The_Capt

The tradition pre-dates WW1 by the look of it. I know in WW1 it was used in the colonies. This sort of micro-social pressure has tremendous power, both good and bad. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_feather Sure the young man could still serve behind the lines but right now he is whining about losing consular services on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. Plenty of work and not all of it fighting. But, as has been stressed many times here, the UA is running low on fighting troops. The answer to this is not tell every 18-30 year old Ukrainian male (not sure what the Ukrainian policy is on women in combat) “Gee, sorry to bring it up but you might have heard Russia is intent on destroying our nation. They are also willing to do so in a brutal and criminal manner. If you feel like it, we would very much appreciate it if you would consider fighting for your nations freedom.” There will always be a slice of the fighting age population excluded from combat for various reasons but they should be contributing as directly as they can regardless. For Ukraine this is a whole of society war, not a “those that kinda want to” war…you know the ones we in the West have been fighting for 30 years.

“Only 20k”?! Let’s not be hypoboblic either. 10% of a field force is no small measure. The point of my original post is that there are young Ukrainian men running away from the fight while (only) 20 thousand foreigners are there doing the dying. That ain’t right.

So the story really does not get into his motivations for not fighting. “I want to be safe” is what we get. Of course to “be safe” in Ukraine right now means fighting for that safety. We do not know if the young man has religious grounds or even ideological ones. White feathers is a poor analogy. They were used in the British Empire to shame young men to go and fight in a mainland European war. Many of these young men were in far flung nations such as Canada or Australia. The peer pressure for them was to go to fight and die in what could be considered an imperial war. Ukraine is in an existential war. The Russians have left pretty much zero doubt of this based on both their plans and actions. If anyone wants to “go home to safe Ukraine” as a Ukrainian they are going to have to either be willing to fight for this..or let someone else do it for them. This young man definitely would have somewhere to live…likely a trench on the front. Based on how desperate the UA is for manpower he would likely have a job…killing Russians. Now it is his personal choice as to whether or not he wishes to do that but this reads a lot like the “cake and eat it too” generations we have right now. I want all the healthcare safeties but no vaccines. I want peace and security but not to fight for it. I want cheap products and lifestyles but no climate change. If this young man wants to live in a free and safe Ukraine he needs to be willing to do what generations before have done…be willing to fight and die to make that happen. Because it simply won’t be delivered like DoorDash or streaming entertainment. Don’t want to kill? Become a medic. My fundamental question back to this kid is “if you want to go home to Ukraine one day then what are you still doing here?”

I assume we are talking about this: Gotta be honest, I see a lot of potential dangerous salients forming up, which was how the Germans made life miserable for the Soviets. The RA lacks the logistics to really support a major drive unless conditions have changed there. I get the concerns but until the RA can take a major operational objective - which based on this map looks like Povrovsk - we have death by a thousand nibbles. However, I do share the concern that the UA is fully capable of collapse as well. If that happens things could shift quickly, albeit likely slower than in Fall ‘22 re: Russian logistics. We need a Deep Battle here to get corrosive warfare happening again. My sense is that this war has recently shifted to front edge attrition which is not what we want. This plays to Russian strengths. The key Russian weakness is systems-fragility and for that we need deep deliberate corrosive warfare approaches.

On more than a few levels to be honest. The fact that this young (assuming healthy) man “wants to return to Ukraine” once the war is over is particularly irksome. Essentially the young man is saying that as soon as “others fight and die for his own nation”, he is eager to return home. Now this is one individual that Canadian overly-liberal media have glommed onto because “if it cries it leads” these days. However, this sentiment cannot be entirely isolated given the significant number of fighting aged people who have simply run away from Ukraine while the nation fights for its life. Meanwhile foreigners, many without any Ukrainian connections, fight and die for that nation. Nope, does not sit well at all.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/i-just-want-to-be-safe-ukrainian-man-in-canada-faces-limbo-amid-consular-freeze-1.6862816 I am sure every war has had individuals like this…but this does not sit well.

