How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Battlefront.com]

2 hours ago, akd said:

A bit better resolution:

 

I've not seen anybody mention this, but it looks like it took a hit to the starboard aft area.  Looks like a chunk of the helicopter deck is missing and the rest of it trashed.  It also looks like the fire burned along the starboard side and exited just forward of the deck below the helicopter pad.  The area is severely scorched.

I dunno if they abandoned too quickly.  Looks to me like it had a high intensity fire engulfing a large portion of the ship.  It was likely beyond the crew to save.  And if the crew casualties are accurate, half the crew was dead or so seriously injured that they couldn't pose for pictures.  Considering the ship sank not too long after this it seems to me nobody should second guess the decision to abandon ship.

Steve

[chris talpas]

2 hours ago, akd said:

A bit better resolution:

 

Wondering if the Neptune missiles might have set off some of the SS-N-12 Sandbox missiles?  Always seemed like a risky weapon design from a damage resistance perspective.

Edited April 18, 2022 by chris talpas
Wrong sea god

[Battlefront.com]

29 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

UA will definitely gone on the offensive so this would be a test for the RA to see is if a stalemate is even possible.  It may, it would turn this war into a longer grind that Russia will still not be able to win but of all the bad options of the “we gotta stay here and die because Putin says so”, a narrow frontage to try and hold that land bridge is the least terrible.  With enough mass and digging enough holes and they may be able to pull off something.

I agree, from both a military and political standpoint the best Russia can do right now is stop the idiotic attacks, cease blowing up civilian infrastructure, shorten the lines, and start trying to rebuild some semblance of a capable mobile reserve.  This could make Ukraine's counter attacks costly (time or personnel or both) enough that negotiations are restarted.  Even holding out hope of giving Ukraine a bloody nose here or there.  By stopping the warcrime attacks on civilians Ukrainian civilians will start to calm down and seek to just end it.

However...

The primary problem with all of this is that Putin and Ukraine's concept of a peace deal are very far apart.  There is no way, short of being on the bring of disaster, that Ukraine will accept losing all that terrain in the south.  No way.  They won't likely let the warcrimes go unanswered.  These are two things that Putin can not accept if he wants to remain in power.

Plus, there are the sanctions that are in place.  I doubt very much that the world is just going to put that genie back in the bottle.  Billions have been spent on supporting Ukraine and billions more are needed to replenish everything that was given to Ukraine.  The West is not as invested as Ukraine, but they do have skin in the game.

So what is the point of Russia continuing the war?  Even if it becomes a harder nut to crack than it is now, I don't see Ukraine letting this war end on Russia's terms.  So best Putin can hope for is a prolonged war of attrition where something goes his way before even that is defeated.

There's no way out for Russia other than Ukraine letting them keep the gains and then get let off with a stern warning to not do it again.  Anybody want to place a bet on the chances of that happening?

Steve

 

[Battlefront.com]

21 hours ago, The_MonkeyKing said:

hmm, I wonder is ISW still hitting the mark and over estimating the Russians. Or have they now been "calibrated". haha

I have to say that ISW's reporting has been the best and most consistent I've run into.  I follow their briefings every day and, in fact, save them for later review.

True, early on they were talking about "stalemate" and Russians regrouping for a renewed attack with all kinds of lessons learned.  Also true that the didn't seem to appreciate how bad things were in the northern front.  However, they also weren't gushing about Russia's chances of resetting the table for another meal and have been, for some time now, solidly in the "they'll never learn" camp.

What I have seen for quite some time is more healthy, conservative reporting with "read between the lines" comments sprinkled here and there that indicate their internal discussions are likely as harsh as ours here.  They are putting in the time and effort to produce a solid product from which speculators, like me, can build a better concept of where things might be headed.

If I knew where these folks hung out I'd make phone call and buy them a round of beers. 

Steve

[Kinophile]

LOL.

