Not-So-Friendly Skies

The inability of the Russian Air Force to dominate the skies over Ukraine has become a hotly debated topic among military analysts. Social media is filled with footage of Russian helicopters and fighter aircraft being shot out of the sky by Ukrainian surface-to-air missiles and anti-aircraft fire.

This failure to achieve anything resembling air superiority has surprised military observers, in view of the five-to-one advantage in combat aircraft the Russians enjoy over the Ukrainian air force.

The VKS (Russian Aerospace Forces) deployed about 350 modern air superiority fighters against fewer than 70 defending Ukrainian combat aircraft of equivalent quality. Despite these vastly superior numbers, the VKS has failed to have much of an impact on the Russian ground campaign.

Despite destroying Ukraine’s early-warning radar system in the first few hours of the war, the Russian air force did not conduct follow-up attacks to destroy the Ukrainian air force. In fact, the Royal United Services Institute, a British strategic think-tank, reported that Russian combat aircraft “largely stayed on the ground throughout the first four days of fighting.”

Military analysts present different theories to explain the lackluster performance of Russia’s air arm. Reuters quoted an unidentified American defense official who said that the Russians were “not necessarily willing to take high risks with their own aircraft and pilots.” This explanation becomes questionable when weighed against the Russian willingness to lose hundreds of late-model armored vehicles and sophisticated air defense systems in the fight to vanquish Ukraine.

In a follow-up report, RUSI analysts concluded that the Russian air force “lacks the institutional capacity to plan, brief and fly complex air missions at scale.” The report also argued that combat experience gained by the VKS during operations in Syria was small-scale, involving four aircraft at most and therefore not relevant to the high-intensity war in Ukraine. 

The Center for the National Interest, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, attributed VKS mediocrity to the relatively few monthly cockpit hours flown by Russian combat pilots in comparison with their Western peers.

After almost two weeks of bitter fighting in Ukraine, one thing has become clear: Vladimir Putin didn’t get the well-oiled military machine his generals promised.

Trapped at Mariupol

Mariupol, a port city of 430,000 inhabitants on the Sea of Azov, has been under siege since March 3, trapping an estimated 200,000 civilians who did not, or could not, flee before the arrival of Russian troops.

Mariupol is now the scene of “fires, no water and bodies in the street,” the BBC reports. Humanitarian ceasefires brokered by the International Red Cross on March 5 and March 6 collapsed, with both Ukraine and Russia accusing the other of opening fire in breach of truce agreements. There is little food or other sustenance for the thousands trapped there.

The British government has accused Mr. Putin of manipulating the Mariupol refugee crisis in a cynical attempt to “deflect international condemnation while giving itself a chance to reset its forces for a renewed offensive.”

Kiev: More Coming

Ukrainian defenses north of Kiev are holding in the face of Russian probing attacks. Video footage filmed by a Ukrainian civilian purports to show Russian armored vehicles concealed within a complex of residential apartment buildings at Irpin, a suburb some four miles north of Kiev proper.

If this report is accurate, these mechanized units are concentrating in their forward assembly areas in preparation for the direct assault on Kiev proper that military analysts are expecting this coming week. Meanwhile, a second Russian armored column is bearing down on Kiev from the east.