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There are many indications of how Ukraine caused great trouble to Russian President Vladimir Putin by dampening hopes for a quick victory.
Russia has lost hundreds of tanks, many of which have been burned or abandoned along the roads, and the death toll in the Russian military is likely to surpass that of the country’s military campaigns in recent years.
However, after more than three weeks of fighting and as hopes over Mr Putin’s initial target of a change of government in Kiev have faded, the Russian military continues to strike Ukraine hard. Russian forces could fight for whatever the Russian president might plan afterwards, whether using a negotiated solution or brutal destruction, military analysts say.
Despite the determination of the Ukrainian people, the losses among the Russian military forces and all the strategic mistakes of the Kremlin leaders, there is no sign that the war will end soon.
Even if Mr. Putin fails to take control of Ukraine, he could continue to launch strong attacks on cities and civilians. The Ukrainian president said Russia was trying to subdue Ukrainian cities by causing famine and that Vladimir Putin was deliberately creating “a humanitarian catastrophe”.
“His instincts will push him to become even tougher because he has gotten into a whirlpool… a big strategic mistakeSays Michael Clarke, former head of the Royal United Services Institute based in Britain, a defense research institute.
“I do not think it is in his character to try to withdraw“, He says.
Vladimir Putin’s forces have been conducting Russia’s largest and most complex combined military campaign since the takeover of Berlin in 1945. His initial objective, which he announced in a televised speech on February 24 when the offensive began, was to “demilitarize” Ukraine and save its people from the “neo-Nazis” as he put it, a completely untrue description of the Kiev government, which is headed by a president of Jewish descent.
Russian President Putin underestimated the national pride and battlefield skills that Ukrainians have built over the past eight years in their battle with Russian-backed separatists in the east of the country.
Faced with an unfriendly population to welcome them, Russian forces reverted to the tactics of their past offensives in both Syria and Chechnya, dropping bombs and rockets on towns and cities, as well as forcing millions of men , women and children to leave the country./VOA
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