How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Jr Buck Private]

To lose 9 helicopters in one night?   I hope they were all parked real close together ... it would make it more satisfying. 

So now the US leadership is worried about a Russian fall offensive?   We should be thankful for it and that it works as well as their Bakmut one last winter.  Although I do worry about Ukraine losing the initiative, and of course Jim Jordan becoming speaker of the house.

[Kinophile]

@Haiduk

The guy holding a bowl of borscht, lol

Edited October 17, 2023 by Kinophile

[cesmonkey]

 

[Kinophile]

https://kyivindependent.com/proving-our-worth-ukraines-female-soldiers-and-their-fight-for-equality/

Any of our Kyiv friends familiar with this statue? 

Edited October 17, 2023 by Kinophile

[Beleg85]

There are another reports on (mainly Russian) TG's of supposed Ukrainian landing across Dnieper. Given that progandists have this kind of fever every time Ukrainians score some major success like recent airstrikes, it should best be treated-for now- as part of PR struggle.

 

[dan/california]

6 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Here's something that makes me a little concerned about Ukraine's capabilities.  Russia has thinned its lines several times this year to keep the fighting in the south bottled up.  Except for Bakhmut, and a few minor tactical skirmishes here and there, Ukraine hasn't seemed able to take advantage of it.  Even crossing the Dnepr seems to have been fairly limited and (possibly) played out.

With the premature pushing of the 25th CCA into Luhansk positions so that 2nd CCA could move down to Avdiivka, you'd think this would be an excellent opportunity to smash up inexperienced, poorly trained, and probably badly motivated forces.  Every day that passes gives the Russians more time to acclimate, yet we're not seeing Ukraine do anything specific in this area.  This seems to hint at Ukraine having hit some limitations of their own.

Steve

 

You might feel better in a day or two, if this is real. According to a quick read Poima is past all of the swampy stuff, and not much more than a rifle shot from the main road into the  bridge to Kherson City, when there was a bridge to Kherson City. Maybe it is just a bigger raid? But maybe not? The exact moment when you just gave the entire Russian army an ATACMS panic would be the moment, now wouldn't it?

Edit: And Putin is in China too, which makes it that much harder to get his permission to redeploy a battalion or two. It would also be rather embarrassing if the Southern front collapsed while he was having a state dinner with Xi.

Edited October 17, 2023 by dan/california

[cesmonkey]

Kofman thinks it might be real:

 

[Battlefront.com]

2 hours ago, Beleg85 said:

There are another reports on (mainly Russian) TG's of supposed Ukrainian landing across Dnieper. Given that progandists have this kind of fever every time Ukrainians score some major success like recent airstrikes, it should best be treated-for now- as part of PR struggle.

For sure I would love for this to be more than just a minor incursion.  If it is something more significant than that, we'll know in a day or so.  There was some information yesterday? that there were landings and ground taken.  Certainly the Russians have been expecting something major for some time now and have, as we have seen, been taking preemptive action by smashing the right bank pretty hard a few times.

Going on the assumption that a) this is real and b) it is a significant effort...

If Ukraine secures Pidstepne and Chelburda, then they've basically secured the eastern side of the bridgehead southward for quite a bit because the Oleshky Sands reserve is a pretty good barrier.  If they can make it to Velyki Kopani, then they are in really good shape because the area south west of there appears to be really crap for either attacker or defender (looks to be sand).  This leaves two narrow strips of settlements; one along the Dnepr (within range of Ukrainian artillery) and along a secondary road to Tavriis'ke to the south west.  I'm guessing it will be quite difficult for Russia to defend this area, not to mention counter attack.

But none of this matters unless Ukraine can put at least a couple of brigades over the river AND keep them supplied.  I'm absolutely not saying this is impossible (though Ukraine might still pull it off even if it were!), but it is definitely very challenging to say the least.

Steve

[The_Capt]

3 hours ago, Beleg85 said:

There are another reports on (mainly Russian) TG's of supposed Ukrainian landing across Dnieper. Given that progandists have this kind of fever every time Ukrainians score some major success like recent airstrikes, it should best be treated-for now- as part of PR struggle.

 

Think unsexy thoughts.  Think unsexy thoughts. 

This is exactly what I was looking for…so it is probably just a raid.  Oh, my but if they can achieve operational level breakthrough…

[chrisl]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

For sure I would love for this to be more than just a minor incursion.  If it is something more significant than that, we'll know in a day or so.  There was some information yesterday? that there were landings and ground taken.  Certainly the Russians have been expecting something major for some time now and have, as we have seen, been taking preemptive action by smashing the right bank pretty hard a few times.

Going on the assumption that a) this is real and b) it is a significant effort...

If Ukraine secures Pidstepne and Chelburda, then they've basically secured the eastern side of the bridgehead southward for quite a bit because the Oleshky Sands reserve is a pretty good barrier.  If they can make it to Velyki Kopani, then they are in really good shape because the area south west of there appears to be really crap for either attacker or defender (looks to be sand).  This leaves two narrow strips of settlements; one along the Dnepr (within range of Ukrainian artillery) and along a secondary road to Tavriis'ke to the south west.  I'm guessing it will be quite difficult for Russia to defend this area, not to mention counter attack.

