poesel

Germany and Poland quarrel about a repair Hub for Leopards in Poland. A letter of intent exists for 2 months now, but political issues have so far stopped the project (text in German). Next Monday is a meeting between both ministers of defense. Seems to be the last chance to fix the issue before the NATO summit. https://www.spiegel.de/politik/deutschland/berlin-und-warschau-streiten-ueber-leopard-werkstatt-a-8a3e52c0-6772-470b-8008-0c1390fb23a7

We had this one a few pages ago and IIRC we were puzzled why it exploded that way. Here it is why: (apologies if we already had that)

Good to see that stuff gets salvaged.

Getting into the EU is quite a convoluted process, especially for a country as big as Ukraine. Integrating Mexico into the US would be a similar exercise. I would not bet on anything less than 10 years in the future. Ah, too bad. I guess these diplomats will be oh so happy to be back in the USSR, er, Russia.

Could be something, could be nothing...

Oh yes, huge problem. We teach our Chinese colleagues and as soon as they know stuff to be useful, they get promoted to office work. Field work has bad status and bad pay. So we have to work with a string of newbies. Or this stuff: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roland_(missile) https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roland_(Waffensystem) The English article is very focused on the missile, the German on the system. France & Germany had quite a lot of them, and they were phased out together with the Gepard. But I don't know what became of them. 8 km range is not that much but better than nothing.

Or it could say: 'I hope I taught my operator to fly out of the danger zone ASAP after dropping a bomb on a pile of explosives from low altitude....'

Paywalled article about two Leopard 2A6 crews: https://www.spiegel.de/ausland/ukraine-krieg-die-maenner-die-mit-dem-leopard-2-in-die-schlacht-ziehen-a-a570e5db-e1fc-4ec6-9624-f6f0865a2d68 Some interesting points: it's his third tank for the gunner his first tank was destroyed near Melitopol in '22. He walked 1.5 kilometers, found an abandoned tank and drove it home! They haven't met Russian tanks, yet mainly infantry support 3 Leos hit mines in the first day at Zaporizhia: one lost, one could drive back on itself and one is immobilized and could not be recovered because it is blocked by a destroyed Bradley (that seems to be the one from that incident) Apart from Kalashnikovs there is hardly any non-western equipment at Zaporizhia They have high losses (compared to the time before) 2 tanks may have been captured by the Russians

Sorry, but my inner grammar Nazi won't shut up. This has been misspelled too often! It's 'Balkenkreuz' (a cross made with beams). Not 'Balkankreuz' (which means cross of the Balkans).

On a lighter note: Germany currently plays its 1000th international football match vs Ukraine. Currently, Ukraine leads 1:2, but it's still one hour to go (flag reads: 'Thanks, now I have Leopard')

So the UA attacked where we (and probably the Russians) thought they would most likely attack. Attacking where the defenders know you are going to attack seems to me very uncharacteristically for the UAF. How long will it take for the Russians to really think this is IT, and begin to shift their resources? And where will the real attack be? Or is this some kind of double think game where the Russian keep thinking that this is a feint, not shift their resources, and then actually get defeated in the place they knew the attack would come?

Oh, yes - I remember getting yelled at like that when two guys stood together

Please don't cite BILD. Whatever they say, most possibly never happened, or the opposite is true.

Yes, but only by supplying missiles and support. No planes, we don't have any that are currently in discussion.

My first thought, too. But for a rescue mission, it may make sense. You can send the vehicle someplace without risking the driver. On the return, the driver is still fresh & without injuries, and he has the full ISR abilities quite close to him. And IIRC the Fuchs has an ABC version. If you need to go into an area which has been, for instance, chemically attacked, remote might be preferable.

Like Erdogan or not - it is a stable government. And he knows how to make deals. Thus, a new NATO command center in Turkey means that Sweden will join NATO really soon.

Longish article about the difficulties Russia has with selling its coal to non-western recipients (in German). TLDR: it's very difficult. The coal is in southern Siberia. The Transsib is already clogged and shipping from Murmansk to China takes 45 days through Suez. From Dudinka it's only 22 days, but the infrastructure to get there doesn't exist. https://www.wiwo.de/technologie/wirtschaft-von-oben/wirtschaft-von-oben-211-russische-kohle-exporte-von-wegen-russische-kohle-fuer-china/29170144.html If were living in Dudinka I would start learning Chinese

Pentagon buys terminals and services from Starlink for Ukraine. That should stop any shenanigans from Musk (in this area...).

IIRC "Wagner" was the nickname of Utkin.

I think Jordan has 60 systems.

This is also an upgraded version from the Netherlands, which has a better radar:

Russia limited the number of German employees of the state in Russia to 350 (from 700). That means that Germany will have to close 2 of the 3 consulates it has in Russia. As a reaction, Germany ordered the closure of 4 of the 5 Russian consulates in Germany. https://www.spiegel.de/ausland/russland-kuendigt-angemessene-reaktion-auf-konsulatsschliessungen-an-a-d41ba823-edd8-45cf-90fa-4539267a4456

A salvo of HIMARS costs about 600,000 (IIRC). If you spread that to 25 drones, that is 24,000 per drone. I guess the per drone costs for Ukraine for a homemade product is less than that. Especially since they have full access to all necessary material. So yes, Ukraine could easily do this every day. They shouldn't, and they won't, but they could. But the secondary effects are well worth doing this at least once.

I'd like to point out that this whole 'Belgorod Republic' thing is a brilliant next step in the 'boil-the-frog' strategy. Up until now, Russian soil was safe (except for counter battery fire and small scale attacks on infrastructure). Now, another of those red lines has been crossed and nothing has happened. I guess we'll see more of those excursions, and they will become regular enough so that Russia has to spend resources. It also means that Russian civilians will have lots of first-hand experience with the war. Another small step in destabilizing Russia.

?