Ukraine will have to use its new resources carefully before trying to liberate more territories from Russian occupation.
Vital support for Ukraine
The Secret Service assessment must have reached some serious conclusions to be able to convince Mike Johnson to risk his position as Speaker of the House and finally try to pass a law providing vital support for Ukraine.
Chronic shortages of ammunition and anti-aircraft defenses have resulted in a limited but potentially significant Russian advance, and Ukraine’s cities are being mined. President Volodymyr Zelensky warned that Ukraine could lose the war.
Once President Joe Biden signed the law into law, the U.S. military began rushing desperately needed supplies to the front lines. The goal is to give Russia as little time as possible to make the most of its current superiority before it starts to encounter more resistance. The votes in Congress were a massive boost to the morale of Kiev, which is now hoping for an auspicious cycle of events to restore its advantage at the front.
Chronic lack of soldiers
The personnel problem, which remains chronic, should now be ameliorated as new recruits no longer face the prospect of being sent into battle with insufficient ammunition. The stockpiles that Ukraine now holds can be put to the test on the spot: there is no need to tear them apart for fear they can never be replenished.
European countries will also be given an impetus to increase their donations for the fight. Rishi Sunak, the British Prime Minister, has already made his own announcement on a visit to Warsaw, a new £500m package. In parallel, a variety of projects are advancing to equip Ukraine with ammunition, Patriot anti-aircraft systems and F-16 aircraft.
In a first phase, it is more likely that the aid will slow down, and not reverse, the current Russian offensive. Even when it was hoped that American aid would arrive at the beginning of the year, 2024 was nevertheless predicted to be a year in which Ukraine would hold its ground rather than break free from its occupied territories.
Ukraine, efforts for a new mobilization
Ukraine’s forces, it was anticipated, would absorb any blow the Russians might attempt against them while they sorted out their personnel problems and made sure their fortification lines held.
Zelenski, his government and army commanders have spent much of the year debating how to mobilize more men as front-line soldiers suffer exhaustion and depletion, and building fortifications to stop anticipated Russian offensives.
It will take time to recover from the difficult first months of war in 2024, and then even longer for Ukraine to begin to fully benefit from new arms deliveries and increased European production and American shells.
New units need to be trained, and there are still command problems left over from the disappointing 2023 counteroffensive, the biggest of which concerns the coordination of large-scale operations.
Last year’s counteroffensive
Even if the Ukrainian military does not want to completely cede the initiative and wants the Russians to start worrying more about how to defend their own positions than how to better attack the Ukrainians, it will take some time before it will have the necessary strength to be able to begin to liberate substantial portions of territory.
Last year’s counter-offensive was trumpeted far too long in advance, and the Russians were not taken by surprise by either its direction or its timing. As a result, Ukraine’s military suffered.
Photo source: Volodymyr Zelensky-Facebook
Kiev may be under pressure to score consistent victories in the run-up to November’s US election to still justify aid, but it cannot afford to let its next big effort end in poor results.
Ukraine will have to carefully manage the resources it receives
It will still need to manage its resources carefully, as it cannot be sure of future levels of aid, especially if Donald Trump wins the presidency. Aside from his legal troubles, another likely reason why Trump has been silent on the new aid vote is to be able to later accuse Biden of wasting money on Ukraine if the situation permits. a.
For now, the best way Ukraine can continue its fight with Russia is to carry out the kind of attacks it has been launching frequently lately. Long-range drone strikes on refineries and other strategic targets in Russia. Ukraine will not be able to attack Russia with ATACMS long-range missiles or the cruise missiles promised in Warsaw by Sunak, Storm Shadow. But there are many military targets in the occupied territories, including Crimea.
Even if there are no easy ways to bring Russia to its knees, its vulnerabilities can be exposed. It will be harder for Putin to see how he can bring the war to an early end, which was surely his hope before the congressional vote.
Little, far from victory
Perhaps he hoped that the loss of a city as large as Kharkiv would push Ukraine into a downward spiral. Now we return to the prospect of endless war. It is also true that Putin prepared for such a thing. But the scale of Russia’s recent losses, only for small victories, and the embarrassment of being unable to stop Kiev’s attacks on its own territory means that it still lacks an obvious route to victory.
Even if Trump were to win in November, that does not guarantee Putin a satisfactory outcome. Trump will want to come up with a peace plan of his own, but according to the press, Putin will find the details as unacceptable as Zelenski. After boasting publicly for the past six months that Russia had seized the initiative in the war, Putin is now forced to contemplate the possibility that the fates may once again favor Ukraine.
(Article by Lawrence Freedman, Financial Times; Translation: Andrei Suba)
