JRL NEWSWATCH: “How Can Ukraine Induce More Russian Soldiers To Quit?” – Forbes/ Craig Hooper
“… Russia’s army is at the end of its tether. With Russia’s modern tanks and armored vehicles largely gone or inoperative, Russia is pulling late 1940’s vintage T-10 tanks and other mechanized relics out of storage. Russian leaders are virtually begging North Korea, Iran, China and other former client states for help. Russian conscripts are arriving on the front under-equipped and then sent into the trenches to largely shift for themselves. … Russian morale is reportedly poor … yet[] Russia’s front-line fighters keep on fighting. … Even after the failed Wagner mutiny …. Western efforts to chip away at Russian morale still seem … halting and disorganized …. [Meanwhile,] Russian ‘blocking’ units target … soldiers who retreat or surrender … Ukraine is likely … too overeager … exchanging Russian convicts or Putin’s more rough-hewn conscripts, returning captured Russians to an uncertain fate — punishment, a penal battalion or worse. Front-line Russian troops may respond well to a realistic opportunity to exit the fighting. Both Ukraine and Ukraine’s friends can certainly do more to help Russia’s bedraggled conscript army realize it has more options than death, suffering or ignominious and punitive assignments after a return from a Ukrainian prisoner of war camp. …”