Russia is Now Simultaneously Collapsing Across Three Different Fronts

With so much focus on the war in Iran right now, it's easy to lose focus on what's happening in Ukraine. And I don't blame people. The war in Iran is, of course, incredibly important, and I too have made several videos about it. What happens there will ultimately decide the fate of an entire region. And not just that region, but everybody who trades with that region, and basically the planet as a whole. But with that in mind, we have to remember that that is also true about Ukraine. And it still remains true, and will likely always remain true, that Ukraine is a much larger-scale conflict. We're talking about a war whose daily casualties at this point are still higher than the entire cumulative casualties of the entire war in Iran for the past three weeks since the war began, about 1,500. And we're talking about a war whose total casualties number approximately 1,500,000. While the casualties in Iran are much closer to approximately 1,500,000. Now, it's of course unfair to compare these conflicts head-to-head, especially this early on. But I just point this out to remind people that the biggest, and sometimes the most important events in the world are not the events that get the biggest and the most frequent media coverage. And that's a shame, because since the war in Iran began, a lot of major developments have happened in Ukraine. In fact, I would argue, some of the most important developments of the entire four years of warfare. A lot is happening in Ukraine right now. And I would argue that what we're seeing is a decisive shift in favor of Ukraine that very few people are noticing. In fact, what we're currently seeing is the culmination of many different things all coming together at once. Things that I've talked about and said are coming for years on this channel, where I have constantly been told and ridiculed that these things would never actually happen, and that this was just wishful thinking. But now, in fact, not just a few of these things, but many of them are all coming together at the same time, creating very clear, very obvious, very noticeable trends. So what I want to do in this video is I want to do a cumulative update on the war in Ukraine as a whole, and what we've seen come to fruition over the past couple of months, so you can see the full picture all together. And I want to do that by dividing the discussion into the three major spheres of this war. We have, first of all, the front lines, where the action is taking place. Then, of course, we have the rear areas, or what some people may refer to as logistics. And then, of course, we have the economic factors. And I want to go through these one by one to show you how, in each of these major theaters, Ukraine is making incredible progress and unleashing new innovations that are really giving Russia a hard time, and how, in response, Russia really has nothing to offer, not just in one of the areas, but in all three major areas. And that might sound biased or unfair, but I want you to know that, when researching this video, I really looked hard for some positives that Russia is currently experiencing to try to balance out the narrative. And I just couldn't find any. And it's not my fault that they just didn't exist. And that sort of tells you how serious what we're now seeing really is. The only exception to that rule is perhaps the fact that Russia is now benefiting from increased global oil prices due to the war in Iran. But as you'll see, I'll cover that in this video, it's not as big of a deal as most people have said. And to the extent that it is, it is offset by other costs, by other negatives of the war in Iran, that are far worse for Russia than the rising oil prices can help them to overcome. A lot of major updates to cover today, the vast majority of which have been overlooked by the more mainstream media, which has been otherwise occupied, publishing stories on the things that people are looking for, and the things that people are asking for. And what's especially been missed is the cohesion of the narrative, how all of these different pieces fit together and point in one particular direction. As we dive into that though, I just want to take a quick break to highlight a Ukrainian business and a Ukrainian story that accentuates why what we're talking about today is so important. With the theme of today's episode in mind, today I want to highlight a Ukrainian business with one of the most unique stories I've heard recently, who also makes an excellent product. That company is Art Winery, who has a profound connection to a place that the viewers of this channel will unfortunately be intimately familiar with, Bakhmut. Art Winery is famous across Ukraine for their sparkling wines, and they were born 236 feet beneath the ancient ground of Bakhmut, inside the world's deepest wine cellar, below the site of what would become one of the most famous battles of Russia's war against Ukraine. The city of Bakhmut, of course, was completely leveled, and eventually fell to Yevgeny Prigozhin and his Wagner forces. And as it fell, we got some of the last footage of Art Winery's ancient cellars, which they no longer have access to, with Prigozhin walking through them and having his troops package up the bottles as spoils of war. Millions of