Russian "Cannon Fodder" Prison Recruits

"[Russia is suffering much heavier casualties than Ukraine in its attempts to capture] Fortress Bakhmut."

"We are destroying the occupier everywhere -- wherever it yields results for Ukraine." 

"Bakhmut has yielded and is yielding one of the greatest results during this war."

"In less than a week, starting from the 6th March, we managed to kill more than 1,100 enemy soldiers in the Bakhmut sector alone, Russia's irreversible loss, right there, near Bakhmut," 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy

"I think the main question is to what extent does defence of Bakhmut represent a strategy with diminishing returns relative to other options."

Michael Kofman, director, Russia studies program, CNA think-tank

"[Ukraine is better positioned to exploit the situation by reducing the size of Wagner's forces from an estimated] 45,000 to 7,000 [fighters]."

"Defending from a fortress is the more effective way to hold the line before launching your own counteroffensive"

Yuriy Lutsenko, captain, Ukrainian drone unit

 

"It is] quite difficult to conclude confidently whether attrition of Russian troops is better done using the current approach or might have been better had we left Bakhmut and shortened the front line."

Mykola Bielieskov, analyst, Ukraine's National Institute for Strategic Studies

Ukrainian service members fire a howitzer M119 at a front line, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, near the city of Bakhmut, Ukraine March 10, 2023. REUTERS/Oleksandr Ratushniak/File Photo

 

"[The situation in Bakhmut is] tough, very tough".

"The closer we are to the centre of the city, the harder the fighting ... The Ukrainians throw in endless reserves. But we are advancing and we will be advancing"

"Yesterday, we got 15 truckloads [of ammunition from the military], today we got 12. And I think we will continue to receive them."

Wagner founder Yevgeny Prigozhin 

Ukrainian servicemen travel towards Bakhmut on Saturday   AFP via Getty Images

The nine-month battle for Bakhmut has become a vicious conflict of attrition, each side focusing on significantly diminishing the number of the other's troops to strangle morale and gain the upper hand in the final, definitive conflict over possession of a city that has been utterly destroyed. Its capture by Russia would signify a rare 'victory', one that would complete its annexation of the Donetsk. 

 

Successfully defeating the Russian intention and retaining Bakhmut represents a signal victory for Ukraine in its epic struggle to save itself from complete Russian domination.

Thousands of Russian fighters -- most of them mercenaries that the Wagner group recruited from prisons, ordering them to assault Ukrainian positions in waves of human decoys whose lives are expendable in the greater drive to complete a mission where the defenders are motivated by love of country and an existential imperative, as opposed to an invading army following orders to prosecute a war with a lacklustre performance by ill-trained and poorly armed combatants -- have perished ingloriously.

 

Russians closed in on Bakhmut from the north, the south and the east. A narrow supply route was left from the west. "The enemy is attacking from all sides. We are getting supplies, but the situation is with each day getting more and more difficult", recounted a Ukrainian soldier. President Zelensky had a change of mind, ordering his forces to reinforce positions in Bakhmut, warning that to abandon the city would grant Russia an "open road" to the rest of Donetsk province.

 

Last summer's successful tactics deployed during Russia's assault on Severodonetsk and Lysychansk, the last two sizable towns under Kyiv's control in Luhansk province, was being repeated in Bakhmut. Where the Ukrainian army last year inflicted heavy losses on Russian troops and militias drawn from occupied territories before eventually withdrawing.

 

Kyiv then launched a lightning offensive retaking territory in northeastern Ukraine and liberating the city of Kherson in the south, taking advantage of Russia's depleted, overstretched forces. Whether Ukrainian losses in men and materiel might hinder its own capacity for a counteroffensive is the question bedevilling western officials. Withdrawal to a new defensive line might represent a favoured move, in the opinion of western experts.

 

American and European officials give an estimate of 200,000 killed or seriously injured Russian troops since February of 2022, with Ukraine suffering a loss equal to half of Russia's. Over the past six months, one western official felt Russia had suffered "between 20,000 and 30,000 casualties". Most were mercenaries fighting for the Wagner private operations focused on Bakhmut.

 

NATO's official estimate is that one Ukrainian had been killed or injured for every five Russians. The estimated ratio in the opinion of Ukrainian national security chief Oleksiy Danilov, was "one to seven in our favour". Irrespective of which the implication is that Ukraine may have suffered several thousand casualties in defence of the city. Fewer Ukrainians die proportionately on the battlefield, however, taking into consideration the superior medical care given them.

 

One Western analyst stated: "Ukraine is losing people all along the front line but Bakhmut has given them a unique opportunity to kill lots of Russians too, given the [meat grinder] tactics the Russians use". Some experts are concerned that Ukraine may be expending high-quality troops and equipment to destroy mere Russian prison recruits as "cannon fodder". Analysts at the Institute for the Study of War felt that Wagner was committing some of its elite forces to Bakhmut, and Russian airborne forces had also joined the fight, however.

 

Ukrainian servicemen fire towards Russian positions near the city of Bakhmut. Photograph: Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images

The Battle for Bakhmut

"Units of the private military company Wagner have practically surrounded Bakhmut."

