Approximately 130,000 Russian ground, air, missile, artillery, logistics, medical, electronic warfare, and command forces now encircle Ukraine from its north and east. Russian forces are also massed inside Ukraine via occupied Crimea and the southeastern Donbas region.
The U.S. and British air forces are now engaged in near-persistent aerial intelligence monitoring of these Russian forces. Air traffic monitoring websites show that this intelligence effort centers on drones, signal intelligence, and ground radar aircraft. Of particular note, U.S. ground radar aircraft are now operating at night. This is likely in order to anticipate either Russian preparations for a night offensive or the covert nighttime movement of more sensitive Russian military equipment, such as missile and electronic warfare systems.
This tactical activity reflects the fact that Vladimir Putin now has the military scale and political-ideological framework to invade Ukraine.
Putin’s Belarusian puppet regent is also saying the right things. Alexander Lukashenko pledged this weekend that Belarus would join any Russian military action against Ukraine. Claiming a nonexistent Ukrainian threat, Russian-Belarusian forces are also shifting more military activity toward Ukraine’s northern border. The scaled array of forces in this area threatens Kyiv (a stone’s throw from the Belarusian border) with rapid encirclement. Indeed, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu may have already issued Putin’s military directives to Lukashenko.
Special operations and intelligence officers from Russia’s GRU service are now operating en masse in southeastern Ukraine. These forces are specially trained in the “maskirovka,” or “camouflage” operations that the U.S. intelligence community believes Russia may conduct in order to justify any reinvasion of Ukraine.
Still, as CNN reports, some Russian field commanders are concerned over the prospect of a full-scale offensive. I also understand from sources that field commanders are frustrated by a lack of guidance as to what missions they might be assigned.
Yet Putin isn’t blinking. In another escalation, Russia’s Gazprom energy giant says it won’t book additional gas supplies to Europe at least until October. Putin wants Europe to have to choose between freezing and dropping support for Ukraine. Meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron in Moscow on Monday, Putin offered a mix of vintage machismo gimmicks (preventing Macron from entering his motorcade straight off the plane) and flattery (designed to elicit Eastern European and U.S. concerns over Western divisions). Those divisions are likely to find further emphasis on Monday, when Chancellor Olaf Scholz meets President Joe Biden at the White House. Scholz has been deeply reluctant to endorse tougher sanctions against Putin in the event that he invades Ukraine.
Put simply, the Ukrainian ground is freezing, and so are the possibilities for peace.
