How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[billbindc]

2 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Yeah, I was just repeating Venezuela... I'm sure it wouldn't be Putin's first choice.  Somewhere in the Middle East makes sense.  For sure if he went to Syria he'd have no problems staying there.

Without US/EU blessing, though, I don't see there being a lot of countries willing to take on the hit of hosting not only Putin but other members of the leadership cast that The Hague would be interested in.  Lavrov... I'm looking at you, buddy.  I'm not sure Saudi Arabia would opt in on its own as weapons supplied to the country might suddenly dry up.

All of this aside, the theory that Putin's Chef is readying a force big enough to secure a defacto state within a state does make a lot of sense.  Putin would never get a good night's sleep even with that force surrounding him, but I doubt the US/EU would pressure a new Russian government to conduct a full scale internal war to get at him.

Steve

Yep to that last point. To me, all signs point to Putin taking more radical measures to *forestall* a need to flee, not to make it easier. Prighozin and his zek-sturm, the preservation of Chechen military capability, adopting a lower key in public affairs, etc, all tell me he's digging in. After all, there's simply nowhere in the world where he's ever going to have the freedom of action and thus be safer than Russia. It's that simple. 

[akd]

Oh FFS

[BlackMoria]

16 minutes ago, akd said:

Oh FFS

Welcome to the Theatre of the Absurd.  Performance art at it finest. 

 

Welcome to the Theatre of the Absurd.  Performance art at its finest.   

Edited December 13, 2022 by BlackMoria

[Kinophile]

4 hours ago, Haiduk said:

Looks like Wagner troops used period of adaptation of likely 128th mountain-assault brigade, which substituted 93rd mech.brigade near Bakhmut.

During previous 2-3 days Wagner completely seized building ceramic factory and approached to "Sinata" plastoboard factory. But much worse thing happened yesterday  - as wrote one soldier from there: "128th let us down again. Minus 2 platoon strongpoints. Guys! To gather yourself!" - and on situation maps was pointed that Russians crossed the pounds line and seized small part of the city area (or at least by other info this is contested area now). 

Bakhmut divided by Bakhmutka river on two almost equal parts. Eastern part has a name Zabakhmutka (i.e "over the Bakhmutka") and on 90 % consists of cottadges.

Also this soldier, mentioned above wrote as if PMC got an order to capture Bakhmut to 1st of January, else commanders, especially "zek"-units will be repressed. Also he wrote looks like enemy has intentions to encircle Toretsk town (between Horlivka, Bakhmut and Kostiantynivka) with simultainous attack from Kurdiumivka by PMC and VDV and from Horlivka by units of 3rd MRR of DPR.  

 

Im surprised.... 128th are no second tier, turkey-stuffing type unit. It sounds like either the hand off was rushed/badly led or that maybe the 128th didn't realize what they were up against, weren't ready for the intensity and tactics (which points back to a flawed hand off,  wrong person taking point for 128). 

There were numerous examples in WW1 of newer units taking over a part of the line and the transition bring a critical weak point for the enemy to attack.  The simplest solution was two-fold: longer handoff and acclimatization of the new unit, followed by keeping the old unit in the locality to respond/reinforce.

If I remember correctly, for the British & Americans it was the higher echelons of command that were usually the points of failure, due to overconfidence and (for the Brits) classic British demeanor of playing-down of issues/events. The casual, non-dramatic way a British officer* would describe a dangerous situation ("yes, bit of a tricky situation, that trench, something to keep a half-eye on, eh?") could be later described by an American AAR in more accurate terms  ("an extremely dangerous weakness manned by inexperienced and badly lead second-rate troops opposed by highly effective and attentive Germans").

Along with the cultural verbal  tangles,  for the US it was the lack of battle experience and brash over compensating, to fend off being looked down on as the newbies.

With the Germans I think it was the quality (and later simply the quantity) of the incoming troops themselves. For the French I think it was an slowness/inflexibility in adapting to new, suddenly applied, German tactics,  which made handovers particularly effective Windows of opportunity. 

