Due to the situation of the battlefield is changing rapidly, we can only talk about the current situation. If there are changes after the article is released, we will continue to talk more and share our thoughts on social media in time. Please also follow the CAMBO TODAY Facebook page.
Let’s analyze the battlefield first, and then spread it out. Let’s make an overall analysis first. In addition to the absolute disadvantage of the navy and air force on the battlefield, Ukraine’s resistance to the Russian army is very well organized, not as weak as many people imagined at first.
On the first day, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense released news: 7 Russian fighter planes and 6 helicopters were shot down, and more than 30 Russian tanks and more than 130 armored vehicles were destroyed. The Russian army lost more than 800 people; Ukraine lost more than 400 people.
Generally speaking, each side will exaggerate its own victory, but there are indeed multiple videos of Russian fighter jets being shot down. On the other hand, the Russian side has not taken the initiative to announce the results of its airstrikes and ground operations. This may have political considerations. Putin claimed that he was only taking “special military operations” against eastern Ukraine, and did not admit to a full-scale invasion, slapped himself in the face, and admitted that he launched a large-scale invasion. Even so, there is relatively little propaganda from the Russian side about the so-called achievement of the mission and the might of our army. In fact, Putin still needs exciting news from the front line. It is used to give blood to the Russian little pink and suppress the domestic anti-war voice. So we can guess that the Russian invasion did not go as smoothly as Putin expected.
Russia vs Ukraine Military Capability
Ukraine’s standing army is quite large, and there are tens of thousands of people, but most of them are still belongings from the Soviet arsenal when the Soviet Union disintegrated. Western countries have always been very taboo to sell large-scale high-tech equipment to Ukraine. Advanced ships, aircraft, and cruise ships Weapons such as missiles, which will be regarded as extremely threatening by Russia, will immediately intensify the conflict between the West and Russia.
Therefore, Ukraine is mostly given small arms, man-mounted air defense missiles, anti-tank missiles, and so on. This has caused a serious shortage of heavy equipment such as tanks, artillery, and aircraft in Ukraine.
In recent years, heavy equipment can only be purchased from other countries threatened by Russia, such as Poland and the Czech Republic. Ukraine is gone, and these countries are more willing to give Ukraine more substance. For example, at the end of 2020, a batch of second-hand self-propelled artillery was purchased from the Czech Republic, but the number is very limited.
However, I think it now seems that Putin is still too optimistic about success. On the first day, everyone will be very pessimistic. I understand, because the Russian and Ukrainian armies are not of an order of magnitude on the hard indicators. It is likely to be the same in the end. The Russian army occupied Kyiv, but the protracted resistance of Ukraine and the loss of Russia exceeded expectations. It will make Putin’s victory very fragile and difficult to maintain. War is never about a single result. War is a continuation of politics and a rational violent activity of the country. We must measure the cost and the impact on all aspects of society. So a small Afghanistan can drag down the mighty Soviet empire.
In contrast, to the Russian army, my impression is that it is almost still fighting a World War II-style battle. First, a bombardment, targeting Ukrainian government facilities, air bases, and then the ground forces advance. We have not seen the UAVs commonly used by the U.S. military. The UAV is a tool that can carry out point-to-point precision strikes on a single person, a single vehicle, and a single stronghold. It is extremely psychologically deterrent to soldiers in every trench. There are drones, which are very useful for destroying the morale of the opponent. But the disadvantage of drones is that they have no self-protection ability, and they cannot evade air defense missiles and ground artillery fire as flexibly as traditional fighters. You can only use drones with confidence when you completely disable the enemy’s air defenses. This shows that the Russian army has not completely paralyzed Ukraine’s air defense system. On the first day, more than 10 military aircraft of the Russian army were shot down, which also shows this.
And on the 24th, there was someone on Twitter reported that the local news in Kyiv was that people’s mobile phone communication can still be maintained, indicating that the Russian army has not been able to launch as strongly as the US military did before the Persian Gulf War in 1990 and the Iraq War in 2003.
