How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[NamEndedAllen]

1 hour ago, Kinophile said:

https://taskandpurpose.com/tech-tactics/army-green-berets-test-silent-arrow-gd-2000-cargo-delivery-drone/?amp

1500 Lbs sent 40km,,accurately. Seems like a winner. 

Saw interesting details on this fully autonomous Blackhawk used as a drone mentioned within reporting on an exercise last year: https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2022/10/militarys-network-warfare-experiment-scaled-year/378790/

The experiment featured an autonomous Black Hawk delivering more than 3,000 lbs of cargo in support of conventional and special operations forces. That demonstration caps eight-plus years of development and experimentationby DARPA, the Army, and Black Hawk-maker Sikorsky to fly a fully autonomous Black Hawk in an actual exercise. Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville emphasized that artificial intelligence was used not only for autonomous flight, but also for predicting maintenance and resupply of troops. 

[danfrodo]

2 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Guest essay in the NY Times (paywall, probably) about why Russians fight.  Nothing new, but it is a good summary of how male ego, propaganda, and poverty are driving Russians to willingly go to war.  The same things also lead to them thinking the war is "just". 

At the end the authors presented the same possibility of support collapsing as you've seen me repeat over and over again.  The incompetence, broken promises, losses at the front, etc. add up and opposition to the war might finally become meaningful (even if it is only draft dodging on a large scale).  However, they also put forward the possibility that Russia might be in such a deep state of psychosis that, like a death cult, people will stick to Putin all the way to the end. 

Over the past year I've become more and more convinced that the only way support for the war will end is if the frontline collapses.  Meaning Ukraine not only takes back large swaths of territory in some dramatic fashion, but also kills/captures a large chunk of the Russian forces while doing so.  Even then I think Russian support will remain strong, however it won't be enough to keep the war going due to equipment lost in such a collapse.  Russia simply doesn't have the ability to replace such large quantities of stuff at all, not to mention quickly.

Of all the things Putin has gotten right with this war is successfully shedding the last vestiges of a modern country and transitioning it to a medieval state.

Steve

I think no matter what happens there will be a pervasive 'stabbed in the back' mythology that most russians will believe.  They were sabotaged by NATO, gays, intellectuals, the underground satanist movement, etc, whatever each idiot picks & chooses from what I am sure will be a long list.  The bigger the loss, the bigger the conspiracy to explain it.  They won't go from thinking RU is a world power to realizing their world view is a great big lie.  Some will, but most won't.  The funny thing is that there is actually a conspiracy to defeat RU in Ukraine.  The actual one which is NATO, EU, US all working to stop this terrorist nation.

[danfrodo]

Short video of UKR soldier in trench fighting first w grenade launcher then w rifle.  Interestingly he seems adept at firing both right & left handed -- is that normal in training nowadays or is he just special?

 

 

[dan/california]

 

Quote

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/01/world/asia/china-russia-ukraine-war.html?action=click&algo=bandit-all-surfaces-variants-shadow-lda-unique-diversify-time-cutoff-30&alpha=0.05&block=trending_recirc&fellback=false&imp_id=553707431&impression_id=d3912fda-d0bc-11ed-b408-3b874f2269fa&index=3&pgtype=Article&pool=pool%2F5bffce26-a993-4ed4-af7d-8894fdf413ca&region=footer&req_id=579520410&shadow_vec_sim=0.29287041969027405&surface=eos-most-popular-story&variant=0_pers_bandit_diversified

A long, well written article about the lessons China is drawing from the Ukraine war. Primary lessons learned.

1) Putin waving the nuclear stick has been effective at keeping NATO from doing more in Ukraine. Waving the nuclear stick will be China's primary strategy to keep the U.S. from committing to defending Taiwan.

2) Starlink has been absolutely critical. They need their own version, and a way to take Starlink down.

3) They seem to be absorbing many of the lessons the board has discussed at length. Don't bleep up your supply lines, do have enough infantry, no such thing as too many drones, and so on.

My two main take aways.

1) A war over Taiwan will absolutely trash EVERYTHING in low earth orbit. There needs to be a plan to deal with that, a good well resourced program to deal with that. The economic damage will be vast too, but a war over Taiwan is going to trash the world economy regardless.

2) The U.S. needs to put a truly large military force on the ground in Taiwan. Large enough to reduce ambiguity to zero. I like the entire Marine division idea, but regardless it needs to big enough that their is no question that the U.S. is going to fight. Ambiguity is how Ukraine happened, if we make it absolutely clear attacking Taiwan is starting a war with the U.S. China might not do it. I have real doubts about anything less, barring a complete change in China's approach.