To be clear,  I'm not casting aspersions on any particular nation,  just highlighting the many and varied ways a hand over can go horribly wrong. Sure, the above were cultural issues sometimes,  but the key aspect always was that someone forgot that The Enemy Is Always Watching. 

 

*A relative (Irish) was in the Irish Guards (British Army) and noted this cultural tic. He said once you got the hang of it that it was actually a useful group coping mechanism in battle, Esp with newer guys but as a Signals NCO it drove him bonkers. He found Gunners far more to-the-point and practical, as you can imagine. Staff dweebs were the worst, the absolute WORST for it. Like bloody Jeeves & Wooster, he said. Maddening. Perhaps @Splinty can confirm? 

Edited December 13, 2022 by Kinophile

[Kinophile]

1 hour ago, billbindc said:

Yep to that last point. To me, all signs point to Putin taking more radical measures to *forestall* a need to flee, not to make it easier. Prighozin and his zek-sturm, the preservation of Chechen military capability, adopting a lower key in public affairs, etc, all tell me he's digging in. After all, there's simply nowhere in the world where he's ever going to have the freedom of action and thus be safer than Russia. It's that simple. 

Absolutely. He'll never leave Russia. 

Edited December 13, 2022 by Kinophile

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, Kinophile said:

Absolutely. He'll never leave Russia. 

I still don't doubt that he's got something else for a worst case scenario where staying in Russia isn't viable.  Call it a Plan C.

Steve

[kevinkin]

Sort of a coincidence - another try at an endgame using elites:

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/3757293-russias-elites-know-theyve-lost-the-war-they-should-jump-ship/

What the West can and should do is encourage the realist Russians to jump ship by offering them, in the spirit of Cold War attempts to encourage defections, comfortable lives under assumed names in the West, but in exchange for testimony against Putin and his comrades at the inevitably approaching war crimes trials in The Hague.

Not the solution in total, but perhaps one line of attack.

 

[The_Capt]

10 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

This is why I've been saying since about Day 3 of this war that it all comes down to Ukraine killing Russians.  The more they kill, the closer Ukraine comes to ending this war on their terms.

I would add a nuance to this - it all comes down to killing the right Russians. This is not simple exhaustion through attrition, this is corrosive warfare.  It basically means killing the critical nodes and connectors within the Russian war machine faster than they can be replaced.  This is precise erosion leading to system collapse - we have seen it operationally three times now.  What I am not convinced of is that this can be upscaled into a strategic level direct campaign - Ukraine is doing this indirectly thru essentially destroying the RA.  Upscaling comes with 1) severe escalation risk and, 2) will not work without more direct involvement by the US/West and 3) may not work at all, and actually shore up Russian Will by shifting the narrative to an existential war for Russian survival (they are trying it now through some pretty stretched logic and not everyone is buying it).

[kevinkin]

Part 2 from yesterday's essay:

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2022/12/12/an_endgame_in_ukraine_american_strategic_options_ii_869609.htm

Option 2:  Reinforce the Rules-Based International Order through Ukrainian Victory

One reason that the war in Ukraine has been met with such alarm is that it is a direct attack on the rules-based international order, which stipulates the sanctity of the territorial integrity of sovereign states.  In the absence of a global government enforcing these rules, enforcement rests on the willingness of the U.S., as a now-weakened global hegemon, to enforce its treaty obligations.

I guess part three will also summarize all options an give some sort of recommendation.

[FancyCat]

17 minutes ago, kevinkin said:

Sort of a coincidence - another try at an endgame using elites:

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/3757293-russias-elites-know-theyve-lost-the-war-they-should-jump-ship/

What the West can and should do is encourage the realist Russians to jump ship by offering them, in the spirit of Cold War attempts to encourage defections, comfortable lives under assumed names in the West, but in exchange for testimony against Putin and his comrades at the inevitably approaching war crimes trials in The Hague.

Not the solution in total, but perhaps one line of attack.

 

tbf, i still think at this point that Russians can still travel to the U.S and Europe, except for certain sanctioned people, but largely their families are free to head over via 3rd party flights to avoid the flight path cancellations. those killings of Russian businesspeople in the west, i think were a overt signal for people that visiting Europe and U.S is fine, as long as you remain faithful and loyal to Russia. 

