How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[CAZmaj]

5 hours ago, akd said:

More fun with Caesar (second clip is first part):

Ugh...fingers in ears  I have not seen any noise muffs, and TCAPS. I hope they at least have foam earplugs?

[Vanir Ausf B]

Apparently English proficiency is required for the Caesar unit commander.

I'm still flummoxed by that UI. The Caesar has never been exported to an English-speaking country, as far as I can tell.

Edited June 10, 2022 by Vanir Ausf B

[Calamine Waffles]

It's been exported to Thailand, Saudi Arabia, and Indonesia, and I think you're going to find a lot more Thais and Indonesians who speak English than who speak French.

Also pretty sure more Ukrainians speak English than French.

Edited June 10, 2022 by Calamine Waffles

[chuckdyke]

4 minutes ago, Vanir Ausf B said:

The Caesar has never been exported to an English-speaking country, as far as I can tell.

The common language in NATO is English. This could be the reason. 

[Battlefront.com]

3 minutes ago, chuckdyke said:

The common language in NATO is English. This could be the reason. 

Yup, I'm pretty sure that contractors develop an English version because it is the most likely to be acceptable.  I am also sure that France would tailor it to a specific language for an extra fee

Seriously though, these days with controls being more virtual than physical it's probably pretty easy to localize into a specific language.  Software is pretty flexible that way.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

2 hours ago, Machor said:

A reminder that when Turkey joined NATO along with Greece in February 1952, it had free-and-fair elections with a two party system, an independent judiciary, and a GDP close to that of Italy.

True, but Turkey's first expressed interest was not greeted warming, it's first official request was outright rejected, and it's second attempt started out as less than full membership.  Had Turkey not been adjacent to the Soviet Union and straddling the Dardanelles Straights, I don't think it would have become a NATO member.

Personally, I think it was a smart move to accept Turkey into NATO at the time.  It served the alliance very well throughout the Cold War and it also benefited from the guarrantees NATO provided.  It's only been recently that Turkey has been problematic.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

On 6/8/2022 at 6:18 AM, Grigb said:

Infamous Murz recently stated that LDNR artillery is extremely low on 122mm ammo and Russian Western Military District is running out of 122mm stock. They are urgently converting LDNR artillery to 152mm caliber (D-20 guns from Russian military storages).

Dimitri just translated a part of the post you referenced here:

https://wartranslated.com/russia_dpr_artillery_standard/

The full post (run through Google Translate) is here:

https://kenigtiger-livejournal-com.translate.goog/2148946.html?_x_tr_sl=ru&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp

It's very interesting generally, not just because it talks about the ammo situation.  Thanks for drawing attention to it. 

Of particular interest is the author is very harsh towards a Russian "military expert", Vladislav Shurygin, which he deems a "media prostitute".  Ouch   And that his "ideas about how the positional war was conducted in the Donbass from 2015 to 2022 are, excuse me, a virgin's ideas about sexual intercourse".  Double ouch!!

Some of the claims we've seen about Russian changes in tactics, drones, etc. has come from Shurygin and the author says it's all BS fantasy.

To get a sense of how little faith we should have in Shurygin's assessments, let me clip this hilarious piece out of a recent Newsweek article:

Quote

"The question of mobilization only needs to be raised when the situation has gotten out of control, and at the moment, Russia is still in total control of this conflict," Russian military expert Vladislav Shurygin told Newsweek.

"The operation might not be moving forward as quickly as was hoped for at the beginning," Shurygin said, "but we are no longer taking the kinds of personnel losses that would require us to bring in masses of new people."

Oh boy

Here's the Newsweek article where Shurygin tells us all we need to know about Russia's pending victory in Ukraine:

https://www.newsweek.com/ukraine-quagmire-may-push-putin-adopt-policy-he-fears-conscription-1713823

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

We haven't had a fun picture in a while, so here's one staring Russia's latest tank battalion to enter the war.  Apparently this was taken on a road march to the norther portion of their Kherson positions.  Anybody want to comment on what we see in this picture?

