How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Battlefront.com]

43 minutes ago, billbindc said:

I agree with all of this. The delta in the situation is that the US admin had done tons and tons of 'what if the Ukrainians hold out' diplomatic and logistical legwork. Once the Russians invaded, the EU governments had already been prepped for the worst case scenario and had already agreed to many of the actions they later took. In fact, DC did such a good job that by the second week EU countries were going beyond what had been asked for. The big question now is holding them to course. You can see the 'war criminal', 'must lose power' etc comments in that light. The White House is locking them into position (as in, it's hard to drop sanctions on someone your government has agreed is a war criminal). 

I said it before the war and I've been crowing about it even louder since... the Biden Admin's persistent public and private use of its very accurate intel was just about the most consequential pro-active geopolitical moves I've seen in my lifetime.

This is not to pat Biden on the back for a job well done (all he did was approve someone else's brilliant recommendations.  Though they likely came to him via people he appointed, so there's that) but to recognize that SOMEONE FINALLY figured out how to screw with Putin's playbook.  Technically, "screw" is not the right term for what happened but I have to follow the Forum rules just like the rest of you, so insert a more appropriate (and naughty) word in its place

The primary, central, most important part of any of Putin's major actions is to put them into action before anybody has a chance to proactively organize resistance (political, economic, or military).  The second most important part of the plan is to conclude whatever action was taken before reactive reactive resistance can form up.  It is so much harder to get a nation to do something after the crisis is over because there's a "well shucks, I guess there's nothing we can do" attitude.

The preemptive political maneuvering got a whole bunch of weapons and ammo into Ukraine ahead of the invasion.  It got a whole bunch of forces deployed to NATO's eastern members weeks ahead of time.  The disinformation campaign Putin planned on was thrown into total disarray before it even got a chance to start.  The invasion's timeline was likely thrown off. etc.

Steve

[DesertFox]

Good interception rate. However still 8 too many:

 

 

[Battlefront.com]

9 minutes ago, billbindc said:

The imagination and attention to detail suggest lots of this was planned well ahead: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2022/03/fbi-trolls-russian-embassy-with-geotargeted-ads-for-disgruntled-spies/

Generally speaking, it seems Putin got the invasion ball rolling last summer.  Plenty of evidence to suggest that.  However, the covert phase was probably in the works for a lot longer.  That was the case with first invasion of Ukraine.  Aside from the usual "control through corruption" scheme there were other activities such as the "paintball" teams in Crimea that appeared to be training instead of just having fun.  IIRC they were active pre-Maidan.  Those guys were almost certainly involved in helping the Russian military take over the peninsula.

Steve

[Artkin]

39 minutes ago, DesertFox said:

As we have talked about T80s a few pages back. Would love to see them in CMBS, whenever the next module is scheduled.

 

 

Oh yes, that's what I'm talkin about

[danfrodo]

and now it's time to stop worrying about how the psycho in moscow will interpret everything the west does.  We need to send weapons that can help drive RU out.  RU-type tanks, AFVs, jets, helicopters, arty from the eastern bloc countries that UKR will know how to use.  Then those countries backfill w modern western weapons.  

Anything short of NATO forces fighting w RU should be on the table.  This stupid hand wringing over "putin will say this, putin will interpret it this way, oh no I just wet my pants" foolishness needs to end.  As long as UKR pilots are in the jets it just doesn't matter where the jets came from.

[DesertFox]

11 minutes ago, Artkin said:

Oh yes, that's what I'm talkin about

Another one here:

 

 

[Battlefront.com]

More evidence of a strategic shift for Russia?  Report that forces are moving out of Ukraine via Belarus:

 

[billbindc]

37 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

This is not to pat Biden on the back for a job well done (all he did was approve someone else's brilliant recommendations.  Though they likely came to him via people he appointed, so there's that) but to recognize that SOMEONE FINALLY figured out how to screw with Putin's playbook.  Technically, "screw" is not the right term for what happened but I have to follow the Forum rules just like the rest of you, so insert a more appropriate (and naughty) word in its place

Three key things: 

1. Biden is the first American President who came into office with zero illusions about Putin/Russia.

2. The people Biden appointed watched 20 years of mistakes, magical thinking and missed chances. 

3. More broadly across the foreign policy establishment there was bipartisan support to take on the task. 

Putin was entirely unprepared for what the meant in terms of applied full spectrum American power.

[TheVulture]

More from Macron on the mentioned humanitarian mission to Mariupol. I notice the plan is to "tell Putin the details" that they decide, rather than to involve him in the discussions.

Quote

"This must not be a humanitarian operation in the hands of Russia" stressed this morning President Macron on the humanitarian operation currently planned by France, Turkey and Greece for Mariupol. "There is an international humanitarian law that we intend to enforce. In Mariupol, we must absolutely protect the most vulnerable people. We have therefore launched a proposal for a humanitarian operation, in conjunction with Turkey and Greece, which have communities in this city. It must be done quickly, in the next few days. We are organizing this operation with the authorities, our partners and NGOs. Then, I will have a discussion tomorrow or the day after with President Putin to tell him the details ("transmettre les modalités")."