[Battlefront.com]

16 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

I would add a nuance to this - it all comes down to killing the right Russians. This is not simple exhaustion through attrition, this is corrosive warfare.  It basically means killing the critical nodes and connectors within the Russian war machine faster than they can be replaced.  This is precise erosion leading to system collapse - we have seen it operationally three times now.  

I'll see your nuance and raise you a caveat

Putting aside Russian civilians as an obvious "not the right Russians", I think Ukraine could win this by simple body count.  Important nodes and capabilities helps speed things along, absolutely true, but Russia's military is a two legged stool.  It might be easier to kick one leg out than the other, but really either will do.

By this I mean the mobiks.  Ukraine has to kill a LOT of them to have an impact, but if there's nobody manning the frontline those logistics could be intact led by functioning command nodes and it's still game over for that section of front.  Do that in enough places and bigger results are possible.

There is also what I've been saying about this since the beginning... killing lots and lots and lots of Russians means there's more stress on the civil society dealing with those losses.  If Ukraine only killed Russians officers this sort of societal corrosion wouldn't happen.

Long way of saying that kill off enough pawns the Queen is going to be exposed to a lot of stress.

16 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

What I am not convinced of is that this can be upscaled into a strategic level direct campaign - Ukraine is doing this indirectly thru essentially destroying the RA.  Upscaling comes with 1) severe escalation risk and, 2) will not work without more direct involvement by the US/West and 3) may not work at all, and actually shore up Russian Will by shifting the narrative to an existential war for Russian survival (they are trying it now through some pretty stretched logic and not everyone is buying it).

I agree with this.  I do not think Ukraine has a strategic capability to push this war to a positive conclusion any faster than it's going now.  Their best bet is to keep cutting off the heads of the Russian hydra one or two at a time instead of trying to dispatch the whole thing all at once.  Takes longer, but it is more likely to end this on terms Ukraine can live with.

Steve

[chrisl]

6 hours ago, MikeyD said:

From the look of it, I wonder if the Russians did it to themselves. The damage (that we can see) looks less like a strike on the bridge and more like its weight limit was exceeded and it buckled.

It's possible the piers underneath were hit with something, but yeah, it doesn't look like any kind of explosion damage from the top.  And you'd kind of expect more asymmetry/twist to the buckling if something had hit the piers

[Offshoot]

20 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

I would add a nuance to this - it all comes down to killing the right Russians. This is not simple exhaustion through attrition, this is corrosive warfare.  It basically means killing the critical nodes and connectors within the Russian war machine faster than they can be replaced.

Regarding the right Russians, a recent overview article on Bakhmut described the situation with Wagner - https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/articles/2022/12/8/7379743/

"Wagnerites, who are stationed on her part of the front, are composed of two groups: the well-trained ones and former convicts.

The first ones act as group commanders. They plan operations efficiently and precisely, track the movement of their soldiers well, and encrypt radio communications.

The latter are dumped onto the front after 2-3 weeks of poor training and used as cannon fodder.

"A captured Wagnerite told us: you killed 50 people today, 50 more were brought to replace them by the evening. If you killed 100 – they [Russians – ed.] would bring 100 more. They [Russian command – ed.] try to keep exactly 900 people in the assault unit. They [Wagnerites – ed.] are told: "Manpower is not a problem.""

A few strikes have recently targeted reported Wagner bases. Hopefully they have been hitting the commander cadre.

[Beleg85]

5 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Yeah, I was just repeating Venezuela... I'm sure it wouldn't be Putin's first choice.  Somewhere in the Middle East makes sense.  For sure if he went to Syria he'd have no problems staying there.

Without US/EU blessing, though, I don't see there being a lot of countries willing to take on the hit of hosting not only Putin but other members of the leadership cast that The Hague would be interested in.  Lavrov... I'm looking at you, buddy.  I'm not sure Saudi Arabia would opt in on its own as weapons supplied to the country might suddenly dry up.

