How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[dan/california]

5 minutes ago, FancyCat said:

Regarding France, maybe the concern with blasting them is due to the ongoing Presidential election between Macron and Le Pen. Would not do any good for Macron to get criticism, not with Le Pen basically having Putin's stamp of approval.

Once the election finishes, I could see military aid ramping up. Something to think of, if I were the military industrial complex, having Ukraine get NATO armaments and equipment, would serve nicely as the beginning of integrating Ukraine into NATO and dovetail nicely with future weapon sales. If I were France, I would definitely offer a Rafale or several to Ukraine lest the U.S gets in with their F-16s.

Win the war, and revenge for the Australian submarine thing, too, brilliant.

[c3k]

26 minutes ago, Huba said:

If you're not versed in Polish internal politics it might sound serious, but it isn't. PiS (the current ruling party) blamed Russia and the then ruling Civic Platform for the crash in Smoleńsk since it happened, before any investigation started, and this conspiracy theory helped it grab the power in 2015.

After PiS came to power, this "special" commission was created as a away to keep the craziest of the leaders of PiS party, Macierewicz, busy so he didn't get in Kaczynskis' way. It existed for 7 years, siphoning money from the budget and at the moment nobody except the most hardcore loons treats it seriously. The commission made a bunch of accusations while producing no evidence whatsoever. The news of it finally finishing work didn't even made it to the headlines very much.

Also, as this is  my first post on this forum: Hello everyone  This thread was recommended to me as concentrated on analysis and not pointless feces throwing, and after reading a large part of it I have to say the the level of insight it provides is really impressive. 

Thanks for the insight, and welcome aboard.

[sburke]

16 minutes ago, FancyCat said:

Maybe someone who is actually Ukrainian can correct me if wrong but maybe outsiders are underestimating the level of internet infrastructure in Ukraine and underestimating how digital Ukraine is?

I think there is a certain degree of ignorance of pre-war Ukraine that many Eastern European states are brushed with concerning economics.

Also notable, Russia is pretty connected, at least urban Russia via the internet. The idea that Russia can do a wall dividing Russia and the rest of the world is sorta overstated?

to give a pretty good example, something like 70% of the global internet traffic is routed by TATA.  There are oodles and oodles (that is a technical term  ) of Internet providers, but actual physical infrastructure is expensive to come by.  You can't just go lay an undersea cable if you handle 150 internet users.  Even running fiber in country is an issue.  Long haul connections have to follow some existing right of way, usually either power lines or rail lines.  Note below, one of those areas they are referring to is Staten Island.  It is a hub point for transatlantic cables.  During that storm I was pretty much up all night on the phone with out network team monitoring the situation in two data centers we had.  One in lower Manhattan and the other in Weehawken NJ to make sure the fuel deliveries for the generators were there and the water levels were not threatening the centers.

The global internet is powered by vast undersea cables. But they're vulnerable. | CNN

In 2012, Hurricane Sandy slammed into the US East Coast, causing an estimated $71 billion in damage and knocking out several key exchanges where undersea cables linked North America and Europe.

“It was a major disruption,” Frank Rey, director of global network strategy for Microsoft’s Cloud Infrastructure and Operations division, said in a statement.

“The entire network between North America and Europe was isolated for a number of hours. For us, the storm brought to light a potential challenge in the consolidation of transatlantic cables that all landed in New York and New Jersey.”

 

[Taranis]

1 hour ago, akd said:

Gotta catch ‘em all:

 

Even him:

 

He doesn't really seem happy

[acrashb]

1 hour ago, The_Capt said:

Russia completely failed on this one, which is odd for what was supposed to the Dark Sith Empire of Cyberwarfare. 

This one I can begin to address; it is part of my day job. 

Pre-war, about 4-6 weeks in advance, the usual authoritative clearing houses (like the US' CISA and Canada's CCCS) were warning of a significant uptick in cyber attacks / reconnaissance.   This uptick has been sustained, but not materially increased, since the war started.  It is mostly or perhaps almost entirely directed at critical infrastructure.

