Huba

True? 
Hopefully. 

Please make it happen. 🙂
 
 
 

In other news
Nesmyan (RU civilian Girkin) comment
War is going according to the plan. Western sanctions do not work.

Meanwhile UKR colleague of Mashovets reports that RU become active along the whole front and are not planning to make operational pause after capture of Avdiivka.
It certainly looks like The main battle started just now.

6. Kill them all. 🧐
Forgot the most important one. 

Great post. Really lifts my spirit. Thanks for that.

Few reports about real effectives of RU drones
RU Nat January 18
 
Another RU Nat
 
RU greatly exaggerates the success of its FPV drone program.

Russian propaganda claim it hit with Iskander grouping of soldiers in Selidovo proving grounds several days ago, killing hundreds of soldiers concentrated there for Avdiivka counterattack.
https://t.me/voynareal/83768
UAF gave dementi, but some Ukrainian tg's indeed write there are military victims, aside from civilians.

IMO most important parts:
"This has led to significant increases in production output. For example, Russia is delivering approximately 1,500 tanks to its forces per year along with approximately 3,000 armoured fighting vehicles of various types. Russian missile production has similarly increased. At the beginning of 2023, for instance, Russian production of Iskandr 9M723 ballistic missiles was six per month, with available missile stocks of 50 munitions."
"Of the tanks and other armoured fighting vehicles, for example, approximately 80% are not new production but are instead refurbished and modernised from Russian war stocks. The number of systems held in storage means that while Russia can maintain a consistent output through 2024, it will begin to find that vehicles require deeper refurbishment through 2025, and by 2026 it will have exhausted most of the available stocks."
"Perhaps the most serious limitation for Russia, however, is ammunition manufacture. In order to achieve its aspiration to make significant territorial gains in 2025, the Russian Ministry of Defence (MoD) has assessed an industrial requirement to manufacture or source approximately 4 million 152mm and 1.6 million 122mm artillery shells in 2024. Russian industry has reported to the MoD that it expects to increase 152mm production from around 1 million rounds in 2023 to 1.3 million rounds over the course of 2024, and to only produce 800,000 122mm rounds over the same period. Moreover, the Russian MoD does not believe it can significantly raise production in subsequent years,"
"This means that to properly resource the armed forces, Russia must – in the short term – further draw down its remaining 3 million rounds of stored ammunition, though much of this is in poor condition. To further compensate for shortages, Russia has signed supply and production contracts with Belarus, Iran, North Korea and Syria, with the latter only able to provide forged shell casings rather than complete shells. Although the injection of around 2 million 122mm rounds from North Korea will help Russia in 2024, it will not compensate for a significant shortfall in available 152mm"
"The Russian theory of victory is plausible if Ukraine's international partners fail to properly resource the AFU. However, if Ukraine's partners continue to provide sufficient ammunition and training support to the AFU to enable the blunting of Russian attacks in 2024, then Russia is unlikely to achieve significant gains in 2025. If Russia lacks the prospect of gains in 2025, given its inability to improve force quality for offensive operations, then it follows that it will struggle to force Kyiv to capitulate by 2026. Beyond 2026, attrition of systems will begin to materially degrade Russian combat power, while Russian industry could be disrupted sufficiently by that point, making Russia's prospects decline over time."

We critically need F-16. Problem of KABs have been becoming more and more dangerous month by month
This serviceman writes from Novomykhailivka, where Russian intensivley attack and drop many gliding bombs:
For the hour 17 KABs impacted, and I more and more looking for F-16 on the horizon 
Autumn photo of Novomykhailivka with two gliding bomb craters
The same serviceman: "Then [in Autumn] about 30 KAB were arriving for a day. More than 200+ bombs were dropped. No one di...k can't sit there. Two years Russians have been grinding it, the cities have fall, but Novomykhailivla still stood"

This is article of UKR OSINT group "Information resistance" (alas in UKR only) about number of KAB usage by Russians: https://sprotyv.info/analitica/taktichna-aviacziya-rf-rekordno-zbilshila-vikoristannya-kabiv/
According their information November of 2023 became a record month of KAB strikes - 1200 and one day - Nov 25th had daily record - 120 KABs. 
For the 10 day of February 2024 Russians aviation already dropped 460 gliding bombs. And this month can beat the previous record. Despite Russian gliding bombs don't have the same precisiosn like JDAM, but their quantity already turning to quality and our troops feel this on their own. 
Russian industry produce up to 50 gliding kits per day for FAB equipping. France is going to give us 50 AASM per month. Feel a difference...
The quantity of US JDAMs likely was also in dozens of bombs. And all they already dropped.  
 