All of this aside, the theory that Putin's Chef is readying a force big enough to secure a defacto state within a state does make a lot of sense.  Putin would never get a good night's sleep even with that force surrounding him, but I doubt the US/EU would pressure a new Russian government to conduct a full scale internal war to get at him.

Steve

Just to remind, gentelmen, that we are talking about de facto Emperor of Russia, one 3 most powerful states on Earth, with thousands of nukes. It is hard to believe he would run away like some Middle Eastern or South American dictator. It is equally hard to imagine what would trigger such escape in current conditions.

2 hours ago, Kinophile said:

m surprised.... 128th are no second tier, turkey-stuffing type unit. It sounds like either the hand off was rushed/badly led or that maybe the 128th didn't realize what they were up against, weren't ready for the intensity and tactics (which points back to a flawed hand off,  wrong person taking point for 128). 

They took some non-insignificant casualties during Kherson offensives, though.

Edited December 13, 2022 by Beleg85

[Kinophile]

58 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

I still don't doubt that he's got something else for a worst case scenario where staying in Russia isn't viable.  Call it a Plan C.

Steve

I dont think his ego could allow it. For him to leave, to abandon a society that he has very literally bound to his personal presence through the re-tzarisation of Russia, would be a soul-crushing moment. He's a pyschopath, and he's a tough one. And it's a big country.

I'll take odds on this one

 

Edited December 13, 2022 by Kinophile

[Kinophile]

1 minute ago, Beleg85 said:

They took some non-insignificant casualties during Kherson offensives, though.

True, I'd heard that. That could point to the "wrong person" idea, ie. a less experienced/over-promoted person or one dumped into a position they're simply not ready for, due to losses of the vets.

[The_Capt]

9 hours ago, FancyCat said:

Other posters were advocating for “easy, quick” solutions for the end of the war. I do not think ATACMS will make the war quicker, or substantially easier.

Then why take the bloody risk?  Ukraine can nibble the RA operational system and have demonstrate it very well against mainstream predictions.  However, you are upscaling linearly on both risk, cost and opportunity.  In order to incremental erode Russias broader strategic capability and capacity to prosecute this war and fundamentally change conditions we are not talking about a few demonstrations with ATACMS.  Back over the summer the UA fired hundreds of HIMARS at RA logistics and effectively crippled them - that wasn’t “nibbling” it was chewing.  That erosion led the RA to the point of full collapse at Kharkiv and a more controlled one at Kherson.  It was erosion of the RA through precise targeting of a critical component.

To do this at the strategic level is much more intensive.  To be effective it would mean hitting Russia across sectors of its military, political and industrial complexes.  The key component missing in your theory is speed.  To conduct corrosive warfare one needs to hit precisely fast.  Faster than your opponent can replace the losses of critical components.  Upscaling means the speed needs to outstrip Russian ability to recover at a strategic level, which means wide scale and heavy strikes on critical components across those sectors.  The UA did not “onsey-twosie” RA logistics at the operational level and the strategic level requirements to do the same are much higher,

9 hours ago, FancyCat said:

Escalation? Bah, Putin has stripped the forces aligned against NATO, https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/09/28/russia-ukraine-war-nato-eastern-flank-military-kaliningrad-baltic-finland/

Article states 80% of the 30k troops facing the Baltics and Finland are now in Ukraine. S-300 batteries defending St. Petersburg are gone. Naval personnel from the Baltic Fleet have appeared in Ukraine. Suggesting Russia will regard the forced movement of nuclear capable bombers away from NATO territory as a serious threat does not mesh with Putin stripping conventional military capability from NATO borders. It speaks the opposite, Putin has no fear of any nuclear or conventional NATO response to Russia anytime soon.

Sure he does - seriously this is dangerously obtuse and what I mean about under prescribing.  If Russia was not deterred by NATO at all, as you claim, Russia would at a minimum 1) be hitting support bases in Poland and 2) likely have employed WMDs- they had no problem in Syria.  In fact if there was no NATO deterrence Russia may have led with chemical weapons which was in line with Soviet doctrine.

9 hours ago, FancyCat said:

It is entirely within reason to classify small amounts of long range missiles to Ukraine as non-escalatory cause western aid continues to be exceeding slow, limited, and often relegated to hand me downs and less preferred equipment.

