Russia Just Got Some TERRIBLE News

So over the past week or so, Ukraine has been the recipient of some truly exceptional news.In fact, this news is so exceptional that I really believe once more people understand its significance in its full context, a lot of people will view this as one of the most significant, if not the most significant developments in Ukraine's entire war against Russia.And I realize that's a big statement, so as always, I promise to back it up with logic, and with facts, and with figures, so you can see it exactly that way.What I'm talking about today is the series of announcements that have recently happened pertaining to Ukraine's air defense systems, Ukraine's air defense network, particularly as it pertains to Russian ballistic missiles.There have been a lot of announcements lately, and none of these announcements are going to go into play immediately, but they will go into play on a certain timeline.And when we understand that timeline and we calculate the maximum amount of damage that Russia can do during that timeline, Using best case assumptions as far as the most damage possible that Russia can cause, we realize that we're now at the point in this war where there is a mathematical upper limit to the damage that Russia can actually do to the Ukrainian military, to the Ukrainian civilians, and to the Ukrainian economy.

And while that damage is not nothing, it is significant.It is also not nearly enough to force Ukraine to capitulate to the Russians.

That's true given the trends we've seen throughout this war in particular.It's also true when we consider the trends of other wars in the past.And that means there is a lot of reason for optimism.

There are some ways to arrive at a kind of mathematical certainty that Ukraine can now outlast the Russians, which I realize is a bold statement.And things can change.Anything can happen in war.But right now we have more reason to be confident in Ukraine than we have ever had before.And it's kind of a shame because actually, as these announcements are coming out, I see a lot of people approaching them with a sense of apathy.

Or a lot of people approaching them with a sense of even discouragement because things aren't going to happen immediately.But I'll remind people that things never happen immediately.In war there are casualties, but that bridge is now being closed.There is now a light at the end of the tunnel.So what I want to do in this video is I want to describe all of the different updates that Ukraine has just had as it pertains to their ballistic missile protection.I want to talk about why we have more reason to be confident about these than not.

And I also want to do a little bit of calculation as to what that mathematical upper limit is that Russia can actually do to Ukraine, which is much smaller than you probably think, or that a lot of people probably think, and also much smaller than you might get the impression of if all you do is read the worst case headlines that we are fed on a daily basis about what's happening to Ukraine.This is going to be a very exciting video, but also a very important video.Because when we have confidence like this, this is what allows us to keep supporting Ukraine to the end.And I really believe that's the point in the war that we've now reached.What we need to do now is allow events to play out and to keep supporting Ukraine to ensure that these events play out in the way that we can anticipate they will.Now, while anything can change on the battlefield, the enemy always has a say, it's also true that we've been watching this war for long enough to understand typically how the enemy responds in this case and what the trends have been.

And while things could still be wrong, there is a lot of reason for confidence.So that being said, let's first dive in by talking about all the different updates that have happened when it comes to Ukraine's ballistic missile protection.

It makes sense to start this portion of the discussion with some news that just came outas I'm recording this video, which is this story about how Ukraine and nine other countries have formed a coalition to produce a European -grown anti -ballistic missile system.This is a hugely significant story, not just for the future of Ukraine's war against Russia, but really for the future of warfare as a whole and for the European continent as a whole.But it also involves US soft power, or indeed even US hard power, and the way that nations will be or not be dependent on the United States in the future.It's a huge story with so many different angles to approach it from, and because of that, it's actually a really great candidate to look at really quickly, and Ground News, who is a longtime sponsor of this channel.I love to use Ground News for stories like this, where there are certain to be lots of different opinions.

Because what Ground News does is it brings together news from across the political spectrum for any given topic, all in one place.and that lets me compare and contrast coverage so I can see how different aspects of the story are being covered or not covered by one side of the political spectrum.It doesn't mean that any one side is right or that the other side is automatically right just because they have a different opinion, but it does ensure, for example, that I get access to all of the data myself so I can actually make a decision rather than just being steered in one direction or the other.Ground News is excellent, because for any given source, it can tell you how factual they're known to be as far as their track record goes.It can also tell you, for example, who owns the source or who funds the source, which can sometimes tell you the reason why there might be a potential bias.And to make things easier, Ground News also has a very helpful bias summary at the top of every story, where they combine all the logic that's being given across all the different articles, and they identify different talking points for different sides of the political spectrum.

