Ukraine was originally part of the Soviet period, that is to say, Ukraine and Russia are brothers and comrades-in-arms, that year World War II for a long time, Ukraine provided the Soviet Union with a large part of the equipment and military resources, of course, Ukraine also suffered more than a million casualties, today, the past brothers and comrades-in-arms have become enemies, this story has to start from the past story!
After the end of the Soviet Union in 1991, the three Baltic countries of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania (direct control), Poland (indirect control) and other countries joined NATO and the European Union. This made Ukraine, which had also been controlled by the Soviet Union, extremely hungry, and Ukraine also wanted to accelerate its integration into Europe.
——Entry into NATO", "as deep as the sea"
Why did Russia allow other former Soviet countries to join NATO (i.e., the European Union) but not Ukraine?
During the Cold War, NATO, led by the United States, and the Warsaw Pact, led by the Soviet Union, had a serious confrontation in Europe. Poland, at the forefront of the Warsaw Pact against NATO, is the far west.
From Poland's easternmost border to the Russian capital Moscow, it is about 1,000 kilometers, which is relatively far. Therefore, the United States wants to station troops in Poland, and Russia strongly opposes it, but it is not a fight to the death. Poland and Russia are also separated by Belarus, which is close to Russia. Even if the United States had the courage to attack Russia from Poland on the ground, Belarus could serve as a strategic barrier – and if the barrier was gone, it would make Russia feel that it had no strategic security.
2014 in particular was a crucial turning point in Russian-Ukrainian relations and relations within Ukraine. Ukraine's largest trading partner is after the European Union. In 2015, the Ukrainian parliament Offina Rada passed the De-Communization Act and in another law placed nationalists who collaborated with the Nazis on the list of "20th-century Ukrainian independence fighters," establishing their legal commemorative status.
Subsequently, the Crimean crisis, the rise of the "neo-Nazi" nationalist movement in Ukraine, and the Ukrainian government's change of "multi-directional" foreign policy and shift to the West made Russia directly feel the danger of NATO power.
Population determines geopolitics
Official statistics show that in 2001, only Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk had just over 70% of the Russian-speaking population (both Russian and Ukrainian). But by 2007, Crimea's Russian-speaking population had reached 97 percent, Donetsk and Luhansk had more than 90 percent of the Russian-speaking population, and four other eastern states had spoken Russian to more than 70 percent.
The west declined further, with less than 5% of the Russian-speaking population in more than 10 oblasts – and since there were no Russians, they simply did whatever they wanted after independence!
After 2008, the geopolitical struggle between NATO and the West and Russia in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus intensified. American strategist Millsheimer pointed out that the West's three-fold policy.
NATO's eastward expansion, EU expansion and the "democracy project" forced Putin to take action, transforming a series of "mundane" regional cooperation into actions to gain geopolitical advantage, which in turn made Ukraine feel "threatened" and "anti-Russian" far-right ideologies and violence gradually rose into the national narrative.
In that year, the attacks between far-right groups and separatist camps broke out, resulting in the Crimean crisis and the Donbass War that continues to this day. The Ukrainian government has armed far-right groups to legitimize their mistreatment and killing of residents of Russian descent in the east. From then on, the contradiction began!
- The situation of troop strength is combat effectiveness
Russians attacked Ukraine, and today there are more than 150,000 Russian troops in Ukraine, or 3.4 soldiers per 1,000 civilian population – but this is not the most, in 1995, the UNITED-led NATO forces, during the battle of the former Yugoslavia, The bosnia they entered had 17.5 soldiers per 1,000 inhabitants, and during the Kosovo War in 2000, NATO had deployed 19.3 soldiers per 1,000 inhabitants.
Although the Ukrainians are still strengthening the defenses in Kiev, and even ukrainian President Zelenskiy announced that he has opened up a visa-free system to foreign mercenaries going to Ukraine, the Ukrainian form is not optimistic, after all, the power gap is very large.
In the past few days, with the continuous upgrading of weapons, from artillery, rocket launchers, to subsequent cruise missiles, supersonic missiles, and then to today's Ukraine continues to receive "Stinger" missiles, "Javelin" and other anti-tank missiles from European and American countries, as well as a number of drones from Turkey, and even laser weapons are on the way!