"Only one route [out] is left."

"The pincers are closing."

"I appeal to the President of Ukraine. ... If earlier the professional Ukrainian army fought with us, today we see more and more old people and children. They are fighting, but their life in Bakhmut is short -- a day, two. Give them the opportunity to leave the city."

Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader, Wagner Mercenaries

 

"[The situation  is] critical [with fighting going on] around the clock."

"They take no account of their losses in trying to take the city by assault. The task of our forces in Bakhmut is to inflict as many losses on the enemy as possible. Every metre of Ukrainian land costs hundreds of lives to the enemy."

"There are many more Russians here than we have ammunition to destroy them."

Volodymyr Nazarenko, deputy commander, National Guard of Ukraine

Ukrainian soldiers have for months been trying to fend off Russian assaults on Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine.

Russian troops and their mercenaries continue to pour artillery toward the last access roads leading  to the besieged city of Bakhmut. Moscow is approaching ever closer to its first major victory in a six-month period that saw it reeling under a succession of Ukrainian assaults in a counteroffensive that has pushed Russian troops back to the border and a number of towns and cities evacuated by the Russian military forces, left in ruins, the remnants of their populations welcoming the arrival of the Ukrainian troops in liberation mode.

 

Speaking via video, the head of Russia's Wagner group, the private army comprised of mercenaries augmented more recently with convicted criminals taking the Wagner offer to serve on the front in Ukraine for their prison sentences to be written off. The untrained convicts have been sent to their deaths essentially, used as cannon fodder. Their deaths haven't seemed to bother the Wagner leader one iota. But he jeers at Ukraine, warning that if Ukrainian fighters are not removed from the encircled city this will be their fate, too.

 

Intense Russian shelling of routes leading west out of Bakhmut in an apparent effort to block Ukrainian forces' access in and out of the city is ongoing. In the close-by town of Khromove a bridge was damaged by Russian tank shelling. Ukrainian soldiers working to repair damaged roads - more troops heading toward the frontline, signalling that Ukraine has no intentions just yet of giving up Bakhmut.

 

Ukrainian troops were digging new trenches for defensive positions, to the west. Presumably in preparation for an anticipated spring counteroffensive. A video clip showing Wagner fighters released by Russia's RIA state news agency, has the fighters walking through a damaged industrial factory with one of the fighters overheard to say that Ukraine is destroying infrastructure in settlements near Bakhmut in prevention of the Russian encirclement.

 

On Friday the commander of Ukraine's ground forces, Eleksandr Syrskyi visited Bakhmut for briefings with local commanders on how best to increase the defence capacity of frontline forces. Bakhmut's pre-war population of 70,000 has been reduced to a few thousand who decided to remain. The city's capture would represent a prize after a costly winter offensive for Russia following the calling up of hundreds of thousands of reservists.

 

A group of Ukrainian servicemen rest after leaving Bakhmut on Friday.(AP Photo: Evgeniy Maloletka)

According to Russia, Bakhmut's capture would represent a stepping stone to the capture of the surrounding industrialized Donbas region. The leader of the Wagner group, Yevgeny Prifozhin, called on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to order a retreat from Bakhmut if he wanted to save the lives of his embattled soldiers. In the video three captured Ukrainians -- a grey-bearded older man and two boys -- were asking to be permitted to return home.

 

Robert Brovdi, commander of a Ukrainian drone unit active in Bakhmut revealed in a video posted on social media that his unit was ordered to withdraw immediately by the military. He had been fighting in Bakhmut for 110 days. In the past several days alarm has arisen in Russia realizing its own potential vulnerability following a report out of Moscow that a number of drones had attacked targets deep within Russian territory. Moscow also reported a described armed cross-border raid.

 

Russia's Security Council was ordered by President Putin to step up "anti-terrorism measures". Ukrainians offering a measure of the violence that Moscow has ordered to take place in Ukraine, back to Russia is terrorism, whereas Russia's invasion is a noble enterprise to free Ukrainians from the tyranny of 'fascism'. A delusional complete reversal of reality.

 

A self-propelled artillery vehicle in Ukraine's Donetsk region on Thursday.(AP Photo: Iryna Rybakova)

Russia, the Moral Outcast

"Now, I do not see any possibility for diplomatic contacts. And the more the conflict goes on, the more difficult it will be to have a diplomatic solution."

"[The UN has become mired in] politicization [because of the war and that has] damaged the authority of the UN and its organizations."

"We do not have any contacts with the Western delegations. On the protocol side we do not see each other. Privately we do not have any contacts, unfortunately ... we simply do not talk to each other."

"And so they will fight until the last Ukrainian."

"[Western countries are using the war] as a matter of pressure on Russia, as a tool of isolation of Russia .. damaging our position, economically, politically."

"They do not care about the Ukrainian people, the Ukrainian soldiers."

