- Hubert Walas
New Deal.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine is now in its 50th day. The Russians have suffered a devastating defeat in the first part of the military campaign. It seemed that it would only be symbolized by a quick retreat from the Kyiv region, but the reality turned out to be even more illustrative. On the night of April 13th, the Armed Forces of Ukraine hit the flagship of Russia's Black Sea Fleet, the Moskva Missile Cruiser, with two homemade cruise missiles, the Neptune. Moskva eventually sank. This is the biggest single loss of face for the Russians, further compromising the Kremlin's warfare, particularly in the area of reconnaissance. Any ship from the Kremlin's perspective would be better to hit than the one you name after your capital. By the way, this is speculation of course, but 2,3 weeks ago Volodymyr Zelenski mentioned that the Ukrainians still have a surprise prepared for the Russians. Could it be that the Ukrainians were keeping their Neptune cruise missiles as a sort of ace up their sleeve, waiting for Russian ships to feel safe in Ukrainian coastal waters? This would also represent another failure of Russian intelligence to appreciate the Ukrainian defense industry, which as it turned out has developed a very sophisticated element, which is the coastal defense cruise missile system.
Despite further blows, the Russians continue their assault and are accumulating forces in Donbas. It is there that the decisive battle will take place. Although still a long war of attrition is more likely. The Kremlin wants to achieve numerical superiority in this area in selected directions, so it is doing everything to find new people for the fight, without announcing a mass mobilization, which it clearly fears. Therefore, all men from the occupied Donetsk and Luhansk regions who are under the age of 65 are compulsorily drafted into the army. The quality or lack thereof, of this forcibly created army, is rather obvious. Moreover, the units repositioned from the north are mainly soldiers from the Eastern Military District. They have been participating in exercises and then war since the beginning of January. So they are 3.5 months away from home, all the time living in field conditions, with the freshly lost battle of Kyiv in their minds. As paradoxical as it sounds - the Russian Federation is most lacking people in its war effort. Usually, it has been exactly the opposite.
Nevertheless, Russian hardware losses should not be underestimated either, as well described by user @partizan_oleg on Twitter. Some may argue that the loss of 500 tanks, which has already been visually confirmed by the oryxpioenkop portal, should not impress Russia, as the overall Russian tank reserves reach up to 10,000 tanks. But the majority of these 10,000 are non-operational - either due to mechanical problems or lack of crews. In practice, Russian forces operated 2,609 tanks in 2021. 80% of these tanks were sent to the war with Ukraine, which amounts to about 2,000 tanks. On the other hand, due to the high proportion of conscripts, some ⅔ of this number was ultimately thrown into combat, which is about 1,400 tanks. It means that the Russian Armed Forces lost about 35% of their total number of tanks thrown into battle. This is a huge loss that will be very difficult to replace.
There is no doubt that the Armed Forces of Ukraine, also suffer major losses of heavy equipment. However, Ukraine has the great military potential of NATO countries on its side. Many Russian tanks have been captured by Ukrainians, but their immediate use is usually not possible. They require servicing, as do damaged tanks of their own, and this, in turn, takes time, very precious time. That's why, instead of voices of support, Kyiv is calling for heavy equipment to start coming into Ukraine. And that equipment is indeed starting to arrive. Previously, military aid was mostly down to hand-held anti-tank and anti-aircraft launchers and smaller weapons for the infantry. Now, this is changing.
There we have Czech howitzers, British and Australian armored personnel carriers, or Slovak anti-aircraft systems. And this is only a part of the assistance. In this field, two events deserve special mention. Firstly, unofficial reports state that 100 post-Soviet T-72 tanks "disappeared" from Polish warehouses. It is not known what happened to them. But if they were found on the Ukrainian eastern front, they would certainly represent a significant reinforcement of Ukrainian firepower. Secondly, the Americans have signed another tranche of military aid to Ukraine in the amount of $800million. In addition to the well-known Javelins, this time the list included many other interesting items including 11 Mi-17 transport helicopters, which the Americans had inherited from Afghanistan. In addition, 18 155m caliber howitzers, 200 M113 armored personnel carriers, and much more. The British are also announcing significant deliveries of heavy equipment.
It is hard not to notice that among the main "security providers" to Ukraine, the two most powerful countries of continental Europe - France and Germany - are missing. Paris is currently subordinating everything to the presidential election. The second round of elections will be held on April 24, and the battle for the presidential seat will be fought by Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen. Both candidates are focused on the fastest possible normalization of relations with Moscow, however, it should be emphasized that the plans of the far-right candidate Marine Le Pen are much more far-reaching in this regard. Le Pen would like to stop sending even the current modest aid to Ukraine, worth 100million euros. In addition, she would like to take France out of NATO command structures and, most interestingly, seek a "strategic rapprochement" with the Russian Federation. In a word, Le Pen's victory would also be a strategic success for the Kremlin. A success in which the Kremlin has invested, because Le Pen's earlier campaign was financed with Russian money.
