As mentioned in my blog post just two days earlier, the ongoing conflict that began following the Russian attack on Ukraine, is moving into a different phase. In the meantime, the Ukrainian Army will have restored the border that was established on February 23 and across the majority of its northern border at the end of this week. Within 2 or 3 weeks, we will likely see a Russian attack in Donbas to try to take the entirety of the territory of Donetsk and Luhansk, and also establish an air bridge that connects Donetsk and Luhansk to Crimea. The weapons provided by NATO at present are sufficient to defend and conduct some activities; however, what Ukraine requires to preserve their territorial sovereignty will include tanks and infantry, fighting vehicles, rocket artillery and tubes, and surface-to-air missile systems, as well as lethal drones (other than Blinken and bureaucrats from the state department). Instead of just defending and destroying Russians, Ukraine must be capable of focusing its combat force on expelling all Russians from Ukraine…including, I believe, the entirety of Donbas along with Crimea. This requires offensive weaponry.
As is usually the case, Europe is setting the pace.
The BMP-1 is a bit old-fashioned and would not be able to give the Ukrainian Army a vehicle that they are comfortable with the operations and upkeep of (assuming that either side is concerned about the care of their vehicles).
Help is coming soon. Well, maybe.
The Biden administration is working with allies to move Soviet-built tanks to help strengthen Ukrainian defenses in the eastern Donbas region, according to a U.S. official on Friday.
The decision to serve as an intermediary in helping transfer Soviet-made tanks that Ukrainian soldiers are able to operate, is a response to a request made by the president Volodymyr Zelensky from Ukraine. This is the first time during the conflict that there has been a time when the United States has helped transfer tanks.
The official confirmed that the transfers are expected to begin in the near future; however, he declined to reveal the number of tanks that would be delivered, nor from what countries they will arrive. The tanks will allow Ukraine to carry out long-range artillery attacks against Russian target areas in Donbas, according to the official who spoke with confidentiality because he wasn't authorized to speak in public.
The Slovaks are in the process of sending S-300 missiles to Ukraine in the event that our Defense Department ever decides to remove its head from its butt.
Many NATO members that are past Warsaw Pact nations have stocks that include Russian tanks. Poland, particularly, has tanks scheduled to be replaced with US M1 Abrams tanks, but are being upgraded with thermal imaging equipment, as well as other improvements. They are likely to be transferred within an extremely short amount of time.
But time is actually the problem.
On Sunday, the Russian Army completed a large-scale withdrawal, but not as an actual “repositioning” claimed by the Pentagon. Ukraine now has control of all of the border area that it shares with Belarus and has recovered the majority of the land along its northern border, which was lost in the invasion on February 24.
The Russian forces that are illegally occupying the territory have been withdrawn back into Belarus, as well as to Russia to replenish, reequip, and integrate the new troops. This process should take at most two weeks, depending on whether Russia exhibits an understanding of logistics. After the rebuilding, those units will move laterally to the east, and move to battle in Donbas. The Ukrainians will likely depend heavily on Territorial Defense Forces to secure the border. It is likely that the Ukrainian Army will need to have a massive force of artillery, armor, and air defense artillery which will enable them to create an armed conflict in order to threaten the center of these fake republics established in the Donbas region by Putin at the border of Donbas.
The indecisiveness of officials of the US Defense Department is costly. If the mechanized and armored formations that were rebuilt following the mauling they endured during the war for Kiev are not matched by equally strong Ukrainian troops, then the conflict will last longer and the process of negotiating peace is going to be a lot more difficult.
