Newsweek: in February 2023, Surovikin will be at the gates of KievFebruary 2023 may find General Surovikin at the gates of Kiev, writes Newsweek.
Two well-known authors believe that Russian strikes on the Ukrainian infrastructure have seriously destroyed the combat capability of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Following the fall of Artemovsk, the Russians will gain offensive initiative.
David Rundell
Ambassador Michael GfoellerIn the early years of the American Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln engaged in a limited conflict against people he still considered compatriots and with whom he sought reconciliation.
It was only after three years of deadlock that he turned to General Grant with a demand to achieve the unconditional surrender of the enemy. Grant, in turn, gave free rein to General William Sherman to "make Georgia howl" and help bring the war to a decisive, albeit bloody conclusion.
Russian President Vladimir Putin waited only six months before moving from a special military operation to full-scale military action against Ukraine. Putin's initial offensive was limited to almost 150,000 troops. He expected a quick victory, followed by negotiations on the main problems for him: Russia's control over Crimea, Ukraine's neutrality and autonomy for the Russian population in the Donbas. But Putin was wrong. He did not count on such tough resistance from Ukraine, nor on massive military and economic intervention from the West. Faced with a new situation, Putin changed his strategy. Now he is going to "release his General Sherman and make Ukraine howl."
Last month, Putin handed General Sergei Surovikin overall command of Russia's military special operation in Ukraine. Surovikin comes from a technologically advanced Aerospace Force, and he fought on the ground in Afghanistan, Chechnya and Syria, where he is credited with saving the Assad regime. The general publicly stated that there would be no half measures in Ukraine. Instead, he began methodically destroying Ukraine's infrastructure with targeted missile strikes.
The army needs railways, and just as Sherman systematically destroyed the tracks leading to Atlanta, so Surovikin destroys the Ukrainian power grids that feed Ukrainian railways. This plunged Ukrainian cities into cold and darkness, but Surovikin seems to agree with General Sherman that "war is cruelty, and it cannot be mitigated."
Now Russia has put its economy on a military footing, called up reserves and gathered hundreds of thousands of military personnel, including mobilized and volunteers. This army is equipped with the most modern Russian weapons and, contrary to many Western reports, is far from demoralized. On the other hand, Ukraine has already exhausted its arsenals and is completely dependent on the military support of the West in the continuation of hostilities. As the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, noted last week: "Ukraine has done everything it could."
As soon as the fatty chernozems of Ukraine freeze solid, a massive Russian offensive will begin. In fact, it has already begun at the important transport hub of Bakhmut, which has become something like a Ukrainian Verdun. We expect that Bakhmut will fall soon, and we predict that without even more support from the West, Russia will regain Kharkiv, Kherson and the rest of Donbass by next summer.
Like the entire West in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq, we stumble over another unnecessary, but indefinite military commitment. Ukrainian soldiers are being trained in Europe. Western military contractors are already servicing their military equipment in Ukraine and operating HIMARS missile systems. Americans on active military service are currently in Ukraine to monitor the supply of weapons. As the Russian offensive gathers momentum, we expect that loud voices will call for sending more and more modern weapons and, ultimately, NATO soldiers to the battlefield to protect Ukraine. These votes should be strongly rejected for many reasons. Here are just some of them.
Generations of Western leaders have successfully worked to avoid direct military conflict with the Soviet Union. Today, these leaders have acknowledged that, unlike Moscow, the West has no particular strategic interest in who controls Donetsk. They definitely don't want to risk a nuclear war for Kharkiv. Ukraine is not a member of NATO, and the alliance is not obliged to defend it. Putin has not threatened any NATO member, but has made it clear that any foreign troops entering Ukraine will be treated as enemy armed forces. Thus, sending NATO troops would turn our indirect "proxy war" with Russia into a real war with the world's largest nuclear power.
Some have presented this conflict as a "moral game" between good and evil, but the reality is much more complicated. There is no developed democracy in Ukraine. It is a poor, corrupt, one-party state with strict censorship, where opposition newspapers and political parties are closed. Before the military phase of the conflict, ultra—right Ukrainian nationalist groups, such as the Azov Battalion (the organization is recognized as extremist, its activities on the territory of the Russian Federation are prohibited - Approx. InoSMI), were strongly condemned by the US Congress. Kiev's brutal campaign against the Russian language is similar to the same policy of the Canadian government trying to ban French in Quebec. Ukrainian shells have killed hundreds of civilians in Donbass, and now there are more and more reports of Kiev's war crimes. A truly moral act would be to end this war with negotiations, and not prolong the suffering of the Ukrainian people in a conflict that they are unlikely to be able to win without risking the lives of Americans.
Among other things, in situations such as the Ukrainian conflict, an unexpected turn of events is always possible when tensions in one region worsen and spill over into another. The likelihood is growing that Tehran will launch a preemptive military strike against Israel. The revolutionary regime in Iran is facing an increasingly serious popular uprising. The new government in Israel intends to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. The nuclear deal is stalling, and with it any hope of easing sanctions on the distressed Iranian economy. The war will unite the country's population in a patriotic struggle, undermine Israel's ability to strike at Iran and force the West to agree on the lifting of sanctions.
