wee

I agree 100%. Well placed words.

I know that russian people generally have that opinnion. I give you the right think so, while I personally disagree in many points. Like some Finns think that Carelia is a genuine part of Finland and should rightfully be returned to us. Personally I think that Carelia was lost in a war, and so be it. No hard feelings. Do you have any infromation, have RF military organized or mobilized any motorized infantry brigades or other military units from Russian citizens in Crimean peninsula region?

Givi's situation reports from the Donetsk airport are fun to watch. I start to giggle like little girl every time he or his subcommanders start to comment Ukranian forces. They are described like Germans in old Dirty Dozen movies, and in the other hand like Spielberg's title Saving private Ryan. They are either stupid, poorly trained and motivated, and can't stand to the "real men of separatist forces" in a real and honest man-to-man fights. And always killed like flies in huge numbers. Only time when Ukranian forces prevail are situations where they use unfair advantage of superior firepower or manpower and "unfair" methods of fighting like snipers, boobytraps and mines. Some other situations they are described as "bandits and rogues" or nearly as cannibal child eaters who get satisfied only, when they destroy civilian targets and kill, abuse and torture helpless civilian population. I'm quite sure that things ain't that simple. So naive propaganda, who the hell even believes that?

My grandfathers and other Finnish veterans of WW2 consider to think, that russian soldiers were respected as an enemy in many ways. Rugged people with good endurance and capability to withstand hard and horrible conditions in the field. Brave and sneaky enemy too in fights, something to be really worried about and to respect. I don't think that these characteristics have changed in the past 70 years. And one thing I know for sure, is the brilliance of russian mindset to design and produce basic infantry equipment. Their assault rifles, general purpose and heavy machineguns, automatic grenade launchers, hand grenades, RPGs, Mortars and basic artillery pieces and some of the vehicles (especially military trucks and mt-lb's ) are the best I know, although im not an expert. Simplicity, ruggednes and reliability are the characteristics I admire the most with such equipment, when serving in the field. Their small arms ammunition characteristics, quality and the purpose to spare valuable resources are also the best overall compromise I know. For example, with 7.62mm and 5.45mm projectiles they invest heavily in penetration over fragmentation in terminal- and barrier performace and Russians also do it with saving valuable resources like copper and lead, and using cheaper steel instead with various components.

Hello Weer I Presume that you pointed your question to me, about the origin of the pictures. Good point, I forgot to link the sources in the post. My bad. I found the pictures by simply using google picture search. "Ukranian national guard" http://www.kyivpost.com/media/images/2014/03/28/p18k2r8ra01hdf1n7msdk11hh13q44/big.jpg http://www.thestar.com/content/dam/thestar/news/world/2014/03/17/russia_moves_swiftly_to_annex_crimea/ukrainian_interim_forces.jpg.size.xxlarge.promo.jpg http://america.aljazeera.com/content/ajam/articles/2014/3/21/ukraine-s-newestfighitngforcestillaworkinprogress/_jcr_content/mainpar/textimage/image.img.png "Crimean self defence troops" http://www.vosizneias.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/h_51272833.jpg http://static.businessinsider.com/image/531ced6f6bb3f7a63ed6217e/image.jpg http://wpmedia.news.nationalpost.com/2014/03/ukraine7.jpg?w=620 I can't really estimate the realibility of these sources, or where the pictrures came originally, although I have no reason to suspect the authenticity of them. Yes, your conscripts and reservists are assigned to various level motorized infantry brigades during mobilization. That's for russian citizens on russian federation soil. With "pro russian militia" I referred to the local volunteers from occupied territories, which are armed by russian military (or other govermental organization) and working in auxiliary or secondary roles alongside with RF military. Allmost all of the armies over the history have had similar arrengements in occupied territories and I presume RF ain't going to make the difference.

Good points and I agree with you. Although non-professional conscripts or older reservists manning obsolete/aging equipment found from near-forgotten warehouse are cheap. Far cheaper to sacrifice, than for example hired professionals or skilled operators using new or latest expensive hightech equipment. Sad, but true fact.

I like your style.

Thank you for the warm welcome guys. Very nice from you. Referring to my earlier message few pages before about the category B/C or Tier 2/3 troops (ukranian national guard and pro-russian militias), I was referring to these kind of units. Ukranian national guard: And the current Crimean equailent: Man, those units looks just like the one I might most likely get assigned in mobilization!

