When Alleged Western Military “Experts” Insist that Russia is Not Making Progress, Just Show Them This | Larry Johnson

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Larry's article can be seen here:

Quoting from the introduction and the conclusion of Larry's article:
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13 April 2025 by Larry C. Johnson 135 Comments


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During his recent testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, General Christopher Cavoli presented a master class in turd polishing. If you listened to his testimony, or read the transcript, you would be inclined to believe that Ukraine is fighting Russia to a stalemate. That is wrong. First, let’s review a summary of the lowlights from Cavoli’s testimony:

Ukrainian Adaptation and Progress: Cavoli highlighted Ukraine’s significant military adaptation, including transitioning from Soviet-era artillery systems to NATO-standard systems under wartime conditions. He described this as “extremely impressive” and emphasized that Ukraine is now in a stronger defensive position compared to earlier stages of the war. What Cavoli should have said is the following: Ukraine is totally on the defensive now and has been unable to mount and sustain a successful counter offensive.

Effectiveness of U.S. Aid: Give yourself a big, old pat-on-the-ass General. Cavoli underscored Ukraine’s heavy reliance on U.S. support, particularly for advanced anti-aircraft systems and intelligence. And he noted that U.S.-supplied long-range missiles like ATACMS have been “extremely effective,” though he reserved detailed assessments for closed sessions due to intelligence concerns. Extremely effective? As measured by what benchmark or standard? I think Cavoli was auditioning for his next job in the military industrial complex. This is some highly professional ass-kissing. The ATACMS are impotent against the Russian advance.

Battlefield Update: Shades of Bojangles. Cavoli did some fancy tap dancing when he provided an optimistic update on the battlefield. Cavoli reported that Ukraine has improved its manpower and defensive capabilities, while Russian forces are increasingly reliant on infantry assaults due to equipment shortages. This is just a blatant lie. In fact, as noted in the next paragraph, Cavoli made some startling admissions about the disparity between the poorly supplied Ukrainians and the industrial might of Russia.

Russian Challenges: Cavoli pointed out that Russia has suffered massive losses, including approximately 4,000 tanks, and that while it has shown some technical adaptations, the overall effectiveness of its ground forces is declining. Yet, in the very next sentence in his written testimony, he conceded that Russia had replaced all of its lost tanks and was outproducing the United States by a factor of 30-to-1.

With respect to Cavoli’s specious claim that Russia’s ground-force capability is declining, let me present you with the facts. In 2024, Ukraine mounted one offensive where they briefly captured Russian territory in the Kursk oblast, and put themselves in the crosshairs of a massive, sustained Russian counterattack. Ukraine’s zenith of territory controlled was in September 2024. By November 2024, Ukraine had lost more than 40% of the land it initially occupied in Kursk. At the end of March 2025, Ukraine, after suffering massive losses of men and equipment, was isolated in two small hamlets on the southernmost tip of Kursk, and had been effectively expelled from Kursk.

Apart from some meaningless raids into the fringes of Belgorod in 2025, Ukraine has failed to mount and sustain an offensive against Russian forces.

How about the Russians? Take a gander at the list of the towns, villages and cities Russia has captured since January 2024:


[snip]

January 2025

  • Velyka Novosilka (Donetsk Oblast): Captured after a prolonged battle.
  • Yantarne (southwest of Kurakhove, Donetsk Oblast).
  • Kalynove (Kharkiv Oblast).
  • Zelene (south of Pokrovsk, Donetsk Oblast).


February 2025

  • Krymske (northeast of Toretsk).


March 2025

  • Sudzha (Kursk Oblast): Recaptured by Russian forces after heavy fighting.
  • Additional settlements in Kursk Oblast: Kazachya Loknya, 1st Knyazhiy, 2nd Knyazhiy, Zamostye, and Mirny.


April 2025

  • Zhuravka (Sumy region): Captured by Russian forces.
Fierce battles are ongoing for control of the villages of Gornal and Oleshnya in Kursk Oblast

Not bad for an army that Cavoli insists, is deteriorating with each passing day. As my friend, Andrei Martyanov frequently notes, wars are not won by simply capturing and holding on to territory. Yes, it can be a valuable metric, but the critical question is always logistics and supplies. No matter how the West tries to polish the turd that is Ukraine, the Ukrainians lack the manpower, the weapons and the industrial capability to produce weapons and ammunition required to stop the Russian advances all along the line of contact.

The sooner the members of the US Congress, as well as President Trump, understand this basic fact, and pull the plug on any additional US material and intelligence support to Ukraine, the quicker we will see the end to the war. As long as the US and Western Europe continue to encourage Ukraine to stay in the fight, more Ukrainian soldiers will die and Russia will control more Ukrainian territory. At this point, it is a math problem… solve it! It also, in my opinion, makes Trump and the Europeans complicit in the needless deaths of tens of thousands of Ukrainian soldiers.

I just stumbled across a video that Danny Davis posted today that is relevant to our discussion:


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5DG-tnGgr4&t=14s&ab_channel=DanielDavis%2FDeepDive

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Chay Bowes

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Russia handed over another 909 bodies of dead servicemen to Ukraine, It received 41 Russian bodies in return. These figures speak for themselves. The catastrophic losses of the Ukrainian military are now inescapable, even for the most deluded Ukrofantasists.
 
Russian Challenges: Cavoli pointed out that Russia has suffered massive losses, including approximately 4,000 tanks, and that while it has shown some technical adaptations, the overall effectiveness of its ground forces is declining.
Our leaders, to include our Generals, now lie to us constantly,.
 
Chay Bowes
@BowesChay
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Russia handed over another 909 bodies of dead servicemen to Ukraine, It received 41 Russian bodies in return. These figures speak for themselves. The catastrophic losses of the Ukrainian military are now inescapable, even for the most deluded Ukrofantasists.

