How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[db_zero]

2 hours ago, Commanderski said:

Based on what they saw of Russia's equipment they may be doing a review of what they have before they decide to do anything.

Not only that but Putin just made it next to impossible for Xi to contemplate taking Taiwan by force as the political, economic and military climate of the West was changed by Putins action.

I watched a video on average opinion of a Chinese citizens on the street and all said Putin made the wrong decision, and this is between Ukraine and Russia. China should not get involved. The only way China should get involved is if US/NATO attacked Russia.

 

Edited March 14, 2022 by db_zero

[DesertFox]

Last nights strike on the installation east of Lvov. 20km from polish border.

 

 

[Fenris]

^ Considering the size of that hole it's appears to be a pretty solid building there at the end.

[BletchleyGeek]

1 hour ago, BletchleyGeek said:

Testimonials of alleged survivors are surfacing on social media and a Swedish newspaper.

BuzzFeed is carrying a story about this

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/christopherm51/russia-missile-attack-yavoriv-ukraine-american-fighters

 

 

 

[keas66]

Russia Deliberating Attacking Foreign Mercenary camps in Western Ukraine   ( including US/UK citizens ? ) ?

Counter with :

Classify Wagner  Organization as a Terrorist organization  and carry out Targeted Drone Strikes on Wagner Assets in Central Africa and anywhere else  they can be found .

This continual backing away by the West simply allows Putin a longer runway .

[dan/california]

Flywheel of barbarity is just going to spin faster, and faster.

[Kinophile]

5 minutes ago, dan/california said:

Flywheel of barbarity is just going to spin faster, and faster.

Considering they cant seem to find their logistical arse with both hands and The Greatest Army In The World(tm) I highly doubt their "hunt" will be anything special, any more cruel than bombing a maternity hospital and most likely just more of the same aimless blundering around the countryside as the 1st Ukrainian Tractor Army takes its grim toll. 

And the idea that the Geneva Convention is adhered to by Russia is just another dumb joke.

Edited March 14, 2022 by Kinophile

[keas66]

Another random  but interesting idea - Poland makes  a historical  ( temporary ) claim for  Parts of the Western Ukraine- ie Galicia  - And looks to place it under Polish and NATO protection  for humanitarian reasons  .

[Machor]

There will be an aid to Ukraine concert, "Russians against War," in... Istanbul; because it would be illegal in Russia, because Russians can enter Turkey without visas, and can still fly there. While I don't expect a significant number to fly in from Russia, it will be interesting to see attendance given the large Russian population resident in Turkey, where the public is overwhelmingly pro-Ukrainian:

 

[Battlefront.com]

Article discussing the long term damage that will come from Russia's seizure of private company assets:

https://thehill.com/policy/finance/economy/597923-russias-efforts-to-salvage-economy-could-have-devastating-impacts

What Putin doesn't understand is that in the West the private and public sectors are distinctly different.  Screw over a government and things can be rapidly repaired if it is politically beneficial to do so.  Corporations have a vastly different view on the world and a much better memory.

Putin also doesn't understand that seizing Starbucks and KFC doesn't hurt the West at all.  Plays well to the domestic audience now, perhaps, but when they want their Starbucks and KFC in the future they might be pretty unhappy to find out it's not so simple.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

4 hours ago, Rokossovski said:

I have decided to quit my job in order to devote myself full-time to reading this thread.

I would too, but for the moment this is my full-time job so I'm lucky

Steve

[Combatintman]

9 hours ago, The_Capt said:

That is a Div/CAA level asset.  The steady stream of these types of losses demonstrate the merry hell the UA is waging in Russian rear areas.

Never used to be - in the Soviet era - tank laid bridges were regimental assets so I would see it as a brigade asset these days.

[Battlefront.com]

3 hours ago, The Steppenwulf said:

Problem is that we don't truly know what condition UKR forces are in to engage in such a phase. Optimistically, I've thought that there must be some deployments going on in west of Ukraine preparing for a counter offensive (launched timely at the Kiev siege), but it's also why I keep insisting that UKR really need a couple of squadrons of aircraft to project a lethal threat, and in this exact case take advantage of the inevitable Russian operational pause to regroup and attack them while vulnerable.     

