Battlefront.com Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 Woke up, couldn't sleep, and wound up thinking about my alleged favorite topic... bridges and river crossings In an off-forum discussion about Hrim-2 I've been having I suddenly came to some thoughts about the strike on Saky that I wanted to run by you. Hypothesis - Ukraine used Hrim-2 to strike Saky airbase Many thoroughly examining both the variables at play and the visual evidence have concluded the most likely cause of the explosions at Saky were missiles. Since there are no known missiles in service of either Ukraine or the West that match the apparent capabilities of the strikes, it seems fairly obvious that whatever was used is something brand new. The only system anybody seems to be aware of to match the observed effects is Hrim-2. And the effects seem to match perfectly in terms of range, accuracy, and warhead size. It also matches what little information we have, including the recent espionage case, about probable readiness level. The attack happened and therefore something was used. Since there are no ready explanations, we must accept that whatever happened it was caused by something "novel". Not only does Hrim-2 fit the known facts, it is the ONLY thing that fits. If Ukraine has some other way of causing the damage done to Saky, then it is so secret that nobody even knows to put it down as a possibility. That is highly unlikely. Confirmed Facts - Hrim-2 exists Hrim-2 has been under active development for many years and open source information indicates it was ready for production as early as 2019 and more than likely by 2021. It's development stages and recent status are fairly well documented. The only reason it seems it wasn't put into active service prior to the war isn't because of issues with the system itself, but because the Ukrainian government didn't fund acquisition of the systems. Additionally, open source information indicates that there are at least two launch systems in existence. Each launcher has a two missile capacity. The 10x10 wheeled launch vehicles are unique to the Hrim-2. Assumption 1 - Production is happening Open source information makes it very clear that the missile was ready for purchasing in 2021. Money seems to have been the only stumbling block. As the war talk ramped up in late 2021 something might have been done "under the table" to get things going faster ahead of February 2022, but if not it's a given that once the war started production of Hrim-2 got a boost. There is just no way Ukraine would leave this system off the table, especially with billions in aid coming in from the West, especially because the US is publicly adamant that it won't give Ukraine a similar long range weapon (i.e. ATACAMS). Assumption 2 - Production time sufficient to produce 4 missiles It is unlikely that full scale production capacity was established ahead of the war due to the lack of certain funding. So the initial rate of production would be quite slow compared to what it theoretically could be. Production time is likely measured in many months per missile even with nearly 24/7 manufacturing. We do not know how long it takes to produce a single missile under wartime conditions and incentives. We do know that there was a strike on the production facilities that disrupted activity there, but apparently that is all that happened. Given how ineffective Russian strikes have generally been, and how hardened the facilities are, it is probable that production was not significant impacted by the strike. Whatever components Ukraine doesn't have on hand could be sourced from the West, thus potentially removing production bottlenecks. There are other instances of the West supply parts for Ukraine's weapons systems. Certainly this is the sort of project that would get priority attention, especially from the United States. The US is under pressure to provide Ukraine with long range weapons and doesn't want to take the political risk. Helping Ukraine produce its own takes pressure off of the US while maintaining its pledge to not provide ATACAMS (or similar) to Ukraine. Assume 4 months of production time between the start of the war and the strike plus some number of partial missiles built prior to the war, especially if production was started after rumors of war came into being. It seems possible Ukraine could have had 4 missiles built in time for the strike. Assumption 3 - Saky was an operational test of Hrim-2 The missile system had, up to this point, not been operationally used. That much we can be certain of. How much testing had been done ahead of August 2022 is not well know, but it does seem that the missile itself had been tested extensively, yet there is no evidence a full system test against a distant target was ever carried out. Such a launch would have been noteworthy and there is no OSINT that it happened. Therefore, Ukraine wasn't entirely sure the system would work as designed. Given the uncertainty of the performance, the Saky strike is probably best characterized as full scale live fire test first and a military/political strike second. This could very well explain the rather unusual strike pattern that was witnessed (see next point). Question 1 - Why the strange firing pattern The attack on Saky was Missile #1, significant gap of time (40 min?), Missile #2, small gap of time (5 min?), then Missiles #3 and #4 within seconds of each other. An accurate accounting of the gaps between strikes is not readily available, but it seems to have been in excess of an hour each. This pattern is odd because the normal strike pattern would be successive launches with very small gaps of time, all at once, or some combination (e.g. two pairs with small gaps between). There could be some pragmatic reasons to space them out, for example killing emergency service personnel and equipment, but if so then targeting the same spot after a pause would be the optimal solution rather than targeting different parts of the base. Unexpected events, such as glitches in the launch systems, could explain maybe one gap, but two glitches requiring two gaps seems unlikely. Yet random firing seems highly unlikely, therefore some sort of logic was likely employed. Plausible Answer 1 - Firing pattern was to facilitate test requirements and prudent caution Imagine that Ukraine has only 4 missiles built in total and so far none have been used in full combat conditions. It seems highly implausible that anybody would fire them all at once not knowing what might happen to them. Maybe they all fail in flight, maybe they all strike way off target and hit dense civilian areas, maybe they all behave differently and there's no way to know what went wrong, etc. Instead, the optimal solution would be to fire them cautiously, observe, then make a determination if the test should continue or be ended. Going under the assumption that this was a test first and a military/political strike second, Ukraine would want to pick a target that fit certain test criteria. the strike terrain should be something that provides easy observation of effects. Especially accuracy. A wide open airfield with explicit aim points would be an ideal choice. Easily observable by satellite. the location should minimize the risk to civilians. The Saky airbase is situated on the coast, limiting the radius of risk. It is also in the middle of a large swath of terrain that is not densely populated. There are some settlements encroaching on part of the northwestern portion of the base, but a hit there would only happen from a major systems failure of some sort and that could land it theoretically anywhere within a couple hundred KMs. So not a huge concern. However, it does explain why the hardened bunker (a more valuable target) near the civilian area wasn't targeted because a significant targeting error or accuracy design flaw would be more likely to hit a civilian area compared to the chosen targeting area. Also, if it did hit spot on the resulting detonation of the bunker would most definitely have destroyed civilian infrastructure. the target locations need to be long term immobile. A lot of assumptions need to be made in test scenarios, therefore they would not want the possibility of Russia moving things around to be in the mix. The four chosen targets were well established and extremely unlikely to be moved for the foreseeable future. the range of the target needed to be far, but not too far. The further the distance traveled the more pronounced any errors in guidance or flight systems will be. The reverse is true for shorter distances, which could mask problems when later trying to hit further out. Selecting a target area in the middle of Hrim-2;s performance range appears to be ideal for a test. because observations of the effectiveness of the hits could only be reasonably achieved by satellite (reliability and logistics reasons) the chosen day would have to be crystal clear atmospherically. Because the target wasn't at risk of moving and there were no other operations dependent upon the strike, Ukraine could wait for the optimal weather conditions to exist. The day of the strike was effectively cloudless and clear of significant atmospheric moisture from the looks of the videos taken at the time. pausing after the first missile impact allowed the engineers time to evaluate how effective it was prior to launching any additional missiles. If the first missile failed in some significant way they could call off the test and retain the precious few missiles, figure out what when wrong, then try again at a time of their choosing. The gap between #1 and #2 provided enough time to evaluate that it both hit the target and detonated within expectations. Certainly it performed within OSINT design parameters. the first missile tested not only the missile itself but the launch complex (system) it was fired from. That consists of the launch vehicle and various supporting vehicles/systems. The second missile was likely fired from the second system in order to test it for the first time and get a second confirmation on missile performance. As with the first launch, it was deemed a success. the third volley had both launchers firing their second missiles in coordinated way. This not only provided two more missile results to examine, but it also tested both systems as a coordinated launch scenario. Just the sort of thing a battery would do under normal circumstances. A large number of variables could be tested, such as having the two launchers many KMs apart and seeing how closely they could time the impacts to each other. To summarize the possible launch sequence: Fire Missile #1 from Launcher #1 Evaluate launch from Launcher #1 and assess impact of Missile #1 Fire Missile #2 from Launcher #2 Evaluate launch from Launcher #2 and assess impact of Missile #2 Fire Missile #3 from Launcher #1 