Russians

• One reason the counteroffensive was announced with little fanfare was that it probably wasn’t going according to plan.
• The counteroffensive may still have plenty of steam, but attempts to present it as having barely got started are certainly misleading.

Significant losses

• Losses have been significant.
• Such losses were soon confirmed by Western sources and are far from exceptional.
• One problem for Ukrainian forces is what seemed like a good idea to them was also anticipated by the Russian side.

Fighting continues in Bakhmut region

• Some Ukrainian effort is also being expended in the Bakhmut region.
• In this area, Ukrainian forces seem to be trying to roll back hard-won Russian gains of recent months and with localized success.
• Being on the defensive also has the benefit for Russian forces of mitigating some of the supply issues they faced during 2022.

Russian army has adapted

• The Russian army has certainly learned and adapted to the nature of the war and the Ukrainian armed forces since 2022.
• One example: Russian forces have been taking measures to reduce the heat signatures of armoured vehicles and their vulnerability to Ukrainian anti-tank weapons.
• Finally, the Russian population — and the army it supports — has in the main hunkered down in expectation of a protracted war.

Heavy losses on both sides

• Much has been written in the Western media about estimated Russian losses and manpower issues, but very little about those of Ukraine.
• Russia has lost large numbers of troops and a significant number of men eligible for military service have fled abroad.
• Ukraine has also suffered heavy losses that are difficult to replace, and millions of Ukrainians have left the country.

How does it end?

At some point there will have to be negotiations — even if only for a ceasefire along the lines of the Korean War. Further escalation, perhaps involving NATO troops, might genuinely risk seeing the use of nuclear weapons. Thankfully, debates in Russian policy circles on the potential for using nuclear weapons remain very hypothetical, at least for now.

• Initially, there were questions on how the dam collapsed or who was to blame, but mounting evidence indicates that the dam was deliberately breached by Russia.
• In my view, as a career U.S. special forces officer, the simplest answer is most often correct and provides the most likely explanation for the dam’s destruction.
• It’s my belief that Russia deliberately destroyed the dam to defend against the Ukrainian counteroffensive that it believed was imminent.

An age-old military strategy

• Quite to the contrary, it is an effective defensive technique that dates back hundreds, if not thousands, of years.
• In another instance, the Chinese military breached levees along the Yellow River in 1938 to slow the Japanese advance.

How Ukraine has used the same tactic

• The Ukranians also deliberately flooded the Zdvyzh and Teteriv rivers to make them unfordable and bolster their defense of Kyiv.
• The destruction of the Irpin dam was fairly limited: 50 of the small village of Demydiv’s 750 homes were destroyed.
• There is also a threat of floating landmines and an ongoing challenge to provide drinking water to thousands.

How the flooding supports Russia’s defense

• In such a posture, the Russian defense has some advantages.
• Defenders fight from fortified positions, whereas attackers must advance from exposed, vulnerable positions while overcoming obstacles, such as flooded streets.
• The defender, by contrast, must spread its forces across the battlefield, if it cannot correctly anticipate the point of attack.

A natural defense

• Nor in my view could they correctly anticipate the location of Ukraine’s main counteroffensive effort.
• It also created a humanitarian crisis that Russia no doubt anticipated, and has further leveraged to its tactical advantage.
• Sadly, the flooding of the Dnieper river will likely be more devastating and last much longer.

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• They failed to stop Putin and Putinism, and now have only themselves to blame.
• In Russia, a common narrative has also emerged, on which acceptance of the war rests – even if there isn’t outright support.
• The frame is that the west is against Russia and determined to cut it off from Europe.
• Putin may not have needed to start the war, but as the current situation offers no way out, Russia has to plough on.

Wanted: a credible opposition narrative

• The Russian opposition in Europe has been largely unsuccessful in offering a credible alternative.
• Others, like Garry Kasparov, believe change should come through a Ukrainian military victory.
• It’s hard to expect many Russians to wish to see their own army defeated, even if they oppose the war.
• Unless the opposition comes up with ideas that offer hope, it risks being confined to an insular and aggrieved group, focusing on their own squabbles, as the interest in the war in the west wanes.

Don’t isolate ordinary Russians

• Russians I have met believe it is too risky to speak Russian in public in the west and that they would be hated if they were to travel.
• Physically isolated from Europe, and cut off from academic and scientific collaboration, Russians feel persecuted as a nation.
• Though sympathies exist in Asia and elsewhere, Russia is a European country and Russians are European people.
• In time, the war will end, and Russians and Ukrainians will find their ways of dealing with each other.