Gennady Gatilov, Russian permanent representative to the UN, Geneva

Tank barriers are seen in front of a barricade in Zaporizhzhya, amid Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photo: AFP/Getty Images

 

Ukraine has always stated it is prepared to discuss an end to the conflict; it is the victim, Russia is the aggressir. Offers by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to meet personally with Russian President Vladimir Putin have gone unanswered. Russia's main complaint is that its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine is being condemned by Western democracies, leaving it in bad odour in Europe, and alarming its near neighbours that they might be next on Russia's agenda for a ;special military operation' aimed at them.

Ukraine's victimization, as far as the Kremlin is concerned is its own fault, for its pro-Nazi, fascist government. It proved itself to be just that when Ukrainians rejected Moscow's choice for President of Ukraine in favour of their own selected alternative, loyal to Ukraine, not to Russia. An event which led to an insurrection by ethnic Russians who mostly populated eastern Ukraine, declaring themselves leaders of a new Luhansk and Donetsk, one allied with Russia, and with Russian assistance fought a conflict to occupy part of the Donbas, enabling Putin to declare he had every right to seize the Crimean Peninsula.

A view of the Russian navy Frigate 'Pytlivyy' docked in the port of Sevastopol. Photograph: Filippo Monteforte /AFP /Getty

Russia's UN Ambassador Gatilov complains bitterly that the UN has failed to support Russia's claim that it has acted with honour intending to liberate Ukraine from the clutches of its neo-Nazi government. It is, in his estimation, the United Nations accepting the Western allies of Ukraine asserting that Ukraine is a sovereign nation with the right, internationally recognized, to make its own decisions how it will align itself and who its allies would be. 

It is the West, he avers, responsible for Ukrainian deaths, not Russia, for encouraging Ukraine in its unreasonable decision to defend itself against a larger, better equipped neighbour, and inciting it to fight the Russian military rather than accept the inevitable, as Moscow sees it; surrendering the eastern provinces to Russia and allowing itself to once more assume the position of satellite state to Russian hegemonic imperialism.

 

A firefighter works at the site of a Russian military strike, as the Russian invasion of Ukraine continues, in Mykolaiv, Ukraine. Photo: State Emergency Service of Ukraine/Handout via Reuters

 

Ukraine will admit to having lost an estimated nine thousand servicemen in the defence of their country, to date. Western intelligence puts Russian losses at an approximately similar number, with the added loss of a surprising number of elite commanders. Russia is apoplectic with outrage that Ukraine has managed to hit its military and destroy its materiel by explosives hitting behind Russian lines. With the use of drones and long-range missiles supplied by sympathetic countries, Ukraine is holding its own.

 

As brutal and as brazen as Russia is in ordering its military to shell civilian infrastructure, giving them free rein to bomb schools and hospitals, to mutilate and murder ordinary Ukrainian civilians, Moscow is still in a state of disbelief that Ukraine would dare aim over its border into Russian towns to blow up weapons and gas depots. Ukrainian towns and villages are disposable, Russian ones are inviolate.

 

A Ukrainian serviceman rides atop a tank near a front line in Mykolaiv region on August 10, as Russia’s attack on Ukraine continues. Photo: Reuters

 

The Kremlin and Vladimir Putin have embarked on a mission to re-write the rules and regulations of international conflict striving to ensure they are as humane as possible in protection of civilian lives along with non-combatants, while Russia seems intent on opening the floods of wartime derangement of human values to encompass all civilians as long as they're Ukrainian.

In the initial month of the occupation, the Russian military was tasked with entering Kyiv and either killing or taking prisoner the government of Ukraine. Likely to stand trial, if they survived, charged with being Nazis deserving of capital punishment. Ukrainian pride and resolve in protecting its own, pushed them back to eastern Ukraine. Now the shortage of regular troops sees Russia releasing criminals from long sentences, to fight in the front lines.

 

Ukrainian soldiers from the Azov Battalion who surrendered at besieged Mariupol: "Some had needles inserted into their wounds, some were tortured with water", said Vladyslav Zhaivoronok, who lost a leg. "They undressed us, forced to squat while we are naked. If any of the boys raised their heads, they began to beat them immediately", added Denys Chepurko.

 

Russia's intelligence agency claims a woman from the Azov regiment planned and carried out the assassination of 29-year-old media personality Darya Dugina, daughter of Vladimir Putin's principle adviser on the Ukraine conflict, Alexander Dugin, who shares all the potent hatred that Putin has been quoted with in his 'reasons' for despising the notion that Ukraine is a nation, claiming it has no culture and is a den of Nazi scorpions. 

Russia, proud of what it considers to be military 'victories', speaks with heated contempt of base Ukrainian motives in resisting the Russian occupation. A country, as far as Vladimir Putin is concerned, that has no right to exist outside of Russia's orbit, and one he is doing his damndest bit by bit to destroy. So far, close to 6,000 Ukrainian civilians dead, towns and cities in rubble, food and energy shortages beleaguering the poorest countries of the world as well as the most advanced.

Ukrainian military officers travel on a wheeled-BTR fighting vehicle in Kramatorsk in Ukraine’s Donetsk region on 22 August. Photograph: Ammar Awad/Reuters

As They See It: Threatened Nuclear Plant ... Amnesty International

Getty Images  A Russian soldier stands guard outside Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant

"Any attack to a nuclear plant is a suicidal thing."

