How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[panzermartin]

44 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Russians can't hit what they can't find.  Even if they could, they had difficulty hitting a power station.  A power station is a tad bit bigger than a HIMARS

Drones have the same limitations as all other forms of ISR in that they can only find what they can see and they can't see everywhere all the time.  Even if they did spot something, HIMARS doesn't stick around and unless you have a loitering munition drone with a munition that tracks moving targets, fat load of good it will do to spot a HIMARS.  Best Russia can hope for is being able to track it back to a hiding place and hit the hiding place.  Given how far behind the lines HIMARS operate, that's not likely to happen.

Correct.  Russian MoD has even stopped lying about hitting HIMARS.  No point because they keep getting hit by them, so lying about destroying them doesn't seem to be worth while.

Steve

Yes it's true that they are very hard to track and obviously UA are taking extreme measures to ensure their most valuable assets is protected both by AD and by moving all the time away from the lines. 

Russians do have some more accurate tracking drones I think, like lancet but still I think saheds are used in a rather dumb way, hitting big static targets and terrorizing civilians, while they could do more damage targeting military units. They still have an impressive range of over 2000kms. They could have been used to slow down the Kharkiv offensive, attack artillery etc but their presence there was minimal if I'm not mistaken. 

[pavel.k]

55 minutes ago, Letter from Prague said:

Russian nukes has been a great excuse to do nothing for years and even now with Russian running drone-assisted genocide they serve as great excuse to do as little as possible.

Iran having nukes will make a lot of people happy (but deeply concerned publicly), because it will make Iran untouchable and thus nothing can be done. It is great when nothing can be done, because then we have to do nothing!

But maybe I'm too negative.

Yes, from my personal view the nuclear threat from russia side was used by West much more than by russian propaganda - with great relief - we must do nothing to keep safe our citizens.

[Beleg85]

16 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

The Soviet Union didn't like Jews any more than Nazi Germany, but after the forced moves out to the Far East they seemed to be less interested in spending energy on dealing with their "Jewish Question".  Then along came Israel and said "hey, if you don't want your Jews, why not send them here?".  And so lots and lots of Soviet Jews were officially allowed to leave the otherwise closed Soviet Union.  For the Soviets it was a win-win... they got rid of Jews and nobody was pissed at them for how they got rid of them.

At least that's how I remember it

Steve

Yup, on side note there was also significant post-Soviet aliyah or immigration that many older Israelis complain about. Growing up in Russia, on average Russian-speaking newcomers tend be more brutal and unforgiving to local Arabs than sefardi Jews, they are also electorate of far-right zionists groups and parties. Ron Leshem (whose books I'd recommend) and several other Isaeli military analysts did somel articles how culture of IDF get gradually more nasty due to newcomers from Russia. In some units traces of dedovshczyna (cast system of humiliating younger by older soldiers) started to appear after Second Lebanese War due to influx of recruits from Russia.

[Letter from Prague]

7 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

This might sound like political partisan statements, but it isn't.  If I were going to make it so I would have put in my own opinions instead of stating very simple, easily proven facts.  Instead, I'm pointing out that some degree of aid to Ukraine is going to be in doubt if the Republicans regain the House.  The pro-Ukrainian Senate and White House can only do so much without approval of the House.  Those here who don't have a solid grasp of US domestic politics need to be informed about this so when it happens there won't be shock.

Meaning if Ukraine can't regain all territory this year, it probably won't be able to, as without US the Western support is basically gone.

[Battlefront.com]

9 minutes ago, NamEndedAllen said:

Polls in 2021 and 2022 consistently show that Republicans view Russian President Putin more favorably than the President of the USA. Let that sink in. Have we ever seen that before? Ever?

Yes.  We saw Communists and Socialists having similar opinions of the Soviet Union.  Those people leaned Democrat (political left).  Now that Russia is overtly fascist it has switched and the Republicans (political right) are now sympathetic if not outright supportive.  The difference between the two situation is there was a huge (and at times unconstitutional) push to punish the political left in the 1950s because the Soviet Union was the United States' enemy.  There is no such push against the political right nor will there be.