My two cents, worth what you paid.

 

[DesertFox]

Good candidate for the turret throwing contest...

 

 

[Kinophile]

https://interestingengineering.com/innovation/australia-ukraine-cardboard-drones

Cardboard supply Drones,  Ikea flatpack style. 

[dan/california]

12 minutes ago, DesertFox said:

Good candidate for the turret throwing contest...

 

 

 I make it 8 or nine seconds, just for reference, per google...

 

Quote

 

5.71 Seconds

 

Longest NFL Punt Recorded, 67 yards, 5.71 Seconds Hang Time, Tommy Townsend Kansas City Chiefs.Oct 14, 2020

 

 

 

[Beleg85]

Pretty interesting sum up of problems faced by Ukrainian military from insider. A lot of them were mentioned here many times, particulary by Ukrainin members.

 

[Haiduk]

Russia launched mass production of primitive FPV-kamikadze drones with stupid name "Boomerang"

This is small drone with hanged explosives like grenade or small HE charge. Episodical usage of these drones were pointed out about one or two months so far, but now Russia claims they have capablities to produce it in huge numbers. There was a photo when several men of city bakery assemble such drones from parts. 

One of "Boomerangs" was captured intact and was disassembled. There is no sanction list parts in it:

https://mil.in.ua/uk/news/spetsialisty-pokazaly-nachynku-trofejnogo-drona-kamikadze-bumerang/ (in UKR)

Body of drone is a flat piece of usual fiberglass. It has also Foxeer camera, videotransmitter Reaper Extreme, antenna and receiver BetaFPV, four electro-motors F80 Pro KV1900 

 

Edited April 1, 2023 by Haiduk

[danfrodo]

A summary for today from my usual source.  Says a russian frigate reported to have been hit?  Not war changing but always fun to punch RU navy.  Plus some good visuals.  And a video at the top that makes my blood boil at what Putin has done.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/4/1/2161475/-Ukraine-Update-Battle-of-Kyiv-was-the-most-decisive-battle-but-Bakhmut-may-be-just-as-important

While I am typing, I may as well share something I've been thinking about.  I think there's actually a lot of comparisons b/w UKR & Vietnam wars, politically.  Both were wars of choice that were initially sold as a modest operation but massively escalated and later sold as existential (stop commies in VN instead of San Fran!).  Both were undertaken for political reasons -- wars of choice.  Both wars continued because the highest level leaders felt they'd lose face and would be ruined w/o some kind of victory, despite the ruinous cost to the country of continuing.  Both are wars where one side could simply choose to walk away from a foreign land. 

[Haiduk]

Recently UKR captured almost intact Lancet, which was caught by defensive netting over 2S1 howitzer. Now we have preliminary results of its disassembling: https://mil.in.ua/uk/news/v-ukrayini-pokazaly-nachynku-trofejnogo-lantseta/

The module, responsible for computing is Jetson TX2 of NVidia company. 

 

Also was identified SOC Xilinx Zynk 

Other chips had worn out markings.

Auxiliary plastid charge in the tail of drone

[akd]

30 minutes ago, danfrodo said:

Says a russian frigate reported to have been hit?

Check the calendar please.

[Beleg85]

https://www.ft.com/content/f85aa254-d453-4542-a50e-fa1171971ab0

One of Europe’s largest manufacturers of ammunition is facing a roadblock to the planned expansion of its largest factory because a new data centre for TikTok is using up all the spare electricity in the area. Nammo, which is co-owned by the Norwegian government and a Finnish state-controlled defence company, has been told there is no surplus energy for its Raufoss plant in central Norway as a data centre that counts the social media platform as its main customer is using up the electricity in the region. “We are concerned because we see our future growth is challenged by the storage of cat videos,” Morten Brandtzæg, Nammo chief executive, told the Financial Times.

Let's hope with ramped up ammo production, more defence-oriented Scandinavia and admission of Finland into NATO (and Sweden some day) such situations will become rare. There was a discussion on the Polish milnet lately of how new, very long border with Russia will influence NATO future- Finns of course will handle themselves perfectly well, but most probably there will be additional NATO units rotated there in the future, hopefully Polish too.

