded Ukraine and caused millions to suffer, but it is the victim, in its own analysis.
A message of strength was broadcast on other Russian media, portraying Russia as having weathered the storm of Western sanctions and aggression, even as Russia is the one doing the aggression.
This attempt to transform the Ukraine war into a defensive war in which Russia is the victim is part of the Moscow narrative. Having annexed areas of Ukraine, Russia can now pretend to be “defending” its lands. Moscow has claimed it won’t conduct peace talks if the annexed areas are on the table. In essence, it is trying to force Ukraine to negotiate over how much land Ukraine will lose.
If the Moscow mentality continues along this line, portraying the Ukraine war as a defensive war, and lobbing missiles and drones at Ukraine to keep Ukraine on the defensive as well, it’s not clear what the way out of the war will be.
Some western politicians and experts are keen on claiming that all wars end in diplomacy and talks. This is also the message of former German leader Angela Merkel who claimed recently that it was better to have tried diplomacy with Moscow before the war, even if it failed.
However, it’s not true that all wars end in diplomacy. The Confederacy wasn’t defeated with diplomacy, and neither was Germany in 1945. Some wars don’t end with peace talks. Some do. Moscow is gambling on the fact that eventually its war in Ukraine, waged entirely in Ukraine and causing Ukraine to suffer, will result in talks that legitimize Moscow’s actions.
This is the “frozen” conflict strategy it has used elsewhere before, such as in Georgia. If the long-term strategy for Moscow is a frozen front line, and continually shelling Ukraine’s cities to cause suffering, then the West and Ukraine will have to come up with a way to reduce this threat.
Countries like Israel, faced with enemies that lob missiles at their civilian areas, have constructed complex integrated air defenses. Even Israel has learned that these have a limit, that they are costly in the long run.
Even if air defenses can stop the Moscow campaign of spreading suffering, they won’t likely end the war.
No, but those are no longer American values either.
Yes, a lot of well-connected American oligarchs got quite wealthy, first by selling weapons to destroy Iraq, then by rebuilding Iraq.
>>> “LOL, please list what “interests” Russia is fighting for that patriots in America value?” <<<
Current Russian Values: Music Video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zr57D9IHuQ0&t=01s&ab_channel=BeloeZlato
Current American Values: Music Video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsm4poTWjMs&ab_channel=CardiB
Whoa!
I suspect the chicoms are behind this to weaken both Russia and NATO.
Phase Two: American-backed corporations make billions rebuilding.
It's a "win-win" except for the Iraqis.
First, there’s no need to swear.
But truthfully, Russia is in the process, like it or not, of thoroughly destroying Ukraine’a ability to wage war.
First, Ukraine’s best, most experienced fighters are dead or injured. Ukraine has resorted to press gangs and is throwing barely trained men into battle.
Second, Russia’s mobilization was very successful. The Ukrainian chief of staff said that himself in an Economist interview. And the Russian men called up are experienced and many have combat experience from the Grozny War, Syria, etc. and certainly the Russian men of the Donbas are every bit as experienced as their Ukrainian counterparts.
Third, as implied, the Russians are being very methodical in their approach. They are going at a slow and steady pace to preserve their own army while fighting a successful war of attrition.
You may suggest that what I am saying is Russian propaganda, but that would only be to dismiss facts that are uncomfortable. The fact is that we are engaged in a proxy war with Russia and we are fighting that war to the last Ukrainian. By the end of this, Ukraine will be ruined. After it is carved up by the Russians, Poles and Romanians it will be lucky to exist as a rump state.
I have tremendous sympathy for the Ukrainian people. But sadly, they are being used.
Thanks for your dumb ass post. You are competing with Travis/ McGee for the New Year 2023
Putin is KGB born and bred. Suffering is his business.
There are people actively working to get close to the actual numbers. It’s not a total mystery at all. Right now, in total, it’s about 125,000 Ukrainian KIA to 26,000 Russians (Regular Army, volunteer militias, Donbas fighters, and PMC Wagner combined). That total does not represent the CURRENT rate of exchange.
Maybe the United Nations could ban all wars during winter months.
Absolute BS on your part to equate Iraqi Civil war deaths with US operations.
The US/Coalition together with the Iraqi Army targeted and defeated both AIQ and ISIS to end their terror campaigns against Iraq. We currently operate out of four bases in Iraq with thousands of troops (still) there keeping the peace, rebuilding the country.
What did you ever do to counter terrorists, protect civilians or promote restoration of a civil society?
Such a deceitful anti-American KGB-DUPE you are. GIGO.
We need Russia to lose. Ukrainians must win this war. Russia had no right to go to Ukraine.
You forgot you gigantic sarc tag! Since when is going to another country to take over a good thing. Russia sucks and must be defeated!
Excellent summary of our SOP. We are currently in the ‘expending war stocks’ of Phase One in this conflict.
What people seem to have forgotten is that Russia is not Iraq. Iraq did not have a space program, satellites, nuclear submarines, almost unlimited natural resources and an industrial capacity to build guided missiles and stealth aircraft. Many want to look at Russia as a gas station run by drunken peasants, but that mistaken prejudice is going to cost lives.
Yeah, and the year is only two days old. We haven't seen anything yet...
What is your view on the recent admissions by Merkel and Hollande regarding the Minsk agreements?
I don’t have one. I haven’t followed that. Was it on free republic?
You aren’t aware of Minsk? You’re a typical low information war monger.
Source, please?
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