bottles were lost, representing the life's work of people like Irina Polymova, a chemistry graduate who developed unique approaches to winemaking, including the playing of classical music in the once-silent cellars. This brought calm and rhythm to the environment, and aided in secondary fermentation. And this classical music was still playing when the Wagner group entered the cellars to take them over. These millions of bottles, which represented years of patient investment, were not only stolen, but also wasted. With little water in the occupied territories of Ukraine, Russian soldiers have actually begun using these bottles of fine wine to flush their toilets. But the Russians didn't steal all of it. Just before Bakhmut fell, some extremely brave men risked their lives to smuggle out several hundred thousand bottles of art wine. That might seem like a strange decision during a war, but remember, this was a significant investment. And products and economies and profits play a real and meaningful role in real people's lives. These last bottles from the cellars of Bakhmut were sent to the United States, a sparkling wine that will never exist again. A piece of Ukrainian history and the legacy of real Ukrainian people, who lost the bulk of a business that they methodically built over generations to Russian aggression. Art Winery has asked me to work with them to help bring awareness to these final bottles, like the one I'm holding now, where only 2,000 of this variant were successfully rescued. I thought it was a unique opportunity for my audience to not only own something unique and special, but to also support a real Ukrainian business in the process. These bottles are perfect for any wine collection, and they also make the perfect gift for someone you love, serving as a great conversation starter to talk more about what's going on in Ukraine. For some bottles, there are as few as 180 remaining. If you want to own a piece of history that can never be made in the same way again, you can get one of these last bottles from Bakhmut at artwine.com. They've even put together a special bundle in honor of this channel and my viewers, the full arsenal. A complete archive of 11 bottles, one of each style that made it out of Bakhmut intact. For now, these bottles are only available in the United States, so only US orders are accepted. But I'm told that some bottles will be available in Europe sometime later this year, so stay tuned. And thank you for considering purchasing goods that you already purchase on a regular basis from Ukrainian companies, supporting Ukraine's economy in a real, tangible, and meaningful way. So we'll start our discussion today in perhaps the most logical place, on the front lines of the war in Ukraine, which in recent months have had some of their most significant changes in literally years, which is saying a lot. If you're familiar with the war in Ukraine, you'll know that the front lines haven't really moved very significantly for a long time. The war started with some big shifts in the front lines as Russia initially invaded Ukraine, and then Ukraine pushed Russia back, and Russia started some major offensives from that point. And with a lot of casualties and losing most of their armor, their tanks and armored vehicles, they were able to take a couple of major Ukrainian cities, cities like Bakhmut and Avdivka. Actually, these cities were more of towns, rather small by most country standards, but as far as their military fortifications, these were relatively significant battles in the war of Russia against Ukraine. Since then, the front lines have essentially been static. Russia has been slowly, slowly, slowly crawling forward, taking massive casualties in the process, but because they basically lost all of their tanks and armored vehicles, they haven't been able to take, to fully take, any really truly significant Ukrainian positions. About a year ago, we were seeing headlines that said that Russia was about to take Pokrovsk and Ches'ev Yar, and now today, Russia still has not fully accomplished those objectives, which tells you how poorly things have really been going, and how really nothing of significance, seemingly, has been happening on the front lines. But over the past couple of months, and especially over the past couple of weeks, that has changed, where Ukraine has actually begun to take some territory back from Russia. Now, it's not a ton of territory in and of itself, but Ukraine is now, for really the first time in this war, since their initial counteroffensive, taking back more territory from Russia on a regular basis than Russia is taking from them. Which means the war is now moving in a direction where Ukraine is pushing against Russia, rather than the opposite. Now, it's still kind of moving in both directions, and it's not that Ukraine is doing a major counteroffensive to completely break through the Russian line, and we're going to see them march all the way to Moscow quite yet, but it turns out that that doesn't actually matter. Because the underlying reasons for the shift on the front lines tell us everything we need to know. Now, there's two major reasons for these shifts on the front lines, and it turns out that neither of these reasons are short-term or temporary. But rather, they seem to be long-term, underlying changes in the