How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Vet 0369]

22 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

More Russians in pure black clothing. Curious.

Steve

Syrians or Isis?

[Battlefront.com]

9 hours ago, billbindc said:

Yep. A significant concession to Prigozhin and whoever backed him while Wagner now plans to spend the next month or more relaxing at their bases before a potential August move to Belarus. Folks, if you are going to 'lose' a coup this is how you want to do it.

I'm still upset that it was so obvious and yet... where were all the Russia experts saying what we were saying here?  Really shakes my faith in what they have to say.

So way back when Prig turned away from Moscow I said we should watch and wait to see what happened with Shoigu and Gerasimov.  Well, looks like one down and possibly one to go.  Obviously things are still in motion.

Steve

[sburke]

China has got to be pissed

As China threat grows in Asia, Japan to open NATO liaison office to counter Beijing (yahoo.com)

Edited July 10, 2023 by sburke

[kimbosbread]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

I'm still upset that it was so obvious and yet... where were all the Russia experts saying what we were saying here?  Really shakes my faith in what they have to say.

So way back when Prig turned away from Moscow I said we should watch and wait to see what happened with Shoigu and Gerasimov.  Well, looks like one down and possibly one to go.  Obviously things are still in motion.

Steve

Instead of being upset, you should be smug and pour yourself a nice scotch!

That said, clearly this hasn’t played out yet. Many pages back during that heady weekend it was speculated that one backroom deal might see the ultranationalists being given a few months to see if they could do anything useful in the war, and then, if not, the realists would take over. I suspect that timeline would be accelerated by the re-takage of Bakhmut or cracking the main defensive line in the South. I am very curious what the deal is!

EDIT: A fun idea for someone who has too much time… track predictions over time of all these public people. Keep a record, for a while. Obviously the public at large doesn’t care, but enthusiasts would certainly pay attention.

Edited July 10, 2023 by kimbosbread

[The_MonkeyKing]

Interesting data points from Oryx loss data over time that are relevant to Ukraines offensive. Still, most chards don't show changes. operations: https://github.com/leedrake5/Russia-Ukraine

 

comparing abandoned equipment to the Russian winter offensive:

Russian artillery losses have accelerated while no change on the Ukrainian side

 

As a whole no major change:

o

[The_MonkeyKing]

Here are some daily loss roundups from: https://twitter.com/lost_warinua

Generally, you can see Ukraine is leading in volume and in value. Russia is losing artillery, enables and armor of various, while Ukraine is mainly losing armor of various kinds. 

[kevinkin]

https://www.aol.com/ukraine-russia-news-live-ukrainian-033530377.html

Key Points
Zelensky says Ukraine holds ‘initiative’ on battlefield

Putin’s aide Medvedev threatens attack on nuclear plants in Kyiv and Europe

‘Important’ call between US and Ukraine’s top diplomats before Nato summit

Russia accuses US of ‘war crimes’ over cluster munitions sent to Ukraine (that's rich)

Russia sees 400 casualties per day in Ukraine war, facing medical aid crisis – UK MoD (another vulerability)

 

[cesmonkey]

Long, interesting article:
https://kyivindependent.com/investigation-eu-inability-to-ramp-up-production-behind-acute-ammunition-shortages-in-ukraine/
 

 

[Maciej Zwolinski]

Last post by Tom Cooper in his Substack  is interesting.

In particular, he makes an interesting observation about the Zaporozhe offensive, that because of Russians' trying to defend all terrain  and constantly counterattacking, they are making their defence belts constructed further back essentially useless. If the Ukrainians are likely to breach the first defence belt only after Russians exhaust all units at their disposal, then at this point the Russians will not have the soldiers to man the subsequent belts. Makes sense.

https://xxtomcooperxx.substack.com/p/ukraine-war-9-july-2023

 

[Tux]

7 hours ago, chuckdyke said:

I hope nobody is here of the opinion that they understand the issue better than the Ukrainian Generals running the campaign in the Eastern Donbas.

No-one is claiming to know better than Ukrainian Generals any more than anyone else is claiming to know better than the 123 states who have signed up to the CCM.

Ukraine, Ukraine's decision-makers and indeed Ukraine's Generals are in a unique position and that position does bring additional weight to the decisions they make.  Personally I think there's a good argument to be had that that weight is almost entirely emotional, but that's not to suggest it should be dismissed as such.

123 other states came to the opposite decision to Ukraine.  I imagine very few of them were fighting pitched defensive wars at the time but neither were the signatories the kind of simpering, pearl-clutching snowflakes that some on this board seem to want to portray them as.  Among the signatories of the CCM you will find some of the most brutalised and war-torn states of the last century.  A great many experienced warfighters considered this issue and decided that the utility of cluster munitions was not worth the post-war consequences and that they would stand by that decision in perpetuity.