Funny coincidence to have a McCarthy involved in a leadership position for both the 1950s and now

Steve

[JonS]

What goes around, comes around

https://twitter.com/Noahpinion/status/1026150926271143936?s=20&t=riNKMGyu57fdHP2DLejyAw

[cesmonkey]

1 hour ago, billbindc said:

As I understand it, the Lend-Lease only accelerates production and delivery of materiel, not the appropriation of funding for said materiel. 

Well yeah ... technically it's a loan.  Whether it ever gets paid back, it depends.

[FancyCat]

I hate how we are using big numbers for aid to underscore how valuable it is except most military aid was already paid for and sitting around in warehouses....it's just sheer misinformation, all of this equipment was basically made and sitting around doing nothing. Whenever anyone asks why are we spending so much, it really isn't a lot...

[billbindc]

19 minutes ago, NamEndedAllen said:

Putin and his inner circle are acutely aware of the implications of American politics for his prospects for prevailing in this war against democracies. And the seeds he planted in the 2016 elections are blooming in a large number of the candidates in next month’s USA midterm elections. Adding the shaky economy strengthens their chances. American economic woes are historically a strong indicator for removing the Party in power.

While Russia tries to determine how to attack Ukraine’s will to fight - its center of gravity? - arguably Ukraine’s center of gravity for international support is the USA’s military assistance and sanctions’ enforcement. We’ve seen Russia’s well-documented and relentless attacks on the USA through every non-combat means available since at least the 2016 Presidential campaign. Undermining the USA’s faith in its own governance, in its democracy, and its internal cohesion as a means to weaken USA foreign policies - especially towards Russia. Republicans are quite likely to control both houses of Congress and the Presidency. They already have a significant majority on the Supreme Court. Polls in 2021 and 2022 consistently show that Republicans view Russian President Putin more favorably than the President of the USA. Let that sink in. Have we ever seen that before? Ever?
 

 

Note: the below is *not* intended to be partisan but rather a reasonable analysis of the current American political milieu. 

I would add some caveats to the above. Putin *was* more popular among Republicans vis a vis  Democrats before the war started in Ukraine but it's actually hard to find any recent data on that now. I would imagine it's not what it was on February 23rd. Pew had Putin's general approval rating in the US around 6% in March. It's also important to note that as of right now 66% of Americans are in favor of continuing to arm Ukraine. That's a big number in a country with our partisan divides. It's also not clear yet where these midterms will shake out. In a normal cycle, this should have been a big year for the out-of-the-White-House party. Candidate quality, Supreme Court decisions and other factors are suggesting that it may not be. We'll see. 

The important point that I was trying to make above is that Ukrainian aid could, at minimum be delayed or cut it's certainly not a popular move in the American electorate. We'll see what happens and of course your vote and mine will have some say in the matter. 

[billbindc]

13 minutes ago, Letter from Prague said:

Meaning if Ukraine can't regain all territory this year, it probably won't be able to, as without US the Western support is basically gone.

I don't believe US aid will just evaporate. It will be *deeply* unpopular in the US to cut off aid and the pressure on the House to come through will be intense. But there will be a much bumpier ride in the next two years if Biden has to bargain with McCarthy than right now where McConnell and Pelosi push the Ukraine bills straight through.

[dan/california]

Just now, billbindc said:

I don't believe US aid will just evaporate. It will be *deeply* unpopular in the US to cut off aid and the pressure on the House to come through will be intense. But there will be a much bumpier ride in the next two years if Biden has to bargain with McCarthy than right now where McConnell and Pelosi push the Ukraine bills straight through.

They just need to do a MASSIVE one right now. Just make it absolutely clear that Putin can run out the clock in this decade...

[FancyCat]

 

 

[womble]

45 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

The Soviet Union didn't like Jews any more than Nazi Germany, but after the forced moves out to the Far East they seemed to be less interested in spending energy on dealing with their "Jewish Question".  Then along came Israel and said "hey, if you don't want your Jews, why not send them here?".  And so lots and lots of Soviet Jews were officially allowed to leave the otherwise closed Soviet Union.  For the Soviets it was a win-win... they got rid of Jews and nobody was pissed at them for how they got rid of them.

