How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Zeleban]

 

it seems that in the north of the Kherson Front, the Ru counterattacks were not as successful as the Ru Nazis tell us

[akd]

17 minutes ago, BlackMoria said:

About a week ago, there was video of Excalibur rounds hitting soft skin vehicles and a dugout.  Those are clearly airburst rounds... the signature explosion is unmistakable.

Edit:  I was an artillery officer for 17 years and a forward observer for most of that time.  Airburst rounds go off at a optimal 7 meters for variable time (VT) fuzes.  Depending with distance and angle of view, that is low enough that an airburst can be mistaken for a normal point detonation fuze burst.  So chances are good that airburst fuzes are being more commonly used...but we are not clearly seeing it in videos...because the 7 metre height and seeing if from a drone video (mainly overhead angle) from hundreds of metres distance makes the airburst look like a ground graze burst.

Yup, look up video of strike on Russian “Zoopark” radar and you will see bursts at optimal height over empty field, higher burst directly over equipment and even higher bursts over trees.  Presumed to be Excalibur.

EDIT: here it is:

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=636548444321688&extid=CL-UNK-UNK-UNK-AN_GK0T-GK1C&ref=sharing

Edited September 2, 2022 by akd

[Zeleban]

41 minutes ago, Billy Ringo said:

https://theins.ru/ru/politics/254573

"В итоге получается, что за полгода агрессии против Украины Россия должна была израсходовать не менее 7 млн снарядов, не считая потерь фронтовых складов в результате украинских ударов. Иными словами, если интенсивность война остается на нынешнем уровне, к концу 2022 года Москва столкнется с ощутимой нехваткой снарядов и будет вынуждена сократить применение артиллерии в целях экономии боеприпасов».

"И даже если предположить, что русские солдаты не пренебрегают процедурами обслуживания стволов и других орудийных механизмов, и что Россия имеет неизвестное, но не бесконечное их количество в резерве (особенно на орудиях со складов хранения), к концу к 2022 году износ артиллерии приведет к резкому снижению ее эффективности».

"Конечно, танки, БМП, БТР и боевые машины десанта большую часть времени простаивают даже во время войны, но если они работают хотя бы по 2-3 часа в сутки, то с начала войны они отработали 370-560 часов. войны.И даже если из воинских частей и складов привезут относительно свежую, пусть и не новую, бронетехнику, то львиную их долю придется отправить на ремонт до конца 2022 года, при условии, что они не уничтожается, если сохраняется высокая интенсивность боевых действий. И здесь стоит повторить: конечен и срок службы танковой пушки».

Небольшое исследование российского военного производства дало несколько конкретных ответов, кроме единодушного мнения о том, что Россия не может соответствовать производству с текущими темпами использования. В какой-то момент в основном все закончится. (Очевидное.) 

Но конец 2022 года кажется довольно общим знаменателем того, когда русским станет намного труднее. (Не только в этой статье, но и в нескольких других.) Фактор холодной погоды и, по-видимому, растущих проблем с логистикой, вызванных украинцами — неужели украинцы просто решили замедлить свои усилия, ожидая, пока русские сломаются под их собственный вес? Стоит ли ожидать чего-то значимого этой осенью и в начале зимы?

 

 

 

it looks like the Russian artillery really has some problems

 

 

Edited September 2, 2022 by Zeleban

[danfrodo]

17 minutes ago, Zeleban said:

new photos from the southern front

That should improve Aragorn's mood today .  But the main point is that we are now seeing donated armor in the fight!

And ChuckDyke is native Dutch??  I thought he was expatriot american.  I'll be danged.

[Rokko]

43 minutes ago, BlackMoria said:

About a week ago, there was video of Excalibur rounds hitting soft skin vehicles and a dugout.  Those are clearly airburst rounds... the signature explosion is unmistakable.

Edit:  I was an artillery officer for 17 years and a forward observer for most of that time.  Airburst rounds go off at a optimal 7 meters for variable time (VT) fuzes.  Depending with distance and angle of view, that is low enough that an airburst can be mistaken for a normal point detonation fuze burst.  So chances are good that airburst fuzes are being more commonly used...but we are not clearly seeing it in videos...because the 7 metre height and seeing if from a drone video (mainly overhead angle) from hundreds of metres distance makes the airburst look like a ground graze burst.

Thanks for the clarification. In the video above it's clearly not airbursts that are used, no? Now in hindsight I couldn't say if I've misinterpreted previous videos or not, but it still seems that airbursts are much less prevalent.

27 minutes ago, akd said:

Yup, look up video of strike on Russian “Zoopark” radar and you will see bursts at optimal height over empty field, higher burst directly over equipment and even higher bursts over trees.  Presumed to be Excalibur.

