How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[akd]

T-position continued, in which the Russians all get squished:

 

[DesertFox]

32 minutes ago, Yet said:

however, soldiers are also mainly assets on the Battlefield. so what are these soldiers worth? i wouldnt like to spend 1€ if the enemy spends 30 Zimbabwean dollars. 

Buying time or territory. That is what soldiers lifes are for. I am pretty sure UKR knows how to spent them wisely.

[Kinophile]

Hacking a Dildo's account to buy Dildos instead of Drones. 

 

 

[Haiduk]

8 minutes ago, akd said:

T-position continued, in which the Russians all get squished:

 

Abstract says that after the battle UKR assault group has taken captives and he told on position were 28 men. UKR tank wasted all ammo and only one shell left, so the tank bypassed mine daisy chain and just burried wagners  in this trench. After this enemy didn't try anymore to capture this location

[quakerparrot67]

5 hours ago, Cpl Steiner said:

I doubt a 60+ resident of a Northeast coastal town whose economy was devastated by EU fishing quotas cares a damn what Putin thinks, if they even use social media. The idea that Russia caused Brexit is pretty ridiculous.

they don't have to care, especially   when they don't know that the 'news' and 'information' being fed to them are bought and paid for by putin and his shills.

 

[Harmon Rabb]

The Russian prophet of doom, speaks again.

Edited April 3, 2023 by Harmon Rabb

[cesmonkey]

2 hours ago, Billy Ringo said:

Would it be possible to limit the name calling, "rural dimwits" "right wing looney's" and focus on the war in Ukraine? 

Thank you.

It makes one wonder if there if there are other discussions forums out there that do a better job at sticking to the war.

I found these other forums:

https://defencehub.live/threads/ukraine-russia-war.3279/
https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/119wltg/war_in_ukraine_megathread_lii/
https://www.reddit.com/r/UkrainianConflict/

Do people know of others?

 

[A Canadian Cat]

6 hours ago, Doc844 said:

Im tired (night shift) but did you just call me a right wing looney????

No, he said don't worry be happy and stop listening to over blown concerns raised by right wing looneys.

Edited April 3, 2023 by IanL

[Harmon Rabb]

17 minutes ago, cesmonkey said:

It makes one wonder if there if there are other discussions forums out there that do a better job at sticking to the war.

I found these other forums:

https://defencehub.live/threads/ukraine-russia-war.3279/
https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/119wltg/war_in_ukraine_megathread_lii/
https://www.reddit.com/r/UkrainianConflict/

Do people know of others?

 

In my experience I have not seen another place on the internet with as much knowledge on military matters as this forum that is discussing this war. Steve also does a fantastic job of keeping obvious pro-Kremlin trolls out of this discussion making the environment much healthier than discussions on Reddit or Twitter. 

When the discussion becomes off topic, I just ignore it until it gets back to the war in Ukraine.

[dan/california]

The thread always gets wonky when there isn't enough real news. Add in the fact that Putin's last, fractional excuse for  hope is cracks in the coalition backing Ukraine, and that involves working preexisting political fault lines.

[Butschi]

1 hour ago, DesertFox said:

I am pretty sure UKR knows how to spent them wisely.

I am pretty sure Ukrainian commanding officers are human beings too and not larger than life Sun Tzus. They are prone to make stupid decisions that cost lives like everyone else. The question is if they make stupid decisions less often or severe as their Russian counterparts and by what margin. Given that they are still in this war with the RA not looking all that good that seems to be the case and the margin large enough. Beyond that I think our information is too incomplete.

Edited April 3, 2023 by Butschi

[Holien]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-65161095

I love this quote

 

Quote

Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak blamed the blast on a Russian "internal political fight", tweeting: "Spiders are eating each other in a jar."

Looks like they have arrested an anti war protestor?

Although why she had a box to deliver?

N.B. As for the Brexit diversion, people really need to read what has actually been written and by whom in the thread - no more discussion is needed, just read and digest.

Now back to waiting for better weather and ground conditions....

[dan/california]

1 hour ago, Haiduk said:

Abstract says that after the battle UKR assault group has taken captives and he told on position were 28 men. UKR tank wasted all ammo and only one shell left, so the tank bypassed mine daisy chain and just burried wagners  in this trench. After this enemy didn't try anymore to capture this location

The short term lesson of this vid is that you really need to try and bring something with a 40mm AGL when you are assaulting a trench. The longer term lesson is that the programmable air burst rounds for tank main guns are worth the expense and in increased complication. 

[kimbosbread]

The US should show Europe who is boss and admit Ukraine + Moldova + Georgia to NAFTA. Forget the EU, our club is more awesome plus we have poutine and tacos.