 

[Battlefront.com]

For those interested in getting a better sense of what is going on inside the minds of everyday Russians, I recommend this article.  After documenting that pretty much everybody in Russia supports the war for this or that reason (all very interesting to read, trust me) it ends with a glimmer of a sliver of a hint that doubt is creeping into people's minds:

Quote

Our hypothesis – and one that we plan to test in the future – is that people’s perceptions of the war are changing significantly as the conflict draws on. We have not observed that people’s initial support for the war was replaced by rejecting it – supporters of the war continue to find justifications for Russian military actions. But in recent interviews, we rarely encounter unconditional support for what is happening.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/russia-ukraine-war-support-interviews-opinion/

There's a bunch of other interesting articles on this site to poke into.

Steve

[Kinophile]

It seems that the current (apparent) Russian offensive plan is a fractal of the original.

• Too many axis
• Bad topology for them
• Still too wide a frontage (even after adjusted for the force reduction)
• No air superiority 
• Not enough PGMs
• Crappy ground
• Crappy units thrown against determined, better equipped defenders
• Same tactics 
• Same road-bound columns
• Same ****ty small unit "leadership"

 

[Kinophile]

23 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

For those interested in getting a better sense of what is going on inside the minds of everyday Russians, I recommend this article.  After documenting that pretty much everybody in Russia supports the war for this or that reason (all very interesting to read, trust me) it ends with a glimmer of a sliver of a hint that doubt is creeping into people's minds:

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/russia-ukraine-war-support-interviews-opinion/

There's a bunch of other interesting articles on this site to poke into.

Steve

Interesting link, thank you. Dispiriting, in many deep ways, but as you note there is some movement. But the propaganda campaign has been so intense for so long that minds are set very very hard. It seems that nothing but Putin's personal admission of fault and blame would change anything. The narrative is just too embedded.

You'd think 60,000 casualties would do something, but the media control is so effective the true cost is only slowly filtering through. At this rate, they'd have to rapidly hit 150,000 for some real effect to occur.

[Machor]

On 4/16/2022 at 4:39 PM, photon said:

I think we're seeing in the Battle of Kiev something like the Battle of Taranto. Everyone should have realized that naval combat was fundamentally different after the British rendered three Italian battleships combat ineffective with cloth covered biplanes. But the British themselves didn't see the dramatic systemic shift and lost the Repulse and Prince of Wales more than a year later.

Grognard objection:  The Italian battleships were at anchor; the British were underway: Big difference for the RN. From "Death of a battleship: The loss of HMS Prince of Wales" (p.63):

"Prior to the deployment of the Prince of Wales and Repulse to the Pacific, the Royal Navy had been operating for over two years (September 1939 - December 1941) in the Mediterranean in the face of intensive attacks from German and Italian land-based aircraft. These airplanes were able to damage the convoys but not totally stop them. British battleships had been repeatedly attacked but never sunk. Based on that recent war experience, it certainly appeared risky but possible to operate in waters covered by enemy land-based air. What was not understood, due to a serious intelligence failure, was the fact that the Japanese bombers based in Indo-China were not an ordinary formation of aircraft but were a force especially trained and equipped for "ship killing". These planes were specifically stationed there because of the predicted arrival of Prince of Wales and Repulse in Singapore. No other enemy or allied air force had this equivalent capability at the time. As the war progressed, ordinary land-based bombers (US B-17s, the Germans and Italians in the Mediterranean) continued attacking ships at sea with limited success. The RAF, using torpedo and rocket-equipped twin engine planes against German coastal convoys, and USN carrier-based planes (using torpedoes and bombs) and USAF B-25s, using skip bombs against Japanese coastal shipping, would finally gain the equivalent potency of these Japanese land-based aircraft later in the war."

[dan/california]

30 minutes ago, Kinophile said:

Interesting link, thank you. Dispiriting, in many deep ways, but as you note there is some movement. But the propaganda campaign has been so intense for so long that minds are set very very hard. It seems that nothing but Putin's personal admission of fault and blame would change anything. The narrative is just too embedded.