I have worked in critical infrastructure, and the state of OT (Operational Technology, e.g., the tech that runs a pipeline) that I've seen is appalling - software so out of date that there are hundreds of known vulnerabilities, and no possibility of patching because it is attached to aged and non-replaceable hardware that can't take more modern software.  The only technical hope here is a hard shell around the OT and highly-segmented internal architectures to limit the spread of introduced malware.  I'm over-simplifying for discussion.

Then there was the successful Colonial Pipeline attack and others; I thought that the war would bring massive cyber-initiated infrastructure disruption, but it hasn't.  There have been a few impacts mostly located in Ukraine but some have spilled out (e.g., the Viasat KA-SAT communication network in Europe was hit Feb 24 and is still in trouble).

Post-war analysis will figure this out; my thoughts: people ignore security until something happens; many probing attacks by state and state-affiliated actors have generated, in the last few years, a sense that something is happening; budgets for cyber security as a result have been increasing; security on critical infrastructure is specifically monitored and promoted in major nations (e.g., the US' NERC CIP compliance regime for electricity generation); various agencies have developed strong cyber attack / counter-attack capability.  So critical infrastructure may be better protected than we all thought and/or the counter-attack capability is so strong, and so well communicated to our adversaries, that they are terrified of starting something (maybe).

Had state actors kept their powder dry and lulled the world into a false sense of security, I think things would have been different.

In addition, organizations globally have implemented breakneck-speed hardening programs since the war started.  For example, my organization is concerned about Russian and affiliated (e.g., Fancy Bear) attacks; the war has caused us to increase the rating of our threat model and we have taken many (exact number is classified) actions to protect our ability to deliver service to our customers, pausing other activities in an organization-wide effort.  Our attack surface and overall risk profile has significantly improved in the last six weeks (it was good before, now it's better).

Regarding cyber attacks on mil infrastructure, that's a different beast and I have no specific insight.  Civvy crit infrastructure is part of war, however, so worth diving into.

 

1 hour ago, MikeyD said:

This is the problem with scheduling your war before the leaves have budded. Even in the middle of a dense forest you're not under cover. This would have been a different war for both sides if it had been scheduled for mid-July.

In the visible spectrum, agreed.  I wonder that other frequencies, passive and active, are available to UAVs and how well they get through leaves.

[FancyCat]

5 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

I have no doubt Ukraine is highly connected but if you are going to lob dozens of cruise missiles and air strikes, hit the information architecture as a priority as opposed to freakin baby-hospitals.  I mean "c'mon!" use cyber to hijack and control what you can, and then all those fancy hypersonics to actually hit something that matters.   Of course to do that they would need some form of Joint Targeting architecture built around a unified Joint Command...ok, now I am getting pulled into "the Russian's suck" too.

NATO/U.S support in the background must be huge and ongoing since before the war began but I would also caution underestimating Ukrainian information warfare capabilities nor that of Eastern European states who are also experienced technologically and fighting Russia cyberwise and can support Ukraine as well. People are aware of Russian hackers, but let's not forget Ukraine's IT industry is very big and important as well, and there was a good degree of mixing with Russia's IT sector prewar. Also, the fact Ukraine is able to read Russian language basically fine, but most Russians can't read Ukrainian might help in a underhanded sense. Yes, there will be specialized groups with language skills, but I'm sure that factor helps.

[Aragorn2002]

1 minute ago, Taranis said:

He doesn't really seem happy

Make the bastard dig trenches.

[sburke]

2 minutes ago, Taranis said:

He doesn't really seem happy

nice bracelets.  Gucci? 

[Taranis]

Pro-Russian soldiers around Mariupol, April 12. ALEXANDER ERMOCHENKO / REUTERS

[acrashb]

6 minutes ago, sburke said:

For us, the storm brought to light a potential challenge in the consolidation of transatlantic cables that all landed in New York and New Jersey.”

There's nothing so falsely assuring as redundant paths that all terminate in the same side of a building (or small island  ).

Edited April 12, 2022 by acrashb

[panzermartin]

57 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

Before 2014 there was full decline of army. Our politics repeated the fatal mistake of Ukrainain socialists in 1917, when they decided that "new era coming without wars, when all nations will be brothers etc" and army was almost completely disbanded, so when Bolsheviks launched offensive, there too few forces remained to defend Ukraine. 

