NATO (Western Alliance) has warned that the firepower of Russian artillery is increasing, and this already today exceeds Ukraine’s capabilities by four to five timeswhich means it is capable of firing more than 20,000 rounds per day, while Kiev forces 4,000 to 7,000 rounds to be fired every 24 hours, and this difference is continuously increasing.
Vladimir Putin has completed Russia’s conversion to a “war economy”. Production of artillery ammunition by the Russian military-industrial complex it is higher than that of the United States and the 28 NATO countries combinedand is preparing to double it in the first half of 2024.
The basic problem of the war in Ukraine is that the Kiev counteroffensive launched in June, equipped and trained by the United States and NATO, it failed miserably and they failed to penetrate any of the Russian defenses built deep along the 800-kilometer front deployed in eastern and southern Ukraine.
Russia has doubled its military contingent in Ukraine in the last six months: it is approximately 300,000 fighters, while they were 140,000 in the February 2022 invasion.
Moscow also created two new military regions. The first of these regions is located on the border with Finland, practically within sight of Helsinki, the capital. Finland, as is known, joined NATO together with Sweden.
The second region is located in the heart of the Donetsk, in southern Ukraine, and constitutes the axis of the Russian defense system, in an area where 80% of the population speaks Russian and recently annexed by Moscow.
The point that needs to be made is that the combination of the failure of the June counteroffensive and the conversion of the conflict into a long-term struggle, seems to have sealed the fate of the war.
Over the past three weeks, Putin has made his first international tour since the invasion in February last year. He headed to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), where he was received with the honors of head of stateprimarily by the prince reigning on the Saudi throne Mohammed bin Salmanwhich awarded him the highest decoration of the kingdom founded by Ibn Saud.
In the Middle East, in short, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine is starting to be thought of in post-war termsjust when the United States finds itself significantly weakened.
For the failed counteroffensive in June, The Pentagon organized, armed and trained nine brigades of the Ukrainian army (36,000 elite men). He did it outside of Ukraine, at NATO bases in Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic and 7 of those 9 brigades were virtually destroyed by Russian defenses.
This means that they lost all of their Bradley fighting vehicles, as well as Stryker armored personnel carriers, as well as virtually all of the Leopard tanks supplied by the Federal Republic.
The Russian defenses were organized over six months through a complex and sophisticated combination of anti-tank ditches, artillery bunkers and extensive minefields, comparable only in their density to those built by the Soviet Union during World War II.
The result of the failure of the June counteroffensive was a complete strategic stalemate, in which Russian forces assumed a defensive position, giving the conflict a prolonged character, in which time became a fundamental factor that clearly favors the Russian side.
This happens when Republican support for Ukraine fades in the United States.
The calculation is that if this situation continues in 2024, at a certain point Vladimir Putin’s victory is approaching.
A fundamental component of the Ukrainian war is the extraordinary political weakening of President Joe Biden, as Volodymyr Zelenskyj’s recent visit to Washington clearly revealed.
What is predictable then is the defeat of Ukraine/USA/NATO in 2024an event that would have an extraordinary global impact and would call into question the pre-eminence of the United States as the system’s first superpower.
The core of military power is not the arsenal of war, but the will and leadership of those who lead it, and in this crucial moment, and in a decisive year, the United States presents a lethal failure.
Ukraine is much more than Vietnam, Afghanistan or Iraq; It is a strategically crucial country located in the heart of Europe, whose importance is immediately global.
“Losing Ukraine” would not be another possibility of war, but a turning point in the United States and around the world. It should be emphasized that this would come in the midst of an election year with the presidential election taking place on the first Tuesday of November 2024 and in which President Joe Biden is one of the two candidates in play. The other is Donald Trump.
Source: Clarin