and Missile #4 from Launcher #2 to hit target simultaneously Evaluate coordination of launches and impacts of Missiles #3 and #4 Launch champagne corks Question 2 - Why not strike the Kerch bridges? Wouldn't it have been better to hit the bridges at Kerch? Answer 2 - Kerch is a bad choice for a test scenario The obvious answer is that the bridges made for a very poor test scenario. If the first missile had performed only a little off its performance parameters it would either have missed the bridge entirely or done nothing effective to it. This would have been more difficult to analyze and evaluate, especially if they did not have access to real time satellite imaging. Water disturbances are time sensitive and more difficult to evaluate compared to craters in the ground. Less obvious is what sort of political considerations Ukraine might have had if the missiles worked or didn't work. If they worked then they would cut off Russians from fleeing in panic in well observed lines of cars. If it didn't work then Ukraine would have shown its hand without having something tangible to show for it. The airbase was a much more sure bet because if one missile didn't hit exactly where they wanted it they could just say it was special forces or a drone strike. With missiles impacting water near the bridges there would be no plausible cover story Plus. there's more in production so Kerch can theoretically can get hit in the future. Conclusions - Everything went very well The results speak for itself, but when viewed as a test it's even clearer how important this strike was. It validated a weapons system that can reliably and accurately attack anything within the occupied territory of Ukraine and a large swath of Russia. We can be very sure that production of more missiles and launchers kicked into high gear after this test. We don't know how many more missiles might already be ready for use, but it's likely Ukraine will once again save them up for something big. The most likely candidate is the Kerch bridges. Some Reference Links Here are some links I referenced about the Hrim-2 system itself. The strikes are from research I did earlier: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/does-ukraine-have-a-stash-of-domestically-developed-ballistic-missiles https://www-ukrmilitary-com.translate.goog/2017/05/spu-grim-foto.html?_x_tr_sl=uk&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hrim-2 https://www.unian.info/economics/2329504-ukraine-unveils-new-hrim-2-short-range-ballistic-missile-photos.html Enjoy! Steve P.S. too tired to proof read what I wrote, so going to bed now and will edit later to smooth out problem spots 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 Holy crap that was a long post Worthy of its own webpage, but we aren't doing that sort of thing with the information here. At least not yet. I have saved this out into my "Saky Folder", so perhaps sometime later it will take another form. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 31 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said: Enjoy I did thanks and does explain why they didn't target some other interesting points in the vicinity. I think your analysis is plausible and a very possible explanation of that strike. Let's hope that they can ramp up production. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akd Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 3 hours ago, Battlefront.com said: This looks to be a vehicle captured in Izyum area. In my link to other older captured vehicles above you can see others with the same tactical markings. Also, there are no Ukrainian marks on it (clearly it is in Ukrainian possession). The PRP-3 is a rare vehicle. I had to look it up To me this looks like another example of Russia scraping the bottom of the barrel to outfit (probably) 1st Guards Tank Army units that were decimated in earlier fighting around Kharkiv. My guess is the specialized equipment in this variant (radar and coms) are either removed or non-functional. Knowing the Russians, I'd guess they didn't bother removing it! Steve It’s just a BMP-2 that has already had the cannon scavenged. No markings visible to identify unit, but could be 4 GTD. They’ve always operated BMP-2, and this is one that received a light “modernization.” 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kevinkin Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 (edited) The failure of Russian air defenses needs to be accounted for. If we chalk it up to complete surprise and utter incompetence, that's OK. A half dozen Hrim-2 descending on Saki would not saturate a S-300/400 system properly manned and networked. This should have been like water off a duck's back. Especially if the launches were staggered for testing. At least a 1-2 incomings should have been taken out leaving less than 4 reaching targets. Maybe the tiny size of the strike "package" on radar worked to Ukraine's advantage and they all got through. Sneaky ... very sneaky. Edited September 18, 2022 by kevinkin 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 I think the use of special forces to neutralise the AD assets could be a fairly plausible explanation especially as they would have been easy to identify beforehand. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zeleban Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 1 hour ago, Billy Ringo said: Continued disparaging of the Russian military---point blank and direct. He doesn't offer any suggestions, just blame and negativity. IMO--he's not positioning himself for any particular position of authority, but speaking on behalf of someone else or group lining up the Russian military as the scapegoats. Also interesting that he can speak so bluntly without falling out of a high window. I've noticed the flag behind him and have seen it elsewhere, who does it represent and is it just a random coincidence that it has resemblance to the Confederate flag from the US Civil War? This is the flag of Novorossia, the united state of the DPR and LPR, which Girkin and his accomplices initially tried to create. This unification did not last long due to the ambitions of the heads of the DPR and LPR and the intelligence services that stood behind them. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kevinkin Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 I agree. There is something else going on to allow a small number to get through. Crimea is a good test bed, so shape the operation in your favor getting data from the few Hrim-2s you have. I wonder if jammers carried by SF could be effective? I have not seen reports of the AD being attacked kinetically. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bil Hardenberger Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said: Woke up, couldn't sleep, and wound up thinking about my alleged favorite topic... bridges and river crossings In an off-forum discussion about Hrim-2 I've been having I suddenly came to some thoughts about the strike on Saky that I wanted to run by you. Hypothesis - Ukraine used Hrim-2 to strike Saky airbase Many thoroughly examining both the variables at play and the visual evidence have concluded the most likely cause of the explosions at Saky were missiles. Since there are no known missiles in service of either Ukraine or the West that match the apparent capabilities of the strikes, it seems fairly obvious that whatever was used is something brand new. The only system anybody seems to be aware of to match the observed effects is Hrim-2. And the effects seem to match perfectly in terms of range, accuracy, and warhead size. It also matches what little information we have, including the recent espionage case, about probable readiness level. The attack happened and therefore something was used. Since there are no ready explanations, we must accept that whatever happened it was caused by something "novel". Not only does Hrim-2 fit the known facts, it is the ONLY thing that fits. If Ukraine has some other way of causing the damage done to Saky, then it is so secret that nobody even knows to put it down as a possibility. That is highly unlikely. Confirmed Facts - Hrim-2 exists Hrim-2 has been under active development for many years and open source information indicates it was ready for production as early as 2019 and more than likely by 2021. It's development stages and recent status are fairly well documented. The only reason it seems it wasn't put into active service prior to the war isn't because of issues with the system itself, but because the Ukrainian government didn't fund acquisition of the systems. Additionally, open source information indicates that there are at least two launch systems in existence. Each launcher has a two missile capacity. The 10x10 wheeled launch vehicles are unique to the Hrim-2. Assumption 1 - Production is happening Open source information makes it very clear that the missile was ready for purchasing in 2021. Money seems to have been the only stumbling block. As the war talk ramped up in late 2021 something might have been done "under the table" to get things going faster ahead of February 2022, but if not it's a given that once the war started production of Hrim-2 got a boost. There is just no way Ukraine would leave this system off the table, especially with billions in aid coming in from the West, especially because the US is publicly adamant that it won't give Ukraine a similar long range weapon (i.e. ATACAMS). Assumption 2 - Production time sufficient to produce 4 missiles It is unlikely that full scale production capacity was established ahead of the war due to the lack of certain funding. So the initial rate of production would be quite slow compared to what it theoretically could be. Production time is likely measured in many months per missile even with nearly 24/7 manufacturing. We do not know how long it takes to produce a single missile under wartime conditions and incentives. We do know that there was a strike on the production facilities that disrupted activity there, but apparently that is all that happened. Given how ineffective Russian strikes have generally been, and how hardened the facilities are, it is probable that production was not significant impacted by the strike. Whatever components Ukraine doesn't have on hand could be sourced from the West, thus potentially removing production bottlenecks. There are other instances of the West supply parts for Ukraine's weapons systems. Certainly this is the sort of project that would get priority attention, especially from the United States. The US is under pressure to provide Ukraine with long range weapons and doesn't want to take the political risk. Helping Ukraine produce its own takes pressure off of the US while maintaining its pledge to not provide ATACAMS (or similar) to Ukraine. Assume 4 months of production time between the