Exactly! Half of my ancestors lived near Odessa and I have been following events in Russia/Ukraine for over 20 years. I want to point out some key indicators that Kiev is obviously losing the war that anti-Russia propagandists will never admit to:
The most significant is that Ukrainian military losses are vastly higher than what Kiev is admitting to, anywhere from five to ten+ times that of Russian losses. This is due to Russia’s vast superiority in artillery and aviation. This superiority comes from Russia’s much better organized military industrial complex (which can actually outproduce the entire West) and its almost unlimited natural resources.
The Russian military is not launching any large scale offensives and, in fact, is very happy to continue its primarily defensive ‘war of attrition’ strategy (where it utilizes its vast firepower superiority to grind down the Ukrainian military until there will be practically nothing left).
Despite not launching any major offensives, Russia’s primarily defensive campaign (with small, limited offensive operations) has still successfully broken through Kiev’s lines on many different parts of the front over the past eight months. In fact, during this time Russian forces have actually liberated around 65 settlements, including two notable cities in the Donetsk People’s Republic (Marinka and Avdeyevka).
During the entire time of Russia’s military operations since late February of 2022, only 300,000 people in the Russian Federation were ‘drafted’ or mobilized, all of which were actually military reservists. By comparison, during that same time, something like 500,000 to 600,000 people also volunteered to join the Russian military (i.e. far more volunteered than were drafted). Meanwhile, Kiev brutally conscripts any man (even the disabled) that it can kidnap and drag off the streets into dirty old vans. Ukrainian men have been frantically fleeing the country for their lives for over two years now and continue to do so.
Russian forces continue obliterating all of Kiev’s military equipment, including “top” Western military equipment (like Leopard 2 tanks, M1A1 Abrams tanks, M109 self-propelled howitzers, M777 howitzers, “HIMARS” launchers, and even Patriot launchers).
Last, but not least, is that Russia’s population is far larger than that of the territory controlled by Kiev. Simply put, it’s only a matter of time until Kiev runs out of men and the whole thing will be over at that point.
This superiority comes from Russia’s much better organized military industrial complex (which can actually outproduce the entire West) and its almost unlimited natural resources.
Is it an MIC in Russia? Or do they retain state ownership of any of it? I am not familiar with who owns their weapons production and so on.
That’s a good question. The Russian Federation’s military industrial complex is primarily state-owned and state-directed. Note, by “military industrial complex” I am referring to Russia’s military related manufacturing companies collectively. As a socialist, I certainly believe that the primary role of state-ownership of these companies makes their production significantly more efficient than, say, the United States’ bloated and corrupt, totally private military industrial complex that endlessly fleeces US taxpayers.
When analyzing the sum of direct and indirect state-owned shares, the state’s ownership in the nuclear power industry, airports, diamond mining, and the military-industrial complex exceeded 70% without accounting for industries represented by a small number of companies in the sample. Therefore, we identified industries with significant state ownership and significant dispersion among its stakes.
It’s not a “military-industrial complex” if there isn’t a bunch of profiteers actively trying to seek war to fill their pockets is there? At least that was my understanding of the phrase, perhaps I have been using it incorrectly this whole time and just lucked out in fitting my conversations anyway.
On the face of it, the term is rather neutral and does not appear to necesitate the existence of war profiteers. Connotations of words often don’t propagate across cultural lines.
A good summary. I think the key factor is that Russia has massive artillery superiority along with the ability to produce shells in the necessary quantities. Something like 80% of the casualties come from artillery fire, so that’s clearly by far the most dominant factor in the whole war.
It’s also worth noting that Ukraine is forced to act very predictably because they have to worry about media perception. This allows Russia to draw Ukraine into cauldrons like Artemovsk, Avidevka, and Volchansk, where Ukraine has no choice but to keep feeding its best forces into losing battles.
I expect that the war will end with the collapse of the Ukrainian army. As motivated and trained people become increasingly replaced with conscripts who have no interest in fighting, the professional core of the army becomes eroded. Eventually there will be an inflection point where there just aren’t enough professional soldiers to hold the whole thing together, and the collapse will be very rapid once that point is reached.
