My Saturday report from the Ukrainian front(s)
Our Ukrainian friend is here again for Brunch.
Keep in mind this is definitely a one-sided report. Our friend is a Ukrainian patriot through and through, and both he and his wife still have family in-country. Also, remember that our friend served with the Soviet Army in Afghanistan, and is familiar with the different ways in which the two armies are organized.
He noted that even the western media have picked up on the fact that several Russian Generals have been killed on the battlefield. He says that the Ukrainian army's generals are not sent into the field, as they don't get to be generals until they are adept at planning and strategy. They are needed at the central command, not in the field. He said the Russian tactic of sending generals into the field is a tactic from World War II, when their needs and objectives were very different. Here, the Russians are the attackers, not the defenders.
He also noted with some puzzlement the western attention being focused on Zelensky. As he (and I) metioned before, in other posts, the Russians focus on the personalty cult of their "fearless leader," where the Ukrainians focus of cause and country. He noted that if Putin were to disappear tomorrow, the country's domestic and foreign policy would be in total disarray. If Zelensky were to disappear tomorrow, nothing in their loves would change much.
In the field, there have been the following developments: Russian fighter/bomber jets that have been fatally hit by anti-aircraft fire have ejector seats, as do all such planes. However, curiously, in the past week, the parachutes of three pilots that ejected failed to open. He said that even one such instance is an incident worthy of note. He said that two in a week practically defies belief. Three in a week (as with last week) went beyond being able to be explained as a accident. Russia doesn't want its pilots talking. Period. Not about what they were told is their mission, what their orders were, or what they even knew about what they had been told to do. In the Ukraine, itself, word is getting around that Russia is sabotaging the parachutes of its fighter planes to make sure that any pilot ejecting will never talk. That is certainly one way to do it. But there is no doubt in Ukrainian minds (probably Russian minds, either) that Putin is ruthless enough to prefer dead pilots to talking pilots. This, on the other hand, gives pilots with non-lethal engine trouble a huge incentive to land on a Ukrainian-controlled airfield, hand over their orders, their planes, and themselves. It certainly beats hitting the ground at an accumulated 32 feet per second per second from several thousand feet up.
Russian tank convoys have been traveling mostly on long straight lines. Maybe the roads don't permit anything else, but now that the Ukrainians have received some serious anti-tank weapons, they have been adept at stopping some of these tank columns with the simple tactic of lying in wait for them, taking out the first and last tanks in the column, thus immobilizing forward and backward movement, and then picking off the rest of them. They have to do this at a dangerously (to them) close range, so it has to be done quickly and efficiently. The tanks are lethal at close range unless disabled before they can focus on their attackers.
It has to be noted these are reports of battles won, not the war. Plus, the stories that the Ukrainians send to their friends in Germany, will naturally be stories of Russian cruelty and Ukrainian successes. He will not dwell on the suffering of civilian populations or setbacks that any Ukrainian unit may suffer. Still, their morale is high, and they are determined to fight. They know the Russian public is being fed BS news because they let Russian soldiers call home, and hear what the families say to their sons. Some families are relieved, but some say "how could bring this shame on us?" The propaganda is so pervasive, that one poor kid, when he described surviving after the rest of his unit was a gruesome collection of body parts, got a nasty "well, then why are YOU still alive?" from his family on the phone.If enough of these stories filter down to the ranks, Putin will be looking at some serious defections before long. Orders will filter down, and executions of Russians by Russians will be a daily experience.
= new reply since forum marked as read
Ty for this update! 
Depends on the overall morale - and it seems conscripted Russian troops' morale is falling.
This anecdotal evidence above bears this out.
Putin is in trouble as ABC is reporting the loss ration at an astounding 20% KWM. The conscripts are perhaps ready to break. His arrest of 8 Generals and other members of Russian leadership can be seen as an attempt to forestall the mutiny.
Keep it up Ukraine - you are holding on so far, in fact doing better then that.
My guess.
As as fascinating. The thing about failed ejector seats via sabotaging per Putin's orders is indeed almost beyond belief, except if one understands the mind of a psychopath as a Commander in Chief. Which I do not, except to know they are vicious, diabolical, cruel, and unpredictable on the one hand, and totally predictable on the other. Predictable in general terms (end game/strategy) unpredictable in specifics. (tactics). And Desperate to "win" at ALL COST.
That particular point has me in a state of great angst.
I find myself barely "checking in" briefly to events in the early morning, but tuning it all out for the rest of the day. I don't think I could get any sleep otherwise. Which is a problem for me generally.
Again thank you and l look forward to reading more of your reports. It's helpful and gives me hope.
I am so grateful I have pressing music commitments to turn my attention and energy to...
Enjoy family and friends and will look for ya in a few weeks.
Stay well.
A lot of interesting food for thought.
I guess the western fascination with Zelenskyy stems from the fact that the US offered to get him out of Ukraine a few weeks ago. Zelenskyy said no, he's staying there and he's fighting along with his countrymen. Well there's a good chance that he could die, but he refuses to run away. We find that courage admirable and heroic, even sort of John Wayne-ish. Maybe the Ukrainians aren't seeing the broadcasts that he's sending out to the rest of the world, so they don't realize it. There's plenty of heroism to go around in Ukraine.
I have no doubts that Ukrainian civilians are suffering horribly, and we're not hearing so much about it. Geneva Convention rules don't mean anything to the Russians. I'm sure they become ruthless bullies when they have the chance to harm unarmed citizens.
As far as the Russian soldiers defecting, I don't find it the least bit surprising. They should all defect when they get the chance. A lot of them were given poorly-made equipment and are untrained, with low-quality provisions. How can they continue in their loyalty to Putin after this awful mess? The fact that the Ukrainians and Russians speak (almost) the same language makes it easier to convince the Russian soldiers they're on the wrong side of this war. Even more true for the Russian pilots, if they already understand there's no way out of this alive.
defined or not, with leaders mostly means to those ends.
Authoritarians, though, whoa! Horrible collection of traits that can become dangerous in mobs and the hands of bad leaders. I never read about the way their minds work without thanking gene pools and random couplings for at least saving me from that. Or read about some nation behaving really badly without knowing hard-core conservatives with probably a lot of people like them have gotten control.
A friend of mine (half Ukrainian, come to think of it!) was about to flunk out of college (a little lazy, not stupid) and get drafted (Vietnam era), so he enlisted in the air force, and told them he spoke German and Russian (well, close anyway 
). They swallowed it and sent him to Spy School in Syracuse, NY. When he was dubbed "spy-proficient," he was sent to West Berlin, stuck in a secret listening installment, and told to monitor Soviet air force radio communications and write down word for word, in Russian, what was said.
One time, the Soviet air force had made some new fighter plane, and wanted to show it off their socialist brothers in East Germany (as if the East Germans had a choice). So, the pilot was told to take off from an airfield in Poland and fly the plane over to an airfield in East Germany. My friend was writing down all communications word for word, as was his job. The Russian pilot took off, and when he was near the East German air base, he flew over it to check out the landing strip. He noticed that the landing strip was much too short, and that he would crash at the far end of the strip if he tried to land there. He radioed to his superiors on teh ground that he couldn't safely land there. The ground officers were pissed since they wanted to show off their new plane. They ordered him to land anyway, and just be careful. He yelled back through the radio, "fuck your mother, I can't land there! The strip is too short and I could die, so I'm flying back to Poland!" which he then did. Since my friend's orders were to write down word for word what was said, he dutifully wrote down "fuck your mother (a common Russian curse), I can't land there...." etc.
Some Russian-speaking Air Force defense analyst must have had a hard time keeping a straight face when he read THAT report.
