How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[FancyCat]

Remember Russia has a lot of rail experience, it wouldn't be surprising if the structural integrity of the bridge is fine, for the tracks to be replaced quickly. 

 

 

[Beleg85]

Interesting discussion (in pl, autotranslate works) about a map posted by account of (reportedly) gen. Zaluzny himself:

What we see here?

1.There are three main visible corridors for muscovite missiles with trackers; many other trackers may denote planes, UAV's etc.

2. Moldova complained that 3 missiles flew over its territory- this map suggest there were many more. This is "corridor" that leads into Western Ukraine, normally relatively safe part of country.

3. Ukrainian AA defence is increasingly imporving. Ca. 50% of missilies and most drones were shot down or lost before impact (some due to malfunctions, which are quite high % in case of Russian stuff).

 

 

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, acrashb said:

All good, wanted to emphasize again that CEP is radius, not diameter.  So 15m CEP is 30 meter diameter of 50% hits.

Damn, correct of course!  Brain focused on too many things.

OK, so if we divide a circle into 8 vectors, this means 2 are 100% chance of hit, 2 are 50% chance, and 4 are somewhere between the two.  That's a pretty good chance of a hit.

1 hour ago, acrashb said:

Your point about misses possibly not being known is well taken.

I haven't seen anybody mention this possibility, but I think it needs to be considered.

Steve

[acrashb]

And one more, this is how hot the train fire was:
https://streamable.com/0tow6w

Melting steel is 'really' hot (I'll leave it to others to google).  Steel rebar loses its strength well below melting point.  Ergo the bridge is damaged, and may not last very long.

Edited October 10, 2022 by acrashb

[Haiduk]

23 minutes ago, rocketman said:

Could it be this one:

https://youtu.be/bFgwHvM0oAA

 

looks like the pilot ejected.

No, this is about two weeks ago - Su-34 near Petropavlivka, Kharkiv oblast.

Edited October 10, 2022 by Haiduk

[FancyCat]

Please remember, while it is more believable than Russia, Ukraine will have their own interest in skewing the missile shot down counts, not even just for PR or morale purposes, but for keeping under wraps their own AD systems as much as possible. 

Goddamnit, give tanks and IFVs to Ukraine, this is intolerable, for Ukrainians to give their lives fighting for the West in stuff that should have been replaced eons ago. 

If we take a really, really broad picture of the conflict, as much as we want to say that Ukraine will fight no matter what, Luhansk and Donetsk and Crimea, and Chechnya give us a inking of what could happen had Ukraine not decided to fight. 

In 10, 20 years down the line, instead of a independent Ukraine part of NATO, we could have been seeing a Russia with Ukraine integrated, intent on muscling into NATO's eastern flank. And don't say NATO would wipe the floor, cause none of us know how NATO, the EU, the U.S will be in 20 years time. 

Ukraine made a choice, to side with the West, we shouldn't be freaking worried about Leopards 1s blasting T-72s sky high 8 months into this conflict. Or M1s. Why freaking Iraq gets M1s but not Ukraine, ugh, i don't freaking know. Purely on a proxy war, puppet state view etc etc, Iraq has both F-16s and M1s....

 

 

Edited October 10, 2022 by FancyCat

[poesel]

3 minutes ago, acrashb said:

 

Melting steel is 'really' hot (I'll leave it to others to google).  Steel rebar loses its strength well below melting point.  Ergo the bridge is damaged, and may not last very long.

No need to google

Steel will get soft (or forgeable) at around 1150 - 1250 °C. Melting begins at around 1400 °C. That amount of heat has surely gotten into the rebars, especially since it burned quite long. The structural integrity of this bridge is toast.

[Haiduk]

17 minutes ago, Beleg85 said:

Ukrainian AA defence is increasingly imporving. Ca. 50% of missilies and most drones were shot down or lost before impact

We have worse result in western Ukraine, likely because a lack of AD assets, pulled out from there to cover more priority areas. 

One of successful examples - UKR fighter jet shot down today two cruise missiles over Chernivtsi oblast. Alas almost all missiles, targeted L'viv, Ternopil' and Khmelnitskyi oblast reached own targets or at least hit surface with detonation.

