IMHO

Why? If one remembers how creative ISIS with its propaganda videos... It's actually quite striking even from FSA-labelled videos. Obviously there're Turkoman ragtag "tribal forces" with heavy equipment of regulars attached and limited Turkish SOF involvement. It seems that even low level command is done by "tribal leaders" rather than professionals. Now it seems they have started providing combat security for heavy vehicles. SAA-labelled side looks more experienced.

Watching ISIS VBIED propaganda videos it's remarkable combat security is nonexistent in Turkish-sponsored forces. Plus insufficient saturation of light AT weapons and underslung GLs. Very telling...

Thank you, @Machor!

Does anyone know RWS producer/model?

No opinion on the units listed, but I'd rather be less specific. It might make the units trackable It's kind of serious stuff these times.

@Haiduk, thank you!

Interesting. Certainly a big step ahead for the Ukrainian military industry. PS A bit off-topic, how can one quote someone's nickname? Like nicknames on blue background.

Haiduk, does Ukraine produces 30mm barrels itself or these are taken from the stocks of BMP-2? I guess ZTM produces though in a low rate production process. Am I right? And the barrel bars / steel are internally produced or imported?

GM-94 is in no way a standard equipment. Not part of TO&E even for "standard" SF units. Guess production numbers are within dozens if not less. Stated reason for going over 40mm you may deduce from the higher volume of HE warhead AND low lethality radius for all-plastic grenade shell. But real reason for a strange caliber is much more mundane. Lock in buyers regarding ammo suppliers. It's just business PS Sorry for being too obvious - I just know the stuff from other sources so I went to look through ARES report after writing the text. Then to make things interesting - you may want to pay attention to the fact that Internal Troops were original clients for the GL development.

29.01.2017-04.02.2017 Ukrainian deployment and bombardment are shown

Both "nonsense of who established Donetsk hundreds of years ago" and "Suitcase! Station! Russia!" were Haiduk's - not mine To my taste - it would be more practical to get rid of political labelling altogether - otherwise emotions would be inflamed nonetheless. Let's see... PS Erwin, PM me if you're interested to continue - I'd rather stick to the rules of the house.

Steve, so this thread is limited to actions of war with no political or emotional labels attached and the rule is golden for all parties present? Am I correct?

WFW3 - World Forum War III I guess the proper question is how long people need to live on the land to be considered residents. Is progeny responsible for deeds of the fathers and if yes is there a limit to this responsibility? Do minorities have inalienable rights and is there a limit to what majority can disallow minority? When majority has the right to revert to force to execute its will? But these are all moral issues - heated arguments, no impact in the end or rather no end to heated arguments

Steve, you have a grand scheme in your mind BEFORE you start looking at the facts. In real life it's extremely dangerous approach because that's exactly the way blunders of historical proportions are made. To quote: "President Bush said to all of us: 'I am driven with a mission from God'. [...] And then God would tell me 'George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq'. And I did." Tens if not hundreds of thousands people died, ISIS sprang up just because critical thinking process was eschewed in favour of beliefs Bluntly put as you estimate 40+ years you mean children and grand children of Russian speaking people resettled to Baltics by Stalin must have been ethnically cleansed for "passive participation in the repression". I'd suggest the term "complicity in reprehensible acts by virtue of one's DNA" Steve, decision making in Russia of today is very intimate process, you're almost seven thousand kilometres from Kremlin, apparently you don't have any first hand sources in the play. I admire how confident you're in meting out verdicts. But in reality it's just Dunning-Kruger effect - the less one knows the more self-assured one tends to be Would you afford me the liberty to conclude our discussion here, would you not?