"We fully support the International Atomic Energy Agency [IAEA] in all their efforts in relation to create the conditions of stabilization of the [Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant]."

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres

"Ukrainian nationalists launched an artillery strike on the territory of the specified object on August 5. Two high-voltage power lines and a water pipeline were damaged as a result of the shelling."

"Only thanks to the effective and timely actions of the Russian military in covering the nuclear power facility its critical infrastructure was not affected."

Russian Embassy, Washington, statement

"Pokalchuk [resigned head of Amnesty International to Ukraine complained that the organization's employees in Ukraine asked Amnesty International for time allowing the Ukrainian Defense Ministry to respond to AI's findings before publication, but officials were given] very little time to respond."

"As a result of this although unwillingly, the organization created material that sounded like support of Russian narratives."

"Seeking to protect civilians, this study instead has become a tool of Russian propaganda."

Oksana Pokalchuk, formerly with Amnesty International

Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant is the largest in Europe   Reuters

 

International inspectors must be given access to the Ukrainian Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant occupied by Russian troops, urged UN Secretary-General Guterres following frightening reports that Ukraine and Russia had accused one another of shelling the nuclear plant, Europe's largest atomic plant, on the weekend.

Mr. Guterres was speaking from Japan, visiting to attend the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Ceremony to commemorate the 77th anniversary of the world's first atomic bombing in Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II, toward the end of the war. The horrors that unfolded in both cities have been memorialized as the first global disaster of its kind, and the risk of another similar event taking place as a result of Russia's invasion of Ukraine is mind-shuddering.

Renewed Russian shelling on Saturday damaged three radiation sensors and injured a worker at the plant. This strike representing the second to hit the site in consecutive days. Leading Ukrainian President  Volodymyr Zelenskyy to accuse Russia of "nuclear terror", warranting more sanctions by the international community, and this time to focus on Moscow' nuclear sector. "There is no such nation in the world that could feel safe when a terrorist state fires at a nuclear plant", stated the president.

The plant has been occupied by Russian forces since early March. The plant's Ukrainian technicians have been left in place to continue operating and monitoring the plant's functionability, on watch to identify any potential emergencies. According to the Russia-installed area authority, it was Ukrainian forces that hit the site, with the use of a multiple rocket launcher, damaging administrative buildings and a storage facility. That might be the storage facility that Russian troops have packed full of military gear and explosives.

Rafael Mariano Grossi, chief of the IAEA, warned that the latest attack "underlines the very real risk of a nuclear disaster". Russian troops are focused on gaining full control of the Donbas region of east Ukraine. "Ukrainian soldiers are firmly holding the defence, inflicting losses on the enemy and are ready for any changes in the operational situation", stated Ukraine's general staff in a Monday update.

While these events are worryingly ongoing, the head of Amnesty International in Ukraine resigned her position with the human rights organization when it issued a report criticizing Ukraine's military. Ukrainian authorities responded with outrage, with the observation the report unfairly blamed the victim in Russia's war. Oksana Pokalchuk was on board when Amnesty highlighted Russian war crimes, but its latest report alleged that "Ukrainian fighting tactics endanger civilians", a charge that conflicted with the Ukrainian office of Amnesty's staff.

"Amnesty International deeply regrets the distress and anger that our press release on the Ukrainian military's fighting tactics has caused."

"Amnesty International's priority in this and in any conflict is ensuring that civilians are protected. Indeed, this was our sole objective when releasing this latest piece of research. While we fully stand by our findings we regret the pain caused."

Amnesty International statement

Rudnyts’ke school was the headquarters of the Russian military before the Ukrainan army retook control of the area in March. Photograph: Andrea Filigheddu/Zuma Press Wire/REX/Shutterstock

Russia: As Duplicitous As Its Word

"In the seaport of Odesa sea-based  high precision long-range missiles destroyed a docked Ukrainian warship and a warehouse of Harpoon anti-ship missiles supplied by the United States to the Kyiv regime."

Russian Foreign Ministry

 

"Russia doesn't break its patterns of breaking agreements. Yes, I was hopeful, along with all those countries waiting for the grain [as per agreement signed by Moscow and Kyiv]."

"But no surprises from Moscow, just their usual terrorist aggressive behaviour."

Lesia Vasylenko, Ukrainian MP

Daily News Egypt

The very day following the Turkey-U.S.-brokered deal signed by both Kyiv and Moscow, to re-open Ukraine's Black Sea ports to the export of grain to alleviate an acute food shortage, saw Russian forces despite the pledge taken by the Kremlin via the signed agreement, bomb the Odesa port, the largest in Ukraine. On Friday, at the signing of the deal, there was euphoria; the world's largest exporters of food would resume shipments averting the threat of famine that millions could face, consequential to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.  

As a result of the five-month conflict following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, food prices globally have dramatically risen, as has energy. Russia had been left free to export its oils and grains, yet its complaint that its shipments abroad were under Western sanctions eschews responsibility. Moscow saw nothing amiss however, in blocking Ukraine from shipping its export-destination oils and grains, leaving parts of the Middle East and Africa on tenterhooks of food insecurity. 

