G.I. Joe

Blinken is doing exactly what the US should...showing the world that our side of this war will entertain reasonable talks. That does not in anyway push Ukraine into anything and Ukraine too is doing what they should...showing the world the strength of their resolve. 
Also, there's plenty of discussion of how to end this war behind the scenes and part of that discussion is about whether or not Ukraine really wants or needs the LDR/DNR territories back. The rebuilding program when this is all over is going to be massive and those places will require a lot of it. While the population is going to transfer in part back to Russia if this all collapses, not all will and many will be quite hostile to the Ukrainian government. 
What you are seeing from Ukraine and Blinken is careful positioning. That's all.

This is a very good point.  I am not sure either to be honest.  Some phenomena will be unique to this war; however, some will be part of larger trends - figuring out which is which will be very difficult.
So lets put Ukraine down and move to a peer fight between say US-led west and a large well funded unnamed Asian country.  Keeping the conversation on hardware - I suspect we will see some of the things we have seen in Ukraine on steroids:
- ISR.  Both sides with a column of ISR capability that goes from space to underwater, and thru cyberspace.  This is backed up by an integrated architecture of human/AI pairing that can keep up with the ISR feeds in real-time.  So what?  Surprise is not a thing until someone's ISR is eroded to the point that they actually have blind spots.
- Unmanned.  Both sides are going to field unmanned systems very broadly.  UAVs are going to be layered from the squad to just below space.  UASs will be capable of ISR, however, they will also be autonomous enough to conduct hunter-killer swarm missions.  Very small UAS armed with precision weapons, or self-loitering munitions - the line between will blur capable of swarming and overcoming C-UAS systems.  We would also very likely see UAS v UAS warfare, something we have not seen in this one at all.  UGS will come online and we will see mixed units of manned and unmanned ground systems.  UGS will be out front, manned systems back.  Like UAS, UGS capable of precision strike and ground based self-loitering munitions will come into play - minefields with legs.
- Massed Precision.  The vast majority of weapons on the battlefield will be "smart".  Designed toward 1-weapon = 1-kill, many able to self-target on the fly. Combined with integrated ISR bubbles, this means that any concentrations within the friendly ISR bubble will be seen and killed, most likely over-the-horizon.  Logistics will remain the most vulnerable part of any military system.
- Deep Strike.  Massed precision with very long ranges.  There will be counter-system development but the physics of some of this deep strike technology will be very challenging to counter in the near-mid term. This, again, combined with ISR will mean that each side can see out to hundreds of kms, and hit single vehicles with a single munition. 
Ok, there is likely more, but lets just take these 4...so what?
Land warfare will evolve - how? Is the question.  Some think it will go the way of naval warfare with a heavy core surrounded by a cloud of ISR and unmanned systems.  A land warfare BG will now engage over the horizon first in an ISR/Unmanned edge war until one sides cloud starts to collapse, then more traditional systems will close in and conduct the finish.  The biggest weakness of this approach is logistics: how does one protect logistics lines that stretch hundreds of kms from being seen and hit? 
The other end of the spectrum is to completely disperse and go as light as possible - all lethal cloud, no steel core.  Gives advantages of much harder to see and hit - ISR is getting powerful but spotting a human is still much harder than a hot large vehicle, same will apply to small dispersed unmanned.  Also has a major advantage of a much smaller logistics tail.  Disadvantage, and question mark, is how will it fair against a cloud-armed heavy core?  If the clouds collide and a non-core force manages to defeat the steel-core cloud, will it have enough power to defeat the steel core, or at that point can Deep Strike precision do the job? 
Upscaling into formations, the most likely answer will be a mix of cores.  Some will be "Light Dispersed" - no core beyond some C2 - thru to "Heavy" having traditional steel in the middle that can still move and hit while bringing protection.  Management of Light - Hybrids - Heavy within a larger formation cloud will be the challenge and the roles of each of these capabilities are up for grabs. In the end we might wind up with an optimized one-size but we will have to go through a series of evolutions first.
To my mind Massed Precision+ Deep Strike+ ISR is a wild card combination. It already looks like it can replace elements of airpower out to around 500km with next gen systems.  There is no viable technological counter to a HIMARs-like system, or very long ranged artillery, except "don't be seen or stand next to (but not too close) to a higher priority target".  The ability to beat counter-systems are just too high when the munition is coming in at Mach 2.5 (e.g. smart submunitions). 
Add to this long range self-loitering/self-targeting swarms of unmanned systems of all types and the battlefield is going to get a lot more lethal, at much longer ranges - to the point that all of our current capability will need a re-think.
Finally, none of this accounts for software warfare - information/cyber, human effects etc. And this war has been mind blowing on how far the needle has moved in those directions. 

