A long time ago, we were having dinner at a fancy French restaurant in Melbourne, Australia. We noticed Bill Hayden, a former cabinet minister and Governor General, at the next table with with his wife, Dallas. She was notorious for shoplifting. When they left, we cheekily asked our server if she'd taken any of the silver. Quick as a flash he replied "The metal detector didn't go off."
Ok, here is my question, which bothers me for a long time. So, to have a properly functional, integrated army, you need a long time to train not only soldiers but also a cooperations between units, etc. This is what is argued as the problem for the Ukrainian arm forces. But when I am thinking about the Soviet Army, during the WW II, surely there was not this luxury of time. I am missing something, somewhere. And I do appreciate that soldiers also learn via combat. Can you, please, explain? Maybe this is a non-question, but I would like to know why it would be a non-question. I do hope I make sense here. Thank you!
In WWII, given the size of the USSR, the Soviet army had a lot of "rear" territories inaccessible to the enemy, to train the soldiers and relocate the industry. When I was a student in the USSR, on the tour of a tractor factory, we were told it takes 3 days to convert a tractor factory into a full scale tank production. Ukraine has nowhere to hide its industry or train soldiers - all can be subjected to the Russian fire. Also, the equipment is more complex now, especially the Western types - takes longer to learn.
Yes, I know they did. They have managed to relocate most of their industries from the Western parts. I am just not sure that they could afford to have months of training before they sent soldiers to the front.
Your question is quite relevant to the situation in Russia and Ukraine today. One of many reasons the West misunderstands Russia is that they do not grasp the answer to your question. Hence the perception that Russia's military is weak or incompetent. Neither is true. It is different from the West.
The more conscripts an army has the greater burden on the officer corps. The coordination you speak of takes place at the officer level more than at the Staff NCO or NCO level as the proportion of conscripts increases. Doctrine becomes simpler, which is not necessarily the same as less effective.
On the other hand a professional army that maintains a permanent core, can push doctrine down to more junior ranks and more complicated doctrine can be developed, at least in theory if not always in practice.
Today, Russia is a mix, having conscripts and permanent forces. On the other hand, many Western nations (not all) have standing militaries with permanent personnel lacking conscripts. These countries typically push responsibility further down the chain of command. This deceases the operational and tactical burden on the officers since Staff NCOs and NCOs pick up responsibility for more of these functions.
Countries like the Scandanavian countries or France and Germany, get much of their doctrine from the rest of NATO, but do not have the same ability to push leadership down to NCO levels. That might step on pride. But, that is my experience training with them. Conscripts provide more resources in manpower, but that comes at an operational cost.
It is also significant to remember combat is a effective educator for any military capable and willing to endure the learning curve. It is deadly.
In World War II Russia not only moved much of its infrastructure eastward, it endured more casualties than any other country and more deaths than all the wars the US ever fought combined several times over. Visiting Russian military cemeteries is sobering. Russia endured staggering losses while it recovered from Stalin's purges of the officer corps, retooled its infrastructure, and came back. The will to endure and fight is impossible to exaggerate.
In the modern sense, training takes more time because equipment and maintenance are more complicated. And the expectation for small unit tactics and operations is often greater. Consequently, forcing multiple types of equipment on untrained or undertrained forces actually hurts more than it helps. It is like giving a person dying of thirst salt water. It might seem good for a short time. Ultimately it speeds the outcome, which is death.
Ukraine is being forced into a NATO mold in a war that NATO doctrine is not configured for ON TOP OF being denied air power, which is integral to NATO doctrine. This is not new. NATO (US/UK) spent 8 years helping Ukraine retool and conform to NATO standards with no major investment in air power. There is no quick way to recover from that. When I served in the US, the pilot pipeline took a year (fast) to two years.
Also, Ukraine has to train outside its borders because (as has been pointed out already), Russia can destroy any training base in Ukraine. This increases training time. And since the trainers are not fighting for the most part, lessons learned are not being captured as quick as they should be, decreasing training effectiveness.
Moreover, Ukraine possesses limited to no ability to maintain equipment. And, the NATO doctrine being taught to Ukrainian troops is not effective. Russia's doctrine was designed to combat NATO. NATO's doctrine was designed to fight counter-insurgency and small wars despite stating its purpose was to defend against Russia or the Soviets before them. NATO lost sight of its objective. This undermines training.
This leaves Ukraine learning on the battlefield at great expense and conscripting ever less capable and willing fighters.
