How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Ales Dvorak]

18 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

It's a very simple thing... the pilot knowingly destroyed something of monetary value and he has no legal defense for doing so.  Therefore, he should be held accountable in an appropriate judicial setting just like anybody else would be for deliberately causing such damage.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/daily/march99/marine5.htm

[Maciej Zwolinski]

1 hour ago, Haiduk said:

Recently Russian milbloggers blamed commander of 126th coastal defense brigade that he didn't establish proper defense of islands and now is grindering personnel,

Oh good Lord no...

[LongLeftFlank]

19 minutes ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

Oh good Lord no...

They're used to it....

 

 

[Peregrine]

27 minutes ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

Oh good Lord no...

Yet more evidence Petey the Sexual Harassment Panda is required.

[cyrano01]

If anyone is interested the Royal Air Force Museum is hosting a virtual lecture entitled:

Why did the West overestimate Russian military capabilities and why does this matter?

 

later today, 1730 GMT.

 

https://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/virtual-events/virtual-lectures/virtual-lecture-why-did-the-west-overestimate-russian-military-capabilities-and-why-does-this-matter/

 

 

[LongLeftFlank]

1 hour ago, Grigb said:

Not sure what you mean - the rumor I reported is unconfirmed. That's why I call it rumor.

I say it again - it was not confirmed that why it is rumor. But this is not the same type of rumor that you usually operate.

You unwisely call any unconfirmed information a rumor. I call only credible unconfirmed information a rumor. That's why it is confusing for you. 

Except you do not understand neither defenition nor my system. But you are free to do whatever you want.

 

I am not joking at all.

Ah, let 'em split hairs.

We are happy to have you back onside!

[Haiduk]

Lukashenko сalled Zelenskiy a "nit" and said "the challenge has issued" - this was his belated reaction on drone atack on A-50 on Machulishchi airfield. Lukashenko claimed KGB arrested over 20 people involved in preparation and execution of this attack, and threten to reach all those, who ran away abroad 

He also blamed SBU and Ukraine in preparation of this action, because "he thought Ukraine really wants a peace", but now he sees Ukraine wants to pull Belarus into the war with assistance of USA.

SBU answered they will noе comment words of Lukashenko and sttories about all "cottons" over Ukrianian border will be available only after the victory. 

Thus, Lukashenko confirmed, that real attack took place and A-50 got damages. And let its weren't critical, but this plane was took out of action and has flown to Taganrog for antenna repairing since about a week after attack

 

Edited March 7, 2023 by Haiduk

[kraze]

21 hours ago, Haiduk said:

Examples? Especially Chaikovskiy %). They were people of own time. Cancelling of Russian classics for "ukrainophobia" is the same sh...t like cancelling of J.Washigton and A.Linkoln by idiotic leftists for "racism". 

If we cancel old Russian culture for anti-Ukrainism, well, let cancel also Polish writer Henryk Sienkiewich for his "By fire and sword" - pure anti-ukrainian thing, and director Hofman - who filmed a movie.

We can cancel Chaikovskiy, but we can't cancel his contribution in world culture. So, why? In WWII also all German was under taboo. German philosophers, writers, musicians. This is just emotions of war. We must cancel all existing in Russian culture, who actively inspired the war, who sow a dirt and sh..t on brains and souls like Mikhalkov, Morgenshtern or Skabeyeva, but not Mendeleyev or Pushkin or to prohibit classical comedy movies of Haidai. Though, of course, we don't need parks of Pushkin and streets of Pushkin in each town and city. 

Chaikovsky wrote several works designed to promote russian imperialism, in particular "Mazepa" based on Pushkin's anti-Ukrainian poem Poltava, where Chaikovsky equally depicted Mazepa as a traitorous greedy trash who sold out for western money.

https://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/Мазепа_(опера)

And last time I've checked nobody is basing education in US or Poland on works of "art" spreading hatred towards other people. In Russia reading dehumanizing works in schools is mandatory.