[chrisl]

10 minutes ago, poesel said:

No need to google

Steel will get soft (or forgeable) at around 1150 - 1250 °C. Melting begins at around 1400 °C. That amount of heat has surely gotten into the rebars, especially since it burned quite long. The structural integrity of this bridge is toast.

It doesn’t have to be nearly that hot to lose strength.  Even ~200 C you have to derate it by about 10%, and about 50% by 500 C, depending on the steel.  So you can relax out the prestress at temps much lower than where it gets soft.

Edited October 10, 2022 by chrisl
Typo

[Battlefront.com]

23 minutes ago, acrashb said:

I will remind all of us of ISW's summary from October 6, only a few days ago:

"As ISW reported yesterday, Russian forces do not appear to be focusing these [Iranian] drones on asymmetric nodes near the battlefield. They have used many drones against civilian targets in rear areas, likely hoping to generate nonlinear effects through terror. Such efforts are not succeeding."

If these missile and drone strikes will not achieve their goals, as ISW says (and I agree), then why do they happen?  Culture.

If a culture thinks that brutality succeeds, then things are seen through that lens.  I've seen it at some corporations, where effectiveness metrics are replaced by "how tough do we want to be".  It ain't about tough, it's about does it work. 

Russian military culture, which of course mirrors the larger culture, is about "how brutal do we want to be", as evidenced in all of their recent wars and in WWII, where my Romanian friend(s) describe their family's experiences with Russian soldiery as "savage". 

 

Absolutely.  None of what Russia is doing surprises any true Russia watcher.  Russian military watchers are even less than not surprised

I'm reminded of how extreme voices in political parties respond to resounding election defeats.  "We didn't lose the elections because we turned people off with our aggressive messaging, we lost the elections because we weren't aggressive enough!"  Russians are saying "we aren't losing this war because we're murderous, we're losing it because we're not genocidal enough".

Russia has a long history of viewing every challenge as a nail.  If it doesn't do what they want it to do, then they get a bigger hammer.  Doesn't matter if the problem is a screw, a spike, a peg in a square hole... Russia traditionally uses brute force to get what it wants.  For a while money was used as an alternative, but that's gone so it's back to it's old faithful brute force mentality.

Military minded people also understand that Russia doesn't have much in its tool chest to deal with the real problems it faces.  Namely that it sucks at war and Ukraine doesn't.  Therefore, it's response to losing the war is constrained by it's limited weaponry.  Namely, striking civilian targets with highly inaccurate weapons.

All very logical and predictable.

Steve

[Zeleban]

8 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

We have worse result in western Ukraine, likely because a lack of AD assets, pulled out from there to cover more priority areas. 

One of successful examples - UKR fighter jet shot down today two cruise missiles over Chernivtsi oblast. Alas almost all missiles, targeted L'viv, Ternopil' and Khmelnitskyi oblast reached own targets or at least hit surface with detonation.

The poor result of shooting down missiles (50%) is most likely due to the mass character of the missile salvo (about 80 missiles). Our air defense experienced such a load only in the first days of the war, and then the percentage of missiles shot down was also low. The Russians simply managed to overload our air defense control posts. One air defense system (and this is a battery of several radar launchers and a control center) is capable of targeting only 6 targets.

[Homo_Ferricus]

Do we know if NASAMS is up and running yet?

[Battlefront.com]

12 minutes ago, poesel said:

No need to google

Steel will get soft (or forgeable) at around 1150 - 1250 °C. Melting begins at around 1400 °C. That amount of heat has surely gotten into the rebars, especially since it burned quite long. The structural integrity of this bridge is toast.

Engineering and physics can often produce ill effects that aren't seen by the naked eye and might not exhibit themselves right away.

Not directly related, but many years ago a family member had a house fire.  Mostly smoke.  The insurance company said everything in the house that had electronics was a write off.  Something about micro particles creating shorts or something like that.  Anyway, there was a fairly new refrigerator that appeared fine.  No smoke got inside the food compartments and the outside had some easily cleanable soot on it.  It ran fine once the power was restored.  Sure enough, a couple of days later it failed.