So this is what this is really about - your personal frustration with the level of western support? And somehow “small amounts of long range missiles” are going to fix this.  So this whole angle is really about making you feel better?  

Ok, well this is where I get off this bus. ATACMS are an escalation as they shift western support to directly targeting Russia inside its own borders.  But apparently you believe NATO holds no deterrence so I am not sure we will ever agree on the deterrence/escalation calculus, regardless.  

Further “small amounts” ATACMS or other weapon systems will largely only serve as demonstrations and strategic harassing fires. Their effectiveness is directly linked to western ISR for target development, validation, prosecution and post-strike assessments, which provision thereof is also an escalation - but we are also not going to agree on that because there is no escalation Russia will respond to according to your position.

Finally, as a citizen of a supporting western nation, I find this continual uninformed western/US bashing insulting and ignorant.  E.g.  we are sending them BMPs because the UA can quickly get them into the fight and keep them into the fight - only a rank amateur would think stuffing Marders  into the UA is easy and west is somehow being lazy for failing to do it.  For example, Marders has 6 dismounts while the BMP has 8 - so the UA can just redesign its squad size over a long weekend while re-aligning it’s logistics system to maintain the things, including a whole new suite of FCS and spare parts…apparently.

The west is sticking its neck way out on this one for a lot of good reasons, and not all of the altruistic; however, they are backstopping Ukraine well above and beyond the call while not dragging us all into WW3.  But people in the cheap seats still want to crap all over us because we did not supply whatever piece of kit pops into their highly uninformed heads.

Ok, I am out…can someone show me where this damned ignore button is?

[Beleg85]

1 minute ago, Kinophile said:

True, I'd heard that. That could point to the "wrong person" idea, ie. a less experienced/over-promoted person or one dumped into a position they're simply not ready for, due to losses of the vets.

This brigade is recruited from Zakarpathian mountaineers, so Russan propaganda, never shy of blatant racism, loved to paint them as wild for some reason (btw. Huculs are treasuretrove of old folklore, if someby likes such stuff). Overall a lot of units from Kherson sector that took heavy casualties does not seem to enjoy some special pause for R&R after capturing the region, the front is too heavily pushed near Bakhmut.

[Battlefront.com]

8 minutes ago, Kinophile said:

I dont think his ego could allow it. For him to leave, to abandon a society that he has very literally bound to his personal presence through the re-tzarisation of Russia, would be a soul-crushing moment. He's a pyschopath, and he's a tough one. And it's a big country.

I'll take odds on this one

 

All I'm saying is I wouldn't doubt if there was a plan in place.  Remember, Putin needs to keep his inner circle around him or he's toast.  The article quoted seems to indicate the escape plan is for those guys.  They might not be as enthusiastic about dying on their swords, therefore having some assurances that they can disappear might be something they care about.  Whether Putin is entertaining fleeing the country or not, I also suspect not.  But that doesn't mean there's no groundwork being laid for Plan C.

Steve

[Kinophile]

1 hour ago, The_Capt said:

I would add a nuance to this - it all comes down to killing the right Russians. This is not simple exhaustion through attrition, this is corrosive warfare.  It basically means killing the critical nodes and connectors within the Russian war machine faster than they can be replaced.  This is precise erosion leading to system collapse - we have seen it operationally three times now.  What I am not convinced of is that this can be upscaled into a strategic level direct campaign - Ukraine is doing this indirectly thru essentially destroying the RA.  Upscaling comes with 1) severe escalation risk and, 2) will not work without more direct involvement by the US/West and 3) may not work at all, and actually shore up Russian Will by shifting the narrative to an existential war for Russian survival (they are trying it now through some pretty stretched logic and not everyone is buying it).

Interesting, so for Ukraine to achieve strategic wins without the un-realisable cost of a strategic campaign it must stay within operational-level boundaries, to maximalist effect.