Add to that the context of people that grew up with that kind of "education" that tells them that everyone but muscovites is subhuman - are actively trying to kill every one of us now - and there you have the primary reason for "canceling" russian "culture" here.

Nobody even tried to "cancel" russian stuff until they decided to do another genocide again. And I doubt in Ukraine we will lose much by not having russian "culture" represented in operas or libraries. People have internet if they absolutely want to feel dirty by reading russian rape poems.

[Grigb]

1 hour ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

To clarify the above - this pertains to the Bachmut area only. In Vuhledar and Maryinka sectors the RUS are bitching about paucity of shells, tubes and worn out barrels. Seems like the artillery was exceptionally concentrated in Bachmut. Possibly Prigozyn won the battle over resources for some time

Prig had a considerably superior supply of artillery/shells till lately. He appears to have succeeded to draw a large number of resources towards Bakhmut at the expense of all other directions. It is the real cause for the Wagnerites' better performance compared to RU army.

Right now, it appears that Prig was denied ammunition (or was given normal supply of shells like everybody else) hence the scandal.

[Grigb]

About current RU losses:

Quote

Dima Bastrakov went to bury our Lyosha . He wrote to me from Rostov [Rostov-on-Don]:

"For the third hour I watch how the stiffened bodies are packed into coffins, sometimes wringing their hands. They are changed into a green uniform, [given] cross into their hands, closed off [in coffins]. [I am] help[ing].

I've seen all sorts of things. But this is p-z [f*cked up]. Endless Urals with bodies. Endless."

A clarification - pay attention to the infamous RU word P-z. That emotional marker about extreme seriousness of the situation. We have RU Nat who fought a whole year and still he is shocked with current RU losses. 

And we know why he was so shocked - BBC RU service

Quote

Five times more than usual: what is known about Russia's losses in Ukraine by mid-February

Over the past 14 days, the number of confirmed losses has exceeded the usual weekly figures by five times.

Fivefold increase in confirmed deaths. 

[Maciej Zwolinski]

14 minutes ago, Grigb said:

Fivefold increase in confirmed deaths. 

Also, since a few days the official reported losses by UKR ministry of defence show very significant losses of RU artillery. A solid counterbattery effort - could that signify preparations for a counteratack somewhere?

[Haiduk]

3 minutes ago, kraze said:

Chaikovsky wrote several works designed to promote russian imperialism, in particular "Mazepa" based on Pushkin's anti-Ukrainian poem Poltava, where Chaikovsky equally depicted Mazepa as a traitorous greedy trash who sold out for western money.

"Poltava" is not "special-anti-Ukrainian", it just glorifies Russian victory and reflects Russian vision of Mazepa as a traitor (and he mentioned only several times in the poem). So, what a difference with Sienkiewich and "his story is anti-Khmelnitskiy only, not anti-Ukrainian in whole"? So, let cancel Sienkiewich too?  Or we should go further - claim very popular in Ukraine Polish song "Hey, sokoly" also like "imperialistic" and "culture appropriative" (because Polish nobleman in it sad about "green Ukraine" and the girl, which he left there) 

We can't blame people of 18-19 century that lived with own knowledges and vision of world and order of things.  

Even among Ukrainans the level of national self-identification was too low even before WWI. Hard work and poor access to normal education didn't leave too much time for thinking about this. And don't forget too, that our national genius Taras Shevchenko, who woke up national memory inside usual people masses, was redeemed from serfdom by Russian cultural doers.

46 minutes ago, kraze said:

People have internet if they absolutely want to feel dirty by reading russian rape poems.

I'm recalling "Heather ale" by L.Stivenson, which we tought in middle classes ) 

[Haiduk]

32 minutes ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

A solid counterbattery effort - could that signify preparations for a counteratack somewhere?

Most probably just Excaliburs have arrived in proper number and we can not save on shells.  

