Rejects: This Week in Ukraine
Courting Kim, Patriot prioritization, the curious case of the Kerch, a mechanized monstrosity, and more annoying alliteration.
Author’s note: There will not be a newsletter for the next two weeks, as I will be traveling throughout Ukraine. If I have internet access and electricity, I will try to post video updates.
1. Courting Another Failed Nuclear Dictatorship
This week, Putin traveled to North Korea to kowtow to Kim Jong Un, another worthless dictator who can barely keep his people alive. After signing a mutual security agreement, the two rejects could be seen enjoying a couple of laps in a Russian-built limousine. Afterward, I’m sure they sat down with a nice glass of North Korean soju distilled from the bones of starved communists to discuss how to destabilize the free world.
Putin is now threatening to arm North Korea. The worry is that Russia will provide nuclear technology, especially regarding hypersonic missiles. Likewise, North Korea will provide Russia with garbage and human-feces-filled ballon technology, in addition to continuing to supply Russia with artillery shells and ballistic missiles. Currently, South Korea ostensibly provides only non-lethal aid to Ukraine (although it was reported that South Korea indirectly provided Ukraine, through the US, with artillery shells). This Putin-Kim coziness has sparked South Korea to consider directly providing military aid to Ukraine, perhaps with more artillery shells (South Korea has an estimated 3.4 million of them) or their indigenously produced K9 self-propelled howitzers of which Poland seems so fond. Regardless, tightening political bonds between international pariahs is never good for a stable world order, nor the war in Ukraine.
2. Patriots Retargeted
This week, the Pentagon announced that it will send to Ukraine the Patriot missiles that had been originally promised to other countries. Clearly, there is a dire need to protect Ukrainian infrastructure and population from Russian air attacks, so it seems like this prioritization should be a no-brainer. Twenty-nine months into a major war in Eastern Europe and the Pentagon finally gets around to moving Ukraine to the top of the list.
But it hasn’t given Ukraine top priority in everything. Early this month, Politico reported that the US Air Force does not have the capacity to train all the needed Ukrainian F-16 pilots because it wouldn’t be fair to bump pilots from other countries. The US Air Force’s weak, bureaucratic indecisiveness in the face of an obvious pathway to doing the right thing will leave Ukraine with around 20 pilots for 60 estimated F-16s. I bet there are plenty of spots for Ukrainians in the Pentagon’s diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility classes (the US military plans to spend $114 million on this initiative in 2024). Maybe that training will save their country from being overrun by the Russian horde.
Also, I wouldn’t want to miss a chance to comment on the overall state of air defense. The costs associated with air defense will be going up. Given its performance in Ukraine, demand for the Patriot system is spiking. Each Patriot missile costs around $4 million, and with customers in at least 19 countries, Lockheed Martin is ramping up production to only around 650 Patriot interceptors by 2027. The longer this war drags on, the increasing cost of air defense will ripple throughout Ukraine’s combat effectiveness. Aid to Ukraine is a zero-sum game. For every air defense missile the West provides, there is a decrease in the amount of financial support to Ukraine for other needed kit like artillery shells, Stingers, and Javelins. That $61 billion in aid ($25.7 billion marked for military equipment) will go fast.
3. The Curious Case of the Kerch Bridge
The Kerch bridge is a symbol of Russian prosperity. At a cost of around $8 billion, Putin built it after illegally annexing Crimea to connect the peninsula to mainland Russia. It has been a valuable ground line of communication (aka “GLOC”) for getting Russian men and materiel into the war. The Ukrainians have been salivating over the prospect of destroying this object since the beginning of the full-scale invasion. They have sent multiple drones to attack the bridge and most successfully deployed a truck bomb in October 2022, the damage from which still seems to be impacting Russian logistics. Recently, when the US gave Ukraine ATACMS missiles with a unitary warhead and the range and destructive capability to take out the bridge, everyone was giddy with the thought of making the Kerch the Black Sea’s next marine wildlife habitat.
Suddenly, the Ukrainian government is no longer interested in the bridge. This week, a Ukrainian naval officer said that the bridge is no longer important, tactically or strategically. The Ukrainian SBU has been attempting to bypass the bridge with their Magura sea drones to strike Russian naval targets held up in the Sea of Azov. To date, there have been no ATACMS strikes on the bridge. And this considering a recent push by the Armed Forces of Ukraine to systematically destroy Russia’s air defense on Crimea, some believe in preparation for some larger operation. Additionally, this week, the Biden administration announced that Ukraine can use US weapons to attack any assembly area in Russia (not only around Kharkiv). The Kerch bridge is exactly that kind of target.
So, why not destroy the bridge? One would believe that the Ukrainians would at least destroy the bridge as a symbolic gesture. My guess is the US government has explicitly placed the bridge off-limits. Why would they do that? Escalation, of course. Even the most die-hard war hawks with limited ability to see the war through Putin’s eyes understand the value of the bridge in terms of his prestige. Destroying the bridge is akin to backing Putin further into a corner. Not that we should care! Perhaps Ukraine is ignoring the bridge as a ruse, biding their time until a massive strike. If so, this bridge will soon be a monument to the failure of Putin and his imperialist aggression.
4. [Video] Blyat!
It is known by many names: the turtle, tsar tank, the barn, the blyat mobile. This week, Ukraine’s 22nd Brigade captured one of these mechanized monstrosities, billed as “impervious to drones,” by attacking it with a drone. The video (found here) is an “unboxing” tour of the adulterated T-62 tank, including its complete lack of combat capability. The tank, described as “blind, loud, and stupid,” is a perfect metaphor for the Ruzzian army.