The military conflict in Ukraine, like many before it is inexorably tied to the media – particularly the Western media. The amount of disinformation that the West has contrived and disseminated in order to stoke support for Ukraine or at least muddy the waters, is terrifying. Every corner of the Anglo-American-controlled media, from CNN to The Guardian, from BBC to Foreign Affairs, has primarily shown only one side of the story. The media perennially has traduced Russia and inflated its losses, while simultaneously portraying the Ukrainian forces as heroes and victors. This sort of one-dimensional reporting was also evident in the war against Iraq, the Syrian civil war, the recent China-Taiwan tensions, and countless other cases where the US and its allies are touted as angelic and the antithetical forces as demonic.
The truth is that the proxy war in Ukraine is currently a war of attrition that Russia is winning. Slowly and surely the Russian forces are bleeding out the Ukrainian resistance and subsequently draining the vast munitions, tanks, and weapons of NATO that the latter is providing Ukraine. This is not to say that Russia has not fared any losses or setbacks – of course, they have –, however, the grim picture painted by the Western media about them is far from the truth.
The current counteroffensive has been atrocious for the Ukrainians. After the humiliation of Bakhmut which was captured by a private military company and led to high Ukrainian casualties, the country was overly optimistic for the current coveted offensive. The news for Ukraine, however, is not good. Analysts like US Army Lt Col Daniel Davis write, “The cold, hard truth in the war between Russia and Ukraine today is that Ukraine’s last-gasp offensive has failed, and no amount of spin will change the outcome.” The media also long reported that the Western/NATO weapons and NATO’s “advanced training” will turn the tide of the war, but “..it was nearly impossible for Ukraine to transform itself in a matter of weeks or a few months of training and a hodge-podge of NATO gear.”
Another US colonel, Douglas Macgregor, who was active in the Gulf War, recently published a video on his YouTube channel titled “The war is over, Russia has won”. For months, Macgregor has been exposing Washington’s lies and illuminating the military ground realities. He has stated that around 300,000 to 350,000 Ukrainians have been killed. Other independent analysts such as Brian Berletic have also been deobfuscating the West’s deceits. He opines that the Ukrainian military currently stands exhausted, and they cannot “reconstitute these brigades that have badly mauled in this offensive and even NATO is going to struggle significantly to even come close to building up another force…” for the next offensive if there ever is one.
In fact, even some Western media outlets have become self-aware of the untenability of their faux reporting. Therefore, many to save face have begun reporting why the Ukrainian offensive is failing. Vox, for example, recently published an article stating that despite the Western equipment, “Kyiv and its newly trained forces have largely failed at conducting combined arms operations on a large scale…” and breaking through Russian defenses. Trying to do so has encumbered the Ukrainians with high casualties and loss of equipment. The New York Times wrote that Ukraine lost around 20% of its weapons and armor in the first few weeks of the counteroffensive. In some areas, the counteroffensive has halted due to Russia’s monolithic defenses.
Another NY Times article cites Ukrainian soldiers stating that they lost a lot of men in the first few weeks of the counteroffensive, with some even berating their superior officers as well as NATO. This same article reports, “Soldiers along the front line blamed commanders for pushing raw recruits into battle…Others criticized the inadequacy of a few weeks of basic training in various NATO countries. A few complained that some of the Western vehicles were inappropriate for the task.” CNN too is now reporting on the NATO-backed counteroffensive’s inability to retake territory. A senior Western diplomat told CNN that “…for them [Ukrainians] to really make progress that would change the balance of this conflict, I think, it’s extremely, highly unlikely.” The Russian multi-layered defenses brimming with mines and huge networks of trenches have been unbreachable so far, with reports stating that the Ukrainians have not been able to even reach the first line of defense. The US provided “literally thousands of armored vehicles, millions of shells, missiles, and bombs, and training and intelligence support – along with scores of billions in other aid. But that help did not produce a Ukrainian victory…”
Even right now, if you Google “Russia is winning”, you will be hard-pressed to find any articles mentioning the same – in fact the opposite will happen. Articles will pop up from Sky News, BBC, RAND, The New Yorker, and many others with titles such as “Has Putin’s war failed and what does Russia want from Ukraine?” and “Russia has already lost. The next year will decide if Ukraine can win.” There is therefore a huge lack of objectivity when it comes to reporting this conflict.
With time, when the reality settles in, as it did in the Afghanistan war, and as it is slowly now in Ukraine, the Western propaganda regurgitation machine will perhaps become cognizant that it yet again stands on the wrong side of history. Concurrently, however, we should not discount how desperate the West is for this war to continue unabated as their oil, arms, and other companies such as BlackRock are profiteering via the conflict. It would therefore be unsurprising that in the face of an imminent Ukrainian defeat, Poland or another NATO nation joins in the combat and this morphs into a much larger war between Russia and NATO – perhaps the beginning of World War III. Hopefully, the West will not be foolish enough to risk this.
Taut Bataut – is a researcher and writer that publishes on South Asian geopolitics, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.