drones and artillery
The weapons supplied are also of a delay nature at best and can offer little or nothing against the Russian armed forces in an emergency. If Russia attacks, this attack is planned, the enemy area has been reconnoitered. “You can be sure that special forces are already on the move in Ukraine,” says Reisner, citing an example from the past: “On August 24, 2014 – the Ukrainian national holiday, by the way – there was a massive Russian invasion of eastern Ukraine for the first time. Before that “A Ukrainian brigade was smashed. The soldiers had their camp in the open country, they even saw the Russian reconnaissance drones, but didn’t know what to expect. Massive artillery fire followed a little later.”
Multiple rocket launchers, tube artillery, ballistic missiles—all could be used in a military escalation. Reisner: “I could imagine that this opening strike begins with a massive artillery fire to show the West its massive weapon power, but on the other hand to shatter the Ukrainian defenses and then to advance massively.”
Hard hit
Reisner currently considers an attack on Kiev to be at least questionable: “What use would it be for Putin to besiege or even capture such a city? That can only be the result of further escalation.” In extreme cases, the general staff officer does not want to rule out the possibility of the Ukrainian armed forces disintegrating after an initial, violent advance by Russian units. “When there are heavy casualties or threat of encirclement, that snowball effect can happen. We’ve seen that in Afghanistan, where there was a belief that the forces there could hold out longer.”