A Couple Of Russian Ukraine “Mysteries” Solved. More Maalox To The Kremlin Please

Those of you who read me know that I’ve covered the Ukraine invasion pretty thoroughly, mostly because I have some background knowledge. And if you’ve read, you know that right from the first week of the war, there were things that Russia was doing, or more importantly not doing that struck me as nothing less than military malpractice.

In the first week of the war, I wrote that Russia had already fucked up, because they didn’t control the skies over Ukraine, even with a superior air force. In the first 48 hours, and for as many more days as needed, no matter what the ground troops are doing, the air force has to be up bombing and strafing Ukrainian aircraft on their bases, and get control of the skies. But the Russians didn’t do it. And they lost a lot of aircraft and helicopters because of it.

The second anomaly came about a month into the war. Due to heavy losses, Putin started sending replacement infantry units up to fill in the lines. But instead of putting them on transport planes and landing them at a local Russian base close to the border and trucking them over, they were trucking them the entire long way around. This delay allowed the Ukrainians to blow holes in the Russian lines, starting a rout that took the Russians all the way back into Belarus and Russia.

Well, mysteries solved. But it’s not going to make Vlad the Imp happy. NBC News security reporters Courtney Kube and Ken Dilanian have apparently been busy little bees. They got a tip about the American intelligence community getting solid intel information, and then freely sharing it with the Ukrainians. And with devastating effect.

In mystery number one, it turns out that the Russians actually tried to take the Ukrainian planes out on the ground, but they may as well not even have bothered. Because US intelligence found a way to get the Russian daily target taskings. Which they immediately shared with their Ukrainian partners. Under cover of darkness they got all of their aircraft and moveable equipment off of the bases, and the Russians bombed empty bases. Once the damage was repaired, the aircraft and equipment were moved right back in, ready to rock and roll.

The second mystery has a similar happy ending. Russia ground transported all that infantry all that way because they were terrified to try to fly them. Because once again, US intelligence twigged to a specific flight plan for a Russian transport plane stuffed with soldiers. They got the word to the Ukrainians, who promptly shot the bird down, with the loss of all on board.

The really cool part is that it isn’t just restricted to these two incidents. Kube and Dilanian have a whole trove of these, but are holding the rest back pending Pentagon approval to publish, in order to not risk sensitive sources and methods. I can’t wait until they get clearance.

But with this new information, it makes it possible to look at a lot of the Russian debacles in a new light. Several weeks ago I marveled that Ukranian surface to air missiles were having a 40% shoot down rate when the normal average is 20%. Did US intel give the Ukrainians advance warning on specific times, launch sites, and destinations, making it easier for the Ukrainians to accurately track the missiles paths and shoot them down?

Did Intel give the Ukrainians the exact route and time, allowing a platoon of Ukrainians with Javelin missiles to clog the whole convoy from the front, wait until the conscripts ran off, and then steal everything they could move? Did Intel give the Ukrainians a heads up that the radar defenses on the Moskva were down for maintenance, allowing the Ukrainians to shoot off the Neptune missiles that sent it to the bottom?

Now, this is all conjecture, but wadda ya wanna bet that it’s exactly the kind of conjecture that Vlad the war criminal is engaging in right now after these revelations? And if he rein’s in the paranoia, it’s the kind of conjecture that could foretell disaster for his troops in phase two of the invasion.

If the US can provide the Ukrainians with any kind of solid intel on ground forces routes and times, then the Ukrainians can set up a classic trap. They can engage in a contact-and-retreat action that draws the Russians into a specific area, and then open up with all of those lovely 155mm howitzers, Javelin missiles, and Switchblade suicide drones, turning the battlefield into a slaughterhouse.

I’ll let you guys know when Dilanian and Kube release more golden nuggets. But just what they released today allows us to look at the entire Russian invasion disaster in a whole new light. Take my word for it, even as an underdog, it is so much easier to kick your opponent’s ass when you know what he’s going to do next and when. Don’t touch that dial.