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| Deadlock or Russian attack? War forecast for 2024 |
| 2023-12-23 |
| Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited. WHAT WILL HAPPEN AT THE FRONT IN WINTER? The war in Ukraine has finally moved into a positional state: neither side can carry out a major operation without spending an unacceptably large amount of resources on it. Ukraine and Russia enter 2024 in a state of trench warfare. That is, a war where the front line does not undergo significant changes regardless of the intensity of the fighting. However, this could change very quickly. In terms of its objectives, a positional war can be called a war of attrition. Unlike maneuver or lightning war, the goals in it are not the defeat of the enemy army, occupied cities or territories, or access to some strategically important positions, but the reduction of the combat capability of the enemy army and the defense capability of his state as a whole, the ability of his people and army to resist. At the same time, a positional conflict cannot in itself end in victory - it either leads to a situation where an exhausted country agrees to concessions, or creates conditions for the war to transition into a more active, maneuverable one. The Kremlin is convinced that Russia’s military, economic and demographic potential is higher than Ukraine’s. In addition, the Russian leadership is confident that foreign aid to Ukraine will soon likely cease, and that the West will tire of this war faster than Russia. Therefore, analysts at the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) remind us that the failure of Russian operations in Ukraine aimed at achieving Vladimir Putin’s maximalist goals is not a given, and only continued Western support for Ukraine can guarantee that Putin’s expansionist aspirations remain unattainable. DEAD END OR NOT DEAD END? ISW assesses that the collapse of Western aid will likely eventually lead to the collapse of Ukraine's ability to deter the Russian military, and that the current trench warfare in Ukraine is not a stable stalemate situation. According to analysts, the current unstable balance [at the front] could quickly tip in either direction, including as a result of decisions taken in the West. Therefore, continued Western security assistance that allows Ukrainian forces to fend off current and future Russian offensive efforts and liberate more Ukrainian territory is the only course of action for now that will ensure Russia's continued failure to achieve Putin's maximalist goals in Ukraine. THEY WILL ADVANCE Analysts recall that Russian troops launched localized offensive operations along the entire eastern sector of the front in Ukraine during the most difficult weather of the autumn-winter season, trying to seize and maintain the initiative and without waiting for severe frosts. ISW predicts that the occupiers will likely try to maintain or strengthen these offensive operations regardless of weather conditions this winter, as Russian forces did in the winter of 2022-2023. |
| Posted by:badanov |