Editor’s Note: Russia’s poor military performance in Ukraine came as a surprise to me and to many observers. Ben Connable of the Atlantic Council argues that one important factor explaining Russia’s failures was the lack of realistic military exercises. Too often, the Russian military tried to script its exercises to assure higher-ups that all was well, and as a result it failed to learn to fight effectively when a real war occurred.
Daniel Byman
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It wasn’t long into the Ukraine war that military analysts began using the apocryphal Potemkin Village analogy to describe Russia’s military: It consists of hollow forces that look good on parade but can’t fight well. Most recently, top experts on the Russian military from the Swedish Defense Research Agency (FOI),
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