Rokossovski

Regarding the negotiations between Ukraine and Russia: the Donets Basin is only a means to an end. Unlike Crimea, the Donbass does not play a military or geostrategic role for the Kremlin. Moscow does not need the Donbass; it serves only as a lever to destabilize and influence Ukraine. A compromise on the Donbass would therefore not satisfy Moscow's real interests. But it would show Moscow, that the western nations are still weak.
The Kremlin might infer that further concessions would be possible: For example, it could calculate that if the West were willing to ignore international law to resolve the Donbass conflict, something could be derived from this for the Transnistria conflict. Could Biden, von der Leyen, Scholz and Macron talk to Selensky about reopening the North Crimean Canal and restoring fresh water supplies to Crimea? Could Washington and Brussels not lobby Kiev to respect the multicultural history of Odessa and Bessarabia and support Moscow in creating two autonomous regions in southern Ukraine? And so on and so forth. Putin will not end until he has the whole of Ukraine.
But all in all i think the people of Ukraine won't allow an agreement with abandonment of the Donbass. And then there are the reparations payments Russia has to do. Ukraine won't allow Russia to not pay for the damage.

For any of you who have never served in an infantry/combat arms unit, speaking from experience as a USMC Infanty, Small Unit Leader (0369) in the 1970s and early 1980s, men basically knew only what the higher-ups were willing to tell them. For example, I participated in the NATO Operation Teamwork in Northern Norway. We went from an airbase, Brekstat, onto Amphibious Assault Ships, steamed up the coast, and made our initial assault by helicopter. We assumed we were in Norway, but could have been landing in Soviet Territory for all we knew. So yes, it is possible that the grunts thought they were still in Russia.

Perhaps they consider the alternatives to be less palatable. "They" here, being the people of Ukraine, who, it seems are pretty invested in making their country unpalatable to the Russians. Perhaps they think that the people of Russia will find the prospect of their sons getting ground up in multiple urban battlefields for no good reason more unpalatable than accepting that force majeur isn't the best way to make friends and influence people.
It's just a little bit early to be speculating about "likely" outcomes. A week ago, many people thought an actual invasion was "unlilkely". The war (and it is a war, though I haven't heard anyone with a good idea of what Russias goals are; I'm sure they have some, but whether it's regime change or annexation remains unclear) two days in and it's certainly not the fait accompli that might have been expected in some quarters.
Perhaps, though I'm advocating nothing, merely suggesting reasons that Ukraine and Ukrainians might be disinclined to adopt supine capitulation as a method of resolving the conflict at hand.
That's a really good question, to which the Russian half is very difficult to determine. If Putin's goal is to make the defensive NATO alliance take a step back from its eastern borders, then he's doing the wrong things. The preposterous claims he's making for internal consumption don't constitute a negotiating position (and any cessation of hostilities will be a negotiation, even if one side has a distinct advantage; there's no realistic prospect that Ukraine will just give up, especially when they don't know what they'd get if they did).

I'm not Ukrainian, but at the moment, I reckon they'd settle for Russian troops just getting the hell out of their country. They're not likely ever to be in a position to demand reparations for the damage done to their country. They can look at Russia nowadays, see the way that Putin runs things, and reckon that even at the cost of thousands, it's worth attempting to emulate the success of the Muj in Afghanistan. It's not for me to judge where they draw the line. It's their country, and worth fighting for to exactly the extent that they consider it so, since they're the ones doing the dying.

It's just as easy to tell people to give up and accept the jackbooted heel of oppression from afar, as well, when you won't be under that heel.

Edited to add: France waited 4 years, Poland waited a similar time. It wouldn't be unreasonable for Ukraine to be thinking in those sort of timescales.

And the Ukrainians should just knuckle under to a dictator who enforces his will with draconian measures and flat-out lies, because the West is leaving them to swing (which they aren't)? The Ukrainians aren't fighting Putin because the West wants them to, they're fighting him and his gangster buddies because they don't want to be ruled by them. This battle isn't about getting Crimea and Donbass back it's about resisting international criminality.

