A turning point of the war: Ramstein meeting and Lend-lease act

UKRAINE - In Brief 29 Apr 2022 by Dmytro Boyarchuk

---

The second week of the "big battle" over Donbas is coming to its end. From all sides we have reports that fighting is very tough across the board. The Russians keep throwing all their forces in frontal attacks on Ukrainian positions. In some sections of the front they are making progress (see maps below) but it’s quite obvious the progress is very minor. And even now we can be rather sure that Vladimir Putin will have little to report to the Russians on Victory Day on May 9. After two weeks of heavy fighting it’s very unlikely something radical will change at the front amid growing military support from the West. And in the West we observe a real historical change in perception of this war. Obviously, none anticipated Ukraine would resist for long, and the base-case scenario was a guerrilla war for many years ahead. It took two months of active resistance and convincing results on the battlefield for the West to see that Ukraine is in a stance to win this war. On April 26 Ministers of Defense of 40 countries met at Ramstein Air Base in Germany to discuss military support for Ukraine. This meeting was already named the “Teheran conference” of this war. At the meeting Ukraine received the broadest support from civilized countries and a clear message that we will have as much military supplies as needed to win in this war. This meeting also gave a signal that the civilized world switched from the policy of restraining Russia to the target of total destruction of "ruzzizm". How this target might be implemented, we do not know. But the goal is rather clear, the world is fed up with never-ending Russian aggression. On April 28, the House passed the "Ukraine Democracy Defense...