Despite not being in full time employment I don’t seem to have blogged for far too long. Plenty to opine on though so here we go.
Let’s start with Ukraine and Russia. It’s clear that the Russian Army is, effectively, finished. The pre 24th February professional contract core is gone, dead, wounded or captured with the remnants unwilling to fight. They are so desperate that the training battalions and one off experimental tanks have been thrown in to the fray to no avail. So the ‘partial mobilisation’ isn’t going to change the dynamic. A modern army has about 30% actual combat troops out of the total strength and these were the troops used at the beginning of the invasion. They’re gone. Replacing them with old, unfit, inadequately trained reservists isn’t going to cut it. Assuming you have any specialist tank troops in the reserves, what have you got for them to use? T64 or T62’s? against T72’s or, so rumour has it, M1 Abrams? So why mobilise? I don’t think Mad Vlad had any option and this was a sop to his ultra nationalists (who he promptly pissed off by releasing the Azov POWs as well) The fake referenda to bring the occupied territories into Russia is, I think, more red meat for the ultras and the nuclear threats are a tactic of desperation to try to get the West to back off on the weapons supply. I don’t think he’ll try to go nuclear but I see the following scenarios if he does: 1) He uses a small tactical device in Ukraine to halt an Ukrainian advance. It works and stops the advance. At which point, as far as Ukraine (and the West/NATO) is concerned, the gloves come off. Ukraine has so far refrained from attacking directly into Russian territory bar a bit of supply chain attacking. That could change and the consequences if Ukraine starts seriously HIMARSing Belgorod won’t be brilliant for Putin. 2) He gives the order but it isn’t obeyed and he is then deposed because otherwise he will kill the generals who refused to obey. 3) He gives the order but the device doesn’t work, the consequences are the same then as for 1). Any nuclear use potentially invites conventional &/or nuclear attack from NATO. So what happens next? I think the Ukrainians will consolidate their gains and push on. I don’t think that the Russian Army can stop them. If Kherson falls then I can’t see Putin regaining control of the narrative and I have doubts whether he has enough force to ride out domestic unrest. As to how long all this takes I have no idea.
Next let’s have a look at the new Prime Minister Liz Truss; To be clear, I don’t think Boris Johnson needed to go but go he did. I think Truss was the best of the replacements, I think the brightest of the leadership candidates. The Left and the Blob seem to be making the same mistake as they made with Johnson in assuming Truss is a lightweight and just using the standard ‘Evil Tories’ mantra. Well, it’s the most diverse Cabinet in UK history and appears to have plenty of talent in it. Certainley more so than the Labour Front Bench seems to. Much shocked surprise when they’ve come out strong with a pretty radical mini budget. After the commentariat effectively forced Johnson out it was obvious that they would then direct their fire on Truss so they had nothing to lose and everything to gain. Not impressed at how ‘the blob’ got rid of Truss either. It appears that the bond markets didn’t like trhe Truss/Kwarteng budget and the pension funds had all signed up to dodgy hedged deals based, if memory serves me, on bond yields and the Bank of England promptly then uncut her. So much for democracy eh? Let’s just parachute Sunak in as he’s more to the Establishment taste. Shoot the fucking lot of ’em I say. Bastards.
Well, it’s now Easter 2023 so let’s checkpoint where we are. No positive gains for Russia since September, some minor gains in Bakhmut at a horrendous cost in manpower and kit and the 300,000 mobilised troops seem to have been wasted. One of their most elite formations, 1st Guards Tank Army is reported to be using T62/T64 tanks. They appear to be sending T55 tanks to the front. The attack on Ukraine’s infrastructure seems to have run out of missiles and has not achieved the desired effect. Russia is frantically digging in on the approaches to and in Crimea. Prigozin and Wagner are moaning that they are not being supplied with artillery ammunition. They claim they are being discriminated against which is possible. It’s equally possible that there simply isn’t enough to spare. However, I can’t see any way that they can make any gains, in fact, it’s looking like it would be a massive achievement just to hold the Ukrainians. Time will tell.
To other matters, to wit the precipitous fall of Nicola Sturgeon. I thought a while back (OK, a long while back) that she had run out of road and I was correct. Had she departed say a year ago she would have left with an intact legacy, such as it was and possibly wouldn’t have got her collar felt by the McPlod. As it is the perception that they were untouchable, that the ‘normal’ rules didn’t apply to them and they could do just as they pleased (they/them refers to her & Peter Murrell) as they would skate any problems exactly as had happened many times in the past. Welcome to the real world.
Time to post this and start another methinks.