How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[chrisl]

15 minutes ago, TheVulture said:

According to the SpaceX figures shared with the Pentagon, about 85% of the 20,000 terminals in Ukraine were paid – or partially paid – for by countries like the US and Poland or other entities. Those entities also paid for about 30% of the internet connectivity, which SpaceX says costs $4,500 each month per unit for the most advanced service. (Over the weekend, Musk tweeted there are around 25,000 terminals in Ukraine.) — CNN, October/14/2022.

https://edition.cnn.com/2022/10/13/politics/elon-musk-spacex-starlink-ukraine/#paragraph-4de74b4a-e6fa-5ddd-937e-d10fb1ae88bd

I don't think starlink is losing money because of what it is providing to Ukraine - that mostly seems to be paid for. I suspect its more that Starlink's business model is losing money, because satellites are expensive and they haven't got enough uptake to cover the initial costs incurred.

The satellites themselves are actually *very* cheap.  A few articles are suggesting costs in the $250K/unit cost, with launch costs of $30M or less per block of ~50 satellites.  There's a bunch of ground costs on top of that, and I'd guess that the limiting factor on subscribers is bandwidth to the fat pipes on the ground.  They could probably sell quite a lot more subscriptions if they let performance degrade somewhat, but it's probably better for them in the long run to maintain a high level of performance over a limited number of areas so that as they open regions they get big blasts of subscribers.

I suspect a few things:

1) Elon has no clue about the details of the economics of them supplying Ukraine with bandwidth.  He's a loud AW who says all sorts of random things that may or may not correlate to reality.  It's common for engineers at his companies to found out about new "requirements" from his public tweets.  That they can deliver on a lot of them is a testament to their engineering capability and willingness to work in the chaos.

2) Starlink is raking in money and even if they're taking a loss right now, they aren't going to go the way of Iridium.  Iridium was a nice idea but was too early and had too limited capability - there wasn't enough demand for poor phone service over the vast amounts of unpopulated space on the surface of the earth.  There *is* demand for high bandwidth data connections in the middle of nowhere.

I've actually dealt with trying to debug hardware that was near the north pole while I was in California.  The people with the hardware had an iridium phone and they could call, or they could email, but they couldn't do both - if we wanted a picture of something, they had to hang up, create a data connection, send (slowly) then call back.  At probably a buck a minute or something.  If they'd had 10 Mbps for $100/month it would have been a *lot* less painful.  There's a lot of inexpensive environmental monitoring equipment that you can put out in the middle of nowhere that's cost effective at Starlink prices.  Or even a few times Starlink prices.

3) People don't talk about it, but Starlink has the potential to offer to high school kids building cubesats a capability that was until recently really only available to the US government (SDS, TDRS).  The data relay system was arguably a bigger secret (and easier to keep secret) than the KH-11 telescopes (although their digital imaging that took advantage of the SDS was also secret).  Anybody who's ever read  the first couple chapters of an optics text can figure out the resolution possible with a telescope of a given size at a particular distance, but the data rates and speed of return are a big deal.  Starlink can potentially sell space nodes to anybody building a satellite and they can get realtime, high bandwidth data returned to the ground for a few hundred $K. That's going to be a very valuable market.

[Kinophile]

@chrisl fascinating,  thank you. Details always matter... 

[dan/california]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

Apparently there is more speculation that Ukraine is using Neptune cruise missiles to strike ground targets.  Most recently the Belgorod power plant and possibly also oil refinery (or storage, not clear which):

One of the sources speculating on this a little over a year ago:

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/reboot/fact-check-does-ukraine-really-have-1000km-range-cruise-missile-191276

We've talked about this possibility in the past.  An unmodified Neptune couldn't effectively used against ground targets, but with the right guidance system it is possible.  Certainly the US military is in the process of adopting a universal missile platform (developed by the US Navy) so the theory, at least, is sound.

Thoughts?

