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> Let's face it, the Russians are not stupid. I thought so too. But one surprising thing about military conflict is that it's easy to be stupid. https://www.y

> Let's face it, the Russians are not stupid. I thought so too. But one surprising thing about military conflict is that it's easy to be stupid. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lICRQPIduFc&ab_channel=Montemayor https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lICRQPIduFc&ab_channel=Monte... Even with overwhelming superiority during WW2, the US damn near lost their first attempt to invade Japan. Ditto for Japan attacking Midway, and every other decisive battle. It's unclear what Russia is even trying to achieve at this point. Supposedly they've only committed 1/3rd of their forces, which means they have about 100k troops in reserve. But the 50k they did commit seem to have achieved nothing. I was expecting a blackout (thanks to air bombardment), followed by a destruction of Ukraine's air force, then the fall of Kiev. Not one of those things happened. It really makes you question whether Russia's reputation is well-earned. The next few days will be crucial. Russia has only a few more chances to plan their next moves. If they continue failing, they'll be forced to withdraw when they run out of supplies. Which is to say, a Ukrainian victory doesn't seem to be impossible, and it doesn't seem to be the result of Russia not wanting to punch too hard.

traceroute66 5y ago
> But the 50k they did commit seem to have achieved nothing. A bit far-fetched I admit, but thinking outside the box, perhaps those on the Russian side of the front line don't really fancy being involved in this ? In other words, "we need to make some noise because the boss is watching" but really the commitment isn't there. Reason I say that is perhaps its an extension of what we saw on that infamous broadcast where Putin was seeking approval from his cabinet but some of them were struggling to find a way to disagree without actually saying it. > It really makes you question whether Russia's reputation is well-earned. But this is also a possibility of course. Who knows. Its impossible to second-guess Putin.
- brabel 5y ago
  > perhaps those on the Russian side of the front line don't really fancy being involved in this ? I think that's definitely the case, Russians are very close to Ukrainians culturally and ethnically. They were on the same side on several wars. I think this may explain why things are not going full on bloodthirsty kill-everything-that-moves yet... but just wait until coffins start piling up on the hangar. Seeing your mates being killed has a way to make you de-humanize and hate the other side, no matter who they are. That's how you end up with entire cities bombed to the ground in later stages of a war... I don't think any war starts that way, that's how it usually ends though. Let's hope they'll find a way to stop this in time.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    In another thread, commenters were remarking about how ineffectual protests by the Russian people would be on account of Putin not caring about their opinions. Whether or not that’s true, I wonder if the Russian people could shame their soldiers into a degree of ineffectiveness (“throwing the game”).
    - A4ET8a8uTh0 5y ago
      No, but upper echelon is well-versed in money and power. If it seems like Putin is losing the game, their opinion could change the power structure. That is not automatically a good thing by the way. There is a reason 'devil known' is a phrase.
- ZeroGravitas 5y ago
  Robert Axelrod's "evolution of co-operation" book on Game Theory discusses instances of German and Allied trench forces in WWI firing their artillery at the same time and place each day so it looks and sounds like a war is happening but the poor schmucks on the front line aren't needlessly murdering each other. It supposses they can organize this without any explicit communication as it's fairly obvious when someone is trying to kill you. There's also a long history of people in wars not even firing their weapons covered in the book "On Killing". People generally don't want to needlessly kill other human beings and a big part of army training and tactics is to work around this basic human instinct e.g. making you fight to keep your small group of friends alive, rather than for the financial benefit of some oligarch hundreds of miles away in safety.
  - HWR_14 5y ago
    > People generally don't want to needlessly kill other human beings and a big part of army training and tactics is to work around this basic human instinct e I wonder if that's the actual source of the purported necessary 3:1 attacker to defender ratio in an insurgency. You have three times as many people willing to kill to defend their home as to invade, so you need more people to get the same number of shooters.
nine_zeros 5y ago
It has only been 3 days. I would give it 30 days for them to destroy (or more likely take control) of critical Ukrainian infrastructure. Make no mistake. This is a seizure of Ukrainian land, sovereignty, resources and infrastructure.
- the_af 5y ago
  Isn't 30 days essentially a military and political failure though? I can see in Putin's thinking that a 3-5 day long decapitation strike would be feasible, and then they occupy Kiev and it's fait accompli. But 30 days, with almost all of the world against it? It's way too long and someone else may get involved.
