Machor
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Posts posted by Machor
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Latest expert opinion on when Russia will start nuking:
"UNDERSTANDING PUTIN’S NUCLEAR DECISION-MAKING"
https://warontherocks.com/2022/03/understanding-putins-nuclear-decision-making/
TL;DR: Not yet, but it's on the table.
Two parts that I found interesting:
"A first key point regarding Putin’s nuclear decision-making is that he does not have a single nuclear button that he could push in splendid isolation. Instead, there are three nuclear briefcases in Russia: one with the president, one with the defense minister, and one with the general staff chief. Most reporting indicates that at least two out of those three suitcases are needed for issuing an order to launch nuclear weapons. That means that, in contrast to the United States, two physical suitcases that are controlled by two different people are required to use nuclear weapons. One of those two would have to be the president, as according to Russian declaratory policy regarding the decision to use nuclear weapons . The general staff would also need to accept the order as valid before it went out into the military unit controlling the nuclear weapons."
"Russian deterrence and escalation management concepts entail that using non-nuclear deterrent forces could serve as a warning to the adversary of a move toward the nuclear threshold. Increased use of dual-capable systems is one indicator to look for in this regard. Russia has now used its novel dual-capable air-launched ballistic missile, the Kinzhal, and pundits are debating whether this should be read as such a signal or not."
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"'I'm alive': Former Canadian Forces sniper debunks rumours of his death in Ukraine
"I'm pretty much the last person to know about my death" — former CAF sniper 'Wali'"
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/wali-alive-despite-russian-disinformation-1.6393191
""I'm a good sniper," said Wali. "Nothing less, nothing more ... I didn't kill any Russians yet. I help doing so because the sniper is doing a lot of observation, reporting.""
"Ukraine's President Volodymr Zelensky put out a worldwide call for volunteers to join his country's defence — but foreign fighters who don't sign three-year contracts with Ukraine's military aren't protected by international law in the event of capture.
Russia has said that it will treat foreign fighters as mercenaries."
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2 hours ago, John Kettler said:
Vet 0369,
Am surprised at this, for unless a visual is somehow obtained, the RCS on the Raven has to be of the order of less than .01 sq m, likely more like .001 As it happens, that .01 is the number for a Tomahawk nose on. This leaves me wondering how the Tunguska is finding your Ravens. Also, there is a key fact regarding the design requirement for the Tunguska, in terms of the target. Prepare to be shocked, for it's that plane you see, a 1950s vintage Hawker Hunter F6, top speed at altitude M 0.96.
.jpg/600px-Hunter_-_Shuttleworth_Military_Pageant_June_2013_(9187713516).jpg)
As first designed, Tunguska was a guns only weapon system. The SAM was added later to hit attack helicopters which popped up to shoot ATGMs fromn outside gun range. Given the sum total of these realities, how is it the Tunguska is eating up your microscopic in cross section vs that Hawker Hunter F6 and below radar Vmin RQ-11? Since I'm working from first principles and a fair amount of real world AD system knowledge, yet coming up bust, would love for someone to explain to me how a Tunguska can do this? If we were talking Pantsir-S1, would be more inclined to believe this, because one of the weapons the Pantsir-Sa was required to defeat was the US HARM, a vastly smaller and many times faster target than that ancient British bird above. This is because Pantsir-S1 was designed to protect strategic SAM sites (S-300) against standoff attacks by ARMs, standoff missiles and guided bombs. It's wheeled because Tunguska couldn't keep up with the wheeled and rapidly displacing S-300 system. The design story of Tunguska and Pantsir-S1 are both on the excellent ausairpower site.
Regards,
John Kettler
Russian Tunguskas have thermals; can't they just engage drones optically?
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10 hours ago, DesertFox said:
To Berlin ???
Reposting this Russian
Kool-AidTV footage for context - can be understood without knowing Russian. This is what happens if you switch from "war is the continuation of policy through other means" to 'war is sexy': -
10 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:
If I were in charge of establishing Ukrainian counter offensive operations I would do the following:
I am interpreting your idea as a 21st century digitized version of the Chinese short attack in the Korean War. Am I way off?
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Aaron Stein told what's shooting down the TB2s - are you here?
- It's the Su-35:
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Belarus seems to be a 'go' - they've got invasion marking:
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6 minutes ago, womble said:
Corruption still exists, subtle and gross in form, in all societies.