Steve

[SeinfeldRules]

17 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Dimitri just translated a part of the post you referenced here:

https://wartranslated.com/russia_dpr_artillery_standard/

The full post (run through Google Translate) is here:

https://kenigtiger-livejournal-com.translate.goog/2148946.html?_x_tr_sl=ru&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp

It's very interesting generally, not just because it talks about the ammo situation.  Thanks for drawing attention to it. 

Of particular interest is the author is very harsh towards a Russian "military expert", Vladislav Shurygin, which he deems a "media prostitute".  Ouch   And that his "ideas about how the positional war was conducted in the Donbass from 2015 to 2022 are, excuse me, a virgin's ideas about sexual intercourse".  Double ouch!!

Some of the claims we've seen about Russian changes in tactics, drones, etc. has come from Shurygin and the author says it's all BS fantasy.

To get a sense of how little faith we should have in Shurygin's assessments, let me clip this hilarious piece out of a recent Newsweek article:

Oh boy

Here's the Newsweek article where Shurygin tells us all we need to know about Russia's pending victory in Ukraine:

https://www.newsweek.com/ukraine-quagmire-may-push-putin-adopt-policy-he-fears-conscription-1713823

Steve

This is a great piece, an absolute treasure trove of artillery and fire support related TTPs.

[Battlefront.com]

Several videos of a Ukrainian stadium destroyed by Grad barrage.  It was being used as a logistics base by Wagner forces operating in the Popasna area.

More details:

https://en.thepage.ua/news/pmc-wagner-base-in-stakhanov-destroyed-what-is-known-or

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

4 minutes ago, SeinfeldRules said:

This is a great piece, an absolute treasure trove of artillery and fire support related TTPs.

I could say that I'm surprised you think so, but honestly I posted it mostly for you because I knew you'd love it

Steve

[dan/california]

12 minutes ago, SeinfeldRules said:

This is a great piece, an absolute treasure trove of artillery and fire support related TTPs.

A treasure trove of technical details and procedures. Even more interesting was the repeated emphatic statements that none of it worked without competent technical personnel and secure and reliable  comms.  He seemed pretty certain the Russian army didn't have a nearly enough of either. In fact he sounded like a man was not having a good time.

[Gpig]

37 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

We haven't had a fun picture in a while, so here's one staring Russia's latest tank battalion to enter the war.  Apparently this was taken on a road march to the norther portion of their Kherson positions.  Anybody want to comment on what we see in this picture?

Steve

Hmmm . . . looks like it drove up on the guard-rail and got high-centred. Mobility kill?

Edit: The driver rolling up on a well marked verge might have something to do with the 420 stencilled on the turret side

Edited June 10, 2022 by Gpig

[Battlefront.com]

In honor of our recent visit from a pro-Russian troll, I think we should look outside the NATO information bubble.  I know, let's see what Scott Ritter, one time Marine and weapons inspector, has to say about the war.  This was in late March.  Don't bother with this more than a minute or two, then scan the comment section for a bit more fun.

Boy, that's not aging well, is it?  A week after this was posted the northern front collapsed.  Yet his post from a couple of weeks ago doesn't seem to remember his previous statements that the war was "nearly over":

https://consortiumnews.com/2022/05/30/scott-ritter-phase-three-in-ukraine/

The great thing about making up your own reality is that you can never be proven wrong.

I wouldn't spend more than 4 minutes and change on this nonsense, but it is good to check out what sources of information the nutty right/left use to form their opinions.

Steve

[sburke]

28 minutes ago, Gpig said:

Hmmm . . . looks like it drove up on the guard-rail and got high-centred. Mobility kill?

Edit: The driver rolling up on a well marked verge might have something to do with the 420 stencilled on the turret side

heh I think it is less about the kill and more what it is,  Gotta wonder what the Russian soldiers saw when it rolled up.  "we are fk'd"

[Grigb]

6 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

The first time I heard about Wagner was in 2014 when they were sent in to clean up some of the "separatist" elements that were too criminal even by Putin's standards. 

Yes, they have an additional role as execution squad. Interestingly, rumors claim they usually visit too independent separatist who publicly became to unloyal to Russians government. It's just these separatists, usually were criminals as well. For example they did not execute notorious torturer Kozitsyn and his band despite them being too brutal even by Russian standards. Loyalty is the key in Russian System.

