How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Vacillator]

6 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

The other forms of taxes, including fuel taxes, are not available for that.

In the UK, as I understand it, all and any taxes end up in the same place.  So road tax on vehicles can end up paying for rockets and bombs, the national health service, holes in roads etc.  The recent NI hike is said to be an ear-marked exception to boost the NHS.  Unless someone comes along to correct me (as long as it's not Jacob Rees-Mogg).

On the wider question I'm happy that my taxes might go to help Ukraine fight now and re-build later.

[MSBoxer]

1 minute ago, Battlefront.com said:

I am waiting for someone smart numbers think tank to project how much the West might save in defense spending if Russia became a peaceful neighbor.  A lot more than $40b a year, that's for sure

Steve

The problem is that many of the nearby countries thought, or at least acted, like they hade a peaceful neighbor

[Armorgunner]

9 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

I am waiting for someone smart numbers think tank to project how much the West might save in defense spending if Russia became a peaceful neighbor.  A lot more than $40b a year, that's for sure

Steve

Hey, don´t forget about China? Please don´t make a game of a Taiwan conflict? We all know it will come to reallity a few years later if you do! Kidding (just a little?) But Russia in a bad millitary shape, could let us sleep a little better at least?

Edited May 13, 2022 by Armorgunner

[Calamine Waffles]

22 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

Why not? ) This information was in open sources. So, main upgrades of T-64BV mod.2017:

- "Nozh" ERA packed in Kontakt-1 ERA boxes

- gunner's thermal sight TPN-1-TPV (6000 m detection reange of "tank" type target, 4000 m - recognition range, zoom 1x, 2x, 4x)

- commander's observation device TKN-3VUM (3rd gen EOP, 1000 m of range with full moon, 550 m with 1/4 of moon, angle of view 11 deg)

- driver's observation device TVNE-4BUM (3rd gen. EOP, 500 m of range with full moon, 100 m with 1/4 of moon, angle of view 32 deg) 

- digital radio Lybid' K-2RB (licenced Mototrola) - up to 70 km range

- CN-4215 GPS navigation system

There are about 200+ T-64BV mod.2017 were in service on the end of 2021

Also T-64BV mod.2022 was under tests in January

Oh, no, I know those things, what I'm more interested in is their combat performance in this war so far, i.e., how well are they doing compared to the normal T-64BVs and unmodernised tanks.

There has been very little info about this (are they taking less losses, are they performing better at accomplishing objectives? etc.) So far I've only seen two BV 2017s lost that are easily identifiable. There's only one video where I've seen them in action, briefly.

https://imgur.com/VDvWMdK

The same can be said for the BM2, which we know the 92OMBr (currently engaged near Kharkiv) has, but has not been seen.

Edited May 13, 2022 by Calamine Waffles

[BigDork]

8 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

I am waiting for someone smart numbers think tank to project how much the West might save in defense spending if Russia became a peaceful neighbor.  A lot more than $40b a year, that's for sure

Steve

This is something along the lines of what I was thinking earlier. The more military and financial aid we provide to Ukraine to cripple and destroy the Russian military, the less of a threat they will be for years and years to come. Yes it's a big sum of money up front but over the long term, the savings could be quite significant. 

How long will it take Russia to replenish and rebuild all these BTGs, aircraft, support vehicles, etc? Especially if sanctions remain in place.

[Calamine Waffles]

Quote

How long will it take Russia to replenish and rebuild all these BTGs, aircraft, support vehicles, etc? Especially if sanctions remain in place.

If the sanctions remain in place? Never. They basically will become a Chinese vassal state and resource extraction source.

[danfrodo]

25 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

I am waiting for someone smart numbers think tank to project how much the West might save in defense spending if Russia became a peaceful neighbor.  A lot more than $40b a year, that's for sure

Steve

that seems to be the calculation that the US, Poland, and a lot of other countries are making.  This is pocket change compared to the year in, year out costs of staying prepared and vigilant about the rabid dog next door.

[Haiduk]

27 minutes ago, Calamine Waffles said:

Oh, no, I know those things, what I'm more interested in is their combat performance in this war so far, i.e., how well are they doing compared to the normal T-64BVs and unmodernised tanks.

No, I havn't such information. There wasn't information which brigades received upgraded tanks, this is classified info. T-64BV and T-64BV mod.2017 visually distuguish itself only with small GPS antenna, so not always can understand what exactly tank you see.