start of the war and the strike plus some number of partial missiles built prior to the war, especially if production was started after rumors of war came into being. It seems possible Ukraine could have had 4 missiles built in time for the strike. Assumption 3 - Saky was an operational test of Hrim-2 The missile system had, up to this point, not been operationally used. That much we can be certain of. How much testing had been done ahead of August 2022 is not well know, but it does seem that the missile itself had been tested extensively, yet there is no evidence a full system test against a distant target was ever carried out. Such a launch would have been noteworthy and there is no OSINT that it happened. Therefore, Ukraine wasn't entirely sure the system would work as designed. Given the uncertainty of the performance, the Saky strike is probably best characterized as full scale live fire test first and a military/political strike second. This could very well explain the rather unusual strike pattern that was witnessed (see next point). Question 1 - Why the strange firing pattern The attack on Saky was Missile #1, significant gap of time, Missile #2, significant gap of time, then Missiles #3 and #4 within seconds of each other. An accurate accounting of the gaps between strikes is not readily available, but it seems to have been in excess of an hour each. This pattern is odd because the normal strike pattern would be successive launches with very small gaps of time, all at once, or some combination (e.g. two pairs with small gaps between). There could be some pragmatic reasons to space them out, for example killing emergency service personnel and equipment, but if so then targeting the same spot after a pause would be the optimal solution rather than targeting different parts of the base. Unexpected events, such as glitches in the launch systems, could explain maybe one gap, but two glitches requiring two gaps seems unlikely. Yet random firing seems highly unlikely, therefore some sort of logic was likely employed. Plausible Answer 1 - Firing pattern was to facilitate test requirements and prudent caution Imagine that Ukraine has only 4 missiles built in total and so far none have been used in full combat conditions. It seems highly implausible that anybody would fire them all at once not knowing what might happen to them. Maybe they all fail in flight, maybe they all strike way off target and hit dense civilian areas, maybe they all behave differently and there's no way to know what went wrong, etc. Instead, the optimal solution would be to fire them cautiously, observe, then make a determination if the test should continue or be ended. Going under the assumption that this was a test first and a military/political strike second, Ukraine would want to pick a target that fit certain test criteria. the strike terrain should be something that provides easy observation of effects. Especially accuracy. A wide open airfield with explicit aim points would be an ideal choice. Easily observable by satellite. the location should minimize the risk to civilians. The Saky airbase is situated on the coast, limiting the radius of risk. It is also in the middle of a large swath of terrain that is not densely populated. There are some settlements encroaching on part of the northwestern portion of the base, but a hit there would only happen from a major systems failure of some sort and that could land it theoretically anywhere within a couple hundred KMs. So not a huge concern. However, it does explain why the hardened bunker (a more valuable target) near the civilian area wasn't targeted because a significant targeting error or accuracy design flaw would be more likely to hit a civilian area compared to the chosen targeting area. Also, if it did hit spot on the resulting detonation of the bunker would most definitely have destroyed civilian infrastructure. the target locations need to be long term immobile. A lot of assumptions need to be made in test scenarios, therefore they would not want the possibility of Russia moving things around to be in the mix. The four chosen targets were well established and extremely unlikely to be moved for the foreseeable future. the range of the target needed to be far, but not too far. The further the distance traveled the more pronounced any errors in guidance or flight systems will be. The reverse is true for shorter distances, which could mask problems when later trying to hit further out. Selecting a target area in the middle of Hrim-2;s performance range appears to be ideal for a test. because observations of the effectiveness of the hits could only be reasonably achieved by satellite (reliability and logistics reasons) the chosen day would have to be crystal clear atmospherically. Because the target wasn't at risk of moving and there were no other operations dependent upon the strike, Ukraine could wait for the optimal weather conditions to exist. The day of the strike was effectively cloudless and clear of significant atmospheric moisture from the looks of the videos taken at the time. pausing after the first missile impact allowed the engineers time to evaluate how effective it was prior to launching any additional missiles. If the first missile failed in some significant way they could call off the test and retain the precious few missiles, figure out what when wrong, then try again at a time of their choosing. The gap between #1 and #2 provided enough time to evaluate that it both hit the target and detonated within expectations. Certainly it performed within OSINT design parameters. the first missile tested not only the missile itself but the launch complex (system) it was fired from. That consists of the launch vehicle and various supporting vehicles/systems. The second missile was likely fired from the second system in order to test it for the first time and get a second confirmation on missile performance. As with the first launch, it was deemed a success. the third volley had both launchers firing their second missiles in coordinated way. This not only provided two more missile results to examine, but it also tested both systems as a coordinated launch scenario. Just the sort of thing a battery would do under normal circumstances. A large number of variables could be tested, such as having the two launchers many KMs apart and seeing how closely they could time the impacts to each other. To summarize the possible launch sequence: Fire Missile #1 from Launcher #1 Evaluate launch from Launcher #1 and assess impact of Missile #1 Fire Missile #2 from Launcher #2 Evaluate launch from Launcher #2 and assess impact of Missile #2 Fire Missile #3 from Launcher #1 and Missile #4 from Launcher #2 to hit target simultaneously Evaluate coordination of launches and impacts of Missiles #3 and #4 Launch champagne corks Question 2 - Why not strike the Kerch bridges? Wouldn't it have been better to hit the bridges at Kerch? Answer 2 - Kerch is a bad choice for a test scenario The obvious answer is that the bridges made for a very poor test scenario. If the first missile had performed only a little off its performance parameters it would either have missed the bridge entirely or done nothing effective to it. This would have been more difficult to analyze and evaluate, especially if they did not have access to real time satellite imaging. Water disturbances are time sensitive and more difficult to evaluate compared to craters in the ground. Less obvious is what sort of political considerations Ukraine might have had if the missiles worked or didn't work. If they worked then they would cut off Russians from fleeing in panic in well observed lines of cars. If it didn't work then Ukraine would have shown its hand without having something tangible to show for it. The airbase was a much more sure bet because if one missile didn't hit exactly where they wanted it they could just say it was special forces or a drone strike. With missiles impacting water near the bridges there would be no plausible cover story Plus. there's more in production so Kerch can theoretically can get hit in the future. Conclusions - Everything went very well The results speak for itself, but when viewed as a test it's even clearer how important this strike was. It validated a weapons system that can reliably and accurately attack anything within the occupied territory of Ukraine and a large swath of Russia. We can be very sure that production of more missiles and launchers kicked into high gear after this test. We don't know how many more missiles might already be ready for use, but it's likely Ukraine will once again save them up for something big. The most likely candidate is the Kerch bridges. Some Reference Links Here are some links I referenced about the Hrim-2 system itself. The strikes are from research I did earlier: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/does-ukraine-have-a-stash-of-domestically-developed-ballistic-missiles https://www-ukrmilitary-com.translate.goog/2017/05/spu-grim-foto.html?_x_tr_sl=uk&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hrim-2 https://www.unian.info/economics/2329504-ukraine-unveils-new-hrim-2-short-range-ballistic-missile-photos.html Enjoy! Steve P.S. too tired to proof read what I wrote, so going to bed now and will edit later to smooth out problem spots Interesting analysis Steve. I had bought the SOF explanation, but this makes a lot of sense. Do you think the ammo depot that was hit in Crimea shortly after the Saki strike could have the same explanation? That was also briefed as a SOF attack. Bil 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Huba Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said: Woke up, couldn't sleep, and wound up thinking about my alleged favorite topic... bridges and river crossings In an off-forum discussion about Hrim-2 I've been having I suddenly came to some thoughts about the strike on Saky that I wanted to run by you. Hypothesis - Ukraine used Hrim-2 to strike Saky airbase Many thoroughly examining both the variables at play and the visual evidence have concluded the most likely cause of the explosions at Saky were missiles. Since there are no known missiles in service of either Ukraine or the West that match the apparent capabilities of the strikes, it seems fairly obvious that whatever was used is something brand new. The only system anybody seems to be aware of to match the observed effects is Hrim-2. And the effects seem to match perfectly in terms of range, accuracy, and warhead size. It also matches what little information we have, including the recent espionage case, about probable readiness level. The attack happened and therefore something was used. Since there are no ready explanations, we must accept that whatever happened it was caused by something "novel". Not only does Hrim-2 fit the known