[Beleg85]

2 hours ago, akd said:

T-position continued, in which the Russians all get squished:

-Another tank seem to be in support after suppressing other RU position, protected by the berm

-Hardly any muscovite moving in the trench after tank blow them point-blank.  Only one person seems visiblly alive in a hole from 5:00 onward and it sucks to be him. I may be wrong but it seems at 7:00 tank purposefully runs over dead body.

-Trench is thoroughly and veeery systematically levelled by machine's tracks; at several points it looks almost like it would bury itself.

-At 7:31 BMP with infantry on the top arrives. Desant secure the place or rather remnants. Curiously, BMP itself rides forward.

-at 9:00 UA soldiers tend the wounded, probably other Ukrainians hit during this attack (they could take some losses when camera was away) or even previously wounded owners of the trench, dig from beneath the remnants.

 

Edited April 3, 2023 by Beleg85

[kimbosbread]

8 hours ago, JonS said:

Something I've been waiting for for about 5 years now is for someone to fly a 'splody drone into or through the window of some VIP

Me too. I doubt we'll have to wait long though. On a similar subject, I wonder if there's gonna be a rapid evolution in sniper rifles soon, where the spotter + sniper converges with kamikaze drones.

[The_Capt]

2 hours ago, TheVulture said:

This I can definitely agree with. Just because Russian troll farms try and push certain talking points, or try to stir up and magnify disagreements in general, it doesn't automatically follow that they are creating problems that didn't exist before. Or even that they have much effect at all.

Britain joining the EU created (economic) winners and losers, and leaving the EU also creates winners and losers. Telling people who are genuinely better of personally for leaving the EU that they only think that because they've been fooled by Russian trolls is...odd. And for some people, the sovereignty issue *is* important and would still be a decisive factor even if they thought the country as a whole would be worse off. There have always been people who thought that, before the UK joined the EU, the whole time we were in, and during Brexit.

I don't agree with them in the slightest: I'm very pro UK being in the EU, and don't give a fig about nationalism and sovereignty vs the EU. But I can accept that others genuinely have different opinions for valid reasons that I just don't happen to share.

To dismiss the whole of Brexit as a result of Russian interference is to ignore that Britain really is very divided in attitudes to Europe and the EU in particular.

 

So I really do not have a dog in this whole EU fight but what I am seeing on both sides of the discussion are classic symptoms of information operations.  Russia has not simply been “troll farming”, evidence points to a re-emergence of subversive warfare doctrines re-tooled for the 21st century.  This is basically a lot of effort aimed at finding and exploiting the fractures and divisions in a society, leveraging that to either create negative decision (undeciding things, like EU membership), null decision (paralysis by rendering something undecidable) or positive decision (reflexive control type stuff where decisions are made that are in the interest of the sponsor, not the targeted state).

The things to watch out for just unfolded in these last two pages.  Polarized information spheres - Cpl S is clearly in one where the narrative is the EU is ruling the UK like a monarch to the detriment of the “working man”.  While others are being given evidence the EU was beneficial etc.  in reality there is enough truth in both to sustain the spheres and keep them accelerating away from each other - we saw the exact same thing with NAFTA here in NA.  The actual truth is almost immaterial, and is usually pretty mundane - something which some have glanced off of.

And then there is the agency reflex - “well I was not influenced”. Well you probably were, how much and how far it influenced your decisions is variable and likely linked to how much you cared (although there is plenty of evidence of apathy reinforcement).  The reality is that if you were involved in a decisive issue you likely have been influenced to a degree.

Now how successful Russia has been is a major problem.  If they have not been the reflex will be to ignore and continue, which is good for the sponsor of the campaign.  Or if it is over subscribed it hijacks heathy discourse and makes a boogeyman where none exists, also good for the sponsor.

We have seen the results right here - sides yell at each other pretty much abandoning any and all facts.  Someone leaves in a huff, which is pretty much what subversive sponsors want because meaningful discourse and compromise do nothing for their effort.  Agency reflex/active denial and actual facts getting lost in the noise.

Finally, the other place to watch for these sorts of things is on issues that are not only highly divisive but hang in a fine balance.  Subversion rarely works in creating massive landslides, they are not designed to and the costs are too high.  On tight races where a few thousand votes can swing things (or conversely in an autocratic society, a few key decision making nodes) this is where subversive warfare really kicks in.

Now as to how well Russia influenced Brexit?  Who really knows.  We do know they were involved and put some effort as it is in their interests to split up the EU.  How successfully they pulled that off would take a lot of effort to figure out.  But in reality the fact that people are still divided and yelling past each other is a pretty good sign they are still getting something out of the whole affair.

[Battlefront.com]

I'm going to wade back into the Brexit issue to tie back into the context of this war and why I brought it up in the first place.  I said this:

Quote

For sure it is a widespread problem.  Very often it is seen in individuals about things that are specific to them, but of course it scales up to shared delusions.  Sometimes very large movements are created based on cognitive dissonance reasoning. 

