Wildly off-topic 5…Russia is losing

Putin is losing.

The West is winning.

Ukraine and Ukrainians are what we should aspire to be.

There is no way Russia will “win” in Ukraine; Putin is running out of troops, ships, armor, money and time.

Meanwhile his objectives for the war on Ukraine, namely:

• easily capture Kyiv and install a puppet government in Ukraine;
• split the West using his oil and gas as leverage,
• damage NATO; and
• scare smaller countries into abandoning the US-led alliance

are further away than ever.

Putin has strengthened NATO and the European Union, unified the West, pushed once-nominally neutral countries including Finland, Sweden, and Moldova into embracing the West, and shown the world that his armed forces are weak, poorly led, poorly equipped, and no match for a country a quarter the size of Russia.

A couple of things worth noting.

It is highly likely US intelligence assets (satellites, NSA, communications intercepts, aerial surveillance) have and are playing a major role in the war (as are the UK’s and almost certainly other western countries’). Reports indicate:

• the sinking of Russia’s largest warship in the Black Sea was aided by US intel
• US intel likely helped lead to the shockingly high number of Russian generals killed (a dozen so far)
• Ukrainian forces are getting early warnings of Russian missile attacks from US  assets
• in the early hours of the war US intel led to Ukraine shooting down a giant transport plane carrying hundreds of Russian soldiers on its way to take over a critical airfield.

a downed Russian plane (likely a fighter)

Ukraine is showing the world how an incredibly motivated, really smart, and very creative people can defeat what used to be thought of as the world’s second strongest armed forces.

A few examples

Ukrainians have made drones – big ones, small ones, tiny ones; armed ones; ones with cameras and ones adapted to carry explosives; commercially-available ones and military-only ones – a major part of their arsenal.

Much of this is appears to be the work of regular Ukrainians…many of whom were are not in the military before Russia’s attack.

A drone drops what appears to be a mortar shell through the sunroof of a car stolen by Russian soldiers…

A Ukraine-developed anti-ship missile is likely the weapon used to sink two of Russia’s biggest warships and destroy a troop transport.

Now that Ukraine has the latest artillery (thanks to France, Canada, the UK, the US, the Netherlands and other countries) it is using it to deadly effect.

Meanwhile Russia is calling up retired service members to fill “administrative” roles in its army. This shows just how deep into the morass Putin is, and how willing he is to keep digging himself even deeper.

What does this mean for you?

There are so many lessons we can learn from this…

• preparation and constant attention to detail are critically important and way under-valued,
• never under-estimate the power of very motivated people,
• leaders that employ only those that agree with them will fail miserably.