facts, it is the ONLY thing that fits. If Ukraine has some other way of causing the damage done to Saky, then it is so secret that nobody even knows to put it down as a possibility. That is highly unlikely. Confirmed Facts - Hrim-2 exists Hrim-2 has been under active development for many years and open source information indicates it was ready for production as early as 2019 and more than likely by 2021. It's development stages and recent status are fairly well documented. The only reason it seems it wasn't put into active service prior to the war isn't because of issues with the system itself, but because the Ukrainian government didn't fund acquisition of the systems. Additionally, open source information indicates that there are at least two launch systems in existence. Each launcher has a two missile capacity. The 10x10 wheeled launch vehicles are unique to the Hrim-2. Assumption 1 - Production is happening Open source information makes it very clear that the missile was ready for purchasing in 2021. Money seems to have been the only stumbling block. As the war talk ramped up in late 2021 something might have been done "under the table" to get things going faster ahead of February 2022, but if not it's a given that once the war started production of Hrim-2 got a boost. There is just no way Ukraine would leave this system off the table, especially with billions in aid coming in from the West, especially because the US is publicly adamant that it won't give Ukraine a similar long range weapon (i.e. ATACAMS). Assumption 2 - Production time sufficient to produce 4 missiles It is unlikely that full scale production capacity was established ahead of the war due to the lack of certain funding. So the initial rate of production would be quite slow compared to what it theoretically could be. Production time is likely measured in many months per missile even with nearly 24/7 manufacturing. We do not know how long it takes to produce a single missile under wartime conditions and incentives. We do know that there was a strike on the production facilities that disrupted activity there, but apparently that is all that happened. Given how ineffective Russian strikes have generally been, and how hardened the facilities are, it is probable that production was not significant impacted by the strike. Whatever components Ukraine doesn't have on hand could be sourced from the West, thus potentially removing production bottlenecks. There are other instances of the West supply parts for Ukraine's weapons systems. Certainly this is the sort of project that would get priority attention, especially from the United States. The US is under pressure to provide Ukraine with long range weapons and doesn't want to take the political risk. Helping Ukraine produce its own takes pressure off of the US while maintaining its pledge to not provide ATACAMS (or similar) to Ukraine. Assume 4 months of production time between the start of the war and the strike plus some number of partial missiles built prior to the war, especially if production was started after rumors of war came into being. It seems possible Ukraine could have had 4 missiles built in time for the strike. Assumption 3 - Saky was an operational test of Hrim-2 The missile system had, up to this point, not been operationally used. That much we can be certain of. How much testing had been done ahead of August 2022 is not well know, but it does seem that the missile itself had been tested extensively, yet there is no evidence a full system test against a distant target was ever carried out. Such a launch would have been noteworthy and there is no OSINT that it happened. Therefore, Ukraine wasn't entirely sure the system would work as designed. Given the uncertainty of the performance, the Saky strike is probably best characterized as full scale live fire test first and a military/political strike second. This could very well explain the rather unusual strike pattern that was witnessed (see next point). Question 1 - Why the strange firing pattern The attack on Saky was Missile #1, significant gap of time, Missile #2, significant gap of time, then Missiles #3 and #4 within seconds of each other. An accurate accounting of the gaps between strikes is not readily available, but it seems to have been in excess of an hour each. This pattern is odd because the normal strike pattern would be successive launches with very small gaps of time, all at once, or some combination (e.g. two pairs with small gaps between). There could be some pragmatic reasons to space them out, for example killing emergency service personnel and equipment, but if so then targeting the same spot after a pause would be the optimal solution rather than targeting different parts of the base. Unexpected events, such as glitches in the launch systems, could explain maybe one gap, but two glitches requiring two gaps seems unlikely. Yet random firing seems highly unlikely, therefore some sort of logic was likely employed. Plausible Answer 1 - Firing pattern was to facilitate test requirements and prudent caution Imagine that Ukraine has only 4 missiles built in total and so far none have been used in full combat conditions. It seems highly implausible that anybody would fire them all at once not knowing what might happen to them. Maybe they all fail in flight, maybe they all strike way off target and hit dense civilian areas, maybe they all behave differently and there's no way to know what went wrong, etc. Instead, the optimal solution would be to fire them cautiously, observe, then make a determination if the test should continue or be ended. Going under the assumption that this was a test first and a military/political strike second, Ukraine would want to pick a target that fit certain test criteria. the strike terrain should be something that provides easy observation of effects. Especially accuracy. A wide open airfield with explicit aim points would be an ideal choice. Easily observable by satellite. the location should minimize the risk to civilians. The Saky airbase is situated on the coast, limiting the radius of risk. It is also in the middle of a large swath of terrain that is not densely populated. There are some settlements encroaching on part of the northwestern portion of the base, but a hit there would only happen from a major systems failure of some sort and that could land it theoretically anywhere within a couple hundred KMs. So not a huge concern. However, it does explain why the hardened bunker (a more valuable target) near the civilian area wasn't targeted because a significant targeting error or accuracy design flaw would be more likely to hit a civilian area compared to the chosen targeting area. Also, if it did hit spot on the resulting detonation of the bunker would most definitely have destroyed civilian infrastructure. the target locations need to be long term immobile. A lot of assumptions need to be made in test scenarios, therefore they would not want the possibility of Russia moving things around to be in the mix. The four chosen targets were well established and extremely unlikely to be moved for the foreseeable future. the range of the target needed to be far, but not too far. The further the distance traveled the more pronounced any errors in guidance or flight systems will be. The reverse is true for shorter distances, which could mask problems when later trying to hit further out. Selecting a target area in the middle of Hrim-2;s performance range appears to be ideal for a test. because observations of the effectiveness of the hits could only be reasonably achieved by satellite (reliability and logistics reasons) the chosen day would have to be crystal clear atmospherically. Because the target wasn't at risk of moving and there were no other operations dependent upon the strike, Ukraine could wait for the optimal weather conditions to exist. The day of the strike was effectively cloudless and clear of significant atmospheric moisture from the looks of the videos taken at the time. pausing after the first missile impact allowed the engineers time to evaluate how effective it was prior to launching any additional missiles. If the first missile failed in some significant way they could call off the test and retain the precious few missiles, figure out what when wrong, then try again at a time of their choosing. The gap between #1 and #2 provided enough time to evaluate that it both hit the target and detonated within expectations. Certainly it performed within OSINT design parameters. the first missile tested not only the missile itself but the launch complex (system) it was fired from. That consists of the launch vehicle and various supporting vehicles/systems. The second missile was likely fired from the second system in order to test it for the first time and get a second confirmation on missile performance. As with the first launch, it was deemed a success. the third volley had both launchers firing their second missiles in coordinated way. This not only provided two more missile results to examine, but it also tested both systems as a coordinated launch scenario. Just the sort of thing a battery would do under normal circumstances. A large number of variables could be tested, such as having the two launchers many KMs apart and seeing how closely they could time the impacts to each other. To summarize the possible launch sequence: Fire Missile #1 from Launcher #1 Evaluate launch from Launcher #1 and assess impact of Missile #1 Fire Missile #2 from Launcher #2 Evaluate launch from Launcher #2 and assess impact of Missile #2 Fire Missile #3 from Launcher #1 and Missile #4 from Launcher #2 to hit target simultaneously Evaluate coordination of launches and impacts of Missiles #3 and #4 Launch champagne corks Question 2 - Why not strike the Kerch bridges? Wouldn't it have been better to hit the bridges at Kerch? Answer 2 - Kerch is a bad choice for a test scenario The obvious answer is that the bridges made for a very poor test scenario. If the first missile had performed only a little off its performance parameters it would either have missed the bridge entirely or done nothing effective to it. This would have been more difficult to analyze and evaluate, especially if they did not have access to real time satellite imaging. Water disturbances are time sensitive and more difficult to evaluate compared to craters in the ground. Less obvious is what sort of political considerations Ukraine might have had if the missiles worked or didn't work. If they worked then they would cut off Russians from fleeing in panic in well observed lines of cars. If it didn't work then Ukraine would have shown its hand without having something tangible to show for it. The airbase was a much more sure bet because if one missile didn't hit exactly where they wanted it they could just say it was special forces or a drone strike. With missiles impacting water near the bridges there would be no plausible cover story Plus. there's more in production so Kerch can theoretically can get hit in the future. Conclusions - Everything went very well The results speak for itself, but when viewed as a test it's even clearer how important this strike was. It validated a weapons system that can reliably and accurately attack anything within the occupied territory of Ukraine and a large swath of Russia. We can be very sure that production of more missiles and launchers kicked into high gear after this test. We don't know how many more missiles might already be ready for use, but it's likely Ukraine will once again save them up for something big. The most likely candidate is the Kerch bridges. Some Reference Links Here are some links I referenced about the Hrim-2 system itself. The strikes are from research I did earlier: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/does-ukraine-have-a-stash-of-domestically-developed-ballistic-missiles https://www-ukrmilitary-com.translate.goog/2017/05/spu-grim-foto.html?