dan/california

The Russians think they have enough willing bodies to keep using them like ammunition. They will be quite sorry if a large of chunk of those bodies suddenly decide they are less scared of their officers than they are of the Ukrainian army. It is worth pointing out that there is very little left that is worth looting in the Donbas, at least as compared tho Kyiv and its suburbs, so that is one less motivation to drive past a couple of dozen burning wrecks on the way to your own date with an ATGM.

There are a lot of factors we don't know that determine if waiting a week helps, or hurts one side of the other. Time lets the Russians pull in the last remnants of their army that are actually capable of operations. Time lets more NATO precision go bang get all the way forward to the Donbas for the Ukrainians. Time lets the Ukrainians dig ever more entrenchments everywhere, especially in fall back positions. Both sides are suffering attritional losses every day, and burning artillery ammo every day. Neither side is exactly publishing their artillery ammo on hand. Time lets the Russians build more forward logistical reserves, and they clearly need it as far foward as they can get it, although their is a large penalty for getting TOO far forward. Time lets the Ukrainian reserves that have been working up since the second or third day of the war start showing up at the front. My GUESS is that time is better for the Ukrainians. But all that is a guess. Ukr and Nato General staff probably have a much BETTER guess. I am assuming the Russians are one step above staggering around in the dark until they prove otherwise, maybe one step BELOW staggering around in the dark, now that I think about it. But a very large dinosaur staggering around in the dark is still quite dangerous. As an aside a competent military, run by a competent dictator would cancel the bleeping parade, and put those troops on a train to the Donbas tonight. Of course there is zero evidence for competence anywhere on the Russian side. Well, unless you looting, rape, murdering civilians, and other assorted war crimes. I suppose Putin might also be at some risk of coup if he ordered his praetorian guard to go get shot at.

The Greens, to whatever extent I understand it, are among other things a very feminist orientated party. That may be a clunky way of putting it, bit I think you get my point. The extent to which the Russian military has openly encouraged rape and much, MUCH worse may have popped their reality bubble even more effectively than it has in the rest of the civilized world. If you are strongly for women being able to fully participate in society, Russian fascism is NOT your thing. The Russians have been doing their level best to make that clear. To their credit the Greens have gotten the message and figured out which of their values are more important. They even picked the right ones, which is sort of miraculous. https://kyivindependent.com/national/hide-the-girls-how-russian-soldiers-rape-and-torture-ukrainians/ I wouldn't actually read it if you like sleeping.......

https://www.forbes.com/sites/dereksaul/2022/04/20/germany-stopping-all-russian-oil-imports-by-end-of-2022-foreign-minister-says/?utm_campaign=socialflowForbesMainTwitter&utm_medium=social&utm_source=ForbesMainTwitter&sh=5aec91c332aa HUGE if true!

We see Ukr forces with NLAWS and Panzerfaust/RPG type weapons all the time. You see a lot less video of them even carrying Javelins. Are the Ukrainians holding the Javelins back for reaction forces to contain Russian breakthroughs, or otherwise issuing them only to specific units with specific jobs where the range really matters? Don't tell me if that is sensitive info.

Some well timed sugar in the fuel tanks of the parade vehicles on the evening of May 8th would be the biggest propaganda coup in the history of mankind. I do wonder if the parade forces will be marched down to the Donbas on May 10th, or is this the Praetorian Guard that Putin can't let out of sight of Moscow. Obviosly if Putin had two working brain cells, and any of those vehicles have working guns, they would be in the Donbas now.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/skullduggery/id1333621434?i=1000558080864 DC media blob still doesn't get how bad the Russian military position is.

As strong a stand as any history, literally! It deserves to be a whole chapter in the books a 1000 years from now.

Sholz seems to have missed the fact that the German defense industry is perfectly happy to get paid for arming Ukraine to max. And thus discounted the fact that his position would be utterly undermined by blatant leaks, or out right press releases from his "own" side.

There are a LOT of pictures of shot up TIGRS. From machine gunned, to disassembled by the ever popular 2x1522 mm IED. So someone has been trying to do something with them, badly.

Her great grandchildren will still be calling Russians orcs.

Somewhat more usefully, i also think the awful atrocities are are part of the reason Ukraine shouldn't try to get Crimea, and the DLPR back. The Ukrainians are going to have an unimaginable amount of grief and anger to deal with. I am more than a little concerned some things might happen that would be .......unfortunate.

The Telegram does a good podcast about Ukraine every weekday. They had one that was entirely about the horror stories. I couldn't listen to all of it, just.... no words , as you said. I did come to the firm conclusion that every Russian soldier in Ukraine needed to die or start running home, preferably they should be on fire either way. I posted it however many pages back, honestly I WOULDN"T recommend listening to it, unless your unsure about which side is in the right. In which case it will clear you right up.

Was the same battery firing ground and air burst? Or maybe mortars and 152mm at the same time? It really looked like there were two different kinds of shells going off.

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-april-19 Do the Russians remotely have the forces, or the logistics to mount ~5 separate attacks? Can they possibly learn that slowly?

The CEP is the CEP, even with the gun laid perfectly you are still have wind, and ammo variability among other things. In an ideal world every round fired with that quality of drone observation would be one of the nifty guided ones, and the Russians would be minus 5 tanks instead of one. Of course in ideal world we would not be having this war. To reference CMBS for a moment, my instinct to shell every tree line on the map when I have the ammo appears to be correct.

they are going to have to get serious about talking up the Chinese....

And they will freeze to death, even this late in the year.

Jomni's latest just posted.

Another example of very well targeted artillery being not being instantly fatal, no clue how many didn't make it out. But a bunch of them had time to decide the building was a bad bet and make it to the trees. Although one guy got hit by something else, or busted his ankle crossing the railroad tracks. Video ends with him pretty clearly regretting his choices in life.

Which is why I am in favor of the NATO lays waste to Russian invasion force bit, but I digress...

https://twitter.com/War_Mapper/status/1516207986993254407/photo/1 Best map I have seen this morning.

In terms of the right beeping now weapons, 120mm mortars with guided rounds seem like easiest most useful thing we could be shipping, after Javelins. I can't imagine it would take more than a day for a Ukrainian mortar crew to familiarize itself with a different tube. They barely have moving parts. The Ukrainians obviously know how to use GPS, and/or laser guidance. And you can haul it around with three or four pick up trucks, including ammo.

EXACTLY!

They didn't seem to feel short of ammunition either.