Amen.
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1 hour ago, Doc844 said:
the main reason the allies push across france into germany came to a standstill was because of logistics.
Ditto with Bagration in the East.
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On a lighter note... Can we have tankriders in CMBS? Oh wait!
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Re: Corruption
I had always thought the best strategy for Russia in Ukraine post-Maidan was to wait it out, just as they successfully did after the Orange Revolution. Turns out this was not viable due to organized crime figures losing power. One of the many bad things about kleptocracies is that they have dynamics that defy Realist strategy:
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2 hours ago, BletchleyGeek said:
That somebody implies a threat to start a nuclear war is something sure to attract attention and focus the minds. But to what end?
I agree that the Kremlin (we keep saying 'Putin' as shorthand, but let's remember he isn't running the show all alone) does not want an escalation. But at the same time, they need to come up with answers for a public that was being served the Kool-Aid below (in Russian, but I think anyone can get the point). Therefore, 'escalate to deescalate' is definitely on the table.
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13 hours ago, Phantom Captain said:
Does one truck hold enough ammo to keep a battery going for a day? Two days?
12 hours ago, Combatintman said:Now I have no idea how much 122mm or 152mm a Ural-375 can carry but there will be a gunner out there who can give some sort of answer. I would hazard a minimum of two reloads and of course each 2S1 and 2S3 would have had a turret load of some description.
This expert made calculations for how many 'rounds' of artillery ammo Russian trucks can carry, a 'round' including both the shell and the accompanying charges. He calculated a six ton Ural can carry 40-50 152mm rounds, or some 80 122mm. That may help visualize the battlefield impact of a burnt-out truck wreck, assuming it was carrying ammo to your CM game. Also sobering to see that going from 122 to 152 has a 2x impact on the logistic tail.
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15 hours ago, c3k said:
Using helos to shoot down drones would be incredibly difficult. Helos don't have air-to-air radar. So, finding the drone would be nearly impossible.
Two questions:
1. Wikipedia states that the Ka-52 has both air-to-ground and air-to-air radar, the former in the nose, the latter in the mast. If true, would this make the Ka-52 an exception to your statement?
2. Again, if the above information is correct, is the Ka-52 unique in this regard? Does the Longbow radar not have an air-to-air mode? (I had no luck searching on Google.)
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22 hours ago, LongLeftFlank said:
a Ukrainian field media crew in an earlier posted clip referred to the Russians repeatedly as 'Mosculs' and occasionally 'orcs' (although others reserve that for Chechens). So, that dehumanizing is gonna happen as more blood is shed.
Sadly, true. What struck me specifically with 'ukrop' is that when I first heard the term being used in 2014, it was limited to Ukrainian security forces, as a counterpart to their use of 'separ' for separatists. Extending the use of 'ukrop' to Ukrainian civilians: 1. Doesn't follow the Kremlin's ideology of this war being something like a civil war. 2. Acknowledges that they are fighting a war of aggression. If the soldiers fighting the war are openly expressing their ideology in these terms, this can go to very dark places...
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13 minutes ago, Machor said:
The losses to aircraft, however, have me thinking about all the Russian Ka-52 losses, since the original Ka-50 was supposedly developed by the Soviets as a 'helicopter-killer.'
12 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:I wonder what Russia is using to shoot down the TB2s. Cannon from helicopters might be the most effective? Helicopters have far more control over speed and altitude than a fixed wing aircraft does.
We may be onto something here.
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8 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:
I just heard a first person account of escaping Irpin. I hate to say it, but I didn't hear anything unexpected of the glorious liberators' behavior.