Here's the great irony.  Russia/Soviet Union has traditionally been able to win military conflicts by tossing so many bodies and bits of steel at the enemy that they wind up winning in the end.  But times have changed and Russia really doesn't have that sort of resource available to it as long as the war is short and/or conscription is not an option.  Ukraine, on the other hand, has vast amounts of manpower to bring into this fight. 

There is at least 100,000 new Ukrainian fighters being formed into units right now.  That's more than 1/2 of what Russia has put into the war so far.  Assuming standard rules of thumb for the attacker:defender ratio, this means Russia has to put in 300,000 soldiers just to combat the reserves Ukraine is currently forming up.  Even if we assumed that tomorrow every single current Ukrainian soldier is out of the picture, and Russia doesn't lose a single soldier doing it, that means Russia must put in 150,000 brand new combat forces to it the magic ratio against the forces Ukraine has yet to deploy.  Not going to happen!

In reality, of course, the Russian invasion force has suffered significant losses of men and material while Ukraine has mostly lost civilians.  If nothing changes on the Russian side (i.e. conscription or some mythical mercenary force) Ukraine could very soon outnumber the Russians on the battlefield.  Does anybody see any reason to think Russia can survive this sort of influx of Ukrainian forces?

Now I know some of you might say, "but Steve!  These new 100,000 soldiers aren't going to have all the latest equipment at their disposal.  They'll basically be light infantry, so won't the Russian superiority of equipment be able to compensate?" To which I'd say "future performance can largely be predicted based on recent performance.  So.... no"

Steve

[Pablius]

Just in to say that this thread has been one of the best sources of information and analysis of this whole horrible thing.

Hope it ends soon and all my support to the Ukrainian people.

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, dan/california said:

Flywheel of barbarity is just going to spin faster, and faster.

First, they are protected as long as they are uniformed and declared a part of the Ukrainian Armed Forces (I haven't double checked that, but I'm pretty sure that is the case).  Second, by this logic Russia's Wagner, Chechens, and supposed Syrians would also be outside of the Geneva Convention.  As would *all* of the non-Ukrainian forces that fought in the Donbas for the last 8 years.

Of course Putin doesn't care about international law or what happens to the people fighting on his side, so he has an advantage there.

Steve

[billbindc]

6 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Here's the great irony.  Russia/Soviet Union has traditionally been able to win military conflicts by tossing so many bodies and bits of steel at the enemy that they wind up winning in the end.  But times have changed and Russia really doesn't have that sort of resource available to it as long as the war is short and/or conscription is not an option.  Ukraine, on the other hand, has vast amounts of manpower to bring into this fight. 

There is at least 100,000 new soldiers being formed into units right now.  That's more than 1/2 of what Russia has put into the war so far.  Assuming standard rules of thumb for the attacker:defender ratio, this means Russia has to put in 300,000 soldiers just to combat the reserves Ukraine is currently forming up.  Even if we assumed that tomorrow every single current Ukrainian soldier is out of the picture, and Russia doesn't lose a single soldier doing it, that means Russia must put in 150,000 brand new combat forces to it the magic ratio against the forces Ukraine has yet to deploy.  Not going to happen!

In reality, of course, the Russian invasion force has suffered significant losses of men and material while Ukraine has mostly lost civilians.  If nothing changes on the Russian side (i.e. conscription or some mythical mercenary force) Ukraine could very soon outnumber the Russians on the battlefield.  Does anybody see any reason to think Russia can survive this sort of influx of Ukrainian forces?

Now I know some of you might say, "but Steve!  These new 100,000 soldiers aren't going to have all the latest equipment at their disposal.  They'll basically be light infantry, so won't the Russian superiority of equipment be able to compensate?? To which I'd say "future performance can largely be predicted based on recent performance.  So.... no"

Steve

I've been pondering the question of the newly forming units. It's been my supposition that Belarus "joining the war" is almost entirely notional except as a way to divert forces to the NW border and the airstrikes are designed to actually delay their arrival into the active battle. So...here's my question: how many do you think will be in the fight and when?