At least that's how I remember it

Steve

Given that background, why would any expat Russian-roots now-Israeli have any sympathy whatsoever for the "Nazis that never went in front of the Nuremburg panels"? Rose-tinted nostalgia goggles? Even when those very same continuation Fascists are doing Genocide right in front of them?

[Haiduk]

4 hours 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?

Shakheds are already being sooting down by fighter jets, but this is dangerous hunting. Several days ago we lost MiG-29 over Vinnytsia - pilot shot down Shakhed, but hadn't time to evade of fragments of destroyed drone (carrying 20-30 kg of HE), the jet was damaged and lost control, so pilot was forced to eject. For two days he shot down two cruise missiles and five Shakheds

Edited October 18, 2022 by Haiduk

[pavel.k]

6 minutes ago, FancyCat said:

 

 

It is like a psychopathic murderer hugs you and tell you: we are friends, aren't we?

[Haiduk]

3 hours ago, panzermartin said:

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...

Shakheds don't fit for HIMARS hunting. They suitable only for stationery object attacks. There were dozen cases when they appeared on frontline, when they destroyed some number of our atrillery pieces and trucks, but all theese strikes were successfull only because targets were found as long-time standing. HIMARSes either move, or hide. 

Edited October 18, 2022 by Haiduk

[JonS]

23 minutes ago, FancyCat said:

I hate how we are using big numbers for aid to underscore how valuable it is except most military aid was already paid for and sitting around in warehouses....it's just sheer misinformation, all of this equipment was basically made and sitting around doing nothing. Whenever anyone asks why are we spending so much, it really isn't a lot...

That's only true if it's never replaced. And given all the screaming about running down of stocks ... it's going to be replaced. Except the replacement kit will be costed at 2023 prices, not ~2010 prices.

[Beleg85]

23 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

They already have been sooting down with fighter jets, but this is dangerous hunting. Several days ago we lost MiG-29 over Vinnytsia - pilot shot down Shakhed, but hadn't time to evade of fragments of destroyed drone (carrying 20-30 kg of HE), the jet was damaged and lost control, so pilot was forces to eject. For two days he shot down two cruise missiles and five Shakheds

Very interesting story, some english and polish channels wrote about this crashed Mig-29 lately but omitted  part when he was hunting drones.

One can watch Surovikin briefing, it looks different than typical boring statement of Russian high officer. Guy is quite theatrical:

https://twitter.com/KevinRothrock/status/1582434857761718273

Also Russian millbloggers positively view "new,  sincere communication strategy" from MoD. They were put in line or seriously prepare society for bad news from Kherson.

There are voices from Russia that Ukrainians prepare to "destroy Kahkovka dam".  Ok, so a signal or possible false flag.

Edited October 18, 2022 by Beleg85

[acrashb]

15 minutes ago, womble said:

Rose-tinted nostalgia goggles? 

In the early 2000's I worked with a guy who had come to Canada, with his parents, in his mid-teens.  The family emigrated because his father had hit the Jewish ceiling in his career in Russia about the time a window of opportunity opened for emigration (later slamming shut).  One of his oft-repeated stories about being a young man was about two police officers dragging him and a friend into a warehouse and beating both of them - because they had lipped-off at the police as rowdy teens might do anywhere.

Canada had been good to my co-worker, who had risen to a Director position at a large company, and to his immediate and extended family.

He thought Putin was 'a great man' and often went on about how "... in Russia..." things would be done differently (in business).  Go figure.  I have no insight as to why this is the case but wanted to note that the phenomenon is not isolated to Israel.

 

[The_Capt]

39 minutes ago, billbindc said:

Note: the below is *not* intended to be partisan but rather a reasonable analysis of the current American political milieu. 

