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The_MonkeyKing

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Everything posted by The_MonkeyKing

  1. I would love to see photo verified manpower losses
  2. https://old.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/10mguev/ukrainian_45th_artillery_brigade_repels_wagners/ Finally seeing some airburst. Out of curiosity I wonder what is up with the spread pattern.
  3. Yeah I don't think we really have to worry about Germany anymore. This was the last handbrake they really had. The next hurdles will be interceptor aircraft and longer range precision fires. Germany really has neither that would be relevant for Ukraine. Of course they might object but they don't have to and cannot take the leading role like with the leopards.
  4. Finally someone puting this in nice short writing. TLDR modern Abrams is not that different from Leopard in terms of logistics and sustainment:
  5. The more I think about it more strange does it soundline. How can Finland make mechanised forces in 6mos for dismounts, 12mo for tank crew, 12mo for all NCOs and platoon leaders? (company commander and above are professional in mech forces) Must be related to that company CO and "sergeant" are professional career soldiers.
  6. Indeed, that is why "good enough", haha. Good enough would be probably little less than what the Finnish military gets in training. That is 6 months for mech infantry (3months basic how to be soldier and 3 months of mech infantry training). 12 months for tankers (3months basic how to be soldier, 3 months of tank equipment course and last 6 months of how to fight as mech force) In UKR case you can leave out the "3months basic how to be soldier" part from both and when you leave out all the peace time stuff and holidays you can get both down at least by third.
  7. Very interesting information! Then we come to the point of "good enough". Lets take into account mass, skill and tech-quality. If it would be equation: combat effectiveness = quantity x skill x tech-quality. This would mean we can live with smaller value on skill part when the other two are compensated enough to account for this. We also are compromising on the skill part to get better timing strategically. It helps that Russian equation is not looking good at all especially in the skill part. Also there is the "on the job" training and the commanders can take this into account by starting with operations with a really stacked deck in Ukrainian favor.
  8. "It's good news that NATO members will provide modern tanks to Ukraine. Tanks remain a critical component in ground warfare, and Ukraine has the most experienced tank crews in the world. However, we should be realistic about what these deliveries mean. Ukraine's goal is to retake all of its territory occupied by Russia. Breaking through well-prepared defensive lines (and exploiting success) is difficult without significant combined arms advantages, and Ukraine is unlikely to have air superiority. Challenger 2, Leopard 2, and Abrams are more survivable and have better optics and fire control systems. That will give Ukrainian tankers an advantage in tank-on-tank fights and other engagements, and tank crews will be more likely to survive (and keep fighting). These new tanks also open up a new line of ammunition available to Ukraine, which is critical since they have been using tanks as artillery. Procuring 3 new types of tanks will be a logistical headache, but it will also give them more options for replacing future tank losses. Tanks will undoubtedly play a key role in Ukraine's future offensives as in Kharkiv and Kherson. The new tanks will increase Kyiv's chances for success but not guarantee it. They are just one component of combined arms, and can only partially compensate for other weaknesses. Personally, I think deliveries of new IFVs and APCs, like the Bradley and Stryker, are more significant than tanks because Ukraine lacks enough IFVs/APCs and the relative improvement of a Bradley/Stryker over BMP-1/MRAP is even greater than Leopard 2 over many Ukrainian tanks. The question is whether the decision by NATO to provide tanks signals that the alliance may be willing to consider other systems needed by Ukraine in the future. These tanks are also another step in the Ukrainian military being equipped with NATO weapons. So this is good news, but NATO tanks are not a silver bullet. If NATO's goal is to help Kyiv so that it can retake all of its territory, this will likely need to include other systems like fighters and ATACMS to improve Ukraine's combined arms capabilities even more. This is particularly true if continued attrition in Bakhmut and elsewhere along the front weakens Ukrainian units that will need to be available for offensives later this year. "
  9. Air space deconfliction existed before IFF was even invented. At least in Finland IFF is just the very last safeguard in a long sequence of procedures and safeguards. Something has already gone horribly wrong if AA operator ever needs to rely on the IFF. Yes, it is hard and it is almost its whole field of military science.
  10. I would think fighter jets are going to be a way easier thing to get going than mechanized force equipment was. Interceptor fighters are just a part of air defense. Just s supplementary capability to the western AA systems being given. And off course AA+Interceptors is more cost efficient than going the same with pure ground based systems. Only possible escalatory capability would be giving them long range strike capacity. But that can be given with ground based systems as well and I am sure you can jerry-rig JASSM to a MIG. Best case would be to get same that Finland is going with its air force. It is the other half of air defence with additionally acting as long range strike platform.
  11. This is the biggest news this year for the war. And there is big competitions so that is saing much: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/24/us/politics/pentagon-ukraine-ammunition.html
  12. Yeah, not wonder weapons. They are just going to give a significant edge. They are going to be a superior system to anything that Russia has. Against a T90M the gap might not be huge(depending on the exact models) in all aspects but as a whole it is a big gap. RUS seems to have significant lack of modernized armored equipment. They will mostly be facing the tech they were designed to overmatch against. This would result in outcomes like seen in the gulf war in terms of tank to tank battles that happened. With these you are likely to find the target first, shoot first, penetrate and even get a way with being hit yourself. Ruskies will be in inverted situation on all these points. A true overmatch would be newest model APS equipped MBTs. That would be on the level of driving to the highest spot and shooting away. (not literally) There is also a large fleet of "unaccounted for" modern RUS tanks. Maybe these are going to be pulled to the front if they exist at all. (of course if we have 50% loss rate in visually confirmed total loss, that might mean the actually operational loss rate is closer to 100%)
  13. Seems to be happening by the looks of it. These level of "rumors" have rarely turned out false in this war.
  14. Yeah, makes you wonder why Germany has not taken this stance. Or at least has had a historical PR failure in the matter...
