The front line of our life

Abstract

On February 24, 2022, at around 5 o'clock in the morning, Putin declared war on Ukraine. Immediately, Russian troops began intensive shelling of the units of the Armed Forces in the east of the country, crossed the northeastern borders, and also launched rocket-bomb attacks on airfields and weapons depots almost throughout the territory of Ukraine. The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine unanimously approved the introduction of martial law [1].
 The war in Ukraine, which has been going on for more than six months, may become one of the bloodiest in modern history. The scale of losses on both sides is already much higher than in a typical modern war [2].
 It is argued that the Russian-Ukrainian war is a new element compared to the 19th century. In the 20th and 21st centuries the distinction between military and civilians is gradually disappearing. On the one hand, the civilians and the military are fighting together, but on the other hand, the civilians are being destroyed as well as the military. These are so-called total wars. At the end of the Second World War, we have about 100 armed conflicts outside Europe or North America. Statistics show that the army rarely fought only with the army, and the vast majority with the population. Almost all these wars ended with the defeat of the aggressor state. It doesn't matter what technologies. Because it is impossible to overcome a motivated population. As Oxford University scientists write: "The more modern and powerful the occupier's troops are, the more they tend to collapse under the pressure of their own weight" [3].
 It was determined that the fact remains that everyone is fighting. So wars are rather the rule, and peace is the exception. If we believe that war is impossible, then we are seriously missing something. After the fall of communism, we thought in vain that new wars were impossible. It is important to remember the rule of the ancient Romans — if you want peace, prepare for war. War is an inevitable companion of human history [2].
 We define a war as a prolonged hostilities between the organized armed forces of different states, as a result of which at least a thousand people died on the battlefield in a year. According to British intelligence, the Russians lost 15,000 soldiers, that is, a little more than 150 soldiers per day (the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reports 34,500 killed). Ukraine, in turn, admitted that it was losing about 200 soldiers per day. Only the losses of Ukraine raise this war in the scale of intensity, not taking into account the losses among civilians, which are clearly higher than average.
 In addition, Russia's war in Ukraine has already exceeded the average duration of wars, and all indications are that the fighting will drag on and it will be a war of attrition. According to the Correlates of War Project, 25% of wars last 13 months or more. Given that the parties were already involved in a low-intensity conflict in the east of Ukraine, this war exceeded the three-year mark reached by only 10% of conflicts [1].