  - tomatotomato37 5y ago
    Desert Storm took that long when you consider the initial air campaign, and even then the ground invasion still took 4 days in a theater with complete air superiority, decent terrain for a mechanical warfare rush, and local support from Kuwait and Saudi Arabia
    - the_af 5y ago
      But was the rest of the world almost unanimously against Desert Storm? I simply cannot see a scenario where a 30+ day slog in Ukraine, with attrition and mounting casualties, has any positive outcome for Putin. (I struggle to see any positive outcome for Putin anyway and cannot understand what his endgame is, to be honest. Even success at toppling Ukraine's government, if achieved at all, may prove to be short-lived)
      - jrexilius 5y ago
        If Putin doesn't care about the opinion of his own voters, the whining of the Western world wont matter (China, Iran, Venzuela and others are not against Russia).
        5y ago
mardifoufs 5y ago
Russia supposedly stopped the offensive yesterday for negotiations and it's now back on. Makes sense considering how calm the front was yesterday and how we are seeing tons of movement today. But of course that could be pure BS, it's hard to even get verification that things were actually calm yesterday since both sides have a pretty solid opsec... at least compared to what I got used to with the syrian civil war!
- deleted 5y ago
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- mint2 5y ago
  That is most certainly BS. There is no doubt, no question. For the past several months Russia’s stated efforts at diplomacy have been an utter farce, the saying “pissing on you and saying it’s rain” does not go far enough. Now all of a sudden Russia says they paused for negotiations… “fool me once shame on you; fool me 100 times with the same ruse, I should stop taking drugs”
- aix1 5y ago
  > Russia supposedly stopped the offensive yesterday for negotiations and it's now back on. An important caveat is that this is according to Russia. Ukraine's version is quite different (it was Russia's attempt to lure Ukraine's top officials to Minsk, which is the only place where Russia is prepared to conduct the talks). In any event, it seems pretty clear that there was no actual ceasefire yesterday or today.
  - mardifoufs 5y ago
    Agreed 100% that this is absolutely just from russian and like very pro russian sources. The only reason why I give it any credit is that it fits with the reality on the ground. If russia was pushing and got actually stalled, I'd have expected to see a lot more air raids and shelling. Yesterday was weirdly calm, even when it comes to airstrikes, bombings etc. Not exactly the signs of a desperate push
    - 5y ago
rndgermandude 5y ago
>It's unclear what Russia is even trying to achieve at this point. That's really the crux of the matter here. What is Russia's goal here? If you're operating on the assumption that they indeed want to capture the entire Ukraine, it then indeed looks like they aren't doing as well as a lot of people seem to have expected, thus far. However, it's possible that Putin is using the Russo-Georgian-War (2008) playbook again which didn't aim to capture the entire country, with the goals of ultimately capturing only some of East Ukraine (Dombass in particular, and keeping Crimea) and forcing the remaining Ukraine in negotiations to become a "neutral" state located between Russia and NATO/EU. While again embarrassing the West and their military and diplomatic resolve as a cherry-on-top. That Russia has been hitting targets in the west of Ukraine might have been to destroy Ukrainian military's capabilities and capacities, in this scenario. Even if it's the Georgian playbook again, I still think Putin might have grossly overplayed his hand there. The NATO and EU will likely not let go as easily this time, especially not because in particular Poland, the Czech Republic and the Baltic states as NATO and EU members feel very threatened and expressed themselves as such.
- sgc 5y ago
  It's 50 more years of standoff if a Russian doesn't give Putin the coup de grace, because of the geographic location. But that is what Putin wanted - to consolidate fiefdoms and polarize the divisions.
- prostoalex 5y ago
  > forcing the remaining Ukraine in negotiations to become a "neutral" state located between Russia and NATO/EU This keeps coming up as if Ukraine's acceptance into NATO was imminent any day now. Realistically NATO membership Ukraine was decades away, if ever. It's a convenient pretext pitched mainly by Russian media, which needed to frame the sense of urgency, but the real reason must be elsewhere.
  - swores 5y ago
    Hypothetically if you were Putin and that was the actual reason, wouldn't you want to deal with it asap when it's still years or decades away, rather than wait until it's close enough that your invasion might lead to them quickly signing it and then sending in Nato forces? Not to mention the fact that he might not trust reports of how far away it is and think it's happening sneakily behind his back soon? I've no idea what Putin's motives are, but I don't think the fact that Ukraine joining Nato wasn't weeks away from happening prevents it from being as likely a reason as if it was that imminent.
jl6 5y ago
It’s only day 3 and Ukraine is big. I imagine Plan A was to expect the Ukrainian military to surrender rapidly, and they are now gathering and mobilising for Plan B.
- thfuran 5y ago
  "Hope the enemy immediately surrenders" should never be plan A.
