Larry About Numbers...

I agree, it was the psychological pressure of the truth which made Ursula, as Larry puts it:

Ursula von Der Leyen’s did the unthinkable today — she told the truth. During a speech condemning Russia for committing war crimes, she noted in passing that 100,000 Ukrainian “officers” (sic) have been killed since the start of the SMO.  

These are NATO estimates  and they are at the lower end--real number of VSU KIAs is even higher, once one considers how Kiev hides KIAs in MIAs statistics--and they are, especially when considered with wounded ranging anywhere between 3 to 5 times the number of KIAs, are terrifying for Pentagon and NATO. Larry concludes:

As I have discussed previously, Russia’s current military leadership is not following the tactics Soviet generals employed in WW II (i.e., mass troop assaults). Russia primarily has relied on massive artillery and rocket/missile strikes before launching a ground offensive. The Russian rate of artillery fire is unlike anything we’ve seen in history. More importantly, the accuracy of the artillery is enhanced by the use of drones and satellites to adjust fires, with updated coordinates relayed in real time to the artillery units.  

Another factor contributing to Ukraine’s horrendous casualties is its lack of air power and effective air defense systems to counter Russian batteries. If Ukrainian troops try to attack a Russian fixed position, their movement by foot or vehicle is unprotected and vulnerable to Russian artillery or combat air.

It appears that some Western analysts who previously pooh-poohed the Russian tactics, are finally beginning to realize that Russia is serious about de-militarizing Ukraine via methodical, grinding tactics. There will come a point when Ukraine runs out of men and cannot field a combat effective force. It appears that day is approaching.

And the question we all must ponder: IS Russian Winter offensive coming once the ground freezes? The forces Russia accumulated around Ukraine are now numbering roughly 540,000 troops (per Douglas MacGregor) and this is slightly less than the size of the force Marshal Tolbukhin had in his 3rd Ukrainian Front (Army Group), including 17th Air Army before Balkans' Campaign and the battle for Vienna. 

Just some historic reference points. Of course, neither Tolbukhin's 3rd nor Malinovsky's 2nd Ukrainian Fronts, which combined had 1.2 million troops, had everything Russia has today, but one has to begin to appreciate the scale of what is potentially cooking. Yeah, Patton with his 150,000 men was ready to "drive Russians back to Moscow", LOL. He did have issues with math, being dyslexic. What is left to us is to wait and see, but what many eyewitnesses describe unfolding in Bakhmut (Artemovsk) is an industrial scale slaughter of VSU and NATO "volunteers" to the point that nobody simply recovers hundreds of bodies. We can bet our asses on those KIAs being statistically defined by Kiev regime as MIAs. Well, it is in operational encirclement and it will fall at some point of time not far in the future. You heard today that Shoigu announced the completion of training of more than 300,000 troops, right? I wonder why, wink, wink.