Thousands of Russian soldiers already dead: Why Putin's army is so failing in the war

Cologne City Gazette Thousands of Russian soldiers already dead: Why Putin's army is so failing in the war Sven Christian Schulz - 8 mins ago Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday praised the war in Ukraine as a "heroic" action by the Russian army. All plans would be implemented, Putin said on Friday in a speech in front of tens of thousands of cheering Russians at Moscow's Luzhniki Stadium, which was broadcast on Russian television. The propaganda show is likely to aim to increase the war morale of the population. Putin's war has already cost the lives of thousands of Russian soldiers. Ukrainian military in the Lugansk region on Thursday Military expert Gustav Gressel from the think tank European Council on Foreign Relations assumes that the losses in the Russian army are significantly higher than among the Ukrainian armed forces. “Ukraine speaks of 14,000 dead soldiers on the Russian side. I think about 10,000 is realistic," Gressel told the editorial network Germany (RND). The expert blames many mistakes made by the Russian army for the many deaths. "The lack of coordination among the battalion combat groups and between the services is very surprising." Many tactical mistakes made by the Russian army Gressel suspects the Russian leadership thought the war would be over very quickly and therefore did not create a command structure to coordinate support. In addition, communication between Russian military districts is very poor. Another blunder: the Russian air defense did not know for a long time what their own air forces were. "That's why the Russians were very reluctant to open fire on the Ukrainian air defenses." Ukraine took advantage of this and often surprised and eliminated the Russian air defenses. This has often happened in the past few weeks. The Lieutenant General a. D. of the Bundeswehr, Heinrich Brauß, pointed out many tactical mistakes. "If the military in the West had been given such an order as the Russian Chief of Staff, then we would have tried to eliminate the Ukrainian army militarily and not attack the big cities first," he told RND. Because if you eliminate the opposing army, the country will also fall to you. Military leadership had apparently miscalculated But for an attack on the Ukrainian army, you need local commanders who can make decisions and lead independently. "Obviously the Russian commanders aren't capable enough to do that," says Brauss, who most recently worked for NATO. In addition, the Russian military leadership has apparently miscalculated. "Your logistical capacities are obviously not sufficient for large-scale operations." According to military expert Gressel, Russia has already shown in Syria and initially in the Donbass that the army is capable of skilful tactical military steps. But now you don't see anything of that anymore. "The Russian Air Force has been flying attacks with many bombs and unguided rockets without using precision weapons since the second day." "The Russians let themselves be lured into ambushes" Either the Russian arsenal is very limited or Moscow is deliberately holding back precision weapons. The expert also noticed that Russia used small drones much more frequently in the Donbass than in the rest of Ukraine. "The Russians have now allowed themselves to be ambushed without first using reconnaissance drones," he said in an interview with RND. The 64-kilometer military convoy that stood east of Kyiv for days also caused heads to shake in military circles. According to Brauss, the Ukrainian army was able to "shoot out tanks, anti-aircraft guns and tankers individually." For him, this is “a sign of military, tactical and logistical incompetence”. Military expert Gressel reported that there were a few ambush raids on the convoy by small ambush squads. Coordination of the Russian armed forces much worse than expected However, large attacks were not possible because the Ukrainians had to get through the Russian lines to the convoy. "Ukraine also attacked the convoy with drones and caused great devastation for the Russian ammunition columns." In addition, the Ukrainian army blew up bridges and tore down dams to flood the convoy's paths. The coordination of the Russian armed forces is also much worse than experts had assumed a few weeks ago. "Months ago, Russian military circles were still praising the advances in data exchange, digitization and coordination - you don't see anything of that now." This is also noticeable in the use of radio technology.