How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[chrisl]

3 hours ago, Huba said:

That's why everyone is investing in AD like crazy, from VSHORADS to exoatmospheric interceptors?

Come on, gun solutions are obviously aimed at the lowest tier of UAVs/ loitering munitions. If a drone can stay out of gun range and still provide intel to the enemy ISR, it clearly deserves to eat a MANPAD or whatever constitutes your VSHORAD.

While in general it's hard to disagree that the goal is not to 'fire at drones' but deny the opponent his ISR by any means available,  I however don't see how would you imagine doing it without reliably and cost-effectively destroying his recon assets?

I don't think he's saying that one shouldn't have cost-effective anti-recon assets.  It's more that he's pointing out that the NG solution in the video, while kind of cool, is just just a big (expensive) fat target for something coming from over the horizon, probably swarmed, and produced at a small fraction of the price of the gun platform.  

Armored vehicles in the future environment are going to be more like aircraft carriers are today - a big platform to get the smaller uncrewed things close enough that they can do their work, while keeping the base mobile,  well protected, and difficult to detect.  AFV-mounted autocannons may turn out to be part of the last line of defense, much like CIWS on ships, but they aren't likely to be effective primary anti-drone systems for very long, if ever.

Edited November 21, 2022 by chrisl
typo

[The_Capt]

3 hours ago, Huba said:

Come on, gun solutions are obviously aimed at the lowest tier of UAVs/ loitering munitions. If a drone can stay out of gun range and still provide intel to the enemy ISR, it clearly deserves to eat a MANPAD or whatever constitutes your VSHORAD.

While in general it's hard to disagree that the goal is not to 'fire at drones' but deny the opponent his ISR by any means available,  I however don't see how would you imagine doing it without reliably and cost-effectively destroying his recon assets

Well the first problem - that this is not solving - is that the lowest tier UAS/loitering munitions can see out to 2+ kms and feed that back to a targeting system.  They are too small for MANPAD or VSHORADs.  Hell they even have commercially available thermal/IR versions - https://www.digitalcameraworld.com/buying-guides/best-thermal-drone  These are class I drones that will be able to see ground based 30mm chain guns blasting away at the clouds from kms away.

Attacking an opponents recon assets is the first basic step in what should be a systemic attacking system, but thinking it is the solution is draining the ocean with a spoon.  Off the top 'o' the old noggin, for an initial start:

- Effective hunter-killer UAS designed to go out and kill other UAS.  This is the beginning of re-establishing symmetry within the unmanned aerial space.  Here we can scratch that recon asset elimination itch but it is a far bigger problem than this. 

- That first one up there needs to be linked into a ground based system to do the same on surface/sub-surface.  This will in effect shift the calculus of warfare to where the comparative knife edge unmanned systems envelop will be as critical to warfare as airpower ever was.

- Then you need a c-space system to deny and disrupt your opponents space based capability and resources (data/GPS) while preserving your own.

- Add to this a healthy offensive cyber capability able to attack and degrade an opponents field C4ISR systems.  This is more than hitting their networks, this is gen 2 information/data warfare where you are able to essentially hijack an opponents C4ISR central nervous system and feed it the wrong data.  This will require physical infiltration/exploitation in addition to the standard cyber-at-range effects.  Nano will likely start within this space about mid-century and expand outward from there - e.g. you physically re-wire an opponents C4ISR.  This will also extend from the frontline all the way back to strategic industry.

- C4ISR overmatch - you need an integrated system that is able to learn faster and better than an opponents...while in motion.  This goes beyond a different technological approach and platforms, it hits at the heart of "how we think  and make decisions about fighting" and operational planning processes.  This is the AI/ML integration space and how we pair these new technologies with people based warfighting systems to develop new theories of cause and effect over an opponent.

- Integrated Precision Deep Strike - land battles are likely to occur more and more decisively over the horizon where the side that can see, fix and strike with long range precision fires will gain advantage.  This will mean unconventional targeting and munitions able to hit an opponents C4ISR system - so long range EM/EW systems, long range unmanned sub-munition swarms able to hit an opponents nerve centers (nodes), networks (connectors) and cognitive centers of gravity (processors).