Supporters of Brexit are very similar to the Catalan independence movement in many ways.  Emotionally driven, hostile to rationale discussion, and enhanced by Russian manipulation to further Russian interests.  We have similar separatist movements like this in the United States, including a long running one in California and a new one in Oregon.  I live next to Quebec and that has quieted down for now.  All of these movements present themselves as the perfect solution to all problems and absolutely refuse to rationally discuss the downsides because it conflicts with the simplistic arguments in favor of separating.

One response to this was a perfect illustration of what I was speaking about.  Specifically, a point of view that is primarily emotional in nature and not based on a solid factual foundation.  Challenging the position on a factual basis, therefore, produces an emotional response instead of a reasoned factual one.  The most likely course of action by the one challenged is name calling and/or leaving the discussion in a huff in order to protect the emotionally held belief system from change.  That is "cognitive dissonance" in a nutshell.

The easiest example in the case of Brexit is supporters claim that pulling out of the EU would result in a sudden and massive influx of money into the British treasury from a combination of EU tax relief and increased economic activity freed up from EU regulations.  The argument never stood up to even cursory, common sense challenges, not to mention the application of detailed economic study.  The pro-Brexit movement leaders could have conceded this point and countered the long term gain as worth the price.  However, admitting Brexit would be detrimental to Britain's near term economic future would have likely lost them a huge chunk of support and so the pro-Brexit propaganda used the usual bag of tricks (lies, blame, insults, "whataboutisms", etc.) to maintain an obviously false promise.  Now that reality is crashing down on the British economy those same people use those same tricks in order to avoid taking responsibility for the costs of Brexit.  Brexit isn't to blame for the FUBAR at Dover, it's bad weather (just the most recent example).

Now, what does all of this have to do with Russia and why this was brought up in the first place?  Two things. 

First, Russian disinformation campaigns are not intended to sway large amounts of people to do something they aren't already predisposed to doing.  No, they specifically target "fence sitters" to increase the likelihood Russia gets a result it views as favorable.  Amplifying existing domestic disinformation campaigns is the most effective way to do that.  In the case of Brexit, all Russia had to do was help convince 2 people out of 100 that the British economy would be better off without the EU.  Given the fact that most people understand economics as well as they do quantum physics, this isn't very hard to do.  There is no way to know how much Russia's influence helped push Brexit over the 50% threshold, but it was greater than zero and in the end Russia got what it wanted.  Whatever Russia spent was well invested.

The second reason for bringing this whole thing up is because it shows the difference in scale of cognitive dissonance in Russia compared to Britain, the US, France, Poland, and even Hungary and Turkey.  In Russia there appears to be no significant counter to the irrational belief that Russia is powerful and is right to take whatever it wants however it wants.  Even in Hungary and Turkey there is significant pushback against this sort of mindset, with the autocratic leadership there maintaining their existence by a small amount (+/-5%).  So while it is true that cognitive dissonance about national identity is not a uniquely Russian affliction, it suffers from it to a degree that few countries on Earth do. 

The fundamental point for bringing this whole thing up in the first place is to argue that no matter what the specifics of Russia's defeat in Ukraine turn out to be, the Russian population is unlikely to change its mindset because they are not inclined to do it on their own and nobody will be able to force them into doing so.  Post war Russia will look more like post WW1 Germany vs. post WW2 Germany.  And we all know which Germany was the better one.

Steve

[poesel]

I have a good friend in the UK who is a brexiteer. I've discussed with him for a while and then dropped it.

He is feeling that the Brexit was the right thing, and no fact would (or will) change that. That is his opinion, and he has a right to it. Going by one's feelings is not a bad thing, and to be honest, most (or all) of us do it all the time. Just think about how you chose your car or phone or football team.

Problem is, that feelings can be influenced quite easily, while with facts this is much harder.

Aaaand Steve already said it much better

7 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Post war Russia will look more like post WW1 Germany vs. post WW2 Germany.  And we all know which Germany was the better one.

Not going to argue that, but post WWI Germany wasn't that bad. Without the global recession in 1929 there probably wouldn't have been WWII (at least not the one we know and love ).

[Grossman]

11 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

I'm going to wade back into the Brexit issue to tie back into the context of this war and why I brought it up in the first place.  I said this:

One response to this was a perfect illustration of what I was speaking about.  Specifically, a point of view that is primarily emotional in nature and not based on a solid factual foundation.  Challenging the position on a factual basis, therefore, produces an emotional response instead of a reasoned factual one.  The most likely course of action by the one challenged is name calling and/or leaving the discussion in a huff in order to protect the emotionally held belief system from change.  That is "cognitive dissonance" in a nutshell.

