DreDay

I don't quite share your enthusiasm for the effectivness of MT-12s on a modern battlefield; but one interesting note about the K model is that it is radar guided and can be fired with zero visual contact in any weather and/or light conditions...wonder if this could somehow be modeled in SF (without just giving it same characteristics as a TI-based system)?

I almost agree with all of your comments except for this one. Unfortunately there is nothing a-okay about Ukranian military perfornmance even when facing lightly (let alone well-armed speratists). Besides the individual soldier valor and bravery which have been proven to be highly admorable on many occasions - I tend to see their overall capacity and skill no higher that of the Iraqi army (circa 2003). Russian army has plenty of its own issues (espcially when compared to us); but their "vacationer" insertion in Agust of 2014 (while operating with extremely limited support and SOPs) sort of let's you know where the balance of power lies there....

That might be the case, I am far from an expert on IEDs and associated countermesures; but I do know for a fact that the Russians were deploying those jammers on their APCs and IFVs way before our guys got to use them in Iraq and Afghanistan... so again - they are no scrubs when it comes to that kind of stuff.

That is something that we would have to agree to disagree on. I see no way in hell that we (US) would risk a nuclear conflict with Russia over Ukraine. We might send a s**t load of Javelins and Stingers over there; but any direct engagement between Russian and NATO forces leads to a nuclear conflict that no one wants or is willing to risk on...

Another great post. I don't mean to either dismiss the Ukranian military nor to over-estimate Russian capacity; but a single brigade on a Kherson border with Crimea can literally be demolished in a couple of days of continuous artillery and air strikes by much stronger Russian forces. We have already seen that happen in East Ukraine with much weaker Russian force of several BTGs (with no Air Support btw) demolishing Ukranian battlegroups due superior firepower and C3 structure. As for IEDs - Russians actually have a lot of experience deadling with them based on their experience in Afghanistan and Chechnya. They are still in a process of designing proper MRAVs (which are being tested right now and are expected to go into service within next couple of years), but they deploy jammers and proper combat engenier support on regular basis - so IEDs and mines could certainly cause some issues and slow the Russian advance rate to a certain extent - but it's nothing that they haven't seen and dealt with before).

Excelent analysis sir. It is tought to discuss the potential Russian stratergy without knowing their full strategic objectives. Kharkov would be an easy picking and it would also significantly limit Ukranian military-industial production; so it is reasonable to assume that it would be one of the first objectives. I also see your point about the danger of extending Russian lines and leaving their flanks unsecured if they were to clear an Azov sea coast route all the way to Crimea... but we are also talking about Ukranian army as their opponnet here - a force that has shown next to zero operational planning and mobility so far. This is not something that would work against a decent opponent, but the Russians might just get away with advancing along the coastline and having a brigade or VDV regiment (along with decent air support) in reserve to counter any flanking attack... After all, what the Russians had pulled off in August of last year goes against any type of military doctrine or common sense; but it had worked out great for them given the level oposition that they were facing.

I have been following this conflict for a while and consider myslef to be somewhat of an expert on it, but I have never heard anyone make this simple point so intuitively and nonchalantly. I completely agree and I am also stealing it from now on Nicely put sir!

Thank you for trying to get us back on topic. If we were to theorized that type of scenario - I blieve that the first objective of Russian forces breaking out of Crimea would be to clear the Kherson area (which, btw has always been fairly pro-Russian outside of major cities) and then to unify with the Russian force coming from Eastern Ukraine through the Azov Sea coast. It would not make any operational sense to assault Odessa before then. No idea what their rate of advance would be. Ukranian army currently has a brigade-sized formation on the Kherson border, once it's overun (which is well within Russian capacity) it would just be a matter of how much guarilla/partisan resistance they encounter...

The thing about those types of inflatable decoys is that they are not really deployed to the frontlines (where all the CMBB engagements take place); but rather rear echelons which would have no effect on the current game engine. They are more of an operrational rather than tactical asset; and I think that we can all agree that CM is all about the tactics.

Right, I get what you mean now. I honestly don't know if the National Guard brigade in Maiople is a "new" or "old" Internal Troops formation. As for Azov, Donbass, Aidar and other "voulenteer battalions" their status is very confusing. I don't belive that they are considered to be a part of National Guard, even though they still fall under the MVD command. Some other "territorial" battalions are under the MOD command... and then you have formations like the Right Sector and OUN battallions that seem to have no legal status or higher command whatsoever...

I am not sure I know what you mean. There are plenty of newly formed units in Ukraine (i.e. territorial battalions, OUN, Right Sector, etc); but I am not aware of the National Guard (aka Interior Troops) structure changing all that much. Do you happen to have an example of what you are refering to?

There are indeed two battallions that have been maid up of Maidan protesters/militants as a part of National Guard. Other than that though, it's exactly the same structure as the old Interior (aka Internal) Troops, just a different name...

