Ways to potentially end a war in Ukraine - HIMAR missile systems to take out artillery
The fastest way to end the war in Ukraine likely is for Ukraine to take out Russian artillery, which it could do with HIMAR missile systems, as well as other long range weapons. Long range weapons are the key to ending the war quickly, as they can outrange the enemy artillery and allow Ukraine to take them out from relative safety. Further the logistic supply trains of the Russians would be easily targeted which are already quite vulnerable, and Russian anti-air defenses and other vehicles. Furthermore, the HIMAR missile utilize cluster munitions, which is largely made up of hundreds of shaped charge warheads over a pound a piece, similar in size to small rocket launcher rounds, which in studies were found to have 30 times higher effectiveness against vehicles and 8 times the effectiveness against infantry than standard singular warheads. The wide area of dispersion, ability to fill in every nook and cranny and anti-armor effectiveness allows them to potentially take out tanks, and they would make short work of dug in infantry in trenches and armored vehicle formations as well. When just four HIMAR missile systems were sent to ukraine, they managed to reduce Russian artillery fire by three quarters, or 75%, cutting their artillery fire in half and then cutting it in half again, and managed to inflict the single deadliest blow to their air force in decades by attacking an air field while the aircraft were on the ground, hundreds of miles away. It's not hard to imagine what could be done if Ukraine had thousands, or even 10's of thousands of these missiles, which were specifically designed to defeat Russian vehicles and defenses, in particular with each warhead able to penetrate more than 2.5 inches of Russian armor even at high angles (although with modern software it can easily get through 8 inches by coming straight down on the target like a javelin), which will defeat the top armor of most older soviet tanks. Armor, infantry, logistic supply trains, anti-air defenses and artillery would be easy to destroy. The U.S. at one point had nearly 600,000 HIMAR missile systems and the plan was to thin out Russian forces before any ground invasion, and while many were destroyed due to international agreements Russia themselves never followed, our substantial stockpiles of them and launching systems would allow for 10's of thousands of these, and many cruise missiles to be sent to Ukraine. Ukranian forces have had trouble advancing during the counter offensive due to artillery shelling them when they try to clear landmine fields. It will be impossible for Ukraine to make real substantial advancements through Russian-held territory without removing these minefields, which can only be done if they are not being relentlessly bombed by Russian artillery. Artillery is responsible for 70-85% of causalities on both sides, even vehicles, and makes up the bulk of the destruction of this war, including the shelling and destruction of numerous Ukrainian cities.
The reduction of civilian casualties as well as Removal of Russian forces relies heavily upon defeating Russian artillery, which is the bulk of the Russian's army firepower and key to them holding ground and advancing in Ukraine. Ukraine's tanks, infantry, aircraft and artillery is superior than Russia's, but Russia simply has such an overwhelming volume of artillery that it can beat Ukraine. Sending large volumes of artillery to Ukraine can offset this somewhat, but artillery duels are risky and dangerous and cost lives to perform. What Ukraine needs, more than anything, is anti-artillery, counter battery weapons, to allow the rest of their military to advance, which can only be achieved via long range weapons which outrange artillery. Artillery is the longest range mass produced weapon on the battlefield, which is why it's so hard to defeat. If the enemy can kill you before you get close, what can challenge it? Only even longer range weapons can defeat artillery, which means long range weapon systems. The Fact president Joe Biden and many democrats have blocked this highly specific and important type of weapon in large volumes is astounding to me. I urge everyone involved to release these weapons to Ukraine in the 10's of thousands, enough to take out Russian's few thousand artillery pieces, so that the tide of the war can shift in Ukraine's favor, and the war can eventually be over.
There is no much point to sending 17 tanks or 50 APCs to Ukraine that will be promptly destroyed by Russian artillery in under a month. These sorts of things will result in Ukraine losing their men's lives to achieve tiny victories or taking back slivers of territory from Russia, while wasting resources from the west. As we can see by how the current six month counter offensive has played out, all of this equipment is useless without a way for Ukraine to gain artillery superiority. The only way for Ukraine to win is to take out Russian artillery, and to do so in an effective and live-saving way requires long range weapons that can be fired from a safe distance. Ukraine pays the price in western hesitancy with blood, and any "escalation" people may fear from Russia certainly cannot be worse than what Russia has already done. What will Russia do, murder civilians, attack the west, try to destroy the west economically and withhold fuel or food or try to destroy our dollar? Perhaps they will blow up pipelines, destroy undersea NATO cables, and threaten our allies if they join or remain in NATO? In the end, the west must be willing to stand up to Russia, to understand western countries have nukes too, and not allow these transgressions to continue, both for basic morality and humanity, and to prevent them from going further in to Europe and the western world. Like after the fall of Afghanistan, we do not want to trigger a cascade of subsequent attacks signaling to the world they can get away with this. The price for such crimes must be so high that it deters nations from even attempting them. The only deterrence to conventional invasions, are conventional weapons. And more importantly, a willingness to use them. If the rest of the world believes were are too weak or too soft to use military power, they will brutally and ruthlessly attack us during our period of hesitation and convince them now is the time to act. We need a win to signal to the world that such transgressions are not allowed and will be severely punished, just as much as to save the lives of hundreds of thousands of people, if not millions, in Ukraine.