 

A grain terminal at the port of Odesa on Saturday, after a string of explosions hit the city. Before the war, billions of dollars worth of grain was exported every year from the port to countries around the world.   Credit...Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times

Turkey had intervened, as the country whose control of straits leading into the Black Sea made it a logical player in Russia's game of food and energy blackmail. The Russian port strike came close to negating the practicality and release of the agreed-upon shipments of Ukrainian food to a waiting world following missiles fired at Ukraine's main Black Sea port. Russia's retort was that the missiles destroyed a warship and anti-ship missiles at Odesa, despite vows to lift the grain blockade.

The 'diplomatic breakthrough' the agreement portended, casually shifted aside by the Kremlin. Punishment for Ukraine's successes on the battlefield, for its surprise strengths in effecting a counter-offensive, in forcing Moscow to pay dearly for its wanton destruction of Ukrainian infrastructure, its direct bombing of hospitals, schools, its levelling of towns and villages, its violent disregard of people's lives, its responsibility in driving millions of civilians from their homes.

 

The Ukrainian military unsurprisingly had a different story than Moscow's, that missiles aside, preparations were to resume the shipping of grains globally. "We continue technical preparations for the launch of exports of agricultural products from our ports", stated Oleksandr Kubrakov, Ukrainian infrastructure minister, even as the Kremlin initially denied firing at Odesa. Around 15 percent of global grain supplies emanate from Ukraine.

 

Back in control of Snake Island following Russian troop withdrawal from the critically positioned control post guarding shipping lanes in the Black Sea along with the arrival of long-range artillery from the U.S. , Russia was placed in the uncomfortable position of having to negotiate to lift its blockade; a situation helped along by vigorous lobbying from African and Middle Eastern Kremlin allies influencing Moscow further. 

Egypt, set to be hugely impacted by the stoppage of grain shipments so hugely depended upon, hosted Russia's foreign minister Sergei Lavrov last week before he went on to tour Ethiopia, Uganda and the Congo Republic. The Russian state nuclear agency Rosatom is under contract to begin work on Egypt's first nuclear power station. To Egypt's government, Mr. Lavrov made it clear that the global shortage of grain was a result of sanctions imposed by the West.

"On the topic of food, the West must eliminate the problems it has created itself", he stated, stretching even the credulity of Russia's forgiving allies. Lifting Ukraine's ports blockade will benefit Russia as well as Ukraine, enabling the Kremlin to take in more proceeds from grain and fertilizer sales, all welcome to continue funding Russia's war on Ukraine. The gratitude Russia will receive from its allies in North Africa and the Middle East, more pluses for the Kremlin.

Russia hungers for good news to boost Moscow's morale. According to a Ukrainian official, by September Russian-occupied southern Kherson region will be back in Ukrainian control. Backed by sophisticated Western weapons newly received, including long-range HIMARs, Ukrainian forces are steadily defeating the Russian army in the region. 

"Kherson region will definitely be liberated by September. We can say that a turning point has occurred on the battlefield."

"We see that our armed forces are advancing openly."

"We can say that we are switching from defensive to counter-offensive actions."

Sergey Khlan, aide, Ukrainian head, Kherson region

The war's momentum has seen a turnaround with the arrival a month ago of HIMARs, allowing Ukraine now to hit Russian supply lines, command centres and allied infrastructure, resulting in widespread damage to Russian equipment and personnel. Before the advent of the longer-range missiles, Russian targets had been located too far behind the front lines to be susceptible to strikes. That has changed.

Residential buildings in Mykolaiv were damaged and officials said 12 people were wounded  STATE EMERGENCY SERVICE OF UKRAINE

Aiding Ukraine, Defeating Russian Imperialism

"We're moving in the tree lines with just Javelins and N-LAWS [shoulder-fired anti-tank weapons]. But we are moving without mortars. The problem is we are sitting ducks for their artillery and sniper fire -- the advance is not happening."

"To be honest, we are not doing good. We go in with eight to fight 50. Down here, it's 5-10 km fields, separated by drainage ditches and that's the only way to move."

"We know where they are and they know where we are at all times... [We] need to get big guns down here, like yesterday."

"They're [Canada] sending junk -- that's what it feels like."

James Challice, 42, Canadian Forces veteran, volunteer trainer of young Ukrainian recruits

"We need to help ensure Ukraine survives, is successful in defence of the country and can evict the Russians."

"Victory is the only way to end this."

"There is lots we can, should and need to do."

Rick Hillier, former Canadian Chief of Defence Staff

An explosion is seen in an apartment building after a Russian army tank fires in Mariupol, Ukraine, Friday, March 11, 2022. (Evgeniy Maloletka/The Associated Press)

James Challice, originally from Cobourg, Ontario, travelled to Ukraine in March inspired to do what he could to help Ukraine in its epic battle with invading Russian forces. Months ago he said in a local news interview that he felt confident Ukraine will manage to oust the Russian invasion since "the morale is phenomenal". At this point, he seems to be less assured of that outcome. And it is not because Ukrainian soldiers are less valiant and determined to defend their country and retake their territory from the invaders but because they have been outmaneuvered in weapons supply.

