Ukraine: Endgame

Is Alex Mercouris right, that the Russians are preparing for a Ulysses Grant all-out, “no surrender” war of attrition?

“Attrition” we can see. But where is the war?

Bakhmut is still a spectacle of blood and death --as it was last week. But it isn’t the war.

The Russians, of course, say this isn’t a war in the conventional sense- it’s an “SMO”. Whatever you call it— if nothing new seems to be happening in a conflict of this kind, but one side is losing, losing, losing in bits and pieces— that means the Endgame is coming. Check your ammo’. Bakhmut, as Brian Berletic notes, is of little strategic importance by itself — just a slaughterhouse.

In Canada, Zelensky fanboy, Justin Trudeau, has a new program called “voluntary deletion” where teens troubled by their zits and lack of sex and unable to cope with depression get to end their lives with the help. In Ukraine, it’s “involuntary deletion”. And just as crazy.

This map is from the excellent Slavyangrad, who posts on Telegram.

OK...TWO maps!

No need to read Russian. A picture is worth a thousand words.

The larger map on the right shows you the “contact line”— with liberated Ukraine in Red and the UAF held areas in puke green. The Ukraine is very large, and the contact line is thin and long, and punctuated all along with little explosions, which mean (Western mostly) Ukrainians dying.

You will also see the contested area (green) is what was Eastern Ukraine until 2014/15 nominally ethnic Russian. Keep in mind, that Russians are not “invading” Western Ukraine, but rather restoring Eastern Ukraine.

The smaller zoomed-in graphic on the left, shows you one chunk of the contact line where you will find fortress towns like Bakhmut—bang, bang, bang.

What matters, however, is not Bakhmut but adjacent and nearby towns. It’s a chain of bloody pearls and the UAF are losing troops and equipment all along this line.

The line is some call the “Russian meat grinder”.

Men dying for nothing

All these men are dying for nothing.

Gonzalo Lira

The quote is part of an amazingly informative discussion between Lira, Mercouris, Berletic and Christoforou on the Duran, which is a major source. Check it out.

Estimates of casualties in this Ukrainian Civil War vary wildly.

But if you want to know what’s going on you have to look at numbers provided by the Russians, which are generally honest – if only because the Russians have no way of hiding the truth about their losses – which, fortunately for them, were only about 6000 KIA as of September and perhaps 7000 now – wounded at about 10:1 thanks to good battlefield medical support. The Russians have a vibrant and generally skeptical media audience, with a low tolerance for lies.

The Ukrainians? Their media is government-controlled propaganda mill which constantly contradicts itself. And the audience has been brainwiped for the last 8 years. With casualties the Zelensky regimes wants to keep them small—so it can say it’s winning. But large to get money and sympathy from Uncle Sam. Size matters. Kind of like Zelensky’s dick— its size varies depending on who he’s with.

Still, it is clear the UAF have suffered huge losses, just as the Confederacy did in the last years of the American Civil War.

In September conservative UAF estimates were about 60,000 KIA, or ten times the Russian rate, with wounded, at least 150,000. More likely is 100,000 KIA with wounded, 300,000. 

Pepe Escobar estimates 400,000 KIA, which is quite possible also.

Complicating estimates is that Ukrainian medical support is overwhelmed and compromised-- reducing the survival rate (probably) to just 2: 1 or 3:1, meaning that while only one out of ten Russian soldiers die as a result, 3 to 5 UAF soldiers will die after the fact.

No matter how you look at it, such losses are unsustainable and have resulted in the UAF conscripting everyone and everything that can walk or crawl, from teenagers to elders. If chimps could be trained to fire rifles, they would be emptying the zoos. Pretty soon they will have wheelchair brigades. Trenches will need ramps.

Zelensky is throwing untrained, ill-equipped men into battle to be killed. They can’t fight – only die. The West rewards him with billions of dollars and puts his face on Time. At home he says, “The Russians are losing a lot more than we are”. Abroad he says, “The Russians are massacring us!”.

For Western leaders and celebrities rush to gush all over him. They line up to kiss the ring, if not the ass of Captain Ukraine.

Good is rewarded in Heaven. Evil is rewarded in Hollywood. If ever there was a war criminal, “Volo” fits.  Will he fit a noose, too?  Probably not.  