The Yom Kippur analogy works both ways, though. A successful deep breakthrough that outruns its logistics net (and pre-assault planning) is in great peril from a concerted counter-attack. This was basically the NATO Cold War strategy. 1) DON'T LOSE OUTRIGHT. 2) take back what you lost once the opponent has exhausted themselves. The takeaway is the more successful Ukraine is today the more vulnerable they become tomorrow. At this point we're relying heavily on Russia's inability to put together a proper response.

No. It surpasses the Israelis. The Israelis were able to enjoy air dominance in 1967 and air superiority in the latter stages of 1973. The IDF was also much better equipped.

First, yes about the news headlines. That’s a bit of a headscratcher.
 
But I think you’ve forgotten all the magic that Israel pulled in the 6-Day and Yom Kippur war. Ukrainian‘s offensive is definitely up there in terms of impressiveness, but even that doesn’t quite surpass what the Israelis were able to pull in their wars.

Astounding if not some digital creation and PR making, but real or not, pretty astounding anyway. Congrats to all Ukrainians, this victory must be unparalleled so far.  
 
 

this thread right now:
ukr.mp4    

There seems to be a recurring pattern of people who live safely thousands of kilometers away from Russia telling people who live right next to it how they should feel and what they should do about Russians. People who have no personal experience and aren't (and never will be threatened) in any way chastising people who had to live with Russian terror for generations.
Their "just give Russians another chance" is other people's "our children born this year will face next war Russia starts as teenagers and adults". Sacrificing yourself for your humanist values is fine, but asking other people to sacrifice themselves (and their safety, their lives, their children's lives) for your values, while cushily living far away is very much not fine. It is easy to be a saint in Paradise, but don't put the same standard on those living in Hell.
And moreover, where were all these defenders of human rights when Bucha happened? Where will they be once we see more crimes against humanity in liberated territories? Why is it they always care more about protecting the bullies from vengeance than protecting the bullied from the bullies?
Because it almost feels like I'm hearing some people of the West (not necessarily in this thread, that's why am not quoting anyone) say "let's give Russians few more second changes and it's fine if they murder and rape and torture few hundred thousand Eastern Europeans while getting it right" and it is completely rotten attitude, opposite of being humane as it claims.

Reportedly just before Khakriv offensive.

Site I go to published this today in summary of latest in the war:
"And really, this offensive is truly possible to all those Territorial Defense Force units stuck in trenches up and down the front for the past six months, getting slammed daily, oftentimes feeling abandoned. Their impossible heroism allowed Ukraines regular army units and 300,000 reserves to prepare in the country’s west, while Western allies equipped and trained them in proper war fighting techniques."
While we're feeling good about progress it's good to remember who's months of suffering and deaths made this possible. 
 

T-64BM2, so most likely the 92 OMBr.

I understand what you're getting at, but maybe using 'genocide' in that specific context isn't your best play?
I also feel that stealing land from one country to give it to two others while evicting the legal occupants is probably not a great way to maintain the moral high ground or credibility.
 

Restored Hansa League AKA the EU. Look at the pickled herring all originated from a similar recipe. Trade in peace and play a robust game of soccer. Don't force strong healthy 19-year-old young men to kill each other. 

I'd say it's about bagging lots of RU men & gear.  RU already stretched very thin.  And there's always the collapse possible due to two massive RU pockets being smashed -- both political and military collapse possible.  As Steve always says it's about killing Russians.  I'd prefer they all surrendered (because I'm nice and need them for trading later) plus all that gear UKR gets.

So, again, do not get too focused on the tactical here.  The UA currently looks like it is balancing two simultaneous operations at either end of the front, one in Kharkiv and one at Kherson.  They are seeing gains in both and look like they are balancing resources to each of them...at the same time.  This is by no stretch "basic competence" for any military, to the point that  I highly doubt 3 out of the 5 EYES militaries could pull this off right now without a lot of prep time - and even the UK may be stretching it.
C4ISR, logistics - especially transport, force generation and projection and deep strike are all being coordinated at a high level between these two operations, and they look like they are doing very well.  No more "oh but the Russian's suck" on this one, what the UA is doing is on the upper end of difficult for any military, let alone one that has been in a meat grinder over the summer.  The last time the west did anything even remotely like this was Gulf War (Iraq 03 was a single axis), and we had air supremacy and it still took months to pull off, and we were not being attacked the whole time. 

