Thug Putin’s War on Ukraine is being undermined by his own army of conscript soldiers.
These young men, forced to participate in the War of Aggression are taking a heroic stand and telling Thug Putin, “We don’t want your War.”
These soldiers want to live their lives in PEACE and not be a part of Putin’s unhinged crusade.
New York Times 3.1.2022
WASHINGTON — Plagued by poor morale as well as fuel and food shortages, some Russian troops in Ukraine have surrendered en masse or sabotaged their own vehicles to avoid fighting, a senior Pentagon official said on Tuesday.
Taken together, these factors may help explain why Russian forces, including an ominous 40-mile convoy of tanks and armored vehicles near Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, have come to a near crawl in the past day or two, U.S. officials said.
Some entire Russian units have laid down their arms without a fight after confronting surprisingly stiff Ukrainian defense, the official said. A significant number of the Russian troops are young conscripts who are poorly trained and ill-prepared for the all-out assault. And in some cases, Russian troops have deliberately punched holes in their vehicles’ gas tanks, presumably to avoid combat, the official said.
The Pentagon official declined to say how the military made these assessments — presumably a mosaic of intelligence including statements from captured Russian soldiers and communications intercepts — or how widespread these setbacks may be across the sprawling battlefield.
Besides dealing with shortages of fuel, food and spare parts, the Pentagon official said, Russian commanders leading that armored column toward Kyiv may also be “regrouping and rethinking” their battle plans, making adjustments on the fly to gain momentum for what U.S. intelligence and military officials say is an inevitable push in the next several days to encircle and ultimately capture the capital.
“They have a lot of power available to them,” said the Pentagon official, adding that 80 percent of the more than 150,000 Russian troops amassed on Ukraine’s borders have now joined the fight.
But U.S. analysts have been struck by the “risk-averse behavior” of such a large force, the Pentagon official said. Russia launched an amphibious landing to seize Mariupol, a pivotal port city on the Sea of Azov, but landed forces around 40 miles from the city. That allowed the Russians extra time and space to mount an invasion, but also gave the city’s defenders time to prepare.
Russia’s vaunted air force has yet to gain air superiority over Ukraine, with Russian warplanes thwarted by Ukrainian fighter jets and a surprisingly resilient and potent array of air defenses, from shoulder-fired Stinger antiaircraft missiles to much larger surface-to-air weapons, the Pentagon official said.
Lee's Perspective 