An equally apathetic approach to the massive Russian killings and rapes in Ukraine is presented by the German government. All ideas of transferring or even selling German heavy military equipment to Ukraine are torpedoed by the SPD party headed by Chancellor Olaf Scholz. There is a clear division within the German ruling coalition itself. Coming from the usual pacifist Green party, Defence Minister Annalena Baerbock is calling for the transfer of heavy German weapons to Ukraine. However, these calls are being quashed by incumbent Chancellor Olaf Scholz. This is causing growing frustration not only in Ukraine but among many other Central and Eastern European countries. An expression of the highest disapproval of German policy was given by Volodymyr Zelenski, who saw no point in meeting with German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier in Kyiv, even though the latter wanted to come. Steinmeier is also a long-time proponent of the Nord Stream gas pipelines, which is probably the main reason of Zelensky's stance. A shadow of hope that the situation would change appeared after a statement by a representative of the third ruling coalition partner, FDP party spokesman Marcus Faber. "Germany will quickly deliver heavy equipment to Ukraine. We have convinced our coalition partners to do so." Time will tell whether this will happen.
The current policy of Germany and France is symptomatic. It is not even about the problem of admitting fault with the assessment of the Russian Federation, which was an equal and important partner in Berlin and Paris even after the 2008 war with Georgia and the first attack on Ukraine in 2014. This shows above all that when the war dust settles will France and Germany be the first to resume close cooperation with the Kremlin. It is not without reason that the Paris administration and Emmanuel Macron oppose calling Vladimir Putin a butcher and the situation in Ukraine a genocide. It is also for this reason that Germany, and specifically German business, because it is the business that in practice determines Berlin's strategic direction, opposes the embargo on Russian oil and gas. Speaking after the head of the German chemical giant BASF, "it is Russian gas that is the foundation of the global competitiveness of German business." And the massacre in Bucha will not change that. BASF, as the producer of the 1940s, hit product - Zyklon B - knows how to take care of its interests.
The war shatters the facades of kind words and shows the real allies. A full victory of Ukraine and the fall of the murderous regime in the Kremlin is mostly in the interest of the US, Britain, Poland, Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Turkey or Romania. It is not, however, in the interest of France, Germany, or Hungary. If it were otherwise, we would observe it in the concrete actions of these states - this is the ultimate barometer of the strategy of a given power center. The aftermath of this event will be twofold - firstly, war completely discredits the European Union as a security actor - whether we call it strategic autonomy or strategic independence - the countries of Eastern Europe will not trust Paris and Berlin in security policy. Second, the war brings us closer to a big change in the security architecture in the Baltic Sea basin. This is obviously because of the very likely accession of Sweden and Finland to NATO, which is likely to happen later this year. Surprisingly, the initiator of this move is Helsinki, not Stockholm. Of course, the Russians are trying to scare the Finns and Swedes with missile troop movements near the Finnish border and nuclear rhetoric. But the Nordic nations are famous for their cold-bloodedness and these threats do not impress either country. Moscow's meticulously executed plan to drive a wedge in Europe's security architecture by reaching out to rapprochement with Germany and France at the expense of Eastern Europe is now falling apart like a house of cards.
To date, NATO's eastern flank has been extremely vulnerable, and a potential quick attack by the Russian Federation on the Baltic States would be a very difficult situation for the alliance to salvage. Cutting the lines of communication running from Poland through the Suwalski Gate to Lithuania with an attack from Belarusian territory to Kaliningrad would completely cut off the Baltic States. Meanwhile, the Russians might now have 1340 kilometers of NATO border and two armies - Swedish and Finnish, to take care of. Both have the most modern equipment with very high capabilities. Much higher than, for example, Germany. In a potential attack on the Baltic States, a large northern front opens up for the Russians which cannot be ignored when making war plans. St. Petersburg is only 200km from the Finnish border. The whole concept of the Russian policy of destabilization, that The Russians exchanged for hard currency in international relations, is broken. The access to Europe for imperialist Russia is closing from every direction. From the south, it is Turkey and Ukraine, in the central part the arming Poland, and from the north Norway and above all potentially Sweden and Finland. And all this is because of the unprovoked attack on Ukraine, which showed how toothless the Russian bear is in practice.
By the way, it was said that this attack also surprised the Ukrainians. We ourselves mentioned this in one of our episodes. Before the war, Americans were terrified that Ukrainians "close their eyes" and do not want to see the inevitable. A different version of events is presented by none other than Alexey Arestovych, that is, let us remind you, an adviser to the President of Ukraine, who predicted the Russian invasion of Ukraine as early as 2019. How does he explain the lack of an earlier reaction of the Armed Forces of Ukraine to the Russian gathering of forces for the invasion? Let's listen.
Mass mobilization and clear declaration of the inevitability of a Russian invasion would cause national communication paralysis and prevent the Ukrainian army from going into defensive positions, which would only benefit the Russian troops. In addition, there would have been information, political, economic chaos, and activation of Russian agents and pro-Russian politicians. The war would begin even before Russian troops actually entered the country. It seems that Ukrainians knew what was coming and chose the lesser evil.
