How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Fenris]

2 hours ago, Haiduk said:

One more heavy interceptor MiG-31 crashed in Murmansk oblast. Pilots are ejected, but got heavy injuries. 

 

 

Another view, smoking in the cockpit again Yuri?

 

[NamEndedAllen]

1 hour ago, Centurian52 said:

What exactly do they intend to feed those 1 billion people after they've cut off diplomatic relations with every country on Earth except for Iran, North Korea, and China?

With lies, of course!

1 hour ago, JonS said:

Well, yeah? Some lawyers become lawmakers. Some lawyers become judges. Some sportspeople become coaches or sports administrators. Some workers become managers. Some doctors become specialists. Some doctors become hospital administrators. That's what people do - go where their experience and training lead them.

Getting waaaay off topic here. But there isn’t a Constitutional separation of hospital administrators and doctors! Admins don’t surrender their licenses to practice. The assertion was that the same people who make the laws here, do not enforce them. That’s the de jure. But de facto? It’s a bit more nuanced. In real life, the same people go back and forth, changing hats but carrying their baggage with them. The law makers and the adjudicators, administrating the law are often the same people. Just a year or two or so apart. Formally, they are supposed to check their baggage first. I think we all know that in practice it falls quite short of that. Which can and does get dicey. Fact of life and scandals. Maybe that’s ok, unavoidable. Fine. It’s just not quite so black and white.

Now back to our regularly scheduled war. 

[Fenris]

Obviously I hope that the various indicators we've seen of the poor state of the RU army are true, I think there's still going to be some hard yards in the months to come.

 

[kevinkin]

31 minutes ago, Centurian52 said:

I'm starting to think the CM AI is pretty realistic when it is controlling Soviet, Syrian, or Russian forces.

That's has been the thinking in wargaming over the many years now. AI is best suited to armies using directive control vs mission style control. (The Soviet style vs German and NATO doctrine). In CM, the AI scripts are pretty directive. But in the end the system is very good especially for a tactical game with such a high level of detail. 

[dan/california]

29 minutes ago, Fenris said:

Obviously I hope that the various indicators we've seen of the poor state of the RU army are true, I think there's still going to be some hard yards in the months to come.

 

This would be exhibit A when the Ukrainians say the lack of ATACMS is getting people killed.

[The_Capt]

3 hours ago, Centurian52 said:

I wonder if this strategy might backfire. I don't think there is any possibility of a soft landing for Russia. But the longer this war lasts, the more casualties Russia takes, the more Russian equipment is destroyed, the longer sanctions remain in full effect, the more time other countries have to adapt to new trade relationships that exclude Russia altogether, the harder the landing will be for Russia.

Well Door #2 in all this is much worse.  A Russia in complete free fall is really risky.  We have never had a nuclear power disintegrate below the state-level - the USSR devolved into a bunch of pre-existing states and even then it was touch and go for a bit.

So as good as a burning Russia might make everyone feel in a whole "rightful comeuppance" sort of way, it will very likely lead to greater regional insecurity.  In the worst scenarios the stockpile of WMDs (and there are a whole suite of them) gets loose and we are talking about Sum of All Fears type stuff.  There is the more mundane civil wars leading to massive refugee crisis, starvation etc.  The idea that it wont spill over is wishful thinking.  We might end up with Ukraine and Europe as a whole in worse shape in the event Russia completely falls apart - a Yugoslavia with nukes.

So somebody better be on top of this or we could be just getting the appetizer in this dinner with this war.  

[Battlefront.com]

2 hours ago, Beleg85 said:

Quite frankly we have so little data it is almost pointless to predict at this point how things will go.

For sure we are mostly reading tea leaves here, but let's not discount what it means to be following this war day to day since it started.  We have a very good sense of the direction specific components of it and to have an even better sense of trends.  And since it's been a while since I've mentioned it, some of us have been calling this war correctly since the start with even less information to go by

My point here is that by every conceivable metric of measuring Russia's military capabilities at the moment, everything is worse than it was last year except for the number of bodies hastily shoved to the front.  So far those bodies have been able to do very little except clog up the end phase of the Ukrainian counter offensive out of Kharkiv and attrit Ukrainian forces at Bakhmut.  So that is about all I expect of the Russians going forward.  That's not going to be enough to have a meaningful negative impact on what Ukraine is lining up to do.

