Do you actually believe any country can mobilize 30 million people? ROFL

Sure, but do these people have the will to fight on the frontlines?

Not buying that.

I think it would be extraordinarily difficult for Ukraine to take Crimea back by force. Once they cut off the land bridge, perhaps they'll be able to strike military/industrial targets in Crimea so that the place becomes uninhabitable. To end this war quickly, I think the most sensible solution is to arm Ukraine with nuclear weapons and long range ballistic missiles. They've proven to be responsible with the weapons we've given them and they have a stellar team of nuclear scientists. The MAD doctrine encourages people to negotiate.

It'll be interesting how Ukraine responds to winter warfare. I imagine that they'll be well prepared and equipped with the appropriate gear and shelter. I'll be surprised if every Russian soldier has access to shoes during the winter.

In times of extreme crisis, yes. Hasn't happened since ww2 - when Russia lost something like 20 million people - but it is possible.

No Putin will win in the winter because he WILL MOBILISE 30 MILLION Russians LOL!

LOL USSR never had a fucking army over 7 million, and 3 million where actually taking part in warfare. And thats like 20 fucking countries together at its peak. You are clueless ROFLMAO

The people that are being called up are mostly only needed to man parts of the front that are presently undermanned and vulnerable to counterattack.

They will only see serious fighting if Ukraine attacks an area they're defending. And even then, they will mostly just sit back and shoot from artillery and tanks and apcs from a safe distance and watch em' fry before they can get too close.

The biggest danger to them will of course be random artillery strikes, but overall their casualties should be light - Russia has very good counter-battery systems as well as aircraft to deal with enemy artillery.

The people actually carrying out assaults to take territory are mainly the chechens, Wagner PMC and DPR/LPR assault battalions. I don't think that will change despite the mobilization. Assaulting is too costly in terms of lives and Russia wants to preserve the lives of their men as much as possible. So they'll leave it to Wagner, who apparently is recruiting directly out of prisons now.

Dear God you've clearly got issues. Sorry your joke of a country is getting wiped off the map bro. Shouldn't have fucking chosen Stepan Bandera as your country's idol and for whatever reason thought that Hitler was on the right track with the whole genocide thing.

Oh well, too late to go back now. Can't wait to see what the map of Eastern Europe looks like in 5 years from now. Guess what country won't be there ; )

Right now the battle is focused 100% on Donetsk oblast. And yes, it is going slowly because Ukraine had spent the past 8 years creating massive fortifications in these areas, and secondly because Russia committed minimal manpower to the operation (something which is now changing.) And they committed even less manpower for assaulting.

Of course, you ignore other aspects of what's happening, you ignore the fact that Russia still controls 15% of Ukrainian territory stretched out across a 1,000 km front line. That is a lot of ground and it includes several large cities, including Kherson. You're actually wrong about them retreating there.

The casualty rate for the Ukrainian army is truly horrific. They have suffered 100k casualties and that is not even counting the terro defense, SBU or mercenaries, all of which have high losses. All of Ukraine's original military equipment has been destroyed - they are fighting now with 100% western-provided equipment. But how long can they keep that up? It is well known that western military stocks are starting to run out of stuff they can freely give to Ukraine. Meanwhile Russia has only suffered 6k dead, not counting DPR/LPR or Wagner.

Russia may not be capturing ground quickly, but what they are doing is inflicting some 10-15x the amount of casualties on their enemy compared to what they are taking in return. One thing is going to happen here, either Ukraine will run out of manpower or Russia will run out of bombs and missiles. Which do you think is more likely?

I should add, it doesn't matter to Russia if it takes another year or if it takes another 5 years to wrap this up. They are taking it slow because they want minimal casualties, both on their side and among the civilian population. Make no mistake, they could do mass carpet bombing and take out all the electricity in Ukraine or hell, even use tactical nukes and wrap this operation up in no time. But they simply don't wanna do that because it would cause mass death and suffering. Russia wants to accomplish their goals but without taking huge casualties and without utterly annihilating all the civilians in Ukraine. It's a difficult position to be in to be sure but I believe they will pull it off eventually.