So, now that our respective 'argument from authority' rounds are spent, perhaps we can recognise (as I think most do) that this is a deeply grey area.  There is no unambiguously correct answer that we can discover, given how thoroughly ambiguous our information is regarding true dud rates, likely usage rates/locations, how diligently records of such will be kept, etc..  That, to answer Twisk's earlier question, is why we're still discussing this issue.

For my part it seems that the utility of DPICM simply doesn't justify its use in 'normal' circumstances.  If it did then I would expect such a case to be quickly and easily made and agreed upon by the kinds of knowledgeable people we have contributing to this thread and the discussion would be over.  However if Ukraine (and their allies) are running out of better ammunition types then clearly that cannot be allowed to be 'normal' and it is preferable to use what is available.

I don't expect the above to move the needle on the opinions stated on this thread but I'm happy to understand that my preferred shade of grey isn't the only one available.  For what it's worth it makes me feel very uncomfortable (world's smallest violin time, I know) to cast doubt on Ukraine's decision under these cirumstances.  I only hope that those energetically supporting the decision now will feel half as uncomfortable when the piper gets paid.

[chuckdyke]

17 minutes ago, Tux said:

I only hope that those energetically supporting the decision now will feel half as uncomfortable when the piper gets paid.

I live very comfortable with the fact that my opinions have zilch influence to the tragic war. They will use it to breach the Russian defenses. I hope it works the message is the tempo to clear the trenches is found wanting. The biggest objection is clusters have too many duds and to clear them post war is the responsibility of the Ukraine. 

[kraze]

9 minutes ago, chuckdyke said:

I live very comfortable with the fact that my opinions have zilch influence to the tragic war. They will use it to breach the Russian defenses. I hope it works the message is the tempo to clear the trenches is found wanting. The biggest objection is clusters have too many duds and to clear them post war is the responsibility of the Ukraine. 

pretty sure those duds will cause much less issues long term than what russians did by mining every single meter of the frontlines with the whole USSR stock of AP mines. Breaches through that crap will be only meters wide and who knows how deep and maybe a hundred meters around them will be cleared, but a 1000 km line will not and walking through fields of Zaporizhya will cause dead and wounded for decades to come.

Dropping clusters in there is like dropping a stick of wood into a burning forest.

[The_MonkeyKing]

https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-military-deaths-facd75c2311ed7be660342698cf6a409

"According to their analysis, 25,000 more inheritance cases were opened in 2022 for males aged 15 to 49 than expected. By May 27, 2023, the number of excess cases had shot up to 47,000."

Nice "low bar" estimate of Russian casualties.

[DesertFox]

Seems like something is on the horizon. We will learn in 48 hours or even earlier I guess. Looks good for me.

 

 Kulebas post:

 

 

[Tux]

1 minute ago, DesertFox said:

Seems like something is on the horizon. We will learn in 48 hours or even earlier I guess. Looks good for me.

 

 Kulebas post:

 

 

If correct do we think it's a good idea to publicise this?  It seems to raise the stakes on all sides without too much obvious benefit.  It certainly sounds gratifying but it also adds some surprisingly hard lines to the circumstances around the war's end, doesn't it?  This announcement would effectively set in stone wherever Ukraine's borders lie at the 'end' of the war, so on the one hand it is a further guarantee that whatever Russia lose from here, they will never regain; on the other hand it puts extra pressure on Ukraine to unambiguously regain everything they want/can before hostilities cease, or lose it forever.

Have NATO decided that Ukraine must give up Crimea or is this a surprisingly strong vote of confidence in Ukraine's ability to regain it before the war is brought to an end?

[DesertFox]

7 minutes ago, Tux said:

Have NATO decided that Ukraine must give up Crimea or is this a surprisingly strong vote of confidence in Ukraine's ability to regain it before the war is brought to an end?

Dunno if you read the same post as I did.  It means that NATO countries agreed to accept Ukraine into the alliance under a simplified procedure - without fulfilling the membership action plan. The terms are still not named, but, most likely, Ukraine will join NATO after the end of the war.

[cesmonkey]

The Russian TV presenter and propagandist, Vladimir Solovyov, sometimes hosts Russian milbloggers on his program to provide updates from the front. If you follow his telegram channel, in addition to propaganda bits, he forwards certain updates from various milblogers.

https://t.me/s/SolovievLive

Anyway, some of the messages he forwarded this morning mention pressure Ukraine is asserting in these areas:

https://t.me/polk105/8996

Quote

Zaporizhzhia direction
Orekhovsky area

At this moment, our soldiers are repelling the third wave of the attack on our positions in the Rabotino area.

