Art of War: Ukraine's new lessons

Two military events have coincided this week. One, since that ubiquitous mud in the fields of Ukraine has dried, everybody starts to expect a serious showdown there. Two, China’s new minister of defense, Li Shangfu, showed up in Moscow for his maiden visit abroad. According to military experts, essentially, Li was asking for details that may help China to understand better how modern wars are being fought. That has to be something that you cannot learn at the maneuvers, small and humble things like the need to have in stock enough of field kitchen equipment working independently of power supply. It is these details that may help China to be ready, in case it’s been provoked into a conflict, like Russia was. That reminds me of one of my columns , published last October and titled Russia And Art Of War. A lot of new lessons on the art of war have cropped up in Ukraine since that time. First lesson is, you may not know, at first, how long it may take and who your real adversary is, so you better stock up for any eventuality. It’s not a secret by now, that Russia is really fighting NATO, while the Kiev regime only acts as a proxy in this war. The result is surprising. NATO countries, the US and Europe, have depleted their stocks of ammunition and weapons, spent or destroyed in East Ukraine. We, in Moscow, are holding conferences on the subject of the prospects for NATO’s rearmament, which may take 5-6 years and completely change the structure of European economy, struggling under the weight of all kind of predicaments today. Second, the logic of Kiev’s actions is in line with the mentioned NATO’s stockpile realities. Meaning that the long-awaited spring or summer offensive may be needed only to achieve some success before negotiations. If there is no offensive at all, the Russian long-range strikes will render the whole Ukraine/NATO machinery useless, and what then? So, Moscow is literally digging in, seriously planning to repel that offensive, with full awareness that the first days of it may bring plenty of nasty surprises. But, at the same time, the slow pressure forward is still going on, increasing the need for NATO to do something drastic to stop the current unfavorable trends. In fact, Russia provokes the adversary into hasty steps. Third, the human factor in wars is becoming more and more important. That, simply speaking, is about the fate of civilians in the East of Ukraine. There were three battles won by Russia in this war, and all were about taking the relatively big cities, inhabited by friendly population held hostage by the Ukrainian military. That’s Mariupol, Soledar and, today, Bakhmut. The first two cities have been taken long ago, Bakhmut is taken, too, although the victory has not been proclaimed officially. In any case, only 10 per cent of the Western suburbs of the city are not in Russian hands yet. To remind, there were several general principles followed by Moscow in this war. One is, lose as few of own soldier as possible. And this order is still standing, there are no heroic suicidal attacks anywhere, soldier’s morale is high because of that, and losses are really at a minimum. The other principle is, no destruction of East Ukraine civilian areas, no harm to civilians. Which only makes sense, since we are talking about the generally Russian population, being harassed and decimated by West Ukrainians since 2014. This war is not about taking territories, it’s about the people living there and wanting out of Ukraine with its endless persecution and atrocities. And it was exactly why the battle for Bakhmut became a sad experience for all Russians, up to Vladivostok. Ask yourself a simple question: how about the citizens of Bakhmut, what happened to them? Only now we are beginning to get information about it. The tactics of holding Bakhmut and other cities were built around the idea that residential quarters with people kept inside are the best defensive positions against Russians. It’s reported that the Ukrainian command gave them a choice – to go West or stay. Figures are not yet known, but it looks like a sizeable part of population of the city opted for staying and waiting for their Donbass brothers and Russian troops to come. After all, it’s an East Ukrainian city, and the people’s opinions were obvious. And that’s what made them hostages. The battle for Bakhmut took 8 months, with hand-to-hand combat and moving from house to house, and don’t forget the order to avoid losses. But then, when they retreated, Ukrainians began to explode multi-storied buildings, often with civilians in the basement. After all, that city was their logistic hub, and there was not much chance to move out all these huge amounts of explosives. So, in the final days of the battle, earth-shaking blasts were heard from the western streets of the city where Ukrainians still were, and Russian soldiers could not do much to avert it. The jihadis of ISIS in Syria used that terrorist tactics, too. It looks that taking civilians hostages and holding on in their houses will be a standard tactics of future wars. So, what now? The situation at the frontline is tricky and double-edged. Taking Bakhmut was an exception in the general defensive strategy of Moscow, because this is a transport hub of all the Eastern Ukraine. All kind of supplies were fanning out of this place, feeding garrisons of Ukrainian troops in dozens of positions. Taking the city lets Russian troops to have their pick among the disjointed defense areas of the adversary. They may advance either on the city of Avdeevka, an artillery shooting range used by Ukrainians to devastate civilian areas in the capitol city of Donetsk, or move West, to the twin city-fortress of Kramatorsk and Slavyansk, the headquarters of all Ukrainian operations in East Ukraine. A Ukrainian offensive may hinder these plans, so it has to start soon, as in now, or never. Dmitry Kosyrev is a columnist for the Russian State agency website ria.ru, as well as for other publications. Views expressed are personal.  Read all the  Latest News ,  Trending News ,  Cricket News ,  Bollywood News , India News  and  Entertainment News  here. Follow us on  Facebook ,  Twitter  and  Instagram .