Notes

Will Ukraine War End in 2024? Experts Weigh In
The problems could extend beyond Ukraine, he said, arguing that Europe could face another wave of immigrants from African and Middle Eastern countries previously reliant on grain exports from Ukraine if the war continued to disrupt maritime exports. The statements suggest the west believes Ukraine cannot achieve a rapid military breakthrough despite the anticipated arrival of fresh Nato-standard arms, while officials in the country have continued to call for rapid help. All of this, of course, assumes that Russia’s war doesn’t escalate beyond Ukraine. One concern is it could yet extend to other post-Soviet countries such as Moldova and Georgia, both of which, like Ukraine, have Russian-backed breakaway regions within their respective territories. The other, perhaps greater, risk is that Russian aggression could spread even farther afield, to the Baltics, which would not only draw NATO into a potential conflict, but also fundamentally threaten the post–Cold War order.


Earlier today, a Russian official said air defences had thwarted a drone attack on the Slavneft-YANOS oil refinery in the city of Yaroslavl. Hein Goemans So, well, that’s interesting, particularly in the context of your earlier question. What are the reasons why Putin keeps fighting and why he can be hopeful and think that he might pull it off in the long run is because he thinks that the west will crumble. So the more people who say let go, we should negotiate now, the long-term is favourable to Russia, the more Putin can hope that the west will in the end fail to support Ukraine. And if that happens, then Ukraine will lose on the battlefield.

About Sky News
“The united Western alliance which supports Ukraine in this war is getting less united and cohesive all the time. https://www.openlearning.com/u/michaelsenbishop-s2dhzs/blog/KirillRogovOnWhatRussiansReallyThinkOfTheWarInUkraine012 change the narrative, and the discussion on the need for a ceasefire and negotiations has started,” he said. “After failing to enter Kyiv and the strategic redeployment of the Russian forces and putting the centre of gravity to eastern Ukraine, the Russians generals decided to go slowly but firmly,” Konstantinos Loukopoulos, a former Greek and NATO lieutenant-general, told Al Jazeera. Thousands of troops have died, billions of dollars in military hardware wasted and entire cities subjected to relentless bombardment – and more than four months on, Russia’s fierce military campaign in Ukraine continues unabated.


But is one of the complications here that in the nuclear age, that’s just not possible. To indicate which parts of Ukraine are under control by Russian troops we are using daily assessments published by the Institute for the Study of War with the American Enterprise Institute's Critical Threats Project. To show key areas where advances are taking place we are also using updates from the UK Ministry of Defence and BBC research.

Putinology: the art of analyzing the man in the Kremlin
But it may not be implausible if the people who have benefited from Mr Putin no longer believe he can defend their interests. Earlier this month, its civil defence minister told a defence conference "there could be a war in Sweden". Carl-Oskar Bohlin asked the public "have you considered whether you have time to join a voluntary defence organisation? If not - get moving!" His remarks were backed up by the country's top military commander, who said Sweden should prepare itself mentally. After shifting its focus to Ukraine’s east, Russia has captured nearly all of the Luhansk province and is likely to continue its efforts until it takes the rest of the Donetsk province – together, these two areas make up the Donbas region.

Kyiv has reclaimed more than half of the land Russia had captured since the start of the war in February 2022 and grabbed headlines by liberating villages and towns in the south and east. The town is sometimes described as the gateway to the city of Donetsk, which has been occupied by Russia and its proxy forces since 2014. The vehicles carry the hope of enabling battlefield wins for Ukrainian forces that will lead to some kind of war-ending scenario — if the weapons arrive in time. The Ukrainian leadership knew very well that, according to established practice, today Ukrainian military personnel would be transported by military transport aircraft to the Belgorod airfield for exchange.
The plant, on the north-western outskirts of the town, dominates the main road into Avdiivka and, the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) believes if Russian forces were to secure it, resupplying the town would "become increasingly difficult for Ukraine". However, the ISW says Russia has made confirmed advances near the town and notes that several Russian sources claim its forces are trying to push Ukrainian troops out of positions in the Avdiivka Coke Plant, which occupies a key tactical position. The Ukrainian General Staff says its forces have repelled Russian attacks near Avdiivka itself, as well as from settlements to the north west, south west, and directly west of the town. Ukraine has continued ground operations on the eastern bank of the Dnipro River with heavy battles reported to be ongoing in the area around the village of Krynky, about 30km (19 miles) from the city of Kherson. It is almost two years since Russia's invasion but the situation on the ground has changed little in recent months - despite Ukraine's counter-offensive, which began in June.