Btw. I observed Russian "public" discussions last week more closely and still can't get over the fact that so few of them (except several nationalists and sober defence experts) were bothered with such historic, obvious and objective sign of Putin's geostrategic failure as Baltic becoming de facto NATO lake. Their selective thiniking has some strong Ancient Greek tragedy vibes- like you know you are losing, you know you could stop it any moment, but something inside you forbids doing so.

[Battlefront.com]

53 minutes ago, Beleg85 said:

Btw. I observed Russian "public" discussions last week more closely and still can't get over the fact that so few of them (except several nationalists and sober defence experts) were bothered with such historic, obvious and objective sign of Putin's geostrategic failure as Baltic becoming de facto NATO lake. Their selective thiniking has some strong Ancient Greek tragedy vibes- like you know you are losing, you know you could stop it any moment, but something inside you forbids doing so.

It is consistent with everything else we know about the Russian mindset; lots of bluster before something happens, near silence after.  Whether it is Lavrov or random babushka interviewed on the street, it's the same thing.  It is understandable because Russia draws "red lines" all over the place, so many that it is probably hard for people to keep track of them all, not to mention rank in any sort of order of importance.  Credit where credit is due... the Soviets were far more selective and consistent about their messaging.  Then again, the lack of Internet back then kinda required that sort of discipline.

The selective thinking part of this is consistent with conspiracy theory mindsets.  No matter how many "facts" or much "logic" the person is forced to admit to being wrong about, the underlying theory remains intact.  And let's be clear, Russia's entire culture is deliberately built on this mindset.  We can see the advantages of it pretty clearly with this war.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Here's a video of Russian propaganda video (English subtitles) talking about the need to "liberate the brotherly Finnish people"

https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarRoom/comments/128mtj1/russian_propagandists_talk_about_the_need_to/

They are funny

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Apparently the newly created 82nd Assault Brigade is the ones that are working with Stykers:

https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarRoom/comments/12800m0/paratroopers_of_the_newly_formed_82nd_assault/

And a bunch of good articles on RFE/RL

1.  Russians tried to find out who told their warship to go f itself by doing the usual things... torture.  Apparently nobody cracked:

https://www.rferl.org/a/ukraine-soldier-russian-warship-search-/32343763.html
 

2.  Russia has banned dairy products from Armenia because of alleged health concerns, a typical Russian excuse for political retaliation.  More indications of where the relationship between Armenia and Russia is headed:

https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-armenia-dairy-products-ban/32344893.html

 

3.  Another article on Russian conscripts not getting paid what they are owed:

https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-soldiers-salaries-unpaid-ukraine-invasion/32345161.html

Steve

[chuckdyke]

 

[Beleg85]

49 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

It is consistent with everything else we know about the Russian mindset; lots of bluster before something happens, near silence after.  Whether it is Lavrov or random babushka interviewed on the street, it's the same thing.  It is understandable because Russia draws "red lines" all over the place, so many that it is probably hard for people to keep track of them all, not to mention rank in any sort of order of importance.  Credit where credit is due... the Soviets were far more selective and consistent about their messaging.  Then again, the lack of Internet back then kinda required that sort of discipline.

The selective thinking part of this is consistent with conspiracy theory mindsets.  No matter how many "facts" or much "logic" the person is forced to admit to being wrong about, the underlying theory remains intact.  And let's be clear, Russia's entire culture is deliberately built on this mindset.  We can see the advantages of it pretty clearly with this war.

Steve

This is all very true, but still even depoliticized, average Russian citizen viewing this pitfull war should start to ask serious questions "how do we win this?" at this moment. Instead they serve them this constant, never-ending show of phantom historical phantasis about nuking Warsaw, Suvorov (reportedly) beating somebody 200 years ago in Switzerland, nuking Washington, their tanks flattering Berlin, nuking Berlin, nuking Helsinki (they seem to have some unverbalized respect for Finns, though)- and that for hours. For first half of the year it was even humourous in some odd way- looking how much more dumb they may become, and admittedly they manage to be somewhat creative in it- but now it is just distatesful and nothing more. Entire country is knee-deep in this necrophilic aesthetic like taken from Siergiey Balabanov or Alexander Sokurov movies. Galeev was actually right, in retrospection, that it was this kind of absurd sadism we should view modern Russian mentallity throught (if one understand a little russian, there are many additional cultural layers in  propaganda- which make it even worse). Minced meat and mysticism. Observing this  process is literally like looking how fascism developed on your own eyes, accelerated within timespan of barely one year for viewer' own comfort.

