Day Eight of the Ukrainian War
I have posted on twitter about the Russian Army columns North of Kyiv decaying into immobile blobs due to the Rasputitsa, poorly maintained Chinese truck tires and shear “follow the plan” Russian incompetence.
The head and first dozen or so kilometers of the southernmost column north of Kiev have been stuck there for EIGHT DAYS. The Russians have since rammed more and more vehicles into this monster traffic jam (idiotically “following the plan” Soviet-style) so the whole thing is now 65-70 kilometers long (almost 40 miles).
And, because the trucks can’t go off-road due to the Rasputitsa mud and tire problems, they’re stuck on the roads and the roads’ shoulders three vehicles wide for the whole @40 miles. That means fuel and resupply trucks can’t move on or off road to deliver anything to anybody.
So all the columns’ heads are now out of fuel and battery power. They can’t move north, south or sideways, and everything behind them is stuck because of the mud, and rapidly running out of fuel and vehicle battery charge too (assuming they haven’t already). Nor can any of those columns defend themselves because they’re too densely packed. They’re just targets waiting for the Ukrainians to destroy them.
Only the Ukrainians had something better to do. They opened the floodgates of reservoirs around those columns to flood them and turn the surrounding areas into impassable quagmires for months – probably until July or August. (See photo below) Probably several thousand Russian vehicles in those columns will be irrecoverable losses. Hundreds of Russian soldiers might have drowned.
This was not just a debacle, but an EPIC one. About 1/5th of the Russian force in Ukraine is now flooded or trapped, and are definitely out of the war for good.
I’ve attempted to do a search on the photo, a lot of war photos and videos have been found to be fakes (other times or other places).
Google recently replaced Google Search with Google Lens. Google Lens says this is a lake in Colorado. But Google Search has links to sites reporting that the Ukrainians have flooded a area to trap the Russians, as does this article.
Let’s hope it’s true.
John the River
On the North River 
Very difficult for me to form an opinion here; my wife (to be) emigrated from Russia (she says she’s from Kyrgyzstan and isn’t Russian) and tells me that Ukrainians are well-known for some pretty bad behavior themselves. She’s related several anecdotes, e.g. “refugees” arriving in Germany in luxury vehicles using ‘relief’ money to hire prostitutes, dining in fine restaurants and flashing passports as payment, etc. Stories coming from Ukraine can’t be trusted, since numerous examples of using the same images from atrocities years ago (remember that trick?) are showing up. Granted, the Russian army isn’t nearly as formidable as feared and that doesn’t matter if people are getting killed, but for some reason I keep flashing back on the Iran-Iraq war. One other thought: how in the world are the ‘relief funds’ being raised on various media platforms going to find their way to evacuated Ukrainians? Not fishy, not at all…
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I agree. That’s why I Google searched the image first. And I’d have to think more than twice before I’d donate to any charity or relief for refugees.
But I had been wondering why the massive column of Russian men and equipment keep getting longer but not moving into Kiev. The ‘Fog of War’ indeed!
As Churchill said, “A falsehood goes around the world, while the Truth is still putting it’s shoes on”.
Ultimately though, I think Putin is going to lose, and pay with his life (it’s a Russian tradition after all).
As long as the Ukrainians are willing and stay in the fight, the Russians haven’t enough troops and equipment to take and hold the country. Every city they take, every square mile they advance will either sap more and more of their men and resources or just close up behind and around them.
“The flies have conquered the flypaper”.
‘The Moon is down, John Steinbeck.’
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