Putin has effectively put every male between 18 and 60 on notice to become human fodder for the war in Ukraine. At this point, Russia has already exhausted all their “professionally trained” military personnel, so now they’re grabbing people off the streets to go through a cram-course in military exercises and then right into battle. This is no different than Stalin throwing more and more soldiers against Hitler’s Wehrmacht during World War II. Unfortunately, the Soviet fodder method worked by wearing the Nazis down as they fought against a seemingly inexhaustible communist foe. But fortunately, Russia of today does not have the capability to replenish its military hardware — unlike during World War II when the U.S.A. and Britain were supplementing much of the Soviet’s war material. So, Russians will get rushed military training, a sub-par rifle of some defective sort, and a pat on the back before heading into the killing fields. What could possibly go wrong? Hopefully, Ukrainians have enough bullets for these raw Russian recruits.
I have always appreciated General Grant’s philosophy of waging war — “The art of war is simple enough. Find out where your enemy is. Get at him as soon as you can. Strike him as hard as you can and as often as you can, and keep moving on.” As long as his Union soldiers killed more Confederates, he considered the battle won because, in the end, Grant understood that Union soldiers outnumbered the rebels. Ukraine must (I’m sure they have) adopt the same sentimentality. Indeed, there may be more Russians available to conscript, but they will never overcome the number of Ukrainians willing to fight to defend their country.