Steve

 

59 minutes ago, TheVulture said:

According to the SpaceX figures shared with the Pentagon, about 85% of the 20,000 terminals in Ukraine were paid – or partially paid – for by countries like the US and Poland or other entities. Those entities also paid for about 30% of the internet connectivity, which SpaceX says costs $4,500 each month per unit for the most advanced service. (Over the weekend, Musk tweeted there are around 25,000 terminals in Ukraine.) — CNN, October/14/2022.

https://edition.cnn.com/2022/10/13/politics/elon-musk-spacex-starlink-ukraine/#paragraph-4de74b4a-e6fa-5ddd-937e-d10fb1ae88bd

I don't think starlink is losing money because of what it is providing to Ukraine - that mostly seems to be paid for. I suspect its more that Starlink's business model is losing money, because satellites are expensive and they haven't got enough uptake to cover the initial costs incurred.

 

46 minutes ago, NamEndedAllen said:

Musk has consistently failed to mention these figures -EIGHTY-FIVE PERCENT - that USA and others have been subsidizing “his” costs. As posted a few pages back. He is among the least trustworthy communicators but has a very loud voice. 

 

17 minutes ago, chrisl said:

The satellites themselves are actually *very* cheap.  A few articles are suggesting costs in the $250K/unit cost, with launch costs of $30M or less per block of ~50 satellites.  There's a bunch of ground costs on top of that, and I'd guess that the limiting factor on subscribers is bandwidth to the fat pipes on the ground.  They could probably sell quite a lot more subscriptions if they let performance degrade somewhat, but it's probably better for them in the long run to maintain a high level of performance over a limited number of areas so that as they open regions they get big blasts of subscribers.

I suspect a few things:

1) Elon has no clue about the details of the economics of them supplying Ukraine with bandwidth.  He's a loud AW who says all sorts of random things that may or may not correlate to reality.  It's common for engineers at his companies to found out about new "requirements" from his public tweets.  That they can deliver on a lot of them is a testament to their engineering capability and willingness to work in the chaos.

2) Starlink is raking in money and even if they're taking a loss right now, they aren't going to go the way of Iridium.  Iridium was a nice idea but was too early and had too limited capability - there wasn't enough demand for poor phone service over the vast amounts of unpopulated space on the surface of the earth.  There *is* demand for high bandwidth data connections in the middle of nowhere.

I've actually dealt with trying to debug hardware that was near the north pole while I was in California.  The people with the hardware had an iridium phone and they could call, or they could email, but they couldn't do both - if we wanted a picture of something, they had to hang up, create a data connection, send (slowly) then call back.  At probably a buck a minute or something.  If they'd had 10 Mbps for $100/month it would have been a *lot* less painful.  There's a lot of inexpensive environmental monitoring equipment that you can put out in the middle of nowhere that's cost effective at Starlink prices.  Or even a few times Starlink prices.

3) People don't talk about it, but Starlink has the potential to offer to high school kids building cubesats a capability that was until recently really only available to the US government (SDS, TDRS).  The data relay system was arguably a bigger secret (and easier to keep secret) than the KH-11 telescopes (although their digital imaging that took advantage of the SDS was also secret).  Anybody who's ever read  the first couple chapters of an optics text can figure out the resolution possible with a telescope of a given size at a particular distance, but the data rates and speed of return are a big deal.  Starlink can potentially sell space nodes to anybody building a satellite and they can get realtime, high bandwidth data returned to the ground for a few hundred $K. That's going to be a very valuable market.

It is very clear that Starlink is a brilliant piece of work technically. The only problem is that Musk owns it, and he is losing his bleeping mind, twitter at $44.20 a share being exhibit A. The Pentagon should either buy it outright, or "encourage" Musk to sell it to one of the major defense contractors who has experience with overcharging the government while creating the minimum possible drama. There is enough drama just now.

[dan/california]

It was bad enough when one side had more or les declared an information blackout, it really bites now that both of them have. Steve, could you possibly give us a small game bone to argue about until there is some credible information about the war?

Edited October 16, 2022 by dan/california

[chuckdyke]

Reminds me of some of the Red Thunder Scenarios.

 

[chrisl]

20 minutes ago, dan/california said:

It is very clear that Starlink is a brilliant piece of work technically. The only problem is that Musk owns it, and he is losing his bleeping mind, twitter at $44.20 a share being exhibit A. The Pentagon should either buy it outright, or "encourage" Musk to sell it to one of the major defense contractors who has experience with overcharging the government while creating the minimum possible drama. There is enough drama just now.