Edited March 7, 2023 by Haiduk

[Haiduk]

25th airborne brigade claimed five destroyed Russian tanks near Chervonopopivka village, 9 km NW from Kreminna

 

 

[kevinkin]

On the air war:

https://www.airandspaceforces.com/ukraine-has-lost-60-aircraft-taken-down-70-in-russian-invasion-hecker-says/

Ukraine has lost roughly 60 aircraft so far since Russia’s renewed invasion of the country in February 2022, while the Russians have lost more than 70, according to the top U.S. Air Force commander for Europe. After Russia’s larger air force failed to establish air superiority in the early days of the war, the air picture has turned into a mutually denied environment, Gen. James B. Hecker said March 6 at the AFA Warfare Symposium.

 “Ukraine’s downed over 70 Russian aircraft. So both of their integrated air and missile defense, especially when you’re talking about going against aircraft, they’ve been very effective. And that’s why they’re not flying over one another’s country.”

The U.S. has attempted to bolster Ukraine’s air force with AGM-88 HARM anti-radiation missiles, which have been jerry-rigged to work with the country’s Soviet-designed fighters.

“Obviously, they’re not as integrated with the airplane as it would be if they’re on the U.S. aircraft, so they do have limitations,” Hecker said of Ukraine’s employment of HARMs. “But they’re doing a pretty good job.”

The U.S. has also recently provided Ukraine’s air force with JDAM precision-guided bombs that have extended the Ukrainians’ strike capability. Hecker said that allows them to hit targets slightly beyond the current range of the GMRLS rockets fired by HIMARS launchers. The GMLRS rockets the U.S. has provided Ukraine have a range of nearly 50 miles. The U.S. has declined to provide Ukraine with long-range ATACMS missiles which have a range of nearly 200 miles.

“Recently, we’ve just got them some precision munitions that had some extended range and can go a little bit further than a gravity drop bomb,” Hecker said. “And it has precision. That’s a recent capability that we were able to give them probably in the last three weeks. But Ukraine still must fly low to terrain mask its aircraft against Russian surface-to-air missiles."

Flying low and longer range don't exactly go together so I wonder if the GLSDB is being deployed in test amounts? 

 

[Haiduk]

Russians issued in TG new video with other UKR captive execution. 

In that time RU milbloggers,  who kept silence about yesterday video, this day already claimed about "staged video". Later, when comamnd of 30th mech.brigade confirmed that was their soldier, who was considered as MIA since 3rd of Feb after the clashes near Zaliznians'ke village (NW from Bakhmut), Russian propagandists have rebooted in the air and claimed this is Ukrainian "barrier troops" shot out deserter as if this did Russians. 

And what Russian liberals? Most of them ignored this video. Just one complained, soldiers have to be limited in usage of gadgets on frontline. Other issued a video in Youtube with a name "Putin's soldiers shot out UKR captive". Not Russian but "Putin's" 

[kevinkin]

On China:

https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/03/06/china-russia-war-taiwan-ukraine-peace-plan-xi-putin/

 Instead, China prefers measures be debated multilaterally by the U.N. Security Council, where Beijing and Moscow wield vetoes. Undoubtedly, the U.S. and European Union-led sanctions regime on Russia has exacerbated Beijing’s dread that it, too, could someday be economically hobbled. But whereas Russia turned to economically more powerful China for support, Beijing would largely be on its own if the situation were reversed. That stark realization undergirds China’s intensifying self-sufficiency push, which is aimed at sanctions-proofing its economy. Those measures include establishing a yuan-based commodities trading scheme and developing the Cross-Border Interbank Payments System, augmented by the digital yuan, to enable sanctioned entities to dodge SWIFT, the Western-controlled global payments network.

