c3k

Plenty of precedent for that, both recent and deeper in Soviet/Czarist history....
 

 
 

^^^
The above was in reference to a statement about the Chinese housing bubble. (Embedded quotes don't seem to carry over.)
Yeah, the US housing bubble is the one I'm familiar with. Not sure about other nations' and their bubbles. The difference is that the Chinese bubble is more like our housing bubble, their personal 401k, and privately held stocks...all wrapped up in a single, non-diversified, investment. Because that's what it is.  The societal effects on China should this collapse as it is feared to...will be epic.

In this night Russians struck with heavy bombs from Tu-22M3 the place, under which was Azov's underground hospital. Reportedly one bomb, penetrated into the deep and caused partial destruction of the shelter. Surgical room is destroyed completely, there are casualties among injured soldiers and civilaians. Two days ago Azov showed photos from own underground hospital, where was about 500-600 injured. Medical teams still working in this hellish conditions and perform surgical operations. The hospital was deployed here on the second day of war, when was decided Azovstal would became the main base of Mariupol defense and its last stand.  
Here the photos, issued two daus ago:



 
 

And in the same day Russian TV showed as Azovstal employee, the engineer, collaborating with Russians, showed to them under which facilities of Azovstal passed underground communications and where the shelters located. Azovstal is huge plant, which bigger than some Ukrainain cities, for example it bigger than Lutsk. So, Russians before this bombed Azovstal randomly. But looks like after this betrayal they adjusted their attacks and achieved some success. Reportedly after heavy bombs exploded, Russian conducted about 50 single sorties with tactical jets and then shelled territory with naval guns.
After attacks finished, Ukr troopers became disassemble ruines:
 

White House sends Congress $33B request for Ukraine:
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/04/28/ukraine-funding-request-congress-biden-00028552
"The Biden administration is asking Congress for a massive new $33 billion funding request to bolster Ukraine’s military as its war with Russia enters its ninth week, ensuring that Washington, and Europe, remain all in on beating back Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion."
 
Well, apparently Ukraine is getting the strongest land army in Europe, brought to you by uncle Sam.

Ok, everyone note, this is where Tha Capt and Steve disagree, was bound to happen.  First off, show respect for the venerable "lunch-box war" as it has seen more action that just about any other carrier (I know, the BTR, blah blah).  She still has legs and can still get some jobs done.
I would not take her directly into battle as all those chain guns will cut her up but lets not forget the more elegant features of this grand dame:
- Simple, simple, simple.  You can literally teach a junior officer to drive one in an afternoon, from experience.
- Relatively easy maintenance.  Not as easy as wheeled but very simple analog systems onboard that can be done by driver and crew.
- Modular.  You can literally stick anything on this thing, so it can fulfill a lot of different roles.
- Mobile.  People would not believe where this thing can go but this little beetle has great battlefield mobility.
- Elegance.  You can't stop staring at those elegant lines.  She is built like a German milk maid...seriously I need a minute. 
So poo-poo all you want Steve, the M113 is one of the finest vehicles to ever grace the battlefield - to know her is to love her. 

Shouldn't all you guys be over on an "Eastern Front" / A3R gaming channel or something? You are all SOOOO macro.  China real estate, FFS??? This thread is a bloody bag of cats.
....Am I the only guy here still studying this thing at CM scale, where this war is actually being decided? The realtime analysis is out there, go find it.
I have a day job I'm neglecting. 🤪
[/peptalk]

It does indeed cost money. I can't describe much in specifics but we had a material we used, sole source vendor because no one else makes it. Also for obscure reasons they own the manufacturing process so other vendors had trouble (a LOT of trouble, like stuff catching fire) duplicating it. Sole source company had no incentive to let loose the process because this was 10% of their total sales.
It took YEARS of analysis and testing to find a new material that could be made (already was actually) by multiple vendors. The cost to qualify vendors though, was pretty eye-watering. For this it's actually a common material although not normally supplied to such stringent quality and consistency, for which there are very valid technical reasons, so not just the DOD being DOD-ish. In the end the sole source vendor wasn't put out because they also supply other material and this special material was a PIA for them, scheduling wise and tricky process.
It's simple for someone to say, "Well, just get another supplier" In practice that can be a huge long term effort, and there are good valid reasons for that.
Dave

https://www.defensenews.com/land/2022/04/07/us-army-initiates-plan-to-replace-stingers-with-next-gen-interceptor/
Found the article, army has been in the early stage for at least a year. Is hoping for test/demo launches 2023-2024. And delivery 2027. I am sure they are scrambling to see if they can move that up, since it looks like they will have to scramble fairly hard anyway to build more stingers. They are doing a LOT of work on drone defense, too. It seems like they get that the low altitude battle has changed completely.