Exactly! Half of my ancestors lived near Odessa and I have been following events in Russia/Ukraine for over 20 years. I want to point out some key indicators that Kiev is obviously losing the war that anti-Russia propagandists will never admit to:
The most significant is that Ukrainian military losses are vastly higher than what Kiev is admitting to, anywhere from five to ten+ times that of Russian losses. This is due to Russia’s vast superiority in artillery and aviation. This superiority comes from Russia’s much better organized military industrial complex (which can actually outproduce the entire West) and its almost unlimited natural resources.
The Russian military is not launching any large scale offensives and, in fact, is very happy to continue its primarily defensive ‘war of attrition’ strategy (where it utilizes its vast firepower superiority to grind down the Ukrainian military until there will be practically nothing left).
Despite not launching any major offensives, Russia’s primarily defensive campaign (with small, limited offensive operations) has still successfully broken through Kiev’s lines on many different parts of the front over the past eight months. In fact, during this time Russian forces have actually liberated around 65 settlements, including two notable cities in the Donetsk People’s Republic (Marinka and Avdeyevka).
During the entire time of Russia’s military operations since late February of 2022, only 300,000 people in the Russian Federation were ‘drafted’ or mobilized, all of which were actually military reservists. By comparison, during that same time, something like 500,000 to 600,000 people also volunteered to join the Russian military (i.e. far more volunteered than were drafted). Meanwhile, Kiev brutally conscripts any man (even the disabled) that it can kidnap and drag off the streets into dirty old vans. Ukrainian men have been frantically fleeing the country for their lives for over two years now and continue to do so.
Russian forces continue obliterating all of Kiev’s military equipment, including “top” Western military equipment (like Leopard 2 tanks, M1A1 Abrams tanks, M109 self-propelled howitzers, M777 howitzers, “HIMARS” launchers, and even Patriot launchers).
Last, but not least, is that Russia’s population is far larger than that of the territory controlled by Kiev. Simply put, it’s only a matter of time until Kiev runs out of men and the whole thing will be over at that point.
Is it an MIC in Russia? Or do they retain state ownership of any of it? I am not familiar with who owns their weapons production and so on.
That’s a good question. The Russian Federation’s military industrial complex is primarily state-owned and state-directed. Note, by “military industrial complex” I am referring to Russia’s military related manufacturing companies collectively. As a socialist, I certainly believe that the primary role of state-ownership of these companies makes their production significantly more efficient than, say, the United States’ bloated and corrupt, totally private military industrial complex that endlessly fleeces US taxpayers.
https://rujec.org/article/27978/ 2017 published in the Russian Journal of Economics
Huh that’s a weird way to phrase it.
It’s not a “military-industrial complex” if there isn’t a bunch of profiteers actively trying to seek war to fill their pockets is there? At least that was my understanding of the phrase, perhaps I have been using it incorrectly this whole time and just lucked out in fitting my conversations anyway.
Anyway that’s a relatively good number to have.
On the face of it, the term is rather neutral and does not appear to necesitate the existence of war profiteers. Connotations of words often don’t propagate across cultural lines.
A good summary. I think the key factor is that Russia has massive artillery superiority along with the ability to produce shells in the necessary quantities. Something like 80% of the casualties come from artillery fire, so that’s clearly by far the most dominant factor in the whole war.
It’s also worth noting that Ukraine is forced to act very predictably because they have to worry about media perception. This allows Russia to draw Ukraine into cauldrons like Artemovsk, Avidevka, and Volchansk, where Ukraine has no choice but to keep feeding its best forces into losing battles.
I expect that the war will end with the collapse of the Ukrainian army. As motivated and trained people become increasingly replaced with conscripts who have no interest in fighting, the professional core of the army becomes eroded. Eventually there will be an inflection point where there just aren’t enough professional soldiers to hold the whole thing together, and the collapse will be very rapid once that point is reached.