You can see if people are intentionally diverging the narrative in one direction or another,and that just helps you make a better judgment for yourself.Now, if you want to try out Ground News for yourself, because they're a sponsor of the channel, you can actually get a significant discount off their Vantage plan, which is the plan that I use to get access to all of their best features.And in doing so, you'll also be supporting the channel.So if you want to try it out, just go to ground .news .

com or scan the QR code on screen.And thanks again to Ground News for sponsoring today's video and for making this recurring content possible.So, this coalition of European countries to help support the production of a homegrown anti -ballistic missile system is so significant because it actually applies a proven blueprint that Ukraine has already used several different times to overcome their biggest challenges in their war against Russia.And now that blueprint is being applied to what Zelensky of Ukraine himself has described as Russia's final argument, which is Russia's ballistic missiles, which Ukraine does not have a homegrown response to.Traditionally, they have been dependent on Patriot interceptors, which are limited in supply and come from the United States, who hasn't always been the most willing giver to give Ukraine what they actually need to protect themselves from the quantities of missiles that Russia is firing.This has often been presented as if it is some kind of unsolvable problem.

But in reality, this is the exact problem Ukraine has faced several different times, and the exact problem that they have solved.And that's why I call it a blueprint that Ukraine has already used successfully in the past.When this war started, Ukraine had very little military production of their own.They were almost entirely dependent on aid from outside countries.And a lot of people don't realize how far Ukraine has progressed from that.At this point in the war, for the weapons that they use on the battlefield every single day, Ukraine supplies the vast majority of what they're using, and they probably

supply everything if they weren't getting different varieties of systems from their partners.In fact, Ukraine is now producing so many drones, for example, that they now have a surplus that they're exporting to other countries.And these aren't just cheap drones that are easy to produce.These are technologically sophisticated drones that other countries simply do not have.For example, even the United States recently decided to start importing Ukrainian -made drones, even though so many people view the United States as technologically superior.Ukraine has proven that because they are under duress, because their lives literally depend on it, they can do things that a couple of years ago would have seemed miraculous when it comes to producing military technology.

Military technology that a lot of people have viewed as having just extremely long timelines.Historically, there has been extremely long timelines to produce military technology, but that has to do largely with the fact that it's being produced in countries that are at peacetime, they're not at war, and in countries where there is a lot of profit incentive to have bureaucratic hurdles to get things produced in different regions and things of that sort.We'll get more into that in this video.Ukraine has proven that they can solve their own problems, though, by producing their own systems.And this ballistic missile system, or rather this anti -ballistic missile system, is really one of the last systems that Ukraine has not created on their own.And now that is being solved.

The timeline of that is not going to be immediate.It's going to take some time to get this program off the ground.But there's reason to expect that the timeline will be far faster than some quote -unquote industry experts might expect, because these industry experts are speaking from their experience in other countries under different circumstances who have never accomplished the things that Ukraine has already accomplished during this war.And once Ukraine has their hands on their own homegrown ballistic missiles, or rather anti -ballistic missile systems, there's really no telling how far they can go.There's really nothing that Russia can throw at them that they cannot prevent, which is incredibly significant.What's significant about this is that the process has already been started, even though the announcements are kind of just coming today.

Ukraine has actually been working technologically on developing these missiles, what they call the Freya missile system, for quite a long time, and they've come quite a long way.What's happening now is that other countries are partnering with them, not as much for the development, although partially, but for the production.So Ukraine probably has working prototypes or is close to it, and now what they need to do is to solve how do we get these things over the finish line and actually get them in the air and intercepting Russian missiles as quickly as we possibly can.with timelines being estimated approximately 12 months from now, which right now seems like an eternity, but in 12 months it'll seem like, wow, that happened basically overnight, as so many other things throughout this war.

So the production of this homegrown ballistic missile system will obviously be incredibly important.But I would argue that it is just as important for its secondary effects as it is for its first order effects.Because I would argue that this plan to develop Ukraine's own ballistic missile system with European support is a big part of the reason why the United States lately has been a little bit more friendly towards Ukraine, particularly with Patriot missile systems.For a long time, Ukraine has been asking the United States if they could just produce Patriot missile systems on their own, and the United States has essentially told them no.But just in this past week, alongside this announcement of this European coalition, we also had Donald Trump agreeing, at least in his own words,words, to allow Ukraine to produce Patriot missiles on their own territory as well.

These Patriots are traditionally built in the United States.The U .S.has not really been willing to allow Ukraine to do this.

