Russia’s military offensive in Ukraine is likely to lose momentum in the near future, giving Ukrainian forces an opportunity to “fight back,” Richard Moore, the head of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), told the Aspen Security Forum on Thursday in Colorado. “I think they’re going to run out of steam,” Moore said of the Russians. “They will have to be stopped somehow and that will give the Ukrainians opportunities to fight back.” Moore said it was important for Ukraine’s morale to “demonstrate their ability to fight back.” “I also think, to be honest, it will be an important reminder to the rest of Europe that this is a winnable campaign for the Ukrainians. Because we’re going into a pretty tough winter,” Moore said. “I don’t want him to sound like a character from ‘Game of Thrones.’ But winter is coming,” said the British spy chief, “And clearly in this atmosphere, with the kind of pressure on gas supplies and all that, we’re in for a tough time.” Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine triggered a global energy crisis. Energy supply stress is particularly high in Europe, which relies heavily on Russia for oil and natural gas. But if the West can maintain the political will to continue providing Ukraine with vital military aid to repel the invaders, there appears to be a growing consensus among analysts and Kremlinologists that Russia will eventually find itself at a standstill in terms of its ability to extend and prolong the attack. . “The Russians are exhausted,” retired Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, the former commanding general of US forces in Europe, recently told Insider. “There’s not much else they can do right now.” Hodges suggested Ukraine could push Russian forces back to its pre-war borders by next year. After failing to capture Kyiv in the early days of the war, Russia turned its attention to Donetsk and Luhansk – the two provinces that make up the eastern Donbas region. In early July, Russia took control of Luhansk, but the conflict has now turned into a war of attrition, with Russian forces advancing at a hard, gradual pace while suffering heavy casualties. Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Army Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters Wednesday that “Russian advances have been maybe six to 10 miles” in recent months. Fiona Hill, who served as the top expert on Russia at the National Security Council under the Trump administration, told Insider last week that the Russians have “a lot of problems and in the long run.” Hill said Russia will struggle with both manpower and maintenance of its military equipment. “The problem is maintaining military equipment and everything in the long term. They’re going to cannibalize equipment,” Hill said, adding, “We’re seeing them go back, not just to the tactics of the previous eras. But the equipment of the previous eras, which drew a lot stuff from the dump or cold storage. There’s a lot of speculation as to how long it will take them to replace the equipment that was lost.” Last week, the UK Ministry of Defense said Russia may resort to prison recruitment to deal with troop losses in Ukraine. Moore said Thursday that Russia has likely lost about 15,000 troops in Ukraine so far since the invasion began about five months ago. But Britain’s spy chief stressed that this was “probably a conservative estimate”. CIA Director William Burns, who also spoke at the Aspen Security Forum this week, offered a similar estimate of the Russian death toll. Burns said the latest estimates by the US intelligence community put the number of Russian soldiers killed at about 15,000, with about 45,000 wounded. “And, the Ukrainians have suffered as well — probably a little less than that. But, you know, significant casualties,” Burns said.