The enemy is serious today, heavy Ukrainian armored vehicles, a lot of Western-made boxes went into battle.

https://t.me/YUGLIVE/28973

Quote

Since night, a heavy battle has been going on on the Vremievsky ledge and in the area of Ugledar.

Our artillery is actively working to stop an attempt to break through the Ukrainian. We are waiting for objective information from the direction.

 

[Bulletpoint]

8 hours ago, The_Capt said:

While I do not dismiss the UXO/ROW of side of this debate, if we are going to use maths:

- On a 200 km front with 50km depth (basically the central frontage from Zap to Donetsk) we are talking 10,000,000,000 sq meters of real estate - it is late so check my math (200,000 m x 50,000 m).  185,000 duds across that sort of area comes to roughly 1 UXO for approx 54,000 sq meters (about 500 x 100 m area, or 5 football fields.) 

Of course there this will not be uniform distribution, there will be areas of high concentration of UXO, here battlefield recording will be key.  High res records of each DPICM shoot will need to be kept so that contamination can be tracked.  The good news on DPICM is that they are technically surface laid unlike mines; however, that is not a guarantee as they can and will be covered up by vegetation etc.  

- This will also render roughly 7.2 million live fully functioning submunition rounds able to do no small damage to both RA mech and infantry forces if applied properly.  That is the payoff as it relates to utility.  In regard to these weapons usage, as there is no legal issue, it is a Ukrainian decision as to whether the risk is worth the payoff.  Clearly the Ukrainian government has decided that “yes” it is worth the risk.

Further given the context, post-war these munitions will fall under a public health/hazard risk.  Currently in Ukraine roughly 102/100,000 people die every years from cancer.  Out of nation of roughly 44 million that is around 45k deaths every year.  Every one of those 185k duds would have to kill someone at that 45k rate for about 4 years to match the hazard of cancer as a disease.

https://ascopubs.org/doi/10.1200/GO.22.00123#:~:text=According to the Globocan database,927.6%2F100%2C000 in the country.

More realistically these UXO will fall much lower, likely lower than vehicle accident death rates pre-war (around 5k depending who you ask):

https://www.roadsafetyfacility.org/country/ukraine

Again if every one of those 185k duds kills a civilian it will take about 37 years before they are all done, at the same rate as traffic accidents.  Of course not every dud is going to kill a civilian, in fact with education and clearance over those “185 years” the death/injury rate will likely be well below traffic deaths.  The major cost is loss of land usage:

Worst case is about 925k football fields of land that will be unusable due to these duds (1 per 5 fields until cleared - basically that entire 200 x 50 km strip.  Ukraine has about 579k sq kms of land that had value in 2017:

https://www.ceicdata.com/en/ukraine/land-use-protected-areas-and-national-wealth/ua-land-area 

That strip of land we are talking about is roughly 10k sq kms - so roughly 1.7%, not counting whatever they have lost to Russian UXOs and mines.  Which is pretty has already (could be as high as 25%)

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/soils-war-toxic-legacy-ukraines-breadbasket-2023-03-01/

Of course right now the loss of that land to Russian occupation is also likely the greater threat.  However mitigation during post-war reconstruction will definitely be a consideration.  However is we are going to reduce this to strictly dollars and land, if these munitions result in similar gains as we saw last Fall, the losses in land due to US supplied DPICM will be far out stripped by the economic gains of re-taken lands being back in Ukrainian hands.

So What?  Well in this case the risk/cost calculus is a national decision, not one of international law.  There is a moral/ethical angle but again so are things like legalization of drugs and nation states reserve the right to weigh these issues internally.  Ukraine has likely done the math and decided that the risk is worth it.  The value of land retaken is worth more than land lost due to use of these weapons, even in non-contaminated areas.  Further the public health risk is also likely considered manageable and mitigable, again doing the math.

In the harsh calculus of war, I can see how this all makes sense to Ukrainian decision makers.  In fact the worst case is if they use the DPICM and the offensive fails anyway the contamination will likely remain on occupied RA territory, which at this point may be viewed as a positive in this upside down world we live in now.

 

I agree with your argument here, but I just want to add a couple more points:

1: Cancer largely kills older people, while left behind cluster munitions often kill curious children. So a direct comparison is not really showing the true humanitarian cost. Disclaimer: Yes I know that it would be better for everyone if this war could be stopped as fast as possible.

2: Even if the intention is to only fire cluster munitions at areas already contaminated with land mines, in reality they will also be used elsewhere. Especially since they are much more effective once Russians leave their trenches and advance over open ground.

