Not included in this image is a comparison of the size of Naval and Air forces. At the start of the war in February, Ukraine had 112 combat aircraft. Russia, by contrast, had 1558. In other words, 14 times the size of the Ukrainian Air Force. The same for transport aircraft and helicopters. With respect to helicopters, Ukraine fielded 15 MI-8s while the Russian rotary wing fleet counted 1397. Advantage Russia by a factor of 93 times.
What about the Navy:
As of 2022, the Ukrainian navy had 15,000 personnel, including 6,000 naval infantry. . . and four surface vessels.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_Navy
Russia has three main fleets–the Black Sea, the Baltic Sea and the Northern Fleet
In the Black Sea alone, Russia grossly outnumbers Ukraine’s nominal presence:
- Admiral Grigorovich-class frigate (3)
- Burevestnik (Krivak)-class frigate (2)
- Steregushchiy-class multi-role corvette (1 on sea trials in the Baltic)
- Buyan-M-class corvette (4)
- Karakurt-class corvette (1 on sea trials)
- Bykov-class corvette/offshore patrol ship (4)
- Tarantul-class corvette (4)
- Bora-class corvette (2)
- Grisha-class corvette (6)
- Kilo-class submarine (1)
- Improved Kilo-class submarine (6)
Why belabor the point? On what basis did anyone in Ukraine, the United States or NATO indulge the fantasy that Ukraine had a snowballs chance in the fiery realms of Hell of matching up with Russia?
As of today, Russia claims to have destroyed the following equipment deployed by Ukraine since February 24:
- 290 airplanes
- 152 helicopters
- 1,889 drones
- 373 anti-aircraft missile systems
- 4845 tanks
- 825 multiple rocker launchers
- 3,369 field artillery and mortars
- 5,343 special military automotve equipment
This means that Russia not only has destroyed Ukraine’s stockpiles that existed at the start of the war, but it is eliminating planes, tanks and MRLS systems subsequently provided by NATO and the United States.
Has Ukraine destroyed some Russian aircraft, helicopters, tanks and armored vehicles? Yes. But so what. Russian losses are only a minuscule fraction of their total strength and Russia, unlike Ukraine, has factories that are continuing to produce equipment and weapons lost or expended during the course of this conflict.
So with these numbers in mind, carefully consider what is happening to Ukraine’s military force in its current offensive. It is being decimated. Capturing a rural village or two or pushing the Donetsk or Luhansk militias backwards a few kilometers is tactically insignificant.
The truth of the matter is that Russia is relying on the Donbas militias to do the bulk of the front line fighting because it is home for those militias. Claims that the Russian military has suffered major casualties is delusional because the Russian forces are in the rear and providing fire support–ground and air–to the Donbas militias. Yes, there are some Russian troops on the frontlines in some places, but the cold, hard fact is that Russia has not committed a significant portion of its total military forces to the battle. Not yet, anyway.
The reality, which the United States and NATO are loathe to accept, is that Russia’s defeat of the Ukrainian military is inevitable; even if the United States or NATO made the suicidal decision to send their own forces into the fray.
If you are looking for a great summary of the military situation facing Ukraine, take time to read the recent lengthy interview with Swiss Army Colonel Jacques Baud. Here is a snippet to whet your appetite:
The aim of this book is to show how the misinformation propagated by our media has contributed to push Ukraine in the wrong direction. I wrote it under the motto “from the way we understand crises derives the way we solve them.”
By hiding many aspects of this conflict, the Western media has presented us with a caricatural and artificial image of the situation, which has resulted in the polarization of minds. This has led to a widespread mindset that makes any attempt to negotiate virtually impossible.
The one-sided and biased representation provided by mainstream media is not intended to help us solve the problem, but to promote hatred of Russia. Thus, the exclusion of disabled athletes, cats, even Russian trees from competitions, the dismissal of conductors, the de-platforming of Russian artists, such as Dostoyevsky, or even the renaming of paintings aims at excluding the Russian population from society! In France, bank accounts of individuals with Russian-sounding names were even blocked. Social networks Facebook and Twitter have systematically blocked the disclosure of Ukrainian crimes under the pretext of “hate speech” but allow the call for violence against Russians.
None of these actions had any effect on the conflict, except to stimulate hatred and violence against the Russians in our countries. This manipulation is so bad that we would rather see Ukrainians die than to seek a diplomatic solution. As Republican Senator Lindsey Graham recently said, it is a matter of letting the Ukrainians fight to the last man.
The post Ukraine and Russia – It Is A Math Problem appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.
