Paul Goble
Staunton, May 19 – For the next two months, Russia may regain the initiative in the war in Ukraine, exploiting the forces it no longer has to concentrate around Mariupol and taking advantage of the drying out of fields which make possible a more mobile kind of fighting, Russian military analyst Andrey Kolesnikov says.
But by August, Ukraine will recover the initiative at least for a time because it has a more motivated army and will by then have much more modern weapons; and if the war becomes one of exhaustion as some predict, Ukraine will have the advantage and Russia will lose, he says (utro02.tv/2022/05/19/v-vojne-s-koalicziej-45-gosudarstv-uczelet-nevozmozhno/).
That is because, Kolesnikov says, “to win in a war against a coalition of 45 countries and without allies, with the exception of Belarus is impossible.” Whatever its leaders say, no country Russia cannot win if Ukrainians continue to demonstrate their commitment to defending their country and if they are able to continue to rely on the support of so many other countries.
Moscow hoped to avoid getting into this situation by organizing a quick knockout blow at the start of the campaign. That didn’t happen. Now, many in the Russian capital hope for a quick victory this summer. But that is unlikely to happen either, Kolesnikov says; and once it fails, the ultimate outcome of the war will become obvious to ever more people.
As that happens, Moscow will find it ever more difficult to mobilize Russians to fight a war their government isn’t going to win; and that will only accelerate the process in which Ukrainian commitment to fighting and Ukrainian advantages in allies, weaponry and experience will be decisive, Kolesnikov concludes.
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