Both arguments misunderstand the kind of wars being fought.
Few years back, Russia was moving faster now it no longer moves.
Remember back then Russia also deployed Wagner PMC that recruited from prisons. Wagner war tactics were effective but produced a lot of body bags.
The west took 10 years fortifying the East in anticipation of this war. Kramatorsk and Sloviansk are at the end of those fortifications. Currently Russia has put Dropopiliya under a cauldron.
Cauldrons
Russia developed a strategy of encirclement. They don’t approach fortifications head-on. They encircle, put the communication lines under their arc of fire. This way soldiers inside a cauldron cannot get new supplies. So they wait. Remember soldiers use ration packs. You can have weeks of supplies in the fortifications. But Russia has the advantage of time. They wait in every cauldron until supplies run dry and soldiers try to withdraw on foot and this is where Ukraine loses 27 000 men each month. Withdraw causes heavy losses on the withdrawing forces.
The difference between USA and Russia in their current conflicts.
Why is USA losing?
You can have the best military and equipment in the world. Geography plays a role. USA is located 11600 km away from Iran. Fighting a distant adversary means the supplies to maintain the war takes time to travel mostly by sea. What America did to shorten the distance over time was to build bases and installations closer to the country they need to contain.
If you look at maps of US bases, you will notice they are mostly concentrated closer to Russia, China and Iran.
What Iran did was go after the US stockpiles in the region. Yes western propaganda media said Iran is hitting Gulf states. But pictures later emerged of destroyed bases. Iran rendered USA incapable of sustaining a war. Hence USA will lose or already lost.
Russia
Russia doesn’t have the problem of long supply lines. It’s a neighbour to Ukraine. Who has long supply lines? Ukraine. Ukraine source military hardware from Europe and America. Supply lines in this front remains intact until Romania and Poland. Immediately they enter Ukraine, Russia start hitting those civilian trains as propaganda media says.
Russia has advantage of bigger population, and artillery. Ukraine ran out of 155mm shells and Russia has increased it’s production and North Korea also supplies Russia.
Russia has serious economic issues which is a front that the west is dealing serious blows. But the west too is taking blows themselves. So it’s a matter of who runs out of money 1st between USA and China as the two giants are Bank rolling that war.
The map in the link below shows those cauldrons.
Military Summary – Interactive Conflict Map and Analysis https://share.google/NCOfxZl7CSVNcelsw