Situation in northern part of Avdiivka became critical. Russians captured transport depo and now try to breakthrough to railway station (SE) and strongpoint around cafe "Brevno" (NW, yellow mark), guarding coke plant from the south.
General Tarnavskyi, commander OTUV "Tavria" wrote "we strenghthe the lines to hold back the enemy" - so no any words about withdrawal. If no happen something miraculous, Russians have all chances to cut Avdiivka on two parts and to block the coke plant.  
 

Usually I ignore most of articles in WP/ NT about Ukraine, because many of them had been written by authors, who worked in Russia or had any relations with Russia and this is not journalistic, but sort of influence on public opinion and to sow scepticism. 
But this is article, despite had been written by "anonimous sources among UKR battalion and company commanders" (if I see "anononimous source", this is 50/50 BS) in whole reflects probably more significant problem, than artillery sjells shortage - the crictical lack of pesonnel in "line units" - those who hold positions and should go forward. Problems with mobilisation and failed information policy of the state in this sector led to army receive too few replenishment. And many of infantry, who come from Ukrainian tarining centers have very weak training. (My addition - existing 151st training center, established by volunteers and saved in endless wars with old soviet dumbs top brass from GS anD MoD gives very food training, but can't reterain more that 2-3 batatlions for one cycle)
In conditions, when units have 30-40 % of personnel, which have no normal rest, we can't think about any offensives, And if this not be solved in short perspective, this with addition of probable US aid termination can lead to very bad consequences
   https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/02/08/ukraine-soldiers-shortage-infantry-russia/

There are some key systems that are only available from the USA. Some of these are: HIMARS/M270 munitions, Patrioit intercepters, AMRAAM/AIM-9(airToAir&GroundToAir) ...
Even if Europe made the decisions to invest in own production it could take a decade and would in many cases make very little sense. Of course it is important for Europe to raise its production capacity and it is already doing it, but there is the transitional period with the long "lead times" and some systems will never be made in Europe. 
Lets make the hypothetical example that Europe had weapons available 5% of Ukraines needs and USA had 1000% available of Ukraines needs. Would it not make sense for the weapons come from the USA with cost split fairly between Europe and the USA?

This is very sad, but looks like Avdiivka battle comes to the end and, alas, not in our favor (not counting about two divisional vehicle sets, which Russians lost here). 
During last three days Russians captured quarry area on the NE of the town and gained foothold in dachas and first streets of northern part of Avdiivka. Yesterday they broke through overpass bridge in front of coke plant. Also reportedly for last two days Russians dropped on Avdiivka about week amout of gliding bombs. 
110th mech.brigade, defending the town itself is completely exhausted, drone operators almost don't sleep by days - FPV attacks and Mavicks maintaining resistance in conditions of artillery shells shortage. But bad weather in last days limited their flights and this immediately gave opportunity to the enemy, having overhelming advantage in manpower. Russians continuously replenish own troops with fresh meat, they go forward, die and next meat come behind of them, death conveyor is working, but Russians achive own goals in this way. 
Our artillery near Avdiivka keep almost full silence already four days - no shells. So 110th brigade command moved to positions as riflemen almost all rear services soldiers, because no more opportunity except FPVs and contact clashes to hold this horde. 
But not only ammunition shortage led to this situation. 
- OTUV "Tavria" command (gen.Tarnavskyi) again repeated all mistakes of Bakhmut defense. Expecting that Russians will assault stronpoints (like factories in Bakhmut and coke plant in Avdiivka) directly, when they use enough flexible tactic and after first fails attacked on flanks, made many bogus small assaults to confuse about real attack directions
- passivity of OTUV "Tavria" comamnd, as far as before October, when Russians recently captured Krasnohorivka and began to fill this northern "balcony" above Avdiivka with troops. 
- no reserve fortifications on flanks of Avdiivka. Only when Russians crossed railways, we started to establish some positions, but in conditions of unstable weather when frosts change themeselves with rains and mud it was belated idea
- manpower lack and fatigue. 110th brigade two years fights in this place and never was rotated for rest in full composition. Other units, who were moved here from Zaporizhzhia front also weren't rested and replenished after summer clashes, when Russians continously were replenishing own units. 
- weak air defense capabilities. For whole Avdiivka battle Russians lost only one aircraft. 
The map of northern part of Avdiivka for 5-6th of Feb. Avdiivka is on 90 % is private 1-2 storey cottages, only on the south east from coke plant there is small "Khimic" ("Chemestrian") micro-district with multistorey urban type buildings for coke plant employees. These are so-called "Old Avdiivka" and "New Avdiivka"
 