Read more CNBC politics coverage
"Even if the costs are high, not only for military support, also because of rising energy and food prices." The West must prepare to continue supporting Ukraine in a war lasting for years, Nato's chief has warned. I wrote about this recently, noting that we're seeing air battles daily, but pilots are rarely involved.

Most analysts doubt this means their use is likely or imminent. Instead of the $61 billion he was asking for, he got a renewed pledge by President Joe Biden and a $200 million chunk of military assistance for air-defense interceptors, artillery and ammunition. The defence said Trepova too was a victim because, sitting only several metres from Tatarsky, she could herself have been killed or wounded.
I am still of the belief that while he’s pretty repressive and he’s switching more to a totalitarian state, he’s not there yet and he’s really literally at risk. Hein Goemans Well, as you say, they have the manpower base, so they can do a mobilisation. They had something like 15,000 tanks and now 2,000 of them are kind of gone now, but they can patch together another two, 3,000 tanks if they want to. And they get plenty of ammunition from the North Koreans or elsewhere. They can actually, you know, try to recreate trench warfare if they want to. And many countries have fought on in what looked like desperate situations for a long time, because they could motivate the people and because they thought there was some chance of realistic victory, even a very small one.

Earlier in the day, Russia accused Ukraine of downing the aircraft, and said 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war and nine Russians were killed. It also said that it monitored the launch points of missiles and their delivery logistics, especially through military aircraft, to reduce to threat of attack. While not admitting responsibility for shooting down the plane, the agency said the "Ukrainian side was not informed about the need to ensure the safety of the airspace in the area of the city of Belgorod in a certain period of time, as was repeatedly done in the past." "It is necessary to establish all clear facts. As much as possible, given that the plane crash happened on Russian territory - beyond our control," Zelenskyy said in his nightly address yesterday. Military investigators and forensic scientists are searching for metal structures, TASS reported.


24 territory as they can get, force Putin to the bargaining table, and then ultimately Ukraine would have to compromise somewhat on issues like Crimea and portions of the east and arrange for solid security guarantees going forward,” Smith told Defense News in a phone interview. “Even technologically advanced, wealthy states in the Middle East eventually reached a point where they’re lobbing missiles at civilian cities, openly using chemical weapons and fighting in waves — just people rushing across the field getting shot at,” Jensen said. And they said winning will depend on a Congress with the resolve to ensure continued support to Ukraine. But even then, the very concept of victory may be inaccurate, they warned.


And the future of the EU's economic aid is seemingly dependent on Hungary's incongruous stance. The prospects for an end of the war in Ukraine remain bleak. Compared with this time last year, Vladimir Putin is stronger, politically more than militarily. President Volodomyr Zelensky has admitted his country's spring offensive has not been the success he hoped. Cuts have already seen the size of the British Army fall from more than 100,000 in 2010 to around 73,000 now. Gen Sanders said that within the next three years the British Army needed to be 120,000 strong with the addition of reserves.


So there is no incentive or there’s no even belief or need or just there would be no sanity in the idea of decisively defeating Russia inside Russia. You have to defeat decisively the Russians in Ukraine to push them back. They want to take over entire Ukraine and perhaps even, being realistic about this, subsequently in Moldova and other parts of the former Russian empire, whether we’d be the Czarist or the Communist one.

Website: https://www.openlearning.com/u/michaelsenbishop-s2dhzs/blog/KirillRogovOnWhatRussiansReallyThinkOfTheWarInUkraine012