Because it wasn't there to start with.
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.
“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.”
putin/russia invaded Ukraine. This is putin’s war against Ukraine. period!
It was supposed to take days, now they are into the 11th month. putin is not only evil, he is stupid!
putin is making russia a pariah nation...evil and stupid
Clown
Because it wasn't there to start with.
We don’t hear about the civilian casualties in “our” wars. So it seems that Americans think we have nice wars.
Thx for posting.
Clown 2023
Destroying the Globalist oligarchs and preserving Christianity, to start.
I was in the US Army from 1988 - 1996. The Concept of “Shock and Awe” was developed in my last year. I saw its implementation in Iraq in 2003.
None of which is possible with Russia’s current attacks, which are aimed at electric infrastructure or civilians, not industry. And the power is already back on from the last mass attack of 120 cruise missiles.
Supplies from Kyiv? Thats not where they’re coming from. Why not just directly attack the rail lines then?
In the News/Activism forum, on a thread titled Russia’s war lacks strategy, only aim is to bring suffering - analysis, MeganC wrote: I personally enjoyed Ukraine’s attacks on Russia over the weekend. I hope your Russian friends and family are thrilled to get a taste of their own terrorism hitting them in their cities and neighborhoods.
Wow. You're sick!
But your post is similar to others I've seen which rabidly thirsts for Russian citizen blood. I've been taken aback by the Ukrainian propagandists here trying to convince us that EVERY person with Russian DNA is evil and MUST be exterminated. Ethnic cleansing - the Ukrainian shills can't keep their hands off of it, neither can the neo Nazis who form the core of the Ukrainian military.
A completely made up ratio. Per Russian sources 600 Russkies might have died yesterday in bombings. You want us to believe 4,800 Ukrainians died yesterday top with no evidence? No photos of the carnage?
Weird logic to attack the USA for taking down Saddam but then using it to justify Russian behavior.
It’s bad when America does it, but good when Russia does it to Ukrainians.
Your perspective on Russian morality, one of the most corrupt and godless nations on Earth, is also on the level of a comic book.
I’m not rooting for Russia.
I’m pointing out glaring hypocrisy.
Gooses > Gander.
Again, this is just Russian crap you are regurgitating without evidence. It is the current party line to explain away why Russia has just been retreating everywhere since July. “We’re retreating victoriously while the Ukrainians advance in defeat!”
But there is simply no evidence for any of this other than the fake news you repeat here without providing any sources, because you know if you provide a source, it’ll go back to some neo-nazi Russian.
Ramzan Kadyrov and Chechens, helping Putin to fight for Biblical Judeo/Christianity!
You have been corrected on your lies about Minsk many times. You have never offered a rebuttal. So why attempt to spread your lies again when you know what will happen?
Every week or so Putinists jerk off with memes about freezing Ukrainians or Europeans to death.
Attempting to erase that history and turning the narrative around is desperate and hopeless.
Just own your sadistic glee and run with it.
Where were you when America used the same tactics on Yugoslavia and Iraq?
Are you serious? Both sides are WEF men. There is no good side. It’s a proxy war. How can folks take sides when Ukraine, Russia and The U.S report propaganda? Nobody is fighting for patriots.
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