But it seems that there is now some pressure on the United States, where the U .S.is realizing that holding back their military technology from countries like Ukraine that are at war that might allow them to save some money or to extract some money out of Ukraine by selling these weapons to Ukraine for a profit.

But it also reduces the U .S.power in the region, because you only have power by holding a weapon system over somebody if that weapon system is something they can actually use, and especially if it's really their only option.Trump and the Trump administration seem to be realizing that Ukraine is increasingly powerful on their own.They have their own cards.And because they have their own cards, there's a real chance that the United States could now get sidelined from European matters.

Which is a step further than what they probably hoped by having this rhetoric against NATO for the past several years, telling NATO to carry their own share, to bear their own burden.Now the United States seems to be wanting to be part of this process of this ballistic or this anti -ballistic missile renaissance in Europe, and they're telling Ukraine, hey, you can go ahead and develop our Patriot missiles as well.That's significant because the Patriot will still be a good part of the mix for this anti -ballistic missile system.It will probably have different strengths and weaknesses compared to the Freya system, and it will certainly help Ukraine to have access to both of these.And so, starting today, production of Patriot missiles will likely begin very, very soon.Now, just like the Freya missiles that Ukraine is developing on their own,

this is going to take time.It's not going to happen immediately.But we're looking at timelines potentially of 12 months or shorter.With the Patriot, maybe it could take longer.It could take two years to four years if we look at precedence.But again, there's reason to be optimistic that Ukraine can do this more quickly than it's been done in the past because they're actively at war and they're trying to get the problem solved rather than just trying to maximize profits for the firms that are producing these missiles.

So between these two systems, the Freya and the Patriot, we now see that in the relatively near future, Ukraine will have access to two different options to fill a gap that, throughout this entire war against Russia, they really haven't been able to fully, effectively fill.And that's a big deal.Now, some people may say that's not the near term, Paul, 12 to 24 months is an eternity, and it can feel that way, it depends on your perspective.

Historically, from a warfare perspective, developing a weapon that will fill a known strategic gap, 12 to 24 months isn't that long, strategically speaking.

Emotionally, though, of course it feels like an eternity whenever we see a Russian ballistic missile hit a Ukrainian apartment building.And those can both be valid at the same time.You can feel like it's taking forever from an emotional perspective, because any casualty is a casualty that shouldn't have happened in the first place.But at the same time, you can also zoom out from a strategic perspective, and you can allow yourself to see these things in context.And that is the failure point that I see a lot of the news not doing right now.In fact, I haven't seen a single news article, maybe it exists, but I just haven't seen it, that actually puts this strategic significance in context.

So that's what we have to do now.Our job now is to bridge the gap between today and when these missile systems or these anti -ballistic missile systems will arrive in Ukrainian hands in significant numbers.And we have to ask ourselves, what can Ukraine do in the meantime?So it turns out that Ukraine actually has quite a few different options here.None of these are going to fill the gap entirely, but they will certainly lessen the blow of Russian ballistic missiles hitting Ukrainian cities.The first option is in the immediate term getting more ballistic missiles from their allies and their partners.

And this is always a political mess.People act like they're not going to do it, and then eventually they do.Right now I feel pretty confident because we are seeing more language about willingness to give Ukraine Patriot interceptors than we've seen in a long time.

For example, we see Poland talking about how Ukrainian cities are getting shot every single night, while Polish cities are not being targeted.

Ukraine is the true front line, and therefore Poland can afford to give Ukraine some of their current stockpiles of Patriot missiles, and they can replenish these with interceptors that will come later.Now, in this case, Poland is referring to donations that were already previously made, But the talking points, the logic is there, and it's very important to recognize that.Because we may see an increased willingness from Ukraine's partners to give them more of their existing interceptors that they don't need, but that Ukraine does, to help Ukraine bridge the gap.

And with a new ballistic interceptor system in progress, on the way, countries will probably feel more confident about that than ever before.Historically, people have been weary about, or leery rather, about giving Ukraine their Patriot missiles for the same reason that Ukraine wants to develop their own system.They worry about whether they could rely on the United States if Russia decided to attack them.And so they want to hold back their stockpiles because in their minds it might be all they ever get, and there is some logic to that.Now though, we see that the production capacityfor an interceptor system is in Europe's own hands, and there's not any bottlenecks.

