Centurian52

Interesting that you say that. Money is one thing (along with tank and artillery stockpiles) that this war is running down fairly quickly.

I think a Wiesel is best classified as a tankette. Is a tankette a tank if there are no MBTs? I don't know. But I suppose the answer, whatever it is, is probably relevant to whether or not we refer to small, tracked, gun-armed UGVs as "unmanned tanks". My stance on the issue is that some sort of direct-fire asset will continue to be a part of the ground warfare combined arms team. Whether or not that direct-fire asset is called a "tank" remains to be seen.

I'll DM you with my email address so you have a place to send anything you have, but I'll put what I'm looking for out in the open. And if anything you have is the sort of thing that can just be posted as a link on this thread, that's probably better than sending it directly to me (provided that isn't a problem for whatever contact you get the info from). That way other people that may be interested in this period can read it. I'm really not looking for anything specific. In fact the point is that I don't want to leave any part of the war untouched in my studies. That means covering events that occurred before the Russians escalated the war into a full scale invasion in Feb 2022 (I already have masses of sources for post Feb 2022, to the point that it would take me more than a day to go through everything I have for any given day (if no one beats me to it I could probably write a book with all this information (but who am I kidding, someone will probably beat me to it))). The kind of information I'm looking for is basically the same as what we're looking at for the Feb 2022-present period. Which is to say anything tactically, operationally, or strategically significant. What actions took place between which units, when, and with what result (ground gained, casualties), what equipment was present and in what quantities, which settlements were captured by which side and when, any relevant machinations between political figures or people in high command, any overall casualty or vehicle loss estimates for a given period, or anything else in this period you think might be of interest to a military history nerd. For the Russian invasion of Crimea details like where Russian troops were landed, how many were landed, what equipment they landed with, what routes they took to what objectives, any information about any clashes they had with Ukrainian forces in Crimea. How the initial fighting in the Donbass broke out, what battles were fought and what their outcomes were. Once things settled down into low intensity warfare I suppose relevant events would be things like raids or exchanges of artillery fire, and whether they resulted in any casualties or anything else significant. The more granular the better, but a higher level picture would also be appreciated. Haiduk has already provided a bunch of information, mostly on the initial fighting in 2014, which I'm slowly working on translating, but I don't want to just rely on one source. Even if something you provide basically says the same thing as something in what Haiduk provided, that's still useful since it means the two sources are corroborating each other (no one source is ever 100% reliable, but when multiple sources are in agreement you may be on to something).

No, they did not (there is a lot of myth around the Battle of Agincourt, but suffice it to say that the successful employment of archers against knights in one battle did not portend the successful employment of archers against knights in every subsequent battle). Granting it's a bit ambiguous when knights stopped being knights, but they were going strong for at least another century after Agincourt (if a "knight" is "a warrior in service to a lord", then it was the professionalization of armies that rendered knights obsolete), and expensive heavy cavalry of some kind continued to be in use right up to the beginning of the 20th century. Sure, but it's also cheaper than a platoon of infantry. And the machine gun didn't stop cavalry from proving their worth in 1914. At least in the British army, which had a sensible doctrine for how to use cavalry in the early 20th century (they almost always fought dismounted, unless a particularly tempting target for a charge presented itself). The British retreat from Mons would have been a lot more difficult if they didn't have a cavalry rearguard. They were admittedly pretty useless during the static warfare phase from late 1914 to early 1918 (they could still fight just as effectively as infantry, but without contributing mobility they were basically just more expensive infantry). But they proved their value again when mobility was restored in 1918. What killed cavalry once and for all wasn't the machine gun, but the realization (in the interwar period) that mechanized units could perform every mission that a cavalry unit could perform, but better. Pikes were used alongside muskets for centuries (the "pike and shot" era is a fascinating period). They ceased to be of any value when bayonets were invented. The bayonet essentially allowed every last soldier to be both a musketeer and a pikeman, eliminating the need to bifurcate the infantry into two roles. As a side note, though no one reputable has ever told me so, I strongly suspect this is why muskets are so absurdly long by the 18th century (with the butt on the ground, the muzzle will reach up to your shoulder, and with the bayonet attached it will be about as tall or taller than you are). They are specifically designed to be a hybrid firearm/polearm. They are far longer than it makes any sense for a firearm to be, while being well short of the optimal length for a polearm. But they are about the perfect compromise length between a firearm and a polearm. I don't think I strongly disagree with anything in the rest of your post. I think we both agree that the tank isn't dead yet, but it's on the way out the door. I think it's further from the door than you do, and that it's on the way out for different reasons.