I would add some caveats to the above. Putin *was* more popular among Republicans vis a vis  Democrats before the war started in Ukraine but it's actually hard to find any recent data on that now. I would imagine it's not what it was on February 23rd. Pew had Putin's general approval rating in the US around 6% in March. It's also important to note that as of right now 66% of Americans are in favor of continuing to arm Ukraine. That's a big number in a country with our partisan divides. It's also not clear yet where these midterms will shake out. In a normal cycle, this should have been a big year for the out-of-the-White-House party. Candidate quality, Supreme Court decisions and other factors are suggesting that it may not be. We'll see. 

The important point that I was trying to make above is that Ukrainian aid could, at minimum be delayed or cut it's certainly not a popular move in the American electorate. We'll see what happens and of course your vote and mine will have some say in the matter. 

I am not an expert on US politics but we do spend a lot of time worrying about up here.  My bet is that this will not be a complete turning off of the tap, not even the most ardent pro-Russian Republicans can justify that to their own voters at this point.  What it may mean is a lot more pressure to “tie this thing off” sooner than later, or make it a European problem.  

Further it could mean bumps for follow on reconstruction support coming out of the US but as I understand it that is a lot more complicated than which party has the gavel as US companies could gain a lot from a massive reconstruction effort.

Bottom line is that there could be some tough decisions ahead and some less than optimal outcomes on the table at least as far as US support is concerned.  If Putin was smart he would shift the narrative with the US audience in mind, sow some seeds of doubt as to what this is all about.  Of course the continuous stream of warcrimes is not helping.  Further the Russians appear so wound up right now in some circles that any concessions or shift, it might blow up in his face.

We are coming to a particularly tricky phase of this thing from a political perspective unless something dramatic happens on the ground.

Edited October 18, 2022 by The_Capt

[Zeleban]

 

[chrisl]

9 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

Shakheds don't fit for HIMARS hunting. They suitable only for stationery object attacks. There were dozen cases when they appeared on frontline, when they destroyed some number of our atrillery pieces and trucks, but all theese strikes were successfull only because targets were found as long-time standing. HIMARSes either move, or hide. 

Exactly.  

Precision has at least three key components: Knowledge, Control, and Time, and you need all three, and just about everything "precision" Russia is using is deficient in all three areas.

Knowledge is the ability to know where your stuff is and where your target is.  With functioning GPS you can know whre your stuff is to a meter or so without a lot of difficulty.  There are other ways as well.  You can use knowledge of your own stuff's locations to use it to figure out where your targets are.  Russia has some ability to get precision knowledge with drones, but it's less reliable than the ISR web that Ukraine has available.

Once you know where your target is, you have to have something that you can control with the same precision (and implied in that is accuracy, as well) to get your rockets and artillery shells there to hit it.   Russia really suffers here.  None of their "precision" stuff seems to have anything vaguely like modern precision control - the can sometimes hit power plants, which are not small targets and don't move around.

The last element is time.  You need to be able to respond with your precision control within some time frame where you still have precision knowledge of where the target is, rather than where it was.  This is where all the RU cruise missiles/buzz bombs/drones really lack. They're slow, so they can only target things that can't move, even if they had 1 m precision and accuracy.  You can make up for time by doing things like using precision to get you to the neighborhood and autonomous guidance to find the target's current precise location.  Anti-ship missiles do this, as do some of the clustered AT bombs/missiles.  With HIMARS, the crew can get a call, drive out to a new launch site, launch, and be drinking tea at a new location before the missile lands.

If you don't have all three, you can't hit anything that can move around unless you just get lucky.

[FancyCat]

16 minutes ago, JonS said:

That's only true if it's never replaced. And given all the screaming about running down of stocks ... it's going to be replaced. Except the replacement kit will be costed at 2023 prices, not ~2010 prices.

https://media.defense.gov/2022/Oct/18/2003098052/-1/-1/1/UKRAINE-FACT-SHEET-OCT-14.PDF

The latest fact sheet, lots of things aren't being replaced. 200 M113s, those 20 Mi-17s we're intended for Afghanistan, hundreds of Humvees, 440 MRAPs, and I'm sure there's a ton else that isn't being replaced once it leaves our warehouses.

[The_Capt]

2 minutes ago, chrisl said:

Exactly.  

Precision has at least three key components: Knowledge, Control, and Time, and you need all three, and just about everything "precision" Russia is using is deficient in all three areas.