In the 20s, both the Germans and the Soviets were international pariahs, and so they got together and trained together. Much of German Panzer doctrine was developed on training grounds in the Soviet Union. Stalin famously had many of his top generals executed when the Nazis invaded because he feared they were too close to the German officers with whom they had trained for so long. Whether or not that fear was justified is a different question, it was not wholly irrational. In any event, the lower and middle grade Soviet officer corps was probably well trained, and provided a robust scaffolding for the expansion of the Red Army.
I know that an aerospace designer Tupolev was imprisoned in the late 1930s on the accusation of selling his designs of the Messerschmitt 109 fighter to Messerschmitt (I read his memoirs in Russian), and he was rehabilitated during WWII and continued to work in aerospace and he brought many other aerospace designers out of from the labor camp. Tupolev was asked to produce a list of who's who in Russian aerospace and he did, and all of them were brought to the special bureaus, called Sharashky to work on fighters. He wrote that all on his list were imprisoned/labor camps since the mid-late 1930s. I think by 1940 the wave of repressions stopped at large.
The USSR sustained enormous casualties during the first 1-2 years of the war. Much was due to the lack of training that you are asking about. I wasn't until 1943 (maybe later) that the Red Army developed into the powerful army that eventually crushed the Germans. Even then there were occasions when units did not cooperate correctly and better generals, like Manstein could take advantage of this. I imagine our host can give examples.
It took lots of casulties and hard lessons for the Red Army to develop into the powerful force it eventually became. Suggest Glantz's When Titans Clash which gives a good account of the occasional victories interlaced with disasters until they got it right.
Just remember that it was the German generals, who lost the war but ended up in the US who were writing/re-writing the history of WWII for the Americans and the Westerners' consumption, (puffing themselves up, cursing Hitler and degrading the Red Army to whom they LOST. All Europe worked for Hitler in WWII, so keep it in mind and don't gulp whatever is being sold. I don't know about you, but I don't take an advice from the losers.
Lubica, If you are interested, there is a book by David Hackworth called "Steel My Soldier's Hearts", a superb introduction into combat training that may answer some of your questions. It illustrates how to motivate borderline mutinous troops, how to train within a theatre of combat and coordinate artillery/air/troops together, how to use guerilla tactics against guerillas, and ultimately how to become a combat leader..
Not sure what the answer is For Ukraine, a country brainwashed into thinking it can win a modern war against a superb fighting opponent, with world war one tactics. Perhaps guerilla war is the only answer for them. Not that they can defeat the Russians even at this, who are vastly more experienced.
The consensus seems to put the number of severely wounded Ukrainians both civilian and military at around 60 000. If that's the case who looks after rehabilitation of these people as well as providing ongoing care and support. Is it left up to individual families and communities on a local level & is it dealt with differently in Russia.
Simplicius, could you please address how much support you think there is for Russia in the non-occupied oblasts, particularly the ones most people think could be likeliest to absorbed into Russia at some point in the future, and how important this could be or how linked it is to Russia's decisions to (or not to) launch a major offensive?
I'd like to imagine that support for Russia is high in Kharkiv, Nikolaev, Odessa, Sumy Regions, etc.., or in the cities of Zaporizhia and Kherson, but that could just be wishful thinking on my part. People in those regions may have brainwashed over the years by the Ukro-nazi propaganda and may have become more culturally attuned to the national ideology coming from Galicia/Volynhia. Seems to me that if there really were high support for Russia in non-occupied Oblasts, and if Russia wanted to occupy that territory eventually, they would create shadow governments and launch insurgencies in eastern Ukraine, but that hasn't happened. It could be that Russia hasn't done that because Russia wants to preserve undamaged the areas they want to occupy later, want to avoid a major escalation that could draw in Nato, or maybe because Russia really doesn't have broad territorial ambitions. But the lack of a Russian offensive could be just because Russia doesn't think they're supported outside the areas they occupy now, so they don't want to launch offensives in territory where the population is hostile.
Likely they did what my deceased Polish In-laws had to. Be fluent in German and Russian. Hide the Hammer and Sickle flag while the Germans occupied the town.
Do we know if Ukraine's indigenous arms sector is producing vehicles, artillery pieces, tanks, etc? I understand there were lots of missile strikes, but if I recall Ukraine left the USSR with a fairly large defense plant, including factories for jet engines. I saw an article about them making 152mm shells but do we know if it has all been crippled?