 

"We don't have enough big guns or ammunition to keep pushing forward", he stated baldly. While the Russian military is well equipped with infantry fighting vehicles and tanks, the Ukrainian military has no artillery support where and when it is badly needed. Because the Ukrainian fighters are running out of ammunition they have been forced to conserve 120 mm shells. As a Canadian fighting for Ukraine as a volunteer with ample conflict experience, Mr. Challice is hugely critical of his government.

 

Ukraine has been offered weaponry, light and heavy, by many NATO-member countries. Its largest source of weapons has been the United States, but countries as diverse as Britain and Australia, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia have been providing Ukraine with weapons. Ukraine is still using Soviet-era weapons, while Russia is known to have invested hugely in upgrading their weapons systems.

 

A Ukrainian soldier directs a Russian tank that Ukrainians captured after fighting with Russian troops outside Brovary, near Kyiv, Ukraine, March 10, 2022. (Thomas Peter/Reuters)

 

Canada, with the third largest Ukrainian diaspora citizenry (after Ukraine itself and Russia) sees its Liberal government pledging undying loyalty to Ukraine, but doing only what it feels forced by circumstances to commit to, to aid the country in its desperate struggle against the fascist tyranny of violent Russian aggression. Public opinion in Canada seems way ahead of government policy in committing to give practical conflict-driven aid to a nation under existential duress.

In the office of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, there is quiet unease over offending Moscow. Canada contributed 20,000 rounds of artillery ammunition, eight armoured vehicles (lacking front-line capability), as well as 4,500 rocket launchers. Four M777 howitzers were also sent as lethal aid by Canada to Ukraine. But Ukraine is burning through everything it gets in a prodigious drive to match the Russian assault with its own successful defence.

As far as James Challice is concerned, no Canadian equipment beyond helmets and night-vision goggles ..."and half of them don't work", have come to his attention. Canada is preparing, evidently, to send additional equipment such as 40 Coyote light armoured vehicles, about to be decomissioned. A Canadian House of Commons committee addressed by Ukrainian MP Yulia Klymenko was informed that LAVs, 155 mm artillery rounds and robot demining systems are urgently required by her country.

What Ukraine's military really needs and wants is big guns; howitzers. Canada should be sending 250 LAV 3s, 50 Leopard tanks and 18 M777 artillery pieces, along with supplying equipment trainers to Ukraine, according to retired General Rick Hillyer. 

After experiencing a humiliating series of setbacks in Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin moved to escalate. (Mikhail Klimentyev/Sputnik/Kremlin Pool/The Associated Press)

"Strategic patience is required because it is a demonstration that the democracies of the world have the resilience, unit and perseverance to resist the coercion and aggression of all of this era's techno-authoritarian regimes."

"The fight in Ukraine is as much about the kind of world we wish to live in as it is about defeating Russian aggression. We owe the Ukrainians the time to win."

Retired Australian Major General Mike Ryan

A Pact With The Devil

"It is unacceptable for our armed forces to be emboldening neo-Nazi groups in Ukraine, or any other country, through the provision of CAF training."

"This is an issue fundamental to the purpose of Canada’s forces and to the respect we owe our veterans – who sacrificed so much to defeat fascism in Europe."

"We urge the Department of National Defence to immediately launch an investigation into the evidence that has been revealed by the George Washington University study and to develop new policies and procedures to ensure that all foreign trainees receive some type of background check to eliminate the possibility of neo-Nazi or other extremist affiliation before receiving training from Canadian forces."

Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies, Canada

October 18, 2021 

"The Canadian government didn't do its due diligence. It's the responsibility of the Canadian defence ministry to know exactly who they are training."

"There is no question that there are neo-Nazis in different forms in Ukraine, whether they are in the Azov regiment or other organizations."

Efraim Zuroff, Holocaust scholar, Simon Wiesenthal Center, Israel

April 12, 2022

EVGENIYA MAKSYMOVA | Credit: AFP

 

The world is watching with bated breath and  hoping that by some miraculous intervention, Ukrainian resolve and the courage of its people, the defiance and practised skills of its military will manage to succeed in pushing back the advance of the Russian military from Ukrainian territory. A vastly out-numbered Ukrainian military, defending itself against the superior advanced technology of the Russian military has seen courage in real time, as Ukrainian forces steadfastly held out against an immense Russian convoy planning to enter and occupy the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv.

Ukraine's charismatic president has minced no words in calling upon Western alliances and Ukraine's European neighbours to come to its aid, invaded by a malign Russian Federation's president who claims to be 'liberating' his neighbour from the malign forces of evil personified in the presence of neo-Nazi fighting volunteers committed to fascism and infused with antisemitism and overall racist values that are contemptful of minorities. A contempt so deep and malicious they volunteered during WWII to act alongside Nazi SS Panzer units whose focus was to advance the Holocaust aspirations of genocide.