- a squad came into his house and demanded paperwork
- they didn't like what he had to say
- asked him if he had weapons, and he said he had a shotgun. He handed it and the shells over
- they said they decided to kill him. They put in in the kitchen and closed the door
- he heard some discussion on the other side and then a burst of gunfire through the door. He barely didn't get hit
- he ran outside via the back door with arms raised and pleading for them to not shoot him
- the shooter came out, expressed surprise he wasn't dead, then agreed not to kill him
- they went back into the house and directed him to help find all his electronics, money, and valuables. They took all of them, of course
- the squad also took all his alcohol and told them they were going to spend the night because they didn't want to be caught out in the open (fear of Ukrainian artillery)
- they got very drunk and the guy feared that one of them would decide to kill him just for fun
- the guy said that the unit had looted all the neighboring houses and killed any large dogs they found
- in the morning he and small group of other civilians were allowed to leave on foot for Kiev
- they made it to Kiev and he was reunited with his parents
When I first watched this video of Russian soldiers enjoying themselves in a Ukrainian home today I genuinely wondered whether it might be Ukrainian propaganda, but both your post and the details in the WSJ article I linked to yesterday sadly confirm that this is, indeed, the truth. Beyond being an issue of military discipline, I am starting to think Russia has a zoomer problem (And I am aghast at their use of the derogatory 'ukrop' to refer to Ukrainian civilians):
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6 minutes ago, Cobetco said:
a very smart friend informed me that the TB2 moves slowly enough that enough Russian SAM systems have a hard time tracking it.
There has been word out there since its use in Syria that Russian radars mistake it for a flock of birds. I do know that marine life is an issue for sonars; no idea about radars. The losses to aircraft, however, have me thinking about all the Russian Ka-52 losses, since the original Ka-50 was supposedly developed by the Soviets as a 'helicopter-killer.'
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12 hours ago, Haiduk said:
First visually confirmed lost Bayraktar. Kyiv oblast
Interestingly, Aaron Stein leaked intel that most TB2 losses have been to Russian aircraft, not ADS:
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13 hours ago, OldSarge said:
I don't think this has been posted, or at least I didn't see it. Looks like more reinforcements on the way. The question is what good is it if Turkey won't let them into the Black Sea? Perhaps an airlift from Syria?
This is an interesting, and potentially escalatory situation (I am unfortunately out of likes today). Turkey's enforcement of keeping the straits closed would be an unprecedented event: They have only been closed in the past during WW2, but then the German and Italian navies never attempted to enter the Black Sea through the straits.
As the ships appear to be carrying vehicles, an airlift from Syria makes little sense: The same airlift would have been possible from Vladivostok, and much more sensible to send them by rail. I am thinking about two scenarios:
1- The vehicles are reloaded onto civilian ships in Syria. It is not clear to me if Turkey would then still be able to block passage through the straits.
2- This could give Russia its infamous 'escalate to deescalate' card. The ships could steam towards the Dardanelles, with Russia stating that Turkey has to let them through since there has been no declaration of war, that hitting the ships is a casus belli, and that Russia would have the right to retaliate with tactical nukes. This could then force NATO to the negotiating table to pressure Ukraine to cede territories, or at least agree to a ceasefire leading to a frozen war.
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40 minutes ago, billbindc said:
"Ukraine would have to undergo a disarmament process to ensure it wasn't a threat to Russia."
This isn't happening...or at least not in any way that actual disarmament occurs.
25 minutes ago, Cobetco said:its just the way things were worded gave me the impression that the author was thinking Zelensky should take the deal. but that is my mistake to have read it that way, and I suspect upon re-reading that its the turks who are flavoring it that way, not the BBC.
Kalın has lumped 'disarmament' with fluff (called "face-saving elements" in the article). If he's not being outright stupid in doing so, my take is 'disarmament' refers to the drivel Russian news outlets started spewing about Ukraine developing WMDs before the invasion, once things started going south for Russia.
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"Ukraine conflict: Putin lays out his demands in Turkish phone call"
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60785754
TL;DR: He's now ready to settle for Ukraine ceding Crimea and Donbas.
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11 minutes ago, Haiduk said:
(not only in Russia artillery is a god of war)
Jumping on Haiduk's post, it is worth remembering we are witnessing the clash of TWO ex-Soviet armies: Senior Ukrainian officers received the same training as their Russian counterparts. This means they will prioritize two things:
1- Fires
2- Urban defense
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14 hours ago, Bulletpoint said:
I'm sure they are effective against many targets, but so are MANPADs etc. when it comes to low-flying attack aircraft or cruise missiles... these seem to be a bit overkill for those?
Turkish troops in Idlib fired some dozen Stingers at RuAF aircraft in February 2020, only to get bombed by the Russians from medium altitude.
How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?
in Combat Mission Black Sea
Posted
Peskov is saying the same thing as the WOTR article I linked to on the previous page (Plus we get more of the 'Ukraine is Anti-Russia', which I take is derived from the 'Anti-Christ'):