You'd think 60,000 casualties would do something, but the media control is so effective the true cost is only slowly filtering through. At this rate, they'd have to rapidly hit 150,000 for some real effect to occur.

Putin's funeral, followed by a tidal wave of denunciations about how he screwed this up would work nicely.

[dan/california]

 

They may be sending all their artillery ammo to the center of the pre 2/24 frontier because that is the only place they physically can get it too. I am not sure if that is an attack of sense, desperation, or both. Maybe they will try a frontal attack on the Ukrainians strongest defensive positions, and hope to get it done by burying them in bodies. Although I have strong doubts they have enough people willing to reenact the Somme.

[sross112]

I said awhile back that I think Putin is awaiting the fall of Mariupol and then he could announce to his people that Ukraine had been denazified and that the military objective of destroying the UA was complete. Then they would hunker down in the LDNR and south of the Dnepr, try to get a western or UN backed ceasefire and hold onto the LDNR and the land bridge. 

I agree that I don't think the UA or the Ukrainian people will settle for that now. So does Putin wait for Mariupol to fall, announce the above bullcrap and then pull back to the starting lines? Sell that as a win to his people and beg the west and UN to help get a ceasefire in place? Does the UA and the people of Ukraine settle for that or do they try to take back all their territory in Crimea too?

That might be a question for Haiduk and Kraze. Does Ukraine say that due to all the separatist stuff in the previously occupied areas it isn't worth taking back at the cost of however many UA lives? Or is the majority of the population in those areas wanting to be part of Ukraine again? Doesn't make too much sense to waste blood and treasure of Ukraine if it would be a drawn out anti-partisan operation but it might if the risk of that is diminished with the RA defeat.

Thoughts?

[Kinophile]

6 hours ago, Combatintman said:

 

 

Slovyansk cannot be bypassed which means that if it is going to be defended, it will require a minimum of 4-5 BTGs to subdue.  A number of 22 x BTGs has been banded around for the force assembling in Izyum meaning that 

Do we have any idea how many BTGs are involved in Mariupol'?

x4 times the population. So it Could be a useful comparison.

Slovyansk also has many marshes, streams rivers and channeling terrain. Any attack in has very predictable paths, is very visible on the approach and must cross significant water obstacles. The entire city is in a valley so observable from all sides, which cuts both ways. There are many dykes and small dams that UA can blow to expand the water coverage, further channeling the attacks.

The limited axis of attack also limit the LOCs, for the same mechanistic reasons - road surfaces and high dry ground. 

The higher ground S & SE of the city is good firing/observation/shielding terrain, allowing relatively obscured UA LOCs into the city.

As mentioned previously, the current iteration of the invasion feels like a fractal of the original idea (as in same bad idea), and Slovyansk gives me the same deja-vu  as to Kiev. It has a lot of the same advantages going for it, except for size. 

Edited April 18, 2022 by Kinophile

[Machor]

8 hours ago, panzermartin said:

On other news, Russia seems to want to exploit all the influence it has on Turkey. Today it was announced it is opening a consulate in occupied Northern Cyprus.

This 'news' - which appears to have originated in the Greek press - was refuted by Russia. Russia will only enlarge its existing unofficial mission for expanded consular services - supposedly, Northern Cyprus has seen a large influx of Russians fleeing Russia:

 

8 hours ago, panzermartin said:

Turkey closed all NATO bases on its territory

??? - All NATO bases in Turkey are open and operational, including the major US airbase at İncirlik with B61 nuclear bombs and a Spanish Patriot battery, and the Kürecik radar station.

8 hours ago, panzermartin said:

I'm worried because when Turkey invaded Cyprus in 1974 it was already a NATO member.

