UK DoD Claims Russians Fighting with "Shovels" - Ukraine Losing Bakhmut, Low on Artillery Shells (TheNewAtlas)

Update on Russian military operations in Ukraine for March 6, 2023:

- Russian forces continue the encirclement of Bakhmut;

- Western media admits Russian operations around Bakhmut is exhausting Ukrainian forces and may diminish them ahead of an anticipated Ukrainian spring offensive;

- US announces another military assistance package for Ukraine with fewer items listed and absent of any specific quantities despite previous packages featuring such information;

- Ukraine has urgently asked the West for more artillery shells in particular, highlighting the inability for Western industry to match or exceed Russian military industrial output;

- German arms manufacturer Rheinmetall claims to be considering building a tank factory in Ukraine. Older articles claim only if approved by the German government and after the conflict is over, newer articles suggest the factory may be built sooner;

- Ukrainian pilots are in the US to assess their skills for potential training on US warplanes (likely the F-16);

- Training Ukrainian pilots on F-16s or other Western warplanes will admittedly take years, if F-16s arrive in Ukraine beforehand they will likely be Western operators posing as Ukrainian pilots;



One of the most telling points in this video is the admission that Ukraine has 300 artillery pieces. However, they started the war with over 1000 and this current number includes Western donations. So they lost in the order of 800 pieces during the war, at least. That is insane. The number of killed is likely on the high end too, being somewhere in the region of 200 to 300 thousand. With that level of attrition they will run out of everything well before the Russians. 

[Posted at the SpookyWeather2 blog, March 7, 2023.]