American public broadcaster NPR tried to figure out what the replacement of the Russian leader of the invasion of Ukraine means. He asked Dara Massicott, a military expert at the Washington research organization RAND Corporation, about it, who was surprised by the demotion of the relatively successful Sergey Surovikin. Unlike the current head of the operation, the head of the Russian General Staff Valery Gerasimov, who, in fact, planned the invasion, Surovikin did not allow outright failures. However, most likely, his methods ― shelling of civilian infrastructure and waves of "cannon fodder", with which the occupiers tried to wear down the Ukrainian resistance, did not show sufficient effectiveness. Not having much choice in terms of people who can be trusted 100 percent, Putin again bet on Gerasimov only in the hope that he will offer at least some fresh ideas, according to Massicott. This is more evidence of a crisis than a cunning plan: Russia simply does not know what can work in the situation in which it finds itself. Another proof of this crisis is that a huge victory in the Russian information sphere is now being presented as the alleged taking of control over the small town of Soledar. If so much attention is paid to the capture of this not even the district center, and if disputes are raging between the "Wagnerians" and regular Russian troops over who should be considered the guarantee of this triumph, then things are very bad for the Russian military adventurer, and the Kremlin can no longer hide this, even in front of its supporters.
What should NATO look like after the end of the Russian-Ukrainian war, in an article for Breaking Defense, the American military expert, George Mason University researcher on national security issues, Joshua Huminski, thinks. The key points of his material: the alliance should increase attention to the mobility of its troops, so that a notional tank battery can be quickly sent from notional Portugal to the eastern border of Poland. Accordingly, it is necessary to improve the system of railways and highways. Another point of effort is the creation of significant stockpiles of shells, since it turned out that despite the change in technologies in the war, artillery still plays a leading role in ground operations, so the consumption of shells is and will be high. And the third conclusion is to develop a fleet of drones, which should be cheap and able to strike. One of the main lessons of this war has been that the speed of information acquisition (reconnaissance drones) and long-range pinpoint strikes (kamikaze drones) can give a belligerent significant trump cards. Therefore, in a confrontation with even an undeveloped opponent, it is better to have a large fleet of drones. And if the enemy is technologically savvy, then the war will primarily be a war of drones. In any case, it is necessary to invest actively in this direction now.