How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Beleg85]

3 hours ago, kraze said:

yeah but "whiter skin" is soon to be a minority even in Moscow where it shuts up and downs their head when they pass by chechens or dagestanis (or I guess tajiks now too) which are already quite numerous and also consider themselves superior to "whiter skin" and regularly bully them.

So it's a mess. But certainly "nats" should keep amplifying that mess until it reaches the boiling point.

Chechens are maybe 1,5 mln in total (not including diaspora in Middle East), Dagestani maybe twice that. They are visible because they tend to stick together, but all minorities in Russia constitutes circa 15-19% of whole population depending on research methodology.

In this context interesting video leaked lately that some (prematurely) took as Syrian Turkish mercenaries fighting in Russian service:

https://twitter.com/PBPaszportu/status/1582022678545805313

They happend to be local Russian Meskhetian Turks, who apparently formed something of a volunteer battalion.

 

[kraze]

1 hour ago, panzermartin said:

Is there a way for Ukraine to counter this? What if Russia goes all the way and the whole country is left with no electricity, no internet, transportation etc

They are going all the way. They are spamming us with drones mixed with whatever missiles they have left without cannibalizing their emergency stocks much. Zelenskyy claimed russians have 2400 Shaheds and since they throw at least 40 daily at us - they can keep going for 2 months non-stop even without more chinese "iranian" drones and missiles.

What will help is ADs that were asked for 6+ months ago.

Edited October 18, 2022 by kraze

[kraze]

8 minutes ago, Beleg85 said:

but all minorities in Russia constitutes circa 15-19% of whole population depending on research methodology.

 

Because no methodology is really representative since the only country that can provide it is... Russia. The old trick here is that any member of any so called "minority" was being forced to register himself/herself as of "russian" nationality throughout whole USSR's existence because not being "russian" meant you were a second rate citizen (even more second rate really than others) that couldn't get any reasonable education or good job or even move to live in another city. It was part of the imperial attempts to erase ethnicities and turn them into "russians" (got so ridiculous - USSR was changing last names of children on birth to sound more "russian", KadyrOV is literally one such example) and something tells me not much has changed since 1991 in there.

But that's how you most likely get "minorities" being 15-19%. It can even mean many of those are people that simply refused to accept becoming "russian".

[Beleg85]

1 hour ago, kraze said:

Because no methodology is really representative since the only country that can provide it is... Russia. The old trick here is that any member of any so called "minority" was being forced to register himself/herself as of "russian" nationality throughout whole USSR's existence because not being "russian" meant you were a second rate citizen (even more second rate really than others) that couldn't get any reasonable education or good job or even move to live in another city. It was part of the imperial attempts to erase ethnicities and turn them into "russians" (got so ridiculous - USSR was changing last names of children on birth to sound more "russian", KadyrOV is literally one such example) and something tells me not much has changed since 1991 in there.

But that's how you most likely get "minorities" being 15-19%. It can even mean many of those are people that simply refused to accept becoming "russian".

Russia is not monolith, it depends on institution doing the survey. Methodology also varies differently as ethnic identity can be a tricky thing. Phone interviews are considered not reliable, but I think scientist connected to Levada center (Russians inherited from Soviets quite developed social science departments- they really liked to know what is happening) did several sophisticated wide polls ca. 2005-8 including questionaries with controll questions, traps etc. They produced reliable results that differed maybe 2-3% from "official" Kremlin narratives, which btw  at that time still did allowed some independent thought. There was also heated discussion in one of old Galeev threads with a guy who professionally did polling then, with links to entire PhD works on methodology and results.

Interesting thing with Kadyrov-Soviets indeed did have such practices that were at least partly successfull; Teyp clan-like system of Chechens did however prove to be quite resilient, even during massive deportations and returns after WWII. Paradoxically relative stability of Putin era and Kadyrov despoty is more dangerous to it than Stalin's massive cruelty.

