With the Russo-Ukrainian War now rolling on into its seventh month, I thought this might be as good a time as any to put together a more extensive analysis than the twitter format allows. What follows will be my assessment of what exactly the Russian Armed Forces have achieved, why they made specific operational choices, and the general shape of the battlefield today.
How I Think About War
We should begin by acknowledging that the Russo-Ukrainian War is a novel experience for humankind. This is the first high intensity war between peer states to occur in the social media age. The content and pace of the information hitting the internet has therefore from the first moment been an aspect of the conflict itself. Ukraine, which is almost entirely dependent on foreign financing, intelligence, and weaponry, has from the beginning been hard at work shaping the story of a plucky underdog showing unexpected resilience against a barbaric invader.