I was speaking more of demonstrating the high cost of this war. As to this, well first the situation is not clear but a 10-15 km advance is going to sting but it very much matters which 10-15 kms. A lot of these Russian advances have had very little operational significance. They have not fundamentally provided Russia positional advantages that can be translated into operational success. Imagine for a moment if the roles were reversed: the UA was making incremental advances at great costs…oh wait, we already did that last summer. The hue and cry of “lost summer offensive” was echoing across the infosphere last summer while the UA was basically doing the same thing the RA is doing now. But with the RA it is “Ukraine cannot stabilize the front!” From a military viewpoint, objectively, both sides have been conducting small tactical actions and taking bites of what is essentially wasteland. Neither side has been able to create the conditions for operational breakthroughs or collapse since Fall of ‘22. From an operational and strategic point of view this conflict has been pretty static. With this surge of new support we might see Ukraine re-take a few kms etc but unless these turn into something more it won’t mean anymore than costly Russian gains this winter.

Meh, the 2% thing is a weak metric and everyone knows it. I mean it is better than nothing but it is not a measure of effectiveness nor contribution. Greece is spending nearly 4% GDP - which is essentially an extension of workfare. When was the last time Greece led a multinational brigade in Latvia or took an entire operational province on in Afghanistan? Cynically 2% GDP is designed to drive NATO members to buy into American defence industry either directly or indirectly as opposed to really measure effectiveness. The reality does not often match the theatre. But we will bow and scrap. Roll in Coast Guard and VA funding and other creative accounting until the heat gets turned off. The US on the other hand cannot walk away from its position as a leader of the free world and expect everyone to forget it.

I think Ukraine has already done this. There is an army's worth of scrap metal all over south-eastern Ukraine right now and at least 50k dead (likely more) and times 3-4 wounded. You know what would demonstrate the futility of the Russian cause even better...another RA operational collapse.

I am kinda skeptical on this point to be honest. I think we could definitely see a draw back and cold shouldering but NATO is the largest military markets on the planet. If the US pulls out completely then NATO STANAGs die then and there. This could see nations go elsewhere for military spending because they are no longer locked into a US driven NATO standard. Of course given the levels of rhetoric over good sense we saw last time, I could also very well be totally wrong.

From the cheap (and safe) seats, I would go for it. But, and it is a big “But”, they would need to create and sustain operational pre-conditions first. The problem with defence only, except for largely symbolic high profile strategic strikes, is that Russia gets to say when it is time to “stop”. There is analysis out there (and posted here) that points to 2026 as Russia’s out-of-gas moment. But that is a long way out and conditions could change a lot. So pinning the war on attritional hopes is a strategy but it definitely comes with risks. The same goes for internal dissent eventually toppling the Russian political power structure. It can happen but hard to build a plan off of, and we have gone on at length on the risks of another Russian Revolution. Offensive operations make headlines, signal resolve and play into “we love a winner” in the West. If the UA sit back and dig in there will be huge and cry on “well we sent them all that stuff and they are doing nothing!” The real trick is to find where the risk-v-gamble line is. We do not want a final gamble but a forward leaning risk. But how to do it? This remains the outstanding question. How to do it with what they have and can support? My money is on light, fast and distributed. Infiltration, isolation and exploitation. But the UA will have to do this in multiple areas to increase RA lateral friction. All the while hitting the backfield. Tricky, tough and absolutely no guarantees. Of course we can’t see the hi res picture. If we had that maybe the choice is far more obvious.

Try living next door. The short answer is “$$$”. US has most of it and is the safest place on the planet to put your own. Or at least was. I have worked in multinational and bilateral situation with the US and if they have a key fault it is “it has to be our idea”. The US will operate at a net loss to support allies and partners…if it “is our idea”. Everytime I have ever run into collisions with US counter parts it is when an idea other than their own gains traction. I have seen US players take someone else’s idea and make it their own, which also works…but it has to be “our idea”. Love them Yanks but they need to be “managed” from time to time, What we are really seeing has a few core dimensions but they all center around where the US sees itself both internally and externally. In some ways this is a referendum on US global primacy and leadership. In other ways it is a referendum on US internal identity and democracy. So essentially what is the “deal of the USA”. This is nowhere near the first time it has happened, not even close. This is the first time the US has gone through this while being the last super power though.