EDIT: here it is:

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=636548444321688&extid=CL-UNK-UNK-UNK-AN_GK0T-GK1C&ref=sharing

Yeah, that's clearly airburst. I hadn't seen this one before, so thanks for (re)posting.

[Huba]

42 minutes ago, Grigb said:

We got update from Rybar.

While Ru continue to push from direction of Davydiv Brid UKR wheeled to opposite direction and expanding the main bridgehead.  That's smart - they are moving toward Inhulets river there (it turns off map). If they managed to reach it they can anchor flank on the river and it big help against RU.

Another interesting thing is that RU are still pushing from the wrong direction as if the reserves are already wasted, committed in wrong place or not committed at all yet. 

That is great news. Looks like UA has the most successes at the most important direction. 

[Grigb]

2 minutes ago, Huba said:

That is great news. Looks like UA has the most successes at the most important direction. 

I believe both Bridgeheads and Vysokopillia are successful directions. But most likely due to less priority and less RU forces there. RU definitely assigned top priority to West direction as it leads directly to Kherson and distance is not too great.

For RU military city hold bigger importance due to additional internal propaganda value - news saying UKR reached Kherson are more dangerous than news UKR cut RU Bridgehead in half. So, it is entirely possible UKR are fixing RU at the West direction while smashing RU forces at Bridgeheads and Vysokopillia. 

[Kinophile]

Ref current Kherson fights.  I wonder if it makes sense for Ukraine to extend the fighting in open country over a week or two, grinding through as many RUS units as possible,before hitting the suburbs of Kherson.

By that  I mean, I do think it's a good idea -  less terrain cover, longer logistics lines (than inside Kherson proper),  keeps RUS formations moving around and burning fuel.  It also let's the UKR units cohese as a operational formation, weeding out the weeker leaders, adapting tactics at a steady rate, ironing out logistics kins and quirks, identifying weaknesses in the tactics and overall plan,  etc. As has been noted here before The overall Kherson attack is probably the most critical op of the war,  in that it'll prove the UA can "solve for offensive", as @The_Capt says. That solving requires time and opportunity. The time is now, high summer, and the opportunity is an isolated,  large pocket of RUS troops that cannot be reinforced at the pace and numbers need to resist attack. 

So a steady grind,  with a smooth irresistible pace will serve UKR well. 

I further wonder if,  once at Kherson,  a feinted  UKR retreat/fall back might induce a RUS counterattack, which can then be torn apart out in the open,further gutting the RUS defenses...

[Zeleban]

https://t.me/zvizdecmanhustu/148 Meanwhile, the Russians are building up forces in the Donbas and Zaporozhye region. It is highly probable that they will soon advance there. It looks like they are not interested in the Kherson direction at all.

[dan/california]

1 hour ago, BlackMoria said:

About a week ago, there was video of Excalibur rounds hitting soft skin vehicles and a dugout.  Those are clearly airburst rounds... the signature explosion is unmistakable.

Edit:  I was an artillery officer for 17 years and a forward observer for most of that time.  Airburst rounds go off at a optimal 7 meters for variable time (VT) fuzes.  Depending with distance and angle of view, that is low enough that an airburst can be mistaken for a normal point detonation fuze burst.  So chances are good that airburst fuzes are being more commonly used...but we are not clearly seeing it in videos...because the 7 metre height and seeing if from a drone video (mainly overhead angle) from hundreds of metres distance makes the airburst look like a ground graze burst.

There are some videos, not least those you mentioned, where the air burst is extremely obvious. But insofar as I can tell, airburst is being used about a tenth as often as it ought to be. I don't know if this is due to electronic counter measures against older VT fuses, or if their are just not enough vt fuses to go around.

[Probus]

In the spirit of the first post in this thread, Japan's new "Top Gun 2" themed F-15 fighters. Almost totally unrelated to the topic I might add:

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/japan-unveils-top-gun-2-themed-maverick-f-15-eagle

[Grigb]

Bits from Mashkovets regarding Kherson

Quote

Apparently, in the near future the command of the enemy troops will be forced to carry out a certain "optimization" on its Kherson - Berislavsky bridgehead.

At least, his 2 BTGrs (1 from the 34th "mountain" msbr of the 49th CAA and the 205th "Cossack" msbr of the same army) are, to put it mildly, not in the best "physical" shape.

And, most likely, they will be taken to the Berislav district for restoration, as they are very badly in need of it.

So far, the enemy is not able to do this, because both of these "tactical units" are involved in intense battles in the area south of Vysokopolya and in the Arkhangelsk region ... I think they will be forced to be replaced by units of the 35th CAA for a certain time.

