Kremlin claims that Russian forces solely attacked northeastern Ukraine to degrade Ukrainian forces before achieving the “main goal” of capturing Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts – such as statements made by the Russian General Staff on March 25 – are false.
Why is this false though? Donbas has been the stated main objective from day 1. Like honestly, if we believe the ~200k invasion force estimate, those were spread between Donbas, Kherson, Mariupol, Chernihiv, Kiev, Kharkiv, Sumy regions and all the smaller pushes (Izyum etc). So even highballing here there were at best 50-100k troops around Kiev. Do we really believe a professional military would try a proper assault on a city of almost 3mio people, the capital no less, with that small of a force? This is all armchair-general stuff, but that should sound insane to anyone.
Why is this false though? Donbas has been the stated main objective from day 1. Like honestly, if we believe the ~200k invasion force estimate, those were spread between Donbas, Kherson, Mariupol, Chernihiv, Kiev, Kharkiv, Sumy regions and all the smaller pushes (Izyum etc). So even highballing here there were at best 50-100k troops around Kiev. Do we really believe a professional military would try a proper assault on a city of almost 3mio people, the capital no less, with that small of a force? This is all armchair-general stuff, but that should sound insane to anyone.