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| Putin Has Already Lost the War |
| 2022-03-05 |
| BLUF: [Townhall] The good news is that Putin has likely already lost the war politically, no matter if he finally subdues Ukraine. Much of human satisfaction or grievance arises from the mismatch of reality with expectations. In this case, the capable Russian military was expected to quickly overpower the much weaker Ukrainian military and territorial defense forces and likely decapitate the Ukrainian government. The Russians may eventually do both, but the operative word here is "quickly" and that did not happen. Days into the invasion, Russian forces have been slowed by more fierce Ukrainian resistance than expected. Also, the vaunted Russian military was not able to rapidly establish air superiority over the battlefield; has not seemingly been able to fight at night; has lost many armored vehicles because its conscripts won’t get out of the vehicles to suppress Ukrainians with shoulder-fired anti-armor missiles; has pursued an overly complicated battle plan of attacking on many fronts, each one of which requires fire support from the ground and air and a separate logistics train; and has had logistical troubles, with stalled vehicles that ran out of fuel or broke down, seemingly because the Russians expected a speedy victory and failed to bring enough supplies. Thus, Russia’s (at least initially) unexpected subpar military performance and Ukraine’s equally surprising scrappy underdog resistance has elated Ukrainians and the world and made the defenders fight harder, while reportedly infuriating Putin. |
| Posted by:Besoeker |