Turkey intervened in on-going fighting between EOKA-B, Makarios loyalists, Turkish Cypriots, and Greek Cypriot Communists after EOKA-B carried out a coup to facilitate the annexation of Cyprus by the military junta in Athens; Turkey's NATO membership had no relationship to the operation itself. However, Turkey did face a years-long arms embargo by the US afterwards because of using US military aid that had been intended for NATO operations; this forced Turkey to create a new, 4th Army, which is not under NATO command and does not use NATO aid and funds.

[Battlefront.com]

15 minutes ago, sross112 said:

I said awhile back that I think Putin is awaiting the fall of Mariupol and then he could announce to his people that Ukraine had been denazified and that the military objective of destroying the UA was complete. Then they would hunker down in the LDNR and south of the Dnepr, try to get a western or UN backed ceasefire and hold onto the LDNR and the land bridge. 

I agree that I don't think the UA or the Ukrainian people will settle for that now. So does Putin wait for Mariupol to fall, announce the above bullcrap and then pull back to the starting lines? Sell that as a win to his people and beg the west and UN to help get a ceasefire in place? Does the UA and the people of Ukraine settle for that or do they try to take back all their territory in Crimea too?

That might be a question for Haiduk and Kraze. Does Ukraine say that due to all the separatist stuff in the previously occupied areas it isn't worth taking back at the cost of however many UA lives? Or is the majority of the population in those areas wanting to be part of Ukraine again? Doesn't make too much sense to waste blood and treasure of Ukraine if it would be a drawn out anti-partisan operation but it might if the risk of that is diminished with the RA defeat.

Thoughts?

My opinion on this hasn't changed... Putin also promised the people all of Luhansk and Donetsk Oblasts.  In fact, this is one of the primary reasons I switched my prewar bet from bluff to shooting war.  It's been one of the points Russia stuck to before negotiations collapsed.  For sure Putin MIGHT drop it, but I think he'll try to pursue it.  At least so far it seems it's still moving in that direction.

As for Mariupol's fall being key to claiming "denazification", that has seemed to be the case and the intense focus on Azov as a "Nazi" unit seems to underscore this. There was some nonsense just put out by the Russian propaganda channels that Azov is forcing the Marine units to fight at gunpoint.  Clearly this fantasy wasn't created without a purpose.

Steve

[Machor]

8 hours ago, TheVulture said:

Turkey-Russia relations are complicated though (as are US-Turkey relations).

The US cooperating with the YPG and Russia wilfully killing 37 Turkish soldiers are in different leagues of 'complicated'. As a side, I think Russia had the chance of a century to turn Turkey to its side with the tensions over the YPG, but chose to bury this chance in the olive groves of Idlib - IMO, that was already a sign of an irrational foreign policy. It was amusing to watch pro-Russian Turkish accounts on Twitter go from "let's buy Su-35s instead of F-35s" in January 2020 to "we shall avenge our fallen" in February.

8 hours ago, domfluff said:

the line that the ruling party has taken is one that's an intermediate one between Russia and the west. Those scales have likely shifted quite a bit over the last few months...

Continuing from my reply above, the scales already shifted in February 2020. If Erdoğan and his Islamists cannot make truce with the West - and there's a presidential election coming in 2023 with the secularist opposition currently easily winning in polls - they'll have to strike a deal with China.

[Kinophile]

if you can't defend your national airspace....

 

[Cobetco]

5 hours ago, akd said:

A bit better resolution:

 

so just because my eyes are trained to look for this stuff, that 2nd image has gone through an AI upscale and any speculation should be thrown into the trash, unsure of the first image, didn't compare the res to the original, but considering the guy posting this has 22 followers, expect this to be a twitter follower grab or hes dumb and doesnt under stand that tech, he's posted multiple "high res versions" ignore this pls. its bad data.

[G.I. Joe]

3 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

I've not seen anybody mention this, but it looks like it took a hit to the starboard aft area.  Looks like a chunk of the helicopter deck is missing and the rest of it trashed.  It also looks like the fire burned along the starboard side and exited just forward of the deck below the helicopter pad.  The area is severely scorched.

