Ukraine Cannot Sustain its Proxy War

By David Sole

Ukraine’s losses in the proxy war that it is fighting for the US and NATO against the Russian Federation can no longer be hidden from the public. The Kyiv Independent, a pro-Ukrainian publication, reported on November 27 that Ukrainian casualties over the past 34 months of war amount to 500,000 dead and severely wounded. The estimates came from another pro-Ukrainian journal, The Economist, which reported this on November 26.

The Economist lists Ukrainian combat deaths at 60,000 to 100,000 and “400,000 more are too injured to fight.” This far exceeds statements from Ukrainian President Zelensky that admits to only 31,000 killed.

The Economist based its numbers “on leaked or published intelligence reports, defense officials, researchers, and open-source intelligence….Almost one in 20 Ukrainian fighting-age men have been killed or injured.” The Kyiv Independent also mentioned very similar estimates from the Wall Street Journal from September.

It is no wonder, then, that Ukraine is having difficulty keeping soldiers on the front lines. ABCNews reported on November 29 that: “Desertion threatens to starve Ukraine’s forces at a crucial time in its war with Russia.”

“Facing every imaginable shortage, tens of thousands of Ukrainian troops, tired and bereft, have walked away from combat and front-line positions to slide into anonymity…. Entire units have abandoned their posts, leaving defensive lines vulnerable and accelerating territorial losses.” The report quotes a Ukrainian lawmaker saying the number “could be as high as 200,000.”

The military situation on the ground has shifted in favor of the Russian Federation forces who are advancing across a long line of contact. On December 12 the New York Times reported that Russian troops had reached “within 3 Miles of Key Ukrainian Transit Hub,” the city of Pokrovsk. This has been described as a key strategic position for Ukraine in the Donetsk People’s Republic which the Russians have been closing in on for months. Other key military targets are also close to being surrounded and seized by the Russians.

The once vaunted “Ukrainian invasion of Russia’s Kursk province” has received little attention by the Western news media. The incursion was halted soon after it began even though Ukraine threw tens of thousands of its best troops and equipment over the lightly defended border into Russia. Since that time the Russians have been building up their forces and counter attacking, causing heavy casualties among the stalled Ukrainians. The Times did report that: “In recent days, Russia’s army has also intensified its assaults on Ukrainian forces occupying a sliver of land in the western Russian region of Kursk.”

The dismal situation for Ukraine in this war planned and financed by the US and its NATO allies is driving the Western powers toward a dangerous escalation in an attempt to keep “weakening Russia” – an original goal admitted by the US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin.

The US, UK and France are launching long range missiles for Ukraine directly into Russia. President Putin has stated that this will put the US and NATO into a state of war with Russia. Russia has retaliated with massive and devastating missile attacks against Ukraine’s military targets and energy facilities, including use of the new Oreshnik hypersonic missile that travels at over 2 miles per second!

The coming fall of Pokrovsk might be followed by a push by the Russian military to the Dnieper River directly to the west, including the large cities of Dnipro and Zaporizhzhia.

In another dangerous move, NATO has sent thousands of troops, including US military units to Estonia, on Russia’s northern border. According to Russia Today: “The Pikne exercises will last two weeks and involve servicemen from the US, Estonia, Latvia, France and the UK.” It is precisely the West’s push to incorporate Ukraine into NATO that led to the Special Military Operation by Russia in February 2022.

The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) released a statement on November 29 claiming that NATO, realizing that their proxy war has failed, wants to freeze the conflict “along the current front line.” This would allow the Ukrainians to rebuild their military but “according to the plan, a total of 100,000 so-called [NATO] peacekeepers will be deployed in Ukraine.”

This report should not be discounted as simply “Russian propaganda.” The Daily Mail reported on November 25 that “Britain and France are ‘not ruling out’ sending troops to Ukraine as part of European coalition to support war effort…”