That all sounds very truthy. But at no point in time has that ever been how anything works. Anti-tank munitions have always been far cheaper than the tanks they are meant to destroy. If you ever have an anti-tank munition that is more epensive than a tank, you don't have an anti-tank munition. There is a fancy name for this actually. It's the shot exchange problem, and it has been plaguing air defenses throughout this war as they struggle with decisions over whether or not to expend an expensive missile to shoot down a cheap drone (in fact this is the driving factor behind the big comeback that anti-aircraft guns have made, since they can shoot down cheap drones without expending ammunition that is more valuable than the drone). So no, cheap ways of killing tanks do not render tanks obsolete. Cheap ways of killing anything has never rendered anything obsolete. And I should remind everyone that the tank losses in this war are not remotely unprecidented (no one mentioned heavy losses recently, but I think the number of tanks destroyed is a large part of why so many people seem to think the tank is obsolete). Tanks have taken extremely heavy losses in every single conventional war they have ever participated in (I'll admit that they haven't taken heavy losses in many guerilla wars as far as I'm aware). The Isrealis lost around 400 tanks in just the two weeks of the Yom Kippur War. The Germans lost around 25,000 tanks in WW2, with the combined US and British tank losses being about the same, and Soviet tank losses being over 80,000. Yes, this war is an order of magnitude smaller than WW2, but tank losses have also been about an order of magnitude smaller. As far as I can tell tank losses in this war have been about on par with WW2 when you adjust for scale. I think I am in agreement with Steve that what is likely to render tanks obsolete in the near future is gun armed UGVs. The services that a tank provides on the battlefield are still essential. But once something comes along that can do a better job of providing those services, such as a UGV, the tank will no longer be required. So I think once a country somewhere adopts a gun-variant of a UGV the tank will be obsolecent (and fully obsolete once that gun UGV has been produced in sufficient quantities). When that happens it will not be Javelins or Lancets that rendered the tank obsolete, but a better direct-fire asset. Even when UGVs do render manned tanks obsolete, I'm still not sure that it won't be entirely appropriate to think of them as unmanned tanks.

I wonder how many times the tank has to die before it finally dies? Sorry, but I gotta stick up for the tank here. Maybe it is dead, but I haven't been convinced of it yet (of course I also think the battleship took longer to become obsolete than some people, so my opinion may have limited value). From the combat footage I've seen it looks like the tank is still playing a useful role. The Ukrainians still want tanks (I doubt they would want them if they didn't have a use for them). And I still find tanks to be a valuable part of my own forces in CMCW, CMSF2, and CMBS (for what that's worth (even with the war on CM is still one of my biggest windows into what modern warfare is like)). Mechanized maneuver warfare might be dead. But the tank predates mechanized maneuver warfare (armies were building them by the thousands even before the Germans plugged them into a maneuver warfare doctrine). So while there's probably no maneuver warfare without the tank, it doesn't necessarily follow that there is no tank without maneuver warfare. The key thing that the tank provides is direct firepower. It will become obsolete either when direct firepower becomes irrelevant or something else does a better job of providing direct firepower. Perhaps the tank will become obsolete when UGVs start providing armored direct firepower (or maybe we'll just call those "unmanned tanks"). I think technology is moving in that direction, so (assuming that you think of a gun-UGV as something other than just an unmanned tank) the tank's days probably are numbered. But that number hasn't reached zero yet.

I think you're being sarcastic, but honestly a more detailed fire-panning interface would be awesome. Are you sure you're talking to the audience you think you're talking to? Also, based on what we're seeing in this war, obstacles and breaching ops clearly are a requirement. At least if you want something that can accurately simulate warfare. And that is what I want. If it wasn't, I'd be playing Starcraft.

This is very big news if true! But fully cutting off and destroying an entire brigade is so difficult and rare that I'm inclined to be extra cautious before I go around repeating this (of course, that is precisely why it would be such big news). What degree of confidence do we have in this? Are other sources saying the same thing? Are there any competing narratives that are more modest about what has been accomplished here?

I concur. Some more breaching assets in future CM titles and modules is a must (don't hold up anything already in development for breaching assets though, if they weren't already planned (I'm all too aware of the dangers of feature creep)).