Vysokopillia and Arkhangelsky are here (date but still relevant map)

But the question remains where is this area South of Vysokopilia and Arkhangelsky?  Time to open FIRMS.  

Here it is!

• Today seems there was no fighting in the West
• There is fighting at Bridgeheads
• And there is fighting South of Vysokopilia and Arkhangelsky

And what do we have there?

Oh, hello UKR push! 

 

[danfrodo]

11 minutes ago, Grigb said:

Bits from Mashkovets regarding Kherson

Vysokopillia and Arkhangelsky are here (date but still relevant map)

But the question remains where is this area South of Vysokopilia and Arkhangelsky?  Time to open FIRMS.  

Here it is!

• Today seems there was no fighting in the West
• There is fighting at Bridgeheads
• And there is fighting South of Vysokopilia and Arkhangelsky

And what do we have there?

Oh, hello UKR push! 

 

so bottom picture indicates road to Vysokopilia is cut?  That would be a big development since RU seems to have put a lot of troops there.  

[Grigb]

5 minutes ago, danfrodo said:

so bottom picture indicates road to Vysokopilia is cut?  That would be a big development since RU seems to have put a lot of troops there.  

Unfortunately, we do not know. The situation is fluid, and we have too little information.  And even if it is cut RU can escape though Novopetrievka.

But it also means they cannot pull out units defending the neck, just like Mashkovets said. And they have to put new units there once the old units are gone. 

 

Edited September 2, 2022 by Grigb

[Huba]

5 minutes ago, Grigb said:

Unfortunately, we do not know. The situation is fluid, and we have too little information.  And even if it is cut RU can escape though Novopetrievka.

But it also means they cannot pull out units defending the neck, just like Mashkovets said. And they have to put new units there once the old units are gone. 

 

Question is, are Ukrainians controlling/ contesting Kostyrka, or is it just "controlled by fire", as we hear so often? If it's the former, the situation of RU in Vysokopylia starts to look more and more like reversed Lysychansk pocket - RU should run the hell out instead of reinforcing that...

[Grigb]

Today Shoigu declared Pisky is "liberated" once more. They "liberated" it 4-Aug then 13-Aug then 21-Aug and finally now - 2-Sep. 1 month, 1 settlement, 4 Glorious Victores. 

[DesertFox]

6 minutes ago, Grigb said:

Today Shoigu declared Pisky is "liberated" once more. They "liberated" it 4-Aug then 13-Aug then 21-Aug and finally now - 2-Sep. 1 month, 1 settlement, 4 Glorious Victores. 

They win theirselves to death. Reminds me of german 44/45 propaganda between Vistula and Oder.

[Grigb]

7 minutes ago, Huba said:

Question is, are Ukrainians controlling/ contesting Kostyrka, or is it just "controlled by fire", as we hear so often? If it's the former, the situation of RU in Vysokopylia starts to look more and more like reversed Lysychansk pocket - RU should run the hell out instead of reinforcing that...

Well, we do not know. But what we do know RU cannot run from there lightly - it means admitting things are bad there. And that is very bad because soldiers and RU citizens starts suspecting everything is BS and it is bad everywhere. 

That is how you might create panic everywhere.

On other hand there is possibility RU already collapsed there and we just do not know it yet.

[Beleg85]

Thread by Rob lee.

5 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

However, this cuts both ways.  While oligarchs tend to stay out of politics, they also tend to steer clear of supporting political goals of the Kremlin.  Putin has struggled over the years to get the oligarchs to do things for the benefit of Russia.  Especially after 2014 Putin did a bunch of things to try and keep Russian capital from flowing to Cyprus, Gibraltar, Panama, Channel Islands, etc.  I don't think it was very successful.

What is also true is that when an oligarch choose to become politically active, he can present either problems or benefits to the regime.  Look at the various oligarchs that financially supported the 2014 invasion and subsequent war.  Or the ones that help keep power in various parts of Russia through their business dealings.  All good from Putin's standpoint.  But then there's Khordorkovsky types that cause problems even after being arrested and economically brought back down to Earth.

The main issue here is that Russian leadership is inherently focused on money.  Oligarchs have a lot of it.  This is a potential problem for Putin because if even one oligarch funds something that runs contrary to Kremlin's best interests, it could be a big problem.  For example, paying for inside information from the FSB in order to hire former FSB agents to blow up Putin.  Girkin is probably pretty wealthy by Russian standards, but I doubt he has the sort of millions of USD and connections that could buy that sort of muscle.

If Putin catches wind of an oligarch exploring ways to use his money to influence things that run counter to the Kremlin's wishes, even in better times, the hammer would come down on him.  Now, with things in a really bad state?  It means murder-suicides with children being slaughtered and generally lower threshold of violation to be thrown out a window vs. other options.

