In 1905 a Corrupt and Incompetent Fleet Limped from the Baltic Sea to the Far East over Seven Months, only to be Sunk in One Day The following is an excerpt from the first chapter of my book on modern Japanese military history, which can be seen at https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/preface-chapter-1-from-brief-military-history-japanese-andrew-wright-rzt7c/?trackingId=BaIiR7KgTbWICcLnkkOD1Q==. Russia and Japan went to war…

May 7, 2024 “You can build a throne with bayonets, but you can’t sit on it for long.” -Boris Yeltsin, Vladimir Putin’s predecessor The Battle of Kiev (February-April 2022): The Battle of Kiev was the first major campaign of the war and decisive in preventing Russia from winning the conflict by a short blitzkrieg. Putin…

May 23, 2024 “Bakhmut never had the strategic importance of Kyiv, the capital, or the port city of Odesa, or Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-biggest city, or even Donetsk, the regional capital some 50 miles north of Bakhmut. The former mining city was best known for its sparkling wine.” -Sinéad Baker The struggle for Bakhmut lasted 320…

July 23, 2024 “Russia is never as strong as she looks; Russia is never as weak as she looks.” -Winston Churchill On the first anniversary of Russia’s unprovoked war against Ukraine, President Zelenskyy told the Ukrainian people that “2023 will be the year of our victory!” Whether this was for domestic consumption, or he genuinely…