  - Denvercoder9 5y ago
    Why not? It's usually the lowest cost (in money, materiel and bloodshed) option for both sides, so it doesn't seem a bad first option. Of course it's unlikely to happen, so you should be ready to execute a plan B.
  - azeirah 5y ago
    ~It can definitely work, see for instance Nazi Germany -> Poland.~ Edit: Nevermind. I am very wrong on this. What I understood to be a "quick" victory from my vague memory of history lessons was a month. I also never considered that Poland never surrendered but _lost_ the invasion. There was no surrender. If Putin believes he had the means to capture Kyiv within a really short time AND he believes his own propaganda that Ukrainians are idiots and cowards and drug addicts and whatever then yeah. I do see how you could logically conclude that they would surrender quickly. But Ukraine turned out to have an extremely strong leader, raising morale to levels far beyond Russia's. Turns out the folk is nationalistic, proud and doesn't want to take shit from Russia. So many civilians in Kyiv are joining the fight because they want to and they have to. Is that what Putin was expecting? I don't know. Do want to note that on Dutch television a historian stated that he believes Russia believes they will have Kyiv captured before early March, since airports near the Ukrainian border have been closed until then. So while 3 days is long for Kyiv to hold out, the reality might be they'll have to hold out for at least 2 weeks before it starts really mattering in the eyes of Putin.
    - hervature 5y ago
      > It can definitely work, see for instance Nazi Germany -> Poland. What are you talking about? The invasion lasted several weeks and had the support of the USSR. They quite literally destroyed the Polish army. In fact, Poland never officially surrendered.
sgc 5y ago
As of now the estimate is they have committed 50% to Ukraine, that is pushing hard at the upper limit of how many can actually be committed before there is no logistical support at all. They could go to 2/3 for a short time, but even more of them would be wandering about begging for food than are now. They appear to have made the same mistake as Rumsfeld when invading Iraq, a similar sized country with a similar sized invading force - he tried to go light and immediate reinforcements were required. The difference is the country of Ukraine is better prepared, they have better resolve, and some better weapons, while the Russians have far lower equipment quality, morale, and training. Nonetheless, there is an enormous logistical advantage of attacking a neighbor from three sides and not a country halfway around the world. Ukraine also has much more forgiving terrain for an attacker than Iraq. Everything is up in the air, but I share your optimism that Ukraine could come out on top.
oceanplexian 5y ago
Why would Russia run out of supplies? They have an unlimited and uninterrupted supply line back to Belarus and Russia in multiple directions. I find it more likely the folks in Kiev run out of food in a few days.I support the Ukrainians but the writing is clearly on the wall and it makes more sense the Russians would wait them out and use their air superiority to keep supplies out of Kiev, for example.
- dragontamer 5y ago
  Russia doesn't even have air superiority yet. Ukrainian air force is blowing up elite paratroopers before they even have a chance to reach the front lines. This entire invasion is already a disaster. Russia still has an advantage but they're taking unnecessary losses already. ------- No Ukrainian city is encircled yet either. Kyiv can't run out of food when it's still safe for supplies to come into the city. Russia needs to establish the basics, and haven't even done that yet. EDIT: it's been like 3 days. It's too soon to expect Russia's military to have a big success yet. Russia's superior weaponry should have a relatively easy time but... Russia is basically trying to perform 4 or 5 simultaneous 'Battle of Fallujah's here simultaneously. Just going all in on major cities around the country simultaneously, where most people in those cities really hate Russians right now.
  - A4ET8a8uTh0 5y ago
    It appears to be an accurate assessment. I was expecting to see blitzkrieg based on initial reports, but it seems less likely now. In a very real sense, I hope that is the case.
    - dragontamer 5y ago
      If anything, the Russians are moving in too fast. I think the Russians really were going for the 'decapitation', trying to quickly kill or capture the politicians in Kyiv, leaving the Ukrainians leaderless. All signs point to this IMO. Russians have failed in that attempt this far, but it's only day 3. Ukraine has been routing or killing a lot of airborne / paratroopers in and around Kyiv (Russian VDV units). Russia really is going for a quick victory, committing so many airborne units there.
philistine 5y ago
> Even with overwhelming superiority during WW2, the US damn near lost their first attempt to invade Japan. > Ditto for Japan attacking Midway, and every other decisive battle. What you're missing here is the fog of war. When decisions are viewed through what information was available to the decision-makers, it paints a far more relatable picture. No one was stupid at Midway. Have a look at this long video going through the battle from the Japanese perspective: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bd8_vO5zrjo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bd8_vO5zrjo

