Rob Lee dials in from Ukraine for a long-form WarTalk on what the front line actually looks like in year four — where infantry sit underground for six months without seeing the sun, where 2% of casualties come from small arms, and where the "forward line of troops" has been quietly replaced by a forward line of UAV teams.
Rob Lee is a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute and one of the most-read analysts of the Russia-Ukraine war; he's joined on the show by WarTalk regulars Bryan Clark, Tony Stark, and Justin.
We discuss…
The six-month infantry rotation and what isolation, drone threat, and zero-line resupply do to a human being
Why Ukraine has reclaimed the drone edge — and what the Hornet, Bumblebee, and FP2 are doing to Russian logistics
Ukraine's new corps structure, where the brigade-only model broke down, and what the Azov-derived elite corps look like
Why 2% of Ukrainian casualties come from small arms and what infantry are actually doing on the zero line
Starlink as the indispensable game-changer — and Russia's increasingly serious attempt to jam it
Combat casualty care when CASEVAC takes 12 hours, the golden hour is dead, and tourniquets sit on for a month
What the Marine Corps should steal from Ukraine — pushing Hornets to the battalion, Bumblebees to the company, and giving up something to make room
this ep's a little too dark for a suno song
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