Russia War Update 8/29/24

In recent days Danny Davis has featured several outstanding discussions, focusing on the US war on Russia. In a comment a few days ago I recommended two of those video discussions—and repeat the recommendation. Listening to these discussions is time consuming, so I don’t make this recommendation lightly. Here are links to those two previous videos:

The Duran’s Alexander Mercouris: Putin's Kursk Response Delayed - or by Design?

Larry Johnson - Lavrov: “West Playing w/ (Nuclear) Fire over Kursk"

Then, yesterday, Davis and Doug Macgregor had an in depth (nearly an hour) exchange on the US war on Russia:

Col Doug Macgregor: Ukraine Front Collapses 8-28-24

Here I’ll just go over some of the highlights, meaning, the most salient points that are made. These are, of course, opinions, but Davis and Macgregor’s opinions are worth listening to.

First, both maintain that the Kursk incursion has turned into a massacre—both of Ukrainian and NATO troops as well as huge amounts of NATO equipment. Macgregor—who must be presumed to have good sources—asserts that, out of an original force of 12k, the Ukraine side’s casualties amount already to 6k. The remainder are largely cut off from resupply and are being relentlessly hunted down by Russian combined arms operations. They lack air cover and their forward NATO supplied air defense systems have been devastated. This attempted invasion—which both agree was targeting the Kurchatov nuclear power plant (NPP)—has stripped other fronts of desperately needed reserves of men and equipment, which are being systematically destroyed.

Next, with regard to the Donbass front, and especially the Pokrovsk direction, this is where Davis and Macgregor speak of a looming collapse of the Ukrainian defenses, a buckling of the front. Before I proceed, let me indulge in a side note. The Wikipedia article for Pokrovsk provides demographic statistics from the 2001 Ukrainian census. Those stats illustrate the complications of glibly speaking of “Russian” and “Ukrainian.”

In terms of identity, the city’s population identified itself as:

• Ukrainian: 75%

• Russian: 22%

But, bear in mind, this was a time when the Donbass was indisputably part of Ukraine. So, the notable fact may actually be that 22% of the population didn’t identify as “Ukrainian”—whatever that might mean.

On the other hand, in terms of native language, the stats are largely reversed:

• Ukrainian: 40%

• Russian: 60%

In other words, in 2001 a large portion of those calling themselves “Ukrainian” claimed Russian as their native language. One wonders how self identification may have changed over the following 20 years, as the Ukro-Nazi regimes in Kiev initiated a full scale cultural war against Russian speakers. The post 2010 Ukrainian elections probably give a pretty good idea, and those elections show a large majority shifting toward identification with Russia. Anyway.

The significance of the breakdown of the Ukrainian defenses leading to Pokrovsk is twofold. First, Pokrovsk is a communications hub for much of eastern Ukraine. That means, concretely, that it is a road and rail hub for shifting war materiels north and south behind the fortified lines, from Ugledar in the south to Kramatorsk (at least) in the north. The Russians have already established a degree of fire control over those lines of communication. Secondly, Pokrovsk basically marks the western end of the prepared massive fortified lines for Ukraine in Donbass. Once Russia breaks through at Pokrovsk they will find themselves in largely open country, no longer facing the Donbass’ industrial towns with their factories and mines that NATO and Ukraine transformed into fortresses after the 2014 Donbass War. That means that the Russian forces will be able to pivot both north and south from Pokrovsk to encircle Ukrainian formations that are stuck in their defensive lines. Like this—for those not familiar with Cyrillic, look for Pokrovsk at the middle left, Покровськ:

Glenn Diesen @Glenn_Diesen

Arestovych, former advisor to Zelensky, posted a map of how Donbas will fall:

- As Russia reaches the strategic logistic hub of Pokrovsk, it can create a massive encirclement in both the north and south

- Also, there are no more defensive lines west of Pokrovsk until the Dnieper

5:24 AM · Aug 28, 2024

Significantly, the pivot to the south could encircle Ugledar, which is the linchpin connecting the Ukrainian defensive lines in the east (Donbass) and the south (Zaporozhye north of the Sea of Azov). It has been a thorn in the side for the Russians and has been likened to a Ukrainian Monte Cassino (but much less scenic)—here is a photo of the type of locations that NATO and Ukraine turned into massive fortresses with extensive underground tunnels that are virtually impregnable:

Now, I should mention that some (Geroman) have suggested caution, warning that the Ukrainians could attempt to pinch off the Russian salient that extends toward Pokrovsk, trapping the Russian forces—which would mirror, on a much smaller scale, the failed German strategy at Kursk during WW2:

The problem I see with this is that to accomplish this the Ukrainians would have to assemble two armored offensive striking forces and then come out of their fortified lines into the open. Every time Ukraine has attempted such a move in the past their forces have been devastated. The current iteration of the Ukrainian military is far less prepared for such a move than past versions were. The Russian domination of the air is even stronger now than in the past, and one assumes that the cautious Russians are well prepared to protect their flanks. And that’s something that works both ways—any Ukrainian attempt in this direction would face Russian attacks on their flanks. Overall, it seems unlikely to succeed.

Next we’re going to do a little pivot or “circle back” of our own.

All of the commentators we linked to above—but especially Larry Johnson and Doug Macgregor—spent a great deal of their time discussing the pointed warning delivered recently by Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov. Lavrov warned that the US is “playing with nuclear fire” and that, if the US thinks it’s secure behind its two oceans, they had better rethink that notion. As Scott Ritter also explained, Lavrov was warning that if the US—with its newly adopted “hair trigger” nuclear doctrine—made any suspicious moves, Russia would not wait to be attacked.