nature of the war in Ukraine. And that matters, because it means that Ukraine's current offensive leverage over Russia, their current initiative, could continue in some way, shape, or form for the long term. That is a major shift. For most of the war, Ukraine has had a defensive advantage over Russia, and that's why they've afflicted so many casualties on them. But they haven't had an offensive advantage, so their goal has been to make this a war of attrition. Over time, make the war costly for Russia, grind down their military capabilities, both through casualties and also through economic attacks on their rear, which we'll get to, until the point that Russia would sort of lose their ability to continue pushing forward. Then, once Russia was weakened, that is the point at which Ukraine could take advantage of that weakness to begin pushing forward. This is a point that it seems we're now beginning to reach. Maybe not in the sense of a dramatic breakthrough moment, but in the sense that Ukraine is now able to have the initiative over Russia. Ukraine is able to decide where they fight, when they fight, and how they fight, rather than simply responding to Russian assaults, at least from a frontline perspective. And that matters a whole lot. It matters, of course, tactically, but it also matters psychologically. For this entire war, Russian soldiers have had one major advantage. They could feel relatively safe and relatively secure within their own bunkers, within their own fortifications. But now, they have to be prepared to be assaulted by Ukraine at any given moment. They have to be prepared to actually defend their positions, not just gather to attack Ukraine. And that is a very, very meaningful shift. So, again, there's two major reasons this is happening. The first is the recent Russian loss of Starlink, which Ukraine has taken massive advantage of. Basically, Russia was relying on Starlink systems for the vast majority of their communications. And, in fact, once Starlink went down, 75% of all Starlink traffic in Ukraine went offline. Because, basically, Starlink was stopped from being used by Russian soldiers. So, we realize how big the scale of their communications dependence was on Starlink. And as soon as that went offline, the soldiers were in a terrible position. Not only could they not assault Ukraine as effectively, opening up opportunities for Ukraine to have some breathing space and to gather and push back, but also Russia, because they lost most of their communications abilities, could not respond as effectively if Ukraine and when Ukraine did push against them. And Ukraine has been taking advantage of that to take some of the weaker Russian positions, the more strategically and tactically significant positions, while Russia has their communications down. But that's a problem that doesn't seem like it's going to be fixed anytime soon. Starlink worked so well because it was very well geared to the electronic warfare environment that the war in Ukraine finds itself in. It relies, of course, on satellite networks. And that's not something that you can just prop up immediately over time. Russia does have satellite networks of their own, Russian soldiers can still communicate, but there are breaks in that communication, there are slowdowns in that communication, and nothing is going to be able to replace what Starlink did at nearly the same scale, basically, for the remainder of the war. So, Russia is essentially suffering from a permanent communications breakdown on the front. The problem isn't just a communications breakdown in and of itself, though. It's also accentuated by the timing of this communications breakdown, which it turns out has coalesced with a major, very dark milestone that Russia recently hit. Where Russia, as of the last three months, has now been losing more soldiers on a monthly basis than they can actually recruit to replace those losses. This is a huge deal. It means from this point forward, the Russian military is effectively getting smaller. And they're not going to be able to accumulate enough forces, unless something major changes, to push against Ukraine. But it's not just the fact of the losses in and of themselves, it's the reason the losses had reached that scale. And that comes down to changes in Ukrainian leadership, and also advances in Ukrainian technology, particularly drones and robotics. First and foremost, there is very effective Ukrainian leadership that has gotten the right incentives in place to make the Ukrainian drone teams just far, far, far more effective. And they're actively hunting Russian soldiers now. Again, they're not just kind of defending their positions, they now have enough excess capacity and excess skill to not just plug the gaps, but to go beyond the front line, and to start finding Russian soldiers within their own home front, within their own bases, where they feel safe. Or rather than saying their own home front, I should say, within the occupied territory that they're treating as their home front. But it's not just Ukrainian drone operators near the front who are hunting Russians near the front. Ukraine has also recently unleashed some longer range drones that can go further into occupied territory, many, many kilometers beyond what was typically considered the combat zone of the war. And so Russian