The Battle Ahead

"The battle for Donbas will remind you of the Second World War," according to Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine's foreign minister, quoted in Financial Times.

Ukrainian troops are dug in with a network of trenches that is reminiscent of World War I.

The NY Times reports:

Analysts predict Russian troops, refocusing on the east after being thwarted in the capital, will carry out a major offensive stretching from Dnipro to Izium, a city almost 150 miles northeast [sic; it's NNW of Dnipro] where fighting has already been heavy, U.S. officials said Sunday. Satellite images showed hundreds of military vehicles moving through the town of Velykyi Burluk toward Izium on Friday.

This area is mostly flat, open land, and will not be conducive to the guerilla tactics that served the Ukrainians so well around Kiev. The sooner they get enormous supplies of heavy equipment, the better.

Two maps that tell the story:

Source: Institute for the Study of War

Source: The New York Times

Click on the maps for a larger view.

The Russian Invasion

Here's something that caught my eye:

From the Financial Times:

A difference of 3mm encapsulates the challenges the west faces as it works out how to supply the weapons that Ukraine needs to hold off, or even repel, Russian forces during the next phase of the war: the looming battle for the Donbas. 

The list of weapons that Ukraine wants includes more long-range artillery to target the Russian positions that have been shelling its cities during six weeks of heavy fighting. However, most Nato countries’ heavy artillery has a 155mm calibre while Ukraine, as part of its Soviet legacy, uses 152mm. 

 “The Ukrainians are running out of 152mm ammunition. Where are they going to get it?” asked Chris Donnelly, an adviser to four former Nato secretaries-general on the Soviet and Russian military. “No one in the west uses it or makes it apart from the Serbs — and they’re on Russia’s side.” 

Looking for more detailed accounts of the military action in Ukraine than you can find in the New York Times or Washington Post?  The best I've found so far (and it's plenty for me) is Critical Threats, a website of the Institute for the Study of War. Critical Threats offers reliable reports and assessments of military activity in Ukraine. It is often used as a source by the Financial Times and the newspapers above.

The map below is from Critical Threats.

 

Timidity?

Back on March 15 we fully expected MiG fighter planes to be delivered to Ukraine for their use in providing air cover. But despite an offer by Poland to furnish the planes, they have not been delivered – apparently from fear that providing the planes, rather than the complications of delivering them, would involve NATO in the fighting.

Which is something I don't really understand.

During World War II, America provided military planes to Great Britain while we were still a neutral country.

In fact, the United States sent tanks to Russia while we were still a neutral country.

We should point this out as the planes and tanks cross the border into Ukraine.