Huba

According to Reznikov, training already started on the Leopard 2. Kinda reinforces the point I made in my post just above - Leo2 is a go, just obfuscated from public opinion's view. As noted in one of the comments, this very well might be going on for some time already, same as with the new "Polish" brigade that is to be deployed in March.

So my take on all of this: - Scholz got his "win" - no Leopards are declared now, but.. - Germany started doing inventory and checking what can be sent (meaning actually starting preparations) - countries participating in Ringtausch agreed to send their new Leo2 and delay deliveries - training on Leo2 is officially starting - talk of PL donating more vehicles to be replaced with M1s - Scholz will announce his final decision sometimes in near future In my opinion it means that the decision to send Leopards was already made. All the preparations are starting. Official announcement will be made later - it allows Scholz to have his little "victory", while in the same time it does not slow down the progress on delivery very much. Reportedly Ukrainians are also about to start training on the Chally2 - I bet that when it comes to actually sending them, there will be already more pledged, to form a fully functional battalion or two. Basically the frog is still being slowly boiled, we are just pretending Germany is not participating in it yet.

Poland still has (had) one battery in service and it reportedly was sent too. I asked about it specifically and it seems that there's a consensus about it being given away . I'd think that in time of mobilization you guys might've found these specialist, even if they are a bit on the older side now. Still would be useful as an area denial weapon vs potential high altitude intrusions; just turning on the radar should put a fear of god in these A-50s hanging near the border.

That is a very good point and you're probably right. I meant that there was no official info about what guns are these going to be. And harsh words, that we have a plenty Up to this point the (semi-)official plan was to retain the Leo2 for another decade. Apart from one "Mini US Army" division, there are 4 more to fill with equipment, and only then the Leo2 could be retired. This seems to be already changing, and M1s are also to be operated by another division, the new one that is to be freshly raised. This implies that there's intent to obtain more M1s than the already purchased 316. The Dutch announced that they will be willing to pay for the Leo2 sent to Ukraine - so the opportunity presents itself. It would mean gutting our two best armored brigades, and I guess dislocation of additional NATO troops in Poland would be in order, but might happen IMO.

What we know about PT91s: - Yermak thanked Poland on Twitter for sending some - At the same time, there were some photos of these on a train - Rumors that 30 -60 were sent And to my best recollection that is it. There were no pictures of them in combat, or even in Ukraine. Reasonable assumptions is that there's some training going on, perhaps UA might field a combat-ready battalion now, but more likely they are training more tankers anticipating transfer of the whole PL fleet. I doubt though that this will happen now, more likely the new brigade Poland is funding will operate freshly refurbished T-72s, there should be a hundred or two left, though in very poor condition. The accompanying IFVs will obviously be BMP-1, there is still a lot more of these around. The guns might be 2S1, but there might be another Krab battalion ready as well. Also I guess that we'll be transferring the whole brigade equipment with support vehicles, trucks etc, basically everything the Ukrainians were training with. Btw, one guy from the twitter military community gathered all the available info about Polish donations up to this point: https://twitter.com/sjanus_pl/status/1616431410121961474

Back to news. The Dutch are definitely on the roll today:

https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1616481025982332943?t=tQL8tx8nFvkBmnvXkKC9Bw&s=19

In other news, reportedly France is training Ukrainian JTACs - the French "Air and Cosmos" reports this as a fact. They also suggest that there might be pilot training going on in France. What it means is that there's a coordinated, NATO-wide effort to provide Ukrainians with Air Force, and it is quite comprehensive - not only directed at plugging the gaps, but being a new across-the-board new capability.

Fact is that doing the actual right thing, and German-bashing for the sake of scoring votes is so much intertwined in Morawiecki's actions that he might perceive it as one. Playing hardball the way it was done here is not the most constructive, but both increases the pressure on DE and appeals to people's emotions and certainly wins him more supporters than opponents at the moment. And it's a calculated risk, cause in practice the chance that DE will not budge and block deliveries from other countries is minimal. If it came to Poland going alone, there might be some options to make it work too - for one, other countries might follow, which would be a catastrophe for DE. Or PL might send say a whole battalion, asking other countries to step up with military presence in PL, again shaming Germany. It is a very good blackmailing scheme - if DE won't submit, it will be painted as the bad guy and Morawiecki as uncompromising leader. If it budges, it's thanks to Morawiecki putting pressure. Given that he doesn't really care about good political relations with DE, this course of action was a fruit hung very low by Scholz himself.