In reference to the not knowing they were going to war and thinking they were only on training ops etc, unless there is a huge difference (which is possible) I'd call bull***t. The only time we were issued live ammo, especially a full combat load is if you were expecting to go into harm's way. I doubt there is a "training" exercise anywhere involving 200,000 troops that are running around with real bullets. Range time, yep. CQB, yep. Field maneuvers, nope.
We always knew real bullets meant real world. The 100% indicator that you are going in is when the morphine gets issued. So unless the RA just wanders around all the time with full combat loads for all their vehicles and people I'd say they had to know. There was never a doubt in our minds when things were training vs real.

Here is something I posted elsewhere on Saturday (so this is definitely no lightning war) ... which remains relevant in the light of the activity just reported in Zarichne and Yampil.  Zarichne is just north of Torske in the schematic below and Zampil is two boxes down from Torske and one to the right.
Here's what I wrote then ...
Activity in the area of Torske is quite interesting.  Should it be captured, it offers a lot of possibilities for the Russians with a series of bridges over the Siverskyi Donets River.  Even if the bridges are dropped, there are also a number of areas that could be bridged with tactical bridging with river widths in some places just shy of 40m (although the average is approaching 90m) which is bridgeable by a TMM set (40m) (Bde/Regt asset).  The banks in many areas also look from the imagery to be suitable to launch tactical bridging and subsequently ferry sites or larger pontoon bridging.  Once south of the river, the ground offers at least a couple of BTG/battalion-sized avenues of approach to hook west towards Slovyansk.  These are shown as red arrows on the schematic below with the black boxed areas as fairly coarse grained NAIs designed to find, track and confirm likely COAs.  Crossing in this area is certainly a better option than trying to grind through Lyman, then the wooded feature beyond before attempting a river crossing in the area of grid square 37U DQ 08 19.

Since I am also curious about the state of play of the slo-mo "Potemkin" offensive against Slovyansk, I went back over the last 90 pages of this thread (only 15 April!) and pulled out some of the key assessments made by our esteemed experts. All hail and praise unto them!
1. @The_Capt scans the terrain for the Izyum axis (page 532)
2. @Combatintman maps out the potential axes for a 'pincer' attack (page 548)
3.  @Haiduk confirms the attack (page 553)

4. @Kinophile shows us vividly how exposed are the northern approaches to Slovyansk (page 556)
5. @Combatintman revises the axes in light of the actual Russian advances (p557)

6. @Combatintman estimates RA force strength around Izyum at 16 BTGs not the 22 advertised
7. @The_Capt floats the interesting hypothesis that this is a 'look busy but don't bleed too much' offensive.
8. @Haiduk updates the actions around Izyum as of 23 Apr (p593)


9. @Combatintman evaluates the Engagement Area around Dovenkhe (Izyum-Slovyansk road)
 

10.  @The_Capt assesses the state of play: "using BTGs to try and find a hole in the UA defence instead of a recon screen" 
 
11. @Haiduk's latest update, noting RA gains in contested Zarichne village and a flanking operation at Yampi (which has netted them some UA prisoners)(p.610)
12.  This....
 
 

Already in the field, eh
 

UKR hit large ammunition storage in Irmino, Luhansk oblast, occupied since 2014. Locals say not only ammunitions was there, but SP-howitzers too.
Explosions is continuing to this time, when the night came. 
 