My layman's understanding is Strategic is a function down-to and up-from Operational; so Ukraine could achieve strategic damage without a specific strategic campaign per se. I mean, a strategic campaign is composed of operations, of course. But true Strategic success against a state the size of Russia would require a US-led WW2+ level of commitment, so its simply not going to happen and is a waste of discussion. But Ukraine can still achieve a strategic effect through operational means, without directly threatening Russia's global threat balancing load. The destruction of the RUS army in Ukraine, though a year-long, continuous succession of offensives could achieve that dissolution by the summer.

For it to be a strategic effect it must be long lasting at a national level? If so then  the AFRF must be comprehensively defeated both materially and psychologically, outside the borders of the Russian motherland.

It cannot be a WW1 style, German Army marches away to the safety of the borders; the main RUS grouping in Donetsk, Luhansk and Zaporizhia must be cut off, cut up and destroyed, without rescue from Russia proper. The defeat must be total, irrecoverable and relatively rapid in its end phase.

This goes back to Steve's line on killing as many Russians as possible, and TheCapt's addendum on killing the right ones, which this idea delineates as every resisting Russian inside Ukraines 1991 (mainland) borders.

Personally, I starting to think Crimea is a red herring. UKR talks about it a lot, Russia frets about it a lot, it is a significant logistical hub - yet it is also extremely vulnerable to isolation, a la the Pacific campaign. The destruction of the mainland Russian forces is really what matters.

Do that, and Crimea inevitably falls. Do the opposite and you still have a massive fight on your hands, plus Crimea with Russian interference/partisan campaigns, missile strikes and the burden of supporting its population & garrison at very extended logistical lines, sucking away manpower, effects and material from the mainland fight.

Edited December 13, 2022 by Kinophile

[The_Capt]

23 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

By this I mean the mobiks.  Ukraine has to kill a LOT of them to have an impact, but if there's nobody manning the frontline those logistics could be intact led by functioning command nodes and it's still game over for that section of front.  Do that in enough places and bigger results are possible.

There is also what I've been saying about this since the beginning... killing lots and lots and lots of Russians means there's more stress on the civil society dealing with those losses.  If Ukraine only killed Russians officers this sort of societal corrosion wouldn't happen.

Well I am not sure I am on board with this one…well maybe on the fence.  This is straight up old fashion exhaustion leading to a much larger collapse of political will in the society.  Man that is a tall order.  I mean nothing says that system warfare and direct attrition can be combined, in fact collapsing  Russian logistics in winter might just do that.

But a big question is “what is the breaking point?”  What is the magic number where Russia taps out?  Further, all war is personal, so a lot of dead Russians could actually have the reverse effect you are looking for. 

I am not sure Ukraine can just simply kill enough front line troops to buckle the entire house, or maybe not fast enough.  Further that may take a very long time.  We are talking beyond strategic corrosion and down to societal corrosion leading to collapse - that is not a small thing and notoriously difficult to do once a nation gets into the clinch of it.  Russia was not entirely sold at the outset…tough one.

Personally I would stick with system corrosive effects on the RA until it collapses - it has worked so far.  This keeps focus on the UAs limited resources and hits the things that hurt the most. If the RA is rendered broken, that also kicks out a leg of that bigger stool - political, military and public.  But as I said, nothing says you cannot get both if you get those mobiks to all freeze to death while hitting RA logistics.  

[dan/california]

 

13 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Well I am not sure I am on board with this one…well maybe on the fence.  This is straight up old fashion exhaustion leading to a much larger collapse of political will in the society.  Man that is a tall order.  I mean nothing says that system warfare and direct attrition can be combined, in fact collapsing  Russian logistics in winter might just do that.

But a big question is “what is the breaking point?”  What is the magic number where Russia taps out?  Further, all war is personal, so a lot of dead Russians could actually have the reverse effect you are looking for. 

I am not sure Ukraine can just simply kill enough front line troops to buckle the entire house, or maybe not fast enough.  Further that may take a very long time.  We are talking beyond strategic corrosion and down to societal corrosion leading to collapse - that is not a small thing and notoriously difficult to do once a nation gets into the clinch of it.  Russia was not entirely sold at the outset…tough one.