Not even storage, that particular company of T-64s was surrounded by a crowd of local civilians (mostly women) during their regular training session. There was no way in hell that Russian crews of the 14th Army would have used force against these people that they saw as their compatriots; so they had chosen to stand down and to let the locals (who were mostly also ex-14th Army servicemen) take posession of these tanks. Again though - we are getting way outside the scope of this thread. Please feel free to PM me if you want to discuss this some more...

Right, that's another aspect that I did not want to get into because I consider it to be way outside the scope of this thread... but I believe that this video shows the action in downtown Bander and not the bridge where most of the T-64 losses had occured. It is also worth noting that these tanks (that were taken over from ex-Soviet 14th Army) were manned by crews that had no time for joint training and they pretty much went into the battle as soon as they were aquired by local militia without any proper pereparation or training...

I am by no means claiming to be an authority on this. I have heard several different accounts of this engagement from both sides and I have quoted the numbers that I consider to be most accurate. I might very well be wrong though... There are other sides to this story that I did not care to elaborate on (i.e. the Trans-Dnestrian T-64s had no MG ammo loaded and quite a few of Moldovan firepoints were supressed by the T-64s in that battle), yet I have never heard about Moldovan ATGMs being used in that particular enagement... Do you happen to have a source for it? I would love to learn more about it.

Just to be clear - Ukranian "National Guard" is just a new name for their old Interior Troops (aka VV - much like those that are deployed by Russia and othre FSU states). It is not some kind of a new militia/reserve formation, but just a new name for the organized units that have already existed for many years...

Those are all great points sir. The AT guns can definitely still be a potent threat, espcially when facing less advanced and older armor (i.e. Ukranian Army). For instance, the first combat use of T-64BVs had occured in Trans-Dnestria region of Moldova in 1992. At that time a company of T-64s had attacked a key strategic bridge that was held by Moldovan forces. Two T-64s were completely destroyed and a couple more had suffered serious dammage and had to withdraw within the course of that battle. All of those losses were claimed by a battery (or less) of well deployed MT-12s... Yet I wonder if the results of that battle would have been even more decisive if the Moldovans were to deploy ATGMs in place of AT guns... I also wonder how long those MT-12 crews would have survived if they were to face more advanced tanks with better protection, advanced FC, and decent thermal sites...

I am not quite sure as to what you mean by "light artilery piece". MT-12s are deployed in anti-tank battallions (2 battaries - 12 pieces) of Russian Motor-Rifle Brigades along with more modern ATGMS. Their mission is the same as that of ATGMs - to halt the enemy armorded force advance in their deployment area. Now it is true that MT-12s had been deployed in both Chechen conflicts as direct support artillery pieces in order to target individual enemy firing spots; but that was mostly done due to the lack of proper opposition from the Chechen side,,,

While I agree with most of your post that shows solid research and analysis; it should be noted that Russian VDV units had gone through a major upgrade of BMD-1s (which had probably made up around 50% of their IFVs till 2008) to BMD-2 standards. That upgrade alone has significantly increased the capacity of VDV units. At the same time, I would certainly agree that the purchases of new VDV weapon platforms (i.e. BDM-4, Rakushka, 2S25) have been very limited up untill now. It would certainly be interesting to see how much the Russians can invest in the manufacture of these new platforms in the next few years...

Just to be clear - I am not claiming to know what a perfect solution for the current lack of a situational awarness would be - I would imagine it to be some kind of a mix of audio, text, and graphical (special icons, arrows, etc) indicators. My bigger concearn is that this needs to be somehow addressed as it is a major limitation of an otherwise amazig game engine. I don't know if Battlefront is currently working on it (I would like to hope that they are); but any suggestions that we can come up with here would probably be appreciated as well....

I am sorry friend, but I think that I've made myself perfectly clear for the past two posts. If you have any kind of military background whatsoever you would know that there are standard COM OPs for reporting movement, enemy contact, casualties and such. Right now the game engine is seriously lacking when it comes to providing real time situational awarness to the player (let's call him battle group commnader) which is neither realistic nor fun. Many others have pointed this out before. I am sure that the Battlefront devs are on top of it and hopefully they can come up with some kind of a system to compensate for it. But hey, if you have never noticed that as being a problem - then God Bless you and please feel free to ingnore this particular thread.

Sorry if I was not clear enough... what I mean are real-time reports from your subordinate CO's saying something like - "Enemy Contact - BMP platoon - 1500 meters away - position X,Y - engaging"; Or "Taking fire, from position X,Y; Enemy strength unknown. No KIA or WIA to report. Suppression fire on the way". The current engine relies on you (i.e. battle group commander) to spot and to track all the enemy contacts visually and also to keep visual track of your own unit status and possible casualties in real-time (if you choose to play in that mode) that is neither realistic nor user friendly and has been criticized by most game reviewers. Don't get me wrong, I love CM series and have a ton of respect for the developers; but that is one glaring weakness of the current engine that has been criticized by most professional reviewers (most of whom have also praised almost all other aspects of the game)....