soldiers who typically would have felt safe even beyond the front lines, they're now being hunted by Ukraine too. And it's allowing Ukraine the ability to not just eliminate more Russian soldiers, but also to prevent Russian soldiers from clustering and gathering to prepare for offensives, the types of things that caused problems for Ukraine earlier in the war, where Russian soldiers were gathering, Ukraine was not allowed, for example, to use US-provided weapon systems to break up those clusters, and so they just had to kind of watch the soldiers gathering, even though they knew they were there, they couldn't do anything about it. Well, now Ukraine has their own homegrown weapon systems that are advanced and designed specifically with the nature of this war in mind, and they are hunting Russian soldiers, and it's causing a lot of casualties. Even more than that, though, another trend that's been developing for a long time when it comes to robotics is now starting to come to fruition, which is advances in ground robotics, where we're now actually seeing Russian soldiers literally surrendering to robots. So Ukraine doesn't have to sacrifice their own infantrymen to take Russian positions, they can soften those targets with aerial drones, and then they can actually send ground drones in to get Russian soldiers to surrender, abandon their weapons, and then the infantry can come in. Something that, by the way, I was told I was crazy if I ever thought that that would happen. Drones don't win wars, you need the infantry to do it. Well, yes, you need the infantry to do it, but the drones can still prevent the infantry from taking casualties, and they can make a small amount of infantry fight the same way a large amount of infantry typically would have, overcoming Ukraine's main weakness in this war, which is the fact that they just have a lot less manpower than Russia does. So all these things have coalesced to create a much, much worse front-line situation for Russian soldiers, and that is why Ukraine is now taking more land from Russia than it's losing. Now, even on top of this, when it comes to moves on the front lines, I think there is a reason why Ukraine feels more empowered to be bold and take risks now than they did, for example, a couple of years ago. And that has to do with some new fortifications that Ukraine has now completed basically behind the entire current front line. And these fortifications are extremely impressive. Again, they were designed specifically with the nature of this war in mind, and that matters. A lot of the current positions Ukraine is holding, that they've been holding very well, are positions that could not be built up ahead of time, and to the extent that they were, they were built up for a different kind of war. Now Ukraine has fortifications that they have had time to fully complete without any gaps, except for gaps that you create on purpose to sort of funnel Russian soldiers through, which is even worse, I would argue. They have these specific fortifications designed for this war that are now completed, which means that if Russia, for example, were able to break through the Ukrainian front that currently exists, they wouldn't win the war. They would just come across an even harder position to penetrate, where they would only take even more casualties, something that we've already seen, they've reached a level where they can't sustain the current level of casualties. As Ukraine, that gives you a lot of strength that allows you to take risks where you can win the war. Because you know, even if you make a massive mistake, and I'm not saying this would be good, but even if you make a massive mistake, and while you are on the counter-offensive, Russia prepares an offensive and they get through a different position, the losses of that are limited, and you can get things to a place where you can control them, and Russia is not going to be able to push all the way through, for example, reach major Ukrainian cities. That matters, Ukraine has a backstop, and again, that changes the psychology behind the war, and it gives Ukraine advantages that they've never had before. So these have been the major updates when it comes to the front lines, which a lot of people see as the major, most important theater of the war. But I actually disagree with that. For a long time I have said that the front lines is where the majority of the action of the war takes place, but it's not actually the most important theater of this war. I have long argued that the most important theaters of this war are the logistical theater, the rear area theater, and the economic theater. And it turns out that that's a good thing as far as Ukraine is concerned, because in these areas, Russia has consistently been taking more and more and more damage, and they are now coming to a point where it seems that they're going to have to contend with things that they've never had to contend with before. Throughout the past couple of years of this war, Ukraine has already done an excellent job of striking Russian logistical and economic targets. Things like factories, supply depots, ammo depots, roads, railroads, refineries. You get the picture. And they have done this essentially with one hand tied behind their back, because they've been doing the vast majority of these strikes with