LongLeftFlank

Terrific visuals @Kinophile, many thanks. That relief map alone answers the question of why the seemingly minor provincial road junction at Izium was such a pivotal point in the battles of 1942 and 1943, and remains so today.

As I noted a while back, provoking the Ukrainians into enacting reprisals against their own Russian minority (see map) may well be the actual war aim here. Cold and evil, sure, but do I really need to convince folks here that Putin et al. are up for that, since they can't have their quick and dirty 'reunification'? Failing that, reawakening the Bloodlands in East Ukraine is Russia's best way of bookmarking this region for a later replay....

And these guys charged toward our trenches. What were they thinking? I don't know, you can't ask them any more.... And the narrator says he'll (maybe) remember them 'until his next booze'. Здоров'я, брате!

Agreed. But if Ukraine can indeed reinvent itself as a (comparatively) shining 'city on a hill' -- with more than a little help from the West -- many of those oppressed Russian narodniks are going to beat feet for the bright lights of Kiev, and Minsk (it's only a matter of time, Lukas[self censored for extreme obscenity].... While China -- whose emerging multinats as like as not will also be heavily invested in a new Ukraine, btw, if only because they are utterly addicted to building stuff! -- is going to want to keep the mangy Muscovite bear shackled. All the better to slowly absorb the wealth of Siberia into Greater China. They don't need Russians for that; let them emigrate! Forget South China Sea; the Arctic is where the (remaining) good stuff is. And it also rights at least one of those old Chinese grievances against perfidious whitey -- that the Russians got to Siberia before they did!

Disquieting thread from Kamil Galeev. Kamil is far from infallible and paints with a very large brush, but like James Burke ('Connections') he does make me think in a way that more erudite and focused 'experts' miss. In short, he synthesizes, concisely (too much sometimes, sure) and tells intriguing stories. Stories (myths, etc.) are what drive action in the nonacademic world, as he himself notes. Anyhoo, Galeev is deeply worried that in order to have a victory to show on Victory Day, May 9th, Putin will need to 'escalate' the war, although in what manner nobody yet knows. P.S. For those interested, here is his 'Russia as North Korea?' thread as well. It's one of the readings that got me thinking about how Ukraine might (in sharp contrast to Russia) reinvent itself postwar.... ...Kind of a Miltonian ('better to rule in Hell than serve in Heaven!') take on society. It's like serfdom never really left. And living here in a deeply caste ridden society (the Philippines), one can see a certain appeal to having 'people for that'. So long as you're one of the masters.... Viktor Suvorov's 'The Aquarium', sadly out of print now, explored some of these same issues from the viewpoint of a nomenklatura functionary living in faction-riven 1970s Soviet society. Here too, I don't honestly care how much of it was fiction; Razun told a great story!

Yeah, pulling myself back into the military ways-and-means here: I have every fear that redeployed and weary-but-wiser Russian VDV paras, already trained to operate self-sufficiently, can mate up with local militiamen and start giving UA forces a nasty dose of their own medicine as their LOCs extend. The key success factor for them will be if they can rely on a critical mass local people..... That adaptation is likely already happening. Don't rely on the Russians staying stupid everywhere and at all times. Bigeard's and Brechignac's paras in Indochina imitated Viet Minh tactics and tech (RCLs, man portable heavy bazookas) with some success, especially in ethnic Thai and Montagnard areas, although it wasn't enough.

1. Sorry. My bad. (my wife simply rolled her eyes) [/Quietly moves on] 2. For avoidance of doubt, the Russian invaders must (a) leave (b) surrender or (c) be killed. All of them. Ukrainians hardly need my permission to hate them and the nation that sent them all they like. BUT 3. Just to be clear, *these* are the only 'Russians' whose welfare I have ever worried about in this matter.... (2016 data) And @BFCElvis, I would argue that these 'Russians' Matter Very Deeply in terms of Troop Movements and war strategy, as well as ensuring there is no replay of this war later. Hypothesis: UA leg infantry hunter-killer detachments must draw on the active support of the populace to be able to prosecute an offensive using the same 'flashmob' tactics that have worked for them to date. Especially out in the steppelands, away from the forests. If they have to create their own roadbound LOCs to sustain them, they risk becoming vulnerable in turn to RA drone strikes. 4. The UA is now reentering oblasts -- which it *must* liberate to stop Putin claiming a 'win' -- where live Ukrainian citizens who are mainly Russian speaking or of Russian (or other FSU) origin. They came, or were sent, at various times. This land is the only home they know. As a group, they feel no special allegiance to Moscow rule. At least not unless they feel 'othered' or threatened. And frankly, there have been problems in the past, fed by Not Very Fine People on both sides: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/04/25/ukraine-passes-law-against-russian-language-official-settings/ This is a very fundamental military problem -- I would say it should be at the very top of the list -- as well as a humanitarian and economic one. I might even propose UA should stand up a 'Vlassov' engineer battalion of Russian defectors, tasked not with heavy combat duties but with cleanup, repair and aid distribution. Paid like UA troops and given Ukraine citizenship if they like upon their honourable discharge. 5. Because, short of a Russian victory or an escalation to WMD, no outcome could be *worse* for Ukraine than certain... dirtbags seizing their chance to do ethnic cleansing, using many of the same rationalizations we've sadly seen on display here. Which beliefs btw, frankly long predate this war. That is quite entirely all. Happy to take a holiday anytime, Elvis, although I am honestly not trying to stir any pots. This is a fundamental matter of war aims, strategy and above all, securing the future of Ukraine.

