How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Kinophile]

@panzermartin

10 minutes ago, panzermartin said:

Many people at the states are angry with the handling of the Ukraine crisis since 2014 and have started facing shortages in food items and skyrocketed prices. 

I'm in Canada. No food shortages here (Or home in Ireland). Things are a little bit pricier, sure, but other than gas, its nothing drastic. Plus gas always fluctuates. That said, I fully expect food prices to increase in the late fall,  but I dont expect Soylent Green food riots.

And tbh not many here remember the Donbass War. So I don't know how many are raging about 2014, a war from 8 years ago, in the ass-end of Europe.

Edited March 29, 2022 by Kinophile

[Kinophile]

On 2/25/2022 at 4:41 PM, Haiduk said:

There was attempt of Russian tank attack from Chernobyl zone through Ivankiv on Kyiv, but because of we had a time to demolish the bridges through the Teterev river, they halted. 

I missed this, that the bridges had been blown.

How did they cross in the end, build over the blown spans, or full pontoon bridges?

As in, what's there now?

[BeondTheGrave]

2 minutes ago, Kinophile said:

@panzermartin

I'm in Canada. No food shortages here (Or home in Ireland). Things are a little bit pricier, sure, but other than gas, its nothing drastic. Plus gas always fluctuates. That said, I fully expect food prices to increase in the late fall,  but I dont expect Soylent Green food riots.

And tbh not many here remember the Donbass War. So I don't know how many are raging about 2014, a war from 8 years ago, in the ass-end of Europe.

Here in the US food doesn't seem to have changed too much, Gas is way up (and people are pissed!) but were also dealing with the late-Covid inflation hangover that most countries seem to be getting into. Hard to separate rising prices rising prices at McDs or Starbacks driven by Covidflation or by Ukraine-driven shortages. 

As I recall North America is an overwhelming food exporter though, that great plain in the center of the continent is great food grown land. So probably its not us who will be hit the hardest.

[akd]

@sburke @Kinophile

Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Kornik, Chief of Staff for 40th Engineer-Sapper Regiment ( @Haiduk says this is part of 41st CAA)

 

Edited March 29, 2022 by akd

[panzermartin]

1 minute ago, Kinophile said:

@panzermartin

I'm in Canada. No food shortages here (Or home in Ireland). Things are a little bit pricier, sure, but other than gas, its nothing drastic. Plus gas always fluctuates. That said, I fully expect food prices to increase in the late fall,  but I dont expect Soylent Green food riots.

And tbh not many here remember the Donbass War. So I don't know how many are raging about 2014, a war from 8 years ago, in the ass-end of Europe.

Well, I clearly remember, on the events in Ukraine, many americans voting against Hillary to avoid WW3, even if they were not Trump fans. Hmmm...

[akd]

26 minutes ago, sburke said:

Question to anyone who might know - The Belgorod ammo dump - I assume that is the main supply hub for the Kharkov axis and by default the main logistical point for the offensive towards Izium?

 

 

 

[Kinophile]

Certainly, when it was "hot" it was a line item in the news, back then. But by 2016, 2 years after the start in 2014, it was a backburner issue. Minsk accords were in discussion, and the last big battle, Debaltsev', was in 2015. Essentially, I dont think the war from back then is a factor/concern in current day thinking/polling.

Edited March 29, 2022 by Kinophile

[Kinophile]

On 2/25/2022 at 6:08 PM, BeondTheGrave said:

If we follow the Soviet doctrine model, as I recall failing attacks were supposed to get starved to support the more successful axis. I would wonder if Kiev SouthEast AO has been deemed the successful axis and is now getting the bulk of resupply and reserves, while Kharkov [& Kiev] is starved and forces there have moved into a holding pattern. 

Current movements could support this (slightly adjusted) read of their doctrine...

Edited March 29, 2022 by Kinophile

[Haiduk]

20 of March Ukrainian mortar shell directly hit Russian blindage. Three officers were killed

- Lt.colonel Dmitriy Dormidontov, MLRS battalion commander

Other names unknown for now

- battalion commander (probably motor-rifle, so mayor or lt.colonel too)

- forward air-controller (usually lt. or captain)

 

[Kinophile]

 

[danfrodo]

18 minutes ago, akd said:

 

Area was full of poultry farms.  So you are saying price of chicken wings will go up.  Dammit!  This was must end!

