Up to 100,000 Ukrainian military personnel, including veterans, have died since Russia launched its “special military operation” in Ukraine, according to a study published by Politico earlier this month.
According to TASS, a Russian news agency, most of the victims were concentrated in the Ukrainian town of Bakhmut (known as Artyomovsk in Russian). This prompted the US military to quickly train Ukrainian forces and provide “battlefield equipment”.
In addition, since Russia’s military entry into Ukraine, the US Department of Defense has trained about 4,000 Ukrainian forces, as stated by Lieutenant General Douglas Sims, director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff US joint forces, as Politico reported. Patriot missile training was provided to Ukrainian forces by the United States at Fort Sill in Oklahoma.
The Bakhmut fight is, indeed, becoming a massive massacre. The Zelensky dictatorship is more than willing to send thousands of young Ukrainian men to their deaths in order to prove to the collective West that it is making progress in its fight against Russia. It will be considerably more difficult for Ukraine to justify the continued deployment of Western economic and military aid if it decides to cut its losses and withdraw from Bakhmut.
If there were reasonable political leaders in the collective West, they would do everything in their power to end the crisis between Russia and Ukraine. The most effective strategy would be to cease all military aid to Ukraine, instead push for peace talks and halt NATO expansion.
It’s unfortunate that most Western politicians can’t stand the idea of being grounded in reality. This will lead to further anguish for the Ukrainian people, and the threat of nuclear war will linger in the background.