[Battlefront.com]

From today's ISW update:

Quote

3 Institute for the Study of War & AEI’s Critical Threats Project 2022 Russia is increasingly pulling forces from its international deployments to reinforce operations in Ukraine, though these deployments are unlikely to shift the balance of forces in the coming week. The Ukrainian General Staff reported on March 13 that 800 personnel from Russia’s 102nd Base in Armenia deployed to an unknown location in Russia on March 9-10 in preparation to deploy to Ukraine.2 They also reported that Russia is recalling elements of its peacekeeping deployment in Nagorno-Karabakh to replenish losses in Ukraine.3 Russia will likely draw further forces from its international deployments in Armenia, Tajikistan, and Syria to replace losses in Ukraine. The Ukrainian General Staff separately reported that Russia plans to deploy 1,500 troops from Russia’s 40th Naval Infantry Brigade (of the Pacific Fleet) to Belarus via rail at an unspecified time

https://www.understandingwar.org/sites/default/files/Russian Operations Assessments Mar 13.pdf

This is a big sign of desperation and a huge (mid-long term) risk to Russia's current land holdings.  First, there aren't that many troops in these areas relative to the tasks they have.  Skimming some off for Ukraine, therefore, is not likely to positively change the equation in Ukraine, but is likely to negatively impact security in these restive areas.  While I don't see this creating serious security problem in those regions yet, if something bad happens in the Kremlin (messy coup attempt) that could change very quickly.  There's already a lot of people in Georgia looking for an opportunity to pounce.

Steve

[dan/california]

11 minutes ago, billbindc said:

I've been pondering the question of the newly forming units. It's been my supposition that Belarus "joining the war" is almost entirely notional except as a way to divert forces to the NW border and the airstrikes are designed to actually delay their arrival into the active battle. So...here's my question: how many do you think will be in the fight and when?

Approximately none, and approximately never. The Belorussian Military is more inclined to depose Lutashenko than it is to Fight Ukrainians with good ATGM. Lutashenko knows this, so he keeps promising Putin they are coming, while they sort of pretend to get ready.

 

[Battlefront.com]

12 minutes ago, billbindc said:

I've been pondering the question of the newly forming units. It's been my supposition that Belarus "joining the war" is almost entirely notional except as a way to divert forces to the NW border and the airstrikes are designed to actually delay their arrival into the active battle. So...here's my question: how many do you think will be in the fight and when?

There's significant numbers of Ukrainian forces tied up manning the border with Belarus already.  Unless Belarus collapses into civil war I expect Ukraine can't remove any forces from the border.  However, I also don't think they need to do much to reinforce them.  If so, this means that the new units (at least the majority) can pretty much all go to fight the Russians in the east.

Steve

[Doc844]

Or they could use their reserve forces to take over the line and redeploy their regular forces elsewhere?

 

Edited March 14, 2022 by Doc844

[Fenris]

But, but "The Russian reserve has over two million former conscripts and contract servicemen..."*

I started looking for info on the russian draft starting 1 April and found this interesting article.

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/explainer-russian-conscription-reserve-and-mobilization

 

*intentional, selective copy/pasting

Edited March 14, 2022 by Fenris

[Battlefront.com]

Article about how to view the various casualty assessments

https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-war-what-next-interview-gressel/31750644.html

As the article points out it's fairly easy for Ukraine to count knocked out vehicles than it is soldiers.  So here's a point at which to start estimating the soldier KIAs.

Current estimates of Russian losses, rounded to simple numbers, is as follows:

• 350 Tanks
• 1200 IFV/APC
• 350 Trucks
• 200 Other vehicles (mostly artillery, air defenses, etc.)

Let's assume that each vehicle is in fact knocked out and was knocked out with 100% crew/passenger capacity and 100% fatalities.  Again, roughly speaking as there's variation in what 100% capacity is depending on vehicle type.  With that in mind, the numbers come out to be:

• 1,050 Tank Crews (3 x 350)
• 10,800 IFV/APC Crews + Dismounts (9 x 1200)
• 700 Truck Crews (2 x 350)
• 1,000 Other Vehicles Crews (5 x 200)

The total for this maximal KIA estimate based on vehicles alone is: 13,500

Obviously this number is fantasy for a variety of reasons.  First, many vehicles are simply abandoned and therefore their crews/passengers may have escaped.  For sure not every knocked out vehicle killed all its occupants.  However, for sure Ukraine has killed Russians outside of their vehicles and these counts don't include a couple hundred possible deaths from shot down aircraft.

With this in mind, the maximum is probably around 14,000 KIA.  We should assume 3x as many WIA, which is 42,000 WIA.

