How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[akd]

@sburke @Kinophile

Major Andrey Spirin:

Major Maxim Klebko, 7th Separate Reconnaissance Battalion, 47th Tank Division:

 

Edited June 19, 2022 by akd

[Letter from Prague]

9 hours ago, Beleg85 said:

Part of Russian twittosphere is already suffling theory that NATO wants to starve Kaliningrad and try to provoke Russia into attacking Suwałki Gap. Probably riding on T-34-s.

You know, freedom of speech is good and all, but the existence of "Russian twittosphere" makes me wonder if we're doing something wrong.

Western social media companies have definitely been important part of Russian propaganda and subversion in the West, going back to Cambridge Analytica, various COVID related things and whole bunch of US political topics we agreed not to talk about here.

Do they see themselves as Western even, or are they cyberpunk extranational megacorps already.

Well thats probably offtopic, sorry about that.

[womble]

22 minutes ago, chuckdyke said:

He probably will say you can't invade your own country. All part of their ambit claim. 

At which point he's using Russia's own, unique definition of "own country". I mean "seat at the UN" is a pretty loose definition that they'd probably rather not have everyone else paying too much attention to, given their ambiguous status as the successor to the USSR on the UNSC...

I mean, the Russians say, "It's our country, really," and the Ukrainians say, "No it frellin' ain't!" And since there doesn't seem to be a solution to the dispute that can be obtained by earnest negotiators sat around a table, the diplomacy has been pursued by other means. Most people would say that's a war, but the doublespeak mental gymnastics of totalitarianism lets the Russians feel good about their aggression.

At least China has had the decency to consistently refer to Taiwan as a "breakaway province", whereas Russia was prepared to go along with the (re)creation of Ukraine as a sovereign entity, at least at the beginning. I don't recall any external parties holding guns to their heads at the time.

[kraze]

18 minutes ago, womble said:

At which point he's using Russia's own, unique definition of "own country". I mean "seat at the UN" is a pretty loose definition that they'd probably rather not have everyone else paying too much attention to, given their ambiguous status as the successor to the USSR on the UNSC...

I mean, the Russians say, "It's our country, really," and the Ukrainians say, "No it frellin' ain't!" And since there doesn't seem to be a solution to the dispute that can be obtained by earnest negotiators sat around a table, the diplomacy has been pursued by other means. Most people would say that's a war, but the doublespeak mental gymnastics of totalitarianism lets the Russians feel good about their aggression.

At least China has had the decency to consistently refer to Taiwan as a "breakaway province", whereas Russia was prepared to go along with the (re)creation of Ukraine as a sovereign entity, at least at the beginning. I don't recall any external parties holding guns to their heads at the time.

Ugh nope. It's like "Warsaw pact" - every single country in it was occupied by russians, with their soldiers committing countless crimes over the decades, but they pretended Poland and Czechoslovakia were sovereign on paper. Because Europeans are more willing to trade with you if you are pretending hard enough you follow their rules.

But since this is Russia and russians are always russians - that pretense always goes out of the window eventually.

Oh and they consider everything up until Berlin their territory too, don't you forget that.

"Warsaw is a russian city" (c)

[chuckdyke]

19 minutes ago, womble said:

At least China has had the decency to consistently refer to Taiwan as a "breakaway province"

You know the Han Chinese migrated to Taiwan around the same time the British settled in America. therefore, their claim is ridiculous. Of the original indigenous population only make out 2% of today's population. 

[kraze]

10 hours ago, Beleg85 said:

Part of Russian twittosphere is already suffling theory that NATO wants to starve Kaliningrad and try to provoke Russia into attacking Suwałki Gap. Probably riding on T-34-s.

More like everybody realizes russians are either stuck in Ukraine or lose the stability in the empire completely if they pull the forces out. They threw everything they had at us and won't stop, because stakes are too high.

So everybody just figured they can treat russians how they deserve it, without consequence, as it was a very long long time coming.

Lithuania in particular has a thing or two to say about the now classic "Lithuanians were killing themselves, so we came to save them"

Edited June 19, 2022 by kraze

[Haiduk]

Captured Russian or LPR soldiers in Luhansk oblast

 

[Letter from Prague]

1 minute ago, kraze said:

Ugh nope. It's like "Warsaw pact" - every single country in it was occupied by russians, with their soldiers committing countless crimes over the decades, but they pretended Poland and Czechoslovakia were sovereign on paper.