_x_tr_sl=uk&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hrim-2 https://www.unian.info/economics/2329504-ukraine-unveils-new-hrim-2-short-range-ballistic-missile-photos.html Enjoy! Steve P.S. too tired to proof read what I wrote, so going to bed now and will edit later to smooth out problem spots Some points that you didn't mention here: - Zaluzhny confirmed at one point that Saki was struck by UA missiles. Didn't specify which, but the only other candidate would be Neptune ( or alleged ground attack version of it). - southern Crimea is attractive as testing ground due to various NATO assets over Black Sea being available for damage assessement, flight observation. ELINT/ SIGINT etc. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 17 minutes ago, Holien said: I think the use of special forces to neutralise the AD assets could be a fairly plausible explanation especially as they would have been easy to identify beforehand. This Remember that Ukraine explicitly stated the their Special Forces were responsible for the attack at Saky. Ukraine has been very careful about outright lies because they tend to undermine confidence. This is a lesson that they've learned and seem to pay very close attention to. However, people are willing to cut a lot of slack for cover stories for something that is clearly sensitive and directly war related. I don't remember the phrasing about SOF involvement, but it was cagey and left plenty of room for inaccurate conclusions without being technically a lie. Russia doesn't do this because the Russian population is conditioned to excuse outright lies, such as we saw in 2014 when Russia said it hadn't invaded Crimea and then later the Donbas. Russians who believed this nonsense at the time later said "that's fine, they had to lie to us" later on when the truth was revealed. Therefore, I suspect that SOF was involved in some way. I suspect they did something to the S-400 systems and/or had some drones in the air to observe the strikes. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Halmbarte Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said: Woke up, couldn't sleep, and wound up thinking about my alleged favorite topic... bridges and river crossings In an off-forum discussion about Hrim-2 I've been having I suddenly came to some thoughts about the strike on Saky that I wanted to run by you. Hypothesis - Ukraine used Hrim-2 to strike Saky airbase Many thoroughly examining both the variables at play and the visual evidence have concluded the most likely cause of the explosions at Saky were missiles. Since there are no known missiles in service of either Ukraine or the West that match the apparent capabilities of the strikes, it seems fairly obvious that whatever was used is something brand new. The only system anybody seems to be aware of to match the observed effects is Hrim-2. And the effects seem to match perfectly in terms of range, accuracy, and warhead size. It also matches what little information we have, including the recent espionage case, about probable readiness level. The attack happened and therefore something was used. Since there are no ready explanations, we must accept that whatever happened it was caused by something "novel". Not only does Hrim-2 fit the known facts, it is the ONLY thing that fits. If Ukraine has some other way of causing the damage done to Saky, then it is so secret that nobody even knows to put it down as a possibility. That is highly unlikely. Confirmed Facts - Hrim-2 exists Hrim-2 has been under active development for many years and open source information indicates it was ready for production as early as 2019 and more than likely by 2021. It's development stages and recent status are fairly well documented. The only reason it seems it wasn't put into active service prior to the war isn't because of issues with the system itself, but because the Ukrainian government didn't fund acquisition of the systems. Additionally, open source information indicates that there are at least two launch systems in existence. Each launcher has a two missile capacity. The 10x10 wheeled launch vehicles are unique to the Hrim-2. Assumption 1 - Production is happening Open source information makes it very clear that the missile was ready for purchasing in 2021. Money seems to have been the only stumbling block. As the war talk ramped up in late 2021 something might have been done "under the table" to get things going faster ahead of February 2022, but if not it's a given that once the war started production of Hrim-2 got a boost. There is just no way Ukraine would leave this system off the table, especially with billions in aid coming in from the West, especially because the US is publicly adamant that it won't give Ukraine a similar long range weapon (i.e. ATACAMS). Assumption 2 - Production time sufficient to produce 4 missiles It is unlikely that full scale production capacity was established ahead of the war due to the lack of certain funding. So the initial rate of production would be quite slow compared to what it theoretically could be. Production time is likely measured in many months per missile even with nearly 24/7 manufacturing. We do not know how long it takes to produce a single missile under wartime conditions and incentives. We do know that there was a strike on the production facilities that disrupted activity there, but apparently that is all that happened. Given how ineffective Russian strikes have generally been, and how hardened the facilities are, it is probable that production was not significant impacted by the strike. Whatever components Ukraine doesn't have on hand could be sourced from the West, thus potentially removing production bottlenecks. There are other instances of the West supply parts for Ukraine's weapons systems. Certainly this is the sort of project that would get priority attention, especially from the United States. The US is under pressure to provide Ukraine with long range weapons and doesn't want to take the political risk. Helping Ukraine produce its own takes pressure off of the US while maintaining its pledge to not provide ATACAMS (or similar) to Ukraine. Assume 4 months of production time between the start of the war and the strike plus some number of partial missiles built prior to the war, especially if production was started after rumors of war came into being. It seems possible Ukraine could have had 4 missiles built in time for the strike. Assumption 3 - Saky was an operational test of Hrim-2 The missile system had, up to this point, not been operationally used. That much we can be certain of. How much testing had been done ahead of August 2022 is not well know, but it does seem that the missile itself had been tested extensively, yet there is no evidence a full system test against a distant target was ever carried out. Such a launch would have been noteworthy and there is no OSINT that it happened. Therefore, Ukraine wasn't entirely sure the system would work as designed. Given the uncertainty of the performance, the Saky strike is probably best characterized as full scale live fire test first and a military/political strike second. This could very well explain the rather unusual strike pattern that was witnessed (see next point). Question 1 - Why the strange firing pattern The attack on Saky was Missile #1, significant gap of time, Missile #2, significant gap of time, then Missiles #3 and #4 within seconds of each other. An accurate accounting of the gaps between strikes is not readily available, but it seems to have been in excess of an hour each. This pattern is odd because the normal strike pattern would be successive launches with very small gaps of time, all at once, or some combination (e.g. two pairs with small gaps between). There could be some pragmatic reasons to space them out, for example killing emergency service personnel and equipment, but if so then targeting the same spot after a pause would be the optimal solution rather than targeting different parts of the base. Unexpected events, such as glitches in the launch systems, could explain maybe one gap, but two glitches requiring two gaps seems unlikely. Yet random firing seems highly unlikely, therefore some sort of logic was likely employed. Plausible Answer 1 - Firing pattern was to facilitate test requirements and prudent caution Imagine that Ukraine has only 4 missiles built in total and so far none have been used in full combat conditions. It seems highly implausible that anybody would fire them all at once not knowing what might happen to them. Maybe they all fail in flight, maybe they all strike way off target and hit dense civilian areas, maybe they all behave differently and there's no way to know what went wrong, etc. Instead, the optimal solution would be to fire them cautiously, observe, then make a determination if the test should continue or be ended. Going under the assumption that this was a test first and a military/political strike second, Ukraine would want to pick a target that fit certain test criteria. the strike terrain should be something that provides easy observation of effects. Especially accuracy. A wide open airfield with explicit aim points would be an ideal choice. Easily observable by satellite. the location should minimize the risk to civilians. The Saky airbase is situated on the coast, limiting the radius of risk. It is also in the middle of a large swath of terrain that is not densely populated. There are some settlements encroaching on part of the northwestern portion of the base, but a hit there would only happen from a major systems failure of some sort and that could land it theoretically anywhere within a couple hundred KMs. So not a huge concern. However, it does explain why