Peregrine

The Russians won't be going anywhere unless there are insane escalations and NATO armies travelling east of Moscow. Even if Putin is ousted a nation of 145 million people just isn't going to stop existing in any sensible way. The Russians can't even finance or build there own country well yet alone a second.

There is a point in history where dozens of smaller nations, entire continent of Africa and tribal indigenous people all over the world could realistically state "insert western nation here" have been brutalising and murdering our people and stealing from us for decades/centuries. These would be truthful statements that could be made at many points in time in history. It would also be absolutely wrong at those points in time to say it will go on forever and "insert western nation here" will never change unless we beat them down. Significant lasting cultural change can take decades/centuries or may take a war, or a genocide or increased influence of religion or decreased religion. But the only thing for absolutely sure is that Russia won't be like this forever. The world has shrunk and changed. The garbage of how nations behaved across the 17th, 18th, 19th and early 20th and how Russia is behaving now doesn't fly anymore. The sad thing for Russians is that in all the upheaval they have had across the last century never once has a sensible system popped out the other side. Czar, civil war, Stalinist mess, WWII, post-Stalin communism, fall of communism, 90s mess and Putin. This is hopefully the point in modern history that Russia learns enough to change.

I was thinking the same thing last week. It could be because this forum has spawned an army of belligerents with the attitude "that's not an operational pause, if you don't use the word right don't use it all" to the point where the term has been stricken from the lexicon of crappy commentary. Hearing it misused to explain failure so often at the start has left me not wanting to hear it ever. The Battle of Technohouse seems a long time ago.

Starting to think the Ukrainians should start publishing collection points where the Russian conscripts can just get off their army truck/bus/hire car/stolen car that shipped them in and simply walk themselves into captivity.

Maybe they were just standing near the edge of an undersea shelf and accidently fell off.

"Month of training? Hey, wet-pants! This isn't the Women's Auxiliary Balloon Corps. You're in the Twenty-Minuters Russian Army now." - paraphrase Blackadder IV Hideous war extending collecting warm bodies for cold trenches that most losing armies persist in well after reason should have kicked in because vain fascists view their ego as more important than their citizens lives.

Can you post your GPS co-ordinates for the beer delivery. Or the HIMARS. Depending how you behave on the international stage.

Nothing says "esprit de corps" more than a shared determination to wear pants correctly.

This is a summary in an Australian military official document that describes the operations in Afghanistan. "NATO led the UN-mandated International Security Assistance Force {ISAF) from August 2003 to December 2014. ISAF's mission was to enable the Afghan authorities and build the capacity of the Afghan national security forces to provide effective security, so as to ensure that Afghanistan would never again be a safe haven for terrorists. ISAF was NATO's longest and most challenging mission to date: at its height, the force was more than 130,000 strong with troops from 50 NATO and partner nations." A lot of the civilized world owns a piece of the mess in Afghanistan. EDIT - original post dropped the following which originally was longer but mainly the point addressing the general theme across the last few pages that NATO is somehow failing. NATO - is not going anywhere. Prior to the Zelensky government Ukraine had a mess of governments that at different times were significantly to ultra corrupted by Russian influence. Add in corrupt influence of criminal gangs, aging Soviet military structure, a public/military service that is at different levels comprised plus voting irregularities. Does that sound like an EU or NATO member country? NATOs little green men policy was response to Russia interfering in non-member states policy. You can't join NATO if your neighboring country has pinched a whole bunch of your territory and is shooting done airliners. Anyone that thinks NATO is failing because Russia is still in Ukraine misunderstands that NATO is primarily a defensive pact and will not attack Russia unless a whole bunch of member states via the UN builds a coalition to do so.

+1 to the above. Every story I read today apart from the above that contained "nuclear" in the reference to Putin's recent announcements was not really presenting it in accurate context.

Just finished reading a story about the exodus the conscription is causing in Russia and was browsing through the comments in the Sydney based news paper to see a steady stream of pro-Ukraine anti-Putin (not Russian) comments from simple to more well informed opinions when I came across this little gem that made me laugh. "Why can’t he just go play civilisation on his computer like the rest of us." - DFISH (anon Australian)

There is no coherent group within any real power that exists like that in Russia. This is the fundamental problem. This is Churchill quote "Kremlin political intrigues are comparable to a bulldog fight under a rug. An outsider only hears the growling, and when he sees the bones fly out from beneath it is obvious who won." There are no sensible bulldogs under the rug at the moment. It seems to be only Putins or more extreme.