If you want to keep things simple, let's presume that there's 14,000 total casualties with 3/4 being WIA and 1/4 being KIA.  This brings us to:

• 3,500 KIA
• 10,500 WIA

This is lower than most estimates, even the conservative ones.  Er, excepting the laughable ~500 the Russians have admitted to.

Based on this I'd assess Russian casualties as being:

• 3,500-14,000 KIA
• 10,500-42,000 WIA

Where do I think the most accurate number is?  Well, based on Russia's obvious desperation to increase it's manpower in Ukraine, as well as the near total collapse of offensive activities, I'd guess it's more on the high end than on the low end of this range.

Steve

[Vic4]

Given the extreme material losses that the Russians are sustaining, do we know if the Russian military industry is fully mobilized (i.e. cranking out T-14’s, BMP-3’s and training personnel etc. as fast as possible)? Do they have the material resources to keep producing sophisticated equipment or were they stockpiled previously in anticipation of the sanctions? How long can/will Russia sustain a conventional conflict with significant losses until only the “rabid animal in a cage with nukes” option is all that is left…?

[Battlefront.com]

42 minutes ago, Fenris said:

But, but "The Russian reserve has over two million former conscripts and contract servicemen..."*

I started looking for info on the russian draft starting 1 April and found this interesting article.

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/explainer-russian-conscription-reserve-and-mobilization

 

*intentional, selective copy/pasting

For sure Russia has more manpower to draw upon that Ukraine.  The issue here is that Ukraine's people support 100% mobilization, Russians do not.  In fact, Putin has already had to promise the Russian people that no conscripts are going to Ukraine (a complete lie) and that anybody found sending them there will be punished (excluding himself, of course).

So yes, in theory Russia has a huge pool of totally inadequately trained, inexperienced, and unmotivated conscripts it can draw up with tremendous effort.  In reality, it can't touch them as doing so will cause too much internal problems and likely won't get to the front soon enough to matter anyway.  Especially because Russia lacks the weaponry, uniforms, vehicles, food, etc. to equip them even if they were already trained (which they aren't, and that's a whole 'nother logistical problem)

On the other hand, Ukraine can draw upon about 500,000 with more than half already trained *AND* a significant percentage having relatively recent combat experience.  Then there's the reported 100,000 from foreigners and returning ex-pats.  All are extremely motivated to fight Russians.

600,000 newly raised forces on the Ukrainian side would mean Russia would need to raise 1,800,000 to maintain traditional force ratios assuming near parity of soldier quality and motivation.  Russia doesn't even have a 1/10th of that number by the looks of it.

Oh, and let's not forget the fighters who do not fit into the normal demographics due to age or being women.  How many random Russian citizens do you see in their 60s getting their affairs in order to go fight in Ukraine?  None.  How many 60 year old Ukrainians in Ukraine do you see tossing a molotov, sniping, reporting enemy positions, etc.?  We have already seen the answer to this.

Add this all up and Ukraine realistically can add about 1,000,000 highly motivated fighters on its side, with a very large portion of them being of military age and having some military experience as well as combat experience.  This would require roughly 3,000,000 Russians to be raised into military units and deployed into Ukraine.  Even if Russia could raise that many fighters, who here thinks they could equip, field, and support a force of even a fraction of this size?

Russia simply can't win a war of numbers.  Which is why I, and lots of other people, over the past few years have said a full on Russian war against Ukraine would be a national suicide mission.

Steve

[sburke]

10 minutes ago, Vic4 said:

Given the extreme material losses that the Russians are sustaining, do we know if the Russian military industry is fully mobilized (i.e. cranking out T-14’s, BMP-3’s and training personnel etc. as fast as possible)? Do they have the material resources to keep producing sophisticated equipment or were they stockpiled previously in anticipation of the sanctions? How long can/will Russia sustain a conventional conflict with significant losses until only the “rabid animal in a cage with nukes” option is all that is left…?

given the world supply chain issues with chips to the point my buddy has been waiting for a year for the pickup he ordered I'd say the likelihood of Russia turning out masses of electronics hungry vehicles is low.  I am curious even how that impacts everyone but a Jav or NLAW needs a lot less than an armored vehicle/SAM unit/EW unit etc.

Steve you forgot all those guys from the VDV who came in on aircraft.. and those couple downed transport aircraft.  I'd be curious to see how the more highly trained units have suffered.  Throwing in poorly trained conscripts to replace their more highly trained units is.. well not a good plan.