traceroute66 5y ago

> But the 50k they did commit seem to have achieved nothing. A bit far-fetched I admit, but thinking outside the box, perhaps those on the Russian side of the front line don't really fancy being involved in this ? In other words, "we need to make some noise because the boss is watching" but really the commitment isn't there. Reason I say that is perhaps its an extension of what we saw on that infamous broadcast where Putin was seeking approval from his cabinet but some of them were struggling to find a way to disagree without actually saying it. > It really makes you question whether Russia's reputation is well-earned. But this is also a possibility of course. Who knows. Its impossible to second-guess Putin.

brabel 5y ago
> perhaps those on the Russian side of the front line don't really fancy being involved in this ? I think that's definitely the case, Russians are very close to Ukrainians culturally and ethnically. They were on the same side on several wars. I think this may explain why things are not going full on bloodthirsty kill-everything-that-moves yet... but just wait until coffins start piling up on the hangar. Seeing your mates being killed has a way to make you de-humanize and hate the other side, no matter who they are. That's how you end up with entire cities bombed to the ground in later stages of a war... I don't think any war starts that way, that's how it usually ends though. Let's hope they'll find a way to stop this in time.
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  In another thread, commenters were remarking about how ineffectual protests by the Russian people would be on account of Putin not caring about their opinions. Whether or not that’s true, I wonder if the Russian people could shame their soldiers into a degree of ineffectiveness (“throwing the game”).
  - A4ET8a8uTh0 5y ago
    No, but upper echelon is well-versed in money and power. If it seems like Putin is losing the game, their opinion could change the power structure. That is not automatically a good thing by the way. There is a reason 'devil known' is a phrase.
ZeroGravitas 5y ago
Robert Axelrod's "evolution of co-operation" book on Game Theory discusses instances of German and Allied trench forces in WWI firing their artillery at the same time and place each day so it looks and sounds like a war is happening but the poor schmucks on the front line aren't needlessly murdering each other. It supposses they can organize this without any explicit communication as it's fairly obvious when someone is trying to kill you. There's also a long history of people in wars not even firing their weapons covered in the book "On Killing". People generally don't want to needlessly kill other human beings and a big part of army training and tactics is to work around this basic human instinct e.g. making you fight to keep your small group of friends alive, rather than for the financial benefit of some oligarch hundreds of miles away in safety.
- HWR_14 5y ago
  > People generally don't want to needlessly kill other human beings and a big part of army training and tactics is to work around this basic human instinct e I wonder if that's the actual source of the purported necessary 3:1 attacker to defender ratio in an insurgency. You have three times as many people willing to kill to defend their home as to invade, so you need more people to get the same number of shooters.

nine_zeros 5y ago

It has only been 3 days. I would give it 30 days for them to destroy (or more likely take control) of critical Ukrainian infrastructure. Make no mistake. This is a seizure of Ukrainian land, sovereignty, resources and infrastructure.

the_af 5y ago
Isn't 30 days essentially a military and political failure though? I can see in Putin's thinking that a 3-5 day long decapitation strike would be feasible, and then they occupy Kiev and it's fait accompli. But 30 days, with almost all of the world against it? It's way too long and someone else may get involved.
- tomatotomato37 5y ago
  Desert Storm took that long when you consider the initial air campaign, and even then the ground invasion still took 4 days in a theater with complete air superiority, decent terrain for a mechanical warfare rush, and local support from Kuwait and Saudi Arabia
  - the_af 5y ago
    But was the rest of the world almost unanimously against Desert Storm? I simply cannot see a scenario where a 30+ day slog in Ukraine, with attrition and mounting casualties, has any positive outcome for Putin. (I struggle to see any positive outcome for Putin anyway and cannot understand what his endgame is, to be honest. Even success at toppling Ukraine's government, if achieved at all, may prove to be short-lived)
    - jrexilius 5y ago
      If Putin doesn't care about the opinion of his own voters, the whining of the Western world wont matter (China, Iran, Venzuela and others are not against Russia).
      - 5y ago

mardifoufs 5y ago

Russia supposedly stopped the offensive yesterday for negotiations and it's now back on. Makes sense considering how calm the front was yesterday and how we are seeing tons of movement today. But of course that could be pure BS, it's hard to even get verification that things were actually calm yesterday since both sides have a pretty solid opsec... at least compared to what I got used to with the syrian civil war!