the hardened bunker (a more valuable target) near the civilian area wasn't targeted because a significant targeting error or accuracy design flaw would be more likely to hit a civilian area compared to the chosen targeting area. Also, if it did hit spot on the resulting detonation of the bunker would most definitely have destroyed civilian infrastructure. the target locations need to be long term immobile. A lot of assumptions need to be made in test scenarios, therefore they would not want the possibility of Russia moving things around to be in the mix. The four chosen targets were well established and extremely unlikely to be moved for the foreseeable future. the range of the target needed to be far, but not too far. The further the distance traveled the more pronounced any errors in guidance or flight systems will be. The reverse is true for shorter distances, which could mask problems when later trying to hit further out. Selecting a target area in the middle of Hrim-2;s performance range appears to be ideal for a test. because observations of the effectiveness of the hits could only be reasonably achieved by satellite (reliability and logistics reasons) the chosen day would have to be crystal clear atmospherically. Because the target wasn't at risk of moving and there were no other operations dependent upon the strike, Ukraine could wait for the optimal weather conditions to exist. The day of the strike was effectively cloudless and clear of significant atmospheric moisture from the looks of the videos taken at the time. pausing after the first missile impact allowed the engineers time to evaluate how effective it was prior to launching any additional missiles. If the first missile failed in some significant way they could call off the test and retain the precious few missiles, figure out what when wrong, then try again at a time of their choosing. The gap between #1 and #2 provided enough time to evaluate that it both hit the target and detonated within expectations. Certainly it performed within OSINT design parameters. the first missile tested not only the missile itself but the launch complex (system) it was fired from. That consists of the launch vehicle and various supporting vehicles/systems. The second missile was likely fired from the second system in order to test it for the first time and get a second confirmation on missile performance. As with the first launch, it was deemed a success. the third volley had both launchers firing their second missiles in coordinated way. This not only provided two more missile results to examine, but it also tested both systems as a coordinated launch scenario. Just the sort of thing a battery would do under normal circumstances. A large number of variables could be tested, such as having the two launchers many KMs apart and seeing how closely they could time the impacts to each other. To summarize the possible launch sequence: Fire Missile #1 from Launcher #1 Evaluate launch from Launcher #1 and assess impact of Missile #1 Fire Missile #2 from Launcher #2 Evaluate launch from Launcher #2 and assess impact of Missile #2 Fire Missile #3 from Launcher #1 and Missile #4 from Launcher #2 to hit target simultaneously Evaluate coordination of launches and impacts of Missiles #3 and #4 Launch champagne corks Question 2 - Why not strike the Kerch bridges? Wouldn't it have been better to hit the bridges at Kerch? Answer 2 - Kerch is a bad choice for a test scenario The obvious answer is that the bridges made for a very poor test scenario. If the first missile had performed only a little off its performance parameters it would either have missed the bridge entirely or done nothing effective to it. This would have been more difficult to analyze and evaluate, especially if they did not have access to real time satellite imaging. Water disturbances are time sensitive and more difficult to evaluate compared to craters in the ground. Less obvious is what sort of political considerations Ukraine might have had if the missiles worked or didn't work. If they worked then they would cut off Russians from fleeing in panic in well observed lines of cars. If it didn't work then Ukraine would have shown its hand without having something tangible to show for it. The airbase was a much more sure bet because if one missile didn't hit exactly where they wanted it they could just say it was special forces or a drone strike. With missiles impacting water near the bridges there would be no plausible cover story Plus. there's more in production so Kerch can theoretically can get hit in the future. Conclusions - Everything went very well The results speak for itself, but when viewed as a test it's even clearer how important this strike was. It validated a weapons system that can reliably and accurately attack anything within the occupied territory of Ukraine and a large swath of Russia. We can be very sure that production of more missiles and launchers kicked into high gear after this test. We don't know how many more missiles might already be ready for use, but it's likely Ukraine will once again save them up for something big. The most likely candidate is the Kerch bridges. Some Reference Links Here are some links I referenced about the Hrim-2 system itself. The strikes are from research I did earlier: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/does-ukraine-have-a-stash-of-domestically-developed-ballistic-missiles https://www-ukrmilitary-com.translate.goog/2017/05/spu-grim-foto.html?_x_tr_sl=uk&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hrim-2 https://www.unian.info/economics/2329504-ukraine-unveils-new-hrim-2-short-range-ballistic-missile-photos.html Enjoy! Steve P.S. too tired to proof read what I wrote, so going to bed now and will edit later to smooth out problem spots Is there a reason to rule out a commando raid? Sneaking into an air base and blowing stuff up is a classic special forces tactic. Although the UA hinting towards special forces would hint that it was something else. But do the Ukrainians know the Russians know they never give a useful official answer so the way to deflect attention from the special forces is to say it was the special forces? Of course, this way lies madness... H 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 10 minutes ago, kevinkin said: I agree. There is something else going on to allow a small number to get through. Crimea is a good test bed, so shape the operation in your favor getting data from the few Hrim-2s you have. I wonder if jammers carried by SF could be effective? I have not seen reports of the AD being attacked kinetically. Remember that the first ever confirmed HARM strikes happened in and around Kherson down to, IIRC, the neck of Crimea. These could be seen as prep for the counter offensive that was already announced publicly, but I suspected at the time (and now) that they were designed to pave a path between the launchers and Saky. Also, I think we've seen clear evidence that both the S-300 and S-400 systems are under performing against supersonic high angled targets. So far as we know they've not hit a single HIMARS rocket. We even saw evidence of them trying a WW2 style flak barrage with the missiles ahead of HIMARS strikes on the Kherson bridges. You don't do that with a precision guided anti-air munition unless you know you're not going to hit with guidance systems. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 1 hour ago, akd said: It’s just a BMP-2 that has already had the cannon scavenged. No markings visible to identify unit, but could be 4 GTD. They’ve always operated BMP-2, and this is one that received a light “modernization.” Thanks for the clarification! I wonder if this BMP-2 went into the field already stripped of its cannon? Or maybe it had a catastrophic failure in the field, had been removed, and was waiting for a replacement? Have you looked at the dozen+ abandoned tanks in the one yard in detail? I haven't. I'm wondering if there's more clues about how far down in the barrel they dug for those. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 11 minutes ago, Huba said: Some points that you didn't mention here: - Zaluzhny confirmed at one point that Saki was struck by UA missiles. Didn't specify which, but the only other candidate would be Neptune ( or alleged ground attack version of it). Yup and the US explicitly stated it was a "weapon" of Ukrainian origin. The SOF statement came out just after that IIRC. In this analysis I didn't want to go into too much detail about why Hrim-2 is the likely suspect. See next post. 11 minutes ago, Huba said: - southern Crimea is attractive as testing ground due to various NATO assets over Black Sea being available for damage assessement, flight observation. ELINT/ SIGINT etc. For sure, though I think all they needed was a clear day and a geosynchronous satellite. Evidence of that? Because we even got pictures within hours of the destruction and were able to get the same sort of info the Ukrainians would be looking for. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeyD Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 Quote Question 1 - Why the strange firing pattern My theory is Hrim-2 was using its optics-matching targeting (Similar to what's used on Iranian 'carrier killer' missiles) which would be ideal for targeting a runway. But in order to target the runway has to be visible. So the successive launches were timed for when the preceding blast effects had dissipated and the runway was visible again. Just my theory. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 10 minutes ago, Halmbarte said: Is there a reason to rule out a commando raid? Sneaking into an air base and blowing stuff up is a classic special forces tactic. Although the UA hinting towards special forces would hint that it was something else. But do the Ukrainians know the Russians know they never give a useful official answer so the way to deflect attention from the special forces is to say it was the special forces? Of course, this way lies madness... H This is a bigger question and is something I already documented already. Since it's, er, a couple hundred pages ago I'll repost it again (argh, I don't have it in my folder! I'll find it and post it again soon). The short of it is that the evidence is the explosions were caused by a massive and catastrophic detonation of munitions. The amount of C4 that it would take to get that to happen would be very daunting and involved to transport, deploy, and reliably detonate simultaneously within a single target area. The other one is all 3 visible craters (one was obscured) were uniform in size, yet the amount of stuff they detonated was not. This indicates the crater was caused by a single explosion delivered in the same way. Not going to get that from C4. There's more, as well as why Neptune was ruled out, but I'll repost that later. