THIS MAY BE RUSSIA’S LAST WAR
How the Tide Has Turned in Ukraine
The End of the Russian Empire
Until now, Ukraine has been fighting a bloody war against a numerically superior enemy with one hand tied behind its back. Despite the odds, it has done better than anyone (including me) expected. Ukraine’s offensive of last summer failed without air support. An overwhelming imbalance in artillery and artillery shells has pummeled Ukraine’s forces on the ground. Yet the “quick victory” promised to Russian soldiers in 2022 has transformed into a war of attrition, with wave after wave of Russian soldiers thrown into a meat-grinder of Ukrainian positions. The front has remained relatively static. Russia’s success in Kharkiv has proven short-lived, and now pockets of Russian soldiers are surrounded, surrendering to Ukrainian forces. “The entire 83rd Airborne Brigade is urgently withdrawn to the rear to restore combat capability,” one observer notes. “There are too many casualties, they can’t fight, there are too many 500s.”
In Russian military parlance, a “code 500” is a soldier who refuses to fight.
The survivors of an entire battalion — that’s hundreds of troops — have been trapped in a chemical plant in central Vovchansk for two weeks, while the Ukrainians have been reducing it to rubble. UK military intelligence has put the…