I didn't know there were US nuclear weapons in the Ukraine. US never objected to conventional weapons from the Soviet Union in Cuba. 

When I read the article it kind of sounded a  bit archaic - railroads? like in the time of Von Moltke the Elder? But yes, if you want to move great volumes of stuff and fast... you use railroads (or ships).

I am pretty sure that getting to a crisis point has been part of the game plan (as a contingency or a milestone I don't know) since the civil war in Syria started, if not from the day that Bill Clinton (and George Bush later) laughed off the question put forward by Putin to join NATO.  
Following up the discussions on logistics, saw a video of some Russian soldiers helping themselves to the shelves of a supermarket in Melitopol, and I remembered this very good article I read back in Xmas
https://warontherocks.com/2021/11/feeding-the-bear-a-closer-look-at-russian-army-logistics/
 

Long time forum lurker here. Very interesting discussion and also a good source for informations, thank you for that.
I too wonder what Putin's end game could be. A week ago I would have been willing to bet good money on that Putin is just bluffing. Not even that, so far I actually had the impression that he is more into Chess than Poker. More or less everything he did so far was rather rational or calculated. Georgia and Eastern Ukraine were obvous consequence of both countries being considered NATO candidates by some. Keeping some kind of frozen conflict going is an "easy" way to prevent a country from joining NATO. The intervention in Syria meant the West had to talk to Russia again, meaning it was a major power again not some regional power as Obama once called the country. And because NATO and especially the US did not exactly behave like saints during the last decades, Putin had made good progress in deviding Europe and the US along several fault lines.
Now this... I don't know. Playing a bit smarter Putin would certainly have been able to gain a lot of concessions. So it seems, gaining anything via negociations seems to never have been his goal. What I find really disturbing is this: If he is really playing poker and still seeks to destroy or at the very least severly weaken NATO, he could go all in. Attacking Poland is out of the question, I think. But the Baltic states... Having Ukraine and Belarus, Russia would be in a very good position to cut off reinforcments for the Baltic or at least make the effort costly. Combined with a threat that any intervention would immediatly be answered with all out nuclear war (remember also, the latest generation of Russian nuclear missiles is causing NATO some headache), the ball would be firmly in NATO's court: Risk nuclear annihilation for waging war that would be difficult to win even if the war stayed conventional? Mourir pour Dantzig (or Riga, for that matter)? Of course, what would NATO be worth, then?
Sounds way too Tom Clancy or Larry Bond, I would have said a week ago, but now...

I'm ok. I just too tired about all these news monitoring, so I havn't enough energy to write here. Today I tried to depart my wife from the city to her parents in more calm Cherkasy oblast, but we can't reach to railway station. Municipal transport stopped on the left bank of Kyiv, though on the right it works like and subway. 
All day from my balcony, wich exits to Obolon' and Vyshhorod periodically heard a sounds of shellings. Now I heard outcoming shots of our 2S7 Pion guns, located in 5 km from my house close to city limit. They fire somewhere to the west, where Russian troops concentrates to attack on the city. All day there were periodycal clashes on the line Irpin'-Bucha-Vorzel-Hostomel. There was attempt of Russian tank attack from Chernobyl zone through Ivankiv on Kyiv, but because of we had a time to demolish the bridges through the Teterev river, they halted. 

Difference is that Germany and Japan were the aggressors.

I said: "gunpoint by a aggressor"

None of us know how this whole thing is going to shake out.  But one thing is for sure:  Putin is saying to Europe, Ukraine, & the US "I am a military threat and I cannot be trusted in business dealings".  Does this is make it more or less likely that NATO countries will increase military spending?  That Ukraine will get advanced AT & AA weap;ons from NATO? 
If Putin wants to feel more secure, he might start by actually being a good trading partner and nieghbor.