Since 1991 our politics told to society that Ukrainans are peaceful nation, we should be "pigeons of peace", never respond with agression on agression, we don't need in big army, because we will not attack anybody and will never be attacked, because we hadn't potential enemies etc. There were two exclusions - during Kuchma was a president. Despite he was moderate pro-Russian, in 1994 during Crimea crisis and in 2003 during Tuzla crisis his tough decisions forced Russia to cool in own ambitions. 

Army has been shortened in several stages, prestige of military was very low. Many officers retired and go to business, securiy, police or even to criminal. Among soldiers in military units reigned ugly Soviet-era semi-criminal habits, so almost all young people tried to avoid conscription in any way (bribe or gaining of officer rank in military department of university - this was pure formalism w/o any military practice or service, I myself am such "lietenant", which made three shots with PM for two years)

Attempts of reforms after 2008 war in Georgia failed because of inconsistency and indecision of authorities and resistans among high-ranked military, which according to Soviet habit didn't want to take any response or to do real things like increasing of real effectiveness of trops.

This looks weird, but most sucessfull attempt ot reforms were when pro-Russian Yanukovich came to power in 2010. In this time we have territorial contest with Romania for the shelf around Zmiinyi island, so Romania suddenly became unspoken potential enemy. There was defensive strategy vision was passed, according to which we could expext "border conflict of low intensity" in middle-time perspective. The vision of army was "small, but high-mobile professional troops, equipped with modernized Ukrainain weapon". Main focus - international cooperation, international maneuvers (both NATO and CIS/Russia), peacekeeping operation etc. Army was shortened again. Russian agents in MoD (and minister himself, citizen of Russia) made all to foil development of new Ukrainian weapon - project of ballistic missile Sapsan was cancelled, BM Oplot program remained w/o funding year by year, delayed building of new corvette and many other. Because of profesioanl army was claimed, MoD issued an order to liquidate all databeses in regional enlistment offices about persons, liablle to military service. So, when 2014 came, we met this crisis with completely disrupted mobilization system, with many "cadred" brigades, which in real had 200-400 of personnel, with faulty vehicles etc. But despite this, our "frontier soul", awake on Maidan and capability to decentralized self-organization saved us from full catastrophe.        

Given the bad state of Ukraine army in 2014 and the defeat in Donbas I wonder why Putin didn't attempt to reach Kiev back then. He would have an almost certain victory compared to a much more aware and better equipped UAF of today. Is his army in better state now? I doubt much has changed. Maybe the US administration back then (Hilary and Co) would be a lot more aggressive in response and he feared that. 

[sburke]

1 minute ago, acrashb said:

There's nothing to falsely assuring as redundant paths that all terminate in the same side of a building (or small island  ).

LOL Our next data center move was to Clifton NJ which is way up above sea level.... didn't fix the transatlantic cable problem though.   It did have better food choices though!

[Huba]

2 minutes ago, Der Zeitgeist said:

@HubaAh, a fellow refugee from that other forum that shall not be named. Welcome! 

The very same, hi @Der Zeitgeist!

So, as this community takes pride in it's ability to predict the course of action in this war, I'd like to ask of your opinions/ ideas on a subject.
There seems to be more or less a consensus that in the upcoming days of weeks we'll observe Zitadelle redux in Donbas - everyone is expecting that, and both sides seem to be preparing for it. I'd think that if Russians hope to achieve some kind of success there, they'd like to achieve at least a degree of surprise when the operation finally starts. I'm thinking about some feign attack, maybe unexpected use of airforce, anything that would disrupt Ukrainian defensive plan really. How do you think they could achieve this, if this is at all possible?
 

[acrashb]

6 minutes ago, panzermartin said:

Maybe the US administration back then (Hilary and Co) would be a lot more aggressive in response and he feared that. 

As much as I try to do minimal politics, if that team (Hilary and Co) was as aggressive about a Ukraine takeover as they were when Ambassador Stevens was killed, Putin could have personally flown to Kiev, shot the Ukraine president, sat on his chair, and nothing would have happened.
I think more likely the issue was a less-prepared / modernized Russian Army, or a lower sense of urgency, or both.