6 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

In particular his crew had been stopping Russian supply vehicles entering Ukraine and shaking them down, including stealing stuff to resell to civilians and other militias.  About a company had gone in with brand new Tigrs and laid siege to him.  I forget the callsign of the particular "leader", but there was a public plea by him as they were being attacked.  Several of his men were killed and he surrendered.  There were some videos and pictures of the Wagner column driving around taking care of Putin's business.

Rumors said they killed Mozgovoy and Bednov aka Batman.

6 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Anyway, I found this interesting tidbit in Dmitry's translation of the Russian 35th CAA veteran complaining about how bad things were around Izyum:

Yes, anyone with a little bit of brain knew the situation was a complete disaster and even usual Wagnerite big payment could not cover it.

[sburke]

Is China Slowly Turning Its Back to Russia? (msn.com)

[Rice]

I believe @Battlefront.com mentioned that there was a desire to make a historical CM title based on this conflict a bit down the road, if so, how granular do you think the modeling of different tank models would be? We have seen enough tank variety that modelling most of them would surpass the WW2 titles. Same question for equipment and small arms too, but I'm not sure how much the engine could support that variety. Having CMPE, the amount of variance in individual soldiers kit that you can program seems to be a swap between a regular and an alt if I recall correctly, meaning there are two possibilities per role/soldier.

[chrisl]

51 minutes ago, Gpig said:

Hmmm . . . looks like it drove up on the guard-rail and got high-centred. Mobility kill?

Edit: The driver rolling up on a well marked verge might have something to do with the 420 stencilled on the turret side

I think I saw it in a twitter thread and the best explanation seemed to be that it was intentionally parked there as a fixed gun emplacement, but I like yours better.

[Grigb]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

It's very interesting generally, not just because it talks about the ammo situation.  Thanks for drawing attention to it. 

All Murz rants are interesting and often very amusing. Ukrainians should get him a medal but only after the war - he already talks too much for a Russian. Only his reputation protects him from disappearing in podval.  

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

Of particular interest is the author is very harsh towards a Russian "military expert", Vladislav Shurygin, which he deems a "media prostitute".  Ouch   And that his "ideas about how the positional war was conducted in the Donbass from 2015 to 2022 are, excuse me, a virgin's ideas about sexual intercourse".  Double ouch!!

Some of the claims we've seen about Russian changes in tactics, drones, etc. has come from Shurygin and the author says it's all BS fantasy.

To get a sense of how little faith we should have in Shurygin's assessments, let me clip this hilarious piece out of a recent Newsweek article:

Oh boy

Here's the Newsweek article where Shurygin tells us all we need to know about Russia's pending victory in Ukraine:

https://www.newsweek.com/ukraine-quagmire-may-push-putin-adopt-policy-he-fears-conscription-1713823

Steve

Shurygin is literally Russian Baghdad Bob (he did the same thing but in Russian for Russians). That is his job. Anything he says must be thrown in a dustbin. Murz loses his temper because he is butthert Shurygin lies too much. 

It is usually like this - the situation on the Russian side becomes worse and worse, Murz becomes more and more upset. He reads Russian propagandists' "opinions" how wonderful everything is, got butthert and BAM, we have another hilarious rant about true situation on the Russian side.

[Battlefront.com]

21 minutes ago, chrisl said:

I think I saw it in a twitter thread and the best explanation seemed to be that it was intentionally parked there as a fixed gun emplacement, but I like yours better.

All signs show that the tank straddled the fence, knocking down quite a few concrete posts before losing forward momentum.  After that, the tank was stuck because too much of the tank's weight is on the posts and not on the tracks.  The tracks then don't have enough grip on the road surface to move the tank.  This is what tankers called "bellied", IIRC.  I had this happen to me once and it is a real PITA to fix.  Stupid frozen tree spun me as I drove over it.  Fortunately I had read a US WW2 tanker handbook and was able to use one of the recovery techniques to get unstuck.

My guess is the driver screwed up.  Likely inexperienced.  The tank was probably back in action fairly quickly, leaving only a destroyed fence and his pride behind

Steve

[Aragorn2002]

12 hours ago, Huba said:

I'd rather avoid another discussion about Germany's involvement, but I meant precisely Leo1 and Marders that are in storage.

Than stop mentioning it.

