How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, Offshoot said:

Low res but submitted for inclusion in the fireworks category. Destruction of a Russian Buk SAM using a precision round, reportedly in the Velikonovosilkivsky district - https://mil.in.ua/en/news/ukrainian-high-precision-projectile-hit-russian-buk-sam/

 

I've told Charles we should put Buk an SP howitzers in the game just so we can see them pop

Steve

[kimbosbread]

3 hours ago, dan/california said:

I don't think they are heavy enough to detonate an AT mine.

Add a small jackhammer with a pad on it

[Battlefront.com]

2 hours ago, strac_sap said:

Again, I agree. Without adequate suppression of the enemy large scale breaches are likely high casualty events, especially in breaching vehicles and engineers which are hard to replace.

Yup, and as we've discussed it's becoming harder, not easier, to overcome suppression EVERYWHERE on the battlefield thanks to things like drones, thermal optics, long range ATGMs, etc.

The first example extreme example we had of "what happens when you try something tough and the enemy knows all about it" was the Russian's attempts to cross the Siverskyi Donets River last May. 

River crossings are a lot like minefield breaching in that they are technically difficult to do even when nobody is shooting at you, almost impossible when they are.  All the tricks of the past, such as suppressing ISR with distance, smoke, terrain concealment, etc. were shown pointless.  All Ukraine had to do was look at Google Maps, identify where the best crossing points would be, send up drones to check them out, then shell the Hell out of them when discovered. 

As a reminder to all, the Russians tried crossing in SIX places within ~10 days of each other.  1 failed before bridging started, 3 were destroyed before they established a crossing, 1 was destroyed and an attempt was made to rebuild it, and 1 (Bilohorvika) was destroyed and rebuilt twice before it was destroyed a third time.  In the process they lost enough bridging equipment (including transports and tugs) to make 7 crossings of this size, roughly 2xBTG worth of vehicles (including some specialized ones), and several hundred soldiers.  Largely because Ukraine had some drones and a fairly modest amount of traditional artillery.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

8 minutes ago, kimbosbread said:

Add a small jackhammer with a pad on it

OK guys, let's move away from speculating about ever "out there" ways to breach a minefield.  The current breaching equipment Ukraine has is perfectly adequate to do what needs to be done.  It's keeping the Russians from whacking them while they do it is the problem.  So far the only answer that makes any sense is to have absolute control of the air and superior ISR coupled with PGMs.  Ukraine is missing 1 out of 3 and it appears to be enough to really throw a wrench into tehir breaching ops.

Steve

[dan/california]

18 minutes ago, kimbosbread said:

Add a small jackhammer with a pad on it

I think it would be way too slow. But I am up for testing anything and everything at this point. Just to sketch out my idea a little more, and it is just an idea, would be to have the high grade robot with a highly capable sensor suite mark the mines. the mines would be marked with some combination of gps coordinates, and a little tag like the ones apple sells to find whatever you keep losing. So the kamikaze robot dogs can do the actual breach at a dead run with minimal sensors. because you aren't getting them back. 

It might be work better to just have the fancy robot place the charges on each mine, but  then it has to keep going back for more charges, and would just be that much easier to spot. There are a lot of possible iterations. The problem needs money thrown at it.

Edit: cross posted, sorry

 

Edited June 29, 2023 by dan/california

[sburke]

38 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

I can tell you one thing though... the extremes don't really like middle of the road historians.  We tend to like pointing out how funny they are, historically speaking

Steve

It takes a younger generation indignant at the status quo with little materially to lose and little appreciation for the long term consequences to push for change. It takes the older generation to keep things in perspective that in fact change is a constant and progress even if slow does occur. Having been on both ends of that experience, I prefer being on the older end.  

[Battlefront.com]

26 minutes ago, sburke said:

It takes a younger generation indignant at the status quo with little materially to lose and little appreciation for the long term consequences to push for change. It takes the older generation to keep things in perspective that in fact change is a constant and progress even if slow does occur. Having been on both ends of that experience, I prefer being on the older end.  

That's just because you're old enough to forget that at one point in time you'd wake up, get out of bed, go about your day, and then go back to bed without anything on your body hurting or not functioning as you'd like just because you woke up, went about your day, then got back to bed

Steve

[chrisl]

51 minutes ago, dan/california said:

I think it would be way too slow. But I am up for testing anything and everything at this point. Just to sketch out my idea a little more, and it is just an idea, would be to have the high grade robot with a highly capable sensor suite mark the mines. the mines would be marked with some combination of gps coordinates, and a little tag like the ones apple sells to find whatever you keep losing. So the kamikaze robot dogs can do the actual breach at a dead run with minimal sensors. because you aren't getting them back. 