Doug Macgregor discussed Lavrov’s warning in the context of the Kursk incursion, and he made several arguments that I found compelling. Macgregor maintains that the Kursk incursion is just one in a series of escalatory moves that do little more than illustrate that the US no longer has any viable strategy in its war on Russia in Ukraine. Ukraine is facing inevitable defeat, and sooner rather than later as evidenced by the crumbling of the Ukrainian fortified lines in Donbass. None of the US’s escalatory moves make any solid military sense. Macgregor argues that the Russians are now eyeing the US warily, realizing that its CinC-less government is in the hands of the increasingly desperate Neocons and their crazy ideological biases, and they are concerned to be on their guard against an escalation to the nuclear level. Thus, Lavrov’s warning.

Macgregor further argues that, in a number of ways, the Kursk incursion is the most serious of the multiple escalations. First, and this is a point that Macgregor insists upon, this is a NATO invasion of Russia—the large NATO component in the Ukrainian forces makes that clear. More importantly, however, Macgregor assumes (with many others) that the target of the incursion was the Kurchatov NPP, and their are at least two ways of looking at that choice of targets. One would be that Ukraine and NATO actually hoped to take control of the NPP, and to use that control to blackmail Russian into an unfavorable ceasefire or truce. Macgregor cites statements by , back in July, in support of the argument that the Kursk incursion was a deliberate, wild ass Neocon scheme to “win the war” in a goofball “masterstroke”. But Macgregor also speculates that, short of actually taking control of the NPP, the plan may have been to simply get within striking range of the NPP to threaten a nuclear disaster on Russian soil. These considerations raise concerns that the Neocons really are losing their grip on reality and could lash out irrationally in any number of ways. That’s a very realistic concern.

Macgregor makes much of this more explicit in a conversation with Glenn Diesen, in which he also speculates that, for all these reasons, Putin may decide that it’s time to put an end to the war by going straight for Kiev:

Colonel Douglas Macgregor:Glenn Diesen 8/22/2024

Here’s a highly edited transcript cum summary from the first 14 minutes. Of course it’s colored by Macgregor’s own predilections, but …

GD: So just when you think there can't be any more reckless escalation or risk-taking in this Ukrainian proxy war, we now see that the Ukrainian invasion of Russian territory--seemingly enthusiastically supported by NATO--yeah things get more crazy by the day ...

DM: ... from the vantage point of Moscow and the Russians this is a NATO Invasion ... I've heard estimates of at least 2,000 men inside this fighting force who are obviously not Ukrainian ... This is a very bad thing in my judgment because it signals to the Russians that they really are de facto already at war with NATO. I don't think NATO and most of its members want anything to do with a war against Russia. To be frank, this may be high adventure for the United States or the British, maybe the Poles. I don't understand why they would feel that way but for everyone else this is a very dangerous proposition. I've been contacted within the last 24 hours by a number of people in the Balkans, NATO members, saying, you know, under Article Five we are not obligated to join in a war against Russia that is offensive we joined NATO because we saw it as a defensive alliance. We don't want anything to do with a war against Russia.

... that's one level. The second level is the original goal--at least as I'm increasingly being told by supposedly knowledgeable people--was to reach the [NPP]. I think there was a view that if we can get to the [NPP] it can become a bargaining chip, [or] perhaps they were going to damage it in some way which would cause an emergency and poison the environment.

They have now lost all of their major equipment. The Russians have targeted everything they could with, of all things, Iskander missiles that carry a very, very powerful warhead--whether it's a fuel air explosive or high explosive. [NATO and the Ukrainians are] now firmly cut off. They are, in effect, in what the Russians call a "fire pocket". I don't see any evidence that they've inflicted much damage on the Russians.

[GD speculates about the "strategy" behind the incursion. NATO, he says, would never admit that the real goal was the NPP because of public reaction to the craziness of it all. Instead they talk about "humiliating Putin", thinking they can spark regime change.]

[Macgregor gets into an historical discursus.]

DM: A wounded animal [meaning Ukraine/NATO] even at the end is still somewhat dangerous. I think the discussion in Moscow now is finishing the war. I think that's very much on the table. [Public sentiment in Russia is, let's get this over with. Russians are enraged at the West.] Putin is now being told by his own population, 'You've got to go the distance. You've got to march all the way to the Polish border. Crush the ukrainians once and for all.' [DM again stresses that NATO has now crossed this border between proxy war and joining in on an invasion of Russia, and Russia surely has to respond.]

GD: What do you think Russia can do?

DM: I think Russia has many options. First of all I think they'll clean out whatever is left of this original force. It will be annihilated, and I'm sure that they will begin to maintain persistent surveillance all along their border. I don't think something like this is likely to happen again. Having said that, I think the Russians will look for other ways to make life miserable for us and for Britain. Most of the planning, as I understand it, in preparation for this went on for several months in Great Britain. I think it was interesting that on the 20th of July this General Cavoli--who is the American military commander in NATO, the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe--made a statement that he was very, very optimistic because the Ukrainians had a great plan to win the war. This was on the 20th of July, which leads me to think that he was probably talking about what was coming with this penetration into Russian territory. ... I think the Russians will press forward and I'd be very surprised if they don't press right into Kiev. ... I think there will be drastic action, but I would also look for problems elsewhere.

Much, much more incisive commentary.