Edited May 13, 2022 by Haiduk

[Battlefront.com]

24 minutes ago, Vacillator said:

In the UK, as I understand it, all and any taxes end up in the same place.  So road tax on vehicles can end up paying for rockets and bombs, the national health service, holes in roads etc.  The recent NI hike is said to be an ear-marked exception to boost the NHS.  Unless someone comes along to correct me (as long as it's not Jacob Rees-Mogg).

On the wider question I'm happy that my taxes might go to help Ukraine fight now and re-build later.

Tax policies are really off topic (thank the gods!), so we shouldn't go down this road.  However, I will say that US tax policy there are certain taxes that are mandated to go to their intended purposes.  Yes, people play funny accounting games, but largely the laws do dictate how the money is spent.  Where one has to be very cautious is when you hear politicians talking about increasing general tax mechanism (VAT for you folks, Sales Tax for us Americans) to fund particular things.  "General revenue" is just that.

Again, the tie-in to Ukraine here is that the quantity of money being requested by the respective Western governments is very small in terms of total GDP even if there is no offsets taken into consideration.  So even if it was just GIVEN away, it's not going to make a big difference to any normal person's tax bill, if any.

We also have to keep in mind that there are lots of offsets to take into consideration.  Weaponry, for example, is a physical item made by a nation's defense industry.  Every weapon made for Ukraine is economic activity in that home country.  Paychecks for workers gets spent locally.  Property expansions gets spent locally.  Many goods/services from related industries gets spent locally.  I don't have any numbers handy, but there are studies that show for every $1 spent on a defense item in the US, some large chunk of that goes into the local economy.

Other offsets are harder to calculate.  Savings on future defense spending, for example, is very hard to gauge.  The value of lives that might be lost in the event of having to go to war with Russia now or in the future is extremely hard to put a pricetag on, yet it counts a lot.  The expense to industry for supply chain disruptions, energy blackmail, etc. also need to taken into consideration.  And of course, the costs of humanitarian disasters that can be avoided or minimized by getting Russia out of the warmaking business counts too.  Lastly, there's all that nefarious Russian influence to make the world a worse place that winds up costing the global community so much (Europeans complaining about Syrian refugees must remember Russia is largely responsible for them).

Steve

[purpheart23]

3 hours ago, asurob said:

We send billions out to countries all across the world...this is no different.  We help those who need it.  Isolation doesn't work in a global society.  The Russian attack on Ukraine WAS an attack on all of us.  We manage to foot the bill rather easily for things that blow up.  This is no different.  You turn your back now and before you know it you are sending American combat troops to fight Russian combat troops in a place like Germany or Poland.  No, you're wrong about this 100 percent.  As is a certain Senator from Kentucky who does stuff like this all the time so he can be in the news.  Believe me if his party was in power he'd be leading the charge to send the money...and you well know it.

Whole lot of conjecture, thanks for chiming. Next!?

 

Edited May 13, 2022 by purpheart23

[Calamine Waffles]

8 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

No, I havn't such information. There wasn't information which brigades received upgraded tanks, this is classified info. T-64BV and T-64BV mod.2017 visually distuguish itself only with small GPS antenna, so not always can understand what exactly tank you see.

I think vanilla BV retains Luna while BV 2017 no longer has it because thermal optics make it unnecessary?

[FancyCat]

Was this posted yet? I can't recall if it's the same footage. Posting it anyway, whyyy are they doing this. The morale of those units must be nothing, no wonder the Kharkov front broke.

 

[SeinfeldRules]

3 hours ago, Combatintman said:

Not necessarily regarding indirect fire assets - it all depends on the mission and task.  Granted FIND is one of the core functions in combat and anything that that you can do to degrade the enemy's ability to execute that function always helps but indirect fire/gunnery/boom boom boom/whoosh-bang is not necessarily the be all and end all.  I recall an exercise where I was the enemy commander and was able to slam a company-sized flanking attack unnoticed into the forward left battalion of a brigade because:

• There weren't enough ISR assets to provide redundancy on the cover all of the identified avenues of approach from the flank.
• The gunners controlling the UAVs were jerking around trying to locate a 120mm mortar battery that I kept displacing every time it fired.