Electronic jamming, completely destroying enemy communications, Russia does not have such strong electronic warfare capabilities. Without complete control of Ukraine’s theater electromagnetic space, the Ukrainian command system will function effectively, and it will be able to continue to resist and will not be in a state of complete collapse.
If the First World War was still the protagonist of infantry positional warfare, it was the 1.0 version of the war in the industrial age. The Second World War was a mechanized sports battle. The Air Force made its debut, and a big step in the improvement of the technological content was the 2.0 version. Now is the information age, it should be upgraded to version 3.0, but the Russian army is fighting a war with patch 2.5.
There is no way to disintegrate the enemy’s command communication, use drones and precise guided weapons to make the enemy feel that they have been hit by dimensionality reduction, and completely lose the will to resist and escape from the battlefield. Or use armored columns to dash forward and use ground fire to drive the enemy away from the position.
It feels like two boxers, one is taller and more muscular, and it takes a few rounds to win. Therefore, the battlefield situation is not simple, and Putin certainly cannot end the operation as quickly as the US military did in the Persian Gulf in 1990 at a very low cost. The news I got at the time of the deadline for this episode was that the Russian army was blocked in many directions, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his main team were still in Kyiv.
Compared to The 1939 Soviet-Finnish Winter War
Many people see Ukraine as the Czech Sudetenland before World War II, sacrificed by the appeasement leaders of Britain and France. That’s not right, its situation is closer to that of Finland in 1939. Finland became independent in December 1917, and St. Petersburg in Russia (later Leningrad in the Soviet Union) was only 30 kilometers away from the Finnish-controlled Isthmus of Karelia, which made Stalin very uneasy.
Before the independence of Finland, the relationship with Germany was very close. So throughout the 1920s and 1930s Finland and the Soviet Union were in a very hostile and tense relationship. The Soviet Union kept asking Finland to redraw the border and give Leningrad more space for safety. It is exactly the same request that Putin made to Ukraine today.
A series of concessions by Britain and France to Hitler from 1938 to 1939 made Stalin see the weakness of Britain and France. In 1939, when the German army attacked Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany, which was called the “Sit-In War”. Stalin saw that you didn’t defend the Czech Republic and Poland, so I took the opportunity to clean up Finland, and it’s even less possible for you to defend.
At that time, the Soviet Union had just divided Poland, Stalin and Hitler were in the honeymoon period, and there was no risk of German intervention, so they attacked Finland. The background is similar to that of Ukraine today. Putin also used Russia’s security as an excuse to dismember and control Ukraine. Europe and the United States also shouted at Ukraine more than they actually did. Ukraine is also fighting alone in the face of Russian reckless men.
Stalin thought that overwhelming strength could quickly bring Finland to its knees, but no analysis believed that Finland could support it independently.
The main battlefield of Soviet-Finland is the Karelian Isthmus near Leningrad. It is 100-110 kilometers wide, there are many lakes and wetlands that are not frozen in winter, and the hard roads are covered with forests, which is very suitable for Finland’s defense. Most Finns have never seen a tank in their entire lives, so when the Soviet tanks approached densely, it began to cause panic, and the anti-tank weapons in the hands of the Finns were almost zero. But soon the Finns calmed down and saw the weakness of the Soviet army. Their tactics are very rigid, they can only attack from the front and the cooperation between infantry and tanks is very poor. The Finnish army has invented many local methods, digging traps, covering iron chains with snow, and after the wheels of Soviet tanks are rolled into the iron chains, they are rolled again. If you don’t break it, you will be stuck lying on the road.