Not heresy at all. I'll grant that there seems to be a positive correlation between people who voice doubts about Ukraine's capabilities and people who have trouble following basic etiquette for healthy discourse. And that may have had the unfortunate side effect of giving the impression that this community is hostile to any naysaying towards Ukraine (maybe it is a little). But I believe this community is open to bad news if it can be supported. I'll admit that I've started to have doubts that Ukraine can reach the Sea of Azov this year. The offensive has been going very slowly after all, and they haven't taken anywhere near as much ground as I think most of us had hoped by this point (I don't think I was expecting them to reach the sea in days, but I had certainly expected that they would have reached the sea after three months). But it's easy enough to find counterpoints. First, the offensive isn't a failure until it is over. And I think the Ukrainians can continue to maintain the offensive for a very long time. Part of their slow progress after the first two weeks is due to a deliberate strategy of force preservation and attrition over gaining ground. The weather will slow, but not stop the offensive. Mud is not helpful for any operation. But it is most disruptive to fast paced mechanized maneuvers. It won't be as disruptive to the kind of small, set piece, infantry-centric attacks that Ukraine has been conducting so far. So I think the offensive will be able to continue through the fall and winter, and into 2024. The Sea of Azov is the big objective. I think the offensive can only be considered a complete success if they reach the sea before the offensive culminates. But Tokmak is also a valuable objective, and I think the offensive can be considered a partial success if the Ukrainians manage to take it, or at least cut the rail line that runs through it, even if they don't manage to reach the sea. The offensive can be considered a failure if they don't manage to even take Tokmak. Things could always speed up if the Russians run out of units they can safely strip from other fronts, they suffer a general collapse, if the Ukrainians pick their way through the last of the minefields, or if the Ukrainians shift their strategy back towards rapid advances (say, if they decide that the Russians have been degraded enough). Things have already been moving a bit faster over the last couple of weeks, so its entirely possible that some of this has already started to happen.

I'm very pro-simulation as a learning tool (I really feel that CMAK, CMBN, CMFI, CMRT, and CMFB have given me insights into the tactical level of WW2 that even some fairly reputable WW2 historians lack). But I think there is a right way to do it. For one thing, just any old game won't do. It needs to model reality as closely as possible (it needs to be a good wargame). The number of rules it takes to do a half decent job of modeling reality is probably more than any human player could be reasonably expected to learn or remember, so I really think computer wargames (which can have an almost endless number of rules, all being processed by a CPU instead of a human brain) are the only way to go (it's actually a bit distressing that the US DoD is still relying on tabletop wargames). It also needs to be recognized that even the best game will never do a perfect job of modeling reality (no offense intended, but I could produce a pretty lengthy list of ways in which even Combat Mission falls a bit short of reality). Any attempt to use wargames to learn or develop modern tactics, or predict the course of a modern war, should begin and end with a discussion of all of the ways in which the wargame doesn't quite match reality, and how those deltas might have influenced the outcome. When using wargames as an aid to studying military history, I think they need to be combined with a healthy amount of reading to help identify elements that the wargame may have missed or imperfectly modeled (I really do advocate this approach, since I think you can learn a lot more about different eras of warfare from wargaming + reading than you can from reading alone).

I think we've established that starving the Russians in Crimea isn't an ideal way of defeating them, since that starves the civilians too. In fact it might be worse for the civilians, since the Russians will probably steal food from the civilians before starving themselves. But once Crimea is cut off the Russians won't just be cut off from food resupply, but from ammunition resupply and reinforcements as well. Their ability to resist a determined push will be decidedly finite. It might still come to starving them (if that's what it takes then that's what it takes), but for the sake of keeping civilian suffering to a minimum I don't think that should be plan A.

I assume the constant raiding across the Dnipro is about keeping up a constant pressure, so that the Russians either have to maintain forces to prevent a river crossing or suffer the Ukrainians actually conducting a river crossing. I seriously doubt they have any major river crossing operation planned beyond being ready to conduct an opportunistic crossing if the Russians ever move too many units away. As for an amphibious invasion of Crimea, I don't think it's even on the cards. Amphibious invasions are extremely risky and difficult (complicated to supply and reinforce, and failure could mean the loss of the entire invasion force). Historically they are only conducted when success is virtually guaranteed. Air and naval superiority are also generally considered prerequisites for any amphibious invasion.

No one wants peace more than an invader. Invasions would go so much more smoothly if people just stopped defending themselves.

Hmmm, this is the first time I've caught a tournament announcement while signups were still open. Having never fought a human opponent before, I expect to do poorly. It should be fun nonetheless.

I don't think economic blackmail would be particularly effective. They already tried withholding gas in the winter of 2022/2023, and it didn't work. For all the natural resources they have to sell, the outside world just isn't as dependent on Russia as Russia is on the outside world (and the countries that buy the most Russian resources aren't the ones that Russia would want to escalate against). While the Russian economy is in a downward spiral, there isn't really any such thing as rock bottom (at least until we're talking about going back to the literal stone age). So they can still do more harm to themselves than they do to anyone else. However far their economy is on track to crash, it is always possible for it to crash further. However bad things are likely do get for Russia if they don't completely cut off exports, they will be tangibly worse if they do cut off exports. There is a big difference between their economy crashing back to the 19th century C.E. and it crashing back to the 19th century B.C.E.

