I think "faster" is relative. If the Russian defense industry is able to retool and start pumping out munitions quickly then yes.. they will be able to restock faster than a devastated Ukraine... after many many months/years. They will never be able to keep up with the output of the collective West supplying Ukraine with various munitions/manpads/atgms/etc. Before this conflict I would never have called Ukraine a "near-peer" to Russia. After the display by Russia, yea perhaps they are closer to that.
I was actually referring to manpower. In terms of equipment, Russia has a ridiculous amount of Soviet stores. And their production capacity is also ridiculous.
Since this is mainly an army war with old equipment on both sides, I'd rather say Ukraine has some advantages here, it's a near-peer conflict. Taiwan is also a near-peer adversary to China, it is all about local advantages within a given area that a near-peer adversary is capable of bringing to bear against a more powerful adversary. Like Pakistan is near-peer to India, and India is near-peer to China. Basically an adversary capable of fighting back.
Also Ukraine's "economy" was barely existent before the war, it has been severely disrupted since 2014.
Yeah. So the more time the conflict takes, the less options Zelensky has.
Halting an invasion of an entire nation to take 1 completely surrounded city that was basically on the frontlines before the conflict erupted is telling though right? If you want you can compare this to the battles of Fallujah in 2004 - well armed, organized and fanatic infantry occupying a city. Operations in Iraq did not stop simply to fight these battles, even after getting bloodied noses in the initial stages.
The numeral advantage the US and allies had against a very significantly weaked enemy that even decided to actually not fight back is a completely different situation. The Russians do not have a numerical advantage in Ukraine, so they are going about it differently.
It's not a great comparison. Niazi was completely isolated and running short of supplies. East Pakistan could not possibly sustain governing an actively hostile population while engaging a superior military force encroaching from all sides. Zelensky enjoys popular support from his populace as well as massive economic/military/food and especially C4ISR aid from the West. I think Zelensky speaks from a better position.
Agreed. Not the same. But just pointing out that what they say and the ground realities may not be the same. If city after city starts falling, and Ukraine's Donbas troops get surrounded, the Russians will have the advantage.
India might use a lot of the same stuff as Russia and Russian stuff might even be world class, but what good is it if they don't use it? I am taking the assumption that they lack the quantities necessary because I can't think of another reasonable explanation. After a month of siege the Ukrainians are still conducting sorties, still using heavy equipment and are overall still conducting a conventional war. With the on paper advantage this just should not be the case. The low usage of precision guided munitions by the Russians is truly perplexing.
They don't want to turn Ukraine into their Pakistan. Massive fires will kill civilians in large numbers, especially if the enemy has decided to hide themselves amongst civilians, particularly in Russian friendly cities like Mariupol. The Russians are working through all of it in phases, aiming for a diplomatic solution to end the war. I suppose they think by taking Mariupol, they will at least take care of their de-Nazification goal to a certain extent, and could force Zelensky to surrender far more quickly.
If they are trying to take civilian causalities into account, you would expect greater usage right? It would also give the advantage of keeping Russian jets higher in the air and out of range of simple/old AA systems employed by the Ukrainians.. or reduce the amount of artillery needed to barrage an area and therefore reduce collateral damage and more effectively destroy conventional opposition.
Precision or not, if you park a gun next to a kindergarten school, the school's gonna be taken out too. Ukraine's committing war crime after war crime.
I am inclined to believe the Russians didn't prepare for a longer, drawn out conflict and that the average Russian private doesn't want to fight/kill Ukrainians .... but the continued inability to refocus and resupply to wage this type of war weeks after the ground reality has become abundantly clear and the Russians have suffered nearly 10k fatalities and untold numbers of other causalities ... it's understandable why it's easy to draw the conclusion that the Russians just aren't what people chalked them up to be.
I don't believe the Russians will back down though. The only real options are either Zelensky surrenders or the Russians retreat. I don't think the Russians are in a position to allow a Ukrainian victory. I mean, whatever's happening with Pakistan will happen to Russia. A second more brutal war will have to be fought in the future, and you can bet Ukraine will somehow get their hands on nukes, because they have the ability to. Ukraine was always gonna go down. This is the West's gambit towards divide and rule. Too bad the Ukrainians got suckered into it. Zelensky the genius thought he was one of them.
