07/4/2024 – Translated from Ukrainian via Google and OFP
Ukraine is solving the personnel problem in the army and forming several new brigades, but delays and insufficient supplies of weapons will most likely prevent it from equipping them all. Timely and appropriate
help from the West is, as before, a decisive factor that determines when and to what extent the Armed Forces will be able to seize the initiative at the front and conduct significant counteroffensive operations.
This was again pointed out by analysts of the Institute for the Study of War (ISW). They reminded that the aggressor country Russia will always be loyal to Putin’s idea of destroying Ukrainian statehood and identity.
Recently, in an interview with Bloomberg, the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, stated that the Ukrainian forces are in a better condition in terms of personnel than a few months ago. And the ability to carry out a future counteroffensive depends on equipping the brigades with heavy equipment and artillery.
According to him, the Armed Forces need ammunition more than manpower. He emphasized that military equipment is being delivered to the front for too long. Also reiterated his comments from early June 2024 about how the slow arrival of US security assistance is complicating Ukraine’s efforts to equip reserve brigades sufficiently to engage them in defense operations.
ISW drew attention to the fact that in recent months, the Ukrainian mass media regularly emphasized the lack of sufficient equipment to equip all new formations. Current reports suggest that Ukraine “will not be able to fully equip” all its future brigades without additional help from the West. The month-long delay in supplies “has deepened problems with Ukraine’s efforts to mobilize forces.”
Analysts believe that Ukraine’s ability to conduct operationally meaningful counteroffensive operations at a time of its choosing is critical to preventing a protracted war. After all, Russian dictator Putin’s “theory of victory” that Russia will be able to gradually move forward for an indefinite period of time will most likely encourage him to prolong hostilities and strengthen his commitment to the destruction of Ukrainian statehood.
“Putin is unlikely to change his calculations without Ukraine suffering further significant defeats at the hands of Russian forces. Therefore, it does not have the time and flexibility to wait for Western aid to equip new units. The longer Ukraine has to wait, the more opportunities the Russians will have forces to impede its efforts to concentrate idle combat power for future counteroffensives,” the ISW said.
They added that Western military aid will ease the pressure of the occupation forces of the Russian Federation on the front, and great confidence in what reserves of the Armed Forces will be available will allow Kyiv to start concretely planning counteroffensive actions.
“Western aid, which provides the Defense Forces with the necessary equipment and weapons on the scale, timing and regularity required for operations to liberate large areas of territory, remains the only likely way to reduce Putin’s current commitment to the destruction of Ukrainian statehood and identity,” the analysts stated.
As OBOZ.UA reported, military expert Mykola Sungurovskyi also emphasized that the events at the front largely depend on whether Ukraine will receive Western aid in the terms and in the amounts that were agreed upon. In his opinion, in the best case scenario, the Defense Forces will be able to seize the initiative and launch an offensive by the end of this year.
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It’s Groundhog Day, folks. Some things simply will never change. People are dying? So what!
It’s not only the lengthy process of getting the promised equipment and supplies to Ukraine, it’s also the continued restrictions on their use and flat out refusal to send certain items that is dragging this war out.
Sometimes I wish that the roach army would just bypass Ukraine and attack Europe directly so that they know what it’s like, since they seem to lack enough imagination to see the horrors of getting shelled, bombed, and have missiles and drones destroy their cities, bit-by-bit every day and night.
They worry about escalation but their dithering promotes and invites escalation, ironically. They should use the “Moskali only understand force, method.”
That’s what we’ve been saying all along. It baffles the sane mind that they don’t see it that way, despite massive evidence to its truth being available for 20 years.