Grigb

Stop lying - NATO has no military strength to occupy and pacify Russia. Full stop. NATO has no interest in fighting, occupying and pacifying Russia. Full stop. If Russians are paranoid about NATO they should attend psychology sessions. Bingo. You just admitted that NATO cannot win conventional war with Russia because Russia will escalate it to all out Nuclear war. NATO threat is just Russian paranoid imagination. Grabbing somebody else land while killing people living there to create buffer state is a Hitler style war crime. Size of Russian land and size of forces required to occupy and pacify it will not change. Let me remind you that USSR was founded on idea of total western destruction. FYI that what Russians still want to do.

Wagnerites and other PMCs used by Ry MOD are not truly mercenaries. They are contract soldiers whose losses Russian MOD does not need to report. During Chechen Wars Russians realized that even their elite infantry can suffer heavy losses hurting Russian military reputation (see Battle for Height 776 where Russian artillery destroyed vdv company). Instead of improving themselves they decided to create grey unit outside of the MOD, so the MOD can plausibly claim that the Russian military suffers no losses.

Sorry to disappoint but I am not Russian veteran. I was planning to become one and participated in two year study program of one of top Russian military college (Actually It was and still is top Russian military technical university) but instead of "graduation" (you would have to study technical disciplines few more years) I decided to quit because of my observation of how the system really works and what it can do. If you study real Russian military history Bucha massacre will not come as surprise. Actually, it was not even the main event. Concentration camps with torture and execution conveyer would come later. After quitting I made sure that my medical records were corrected, and my mobilization level was severely restricted. Russian corruption is a feature, not a bug. Then after a couple of years I decided to leave completely. Obviously I have connections inside Russia and keeping an eye on what's going on there.

Thank you. I am actually long time CM player (fell in love with CMBO) and forum reader as well. But I avoided commenting because until recently my opinion that Russians military sucks big time was not very popular. If I am not mistaken Murz said somewhere else that they started to compensate lack of proper infantry by increasing number of tubes used for assault support leaving some areas defenseless. For example, for Popasna assault they left Donetsk defenseless artillery wise. AFAIK It is much worse - when weapons go to storage they are usually cannibalized for spare parts. After that nobody really checks or maintain them. Any auditor/controller is simply bribed. Possibly that is the reason they do not inspect guns beforehand - otherwise they will have to report the scale of the problem and face the consequences. I do not believe they had a large "ready" inventory or any inventory at all. Do not underestimate incompetence of Russian officers. 20 years ago when I almost became one I was very flabbergasted at the whole system and decided not to proceed. Oh, I hope one day somebody translate all Murz rants about how inefficient Russian Army is. Only Wagnerites/PMC or LDNR+Russian volunteers may be capable of doing that fast. But regular Russian Army on a mass scale? No. Just No. Personally, from my limited experience with Russian army + what I know from reading Russians I believe your predictions are spot on. It is just Russian society (and the army as part of that society) is like pressure cooker - it can withstand a lot of internal pressure without huge visible cracks for a time being. Then it explodes when nobody expects.

Just decided to add my couple of cents. Infamous Murz recently stated that LDNR artillery is extremely low on 122mm ammo and Russian Western Military District is running out of 122mm stock. They are urgently converting LDNR artillery to 152mm caliber (D-20 guns from Russian military storages). As result: LDNR is not able to capitalize on fall of Mariupol due to some units are out of 122mm ammo and some units are in the midst of conversion to 152mm. LDNR CB capabilities around Donetsk are negligible now and because of that UKR artillery is highly active there. Murz also stated during fire missions they are encountering multiple problems with 152mm guns (D-20) taken from storage. Interestingly, his statement implies they (LDNR and Russians) are unable (unwilling) to thoroughly inspect these guns before sending them to the fight.