I don't think is reasonable to compare nation building in Afghanistan / Iraq to Ukraine. In the middle east at every level of society from the bottom to top their was always be going significant resistance or ambivalence due to either self-interest, ignorance or flat out cultural aversion to change. And it doesn't matter how hard you try as soon as you use airpower to a significant degree there is mistakes. The longer troops are on the ground more mistakes. Lots of mistakes over a long period of time slowly but surely adds up to looking like you simply don't care - fail. Cultural change isn't especially fast and to suggest that Iraq / Afghanistan are only 60?! or so years away from organically morphing into modern democracies so lets fight a war and do it in 20 is ludicrous. The Ukrainians on the other hand were already clearly starting to walk the walk to be a functioning part of the Western world which is probably not an insignificant reason they were invaded in the first place. I have not even bothered checking Zelensky's Ukrainian popularity but Western leaders trust them enough to give them stupendous amounts of weapons and an indeterminable look at our Intel capabilities. There is a clear and obvious enemy to be beaten. Partisan style warfare after major hostilities seems unlikely unless of course criminal gangs being criminals count as freedom fighters. Ukraine will have their own trouble with corruption and waste when the war finishes but their start point prior to invasion isn't anything remotely like Afghanistan/Iraq.

It will be impossible to tell the Russian supply situation until well after this war is over and maybe not even then but 300000 people is 15-20 divisions. That is a lot of gear lying around that nobody already has dibs on. So considering corruption is a top to bottom national pastime it may not have been possible until now or even now to put that many guys additional guys in the field. I am hoping this is desperation time on the Russian part putting warm bodies into the contested areas to make it a bloodier prospect short term for Ukrainian victories. Because same training + same equipment + same doctrine versus Ukrainian divisions that have only improved since the war started (ie improving(ed) gear + winning experience without burnout + doctrine that is getting results) is not a recipe for success.

Because of discussions re annexation and referendums this was part of the ISW summary 19 Sept. "Partial annexation at this stage would also place the Kremlin in the strange position of demanding that Ukrainian forces unoccupy “Russian” territory, and the humiliating position of being unable to enforce that demand." If you have zero credibility or respect I guess you can't get lower so why not keep walking down the path of absurd idiocy.

At one level it is propaganda to a degree but how many Russian soldiers do you think you would have to interview to get the same natural disbelief at the situation they are in but at the same time the quiet determination that their reality is that they will be a soldier until they get the country back.

Long time since I have played Harpoon and I have no idea what other shipping is in the area (there must be some based on rescue reports) but firing BOL then having a missile hit whatever ever it sees can be a risky way to make an attack if you are after a specific unit in a space that has commercial traffic.

It's anti-tractor defense. You stick your tank in the mud then surround it with a large moat.

I don't know anything about the Winter War but Commissars were part of the Soviet organisation and at different times throughout WWII the guys obviously made retreating difficult to the point that it could have seemed suicidal to the average soldier.

All your base are belong to us. The above is actually 30 years old originally but got wide spread use with the second Gulf War. You don't have to be that young.

Every time I see a tractor in any situation I instantly hear Ride of Valkyries in my head.

The conclusion would have been pure jealously. I could steal 1/2 as much and be 5 times as rich.

"The GUR reported that the Russian military ordered its base in Hmeimim, Syria to send up to 300 fighters from Syria to Ukraine daily. The GUR additionally reported that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has promised to recruit 40,000 Syrian fighters to deploy to Ukraine. The GUR reported Russian authorities are promising Syrian recruits that they will exclusively act as police in occupied territories." The above was from the understanding war summary that several people linked too. If largely true what bigger sign could there be that Russian forces are failing at every level and they are already at the stage of fighting where they are prolonging a war hoping that the something is going to magically change and everything work out. As a country Russia has been looking at Ukraine for 8 years+ in some form of military invasion/active combat sense and 3 weeks after openly invading the recruiting of 40000 Syrians to be police is necessary. The thought of the "liberated" areas of Ukraine being policed by a Syrians would seem to be a wonderfully terrible idea in every sense. How desperate must they be for manpower if this is even remotely being considered.

Tractors got some serious drift happening. Not quite sim enough for me. Great music. Can we still customize our loading/splash screen music?

Pretty sure a Putin government could argue the drive to Kyiv is 95 or even 100% successful so it's going better than MG. Any chance of schwimmwagen tractors making into CMBS based on their anecdotal but seemingly extensive use.