Ukraine On Its Last Legs
Knowledgeable commentators are openly speaking of a coming collapse of the Ukrainian military—greatly accelerated by the disastrous Kursk venture. According to Alexander Mercouris, Ukrainian government sources are admitting they have only 60 days worth of weapons left. In the preview of his live blog today,
The Last Stand of Ukraine's Army
Massive Losses in Kursk, Collapse in Donbass
Mercouris writes:
In my opinion the big news continues to be the war in Ukraine, in which the Ukrainian army appears to be hurtling towards collapse.
There are reports that their equipment losses in Kursk are now as great as during the 2023 summer offensive, and the front lines in Donbass are collapsing so fast that some, such as the Ukrainian MP Marianna Bezuglaya, are talking about the Ukrainian High Command having effectively written Donbass off.
Apparently NATO had saved up the best trained Ukrainian troops (trained in NATO countries like the UK, FR, Poland, Germany) and the units best equipped with NATO armor. These were launched into the Kursk direction in the fantastical hope of capturing the nuclear facility near Kursk and, essentially, holding it for ransom. The priority placed on this crazy scheme can be seen in Doug Macgregor’s repeated claim that, of the 12K personnel involved in some way in the operation, a good 2K were NATO troops, including Americans. Macgregor’s sources tell him much the same things that Mercouris reports—that the equipment and personnel losses are staggering, the remaining units are cut off from most resupply and are being systematically eliminated. Will Schryver puts it this way: What started as a battle has developed into a “methodical massacre.”
If you are one of those who likes to wade into the tall grass of tactical maneuvers from time to time, the Warlord provides a first-rate analysis of how the Russians have approached the AFU/NATO kamikaze run into Kursk.
The battle has now become a methodical massacre.
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Armchair Warlord @ArmchairW
How Russia Fights Part 2.3: The Battalion Tactical Group in 2024 Something occurred to me yesterday while reading coverage of the ongoing battle on the Kursk border. The Russians only sent in one heavy brigade - the 810th Marines - and it's covering a 70km front. How? BTGs!
In the meantime, on the Donbass front, the Ukrainian defenses are giving way to Russian pressure. The Ukrainians are no longer able to plug all the holes, while the Russians probe with ever more force. Back on Aug 12 Mikael Valtersson foresaw difficulties ahead in Donbass for Ukraine, as a result of the Kursk venture:
In Southern Donetsk RuAF continues their successful offensive towards Toretsk, Pokrovsk etc. This offensive is partly due to the lack of Ukrainian resources and the collapse of the entire SW Donetsk area is getting closer. If that would happen RuAF would be behind the deep (50km) Ukrainian fortified areas and have free rein to advance through Eastern Dnipro and Southern Kharkov regions. Thereby threatening the entire Ukrainian Eastern front.
On Aug 20th he added what should have been clearly implied: Rather than just rampaging westwards, the Russians, having broken through the 50km deep fortified zone, will probably seek to swing around and encircle other areas of the Donbass and Zaporozhye fronts and trapping concentrations of Ukrainian forces that will have lost their lines of supply:
Situation critical for UkrAF at the Pokrovsk-Selidovefront. Large scale collapse of several defencelines might occur the coming week. RuAF in the suburbs of Seledove. Russian advance a long the railway from the fall of Avdeevka is 40km.
New York fell to RuAF yesterday. Huge Russian territorial gains by RuAF north and east of New York the last week. All in all, more than 150 sqkm. Toretsk might become semiencircled in near future.
RuAF are taking coalmine north of Vuhledar. Vuhledar will soon also be semiencircled.
All of this collapse could force itself upon even the American consciousness as the presidential campaign season progresses.
The US is complaining to China about China’s support for Russia:
China is actively supporting Russia’s defense production cycle, undermining the significant impact of U.S. and Allied sanctions. The PRC must stop enabling the Kremlin’s unjustified war of aggression against Ukraine, which poses a significant threat to European security and stability.
The Chinese were having none of it and quickly shot back:
The U.S. is actively supporting Israel’s massacre in Gaza with endless bombs and vetos at the UN. US wants to use and abuse Ukraine and fight to the last Ukrainian to benefit US selfish geopolitical agenda.
Speaking of China, Arnaud Bertrand provides an insight into the Neocon mentality, which we were discussing yesterday. Bertrand thinks the Neocons are insane. Perhaps just evil? Of course the Chinese run a professional intel and diplomatic operation and are fully aware of the crazy things Neocons say:
Arnaud Bertrand @RnaudBertrand
Genocidal speech of the most awful kind has clearly been liberated lately in some corners of the West.
Here Michael Rubin, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (a prominent US Think Tank), writes - citing the infamous Gordon Chang - that as part of its "defense" strategy "Taiwan could kill tens of millions of people by destroying Chinese dams".
Literally advocating the mass murder of tens of millions of innocent civilians. These people are very dangerously insane.
One of Bertrand’s readers seemed to get the point:
This is why Israel and the US are best buds, both are insane.
A genocide here, a genocide there, pretty soon we’re talking about serious killing. Ukraine, Palestine, China next. Same people. Neocons are prime movers behind it all.
Scott Ritter is reporting via his contacts in Russia that the MoD considers the Kursk Offensive to be a joint NATO/Ukraine operation because of the number of foreign mercenaries fighting there. In other words, it was an overt act of war against Russia by NATO. Had they succeeded in capturing the Kursk NPP, it likely would have escalated things into a nuclear confrontation rather than intimidate Moscow into an unfavorable negotiation. Russia would likely have targeted NATO military bases in Poland and Romania first using conventional missile weapons, while putting their tactical nuclear deterrent on high alert status. Then wait to see how NATO responds. Serious game of chicken ensues in which a leaderless United States could easily stumble us all into Armageddon. And if Biden's neocon handlers decided to up the ante, Russia would likely take out all of Britain's military facilities in a preemptive tactical nuclear strike as a sign that they view the war as existential.
Moral of this story. Being lead by evil idiots can get us all dead. That is no trivial thing.
How is it that energy (over land gas pipelines) can flow between Russia, thru Ukraine into Eastern Europe uninterrupted? If Russia is fighting NATO proxies, then why fuel their economies? The Russians have largely knocked out the electricity generation of Ukraine, but Ukraine hasn't touched these pipelines. Why?