DBSAPP:  Yes, Ukraine, backed by NATO, is going to attack Russia.  Do you even hear yourself?  I've been avoiding this but that is so F-ing stupid it's unbelievable.  How can there be 'discussion' when someone lives in a fantasy world?  Are you so brainwashed that you think Ukraine is going to attack Russia -- it's suicide!   How can that make sense to anyone?
What other fun, totally ridiculous conspiracy nonsense do you have?  This one has gotten kinda stale and I am looking for some entertainment.

XD I also find the "war hysteria" argument just golden.
First of all, you are going to have to tell me what problem there is with the 1,4 and 5 point, which they are objectively good, and with the 2 and 3 point, you put it as if Rusia has not done that by itself, via moilizing its army towards Ukraine borders, and by cutting gas flow to European countries, which by the way, gets me to my second point
All this war hysteria coming from the USA and NATO, or wherever, could just ****ing be so easily disproven by Russia, as that, hysteria, by just ending its mobilization. Plain and simple. Stop ****ing mobilizing 60 %( that we know) of your army towards Ukraine borders (military occupying Belarus along the way), resume gas flow towards european countries, return the 150+ armada of ships that have assembled in the Black Sea back towards their original ports, stop with the diplomatic play against NATO and the EU, stop trying to fragment both alliances, and in general stop with all the war proping propaganda against Ukraine (I cannot find it, but I saw a tweet some hours ago one of the principal RT journalist fake crying about the necessity of invading Ukraine because they are about to start setting up concentration camps and gas russians for **** sake, if I find it, I will edit it here. EDIT: https://twitter.com/JuliaDavisNews/status/1492973389971173382, here it is. Being fair its just a screeenshot so we would have to trust the tweeter about what she was really talking)
.If they do that, and just like that; the war hysteria loses all of its strenght, and then they can show the world how wrong the Americans, and all of the people who thought that war was coming, were, and avoid such unfair losses towards their image and their economy. Easy peasy. Until then, there is nothing hysterical about the reaction.
 

1. Russia achieved that in 2014. NATO was almost completely moribund when the Crimean invasion took place and galvanised countries.
2. Strange, Putin is supposed to be so smart, yet fell right into their trap. Still, he could take the wind out of their sails by moving troops away from the border. I wonder why he doesn't.

Okay lets go one by one. First of all, isnt this all pre-November 2021? So esentially before the beginning of the "crisis"? How is that relevant? I would like to know how much gas was supplied from December till now, and how it compares to gas flow in previous years during these winter months. I know by a fact that gas reserves are unusually low, and that was after an emergency supply of LNG of the USA, which was reggistered in a marine traffic, so the numbers deffinitively dont add up. I will look up spenditure of western countries to compare, just in case there has been an unusual higher use of gas, but I doubt it
XDD Okay, you cannot be serious, right? https://twitter.com/RALee85 There are hundreds of both ground videos and satellite images showing Russian mobilization and its scope. This is just one of the accounts which sum up and compiles all of the media available. Go take a look and you tell me if there is no mobilization. I mean, just ****ing look at this:
https://twitter.com/COUPSURE/status/1492983544909545486
https://twitter.com/KaptainLOMA/status/1492812101961846789
 
https://twitter.com/DragonLadyU2/status/1493186330288918531
(This is just an example, add so movement of helicopters and planes towards Ukraine, airlift towards the border, mobilization of Rosguardia, etc..., you can find more in the shared profile)
XDDDDDDDDDDDDD. This just takes the cake honestly. First of all, I would like to know what you would consider as a an Ukranian large assault into the Donbass. It implies an actual full scale offensive by the Ukranian army, or just some bombardment of military positions/use of drones?. In the first case, Darwin awards would go to the Ukranian leadership honestly, consediring the gigantic military blunder that they have just comitted. If there was any benefit in case of full scale invasion  I could see it happening as a preemptive attack, but what would the Ukranian army achieve by getting the Donbass, apart from getting itself encircled as the Russian army attacks via Kharkiv and Kherson?.
Then there is the "possibility" of a """"""bombardment""""""" against a military post or civilians. In that case, the russian high command should really, really thank the Ukranians because of their consideration. They could have made such an attack any moment, like for example, when there wasnt such a naval concentration in the Black sea (Russian ships crossed the bosphorus around the 8-9 of Febraury), or when the russians were starting its mobilization and just had like 60 BTG in its borders. But no, they decided to do it, just when the russian army had fully deployed. Extremely nice of them, really. 
Nah not really. All the contrary, really, as it raises the cost of a Russian invasion. The old roman catchphrase, "si vis pacem, parabellum"
 