3: I think it's unlikely that detailed records of each cluster strike location will be made and kept in the heat of battle.

4: Ukraine is likely expecting that the cost of demining the cluster UXOs will be rolled into the rebuilding aid packages they will almost certainly receive after the war. So the cost/benefit calculation assumes someone else will pay the costs. Always an attractive proposition.

[cesmonkey]

 

[DesertFox]

16 minutes ago, cesmonkey said:

 

Yeah, we still dont know the "behind the curtain" charade. There is something brewing in russia.

[The_Capt]

42 minutes ago, Bulletpoint said:

 

I agree with your argument here, but I just want to add a couple more points:

1: Cancer largely kills older people, while left behind cluster munitions often kill curious children. So a direct comparison is not really showing the true humanitarian cost. Disclaimer: Yes I know that it would be better for everyone if this war could be stopped as fast as possible.

2: Even if the intention is to only fire cluster munitions at areas already contaminated with land mines, in reality they will also be used elsewhere. Especially since they are much more effective once Russians leave their trenches and advance over open ground.

3: I think it's unlikely that detailed records of each cluster strike location will be made and kept in the heat of battle.

4: Ukraine is likely expecting that the cost of demining the cluster UXOs will be rolled into the rebuilding aid packages they will almost certainly receive after the war. So the cost/benefit calculation assumes someone else will pay the costs. Always an attractive proposition.

1.  I have seen no unbiased studies that support the claim that cluster munitions kill more children.  A whole lot of heat and light has been put on these incidents but I would like to see some actual statistics.  Cancer kills across demographics and age groups but does lean into the older demographics.  Traffic accidents and many other public health issues do not, like drug overdoses.  The reality as a public health issue the 185k dud DPICM from the US supply is a limited risk when compared to other risks.  The economic risk would appear the higher issue.

2. The munitions will be used on non-contaminated areas no doubt, but again we are talking fairly limited (see 1 munition in 5 football fields).  The risk to life and limb is less than the fact that those fields need to be cleared.  However, as we saw in France and Belgium, farmers will likely use the fields anyway and accept the risk in order to make their livelihoods.

3.  Considering that Ukraine is also using AT mines and they require recording by LOAC, they will also likely be required to record DPICM usage…even in “the heat of battle”.  Also considering that a lot of artillery systems are computerized and linked into GPS this is something that will more likely happen automatically.  

4.  Considering that upwards of 25% of agricultural land may be contaminated by Russian actions, along with loss of other industries. I think the Ukrainian leadership determined the cost escalation was simply far too low when compared to the risk to military operations.  Of course if contributing nations wish to only fund clearances of Russian DPICM and leave Ukraine to foot the bill for US supplied munitions they can sit on that righteous hill after the war.  Of course perversely any children killed by US  supplied DPICM will also be a “good thing” as it will sure teach those Ukrainians and US a lesson on how evil cluster munitions really are.  We will all feel bad for the children killed by Russian cluster munitions however…because morality is relative after all.

Edited July 10, 2023 by The_Capt

[Bulletpoint]

8 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Of course as you note any children killed by US  supplied DPICM will also be a “good thing” as it will sure teach those Ukrainians and US a lesson on how evil cluster munitions really are.  We will all feel bad for the children killed by Russian cluster munitions however…because morality is relative after all.

I'm a bit puzzled about how you got that out of my post.

[chuckdyke]

Western European Countries surrendered to the Germans inside weeks. France was the longest. If they had put up a fight like Ukraine does now World War 2 would have ended in 1942. You win wars by not being nice to your enemies. 

Edited July 10, 2023 by chuckdyke

[chuckdyke]

You can't argue with facts.

 

[kevinkin]

Beside the moral question re: clusters, a reason for their release is that the UA and the west are running out of standard shells and the replacement rate will be insufficient for offensive ops and problematic for defensive ones to hold ground gained.  Apparently: A March 2023 letter from top House and Senate Republicans to the Biden administration said the US may have as many as 3 million cluster munitions available for use, and urged the White House to send the munitions to alleviate pressure on US war supplies.

I think the question of morality should come up later when the west attempts to fund their replacement. Someone in an office in Washington knew this situation was enviable. It's math.  This is why a "just enough pressure", "just enough not to lose", "we can't have Russia lose", but "Ukraine can win strategy" will not go too much farther. How did the west put itself into a position were some are concerned for NATO's security re: of all things - ammo? Wouldn't it be ironic if NATO falls back on its airpower just to keep Ukraine in the game. Air power that should have been involved months ago. 

Edited July 10, 2023 by kevinkin