Ukraine has a shameful  history of antisemitism and was complicit with the Nazi occupiers in destroying vast numbers of Jewish lives. But so too was every other Eastern European country under occupation, from Lithuania to Hungary to Poland. And nor was Western Europe exceptional in shielding Jews from the Third Reich's 'Final Solution'. Vichy France was a collaborationist country, Italy was an Axis nation, and Holland surrendered most of its Jews to their grim fate.

 

 SERGEY BOBOK | Credit: AFP via Getty Images

As a fierce fighting group whose loyalty as committed nationalists Ukraine depends upon in its defence from Russian aggression, the former president of Ukraine welcomed the Azov Battalion and a number of other fascist Ukrainian militias into the ranks of its institutional national military. The current president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy knows his history very well, as a son of Holocaust survivors. He well understands his country and its ongoing flirtation with fascism. But it is his country as much as it is the fascists' and it is certainly not Russia's geography in a war of cultural/political/territorial imperative.

Canada, which celebrates itself as a bastion of Liberal Democracy, has among its citizenry the third largest Ukrainian population after Ukraine itself and the diaspora contingent in Russia. Canada's Liberal Party currently in power under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is a virtue-signalling country portraying itself as an enemy of injustice and a champion of human rights. When Ukraine appealed to the world community for aid in his country's time of desperate need, he appealed to NATO and EU countries particularly for military equipment.

When ethnic-Russian Ukrainian rebels separated the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine from the West-leaning government in Kyiv, in a conflict that created their self-styled Republics of Donetsk and Luhansk, where Moscow surreptitiously sent its military to support the separatists, and finally marched across the border between Russia and Ukraine to claim the Crimean Peninsula as its own territory, appeals for military aid failed to resonate; no other countries relished the prospect of clashing in conflict with Russia.

Now that the Kremlin has decided it was time to finally destroy Ukraine as a nation, military gear is being freed up for Ukraine; too little, too late. In response to the ongoing separatist conflict and the Crimean crisis, military trainers were made available under NATO to teach modern warfare techniques to the Ukrainian military, and Canada had a contingent of trainers preparing the military in Ukraine for future defence. It was these trainers and those among the Ukrainian military known for their white-supremacist fascism who were among those being trained that caught the eye of the Simon Wiesenthal Center.

 

Al Mayadeen English

The Canadian government, through the Canadian Forces denies it has an obligation to know of the presence of neo-Nazis among those that were being trained by Canadian military experts. Despite the presence of one Ukrainian soldier who proudly wore the crest of a Nazi SS unit -- the insignia of the WWII Ukrainian fascists who joined the Nazis, on his uniform -- and the presence of known fascists in the Azov regiment, an all-inclusive training continued. 

The meaning of the insignia was not lost on the Canadian trainers. All Canadian military members engaged in training Ukrainian troops were exposed to information enabling them to recognize patches and insignia associated with right-wing extremism. In theory, should Canadian soldiers suspect Ukrainian counterpart trainees to be possessed of racist values or belonging to such organizations, the trainees are removed. But no burden of proof is on the Canadian Armed Forces beyond a reasonable doubt to act as theorized.

"Multiple members of Azov have described themselves as Nazis", a briefing note on the Azov Battalion acknowledged, produced by Canadian officers with Canada's elite Joint Task Force in 2017. The American Congress banned U.S. funds from reaching Ukraine to provide arms, training or other assistance to the Azov Battalion in view of its links to the far-right and neo-Nazis. Both the UN and Amnesty International accuse the unit of conducting human rights violations.

"There is an element of the ultra-right in Ukraine and it's absurd to ignore it", repeated Efraim Zuroff. The impetus is there to ignore it, since its presence in Ukraine is cited sanctimoniously by Vladimir Putin as justification for his invasion of Ukraine. In the context of Ukraine's moving cri de coeur, the emphasis is, rightfully so, on its preservation, its right to exist as an independent nation, to choose its future course. And the need to help in whatever way is possible, short of igniting the fuse for a Third World War.

This situation is what is meant by a dilemma of contradiction and making a pact with the devil.

"The call for Ukraine’s defence has been met by a wide section of Ukrainian society, from the young to the old. Volunteer battalions include anarchists, gay go-go dancers, imams and Hasidic Jews, for example. In Irpin, I met a lesbian territorial defence volunteer named Anna, who was fighting alongside a native Georgian. To ignore these people and concentrate solely on Azov does little to serve Ukrainian civil society, which faces an existential threat at the hands of Russian fascism".

"That’s where this argument moves from the absurd to the obscene. Vladimir Putin is a major sponsor of far-right political parties across Europe, and is close to a militia (the Wagner Group) that is involved in military action around the world and has been linked to white supremacy movements. Under Putin, Russia has regressed into a totalitarian fascist regime. He threatens Ukraine not because it has a far-right element, but because Ukraine is a growing, sovereign liberal democracy that he can no longer control."