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 23 minutes ago, Bil Hardenberger said: Interesting analysis Steve. I had bought the SOF explanation, but this makes a lot of sense. Do you think the ammo depot that was hit in Crimea shortly after the Saki strike could have the same explanation? That was also briefed as a SOF attack. Bil From what I remember we figured out that one was likely SOF. First attack on the tower was a distraction followed by IIRC 2 attacks by something (possibly drones? I forget the details). Even if this was a Hrim-2 follow up, we've seen nothing since then. Which indicates they had to build more and/or are saving up for something big. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 Slight modification to the timeline. I found, buried in a sub folder, I copied an eye witness statement. Not sure where from, but I don't take clippings like that from RUMINT so it was likely a Western media source. Here is what it said: Quote Witnesses also told us that the largest explosions were at the start — we confirmed the first occurred just before 3.20 pm, followed by another minutes later — and the dual blasts that hit around 4.11 pm. This means there was about 50 minutes from the launch of #1 to the last (dual #3 and #4) launch. If they had real time satellite access (looks over at DC with a wink) then I think 40 minutes or so would be plenty of time to assess that the first strike did what it was supposed to do and a couple minutes more to verify the #2 did as well. I mean... c'mon, the evidence is rather obvious even to an amateur The first hit would have been a little harder to assess because of the smoke. Thermal imaging might have been needed to be absolutely sure of the impact area. But since they were most interested in hitting in the general area and having it go BOOM they wouldn't need to wait for the smoke to dissipate to know that they had a successful hit. If they struck empty field they would not have seen what we all saw. Again, even my untrained eye could tell that was a massive detonation, far greater than what any one munition could produce. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Huba Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 (edited) 21 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said: Yup and the US explicitly stated it was a "weapon" of Ukrainian origin. The SOF statement came out just after that IIRC. In this analysis I didn't want to go into too much detail about why Hrim-2 is the likely suspect. See next post. For sure, though I think all they needed was a clear day and a geosynchronous satellite. Evidence of that? Because we even got pictures within hours of the destruction and were able to get the same sort of info the Ukrainians would be looking for. Steve No, they confirmed that it was a missile a month later, it is the official explanation now: Edited September 18, 2022 by Huba 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Taranis Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 (edited) 28 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said: Thanks for the clarification! I wonder if this BMP-2 went into the field already stripped of its cannon? Or maybe it had a catastrophic failure in the field, had been removed, and was waiting for a replacement? Have you looked at the dozen+ abandoned tanks in the one yard in detail? I haven't. I'm wondering if there's more clues about how far down in the barrel they dug for those. Steve Indeed, that was a mistake on my part. Sorry. It is indeed a BMP-2 and not a PRP-3. Thanks @akd Edited September 18, 2022 by Taranis 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grossman Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 2 hours ago, Battlefront.com said: Woke up, couldn't sleep, and wound up thinking about my alleged favorite topic... bridges and river crossings In an off-forum discussion about Hrim-2 I've been having I suddenly came to some thoughts about the strike on Saky that I wanted to run by you. Hypothesis - Ukraine used Hrim-2 to strike Saky airbase Many thoroughly examining both the variables at play and the visual evidence have concluded the most likely cause of the explosions at Saky were missiles. Since there are no known missiles in service of either Ukraine or the West that match the apparent capabilities of the strikes, it seems fairly obvious that whatever was used is something brand new. The only system anybody seems to be aware of to match the observed effects is Hrim-2. And the effects seem to match perfectly in terms of range, accuracy, and warhead size. It also matches what little information we have, including the recent espionage case, about probable readiness level. The attack happened and therefore something was used. Since there are no ready explanations, we must accept that whatever happened it was caused by something "novel". Not only does Hrim-2 fit the known facts, it is the ONLY thing that fits. If Ukraine has some other way of causing the damage done to Saky, then it is so secret that nobody even knows to put it down as a possibility. That is highly unlikely. Confirmed Facts - Hrim-2 exists Hrim-2 has been under active development for many years and open source information indicates it was ready for production as early as 2019 and more than likely by 2021. It's development stages and recent status are fairly well documented. The only reason it seems it wasn't put into active service prior to the war isn't because of issues with the system itself, but because the Ukrainian government didn't fund acquisition of the systems. Additionally, open source information indicates that there are at least two launch systems in existence. Each launcher has a two missile capacity. The 10x10 wheeled launch vehicles are unique to the Hrim-2. Assumption 1 - Production is happening Open source information makes it very clear that the missile was ready for purchasing in 2021. Money seems to have been the only stumbling block. As the war talk ramped up in late 2021 something might have been done "under the table" to get things going faster ahead of February 2022, but if not it's a given that once the war started production of Hrim-2 got a boost. There is just no way Ukraine would leave this system off the table, especially with billions in aid coming in from the West, especially because the US is publicly adamant that it won't give Ukraine a similar long range weapon (i.e. ATACAMS). Assumption 2 - Production time sufficient to produce 4 missiles It is unlikely that full scale production capacity was established ahead of the war due to the lack of certain funding. So the initial rate of production would be quite slow compared to what it theoretically could be. Production time is likely measured in many months per missile even with nearly 24/7 manufacturing. We do not know how long it takes to produce a single missile under wartime conditions and incentives. We do know that there was a strike on the production facilities that disrupted activity there, but apparently that is all that happened. Given how ineffective Russian strikes have generally been, and how hardened the facilities are, it is probable that production was not significant impacted by the strike. Whatever components Ukraine doesn't have on hand could be sourced from the West, thus potentially removing production bottlenecks. There are other instances of the West supply parts for Ukraine's weapons systems. Certainly this is the sort of project that would get priority attention, especially from the United States. The US is under pressure to provide Ukraine with long range weapons and doesn't want to take the political risk. Helping Ukraine produce its own takes pressure off of the US while maintaining its pledge to not provide ATACAMS (or similar) to Ukraine. Assume 4 months of production time between the start of the war and the strike plus some number of partial missiles built prior to the war, especially if production was started after rumors of war came into being. It seems possible Ukraine could have had 4 missiles built in time for the strike. Assumption 3 - Saky was an operational test of Hrim-2 The missile system had, up to this point, not been operationally used. That much we can be certain of. How much testing had been done ahead of August 2022 is not well know, but it does seem that the missile itself had been tested extensively, yet there is no evidence a full system test against a distant target was ever carried out. Such a launch would have been noteworthy and there is no OSINT that it happened. Therefore, Ukraine wasn't entirely sure the system would work as designed. Given the uncertainty of the performance, the Saky strike is probably best characterized as full scale live fire test first and a military/political strike second. This could very well explain the rather unusual strike pattern that was witnessed (see next point). Question 1 - Why the strange firing pattern The attack on Saky was Missile #1, significant gap of time, Missile #2, significant gap of time, then Missiles #3 and #4 within seconds of each other. An accurate accounting of the gaps between strikes is not readily available, but it seems to have been in excess of an hour each. This pattern is odd because the normal strike pattern would be successive launches with very small gaps of time, all at once, or some combination (e.g. two pairs with small gaps between). There could be some pragmatic reasons to space them out, for example killing emergency service personnel and equipment, but if so then targeting the same spot after a pause would be the optimal solution rather than targeting different parts of the base. Unexpected events, such as glitches in the launch systems, could explain maybe one gap, but two glitches requiring two gaps seems unlikely. Yet random firing seems highly unlikely, therefore some sort of logic was likely employed. Plausible Answer 1 - Firing pattern was to facilitate test requirements and prudent caution Imagine that Ukraine has only 4 missiles built in total and so far none have been used in full combat conditions. It seems highly implausible that anybody would fire them all at once not knowing what might happen to them. Maybe they all fail in flight, maybe they all strike way off target and hit dense civilian areas, maybe they all behave differently and there's no way to know what went wrong, etc. Instead, the optimal solution would be to fire them cautiously, observe, then make a determination if the test should continue or be ended. Going under the assumption that this was a test first and a military/political strike second, Ukraine would want to pick a target that fit certain test criteria. the strike terrain should be something that provides easy observation of effects. Especially accuracy. A wide open airfield with explicit aim