War in our time? As Russia prepares to crush Ukraine, how the war to come is likely to play out

Part I: Welcome to wherever you are Ten months into Putin’s Special Military Operation (SMO) in Ukraine - or what used to be Ukraine - the Russian military machine seems to be preparing for a decisive war. The conscription of almost half a million troops is done - 300,000 as announced earlier this year and another 200,000 as regularly scheduled every year. Four days before Christmas, Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shogu announced plans to grow the Russian army from the present 1.15 million to about 1.5 million, no doubt a response to the upcoming entry of Finland and Sweden into NATO. It is the recent statements coming out from Moscow that underline this all-new belligerence after almost a year of the SMO. That seems to have climaxed into a hybrid of slug-it-out frontlines like those of the Great War and the more recent US shock-and-awe missile strikes across West Asia. “We haven’t even got started in earnest yet,” Putin had ominously– and confidently- told Russian parliamentarians in July, four months into the Ukraine operation. That speech should have made the West sit up and take note, so hawkish was the Russian leader. “Today we hear that they want to defeat us on the battlefield. What can you say, let them try,” he had said. And: “We have heard many times that the West wants to fight us to the last Ukrainian. This is a tragedy for the Ukrainian people, but it seems that everything is heading towards this.” The ‘everything’ began way before the Ukraine conflict. The Bush Junior-led US killed the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty in 2002, prompting Russia to develop an entirely new class of nuclear weapons that could beat the anti-ballistic missile systems the US was developing on priority then. By 2007, Putin was out of his Matryoshka closet, clearly articulating his concerns about the concomitant eastward expansion of NATO. “I think it is obvious that NATO expansion does not have any relation with the modernisation of the alliance itself or with ensuring security in Europe. On the contrary, it represents a serious provocation that reduces the level of mutual trust. And we have the right to ask: against whom is this expansion intended?” Putin told the Munich Security Conference – the diplomatic equivalent of pounding his fist on the table. The next year, Germany and Georgia became part of NATO. Cut to 2015: Putin’s fist-pounding had gone beyond NATO and was beginning to sound like anguish. The US war on terror had ravaged swathes of West Asia and Afghanistan, and Putin didn’t mince any words. “Instead of the triumph of democracy and progress, we got violence, poverty and social disaster — and nobody cares a bit about human rights, including the right to life,” Putin said through a translator. “I cannot help asking those who have forced that situation: Do you realise what you have done?” he told the UN General Assembly on September 28 that year. Two days after that speech, Russian boots were on Syrian ground, in the same theatre of war with US troops. Syria didn’t work out for whoever wanted it in tatters; the House of Assad continues. And Russian boots are still there. Syria was where Russia battle-tested most of its electronic warfare suites. Some worked rather well, like the ‘blinding’ of US surveillance drones, executed by blocking GPS satellite signals. Syria was, at that time, the “most aggressive EW [Electronic Warfare] environment on the planet”, General Raymond Thomas, then commander of U.S. Special Operations Command, had said. One April day in 2016, two Russian Sukhois made 20 wingtip-brushing passes of the USS Donald Cook, a guided missile destroyer, in the Baltic Sea. Rumour soon spread that the ship had suffered a complete communications blackout. That’s a little far-fetched but goes to show what awe Russian EW actions were already invoking in likely targets at the time. Read: Deadly secret: Electronic warfare shapes Russia-Ukraine war Not just EW systems, Russia has spent the first two decades of the 21st century in modernising its military, from missiles to aircraft, and from submarines to rifles. By 2018, Putin had unveiled six all-new strategic weapons. Russia’s new hypersonic missiles – those that travel at speeds in excess of five times the speed of sound – are simply unstoppable. They are, again quoting Putin, “invincible”. He had then said the missiles can hit any point in the world and that no system could stop them. This range includes the Kinzhal, a 2,000-km range missile, that is fired from a MiG-31 aircraft and goes hypersonic in the atmosphere. The air pressure created in its front as a result of its tremendous speed turns air into a plasma cloud and blocks radio waves, meaning it is stealthy as well. It is a ‘carrier killer’, and effectively renders US aircraft carrier groups, the major method of US power projection, obsolete. The Kinzhal has been used three times already in Ukraine, and has proven to be a success; “brilliant”, according to Shogu. Its first use was against a Ukrainian munitions depot at Delyatyn village in the Ivano-Frankivsk region. The depot was in a Soviet-era facility designed to survive an atomic blast. The hypersonic Kinzhal strike in March destroyed it completely. Russian strategists have let it be known that the Kinzhal could, in one strike, take out the US Aegis Ashore base – a top-of-the-line US missile defence system – in nearby Romania. Two days ago, Putin was asked about the Patriot system that the US is supplying to Ukraine. “Of course, we will destroy it, 100 per cent!” was his reply. Read: Explained: What is the Patriot missile system that US plans to send Ukraine MiG-31s armed with Kinzhals are already stationed in Kaliningrad, a Russian enclave between NATO and EU members Lithuania and Poland. The Zircon is another hypersonic missile, designed to be launched from naval vessels against enemy ships or coastal targets. It can fly at eight times the speed of sound and is manoeuvrable during flight, making it extremely deadly. A missile of that speed will give no practical response time to a defender or target. Read: Russia successfully test-fires hypersonic missile from nuclear submarine Then there’s the Avanguard, a hypersonic glide vehicle that can be manoeuvred till the very end of its flight. The Avanguard itself is launched by the Sarmat Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile, capable of 35,000 km of sub-orbital flight. The Sarmat can fly over the South or North Pole, rendering it practically invisible to known systems. Then it can fire a bunch of unstoppable hypersonic nuclear vehicles. It’s a monster that the West calls Satan, and dwarfs the US Minuteman missiles in size and payload. The other new Russian missiles are the Poseidon, a long-range underwater nuclear drone, and the Burevestnik, a nuclear cruise missile with unlimited range. Russia also unveiled the Armata main battle tank at the annual Red Square victory parade in 2015. As is Russian tradition, their tanks are innovative and high on mobility, a feature that has stood out in their successes since the T-34s of World War II, some of which are still in use in Africa. The Armata has a crew of just three compared to the usual four in a modern MBT; its turret is unmanned and the crew is stationed in a special pod within the armoured body of the tank. The Russian artillery is in a class by itself; doctrine puts the heavy guns and rockets as the prime piece in war and not as support for infantry and armour. No wonder then that all of two Ukrainian brigades were reported as wiped out in a battle near a place called Zelenopillya in July, their destruction completed in minutes by massed Russian artillery. Read: Explained: Russian T-14 Armata tanks in Ukraine soon? Russian soldiers in the field are also using the latest versions of various small arms. Their rifles, the AK series included, and equipment are second to none. Russia is as strong as it can be; indeed, its military has a technological edge as well over the West now. Battle-hardened mercenaries from Chechnya and foreigners of various shades are on the Russian side in the Ukraine theatre too. Tomorrow: Part II: The Russian bear is ready and growling Read all the Latest News , Trending News ,  Cricket News , Bollywood News , India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.