Ok so let's end all this horsesh#t.  The great thing about the US is that they put everything out to the public.  No other nation on earth is as transparent.  So here is what Miller actually said:
https://www.state.gov/briefings/department-press-briefing-january-4-2024/
First as to "no more money"
"QUESTION: Thank you. Let’s discuss Ukraine a little bit. How long will the latest package that you guys have sent already in December will give operations until they run out of funding again?
MR MILLER: I will let Ukraine speak to that because that pertains to – and my colleagues at the Pentagon may have some additional insight to offer on this. But ultimately, that’s a question to Ukraine to speak to because it goes to their rate of expenditure and other really military questions.
But I will say that we do need Congress to act. We are out of funding here. We know that we need to continue to support Ukraine. They need – they rely on this assistance. They rely on it to continue to fight what is a brutal Russian assault that continues, even over the – that continues every day. And so it’s important for Congress to act to continue to fund this democracy that is continuing to defend itself."
That is all about pushing Congress to act.  Inside DC baseball, not a US intent to cut off all funding.
As to current state of the war:
"QUESTION: And would you say that, given the latest developments, that the war is turning in Russia’s favor?
MR MILLER: No, I wouldn’t say that at all. I think people forget oftentimes the actual stakes of this war and what Vladimir Putin’s actual goal was, and what Ukraine has actually achieved and what it continues to achieve. Remember that Putin launched this as a war of total conquest where he wanted to take over Ukraine. He wanted to throw the government out of power. He wanted to subsume Ukraine inside Russia. Not only was Ukraine able to prevent that from happening, which everyone sort of takes for granted now but it was very not – it was very much not a settled question at the start of this war – they have managed to retake around half of the territory that Russia seized in the opening weeks of the war.
And even in the past few weeks, they continue to make battlefield gains. Remember the – over the last summer we were talking about the difficulty when Russia pulled out of the Black Sea Grain Initiative, and it looked like Ukraine wasn’t going to be able to continue to export grain. Well, because of advances that Ukraine made to open a Black Sea lane and expel the Russian fleet from certain parts of the Black Sea, they are now able to continue to export grain, which is critical to their economy.
So there are going to be battlefield developments back and forth, where you see each side gaining or losing territory. But when you look at the ultimate stakes of this war, it’s quite clear that Ukraine is going to exit this war independent, strong, with an improved economy, and looking west when what Russia wanted at the outset was not just a Ukraine that was looking east but Ukraine that was actually part of Russia."
Boy this sounds familiar...because some on this thread have been saying it all along.
And as to the statement that has some people running around like the panicky idiot in a bad plane crash movie:
"QUESTION: As long as it takes?
MR MILLER: As long as it takes. That does not mean that we are going to continue to support them at the same level of military funding that we did in 2022 and 2023. We don’t think that should be necessary because the goal is to ultimately transition Ukraine – to use the language that you repeated back – to stand on its own feet and to help Ukraine build its own industrial base and its own military industrial base so it can both finance and build and acquire munitions on its own. But we are not there yet, and that is why it is so critical that Congress pass the supplemental funding bill, because we are not yet at the point where Ukraine can defend itself just based on its own. And it’s why that it continues to be important for Congress to support Ukraine and continues to be important for our European allies and others throughout the world to support Ukraine."
From a State Dept talking head no less.
Oh, ya that totally says that "Ukraine is totally cut off and will have to build its own tanks from here on out."  You know we should totally freak out now and point to every Russian leg twitch as a major victory, while screaming "Ukraine is doomed!!" From the heights of the thread.
So "yes" I am saying the US will backstop a Ukrainian MIC as it plans for a transition away from tactical handouts to long term strategic sustainment...just like they did in South Korea.  But hey you wanna be "soundbite panic guy" on the thread, go right ahead.  
 

