Ukraine has become a “meat grinder” for top Russian officials since the invasion began, according to a report in The Daily Beast, suggesting that President Vladimir Putin’s war effort in Ukraine is winding down.
According to this report, Russia has lost at least 100 senior officers since the invasion of Ukraine, and three senior Russian officers have been killed in the past two days alone.
A British intelligence analysis released this week suggests that at least 10 Russian generals have been killed on the battlefield since February.
According to Glenn Howard, president of the Jamestown Foundation, nearly six months after the war, Russian forces continue to be mismanaged at home and abroad.
Howard, who used to work at the US Embassy in Moscow, says it was because of their careless leadership in the war.
Putin has fired many generals and army chiefs in an effort to find a suitable approach to the war in Ukraine.
“Putin is certainly adopting a strategy of trying to find a successful combat general. Fortunately for us, he has yet to find one,” the report quoted Howard as saying.
From the beginning of the war, the Russian military struggled to achieve key objectives. Russian forces failed to capture the capital city of Kyiv in the early days of the war, and instead struggled outside the capital due to a series of logistical failures.
The report notes that Putin intended to install a Moscow-backed regime in Ukraine and take control of the entire country, but this did not happen.
According to British intelligence, Russian military defeats in the war may have led to a series of dismissals of Russian leadership.
The intelligence report noted that “the poor performance of the Russian armed forces during their invasion of Ukraine cost the Russian military leadership, which is likely to lead to the dismissal of at least six Russian commanders since the start of the conflict in February 2022.”
According to the report, the heavy losses suffered by Russia could put more pressure on Putin, which could force him to back down or start mobilizing more.
Although Russian forces attempted to recover from their early defeats in the war through a series of reorganizations and changes in approach, the forces and leadership continued to suffer costs.
According to Monday’s assessment by the US Department of Defense, Russia has lost between 70,000 and 80,000 soldiers since February.
With so many Russians killed, Howard described it as a meat grinder in progress.
The report concludes that the number of deaths and expulsions in the ranks of the Russian military does not necessarily mean the end of the war or the loss of Russia, and that it depends on the political decisions that Vladimir Putin will make in the end. .
Source: Lebanon Debate