The point is many people who have non-slavic ancestry consider themselves fully Russians nowadays, so they cannot be considered candidates for potential ethnic troubles anyway. Users of different language groups, which is often main cause of ethnic troubles around the world, are much lower- maybe 3-5% total. And of course Russian society is very shauvinistic and full of racists from Slavic majority (and minorities too- sense of entitlement Chechens display make them most hated group in Caucasus), no doubt about that. Still, these ethnic tensions are not something of a magnitude that would collapse system on itself; they are also chiefly limited to some Caucasians, maybe some Tajiks/Uzbeks and very occassionally Siberian natives. Mari, Mordvins, Chuvashes and various Turkic-language groups does not seem to be oriented toward any serious cultural or political autonomy.

PS. Of course there is an issue with migrants from abroad, chiefly from Central Asia. I did not see any reliable data on how many of them may be in Moscow and big cities; such "blacks" are visible enough and Russian nats are constantly complaining about them. But they are often illegal, temporary workers that go back to their countries sooner or later, so constitute even less "political" factor than average Russian minority representative.

Edited October 18, 2022 by Beleg85

[Haiduk]

5 hours ago, poesel said:

Ok, what piece of equipment is shown here in this historical enactment? And where is this museum?

This is Osa (SA-8). Theese SAMs organized in regiments - one per each Operative Command + one in Naval Forces. 

[Bulletpoint]

The drone attacks are often portrayed as the desperate actions of Putin, trying to get revenge, maybe to please the infamous Russian "nats", but I've been wondering if a big part of the reason Russia is now sending in all those kamikaze drones is also that they hope they can deplete Ukrainian air defences this way?

According to Wikipedia, a Shahed-136 drone costs $20,000, while a Stinger missile costs $120,000. And sending up fighter planes to shoot down the drones wastes valuable time these planes could have been doing other things.

Some of the drones are of course lost to small arms fire or maybe just crash due to technical faults, so the final cost to Russia is probably a bit higher.

But it's not only about money, it's about supplies too. I don't know how limited the supply of Stingers and similar missiles is. Firing a stinger on a Shahed is a waste of a weapon that could down a Russian airplane, but it's a waste that Ukraine has to accept if they don't want the drone to reach Kyiv.

[Seedorf81]

4 minutes ago, Bulletpoint said:

The drone attacks are often portrayed as the desperate actions of Putin, trying to get revenge, maybe to please the infamous Russian "nats", but I've been wondering if a big part of the reason Russia is now sending in all those kamikaze drones is also that they hope they can deplete Ukrainian air defences this way?

According to Wikipedia, a Shahed-136 drone costs $20,000, while a Stinger missile costs $120,000. And sending up fighter planes to shoot down the drones wastes valuable time these planes could have been doing other things.

Some of the drones are of course lost to small arms fire or maybe just crash due to technical faults, so the final cost to Russia is probably a bit higher.

But it's not only about money, it's about supplies too. I don't know how limited the supply of Stingers and similar missiles is. Firing a stinger on a Shahed is a waste of a weapon that could down a Russian airplane, but it's a waste that Ukraine has to accept if they don't want the drone to reach Kyiv.

Back to barrage balloons?

[kraze]

8 minutes ago, Bulletpoint said:

The drone attacks are often portrayed as the desperate actions of Putin, trying to get revenge, maybe to please the infamous Russian "nats", but I've been wondering if a big part of the reason Russia is now sending in all those kamikaze drones is also that they hope they can deplete Ukrainian air defences this way?

According to Wikipedia, a Shahed-136 drone costs $20,000, while a Stinger missile costs $120,000. And sending up fighter planes to shoot down the drones wastes valuable time these planes could have been doing other things.

Some of the drones are of course lost to small arms fire or maybe just crash due to technical faults, so the final cost to Russia is probably a bit higher.

But it's not only about money, it's about supplies too. I don't know how limited the supply of Stingers and similar missiles is. Firing a stinger on a Shahed is a waste of a weapon that could down a Russian airplane, but it's a waste that Ukraine has to accept if they don't want the drone to reach Kyiv.