Because NATO does not, and has not ever, amassed an invasion-postured force on Russia’s border.  The standard that neighbors must be incapable of self-defense for Russia to feel secure is absurd.

Right - PhD in Combat Mission studies...

I don't seek out armor duels because they are a bit like tossing a coin, but they come up again and again. So I was interested to learn what I can do to maximize the chances for my tank in a duel if it gets into one.
So I put two identical Pz IVH (late) tanks with regular crews, no modifiers, against each other at 600 m range. I called one "Attacker" and the other "Defender", although it does not mean anything. I put both on a mild slope (partial hull down) and varied different conditions. Crew hatches open/closed, vehicle movement, terrain type, crew experience. I ran each case at least 1000 times and recorded the percentage of wins by each side. A 'win' means that the other vehicle was destroyed or the crew bailed out. If both vehicles were alive after 5 minutes, neither side won - usually one vehicle got hit and retreated back down the slope. If neither vehicle survived, both sides got a win.
The tables show the win rate on each side. The statistics were not perfect even with 1000 duels per case. Results of repeat runs could vary by up to +/- 3%. Notably I did not get a perfectly symmetric results even for reference cases R1 and R4 where the vehicles had identical conditions on both sides. So, don't take the numbers as the absolutely accurate truth. They just show what works.
Pz IVH was a good tank for this purpose because it can easily kill itself - powerful gun and vs weak armor. Therefore, the duels were mainly about who is able to spot first and land the first round accurately on target.
I did not find anything revolutionary - mostly stuff people already know and do - but it was still interesting to see the numbers. Here it is:
1. Keep your crew hatches open when expecting to fight an enemy AFV. If you can, force the enemy to close theirs.
Table 1. Effect of crew hatches open/closed. Both AFVs are stationary on Grass.
Attacker
Defender
Closed
49%
49%
Closed
Open [R1]
48%
50%
[R1] Open
Open
76%
21%
Closed
2. Minimize movement when within enemy LOS. Stop as soon as your vehicle can see the place where the enemy is (represented with the "Hull Down" command in the table below, which gives additional advantage of being harder to see and hit due to being hull down; this is not to say that the Hull Down command is always useable, but it worked here well because the Attacker was going up the slope). Movement makes you more visible - and it does not appear to matter what kind of movement command you use - in fact the faster movement commands seem to work a bit better.
Table 2. Effect of vehicle movement. Attacker starts out of LOS and moves in towards the Defender using different movement commands. Both AFVs are on Grass and the crew hatches are open.
Attacker
Defender
Hunt [R2]
41%
57%
[R2] Stationary
Slow
35%
63%
Stationary
Move
39%
59%
Stationary
Quick
42%
56%
Stationary
Fast
41%
57%
Stationary
Hull Down
61%
29%
Stationary
Quick: Minimizes the time interval when the Attacker is moving within the Defender’s FOV. Therefore, Quick works well as it gets the attacker into position quickly, whereas Slow works poorly.
Hull Down: Better cover than the Defender and minimizes time when the Attacker is moving within the Defender’s FOV. Also: Easier to disengage when damaged – probably for both sides. High percentage of duels with no winner.
3. If you have to Hunt, point 1. about crew hatches still applies and can reverse the odds in your favor.
Table 3. Effect of crew hatches open/closed while the Attacker is moving. Attacker starts out of LOS and moves in towards the Defender using Hunt. The Defender is stationary. Both AFVs are on Grass and the crew hatches are open.
Attacker
Defender
Closed
37%
60%
Closed
Open [R2]
41%
57%
[R2] Open
Open
64%
34%
Closed
Closed
14%
82%
Open
4. Target arc can serve various purposes but does not help with seeing or hitting the enemy. TRP helps, likely by increasing the chances of a first hit.