Using the standard best, worst, and expected case examination of how things might play out:

Best - Russian lines collapse and the bodies Russia needs to clog up the offensive surrender, run away, or become casualties.  Ukrainian forces are able to achieve whatever their maximum goals and maybe more than that.

Worst - Kherson type grinding offensive where Ukraine certainly does make progress, Russia still probably has to do a mobilization (which could cause other problems for it), yet the goals are mostly not taken.  Worse, heavy Ukrainian casualties means no good prospects for Fall or Winter offensive actions.

Expected - my guess is the main effort will initially be difficult for Ukraine, but steady progress and major Russian casualties will eventually cause that section of front to rip open and allow for larger advances.  Russia mobilizes and, like Kharkiv, throws enough cannon fodder at the tired and worn down Ukrainian force that it slows to a crawl and the front stabilizes.  However, I also think Ukraine will launch at one other significant effort somewhere else after the main one draws forces away.  This should also achieve gains for Ukraine, though I'm thinking not as big as Kharkiv last year.  Mostly because I expect this secondary attack to (again) be in the northern part of the eastern line.  And like Kharkiv, piles of dead mobiks will slow and then halt the advances.

With that said, things might be so bad on the Russian side that the expected case might least to best case results due to systemic collapse and/or Russia having far more difficulty getting the cannon fodder to the front in large enough numbers quick enough to have a significant impact on the fighting (i.e. Ukraine's offensive runs out of logistics steam all on its own).

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

2 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Well Door #2 in all this is much worse.  A Russia in complete free fall is really risky.  We have never had a nuclear power disintegrate below the state-level - the USSR devolved into a bunch of pre-existing states and even then it was touch and go for a bit.

So as good as a burning Russia might make everyone feel in a whole "rightful comeuppance" sort of way, it will very likely lead to greater regional insecurity.  In the worst scenarios the stockpile of WMDs (and there are a whole suite of them) gets loose and we are talking about Sum of All Fears type stuff.  There is the more mundane civil wars leading to massive refugee crisis, starvation etc.  The idea that it wont spill over is wishful thinking.  We might end up with Ukraine and Europe as a whole in worse shape in the event Russia completely falls apart - a Yugoslavia with nukes.

So somebody better be on top of this or we could be just getting the appetizer in this dinner with this war.  

The videos linked to a bunch of pages ago, which I relinked to a couple of pages ago, describe the risks of a breakup very well.  Nobody should want Russian to go into violent disintegration, especially not China.  However, a controlled breakup (akin to 1990) would be a different beast completely.  There would still be violence between the new states fighting over new borders (such violence is *still* going on right now), but it would likely be manageable.

Steve

[sross112]

5 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Expected - my guess is the main effort will initially be difficult for Ukraine, but steady progress and major Russian casualties will eventually cause that section of front to rip open and allow for larger advances.  Russia mobilizes and, like Kharkiv, throws enough cannon fodder at the tired and worn down Ukrainian force that it slows to a crawl and the front stabilizes.  However, I also think Ukraine will launch at one other significant effort somewhere else after the main one draws forces away.  This should also achieve gains for Ukraine, though I'm thinking not as big as Kharkiv last year.  Mostly because I expect this secondary attack to (again) be in the northern part of the eastern line.  And like Kharkiv, piles of dead mobiks will slow and then halt the advances.

Most of the thought seems to be that the UA will unleash everything into the big push right away. Most of the rumormill has talked about the newly trained, equipped and formed brigades being the force that will be used. With these new brigades, might we see a series of smaller ops; destroy a BTG, take this general area, etc before we see a big push? Wouldn't the UA want to give the brigade's troops and especially their staff a little real world training and experience before committing to a big plan? @The_Capt has stressed how the staff side isn't easy to build and integrate on short notice. I'd think they would want to establish that the new units could complete the fundamentals before throwing them into larger and more complicated operations. 

Opinions?

