How long will it take for Russia to capture the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv?

 

In 1999–2000, Russian military spent more than 2 months capturing Chechen capital Grozny, then a city with a population of less than 200 thousand, from Chechen paramilitary forces. In this battle, Russia lost more than a thousand soldiers[1]. Despite capturing the capital, the 

 in Chechnya lasted for the whole next decade, with Russian troops losing thousands more people. Even today, there is sporadic resistance of Chechen militants to Russian rule in Chechnya.

Ukraine is dozens of times bigger, more populated and economically powerful than Chechnya. Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, is a city of almost 3 million people, 20 times bigger than Grozny was during the war. It stands on the Dnieper river, and has a strategic hill location, which makes it very hard to conquer. If Russia invades Ukraine, its troops will first need to reach Kyiv and break the resistance of Ukrainian professional army and paramilitary forces. Even if they reach Kyiv, the Russian losses would be huge. To capture Kyiv, the would have to break the resistance of not only the regular army, but also civilians, who are likely to use the city’s topography to destroy Russian invaders. Even if the city falls, Russia is to get a ruined place with lots of partisan activity, which will be a drain on both the personnel and economy. So many troops would be needed just to control the city and its outskirts, which are mostly forests, suitable for guerrilla activities, that further invasion of Ukraine would hardly be possible. This is why even a top Russian general warned Putin, that an invasion of Ukraine would be a disaster for Russia in the first place.

Ukrainians in Kyiv training to resist a possible Russian invasion in 2021

To sum up, conquering Kyiv would be a very hard task for a Russian army, much harder than the Chechen campaign in the 1990s, even though Russian army is currently in a better condition. Attacking the city would mean death for many thousands of Russian troops, it would destabilize the situation inside of Russia, and it would make Ukrainians even more devoted to protect their country and resist the Russian invasion. Invading Kyiv would likely be the last thing Putin would do in his political career.

 For more visit here