Edited April 12, 2022 by acrashb

[danfrodo]

11 minutes ago, Taranis said:

He doesn't really seem happy

But they gave him nice silver bracelets to accessorize.  The Ukrainians are both kind and fashion conscious.  I wonder if they'll also give him a nice necklace at some point?  What is the punishment for selling out your country to be murdered by the dozens of thousands?

[panzermartin]

2 minutes ago, acrashb said:

As much as I try to do minimal politics, if that team (Hilary and Co) was as aggressive about a Ukraine takeover as was on display when Ambassador Stevens was killed, Putin could have personally flown to Kiev, shot the Ukraine president, sat on his chair, and nothing would have happened.
I think more likely the issue was a less-prepared / modernized Russian Army, or a lower sense of urgency, or both.

But given they used green men, and according to the democrats sabotaged the US elections to prevent Hilary taking over, (and Trump voters voting to prevent WW3) they must have feared something that now they don't. 

But yes, probably weren't even prepared for sanctions as they are now I guess. 

[Aragorn2002]

8 minutes ago, Huba said:

The very same, hi @Der Zeitgeist!

So, as this community takes pride in it's ability to predict the course of action in this war, I'd like to ask of your opinions/ ideas on a subject.
There seems to be more or less a consensus that in the upcoming days of weeks we'll observe Zitadelle redux in Donbas - everyone is expecting that, and both sides seem to be preparing for it. I'd think that if Russians hope to achieve some kind of success there, they'd like to achieve at least a degree of surprise when the operation finally starts. I'm thinking about some feign attack, maybe unexpected use of airforce, anything that would disrupt Ukrainian defensive plan really. How do you think they could achieve this, if this is at all possible?
 

Maskirovka...pretty hard nowadays.

[Saberwander]

On 4/11/2022 at 4:10 PM, Der Zeitgeist said:

Very interesting article here, explaining the development of military culture in Russia and Ukraine, and how it influenced their battlefield performance in this war.

https://www.thebulwark.com/i-commanded-u-s-army-europe-heres-what-i-saw-in-the-russian-and-ukrainian-armies/

Thank you for the article. Hertling is quite interesting to read on Twitter as well.

8 hours ago, chuckdyke said:

Here is Metro Kiev no good shelling it into rubble. You need the infrastructure; this city controls the Dnieper crossing. Ukraine needs it to send their reinforcements to the east. Russia will pay a heavy price for not taking it. The West need to provide aircover to the Donbass it is 1000 km.

This made me realize that Russia did not go after the infrastructure. I could understand not bombing the bridges when they expected to roll onto Maidan and hold a victory parade on Day 3 but why are they not destroying all the bridges over Dnieper? Why are Ukrainian railways mostly functional across Ukraine? They retreated from the north, there is no real need for them to keep those bridges functional (and other bridges over Dnieper to the south).

Surely it can't be that they are "saving" the infrastructure as they expect to occupy it? Is it just being unable to target it without losing many aircraft?

By focusing on destroying bridges across Dnieper and/or adjacent areas they could make Ukrainian supply that much harder. The fact that Russians seem unable or unwilling to do that shows another issue in their war plan. They are just not fighting this in a way that can achieve victory.

Edited April 12, 2022 by Saberwander

[dan/california]

5 minutes ago, panzermartin said:

But given they used green men, and according to the democrats sabotaged the US elections to prevent Hilary taking over, (and Trump voters voting to prevent WW3) they must have feared something that now they don't. 

But yes, probably weren't even prepared for sanctions as they are now I guess. 

They also just own Belarus now, and could base from there. In 2014 Lukashenko wasn't just a wholly owned Russian subsidiary.

Edited April 12, 2022 by dan/california
spelling

[panzermartin]

1 minute ago, dan/california said:

They also just own Belarus now, and could base from there. In 2014 Lukashenko wasn't just a wholly owned Russian subsidiary.

Good point 

[Maquisard manqué]

36 minutes ago, Aragorn2002 said:

But it ain't impossible, ain't it? Reminded me of general Sikorsky at the time.

But that’s a minimum requirement for any decent conspiracy theory. Can’t be quickly proven wrong, even if it makes no sense at all, so it wriggles in to the mind through pre-existing doubts, preconceptions and biases.

[Aragorn2002]

3 minutes ago, Maquisard manqué said:

But that’s a minimum requirement for any decent conspiracy theory. Can’t be quickly proven wrong, even if it makes no sense at all, so it wriggles in to the mind through pre-existing doubts, preconceptions and biases.