[Battlefront.com]

3 hours ago, Ales Dvorak said:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/daily/march99/marine5.htm

Not really relevant as it was an accident in question, not an intentional act.  However, it reinforces what I said which is that military personnel need to be held accountable for their actions when they are outside of legally justifiable parameters.  However, "justice" is a more difficult goal to obtain.  Just like any legal environment (criminal, civil, military, civilian), justice is often elusive.

In the case of Russia accountability has to be imposed upon them from the outside since Russia itself has no interest in being held accountable.

Steve

[poesel]

16 hours ago, chuckdyke said:

Siberia? Not really belonging to Europe in their eyes. Kazakhstan moves closer to the west. I wonder why this is.

 

16 hours ago, danfrodo said:

I am guessing "make friends w folks that have fossil fuels?" and protect their new soveriegnty via weapons & support.  In exchange for nice oil concessions, of course.  

 

14 hours ago, dan/california said:

There is an interesting side question about Japan and Kamchatka. If Russia was really cracking up the Japanese would pay some incomprehensibly large bribes to get Kamchatka back. Not to mention promising to turn the entire Island into a construction site. The Free Republic of the Kuriles" might have to last a whole month as an independent country before it was welcomed back to the bosom of the Rising Sun with literal cargo ships full of Yen.

Japan and Kamchatka is an angle I hadn't thought of. But that would collide with China's interest in having unrestricted access to the Pacific.

China could occupy or vassalize Siberia. Occupying it would put China in the club of Arctic Sea neighbors, which might create opposition from the other club members.

No matter in which way China controls Siberia, it would have the same problem as Russia: how to get the resources south. But then China is good at long term planning, so they may have the patience to build a pipeline.
And they could do another thing: there is only one railway north that ends in Yakutsk. If that were to be extended to the arctic sea, China could finally have a port with unrestricted access to the Atlantic. By the time this is finished, the Arctic Sea would be ice free most of the time.

I'm not sure how much all of that is an incentive for China not to support Russia too hard.

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, Haiduk said:

25th airborne brigade claimed five destroyed Russian tanks near Chervonopopivka village, 9 km NW from Kreminna

 

 

I know it is anecdotal, but I feel we've been seeing more videos of Russian staging positions being hit appearing in the last week or so.  Could be the nature of OSINT creating a false image of an increased attention on behind the lines concentrations, or it could be that there's a real uptick in such missions.  If history is to be used as a guide, we should be expecting Ukraine to start increasing such attacks as that is what it has done in the past ahead of larger offensive operations.

Steve

[The_Capt]

4 hours ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

Pre-HIMARS he was justified to drum those drums. I think that everybody then was laughing at snail's pace of Russian offensive, but only because we were not getting accurate asessments of UKR losses. Russians were not getting land, but they were killing a lot of UKR - that was the moment before their getting M777 and after they started to run out of 152/122 mm ammo. UKR were trading people for artillery shells.

The surprising arrival of HIMARs gave UKR some breathing space, and quick deliveries of Western guns and ammo stabilised the situation.  So I would say Kofman's early predictions got HIMARSed together with RUS ammo depots. To his credit, Kofman was correct in pointing out what the Russian weakness was (lack of infantry) and that it will hurt RUS heavily. In essence, after HIMARS he correctly predicted the mechanism, if not the precise location, of the Kharkiv-Izium-Lyman counterattack. 

I think Steve answered this one pretty well.  Kofman was pretty much way off at the beginning of this war, but to his credit did get better over time.  In fact we noted how much we were in agreement in that last podcast.

As to last year, this forum was one of the only places that saw the war as clearly driving towards Russian disadvantage from very early on.  And again, the RA did collapse, twice.  We predicted a collapse was likely (all the indicators were there) while most were crying about how Russia was turning it into a war of attrition.

And Kofman really did not understand the impact of HIMARs as far as I could see.

”Kofman on HIMARS. "I think I've seen Ukrainians use it in a very effective manner over the last two weeks. The Russian military is going to do what they can to adapt and probably its effectiveness will degrade over time." New weapons most effective when first introduced, he says.”

whoops.