- People.  We will likely re-think how we select, train and employ people dramatically to gain advantage within this environment.  The internal military cultural issues aside (and they are legion) - occupations and trades, leadership skillsets and decision making within human dimensions will all need an overhaul as we are all working on 20th century models.  Western governments are going to insist on keeping humans in the loop, and if we think we can stick the same humans we have been using for decades into that loop it will very likely cause serious problems. 

Advantage will go to the side that can collect, process and weaponize data faster, better and at greater overall scales - just as we have seen repeatedly in this war.

So, no, I am sorry but NG does not get a participant medal for bilking the military contracting and acquisition process for billions cause "at least they are trying something".  Lord we have been here before with IEDs back in the '00s.  We got sold a lot of "up armored Mad Max vehicles" that we are dumping now and a bunch of c-IED robots/ detection systems.  The reality is that C-IED was a counter system requirement that spanned from finance/logistics-planning/targeting-production-employment-exploitation, all looped within COIN.

In war it is almost never simply countering the thing. It is about countering the things that made the thing, a thing, in the first place.

Edited November 21, 2022 by The_Capt

[kevinkin]

Coming to a front near you ...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/21/china-reports-first-covid-death-for-six-months-as-beijing-cases-rise

Maybe a new "arms" race is the way to go. Flood the UA and people with effective vaccines and leave Russia to cough it up using what amounts to saline solution. Imagine the panic if COVID went through the ranks of Russian conscripts this winter? 

[Kinophile]

Separately, Nord Stream blast site dive. 

94 tonne pipe sections tossed 200m from Blast. 

 

 

[Kinophile]

And a little info on Kropyva

 

[sross112]

14 minutes ago, kevinkin said:

Coming to a front near you ...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/21/china-reports-first-covid-death-for-six-months-as-beijing-cases-rise

Maybe a new "arms" race is the way to go. Flood the UA and people with effective vaccines and leave Russia to cough it up using what amounts to saline solution. Imagine the panic if COVID went through the ranks of Russian conscripts this winter? 

Considering the conditions we see the RA living in I'm betting you'd get a lot more mileage out of the old standards of Cholera, Dysentery and Typhoid than Covid. We are more likely to see way more soldiers taken from the front by trenchfoot and frostbite than anything else. Covid to the 20 to 40 year olds will be just like influenza and other respiratory infections at the front; rampant, inconvenient and sucks but not killing them or taking them out of the fight in large numbers.

[Taranis]

"A tank of the 58th brigade of the Ukrainian army in the vicinity of Bakhmout, November 19, 2022. LAURENT VAN DER STOCKT FOR "LE MONDE""

[FancyCat]

 

 

 

[Taranis]

1 hour ago, Vanir Ausf B said:

 

 

 

Edited November 21, 2022 by Taranis

[danfrodo]

29 minutes ago, FancyCat said:

 

 

 

well well well.  Something interesting indeed.  It's almost as if UKR is trying to get RU to move troops to lower left bank.  This has feint written all over.  Hopefully Putin will drag units away from other sectors (melitopol area) to counter this and when ground freezes RU will find its rail line cut.  Which can be done not too far from front at Tokmak.

[kevinkin]

1 hour ago, sross112 said:

Cholera, Dysentery and Typhoid than Covid.

Nothing wrong with piling on I'll say. 

[A Canadian Cat]

4 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

I've seen references to a bunch of videos purportedly showing VERY large quantities of Russian bodies around Bakhmut.  Reddit now has age restrictions that require logins, and I refuse to have an account with Reddit, so I haven't seen them.  Not that I really want to. 

I like Reddit. It's one of the best social media sites for curating your own feed. I just see the posts from the sub reddits I subscribe too. So, it's easy to avoid dumb *** memes (looking at your FB) and nutters posting about their nutty political theories (looking at you Twitter). I see just the things I want to.

4 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

However, I am curious if anybody has seen them if they can confirm that there's now proof of some of the mobik slaughters we've been reading about from Russian sources.

