Many of us outsiders never really saw this coming, that the Ukrainian armed forces would expose Russia’s once-vaunted military machine to be a third-rate fighting force.
It has occurred.
Now, to be sure, I did once assert as war loomed more likely between Ukraine and Russia that the Ukrainians weren’t “defenseless.” The now-sovereign nation once was part of the Soviet Union and, thus, benefited somewhat from its exposure to the Red Army’s legendary battlefield prowess.
The USSR is gone. What is left is a country, the Russian Federation, that comprises roughly half of its former population. It does maintain a significant nuclear force.
What we’re seeing played out on the field of battle in Ukraine is a case of a nation fighting desperately — and effectively — to preserve its independence while its opponent is suffering from a lack of morale, incompetent battlefield leadership and a national leader who has become a pariah among world leaders because he launched an illegal and immoral war.
What’s more, the Russians have committed war crimes with their indiscriminate attacks on women, children and other “soft targets.”
I don’t expect Russia to surrender to Ukraine. I am now beginning to believe the reports that Russian goon Vladimir Putin might be exploring a possible face-saving way to end this conflict.
Do I believe he will use tactical nukes on Ukraine? No. He knows the consequences would be catastrophic. Indeed, President Biden has dropped broad hints that the allied response to any such act of madness could produce even more economic pain on the Russians than they ever imagined.
The course of this war has simply blown my mind. It has produced at least a glimmer of hope that battlefield incompetence will succumb to a nation’s will to survive.