Agreed. One needs to be very careful with that. And at the same time keep an open mind.

[FancyCat]

8 minutes ago, dan/california said:

Win the war, and revenge for the Australian submarine thing, too, brilliant.

Wow I completely forgot about that. France is dearly protective of their defence industry, it must kill them to be so sidelined in Ukraine due to the election. Once the election ends, I would bet on big-ticket items being offered, the opportunity is just too great to let the U.S or Germany or the U.K to have all the money. Macron of course can't tout it too much, a lot of it will be free (till the war ends) but the long term advantage of securing a Eastern European state for armament sales is going to undoubtedly outweigh any prior Russian sales or other Russian anger.

Plus, while it is important to underscore that Russia is heavily disadvantaged and will lose this war in some factor, national survival being so important a factor in Ukrainian resolve and resistance, it is deeply important to emphasize that Russia's imperialist, colonial mindset in it's population and government will not disappear and die so easily. We saw in the 2nd Chechen War (that Putin made his bones on) Russian humiliation forged into revenge. Yes, Russia is gonna be screwed now, but regime change is impossible from the outside due to nukes, and impossible on the inside due to a somewhat docile population. (No offense to Russians but Maidan, the Orange Revolution illustrates Ukrainian civil society is very strong and active)

Ukraine will continue to maintain a active, upgraded and aware stance towards it's larger neighbor and that entails all the lovely money for Western armament sales. Looks like China will lose out. Ukrainian arms industry will certainly have some good selling points afterwards, I expect the Ukrainian arms industry to flourish in spite of NATO armaments as Ukraine will be undeniably worried about being left alone in a future fight.

Ukrainian civil society is also a deep important factor in Ukrainian civilian resolve and resistance, we now know that the U.S prewar warning that Russia prepped kill lists targeting Ukrainian government, civil society was true, and that decapitating the civil society was just as important as ending the Ukrainian government and destroying it's military.

[acrashb]

Here's something hopeful for those who believe human nature is irredeemably savage:

https://nationalpost.com/news/world/syrian-fighters-join-ukraine-against-russia-whose-troops-are-now-led-by-their-brutal-commander-dvornikov

Syrians helping Ukrainians, not bad.

[FancyCat]

15 minutes ago, Saberwander said:

Thank you for the article. Hertling is quite interesting to read on Twitter as well.

This made me realize that Russia did not go after the infrastructure. I could understand not bombing the bridges when they expected to roll onto Maidan and hold a victory parade on Day 3 but why are they not destroying all the bridges over Dnieper? Why are Ukrainian railways mostly functional across Ukraine? They retreated from the north, there is no real need for them to keep those bridges functional (and other bridges over Dnieper to the south).

Surely it can't be that they are "saving" the infrastructure as they expect to occupy it? Is it just being unable to target it without losing many aircraft?

By focusing on destroying bridges across Dnieper and/or adjacent areas they could make Ukrainian supply that much harder. The fact that Russians seem unable or unwilling to do that shows another issue in their war plan. They are just not fighting this in a way that can achieve victory.

Imo, this illustrates that Russia still hopes to conquer all of Ukraine, yes I'm sure many Russian analysts are aware it is impossible, but in the same vein that Russia undertook the option most unlikely to succeed and therefore the most dangerous, outlandish and unthinkable to occur in a full scale invasion of Ukraine, I think we underestimate just how screwed up Putin/Russian government is calculating the odds right now.

I know Putin has a aura of being right, but part of it isn't just choosing right, it's also knowing when to walk away. Had he chosen a limited invasion, he probably could have taken the rest of the contested oblasts, damaged the Ukrainian military heavily, kept his own forces intact largely, and limited Western involvement.

Rinse, repeat every few years, boil the frog. Also, a limited invasion would have damaged the hell out of Zelensky's government, by forcing a calculation between peace or heavy fighting. Full scale invasion with overly loud signals of full annexation and of near genocidal intent for the Ukrainian population, the frog is jumping out.

Meshes well with reports that many Ukrainians were shocked this invasion happened (tho I will readily accept being wrong if resident Ukrainians chime in)