More in depth
I have been hesitant to give my opinion on ending the war in Ukraine or the issue in general given the complexity of the situation and my direct lack of involvement. It would be prudent to avoid making major assumptions about a conflict from a distance, and I hesitate to act as if I have all the answers to all the problems in Ukraine. However given the frequency of people who insist they have the right answers that are obviously wrong and the various Ukraine grifters which have emerged over the years, some of them literally financed by Russia, I've decided to provide my input. The simplest and fastest way to end the war in Ukraine is by taking out Russian artillery. Without Russian artillery, the Russian military is largely ineffectual. The Russian military often been described as an "Artillery army with tanks and human wave charges", and given their recent performance in Ukraine this would seem accurate. Russia has always depended heavily on artillery barrages, be it in WWI, WWII, in Chechnya or any conflict it's been in. Calling it the "King of battle", the Russians put an inordinate amount of emphasis on artillery, and use it in the same way the United States used carpet bombing during WWII, only with even less regard for civilian lives. Russian artillery bombardments killed more civilians than the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs in notable shellings of cities during WWII, and unlike the U.S. they did not drop leaflets and try to warn civilians ahead of time. Despite modern JDAM's making precision bombs dropped from the air a reality, going from a 1 mile radius down to just 6-30 feet (2-10 meters) on average, Russia has instead continued it's trend of shelling in to oblivion any area it deems enemy territory. It is also inaccurate even by artillery standards, with Ukraine inflicting higher casualties on the Russians, despite Ukraine using approximately 1/3rd to 1/10th the amount of rounds as the Russians, and using the same type of artillery cannons. It's estimated Russia may have burnt through as much as 12 million of it's prior 17 million soviet stockpile of artillery ammunition, and that's just to gain slivers of territory in Ukraine, of which much of which it promptly lost. The key to stopping Russia in Ukraine is to take out their artillery; without it, their military would crumble. 70-85% of casualties on both sides are due to artillery, Russian artillery is it's only saving grace, and it's key to both preventing Ukrainian advances as well as advancing their own. The Russians also have enormous volumes of artillery from their soviet days, including artillery Ukraine was forced to give them, which only furthers this problem. Russian treaties have forced countries to give up artillery or long range missile systems that could counter them, resulting in an even greater advantage for Russia in this domain. A form of hybrid political warfare.
Some would argue Ukraine should cede territory to Russia, although this a horrible idea for many reasons. Other than the immoral injustice of Ukraine having to surrender people who are being wholescale slaughtered to the Russians, the Russians open admission that they will not stop until Ukraine is demilitarized, Denazified, and "De-ukranized", implying a removal of over 1/3rd of the Ukranian people in a genocide (a stated objective by Russian media and Putin), it would encourage Russia to continue to gain victories in Ukraine. It needs to be clear to the Russians that Russia cannot win and has been soundly defeated, that it has lost over 300,000 men and half a million injured, for nothing, that it gained nothing and the Russians simply lost in a humiliating defeat. Russia must not be able to stroke it's ego and pride, or else the leaders can go back to their people and say the inordinate price was worth it. If the entire war was for nothing in the minds of the Russian people, than Russia cannot sell it defended Russia or achieved it's stated goals, which, while shifting and changing, would be impossible to deny if Russia was kicked out of Ukraine completely. As long as Russia has an inch of Ukrainian territory, it can sell to it's people the idea of victory, and will never truly stop it's campaign in Ukraine.
