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Notes -
Your Quarterly Ukraine War check-in
Three and a half months ago, we checked in on the war in Ukraine. That post was itself a check in to follow up on dire predictions from the pro-Russia posters in fall of 2025 that the loss of Pokrovsk was heralding the collapse of Ukrainian front lines and encirclement of Ukrainian troops. Amusingly, @No_one went back and deleted all of their posts after the last check in, so I can only leave you with this:
I expected the Iran war to be a major tailwind for Russia (oil prices, sanctions relief, US distraction) but on the contrary, the western information space seems to argue that things will remain stalemated for the foreseeable future. Ukraine seems to be pumping out drones (is this all that matters now?), and has started hitting Russian oil refineries. People have been hyping up what seems to be a mostly symbolic bombing of Moscow. The map hasn't moved, supposedly Russian recruitment is down. The Russian spring offensive has been underway for several weeks and made no progress:
On the flip side, people write articles about how bad the Russian economy is, and then drop this line near the end:
I'd be interested to hear whether anyone has insight into the rhetoric on the Russian side or the pro-Russian perspective at the moment.
So - any new/modified predictions? We had @ABigGuy4U saying collapse in July-August (still a few months to go), @Lizzardspawn saying to look at the frequency of blackouts in Kiev (still unchanged at 6-8 hours a day afaict).
2022 we saw a massive Ukrainian counter offensive in Kharkiv and Kherson. retaking a decently sized city, multiple towns and a sizeable piece of land.
2023 there was the infamous summer offensive but it was large scale and a powerful attack.
2024 Ukraine launched a major offensive into Kursk pressing 24 km into Russia proper.
2026 Ukraine has recaptured some positions that have recently been captured by Russia and were poorly consolidated. Despite Ukraine heavily prioritizing its offensive units when it comes to manpower and equipment they have managed to achieve their most lacklustre counter-attack in the war. Looking at the Russian numbers they are taking roughly as much territory as they were last year. The difference is that the net gain is lower due to a Ukrainian counteroffensive.
Meanwhile Ukrainian losses are high while Russian confirmed losses are unusually low.
Where are you getting that from? I just read today that Russia lost more personnel than they recruited for the fifth straight month. Those are Ukraine's estimates but they're far from 'unusually low'.
Ukraine's equiptment losses are far higher
Ukraine has an enormous number of desertions that are difficult to explain in any other way than soldiers wandering into the steel storm and not returning. Russia is pounding Ukraine with 8000 airstrikes a month. That is one airstrike every 125 meters of frontline every month. These airstrikes aren't random but guided and aimed at Ukrainian positions. One bomb is enough to level an apartment building.
Hey an actual pro Russian, we're low on those since @No_one left, and @ABigGuy4U is more ironic as far as I can tell and mostly thinks that smaller countries shouldn't mess with their local superpower. If Russia is revealed to be a poorly performing regional power rather than super, he might not be on your team anymore, but that's up to him of course.
Do you have a source for that table? It doesn't seem to match much else, but it could be accurate. Stranger things have happened, I just can't remember when.
Certainly the equipment losses gap has closed, but that appears to be because Russia is critically low on much of its kit and now sends handfuls of men on foot to infiltrate and try to take ground, anything bigger died or is being held back from Ukraine's kill zone. However, I think the table might just be wrong.
Could I check, why do you think that the rate of Russia's advance has collapsed this year? Do you think Ukraine hitting the refineries and rear logistics lines with new drones are a concern? Do you think the pro Russia military bloggers who are saying the situation has deteriorated to the point that either mobilization must occur or peace be signed by fall are deluded?
I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s ironic. I would say that I think the war was foolish and probably avoidable. And that Ukraine could have easily ended up like Turkey, balancing NATO and Russian interests and getting rich in the process. I also think that Russia will win, barring some major black swan like NATO overtly entering the war with ground troops, nuclear weapons, Russian economic collapse, etc.
That’s not necessarily because they’re low on gear, that’s just the meta in the age of drones and cheap cruise missiles. This is how Ukraine fights now too after their larger scale tactics failed. Ironically, it’s a hell of a lot like what everyone in the 1950s predicted the nuclear age battlefield would like: everything done with small units because big assaults would get zotted with tactical devices. Ukraine and Russia are actually adapting a lot of their old Soviet nuclear land battle strategies for the Ukraine war.
I really don’t think this is true. Russia has made major advances in the south, and around Kramantorsk, and some new fronts in the North. Ukraine has done a genuinely good job of reducing the Kupyansk cauldron these past few months, which is a good example of what they could have achieved more of if they hadn’t wasted three years and a trillion dollars trying to LARP the Fulda Gap.
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Powerpoint slides with no attribution or methodology breakdown shared on reddit aren't considered authoritative sources? Especially for the hundreds of civillian vehicles blown up counted as military vehicles which is kinda rich coming from russians doing the kherson safari. Russian telegram calls ukrainian children 'maggots' as well and revel in pictures of dead ukrainians (they don't condone rape fantasies so that makes them better than arabic telegram), so maybe civillian apartment blocks are considered barracks too.
Russian rate of advance collapsing is obviously because Russia is consolidating and carefully cultivating resources in the background while putting pressure on the khokhols, so once the Ukrainians are sufficiently exhausted they'd be wiped out easily like the vermin they always were compared to glorious Russia. Anytime now, the mighty rush will be sprung. Aaaaaany day now. Aaaaaaaaaaaany day....
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