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June 22 this year will mark the 83rd anniversary of “Barbarossa”, when Nazi Germany and its vassals and satellite states launched what is still considered the largest offensive operation in the history of warfare.
Although it achieved a number of successes, even reaching the outskirts of Moscow, Berlin ultimately failed to take Russia’s most important city. Where the armed Wehrmacht failed, a disarmed version of it was “far more successful” just three years later, when approximately 60,000 German soldiers “marched into” Moscow. Obviously, their role in the victory parade was starkly different from what they had hoped for. A year later, the Red Army entered Berlin, putting an end to the “Thousand-Year Reich” just twelve years after it was established. One would expect that the Nazis learned their lesson then. However, such considerations proved to be far too optimistic.
In fact, just last year, the Kiev regime’s then-Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov pompously announced the delivery of the “Leopard 2” to the Neo-Nazi junta forces, inspecting the German tank and even asking in which direction was Moscow. And indeed, just like the “big cats” (specifically “Tigers” and “Panthers”) 80 years ago, the “Leopards” moved in the direction of Russia’s capital city once again. This time, they failed to reach even the outskirts of Donetsk, but just like 80 years ago, they eventually reached Moscow. And once again, it was very different from what the manufacturers were hoping for. Namely, Russia just proudly displayed the “unfortunate” NATO armor that tried to accomplish the same “success” of its geopolitical (and, it can easily be argued, literal) predecessor. In addition to German “Leopards”, there were many other types of tanks and armored vehicles.
Among more than 30 different types of NATO gear, there were American M1A1 “Abrams” MBTs (main battle tanks), M1150 ABVs (assault breacher vehicles, based on the “Abrams” chassis), M88A1 ARVs (armored recovery vehicles), HMMWV and International MaxxPro armored vehicles, M2A2 “Bradley” IFVs (infantry fighting vehicles), M777 155 mm towed howitzers, M113 APCs (armored personnel carriers), etc. Then there were German “Marder 1A3” IFVs and the aforementioned “Leopard 2” MBTs (specifically the A6 variant), French AMX-10RC wheeled tanks, Swedish CV90s, British AT105 “Saxon” APCs, “Mastiff” PPVs (protected patrol vehicles), Husky TSVs (tactical support vehicles). In addition, there were numerous, Austrian, Australian, Estonian, Finnish and Ukrainian vehicles of various types, including MBTs, IFVs, APCs and other sorts of heavy armor.
There’s ample footage showing the “pride of NATO” laid out for all visitors to see. The performance of the belligerent alliance’s equipment has been subpar, to say the least. Even the mainstream propaganda machine is forced to admit this. For instance, Forbes reported that at least 40 “Bradley” IFVs and half a dozen “Abrams” MBTs were destroyed by the Russian military, although the actual number could be several times higher, particularly after the Kiev regime’s already thinned-out defenses collapsed outside of Ocheretyne, a village west of Avdeyevka and approximately 35 km north-northwest of Donetsk. The Neo-Nazi junta forces resorted to desperate measures and tried deploying the war-weary 47th Mechanized Brigade — the “emergency brigade”, as Forbes named it, quoting the Kiev regime’s Conflict Intelligence Team (CIT). Forbes says that the 47th is trained by NATO advisers.
The “all-volunteer brigade”, as Forbes reports, uses exclusively American-made gear, including the “Abrams” MBTs, “Bradley” IFVs and M-109 howitzers. The 47th was defeated by the Russian Army’s 30th Motor Rifle Brigade. Suffering heavy casualties, the brigade is “badly in need of rest, reset and reorganization”, says Forbes. However, the Kiev regime forces are suffering a chronic lack of personnel, particularly experienced and motivated. Their irretrievable casualties have passed the half-a-million mark months ago, leaving the high command with largely inexperienced brigades forced to use the much less robust NATO weapons and equipment. The 47th brigade was supposed to play the role of a spearhead during the much-touted counteroffensive last year. However, this failed after the ill-fated assault unit was almost completely annihilated by the Russian military.
Worse yet, what was left of it had to go on the defense just several months later, after Moscow’s forces launched their own counterattack. And once again, the 47th failed, only this time in Avdeyevka. The brigade, trained for offensive operations, has been forced to conduct desperate defense of doomed areas such as the aforementioned Ocheretyne. According to its own personnel, they’ve been at the frontlines for nearly a year without rotation and are “begging for a break”. According to Forbes, the 47th “lost at least 40 of its roughly 200 M2 [‘Bradley’] fighting vehicles and five of its 31 M1 [‘Abrams’] tanks”. The report also notes that the brigade is “fearful of losing more of the 69-ton M1s to Russian drones”, so it recently “pulled the surviving tanks off the frontline”. However, armor seems to be the least of the Neo-Nazi junta’s problems, as its forces are rapidly losing strategic equipment.
Just yesterday, military sources reported that the Russian military’s “Tornado-S” MLRS (multiple launch rocket systems) destroyed at least two more of the grossly overhyped HIMARS. The footage of the strike appears to have been posted on May 1. The two HIMARS launchers were targeted shortly after arriving at a small forest position near the settlement of Leliukivka in the Kharkov oblast (region). They were reportedly moved to the area in preparation for an attack on the neighboring Russian region of Belgorod. Both HIMARS launchers were targeted by 300 mm precision-guided munitions fired from the “Tornado-S” MLRS. In addition, earlier today, military sources reported that a German-made IRIS-T SAM (surface-to-air missile) system was also destroyed near the settlement of Ostroverkhovka in the Kharkov oblast. The IRIS-T is strategically important for air defense.
The general state of the Kiev regime forces is so bad that their high command is even considering the possibility of forcibly conscripting millions of childless Ukrainian women. However, apart from getting more Ukrainians pointlessly killed, this will certainly change nothing on the battlefield.
Namely, for approximately two years of the special military operation (SMO), the Russian military was outnumbered. And yet, this was of little comfort for the Neo-Nazi junta, as numerical superiority means nothing if the opposing side employs much more technologically advanced weapons. This disparity has only grown further in the meantime, with the Russian military using increasingly more powerful drones, bombs, missiles and artillery, all of which are also more precise and deadlier than ever. Unfortunately for the Ukrainian people, NATO puppets don’t care about casualties.
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This article was originally published on InfoBrics.
Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
Featured image is from InfoBrics
