Russia's invasion: what's the military strategy?
The Briefing Room
BBC
4.8 • 731 Ratings
🗓️ 3 March 2022
⏱️ 30 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The war in Ukraine is a week old. What have we learned about the military strength - and tactics - on both sides?
And what might that tell us about how the conflict might play out?
David Aaronovitch is joined in The Briefing Room by:
Vitaliy Shevchenko, Russian editor at BBC Monitoring.
Colonel Liam Collins, founding director of the Modern War Institute in New York.
Ed Arnold, Research Fellow in European security at RUSI and an ex British Army officer who was posted to NATOs Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe in 2014 during the Russian annexation of Crimea.
Kataryna Wolczuk, Professor of East European Politics at the University of Birmingham.
Bettina Renz, Professor of International Security at the University of Nottingham.
Producers: Rosamund Jones, Kirsteen Knight and Ben Carter Production co-ordinators: Sophie Hill and Siobhan Reed Studio manager: James Beard Editor: Richard Vadon
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts. |
| 0:06.1 | Welcome to the briefing room with me, David Aronovich. The briefing room is the corner of the metaverse, where you, me and the top experts get together to understand a big issue of the day. |
| 0:16.1 | This week, what military strategy is being pursued by Russia in Ukraine and how successful is it likely to be? |
| 0:26.6 | Blitzkrieg or traffic jam? It's hard to tell right now. |
| 0:30.6 | A week on from the Russian invasion of Ukraine, what have we learned about the balance of forces from equipment to morale? |
| 0:38.3 | And what does this tell us about an outcome? |
| 0:41.3 | Step inside the briefing room and together we'll find out. |
| 0:47.3 | And let's remember before we get started that behind the statistics and the strategies |
| 0:51.3 | are the human realities of shattered lives, uprooted families, |
| 0:55.9 | and traumatised communities. So first, live with the latest, is Vitali Shifchenko, |
| 1:01.7 | Russian editor at BBC Monitoring, which has been tracking news reports from Russia, Ukraine |
| 1:06.1 | and surrounding countries. Vitaali, what's the latest news and what's happening in Ukraine |
| 1:10.7 | and how much of |
| 1:11.7 | Ukraine now appears to be under Russian control? Well, it's an endless stream of reports of devastation, |
| 1:19.7 | suffering and defiance. It's hard to exactly estimate how much of Ukraine's territory is under Russian control because it's a very |
| 1:29.4 | fluid situation as we speak the fighting continues and it's not even the area that Russians |
| 1:36.9 | control but the places they control. They've been trying to seize, for example, the port city |
| 1:42.4 | of Mariupol which would open up away to the north and establish |
| 1:46.8 | them a land route from Russia to Crimea. |
| 1:49.3 | They've not been able to do that so far. |
| 1:51.9 | Kharkiv fighting has been going on there. |
| 1:53.9 | The only big city that they have captured so far is Hirserson also in the south, but the Ukrainian administration |
... |
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