WAITING

THE COUNTER-OFFENSIVE

When, How and From Where Will the Kiev Counteroffensive Come? Rambling through the streets of Novorosiyya

 

By Sir Charlattam

A stroll through St. Petersburg was just what I needed. I am talking about the legendary Russian city on the Baltic Sea. It had been several years since I had boarded a plane to visit old Russia and what better time than now. When I arrived and wandered through its streets I realised that the publicists of the collective West should pay a visit to clear their heads of the information toxicity of the companies that pay their salaries and see up close the reality that is not as they tell it.

Admittedly, that was the quiet, touristy part of my trip. What mattered most was to see with my own eyes the situation in the hot zone. I was motivated to walk through the Slavic territories of historic Novorossiya (New Russia) liberated by the Special Military Operation and see for myself what the terrain looks like in the face of the much-heralded counteroffensive that Kiev and its Anglo-American backers were preparing just beyond the horizon.

After travelling by van through one of the settlements near Lisichansk in the Lugansk Oblast, it is still necessary to go around certain roads or simply go down and continue on foot through the mud that saturates the roads. Looking out over an expanse where you lose sight of it, it would seem easy for brigades of NATO “donated” tanks and ARES armoured personnel carriers, FV103 Spartans and old British-built FV430s to speed through the yellowing fields, supported by air assistance. It sounds easy, but it is not.

Of course, for such a thing to happen (if that were the plan), the roads would have to be dry and the vanguard would also have to be well equipped with anti-tank systems. This is probably why the Pentagon signed a juicy $7.2 billion contract with Raytheon and Lockheed to supply some 4,000 Javelin missiles a year.

I couldn't help thinking that while we were walking with a LPR militia patrol, NATO satellites and their stationary high-altitude drones are 24/7 scanning the whole territory. I know. Their technology has been an advantage they exploited with small Arab and Latin American countries, but here it is different. This is Russia and unlike those countries it can strike back even before Brussels and Washington have given the order.

We should not lose sight of the fact that the US administration has invested the not inconsiderable sum of 160 billion dollars to finance (in addition to the luxuries, cars, prostitutes and cocaine of its officials) the war apparatus of the ultra-nationalist regime in Kiev. Of course, into that account go the millions of British pounds and a substantial stock of Javelin missiles paid for out of the taxes of British citizens. Charming indeed! Don't you think so?

The morale of the Lugansk fighters is high and they know that Kiev and its sponsors' military advisers are preparing for a desperate onslaught, but they are prepared and confident that they will not do it head-on. That was a point of view that struck me and so I asked, "How do you think they will do it? All I got was a few laughs and that was it. The attitude is understandable and even though they know my position, they are not going to risk it.

Even though we continued our excursion, I couldn't get what I had been told out of my head and began to ponder the point. A Blitzkrieg sounds rather old-fashioned in today's military reality. A wave of thousands of tanks all breaking through at the same time along the entire front for thousands of kilometres is impossible. If so, a significant section of that spearhead would have to cross the Dnieper River and many of the donated armour would not float. That begs the question: who will provide the bridges or the armoured vehicles that can cross it?

Another problem with this idea is where will so many Ukrainian tankers come from? Nowhere, as most of the regular crews are either dead or prisoners. Add to this the fact that it will not be the old Soviet-era T-72s but Bradley tanks, Abrams and Leopards, and the number of trained tankers is much smaller. Although it should not be ruled out that crews were already being trained even before the war in the US and obviously in Britain. With regard to the latter, it would not be surprising if Ukrainians in British uniforms were being trained in any of the three armoured regiments.

Undoubtedly, many of these vehicles will be manned by NATO troops who, while wearing Ukrainian uniforms, are foreigners in camouflage.

Such an offensive would require substantial air cover unless NATO creates a naval diversion in the Black Sea that forces a significant part of Russia's aerospace force to come in support of its fleet. Such a trick would be an amphibious mobilisation that looks like preparations to invade Crimea by sea.  Another possibility would be to create movements at air bases in Poland and Romania that would give the appearance of preparations for a massive incursion into Ukraine, or even to put false radar echoes in the air that would give the impression of an air strike from unexpected directions.

NATO assets could also conduct massive movements of artillery pieces to give the appearance of providing cover for an imminent attack.

In reality, whatever stratagem the Kiev regime employs, it is clear that it will not be without NATO's superlative assistance, making its interference in the hostilities politically no longer excusable and allowing Moscow to draw on its strategic nuclear assets to ward off and defend against an imminent threat to its national security.