The Russians seem to have created a successful new strategy — agree to a ceasefire and then concentrate their forces in one small enemy area and annihilate it.
As long as the global media keeps reporting that the ceasefire has been holding except for maybe a minor infraction or two, as it’s been reporting until this very moment, Russia has nothing to lose by pressing forward.
This is the same global media, of course, that excoriated Israel during last summer’s Gaza War when it tried to defend itself against thousands of air attacks from Hamas. Yet here is Russia, the aggressor, under no danger to its own people, being honored by newspapers everywhere for keeping the recent truce when it really wasn’t.
And does anyone doubt that the global media will continue to look the other way as Ukraine continues to collapse, one ceasefire after another which Russia will continue to strategically renege on?
That is pretty much what the OSCE monitors reported also.
http://www.osce.org/ukraine-smm/141426
“The SMM encouraged each side to confirm that they were willing and able to cease fire, in line with their earlier agreements. Some participants estimated that about 2,500 civilians remained in Debaltseve. SMM reminded participants of the likelihood of civilian casualties, if they failed to honour the agreement to the ceasefire. The representative of the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said the Ukrainian Armed Forces were willing to cease fire. The “DPR” and “LPR” were not willing to do so. The SMM noted that this refusal to cease fire was in clear contravention to their earlier agreement to do so and amounted to a restriction of the Mission’s freedom of movement.”
Maybe you should pay closer attention to the events leading up to the Minsk II conference in the first place.
The separatist forces turned another Ukrainian offensive into a ‘cauldron’ by letting them advance then attacking their flanks, effectively surrounding the Kiev forces and cutting off their supply lines.
Only when the Ukie offensive stalled out did the feckless Europeans fly to Moscow and plea for another truce.
Everyone who attended Minsk II knew that 6-8 thousand Ukrainian troops and foreign mercenaries were surrounded by Ukie separatists...that was the reason for the cease fire negotiation in the first place. Yet not one word about them was put into the cease fire agreement...go figure.
-btw waiting for the global media to report anything besides western propaganda in this matter is an exercise in futility.