Two years have passed since Russia's full-scale invasion on February 24, 2022, but resistance in Ukraine remains significant. Confident initial predictions of a quick Russian victory were repeatedly proven wrong. Instead, the Russian military suffered from poor logistics, corruption, a rigid chain of command, and an inability to counter Ukrainian tactics.
Kiev forces successfully thwarted Russia's reckless attempt to capture the Ukrainian capital, and subsequently halted the entire Russian advance. Six months later, they began to drive back the Russian invaders, retaking territory around Kharkov in the north and Kherson in the south.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy drew praise from Western leaders for using his personal popularity to promise military aid and insisting that Ukraine could win with more sophisticated weapons.
However, despite all these early successes, the war soon devolved into repeated human attacks by Russian conscripts against well-defended Ukrainian positions. Slow intravenous supplies of Western weapons forced Kiev to significantly delay its 2023 counteroffensive. This gave the Russian military time to design deep and elaborate defensive fortifications, minefields, and tank traps.
Ribcos/AP
In fact, thanks in large part to Russia's efforts, Ukraine is now the most mined country in the world.
Once the Ukrainian counterattack began, Ukrainian forces made little progress and suffered heavy losses, especially due to the lack of air support.
Faced with shortages of personnel and equipment, President Zelenskiy dramatically fired military commander Valery Zarzhny earlier this month and opted for a new strategy to build up Ukraine's military capabilities while preventing further Russian advances.
Russia: Weakened but determined
After being humiliated by not immediately achieving the goal of a “special military operation” in early 2022, the Kremlin uses bluffs and abuse to bring stubbornly united Western powers to their knees, while bashing Ukrainian cities and military positions. I tried.
He repeatedly sounded nuclear sabers, mobilizing isolationist and far-right groups across Europe and warning of impending world war. President Vladimir Putin's rhetoric has been unbridled, punctuated by rants about the “demonic” moral decadence of Western culture that only Russia's traditional values can resist.
In a rare act of honesty, Putin also acknowledged the obvious. He said the invasion of Ukraine was meant to recover what he considered Russia's “historic lands.”
The Kremlin sought to project an image of a xenophobic but stable troika-supervised society while mobilizing hundreds of thousands of victims in Ukraine's meat grinders. Putin was a wise tsar, the Orthodox Church was the custodian of Russia's conservative soul, and the military served as Russia's armored bulwark.
Mikhail Klimenchev/Pool Sputnik Kremlin/AP
In the absence of good news to report, Kremlin propagandists created a bizarre narrative that Russia was defending itself from NATO invasion and generously labeled Russia's opponents as “Nazis.”
However, this could not hide the reality that Russia itself was becoming increasingly Nazi-like, as Russia's ultranationalist “Z” movement made clear. So are the repeated genocidal and anti-Semitic language.
At the same time, Russia's harsh crackdown on domestic opposition resulted in long prison sentences for those found guilty of criticizing the war or the military.
Anatoly Maltsev/EPA
Russia's failures also led to a bold revolt in June 2023 by Evgeny Prigozhin, leader of the Wagner mercenary group and one of President Putin's closest aides. And despite Prigozhin's subsequent inconvenient death, the fact that he was able to march through Russia with little resistance until he spontaneously stopped 200 kilometers from Moscow seems to have weakened Putin considerably. I showed it to
However, as 2024 began, Russian forces again began to press the battlefield and captured small territories.
According to recent reports, the number of Russian military personnel currently stationed in Ukraine is 470,000. And although it is thought to have lost a staggering 8,800 armored fighting vehicles and around 315,000 casualties (fully 90% of the force that started the war), the Russian military has finally begun to adapt.
Anatoly Maltsev/EPA
What will happen next year?
How the war unfolds in 2024 will have profound consequences for the world, but this fact has not received enough attention in Western media coverage.
It will determine whether Ukraine can retain its territory and begin a painful reconstruction process.
It will be decisive for Putin's bet that conquest will come without consequences, and perhaps embolden him to look to his surrounding countries.
It will determine whether Europe can remain stable, secure and united, and whether the United States continues to be seen as a reliable ally.
A key question for the Kremlin is whether it can keep domestic discontent contained long enough for the West to lose interest in the war and withdraw support for Ukraine. It is unlikely to run out of weapons, having significantly ramped up domestic weapons production and procuring drones and ammunition from pariah groups Iran and North Korea.
Ukraine, which is fighting for its survival, faces an even tougher year in 2024. It must continue to absorb Russia's relentless attacks, maintain its economy, and rebuild its military in preparation for new attempts to oust Russian forces.
Zelenskiy's famous response to the US offer to evacuate him in 2022, “We need ammunition, not vehicles,” applies just as well two years later. Without continued military aid, it will be very difficult to maintain Ukrainian resistance.
Read more: Ukraine war: The West is at a crossroads – double aid to Kiev, accept a compromise or face humiliation by Russia
Aid from the United States, Ukraine's most important backer, is being blocked by the far-right wing of the Republican Party. This is causing a shortage of ammunition, which is already causing serious problems for the lives and territory of Ukrainians.
But a far greater threat looms over the real prospect of a second term for Donald Trump. President Putin is well aware that President Trump will give him a free hand in Ukraine and perhaps beyond.
Therefore, he spends a lot of effort supporting his candidacy. The extraordinary scene in which President Putin, the leader of a hostile foreign power, used an “interview'' with former Fox News personality Tucker Carlson to rally Trump supporters was a clear illustration of this.
Europe is finally waking up to the reality that the United States under Trump may abandon NATO in addition to Ukraine. However, it remains an open question whether European countries will be able to overcome institutional inertia and a tangled web of interests and decisively resist Russia on their own.
As the old saying goes, war rules the world. Their achievements are far-reaching. It is the beginning of the redrawing of maps, the establishment of new fault lines, the birth and death of nations.
Russia's war against Ukraine is proving to be similar.