My question is about red lines. There are always talks about red lines for Russia that Ukraine and the western sponsors cross and do not care about. Are there real red lines for the West that once crossed by Ukraine would cause western sponsors to get really afraid, disown Ukraine and force Zelensky to ask for peace talks? Something like attacks against Moscow with mass casualties? Perhaps a desperate Ukraine might start a bombing campaign against civilian infrastructure in large pre-war russian cities just for the propaganda.
I'd like to follow up on the previous question in light of Joe Biden's corruption: Can the current U.S. government even afford to withdraw from Ukraine? There must be a lot of incriminating material on Biden on the Ukrainian side. If Biden disappoints the Banderists, they will be able to pass the deals to the U.S. judiciary and the whole Biden family will be busy with trials and jail terms for the rest of their lives. So my question: Can Biden withdraw from Ukraine - even if he wants? And can Biden afford to lose the US elections? Thanks to Biden's corruption, the future for the world as well as the US seems very bleak...
With the new round of escalations with the U.S. providing the long range missile to Ukraine which, of course will hit Kerch bridge again or Moscow, do you think that Russia will hit the targets on the U.S. soil to wake the Americans up to the danger of what's going on?
My question: I read that Finland sign a treaty where they got land from Russia but they need to stay a neutral country, can you comment on this? Implications? Is it true?
With Russia and Russian society more and more on the war footing, with their MIC ramping up, and with the West essentially demonising them and shutting them off, how do you see the whole thing winding down, if at all?
And as a follow up, if it does not wind down, where do you see this going in 5 to 10 years?
At this point in time, I see only escalation options, and this is without even mentioning the Chinese question. It is very easy to start a fire, but sometimes near impossible to put it out.
What keeps the Ukrainian soldiers attacking when they're always suffering such high casualties, and is this behavior unprecedented in terms of the casualty rates?
Following up on the “Russian propaganda” issue please point out as specifically as you are able to do it, what are in your considered opinion the major Russian state (hidden/subrosa)propaganda efforts viz the war?
Surely you have had to vet and consider virtually everything out there. Just as surely the Russian state cannot ignore the fact that effective persuasion is an essential arrow required to be in a quiver for modern warfare. We know that real Russian propaganda is out there beyond just RT and standard “our point of view” stuff. What is less obvious? Where is it? What should be avoided. What do you toss out? How effective do you think such efforts are?
Given the horrible casualty rate in the AFU, what are the Ukrainians waiting for to revolt against their government, pardon, dictatorship? Why do not conscripts turn their weapons against their commanders and all the way up to Zelensky? Have they been completely brainwashed and lobotomized by NATO propaganda?
(There are 3 question marks, but the first two questions are really the same and the third is a corollary question).
I mean: if I was a Ukrainian forced to go to the frontline, I would risk my life killing my commander(s) to try to set free my country rather than dying at the front, serving a drug addict and American interests.
I would like to add just a note to my previous comment, as this morning I have stumbled upon this article, quoting a recent poll, according to which "78% of surveyed Ukrainians believe that the president bears direct responsibility for corruption in the government and regional administrations":
I recall in the first year (or so) of the SMO there were quite a few prisoner exchanges and it was always lopsided: two or three hohols for one Russian because clearly the Russians have, and continue, to capture far more Ukes than the other way around. It seems that the number of prisoner exchanges have dropped of considerably and the hohols are demanding exhorbatent exchange ratios like 10 or more Ukes (often of fairly high rank) for even a single Russian private. That interview you posted recently with that Russian prisoner is evidence of this. Russia clearly just wants to get their guys back and protect them from torture and mistreatment, but what is the Ukrainian game here? Do they just want to basically halt the exchanges to make is slightly less obvious that more and more of their guys are surrendering? Are they desperate and think that maybe the Russians are so concerned to get their guys back that they might really make these lopsided deals? Or am I off base and the exchanges are just still going on and I am not hearing about them?
A long time ago, we were having dinner at a fancy French restaurant in Melbourne, Australia. We noticed Bill Hayden, a former cabinet minister and Governor General, at the next table with with his wife, Dallas. She was notorious for shoplifting. When they left, we cheekily asked our server if she'd taken any of the silver. Quick as a flash he replied "The metal detector didn't go off."
The raisin date for the war was to bleed Russia. Forever war is the ideal.
"raison d'être"
Haha no pretty sure it’s raisin date. Bon apple tea.
Ok, here is my question, which bothers me for a long time. So, to have a properly functional, integrated army, you need a long time to train not only soldiers but also a cooperations between units, etc. This is what is argued as the problem for the Ukrainian arm forces. But when I am thinking about the Soviet Army, during the WW II, surely there was not this luxury of time. I am missing something, somewhere. And I do appreciate that soldiers also learn via combat. Can you, please, explain? Maybe this is a non-question, but I would like to know why it would be a non-question. I do hope I make sense here. Thank you!