Not just technically - also economically.  The USG already could put whatever performance they wanted into space for vast amounts of money.  Starlink is very commercially viable.  The government basically already did what you suggested - Iridium cost about $5B to put into space and there wasn't enough market to pay to operate it and pay whatever debt service they had.  It got picked up at a fire sale price of tens of millions, like a space version of the Pontiac Silverdome, by a company that was at least initially basically reselling service to the DOD.  It was a bargain for DOD - the hardware was already in space, so all the cost and technical risks were gone, and they just had to put enough money in that the buyers could continue to operate it while they looked for other customers.

Starlink really needs to stay private because there are a ton of non-DOD applications for it, and it looks like it works economically. The only real issue is that Musk is a nutcase.

Edited October 16, 2022 by chrisl

[danfrodo]

1 hour ago, NamEndedAllen said:

https://www.reuters.com/technology/musk-will-keep-funding-ukraine-even-though-starlink-is-losing-money-2022-10-15/
Musk tweeted: "the hell with it … even though starlink is still losing money & other companies are getting billions of taxpayer $, we'll just keep funding ukraine govt for free".

well, gosh, arrogant emotional self-absorbed ***, maybe you shouldn't do your business negotiations over twitter.  And you shouldn't undermine US foreign policy before (quite reasonably) asking for some funding help for starlink-UKR, again, over twitter.  Oh, and btw you shouldn't have impulse-bought twitter, which seems to have really angered investors who expect you to actually focus.

Musk has done some really great things but he's also super immature and narcissistic.

[chrisl]

1 minute ago, danfrodo said:

well, gosh, arrogant emotional self-absorbed ***, maybe you shouldn't do your business negotiations over twitter.  And you shouldn't undermine US foreign policy before (quite reasonably) asking for some funding help for starlink-UKR, again, over twitter.  Oh, and btw you shouldn't have impulse-bought twitter, which seems to have really angered investors who expect you to actually focus.

Musk has done some really great things but he's also super immature and narcissistic.

There are almost certainly a bunch of program managers at SpaceX/Starlink who aren't absolute nutters who have been on the phone with their DOD contracting, launch-approving, and export reviewing counterparts doing whatever damage control needs to be done (probably not all that much).  Musk can say whatever random stuff he wants to say on twitter, but the people in the background actually do all the contracting and government interaction and both sides know how things work.

[Offshoot]

4 hours ago, JonS said:

Well that's a super confusing colour palette - green for ocean, blue for land. Good work, edgy graphic designer guy.

It looks like a close in wind map, for which this colouring is common ( https://www.weatherwatch.co.nz/maps-radars/wind/current-wind ). It makes more sense animated and is exaggerated because the body of water is enclosed in land.

[dan/california]

3 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Apparently there is more speculation that Ukraine is using Neptune cruise missiles to strike ground targets.  Most recently the Belgorod power plant and possibly also oil refinery (or storage, not clear which):

One of the sources speculating on this a little over a year ago:

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/reboot/fact-check-does-ukraine-really-have-1000km-range-cruise-missile-191276

We've talked about this possibility in the past.  An unmodified Neptune couldn't effectively used against ground targets, but with the right guidance system it is possible.  Certainly the US military is in the process of adopting a universal missile platform (developed by the US Navy) so the theory, at least, is sound.

Thoughts?

Steve

Missile guidance used to be a hard problem. It just isn't anymore if you have access to undegraded GPS data, and TSMC's services. I am not really joking when I say that the hardest thing about using a newish iphone for a guidance system is just getting the control signals out of it, and that isn't that hard. I am sure your real world performance goes way up if you can get a little help from the U.S. Air Force unit that specializes in routing them to avoid radar and such. Or maybe just some quiet consultations with retired people from said unit you mysteriously found in nice apartments in Warsaw.

The next big defense industry winner is going to be the best laser system to shoot down all the low to mid grade flying things that want to kill you. Because it is going to #^#&& ###(&^^ to show to the next war without said pieces of equipment. It appears you will need a system for literally every platoon of mechanized anything, all the way back down the logistics train as well. Being a superpower is expensive, but losing is even more so. You can ask the Russians how it feels.

