Ukraine Whipping Russia By Using Better Weapons, Smarter Tactics

Prof. Phillips Payson O’Brien of the University of St. Andrews in Scotland argues that Ukraine beat Russia in the Battle of Kyiv by employing smart small-unit hit-and-run tactics while armed with advanced anti-tank rockets and anti-aircraft missiles to hit Russian forces spread out thinly on muddy roads and freezing vehicles.

Photo Insert: Ukrainian forces prevented Russia from winning control of Ukraine’s airspace by combining a range of systems, including a small number of highly effective MiG fixed-wing aircraft, advanced anti-air systems, and a plethora of handheld anti-air weapons, such as Stinger missiles.

In an essay for the Atlantic issue of April 8, 2022, O’Brien said “the Ukrainian way of war is a coherent, intelligent, and well-conceived strategy to fight the Russians, one well calibrated to take advantage of specific Russian weaknesses. It has allowed the Ukrainians to maintain mobility, helped force the Russians into static positions for long periods by fouling up their logistics, opened up the Russians to high losses from attrition, and, in the Battle of Kyiv, led to a victory that has completely recast the political endgame of the Russian invasion.”

O’Brien said the Ukrainian way of war has a few foundational elements. They are: Contesting air supremacy over the area of battle; denying Russia control of cities, complicating the Russian military’s communications and logistics; allowing Russian forces to get strung out along roads in difficult-to-support columns, and; attacking those columns from all sides.

Ukrainian forces prevented Russia from winning control of Ukraine’s airspace by combining a range of systems, including a small number of highly effective MiG fixed-wing aircraft, advanced anti-air systems, and a plethora of handheld anti-air weapons, such as Stinger missiles.

Moreover, the Russians failed to take over the Sumy and Chernihiv regions, preventing them from moving troops and weapons into the Ukrainian heartland. Most of all, the Russians had to contend with hostile Ukrainians resisting an unjust war.

In using light forces this way, the Ukrainians have shown that even in a conventional war between states—as opposed to an insurgency—a smaller force can engage the conventional forces of a larger and more technologically advanced enemy and fight them to a standstill.

“The Ukrainians have also reminded everyone that the American military, with its lavish logistical support and ability to dominate the air war and the electronic battlefield, is unusual. The Russian military is not some smaller, less-efficient version of the US military. It is a significantly less advanced and less capable force that struggles to undertake many of the operations that the US handles with relative ease. The Ukrainians did not make the mistake of overestimating the Russians, and were able to deal a huge blow to Russian power,” O’Brien concluded.

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