In WWII, given the size of the USSR, the Soviet army had a lot of "rear" territories inaccessible to the enemy, to train the soldiers and relocate the industry. When I was a student in the USSR, on the tour of a tractor factory, we were told it takes 3 days to convert a tractor factory into a full scale tank production. Ukraine has nowhere to hide its industry or train soldiers - all can be subjected to the Russian fire. Also, the equipment is more complex now, especially the Western types - takes longer to learn.
Yes, I know they did. They have managed to relocate most of their industries from the Western parts. I am just not sure that they could afford to have months of training before they sent soldiers to the front.
Lubica,
Your question is quite relevant to the situation in Russia and Ukraine today. One of many reasons the West misunderstands Russia is that they do not grasp the answer to your question. Hence the perception that Russia's military is weak or incompetent. Neither is true. It is different from the West.
The more conscripts an army has the greater burden on the officer corps. The coordination you speak of takes place at the officer level more than at the Staff NCO or NCO level as the proportion of conscripts increases. Doctrine becomes simpler, which is not necessarily the same as less effective.
On the other hand a professional army that maintains a permanent core, can push doctrine down to more junior ranks and more complicated doctrine can be developed, at least in theory if not always in practice.
Today, Russia is a mix, having conscripts and permanent forces. On the other hand, many Western nations (not all) have standing militaries with permanent personnel lacking conscripts. These countries typically push responsibility further down the chain of command. This deceases the operational and tactical burden on the officers since Staff NCOs and NCOs pick up responsibility for more of these functions.
Countries like the Scandanavian countries or France and Germany, get much of their doctrine from the rest of NATO, but do not have the same ability to push leadership down to NCO levels. That might step on pride. But, that is my experience training with them. Conscripts provide more resources in manpower, but that comes at an operational cost.
It is also significant to remember combat is a effective educator for any military capable and willing to endure the learning curve. It is deadly.
In World War II Russia not only moved much of its infrastructure eastward, it endured more casualties than any other country and more deaths than all the wars the US ever fought combined several times over. Visiting Russian military cemeteries is sobering. Russia endured staggering losses while it recovered from Stalin's purges of the officer corps, retooled its infrastructure, and came back. The will to endure and fight is impossible to exaggerate.
In the modern sense, training takes more time because equipment and maintenance are more complicated. And the expectation for small unit tactics and operations is often greater. Consequently, forcing multiple types of equipment on untrained or undertrained forces actually hurts more than it helps. It is like giving a person dying of thirst salt water. It might seem good for a short time. Ultimately it speeds the outcome, which is death.
Ukraine is being forced into a NATO mold in a war that NATO doctrine is not configured for ON TOP OF being denied air power, which is integral to NATO doctrine. This is not new. NATO (US/UK) spent 8 years helping Ukraine retool and conform to NATO standards with no major investment in air power. There is no quick way to recover from that. When I served in the US, the pilot pipeline took a year (fast) to two years.
Also, Ukraine has to train outside its borders because (as has been pointed out already), Russia can destroy any training base in Ukraine. This increases training time. And since the trainers are not fighting for the most part, lessons learned are not being captured as quick as they should be, decreasing training effectiveness.
Moreover, Ukraine possesses limited to no ability to maintain equipment. And, the NATO doctrine being taught to Ukrainian troops is not effective. Russia's doctrine was designed to combat NATO. NATO's doctrine was designed to fight counter-insurgency and small wars despite stating its purpose was to defend against Russia or the Soviets before them. NATO lost sight of its objective. This undermines training.
This leaves Ukraine learning on the battlefield at great expense and conscripting ever less capable and willing fighters.
In the 20s, both the Germans and the Soviets were international pariahs, and so they got together and trained together. Much of German Panzer doctrine was developed on training grounds in the Soviet Union. Stalin famously had many of his top generals executed when the Nazis invaded because he feared they were too close to the German officers with whom they had trained for so long. Whether or not that fear was justified is a different question, it was not wholly irrational. In any event, the lower and middle grade Soviet officer corps was probably well trained, and provided a robust scaffolding for the expansion of the Red Army.