Yeah, Simplicius brought up this new body exchange in his most recent article:
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Another exchange of bodies took place on the front, with an even more lopsided tally than last time: 909 Ukrainian dead to 41 Russian.

Some channels have put together the exchanges going back two years—Russian in red, Ukrainian in blue:
body_exchanges.jpg

==
18.04.25 Exchange of the dead

On April 18, another exchange of bodies of fallen servicemen took place in the SVO zone between Russia and Ukraine. Ukraine received the bodies of 909 fallen servicemen, Russia - 41.

Graph of exchange of bodies of the dead for the years 23-25.

In total, Russia transferred 6881 bodies, Ukraine 1374 bodies.

==

For those who are new to this, a Ukrainian government body called the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War publishes the exchanges on their official governmental site, with the latest being here:

https://koordshtab.gov.ua/posts/v-ukrayinu-povernuly-tila-909-polehlykh-oborontsiv-2079

On the above site they even provide photos of the Russian morgue trucks which delivered the bodies, which were from:
bodyexchangepic.jpg
Source: https://koordshtab.gov.ua/posts/v-ukrayinu-povernuly-tila-909-polehlykh-oborontsiv-2079

But as I’ve said before, they do not publish the amount of Russian bodies they return to Russia. The reason seems obvious: that they do not wish for the casualty disparity to be known. So the “41 bodies” returned to Russia is a figure taken from the Russian side.

For the record, my own previous ongoing tally from a March exchange was:

Russian losses: 464
Ukrainian losses: 5,213
Ratio: 11.24 to 1
So now we add to it and get:

Russian losses: 505
Ukrainian losses: 6,122
Ratio: 12.12 to 1
I’ve only been tracking them for a year or so, unlike the earlier chart, but figured it’s worth to keep my own tally going.

I really do wonder what possible reasoning detractors can come up with for such an increasingly lopsided exchange rate. Surely people can’t still be attributing it to simply: “It’s because Russia is advancing and collecting the bodies”, can they?
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Full article:
 
Yeah, Simplicius brought up this new body exchange in his most recent article:
**
Another exchange of bodies took place on the front, with an even more lopsided tally than last time: 909 Ukrainian dead to 41 Russian.

Some channels have put together the exchanges going back two years—Russian in red, Ukrainian in blue:
View attachment 48301

==
18.04.25 Exchange of the dead

On April 18, another exchange of bodies of fallen servicemen took place in the SVO zone between Russia and Ukraine. Ukraine received the bodies of 909 fallen servicemen, Russia - 41.

Graph of exchange of bodies of the dead for the years 23-25.

In total, Russia transferred 6881 bodies, Ukraine 1374 bodies.

==

For those who are new to this, a Ukrainian government body called the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War publishes the exchanges on their official governmental site, with the latest being here:

https://koordshtab.gov.ua/posts/v-ukrayinu-povernuly-tila-909-polehlykh-oborontsiv-2079

On the above site they even provide photos of the Russian morgue trucks which delivered the bodies, which were from:
View attachment 48302
Source: https://koordshtab.gov.ua/posts/v-ukrayinu-povernuly-tila-909-polehlykh-oborontsiv-2079

But as I’ve said before, they do not publish the amount of Russian bodies they return to Russia. The reason seems obvious: that they do not wish for the casualty disparity to be known. So the “41 bodies” returned to Russia is a figure taken from the Russian side.

For the record, my own previous ongoing tally from a March exchange was:


So now we add to it and get:


I’ve only been tracking them for a year or so, unlike the earlier chart, but figured it’s worth to keep my own tally going.

I really do wonder what possible reasoning detractors can come up with for such an increasingly lopsided exchange rate. Surely people can’t still be attributing it to simply: “It’s because Russia is advancing and collecting the bodies”, can they?
**

Full article:
The sense that I get from my well curated grapevine is Russia has about 125,000 dead, NATO is about 1.3 million for 10.4/1....and it is getting worse for NATO.
 
"I predict that before this is over Russia retake Kiev, and they will retake Odessa"


For the audience, the quote above is from Larry Johnson, who I believe runs Sonar21. As to Mr. Johnson's background:
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Larry C. Johnson is a former CIA officer and intelligence analyst, and former planner and advisor at the US State Department’s Office of Counter Terrorism. As an independent contractor, he has provided training for the US Military’s Special Operations community for 24 years.

Since its founding in 1998, Larry has been managing partner of BERG (Business Exposure Reduction Group) Associates LLC, which specializes in investigating money laundering and counterfeit products, as well as providing financial analysis and counter terror strategy.

Larry was a frequent guest on all major US networks from the 1990s to the late 2000s, but made the “mistake” of consistently offering candid insights and honest assessments, without deferring to establishment bias. As waging “Forever Wars” became the singular policy objective of 90% of the nation’s elected officials, and of the entire media, those voices offering independent and unbiased analysis were relegated to the wilderness, Larry’s along with them.

Vilified by the establishment right, left and center, Larry must be doing something right. His take on global security, intelligence and geopolitics is regularly sought by businesses, by non-mainstream media, and by an organic and growing online cooperative of non-partisan dissident journalism and commentary.

In 2024, Larry addressed the United Nations Security Council, and attended the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF). He appears regularly on various news sites, video blogs and independent online channels, including Sputnik, RT, Judging Freedom, Redacted and The Duran, among many others.

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Source:

As to his comment, so long as Ukraine continues to avoid negotiating with Russia, I think he's probably right that Russia will take Odessa and even Kiev, at least temporarily, in order to purge them of Zelensky's Administration.
 
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