And one more news before the Ramstein meeting starts 1 hour from now. $400M is a lot of money, and Finland has a lot of artillery: Archer is impressive, but RCH155, even though quite goofy-looking, takes CB avoidance to another level. Fire on the move sound's like the next logical steps for SPGs. I guess it might add a bit to the rounds dispersion at range, but for guided rounds this shouldn't be an issue:

Dunno, there are other security risks to consider:

Finally!

That's kinda disappointing... OTOH imGLSDB can be hiding under "HIMARS ammunition" entry, it has to be produced anyway and it will take time. Question is, was it ordered?

This might be a great opportunity to make the Ringtausch (spelling?) sxheme really work. I bet many states would be willing to commit much more with perspective of getting replacements cheaply, say partially by through EU funding. NL seems to be willing to finance some Leo2 purchases as well. I guess the scheme could be also applicable to Leo1, maybe Greeks would be willing to chip in that way, they have a huge stock. And RM/ KMW would be over the moon In any case, fingers crossed!

Have all of that in PL. Well, registering the company gotta be done by website, not app, but I carry all my documents in digital form; only banks and few other institutions require physical documents. There's two level verification and what not ( where it's needed) , I never heard about any security issues with the system. Since some time we are also not required to carry any car related documents - traffic cops get the registration/ insurance info from the database and your license data based on personal ID number or name and date of birth. May sound Orwellian to an American I guess, but it's really really convenient. In other news, it seems the tank debate will be solved soon: He also added that DE decision regarding their own vehicles will be dine in upcoming days. IMO they will allow both transfer from other countries, and will join too.

I dare anyone here to try to pronounce "Żądło"

If Scholz finally says "Nein!" tomorrow, I wonder if Morawiecki will follow with his promise to act unilaterally. I'd say it would be much funnier if we didn't say nothing, and denied that the Leopards that appeared in Ukraine are ours - after all, you can buy these in any tank shop, right?

Here's a zoomed-in vid: And picture of Pantsir on another building, with distinct Flakturm feel. I was mistaken regarding apartment blocks, these are reportedly all on public buildings, a much more sensible approach.

I read somewhere that the reason are the new 1000km ranged Ukrainian Shahed analogs that they supposedly just finished testing and are about to mass produce. IMO something hitting Moscow will happen at one point, though it won't be anything West produced. But as a bargaining chip for future negotiations it makes a lot of sense.

Poland will send... modernized S-60 guns and ammunition Hopefully there will be more, but you never know. In a confidence-inspiring move, Russians are mounting Pantsirs on Moscow apartment blocks:

More pledges: Latvia: - 2 Mi-17 choppers - 10 Stinger launchers and missiles - small arms - will train 2000 soldiers Lithuania: - also 2 Mi-17 -"dozens" Bofors L70 guns

19 CAESARs that were scheduled to be delivered to Denmark in upcoming months will be diverted to Ukraine. And more Brimistones from the UK:

In this particular context the whole supply part of the equation is on the side of country providing the vehicles and their own supply chains and stocks. I'd think that getting the stuff from Rzeszów to the unit fighting in Ukraine is rather easy compared to that.

I have no idea, for sure it wasn't advertised by our gov. I guess the discussion is being waged through media at this point, and making formal request will happen only when understanding is reached. Filing formal request might very well mean that it is formally denied, an outcome nobody would really want. Also sorry for spamming memes, but this debacle results in a lot of hilarity popping up:

The press conference of our MoD is on. For now: - German bashing - Russia bashing - confirmed work on creating Leo2 coalition - and that's it. Kinda weird, it was being spun as something important. Disappointing.