- The assault of high-precision weapons in Ukraine and Russia begins
In this duel, Ukraine almost gave its all and all its strength, except for not using large missiles, almost all of which could be used, including long-range rocket artillery, self-propelled artillery, and modified MiG-29 and Su-27 fighters, and of course, anti-aircraft missiles and drones traveling overseas. Turkey's drones, in particular, look somewhat lethal.
The United States supplies Ukraine with Javelin anti-tank missiles, which are also advanced weapons categories. Ukraine has about 130 Javelin missile launchers and 1,200 Javelin anti-tank missiles, posing a huge threat to Russian tanks and armored forces.
"Javelin" anti-tank missile full name FGM-148 single-soldier portable anti-tank missile, is the fourth generation of advanced portable anti-tank missiles in the United States, hit rate of 94%, equipped with infrared gaze lock image guidance, while the anti-jamming ability is strong, with "after launch" capability, the farthest launch distance of 4 kilometers, the whole system weighs 22.5 kg; the new "Javelin" anti-tank missile after the improvement, equipped with a CLU launch system, the launch weight is reduced by 30%, Increased range allows for surprise attacks on tanks or armored vehicles in relatively safe areas.
The Ukrainian military announced the reactivation of the S-125 Neva (NATO codename: SAM-3) surface-to-air missile, and Ukraine and temporarily raised 12 Neva SC anti-aircraft missile systems from Poland, which are the latest upgraded version of the S-125 and have made great improvements in digitalization, friend identification and command communication, with a range of 43 kilometers.
Ukraine used a TB-2 drone imported from Turkey to successfully attack the Russian ongoing beech air defense convoy, blowing up some vehicles and missile equipment - the TB-2 drone is a small tactical strike integrated drone developed by Turkey, with a length of 6.5 meters, a wingspan of 12 meters, a maximum take-off weight of 630 kg, a maximum flight altitude of 8,000 meters, and a flight speed of 220 km / h.
Turkey's drone range is only 150 kilometers, carrying 4 small missiles or bombs, and the gap with the United States' Global Hawk, Predator and China's Rainbow and Pterodactyl series of drones is too large, and the price is only $500,000.
At present, Ukraine has imported 48 TB-2 drones from Turkey, and if you add a batch of drones sent by Turkey, it is estimated that there are about 80 Ukrainian drones.
At present, the best main battle tanks in Ukraine are the improved T90 and T80, the aircraft used by the Air Force are still the MiG-29 and Su-27 and MiG-23 in the Soviet period, and there is almost no development of a new generation of fighters, and the air force is not highly effective.
On the Russian side, with the escalation of the campaign, the Russian army has continuously increased and upgraded the high level of equipment, from the initial Su-27, Misu-30, to later join the Su-34 and Su-35, and several stealth aircraft Patrolling the periphery of the Su-57, that is to say, at present, except for the Tu-160, everyone else that can go has gone to the Ukrainian battlefield.
In addition, the Russian army also has the world's most advanced anti-aircraft missiles, it deploys S-400M and S-500A series of anti-aircraft missiles, their strike defense is all over the field, from high-altitude and low-altitude targets to fighter missiles shot down, Ukraine can only look.
With the addition of Turkey's new drones, the Russian military may use laser equipment including stealth drones and anti-drones - the rapid attack drone "Thunder", which is not comparable to the Turkish drone.
The Russian "Thunder" UAV, which belongs to the stealth drone type, has four suspension points, two are installed under the wings and the other two are installed in the fuselage. The Thunder drone has a takeoff weight of 7 tons and can carry a payload weighing about 1.3 tons to a range of at least 800 kilometers.
The Russian military plans a fleet of 10 Lightning (Молния) attack drones to be used against Ukrainian ground combat forces or Ukrainian drones.
The Russian military's latest service "Hunter" UAV, the total weight of 20 tons, the fuselage is designed with a flying wing layout, other fuselage materials are also very precious wave-absorbing stealth coating, this coating can reflect radar waves and other radio signals, so as to achieve the effect of stealth, "Hunter" speed is very fast, up to 1000 kilometers per hour.
In addition to drones, there are too many high-precision weapons that the Russian military can put in, and Europe and the United States think that Ukraine and Russia are just a simple duel on the ground, and now the battlefield has become a group fighting battlefield with "high-precision" weapons.
Of course, Ukraine also understands that Russia is the world's second largest military force, with more than 1 million regular troops, while Ukraine only has a mere 290,000 people, and the reserve force Ukraine cannot be compared with Russia, and the war resources are incomparable.