Gurezaemon:

 

I think one of the more worrying possibilities for a Russian military that is not doing as well as it hoped is the escalation into explicit disregard for civilians, similar to how they conducted attacks in Syria, as a way of speeding up a conclusive result.

 

The idea of a fast, brutal war being less painful for everyone in the long term (contrasted with sometimes paralysing US reluctance to accept any collateral damage) is familiar to Russian military planners. Levelling city blocks with thermobaric or other weapons would undoubtedly be horrific, but they may be prepared to take the international outrage on the chin if such action broke Ukrainian resistance and will to fight.

 

Thats the Russian way.

A piece on CNN tonight had two experts giving Kiev a show. One is an urban war expert. They will need 5 x the UKR forces at least. Guerrilla warfare in an urban setting is tough. Buildings are empty, yet they are full of UKR army and reservists. Tanks might roll in and control everything yet they get picked off by invisible people. Govt buildings get taken over but they are empty, papers gone, something innocuous as removing all the power fuses. So they occupy Kiev yet they dont really have any control.