Sunday, April 10, 2022

Can Ukraine Ever Win? It can inflict such destruction that Putin will fear global humiliation; The Drone-Warfare Revolution Is Here; US Training Ukrainian Troops On Switchblade Kamikaze Drones; World cannot look away from Putin’s latest atrocity, LIVE UPDATES and MORE

Illustration by Linas Garsys/The Washington Times
Can Ukraine ever win?
It can inflict such destruction that Putin will fear global humiliation
Even a truncated Russian Federation has four times the pre-war population of Ukraine. It enjoys well over 10 times the Ukrainian gross domestic product. Russia covers almost 30 times Ukraine’s area.
And how does Ukraine expel Russian troops from its borders when its Western allies must put particular restrictions on their life-giving military and financial aid?
The interests of Europe and the United States are not quite the same as those of a beleaguered Ukraine. NATO also wants Russian President Vladimir Putin humiliated, but only if the war can be confined within the borders of Ukraine.
The West seeks a resounding reaffirmation for the supposed “rules-based international order” that prevents aggressive invasions across national borders — but not at the price of a nuclear exchange.
So to accomplish those grand agendas, the West restricts some of its generous supplies to Ukraine. It sends plenty of lethal weapons — as long as some of them will not provoke a losing Russia into doing something stupid, like resorting to tactical nuclear weapons to save face.
There are other complications. Time is fickle. In theory, it should favor a resilient Ukraine.
The longer the war goes on, the more sanctions will hurt the Russian economy and insidiously undermine Russian public support for the war. --->READ MORE from Victor Davis Hanson HERE
Press service of the UGF/Handout via Reuters
The Drone-Warfare Revolution Is Here:
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has shown the world drones’ power to change the way wars are fought. America should take note.
The most unlikely hero of the war in Ukraine has been a drone — or, to use the Pentagon’s preferred term, an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). The Turkish-made Bayraktar TB-2, a medium-altitude, long-endurance drone that’s 21 feet long with a 39-foot wingspan, can stay aloft for 24 hours at a stretch. It also carries a lethal punch: a “smart” munition that has been taking out Russian armored and supply columns and helping to grind the Russian ground offensive to a halt.
Meanwhile, civilian clubs of Ukrainian drone enthusiasts have weaponized their much smaller, commercially made drones — including Chinese-made DJI machines — by flying them above ridgelines and buildings to conduct reconnaissance on enemy units and send the information back to Ukrainian artillery units and other commanders. According to the Independent, Ukrainian officers have even been traveling to Poland to learn how to do the same thing with their military UAVs.
In short, the Russian invasion of Ukraine is showing the world how drones will change the way wars are fought going forward. The question now is: Will our military realize that UAVs as the airpower weapon of the future, or will the lessons of Ukraine be pushed aside and forgotten?
There’s a related issue that needs to be confronted first, however. Why are the Ukrainians relying on drones made in Turkey and China instead of American drones? It’s true that we are planning to provide Ukraine with Switchblade “kamikaze” drones, which are small enough to be carried in a backpack and explode when they hit their target, and training a small number of Ukrainians to use them. But there’s much more in the way of drones that the U.S. could be offering Ukraine, and the fact that we are not explains why we’re still behind in realizing the potential of UAVs as an airpower weapon.
There are two reasons we aren’t doing enough. --->READ MORE HERE
Follow links below to +++++relevant+++++ and related stories:

+++++Russia-Ukraine News LATEST UPDATES: (REUTERS) (AP) (NY POST) and (WSJ)+++++

+++++US Training Ukrainian Troops On Switchblade Kamikaze Drones+++++

+++++World cannot look away from Putin’s latest atrocity+++++

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