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
mint2 5y ago
That is most certainly BS. There is no doubt, no question. For the past several months Russia’s stated efforts at diplomacy have been an utter farce, the saying “pissing on you and saying it’s rain” does not go far enough. Now all of a sudden Russia says they paused for negotiations… “fool me once shame on you; fool me 100 times with the same ruse, I should stop taking drugs”
aix1 5y ago
> Russia supposedly stopped the offensive yesterday for negotiations and it's now back on. An important caveat is that this is according to Russia. Ukraine's version is quite different (it was Russia's attempt to lure Ukraine's top officials to Minsk, which is the only place where Russia is prepared to conduct the talks). In any event, it seems pretty clear that there was no actual ceasefire yesterday or today.
- mardifoufs 5y ago
  Agreed 100% that this is absolutely just from russian and like very pro russian sources. The only reason why I give it any credit is that it fits with the reality on the ground. If russia was pushing and got actually stalled, I'd have expected to see a lot more air raids and shelling. Yesterday was weirdly calm, even when it comes to airstrikes, bombings etc. Not exactly the signs of a desperate push
  - 5y ago

rndgermandude 5y ago

>It's unclear what Russia is even trying to achieve at this point. That's really the crux of the matter here. What is Russia's goal here? If you're operating on the assumption that they indeed want to capture the entire Ukraine, it then indeed looks like they aren't doing as well as a lot of people seem to have expected, thus far. However, it's possible that Putin is using the Russo-Georgian-War (2008) playbook again which didn't aim to capture the entire country, with the goals of ultimately capturing only some of East Ukraine (Dombass in particular, and keeping Crimea) and forcing the remaining Ukraine in negotiations to become a "neutral" state located between Russia and NATO/EU. While again embarrassing the West and their military and diplomatic resolve as a cherry-on-top. That Russia has been hitting targets in the west of Ukraine might have been to destroy Ukrainian military's capabilities and capacities, in this scenario. Even if it's the Georgian playbook again, I still think Putin might have grossly overplayed his hand there. The NATO and EU will likely not let go as easily this time, especially not because in particular Poland, the Czech Republic and the Baltic states as NATO and EU members feel very threatened and expressed themselves as such.

sgc 5y ago
It's 50 more years of standoff if a Russian doesn't give Putin the coup de grace, because of the geographic location. But that is what Putin wanted - to consolidate fiefdoms and polarize the divisions.
prostoalex 5y ago
> forcing the remaining Ukraine in negotiations to become a "neutral" state located between Russia and NATO/EU This keeps coming up as if Ukraine's acceptance into NATO was imminent any day now. Realistically NATO membership Ukraine was decades away, if ever. It's a convenient pretext pitched mainly by Russian media, which needed to frame the sense of urgency, but the real reason must be elsewhere.
- swores 5y ago
  Hypothetically if you were Putin and that was the actual reason, wouldn't you want to deal with it asap when it's still years or decades away, rather than wait until it's close enough that your invasion might lead to them quickly signing it and then sending in Nato forces? Not to mention the fact that he might not trust reports of how far away it is and think it's happening sneakily behind his back soon? I've no idea what Putin's motives are, but I don't think the fact that Ukraine joining Nato wasn't weeks away from happening prevents it from being as likely a reason as if it was that imminent.

jl6 5y ago

It’s only day 3 and Ukraine is big. I imagine Plan A was to expect the Ukrainian military to surrender rapidly, and they are now gathering and mobilising for Plan B.