Since I don't follow the Ukrainian war on Reddit (yikes too much garbage) I had to go look. I searched for "Russian bodies Bakhmut". The results contain lots of videos some with dramatic headlines. I don't see evidence of anything extraordinary. I found several videos of what appear to be Russian casualties but nothing like a massive slaughter per-say. There are several videos of trench networks with half a dozen to a dozen bodies and a few area shots of compounds with similar numbers of bodies. They do not match the wild head lines and frankly nothing more than I would have expected if a platoon was overrun and did not surrender quickly.

Edited to add my comment reflects the disconnect between the headlines and the actual videos. All four of the videos I watched were clearly from different places and if they were from when and where reported then clearly the UA kicked some serious ***. It's just like headlines like "bodies are piled up like cordwood" do not match the actual content.

Edited November 21, 2022 by IanL

[kevinkin]

Some not groundbreaking but good news on NATO membership. 

https://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/articles/2022/11/20/web-exclusive-sweden-to-move-deadline-up-for-natos-2-gdp-threshold-requirement

The previous government had vowed to raise its defense spending in line with the NATO threshold by 2028. Jonson said Sweden currently spends about 1.4 percent of its GDP on defense. However, with the worsening security situation in Europe, the nation will move that goal up to 2026, he said.

[Cogust]

The problem with Swedish rearmament is not money, it is things to spend the money on. 

Building new training facilities takes time and so do producing/buying advanced weapon systems.

[kevinkin]

So moving the spending up is sort of a good thing. Not ground breaking. They will probably do what you said while determining their operational role within NATO like helping monitor the Baltic via air and sea. That could partly relive other NATO forces. There are a lot of less tangible benefits for Sweden like tapping into advanced system development down the road to supplement their own. Being part of a large team might help them focus their spending once they get going. The exact money and timing is just for public consumption. 

[Cogust]

We have been monitoring the Baltics and sharing intel with the US since the 1950's, so NATO membership won't change much in that department. What we lack most is training facilities (manpower) as well as some advanced hardware, mostly in the navy and airforce but also enough tanks and artillery to equip a larger army. 

[dan/california]

16 minutes ago, kevinkin said:

So moving the spending up is sort of a good thing. Not ground breaking. They will probably do what you said while determining their operational role within NATO like helping monitor the Baltic via air and sea. That could partly relive other NATO forces. There are a lot of less tangible benefits for Sweden like tapping into advanced system development down the road to supplement their own. Being part of a large team might help them focus their spending once they get going. The exact money and timing is just for public consumption. 

There is a desperate need for NATO/EU wide procurement reform. Nato doesn't need seven kinds of 155mm SPG. It needs ENOUGH of one kind. And this holds for virtually every single major system, with spares support and ammo. I don't expect it to actually happen, but it is desperately needed.

[kevinkin]

@Cogust

I don't either. But not sure how you guys would use more ground forces. Perhaps in the Baltic States. But there needs to be a program modernize the formations now fielded eventually. So yes, that would be valuable. 

 

Edited November 21, 2022 by kevinkin

[Beleg85]

7 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

I've seen references to a bunch of videos purportedly showing VERY large quantities of Russian bodies around Bakhmut.  Reddit now has age restrictions that require logins, and I refuse to have an account with Reddit, so I haven't seen them.  Not that I really want to.  However, I am curious if anybody has seen them if they can confirm that there's now proof of some of the mobik slaughters we've been reading about from Russian sources.

Steve

It depends what one's mean by large, probably. There are many videos with -10 people dead and several with many more than like 10+ relatively close. Ther are reports of Ukrainian soldiers descibing "slaugther field" exactly like in WWI, with corpses littering No Man's Land. Lachowski talked something like moth ago in interview he met a group of guys from 93rd that were so fed up with manning a trench sorrunded with dozens Wagner bodies lying around, they were unable to fight and needed several days at the back to recover psychically. Stress from killing (and being killed) is visibly straining defender's morale.

A clip with Ukrainian Igla operators explaining reaction times they have from spotting enemy aircraft until until it disengages: 10-15 seconds. Interesting is they try to figure out muscovites tactics by reading their manuals.

 

Edited November 21, 2022 by Beleg85

[sburke]

Russia in flames: At least five dead as Moscow rocked by explosion by major train stations (msn.com)

Quote

 

Russia's Investigative Committee - which oversees probes into potential major crimes - said this morning that the number of victims of the fire was still being assessed. State news agency TASS had previously reported seven dead, citing emergency sources.