I know that an aerospace designer Tupolev was imprisoned in the late 1930s on the accusation of selling his designs of the Messerschmitt 109 fighter to Messerschmitt (I read his memoirs in Russian), and he was rehabilitated during WWII and continued to work in aerospace and he brought many other aerospace designers out of from the labor camp. Tupolev was asked to produce a list of who's who in Russian aerospace and he did, and all of them were brought to the special bureaus, called Sharashky to work on fighters. He wrote that all on his list were imprisoned/labor camps since the mid-late 1930s. I think by 1940 the wave of repressions stopped at large.
I think this article will answer your question
https://bigserge.substack.com/p/apocalypse-operation-barbarossa
Very good essay.
The USSR sustained enormous casualties during the first 1-2 years of the war. Much was due to the lack of training that you are asking about. I wasn't until 1943 (maybe later) that the Red Army developed into the powerful army that eventually crushed the Germans. Even then there were occasions when units did not cooperate correctly and better generals, like Manstein could take advantage of this. I imagine our host can give examples.
Yes, thank you. I suppose, then, my question is rather how could the Red Army developed into the powerful army during the war?
It took lots of casulties and hard lessons for the Red Army to develop into the powerful force it eventually became. Suggest Glantz's When Titans Clash which gives a good account of the occasional victories interlaced with disasters until they got it right.
The high capture rate was lack of mobility which was solved by the thousands of American made Studebaker trucks sent to Russian through Iran.
Oh for the days when the USA could work with Russia.
Just remember that it was the German generals, who lost the war but ended up in the US who were writing/re-writing the history of WWII for the Americans and the Westerners' consumption, (puffing themselves up, cursing Hitler and degrading the Red Army to whom they LOST. All Europe worked for Hitler in WWII, so keep it in mind and don't gulp whatever is being sold. I don't know about you, but I don't take an advice from the losers.
Lubica, If you are interested, there is a book by David Hackworth called "Steel My Soldier's Hearts", a superb introduction into combat training that may answer some of your questions. It illustrates how to motivate borderline mutinous troops, how to train within a theatre of combat and coordinate artillery/air/troops together, how to use guerilla tactics against guerillas, and ultimately how to become a combat leader..
Not sure what the answer is For Ukraine, a country brainwashed into thinking it can win a modern war against a superb fighting opponent, with world war one tactics. Perhaps guerilla war is the only answer for them. Not that they can defeat the Russians even at this, who are vastly more experienced.
The consensus seems to put the number of severely wounded Ukrainians both civilian and military at around 60 000. If that's the case who looks after rehabilitation of these people as well as providing ongoing care and support. Is it left up to individual families and communities on a local level & is it dealt with differently in Russia.
Simplicius, could you please address how much support you think there is for Russia in the non-occupied oblasts, particularly the ones most people think could be likeliest to absorbed into Russia at some point in the future, and how important this could be or how linked it is to Russia's decisions to (or not to) launch a major offensive?
I'd like to imagine that support for Russia is high in Kharkiv, Nikolaev, Odessa, Sumy Regions, etc.., or in the cities of Zaporizhia and Kherson, but that could just be wishful thinking on my part. People in those regions may have brainwashed over the years by the Ukro-nazi propaganda and may have become more culturally attuned to the national ideology coming from Galicia/Volynhia. Seems to me that if there really were high support for Russia in non-occupied Oblasts, and if Russia wanted to occupy that territory eventually, they would create shadow governments and launch insurgencies in eastern Ukraine, but that hasn't happened. It could be that Russia hasn't done that because Russia wants to preserve undamaged the areas they want to occupy later, want to avoid a major escalation that could draw in Nato, or maybe because Russia really doesn't have broad territorial ambitions. But the lack of a Russian offensive could be just because Russia doesn't think they're supported outside the areas they occupy now, so they don't want to launch offensives in territory where the population is hostile.
Gracchus - There were local elections over the weekend in the four oblasts that Russia has absorbed since the beginning of the SMO.
See this article by Gilbert Doctorow as you are unlikely to see any reports in the mainstream media:
https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/09/11/elections-in-russias-4-new-formerly-ukrainian-regions-this-past-weekend-sham-or-exercise-in-democracy/
It won't answer all of your question but it should address some of it.
Stay safe.
Likely they did what my deceased Polish In-laws had to. Be fluent in German and Russian. Hide the Hammer and Sickle flag while the Germans occupied the town.
Do we know if Ukraine's indigenous arms sector is producing vehicles, artillery pieces, tanks, etc? I understand there were lots of missile strikes, but if I recall Ukraine left the USSR with a fairly large defense plant, including factories for jet engines. I saw an article about them making 152mm shells but do we know if it has all been crippled?