Since russians do not have air superiority and operate only near frontlines at best - most MANPADs remain unused, so diverting them to shoot down drones shouldn't put much of a dent in their numbers, not to mention that shooting down a $20.000 drone with a missile that costs $120.000 literally saves millions of $$ in repairs, not to mention lives.

[Bulletpoint]

1 minute ago, Seedorf81 said:

Back to barrage balloons?

I wouldn't be at all surprised to see barrage balloons go up any day now. But since the wingspan of the drones is so small, it would need an awful lot of those tethering wires to close the airspace.

[keas66]

Just now, Seedorf81 said:

Back to barrage balloons?

I'm becoming more curious about what exactly is holding back various actors in the region from reaching out and "touching" the Iranians .

[Bulletpoint]

1 minute ago, kraze said:

Since russians do not have air superiority and operate only near frontlines at best - most MANPADs remain unused, so diverting them to shoot down drones shouldn't put much of a dent in their numbers, not to mention that shooting down a $20.000 drone with a missile that costs $120.000 literally saves millions of $$ in repairs, not to mention lives.

Yes, that's why I said you can't really just decide to not fire the Stingers if you have them. But Putin might be hoping that you will run out of Stingers well before he runs out of Shaheds. So it might not only be the irrational terror bombing it's made out to be. I've seen several commentators saying it's a mystery why he attacks civilian targets this way, as it won't break civilian resolve, and it won't help won the war. But maybe it's not only a desperate act of evil.

[RockinHarry]

7 hours ago, poesel said:

14 hours ago, kevinkin said:

Would Russia ever consider passing WMD technology to a non-state actor as their world collapses?

Yes. Why not?

I tend do believe rather not. If giving i.e Iran some required stuff (in exchange for more drones or frightening the west) then there´s no guarantee some is spreaded farer into islamic world. Israel would not just keep watching and China got to fear some might make it to the Uyghurs.

[Bulletpoint]

2 minutes ago, keas66 said:

I'm becoming more curious about what exactly is holding back various actors in the region from reaching out and "touching" the Iranians .

I could imagine that's the next step. An ultimatum to stop providing those drones.

[RockinHarry]

4 hours ago, Zeleban said:

WTF!!!

Drones hunting drones. Looks like the future for anti drone warfare. Is some of these things already beeing used in UKR?

 

[kraze]

16 minutes ago, Bulletpoint said:

Yes, that's why I said you can't really just decide to not fire the Stingers if you have them. But Putin might be hoping that you will run out of Stingers well before he runs out of Shaheds. So it might not only be the irrational terror bombing it's made out to be. I've seen several commentators saying it's a mystery why he attacks civilian targets this way, as it won't break civilian resolve, and it won't help won the war. But maybe it's not only a desperate act of evil.

It's a war that russians want to end with them exterminating as many of us as possible, even all of us if they decide so (as per their very own statements) - so any civilian casualties fall in with that goal. Don't even need to look for any sane reasoning after all the massacres they do in person from town to town. More dead Ukrainians is all that they truly want since they can't get any more land.

[Seedorf81]

38 minutes ago, Bulletpoint said:

I wouldn't be at all surprised to see barrage balloons go up any day now. But since the wingspan of the drones is so small, it would need an awful lot of those tethering wires to close the airspace.

Yes, but to my amazement in ww2 barrage balloons were rather succesfull against V1's (Wiki).

Those were bigger than drones, but still, balloons - perhaps with some form of netting - could be a rather cheap (temporary) solution.

I have no doubt the Ukranians are already thinking about something similar.

Edited October 18, 2022 by Seedorf81
spelling like always

[kraze]

21 minutes ago, RockinHarry said:

I tend do believe rather not. If giving i.e Iran some required stuff (in exchange for more drones or frightening the west) then there´s no guarantee some is spreaded farer into islamic world. Israel would not just keep watching and China got to fear some might make it to the Uyghurs.

China, Russia and Iran are allies (or rather one is more and more like a master putting its dragon claws deeper into the other two). Besides Russia and China already helped DPRK get nukes and those are carefully watched by them. Iran would be going all in only if something HUGE like getting nukes was at stake, not to mention it already worked well and there was zero consequences from the West.