Secondly, Crimea, the Donbass regions and others were surrendered by Ukraine after international opinion decided Ukraine MUST surrender this territory to Russia, and Russia not only invaded multiple times afterwards, but had any easier time doing so. Crimea was a shaping operation, to establish a foothold in Ukraine to launch another invasion. Russia has violated every single peace agreement and ceasefire Ukraine has agreed to, and has violated international law and committed heinous warcrimes from torturing prisoners to attacking civilians, to flooding areas to attacking nuclear reactors, and shelled entire cities in to oblivion. There is no reason to believe Russia would simply not try again, more emboldened and better rested with another ceasefire, as it did after Crimea and it's Donbas invasions more than 8 years prior. Finally, we see what happens to territory Ukraine cedes to Russia. Mariupol, despite surrendering to Russia, was bombed in to oblivion and nearly completely annihilated with 95% of the residents gone and over 95% of the buildings destroyed. Even if the territory was ceded, Russia is set on Deukranizing Ukraine, that is to remove all the Ukrainians. Given the castration and torture of Ukrainian prisoners, the mass rape and murder of woman, the Bucha massacre and kill lists targeting gun club members, bloggers, school teachers and other civilians directly, and the selling in to slavery Ukrainians to Chechnyan terrorists, Russia will not be kind to the people in the captured territories who are currently held hostage and have trouble escaping. The only thing that keeps Russia from murdering all of them is the fear of reprisal from Ukraine who may very well take this territory back one day. If it is handed to Russia, even for a few years, the civilians will likely all be wiped out in Brutal fashion, judging by what Russia has already done.
We know this from Russia has already done to surrendered areas in Ukraine, the kidnapping and brainwashing and torture of 10's of thousands of Ukrainian children, which is considered so bad there now is an international arrest warrant out for Putin. We also know what the Russians have done in Chechenia by shelling entire cities such as Grozney, and in Georgia and Moldova. There isn't a way to let Russia think it has won that doesn't result in the genocide of millions of people. The only way to defeat Russia, is to defeat them militarily. To do that, Russian artillery must be removed, which both destroys entire cities and turns them in to rubble, and prevents Ukrainian advance. Ukrainian forces are relatively safe when in trenches or underground, but Ukraine loses thousands of men every month. However when they come above ground they have no protection, and artillery casualties may increase by over a 100 fold. When out in the open and stuck in half mile deep landmine fields, Ukranian forces simply cannot advance. The key to victory is taking out Russian artillery. To stop the slaughter of civilians, it is imperative that the west help Ukraine take out their most powerful and deadly weapon, which is the only reason why Russian forces have advanced at all.
Additional options (covered trenches, drones, and body armor)
As said before, the key problem with the war has been artillery, which is responsible for 70-85% of casualties on both sides. One way to mitigate the advantages to artillery could be better defenses or armor, to allow troops to have a higher chance to survive an attack. This could take the form in better designs of trenches, which Ukraine has already implemented, or simply more reinforced trenches. One thing most infantry trenches lack is a roof, which means if shells do land in the trench or near it, troops are likely going to die. While air-bursting shells produce a lot of casualties, they don't often result in severe injury or death being so far away. But if a full sized artillery shell detonates inside of a trench, the impact is often devastating. While it may take on average 100-200 shells for the Russians to kill one Ukrainians, it takes about 500-1000 to actually land inside the trenches. But when it does, it results in many deaths per shell, as they are extremely large and powerful. It's so powerful that at 10 meters, it's rated to get through much tank armor, or 30mm resistant armor, as fired from the A-10 warthog. STANAG Level V rating requires stopping 30mm rounds or 155mm artillery shrapnel at 10 meters. Artillery often destroys enemy tanks through sheer shock force and through penetrating the weaker parts of the armor such as from the side or rear. If this lands within 30 feet of infantry, it practically guarantees their death. One way to prevent deaths from artillery and large injury figures, with ukraine being low on medical supplies especially after Russia used missiles to blow up civilian hospitals and create civilian casualties to overwhelm them, is simply to provide a roof. A very simple half pipe could be placed over a trench which would allow 5-10 feet of dirt to be placed on top, with pipes being found all over society and buried deep underground. Corrugated concrete, plastic or sheet metal could be use, and would allow the roof of a trench to withstand at least one direct hit from artillery and stop virtually all air-bursting shrapnel, greatly reducing civilian casualties.
Early on in the war Ukraine attempted to do something like this, but had much of it's construction vehicles get destroyed as they weren't armored and essentially ad hoc units pressed in to service out of desperation. Armored construction vehicles as well as building supplies could be a great help to Ukraine, giving tanks with construction equipment added so these same vehicles could be multipurpose and not overly specific. As tanks and other vehicles are waiting for an offensive, they could be used to reinforce defensive positions. Furthermore the west could likely produce much better roofs for trenches, or even easily submerged full pipes outright, which would make them stronger and easier to deploy. Trenching equipment, trucks which can transport many half pipes and cranes to install them would speed up the process and allow enough to be built under Russian fire to reinforce these positions. The west should likely develop these resources themselves for their own purposes and start building reinforced trenches in the west as well. The best way to build these is over many years while not under Russian artillery fire, so it behooves us to start now.