Main workhorse and concern are still 155 mm shells, PGM or dumb. Would be difficult to produce them in Ukraine only, in mass. Even if placed underground, Russians would find a way to bomb these facilities.
Workshops and startups for drones are already working in neighbour countries, but they not formally part of traditionally understood MIC.

I don't mean anyone specifically. But looking at elections predictions (shaky as they are) still says a lot about the pro-Russianess of it all. This is telling:

I am waiting for more predictions for elections in my country, I assume they will be no less horrible. We got like half a million Ukrainians more than we had before the war - which is a lot for 10 million country, though not that much compared to, say, Poland - but the populists and fascists are already using it heavily.

More on this here => 
 
Ignore the click-baity title of the vid. It's a reasonably informative take. According to this guy the problems with the delivery are caused by
1. Currency. The agreement was that India would pay half with Chinese yuan and half with the UAE dirham for the Russian oil. The Indian Govt. was reluctant to use yuan, and now the UAE banks are reluctant to provide dirham because they are concerned that the deals are in breach with of the oil price sanction and they don't want to face secondary sanctions  
2. Russia has increased prices of its oil to above $60 a barrel while Iraq has reduced its price to around the same. Therefore for India, it's less risky to buy the Iraqi oil
3. Clampdown on sanctions. Some of the ships have cargoes that are above the $60 a barrel sanction cost and the Indian ports 
Seems a reasonably solid explanation and he does by and large provide sources. Russia rather desperately needs this money. Their economy is under considerable strain and their rainy day fund won't last forever. Income down, expenditure up and diminishing reserves can't last forever or even very long in a war of this intensity. Especially if they splurge 100s of millions of dollars in missiles on non-military targets. That said, economies are resilient and these conditions can take years and years to have a decisive impact.
This is obviously a land-centric wargaming forum and that's what we are mainly interested in but the economic stuff is really, really important. 

This doesn’t surprise me at all. During the Vietnam Conflict, the “Tail-gunner Joe” idiots convinced the U.S. political and military leaders that North Vietnam would ask the Chinese to help them. Unfortunately, the closed minded fools never bothered to consider the history of the region. The Vietnamese had relatively recently (about 100 years earlier) evicted China from Indochina after about 1,000 years of Chinese domination. Within just a few years after the U.S. withdrew its forces, China began hostilities on Vietnam’s northern border.
Really powerful and influential positions and military who failed to learn the history of the region.

This leads too far away from the topic, but I dare to make this one post before the mods and admins rightfully punish me.
In both the fields of psychology and sociology, research shows quite reliably that (Western) conservatives are more likely to go with their "gut feeling", they value personal experience (empiricism) more than abstract thinking (rationality), they are more invested in their close social surroundings than general principles, they tend to have stronger stress responses to perceived challenges etc. These psychometrics form a pattern.
This type of human* has its place and likely had an evolutionary beneficial function in our society, but the problem is that the modern age is increasingy confronting us with problems in which the characteristics and qualities of the Homo Conservatus do not help as much anymore. E.g. instead of tribal conflict over a wild fruit orchard or keeping social cohesion in the village during winter famines, we now have "post-normal", abstract problems like climate change, global macroeconomics, and intercultural exchange on an unprecedented scale. None of these processes favour an empiric approach to their understanding, but populist slogans on the other hand are basically designed to exploit the emotional vulnerabilities people have based on their "lived experience", and those who favor lived experiences over abstract knowledge tend to be conservatives.
*type of human =/= an unchanging group here, but a number of humans as a sub-group of all humans at a given time. Generally humans change their political preferences over time through environmental factors, aging, and personal experiences etc. whatever affects our hormonal and neural make-up, which are the things which give us political preferences in the first place (no matter which side of the political spectrum someone is from).