[billbindc]

16 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Well Door #2 in all this is much worse.  A Russia in complete free fall is really risky.  We have never had a nuclear power disintegrate below the state-level - the USSR devolved into a bunch of pre-existing states and even then it was touch and go for a bit.

So as good as a burning Russia might make everyone feel in a whole "rightful comeuppance" sort of way, it will very likely lead to greater regional insecurity.  In the worst scenarios the stockpile of WMDs (and there are a whole suite of them) gets loose and we are talking about Sum of All Fears type stuff.  There is the more mundane civil wars leading to massive refugee crisis, starvation etc.  The idea that it wont spill over is wishful thinking.  We might end up with Ukraine and Europe as a whole in worse shape in the event Russia completely falls apart - a Yugoslavia with nukes.

So somebody better be on top of this or we could be just getting the appetizer in this dinner with this war.  

Exactly. Does anyone imagine that there won't be more than enough embittered great Russia extremists in a Russian state collapse who will try to seize nukes for terrorism, revenge, you name it? Be careful what you wish for (see, Gulf War I and Gulf War II for reference).

[Battlefront.com]

6 minutes ago, sross112 said:

Most of the thought seems to be that the UA will unleash everything into the big push right away. Most of the rumormill has talked about the newly trained, equipped and formed brigades being the force that will be used. With these new brigades, might we see a series of smaller ops; destroy a BTG, take this general area, etc before we see a big push? Wouldn't the UA want to give the brigade's troops and especially their staff a little real world training and experience before committing to a big plan? @The_Capt has stressed how the staff side isn't easy to build and integrate on short notice. I'd think they would want to establish that the new units could complete the fundamentals before throwing them into larger and more complicated operations. 

Opinions?

Impractical.  Once the new forces are deployed they will be difficult to move around and redirect.  There is also the problem of troop density.  Units would have to rotate in mostly 1:1, which is extremely disruptive and it will take quite a while to get all the new units through a rotation.  Practically we're talking a full year.  And then there's the problem that this gives Russia a chance to attrit the hardware which is needed for the offensive, which would require replacements which might not be so easily sourced.

Nope, I think Ukraine is better off doing what it did last year and that is moving its new units directly into the offensive.

Steve

[The_Capt]

2 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

The videos linked to a bunch of pages ago, which I relinked to a couple of pages ago, describe the risks of a breakup very well.  Nobody should want Russian to go into violent disintegration, especially not China.  However, a controlled breakup (akin to 1990) would be a different beast completely.  There would still be violence between the new states fighting over new borders (such violence is *still* going on right now), but it would likely be manageable.

Steve

Heard this one before too. The biggest problem is that Russia did not fall apart back in 90, the USSR did.  This was more like the EU falling apart than a homogenous nation.  The USSR had a lot of central control but it did not remove the internal governance of the nations states within it.  Russia falling apart has no such safety net.  The provincial and regional governments can go some way, but a lot more points of failure in that construct.  Enough to make me nervous.

[Fenris]

Wonder if this is true.  I would really like to see one working under combat conditions

 

Edited April 26, 2023 by Fenris

[Fenris]

Perhaps they got them to protect these

 

[Fenris]

Just posting to round out the shots of the Bradleys from yesterday

 

[Fenris]

Two clips that are hopefully indicative of how things are on the RU side.  The GAZPROM guys look like a motley bunch.

Apologies for spamming the thread, if it's too much let me know

 

Edited April 26, 2023 by Fenris

[Kinophile]

4 hours ago, Bulletpoint said:

That's the official line, but I think it's more the other way around. If you wanted Kyiv to take a peace offer, they wouldn't have much choice but to accept. At least if the alternative was no more weapons.

Any peace will require a referendum. 

There isn't ever gonna be a repeat of Minsk II. 

[Vet 0369]

2 hours ago, Fenris said:

 

Another view, smoking in the cockpit again Yuri?

 

Looks to me like a fan or turbine came apart, or, it could have been a natural even such as a large bird strike. This is the time of year when geese, ducks, and others begin migrating to nesting sites in the Arctic. We’ll probably never know.

