The other looming problem is a shortage of hard weapons, Ukraine may now have more tanks, I bet the gap in terms of artillery is closing and they are also getting multiple drone weapons.
Ukraine has also shown itself to be very adept at destroying Russian military hardware of all kinds, but particularly tanks.
Russia is now honest about the true (current) objective of the war, to invade and occupy the East and South of Ukraine.
If may become apparent that that isn't going to be possible. Russia will gain nothing by throwing more people at a war they can't win.
Ukraine can make a return to the Feb 24 boarders and the return of all kidnapped Ukrainians a precondition for a referendum on a wider settlement,.
That is the best deal I think Russia is going to get, the longer the war goes on the more of their army and hardware will be destroyed.
I can't see Ukraine urgently needing a deal, if anything Germany will bow to growing pressure and join in significant arms supplies.
Support for Ukraine of all kinds should keep flowing, a few more wins will boost morale.
Russia really needs to make significant progress soon, morale and public support mist be dropping the longer it goes on.
The Russians originally planned to take the entire country, but they have scaled back to an objective that would have been achievable if it had been the original plan. Now they are trying to achieve it with a severe shortage of almost everything.
Another problem the Russians are facing is the factory that burned down near Moscow made butyl acetate which is used in making smokeless powder. That's going to cause a shortage of ammunition for rifles and gun artillery. This was the largest chemical plant in Russia and the only plant in Russia that made butyl acetate..
Wow, only one crew member died...
Ukrainian officials and satellite images point to evidence of mass graves outside the besieged city of Mariupol as Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed its "liberation." Follow here for live updates.
www.cnn.com
Why am I skeptical about this?
If it only were true, great opportunity for separatist movements across Russia, now:
It isn't ripe now, but I think a civil war scenario is a possibility. The Russian army is dying in the field, they are taking losses they can't replace. I suspect they are going to do a suicidally stupid offensive without enough resources and take massive losses just to try and meet the May 9th deadline.
That could trigger rebellion among those who are left and essentially a disintegration of any order within the army. And that could be the first stage of a civil war.
Kamil Galeev has talked quite a bit about Russian history and the culture of Russia. Russia is made up of a relatively small white Russian minority ruling over a lot of different ethnic groups who have soft loyalty to Moscow. He talked about getting Siberian troops to fight the Germans was difficult. They felt it wasn't their fight.
The Russian army is overwhelmingly not the white Russians, it's made up of the ethnic groups from the outer provinces. They are the only groups with any kind of birth rate. The birth rate among white Russians is among the lowest of any group in the world. They were always a smaller cadre than the people they rule over and that's been shrinking for 40 years. The outer provinces can raise more manpower to fight a civil war than the white Russian provinces, though the outer provinces are desperately poor. But they have manpower and if the army rebels followed by regional rebellions, the minorities in the army will take their weapons and fight for their province's freedom.
I strongly suspect this is Kadyrov's long term game. He has been keeping his troops out of the fight, I think preserving them for a possible civil war. With a weakened Russia, Chechnya might succeed in breaking away this time and his TikTok troops would be well armed and in good shape vs an exhausted and worn out Russian army with a desperately poor supply situation.
The good news in a civil war scenario the Russians might agree to anything to make peace with the Ukrainians.
Get the latest United States Dollar to Russian Ruble (USD / RUB) real-time quote, historical performance, charts, and other financial information to help you make more informed trading and investment decisions.
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The Russians have been working hard to prop up the ruble. They have been playing games like any Russian with a foreign income must convert 80% of it to rubles. They have also been pouring their reserves into propping it up. My partner has read some economists who opined this was a stupid move. Propping up the ruble should not be the highest priority, but they are burning reserves doing it which won't be available later when the sanctions really start to bite.
The ruble is back to about where it was at the start of the war
US Dollar to Russian Ruble Exchange Rate Chart | Xe
Against many other currencies the dollar is growing in strength
US Dollar to Euro Exchange Rate Chart | Xe
www.bbc.com
