January 27: T’anks for everything!

In which, Ukraine gets a fresh influx of weapons, more classified docs turn up in politicians' homes, Turkey and Sweden duke it out over NATO membership, and violence escalates in the West Bank.

T’anks for everything!

Last week ended with the US declaring the now infamous Russian PMC Wagner Group as a terrorist organization. I thought that was a pretty strong step considering Wagner is supplying a lot of the shock troops for Russia’s ground operations in Ukraine. But that was just the opening move in a week of big moves.

After weeks of diplomacy, public and private, President Zelensky and Ukraine got the thing they’ve been asking for: Tanks, tanks, and more tanks (apparently in exchange for a massive anti-corruption sweep of the Ukrainian government).

Once Germany and the United States 180’d and decided to send tanks to Ukraine, numerous other countries announced decisions to send tanks, artillery, and other aid… even as America tried to shame Chinese companies into not doing the same for Russia.

In other words, this is now a full fledged proxy war between Russia and NATO; and leaders from Germany to Hungary are saying that quiet part out loud. While Ukraine supplies the manpower, the vast bulk of its war materiel is being supplied by the US and NATO (heck, even the Swiss are getting in on the action).

Russia, quite rightly interpreted the move as further commitment of NATO to defeat and humiliate Russia, and responded with renewed missile barrages against Ukrainian cities.

There are several ways people have read these recent developments:

1. This is one step closer to nuclear escalation as NATO leverages its massive resources against Russia’s dwindling resources, which will force Russia to deploy a nuclear weapon.

2. This indicates NATO’s long term commitment to defeating Russia in Ukraine… decisively.

3. This desperately needed materiel will give Ukraine the decisive battlefield edge in the coming spring offensives.

Maybe, maybe, and maybe..

As Russia military expert, Michael Kofman notes, we still don’t know what the true state of Ukrainian forces are on the ground, though we do know both sides have taken heavy losses. Eventually, Russia’s manpower advantage could be brought to bear with further mobilization. But even that scenario is dependent on Russia’s newly minted soldiers getting the materiel they need. Both sides are struggling to get the munitions and weapons they need, so it’s not just manpower, but logistics and supply lines as well. 

It could be Ukraine’s forces are slowly bleeding out as battlefield victories come at too high a price and this newest influx of western arms is meant to be a badly needed force multiplier to at least hold the line against fresh Russian reinforcements. 

There’s still a lot that’s unclear, but the amount of movement clearly indicates one thing: both sides think that this spring will be a significant pivot point in the war and are racing against the clock to ensure any scrap of advantage they can.