The truth is that certain Western powers are still very (purposefully) slow in their response, probably due to still hoping Russia and Ukraine will get tired and the war will get "frozen" and everybody will be doing business as usual once again. Hence the West is only being reactive instead of proactive. Hence the ban on tanks and talks about help with ADs only now getting serious, when it may just be too late in a month.

[dan/california]

1 hour ago, Bulletpoint said:

The drone attacks are often portrayed as the desperate actions of Putin, trying to get revenge, maybe to please the infamous Russian "nats", but I've been wondering if a big part of the reason Russia is now sending in all those kamikaze drones is also that they hope they can deplete Ukrainian air defences this way?

According to Wikipedia, a Shahed-136 drone costs $20,000, while a Stinger missile costs $120,000. And sending up fighter planes to shoot down the drones wastes valuable time these planes could have been doing other things.

Some of the drones are of course lost to small arms fire or maybe just crash due to technical faults, so the final cost to Russia is probably a bit higher.

But it's not only about money, it's about supplies too. I don't know how limited the supply of Stingers and similar missiles is. Firing a stinger on a Shahed is a waste of a weapon that could down a Russian airplane, but it's a waste that Ukraine has to accept if they don't want the drone to reach Kyiv.

So pondering the short term emergency fix to this drone problem, as opposed to the long term engineered fix. These things fly very slow and don't dodge right? So what is the the lightest, cheapest, most available aircraft that you can hang a gun pod on? The pilots don't exactly need full top gun skills either. And is their some sort airborne radar set that could be hung on a twin engine king air to find the bleeping things? Ukraine really needs some sort rough and ready solution to this problem RIGHT NOW. None of this stuff has to fit for real combat to patrol for drones on the west side of the Dnipro. And if there is anybody out there working on a balloon mounted radar this would be the moment to raise your hand.

25 minutes ago, kraze said:

China, Russia and Iran are allies (or rather one is more and more like a master putting its dragon claws deeper into the other two). Besides Russia and China already helped DPRK get nukes and those are carefully watched by them. Iran would be going all in only if something HUGE like getting nukes was at stake, not to mention it already worked well and there was zero consequences from the West.

The truth is that certain Western powers are still very (purposefully) slow in their response, probably due to still hoping Russia and Ukraine will get tired and the war will get "frozen" and everybody will be doing business as usual once again. Hence the West is only being reactive instead of proactive. Hence the ban on tanks and talks about help with ADs only now getting serious, when it may just be too late in a month.

The boil the frog approach is wrong, has always been wrong, and is being proven to be ever more wrong. The Russian army in Ukraine needs to smashed into very small smoking, bleeding pieces as fast as humanly possible. Then tell the Russians the lights can go out in Moscow and St Petersburg, too. The Poles need to start very publicly setting up a production line to produce slightly improved copies of the Iranian drones and point out the Kharkiv to Moscow just isn't that far., and It also gets a LOT colder in Moscow

 

Edit: Would those laser guided 70 mm rockets work for this application in an air to air role?

Edited October 18, 2022 by dan/california

[chrisl]

22 minutes ago, Seedorf81 said:

Yes, but to my amazement in ww2 barrage balloons were rather succesfull against V1's (Wiki).

Those were bigger than drones, but still, balloons - perhaps with some form of netting - could be a rather cheap (temporary) solution.

I have no doubt the Ukranians are already thinking about something similar.

In the grand scheme of things, the V1s weren't a whole lot larger - the wingspan of the V1 was 5.7 m, and the Shahed is 2.5 m.  So a little less than half the size.  If they have a very distinct acoustic signature the balloons could trigger on the sound, rather than depending on contact with the tethers.

[danfrodo]

So why is it not possible for these to be shot down w aircraft?  The drones are slow and don't maneuver.  Helicopters and fighter aircraft could shoot them down I would've thoght.  I am guessing there's something that makes this infeasible but I don't know what it is.  Anyone know why this doesn't work?

