![]() To answer these questions, this analysis adopts a mixed-methods approach. To understand how the war has proceeded and how it may change in the future, this analysis asks three main questions: What is the current state of the war? What factors-particularly Ukrainian military innovation-have contributed to battlefield performance? What are the future prospects for continued Ukrainian innovation and the requirements for additional Western assistance in a war of attrition? Yet Russia’s preponderance of power has failed to deliver it swift victory on the battlefield. Examples of Russian capabilities included advanced fighter aircraft (such as the Su-34 and Su-35), artillery (such as the 2S7 Pion, BM-21 Grad, and 2S4 Tulpan), main battle tanks (such as the T-72 and T-90), nuclear weapons, and one of the world’s most feared offensive cyber capabilities. Before its invasion in February 2022, Russia had nearly five times as many military personnel as Ukraine, a defense budget eleven times larger, an economy almost eight times larger, and significantly better military capabilities. ![]() One of the most interesting puzzles is how Ukraine-which has a significantly smaller military, weaker military capabilities, a limited defense industrial base, and a smaller economy-was able to blunt a Russian blitzkrieg and then conduct a series of counterattacks against dug-in Russian forces. The Prussian general and military theorist Carl von Clausewitz wrote that war is filled with unpredictability and that “in war more than anywhere else in the world things happen differently to what we had expected.” Just ask Russian political and military leaders in charge of the war in Ukraine today.
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