The easiest example in the case of Brexit is supporters claim that pulling out of the EU would result in a sudden and massive influx of money into the British treasury from a combination of EU tax relief and increased economic activity freed up from EU regulations.  The argument never stood up to even cursory, common sense challenges, not to mention the application of detailed economic study.  The pro-Brexit movement leaders could have conceded this point and countered the long term gain as worth the price.  However, admitting Brexit would be detrimental to Britain's near term economic future would have likely lost them a huge chunk of support and so the pro-Brexit propaganda used the usual bag of tricks (lies, blame, insults, "whataboutisms", etc.) to maintain an obviously false promise.  Now that reality is crashing down on the British economy those same people use those same tricks in order to avoid taking responsibility for the costs of Brexit.  Brexit isn't to blame for the FUBAR at Dover, it's bad weather (just the most recent example).

Now, what does all of this have to do with Russia and why this was brought up in the first place?  Two things. 

First, Russian disinformation campaigns are not intended to sway large amounts of people to do something they aren't already predisposed to doing.  No, they specifically target "fence sitters" to increase the likelihood Russia gets a result it views as favorable.  Amplifying existing domestic disinformation campaigns is the most effective way to do that.  In the case of Brexit, all Russia had to do was help convince 2 people out of 100 that the British economy would be better off without the EU.  Given the fact that most people understand economics as well as they do quantum physics, this isn't very hard to do.  There is no way to know how much Russia's influence helped push Brexit over the 50% threshold, but it was greater than zero and in the end Russia got what it wanted.  Whatever Russia spent was well invested.

The second reason for bringing this whole thing up is because it shows the difference in scale of cognitive dissonance in Russia compared to Britain, the US, France, Poland, and even Hungary and Turkey.  In Russia there appears to be no significant counter to the irrational belief that Russia is powerful and is right to take whatever it wants however it wants.  Even in Hungary and Turkey there is significant pushback against this sort of mindset, with the autocratic leadership there maintaining their existence by a small amount (+/-5%).  So while it is true that cognitive dissonance about national identity is not a uniquely Russian affliction, it suffers from it to a degree that few countries on Earth do. 

The fundamental point for bringing this whole thing up in the first place is to argue that no matter what the specifics of Russia's defeat in Ukraine turn out to be, the Russian population is unlikely to change its mindset because they are not inclined to do it on their own and nobody will be able to force them into doing so.  Post war Russia will look more like post WW1 Germany vs. post WW2 Germany.  And we all know which Germany was the better one.

Steve

The goal is to push the Russians back beyond their frontier and for them to sort out how they want their country to be. Ukraine, Georgia and the west want nothing more to do with the Russians.

[dan/california]

16 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

The fundamental point for bringing this whole thing up in the first place is to argue that no matter what the specifics of Russia's defeat in Ukraine turn out to be, the Russian population is unlikely to change its mindset because they are not inclined to do it on their own and nobody will be able to force them into doing so.  Post war Russia will look more like post WW1 Germany vs. post WW2 Germany.  And we all know which Germany was the better one.

Is this likely to be so bad the West is better off with extremely difficult scenario of Russia breaking up? Because a generation of Z, Z, Z, Z propaganda seems awfully likely to cue up another war. Putin has already gone completely bat bleep  with indoctrination in the schools.

Edited April 3, 2023 by dan/california

[kevinkin]

2 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Russia will look more like post WW1 Germany vs. post WW2 Germany.  And we all know which Germany was the better one.

If that is so, and I happen to agree, did the west have a better long term solution not involving a war like we are seeing? Turning Ukraine into an armed western camp might have been a deterrent. But short of that, Russia was on course for a WW1 type finale even with all types of "talks" and "sanctions". Maybe if the entire world turned them into a complete pariah and stop all relations, this would not have stopped the enviable. So maybe what is playing out is one of the most illogical logical events in history. It's as if Russian is addicted to self destruction. But like an addict, they know they are, but continue addictive behavior because they can't figure out there is a brighter side to life. 

[A Canadian Cat]

17 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

There is no way to know how much Russia's influence helped push Brexit over the 50% threshold, but it was greater than zero and in the end Russia got what it wanted.  Whatever Russia spent was well invested.

And even if it didn't push enough people to get over 50% they would have been close and the divisions would have remained a raw point in UK politics: Whatever Russia spent would still have been well invested.

As a Canadian I hate to think what a separation referendum would be like if it were held today instead of 1995. <shudder>

[billbindc]

<taps sign>

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/04/03/nord-stream-bombing-yacht-andromeda/

[masc]

New video on Russia's Assault Units: 

 

 

Interesting how at the heart of the unit is the two assault platoons with only 12 men each.  Seems to be a large commitment of support units for such few men.