[billbindc]

1 hour ago, The_Capt said:

Heard this one before too. The biggest problem is that Russia did not fall apart back in 90, the USSR did.  This was more like the EU falling apart than a homogenous nation.  The USSR had a lot of central control but it did not remove the internal governance of the nations states within it.  Russia falling apart has no such safety net.  The provincial and regional governments can go some way, but a lot more points of failure in that construct.  Enough to make me nervous.

This. The big difference between the Soviet Union and the Russian Federation is that the latter is a far more centralized state than its predecessor. Yes, the USSR was an autocracy but power was highly distributed within the system and a lot of decision making was made by the constituent republics on that level. A one party state but a layered bureaucracy and decision making process. In the Russian Federation, there is no party as such but the state itself is far more highly centralized in terms of decision and direction. If it breaks, there will be no bureaucratic or political inertia to hold it together or slow any violent jockeying for power. That's a highly combustible situation.

[kevinkin]

What level of UA success this summer will be enough to keep the west interested and support flowing? What level of failure would force Ukraine into unwanted talks? I think the support will always be there in an amount to keep Ukraine from falling. But maybe not enough for an ongoing string on offensives year after year. The lines will move forward, but perhaps not with a crushing blow. Myself and others think a crushing blow might not be in the interest of all stakeholders. How will the west define success? It might be less spectacular than we think.  

Could the Hippocratic Oath apply; do not jeopardize incoming support and just keep getting stronger while Russia gets weaker. Chinese water torture, drip by drip. Don't go over to the offensive right now. Is there a hurry? The US elections?
I don't see a lot of risk associated with an offensive now other than losing trained troops. There can be a lot of benefits of entertaining "seek and destroy" offensive ops i.e. taking the battle to a weakened enemy. Nothing like getting the rats out of their holes into kill zones. 

It's only the west's fear of escalation that these questions come up in April 2023. Without that fear, this war should be over. Yet, that fear is not going away.  And now China is more in the mix. Like it or not, the next 6 months will have to be measured on the ground and geostrategically. The Ukrainian people never deserved these cold calculations. But here we are.  

[billbindc]

34 minutes ago, kevinkin said:

What level of UA success this summer will be enough to keep the west interested and support flowing? What level of failure would force Ukraine into unwanted talks? I think the support will always be there in an amount to keep Ukraine from falling. But maybe not enough for an ongoing string on offensives year after year. The lines will move forward, but perhaps not with a crushing blow. Myself and others think a crushing blow might not be in the interest of all stakeholders. How will the west define success? It might be less spectacular than we think.  

Could the Hippocratic Oath apply; do not jeopardize incoming support and just keep getting stronger while Russia gets weaker. Chinese water torture, drip by drip. Don't go over to the offensive right now. Is there a hurry? The US elections?
I don't see a lot of risk associated with an offensive now other than losing trained troops. There can be a lot of benefits of entertaining "seek and destroy" offensive ops i.e. taking the battle to a weakened enemy. Nothing like getting the rats out of their holes into kill zones. 

It's only the west's fear of escalation that these questions come up in April 2023. Without that fear, this war should be over. Yet, that fear is not going away.  And now China is more in the mix. Like it or not, the next 6 months will have to be measured on the ground and geostrategically. The Ukrainian people never deserved these cold calculations. But here we are.  

My definition of a fully successful spring/summer offensive would be Ukrainian units controlling the rest of Kherson, the entrance to the Crimean peninsula and then eastwards to the point at which the Kerch Bridge is in range of UA fires. It would be sufficiently successful to ensure continued aid if the first two conditions were met because if Ukraine manages it, then Russia has definitively lost no matter what happens thereafter. Moscow would be facing a slew of unhappy strategic choices with few options to change the menu.

[dan/california]

1 hour ago, billbindc said:

This. The big difference between the Soviet Union and the Russian Federation is that the latter is a far more centralized state than its predecessor. Yes, the USSR was an autocracy but power was highly distributed within the system and a lot of decision making was made by the constituent republics on that level. A one party state but a layered bureaucracy and decision making process. In the Russian Federation, there is no party as such but the state itself is far more highly centralized in terms of decision and direction. If it breaks, there will be no bureaucratic or political inertia to hold it together or slow any violent jockeying for power. That's a highly combustible situation.

