- Most important factor: Weather continues to be warm in Kiev, not cold enough to freeze the ground.
- Ukraine’s challenge: Ukraine has fewer people than Russia and must inflict high casualty ratios to be victorious.
- Russia’s perspective: This war is a battle for Russia’s survival, and they will not stop.
- Ukrainian strategy: The only way for Ukraine to emerge victorious is to kill so many Russian soldiers that the Russian front collapses.
- Russian tactics: Wagner group has been using convicts in human wave tactics, throwing wave after wave of humans at Ukraine until weather changes or logistics shifts.
- Estimations: Minimum deaths in the war so far in the Russian side is 120,000 and estimates for Russian deaths in the battle specifically is somewhere between 10 and 40,000.
- Upcoming months: Russians will move more troops into the front and with the second mobilization underway, they will be badly led, equipped, supplied, and trained.
- Ukrainian strategy: Ukraine needs to free up the conflict into a war of movement, allowing tanks and artillery to do an offensive where Russians can’t resist or maneuver.
Published February 23, 2023
Visit YouTube to watch Peter Zeihan’s original vlog Peter Zeihan – The Ukraine War: Operational Updates