Comments by "PNH 6000" (@PNH-sf4jz) on "What will happen in year three of the war?" video.
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I agree with your comment and have supported it. Yes, I believe that there is a degree to which the US wants Europe to be more accountable for each country's own defense and adequate resources for defense of the whole European theatre. Though I do not believe that desire is based on malicious intent. The current political impasse in the US may even be useful to that end, for as long as required.
I also believe that the coalition/conference of ~60 countries has a plan mapped out. There is no point in Ukraine initiating full scale offensives with only half the resources required to make such offensives successful. It is my belief that once "all the ducks are lined up", that all the resources, including the air support provided by F-16s and other land-based and airforce elements are "on the ground" and ready to go, that we will then see a coordinated offensive using the full complement of resources available through the NATO Defensive Alliance and other countries assisting and supporting Ukraine.
The present situation is not one of "Russia winning", though they may gain ground from time to time. Rather, the Ukrainians are aiming at holding ground, with the fewest possible casualties, until preparation has been completed for a full-scale offensive. In the mean time, Russia has gone from fresh troops and more than four times the quantitative and qualitative firepower advantage, two years ago, in terms of land and airforce resources, combined with an "invincible Russian Black Sea fleet", to almost parity on land, loss of more than 20% of their "invincible" Black Sea fleet and and a significantly reduced airforce capacity. So the time is not being wasted by the Ukrainians. All this despite Ukraine having virtually no navy assets and a significantly smaller airforce.
A "hotter" WAR, fought more quickly would likely have caused many more deaths of Ukrainian military personnel and civilians and a great deal more destruction cause by the Russians. The Russians would likely have retained far more of their weapons than they have as a result of a slower attritional WAR. Despite not everyone being pleased with progress, I believe that Ukraine is accomplishing its goals and objectives in a methodical and purposeful manner.
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@u2beuser714 You need to bring yourself and the country that you represent into the present century. We are now in the 21st Century, not the 18th Century. It is also worth noting that the Ukrainians, without a navy, have reduced the "invincible Russian Black Sea fleet" by more than 20% with the destruction of 15 ships and as many smaller boats again, of the 70 ships and boats of the reinforced Black Sea fleet.
The Great Northern War and the Rise of Russian Sea Power
By Eric Mills June 2023 Naval History Magazine Classic Sea Fights
Europe has produced its share of mighty empires down through the ages, and when you run the list of them through your head, the one that probably doesn’t spring first to mind is Sweden. But during the 16th and 17th centuries, Sweden indeed achieved great-power status and oversaw a Northern European empire that rendered the Baltic Sea—as geostrategically vital then as it is today—a virtual Swedish lake. By controlling the Baltic, Sweden had a chokehold on the fortunes of all the nations along its rim.
Resistance to such dominance was eventually inevitable. And when a coalition of kingdoms united against Sweden in the Great Northern War of 1700–1721, they thought their prospects looked pretty good—because the new Swedish king, Charles XII, was a mere stripling of a lad, all of 14 years old.
“Charles XII” and “Tsar Peter I.”
The boy-king proceeded to quickly disavow them of their overconfidence. In a series of remarkable campaigns, Charles displayed a flare for audacious, ingenious strategy and tactics. He thwarted an attack from the Danes by laying siege to Copenhagen and forcing them to the negotiating table. He humiliated a far larger Russian army at Narva. He repulsed the forces of Saxony at Riga. With each stunning victory, the wunderkind left the coalition forces arrayed against him in fearful awe.
But the heady wine of such success was too strong for the adolescent monarch, engendering in him a false sense of invincibility and unerring genius. And Charles XII morphed from someone reminiscent of Alexander the Great during his legendary winning streak to someone more akin to Adolf Hitler from June 1941 on, spoiled by early success and convinced of his own brilliance, proceeding to make one fatal blunder after another, obsessed to the point of self-destruction with that tantalizing target that would lay many a would-be conqueror low: Russia.
After Sweden’s crushing defeat by the Russians at the Battle of Poltava in 1709, it was all over but the shouting for the Swedish Empire, though the war would drag on. In Russia’s leadership, the bold King Charles XII had met his match: Tsar Peter I—Peter the Great. Peter realized his imperial ambitions for Russia required that it be not just a land power, but a sea power as well.