[billbindc]

9 hours ago, The_Capt said:

To do it would mean Russia is managing its own form of corrosive warfare. It is able to attrit with precision on the front and in depth while throwing human waves forward.

And we are back to ISR, we know they do have some, but we also get reports they do not have enough.  And of course if they have that level of resolution, why throw in human waves?  Instead they could poke, prod and hammer being able to see.

As far as we can tell the RA does not even have the firepower advantages it had last summer.  We know the AirPower situation has not changed.

Someone is going need to really unpack this with some proof.

Pure anecdote but I was watching an interview the other day with an old Brit war journo nearish to Bakhmut. They were talking about where the front line was and the old chap was saying basically a couple of km that way and a couple the other. This was being done standing around, in the clear by a gas station and I couldn't help but think that really said something about the general state of the Russian attack. It's a blunt instrument right on the line without much penetrative depth at all.

[Battlefront.com]

4 hours ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

Pre-HIMARS he was justified to drum those drums. I think that everybody then was laughing at snail's pace of Russian offensive, but only because we were not getting accurate asessments of UKR losses. Russians were not getting land, but they were killing a lot of UKR - that was the moment before their getting M777 and after they started to run out of 152/122 mm ammo. UKR were trading people for artillery shells.

The surprising arrival of HIMARs gave UKR some breathing space, and quick deliveries of Western guns and ammo stabilised the situation.  So I would say Kofman's early predictions got HIMARSed together with RUS ammo depots. To his credit, Kofman was correct in pointing out what the Russian weakness was (lack of infantry) and that it will hurt RUS heavily. In essence, after HIMARS he correctly predicted the mechanism, if not the precise location, of the Kharkiv-Izium-Lyman counterattack. 

I agree that the situation for Ukraine was always "fluid" and that it could have resulted in the stalemate that Kofman spoke of.  However, I still think his characterization of this period of the war was skewed in the wrong direction.

What I saw from him was that Russia still had tricks up its sleeve and Ukraine didn't.  He painted a picture that it was basically a matter of time before Russia's tricks would overcome all defeats it had so far suffered and there wasn't much Ukraine could do about it.  As the war moved away from February his opinion of what Russian "victory" might look like evolved to something more-or-less plausible, but the basis was still on Russia's overwhelming numbers would crush Ukraine.  This painted a pretty dim view of Ukraine's chances of defeating Russia on the battlefield.

Others, myself included, saw Russian numbers as being more limited in quantity and definitely less effective than Kofman credited them with.  We also saw what Ukraine was doing with what it currently had on hand and, even without HIMARS, saw reasons to think Russia wasn't going to end the war on its terms any time soon.  We also saw that, unlike Russia, Ukraine was the one that had tricks up its sleeves.  The smashing of Snake Island, the sinking of the Moskva, strikes on Crimea, etc. were hints that Ukraine was the one to watch for surprises.  We also looked at the support from the West and figured that it would soon make a difference on the battlefield.  And the whole time we saw no realistic scenario for Russia countering these new threats or improving its skills at waging war.

A perfect example of this was Russia's "Easter Offensive" to take the Donbas.  I went on the record here stating that it was going to end in disaster.  I even called out when it would effectively run out of steam.  I was correct on both counts.  And guess what?  Ukraine had no HIMARS or Excaliburs on hand.  It was still using Soviet era ammo.  It was still wildly under equipped compared to Russia.  And yet Russia got the stuffing knocked out of it.

This is the sort of stuff that Kofman and others were missing at the time, but others were not.

Steve

[Bulletpoint]

1 hour ago, Haiduk said:

And what Russian liberals? Most of them ignored this video.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/xgdmdn/russian-law-fifteen-years-jail-tweeting-ukraine-war

March 4: Russia’s lower parliament unanimously passed a law on Friday morning that will criminalize sharing what the Kremlin determines is “fake” information about the country’s armed forces, with punishments ranging from fines of $45,000 to prison terms of up to 15 years.