 

Edit: I mean the "suicide drones" that Iran sold the Russians are just small cruise missiles with a data link. I am not saying the Iranians are stupid, but they don't exactly have a world class industry in much of anything, just some oil money and a fair bit of determination. Unfortunately that also suffices to put them on the verge of making nukes as well.

 

Edited October 16, 2022 by dan/california

[LongLeftFlank]

10 hours ago, kraze said:

In this case writing Gen Z is more appropriate than you think

Zed's dead, honey. Zed's dead.

[LongLeftFlank]

We're going to hang out the washing on the Siegfried Line / Have you any dirty washing Mother dear....

That being said, this (grainy) "CM Level 7" drone footage (7 minutes) from last month of a UA mechanised battalion getting backed up in a hedgerow gives you an idea of what could happen here.  Russian shells start falling around minute 2:00. 

"Bad pathing" in action.  UA please fix or do sumfink.

.....The lead UKR tank actually has to *back up* and (via shouting???) get the rest of the platoon moving and out of the hedgerow breach.  But by then, precious time has been lost and a traffic jam has formed, as the RU gunners zero in.

This reminds me of some of my more frustrating CM games.

Edited October 16, 2022 by LongLeftFlank

[sburke]

As the Russian Army Digs In, A Pro-Kremlin Mercenary Company Goes On The Attack in Ukraine—And Begs For Credit (msn.com)

[LongLeftFlank]

21 hours ago, LongLeftFlank said:

Bakhmut tactical situation (most of our discussion has been about Wagnerites and symbolic (un)importance. I am sticking here to the frontline situation).

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-63261600

Col Serhiy Cherevatyi, a spokesman for Ukraine's Eastern Command, still doubts the Russians have the numbers or equipment to take Bakhmut - which he says is now the concentration of its military efforts....

It is still possible that the Russian forces may be able to capture Bakhmut. But what then?  "When we retreated from Lysychansk we exhausted the enemy," said Col Cherevatyi. His expectation is that Bakhmut might do the same. 

Maps. The longggggg topo map.....

(miladviser is a RU source....)

 

Southern front unit positions. (New source, so I cannot certify its reliability, but I've yet to run across a Pole who is pro-RU)

 

Edited October 16, 2022 by LongLeftFlank

[akd]

@sburke @Kinophile

May be one of those “commander in” vs “commander of” wording issues, but this says now dead Sr. Lt. Igor Boychuk was commander of the Engineer-Sapper Battalion in the 138th Separate Guards Motor Rifle Brigade:

Maj. Gleb Mayboroda, unknown VDV unit:

 

Edited October 16, 2022 by akd

[Kinophile]

1 hour ago, Offshoot said:

It looks like a close in wind map, for which this colouring is common ( https://www.weatherwatch.co.nz/maps-radars/wind/current-wind ). It makes more sense animated and is exaggerated because the body of water is enclosed in land.

Oh very cool 

[Kinophile]

See, this is yet another reason I'm conflicted on a truck bomb, or possibly that if UKR did the attack with a VBIED that it was one time, opportunistic attack and not a beginning of a campaign (like we saw with Saki). I want it to be a missile because that would signal the start of a campaign but there's been no follow up and no missile debris found (that we know of). 

The railway is a tougher construction, but if you can take out some pillars it's a hugely complicated task to repair. The best place to hit is definitely the actual bridge span itself,  as that's enormously hard to fix. 

UKR would absolutely have known that any damage to the main road/rail sections is repairable. Even the crazy bottle necks now will eventually clear.  

If you're going to hit the Kerch it's gonna take a campaign -  hit the bridge span, then hit the specialised repair equipment and personnel (sorry Russian Engies not sorry) then hit the approach spans, hit the repair crews and gear for that. 

Basically, make the biggest initial mess you can then hit the clean up crews. And keep doing it, for weeks.

Thats exactly what UKR did and continues to do at Kherson and I'm very sceptical they would waste a chance on the Kerch with a random truck bomb. 

[FancyCat]

 

 

 

[LongLeftFlank]

I can haz air superiority?

hmm... 

 

 

Edited October 16, 2022 by LongLeftFlank

[LongLeftFlank]

Interesting thread on RU drone war.

