How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Bulletpoint]

If the airbase explosions were caused by a drone, that would mean Ukraine has jetpowered attack drones - basically cruise missiles by another name?

Did they develop these themselves, or are they a secret lend-lease?

[Huba]

Gepard downs a cruise missile:

Guy with AK surely has an admirable fighting spirit, but seemed kinda redundant

Edited December 5, 2022 by Huba

[BlackMoria]

3 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

These drones fly high.  The temperatures at that altitude will be significantly colder than on the ground.  More importantly, freezing isn't the standard to go by.  Cold is.  The plastics have to be formulated for the temperatures they are operating in.  If the operating temperature is too cold or too warm, the plastic becomes brittle.  Cold and warm are defined by the plastic's characteristics, not an arbitrary number such as freezing.

Steve

Weather would be my savior where I live right now.   I woke up to a rather brisk -32C this morning and it is only early December.   Best of luck sending a drone my way other than by courier or mail.  

[Battlefront.com]

3 minutes ago, BlackMoria said:

Weather would be my savior where I live right now.   I woke up to a rather brisk -32C this morning and it is only early December.   Best of luck sending a drone my way other than by courier or mail.  

Heh... I live in a similar climate, though we don't get those temps until January or early February.  I have long since learned not to kick or slam plastic things when the temps get that low.  OK, "learned" is not the right term because just last year I kicked my plastic snow scoop and put my foot straight through it.  Learning is apparently an ongoing thing

Steve

[BlackMoria]

10 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Heh... I live in a similar climate, though we don't get those temps until January or early February.  I have long since learned not to kick or slam plastic things when the temps get that low.  OK, "learned" is not the right term because just last year I kicked my plastic snow scoop and put my foot straight through it.  Learning is apparently an ongoing thing

Steve

Heh ... the North American auto industry decided that plastic bumpers would be a great cost saver.  Not!   I had a Dodge Caravan van.  Very cold day and my daughter took it out and hit a huge a** porcupine crossing the highway.   Explaining to the auto insurance people the porcupine shaped hole knocked out of the plastic bumper was a interesting exercise.

Insurance adjuster:  "Did you hit a rock or something?"

Me:  "No.  A huge porcupine crossing the highway"

Insurance adjuster:  *blink*blink* "No way that was caused by hitting a porcupine."

Me: "Here is quills as proof and pictures my daughter took, including the deceased porcupine."

Edited December 5, 2022 by BlackMoria

[Beleg85]

Gepard reportedly shooting muscovite rocket, faster than one can spell Flugabwehrkanonenpanzer

[Oh sorry, doubled with Huba]

 

Edited December 5, 2022 by Beleg85

[Battlefront.com]

OK, let's look a these Russian base hits from a higher level to see what we can do to narrow down what the latest surprise might be!

Two closely spaced Russian airbase hits against aircraft directly responsible for the terror attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure.  I think we can rule out smoking and coincidence, which means the most likely deliberate attacks.

We have very little information to go on, but from the videos we probably know two things:

1. the munition was of a significant size
2. it was delivered by a fast moving aerial platform

These two things rule out all kinds of things we've seen offered up as possible explanations in previous mystery attacks.

Another thing we know is the distance from Ukrainian territory is more than FOUR times as far as anything previously seen in this war.  Holy crap.

It is improbable that Ukraine used a Western supplied system given the reluctance of the West to provide even shorter ranged systems such as ATACMS.  The Turks have been working on longer ranged drones, so that's at least something to examine.  That possibility aside, it would seem whatever was used came from Ukraine's own designs and manufacturing (even if Western components were repurposed).

I doubt Ukraine could have flown a manned aircraft into Russian airspace to drop something.  The probable size of the weapon probably rules out being smuggled into Russia and launched from there, but I suppose it can't be ruled out yet.  The most likely scenario, then, is whatever it was launched from Ukrainian territory.

The most likely weapon is the newly announced 1000km range suicide drone.  Seems might suspicious that there was a public announcement of it and then almost immediately two attacks that have no ready explanation.

Steve

[Huba]

Russians claim it was the modified Soviet drone:

 

[poesel]

30 minutes ago, Huba said:

Gepard downs a cruise missile:

Guy with AK surely has an admirable fighting spirit, but seemed kinda redundant

Right at the end, the Gepard shoots a few rounds in the ground. Looks like the target radar was still following the downed missile and the operator was still pulling the trigger

But happy to finally see the Gepard in action!

[Kinophile]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

Here's a tidbit that might mean something or might mean nothing.  Tula Russia is printing 600,000 food ration cards:

https://poland.postsen.com/world/156200/Russia-Food-stamps-produced-in-Tula-Authorities-Updating-documents.html

Steve

They cant be in that dire straits that food rationing is a potential future thing...can they? I mean sure, sanctions are grinding in like dog **** into a white carpet, but Russia can feed itself.