  15. "The Scholz effect" The effect created by Scholzing in which the desired outcome of Scholzing gets reversed because of external factors.
  16. https://warontherocks.com/2023/01/manpower-materiel-and-the-coming-decisive-phase-in-ukraine/ In his latest discussion with Ryan on the war in Ukraine, Mike Kofman explains why the coming spring and summer will be strategically decisive. He also offers his analysis on the Russian command reshuffle, new Western kit, and the grinding battle for Bakhmut. Bulletpoints: Bakhmut, on the ground Russians have made progress. Difficult grinding fight. Odds about 50/50 that Russia takes Bakhmut in the coming weeks, BUT it doesn't matter which way it ends. What will matter are the casualties on both sides. We need to consider the risk UKR is losing higher quality troops while RUS is mostly using expendable troops. Fighting in Bakhmut might indeed be the smartest thing to do for the Ukrainians. Is there a spot that is more advantageous? There is criticism of UKR accepting this grinding fight, but Ukraine might not be able choose a better fight at the moment. It is an important open question how much RUS is experiencing or going to experience shell hunger and its causes. We know the RUS shell usage has gone down but the reasons are unclear (smaller need now?, lack of supply lines?, lack of stockpiles? ...). We will know more when the fighting again widens and intensifies. RUS primary goals remain in taking the Dombas On the tank debate: The classifications of weapons (is it a tank or not or offensive weapon or not) depends on the needs of the policy. "It is what you make of it" It is a offensive weapon if the policies require it to be and it is not if the it needs to be policy constrained. About the Challenger 2s actually the AS90 is way more important. Western country giving significant percentage if its modern system. Heading to 2023 there is a quest to make Ukraine succeed in offensive operations under these new constraints. Constraints: RUS has the manpower advantage and next set of fights are going to be more difficult. Increase the qualitative advantage of Ukraine (better equipment and equipment for new formations) Equipment and manpower grind has to be avoided. RUS could sustain this for some time Develop and increase the UKR precision strike abilities. Shift Ukraine has mostly fought this as an artillery war. This is a costly and attrition approach as seen in Kherson. West is unlikely to be able to supply UKR with enough of overmatch of a fires advantage to win in this way. Even at this rate the ammunition and barrel consumption is hard to sustain. Combined arms training. The fix for the point above is to give UKR the skill and equipment to do mobile warfare. This is clearly now being pursued. Spring and summer look to become decisive. Next offensive UKR has a good opportunity to show that it can still advance under these new conditions. There will be lots of people eager to call stalemate Unlike in Kherson&Harkiv now in the next offensive UKR has a very real risk of RUS counter offensive if they fail or fall short. RUS offensive capacity is constrained but now there is a real risk. Lets be frank the Kherson offensive didn't start off well, this time around there will be risks if that happens. It is not clear what is happening with the forces. Have UKR managed to set aside enough units for offensive operations? What is going on with the RUS mobilization? Very little information on the Russian new forces, most like a lot of them are for rotational proposes. This war going nuclear is matter of two points: Cascading failure and collapse of the Russian force and the campaign. Koffman sees this as low probability event. what Putin decides to do in the above situation. This probability is pretty hard to judge. talk about internal struggle between the RUS war leadership RUS In Bakhmut interesting to see the changed tactics of no armor, only infantry and artillery. Also the artillery ammo is being rationed or having shortages. They are clearly preserving their mech forces. RUS is likely not going to announce 500k man mobilization . It never ended, it is going to keep happening in the background. Also there is no way of sustaining such force increase. The war aims are going to stay inside Donbass. So forget about these fanciful plans being talked about in the press.
  17. Counter thread from a Finnish analyst to that Germany did nothing wrong thread:
  18. It is not bs. You just really have to get to the weeds to see the Leo is the better option. Of course other options can be made to work if Leo doesn't work out
  19. To me sound like he filling all the unknowns with his own oppinions. I could just as well fill those unknowns but with inverted conclusions. Seems to be just a random dude with 500 followers.
  20. Well, maybe it is not such a big deal to have different equipment as long as they are at least in their own brigades? (in war time) Clearly if this would be a major issue we would see that reflected in the aid decisions?
  21. At least this Leopard/MBT crysis is giving a smoke screen for the GLSDB, that is a system that matters much, much more in the sort and medium term.
  22. There is going to be a series standoff with these Leopards and the H-hour is tomorrow in Rammstein meeting. Poland PM hinting that we will do what has to be done, no matter the German export permissions. Germany painted itself to a corner with the US M1 Abrams demand. I think there was absolute no plans for doing this anytime soon, for multiple good reasons. Only compromise I can think of is US making a sale of M1 Abrams with a far off delivery date. EDIT: new plot twist: Cannot make this **** up
  23. Yes, dumping ground for equipment that was created for the job that they would be doing in Ukraine. Sounds good to me. Of course planning and coordination(and generally using sense) is needed and has been lacking in the past (example lets not give 4 different types of western MBT, optimally just one maybe two). Ukrainians clearly want them and think they need them. Brittish can support this equipment but don't want to because it is not optimal for them. Not that they are some sort of "toxic waste".
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