Sensible, but I want to make one terrible point here:
It was 5-1, sometimes even higher, when Russia attacked pushed actively in Bakhmut (and elsewhere), but you have to take into consideration that 60 00 to 20 000 artillery shells fired daily by RU on Ukrainian positions have an effect, even though most of them don’t kill. It is still a staggering number compared to Ukrainian output, which will probably mathematically equalise to a degree the loop-sided losses Russia sustains in storming operations. Remember that in such wars, artillery and mortars are the main killers, not rifles and machine guns.
I think 200 000 Russian cas (probably a bit more) and 120 000 UA cas is a quite realistic number (and that’s not 5-1) due to overwhelming Russian superiority in artillery (even if their shelling is down now).
I meant specifically in the Bakhmut fight for 5:1, I doubt we observed better than 3:1 very much since the catastrophic Russian attacks early last year. It is very hard for any conflict to sustain a loss rate as asymmetric as even 3:1 for any length of time, that will usually result in a definitive outcome. The periods where Russia has been sustaining that kind of loss have been when Russia looked shaky. Right now, while their ultranationalists must be frustrated, I don’t think their situation is as fragile.
Yeah, the situation there is beyond any recovery now. I hope that the Ukrainians managed to get out a majority of their tropps out of that cauldron, and have built up a solid fall-back option.
US has released the intercept footage from the downed drone, more or less confirming their account. The only real question at this point is at what level the order to conduct that dangerous fuel dump-flyby came.
She’s damn right. Western countries are utterly hypocritical when it comes to have a go at Russian billionaires. A lot of aggressive talk, but not much action against them.
If they wanted to get serious about money laundering and corruption then they would have to crackdown on tax havens , shell companies and all the rest of it. But since that is not only the preserve of Russian oligarchs , but is used by wealthy people worldwide to avoid paying tax , then the chances of that happening are about zero.
‘Western’ countries are hypocritical when it comes to corruption.
Any investigations into where money is coming from and going to would destroy far more than Putin’s cronies unless the investigation was completly corrupt.
The daunting thing about a potential attack along that axis is just how difficult it will be to force the combat into the mobile warfare where UKR has a demonstrated advantage. At least until they break through, that linear combat is fighting on terms favourable to RUS.
I do think that is the sector Ukraine has to hit. If they can break out anywhere along the line, there are few East-West obstacles to facilitate secondary lines of defence. After the Konka river, there are some that create constricted channels, but nothing in the way of a line. At the point Melitopol is in conventional 155m artillery range, the Russians face logistical disaster.