drones. Now, drones are great. Obviously, they can get the job done. But the problem with a drone is that typically they have a more limited range, and they also have a more limited payload. And that means that if Ukraine can strike a Russian target, they often can't take it completely offline. Although sometimes they can, and even if they can't, they can disrupt it to a large degree, and that makes a big difference. But now it seems that Ukraine is prepared to upgrade that game in a major way. Through the release, we're hoping soon, of two major missile systems. One of which is rather new. One of which we were expecting to see about a year ago. It's had some delays, but it now seems like it's potentially ready for prime time. We're of course talking about the Flamingo missile, the Flamingo cruise missile, but also a new ballistic missile, which it seems that Ukraine is getting ready to test soon. And both of these essentially have the same advantage over drones. They can carry a much higher payload, and they can also fire further ranges, which means that Ukraine can not only hit targets better and more effectively, but it can also hit new categories of targets. And when they do hit those targets, sometimes they can penetrate deeper into things that maybe they couldn't ever destroy before. Now that matters, not just in terms of destruction, but also in terms of the way that Russia positions its air defenses. Russia already has limited air defenses. And now with these new missile systems coming into the fray, Russia is going to have to reposition its air defenses to protect its most critical targets against these better Ukrainian weapon systems. And as they do that, other targets will be more open for Ukrainian drones to strike. And even as Russia moves their air defense systems, that creates problems. Because it shows Ukraine what targets Russia is prioritizing as far as defense. Where they put their air defense shows them what the Russians think is the most important. And also, as Russians move air defense systems, that makes them more vulnerable and easier to take offline. We already saw that when Ukraine started talking about the Flamingo missile about a year ago. All of those things happened, and now they're happening again. Ukraine seems to be targeting a lot of Russian air defense systems in a very short span of time, showing that they're preparing for something big, and they're trying to create some panic in Russia's ability to protect its rear areas. And as far as the Flamingo missile goes, we've seen some recent proof of concepts that show us that this missile has overcome the challenges that caused it to not come to combat as soon as we were hoping. First and foremost, we were informed that Russia did effectively strike a Flamingo production facility, which did cause major delays. But another problem the Flamingo missile always faced was basically mapping. A cruise missile works by essentially flying lower under the radar so that not as many air defense systems can pick it up and shoot it down. But to do that effectively, to fly low, you need effective mapping data, very accurate mapping data. Ukraine has recently shown that they can fly deep into Russian territory with Flamingo missiles, not one time, but several different times, showing that they do indeed have much better mapping data now than they did before, meaning that at a time of their choosing, potentially, this Flamingo could still come into the picture. And if that happens at the same time that Ukraine releases these new ballistic missiles, that's going to cause major, major chaos within Russia. Now, these rear strikes matter a lot because they only accentuate the problems we already discussed on the front. We already talked about how when Russia had equipment, tanks and armored vehicles especially, they were able to take far more Ukrainian territory far more quickly. Since they lost that, they basically haven't been able to push forward in any significant way except for with massive, massive, massive human casualties. And even then, it's very limited. So the rear strikes keep that dynamic going. It ensures that Russia cannot accumulate enough equipment for their men, and also not just equipment, but also basic things like ammunition. Food. Water. Clothing to keep warm. So it makes the Russian military far less effective than they would otherwise be. And as Russia is already facing all these problems on the front, and Ukraine is only getting better and better and better at taking out their capabilities in the rear, it just makes the equation work more in a particular direction, and it actually kind of removes from Russia the only wind condition possible for them, or at least the only wind condition that they've been able or willing to accept, which is we're going to take more Ukrainian territory. Russia clearly isn't going to be able to do that if the front line situation has changed so drastically, and the rear line situation decays every single day. And so that makes a big, big difference. But in addition to these rear areas, or kind of another aspect of the rear areas, what I want to talk about next is the damage to the Russian economy, which is one of the most important aspects of the entire war. Russia has basically been able to carry out this war because they have kept their country from descending into