That is the sort of thing we should expect of the bridge.  Too much heat for too much time.  The bridge sections that were fried are going to fail sooner rather than later.

Steve

[Harmon Rabb]

27 minutes ago, FancyCat said:

Please remember, while it is more believable than Russia, Ukraine will have their own interest in skewing the missile shot down counts, not even just for PR or morale purposes, but for keeping under wraps their own AD systems as much as possible. 

Goddamnit, give tanks and IFVs to Ukraine, this is intolerable, for Ukrainians to give their lives fighting for the West in stuff that should have been replaced eons ago. 

If we take a really, really broad picture of the conflict, as much as we want to say that Ukraine will fight no matter what, Luhansk and Donetsk and Crimea, and Chechnya give us a inking of what could happen had Ukraine not decided to fight. 

In 10, 20 years down the line, instead of a independent Ukraine part of NATO, we could have been seeing a Russia with Ukraine integrated, intent on muscling into NATO's eastern flank. And don't say NATO would wipe the floor, cause none of us know how NATO, the EU, the U.S will be in 20 years time. 

Ukraine made a choice, to side with the West, we shouldn't be freaking worried about Leopards 1s blasting T-72s sky high 8 months into this conflict. Or M1s. Why freaking Iraq gets M1s but not Ukraine, ugh, i don't freaking know. Purely on a proxy war, puppet state view etc etc, Iraq has both F-16s and M1s....

 

 

I was going to write something like this after seeing the terrible images from today but thought it would be like preaching to the choir.  Pretty much all of us here support arming with more weapons to help them fight this war. I really hope the folks in charge agree to do this soon.

I did see an interview today with the President of the European Parliament where she was promoting the idea of sending more weapons including tanks to Ukraine.

 

Edited October 10, 2022 by Harmon Rabb

[Haiduk]

UKR kamikadze drone RAM II hit Russian SAM Osa (SA-8)

RAM II is short-range drone, developed by UKR company KORT. It can fly up to 55 minutes on the range 30 km, carrying 3 kg warherad (HEFRAG, HEAT, thermobaric). Cruise speed 70 km/h. Manufacturer is upplying army with small number series of theese drones, which ordering mostly in crowdfunding way. Since today Serhuy Prytula charity fund anounced fundraising for big batch of RAM II as a revange to Russins for strikes. Only for a day already 5,6 millions USD were gathered. 

 

[Battlefront.com]

Looks like the attack on the rail yard in Ilovasik didn't do all that much damage:

 

[FancyCat]

Its a apt time with recent posts to reflect on Imperial Russia and how military power factors into Imperial Russia, and why as a Empire, some people want its defeat. One, it must be understood Russia is a imperial power, now and in the past as the Soviet Union and Russian Empire. 

 

 

 

As we can see from how Russia acted past the fall of the Soviet Union in Chechnya, Georgia, Syria, etc, it saw repression, cruelty work in maintaining its Empire, its influence. This is why we have Russia bombing Ukraine with near complete lack of regard for IHL, and for the international system despite being one of its prime benefactors. It has been a long timeline of Russia benefiting from being cruel, benefiting from ignoring critics, and getting what it wants via violence. The tweet sums it up, only inflicting military defeat on Russia will convince it that being cruel and violent is not the way for countries to exist. Failure to not defeat Russia militarily will mean Russia will adopt the same lessons as it did in the past, and come back with more cruelty and violence a la 2nd Chechen War.

It isn't possible to conduct total victory in the sense of occupying Russia, but that i think isn't at all needed, merely retaking all lands of Ukraine should suffice. 

 

 

[Letter from Prague]

57 minutes ago, Beleg85 said:

What we see here?

I see that the place on the coast they attacked from seems definitely HIMARSable. The one in Russia seems in range as well, but if it was bombers they might be stationed quite far. And Crimea is hittable by Hrim.

I assume Russians are probably not hiding their stuff now, but instead are celebrating their terrorism. So if Ukraine acts fast, this might be the last time Russians were capable of doing something like this.

