John Spencer

2 months ago | mwi.westpoint.edu | Liam Collins |John Spencer

Almost exactly three years ago, on February 24, 2022, Russian forces launched the invasion of Ukraine that had been anticipated for weeks. The thirty-six months of grinding, attritional war that has occurred since the invasion was not in Russia’s design. The Kremlin sought a rapid victory in the form of an assault on Kyiv that would have served as a coup de main, after which the entire country’s defenses would have crumbled and Russia would have been able to declare victory.

Jan 24, 2025 | mwi.westpoint.edu | John Spencer

According to Joint Publication 3-0, legitimacy is one of the twelve principles of joint operations. Doctrinally, the purpose of legitimacy is to “maintain legal and moral authority” during military operations.

Jan 14, 2025 | mwi.westpoint.edu | John Spencer |Liam Collins |Jayson Geroux

In 2008, a surge in violence from an Iraqi militia called the Jaysh al-Mahdi—better known to coalition forces as JAM—broke out in Baghdad. It was, in part, a response to an Iraqi military offensive against the group’s fighters in the southern city of Basra. For months, attacks with improvised explosive devices and other weapons had dropped precipitously in the Iraqi capital.

Jan 14, 2025 | mwi.westpoint.edu | John Spencer

John Spencer, Liam Collins, and Jayson Geroux | 01.14.25The Battle of Sadr City occurred from March 23 to May 12, 2008, during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Sadr City is a densely populated neighborhood in Baghdad’s northeast. It is a diamond-shaped area of twenty-five square kilometers, laid out in a grid pattern with streets running from northeast to southwest and northwest to southeast.

Nov 28, 2024 | mwi.westpoint.edu | John Spencer

When Russian forces invaded Ukraine in February 2022, one of their first targets was Mariupol, an important port city on the Sea of Azov and vital to Russian plans to establish a land bridge connecting Russia with Crimea. In the initial days of the assault, ground forces advanced while artillery bombarded the city. Within a week Mariupol was surrounded and the besieged Ukrainian defenders in the city cut off.