Of course, you could see what happens when people believe that lie and try to make use of that sovereignty in 1968. But yeah, there were people who actually believed that ****.

A while ago, I found discussion forum like this one, focused on military history. Lots of people with lots of interesting points, mostly Czechoslovak People's Army veterans. Most interesting topic there was a former tank commander analysing Soviet plans of attacking west, tank battle tactics and organizational structure of CSLA (might actually be fun for CMCW reading, but it's in Czech so not a lot of people can read it. I can link it if there's interest.)

Even though it predates first Russian invasion in 2014, there was lot of stuff that was almost prophetic - Soviets not having enough logistics, the idea that all aviation would be taken out in first few days by long-range missiles, stuff like that.

But the saddest thing when reading it, especially when the discussion turned to who would win Cold War turned hot, was that even in year 2014, half the people on the forum believed in Warsaw pact and considered them "our side". Even though from the strategic level it was obvious they were there just to die to lower Soviet losses.

Reading that forum now is even sadder, because half the people there are pro-Russia. Bleh.

[JonS]

2 hours ago, womble said:

unless you're a King, and then you have to use your last argument.

I understand that reference.

[poesel]

42 minutes ago, kraze said:

Because Europeans are more willing to trade with you if you are pretending hard enough you follow their rules.

But see, that's the trick. Soon your youth cannot discern between 'pretend' and 'real' and will be sucked into the decadent ways of western thinking. In the end you will be assimilated.

P.S.: doesn't work for orcs seemingly

[Raptor341]

The Final Argument of Kings is showing it’s relevance and worth many times over in this war. Artillery remains a king of battle, something that will hopefully influence future defence procurement in NATO countries, including Canada. This isn’t to say that it is the only takeaway lesson from the war but it is a major one. 
 

I have definitely been questioning every wargaming or simulation methodology that says that artillery is ineffective against armour, as is often the case is wargame design. Those lessons were obvious back in 2014/2015, and are now much stronger. 
 

 

[Haiduk]

Russians are throwing in the battle near Popasna even old T-62. Probably theese tanks reinforce LPR regular or even conscript units. I read that in LDPR regular units very bad situation with tanks. Many of them either knoked out or broke, so it's very lucky if brigade has a combined company ot some more of combat-ready tanks instad battalion. And most of them are captured Ukrainain T-64BV

 

Edited June 19, 2022 by Haiduk

[Beleg85]

2 hours ago, Letter from Prague said:

You know, freedom of speech is good and all, but the existence of "Russian twittosphere" makes me wonder if we're doing something wrong.

These are mostly Russians from diaspora or Kaliningrad, Twitter is not that popular in Russia anyway. And there is absolutely no problem for Russians proper to go around the ban. Soon we will have a situation as with Great Aiatollah- guy is passionately twitting while aplication itself is heavily banned in Iran.

Normal thing in these strange times.

1 hour ago, Letter from Prague said:

But the saddest thing when reading it, especially when the discussion turned to who would win Cold War turned hot, was that even in year 2014, half the people on the forum believed in Warsaw pact and considered them "our side". Even though from the strategic level it was obvious they were there just to die to lower Soviet losses.

Reading that forum now is even sadder, because half the people there are pro-Russia. Bleh.

Curious. That is also with Czech former Communist military? I attanded several meetings of veterans of Polish People Army in the past-some of them were forcefully dragged into operation Danube- and almost all despised Soviets to the point of swearing. No doubt they would rather shoot Soviets in the back whenever they could than attack anybody in real war.

Current Belarusian military is probably of similar spirits. If they invade, I can imagine them throwing weapons and shooting commanders faster than killing any Ukrainians. Probably some policing duties in the back is maximum what can be expected from majority of them.

Well, after second thought- even that could backfire. They could sell their BTR-s to local Ukrainian resistance.

 

Hmm I think we should wait for confirmation but that would be interesting axis.

Edited June 19, 2022 by Beleg85

[Huba]

30 minutes ago, Beleg85 said:

Hmm I think we should wait for confirmation but that would be interesting axis.