:Russia’s information war focuses on Ukraine’s neo-Nazis because it seeks to take control of the narrative. It wants to dehumanise Ukrainians to the point that when a bomb is fired on a theatre full of children in Mariupol, it can blame the atrocity on Azov and avoid international condemnation and accountability. This is a tried-and-tested model that Russia has perfected in Syria over the past decade."

Oz Katerji, The New Statesman

Members of Ukraine's Territorial Defense Forces during training at a former asphalt factory on the outskirts of Kyiv. Photo by Ethan Swope/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Moscow in Retreat?

"The combat potential of the Armed Forces of Ukraine has been considerably reduced, which makes it possible to focus our core efforts on achieving the main goal, the liberation of Donbas."

Sergei Rudskoi, head, Main Operational Directorate, Russian General Staff

"Ukrainian counter-attacks, and Russian forces falling back on over-extended supply lines, have allowed Ukraine to reoccupy towns and defensive positions up to 35 km east of Kyiv."

British intelligence report

"I'm not sure that anything that the Russian military will do will change the balance. It's more about patching up gaps."

"They're going to be brought in as fresh bodies primarily, to replenish the losses ... folks who are suggesting they're bringing in everybody they can for one big push to break Ukrainian resistance -- I don't see that as possible now."

Dmitry Gorenburg, Russian military expert with think-tank CNA

An armoured convoy of pro-Russia troops in the Donetsk region © Alexander Ermochenko/Reuters

Mission partially completed, signals Moscow, now on to auxiliary mission... Russia has initiated a draw of forces from Georgia into Ukraine, badly needed reinforcements to make up for the unfortunate loss of Russian servicemen falling to the ferocious defense by the Ukrainian military. According to Moscow, no such thing, a mere handful, not the gross numbers quoted by Western intelligence, have fallen. The decision to bring in reinforcement from Georgia is only fair; they're no longer needed there to repress protests, so they're being given the opportunity to earn their keep, in Ukraine.

 

It has been a month since Russia invaded Ukraine and met with the surprise of fierce Ukrainian resistance, when Ukrainians failed to realize they were meant to greet the invaders as saviours, welcoming them with appreciative open arms. Instead Ukraine's citizens have been arming themselves in defence of their nation against the brute mechanized force of a volatile, oppressive and dangerous neighbour. One who has flouted all 'civilized' rules of conflict; an invasion where no threat exists leading to ceaseless, deliberate bombing and shelling of civilian infrastructure and the mass murder of innocent people. 

The cities of Ukraine have been bombarded and encircled, residential areas laid to waste, as up to three-and-a-half million of Ukraine's 44-million-strong population has been terrorized and displaced, thousands killed, others turning in desperation to find haven in sympathetic, Russia-aversive neighbouring countries. To which the Russian Defence Ministry addressed itself claiming its first phase of operations completed, it would turn its focus on the 'liberation' of the eastern Donbas region.

 

Heavily damaged residential buildings in the town of Volnovakha in the Donetsk region © Alexander Ermochenko/Reuters

 

The thousands of Russian troops stationed at military bases ranging from Georgia to Syria to Tajikistan, many in motorized rifle brigades, combat-capable and ready to deploy on orders from the Kremlin have not yet been called to duty in Ukraine. There is the trifling matter that withdrawing troops in those outposts would result in losses there. The Kremlin appears not quite prepared to order them wholly to disperse to Ukraine in a boost to the Russian ground offensive there.

The reality on the ground with heavy losses of servicemen, including the unprecedented losses of generals in the field mere weeks following the beginning of the invasion has shone a spotlight on an ill-conceived and poorly executed military manoeuvre destined to fail, in the face of a badly reduced 'combat power'. Up to 15,000 Russian troops, according to NATO, have been killed in the war up to the present, a number that Russia denies, citing a loss of 1,351 of its servicemen.

In any event, should an influx of reinforcements be brought in to relieve the beleaguered troops in Ukraine the course of the war seems unlikely to improve for Russia, given the vulnerability exposures that would eventuate in the redeployment of foreign-based troops in other global hot-spots controlled by Moscow. Reality is Volodymyr Borysenko, the mayor of an eastern suburb, the locale of Kyiv's main airport, reporting a call to clear out civilians to enable Ukrainian troops to counterattack.

Ukrainian forces have been planning and executing an encirclement of Russian troops on the main front outside Kyiv, in the suburbs of Irpin, Bucha and Hostomel. Troops that will be ordered to deploy to the self-proclaimed Republics of Donetsk and Luhansk, to 'secure' the Donbas for Russia in its plans to eviscerate Ukraine, a scheme that began when Vladimir Putin decided to gift Crimea back to Russia.

A destroyed tank lies amid rubble in northern Mariupol © Maximilian Clarke/SOPA Images/dpa

 

At the same time Sinopec Group, the largest oil refiner in Asia, has halted discussions on a petrochemical investment and venture to market Russian gas. Even with China, sanctions imposed against Russia have had their influence.  "Companies will rigidly follow Beijing's foreign policy in this crisis. There's no room whatsoever for companies to take any initiatives in terms of new investment" stated an executive at a Chinese state oil company. Abandoning the ship of friendship established most recently on pledges of undying support between China and Russia.