It might be work better to just have the fancy robot place the charges on each mine, but  then it has to keep going back for more charges, and would just be that much easier to spot. There are a lot of possible iterations. The problem needs money thrown at it.

Edit: cross posted, sorry

 

They make jackhammers with pads on them.  They’re for compacting soil/sand before paving.  
 

But if you can ID the locations of all the mines, why wouldn’t you just use a drone to drop sticky primers/firecrackers with a simple delay fuse on them so the drone has time to get away from direct overhead?

[dan/california]

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-rachman-review/id1504048545?i=1000618701113

Really good podcast, nothing completely new, but it lays out the post coup situation really well.

 

[strac_sap]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

Yup, and as we've discussed it's becoming harder, not easier, to overcome suppression EVERYWHERE on the battlefield thanks to things like drones, thermal optics, long range ATGMs, etc.

The first example extreme example we had of "what happens when you try something tough and the enemy knows all about it" was the Russian's attempts to cross the Siverskyi Donets River last May. 

River crossings are a lot like minefield breaching in that they are technically difficult to do even when nobody is shooting at you, almost impossible when they are.  All the tricks of the past, such as suppressing ISR with distance, smoke, terrain concealment, etc. were shown pointless.  All Ukraine had to do was look at Google Maps, identify where the best crossing points would be, send up drones to check them out, then shell the Hell out of them when discovered. 

As a reminder to all, the Russians tried crossing in SIX places within ~10 days of each other.  1 failed before bridging started, 3 were destroyed before they established a crossing, 1 was destroyed and an attempt was made to rebuild it, and 1 (Bilohorvika) was destroyed and rebuilt twice before it was destroyed a third time.  In the process they lost enough bridging equipment (including transports and tugs) to make 7 crossings of this size, roughly 2xBTG worth of vehicles (including some specialized ones), and several hundred soldiers.  Largely because Ukraine had some drones and a fairly modest amount of traditional artillery.

Steve

Great summary, thanks. I wasn't looking closely when the Ukrainians repulsed these crossings and it informs what is happening to them now pretty concisely.

[sburke]

43 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

That's just because you're old enough to forget that at one point in time you'd wake up, get out of bed, go about your day, and then go back to bed without anything on your body hurting or not functioning as you'd like just because you woke up, went about your day, then got back to bed

Steve

And I had hair. 

[sburke]

Putin continues to hunt for his enemies

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/28/world/europe/putin-prigozhin-russia.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare
Putin Moves to Punish Prigozhin Allies
 

[strac_sap]

2 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

For sure.  And there's quite a bit of science to indicate that as we age we become more conservative.  There's both biological and learned reasons for this, beyond the usual of telling youngsters they don't know what hard work is, how they don't know how lucky they have it, etc.

I can say that as I age I too find myself thinking like this.  My wife too.  Millennials are a favor topic of derision, as they should be

I engage with young adults at work constantly, and the changes due to aging in my opinions are profound. I feel like it is absolutely true that they are less motivated, find less joy in overcoming hardships towards success, and rarely even show up. But hasn't this always been the case? Haven't the older generations always lamented the youth's frivolity and laziness? So are my beliefs about this influenced by this intrinsic push towards conservatism with age? Trying to use the analytic brain and not the emotional brain here...

[Fenris]

16 minutes ago, strac_sap said:

I engage with young adults at work constantly, and the changes due to aging in my opinions are profound. I feel like it is absolutely true that they are less motivated, find less joy in overcoming hardships towards success, and rarely even show up. But hasn't this always been the case? Haven't the older generations always lamented the youth's frivolity and laziness? So are my beliefs about this influenced by this intrinsic push towards conservatism with age? Trying to use the analytic brain and not the emotional brain here...

I saw an amusing show some years ago called something like Grumpy Old Men. At one point the narrator read a quote with the same gist as the above.... It was penned in the 1700s. So nothing new, its society evolving.

If you look at the young Ukrainians fighting this war I think we can see an example where they are just as capable and dedicated as any other generation. They're just a bit different and lack the years of experience and confidence that is gained with age.

Wandering off topic so will leave it there.

Edited June 29, 2023 by Fenris

[sburke]

6 minutes ago, strac_sap said:

I engage with young adults at work constantly, and the changes due to aging in my opinions are profound. I feel like it is absolutely true that they are less motivated, find less joy in overcoming hardships towards success, and rarely even show up. But hasn't this always been the case? Haven't the older generations always lamented the youth's frivolity and laziness? So are my beliefs about this influenced by this intrinsic push towards conservatism with age? Trying to use the analytic brain and not the emotional brain here...

