Jump to content

Hapless

Members
  • Posts

    417
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    5

Posts posted by Hapless

  1. 50 minutes ago, Carolus said:

    5.56 and 7.62 are too small for explosive or airburst bullets, but what would a flechette bullet do to a drone? It was in development during the Vietnam era.

    Or maybe these modern dumdum rounds which splitter on impact??

    I don't think a flechette round is going to do anything that your basic 5.56/7.62 isn't- the problem looks more like drones are very difficult to hit, rather than current ammunition doesn't do enough damage.

    It's got me wondering though- how big do jammers need to be to be effective? Could you stick one inside a 40mm grenade with a parachute and bloop them off into the sky a la instant EW barrage balloons?

  2. [Edit: Ok, I missed that this popped up earlier in thread. But hey, looks like that video got deleted so at least there's a link again.]

    Back to the Tactical problem- this is apparently from a foreign volunteer unit, so plenty of English being spoken. Clearing trenches, kamikaze drones, and at 7:50 some absolute mind-boggling insanity.

    Seriously, that's the craziest thing I think I've seen so far.

  3. To chip in on the WW1 front-

    The interplay of tactics on both sides is important. The only reason the Germans could suceed with infiltration tactics in 1918 was because the Allies were reorganising to dispersed defence in depth. Infiltration attacks in 1915-17 would have found no gaps to exploit... hence the Allies doubled down on the scripted set piece.

    And that's to some definition of 'suceed'. There were plenty of German infiltration type attacks in the Spring Offensive that were massacred to no effect.

    But anyway, back to the war in Ukraine... I'm sure we'll see the same dynamic.

  4. I think 70km the other side of Belgorod means this is either some very ballsy SF with MANPADS or- more likely- the kind of SAM raid we've already seen a few times.

    Roll a Patriot further forward than normal, light up a juicy target, bug out. Just an exercise in extending threat into areas the Russians think are safe.

    Last week it was a Mainstay, this week it was Il-76.

  5. 13 hours ago, The_Capt said:

    the Somme was a massive operational level offensive about as well planned and resourced as they come.  Its complete and utter failure was a clear indication that something had fundamentally shifted.

    Complete and utter failure is a bit harsh- the defenders lost 400,000 men and voluntarily abandoned the whole area because they believed it was untenable.

    There's an interesting perspective element here though re the current the conflict- who won the Battle of Sievierodonetsk? The side that got punished the most or the side that was evicted? A pyrrhic victory is still a victory... right? Unless it's the other side.

  6. Meanwhile, in Russia:

    Assuming this is accurate, the TLDR of fun questions that popped up:

    "When will the war end? When will there be peace in the skies? When will peace talks begin?”

    “Why does your reality differ from ours?”

    “Mr President, when will real Russia stop being different from the one on TV?”

    “Hello, how can I move to the Russia they talk about on Channel One?”

    “Cucumbers 900 roubles/kilo, tomatoes 950 roubles/kilo, lettuce costs 1,500. I won’t even bring up the price of fruit. Give us normal prices!”

    Not great optics, I haven't watched the thing and don't speak Russian (and Galeotti says it's the most boring, vapid thing he's watched for ages), but I assume Putin isn't answering these.

    That might not seem like it matters, Russia functionally being a dictatorship, but Galeotti insists that it matters more. If you upset the people in a democracy, you get voted out in the next election and hop on the gravy train. If you upset the people in a dictatorship... there's the chance you get dragged out of a sewer pipe and executed on the spot.

  7. 1 hour ago, The_Capt said:

    Defensive primacy might be back (for now).  Denial primacy definitely is happening.  Themes of Denial, Corrosion, projected friction, precision, smart mass, Illumination, Hyper-connectivity, dispersion, deception and attrition seem to really dominate.  A battlefield of negative decisions - I can’t have positive decisions but neither can you.

    The military problem may be unsolvable.  Over to the political side.

    If no one can attack the result is... peace?

    I mean, caveats ahoy and not necessarily a warm, fun peace that everyone enjoys... maybe more like the 90s where it's 'peace' if you live in the right places and people living everywhere else double down on that asymmetry thing.

×
×
  • Create New...