Knowledge is the ability to know where your stuff is and where your target is.  With functioning GPS you can know whre your stuff is to a meter or so without a lot of difficulty.  There are other ways as well.  You can use knowledge of your own stuff's locations to use it to figure out where your targets are.  Russia has some ability to get precision knowledge with drones, but it's less reliable than the ISR web that Ukraine has available.

Once you know where your target is, you have to have something that you can control with the same precision (and implied in that is accuracy, as well) to get your rockets and artillery shells there to hit it.   Russia really suffers here.  None of their "precision" stuff seems to have anything vaguely like modern precision control - the can sometimes hit power plants, which are not small targets and don't move around.

The last element is time.  You need to be able to respond with your precision control within some time frame where you still have precision knowledge of where the target is, rather than where it was.  This is where all the RU cruise missiles/buzz bombs/drones really lack. They're slow, so they can only target things that can't move, even if they had 1 m precision and accuracy.  You can make up for time by doing things like using precision to get you to the neighborhood and autonomous guidance to find the target's current precise location.  Anti-ship missiles do this, as do some of the clustered AT bombs/missiles.  With HIMARS, the crew can get a call, drive out to a new launch site, launch, and be drinking tea at a new location before the missile lands.

If you don't have all three, you can't hit anything that can move around unless you just get lucky.

This is really good. I would add Scalability, you can have the other three but if the weapon you are using is not scalable to the effect you want on the target you get over or under kill.  Taking this above the tactical one needs the ability to Communicate effectively in order to hand off Knowledge to other systems for better prosecution.  Finally you need unified and timely informed Authority or Command to ensure that prosecution meets the Time requirement and you are synchronized laterally towards a common objective.  

And now that we are on it, the Russians do not have advantage in any of these areas either.  So vertical integration of Knowledge, Time and Control (maybe Scalability is part of this) and horizontal integration of Communication and Command are all lagging in the Russian system.  

So what?  They are relying on mass which has a much lower vertical and horizontal integration requirement when compared to precision.  However mass runs into a final component Capacity.  One needs it at the back end for either precision or mass, but mass is far more vulnerable.

[NamEndedAllen]

56 minutes ago, billbindc said:

Note: the below is *not* intended to be partisan but rather a reasonable analysis of the current American political milieu. 

I would add some caveats to the above. Putin *was* more popular among Republicans vis a vis  Democrats before the war started in Ukraine but it's actually hard to find any recent data on that now. I would imagine it's not what it was on February 23rd. Pew had Putin's general approval rating in the US around 6% in March. It's also important to note that as of right now 66% of Americans are in favor of continuing to arm Ukraine. That's a big number in a country with our partisan divides. It's also not clear yet where these midterms will shake out. In a normal cycle, this should have been a big year for the out-of-the-White-House party. Candidate quality, Supreme Court decisions and other factors are suggesting that it may not be. We'll see. 

The important point that I was trying to make above is that Ukrainian aid could, at minimum be delayed or cut it's certainly not a popular move in the American electorate. We'll see what happens and of course your vote and mine will have some say in the matter. 

Those are good points. However the rub is that after the voting, it is Congress and not voters that make the decisions, whether funding or other policy matters. This is not a partisan comment, but as Steve mentioned earlier, purely procedural. The Republicans in office have fairly consistently opposed policies that the majority of Americans favor. This includes bizarrely enough even matters involving gun controls and abortion. Both quite hot button issues. I point this out only to underscore that financial support for Ukraine is not guaranteed in a Republican House (the House is where spending bills begin). The likelihood is that efforts to cut taxes and domestic and foreign aid spending will occupy the House. Ukraine aid could suffer as a result as divided government grinds most legislation to a halt. And all bets are off after 2024.

None of this is to say it WILL happen this way! Only that the scenario has a significant probability. Other events can and will affect future decisions, whether on the battlefield in Ukraine, the USA and European economies, or unforeseen other events. Nonetheless, in my opinion, Putin sees the American political landscape proven vulnerable to outside manipulation. And that it represents a decent Hail Mary play for his prospects, even survival.