I think it is more about lessons learned. Being able to judge people’s real motivations for example.  When I was younger my father warned me of things like that. Being more idealistic I just wrote off his lack of trust to a more conservative outlook. It took some painful lessons to learn what he had already learned. 
if you look for example of the recent experience for BLM and how folks in leadership took advantage of the organization financially. It is for so many folks in that movement a bitter betrayal. That in turn leads to folks being more conservative in who they trust. 

[paxromana]

57 minutes ago, strac_sap said:

I engage with young adults at work constantly, and the changes due to aging in my opinions are profound. I feel like it is absolutely true that they are less motivated, find less joy in overcoming hardships towards success, and rarely even show up. But hasn't this always been the case? Haven't the older generations always lamented the youth's frivolity and laziness? So are my beliefs about this influenced by this intrinsic push towards conservatism with age? Trying to use the analytic brain and not the emotional brain here...

"What is happening to our young people? They disrespect their elders, they disobey their parents. They ignore the law. They riot in the streets, inflamed with wild notions."

Plato (420s-340s BC)

I often had arguments with my fellow High School teachers before I retired - the often lamented 'the youth of today' and their alleged laziness and lack of motivation, poor behaviour, etc ... and had fun pointing out that if they thought back to their own youth they would find their younger selves exhibited the same sorts of behaviour and to pretty much the same degree,

Edited June 29, 2023 by paxromana

[Bulletpoint]

12 hours ago, kluge said:

But Moore's Law states that computing power doubles every two years. At that rate of exponential growth, it won't be all too long before computer chips are powerful enough that a smartphone-sized device will be able to create the video we all just saw.

Moore's Law has been dead for quite a long while though. Computing power still increases, but far from doubling every two years. More like slight increases of 5-10 pct. every two years, and it gets slower and slower and more and more expensive to keep it up.

[sburke]

59 minutes ago, Bulletpoint said:

Moore's Law has been dead for quite a long while though. Computing power still increases, but far from doubling every two years. More like slight increases of 5-10 pct. every two years, and it gets slower and slower and more and more expensive to keep it up.

So computers are getting smarter slower and humans are dumber faster?

[Maciej Zwolinski]

7 hours ago, The_Capt said:

My guess is that the trick to beating minefields in this war is not to focus on the minefield itself but those who are observing and covering it.  So focus on enemy ISR, C2 and logistics until a level of tactical collapse occurs, then go for a breach.  Dispersed infantry likely across first, use precision fires to isolate any enemy and kill them

That would only work if the minefields are mostly anti-tank, right? But Russians do not give a toss about modern Western sensibilities and the resulting Ottawa Treaty, and plant anti-personnel mines in huge numbers

[Butschi]

24 minutes ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

That would only work if the minefields are mostly anti-tank, right? But Russians do not give a toss about modern Western sensibilities and the resulting Ottawa Treaty, and plant anti-personnel mines in huge numbers

Russia, Iran, Syria, China, North Korea and... USA. Not meant as whataboutism, just an... encouragement.

[DesertFox]

 

 

[chris talpas]

1 hour ago, Bulletpoint said:

Moore's Law has been dead for quite a long while though. Computing power still increases, but far from doubling every two years. More like slight increases of 5-10 pct. every two years, and it gets slower and slower and more and more expensive to keep it up.

Actually while not quite keeping up with Moore’s law GPU performance (what AI is running on) is doubling every 2.5 years

https://www.lesswrong.com/out?url=https%3A%2F%2Fepochai.org%2Fblog%2Ftrends-in-gpu-price-performance

I would agree that cpu performance increases are far more incremental 

 

 

[The_Capt]

56 minutes ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:

That would only work if the minefields are mostly anti-tank, right? But Russians do not give a toss about modern Western sensibilities and the resulting Ottawa Treaty, and plant anti-personnel mines in huge numbers

AP landmines are really more of a nuisance than a denial weapon in conflicts like this.  If we were talking a very long term conflict zone where each side has had years to lay down AP belts, maybe; however, AP mines need a lot of density to stop dismounted infantry - and even then you are not going to fully stop them.  The numbers of AP mines would be insane to cover these frontages and the RA simply has not had the time to plant them.

So dismounted infantry penetration is still likely a viable option and I am betting the UA is doing it.  Problem is getting the vehicles across to sustain and support them.

[DesertFox]

Right now without paywall. Worth reading.

 

 

[DesertFox]