I dunno if they abandoned too quickly.  Looks to me like it had a high intensity fire engulfing a large portion of the ship.  It was likely beyond the crew to save.  And if the crew casualties are accurate, half the crew was dead or so seriously injured that they couldn't pose for pictures.  Considering the ship sank not too long after this it seems to me nobody should second guess the decision to abandon ship.

Steve

Agreed...it's hard to tell what was going on below decks, which systems were out, etc. Also, I gather damage control equipment on Soviet ships was not up to the same standard as NATO vessels (I think @asurob may have alluded to this a while ago). I remember going aboard USS Kinkaid for a tour during a port of call visit in Vancouver in 1992, when I was eleven. The sailor conducting our tour said he had had the chance to tour a Sovremenny and an Udaloy (if memory serves correctly) recently on an exchange visit...he said the thing that had struck him most was that he saw about two fire hoses on each ship throughout the whole tour. That really stuck in my mind because Kinkaid had fire hoses all over the place...same story aboard HMCS Vancouver a year later.

3 hours ago, chris talpas said:

Wondering if the Neptune missiles might have set off some of the SS-N-12 Sandbox missiles?  Always seemed like a risky weapon design from a damage resistance perspective.

That seems unlikely to me...the SS-N-12 has a 1000 kg warhead (compared to 150 kg for the Neptune), I'm guessing that if one of them cooked off the ship wouldn't so much sink as explode. It does look like one of the hits may have been fairly close to that area, maybe part of the rationale for abandoning ship...

Edited April 18, 2022 by G.I. Joe
Punctuation

[Combatintman]

5 hours ago, dan/california said:

So basically the road system dictates that  from Izyum they attack southeast towards Barvinkove, southwest towards Slavyansk, or both. There is a small river running more or less east west through Barvinkove. It enough of an obstacle to let the Ukrainians really slow or outright stop them right there? I am assuming the Ukrainians are reading these maps, or better ones. I am a lot less sure what the Russians are reading.

Yes it is enough of an obstacle in many places - hence the 'Severely Restricted' marking in many places.  Severely Restricted in IPB terms = cannot be bridged by an AVLB.  I haven't finished doing that river yet but a lot of it is 'Restricted' which means that it can be crossed by an AVLB and some stretches will be 'Unrestricted' which is 5' gap or less (1.5m ish in new money).  Russia needs tactical bridging whichever Avenue of Approach is used and will likely need a lot of it.

[Machor]

3 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Looks to me like it had a high intensity fire engulfing a large portion of the ship.  It was likely beyond the crew to save.  And if the crew casualties are accurate, half the crew was dead or so seriously injured that they couldn't pose for pictures.

It is claimed by this (serious) account that the Moskva used an unusually large quantity of aluminum in its construction which led to a catastrophic fire. Someone replying to him claims that the mother of a Russian sailor stated only some 200 sailors made it to Sevastopol and that her son is MIA:

 

[Kinophile]

I wonder if UA is looking to cut across from Vesele to Horokhavtka, choking off Izium.

[Machor]

This was Russian military analysts' hubris about the Ukrainian Neptune missile before the sinking of the Moskva:

And an interesting coincidence: If the last picture of the Moskva is indeed from April 15, this means it sank on the same day as the 110th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic:

 

[dan/california]

3 minutes ago, Kinophile said:

I wonder if UA is looking to cut across from Vesele to Horokhavtka, choking off Izium.

Or at least credibly threaten too, and completely spoil the attack the Russians are trying to set up. There is also a credible report the Russians are just pouring artillery right on the middle of the pre 2/24 defensive line. My speculation is that is the one place they can move ammo easily and so the best spot for a distraction. But who knows they might go for a full replay of the Somme, but against modern munitions. 

[dan/california]

And they don't have to completely close the pocket, just bring the supply lines under effective artillery fire.