 

Just now, billbindc said:

My definition of a fully successful spring/summer offensive would be Ukrainian units controlling the rest of Kherson, the entrance to the Crimean peninsula and then eastwards to the point at which the Kerch Bridge is in range of UA fires. It would be sufficiently successful to ensure continued aid if the first two conditions were met because if Ukraine manages it, then Russia has definitively lost no matter what happens thereafter. Moscow would be facing a slew of unhappy strategic choices with few options to change the menu.

 

 

3 hours ago, The_Capt said:

Heard this one before too. The biggest problem is that Russia did not fall apart back in 90, the USSR did.  This was more like the EU falling apart than a homogenous nation.  The USSR had a lot of central control but it did not remove the internal governance of the nations states within it.  Russia falling apart has no such safety net.  The provincial and regional governments can go some way, but a lot more points of failure in that construct.  Enough to make me nervous.

My new analogy for what we are trying to do. The U.S. is the sponsor of a race car team. we want to win the whatever cup by a respectable margin, but not by so much that the other main team quits and the public loses interest in the whole thing. The problem is, as the sponsor of one team, we have no control of the fact the other guys are run by idiots. If they alternate the last six races by driving into walls, and spreading engines all over the track in little tiny pieces, this is going to be a blow out. It also isn't clear they have enough money to continue next year regardless. All of this is beyond our control.

[billbindc]

 

Worth reading to get sense of the sheer, abject stupidity of this clown.

[kevinkin]

33 minutes ago, billbindc said:

would be Ukrainian units controlling the rest of Kherson, the entrance to the Crimean peninsula and then eastwards to the point at which the Kerch Bridge is in range of UA fires.

That would be great. Maybe the UA just needs to demonstrate they can offensively maneuver where and when they choose without risking the trained troops and western equipment so diligently marshalled. I am one to recommend going for the jugular since opportunities can fade away unpredictably. That's why a purely military analysis can lead in one direction and a cautious geopolitical analysis another. But in the end, let the geopolitics fall where they may and get this God awful war over with. Maybe the west will get out of their playpen this summer and provide lethal assistance and demonstrate to Russian and yes China there is no point in holding Ukrainian territory. 

[Battlefront.com]

4 hours ago, billbindc said:

This. The big difference between the Soviet Union and the Russian Federation is that the latter is a far more centralized state than its predecessor. Yes, the USSR was an autocracy but power was highly distributed within the system and a lot of decision making was made by the constituent republics on that level. A one party state but a layered bureaucracy and decision making process. In the Russian Federation, there is no party as such but the state itself is far more highly centralized in terms of decision and direction. If it breaks, there will be no bureaucratic or political inertia to hold it together or slow any violent jockeying for power. That's a highly combustible situation.

Yes and no.  The degree of centralized control is stronger than it was for the breakaway republics when the Soviet Union disintegrated, but some of the republics that broke away were VERY tightly controlled.  The Baltics, for example.

At the most basic level that matters, these regions have their own governments.  They are largely staffed by locals out of necessity (language, culture, willingness to live in that place, etc.) and have experience running their own daily affairs.  They have their own courts, schools, police, fire departments, road departments, etc. as well.  For sure they operate under edicts coming from Moscow more than not, but that could be fairly easily ignored and all decisions relegated to a regional capital.  Implementation and transition of this new rule would be difficult, of course, which would likely mean it is violent and generally messy.  Which is why this is an outcome that would best be avoided.

The more peaceful scenario is that Moscow cries uncle and voluntarily gives back the control that had previously been withdrawn in recent years.  This is a realistic scenario if Moscow senses the alternative is widespread disintegration.  As the video very rightly points out, Moscow can only fight one or two uprisings at a time.  It took all of Russia's concentration to wage war against the Caucuses (Chechnya being the highest profile one) and it lost the first round and only won the second round through intrigue.  Imagine if 10 of 15 republics all decide at the same time to give Moscow a big FU.  It will not be able to stop them all, or maybe even any of them thanks to the distraction in Ukraine.

There's also a hybrid possibility of some going violently, some renegotiating control, and some staying loyal.  No matter what the mix might be, in the end Russia will not be the centrally controlled territorial behemoth it currently is.

Steve