The irony is that after the Russians broke the back of the UAF back in the Spring., this conflict could have been-- and should have been negotiated-- using Minsk 2 as a basis. 

Not that Minsk ever meant anything to the West. Angela Merkel has let slip that her government agreed to Minsk with no intention of implementing its provisions--but only of buying time to arm the Ukrainians to create Europe’s second most capable military after Russia. Not that that wasn’t obvious after the first year.

Yup. That’s Proxy War fer yah.

This is not a war between Western Ukraine and Eastern Ukraine. Nor between Ukraine and Russia — it is a war between East and West. A world war.

The Ukrainians are just meat for the grinder. Think about that before buying a Big Mac.

Who will win? It really comes down to leadership.

The West has Biden. The East has Putin and Xi who at least don’t have to wear nappies.

The collapse of Western Ukraine

That brings us back to Mercouris’ ideas and those of Gfoeller and Rundell about the American Civil War and Ulysses S Grant.

Putin is Russia’s Grant.

Grant was a strategic genius, but he could not accomplish what he did without also being an organizational genius as well.

Putin is similarly polymathic.

Putin evaluates strategy as it is realized in context and adapts it to match changed circumstances.

He then reconfigures his teams, bringing in new leaders where necessary that can implement new approaches, changing command structure so that leaders with the right skill sets are in place. Everything is aligned and coordinated flexibly. This is John Boyd’s OODA Loop on a grand scale.

And it is exactly what Grant did, allowing him to win the Civil War in just two years.

One difference, however, is that Putin is taking his time in Ukraine, realizing that is just one battleground. The Confederacy had no military allies. But the Ukraine is a front for a huge military alliance of nations. Still, the time frame for real resolution will probably be at least two years.

Minsk gave the West time to prepare. But it also gave Putin time to prepare. And he did so as Grant would have done had Great Britain and France backed the South — allowing himself as many options as possible— just in case. As it turned out he needed — and needs — those options.

Similarities abound.

The South was big—which gave it a logistical advantage with its railroads. Grant therefore started attacking railroads.

The Ukraine is also large. Logistics are the key to everything.

The UAF depends on railroads, which are mostly electric. The Russian’s strikes on electrical infrastructure, impede the UAF’s inability to move troops and supply its forces.

In the Civil War, the morale of the boys in grey sagged as losses mounted, with lack of mobility. The mood tanked back at home, too.

The same thing is happening in Ukraine.

Two Ukrainian women at the coffee shop today. One with tryzaub handbag, one with SS runes earrings. Speaking Russian (I had a Russian/Ukrainian handyman who moved here in 90s tell me that), English, and Hebrew. Yes, a Jewish woman with SS runes for jewelry. They pulled up and parked illegally in an Audi Q8 so they are doing fine. They were talking loudly and half the place was listening. Definite air of panic. Repeated many times "Kill all the Russians", "Every Russian must die", etc. Also "When the war stops the money stops." They do think the war is going to stop sometime soon. A few months ago such emigrés would have been fêted by the patrons. Mostly everyone was a bit nervous.

Oldhippie. Posted on Moon of Alabama.

These women are quite happy. They are not in Ukraine, for one thing. No suffering for them. As long as the war goes on, the money keeps on coming. They are affluent and need worry only about parking for the Audi.

But the people around them are not so well off. Where once these people welcomed such women as victims — now they blame them for the decline of living standards. And there is that parking thing, too.

When the narrative fails

All politics may be local. But all wars are personal.

One reason, the Zelensky regime doesn’t want to give up Bakhmut is because it has become a symbol of its “victory”. “We’re winning”, says Volo’. It’s personal for him. His wallet is where most people have a heart.

I pledge allegiance to my wallet

The dead would object— except, of course, they’re dead.

The living see their son or brother or cousin or best friend dead or maimed, and ask, “winning what?”. 

This last week, massive drone and missile strikes have “de-energized” even more of Ukraine.  But Zelensky tells his followers at home that his air defenses, which he also moans to the West as inadequate, are shooting down 90% of the missiles.    Where has light, heat, water and transportation gone? Why are kids and their puppies dying from the debris of Ukrainian missiles, which missed their targets.  Also, why are mayors asking people to evacuate their homes.

“Go where?

Europe doesn’t want you. 