For example, Germany, they can produce Patriot interceptors technically, but there's bottlenecks in terms of components and supplies that they haven't been able to source.And so the process of actually creating those in practice is taking a lot longer.A European system won't have those same bottlenecks from the United States, just as one example.So we may see some willingness to help Ukraine bridge the gap a little bit.At the same time, Ukraine also has the capability that they have proven, this is not theoretical, Ukraine has done this, to hit the facilities that are producing Russia's ballistic missiles in the first place.Whether it's the facilities that create the components, or the facilities that actually assemble the missiles themselves.

Ukraine has actually hit these facilities several different times, and they've done it with a big punch.For example, with their Flamingo cruise missiles, which cause a lot more damage than just a couple of drones.And if anything, we see that Russia's air defenses are getting worse, not better.Russia is having to make tough choices about what to protect, whether that be Moscow or Crimea.And Putin seems to be worried more about the political situation than actually defending strategic military targets.And that does mean it could reach a point where Russia's ballistic missile factories are more vulnerable than ever before, and Ukraine can take offline a big portion of Russia's production.

Again, it will not plug the entire gap.but it will help Ukraine bridge the gap until they can bridge the gap entirely.

That being said, understanding all of these different factors, we're now in a position to analyze why it has become mathematically impossible, in my opinion, for Russia to win this war against Ukraine.And that is an analysis of this actual gap period until Ukraine hastheir own interceptor missile production capacity, and how much damage Russia could actually do to Ukraine during that time period, which, as I already stated in this video, is a lot less than most people realize.Now, this analysis is difficult to do precisely, so the point here isn't to be precise, it's to be directionally accurate.And you'll realize these assumptions could be off by two times or three times, and the result would likely still be the same.Because we realize that Russia has an upper limit to how many missiles they can produce.

Everybody talks about Ukraine's production problems.The reality is that Russia isn't exactly having a cakewalk either.And they can only produce a certain limit of ballistic missiles that they use to attack Ukrainian cities.Those ballistic missiles themselves don't do unlimited damage.They do a finite amount of damage.And so even if we make worst case assumptions, An assumption that Ukraine, from now until all the production capacity is online, doesn't intercept a single additional ballistic missile.

Every Russian ballistic missile hits their target.And we make assumptions that Russia's production capacity isn't hampered at all, which is unrealistic also.When we make those assumptions, we realize the upper limit of Russian strikes against Ukraine is very small.It is something like one and a half to three percent of apartment buildings in Ukraine being damaged.

Now, I didn't say destroyed.I said damaged.When Russia hits an apartment building with a ballistic missile, for example, we see the dramatic ones in the news, the ones where 20 people die, and those are horrific.But that's not usually what happens.More often, you will see it damage a portion of a building, and maybe there will be a couple of deaths, not to minimize any death, but from a strategic perspective,

Russia damages a couple floors.

For the most part, people can actually move back into those buildings after some work is done and people keep on fighting.As the British used to say, keep calm and carry on.That's what the Ukrainians are doing now.So when we think about that in context, when we look at Russia's production numbers of ballistic missiles.

How much damage those missiles can actually do in a worst case scenario, assuming none of them are intercepted.Even in that worst case, completely unrealistic scenario, we see significant damage to Ukraine, but nothing even close to causing Ukraine to lose the war.

And remember, Zelensky himself has described this as Russia's final argument.This is the worst that they can do.Understanding that gives you a lot of confidence as you approach this war.For example, when you look at what happened in World War II, and how much infrastructure was destroyed in bombings then, where entire cities were leveled, entire sections of huge cities were leveled, tens of thousands of people died, the damage was so much worse than what Ukraine could expect to receive even in a worst case scenario.And still, those air raids, those air bombing campaigns didn't cause any side to give in.Because that's not how wars are won.

Wars are won not by terrorizing civilians, which just empowers them and makes them want to fight you even more, but wars are won by actually taking offline your opponent's strategic capabilities.There's a big divergence here.Russia, of course, they can lash out, and that's exactly what they're doing.they can continue to strike apartment buildings because that's what they're capable of doing.But it's not the same as what Ukraine is doing to Russia, which is plugging gaps wherever they exist and creating new capabilities to take offline Russia's strategic capabilitiesmore and more every single day.

We realize then that we have a lot of mathematical, logical reasons to be confident for Ukraine.But that doesn't mean we now have permission to sit back and do nothing.In fact, this should give us the confidence to support the winning side, and to give them everything they need to actually win the war, while taking less damage than the worst case scenario would imply.

