Commentary by Russian military blogger Andrey Chervonets is in italics.
An indifferent American journalist communicates with the author of the TG channel Ramsay and dropped him some interesting information
Even if you want to, you can't think of it. Therefore, it is very similar to the 100th truth.
They write to Ramsay:
Vladislav, hello!
All from the same West Point Academy veterans forum, my brother pulled out a letter from one of the "forumans", which he mistakenly posted in the public domain, but then he caught himself and rubbed it. Well, very interesting!
And for five weeks the Ukrainians have not even been able to break through the first line of Russian defense. At the same time, the losses in people and equipment are very large. In fact, they no longer have the strength for a deep breakthrough. The fighting capacity of their brigades is low.
In general, Ukrainians have changed a lot. If a year ago we were perceived with great enthusiasm and our military assistance inspired them, today the attitude towards us has become cold and pragmatic - consumer (my note - "you must", "you must", "give", "what are you talking about, what thanks"?!,).
The only thing we now hear is: "Give us ATAKAMS, give us F-16s, give us a lot of Abrams, give us shells!" The
Ukrainians perceive the help of our advisers openly critical. Our training programs are considered outdated and ineffective. It gets to the point that, to the remarks of advisers, they snap with phrases: "First, go fight the Russians, and then you will teach us!"
At the same time, the level of training of troops is constantly decreasing. Even the best Ukrainian brigades, who fought successfully a year ago and were determined to defeat the Russians, today are not much different from ordinary infantry brigades, which have almost no heavy weapons and are equipped with all sorts of rabble that Ukrainian military registration and enlistment offices literally grab from the street, as in the days of a century wars in Europe.
The reason is the huge losses suffered by the Ukrainians during these months. Most of the brigades fighting since last spring have lost between half and two-thirds of their personnel, and some have already changed their combat strength twice.
Second and third formations of operational level units which have been exhausted is SOP in Slavic militaries, especially so with the Russians; so apparently it is with the Ukrainians.
As a result, these brigades have only constant command and command and control, which themselves do not enter into battles and only manage combat operations from well-defended command posts.
This has led to the fact that the command of the brigades has lost a sense of responsibility for their soldiers and considers them solely as consumables for the performance of a particular task. And this only adds to the loss.
The second factor provoking losses is the requirement of the command to protect equipment.
They do not have a military industry and all deliveries of armored vehicles and artillery come only from us. There is no rhythm in these deliveries. And part of the weapons is generally poorly compensated. Especially tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and self-propelled guns. We don't even have them in stock! And so the Ukrainian command gave the order to stop the use of heavy armored vehicles on the battlefield until the Russian defense was breached and to switch to the tactics of attacks by small infantry units, believing that in this way they would exhaust the Russians and force them to withdraw their forces under the pressure of continuous attacks.
If for the first two weeks such tactics allowed the Armed Forces of Ukraine to advance a little, now the Russians have adapted to it and, letting the Ukrainians come closer, they simply destroy them with mortar and machine-gun fire, themselves go into counterattacks and break into their positions on the shoulders of those fleeing and occupy them.
The general mood in the Ukrainian headquarters is despondency and anger. Whereas last autumn Ukrainian generals had a fire of determination in their eyes, plotting future strikes and arguing over how to storm Perekop and Sevastopol, now the days begin with reports of the lack of progress of the attacking battalions, the loss of equipment and the remaining stocks of shells. And the faces of the same people who planned to storm Sevastopol in the fall have the stamp of hopelessness.
In frank conversations, many Ukrainian senior officers are now increasingly admitting that they do not see any prospects for a successful conclusion to the war. The only hope, which, oddly enough, many of them have, is the hope that we will directly intervene in this war. But, again, many immediately add that this hope is like believing in Santa Claus.
Separately, it must be said that, like any failure, the current unsuccessful offensive deepened the conflict in the Ukrainian military leadership. Commander-in-Chief Zaluzhny and Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces Syrsky frankly cannot stand each other and even avoid appearing together at the same meetings.
Zaluzhny, who returned to duty after being seriously wounded, accuses Syrsky of being unscrupulous, that he agreed to launch an offensive, although the Armed Forces of Ukraine were not yet ready for it. But this is hardly Syrsky's fault. To attack was the categorical demand of "Marshal G" (apparently, we are talking about Biden's assistant Sullivan, who actually oversees the conduct of the war against Russia) and Zelensky repeatedly relayed it at all meetings with the military.
Zaluzhny was simply “lucky” not to be at the helm at that time. Deepening all this is our conflict between Millie and Austin, who in the same way cannot stand each other and therefore act in dissonance. If there had been agreement and understanding between them, this adventure would hardly have begun at all with the offensive ... "