After Suffering Heavy Losses, Ukrainians Paused to Rethink Strategy

 via New York Times (behind paywall)

Early in the counteroffensive, Ukraine lost as much as 20 percent of its weapons and armor. The rate dropped as the campaign slowed and commanders shifted tactics.

Here 

A couple of things...

1.  Ukraine has lost more than 20 percent of its weapons and armor.  If they're giving you that number along with what we've seen thru open source along with the begging then you know the truth is much uglier.

2.  Fuck the loss of armor and equipment.  People are getting chewed up in this thing to include the Ukrainian Forces.

3.  What's gone unsaid and I have no contacts (had only a few before) in the "contractor" community I would have to guess that this is no longer an attractive fight.  The money might be good but money ain't no good if you're not alive to spend it.  

4.  I've been yelling that they needed to pause this thing.  Looks like commonsense is about to be a common thing with the talking heads this weekend.  Can't wait to hear all the military experts with stars on their shoulders from past lives try and spin this into good news.

5.  Speaking of which.  It amazes me how many on this blog so believe what they're told OR attempt to justify what they're seeing with their own eyes in comparison to what THEY WANT to believe.  Its been obvious for over a month that this counteroffensive was a clusterfuck from the deepest darkest points of hell.

6.  I've claimed that this was a political counteroffensive and that it made no sense militarily.  This is the result.  All that treasure basically wasted with the ability to reinforce it becoming more and more limited.  The US can send over Abrams but they're gonna have our top line armor and the Chinese will have their metalurgalists all over it to get the mix right.

TLDR?

The Ukrainians fucked up by pushing a counteroffensive before they were ready.  They chose politics over the military art and now Ukraine/NATO are paying the price.