[dan/california]

1 minute ago, danfrodo said:

So why is it not possible for these to be shot down w aircraft?  The drones are slow and don't maneuver.  Helicopters and fighter aircraft could shoot them down I would've thoght.  I am guessing there's something that makes this infeasible but I don't know what it is.  Anyone know why this doesn't work?

Just the sheer volume to be defended, and the fact the radar signatures are quite small. Hence my proposal about arming whatever light civilian aircraft make the most sense in the largest possible numbers. Nothing close to full combat capability is required.

[sross112]

1 hour ago, Bulletpoint said:

Yes, that's why I said you can't really just decide to not fire the Stingers if you have them. But Putin might be hoping that you will run out of Stingers well before he runs out of Shaheds. So it might not only be the irrational terror bombing it's made out to be. I've seen several commentators saying it's a mystery why he attacks civilian targets this way, as it won't break civilian resolve, and it won't help won the war. But maybe it's not only a desperate act of evil.

If he is trying to degrade Ukrainian air defense assets or munitions why wouldn't he point them at air defense assets, supply dumps, HQ's or any other military target covered by AA? Then they either get shot down and eat up munitions or get through and take out the valuable military target. That would be the more sensible way to degrade your enemy's air defense network and military capabilities. Since instead they are primarily sent at civilian targets it is pretty hard to argue any other angle than evil terrorist attack.

[Chibot Mk IX]

8 minutes ago, danfrodo said:

So why is it not possible for these to be shot down w aircraft?  The drones are slow and don't maneuver.  Helicopters and fighter aircraft could shoot them down I would've thoght.  I am guessing there's something that makes this infeasible but I don't know what it is.  Anyone know why this doesn't work?

There are some videos of Mig-29 engaged the drones, but due to the number of available fighter A/C, distance of airfield base to the impacted area (which makes interception mission impossible, only combat air patrol mission got a chance), A/C maintenance time. Don't expect the fighter A/C to be the solution. 

9 minutes ago, dan/california said:

Just the sheer volume to be defended, and the fact the radar signatures are quite small. Hence my proposal about arming whatever light civilian aircraft make the most sense in the largest possible numbers. Nothing close to full combat capability is required.

This solution and helicopter solution can be explored, but even the drone has a small radar signatures, locates the drone target with MK 1 eyeball, IR sensors could have much more difficulties.  You will still need an airborne radar on the interceptors.

Another risk is, due to the difficulty of communication these civilian A/C interceptors could be mistakenly identified as hostile target, engaged and destroyed by ground anti-air fire.

[Battlefront.com]

The use of drones is an act of desperation, but doesn't mean it isn't well thought out or stupid.  It's just that Russia's greatness failed so utterly that this is all they are left with.

Russia is definitely trying to terrorize the Ukrainian people and force them to sue for peace.  Which is, as we've all said, unlikely to work.  But Russia has pretty much no shot at getting what it wants out of this, so it makes sense that they are trying this route as there really isn't anything else for them to try.

I do think the drone strategy is smart when you look at it from Russia's position.  First, it is something Russia is capable of doing (i.e. they can buy a ready made product NOW).  Second, it uses up precious air defenses which opens other opportunities for Russia later on.  Sure, those opportunities are about as fantasy as continuing the advance from Kherson to take Odessa, but that's a different matter.  Third, hitting electricity production at any time of the year is difficult on the lives of ordinary people, but hitting them as winter sets in is particularly effective in making people miserable.  Fourth, what has Russia to lose?  It is already a demonstrated terrorist state, so terrorizing Ukrainians more doesn't really change things from Russia's strategic standpoint.

It's not likely to work, but it is something to do and Russia desperately needs to do something.  Hence this being desperation

Steve

[panzermartin]

What I dont really get is why Russia, facing the major threat of himars and other artillery pieces, didnt conduct a massive drone campaign against these. They did fire more at night and RU ISR is lacking but still I would at least try with a swarm of Shaheds and a surv drone towards suspected areas. I think Ukraine hasnt lost a single HiMARS so far...