Hey, and as a nice Jewish boy (let me stereotype just in case someone here has mistaken me for some kind of flabby kumbaya liberal, Russia truly went to hell IMHO when they lost their Jews), no doubt he knows who to speed dial in Tel Aviv to spin up some VC seed money for, ohhh: 1. biotech GMP plants (NOT biowarfare, FFS people, get a grip! the big money is in meds for an aging planet, not effing novichoks) and 2. chip fabs and solar panel factories So very sorry, Great Helmsman Xi, and your Belt and Road too. And you too, Erdogan. Europe's next pool for cheap manufactures and value added services lies on its own doorstep. Will Ukie lumberjacks be Europe's new 'Polish plumbers' for a while? Probably. And some of them will become French and Czechs. And retire comfortably in Kherson. Or Crimea, when it comes begging to be let back into Ukraine.... Does Karl Marx *hate* this whole global labour arbitrage 'exploitation' model (along with a bunch of bitter US Rust belters)? Sure, and too bad. May as well repeal gravity. Anyway, ask a Thai or Malaysian uni grad whether he prefers his country today over the one his dad grew up in. It's worth it, and I'll bet the Ukrainians have the mojo to climb the ladder swiftly, as they are showing us now.

You are hitting on something extremely important here, but not just punitive reparations in the Versailles sense.... This topic risks going way OT so I'll try to keep this tweetstorm as brief as I can. I exaggerate in places for clarity, nothing is so simple of course, nor is success guaranteed: 1. Let's assume the Western master game is for the 'European frontier' (i.e. the edge of the Western economic order as well as its military boundary) to shift east from Poland to Ukraine (and Belarus). 2. For that shift to occur, and not to revert to chaos, gangsterism and mass emigration, a stable economic order must be established. That doesn't mean an immediate German or even Polish standard of living, but it must deliver reasonably broad prosperity that keeps talented Ukrainians (including the cheerful, resourceful citizen soldiers who are presently astonishing the world!) at home! 3. The aftermath of this war presents a fantastic opening to "Build Back Better!"(c). Not everywhere and not always optimally or fairly. But in addition to aid monies, private (profit seeking) capital investment is absolutely essential. 4. Globalization 2.0 is underway right now as multinationals seek to diversify operations out of an increasingly extortionate and unreliable China. ASEAN has countless high tech parks building right now, levering their cheap talent and basic infra (where it exists). They are overwhelmed and there is room for others to play too. 5. The Ukrainian infra base remains solid, if rusty and uneven. And rebuilding isn't as hard or expensive as some folks may think. Infra and plant is modular today, and the Chinese have driven global costs (and quality lol) through the floor, the current inflation notwithstanding. That's IF an investment case is there to bring in private FDI (and not just fat cat contractors gobbling subsidies a la Haiti). 6. Talent and infra (plus low cost energy) are table stakes, but not sufficient. You must also have reliable (I didn't say good or honest -- look at Thailand) government. The post-Soviet disease of gangsta kleptocrats turned oligarchs (ref. Galeev for the short form) taking rakes off resource flows and other forms of graft afflicted Ukraine as badly as it did Russia. If it returns, it will poison the well and foreign investors will go elsewhere. Look at the Philippines and Indonesia, whose governments talk big but can't get out of their own way or manage the greed and corruption of their oligarchs. Even the Chinese have trouble making headway. ....That will be postwar Russia btw, with or without Putin. Screw 'em, let them rot in Chinese receivership, and in time take their brightest young people in as new Ukrainians! 7. BTW, that's why I have absolutely NO sympathy for the kinds of ancient 'tribal' hatreds espoused (or at least not denied) by certain folks on this board, where everything will be just great if only our golden motherland can be, ahem *cleansed* of those horrid Mongoloid Russian orcs who take murder and rapine in with their mothers milk. That Bloodlands crap leads only to even worse evils than what Putin is visiting today, and impoverishment. 8. Embrace Ukraine's melting pot! when Kiev and Odessa are filled with South Asian tech bros (with their Ukie counterparts shuttling to Chennai), you'll know things are going in the right direction! 9. Am I just blowing Thatcherite hopium smoke? Maybe, I don't know, it isn't my country. But the ONE good thing the Commies left behind them is solid primary education. As I once told Lech Walesa (and really p***ed him off!) to his face back in 1997, the post-Soviet game was kleptocrats playing smash and grab for the rusting hulks of the Soviet order, and then taking a rake off resources. While where the wealth really was, and is, is in the people. 10. As a pool for talented labor, this region is quite cost competitive with the 'expensive' end of ASEAN (Thailand, Malaysia), and with the emerging tech centers of India. Do you need a soaring birthrate society? Nope, that creates as many problems as it solves. Witness Phils and Nigeria. And once Ukrainians have stable work, they can afford things like families and kids. ....Anyway, I think I made my point. [/hopium]

