Mike clients military analysts. Mike served with various military organizations both domestically and throughout the world throughout his career, served with the great distinction there's a respected military analysts. Mike. How are you, sir, guy. It's great to be back with you today. Thanks. You know, there are some developments in the last couple of days we can talk about, but let's go big picture. Six months in where are we? Yeah, big picture? Uh. You know, it's kind of like going
to boil the ocean down here quickly for it. Because if you look at domains you look at from a military perspective, land, air, see, uh, cyber and let's stay communication, propaganda. Not a single one of those domains does Russia control. We thought six months ago this was going to be over, this illusion of a short war, short battle that has taken place throughout history. Uh. Six months now into this,
Russia has not any control over any of those domains. Uh. In fact, it's stillmated in each and every one of them. And uh and now we perceived to both sides, you know, really digging in the winter is going to start. And now you're seeing things of expansion with regard to what's what's Europe going to do. I saw reports about the European countries possibly poll and properly Ukraine helping them destroy
the Norrange stream pipelines. We're getting into economic, you know, kind of state craft with regard to sanctions that that are going to just on Russia, but to kind of again boil it down. Russia did not expect to be where it is right now. Six months on Ukraine Independence Day.
They thought they have full control of Ukraine well by this point, and I've heard reports that we the West, they tell whomever, we're furnishing the Ukrainians with increasingly sophisticated weapons systems, accurate artillery to fifty miles, what should we know about that? We are? And all that is good, But what's happened Russia has learned and finally and they're
starting to dig in. This is now taking the shape of again what we've seen wars in the past, of trench warfare, and they've been able to protect themselves from from these weapons systems. It gives the Ukraine military at least an advantage that they don't have in numbers, but they'll never have in numbers. And this is why from a war of attrition perspective, Russia could just grind us away, They could just grind us down and just keep this
going until both sides are exhausted. Look how long World War One last A four years of basically this kind of thing. Um, you don't I don't see Russia stopping right now. If they wanted to, they should stop, build a border, try to keep the land that they've they've taken, which is why Ukraine would have to say that they've they've been at a loss. But but again from on the ground, from a conventional perspective, Russia thought this was going to go a lot, a lot better than it has.
They still own a nap about once set of that land mass. But and some highly really areas of industrial strength that that will help Russia if they can keep it and maintain it. Yes, so President Zelinski said, I think it was yesterday very forcefullly, that we will take back all that land, including Crimea, and we will not stop until we've accomplished that. Um, what do you think
of the of that. That's a pretty powerful statement, it is, and it's going to only take place with a regular warfare because they just don't have the conventional forces to run kilometer Front, which is really what what exists right now Russia does. They've got some capacity and now they're even on the defense in some areas there. So, Um, the fact that they're bombing into Crimea ammo dumps. We saw Russia now starting to store some ammunition at Depa Faiza.
That's that nuclear power plant. They're going to use that as a way to try to protect some of the military assets. But that's just the thing. Russia is not going to stop Ukraine's not going to stop. The winner's coming. And um, you know, we have to see what actually Western Europe does. If they're gonna cave get weak at the knees when it comes to buying Russia oil and gas, if they keep making dumb decisions about the outsourcing their energy,
then they have everything you know coming to them. Military analysts, my clients on the line, Mike, the point you made about a war of attrition and Russia's advan there is undeniable. But at the same time, uh, they they have already proven their lack of adequacy as a fighting force, the lack of discipline and training and equipment among their people. Um, what's Russia's next step if indeed this war grinds on
for another god knows how long. Right, they've proven real incompetence on the grounds their inability to take care and manage their their troop levels and their soldiers. The leadership is awful. Uh, they can't keep morale in the units. But what they have is artillery, and artillery is called king of battle for a reason, and that artillery is going to hold off any Ukrainian attempts to kind of claw back any of some of this land there because they outgun them likely tend to one. Now, well, we've
given them missile systems and things that are highly accurate. Um, there's a principle of war called mass that's still Russia still owns in this case because of the size of its country. So um, they're they're they're going to use that to their advantage. They're not going to run out of ammunition anytime soon. Uh, they'll likely start conscripting more
troops to be thrown into the fodder. Uh we saw from from barge sticks conscripted sums would likely see them start to come in the next couple of months as at both sides just really really dig in. At this point, it's gonna be I think you're gonna seem more like a World War One trench warfare. Yeah, you know, I look at these daily battle reports and they literally moved feet and yards at a time. They're not taking any large cities. There's no major offensive operations taking place. It's
it's now coming down of trench warfare. Man. That's uh, that sounds ugly. What's your this is opinion stuff. What's your opinion on? Are we giving Ukraine enough stuff fast enough? I think so? Um And the more, you know, billions of dollars on the way there, I think we're doing all we can, but we can't give them what they really need, and that's an army. You can't give them
the man of material and and that that goes with it. Um. I know folks that are flying over there helping them with training, virtual reality training, every single every single let's let's called battlefield exceler rent is being put there. But the quote, you know, the old Roman legions, Until you're willing to put your your people in the mud, nothing's really going to happen. So what they need is an army. They need two or fifty troops, they need that level
of manpower. We can throw all the technology after them that is a combat multiplier, but from their perspective that they're just short on people and that's really where this Russia does have the advantage, and that's where this war patrician will just potentially grind them out. Still. The final question for me, Mike, and it's kind of a personal request. Amidst my life of the endless consumption of dreary, endless
depressing news articles, I've rededicated myself to reading books. Do you have a favorite book about a particular military conflict or war or military conflict in general that you think the folks would find enjoyable or edifying. Boy, great question, I've got a lot of them. One right away, Yeah, i am. I'm after listening to one right now called, you know, the Battle of War and uh. One that comes to mind that to me is that it's called
The Heights of Courage. It's by a guy named Avador Kahalani, and it's about the Israeli conflicts in the seventies and what took place in the Israeli army and what they did to from from their technology perspective, to overcome the numerical superior our force they were fighting. Um, all of the things that go into small unit tactics. I I'm a small unit tactive guy. I commanded on the ground at the lowest level. And well, I have lots of general officer friends that you know that kind of sat
in the talk and kind of watched them going. I was in the execution phase of the army when I was doing it, and so when I when I read that book, I just you know, got you. It gets you inside the tank, It gets you inside those firing mechanisms and the decisions that had to be making split seconds, and the amount of courage it took from the Israeli Army to defend, especially on the Gold Heights there. So that that's one of my favorite the Heights of Courage.
It's an old book, but it's really it's really worth history. And I think so many things today actually go back. But I think the Ukraine is very similar to those Abzraelist wars in the seven and he's based on the surprise attack aspect of it, based on being outnumbered by Numerican spirit force, but using technology in order to try to overcome that disadvantage. Terrific, great stuff. Mike Clients, Military analyst Mike We appreciate it so much. Thanks. Yeah, that's
good stuff. I hadn't heard anybody say that, but it makes a lot of sense if you're gonna, if you're gonna try to draw comparisons, you know, stay away from World War one or two or various places and go with the Arab Israeli conflict. Massively out numbered, surrounded, surrounded. Yeah, arm and