Ok, I  give up on checking this propaganda for some time, it is really too sick. Just several takes from short journey into Mental Wildlands I wanted to share here, let's get back to topic.

Btw. this odd lack of care about Finlad/Sweden is showing perfectly how hollow are some "realistic" arguments about NATO supposedly expanding and creating danger for Russia.  Several angry Baltic fishermen can now effectively cut out Kaliningrad and Petersburg from ocean. Russian reaction-  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ .

Edited April 1, 2023 by Beleg85

[chris talpas]

4 hours ago, dan/california said:

 I make it 8 or nine seconds, just for reference, per google...

 

 

 

with regards to the tank turret

Call it roughly 4 seconds falling from max height and assuming negligible wind resistance

d=.5 g t^2
= 5 * 4^2
= 80 m.  =~240 ft

very impressive

Edited April 1, 2023 by chris talpas

[Dmytro Gadomskyi]

Depends on what case.

[cesmonkey]

For those that live in Ukraine, can we say that the mud season is over in the southern part of the front?

[Fernando]

9 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

It is consistent with everything else we know about the Russian mindset; lots of bluster before something happens, near silence after.  Whether it is Lavrov or random babushka interviewed on the street, it's the same thing.  It is understandable because Russia draws "red lines" all over the place, so many that it is probably hard for people to keep track of them all, not to mention rank in any sort of order of importance.  Credit where credit is due... the Soviets were far more selective and consistent about their messaging.  Then again, the lack of Internet back then kinda required that sort of discipline.

The selective thinking part of this is consistent with conspiracy theory mindsets.  No matter how many "facts" or much "logic" the person is forced to admit to being wrong about, the underlying theory remains intact.  And let's be clear, Russia's entire culture is deliberately built on this mindset.  We can see the advantages of it pretty clearly with this war.

Steve

Most of that people (in fact most of human beigns) suffers "cognitive dissonance".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance
 

In the field of psychology, cognitive dissonance is the perception of contradictory information and the mental toll of it. Relevant items of information include a person's actions, feelings, ideas, beliefs, values, and things in the environment. Cognitive dissonance is typically experienced as psychological stress when persons participate in an action that goes against one or more of those things.^[1] According to this theory, when two actions or ideas are not psychologically consistent with each other, people do all in their power to change them until they become consistent.^[1][2] The discomfort is triggered by the person's belief clashing with new information perceived, wherein the individual tries to find a way to resolve the contradiction to reduce their discomfort[...]

In short, when reality or other ideas conflict with one's own beliefs and ideas, there is a very marked psychological tendency to distort that reality and ideas to accommodate one's own ideas and beliefs.

It happens everywhere everytime. Here in Catalonia I have experienced it in an extraordinary way with the Catalan independence movement, which has seemed to live continuously in cognitive dissonance. It is not a rare phenomenon but a very common one.

Edited April 2, 2023 by Fernando

[Beleg85]

3 hours ago, Fernando said:

t happens everywhere everytime. Here in Catalonia I have experienced it in an extraordinary way with the Catalan independence movement, which has seemed to live continuously in cognitive dissonance. It is not a rare phenomenon but a very common one.

Of course heavily subsidized by Russia as well. One of reasons why even far Madrid also should have some beef with Kremlin.

Still hard to say if it was Putinist Russia making these postmodern ripples of "no-reality" across the West, fighting imagined enemies accidently drowned herself, or simply it is another episode of their constant, historical mental state just now revealing itself again. But it is fascinating topic for historians.

Nice comedic Ukrainian video by soldier after hours- "Bakhmut is almost sorrounded, we are cut off from food supplies and must stuff our bellies with what we find int he city. I don't know how we will handle. [eat sushi and pizza]. We don't know how long we can hold on such ratios".

Edited April 2, 2023 by Beleg85

[Haiduk]

7 hours ago, cesmonkey said:

For those that live in Ukraine, can we say that the mud season is over in the southern part of the front?

Southerm oblasts weren't affected with last week snowfall, but next week will be rains on all Ukraine. Zaporizhzhia oblast will have rains every other day 

[Haiduk]

How looks the road Chasiv Yar - Khromove - Bakhmut.

The driver, approaching to hairpin curve (in Bohdanivka village area) says: "Motherf....rs sat in 200 m left from this place". Along all road there are destroyed pick-ups, jeeps, BTR-4. MaxPro and some armored car