Russia vs Ukraine: scenarios in a possible war, according to Western military experts

Ukraine’s army is around half the size of Russia’s, air defence and electronic warfare are key vulnerabilities

But motivated forces would inflict high Russian casualties, and Vladimir Putin could face a hard sell to his own population

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Ukrainian reservists take part in a military exercise near Kyiv, Ukraine on December 18. Photo: EPA

Published: 12:07pm, 22 Dec 2021Updated: 2:38pm, 22 Dec 2021

Ukraine’s armed forces are heavily outnumbered and outgunned by Russia’s but could put up a level of resistance that would force Russian President Vladimir Putin to pay a price of many thousands of Russian lives for any new invasion.

Western military analysts say Ukraine’s army is better trained and equipped than in 2014, when Russia captured the Crimean peninsula without a fight, and highly motivated to defend the country’s heartland.

For those reasons, they see it as highly unlikely that Putin would contemplate an outright conquest of Ukraine.

“We won’t see a big giant red arrow going across Ukraine. I don’t believe the Russians have the capability to just completely overrun Ukraine and take over the whole country, nor do I think they want to,” said Ben Hodges, a retired US lieutenant general now with the Center for European Policy Analysis.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and General Valery Gerasimov at the National Defence Control Centre with a Russian military map showing the alleged deployment of US private military contractors in eastern Ukraine. Photo: AP

A plausible alternative, he and others said, was that Russia might push south and west from Ukraine’s Donbass region – already controlled by pro-Russian forces – to link up with annexed Crimea and the Black Sea. But even that more limited objective would entail high Russian casualties.