Sullivan’s Mistake
2025, Huh?
There are two types of things that bother me. The first type involves issues that initially seem troubling but eventually make sense as logical solutions emerge over time. These problems may seem distant at first, but they become manageable as they unfold. The second type consists of issues that never make sense to begin with. These problems are so out of place that it’s perplexing why we even encounter them, leaving us confused about which direction to take. Such issues never fade away; they linger in the back of my mind, persistently demanding resolution.
The problem statement delivered by U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan in the first week of May squarely falls into the latter category. It took me almost two months to wrap my head around it.
Almost two weeks after the U.S. Congress cleared the $61 billion Ukraine aid package, on May 5th, 2024, Mr. Jake Sullivan, the National Security Advisor of the United States, told the world how he views the Russian war against Ukraine.
According to Mr. Sullivan,
He still expects “Russian advances in the coming period” on the battlefield, despite the new US funding package approved last month, because “you can’t instantly flip the switch”.
But he said that with the new aid from Washington, Kyiv would have the capacity to “hold the line” and “to ensure Ukraine withstands the Russian assault” over the course of 2024. And pointing to the scenario for the war next year, Sullivan said Ukraine intended to “to move forward to recapture the territory that the Russians have taken from them”.
It made no sense whatsoever to me. The situation Mr. Sullivan described as the reasonable path forward was completely out of place. Even before the American aid was cleared on April 24, 2024, Ukraine had already begun obliterating sites housing Russian air-defense assets inside Crimea. Despite being low on manpower and ammunition, the casualty rates of the Russian armed forces kept rising month by month in 2024.
Any influx of weapons for Ukraine will materially increase the cost of Russian operations in occupied Ukraine. They don’t need F-16s and Patriots to keep raising the cost for the Russians; simply meeting the baseline requirements of ammunition would suffice.
By that time it had also become clear that Ukraine has started to fix the biggest mistake they had committed. They started ramping up on recruitment. These were the reasons why I wrote at least twice in the recent past that Ukraine will first stall the Russian advance and start localized counter-offensive actions across the theater. There won’t be any need to launch a massive counter-offensive operations as the enemy lines will start to weaken on its own, creating those openings to breakthrough.
I even suggested where these openings will be created: In all the sectors where the Russians had advanced since the beginning of this year, with northeast becoming their primary weakness.
I am glad to report to you that Russian combat power is starting to come down. Their reserve strength is starting to weaken.
ISW: The Russian military command may have committed under-equipped units initially intended to act as an operational reserve to combat operations, possibly due to constraints on the Russian defense industrial base (DIB) or efforts to reinforce ongoing Russian grinding assaults in Ukraine.
Russia’s ongoing force generation efforts are creating a marginal number of additional forces not immediately committed to the front as reinforcements that Russia can use to gradually establish operational reserves but that the Russian DIB is unlikely able to fully support Russia’s reserve manpower.
In the last week of June, Ukraine received the first batch of artillery shells from the Czech-led initiative. Ukraine’s spy chief Budanov and President Zelensky said it will take some more time for the weapons deliveries from Western partners to arrive at scale on the frontlines.
As you can see from the image below, the Russian advance in the Northeast has completely stalled for more than 45 days. They are now starting to lose territory.
Ukraine has yet to receive the full benefits of the American aid package. They have not fully realized the advantages of Czech-sourced artillery shells. They have yet to see the F-16s and the committed four additional long-range air-defense systems. Despite this, they have already contested the entire frontline of the Russian incursion in the northeast.
Since May 2024, I have firmly believed that Ukraine is just a few months away from contesting the entire theater. My conviction has only grown stronger as Russian casualty rates have surpassed the critical 1,000-per-day mark, and because the Russians have started hiding their tanks and armored personnel carriers, indicating they are running low on both.
On July 12, the Institute for the Study of War arrived at the same conclusion: Ukraine can contest the initiative in 2024, not 2025.
Western and US officials reportedly assess that Ukrainian forces will continue to be on the defensive for the next six months and will not be able to conduct a large-scale counteroffensive operation until 2025. Ukrainian forces are already attempting to contest the tactical initiative in limited counterattacks in select sectors of the front, however, and Ukrainian forces may be able to conduct limited counteroffensive operations even while largely on the defensive depending on the arrival of Western aid.
By shifting the timeline to 2025, the U.S. National Security Advisor may have lowered expectations for Ukraine, inadvertently allowing slow-walking allies to move even more slowly. However, given the actions of the Germans in the last two months, there seems to be significant momentum in terms of supplying Ukraine with the right weapons now rather than later.
What should Ukraine do?
This might sound counterintuitive, but the more pressure Ukraine applies to the Russians in the northeast, the more likely the Russians might be tempted to open up another front further north of their current incursion. Let’s keep an eye on this.
Ukraine has to keep grinding the Russian forces in the northeast. Every other sector is secondary. It doesn’t matter even if you lose territory elsewhere, which I don’t think will happen, as the Russians do not have the reserve strength to advance.
The northeast will remain Russia’s biggest weakness. Exploit it until the very end.
Thanks for reading. Making critical information on Ukraine accessible is one way to fight misinformation. That’s why I’ve made 220 stories free to the public in 2024, including this one.