Was curious about Cypress being a landholder in Ukraine. Assume it’s bank holding firms, what are the most likely money interest ?
Thanks for your work -
My question is about red lines. There are always talks about red lines for Russia that Ukraine and the western sponsors cross and do not care about. Are there real red lines for the West that once crossed by Ukraine would cause western sponsors to get really afraid, disown Ukraine and force Zelensky to ask for peace talks? Something like attacks against Moscow with mass casualties? Perhaps a desperate Ukraine might start a bombing campaign against civilian infrastructure in large pre-war russian cities just for the propaganda.
I'd like to follow up on the previous question in light of Joe Biden's corruption: Can the current U.S. government even afford to withdraw from Ukraine? There must be a lot of incriminating material on Biden on the Ukrainian side. If Biden disappoints the Banderists, they will be able to pass the deals to the U.S. judiciary and the whole Biden family will be busy with trials and jail terms for the rest of their lives. So my question: Can Biden withdraw from Ukraine - even if he wants? And can Biden afford to lose the US elections? Thanks to Biden's corruption, the future for the world as well as the US seems very bleak...
Can Biden go to war with China? Won't be the first dog that bit it's master.
With the new round of escalations with the U.S. providing the long range missile to Ukraine which, of course will hit Kerch bridge again or Moscow, do you think that Russia will hit the targets on the U.S. soil to wake the Americans up to the danger of what's going on?
My question: I read that Finland sign a treaty where they got land from Russia but they need to stay a neutral country, can you comment on this? Implications? Is it true?
The Treaty is true. And Finland, foolishly, tore it up.
Here is quick (to ask) question.
With Russia and Russian society more and more on the war footing, with their MIC ramping up, and with the West essentially demonising them and shutting them off, how do you see the whole thing winding down, if at all?
And as a follow up, if it does not wind down, where do you see this going in 5 to 10 years?
At this point in time, I see only escalation options, and this is without even mentioning the Chinese question. It is very easy to start a fire, but sometimes near impossible to put it out.
Any interest in investigating the money trail on building and individual death insurance payouts for 9/11?
What keeps the Ukrainian soldiers attacking when they're always suffering such high casualties, and is this behavior unprecedented in terms of the casualty rates?
Following up on the “Russian propaganda” issue please point out as specifically as you are able to do it, what are in your considered opinion the major Russian state (hidden/subrosa)propaganda efforts viz the war?
Surely you have had to vet and consider virtually everything out there. Just as surely the Russian state cannot ignore the fact that effective persuasion is an essential arrow required to be in a quiver for modern warfare. We know that real Russian propaganda is out there beyond just RT and standard “our point of view” stuff. What is less obvious? Where is it? What should be avoided. What do you toss out? How effective do you think such efforts are?
Given the horrible casualty rate in the AFU, what are the Ukrainians waiting for to revolt against their government, pardon, dictatorship? Why do not conscripts turn their weapons against their commanders and all the way up to Zelensky? Have they been completely brainwashed and lobotomized by NATO propaganda?
(There are 3 question marks, but the first two questions are really the same and the third is a corollary question).
I mean: if I was a Ukrainian forced to go to the frontline, I would risk my life killing my commander(s) to try to set free my country rather than dying at the front, serving a drug addict and American interests.
Thanks for your time and keep up the good work!
I would like to add just a note to my previous comment, as this morning I have stumbled upon this article, quoting a recent poll, according to which "78% of surveyed Ukrainians believe that the president bears direct responsibility for corruption in the government and regional administrations":
https://kyivindependent.com/poll-most-ukrainians-consider-president-directly-responsible-for-corruption-in-government/
Are the Ukrainians starting to open their eyes?
I recall in the first year (or so) of the SMO there were quite a few prisoner exchanges and it was always lopsided: two or three hohols for one Russian because clearly the Russians have, and continue, to capture far more Ukes than the other way around. It seems that the number of prisoner exchanges have dropped of considerably and the hohols are demanding exhorbatent exchange ratios like 10 or more Ukes (often of fairly high rank) for even a single Russian private. That interview you posted recently with that Russian prisoner is evidence of this. Russia clearly just wants to get their guys back and protect them from torture and mistreatment, but what is the Ukrainian game here? Do they just want to basically halt the exchanges to make is slightly less obvious that more and more of their guys are surrendering? Are they desperate and think that maybe the Russians are so concerned to get their guys back that they might really make these lopsided deals? Or am I off base and the exchanges are just still going on and I am not hearing about them?