thfuran 5y ago
"Hope the enemy immediately surrenders" should never be plan A.
- Denvercoder9 5y ago
  Why not? It's usually the lowest cost (in money, materiel and bloodshed) option for both sides, so it doesn't seem a bad first option. Of course it's unlikely to happen, so you should be ready to execute a plan B.
- azeirah 5y ago
  ~It can definitely work, see for instance Nazi Germany -> Poland.~ Edit: Nevermind. I am very wrong on this. What I understood to be a "quick" victory from my vague memory of history lessons was a month. I also never considered that Poland never surrendered but _lost_ the invasion. There was no surrender. If Putin believes he had the means to capture Kyiv within a really short time AND he believes his own propaganda that Ukrainians are idiots and cowards and drug addicts and whatever then yeah. I do see how you could logically conclude that they would surrender quickly. But Ukraine turned out to have an extremely strong leader, raising morale to levels far beyond Russia's. Turns out the folk is nationalistic, proud and doesn't want to take shit from Russia. So many civilians in Kyiv are joining the fight because they want to and they have to. Is that what Putin was expecting? I don't know. Do want to note that on Dutch television a historian stated that he believes Russia believes they will have Kyiv captured before early March, since airports near the Ukrainian border have been closed until then. So while 3 days is long for Kyiv to hold out, the reality might be they'll have to hold out for at least 2 weeks before it starts really mattering in the eyes of Putin.
  - hervature 5y ago
    > It can definitely work, see for instance Nazi Germany -> Poland. What are you talking about? The invasion lasted several weeks and had the support of the USSR. They quite literally destroyed the Polish army. In fact, Poland never officially surrendered.

sgc 5y ago

As of now the estimate is they have committed 50% to Ukraine, that is pushing hard at the upper limit of how many can actually be committed before there is no logistical support at all. They could go to 2/3 for a short time, but even more of them would be wandering about begging for food than are now. They appear to have made the same mistake as Rumsfeld when invading Iraq, a similar sized country with a similar sized invading force - he tried to go light and immediate reinforcements were required. The difference is the country of Ukraine is better prepared, they have better resolve, and some better weapons, while the Russians have far lower equipment quality, morale, and training. Nonetheless, there is an enormous logistical advantage of attacking a neighbor from three sides and not a country halfway around the world. Ukraine also has much more forgiving terrain for an attacker than Iraq. Everything is up in the air, but I share your optimism that Ukraine could come out on top.

oceanplexian 5y ago

Why would Russia run out of supplies? They have an unlimited and uninterrupted supply line back to Belarus and Russia in multiple directions. I find it more likely the folks in Kiev run out of food in a few days.I support the Ukrainians but the writing is clearly on the wall and it makes more sense the Russians would wait them out and use their air superiority to keep supplies out of Kiev, for example.

dragontamer 5y ago
Russia doesn't even have air superiority yet. Ukrainian air force is blowing up elite paratroopers before they even have a chance to reach the front lines. This entire invasion is already a disaster. Russia still has an advantage but they're taking unnecessary losses already. ------- No Ukrainian city is encircled yet either. Kyiv can't run out of food when it's still safe for supplies to come into the city. Russia needs to establish the basics, and haven't even done that yet. EDIT: it's been like 3 days. It's too soon to expect Russia's military to have a big success yet. Russia's superior weaponry should have a relatively easy time but... Russia is basically trying to perform 4 or 5 simultaneous 'Battle of Fallujah's here simultaneously. Just going all in on major cities around the country simultaneously, where most people in those cities really hate Russians right now.
- A4ET8a8uTh0 5y ago
  It appears to be an accurate assessment. I was expecting to see blitzkrieg based on initial reports, but it seems less likely now. In a very real sense, I hope that is the case.
  - dragontamer 5y ago
    If anything, the Russians are moving in too fast. I think the Russians really were going for the 'decapitation', trying to quickly kill or capture the politicians in Kyiv, leaving the Ukrainians leaderless. All signs point to this IMO. Russians have failed in that attempt this far, but it's only day 3. Ukraine has been routing or killing a lot of airborne / paratroopers in and around Kyiv (Russian VDV units). Russia really is going for a quick victory, committing so many airborne units there.

philistine 5y ago

> Even with overwhelming superiority during WW2, the US damn near lost their first attempt to invade Japan. > Ditto for Japan attacking Midway, and every other decisive battle. What you're missing here is the fog of war. When decisions are viewed through what information was available to the decision-makers, it paints a far more relatable picture. No one was stupid at Midway. Have a look at this long video going through the battle from the Japanese perspective: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bd8_vO5zrjo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bd8_vO5zrjo