Kremlin prepares Russians for 10-year war with complete destruction of Ukraine - ISW
Kremlin prepares Russians for 10-year war with complete destruction of Ukraine - ISW
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Soviet Union had a pretty significant army on their disposal and they were a force to really pay attention to. Russia in it's current state is a poor imitation of that. Current Russian military had 14 000 tanks (rough estimates) and 2/3 of them is currently rusting away on some field in Ukraine, most of that was ww2 era stuff, which is a sitting duck on a literal pair of fighters on a ATV with a javelin or similar as we've seen.
On artillery russia has been shipping their own ammunition and barrels from the 40's back to the front lines from North Korea. Depending on which source you'll like to cite they've lost either almost all of what they got or everything they've had few times over. The picture is pretty similar across the board.
Air force hasn't really done anything on the front beyond bombing civil intrastructure and getting destroyed by a cardboard drones from the Ukraine. Of course any kind of mig or shukoi is a sever threat to anything operating on their reach, but their performance hasn't really shined on the current front where the opponent has been either lacking resources or have had hands tied to polictics across the continent.
Ukraine stopped the original attack with a handful of troops and they've been more and more successfull as the training with experience is getting more and more effective. If Russia can be stopped with pretty much with their own equipment from the soviet era what do you think will happen if they try to attack someone who's been preparing on that since 1945?
Current state in Europe is a very bad excuse on what we should have, but even that, with 60 years of preparation, is well enough to counter anything what former ghost of the Soviet Union has to throw against EU. China, India and the rest of global south are the real threat and if things escalate to global war then it's a whole different scenario, but Russia taking over europe is not a part of that.
All of this is true. But Russia is still outproducing the rest of Europe by a large margin. They are failing in Ukraine only because of extensive support from NATO (more than 70% of which is provided by the USA), starting long before the war began. Ukraine would not have been able to repel the invasion without it.
I don't deny that a united NATO can stop Russia. But Russia can beat a divided one country by country if it's allowed to happen. And there are many in Europe and the USA working towards that.
But Russia is still outproducing the rest of Europe by a large margin
citation please.
Unfortunately I don't think I have a single source for this. You would need to read many articles, watch YouTube videos of people who have researched it. But it's true. And not by a small margin either. For example, for artillery production, or for example tanks, Russia annually produces more tanks than the entire inventory of any country in Europe. It is claimed 2100 tanks total, of which 200 are new ones whereas for example the largest fleets in European countries, built up over decades are only a few hundreds
Fair enough. I'm not particularly satisfied with the youtube military size comparison video you previously cited. Much of its data is incomplete, misleading, and unsourced. 2 glaring examples are that Russia's aircraft carrier is listed as in service when it hasn't been for 90% of it's existence and is in dry dock right now possibly getting repaired for the 12th time, and that it only lists 2 variants light attack aircraft (F16/F35) when there are absolutely more variants in both Russia/Europes arsenal. It screams 'unfounded propaganda' to me.
Additionally, what is being manufactured by Russia is clearly insufficient to keep up with their losses. New vehicle manufactures annually account for 1-2 months of losses at their current rate. That is 1/6th of what they NEED it to be just to continue this war let alone another one and their stores of usable ancient vehicles are almost completely gone. Comparisons of this already insufficient manufacturing rate to those of Europe not geared to a wartime economy are unreasonable.
Finally, your whole premise of 'a divided Europe would struggle against Russia' is kinda significantly undermined by how well a woefully under-equipped and sized military fared against Russia's assault in the beginning let alone nowadays with support. Also consider the change in fighting strategy Europe has. They do not care about Russia having 5x the artillery guns with a max 80km range when they have 5x the aircraft to precision strike from positions hundreds of kms away.
Regardless the whole concept of ' divided Europe' is a Russian fantasy. Every member nation of NATO signed on specifically due to the threat of Russia. To think any nation wouldn't contribute everything it absolutely could to put down an Orc uprising is to be delusional. Political stupidity of a couple member nations of late be damned. They would still join in lest the obvious consequence of nobody coming to help them when it is their turn become realized.
;tldr unless you can make a concretely sourced, supported argument for your claim in spite of all the evidence to the contrary this is fear-mongering propaganda and must cease.
Yes the Admiral Kuznetsov is a massive piece of shit and shouldn't be counted anywhere ;-). I would happily take an alternative source if you've got one. And yes, Russia is losing more than it's making. Which means we are on a good path if we can sustain it. My only fear is that with a Trump win and far right parties winning all over Europe, we won't be able to.
I will take issue with Ukraine being woefully underequipped, though. They weren't worse off than many European nations and were far better off than the Baltic states are now. Many people are totally ignorant of the large amounts of NLAWs and ATGM's pumped to Ukraine by the west before the invasion. Without these I think it would have been a very different story. I have a link to some numbers somewhere in my history.
As for a divided Europe, it is a fantasy for now, but the trends are heading in that direction, largely due to Russian disinformation efforts. Unfortunately Putin gets a chance to fuck us up at every election while he will be there until he dies. So time is on his side in that way.