Russia’s second Ukraine offensive

Ukraine wants more tanks, selfpropelled artillery and combat aircraft from NATO countries for its war with the Russian invaders, but it won’t be getting them in the tranche of military aid that is being decided in Washington right now.

There is a good reason for that. Kyiv will be getting bigger and better drones, lightly armoured vehicles like Humvees, and maybe some anti-ship missiles, but Joe Biden’s administration is still playing Mother May I?/ Grandmother’s Footsteps with Moscow. He moves one cautious step up on the list of weapons he gives Ukraine, watches for the Russian response, then takes another step.

It doesn’t matter at the moment, because this is the “rasputitsa,” the season of rain and mud in eastern Ukraine when off-road travel for heavy vehicles varies from difficult to impossible.

The Ukrainian forces won’t be attempting any grand offensives and the Russians are very likely to get bogged down.

The mud season will probably last for another six weeks. Strict military logic would argue for postponing the Russian offensive in eastern Ukraine until then, but Putin probably can’t wait that long. The defeats and losses he suffered in his first attacks in northern Ukraine will gradually but inevitably leak out to the Russian public, so he needs a quick victory.

He might get lucky, but there is unlikely to be a decisive Russian victory for two reasons.

First, the Russians in the east will be attacking the besttrained, most experienced part of the Ukrainian army, well dug into defences that have grown every year since 2014. It can probably stand its ground and inflict heavy casualties on the Russians.

That would not save the main Ukrainian army if other Russian forces can make a “pincer movement” behind it and cut it off, which is precisely what they will now try to do.

The Russian troops now besieging Mariupol on the south coast will advance to the north as soon as it finally falls. Other Russian troops are already attacking south from around Kharkiv.

If they succeed, Ukraine will have to seek a ceasefire, ceding all the lost territory to Russia, and Putin will have his victory. But first, the Russians will have to advance about 150 kilometres on a single, two-lane road that passes through villages ideal for ambushes. And it’s the rasputitsa, so you can’t go around the villages.

This is precisely the task that the Russian army spectacularly bungled in its attempt to seize Kyiv last month. What are the odds that it will do better this time?

Assume that it’s late June, the ground is drying out, and the Russian troops are exhausted, overextended and demoralized.

In Kyiv, they will be thinking about taking back their lost territory — at least the territory they have lost since February, but some will also be thinking about recapturing the territories that Russia conquered in 2014.

That’s when the extra tanks and self-propelled artillery that the United States is not giving Ukraine now would come in very useful. But it would also be the moment of utmost humiliation for Vladimir Putin, and it is always wiser to leave your defeated enemy an avenue of retreat.

Perhaps this entire article is an exercise in counting one’s chickens before they hatch, but you may be sure that they are also being counted in Washington and in NATO right now.

Nobody will admit out loud that Ukraine is being kept on a leash, but of course it is. Six weeks ago it had not occurred to anybody that doing that would be necessary, because they all expected Ukraine to lose.

You can sympathize with its desire to take revenge if it wins, but for the sake of peace in the future it cannot be allowed to do that.