The Soviet tanks were paralyzed and blocked the road, and the late infantrymen behind were blocked in groups, which became the living targets of the Finnish defenders, which caused great casualties to the Soviet army. The Finnish soldiers came from the local people and were familiar with the local environment in winter. Everyone was equipped with skis, moved quickly, and was invisible. They opened fire on the Soviet army from this direction for a while, and then came out of another place in a daze, bullets. It flew towards the Soviet army from the other direction and beat the Russians to the point of wailing.
So contrary to Stalin’s surprise, the Soviet offensive in several directions was quickly blocked. Before the end of 1939, the three waves of Soviet offensives on the Karelian Isthmus had been thwarted, troops were lost in several directions, and the military planners had to be adjusted.
In February 1940, the Soviet army made a breakthrough on the west side of the isthmus, but the mainline of defense on the east side of the isthmus was not completely broken until the end of the war. The biggest obstacle for Finland is not the lack of manpower, but the lack of ammunition, especially heavy weapons.
Before the war, 122mm caliber artillery shells had only more than 40,000 rounds in stock, and 150mm caliber shells only had 6,000 rounds, which were quickly exhausted and lacked heavy weapons. Finland is very similar to today’s Ukraine. Sweden, which is backed by Finland, did not want to offend the Soviet Union and get involved in the war, so it never opened its borders, allowing British and French supplies to be transported to Finland through its territory.
In the Winter War of 1939, the Soviet Union won a tragic victory. It was very embarrassing and ugly. Although it was a victory, it was beaten to the point of being bruised, and almost losing the Soviet arsenal. Stalin saw that this battle could no longer be fought, so he closed it when he saw it. Thus, the map was revised. The Soviet Union obtained the Karelian Isthmus and some islands, and it was enough to reach the safe space required by Leningrad. It was impossible to conquer the whole of Finland as a victorious country. This battle also allowed Hitler to see the strength of the Soviet giants.
The 1939 Soviet-Finnish Winter War is only a small branch of the Second World War. Our audiences and I also know relatively little about it. However, there are various angles to analyze it. A large number of commanders were executed, and the Soviet army’s battlefield command ability was greatly reduced. The main purpose of this article is not to talk about this war, so this part will be omitted here.
Ukraine’s Today: the Advantage of International Sanctions on Russia than the former Soviet
The impact of international sanctions on the Soviet Union in 1939 was very slight. The Soviet Union was already isolated and the volume of international trade was very small trade, investment, and financial sanctions affect Russia today.
In 1939, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was in full swing, and there was no domestic opposition force; today Russia is a semi-democratic country, and there are mature anti-Putin forces in the country. On February 24, many cities such as St. Petersburg held large-scale anti-Putin and anti-war demonstrations.
After the epidemic, the Russian people do not want to fight, especially for a long time, to be sanctioned. And Ukraine is bigger than Finland, its depth is great. It’s just that Kyiv is close to the Belarusian border, and it is easy for the Russian army to pass through Belarus to the city of Kyiv. If Ukraine is fully prepared in advance, the Russian army will occupy Kyiv and the Ukrainian government will be transferred to the capital, and there are still conditions to persist in the war of resistance. In addition, although Ukraine currently receives less military assistance, it is more than Finland in 1939. Although the Ukrainian army is weak, its strength is still stronger than that of Finland in 1939.
Russia, one thing in common with 1939 is that the inner circle of the leadership is too single-minded and not diverse enough, and intelligence officials have too much influence on the final decision. During Stalin’s purge, he relied heavily on the secret police system, and officials in the intelligence circle had a great influence on his decisions; the same is true of Putin today. In this way, it is not easy for them to listen and hear different voices. For example, the analysis of the situation by officials in the economic field, the voices of the diplomatic system, and the views of the military grassroots on the situation. If these voices do not reach their ears, it is easy to misjudge the situation.
In brief, the situation is changing rapidly, and I am currently sharing my views on what I learned until this weekend, and we wait to see how the situation going on. Then to see whether the International Sanction can be worked to help Ukraine get out of the trouble. God bless Ukraine, and we pray for peace all over the world.
