No one who has lived in central Europe forgets the winters. From November to April, you can be fairly certain that every time you step out of your usually well-heated apartment block, you’ll be walking into what amounts to a freezer. It is this, perhaps more than any other factor, that has driven Russia’s recent “strategic” bombing campaign directed against Ukraine’s electricity supply to undermine the Ukrainian population’s will to resist.
But Russia is now running seriously short of precision-guided missiles – Ukraine’s defenders are becoming increasingly successful at shooting down Iranian-supplied Shahed-136 drones and other missiles – but all too many of them get through. Ukrainian friends tell me that the atmosphere in Kyiv is tense but fiercely determined – with a brisk market for small generators to offset the expected power cuts. It is going to be very hard for Ukraine’s civilians as they try to endure what is going to be a long winter.
But it’s likely to be a lot harder for their enemy’s troops. Nato has been planning for months to ensure that their Ukrainian allies are as well-equipped as possible. Canada has weighed in with nearly half a million sets of winter gear drawn from their modern and effective military stocks. Other countries, including the US and Estonia have followed suit.