Yup, that is more or less how it looks. Generally "oligarch" as a term is overused in the West, appealing more to stereotypical image of Russian millionaire rather than specific block or faction. "People with money" are very varied bunch of guys. What is important here is that in Russia one cannot be trully millinaire/billinaire and not have connections to the state; there are some exceptions within IT and tech branches, but they are relatively rare.

5 minutes ago, Grigb said:

Well, we do not know. But what we do know RU cannot run from there lightly - it means admitting things are bad there. And that is very bad because soldiers and RU citizens starts suspecting everything is BS and it is bad everywhere. 

That is how you might create panic everywhere.

On other hand there is possibility RU already collapsed there and we just do not know it yet.

Thanks for great reporting.

You think people in Russia are really so sensitive to events at the front? I mean can we estimate the numbers of common Russians actively tracking progress of the war and this offensive particularly?

 

PS. @Huba did you saw how J.Wolski is loosing it about Ukrainian offensive? He overreacted again and now people quarrel in his feed.

PS2. Nice Fella.

Edited September 2, 2022 by Beleg85

[Huba]

15 minutes ago, Beleg85 said:

PS. @Huba did you saw how J.Wolski is loosing it about Ukrainian offensive? He overreacted again and now people quarrel in his feed.

PS2. Nice Fella.

Yeah I saw, he almost went full Julian Roepcke there, and you never go full JR. I like his analysis most of the time, but often he's a bit too authoritative with his conclusions. Also, just sitting there waiting for some info (especially when mudding through RU telegram in the meantime) is not that easy I guess, makes you appreciate our support group here

Edit: that just in. Doesn't tell us much, except that there is fighting going on.

 

Edited September 2, 2022 by Huba

[Grigb]

38 minutes ago, Beleg85 said:

You think people in Russia are really so sensitive to events at the front? I mean can we estimate the numbers of common Russians actively tracking progress of the war and this offensive particularly?

They are sensitive to unexpected bad turn of events that create uncertainty. Probably due to historical insecurity, a certainty and stability in life is very valuable in RU. Putin was portraying himself as provider of certainty and stability after turbulent and uncertain 90s.

Completely unexpected bad turn of events creates huge uncertainty - if they lied about this, then what else did they lie about? And uncertainty breaks the perception of stability - your world is not as safe or as stable as you thought. That leads to some panic behavior (remember toilet paper shortage?) And that panic behavior reinforces RU perception that things are bad even though they might not be that bad yet. And more people start panicking and then it is self fulfilling panic that might not have any relation to reality.

It does not mean it will happen. But there is real possibility of that.

[UPDATE] Majority of them are keeping an eye on what is happening generaly. War is scary for RU. It is like living under an old dam. You do not watch it every day, but you do certainly keep an eye on it.

Edited September 2, 2022 by Grigb

[Grigb]

Another sober assessment from frontlines

Quote

An enemy DRG [Recon and Sabotage group] of one hundred and fifty people is working in the Kherson direction, our Pantsir-m complex was destroyed today, and a strike was made near the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station, in fact, the bridge was destroyed and crossings over Dnieper are impossible...

Not everything is as rosy as the military reporters write, THE SITUATION is VERY COMPLICATED!

IT'S TIME TO TAKE TOUGH MEASURES....

Good in this situation, only our aviation and our Paratroopers, who are actually plugging these gaps now, but this resource is not infinite... Up there they should understand it.

DRG with the size of reinforced company sounds implausible (it is usually squad sized unit). Most likely he wants to downplay the issue - it is just DRG, nothing to see here!

[danfrodo]

14 minutes ago, Grigb said:

IT'S TIME TO TAKE TOUGH MEASURES....

and just what is that supposed to mean?  Perhaps he wants to attack Poland?  Or launch offensive from Byelarus?  Nuclear dirty bomb via power plant?  What measures does this clown have in mind???  The right measure was pull out of Kherson to shore up the rest of the stolen territory.  That was the only measure they had.  

[Beleg85]

1 hour ago, Grigb said:

Completely unexpected bad turn of events creates huge uncertainty - if they lied about this, then what else did they lie about? And uncertainty breaks the perception of stability - your world is not as safe or as stable as you thought. That leads to some panic behavior (remember toilet paper shortage?) And that panic behavior reinforces RU perception that things are bad even though they might not be that bad yet. And more people start panicking and then it is self fulfilling panic that might not have any relation to reality.

It does not mean it will happen. But there is real possibility of that.

[UPDATE] Majority of them are keeping an eye on what is happening generaly. War is scary for RU. It is like living under an old dam. You do not watch it every day, but you do certainly keep an eye on it.

Just when I was going to write some response about...

Edited September 2, 2022 by Beleg85

[BlackMoria]

Some humor....