Granted that this was a simulation and I knew where all the moving parts were but I wanted to, and did, make the point that ISR needs to be focused and the people that are controlling key assets like UAVs need to be supporting the ISR plan ... which they weren't.  BTW I did not take advantage of my god's eye view to use an avenue of approach that had not been identified during IPB or deliberately dodge the assets that should have been covering the NAI's in the Decision Support Matrix.

This is an incredibly common trend you see in training. UAVs can have very much a soda straw effect when it comes to processing and analyzing the feed. Even when you find something it can be hard to place it in context as you often don’t get the full picture of what formation that unit represents. From what I’ve seen, often one of the best ways to use a UAV is to have another intelligence asset cue them on and have the UAV complete the kill chain with accurate targeting data. 
 

Another under appreciated aspect of UAVs is the support required to operate, analyze and integrate their collection into a a coherent intelligence picture for units - command posts are already bloated with personnel and have survivability issues, I can only imagine the number of people you would need to view, assess and analyze dozens of UAV feeds. AI can help but that’s probably farther off then a drone rich environment. Plus the air space control plan you would need, the possibility of target duplication and overestimation (multiple UAVs collecting on the same target, turning what is only 3 vehicles into an entire company). Where are all these UAVs going to take off? All of the more capable UAVs need room and personnel to operate. UAV integration is a non trivial problem set. 

[Battlefront.com]

34 minutes ago, MSBoxer said:

The problem is that many of the nearby countries thought, or at least acted, like they hade a peaceful neighbor

I think this is one of the big lessons that much of Europe is wrestling with right now.  The general European policy of appeasement is now seen for what it always was... a complete and utter failure.  The only reason why Russia is paying a price now is because he made sure everybody learned this lesson.  If Putin had instead ordered a limited military expansion of the Donbas republics I'm sure Europe would have (largely) continued with appeasement.  But Putin screwed up and so we are in a different world now!

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

2 minutes ago, purpheart23 said:

Whole lot of conjecture, thanks for chiming.

Not really.  Appeasement and isolationism have never worked to contain an expansionist autocratic state.  Ever.  You might call that conjecture, I call it knowing how the world works.

Putin has made it very clear he wants the Baltics and even Poland.  To keep him from doing that NATO has spent a lot more than $40b.  If there were no NATO then the Baltics would be back under Russian rule, of that there should be no doubt.

Steve

[purpheart23]

"No, you're wrong about this 100 percent"

"Believe me if his party was in power he'd be leading the charge to send the money...and you well know it. "

"You turn your back now and before you know it you are sending American combat troops to fight Russian combat troops in a place like Germany or Poland."

Looks like a lot of opinion to me. @Battlefront.com

6 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Not really. 

Steve

 

[Haiduk]

Only owen left...

1943/44

2022

[Battlefront.com]

4 minutes ago, SeinfeldRules said:

This is an incredibly common trend you see in training. UAVs can have very much a soda straw effect when it comes to processing and analyzing the feed. Even when you find something it can be hard to place it in context as you often don’t get the full picture of what formation that unit represents. From what I’ve seen, often one of the best ways to use a UAV is to have another intelligence asset cue them on and have the UAV complete the kill chain with accurate targeting data. 
 

Another under appreciated aspect of UAVs is the support required to operate, analyze and integrate their collection into a a coherent intelligence picture for units - command posts are already bloated with personnel and have survivability issues, I can only imagine the number of people you would need to view, assess and analyze dozens of UAV feeds. AI can help but that’s probably farther off then a drone rich environment. Plus the air space control plan you would need, the possibility of target duplication and overestimation (multiple UAVs collecting on the same target, turning what is only 3 vehicles into an entire company). Where are all these UAVs going to take off? All of the more capable UAVs need room and personnel to operate. UAV integration is a non trivial problem set. 

This something I've been making copious notes about throughout this entire war.  One thing trap we seem to fall into when talking about UAVs is kinda mushing them all into one of two types; things that look and kill, things that can only look.  But this is a gross oversimplification of both capabilities as well as missions.

The quadcopters, for example, are FANTASTIC for answering very basic tactical questions.  Is there someone on the road we're about to drive down?  Someone spotted a flash of something over there, can we get a better look at it?  We know there's enemy forces in this section of town, can we get a better idea of their numbers and capabilities?  That sort of stuff.