"In reality Berlin is supplying large amounts of weapons; not as much as the US, but comparable to other European countries. Experts say Germany ranks somewhere in the middle." according to the BBC. It's a safe bet Germany will have paid  the most and Poland will have profited the most of all European countries when the dust has settled.

I think the pressure upon Germany by Poland (as usual) and Ukraine is more political/financial than something else and aimed at weakening the German positon within EU/NATO for future use. Preparing those Leopards and Marders will take months and months. And will take away much needed production and maintenance capacity that the Bundeswehr badly needs itself now. The Bundeswehr is in full swing at the moment and not a day too soon.

Apart from that the German economy can't manage without the Russian energy yet. Hard fact of life. And if the German economy goes down, the whole of Europe goes with it.

https://www.bundeswehr.de/de/organisation/heer/aktuelles/einsatzverband-besteht-feuertaufe-fuer-litauen-5443686

 

Edited June 10, 2022 by Aragorn2002

[Artkin]

I'm gonna guess T-62 MV. Strange that these are floating around, russia should have 1400 ish mbts still. 

[Battlefront.com]

49 minutes ago, Grigb said:

Yes, they have an additional role as execution squad. Interestingly, rumors claim they usually visit too independent separatist who publicly became to unloyal to Russians government. It's just these separatists, usually were criminals as well. For example they did not execute notorious torturer Kozitsyn and his band despite them being too brutal even by Russian standards. Loyalty is the key in Russian System.

Rumors said they killed Mozgovoy and Bednov aka Batman.

Ah, names that sit in the back of my head.  Of course the rapid killings and attempted assassinations of quite a few high profile "Separatists" (many of which were Russian), including sophisticated ambushes, could have been from more than one source.  Besides these official Russian government authorized killings, these guys were often at war with each other to secure more wealth for themselves.

49 minutes ago, Grigb said:

Yes, anyone with a little bit of brain knew the situation was a complete disaster and even usual Wagnerite big payment could not cover it.

That is the downside of mercenaries.  Especially ones who have established a reputation for brutality and murder. 

Speaking of which, I'm not sure this article was posted here yet.  Fairly detailed accounting of Wagner brutality after lengthy documenting of a Wagner murderer with the nickname of "Executioner".  Fortunately this was about his getting killed by a Ukrainian sniper a few days ago.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10891847/Ukraine-war-Russian-Wagner-mercenary-Vladimir-executioner-Andonov-killed-near-Kharkiv.html

24 minutes ago, Grigb said:

It is usually like this - the situation on the Russian side becomes worse and worse, Murz becomes more and more upset. He reads Russian propagandists' "opinions" how wonderful everything is, got butthert and BAM, we have another hilarious rant about true situation on the Russian side.

Then we can look forward to some more great posts by Murz in the near future.  Murz, Girkin, etc. already see how worn out the attack is and that no more help is available.  These guys know enough to understand what that means given the rising capabilities of the Ukrainians and how the war has gone so far.  It's still uncertain what will happen in the next few weeks, but a sudden Russian victory is not something they think is possible.

BTW, for those of you who read Murz's full rant I posed above, there was something in there referencing 150 dead Russians at the hands of Americans.  That is in reference to an action in Syria where a Wagner led force was dumb enough to attack US Special Forces:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/24/world/middleeast/american-commandos-russian-mercenaries-syria.html

Steve

[Kinophile]

Many (at this point hundreds) of pages back, June/July were identified as the pinch point between Russia's massive last gasp versus Ukraine surpassing them in men & material. 

It does seem like UKR losses are mounting, in totality and rate. 

But it's also quite clear that RUS losses are increasing even more so, in equivalence to force quantity.

Ukraine needs to come through these bitter months with a still coherent and motivated force, upgunned and reinforced. 

If it can mount serious counter offensives in August through September) then it could drastically improve its situation before the fall raspusitsa (which I suspect will be much worse than the early spring's).

The danger here is that UKR will be racing the seasonal clock so itll be in Russias interest (and matching its then degraded capabilities and force posture) to delay, slow and degrade the Ukr offensives.

I imagine Kherson would be a critical battle, to prevent a new Russian winter/spring offensive north. How they crack that nut will be a critical test of their abilities/capabilities.