Russia Intensifies Offensive Action as Ukrainian Defence Lines Begin to Falter Under Pressure

The war in Ukraine is being fought at the same level of intensity for well over two years now as per the latest India news in Hindi and other sources that are following the war. For most folks in India and other parts of the world, it has become somewhat of a challenge to understand what really is going on at the battleground in Ukraine. That is because of the massive campaign of fake and false news about the war being carried out by the entire western mainstream media and most of the western digital media.

Russian President Vladimir Putin  Source: CNN

In matters of international news stories, Indian media outlets usually look up to the western media and that is the main reason why knowledge and awareness of the war in Ukraine is so poor in India.

The sheer scale and intensity of the war in Ukraine is something that most of us in India simply do not realize and oftentimes well-known media commentators make bizarre statements in this regard.

I have heard prominent commentators in India ask, “If Russia is such a great military power, why has it not been able to overrun Ukraine in over two years?”

Russia is in control of more than one-fifth of Ukrainian landmass according to the top 10 breaking news in India as well as other international sources of information.

A look back into the recent history of Russia-Ukraine ties

Ever since the disintegration of the predecessor of today’s Russian Federation, the Soviet Union, in late 1991 it took over 30 years of near capitulation to the US, struggle and humiliation for this nation to regain its self-esteem.

Disintegration of erstwhile Soviet Union in 1991  Source: StandardMediaKenya

Ukraine used to be a part of Russia for most of its history and around half the Ukrainian population is ethnically and linguistically connected to Russia if you go by the top 10 breaking news in India.

The US manipulated a regime change in Ukraine by orchestrating a mass protest against the elected government in 2014 and then began controlling the new rulers of this country by proxy.

Ever since then the US poured in tens of billions of dollars into Ukraine to turn it into a military powerhouse that could easily be counted as the strongest military force in Europe going by the latest India news in Hindi.

US strategy was to turn Ukraine into a NATO country, which would have meant that any attack on Ukraine by a non-NATO country including Russia would be considered an attack on the whole of NATO.

Why has Russia not been able to overrun Ukraine in two years?

Well, this is not merely a fight between the Russian giant and a much smaller Ukraine. It is a geo-strategic war between a post-Cold War Russia that has resurrected itself from defeat and the United States [US]-led North Atlantic Treaty Organization [NATO].

Russia Vs NATO  Source: TheInfographicsShow

It is an attritional war of the type not fought since the Korean War of the 1950s where both sides were quite evenly matched in their own ways as per the latest India news in Hindi.

In the two years of the war in Ukraine, this country has received western aid to the tune of over USD 170 billion, which equals two years of Russian defence budget!

Ukraine has been armed to the teeth precisely for the purpose of confronting and eventually fighting Russia and what we are witnessing today is the unfolding of this NATO plan.

This is a real war unlike the wars against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq or against Afghanistan under Taliban 1.0. These were at best, one-sided military exercises with small developing countries that were poorly armed and economically wrecked.

So, the Ukraine war is not something similar to US action in Iraq and Afghanistan and it is important to know that this war is quite different especially because of the scale and intensity at which it is being fought.

For Russia, stakes in this war are very high as it is an existential threat

As a military superpower, Russia has enormous stakes in ensuring that Ukraine is free from western influence and interference as it is right on Russia’s doorway so to say.

Ukraine is Russia’s Red Line for NATO Expansion  Source: @Royaards

History shows that Hitler’s invasion of Russia in 1941 during World War II had gone through the flat undulating plains of Ukraine. That campaign had achieved greater initial success as compared to Napoleon’s invasion of Russia in 1812, which did not go through Ukraine.   

Since the eastern half of Ukraine east of the Dnieper River is historically a Russian region, the main objective of Russia is to first occupy these lands and secure it for the ethnic Russians living there.

As per the latest India news in Hindi, by occupying over 20% of Ukraine in the country’s east, Russia has already achieved more than half of this objective.  

Today, the Russian armed forces are fighting through some of the heaviest fortified lines built by the Ukrainians with NATO assistance and resources. They are literally fighting through every little village and town along the battle frontline to move forward but they are slowly and steadily achieving it. According to many reliable experts and observers who are not part of the western propaganda brigade, the Russians are pursuing a definite strategy of continuously engaging the Ukrainians all along the battlefront. They are using their overwhelming strength in artillery and missile battery systems to inflict heavy damages on the Ukrainian army which is now woefully short of men and material to continue fighting at this intensity much longer.

AUTHOR: Dev Kumar is an independent geo-political observer, commentator and blogger who tries to look at international issues in relation to India and present a different dimension that has hardly been covered by mainstream experts.