Personally I would stick with system corrosive effects on the RA until it collapses - it has worked so far.  This keeps focus on the UAs limited resources and hits the things that hurt the most. If the RA is rendered broken, that also kicks out a leg of that bigger stool - political, military and public.  But as I said, nothing says you cannot get both if you get those mobiks to all freeze to death while hitting RA logistics.  

Do you think that Mobiks dying from the cold is actually worse for Putin than Ukrainian direct action? It just seems to make the entire Russian state apparatus look REALLY bad for them to be taking massive winter weather casualties. Beating the Germans because they made they same dimwitted mistakes is pretty much the foundation of their entire national mythos.

[The_Capt]

6 minutes ago, Kinophile said:

Interesting, so for Ukraine to achieve strategic wins it must stay within operational-level boundaries, to maximalist effect within those.

My layman's understanding is Strategic is a function down-to and up-from Operational; so Ukraine could achieve strategic damage without a strategic campaign. Strategic success against a state the size of Russia would require a US-led WW2+ level of commitment, so its simply not going to happen and is a waste of discussion. But Ukraine can still achieve a strategic effect through operational means, without directly threatening Russias strategic balancing load. The destruction of the RUS army in Ukraine, though a year-long, continuous succession of offensives could achieve that dissolution by the summer.

For it to be a strategic effect it must be long lasting at a national level? If so then  the AFRF must be comprehensively defeated both materially and psychologically.

It cannot be a WW1 style, German Army marches away to the safety of the borders; the main RUS grouping in Donetsk, Luhansk and Zaporizhia must be cut off, cut up and destroyed, without rescue from Russia proper. The defeat must be total, irrecoverable and relatively rapid in its a end phase.

This goes back to Steve's line on killing as many Russians as possible, and TheCapt's addendum on killing the right ones, which this idea delineates as every resisting Russian inside Ukraines 1991 (mainland) borders.

Personally, I starting to think Crimea is a red herring. UKR talks about it a lot, Russia frets about it a lot, it is a significant logistical hub - yet it is also extremely vulnerable to isolation, a la the Pacific campaign. The destruction of the mainland Russian forces is really what matters.

Do that, and Crimea inevitably falls. Do the opposite and you still have a massive fight on your hands, plus Crimea with Russian interference/partisan campaigns, missile strikes and the burden of supporting its population & garrison at very extended logistical lines, sucking away manpower, effects and material from the mainland fight.

Ya that is pretty much it. It is about effective translation. Russia is doing all sorts of strategic flailing and it is not translating to operational effects.  Ukraine is translating much better upward and if they operationally break the RA it will theoretically achieve the strategic effect everyone is looking for without escalation risks, or at least without as much escalation risk.

As to end-state, that is a hard one.  As we discussed, total and complete Russian defeat may fracture that nation, which is what we do not want.  But if it is a “peace with honour” we will be doing this again in a decade or two, which we do not want.  My bet is we are talking about a Russian withdrawal, Putin gone and some sort of re-normalization effort with a new regime - which will need to include reparations and warcrimes prosecution - while Russia manages to keep it together. Ukraine in NATO and EU, reconstruction in full swing to try and pay everyone off.  We can risk manage the future at that point with respect to Donbas and Crimea.  But that is really best case…lotta points of failure on this one.

[The_Capt]

Just now, dan/california said:

 

Do you think that Mobiks dying from the cold is actually worse for Putin than Ukrainian direct action? It just seems to make the entire Russian state apparatus look REALLY bad for them to be taking massive winter weather casualties. Beating the Germans because they made they same dimwitted mistakes is pretty much the foundation of their entire national mythos.

Makes it look bad to us.  I am not sure how much of what is really happening makes it back to the average Russian - it is an authoritarian state after all. I do think the winter is a very good opportunity to kill a lot of poorly supplied and trained RA recently mobilized troops.  This in combination with continued corrosive pressures in line with what they have done all fall is an excellent idea.  It may actually hit Steve’s breaking point scenario.