This comes from the mayor:

 

[Offshoot]

Guy is a good shot

 

[Beleg85]

This captain from Alfa group was killed 2 days ago, reportedly when Vasily Vekh was harpooned. Which is interesting, because it shows Russians are probably trying to stuff Snake Island with elites. Hopefully they do not plan to stir some troubles on platforms next to Romanian coast.

 

19 minutes ago, Huba said:

This comes from the mayor:

Ok so probably not convincing. He may mean sabouteurs, SF or just throw info like that to keep morale going.

 

[Taranis]

"An Ukrainian soldier holds a position in a trench on the front line near Avdiivka, June 18, 2022. ANATOLII STEPANOV / AFP"

[Letter from Prague]

59 minutes ago, Beleg85 said:

Curious. That is also with Czech former Communist military? I attanded several meetings of veterans of Polish People Army in the past-some of them were forcefully dragged into operation Danube- and almost all despised Soviets to the point of swearing. No doubt they would rather shoot Soviets in the back whenever they could than attack anybody in real war.

Yeah - those were career soldiers and officers of the pre-revolution military, so I assume they went through some kind of ideological selection - Soviet haters would probably not last there for long. The Czechoslovak People's Army had lot of oversight from Moscow directly.

It felt they were more proud about their jobs rather than actual Soviet believers. The job was still to kill Germans and Austrians once the Moscow says so, though.

[Haiduk]

1 hour ago, Beleg85 said:

This captain from Alfa group was killed 2 days ago, reportedly when Vasily Vekh was harpooned. Which is interesting, because it shows Russians are probably trying to stuff Snake Island with elites. Hopefully they do not plan to stir some troubles on platforms next to Romanian coast.

Russian TG source told about lose of several elite special forces officers, as source wrote "brilliants of special forces". Maybe this captain relates to this incident. 

Edited June 19, 2022 by Haiduk

[Haiduk]

@sburke @Kinophile

Mayor Gennadiy Khalcheko, probably VDV, killed 7th of May

 

[Haiduk]

Yesterday Ukraianian military correspondent Roman Tsumbaliuk claimed UKR artillery hit HQ of Russian 20th CAA in Kharkiv oblast. He claimed 40 of personnel was eliminated and wounded. 

Today Russian MoD quiclkly reported that their Kalibr cruise missile hit UKR command post in Dnipropetrovsk oblast, where many top-officers of General Staff, Air-Assault Command, "operative-startegical grouping "Oleksandria" (what?) and "grouping "Kakhovka" (why not Nova Kakhovka?) gathered. As if 50 UKR generals (!!!) and top-officers were killed. This is similar to their reaction on losses around Zmiinyi island on 7th of May, when Russian also flipped this developments upside down as if this is Ukraine suffered heavy losses. If they repeat it now, very likely informatin about 20th CAA HQ hit is true.

Edited June 19, 2022 by Haiduk

[Beleg85]

23 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

Yesterday Ukraianian military correspondent Roman Tsumbaliuk claimed UKR artillery hit HQ of Russian 20th CAA in Kharkiv oblast. He claimed 40 of personnel was eliminated and wounded. 

Today Russian MoD quiclkly reported that their Kalibr cruise missile hit UKR command post in Dnipropetrovsk oblast, where many top-officers of General Staff, Air-Assault Command, "operative-startegical grouping "Oleksandria" (what?) and "grouping "Kakhovka" (why not Nova Kakhovka?) gathered. As if 50 UKR generals (!!!) and top-officers were killed. This is similar to their reaction on losses around Zmiinyi island on 7th of May, when Russian also flipped this developments upside down as if this is Ukraine suffered heavy losses. If they repeat it now, very likely informatin about 20th CAA HQ hit is true.

Russian military PR policy is a joke. Let's hope the harvest of Ukrainian artillery at 20 CAA was bountiful, we should know in a week or so.

 

37 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

Russian TG source told about lose of several elite special forces officers, as source wrote "brilliants of special forces". Maybe this captain relates to this incident. 

Yep, I read something like that. Deaths of specials of this level are rarely shown, at least in public. This was also announced surprisingly fast, basically the day after event.