I am off to bed. Tell me in the morning Izum was liberated. 
 

There is also a shock effect on western sensibilities.  We have not seen a war like this, even from afar, in some time (or at least not one we pay attention to - sorry Yemen).   We are invested in the war, but it does not look like any war we have been in since Vietnam or Korea.  For example, attacking a peer force that is dug in, 5:1 casualties is not crazy at the tactical level in an attack, they are trading lives for results and that is an equation we have simply forgotten.  None of our recent wars, and we had days on them trust me, are anywhere close to this.  In fact if we had an entire platoon wiped out in Iraq of Afghanistan it would have had major political results.  We make the mistake of applying our old metrics to this fight and they do not add up because this is a very different fight.

Guys, can we please all, collectively give @Grigb and @H1nd +1 for these super clear maps and twitter threads.
Grigb, I love how you sometimes do angled views, not just the classic and limited top-down. Highly informative.
Excellent work, sirs.

It is funny how they blame UKR channels but I read mostly RU channels (80%). Almost everything you see here is from them.
Panic started from RU channels due to unexpected UKR attack that resulted in capture of Arsenal - means Balakley is almost encircled. At some point RU channels got directive to shut up and panic changed to statement: there is not panic UKR did not penetrated deep enough, we stopped them.
They are claiming everything is fine

The problem is:
At least UKR recon reached Arsenal UKR reached Yakovlivke at the Volokiy Yar-Balakleya road - RU main supply road RU Nats with links to local troops reports Balaklya is operationally encircled So, the current situation most likely looks like this: UKR controls the majority of Verbovka and contest north of Balaklya including Arsenal, RU control Balarklya itself (south of Arsenal) but they are present only in some parts of Balaklya. Ru still have road to East to escape but the issue is there are rumors UKR reached Savyntsy (actually a few more settlements nearby as well). If true, then RU indeed encircled. 
  

1. Great 'CM Level 5' overview of hasty Russian field fortifications (Snihurivka). No bang bangs, just recce, good quality video, few jump cuts. Scenario design material. 
2. Also, great source material for a future CMBS 'squalor' mod.  If only I had the time, sigh.... 
3. In occupied Ukraine, mine step on YOU! 
4. And at the far opposite end of situational awareness: a Level Zero (Russian) grunt's eye view -- the awful isolation of the battlefield, can't see the enemy, only your squadmates dead and dying....
 
 

Interesting read:
https://energyandcleanair.org/publication/financing-putins-war-fossil-fuel-exports-from-russia-in-the-first-six-months-of-the-invasion-of-ukraine/
Some takeaways:
* During the first six month Russia earned a staggering 158 bln Euros from exporting fossil fuels.
* While EU has drastically decreased pipeline gas imports (whether by forced or by choice) from Russia, revenues did not really suffer because prices have skyrocketed.
* What we really should be looking at is Russian oil exports. They continue with some help from Europe (Greece ships, UK and Norwegian in insurers).
* The top buyers where China, Germany (only 2nd best, again...) and the Netherlands but also Poland is among the top 6 mainly due to oil imports.
* In the long run high prices and unreliable deliveries will probably hurt Russia [but also other fossil fuel exporters] as lots of countries now drastically ramp up their investments in renewables, especially China.

Drone bombers are improving faster than WW1 aircraft it seems. Compare these badboys to the crappy contraptions from few months ago that were dropping handgranedes in bottles. I can't find the link right now, but I saw some Polish project that was  armed with DPICM, this sounds like the perfect weapon for the bomber drones. Oh, and I picked up a new favorite neologism - "Bombodron".

Happy fishing...
 
 

This are words of Buk M1 battery commander Yarosalv Melnyk which was submited to the title Hero of Ukraine. This story as if happened in Kharkiv oblast in first weeks of the war. I doubt this is true, like and a story that oldman shot down Russian jet in Chernihiv with hunting rifle, where it flew over the roof of his house. Though, on the war can be anything and society during the war needs in such type of stories.
Also claimed his battery shot down 11 planes, 2 helicopters, 2 cruise missiles and 2 UAVs. As for me number of shot down planes obviously overestimated. I suppose, most of 236 jets, claimed  as shot down, indeed were decoys or just were "for good statistic". But this usual thing in any war. Each side in Korea, Vietnam, Israel-Arab wars claimed huge number of shot down aircraft and recognized minimal number of own losses. Since phone cameras, social networks and OSINT developmnet we can see more accurate picture