And therein lay Russia’s perpetual problem: access to a warm-water port. Peter the Great’s attempt to build a Black Sea Fleet came crashing down ignominiously in the face of Turkish naval superiority in 1710. With Black Sea hopes dashed, Russia was left with another option for warm-water access to the open ocean: the Baltic. There was, of course, the little matter of Sweden standing in the way.
Peter had made bold moves in that direction: carving out—from ostensible Swedish territory—the coastal location for what would become St. Petersburg, expanding outward to wrest control of more of the surrounding coastline, building up a fleet. The vessels were ungainly in design, made from less-than-ideal wood, with subpar cannon manned by crews inferior in their gunnery—but a fleet nonetheless. Peter the Great was many things, one of them being a naval visionary. He was the father of the Russian Navy, founder of the Russian Naval School—the tsar who worked himself through the ranks to truly acquire the skills and honestly attain the rank of rear admiral. And he had a valuable mentor in the form of Count Fyodor Apraksin, Russia’s first admiral (and a general of renown before that). Together, these two would sail forth with their newly minted Baltic Fleet and trounce the Swedish at the decisive Battle of Gangut, aka the Battle of Hangö, on 17 August 1714 (27 July by the Gregorian calendar).
{Graphic painting: 1714 Battle of Gangut Russia’s Baltic Fleet surrounds and decimates the Swedish enemy at the 1714 Battle of Gangut—a clash that heralded the emergence of a new naval power. Public Domain}
The Swedish fleet under Rear Admiral Nils Ehrenskjold had them bottled up in the Gulf of Finland, and the Russians were determined to break through. Ehrenskjold, greatly outnumbered by the 100-galley Russian fleet, made use of the narrow channel to array his ships broadside to the foe. So while the Russians had the advantage in numbers, the Swedish had the advantage in position—one that cramped the efforts of the enemy ships.
Twice the Russian galleys charged, only to be repulsed by the Swedish line. On the third attack, they focused on the flanks and broke through, overpowering Ehrenskjold’s flanking galleys, boarding them in such overwhelming numbers that one of them sank under the sheer weight. By now, Ehrenskjold was wounded and his flagship was on fire. He surrendered as the Russians swooped in from all sides.
“Peter took tremendous pleasure and pride in this victory, which he considered equal in importance to Poltava,” noted biographer Ian Grey. At the great Battle of Poltava, Peter “had defeated Sweden’s army; now, he had defeated her navy. His dearest ambition had always been to make Russia a sea power.” With the Battle of Gangut, “he realized this ambition.”
To this day, Russia’s Navy Day, a national holiday marked by parades and fanfare, takes place on the last Sunday in July in honor of the battle. And traditionally, the Imperial Russian Navy always made it a point to have one ship in service named the Gangut, a name worthy of memory—for it was the first major victory of the Russian Navy.
2023 - 2024 Russia loses 20% of its supposedly "invincible Black Sea fleet" to Ukraine, a country having no navy.
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@gelzamangitzaman1482
Vladislav's story
On the edge of Cherkasy, there is a cemetery with a long line of recent graves. They're for the men of all ages from the town who've died fighting since Russian President Vladimir Putin gave the order to invade.
Ukraine honours the dead as heroes, but it's left to their families to grieve.
Each grave is decorated with national flags and heaped with wreaths and flowers. There are images, fixed to crosses or etched into marble headstones, of the soldiers in military uniform.
A woman stands next to her son's grave in Cherkasy
Image caption,
Inna's son was killed when a mine exploded
Inna can't bear to put her son's photo on his grave yet. The image that she used for his funeral is still at home. She's not ready to let go.
Vladislav Bykanov was killed last June by a mine explosion near Bakhmut. He was about to turn 23 and already a deputy commander.
"I believe my son died doing the right thing," Inna says firmly, as her daughter cries quietly beside her.
"I'm a teacher and I always tell the children this: we are right, we are defending our country and our children. My son was defending us. He believed in this cause. And I believe," Inna says before pausing to take in the flags and faces all around.
She hasn't visited the cemetery for a little while and the row of soldiers' graves has grown.
"Do you think my son wasn't afraid? I was afraid too, when he went. Everyone's afraid of dying," she answers, when I wonder what she thinks of those who avoid signing up to fight.
"But maybe being enslaved by Russia is more frightening? Now we see death. It's very difficult. Very difficult. But there is no way back. We can't give up."
Additional reporting by Anastasiia Levchenko and Paul Pradier
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