No one from the command understands anything about UAVs! ...they decided that a copter for 16K rubles would be enough for reconnaissance. It’s just difficult to explain...to the old reserve colonel, that you need DJI Mavic 2 or 3, that it needs batteries, accessories, tablets, androids and flash drives, other stuff, and ideally, a couple (of qadrocopters) to work continuously.

[From the nested thread]There is a huge shortage of qualified UAV operators, and an even more significant shortage of good instructors. (DRONNITSA) organizers have plans to train both. 

 

 

Edited October 16, 2022 by LongLeftFlank

[chrisl]

2 hours ago, Kinophile said:

See, this is yet another reason I'm conflicted on a truck bomb, or possibly that if UKR did the attack with a VBIED that it was one time, opportunistic attack and not a beginning of a campaign (like we saw with Saki). I want it to be a missile because that would signal the start of a campaign but there's been no follow up and no missile debris found (that we know of). 

The railway is a tougher construction, but if you can take out some pillars it's a hugely complicated task to repair. The best place to hit is definitely the actual bridge span itself,  as that's enormously hard to fix. 

UKR would absolutely have known that any damage to the main road/rail sections is repairable. Even the crazy bottle necks now will eventually clear.  

If you're going to hit the Kerch it's gonna take a campaign -  hit the bridge span, then hit the specialised repair equipment and personnel (sorry Russian Engies not sorry) then hit the approach spans, hit the repair crews and gear for that. 

Basically, make the biggest initial mess you can then hit the clean up crews. And keep doing it, for weeks.

Thats exactly what UKR did and continues to do at Kherson and I'm very sceptical they would waste a chance on the Kerch with a random truck bomb. 

It's not a wasted attack with a one-off truck bomb.  It still will slow down transport across the bridge by both rail and truck since they have to crank up inspections.  And it's not like they're going to be efficient about inspections - they haven't shown any efficiency in logistics since Feb.  And if they don't crank up inspections they'll get bombed again.

The rail bridge may also have some pretty severe hidden damage.  At least one discussion of it I saw claimed that it's ballast in a steel pan, rather than reinforced concrete.  If it's true, it probably heated up the steel much faster than it would heat through concrete, and the segment that had the extended fire would be very weakened and susceptible to deformation and eventual failure if they run heavy trains across it.  Unfortunately the bridge construction doc that was linked a few days ago only has detail on the road bridge, not the rail bridge, so I haven't seen if it's true about the ballast-in-a-pan thing.

[FancyCat]

Any amount of delayed logistics is good. The bottleneck is now not only the crossing of the Dnipro, but just getting it to the left bank of the river will be a problem.

Right now, Russia is forced to use it's inadequate road supply to both ship to Crimea to then head to Kherson. Recall for example that you only needed to use road supply from Crimea to the front before the bridge strike. A huge additional length in inefficient logistics.

Just complete brainworms.

 

[JonS]

10 hours ago, Kinophile said:

UKR would absolutely have known that any damage to the main road/rail sections is repairable. Even the crazy bottle necks now will eventually clear.  

True, but assuming it was deliberately timed to occur a few days before the latest offensive kicked off (rather than the timing being coincidental), then they'll be planning on the offensive being over by the time the bridge is fully operational again. Till then Russia has to contend with a severe bottleneck at the exact time they *really* want to be running at full flow.

P.s.: I don't think the timing was a mere coincidence.

Edited October 16, 2022 by JonS

[mosuri]

15 hours ago, dan/california said:

That is the video you want the starving conscripts on the other side to see.

Also, if the other side manages to set up a Gulaschkanone, spice their soup with a mortar bomb.

[Butschi]

9 hours ago, NamEndedAllen said:

Musk has consistently failed to mention these figures -EIGHTY-FIVE PERCENT - that USA and others have been subsidizing “his” costs. As posted a few pages back. He is among the least trustworthy communicators but has a very loud voice. 

I'm not an Elon Musk Fan myself, but let's do the maths correctly (assuming the numbers are correct). The 85% others paid for the terminals (around 600$ according to a quick search) is roughly 10 million $ vs 1.8 mio $ for SpaceX, true. But the relevant number is that SpaceX pays for 70% of the connectivity costs for 25,000 devices at 4500$ a month each, which is 79 mio $ a month. The devices are peanuts in comparison and focusing on them is a bit... flawed.