In any case, if you’re male you can’t get to Poland or Germany unless you have enough money to pay the appropriate bribe. No money? Zelensky wants your body, another log for the fire of war, and more money in his wallet.   

Getting money is hard.

The Ukrainian GDP is down close to 40%, with unemployment soaring, technically about 10% —but much higher, in the order of 20% — keeping in mind that the conscripted are considered employed.

While this SMO is personal for the Ukrainians and becoming that way for European people who are beginning to suffer too, it’s just entertainment for the US, a convenient distraction from other problems. In fact, foreign issues don’t even show in a recent Gallup Poll, as Kevin Zuesse says.

But…. if your team loses game after game, season after season, who wants to pay the price of a ticket to see them play anymore?

This week’s game ended badly. The media cheerleaders keep on stumbling. The hot dogs are sold out. It’s time to go to a bar and get drunk and complain about the other team cheating. But your team is going to be disbanded — and who gives a fuck?

Wars kill personal illusions.

Just as Grant killed the dream of the Old South that was a nightmare for black people, Putin is killing the dream of Western Ukraine that was a nightmare for ethnic Russians.

As Old Hippie’s anecdote implies affluent anti-Russian Western Ukrainians who profited from Maiden are leaving for Europe or elsewhere and what is left is just ordinary people who never cared that much about politics but just their job and their families and kids. These are the ones who voted for Zelensky because he promised peace. These are the ones who will form the basis of a new Western Ukraine when Volo’ moves to Beverly Hills.

Right now, the Russians are consolidating their successes along the contact line, fortifying positions from which to launch offensives from, while drawing out the UAF. In Kharkov there are reports that the UAF is assembling a force of about 20,000 perhaps for an offensive. Some think that they might use these forces to attack Belgorod — which is part of Russia—but it is too small a force to challenge the full force of the Russian army. More likely, the troops will be used to attack Russian forces in the positions they withdrew to after the retreat from Krasny Liman. In either case, military suicide — sorry, “voluntary deletion”.

No wonder, there are reports of UAF units refusing to attack.

The Endgame is not yet here.

There is much talk of big, nasty, “shock & awful” Russian counteroffensives—but it might well be that this “war’ will not end with a bang but with a whimper.

We will have to wait for Putin’s January press conference to find out. In the meantime, look at Karl Sanchez’s translations of Putin’s recent speeches. You will see the Russian leader is dotting all the “i”s and crossing all the “t”s. The UAF is the madman banging his head against the wall until unconscious. The US is drugged out in a padded cell, wanking happily.

Western Ukraine will likely end up a “separate but not so equal” state dependent on a a newly constituted, prosperous, and progressive Novorossiya, a new addition to a Russsian Federation, unified by the “war”. This new Ukraine will be like what the South was after the Civil War, a poor relation of the North.

Although many of the real extremists will be gone and the institutions of pluralistic democracy restored, the legacy of hate will endure—as Helmholtz Smith says on Larry Johson’s site, and tensions will remain. How the Russians deal with that, it remains to be seen.

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Julian Macfarlane

I am 76.  Yes, I know—my profile picture, which is recent, looks younger.  There is a reason my book is called "Ageing Young-- You're Never Too Old To Rock and Roll", the title given to me by David Bowie's lead guitarist and songwriter, Mark Pritchett.

I write a lot about health issues, ageing successfully, cognitive issues like ASD—and… umm…genius. (Oh, I wish! But I will have to learn to tie my shoes first). I am pretty much “dys” everything. You will notice lots of typos. Dyslexia. Correct me please.

Recently, I have turned to geopolitical issues. 

I have worked in the media for almost 50 years. I was a stringer in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War.  Then I was in Korea. And after that in Japan where I studied martial arts and Buddhism and did a lot of things: union organizer, writer, broadcaster, media analyst, beer and pizza. 

I am neither Left nor Right. It’s a cognitive disability, an aspect of my ASD. I have trouble with that: tell me to turn right and I may go left and vice versa.  Politically, I prefer to say I am "multipolar".  Multipolar Personality Disorder?

Which is probably what most people have.  People who label themselves "left" or "right" seem to be limiting themselves to an ideology. 

Guess that is OK if you are paying membership dues to a political party.  But I don't have money for that.