points would be an ideal choice. Easily observable by satellite. the location should minimize the risk to civilians. The Saky airbase is situated on the coast, limiting the radius of risk. It is also in the middle of a large swath of terrain that is not densely populated. There are some settlements encroaching on part of the northwestern portion of the base, but a hit there would only happen from a major systems failure of some sort and that could land it theoretically anywhere within a couple hundred KMs. So not a huge concern. However, it does explain why the hardened bunker (a more valuable target) near the civilian area wasn't targeted because a significant targeting error or accuracy design flaw would be more likely to hit a civilian area compared to the chosen targeting area. Also, if it did hit spot on the resulting detonation of the bunker would most definitely have destroyed civilian infrastructure. the target locations need to be long term immobile. A lot of assumptions need to be made in test scenarios, therefore they would not want the possibility of Russia moving things around to be in the mix. The four chosen targets were well established and extremely unlikely to be moved for the foreseeable future. the range of the target needed to be far, but not too far. The further the distance traveled the more pronounced any errors in guidance or flight systems will be. The reverse is true for shorter distances, which could mask problems when later trying to hit further out. Selecting a target area in the middle of Hrim-2;s performance range appears to be ideal for a test. because observations of the effectiveness of the hits could only be reasonably achieved by satellite (reliability and logistics reasons) the chosen day would have to be crystal clear atmospherically. Because the target wasn't at risk of moving and there were no other operations dependent upon the strike, Ukraine could wait for the optimal weather conditions to exist. The day of the strike was effectively cloudless and clear of significant atmospheric moisture from the looks of the videos taken at the time. pausing after the first missile impact allowed the engineers time to evaluate how effective it was prior to launching any additional missiles. If the first missile failed in some significant way they could call off the test and retain the precious few missiles, figure out what when wrong, then try again at a time of their choosing. The gap between #1 and #2 provided enough time to evaluate that it both hit the target and detonated within expectations. Certainly it performed within OSINT design parameters. the first missile tested not only the missile itself but the launch complex (system) it was fired from. That consists of the launch vehicle and various supporting vehicles/systems. The second missile was likely fired from the second system in order to test it for the first time and get a second confirmation on missile performance. As with the first launch, it was deemed a success. the third volley had both launchers firing their second missiles in coordinated way. This not only provided two more missile results to examine, but it also tested both systems as a coordinated launch scenario. Just the sort of thing a battery would do under normal circumstances. A large number of variables could be tested, such as having the two launchers many KMs apart and seeing how closely they could time the impacts to each other. To summarize the possible launch sequence: Fire Missile #1 from Launcher #1 Evaluate launch from Launcher #1 and assess impact of Missile #1 Fire Missile #2 from Launcher #2 Evaluate launch from Launcher #2 and assess impact of Missile #2 Fire Missile #3 from Launcher #1 and Missile #4 from Launcher #2 to hit target simultaneously Evaluate coordination of launches and impacts of Missiles #3 and #4 Launch champagne corks Question 2 - Why not strike the Kerch bridges? Wouldn't it have been better to hit the bridges at Kerch? Answer 2 - Kerch is a bad choice for a test scenario The obvious answer is that the bridges made for a very poor test scenario. If the first missile had performed only a little off its performance parameters it would either have missed the bridge entirely or done nothing effective to it. This would have been more difficult to analyze and evaluate, especially if they did not have access to real time satellite imaging. Water disturbances are time sensitive and more difficult to evaluate compared to craters in the ground. Less obvious is what sort of political considerations Ukraine might have had if the missiles worked or didn't work. If they worked then they would cut off Russians from fleeing in panic in well observed lines of cars. If it didn't work then Ukraine would have shown its hand without having something tangible to show for it. The airbase was a much more sure bet because if one missile didn't hit exactly where they wanted it they could just say it was special forces or a drone strike. With missiles impacting water near the bridges there would be no plausible cover story Plus. there's more in production so Kerch can theoretically can get hit in the future. Conclusions - Everything went very well The results speak for itself, but when viewed as a test it's even clearer how important this strike was. It validated a weapons system that can reliably and accurately attack anything within the occupied territory of Ukraine and a large swath of Russia. We can be very sure that production of more missiles and launchers kicked into high gear after this test. We don't know how many more missiles might already be ready for use, but it's likely Ukraine will once again save them up for something big. The most likely candidate is the Kerch bridges. Some Reference Links Here are some links I referenced about the Hrim-2 system itself. The strikes are from research I did earlier: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/does-ukraine-have-a-stash-of-domestically-developed-ballistic-missiles https://www-ukrmilitary-com.translate.goog/2017/05/spu-grim-foto.html?_x_tr_sl=uk&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hrim-2 https://www.unian.info/economics/2329504-ukraine-unveils-new-hrim-2-short-range-ballistic-missile-photos.html Enjoy! Steve P.S. too tired to proof read what I wrote, so going to bed now and will edit later to smooth out problem spots Steve. There doesn't seem much doubt the strike was Hrim-2 on account of range and devastation. The firing pattern is an interesting observation. More Hrims are being built or have been built. The special target will be the Kerch Bridge. It hasn't been taken out for now because of the Ukrainian war strategy. It is the Russian supply link between the east and west fronts, the Donbas and Kherson. The UKR plan was to blow the Dnieper bridges and decoy Russian forces to Kherson, meanwhile reclaim the Donbas, fighting reduced Russian forces. We'll see the Kerch bridge eliminated when UKR wants to bottleneck RU troops in Crimea and isolate the Black Sea front . 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Huba Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 4 minutes ago, Grossman said: Steve. There doesn't seem much doubt the strike was Hrim-2 on account of range and devastation. The firing pattern is an interesting observation. More Hrims are being built or have been built. The special target will be the Kerch Bridge. It hasn't been taken out for now because of the Ukrainian war strategy. It is the Russian supply link between the east and west fronts, the Donbas and Kherson. The UKR plan was to blow the Dnieper bridges and decoy Russian forces to Kherson, meanwhile reclaim the Donbas, fighting reduced Russian forces. We'll see the Kerch bridge eliminated when UKR wants to bottleneck RU troops in Crimea and isolate the Black Sea front . In a nutshell - yes, I agree. Logically it will happen either when UA moves against the "landbridge", or Crimea itself. Access to Azov shore might be nice to combine it with cruise missile/ ER- GMLRS strike. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kinophile Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 7 hours ago, FancyCat said: Long thread on Kharkiv, nothing not gone over by others on this thread but hey, it's nice to see emerging agreement. Gonna quote some interesting stuff. One, as Grigb has gone over, the Russian forces in Ukraine are divided into LPR and DPR, the National Guard (Chechen and non Chechen Rosgvardiya), the army, and Wagner. Wagner can get support, it's seen separatists, army, Rosgvardiya support it's units, even has airplanes but is pretty small, 4-5k, answers only to Putin thanks to Prigozhin. Wagner is therefore uncontrollable. Same applies for the rest of the factions, who jealously guard their power. Wagner can recruit from anywhere, Putin's Chef is untouchable, but the rest of Russian bureaucracy remains, and the SMO means no one wants to join willingly, Russia is just dead on manpower. Mobilization will probably do nothing, cause Russians can smell the stink of the SMO and this defeat in Kharkiv will cement their decision to stay far away and Putin's control over Russia is nowhere near absolute. As seen in the quote below, there were many saying Izyum contained a powerful set of units, the basis for the cauldron or trap for Ukraine to be lured into depended on the Izyum grouping to be a pincer. We know now they were as stripped as anything else in the area. I strongly believe that the rot in the Russian military is so high that the General Staff can no longer have accurate data on their own units, neither men, supplies, capability, it's all equally suggestible to be false as true. How is Russia supposed to defend any new defensive line when their officers are more afraid to say everything is going wrong than smoothly? When it's more important to lie about the capability of their unit than to ensure they can win the next battle? One would hope that maybe this would be a proper wake up call but...I doubt it. That was really great, thank you for linking 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cederic Posted September 18, 2022 Share Posted September 18, 2022 1 hour ago, Zeleban said: This is the flag of Novorossia, the united state of the DPR and LPR, which Girkin and his accomplices initially tried to create. This unification did not last long due to the ambitions of the heads of the DPR and LPR and the intelligence services that stood behind them. Without knowing its precise historical basis, it does feel reminiscent of the Naval Jack of Russia, which itself looks to be based on variations of individual imperial standards - e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsesarevich#Tsesarevich_of_Russia (which predates America) 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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