Table 4. Effect of using Target Armor Arc and Target Reference Point (TRP). Both AFVs are stationary on Grass and the crew hatches are open.
Attacker
Defender
No arc [R1]
48%
50%
[R1] No arc
Target Armor Arc
50%
49%
No arc
TRP on Defender
72%
28%
No TRP
Note: Target Arc can still help by pointing the gun and the Commander’s attention to the right direction if the vehicle is not moving directly towards the defender. Also, it prevents distraction of the Attacker by other, low-priority targets.
5. Ground type can provide some help by concealment. Tall types of grass (T and TY), Weeds, Brush, Lt Forest (without trees) and Crop 1 give a small advantage over hard or bare surfaces. Very tall types of crops (2-6) and Grass XT give significant advantage. There is no disadvantage in being on road or pavement compared to grass, but sand, mud and cobblestone seem to hurt a little, possibly because they lower the chances of disengaging when retreating in damaged condition.
Trees are complicated and depend on type. Type A trees are somewhat helpful if there are 2 or 3 on the tile. Type B trees are not helpful at all. Type C trees seem to be best, especially if there are 2 or 3. Type D trees are somewhat helpful independently on their number. Type E are like Type A. Bush does not make much of a change.
Stone and brick walls and low bocage give some advantage - can be concealment as well as cover. But bocage is the big one. A tank behind bocage almost always wins against a tank in open ground.
Table 5a. Effect of Defender ground type – bare surfaces, hard surfaces and roads. Attacker on Grass. Both AFVs are stationary and the crew hatches are open.
Attacker
Defender
Grass
45%
51%
Dirt
Grass
47%
50%
Dirt Red
Grass
49%
48%
Hard
Grass
50%
48%
Rocky
Grass
49%
49%
Rocky Red
Grass
52%
47%
Sand
Grass
52%
47%
Mud
Grass
50%
49%
Pavement 1
Grass
50%
50%
Pavement 2
Grass
52%
47%
Cobblestone
Grass
47%
51%
Gravel
Grass
46%
49%
Dirt Lot
Grass
49%
48%
Dirt Road
Grass
47%
50%
Gravel Road
Grass
51%
48%
Paved 1
Grass
48%
51%
Paved 2
Grass
47%
49%
Foot Path
Sand, Mud, Cobblestone (?): Can impair movement, possibly making retreat of a damaged vehicle slower and less likely to succeed before the Attacker fires another accurate shot.
Table 5b. Effect of Defender ground type – low vegetation and cultivated fields. Attacker on Grass. Both AFVs are stationary and the crew hatches are open.
Attacker
Defender
Grass [R1]
48%
50%
[R1] Grass
Grass
50%
47%
Grass Y
Grass
50%
48%
Clover
Grass
50%
48%
Flowers
Grass
49%
50%
Plow NS
Grass
50%
50%
Plow EW
Grass
43%
57%
Grass T
Grass
43%
55%
Grass TY
Grass
44%
54%
Weeds
Grass
44%
55%
Grass + Brush
Grass [R3]
46%
54%
[R3] Lt Forest
Grass
42%
57%
Crop 1
Grass
39%
60%
Crop 2
Grass
39%
60%
Crop 3
Grass
39%
60%
Crop 4
Grass
40%
58%
Crop 5
Grass
39%
59%
Crop 6
Grass
38%
60%
Grass XT
Table 5c. Effect of Defender ground type – foliage. Attacker on Grass. Both AFVs are stationary and the crew hatches are open.
Attacker
Defender
Grass [R1]
48%
50%
[R1] Grass, no foliage
Grass
50%
46%
Grass + 1x Type A Tree
Grass
44%
51%
Grass + 2x Type A Tree
Grass
42%
54%
Grass + 3x Type A Tree
Grass
49%
49%
Grass + 1x Type B Tree
Grass
51%
46%
Grass + 2x Type B Tree
Grass
51%
47%
Grass + 3x Type B Tree
Grass
43%
52%
Grass + 1x Type C Tree
Grass
33%
62%
Grass + 2x Type C Tree
Grass
32%
62%
Grass + 3x Type C Tree
Grass
44%
52%
Grass + 1x Type D Tree
Grass
44%
51%
Grass + 2x Type D Tree
Grass
40%
55%
Grass + 3x Type D Tree
Grass
50%
47%
Grass + 1x Type E Tree
Grass
42%
55%
Grass + 2x Type E Tree
Grass
41%
55%
Grass + 3x Type E Tree
Grass
49%
49%
Grass + 1x Type A Bush
Grass
52%
47%
Grass + 2x Type A Bush
Grass
50%
46%
Grass + 3x Type A Bush
Grass [R3]
46%
54%
 [R3] Lt Forest, no foliage
Grass
44%
54%
Lt Forest + 1x Type A Tree
Grass
39%
57%
Lt Forest + 2x Type A Tree
Grass
37%
59%
Lt Forest + 3x Type A Tree
1x Tree: Can be detrimental because it does not provide enough concealment and can trigger APHE shells passing high, wounding the exposed Commander.
Table 5d. Effect of Defender ground type – walls and fences. Attacker on Grass. Both AFVs are stationary and the crew hatches are open.
Attacker
Defender
Grass [R4]
48%
51%
[R4] Grass
Grass
46%
54%
Grass + Stone
Grass
47%
52%
Grass + Brick
Grass
 