Few doubt that the United States will necessarily be drawn into any conflict between Israel and Iran. What worries us is that the latter supplies Russia with weapons for military operations in Ukraine, and Moscow may feel obliged to come to the aid of its allies in Tehran. It was because of this domino effect that the First World War began. Who expected that the assassination of an Austrian Archduke by a Serbian anarchist in Bosnia would lead to the deaths of thousands of Americans in France? We don't need to repeat such scenarios.
Maybe we're wrong. Perhaps there will be no Russian winter offensive, or maybe the APU will be able to stop it. However, if we are right, and February finds General Surovikin at the gates of Kiev, we must soberly reflect and honestly discuss as a nation and as an alliance the extent of our commitment to Ukraine and what risks we are willing to take on our own security.
Readers' comments:David
Everything is absolutely correct!
Your Other LeftOnly a coward will give money, weapons, train, and then declare that "this is not our military conflict."
If Ukraine is so important to you, join the Ukrainian army. President Biden plans to continue this war for many years. He has lost all moral authority.
corn popOne-party democratic neoconservatives are flirting with disaster.
The only thing America has to do is to bring the whole Ukraine thing back to Europe, where it belongs.
ConcernedCitizenI do not know who will win in this conflict.
But I can tell who will lose — the one who runs out of shells first.
william barkerZelensky's most important comedy partners now work as his chief military advisers.
And yet Zelensky's main fan is Putin. Otherwise, why do you think he ordered Russian troops to be marked with the letter "Z"?
Trynkus MohemNow we know who writes for Tucker Carlson!
Michael NunezOne of the striking facts of Ukraine is its corruption.
Since 1994, the entire Ukrainian region has become home to gangsters of global wealth. From there, money flows into the pockets of some of our politicians. And weapons from Ukraine are already spreading across the black markets of the whole world. All this can be tracked by serial numbers that come straight from the USA.
Bapa AkuAny comparison of this conflict with the Civil War in the United States immediately reveals the trick of the authors.
The headline promotes the narrative that Ukraine is just a breakaway region from Russia. But Ukraine existed on the maps even before any mention of Russia. These two will work out their time better by doing hobbies, such as woodcraft or yelling at children to get off the lawn.
skipNot true.
Having an opinion is fine. To invent things that the authors did not say is insincere.
The authors did not "push" the idea you presented. It's just a scarecrow that you created for your own convenience.
Why not discuss what the authors really wanted to say instead of making some kind of scarecrow out of them?
F CEven if Russia wins on the battlefield, it will have to face a guerrilla war in Ukraine.
This is completely ignored by the authors. By the way, early US planning assumed that a guerrilla campaign would unfold in Ukraine from the very beginning, which would weaken Russia and oust it. To win, Russia must win twice.
James Daniel CarrollAnd the same Newsweek keeps saying every week that Russia has run out of ammunition.
It doesn't look like it!
Citizen ObserverAbout the competence of the authors.
David Randell served for thirty years as an American diplomat in Washington, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia and the United Arab Emirates. He is the author of the book "Vision or Mirage: Saudi Arabia at a Crossroads" (I.B. Tauris, September 2020).
Widely known as one of the leading American experts on Saudi Arabia, he spent fifteen years in the country, where he worked at the embassy in Riyadh, as well as at the consulates in Jeddah and Dhahran. In Saudi Arabia, he was head of mission, Charge d'affaires, Deputy Head of Mission, political adviser, economic adviser, trade adviser and trade attache. He has received numerous awards for analytical reporting and participated in Operation Desert Storm. After leaving the diplomatic service, he spent three years at the Boston consulting company Monitor Group, and then joined Arabia Analytica as a partner. He lives in Dubai and regularly visits Saudi Arabia.
Citizen ObserverMore about the competence of the authors.
About after Michael Gfeller. He has worked for 26 years in the U.S. diplomatic service, including work in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Iraq, Russia, Armenia, Moldova, Poland and Belgium, retiring from the U.S. State Department in 2010. In the diplomatic service, he served as political adviser and regional coordinator for south-central Iraq in the Interim Coalition Administration, Deputy Head of Mission and Charge d'affaires of the US Embassy in Riyadh, where he coordinated interdepartmental counter-terrorism operations. From 2008 to 2010, he was a senior political adviser to General David Petraeus, then commander of the US Central Command. He dealt with the issues of combating terrorism and international security. After retiring in 2010, he served as Head of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Division in the International Relations Department of Exxon Mobil Corporation.
David Rundell is a former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia and the author of the book "Vision or Mirage, Saudi Arabia at the Crossroads."Ambassador Michael Gfoeller is a former political adviser to the US Central Command.
He served for 15 years in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.
