War News

From the start of the war the news out of Ukraine was, for the Russians, rarely good, and last week was no exception.

The first piece of bad news was that the Ukrainians used their new HIMARS missile systems,* donated by the U.S., to punch holes in a crucial bridge over the Dnipro river, thus making it much more difficult for the Russian troops occupying the major city of Kherson to be resupplied:

Ukrainian forces using U.S.-supplied precision artillery severely damaged a bridge vital to the Russian military's supply lines in occupied Kherson, Ukraine authorities said Wednesday.

"Successful missile strikes on bridges over the Dnipro River by #UAarmy create an impossible dilemma for russian occupiers in #Kherson," the Ukrainian Defense Ministry tweeted. "Retreat or be annihilated by #UAarmy. The choice is theirs."

The bridge is one of two crossings over the river that Russia uses to transport personnel and equipment to territories it occupies. The strike didn't aim to destroy the bridge but to make it impossible for the Russian military to use, Ukraine's Operational Command South spokeswoman Nataliya Gumenyuk said.

The second piece of bad news was that the Ukrainians announced that total Russian combat losses included more than 40,000 troops killed or wounded along with the destruction of 1,738 tanks and 3,971 armored vehicles.

Then the BBC reported on a speech by British MI6 chief Richard Moore who, speaking at the Aspen Security Forum, opined that recent Russian gains were "tiny" and that Russia was "about to run out of steam":

Our assessment is that the Russians will increasingly find it difficult to find manpower and materiel over the next few weeks. They will have to pause in some way and that will give the Ukrainians the opportunity to strike back.

On top of this are repeated reports of poor Russian morale and very costly Russian incompetence in the field. In one recent instance three Russian helicopters opened fire on their own troops on the ground. The troops fired back and downed one of the helicopters.

This episode came a week after Russian troops in Luhansk, trying to target a Ukrainian missile battery, accidentally shot down one of their own Su-34M fighter jets instead.

Whatever the final outcome of this barbaric war of aggression on the part of the Russians turns out to be, it has been an extraordinarily costly undertaking in terms of men, material and the Russians' reputation around the world.

If they do eventually prevail it'll be a perfect illustration of what's meant by a Pyrrhic victory, one from which it may take them decades to recover. *HIMARS is a mobile missile system that uses GPS to ensure very accurate strikes at up to 50 miles away. These missiles have allowed Ukraine to hit ammunition dumps behind Russian lines and to target command centers. This not only erodes Russian morale, it has also forced them to pull their ammunition back which lengthens supply lines and slows their ability to keep their own artillery and troops supplied.