Item — HN Reader

No, Russia won't use its Nukes against Ukraine yet. Remember that the Russians believe the Ukraine conflict is a NATO proxy war against it. And over the past 3+ years, Russian media has reported that the "escalations" that they have seen in the war are deliberate attempts by the west to provoke an "undesirable" reaction from Russia (against the Ukrainians) to use as an excuse to escalate the war and possibly even directly get involved in the conflict and invade Russia.

Russian media analysis believe that Ukraine's polity is now resigned to the fact that they can't really militarily defeat Russia alone. And so they've shifted their strategy to use Ukrainian military to create high impact media headlines, to please their western "financiers" and to psychologically demoralise the Russians. That does make sense as attacks like this while being demoralising doesn't really offer any real military breakthrough to the Ukrainians, nor is it likely to stop the Russian advances.

The Russians already occupy around 20% of Ukrainian territory which the Ukrainians have been unable to take back. Since last year, the Russians have reportedly captured nearly 2000+ kms more of territory from the Ukrainian forces (including the Russian regions that were under Ukrainian control). And the Ukrainians forces can't realistically launch another major counter-offensive as they are very wary of running out of manpower (Ukrainians have 1/4th the wartime population of the Russians, and thus can't replenish their military as much as the Russians can).

Thus, it is an undeniable fact that right now, the Russian military have the advantage and the Ukrainian military is losing the war.

What remains to be seen is how much longer is the Zelensky administration willing to gamble that Russian economy will soon collapse or Putin may be deposed or NATO or EU boots will soon join the Ukranian forces to fight the Russians?

2 comments

> That does make sense as attacks like this while being demoralising doesn't really offer any real military breakthrough to the Ukrainians

Eh? These planes are regularly used to attack Ukraine, and they are irreplaceable (one odd dynamic of this war is that a lot of the Russian equipment is a legacy of the past; modern Russia simply does not have the industrial base to replace it, so unless they can somehow convince China to sell them bombers, every bomber lost is a permanent reduction in offensive capability.)

I agree with you that it certainly hurts the strategic wings (one of the 3 components of the nuclear triad) of the Russian military. But does it change the war in favour of the Ukrainians in any meaningful way? The answer is no because Russian airpower still outguns Ukrainians airpower. Russia still has enough tactical bombers, strategic bombers, fighter jets and drones to launch lethal attacks that Ukraine cannot completely thwart (because of the lack of air defence and its crippled airforce). It also hasn't distracted the Russian military to slow down their offensive.

And the Ukrainians still don't have the ability (or are apprehensive) to launch a meaningful counter offensive, while the Russians keep advancing slowly.

As for the bombers being "irreplaceable" that's the western media fudging with the facts - yes, Russia is no longer manufacturing these particular old but operational strategic bombers any more and hence they cannot be replaced. But Russia has been able to revive production of the TU-160 (and its variants TU-160M, TU-160M2 - the largest operational bomber in the world) and has started manufacturing these new / revised supersonic strategic bombers since 2022 (Full production of Russia's Tu-160 bomber restarted after 30 years - https://newatlas.com/military/russias-tu-160-bomber-restarts... ). It has also developed prototypes of a new stealth bomber, the PAK-DA. So it is ignorant and incorrect to say that Russia doesn't have an industrial base any more to manufacture such kind of bombers. (I will however concede that sanctions are definitely interfering with Russians progress in this domain, and hindering fast production and research effort).

They appear to have built two Tu-160Ms, over a number of years, at least one of which uses an unfinished frame from the Soviet era. To what extent they can actually build them (vs relying on unused parts from decades ago) is unclear, but at any rate they don’t seem to be able to do it fast enough to meaningfully maintain their stock of strategic bombers.

The plant seems to have successfully upgraded two old models to the M1 or M2 variants and delivered two new bombers (built with old airframes). But yes, it appears that it can currently manufacture only 3 bombers a year. So I don't see how it can deliver 50 bombers by 2030 that the Russians have apparently ordered (though one wonders if Russia really needs 50 bombers to maintain strategic parity when there are so many other delivery systems?). Sanctions have definitely hampered the industry too. But overall, the Russians do seem have to revived their aviation industry base in the last 2 decades or so, which they certainly are treating as a priority. All this may also explain why the Russians are suddenly willing to offer the Indians, the Su-57, with some technology transfer including the full source code of the fighter jet - https://militarywatchmagazine.com/article/russia-offers-indi... - (which is quite unprecedented). If India accepts it, such an order (and partnership with India) would be a major boost for the Russian defence aviation industry and revitalise it.

i disagree with your assessment. remember, Russias economy is smaller than the Italian economy bigger than Spains.

this war is bankrupting Russia the longer it continues

Russia’s Wartime Economy isn’t as Weak as it Looks - https://www.rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/comme...