WW2, Vietnam, and Iraq apparently biased our understanding of what a war is like.
I told my Ukrainian buddy that as long as he doesn't get drafted, he'll be okay, and to stay put. I thought that every combatant was going to become either unalive or a prisoner.
Their leader is a badass. https://www.reddit.com/r/Damnthatsinteresting/comments/t1pr8... I told my friend, "If I were him, I'd be scared shitless." His response appears to be showing me that I'm empirically a lot more cowardly than I care to admit.
They're managing to hold. Against Russia! Ukraine has internet, water, food, and their air force is intact. It's just incredible.
Hats off to everyone in (or near) Ukraine who are resisting.
WW2 and Vietnam featured absolutely huge levels of mass area bombing that cannot be achieved now. The entire Russian air force is only about 1,000 aircraft: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_active_Russian_Air_For... ; difficult to get figures for the buildup, but this https://www.businessinsider.com/russias-air-force-is-joining... suggests that a few hundred are within range of Ukraine (makes sense, they're not going to leave the rest of the country undefended)
By comparison in WW2:
> On the morning of March 18, 1,329 bombers and 733 fighters of the US Eighth Air Force formed up over England and set a course for northern Germany. The target for 1,221 of the bombers was Berlin
> More than half of the bombers, 714 planes, sustained damage from German anti-aircraft fire. 16 suffered hits so severe that they had to crash land behind Soviet lines. In total, 24 bombers and six fighters were lost on the mission. 178 Americans were killed, wounded, or captured in the raid. The German Luftwaffe lost just three pilots.
Also, it's like day 3 of the war, there simply hasn't been time for attrition against civilian vehicles and fuel supplies to empty the streets.