economic chaos basically through sugar rushes that allow for some short-term durability but undermine long-term sustainability, and Russia is now reaching the point where that is running out. And this contributes also to their military strategy because their primary military strategy has been to essentially bribe soldiers, pay them high salaries, high signing bonuses, high benefits, to get them to join the military. They have been very hesitant to stoop to conscription. But now Russia is running out of money. Russia is running out of money to the extent that they're not willing or not able to pay the high bonuses anymore, especially in some of the regions that they want to recruit from the most. Because the budget just isn't there. So as the Russian economy wears down, eventually the country will reach a breaking point. They will reach a point where their savings prior to the war, and the inflation and other methods that they've been using to drag the economy out even further, will not be able to be effective anymore, and that's going to cause major, major, major problems. Now the discussion about the economic aspects can get a little bit more complicated, and I do have several lengthy videos explaining all of these separate issues in a lot of depth. So if you want more depth, you can find it there. I want to focus the discussion today on one central point that the Russian government has reached recently, which is where the Russian government is now running a deficit. And this is a big deal for the Russian government because unlike the United States, for example, they don't have a big market that wants to buy Russian government debt. And so when they run a deficit, they're forced to print money. And I have a long discussion on this in another video where I explain why this is basically Russia reaching one of the more terminal phases of their economic decline, where soon they are going to be forced into a massive amount of inflation. But what a lot of people are saying is that this has now been abated because of the war in Iran. They're saying that because the Strait of Hormuz has been blocked and 20% of global oil has been stopped from being transported, well, now oil prices are going to go up and they're going to go up for the long term. And as they go up for the long term, that's going to massively benefit Russia and it's going to save them economically. And I just fundamentally do not believe that is true. I do not believe that the Russian economy can be saved by what's happening in Iran, although it might buy them a couple of months at most. Most importantly to point out here, for the Russian government, as far as the war is concerned, the economy is a means to an end, not an end in and of itself. And even if the Russian economy was fully saved, it would not overcome any of those other aspects that we've already discussed previously in this video, except for perhaps they could recruit more soldiers, but that's already not been enough for them. But the crisis in the Strait of Hormuz is not likely to benefit Russia nearly as much as people think economically for a couple of different reasons. First and foremost, we should point out that as long as the war in Iran has been going on, while Russia could theoretically benefit from higher oil prices, there have been a lot of constraints that have prevented them from doing that. Ukraine has been very smart and they have taken out a lot of Russia's facilities that actually allow them to load additional oil onto tankers. And for example, a lot of the facilities in the Black Sea have been offline basically for the entire length of the war in Iran so far. So Russia hasn't been able to benefit from those increased prices there. And also this entire time, the Druzba pipeline, which supplies Hungary and Slovakia, that's also been offline, and that was because Russia struck that pipeline and Ukraine just basically refused to rebuild it because the strike took place on Ukrainian territory. These factors and other factors mean that Russia's ability to actually get oil into the global markets has been reduced by about 30% for the entire length of the war in Iran. So Russia has been able to benefit from higher prices for ships that were already on the water, and they've been able to get prices that were maybe in some cases up to 50% higher, but at that same time, their supply to the global market has been reduced by 30%, which largely offsets that. And there's reason to believe that while there will be upward pressure on prices because of the Strait of Hormuz, it won't be as high as people think for the long term. First and foremost, a good portion of the traffic that goes through the Strait of Hormuz is now going back through it. And there's also bypass pipelines to the Strait of Hormuz that offset some of that capacity as well. So while a lot of news outlets are citing the fact that 20% of global oil traffic has been halted because of the war in Iran, very soon we're going to see that number in reality probably be closer to 10%. Now that's still a big problem, but it's half the crisis that we're being advertised. And beyond that, there's also the fact that there are massive global oil reserves which can more than offset these losses of supply. Now it's going to take some time for these market dynamics to get into place. There will