ARGUMENT: UKRAINE’S RESISTANCE How Ukraine’s Military Has Resisted Russia So Far

Ukrainian troops are mounting a stiffer-than-expected resistance to Russian forces, to the surprise of military analysts. The Ukrainians are fighting with a resourcefulness and creativity that U.S. analysts said could trip up Russian troops for weeks or months to come.

Eric Schmitt, Helene Cooper, and Julian E. Barnes write in the New York Times that what has helped Ukriane is the fact that Russia bungled the opening stages of the war, dissipating Russia’s numerical advantage by sending forces which were too small to attack too many targets. Moreover, Russian logistical operation has been hobbles by fuel and food shortages.

Schmitt, Cooper, and Barnes add:

The Ukrainian army has been training for further Russian encroachment ever since Russia seized Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014 and began supporting separatists in the Donbas region, in eastern Ukraine. Many of Ukraine’s veterans fought in those battles, so there is a subset of the population that is trained and knows how to fight Russians.

U.S. Special Operations Forces have also trained Ukrainian military forces. Leaders in Kyiv then assigned those soldiers to conventional units, allowing them in turn to train a larger portion of the army. American analysts say that training has made a difference on the battlefield.

….

While it is often easier to defend than attack, especially in a complex multifront invasion, the Ukrainians have taken advantage of the Russian decision to use too small a force, sometimes only two battalions at a time, to take key points.

“[The Ukrainians] have been much more evenly matched at the tactical level than they should have been, had the Russians conducted the operations well,” Frederick W. Kagan, a military strategist who has advised the U.S. command in both Iraq and Afghanistan, told the Times. “The Ukrainians have just been much smarter about this than the Russians.”

Schmitt, Cooper, and Barnes note:

U.S. officials have been impressed with the fighting prowess of the Ukrainians, but their assessment that Russia has the superior military has not changed.

Ukraine has succeeded in slowing the Russian advance, but has not been able to stop it, nor is the resistance strong enough to shift Russian President Vladimir V. Putin’s war aims. Over the long term, U.S. officials said, it will be difficult for Ukraine to continue to frustrate the Russian advance.