In fact, what I would do here is to issue a challenge.I would challenge any decision makers who have access to more and better data than I have to do the calculations for themselves.To calculate Russia's ballistic missile production rate.To calculate the interception rate.To calculate the hit rate and how much damage is caused by each hit.To calculate the timelines between now and when Ukraine's own homegrown ballistic missile shield will be online.

and to calculate their own upper limit for how bad things can actually get for Ukraine.

And to use that as their data point, to realize how much confidence we can have that Ukraine will not lose this war.This is incredibly important.I don't see a lot of people doing this, but I think if we had this confidence, if we knew how bad it could be from the beginning, and if we calculated that and we accepted that, we would be able to endure longer.

We wouldn't feel every loss so heavily, and we should, from an emotional standpoint, feel every loss.But from a strategic standpoint, we wouldn't feel every loss so heavily.We wouldn't see so many articles pressuring Ukraine to end the war and negotiate just because they're getting hit by Russian ballistic missiles.

But we would see people having calculated the cost up front, and they would have to ask themselves, and even the Ukrainians should do this, and they should ask themselves, is your independence from Russia?not just today for your generation, but for every generation.in the future, is it worth that cost?And I will tell you that every country who has calculated that cost in the past, even if they haven't, and only in hindsight they've calculated the cost, every country that has fought for their independence and has won it, they have said that it was worth it for them.And it will be the same for you Ukrainians if you're watching this.War is horrible.

Every casualty is horrible.But Russia wants you to think things are worse than they actually are.In fact, I would make an argument that there is a reason that Russia concentrates most of these strikes, for example, around Ukraine's capital city, which is one of the most heavily defended portions of Ukraine.And that's because Russia wants to make an emotional argument here to the Ukrainian people and to the Ukrainian leadership.Russia isn't trying to win this war by taking off taking offline strategic military targets.Russia is trying to win this war by making the cost feel higher than it is.

Not by distributing the damage across the entire country of Ukraine, but by concentrating it in areas where the leaders will have to see it every single day.Russia is trying to make Ukraine's leaders feel the cost of every single life, when Russia themselves doesn't care about human life.Russia throws millions of bodies at this problem, and yet they still keep on going on.But they want to convince Ukraine that they should completely cede to them because of casualties that are far smaller and far less significant than what happens to the Russians.It is a dirty game that they're playing.They really understand human psychology and how to manipulate it and how to exploit it.

And it's our job as people paying attention on the other side to not allow ourselves to be manipulated as such.Yes, we can still feel the loss of every single casualty.I myself understand thatmore than most.I had a cousin who was actually lost to this war, who died fighting the Russians.We can still feel those losses, but from a strategic standpoint, we also have to know when it's time to stand up and keep fighting.

And Ukraine is nowhere close to losing this war, where Russia is losing capabilities every single day.So that's my message to any leader, any person, any Ukrainian watching this, keep calm, and carry on.This thing is extremely winnable.

Now the last thing here to analyze is that as much as we analyze Ukraine's air defense shortages and how many Russian ballistic missiles get through to hit their cities, we also have to do the same in inverse.And we have to analyze Russia's air defense shortages and how often Ukraine is getting through to hit Russian targets.And that gap is growing every single day.We increasingly see Ukraine sending larger waves into Russia than Russia is sending towards Ukraine.And Ukraine is hitting more strategic targets more frequently with higher payloads causing more damage that's accumulating faster than ever before.And Russia's air defenses are on a trajectory to get worse and worse and worse over time.

Because unlike Ukraine, Russia does not have international partners who are helping them develop new air defense systems or providing them with more missiles, limited as they are, for existing air defense systems.Russia is on their own.And so while Ukraine has a time -bound path to solve their problem, Russia's problem just gets worse every single day that the war goes on.So everything that we're seeing today, we have every reason, every expectation, to think that it will get better for the Ukrainians as more time progresses, and worse for the Russians.And that is entirely necessary to have a complete analysis of this topic.Not only can the Ukrainians endure, there's reason to believe that the Russians will.

And that's really the full story.Now, if you watched this long, I'm certain you have some thoughts, so let me know those thoughts in the comments below.And before you head out, will you do us both a quick favor?Will you like this video, and will you subscribe to this channel?It will only take you a quick second, and it'll help me out because it will boost the video and the algorithm, and it'll help you out because because it'll ensure you get recommended more content just like this, which I'm assuming you hopefully enjoyed.That being said, before you go, also consider becoming a supporter of the channel, either a patron or a YouTube channel member.

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