It is worse than this re: Trump in White House. If Trump somehow takes the presidency (from a prison cell...seriously best sitcom ever) he can also order all US military support to pull back. This will include operational and strategic C4ISR. This would have a potentially drastic effect on the battlefield as Russia would be on an equal or better C4ISR footing than Ukraine. At that point the entire framework of this war shifts away from precision and back to mass. More simply put, tanks may start to work again. This makes the next moves for Ukraine very high stakes. Go on defence and make the surge in support try to outlast Russian reserves. Or bulk up and roll the dice one more time on an operational offensive. If the offensive succeeds it may create enough momentum that even Trump could not stand in the way. If it fails, further US Ukrainian support could very well be doomed even if Biden retains the White House. So, definitely, this war needs an offset strategy. And to my eyes that is the EU and NATO.

And we are back to breaking the Russian war machine. Which of course will take more fighting men. There is no magic technology solution here. They can dig in and hope to attrit the RA enough for the Russians to stall and then shoot for some BS empty peace. Or they can go on the offensive and pay the blood price. The West can supply a lot but they cannot supply fighting troops or the will to resist. If Ukraine cannot muster this then no viable alternatives really exist beyond attempts to freeze this thing, which may very well fail due to Ukrainian “exhaustion”. That is an 800 km frontage, longer than the Western Front in WW1. They can reduce troop density requirements quite a bit but not to zero, not yet. There are no free lunches in war.

We bounced around some ideas a few dozen pages back. So to my thinking the key problem is denying enough space around a minefield to be able to breach it. The range of enemy ISR, UAS and artillery is making traditional breaching ops impossible. So the only way I can see doing this without getting back into jetpacks is to use light infantry to try and infiltrate past the mine belts but send them with all sorts of FPVs and supported by larger UAS. They will need EW and all the C4ISR and layering of indirect fires and deep strike. They will also likely need C-UAS UAS in order to create a space for breaching and larger forces to push through. So basically yes, small groups of FPV teams pushing forward and swarming as best they can and as deep as they can with a steady supply of new FPVs delivered by larger UAS, and supported by everything. Pull all that together along with a deliberate corrosive warfare campaign and basically the RA becomes over-extended by virtue of shaping and infiltration. Do a breach and then send the troops deep. Russians hate this and will fall back to re-draw the line. This is what momentum starts to look like. If the UA cannot do this then we are back to tactical leg humping and symbolic war porn videos of strategic strikes. In fact if the UA cannot do the above re: offensive, then they should simply go firm and dig in. Save all the expensive ammo and bleed Russia white over the next two years when best guesses are the Russians may run out of strategic gas.

I would very much like for the Ukrainian strategic strike campaigns to stop being “symbolic” and start shaping the battle space for re-engaging in offensive operations. Symbolism is great but destroying Russian abilities to effectively defend an 800km frontage with a highly degraded military are much better. Further, “symbolism” is not going to keep western support coming…operational gains that push the Russians back will. The thumbnail sketch plan: - Re-establish denial of air and ground. - Hit the RUAF hard and keep them well back. - Hit The RA where it hurts…logistics, enablers and C2. Prioritize artillery and EW. - Hit the SLOCs. Hard military targets that move all that hardware and people to the front and then up and down it. - Solve for offence. Stop using FPVs defensively now that artillery is showing up and use them offensively en masse. Saturate bridgeheads and try bounce crossings at scale. - Re-establish forward momentum and get the RA reacting to them, not the other way around. - Bite, grab and hold….repeat. Eventually, if we are lucky, corrosive warfare will work again and the RA will have to re-set like it did in Fall 22. That is one helluva bill to pay but it is the one in front of the UA and the West to support. Do not waste limited military high end hardware on “symbols”…use it to kill the Russian war machine.