I think?

[Splinty]

3 minutes ago, Kinophile said:

They cant be in that dire straits that food rationing is a potential future thing...can they? I mean sure, sanctions are grinding in like dog **** into a white carpet, but Russia can feed itself.

I think?

Well, maybe under normal circumstances. But sending a huge chunk of their labor force to die in Ukraine may have screwed things up a little. That's pure conjecture on my part, but it is a possibility.

[Kinophile]

1 hour ago, BlackMoria said:

So, warfare will be launching swarms of these drones at another countries military infrastructure and critical civilian infrastructure.

What's scarier than that is that you conceivably, in large country like the US, launch drone attacks from within your opponents territory. You don't even need to be there, just containerize a few hundred drones, activate and target remotely.

Gawd WW3 will be just awful, everywhere.

Edited December 5, 2022 by Kinophile

[FancyCat]

Hey, at least the Gepards indicate that solutions against drones can be inexpensive. Just gotta get the Germans and Swiss to settle ammo and restart production and sprinkle them liberally across NATO.

Edited December 5, 2022 by FancyCat

[Huba]

This Tu-22M won't be operable anytime soon:

 

Edited December 5, 2022 by Huba

[kevinkin]

58 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

The most likely weapon is the newly announced 1000km range suicide drone.

Absent additional info, this analysis should be more straightforward compared to the bridge. Those involved with producing the ordinance and delivering it should be very proud. What a bolt from the blue. Sort of like a Doolittle moment except the war is in Ukriane's favor compared to the WW2 raid. 

[Taranis]

2 hours ago, Huba said:

“We are in a position to support Ukraine, but it’s more the mid and long term,” Bush said. “By creating this capacity ... if this war goes three or four years, we’ll be in a position to just vastly outproduce the Russians all by ourselves ― and if you combine that with our allies, then we’re just dwarfing their capability. They won’t be able to keep up.”

 

Hope this will be over by this time. But OMG, what a shower it will be for the russians 

[MikeyD]

One can imagine the US telling Ukraine 'We can't provide you with deep strike weapons for geo-political reasons but if you happened to build your own with some discrete assistance... (wink-nod)'

[Offshoot]

Ukraine claiming 60 of 70 missiles launched by Russia were shot down.

 

[Zeleban]

 

[Vanir Ausf B]

Good thing Ukraine is developing alternatives to ATACMS.

__________

The U.S. secretly modified the advanced Himars rocket launchers it gave Ukraine so they can’t be used to fire long-range missiles into Russia, U.S. officials said, a precaution the Biden administration says is necessary to reduce the risk of a wider war with Moscow.

The U.S. has refrained from supplying Ukraine with long-range ATACMS missiles. But the modifications ensure that Ukraine couldn’t use the Himars launchers the U.S. has provided to fire ATACMS missiles if Kyiv were to acquire them from other sources, such as foreign nations that have purchased the weapons from the U.S. Nor could Ukraine use those launchers to fire other types of longer-range missiles if Kyiv somehow managed to produce or acquire them, officials say.

__________

Probably paywalled, but... https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/u-s-altered-himars-rocket-launchers-to-keep-ukraine-from-firing-missiles-into-russia-11670214338

[Bulletpoint]

5 minutes ago, Zeleban said:

 

Who is taking these pictures and uploading them? Wouldn't that count as treason?

[cesmonkey]

Interesting ...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tupolev_Tu-141
 

Quote

On 15 March, an undisclosed source close to the MoD of Croatia was cited in the Croatian news magazine Nacional as saying that the investigation had concluded that the crashed drone belonged to the Armed Forces of Ukraine and carried a bomb that was meant for striking Russia's positions, but the drone had strayed off course and crashed after it ran out of fuel.[11]

 

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, Splinty said:

Well, maybe under normal circumstances. But sending a huge chunk of their labor force to die in Ukraine may have screwed things up a little. That's pure conjecture on my part, but it is a possibility.

Could be, but I think the more likely scenario is that these cards are what we in the US call "Food Stamps".  There's a LOT of Russians out of work and Russia has been scaling back its social safety net for years.  Starving people present, uh, administrative challenges.

However, the fact that the government feels this (apparent) new step is necessary could mean things are worse than they appear.  Very much in keeping with the NY Times article I posted a couple of pages ago.  With winter here they may be concerned about food stocks running low and no real chance to restock until mid Summer.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Rob Lee has some good posts on the strikes:

His posts are a bit disjointed for some reason, but there's good stuff to read if you back out of the above link and look at his main feed.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

44 minutes ago, cesmonkey said:

Interesting ...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tupolev_Tu-141
 

 

Yeah, a number of posts I just read referenced this.  It seems odd that Ukraine would have waited all this time before using them again.  Maybe it took that long to get the guidance system worked out?  Clearly the one in March didn't perform as expected, to say the least.

Steve