Look at the crater after Ukrainan strike. As of yesterday nights fires were reportedly still burning, 24 h after event. Perhaps that was the cause Putin was rather saddened at his Forum...If he ever received the news about those strikes.

Edited June 19, 2022 by Beleg85

[The_Capt]

3 hours ago, Raptor341 said:

The Final Argument of Kings is showing it’s relevance and worth many times over in this war. Artillery remains a king of battle, something that will hopefully influence future defence procurement in NATO countries, including Canada. This isn’t to say that it is the only takeaway lesson from the war but it is a major one.

The only takeaway lesson from this war I am drawing is - nothing is working like it was supposed to.  Airpower, cyber, armor/mech, and yes, artillery have not performed anywhere near what we thought going into this war.  No matter how hard we try and tie reality into knots to explain it, we likely will not know why for some time...and even then we will likely ignore it if history is any indication. 

Worse, I am hearing this is in military circles and moves to tie this to military procurement as politicians scramble to "spend more" in order to demonstrate collective resolve.  While military services are using this war as justification for stuff they have been wanting to buy for years without actually looking at what is happening on the ground.

Let's take artillery - "the king of battle" (talk about 'presents well'), no it has not been the ruling monarch in this war.  It has been the "king of attrition" but it has not been decisive in the least.  If massed artillery fires were still decisive the Russians would have taken Kyiv by now, let alone this small rump in the Donbas.  If "more guns" was the solution then Russia would have already taken their operational objectives instead of this war-by-inches bleeding out.  The one instance we did see decisive use of artillery was in the first phase of this war by the Ukrainians, and that wasn't any of that sexy western stuff.  It was highly integrated and linked to a superior UA C4ISR/information system so that the smaller artillery was hitting the right targets to cause the most stress to the Russian system - decisive attrition has been the "king of battle" if anything has been in this war so far, and even that is weird because we were supposed to be seeing the dominance of manoeuvre a la Gulf War.

Back to procurement; we are already hearing services drooling over "investment" in "new capabilities" we have had since WW2 and using this was as "proof".  Right now the only "proof" I have seen is for: unmanned like crazy including all forms of next gen ATGM/MANPAD systems (NLOS, self-loitering etc), dispersed light infantry that one can generate from reservists very quickly,  resilient and pervasive battlefield communications systems that include crowdsourcing, new forms of logistical systems that look more like Amazon than what we have, C4ISR that includes space-based assets to tie it all together rapidly.  And all that will buy you is an ability for large scale defence-thru-denial that may force an opponent's system to collapse under its own weight.  We have no idea what works for offensive operations because neither side has been able to do it yet.

"Tanks, guns, IFVs, F-35" are what are being pitched right now and that is billions of dollars into tools that Ukraine did not employ decisively to defeat the RA, but they are the capabilities that Russia invested heavily in, brought to this war, and are now scattered all over the Ukrainian countryside. 

One thing I am seeing out of all this is "we have to understand what 'fighting smarter' really means".  And it does not appear to be more expensive singular platform centric-warfare.  This is like France '40 - the French had more, better tanks but they had not created a smarter integrated tank-system - the Germans did (often in spite of themselves).  All domain systems integration, while denying the same to your opponent may be the future "king of battle" [when you really think about it, maybe it always has been] but again we have only see it work decisively on the defensive, so the jury is still out. 

I am hoping that the UA is employing this whole Severodonetsk thing as an attritional honeypot to bleed the Russians white in order to open up options for some old-school operational manoeuvre in Phase 3 of this thing.  My guess is this may occur in the western side of this theatre around Kherson-Melitopol as the Russians over-commit more and more to this baffling fight in the Donbas - "Lure your enemy onto the roof, then take away the ladder."

 

Edited June 19, 2022 by The_Capt

[Grigb]

Girkin

Quote

Yesterday, as a result of shelling in Donetsk, the building of the headquarters of the 1st Corps of the People's Militia of the DPR was completely destroyed and burned down.

UKR artillery is working hard in Donetsk.

[chris talpas]

Impressive looking photo which was shared by LLF on the previous page:

Not sure how wise it is to bunch all of this valuable equipment up?  Looks like a juicy target for Russian aviation or missile strike.