Hey politics day. Well for my two cents.

According to the oh so helpful political campus and my lifelong voting record I'm a conservative. No way around it the truth is more than enough people with right wing views seem to have accepted the idea that Putin is not so bad, or Ukraine is not our problem. I think a lot of them think this way because they believe that our society is deteriorating, and Russia represents true traditional Christian values or whatever. Thing is Russia is basically just a mafia state. Some just don't like how much this war costs.

Well, that being said some folks on the left read "tankies" also give Russia a pass, because they still like Russia as it is a successor to the Soviet Union and they still think the Soviet Union is a force for good...Lets ask some of our friends from central and eastern Europe about that.

Anyway, I think the North American conservative movement needs more guys like Mitt Romney and Steven Harper as far as their understanding of the threat that Putin presents. As far as Russia goes, I think both of those guys would feel right at home on this forum.

What I always loved about this place is we have liberals and conservatives uniting to oppose an unjust war of aggression by a nation ruled by a man that we know is not our friend. 

Alright now that I said that I will go back to posting cool videos from Twitter. 🙂

In light of latest discussions about Russian replenishment equipment capabilities, it is worth to paste here Wolski's (one of PL analitics) post about tank production of both sides. Roughly translated but you can get the idea:
Yesterday, there was a discussion about what she posted in Le Monde by [...].
. The article mentions 600 tanks A YEAR in UWZ (T-72/90 family) and Omsk (T-80) And yes, it is possible. But not as the production of new machines, but as the production of new ones, the restoration of old ones and the renovation of shot machines recovered from the battlefield. After the collapse of the USSR at peace, in the best years UWZ could produce about 250 - 300 T-90S/T-90A tanks, where the main limit was the availability of W92 and W92S2, then - here there was a limit of about 250 tanks per year, and in 2A46M5 barrels with a bayonet connector which are incompatible with older guns 🙂 Oska built about 60 T-80BWM per year.
Is it possible to double production on a war footing? In theory, in practice it didn't work out very well for the Russians. Otherwise, we would be talking about 1k+ machines delivered this year to MO FR together with renovated vehicles. And so we write "only" about the delivery of 600 tanks in 2023, including refurbished vehicles. Of course, La Monde forgot about Chita and other factories where the T-62M is currently manufactured using components from North Korea. It was planned to deliver 260-280 vehicles this year, but production, or rather reconstruction at the factory, is to be completed by about 130 tanks, and the target capacity will be achieved next year. As a result, we are talking about the fact that the Russian Armed Forces will receive about 700 tanks this year - new tanks, restored from warehouses and renovated after evacuation from the battlefield. The Russians have so far lost about 2,500 tanks in the war, and as you can see, within a year they managed to regain about 25-27% of the loss they suffered. This does not mean that they will be able to make up for all the losses by 2026 - for example, the process of restoring machines from warehouses is non-linear - in 2024 there will be a peak in capacity and then the pool of machines (capable of doing so) will begin to run out. Therefore, RUS is trying to expand the production of UWZ and Omsk because they know that from 2025 they will have to rely mainly on new tanks in the process of reproducing combat losses of armored weapons.
Personally, I estimate that in 2024, the RUS will be able to incorporate about 1,000-1,200 tanks of all categories into the Russian Armed Forces (new, recovered from warehouses, repaired after evacuation from the battlefield). Well, what does it look like in Ukraine? Ukrainians repair about 30 tanks a month recovered from the battlefield OUTSIDE Ukraine. Which is approximately 360 recovered machines per year. From T-64BW, for which there are no components, through T-72M1 to Leopard 2. Deliveries of new machines in 2023 and those contracted until the end of the year (including Leopard 2 and Abrams) will make up for the irretrievable losses from this year, including those from the failed offensive. Perhaps even slightly positive at the end of the year. Of course, this is only possible because Poland has donated over 350 machines to the UA in less than two years. And we can give another hundred (PT-91). But so far, the cars renovated in Ukraine + delivered by the West this year give a value approximately equal to the Russian 600-700 cars 🙂 Yes, you read that right. Please make a note of this.
However, we have an elephant in the room here, which I have been writing about since November 2022 - the pool of Western machines that can be delivered is a finite value, and this year is only "saved" by surprisingly low UA irreversible losses. Unfortunately, the year 2024 will see an almost double increase in the reconstruction capacity of RUS and a significant decrease in the reconstruction capacity of UA (by over 1/3, how much more - it is debatable). However, what does the ANNUAL production capacity look like in the "West"? South Korea: 40 to 80 K2 (confirmed closer to 40) Israel: up to 100 Merkavs and Namers (approximately) Germany: 25-30 Leopard 2A7V USA: 180 in one shift in LIMA 🙂 Yes, the US's production capacity is about the same as the rest of us combined. The above data is OSINT ofc - just read parliamentary interpellations, congressional reports, state senators', annual reports of companies, open statements of company presidents and directors, etc. Of course, the above may be increased: Lima produces 15 Abrmas per month and 5 Strykers, there is an option to produce 20 M1 m/c (240 per year) and when the second shift is launched: 33 vehicles per month (396 per year!). South Korea's capabilities are difficult to estimate, and KMW personally estimates it at double what it already has - although deliveries to Hungary and Norway indicate that there will be around 25 tanks per year there.
What's the moral in this for us? 1) In Abrams we trust because only GDLS has the appropriate production capacity 2) Licensed production of either M1A2SEPv3PL or K2PL should be launched in Poland, but care should be taken to ensure that it becomes the basis for a mobilization plan for renovations and distributed production based on components already produced in peacetime. And most importantly: I challenge the author of the fall of the Panzerwaffe (article)@WojenneH because Norbert wrote several epic articles about what happened to the Panzerwaffe in 1943 and 1944, that it collapsed.
What matters is not how much you produce/renovate, but how much you lose during this time and... whether your production base can be effectively attacked by aviation and production interrupted and disrupted. And at the end of this long entry, one more question: In the event of a NATO vs. Russia conflict, UWZ and Omsk would not stand in one piece for long 🙂 . And the need to disperse production and hide it underground would quickly reach the scale of the Third Reich's needs in Russia in 1944. Unfortunately, Ukraine has no room for maneuver here and we are seeing a material war in its worst form.

