Carolus

We don't see "mass mobilisation" in Russia because the political system is fragile and they are afraid that pushing too hard could make the whole thing topple down. Despite the rethorics of fighting the entirety of NATO in Ukraine at the moment (which makes me wonder what the regime will say when they actually pick a fight with NATO). Besides, 20.000 men per month is not a significant mobilisation for you? We are watching a war that is being fought with the utmost brutality and determination yet at the same time is being "cooked on a small flame" by political leadership in order to keep the civil economy from being affected as much as possible. Same is true for Ukraine's supporters. It's a localised conventional war and a global hybrid war that is supposed to not get noticed and cost less than a COINS operation for the West - where most people refuse to even acknowledge that they are under attack. So I don't think that not seeing mass mobilisation is a positive hint for Russia. I think it is very characteristic for this war. Imagine if the USA had to draft 20.000 men per month for 20 months, and it has almost triple the population of Russia. It would be considered a scandal. In Russia less so, yet still they rely on Africans, Arabs and Asians to bolster that number and keep the war as much under the radar for the average Russian as possible.

That is true. Only 21) and 22) allude to that direction.

This fellow summarized the German-Ukrainian agreement:

While I am not in favor of it, I can understand the reasoning well. The European arms industry is structured completely differently than the American one. They cannot be ordered to increase production, they rely entirely on orders.

Decent SPGs, but a long wait time.

New toys arrived. I wonder what the launcher looks like.

Still waiting for confirmation, but if true. this is truly getting comical.

That's maple syrup on my pancakes eh, as the Canadians would say. Yeah, that would be a card they can only play once.

Just because a Rheinmetall plant is in South Africa does not mean that South Africa has any control over the product. It is not a nationalized industry like in the USA. It's a private enterprise. If a European country orders shells from Rheinmetall, it does not matter where the plant is located - all locations will work to fulfill the contract. If you think South Africa could in any way meddle with that, you are vastly overestimating the influence of South Africa. The only thing that could realistically hamper ammo production for a NATO customer in SA is the fact that half the country experiences rolling brown-outs while the other half experiences rolling black-outs of its electricity grid.

Not to be a party pooper, but that is absolutely not the case with the Trump base. As soon as US troops took casualties in the Middle East lately, the MAGA sentiment was "why are we there in the first place? These troops should be used to guard the Mexican border." It will be the same when US troops in the baltics get attacked by Russians. "Why are we stationed in lands that we have no association with? In opposition to peaceful and smart Putin?" Pulling out will not be seen as weak, but as putting America first. That does not mean I believe that the US will definitely abandon NATO. But the idea of Pax Americana is now seen as a waste of tax money -that is the pure and utter conviction of the Trump base. And the other Republicans will go along with it, because they realise what a loyal voting base you can get if you just tell them what they want to hear. You can have a rape video with an underage girl get leaked on the internet and the Trump base would defend you and call you a second coming of Christ, with the video being doctored by Banderists in Ukraine.

Russian Starlink not just in occupied territory, but directly on the zero line too.

Russian Army gets satellite internet. Potentially significant.

The total transparency the battle space is a real shame. It makes it almost impossible to perform ambushes and maneuvers on a larger scale. Without that visibility, the RA could certianly be enticed into new spearhead or thunder run attacks if the UA gave ground and allowed them to penetrate deeper - only to annihilate them again with light infantry and artillery from all sides. I don't think RA losses mounted ever as quickly again as during the first weeks of the war. Russian officers are just very reliable at not learning their lesson. But even without total transparency which could make this feasible, the internal and external reaction to it might be too costly. The retreat would have to look real to everyone, after all.

Seems all pretty accurate. The best thing Ukraine can do is dig in, minimize their own losses, maximize Russian losses, only take offensive actions when an opportunity presents itself, stabilize the country internally, mobilize the civilian economy to support the military with goods and supplies (as seems to be finally the case with the drone productions springing up all over), mobilize military personnel to create reserves and make rotations possible, keep their heads above water with foreign aid, and continue to degrade the Russian industry with strategic long-range bombing and sabotage and pin-point killings. Make Ukraine the new graveyard of empire.

Something in or near Ishevsky exploded, a town ca. 1000km east of Moscow. There is a missile manufacturing plant there, and a site for decommissioned rocket fuel, but it is not yet known what exactly happened and why. There is also a small arms factory there.

Some hackers did some sleuthing about Shahed imports. "The Iranian side announced a starting price of $375,000 per unit. However, during the negotiations, an agreement was reached for $193,000 per piece when ordering 6,000 units or $290,000 when ordering 2,000 units. The total price of the production contract, including the transfer of technologies, equipment, 6,000 pieces of UAVs and software, is roughly $1.75 billion. According to other published documents, at least partially, Russia conducts its financial transactions and payments with Iran in gold."

America is just playing with my feelings. I want a divorce.

I am sure they will find other ways but this is not bad.

I will leave the military related points to those who are militarily savvy. But this... sorry to say but this is pretty shoddy sourcing. The first two sources refer to the same incident, the source of which is a local pro-Russian official, and there have been Donetsk civilians who have been lamenting on social media that the shelling came from the Russian side as part of a "disciplinary measure". It was also apparently mortar rounds in an area where even heavy mortars with extended range can't reach from UA controlled territory. Aljazeera is not a source - it is a privately funded broadcaster whose purpose is doing marketing for its founders and islamist terrorist organisations who have the favor of these founders (and malign those who do not). Then there is Wikipedia, the purpose of which is being a collection and summary of online sources. That doesn't mean Wikipedia is bad, but one has to be aware the content is often "Party A said this, Party B said that". It is not doing investigations or journalism, it is a collection of infos. And the last one, directly in the first fat paragraph, says "a Kremlin-installed official in the eastern region of Ukraine said. This has not been independently verified" Really? After Russia's abysmal track record over the last... decades?

Shot down so hard verbally before it was shot down with a gun, ufff.

Heavy drone for medical transport. Is this the beginning of the new air-mobile (drone mobile?) infantry? Drone Dragoons. Drongoons.

As was said in this thread before: this is one of the dumbest wars even among the list of really dumb wars in history. Extremely costly and no tangible gain - no resources, no strategic advantage, nothing. Everything Russia has is a vague manifest destiny to "make nation go big", mostly so that they can print new maps, and they are using their social acceptance of unparalleled nihilist cynicism, callousness and cruelty towards themseves and towards others to willingly go for it.

There is a rumor going around that Ukraine will get JASSM with their F16s, but I haven't found a good confirmation. A bunch of outlets say the origin is Naev, the commander of the northern front in Ukraine. JASSM seems pretty new. Is it realistic that the US would give them away or even allow it after the song and dance around ATACMS?

From what I read online the bill is guaranteed to get killed on the floor of the House.

That makes the drones very tiny while raising the requirements to mil standard for howitzer ammo. When I think future I think about the American palletizing cruise missiles. That also makes me think of glide bombs. We are focusing on tunes a lot because that's what the Russians and Ukrainians use. I think the NATO way sounds more like a fat glide bomb that opens up like a cluster bomb and releases the drones over an area. Strap a rocket engine on for range extension if needs be.