Sunagakure's seemingly uncompromising approach was also born of necessity. After all, the Land of Wind was nothing but desert, and the Sand Shinobi were the poorest village among all the ninja villages.
Without sufficient logistics, the Sand Shinobi had no choice but to go for a rapid offensive.
Though such a rapid offensive lacked staying power, its first wave was indeed fierce. Pakura, Rasa, and Chiyo were not particularly strong among Kage-level Ninja. Even if they joined forces, they would not pose much of a threat to Konoha's overall strength.
But the key was that they were not facing all of Konoha right now, but merely a small portion of Konoha's ninja!
Uchiha Feiyu sat in the command post, quietly pondering to himself:
If I weren't here, how would Konoha fight this battle? Orochimaru definitely isn't weaker than the Fourth Kazekage, but the Fourth Kazekage could still keep Orochimaru occupied. As for Chiyo, Torifu Akimichi is in his prime, and with a few Jonin, he could keep her tied down too. But how would they deal with Pakura?
No, if I weren't here, Pakura would probably still be fighting Kirigakure! She couldn't have rushed over here directly.
Moreover, if it had not been for him, the Iwagakure Ninja would likely not have withdrawn so quickly. Kitsuchi, this prisoner, had already been sent to Konoha. Nothing like that had happened in the original story. Without him, the Kikyo Mountain battlefield should still have been in a chaotic three-way melee.
After its war with the Iwagakure Ninja, Konoha had suffered the destruction of its field hospital, then endured the Sand Shinobi's poison tactics for several months. It had lost quite a few ninja, and its current numbers had fallen below four thousand.
In terms of the overall strength of their rank-and-file ninja,