 
Grass + Rural Stone
Grass
43%
55%
Grass + Low Bocage
Grass
7%
89%
Grass + Bocage
6. Crew experience - there is a big change from Green to Regular to Veteran, but Crack gives little advantage over Veteran.
Table 6. Effect of crew Experience. Both AFVs are stationary on Grass and the crew hatches are open.
Attacker
Defender
Green
33%
66%
Regular
Regular
36%
61%
Veteran
Veteran
44%
57%
Crack
Green
20%
78%
Veteran
Regular
32%
67%
Crack
Green
18%
82%
Crack

So now its been three and half weeks since the patch was made available, but there is still no patch for Steam. Could BFC inquire with Slitherine to determine what is holding it up? My experience (not, admittedly in the field of gaming software) is that when a matter involves multiple entities progress can be blocked by strange misunderstandings. Often a phone call or an e-mail to the right person can do wonders.

So now its been three and half weeks since the patch was made available, but there is still no patch for Steam. Could BFC inquire with Slitherine to determine what is holding it up? My experience (not, admittedly in the field of gaming software) is that when a matter involves multiple entities progress can be blocked by strange misunderstandings. Often a phone call or an e-mail to the right person can do wonders.

Any news on the steam update?

So now its been three and half weeks since the patch was made available, but there is still no patch for Steam. Could BFC inquire with Slitherine to determine what is holding it up? My experience (not, admittedly in the field of gaming software) is that when a matter involves multiple entities progress can be blocked by strange misunderstandings. Often a phone call or an e-mail to the right person can do wonders.

I saw the Kirtorf video by the way Megalon. Excellent as always. You deserve a bigger audience.

Hmmmm . . . . Still no Steam update. Automatic patching was one of the things I was hoping would be improved with using Steam.

Hmmmm . . . . Still no Steam update. Automatic patching was one of the things I was hoping would be improved with using Steam.