 

 

[billbindc]

Cracks widening a bit.

[DesertFox]

22 minutes ago, DesertFox said:

Another one here:

 

 

Another one between Sumy and Kharkiv. This time a T-80BV

 

 

[TheVulture]

Mayor of Slavutich: Russian forces have left the town. 

Slavutich is pretty close to the Belarussian border, west of Chernihiv,, and Russia troops ignored the town on their way to attack Chernihiv, an only sent forces there in the last day or two. But now apparently they've upped and left again/

https://t.me/spravdi/3707

 

[DesertFox]

6 minutes ago, TheVulture said:

More from Macron on the mentioned humanitarian mission to Mariupol. I notice the plan is to "tell Putin the details" that they decide, rather than to involve him in the discussions.

I believe it once I see it. I however have the suspicion it is just Macron being desperate about the election coming closer.

Edited March 27, 2022 by DesertFox

[Battlefront.com]

6 minutes ago, billbindc said:

Cracks widening a bit.

This is the big threat from Putin... not the pro-democracy types, but the hardline nationalists who recognize that the Russian fascist state that they love so much is over and done with.  Or in the case of the guy in the above video, over and done with as soon as a treaty is signed with Ukraine.  What he has wrong is that it's already over and done with.

The scary part of this is that for ultra nationalists like this guy it would be better to "start the final countdown" and become radioactive ash than to figure out a new way forward.  That's some fine doomsday cult thinking there.

Steve

[kraze]

3 hours ago, danfrodo said:

Yeah, the entire strategy was to take the land and banish/enslave/murder all the people there.  Kinda hard to go backwards and say "if they just would've...." about things that were completely opposite of the war aims in the first place.  This was a war of conquest, with all the old school meanings of that -- resource extraction, colonization, slavery, murder-as-desired/required.  Germany did later recruit dissaffected slavs quite heavily, but that was based on necessities of Plan A failing so very badly.

Ugh, USSR fought its part of WW2 exactly like that too, hence why USSR and Nazi Germany were allies - they found a common ground - both were full of genocidal narcissists.

Heck they were such bros that they even literally traded enslaved in 1940 (Nazi Germany exchanged Baltics for more Poland)

But of course their ideas of how to murder and enslave locals ended up dividing them and then Hitler got the chance at the first strike.

[Battlefront.com]

8 minutes ago, TheVulture said:

Mayor of Slavutich: Russian forces have left the town. 

Slavutich is pretty close to the Belarussian border, west of Chernihiv,, and Russia troops ignored the town on their way to attack Chernihiv, an only sent forces there in the last day or two. But now apparently they've upped and left again/

https://t.me/spravdi/3707

 

OK, I have a theory here.  It appears that Russia just withdrew significant forces though this border area in the last day.  The forces that moved to Slavutich might have been an operational screening force designed to keep partisans away from the withdrawing forces.  Now that the forces have left Ukraine, screening force withdrawn as well.

Steve

[acrashb]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

persistent public and private use of its very accurate intel was just about the most consequential pro-active geopolitical moves I've seen in my lifetime.

Not just consequential, paradigm-breaking.  The instinct of a spook is to keep intel in a very close circle; weaponizing it through broad dissemination, in opposition to instinct and the public's impression (somewhat earned) that governments mostly lie, was a stroke of genius from whatever person developed the idea and the committee that approved it.  From there, at least the powers that be accepted the recommendation.
 

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

The preemptive political maneuvering got a whole bunch of weapons and ammo into Ukraine ahead of the invasion.  It got a whole bunch of forces deployed to NATO's eastern members weeks ahead of time.

It did that; it has also sowed division and distrust within the Russian government and the FSB, introducing more Clausewitzian friction into their prosecution of the war.

When the announcements started, I was startled and mistrusting (see previous "somewhat earned").  Then as OSINT sources continued to validate the announcements, still startled but in a state of admiration.

Edited March 27, 2022 by acrashb

[Kinophile]

2 hours ago, DesertFox said:

Good interception rate. However still 8 too many:

 

 

Wait that's mental. That can't all be Interceptions. I've read of a ridiculous PGM failure rate of 60%. Sounds too much, tbh, but even if cut in half that's 1/3 with no effect, but then interceptions take their toll.

Still, 8...

I wonder also if these are the older stick, brought out of storage due to the unforseen usage rate.

And if their tank storage (actual) practices are anything to go by...

Edited March 27, 2022 by Kinophile

[Holien]

As for the interception rate it could have more to do with the quality of the product being rushed out of the factory?

All it has to do is fly for the factory to be off the hook from not supplying a fully functional missile...

Yes Comrade we have supplied you the missiles we promised...

[Battlefront.com]

Interesting.  Russian media conducted an interview with Zelensky today and the Russian media censors threatened the journalists if they posted anything about it.  They went ahead and posted it:

 

This is interesting for two reasons.  First, that Russian journalists defied Kremlin threats.  Not sure what to make of that.  The second is that the Kremlin obviously did not want Russians to hear Zelensky's positions.  Probably because they sound very reasonable.

