A Rolling Start to the Ukrainian Offensive

Events are about to move very quickly in Ukraine. Michael Clarke assesses the current military situation and outlines the importance of the air campaign in the coming battles. The much-heralded Ukrainian offensive cannot now be long delayed. Like the rest of the world, the Russians will know it’s started when Ukraine’s heavy metal – its …

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Digging-in in Ukraine and digging a hole for itself in Moscow. Russian Rhetoric and Military Signals 

Yet again, Kremlin behaviour is strengthening the European and American consensus against its invasion of Ukraine, whatever gains it thinks it is making winning some new friends in countries like Israel, Mali and South Africa. With a mixture of wild rhetoric and military signals, Russia has convinced the western alliance that it must invest in …

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Russian Boots on the Ground, but in the Wrong Place: Ukraine’s Counter-offensive

Ukraine’s counter-offensive against Russian forces has been anticipated for some time. But few thought it would be a two-pronged affair. Or that it would be such a surprise package for the Russians. In less than a week, Ukrainian forces have taken back well over half the territory it took the Russians five months of grinding …

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Winter Is Coming

Winter is coming in Ukraine and both Kyiv and Moscow have good reason to think carefully about when it will arrive and how it will make a difference to their military fortunes on the ground. Following his article on this subject in the Sunday Times on 4 September, Michael Clarke offers some of the detail …

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Putin and Xi Jinping Flirt With the Attractions of a Wider European War

We have had to keep revising our interpretation of President Putin’s motives in Ukraine as each new threshold has been crossed in this crisis. And China’s Xi Jinping, always hard to second guess, is showing his hand more as events tumble over themselves.  The two great dictators of the twenty-first century may each have come …

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Fighting Out of Their Skins; the Ukrainian Response to Russia’s Invasion

Some people say that fighting out of your skin is not really brave if there is no alternative. Perhaps. In Ukraine’s case it is magnificent all the same. Faced with Russian invading forces at least twice their size, and more now being drafted in by Moscow, the Ukrainians are fighting the Russians to something close …

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