From the New York Times, I'm Sabrina Tavern-E.C. and this is The Daily.

Russia's military failures have defined its war against Ukraine and were exemplified by

a major attack this week in which dozens of Russian soldiers were killed as they slept

in their barracks.

Today, my colleague Michael Schwartz interviews Russian soldiers and reveals new details

about how this military superpower keeps making the same mistakes and why, despite all

of that, its soldiers keep going back to fight.

It's Wednesday, January 4th.

So Mike, you have been investigating this question I think a lot of us have had, those

of us who have been paying attention to the war in Ukraine, and that is this.

That both Russia and I think to a certain extent, the world thought that Russia would just

roll in and defeat the Ukrainians outright.

Even close, you and our colleagues decided to take a deep look into how the Russian forces

failed so badly.

Tell me what you guys did.

What my colleagues and I decided to do is really drill down into the question of why.

Why is it that this military that the entire world thought was advanced, was huge, was deadly,

was menacing, how were they unable to carry out the war plans that everybody envisioned,

that the Russians envisioned, that the West envisioned.

One of the important questions I wanted to answer was how the Russians themselves viewed

this war, what they thought of what they were doing, and what they thought of their success,

how they evaluated their performance.

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