For this sort of task you don't need huge infrastructure, you just need one dude and some direction from a junior commander on the spot.

But if you're trying to figure out what is going on within a large battlespace, then quadcopters are not going to be all that good unless you have a lot of them and the infrastructure to tie all that info together to create a single picture.  And even then, it's still likely to be missing a lot of stuff in particular due to range restrictions.  So for this sort of larger picture ISR you need bigger UAVs and a room full of people crunching information to make sense of it.

This is the same for weaponized UAVs.  Quadcopters with grenades work great to get rid of a single thing that's causing a problem, they don't work well at all against large dynamic forces.  Even the bigger UAVs run into limitations rather quickly, but their punchier weaponry has more potential to create an outsized effect.  And trying to use UAVs to nail things specific to a larger operational plan... yup, lots of coordination needed to make that happen.

Again, this stuff fascinates me in more ways than I can count

Steve

[dan/california]

13 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Tax policies are really off topic (thank the gods!), so we shouldn't go down this road. 

At least it hasn't ended as badly as the forest road adventure those two Russian BTGs wandered off on, yet....

[Calamine Waffles]

Peter Zeihan generally explains pretty well what Russian geopolitical goals in Europe are, and it's basically to secure its "borderlands". In particularly they want to control those red lines

[chrisl]

37 minutes ago, Calamine Waffles said:

If the sanctions remain in place? Never. They basically will become a Chinese vassal state and resource extraction source.

Even if sanctions don't stay in place, an awful lot of that stuff was developed and built in the Soviet years, and the time since then has not been kind to Russian technology.  There was an immediate sucking sound of brains to the west in the early 90s, and it's continued steadily since then.  Anything that hasn't been in production for a while may depend on information or equipment that's been lost in the meantime.  That even happens in the US, where a few of the wrong people retire at the supplier of some critical component and it becomes a crisis to their customers if something goes wrong and part of a process is lost.  It's even worse when all your educated people are leaving the country because the employment opportunities are orders of magnitude better.

[dan/california]

6 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

Only owen left...

1943/44

2022

At first I thought they were cooking Owen........

 

Edit

Then I typo in my joke.....

Edited May 13, 2022 by dan/california

[Battlefront.com]

2 minutes ago, purpheart23 said:

"No, you're wrong about this 100 percent"

"Believe me if his party was in power he'd be leading the charge to send the money...and you well know it. "

"You turn your back now and before you know it you are sending American combat troops to fight Russian combat troops in a place like Germany or Poland."

Looks like a lot of opinion to me. @Battlefront.com

 

Sure, because nobody can see into the future.  However, there's a difference between making logical and sound arguments based on historical precedence and understanding the situation vs. pretending historical precedents don't exist and/or that they can't be learned from.

I'll put it back to you.  Can you show a situation where appeasement and/or isolationism has not resulted in an eventual larger investment later on down the road, including war?  Yes I have a degree in history.  Yes I have spent my life studying wars and autocratic states.  But no, I'm not infallible.  Maybe you know of an example of doing nothing has worked, so I'm totally open to learning from you if you have something to share.

Steve

[keas66]

6 minutes ago, purpheart23 said:

"No, you're wrong about this 100 percent"

"Believe me if his party was in power he'd be leading the charge to send the money...and you well know it. "

"You turn your back now and before you know it you are sending American combat troops to fight Russian combat troops in a place like Germany or Poland."

Looks like a lot of opinion to me. @Battlefront.com

 

You have not exactly posted any strong arguments for  your own position . I don't feel its the purpose of this forum to convince you of anything ...rather the opposite . If one has a strong opinion about some aspect of the conflict  - one usually provides some sort of demonstrable proof of the correctness of ones views  . So what are your actual arguments for not helping out Ukraine to the extent  that we are ?

[Phantom Captain]

1 minute ago, keas66 said:

You have not exactly posted any strong arguments for  your own position . I don't feel its the purpose of this forum to convince you of anything ...rather the opposite . If one has a strong opinion about some aspect of the conflict  - one usually provides some sort of demonstrable proof of the correctness of ones views  . So what are your actual arguments for not helping out Ukraine to the extent  that we are ?

MAGA.  Lol.  No intellectual defense of anything, just talking points, confrontational attitude and dismissiveness of anything contrary to their delusional reality.  Not worth arguing.  Seriously.