Originally Posted by
SLXOwft
I do wonder if his plan is to create the previously threatened South-East Ukrainian Autonomous Republic as that's where he is having success and appears to be using better forces and that the action in northern central Ukraine is a brutal diversion and he declare peace and withdraw from those areas once he has consolidated his puppet state in the relevant oblasts and separating the Western leaning ones from the sea.
It was my impression, for the past few years, that Putin has wanted to annex the two provinces whose recognition as separate was his premise (however dubious) for the recent invasion of Ukraine.
This idea (me guessing on how he'd pursue a limited war) left me puzzled at the broader push towards Karkhiv and Kiev, since a "weight the main effort" approach would focus on those two regions as a second bit taken (Crimea being the first bit a few years back) that was both digestible and manageable.
My thought was that the big build up in the north was intended as a threat, even a feint, roughly a Sword of Damocles, while the move into Luhansk and Donetsk was accomplished.
Obviously, my estimate was incorrect. (And it would still result in no land bridge to Crimea).
The air superiority I expected the Russians to exercise seems to not have materialized.