good lord, how can they sustain these losses?   Oh, wait, now I sound like German General Staff in 1941.  Yikes.

Some ballpark (or beer coaster) calculation wrt to shooting done the current generations of drones with lasers.
A quad-copter propeller weighs roughly 3-5 g. Most plastics have a heat capacity of 2 J / kg K. Most plastics also melt or burn or get weak enough at 200 °C.
So you need about 2000 J (or Ws) to heat up a propeller by 200 °C.
Let's assume 10% of the laser's output actually reach the target (wild guess). Dividing the energy needed (2000Ws) by the power, and you get the time you need on target.
Another good guess: a drone can accelerate with roughly 20 m / s^2. With that, I calculated the distance a drone could move (or deviate from its current flight path) until its propeller melted. Assuming it has a heat sensor and reacts automatically.
Laser power - time to melt - dodge distance
20 kW - 1 s - 10 m
50 kW - 0,4 s - 1,6 m
300 kW - 0,067 s - 0,045 m
First, it is easy to see why they aim for higher power. The target can hardly move away in time before it dies.
Secondly, it is easy to see how to defeat this threat to drones: use steel blades. 250x times the heat capacity and 8x the melting point. You'd need lasers in the GW range to defeat that.
I don't even know how long and how often you can fire these things. But it is probably less than you need against a swarm.
You could also try to attack other things than propellers on a drone, but that is even easier to shield.
You can probably punch a lot of holes into this calculation, but I guess the direction is clear. Lasers are not the solution for fast, maneuverable drones.
I'd put my money on kinetic attacks, e.g. bullets. MG on a 2-axis motorized mount paired with some acoustic & optical sensors. Put that on a UGV that follows your squad, and you have a mobile 300m bubble that keeps the drones away from your neighborhood.