Steve

[kraze]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

Generally speaking, it seems Putin got the invasion ball rolling last summer.  Plenty of evidence to suggest that.  However, the covert phase was probably in the works for a lot longer.  That was the case with first invasion of Ukraine.  Aside from the usual "control through corruption" scheme there were other activities such as the "paintball" teams in Crimea that appeared to be training instead of just having fun.  IIRC they were active pre-Maidan.  Those guys were almost certainly involved in helping the Russian military take over the peninsula.

Steve

And everybody forgot or outright dismissed the first attempted russian invasion of Ukraine in 2003..

[DesertFox]

9 minutes ago, Kinophile said:

Wait that's mental. That can't all be Interceptions. I've read of a ridiculous OHM failure rate of 60%. Sounds too much, tbh, but even if cut in half that's 1/3 with no effect, but then interceptions take their toll.

Still, 8...

I wonder also if these are the older stick, brought out of storage due to the unforseen usage rate.

And if their tank storage (actual) practices are anything to go by...

I wouldn´t be too surprised if 60-80% of those 62 were duds (44) and the ukrainians intercepted 50% of the rest (10) and 13% (8) actually hit their target.

Edited March 27, 2022 by DesertFox

[Battlefront.com]

11 minutes ago, acrashb said:

When the announcements started, I was startled and mistrusting (see previous "somewhat earned").  Then as OSINT sources continued to validate the announcements, still startled but in a state of admiration.

When it all started something felt really "off" about the warnings.  A friend, who is still in Kiev now, and I started talking about it in detail.  We initially thought that the US intel was buying into deliberate misinformation from the Kremlin since it is normal for the Kremlin to try and mislead foreign intel from what it really is doing.  Part of the reason for us being skeptical was because we saw absolutely no chance of Russia gaining from a full scale war.  Upping the ante in Donbas?  Yes, but not a full invasion.

As the US intel releases got more specific and seemed more inline with verifiable facts it seemed more and more likely that some form of military adventure was in the works.  Again, we figured it was just a more aggressive move in Donbas.  And again, because a full invasion was likely suicide for Putin's regime.

Then a few days before the war a couple of subtle things happened and both of us thought "oh crap, Putin might really be planning a full scale war".  We double checked ourselves and felt that our assessment of Russia's chances of success were still zero, and so we hoped that Putin would decide at the last minute to go with something less than full invasion.

And then a few days later... nope

Steve

 

 

[kraze]

21 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Interesting.  Russian media conducted an interview with Zelensky today and the Russian media censors threatened the journalists if they posted anything about it.  They went ahead and posted it:

 

This is interesting for two reasons.  First, that Russian journalists defied Kremlin threats.  Not sure what to make of that.  The second is that the Kremlin obviously did not want Russians to hear Zelensky's positions.  Probably because they sound very reasonable.

Steve

We should remember that there's no opposition media in Russia.

Thus no russian journalist can ever defy Putin because they are all basically ordered to do things by Putin.

But unlike big russian state media that is watched by mostly 40+ y.o. - channels in question are watched by "more active" 20-40 y.o. and thus Putin has to provide media sources that won't be filled with old mammoths to cater to that generation.

And they have to think that this media is different so they do this classic "roskomnadzor forbids" and "we do it anyway" dance to seem like "look we are rebellious and relevant just like you".

And that interview was super weird too. I have no idea what Zelenskyy's game is but that interview was devoid of any critic of Russia or Putin in particular (otherwise it wouldn't be allowed to be made in the first place) and instead he offered russians to think about "resolving Donbass issue" and ignoring Crimea if they pull back troops to pre-feb24 locations, no strings attached.

It was like this super weird Chamberlain moment.

Maybe he wanted to call to russian empathy or something but since those "opposition" channels spent last 8 years talking about how evil and subhuman Ukrainians are and how Ukraine is nothing more but a piece of land that belongs to Russia - it's like preaching to a wall.

Edited March 27, 2022 by kraze

[billbindc]

33 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

This is the big threat from Putin... not the pro-democracy types, but the hardline nationalists who recognize that the Russian fascist state that they love so much is over and done with.  Or in the case of the guy in the above video, over and done with as soon as a treaty is signed with Ukraine.  What he has wrong is that it's already over and done with.

The scary part of this is that for ultra nationalists like this guy it would be better to "start the final countdown" and become radioactive ash than to figure out a new way forward.  That's some fine doomsday cult thinking there.

Steve

That bit gets a bit complicated. Those jokers don't possess any real power themselves and yet they are saying things that certainly wouldn't be what Putin would prefer. They are doing the running for others who actually do have a power base. I think what they are saying is almost irrelevant to the fact that they can say anything at all. Put another way, an endgame involving a blazing nationalist pushing Putin aside and then signing a treaty with Ukraine wouldn't surprise me in the least.