Quote:
Originally Posted by ikalugin
The geopolitical picture (and this is my own private opinion) is both more and less complex.
Ie, the objective of the separatist forces is simple:
- wait for the winter. When winter comes the lack of heating and general economical collapse would make the general population somewhat unhappy. This also would lead to probable collapse of Ukranian Armed forces, as they already have issues with drafting more people as well as the equipment/supply shortages (not to mention shortage of proffesional soldiers and officers).
For that they need to preclude any offensive operations by the Ukranian Armed Forces, such as the ones that happened straight after the well known plane crash. This is so because such operations can (in theory) lead to critical situations, such as the near blockade of the Donetsk and Lugansk cities.
This is why they have conducted several attacks in the direction that was not covered by the Ukranian Armed Forces and thus forced the later to commit their last coherent reserves there. It also had an additional benefit of controling more border crossing sites and thus better conditions for the flow of the volonteers and supplies.
|
That makes sense, and is strangely familiar in its context of waiting for winter.
I read a few days ago that the Ukraine is likely to implement full scale conscription shortly, and there's not a great deal that's more damaging for civilian morale in areas not affected by the war than to have husbands, sons and fathers march off to potential death. Of course, with the 'Russia is invading us' propaganda line they can probably negate that a little, but the longer it goes on the worse its going to get.
However, a new factor to consider is NATO propping up the Ukrainian army, there's already talk of NATO opening up a fund-raiser for supporting the Ukrainian army, I suppose they figure turnabout is fair play, and it's only a matter of time before western equipment makes its way into Ukrainian hands, and then we have another war by proxy, like Korea and Vietnam.
What's that they say about history repeating?