To do what with exactly? Choke off the Crimea? Except for that whole strategic corridor problem of course. Screw that, the Kerch Bridge would soak up a lot of punishment for not enough gain. Russia’s ability to attack or defend is not dependent on it right now at all. Maybe if they got bottled up in the Crimea but that would take breaking the defence in the middle which is no small hill to climb. Nor will Russia fall by some weird symbolism. Use the damned missiles to hit strat LOCs, airfields, ports and C2 nodes to erode the Russia ability to prosecute the war directly. In the business we call it “shaping”. Then solve for those minefields and regain operational offensive initiative. The Kerch Bridge does little to support any of that beyond making us feel better.

That entire theory does not track at all. The UA already hit that damned bridge and Russia did not buckle. The idea that if we somehow hit it that it will be the starting gun to internal dissent is the sort of wild theory the critics on the right use against support of Ukraine in this thing. FFS the UA hit Moscow with long range drones and it did not increase internal dissent. Further if the Kerch Bridge is so symbolic that it can topple Russia, then why isn’t the opposite true and it drives support in Russia for this war to all time highs? I mean if the fate of the Russian people is tied to that bridge Putin should have dropped it himself as a demonstration of just how under siege the greater Russia is by the West.

Seriously this Kerch Bridge lust has to stop. Taking it out will be an annoyance and likely be spun as some sort of humanitarian disaster. It is not a war winner. So the primary difference between HIMARs and long range drones is that there is no real defence against HIMARs once fired. They can try GPS jamming but all those advanced ATACMs come with inertial guidance for the last mile. If you point an ATAMCs at something it is going to die. So if the UA were to take 25-50 ATACMs and decide to conduct a strategic strike campaign on the oil and gas infra in range…and then layered drones on top of this…they could severely damage the Russian energy industry. And do it at a rate that Russia could not keep up with. My guess is the US sees this as an escalation too far as it may trigger bad things we do not want. So these systems will likely be pointed at hard military targets…like airfields and C2….maybe rail/tn. The ‘so what’ is that the US has likely crossed a rubicon of providing targeting support directly into Russia. They may have before but when those ATACMs start to fly it will be undeniable. Edit: well that did not take long https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/ukraine-uses-long-range-missiles-secretly-provided-by-u-s-to-hit-russian-held-areas-officials-say-1.6860160

I would not be surprised to see that stuff was preposition in Poland waiting for the bill to pass. The President does not meet Congressional approval to push US military anywhere and I would be surprised if DoD was not directed to “lean forward” What is really interesting is the ATACMs. If the US is releasing the really long range stuff then it is also very likely providing the C4ISR and targeting support to the UA for those systems. That is an escalation and a very clear signal. It may also explain the whole “hey Ukraine wanna lay off Russian oil industry” narrative that popped up. I am pretty sure the US is not onboard with those missiles shredding the Russian oil industry.

Guess it depends on point of view. I want about 100 of these to walk over a minefield and then burn anything that resembles a Russian ATGMs in a 5km bridgehead while FPVs hammer anything that runs away from the flames. Toss in some EW and a dash of c-bty and one might have the makings for a breaching op that goes somewhere.

Dear Gawd, this one is so absolutely extreme that it straddles that line between genius and insanity.

Well if the pattern is consistent we should get a troll through here in the next week or so, shedding wolf's tears about the "inhumanity of this terrible war" and how we need to stop it now. Of course the way to stop it is to cut off funding to Ukraine and force them to the negotiation table. To which we will ask - just like last time - "What f@cking table?!"

Depends on the aerosol. If it is just plain old smoke…not really. Even cheap commercial drones can have multi-spectral cameras onboard, let alone the higher end stuff. If it is treated smoke, which is harder to make and more expensive, it could give IR protection. Problem with drones/FPVs is that they can fly under that layer unless they basically do it at ground level.

Now that is the question of the year…or maybe next year.