UKR soldier tells about how changed the war, what matches with Dvorikov's conception
Translation:
Heavy fights is continuing. Occupants is jamming comms constatntly. Exactly because of this there are no videos [means form his axis] with killed or captured Russians and even more - the situation is canged in waging of war. 
Taking huge losses, occupants moved on what they do the best - the typical Soviet f...ing matter. F...ing alot of preliminary bombardments (and 100% they have advantage in artillery and this is a fact) and after this crawling advance - the village by village. Now we will have more losses, and some more of our captured.
Because having continuous front, somewhere we retreat, somewhere we beat up them. But now in whole the objective of AFU is to hold itself about two months. Because during this time many heavy wepons will come to us. And our light motorized infantry brigades will turn out to mech.brigades.
You get the gist. Bad news will  be, it will be mixed with good. In addition, it plays a role, that we can't  conduct rotations, alas, it is so. One roatation = one months of battleworthy, fresh and extremaly motivated unit. The situation in such, that guys can't be rotated so far from the autumn. They have to be rotated in March, but by fact they are on positions to this time. 
About stupidity of Russians. Yes, they stupid, in strategic layer they fight worse, but on tactical layer we have almost parity. A partity, because we fight for our families, our land, our country, our freedom. I'l clarify, because of morale of our troops we are in winning position. Not to mention that to defend on own land always easier, than advancing. But that doesn't mean that is's too easy for our lads.

"The drone will always get through."

Bonus points for smuggling Switchblade drones into Moscow on May 9th.

Russian refinery fires not all that uncommon, but seems to have increased in frequency lately...
June 16, 2014 Night inferno as refinery explodes in Russia - Achinsk refinery in Krasnoyarsk region
October 19, 2017 Refinery Explosion 4 Dead Norsi oil refinery in the Kstovsky district
November 2 2017 Yanos refinery fire in Yaroslavl
January 9, 2020 10-Hour Refinery Fire in Northeast Russia Injures 1
December 22, 2020 Fire at Rosneft refinery in Russia's Far East contained
January 25, 2021 Storage Tank Fire Reported at Ufaorgsintez Russian Refinery
October 8, 2021 A huge fire has broken out at the Amur Gas Processing Plant in Svobodny in the far east of Russia, just a few months after it was opened by president Vladimir Putin
January 4, 2022 Antipinsky oil refinery, Russia's largest independent oil-processing plant
January 5, 2022 Russia's Amur gas plant says a unit caught fire
 

A helpful and detailed breakdown of the Russian VDV BTG order of battle (with pictures!) - auspiciously timely before the BFC's impending announcement that they will be releasing the next CMBS module as an Orthodox Easter present: 
The source material in Russian:
 

Melting like snow in the sun...
 
 

My take on the Russian approach: Send a BTG, then pummel with artillery whatever it is that the BTG got stopped by. Repeat.
Given that (very simplistic) summary, artillery is the Russian weapon that needs to be countered/eliminated.
The rush of Western artillery should help Ukraine do exactly that. Massive ISR saturation of the Russian support echelon should give Ukraine a detailed target set of Russian artillery (I include the various missile launchers here as well).
Extended range munitions (Excalibur rounds, GMLRS, Switchblade 600, etc.) should allow Ukraine to aggressively attrit the Russian artillery arm.
Once that is done, that will represent the accomplishment of a pre-condition to any Ukrainian counterattack.
Some of these attacks, like any attacks on Russian airbases/logistics hubs, will occur on Russian territory. I do not see that as an escalation. Russia has invaded Ukriane. Ergo, Russia landmass is a legitimate target. As long as Ukraine uses precision targeting and limits the attacks to military targets (or those that are directly supportive, e.g. bridges, POL facilities, etc.) I cannot see any negative repercussions. Sure, Russia will bitch. What are they going to do? Send MORE BTGs into Ukraine and threaten to rape, loot, and pillage? BTDT.
Given the depth of Russian penetrations into Ukraine, getting 150+km range weapons into the fight will have a noticeable impact on the course of this campaign.

Gah! Were I King for the Day, and a minion presented the idea of hacking into the Russian ICBMs to neuter them, I'd have to put that minion in stocks for the day.
I cannot imagine a more dangerous thing to try to do. Let's imagine...
1. The hack is successful and Russia cannot use their ICBMs. They would, most likely, presume this to be an attack precursor and they would then use/launch their SLBMs, and any other nuke (SRBM, air-launched) etc. against whichever agency they think has just hobbled them.
2. The hack is unsuccessful. See "1", above.
 

