dan/california

ISW's take on Ukraines campaign against Russian air defenses.

If only there was somewhere else that veteran air force personnel might be profitably employed. Anybody have any suggestions?

An excellent demonstration of what we we were talking about just a day or to ago. Russian engineering units getting shredded while trying to build fortifications within drone range. Hydraulic fluid burns, who new?

Well we know what Budanov is doing for the rest of the month The reasons not to do this all come back to hoping the world could be reset pre Feb 2022. As soon as the blob admitted to itself this wasn't happening, there was less than zero reason not to do it. Now lets see if various governments can follow through with all the thingsthey need to do with their OWN money to deal with the world as it is. See above, people are are finally pulling some the levers that -Edit:cannot- casually be undone.

Russia is starting to Recruit FEMALE prisoners for combat roles. I wonder how many Russian snipers survive a year at front...?

Really good episode of "Ukraine the Latest" The single most interesting bit is a strong supposition that one of the reasons Russian S-300 and S-400 systems are dying like flies in Crimea is that the shorter range air defense systems that ought to be keeping them alive have been diverted to defend both military targets and oil refineries in Russia proper. It may be a case of where the Russians running out of one important system leads directly to more pressure on other important systems, and hopefully even bigger problems. They also discuss the supply of Patriot systems to Ukraine. They point out, but not strongly enough that the U.S. doesn't have enough of these, AND WE NEED TO FIX THAT. The production capacity of these things needs to increase by at least a factor of five, with enough upfront investment to get the unit cost down to merely agonizing.

Speaking of hilarious!

Hilarious!

We are winning, also we are forcibly recruiting female convicts to feed the meat grinder. Both of these articles can't be right.

I wonder if the Israelis are mad enough at Putin to ship this to Ukraine? Or will the Ukrainians have build their own copy? It is the acceleration of what we have been discussing forever. If that Bradley with the cancerous turret can't deal with a drone like this, and do it without giving away its position to one of five OTHER ISR systems it is just a target, and an expensive one at that The closest thing I am aware of is some of the simulations the various bits of the government use to simulate things like evacuating a city. But that is still a short term, known goal simulation. Apparently cell phone location data is improving this kind of model immensely. The problem for anything more general than that is simulating people is HARD over the long term. Even simulating purely economic behaviors is hard, which brings us to that old joke about economist have predicted twice as many recessions as we have actually had. Including one we didn't have in the last eighteen months. Maybe models made up of autonomous AI agents will eventually make it better. My bet though is that will take a computer the size of a football stadium with its own nuclear power plant, and river diverted right through the middle of it to keep it cool. Of course if it worked it would probably be worth it.

I am sure this list is far rom perfect, a there is a bias towards drones because the footage is automatic, but still.

Detailed look at trench fighting, At one point a Ukrainian drone starts dropping grenades 10 meters from their own guys.

If those minefields, and all the fortifications that went with the were 20 km further back it would matter a LOT more on the land bridge that it might in a lot of other places. If the Ukrainians had been able to advance 20 km on a broad front across the land a bridge a LOT more territory and infrastructure would be in 155 range. That would meaningfully effect the viability of. the whole thing. If Robotyne was firmly in Ukrainian hands with several kilometers of cushion, instead of a grey zone that is suicidal for anything bigger than a mouse, Ukrainian 155 SPGs would be in range of Melitipol or very near it.

After Donald Trump, Boris Johnson, and Gerhard "the gas man:" Schroeder, no one is exactly covering themselves in glory. Macron has at least looked at the evidence and changed his mind, which shouldn't make him a giant among his generation of leaders, but actually kind of does.

Yes, seen multiple things this week that imply Ukrainian drones are operating at much greater depth. I also give a small percentage that the dump truck video was insurance fraud by some enterprising vatniks.

No way, the Ukrainians have so many drones up now that they are blitzing random civilian dump trucks across the border from Kharkiv. I assume these got targeted because the drones were about out battery, but still... Imagine what is landing on REAL targets.

Macron is a French politician, fill in your joke of choice here, but I still like it a lot better when is per-formatively amping support for Ukraine than when he is per-formatively licking Putin's boots. I take both poses with an entire shaker of salt, but the latter one still taste better.

Military health food...

https://www.threads.net/?xmt=AQGzUnm85Mo6Fx_WE7Y194FFlm7Jrqe_ZS6tZG3V3_OiZgM 24hoursukrainenew 1h about an hour ago Victoria shared pictures for the first anniversary of her marriage. However, only she herself is on them, her husband was killed by the russians.They got married in May 2023, but the celebration was postponed for a year due to the counter offensive.But in November 2023, Vladyslav died during the fighting in Donetsk region.

The all seeing eye works all day every day. A smart vatnik would stay home...

There was a great interview I listened too a year or more ago with a U.S. Soldier that had volunteered for Ukraine. He spoke about this at some length. He said the big advantage came from the the fact that i made it harder to target the defending troops, or at least it took a lot more artillery ammo. The most effective way to fight from these kind of positions was to do as much of the engagement as possible with indirect fires, and put off revealing the exact location of the front line defenders as long as possible. Ideally you could completely wipe multiple probing attacks before you had to reveal the forward positions. Indeed being more proficient at this was one of the big differences between experienced and/or well trained troops, and units that had been put together in a hurry. It is probable that this has gotten harder to do as both sides have ever more drones up...

Good article.