Thank you so much It looks illogical because you try to apply the reasons of war where the rationale is political. To understand why it's Avdiivka industrial zone - the concentration of the initial Ukrainian attack - you can just look at the map. How this sector differs from a middle of nowhere in Luhansk? Middle of nowhere: less protected, less population - just an open field. Avdiivka industrial zone: no man's zone holds Avdiivka Coke Plant - the only source of heating and means of existence for Avdiivka of 250 thousand people, the line of control cuts right through populated Donetsk metropolis - so any lower caliber artillery support should originate from there due to range, and the sector poses highest danger to DNR as it allows shortest path to Donetsk center. So if one wants more land at lowest risk then it's logical to attack at Luhansk or at a less populated area in Donbass. If one wants to put as much population in danger as possible and wants a violent and emotional response from the opposition one should attack at Avdiivka. Shelling Donetsk puts the in danger the lives of wives and daughters of people who literally hold the trigger. High command may issue any order of restraint but the actual decision is made by those people. And to this you may add, after the Avdiivka industrial zone was taken by Ukraine with no proportionate response from DNR, the action took over wide swaths of the front, Ukrainian press started the talk about opening a second front from Mariupol, OSCE was allowed to make pics of Ukrainian tanks standing at Avdiivka residential area. After all OSCE reported shelling from Ukrainian high caliber artillery but somehow was not able to photograph them, yet easily locatable pictures of Ukrainian tanks inside the residential area quickly made it into the public view. I don't want to argue the morality of it - clearly opinions differ here - just the logic.

Would you name those "various power blocks", the sources of their influence and their views on Donbass? If I start reposting Ukrainian war forums here, you'd see a much worse picture than "Station, suitcase, Russia" and obviously that's what people really feel and intend to do should they overrun DNR/LNR. Don't you think Putin may truly believe he's saving the people of Donbass and that's not that far from reality? PS I don't want to argue "Station, suitcase, Russia" in itself I only want to understand why you believe Ukrainian nationalists' actions and intents have no bearing over Russian leadership.

Sure, I put it on purpose. It was a popular stock of Russian vs. Ukrainian nationalist discussions of 1.5-2 years ago. Either borders of Kievan Rus' as "original" borders of Ukraine and which side holds an "eternal lease" to various provinces of Ukraine or who owns "copyright" to the name Rus' / Russia and the origins of Russia itself. As if some dukes of 800 years ago rise from the dead and start laying out maps for the action of today

Thank you for understanding. And despite the supercharged nature of the discussion I honestly want to thank both people who shared common point of view and those who do not - you, Haiduk, Juan Deag and others. There's no better way to learn what's on people's minds than hear it directly from them.

May I add some more humour to the thread? Friends sent me a clip from Russian main state TV channel. The broadcast claims there are foodstuff shortages in the UK because of Brexit, prices grew fourfold and sales limits were put in place Kim Jong-un bites the dust royally. Seems like Recreational Santa of The Great State of California came to Russian propaganda people one year early

[In a raspy Darth Vader voice] Fall back! Let 'em conquer the thread!

Well... I believe I'm not qualified enough to go that far Steve, we're kind of speaking different languages I believe it makes more sense to look at numbers and hard facts rather than waste time on their passionate interpretaion As for the Baltics - you're not absolutely correct A hell of people left the Baltic states - both of Russian and Baltic descent. We'll never know the precise breakdown between political and economic reasons as they don't ask. By proxy numbers my guess would be a prevalence of "Suitcase! Station! Russia!" migration during the first years of independence then, after this movement exhausted itself, - economic. Kudos to Haiduk for very telling terminology PS BTW, getting proxy numbers straight on reasons to emigrate from Baltics requires some time and effort. The guys didn't want it to look like a textbook case of ethnical cleansing - however soft methods they used - so they did a funny exercise of playing with methodology. But it's a very telling sign in itself when quite intelligent people find it necessary to fudge the numbers Nope it's not dodging - I'm just trying to disengage and go over to the dark side of jokes and humour