It attributed the cause of the blaze to "violations of fire standards".

Large fires are fairly commonplace in Russia, and are typically attributed to ageing buildings and infrastructure, as well as a laxed attitude to safety requirements.

 

Somebody smoking again?

Edited November 22, 2022 by sburke

[JonS]

3 hours ago, kevinkin said:

So moving the spending up is sort of a good thing.

One of the Baltic States faced the same issue a couple of years ago - wanting to notably step up defence spending. But defence procurement - done well - takes /time/. You can do a awful lot of work initially trying to figure out what capabilities to get, and then which specific widget to buy. That all takes a long time, but really doesnt cost much.

So, they went out and bought a whole lot of random sh!t. Defence spending went up -> 2% gdp achieved -> tea and medals for all involved.

Of course, the defence force wasnt actually any better off afterwards. Worse, in some ways, because theres a whole bunch of useless stuff they now have to take care of.

So, no. Moving defence spending up is not a good thing. Not generally.

[danfrodo]

1 hour ago, sburke said:

Russia in flames: At least five dead as Moscow rocked by explosion by major train stations (msn.com)

Somebody smoking again?

Very very interesting.  I've been wondering if UKR has sabotage teams in RU.  Given that there are huge numbers of ukrainians who speak perfect russian, it's not that hard to have teams posing as RU citizens doing bad things.  And the culture of corruption might make it easy to have a security guard look the other way at an opportune time.  We don't know for sure this was an attack but I've been hoping for SOF teams to start knocking out RU electrical grid to help even the playing field. 

[chuckdyke]

12 minutes ago, danfrodo said:

Very very interesting.  I've been wondering if UKR has sabotage teams in RU.  Given that there are huge numbers of ukrainians who speak perfect russian, it's not that hard to have teams posing as RU citizens doing bad things.  And the culture of corruption might make it easy to have a security guard look the other way at an opportune time.  We don't know for sure this was an attack but I've been hoping for SOF teams to start knocking out RU electrical grid to help even the playing field. 

Always an accent which would raise suspicions. Like me going on vacation in the Netherlands they picked up right away my Dutch was a little different.

[Zeleban]

Recently there was a video from Pskov with a helicopter explosion. It is not necessary to go to Russia for this. There are many Russians who are dissatisfied with the Putin regime. Also, do not forget that the population of Ukrainians in Russia is in 3rd place after Russians and Tatars

[Battlefront.com]

6 hours ago, IanL said:

I like Reddit. It's one of the best social media sites for curating your own feed. I just see the posts from the sub reddits I subscribe too. So, it's easy to avoid dumb *** memes (looking at your FB) and nutters posting about their nutty political theories (looking at you Twitter). I see just the things I want to.

Since I don't follow the Ukrainian war on Reddit (yikes too much garbage) I had to go look. I searched for "Russian bodies Bakhmut". The results contain lots of videos some with dramatic headlines. I don't see evidence of anything extraordinary. I found several videos of what appear to be Russian casualties but nothing like a massive slaughter per-say. There are several videos of trench networks with half a dozen to a dozen bodies and a few area shots of compounds with similar numbers of bodies. They do not match the wild head lines and frankly nothing more than I would have expected if a platoon was overrun and did not surrender quickly.

Edited to add my comment reflects the disconnect between the headlines and the actual videos. All four of the videos I watched were clearly from different places and if they were from when and where reported then clearly the UA kicked some serious ***. It's just like headlines like "bodies are piled up like cordwood" do not match the actual content.

Thanks for the various responses to my quesiton.  NPBII helped out with the old.reddit.com trick as well.  I looked at a video that was talking about the thousands of bodies lying around Bakhmut, but the video was the same one posted here in the previous page.  Shows a lot of dead Russians, for sure, but the person posting that video was talking about the same vague information we have... piles of Russian dead.  That's what I figured.

For sure I've seen a lot more videos of tactically significant numbers of dead in concentrated areas.  Losing two dozen in a place where one drone can spot them is horrific losses to be sure.  However, I once saw a pile of a dozen Ukrainian soldiers heaped in the woods, so tactical losses on this scale are not evidence of "thousands" of dead.

Steve