be heightened prices for a time, but eventually things will level out, and they'll level out at a point that's a little bit more profitable for Russia, but not nearly enough to actually save the Russian economy. And there's even more factors than this, but this video isn't primarily about that topic. So if you want to learn more about that, I do have a dedicated video to that topic, talking about why it won't be as good for Russia as a lot of people think. Now with all of that being said, we should close our discussion on the economic aspects of the war by mentioning Ukraine's economy, which in contrast to Russia's economy, is actually doing quite well. And I don't mean that the Ukrainian economy isn't suffering or anything like that, but in terms of Ukraine's economy's ability to strategically withstand the length of the war, Ukraine is doing quite well, and that's largely because of a 90 billion euro loan from Europe to Ukraine. Now this hasn't gone through yet fully, Hungary is currently trying to block this, but Hungary's leader will probably be out of office soon, and then the loan can move forward. And even if that doesn't happen, the European Parliament has already indicated that if for some reason this loan remains blocked, they're going to make sure that it happens through some other kind of channel anyways. So one way or another, Ukraine is going to get a 90 billion euro loan from Ukraine, which is enough to keep their economy functioning for several years. But this is not the only economic thing that's happening to ensure that the war is sustainable for Ukraine. Actually, the fact that Europe is giving this loan to Ukraine indicates a strategic shift in Europe, where they've kind of decided they need Ukraine to withstand the war. And the reason they've decided that is because they are now tying their military-industrial complex directly to Ukraine's. Europe is now building Ukrainian drone factories all over the place, and the profits from this are flowing into Ukraine. And so that's another way that Ukraine is economically benefiting in ways that they haven't throughout the entire war. But on top of that, the war in Iran has just exploded demand for Ukraine's military technology, and yes, they do have a surplus that they can safely export. So Ukraine is actually making a lot more money because of the war in Iran, at the same time that Russia is making a lot more money. And we can compare that in dollar or euro terms, but that's not really what matters. What really matters is, is it enough to sustain the war effort? And what Ukraine is currently receiving is enough to sustain the war effort. What Russia is receiving is not enough to sustain the war effort over the long term. And on top of that, the war in Iran, while it may bring some financial benefit to Russia, it's bringing a lot of tactical deficit. Because the war in Iran is obviously hindering Iran, which is providing Russia with Shahed drones and Shahed drone parts. Now these parts aren't going to Russia, and Russia is in fact having to divert some of these Shahed drones to Iran, or maybe they're choosing to do that, they don't have to obviously. But Shahed drones that would otherwise be striking Ukraine are now occupied in Iran, and obviously that benefits Ukraine's war effort. So we've looked at a lot of different things in this video. The three major theaters of the war. We have the front line, the rear line or logistics, and also the economic theater. And we've shown how in all of these ways, the war is shifting in a pretty significant direction. It's not over yet. It's a shift. It's not the final push. But a lot of people are missing this shift in the significance because the media isn't sharing these details. And if they share one or two of these details, they're certainly not sharing all of them, and they're certainly not sharing them in a cohesive way to bring you this complete picture. Now that's why this channel exists. To give specific focus to important issues that the media often doesn't focus on, and to bring you the full picture that you might otherwise miss. And if you learned some things in this video that you didn't know about the war in Ukraine, there's probably a reason for that. I don't belong to a newspaper. I don't belong to a news channel. I don't belong to a journal. I am an independent analyst who is supported by this community. A community of people who only chooses to come back if the things that I say do indeed turn out to be true. And so far, the vast majority of people keep coming back. Because what I say does indeed keep turning out to be true. Doesn't mean I get things right all the time. Nobody does. But I do very hard work to try to get the most accurate information and the most accurate analysis possible to you guys. So if you appreciate that, you can help keep me independent by becoming a YouTube channel member or a patron. It's completely voluntary. I don't put a lot behind paywalls on purpose. But your support really does help me a lot. Now before you go, don't forget to pick up a bottle of Artwine. A truly, truly unique product with a truly unique story. Something that can never be made in the same way again. Get your limited bottles, like this one, before there aren't any left. By going to Artwine.com Thanks so much for watching. I'll see you guys on the next one.