it is odd after months of relatively stagnant front line with minor gains and losses for both sides that suddenly Russia seems to collapse. I don't totally buy it as up to even a few weeks ago most sensible reporting was relatively pessimistic of Ukraine prospects with an assumption that Russia will just keep throwing many power and equipment/artillery at the war and that they could easily raise 300-500k conscripts for the grinder and push slowly over Ukraine. Especially once winter sets in.
The sudden fallback within a week was.not expected at all. I wonder if it reflects some internal political positions surfacing.
No it's clear that Ukraine has just been holding the line and buying time to prepare.
All this time more equipment, training, and hardware has been arriving, and since HIMARS they've had the initiative (how many ammo dumps have gone up in flames? it's more than a few!).
The combination of the above + intel from every country in EU and US means that Ukraine was more than ready to push when they needed to, the failure here is simply that Russia was ill prepared for this eventuality.
Look at Kherson, they had (by reports) 25K troops sat there, unable to be supplied properly due to the crossings of the river behind them being blown up, and the threat of encirclement if the Ukraine army cuts them off from behind.
This is a coalition effort against an opponent that lacks equipment, drive, training, and leadership. Once Ukraine didn't collapse early on, they (Russia) had already lost once the support started rolling in.