I wonder, what's the benefit for the system or training results that beating up the recruits will give? When I was a conscript in Finnish army in 2001 (light motorized infantry), we never had any fear for physical violence, but for extra physical training and especially extra duties on your limited free time. Guard duties during nights, chopping firewood and taking care, cleaning and maintance of platoon equipment were the most common. Once when we were in shooting range in combat excercise, our platoon drill instructor noticed that me and my mate had unshaved one-day "beards". As a result, he gave us one hour time to run back and forth to the barracks (4km one way, so total of 8km) in full combat load and shave ourselves. Nothing too bad and we made it in 50 minutes. We never starvated in combat excercises, but problems in supply line and low supplies were simulated with modest selection of food and rations. Once, the only food I had and ate in three days was apples and dried bread, crispbread or "näkkileipä" in Finnish. We were never supplied with combat rations in excercises, MRE or similar stuff, but we always had a big box (few kilos) of crispbread and about 15 litres of water in our APC and that crispbread was also stuffed to messkits and your combat load too. Most of the guys also had some privatetly bought canned food, like tuna and spam mostly, and some choclade in their equipment. Always in excercises, our four men "rations and food squad" in company's supply platoon (I don't know the correct term in english) made up to three warm meals in a day to the whole company with their field kitchen. All the guys were professional cooks so the the dishes were sometimes very delicious, depending on what ingredients and spices they have gotten from the brigade's supply depot. Some of their field kitchens were actually quite cool. Few pieces were relics from WW2, from our winter- and continuation war, made in 1930s and early 40s, but that wasn't a problem. Far from it. The old models were very simple in structure, well made and designed and very rugged in the field. Our cooks said that they never had any problems with them (as long as you had chopped firewood readily available). If I remember right, the old field kitchens were modernizied only from the chassis, so those could be towed with higher speeds during the marches. Later models were more complex and considered too fine for field use, so more problems and failures also occcured. Little different topic to discuss, but as a regular rifleman, your company's field kitchen is more closer to your heart and everday life than some fancy and scare tanks or aircrafts in some distant unit, which you have never seen, except in paper.

Buhahahhahaha! May I add picking up all the sticks from nearby forest or collecting cones for several hours.

Excellent point DreDay. They must have/had different at-gun tactics for different operations and combat situations. "WP/Soviet/Russian doctrine was to deploy the AT units (both guns and ATGMS) in the areas where enemy armored breakthrough was most likely" Flanks and sides are always potential target for enemy attacks and manouvers. While the low mobility makes AT-guns obsolete in many ways, they still have ****loads of them in depots and warehouses. Besides, I think that most of the other artillerists can be trained to use them with little or short training. AT-guns are cheap compared to tanks, easily camouflaged and entrenched and accurate for pinpoint firesupport against stationary targets over long distances (like air traffic control towers ). As a bonus, you get mt-lb with gun if you are lucky, and those things are damn useful and practical for various secondary support roles for the fighting army. Maybe my favourite vehicle in the battlefield and military purposes excluding the fighting and beign under direct fire.

Is MT-12 capable for practical indirect firemissions? Interweb, including wikipedia says that PG-1M sight is available for indirect firemissions, but maximum elevation of 20 degrees sounds little low for indirect artillery piece? But beign currently a medical nco in reserve and medic/rifleman by conscript training, I far away from artillery expert so I can't be sure. Manufacturers description doesn't say anything about indirect fire with PG-1M sight. http://www.opticoel.com/en/shop/optical-sights-for-artillery-systems/panoramic-periscope-sight-pg-1m/ If I remember right, AT-guns are/were used in WP/Russian doctrine to protect the flanks or secondary directions of the unit, to save and concentrate more capable and mobile armored units to the primary direction.

W or "Whiskey" is the first letter of my surname. "Wee" is Much more appropriate than the nickname I got later from my squad mates in military, which was "wanker"

Greetings from Finland, this is my first post to this forum. Thank you for all the participants in this topic, it has been a fun and very informative subject to read. I'm eagerly waiting for the CMBS to be released. I even bought new computer to play the game. As beign aging reservist by myself, I would love to see some reserve, Category B or C units in the game. No matter what conflict would it be, real or fictional, all the sides would use and deploy similar units to the operational area to hold the ground and occupy area, to free better units to more critical tasks. And when or if the conflict escaletes to "worst case scenario", these troops would be used to direct combat tasks (like German Volkssturm in Seelow heights in 1945) to fullfill the gaps and lack of more suitable infantry combat units. Ukraine has it's national guard activated last year and Russia has long history of deploying and arming pro-russian militias in occupied territories (like all major military powers have done in most of the large scale armed conflicts over the past decades and centuries). Seeing catergory B or C units in CMBS with simplified OOB, older and/or lighter equipment and more modest soft factors would be a fresh experience. Ps. While our nicknames are quite similar, I hope all of you won't confuse me and member "Weer" with each other.