[womble]

9 minutes ago, danfrodo said:

Area was full of poultry farms.  So you are saying price of chicken wings will go up.  Dammit!  This was must end!

Well they used a Kindjahl on a chicken farm*, so they must have something against chickens. And they beat a bunch to death, too.

* At least, the video they used to show they'd used one on an ammo dump was claimed to be historical footage of some strike on chicken huts which may, or may not have been by a hypersonic missile... I got the impression that they *did* use one on that ammo dump, cos the Ukrainians never denied they'd been hit, as far as I saw, but the "overwatch drone footage" (or whatever it was meant to be) wasn't of that incident as far as anyone could tell, IIRC.

[Vic4]

@Battlefront.com@The_Capt et al,

Barring any imminent cease fire or diplomatic resolution do you anticipate the UA will pursue counter offensives to regain territory in the DR/LR?

Also, do you think the UA will expand its’ scope to mount any offensives into Crimea?

Given the “annexation” would Russia perceive this as an attack on Russian soil and therefore respond with full mobilization and/or other escalatory measures?

[Battlefront.com]

I will remind people that at least one major ammo dump blew up during the 2014/2015 Russian invasion, IIRC also in the Belgorod area.  Of course there was speculation that Ukrainian SF were responsible, but most people felt it was just incompetence of the Russians that caused it.  Lots of new people handling way more ammo than they've ever seen, in field conditions, with time pressures, all without adequate training and oversight.  Something is bound to go bad and when it does, well, it does go bad rather quickly.

I suspect the same thing here.

Russia could afford to lose the dump in the first war because it wasn't engaging in more than a relatively small military action.  This war is very different.

Steve

[TheVulture]

28 minutes ago, Kinophile said:

 

If that map is accurate there's already one pocket of the Russian forces left on the M06 highway in Kopyliv and Motyzhyn, and Ukraine are trying to cut off the forces in the Vorzel / Hostomel area too.

That's possibly a big "if" though

[dan/california]

3 minutes ago, Vic4 said:

@Battlefront.com@The_Capt et al,

Barring any imminent cease fire or diplomatic resolution do you anticipate the UA will pursue counter offensives to regain territory in the DR/LR?

Also, do you think the UA will expand its’ scope to mount any offensives into Crimea?

Given the “annexation” would Russia perceive this as an attack on Russian soil and therefore respond with full mobilization and/or other escalatory measures?

My read, worth what you are  paying for it, is that they would cut off Crimea at the most militarily convenient point and push on towards Mariupol. Very strong political/morale pressure to relieve Mariupol if they possibly can. But to do either of those things they have to take Kherson back, which is not trivial, and apparently the Russians have rigged the main bridge at Kherson to blow, so they will have real logistics headache to advance past that point. The Russian air force seems to have an easier time operating around Crimea/Mariupol area as well, which makes offense much harder for the Ukrainians. My vague impression is that theRussians have really good SAM/radar coverage from Crimea, and the southern reaches of the bit of Ukraine they have had since 2014. There may be advantages for the Russian planes to come in from over the Black Sea. They would only have a brief overland exposure to shorter range Ukrainian SAMS.

 

[BeondTheGrave]

1 hour ago, Kinophile said:

Current movements could support this (slightly adjusted) read of their doctrine...

I had to double check when I wrote that, it feel like a lifetime ago.

But I would agree that were seeing (weve seen?) a transition there. I have to assume though that doctrine has been totally abandoned in terms of planning at this point. Is anyone still following 'the book' after the last month of spectacular failures?

Actually I would be interested to hear your thoughts on that point @The_Capt

[The_Capt]

59 minutes ago, Vic4 said:

@Battlefront.com@The_Capt et al,

Barring any imminent cease fire or diplomatic resolution do you anticipate the UA will pursue counter offensives to regain territory in the DR/LR?

Also, do you think the UA will expand its’ scope to mount any offensives into Crimea?

Given the “annexation” would Russia perceive this as an attack on Russian soil and therefore respond with full mobilization and/or other escalatory measures?

