Russian Troops Stung Again by Ukraine's Superior Strategic Action

"[The number of casualties is] in the several hundreds; [with a great number still missing, trapped under debris]."

"[Repeated complaints reached him that Russian troops in eastern Ukraine could be under a deadly attack] at any moment [stationed close to the front line, within the range of the HIMARS.]"

"Nearly all the military equipment, which stood close to the building without the slightest sign of camouflage, was also destroyed. There are still no final figures on the number of casualties, as many people are still missing." 

Igor Girkin, retired Russian official, Kremlin critic

"[Officials who ] allowed the concentration of military personnel in an unprotected building [and] all the  higher authorities who did not provide the proper level of security [must be subject to criminal liability]."

"Obviously neither intelligence nor counter-intelligence nor air defence worked properly."

Sergei Mironov, Russian legislator, former Senate chairman

 

"[Russian] incompetence and an inability to grasp the experience of war continue to be a serious problem."

?As you can see, despite several months of war, some conclusions are not made, hence the unnecessary losses, which, if the elementary precautions relating to the dispersal and concealment of personnel were taken, might have not happened."

Boris Rozhin, who blogs about the war effort under the nickname Colonelcassad

 

"Apparently, the high command is still unaware of the capabilities of this weapon."

"I hope that those responsible for the decision to use this facility will be reprimanded."

?There are enough abandoned facilities in Donbas with sturdy buildings and basements where personnel can be quartered."

Daniil Bezsonov, former official in the Russia-backed Donetsk administration

Russian President Vladimir Putin, shown in Moscow, suffered a major political blow when the Moskva sank, observers say. (Mikhail Tereshchenko/Sputnik/Reuters)

 

An earlier surprise attack by the Ukrainian counteroffensive responding to Russia's violent aggression in invading Ukraine to entirely subjugate it into a reprise of its former satellite status in the Soviet Union, had served to inform the Kremlin that Ukraine was not the pushover prize they had assumed it would be. Back in April, the Ukrainian military struck the Russian flagship Moskva, sinking the vessel. The number of deaths has never been officially supplied; Moscow claimed that almost 400 sailors had been rescued and 27 were unaccounted for, finally admitting one death and 17 missing.

 

Accurate figures on the loss of lives on that inauspicious day for the Russian navy are not available; the loss shocked Russians into the recognition that what their government was imposing on a neighbouring nation was their tragedy in human life lost as well. Since then, it has been hazarded by international warfare experts that 100,000 lives, both Russian and  Ukrainian have been lost to Vladimir Putin's little 'special military operation'.

 

A sailor looks at the Russian missile cruiser Moskva. Russia's Defence Ministry said Friday in a terse announcement that one crew member died and 27 were left missing after the ship sank. (Reuters)

On this more recent occasion when another Ukrainian surprise strike hit a vocational school building turned into a troop barracks located in the Donetsk region occupied by Russia in the Donetsk suburb of Makiivka, insider information puts the number of troops in the building at close to 700, although the official number is less than half of that. This is a building that was completely destroyed, nothing left but ruin when a HIMARS New Year's Eve attack on the barracks left utter ruin.

 

The site of the rocket attack in Makiivka.Via social media

And though Moscow has played down the numbers killed, Ukraine estimated the death toll at roughly 400, with another 300 seriously injured. A death toll that made that of the Moskva look like a light loss of life. The huge building housing those recently mobilized Russian soldiers still in training was completely razed, and a search and rescue exercise was quickly ordered, cranes brought in to move the immense piles of rubble. Ukraine's recently U.S.-acquired multiple-rocket system that shoots precision missiles did its job well.

 

Russian authorities in Moscow have washed their hands of responsibility for the carnage in human life, turning instead to placing the blame on the Russian military for unprofessionalism and carelessness. As far as they're concerned it was the lavish use of communications by the conscripts that had allowed Ukrainian forces to trace their geographic location and plan the attack they launched so successfully. The victims, in other words were themselves responsible for betraying their presence to their adversaries.

 

And the Military brass were themselves responsible for the mass casualties for deciding to house so many soldiers in one front-line building, rather than scattering  hem about, making it less likely that such a huge death count would occur; the very vulnerability and thoughtlessness of the Russian Military command, a reflection of the lack of professional training and expertise in strategic awareness, practise and self-defence.  Their critics pinpointed the problem as the Ukrainian army having detected unusual "activity of the mobile network and location of the subscribers".

Russia, needless to say, has for months been relentlessly bombarding Ukrainian towns and cities with missiles and suicide drones; the latter a relatively inexpensive alternative to their dwindling supply of missiles. The Shaheed suicide drones that Russian military members have been trained to use by Iranian specialists, have mostly been shot down by Ukrainian self-defence units, but the falling parts of both missiles and drones have wrought incalculable damage to the Ukrainian energy system, debris falling on power lines resulting in massive blackouts.

Emergency workers remove the rubble of a vocational school destroyed by shelling in Makiivka in the occupied Donetsk region of Ukraine on Monday.  RIA Novosti / Sputnik via AP