While the new law is being seen primarily as yet another nail in the coffin of a free press in Russia, the wording of the legislation is so broad that it applies not only to journalists and media outlets, but to any citizen expressing their opinion.

[Battlefront.com]

4 hours ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

Many Ukrainian reports discuss huge advantage in artillery on RUS side - like 10:1 advantage in tubes, plus resurgence of shell shortage on UKR side.  How serious it is in proportion to RUS shell shortage, impossible to guess, but it is there on the UKR side as well. Also mortar shortage and mortar shell shortage - this is just on the UKR side.

If you are the guy in the trench and getting hammered over and over again with artillery, your opinion is going to be very different than the rear unit that is untouched by artillery.  We just had a report the other day that the Ukrainian LOCs into Bakhmut are untouched by artillery.  It is also a fact that artillery activity across the entire front is down to little more than harassing fire compared to what Russia was doing for the first half of last year. The shortages are apparent.

4 hours ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

Advantage in artillery fires is how RUS achieved favourable loss ratios in Donbas in spring 2022  before the great HIMARSing- I think it is not disputed by now that UKR were losing more men at that time, despite RUS being on the offensive.

I dispute this   First, we don't have a clue what the Russian losses or Ukrainian losses were.  Second, all battles have different phases and what might be true for one phase or sector might not be true for another.  What we can pretty well say is that when Russia wanted a particular sector of front to bleed it could make it bleed.  However, we also saw that Russia didn't limit itself to pounding Ukraine with artillery, but instead launched dozens if not hundreds of uncoordinated small scale attacks that were decimated by Ukrainian fire.  The Oryx reports constantly confirmed Russian losses were high throughout this time period.

4 hours ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

Additionally, RUS have gained in positional terms. They are on the 3 sides of Bakhmut on the high ground so crossfire opportunities are available. Also all kinds of fire over the voie sacree from Chasiv Yar are possible - films show crashed cars around the road. Moreover, there are in the city now fighting block by block with less cover differential between the attacker and defender. While that kind of fighting is technically difficult for the attacker, the research shows that after the dust settles the overall casualty ratio tends to be closer than in open country fighting. Finally, the sacrificial zeks are not used anymore/all dead by now so those casualty rich zek/zerg rushes do not happen so often.

Right, but you're cherry picking here.  Russia has been attacking for the better part of... what... 8 months now?  And for almost all of that time its gains have been measured in meters, not kilometers.  We also saw the hilarious examples of Russia taking the same meaningless bit of terrain a half dozen times, not because they got kicked out and retook it but because they kept prematurely announcing a great victory in taking a gas station or chicken shed.

So no, I flat out reject any argument based on the evidence that Russia has had anything other than an abysmal exchange rate of casualties for this battle.  The problem for Ukraine is that Russia has sacrificed so many bodies and resources for this battle that even the highly favorable loss ratio for Ukraine still results in a cumulatively high body count of its soldiers.  By some accounts Russia lost 40,000 Zeks alone.  At a loss ratio of 1:4 that still means Ukraine lost 10,000 soldiers.  That's a huge number.

4 hours ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

Summing up, there are reasons why the casualty ratio reported by Muzyka may be accurate now. Depending over what period you want to calculate it. 

Sure, just as when there was reporting of 1:7 favoring Ukraine might have been accurate too.  Which is why it is not productive to focus on small slices of time or frontage.

4 hours ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

Anecdotally, on the films released recently by Bakhmut defenders the narrators seem to me like they were consciously describing the fighting in a more positive way than it is really warranted.Telling white lies to maintain the morale at home. Cannot point to anything specific, but something in the choice of words, the non verbal posture, etc. So I think Muzyka is correct

Of course the situation in Bakhmut sucks for Ukraine and even the smallest positive comments are putting a happy face on for whomever is listening.  It means little.

Steve