I think he meant what can they do as far as escalation. And I think when it comes to escalation the only things they can do are exactly what The_Capt said. They can mobilize, and they can go nuclear. I think mobilization (at least another partial mobilization, if not full mobilization) is only a matter of time regardless what the west does, simply because they will eventually have no choice. So it's not really a viable "we'll do this in response to something you do" sort of escalation. And going nuclear means WW3 by definition, which they definitely don't want any more than we do, so it's not really credible. So I think the reality is that they have precisely zero escalation options.

Are those Leopards among the 135 Leopard 1s that Oryx lists as already pledged?

deleted, as interesting as some of these sidebars can be I should probably stop getting so off topic

Special military operations?

My own feeling on the soldier/warrior discussion is that I always felt that "soldier" felt more professional. Both warriors and soldiers do more or less the same thing. But a "soldier" is a member of a formalized organization, called an army. Political units which don't have formal armies fight their wars with warriors, not soldiers. This is not to say that a soldier is necessarily better than a warrior (you could conceivably frame it as meaning either that a soldier is more professional than a warrior, or as meaning that a warrior is freer than a soldier). I mean nothing further than: Soldier: Member of a formal organization Warrior: Not a member of a formal organization

We won't know for certain until we send some test subjects* for some long duration experiments. But my feeling is that a mix of bioforming and clever habitat design may be necessary. *colloquially known as "astronauts".

Not just Prussian (German by this point) regulations. This is how every army worked pre-WW1. And it's mainly about maintaining command and control. There are no radios or modern NCO corps yet, and no one can shout loud enough for orders to be heard along the entire length of a company or even platoon that has deployed into skirmish line (squads exist at this point in time, but they aren't independent maneuver elements yet). And it isn't really considered possible to change direction while in skirmish line (you can try to make a company sized skirmish line turn, but it's gonna be ugly (just imagine 200 men in an extended order line trying to conduct a 90 (or 45, or any number) degree turn, especially when no one on the flanks as even heard the order)). So you march to your start line for the attack in close order, get faced in the right direction, and then deploy into skirmish line to conduct the attack. Once a unit has deployed into skirmish line they can only move forward. Once they have made contact with the enemy they are now the "firing line" and the higher level commander has effectively lost all command and control over that unit until it has finished its attack. So the only further influence the commander has over the battle is in committing reserves to the firing line. Those reserves may be held back behind the next terrain feature in close order, or following a few hundred meters behind (in close order if it is considered safe enough, or in extended order if enough fire is still reaching them). It is considered preferable to commit the reserves to the flank of the existing firing line, making it longer and preventing units from getting mixed up. But the limited frontages available for the attack usually meant that it was more practical to merge the reserves into the existing firing line from behind. The downside to merging the reserves in behind the existing firing line is that there is no way to prevent the units from getting mixed up. After the attack is completed everyone needs to be called back into close order so they can be reorganized and reoriented for their next orders. I conceptualize it as being pretty similar to how we use mechanized infantry (can the order get any closer than being crowded into the back of an armored vehicle?). Only "move mounted and fight dismounted" becomes "move in close order and fight in extended order". But, while in theory you should always fight in extended order, in practice a unit moving in close order may get surprised, or a commander trying to keep his unit controllable "just that little bit longer" may misjudge how far it is safe to stay in close order. Everyone with any sense (and not everyone had any sense) has figured out by this point in time that units are extremely vulnerable to fire while they are in close order, so should always be shaken out into extended order before making contact. But no one has figured out a system of command and control that can entirely dispense with close order formations just yet. I think the problem was that existing maneuver elements were just too big to be controllable or maneuverable while in extended order. Light machineguns will give squads enough firepower to be a useful maneuver element (10 men with bolt action rifles can't really generate enough firepower on their own to be useful), and the forging of a modern NCO corps gives armies a high enough density of leaders to make squads useable maneuver elements. Once the squad has become a useable maneuver element you finally have a formation that is small enough to easily change direction and hear the shouted commands of its leader while in extended order. But I digress. There is a whole other thread for this.

Yeah that's a fair point. The US military may or may not be intended for defense. But it certainly isn't for self defense.

Those numbers seem plausible. 15-20% is an embarrassingly high number of T-55/T62s.