Hmmm... Quite fair approach to comparison

Thank you for you words In no way they are Well... First and foremost it's a total mess for everyone Too much emotions, too many decisions made on spur of the moment. And if one thinks that it's a win for Russian side - it's not so. One needs to go deeper than simple square kilometres under control - there are no winners except for Ukrainian "far-right" politicians who won tickets to the Parliament. But the real problem that I see here - Ukrainian leadership of all kinds is either inexperienced and/or incompetent or it has too short a planning horizon. What was the story of the agreement to stop hostilities. Ukraine lost 60% of their military might that was not particularly impressive right from the start (I rely on Poroshenko's to provide the number ). Ukraine could have been totally overrun in a matter of days. It would have been an even worse scenario but it was a very possible one - not my words but the words of Ukrainian leadership of the times. So an agreement was signed to move the conflict from a theater of death and destruction to political dimension. After the agreement it turned out that whoever is posing as a "leader" of Ukraine is no more than a moderator in the internal Ukrainian dialog where even the least important dudes have their own private armies at least matching Armed Forces of Ukraine. The guy who is the sponsor of current hostilities may simply order his "patriotic" battalion into the very center of Kiev to take over the head office of the biggest Ukrainian company - oil and gas monopoly - just because he does not like new management. Officially he has no right to complain - everything has been done to the Charter. But he used to control the company according to the intricate web of internal Ukrainian allegiances and tacit agreements with the PREVIOUS leadership (yes, I mean Yanukovich ). And Poroshenko cannot do anynothing - no police operation, no charges brought - he just talks the guy to death over the night. Now what does this story tells to an any external party? Any agreement signed by the President of the Greater Ukraine is not worth the paper it's printed on. One should collect 20-30-40 signatures from Ukrainian side just to delude himself with an idea of having a text he may refer to in future. And these 20-30-40 people constantly change their minds, business plans, moods of the "constituencies" swing as well. That's not the way serious international agreements are made. So last time Ukraine was trusted, but after that it blatantly broke its word - remembering Haiduk - if the agreement is implemented they will have a new revolution next morning. Now we have an erratic guy in White House, main EU sponsors have elections looming with no more faith in Ukraine's commitments than Russia and a history of EU not willing to enforce Ukraine to honour any political compromise. The talk how much progress was made in rebuilding the Ukrainian armed forces is pure PR stint, everyone watching knows the numbers - Ukrainian military imports and internal production is no great secret. And Ukrainian nationalists start to pull the tail of the tiger against such remarkable a backdrop - there's even a talk in Ukrainian mass media that a new offensive from Mariupol direction is in works. Right now there's no serious response from the opposition but if Ukrainian side pulls too hard - there might be no agreement next time. And everyone will be in a much deeper **** than now. But for some reason Ukrainian leadership either does not understand or it does not care - either way, it's Ukrainian job to sort their mental problems. That's what is so dangerous about the current situation - not the game of pull and push over few hundred meters of land. But if this scenario happens - God forbids - everyone will start talking about Russian aggression

And as for the international and US views on whodunit in Georgia, one can look into Georgia military imports before and after the war and post-war career of Mr. Matt Bryza. It's actually quite funny whatever picture an establishment may present to public eye they still have to make decisions based on their true evaluation for nothing is hidden that will not be made manifest

Rinaldi, you take it too serious An efficient discussion has to include: The history of polls and elections to the national and regional parliaments Ownership map for serious national and regional business, at least high level financial KPIs Dependencies for these businesses - both for supplies and revenue generation National economy and international trade/capital flows Power structure - again regional and national level (oblast') Dynamics of internal politics Decision making structure, views of the participants and how both evolved Repeat point 4-6 for Russia and points 5-6 for select EU countries and US at least at a high level plus management strategies and views from World Bank group, IMF and ECB+EBRD Ukrainian military industry and stores Military balances and how they evolved The history of decisions on both sides - both overt and covert wherever there's information Then it would be REAL analysis, interesting to go over. All of these crucially affect what's going on - trust me will you? But you can imagine all of these are way more fluid and uncertain matters. We have miles between us on a straightforward story of Georgia, what good discussion can we have on Ukraine case with all the turns and twists on both sides of the conflict? I can put on the table evolution of Georgian economy, military structure, military imports in equipment and stocks, scenarios for military exercises and what units played what roles, rotation of the Georgian troops in the peacekeeping forces, movement of the Georgian units immediately before the war and during the war, reports of peacekeeping commission on reconnaissance drones overflights of Ossetia and Abkhazia etc. But whatever I do - my feeling is I'll get "Georgia was within its rights to launch the offensive in August" in the end. Luckily for Ossetians - political establishment all over the world does not share this position Everyone knew that Georgia would attack sooner or later. The size of the war relative to the size of Georgian economy and military - intent and preparation were impossible to hide. And this knowledge was on a much more sound basis than "It’s just because this is what that bastard [Putin] has done before" - I quote Steve from somewhere else. Again, you can read Condolizza's memoirs, ICG and/or EU fact finding mission reports etc. if you want an executive summary. PS Steve, please do not take offence. We do have different opinions but I certainly strive to stay within the limits of civility.