Wow, only 100 in service??? 71 lbs. The narrator's cheery pitchman style is really annoying, like something out of the Simpsons. But many thanks for sharing

Hmm, another Operation 'War of the Rails' imminent perhaps? Those units will ship mainly by train. Besides blowing up bridges and switchyards, what's the best way to screw with freight rail systems?

Yes! And I'd add that this crowdsourced hybrid system is amazingly 'antifragile' in the Taleb sense... UA doesn't actually *need* the high level 'air traffic control' and rooms full of drone operators noted by Steve, although that would surely be optimal -- and lethal. Small detachments of trained operators with the help of locally savvy 'muddy guys' who look like a mix of lumberjacks and poachers can come together, rain hell and then disperse again. They are also free to prosecute 'low tech' low cost IED warfare against the Russian LOCs in parallel. Air power, artillery firebases, all of very little value -- ok, they might get lucky a few times, mainly by hitting the UA troops on the roads. But even resorting to WMD (chems) isn't going to neutralize these kinds of tactics, so long as the weapons keep flowing in, and so long as the Russians can't develop infantry-based 'LURPS' type countersweeps to limit the UA freedom of movement. ....Which tactics require both a skilled cadre of subunit leaders (NCOs) and a sheer bloody mindedness that is pretty much absent outside the Chechen, VDV and spetsnaz formations. Which groups don't seem to 'play well' with the conventional units.

Yeah, and it's pretty clear that these blokes know what's about to rain holy hell on them. With a soundtrack by the Ukie version of the Dropkick Murphys.

Holy heck, this is the systematic destruction of half a RA mech company! And the destructor may not even be UA divisional artillery assets like Pion or even 152s. It might well be squads of strong well-trained blokes like in this clip, lugging 122mm heavy mortars into the woods and launching drone-guided smart rounds. Do the job, then pack up and move. How the heck do you counter that kind of nimble heavy firepower. This is beyond 'partisans with panzerfausts'. This is pack howitzers sans mules! Viet Minh overmatching the French CEFEO.

More Stugna hits, including non 'guncam' footage of the reloading of the launcher itself.

Summary of US DoD assessment, worth a skim. I like this map better than most of the others I've seen to date, as it is honest aboout large zones being contested:

This slogan goes back to Frederick the Great at least... ISTR it's originally a Swedish thing but too lazy to google it.

This is all starting to look very much like @The_Capt's (and/or Steve's) point several hundred pages back: when one side is roadbound then who's 'encircling' whom, really? And what do those blobs of red and blue on maps honestly signify in terms of 'control'? Forget the fuel LOCs. Russians are fast running out of time to get their shinola together and field their own leg infantry kill squads to screen their various hedgehog positions. But do their line infantry have the mojo, still less the kit, to get down and dirty in the steppes? with Ukrainian snipers going to work on them, day and night (with NVG).... Elsewise, this is going to be the UA eating the proverbial elephant... one bite at a time.

зи нами бог (some readers may be more familiar with the German version: Gott mit uns )

You can safely assume @Splintyknows what he's talking about.... The Iraqis also did some rather clever stuff using washing machine timers.

If you need anything, just nod.... You know, that old movie is starting to seem like a documentary, not fiction. There's only one way out of this valley, back through that pass you came through. Or.... You know our standing orders: Out of commission, become a bunker; out of ammo, become a pillbox; out of time, become heroes....

Splinty probably has more direct experience with this , but the idea is you can burn a small deep hole in tarmac much faster and less obviously than by digging/picking and then plant a bouncing betty or just a hand grenade under the AT mine.

IEDs, ATGMs, Molotovs, direct fire ambushes.... It's not a good time to be a Russian truck driver. Especially out on the steppelands which are now becoming the locus of this campaign....

The drone footage from Hostomel will be mapmaking gold for whenever we feel up to doing CM scenarios for this conflict.... not too soon though. Seems pretty crystal clear whose side these people are on, and that they want their boys to keep kicking ass. Nobody forcing them to mumble 'Achmet is strong.'