[Haiduk]

10 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Looks like the attack on the rail yard in Ilovasik didn't do all that much damage:

Several stationery tanks with volume like tank-car exploded. Also several railway cars were destroyed/damaged and some light facilities burned. 

Edited October 10, 2022 by Haiduk

[sburke]

6 minutes ago, FancyCat said:

It isn't possible to conduct total victory in the sense of occupying Russia, but that i think isn't at all needed, merely retaking all lands of Ukraine should suffice. 

it is enough in the sense of restoring the territorial integrity of Ukraine.  I think however Russia needs to be treated as the pariah state it is.  To restore relations to the west, Russia needs to pay reparations and war crimes trials.  Until that happens the west should continue to isolate Russia economically and politically.

[Probus]

21 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

UKR kamikadze drone RAM II hit Russian SAM Osa (SA-8)

RAM II is short-range drone, developed by UKR company KORT. It can fly up to 55 minutes on the range 30 km, carrying 3 kg warherad (HEFRAG, HEAT, thermobaric). Cruise speed 70 km/h. Manufacturer is upplying army with small number series of theese drones, which ordering mostly in crowdfunding way. Since today Serhuy Prytula charity fund anounced fundraising for big batch of RAM II as a revange to Russins for strikes. Only for a day already 5,6 millions USD were gathered. 

 

I wonder how many drones the $5.6 million can purchase.  I can't find the cost of these.

[sburke]

The War That Russia Already Lost (msn.com)

[Haiduk]

Some controversal information from Crimea. Local social media five hours ago have been posting about the strike at Dzhankoy airfield, where 39th helicopter regiment is deployed. As if dozens killed and wounded. Other publics refute this information, telling AD shot down UKR missile or kamikadze UAV and it fragnents fell on private houses, causing destructions and damages of several barns and houses. One girl was wounded. 

Aftermath of probably shot down object falling in Dzhankoy:

And news about strike at airbase:

Other writing tells about the strike and losses, but "authorities keep silence about many losses, my friend called me - they expected invasion from the mainland"

 

Later this photo appeared as if the fire on airbase, but still no any information

 

 

Edited October 10, 2022 by Haiduk

[FancyCat]

4 hours ago, sross112 said:

This is a big fail on NATO and western supporters. Ukraine should have a better AA umbrella by now. It is a defensive weapon, not escalatory, and their is a documented need to protect civilians. There can be absolutely no negative to supplying Patriots or whatever they need to stop this crap. 

They will probably approve ATACMS i think. 

Someone else correct me, isn't NATO doctrine to destroy the offending entities via airpower instead of Air defense umbrella? Would make sense why NATO needs to build more AD for Ukraine and why we had to hunt around for the Gepards. 

Also....big congrats to Ukraine on downing a cruise missile with a MANPADS, isn't that the first time ever it has occurred? 

Why the hell are they sending out people with barely any training. Whyyyy. If they got captured or killed around Bakhmut I'm going to lose it, they are driving manpower into the ground for literally no reason. If they stopped attacking Bakhmut for some rearmament and training and rest, I doubt any RU nat would complain, this is entirely for Putin and/or Prigozhin.

 

 

 

 

[billbindc]

3 hours ago, kraze said:

Russia is an empire. It's not a single country. Political change in an empire is impossible because anything but an aggressive, violent, despotic government leads to a very fast disintegration.

And if empires can't just take and hold new lands - they start exterminating the populace until they can. Anyone in putin's place will keep doing the same. Because an emperor is as much a slave of the system as he is an owner of it.

Changing a guy on the imperial throne will not stop the cycle of violence, because a weak one will simply get dethroned by his stronger subordinates.

So no, no subtle way about it. Time to accept that Russia should not exist as a single entity, it has to end or millions will die.

Political changes in empires have historically been constant and when it happens if often doesn't lead to fast disintegration. The Chinese and Ottoman Empires are obvious examples. Rome another. Your premises across the board are wrong. Your desire is for total war against Russia and regime change from without. You should understand that that won't happen short of a nuclear exchange which will not be forthcoming from the US unless we are struck first. There are more likely and legitimate goals might want to consider.