[FancyCat]

31 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Then why take the bloody risk?  Ukraine can nibble the RA operational system and have demonstrate it very well against mainstream predictions.  However, you are upscaling linearly on both risk, cost and opportunity.  In order to incremental erode Russias broader strategic capability and capacity to prosecute this war and fundamentally change conditions we are not talking about a few demonstrations with ATACMS.  Back over the summer the UA fired hundreds of HIMARS at RA logistics and effectively crippled them - that wasn’t “nibbling” it was chewing.  That erosion led the RA to the point of full collapse at Kharkiv and a more controlled one at Kherson.  It was erosion of the RA through precise targeting of a critical component.

To do this at the strategic level is much more intensive.  To be effective it would mean hitting Russia across sectors of its military, political and industrial complexes.  The key component missing in your theory is speed.  To conduct corrosive warfare one needs to hit precisely fast.  Faster than your opponent can replace the losses of critical components.  Upscaling means the speed needs to outstrip Russian ability to recover at a strategic level, which means wide scale and heavy strikes on critical components across those sectors.  The UA did not “onsey-twosie” RA logistics at the operational level and the strategic level requirements to do the same are much higher,

Sure he does - seriously this is dangerously obtuse and what I mean about under prescribing.  If Russia was not deterred by NATO at all, as you claim, Russia would at a minimum 1) be hitting support bases in Poland and 2) likely have employed WMDs- they had no problem in Syria.  In fact if there was no NATO deterrence Russia may have led with chemical weapons which was in line with Soviet doctrine.

So this is what this is really about - your personal frustration with the level of western support? And somehow “small amounts of long range missiles” are going to fix this.  So this whole angle is really about making you feel better?  

Ok, well this is where I get off this bus. ATACMS are an escalation as they shift western support to directly targeting Russia inside its own borders.  But apparently you believe NATO holds no deterrence so I am not sure we will ever agree on the deterrence/escalation calculus, regardless.  

Further “small amounts” ATACMS or other weapon systems will largely only serve as demonstrations and strategic harassing fires. Their effectiveness is directly linked to western ISR for target development, validation, prosecution and post-strike assessments, which provision thereof is also an escalation - but we are also not going to agree on that because there is no escalation Russia will respond to according to your position.

Finally, as a citizen of a supporting western nation, I find this continual uninformed western/US bashing insulting and ignorant.  E.g.  we are sending them BMPs because the UA can quickly get them into the fight and keep them into the fight - only a rank amateur would think stuffing Marders  into the UA is easy and west is somehow being lazy for failing to do it.  For example, Marders has 6 dismounts while the BMP has 8 - so the UA can just redesign its squad size over a long weekend while re-aligning it’s logistics system to maintain the things, including a whole new suite of FCS and spare parts…apparently.

The west is sticking its neck way out on this one for a lot of good reasons, and not all of the altruistic; however, they are backstopping Ukraine well above and beyond the call while not dragging us all into WW3.  But people in the cheap seats still want to crap all over us because we did not supply whatever piece of kit pops into their highly uninformed heads.

Ok, I am out…can someone show me where this damned ignore button is?

I am unsure where the ignore button is unfortunately.

They don't need to be immediately sent to Ukraine of course, but pledges and public promises for the creation and maintaining of supplies is important. Big portions of the industrial capacity of Ukraine is status unknown or damaged or knocked out, including military repair. Restarting and increasing NATO and Soviet ammunition is continuing, but I believe Soviet air frames are largely phrased out in Europe no? Other operators of Soviet era aircraft are unlikely to be friendly to NATO. The sooner training and procurement can begin, the easier the time for Ukraine to phrase it in especially if this war continues.

As for uninformed, Ukraine itself is leading the requests for tanks, long range missiles, (tho recently this switched to air defense) so I unsure why Ukraine is asking for it if not militarily useful. Ukraine led requests for western aircraft. I remember when it was begging for western anti-ship missiles. I strongly recall Russian sentiment that it would be unacceptable escalation for it to be provided. It's been a constant narrative the entire conflict, even as Russia escalated it's demands and expanded their aims and set new lines like annexing territories. 

But I am not ignorant to risks of escalation, but suggesting Putin is going to flip the switch due to targeting of inside Russian borders, again Russia has claimed the Donbas and Crimea as it's territory, we are clearly standing on red lines.