My take on the Russian approach: Send a BTG, then pummel with artillery whatever it is that the BTG got stopped by. Repeat.
Given that (very simplistic) summary, artillery is the Russian weapon that needs to be countered/eliminated.
The rush of Western artillery should help Ukraine do exactly that. Massive ISR saturation of the Russian support echelon should give Ukraine a detailed target set of Russian artillery (I include the various missile launchers here as well).
Extended range munitions (Excalibur rounds, GMLRS, Switchblade 600, etc.) should allow Ukraine to aggressively attrit the Russian artillery arm.
Once that is done, that will represent the accomplishment of a pre-condition to any Ukrainian counterattack.
Some of these attacks, like any attacks on Russian airbases/logistics hubs, will occur on Russian territory. I do not see that as an escalation. Russia has invaded Ukriane. Ergo, Russia landmass is a legitimate target. As long as Ukraine uses precision targeting and limits the attacks to military targets (or those that are directly supportive, e.g. bridges, POL facilities, etc.) I cannot see any negative repercussions. Sure, Russia will bitch. What are they going to do? Send MORE BTGs into Ukraine and threaten to rape, loot, and pillage? BTDT.
Given the depth of Russian penetrations into Ukraine, getting 150+km range weapons into the fight will have a noticeable impact on the course of this campaign.

Gah! Were I King for the Day, and a minion presented the idea of hacking into the Russian ICBMs to neuter them, I'd have to put that minion in stocks for the day.
I cannot imagine a more dangerous thing to try to do. Let's imagine...
1. The hack is successful and Russia cannot use their ICBMs. They would, most likely, presume this to be an attack precursor and they would then use/launch their SLBMs, and any other nuke (SRBM, air-launched) etc. against whichever agency they think has just hobbled them.
2. The hack is unsuccessful. See "1", above.
 

My take on the Russian approach: Send a BTG, then pummel with artillery whatever it is that the BTG got stopped by. Repeat.
Given that (very simplistic) summary, artillery is the Russian weapon that needs to be countered/eliminated.
The rush of Western artillery should help Ukraine do exactly that. Massive ISR saturation of the Russian support echelon should give Ukraine a detailed target set of Russian artillery (I include the various missile launchers here as well).
Extended range munitions (Excalibur rounds, GMLRS, Switchblade 600, etc.) should allow Ukraine to aggressively attrit the Russian artillery arm.
Once that is done, that will represent the accomplishment of a pre-condition to any Ukrainian counterattack.
Some of these attacks, like any attacks on Russian airbases/logistics hubs, will occur on Russian territory. I do not see that as an escalation. Russia has invaded Ukriane. Ergo, Russia landmass is a legitimate target. As long as Ukraine uses precision targeting and limits the attacks to military targets (or those that are directly supportive, e.g. bridges, POL facilities, etc.) I cannot see any negative repercussions. Sure, Russia will bitch. What are they going to do? Send MORE BTGs into Ukraine and threaten to rape, loot, and pillage? BTDT.
Given the depth of Russian penetrations into Ukraine, getting 150+km range weapons into the fight will have a noticeable impact on the course of this campaign.

My take on the Russian approach: Send a BTG, then pummel with artillery whatever it is that the BTG got stopped by. Repeat.
Given that (very simplistic) summary, artillery is the Russian weapon that needs to be countered/eliminated.
The rush of Western artillery should help Ukraine do exactly that. Massive ISR saturation of the Russian support echelon should give Ukraine a detailed target set of Russian artillery (I include the various missile launchers here as well).
Extended range munitions (Excalibur rounds, GMLRS, Switchblade 600, etc.) should allow Ukraine to aggressively attrit the Russian artillery arm.
Once that is done, that will represent the accomplishment of a pre-condition to any Ukrainian counterattack.
Some of these attacks, like any attacks on Russian airbases/logistics hubs, will occur on Russian territory. I do not see that as an escalation. Russia has invaded Ukriane. Ergo, Russia landmass is a legitimate target. As long as Ukraine uses precision targeting and limits the attacks to military targets (or those that are directly supportive, e.g. bridges, POL facilities, etc.) I cannot see any negative repercussions. Sure, Russia will bitch. What are they going to do? Send MORE BTGs into Ukraine and threaten to rape, loot, and pillage? BTDT.
Given the depth of Russian penetrations into Ukraine, getting 150+km range weapons into the fight will have a noticeable impact on the course of this campaign.