I honestly do not know.  Ukraine is in a tricky situation right now. Unless they want this thing to drag on for months they need Russia to have an out (as in "get  the hell out") but at the same time they need to keep up the pressure so that Russia does not get too comfortable.

Second to this I am not sure about UA offensive combat power.  This hybrid/crowd sourced warfare worked very well in basically integrating a bunch of local defence into a living nightmare for invading forces.  If they can somehow point that at something and get it moving we then have to see how it does against conventional troops dug in WW1 style.  My honest bet is this will look like steady chewing until they see an opportunity for an operational move (if they see one).  But again too large a gesture and Russia might dig in a choose the hard way.

UA will definitely pursue c-moves, my bet would be around Kyiv as top priority and then any other major urban centers they can to get the guns out of range.  Then once they do that then it will depend what the political level want to demonstrate.  I am not sure the UA can do large scale offensive actions, it will be Xmas morning if they can take their current approach on the road in a big way.

Donbas (DR/LR) are definitely in play, but I gotta tell you I honestly think Crimea is off the table.  The West was ready to basically live with it, I am sure Ukraine is still pissed but we are talking Sevastopol and the Russians are not going to give that up.  As you point out the Russians might just play the race card and declare it an attack on the homeland, which not only means mobilization but we might still get a chance to see them WMDs we were all worried about.  And I am not sure the West would see a tac nuke on a UA offensive in the Crimea in the same light.  We were definitely not cool with killing civilians but UA conventional troops advancing on Russian soil makes this really awkward and weird because every nuclear power has pretty much declared they will do the same thing.  It probably also explains why we have not seen deep attacks into Belarus and Russia before now, all those railyards are actually in drone range.

So stay strapped in cause it could still get wackier.

[billbindc]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

I wonder if this is the result of Ukraine releasing the c.600 names of covert FSB dudes?

Steve

No. I'd suspect something more along the lines of having an opportunity to clean out a long standing annoyance that was politically unpalatable BU (before Ukraine). I deeply doubt that any of those png'd folks were unmarked throughout their tenure.

[billbindc]

1 hour ago, TheVulture said:

If that map is accurate there's already one pocket of the Russian forces left on the M06 highway in Kopyliv and Motyzhyn, and Ukraine are trying to cut off the forces in the Vorzel / Hostomel area too.

That's possibly a big "if" though

I would pretty emphatically trust a map from the Jamestown folks.

[The_Capt]

27 minutes ago, BeondTheGrave said:

I had to double check when I wrote that, it feel like a lifetime ago.

But I would agree that were seeing (weve seen?) a transition there. I have to assume though that doctrine has been totally abandoned in terms of planning at this point. Is anyone still following 'the book' after the last month of spectacular failures?

Actually I would be interested to hear your thoughts on that point @The_Capt

Honestly, really way to soon to be calling this a doctrinal shift.  Could very well be a strategic shift, or even making stuff up on the spot.  But I doubt the Russians have anything resembling a functioning doctrine right now.  Whatever they brought to this war got shredded and they are more likely ad hoc-ing a lot, particularly as they really don't have a joint command structure.  So we are likely to see 4 or more attempts at SOPs and operational improvisation.

Doctrine is what this Russian clown show is going to do once they go home (those left), fire a bunch of generals (some out of cannons) and undertake a military reform that will likely last a generation.  Then when we are all really old farts - turn based only - we can watch them try again.

[Commanderski]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

Lots of new people handling way more ammo than they've ever seen, in field conditions, with time pressures, all without adequate training and oversight.  Something is bound to go bad and when it does, well, it does go bad rather quickly.

Remember that video that showed the Russians just tossing the ammo on the ground and letting slide downhill? They probably did that again.

[sburke]

17 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

really old farts - turn based only

Hey I resemble that remark

[Fenris]

What model of AK is Vlad holding?  Has a drum and some sort of sight but I can't see a bipod or is it just a AK74 with a drum?

 

[dan/california]

My quick count is approximately fifty CONFIRMED Russian vehicle losses. So they are continuing to lose about a BTG per DAY. They can't do that indefinitely, or even for vey long.