But none of this matters unless Ukraine can put at least a couple of brigades over the river AND keep them supplied.  I'm absolutely not saying this is impossible (though Ukraine might still pull it off even if it were!), but it is definitely very challenging to say the least.

Steve

If it's real it will be easier to maintain with RU being very short on artillery shells combined with ever increasing UA CB range.  If there's no artillery threat, and RU can't put anything in the air that can fly close, UA can put floating bridges across at much lower risk and be able to move a lot more equipment across.

[danfrodo]

1 hour ago, The_Capt said:

Think unsexy thoughts.  Think unsexy thoughts. 

This is exactly what I was looking for…so it is probably just a raid.  Oh, my but if they can achieve operational level breakthrough…

I keep getting my hopes up when I see these cross-river raids and I know it's so impossibly hard to supply it, so much risk, as in 'arnhem' level risk.  But wow, it sure does present RU w some tough choices.  If it is real, RU is facing probable annihilation of their land bridge defenses, so RU has to respond.  But with what do they respond?  They just burned up their 'reserve' army at Robotyne & Andiivka.  So they'll have to thin the lines somewhere, move some artillery & support, etc.  If they don't respond strongly they'll be at risk of UKR actually making a bigger move.  Good timing, w RU now fully committed at Andiivka and having burned up a huge amount of shells, men, & vehicles.  

Maybe UKR is looking at this as being a nice place to ambush RU reinforcements out in the open with artillery as they coming rushing in w orders to wipe out the bridgehead.  

There was talk of option space recently here in the thread.  This crossing definitely reduces RU option space, and makes the options they do choose that much more risky.  I like it.  

[Fenris]

Won't it be all nigh impossible to provide any kind of significant levels of supply going over the river though?  It is still a real river this far down right?

[kimbosbread]

26 minutes ago, Fenris said:

Won't it be all nigh impossible to provide any kind of significant levels of supply going over the river though?  It is still a real river this far down right?

If your pontoon bridge is out of artillery range, and there aren’t fighters with glide bombs nearby, yes. So you’d want a Patriot system and some HIMARS nearby for sure.

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, Fenris said:

Won't it be all nigh impossible to provide any kind of significant levels of supply going over the river though?  It is still a real river this far down right?

Russia managed to do it for a very large force (~20k with lots of vehicles) under intense pressure, so it is definitely possible.  However, Russia put in ENORMOUS effort and shrugged off a lot of losses in order to keep their lines open.

The other problem is that Russia might have mined things enough to slow down advances of a fairly small attacking force even with crap screening infantry.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

More video of FPV drones being used to decimate a Russian mech assault:

In game terms, I think Ukrainian drone bombers are now at Elite status:

 

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

I think this was posted the other day, but I don't recall anybody pointing out that it is a BMP-1AM "Basurmanin":

Anybody have an idea of how common these are on the battlefield these days?  I don't remember seeing any since the long ago, and still hilarious, Russian river crossing fiasco:

https://en.defence-ua.com/weapon_and_tech/ukraines_armed_forces_destroyed_russian_bmp_1am_basurmanin_ifv_in_the_luhansk_region-2850.html

Steve

[Homo_Ferricus]

Timing of this left bank raid is definitely interesting. I'm thinking the purpose may be to draw Russian reinforcements/redeployments to the Kherson region, which can be clobbered with their shiny new ATACMS cluster missiles as they redeploy along the old familiar paths (which are now in range).

[LongLeftFlank]

5 hours ago, The_Capt said:

Think unsexy thoughts.  Think unsexy thoughts. 

 

• The facts we hate
• We'll never meet
• Walking down the road
• Everybody yelling, "hurry up, hurry up"
• But I'm waiting for you
• I must go slow
• I must not think bad thoughts
• What is this world coming to?
• Both sides are right
• But both sides murder
• I give up
• Why can't they?
• I must not think bad thoughts
• I must not think bad thoughts
• I must not think bad thoughts
• The civil wars
• And the uncivilized wars
• Conflagrations leap out of every poor furnace
• The food cooks poorly
• And everyone goes hungry
• From then on, it's dog eat dog

Edited October 18, 2023 by LongLeftFlank

[chrisl]

2 hours ago, Homo_Ferricus said:

Timing of this left bank raid is definitely interesting. I'm thinking the purpose may be to draw Russian reinforcements/redeployments to the Kherson region, which can be clobbered with their shiny new ATACMS cluster missiles as they redeploy along the old familiar paths (which are now in range).

I'm also a little curious as to the mud situation.  Ideally, Russia will be struggling to shuffle all those forces to Kherson on trucks in mud.  And if mud makes it harder for Russia to bring up supplies and reinforcements to the left bank, so much the better.

[LongLeftFlank]

1 minute ago, chrisl said:

I'm also a little curious as to the mud situation.  Ideally, Russia will be struggling to shuffle all those forces to Kherson on trucks in mud.  And if mud makes it harder for Russia to bring up supplies and reinforcements to the left bank, so much the better.

Yeah, very important point here. In rasputitsa season, heavy trucks have big trouble offroading. But roads are not rail lines. 

I'll ask the pros on the board to chime in, but it seems much harder to outright knock down rail and road bridges and overpasses with artillery shells/rockets than using (much bigger) aircraft bombs. IIRC, even the Antonovskii bridge needed a lot of hits to make it unusable.

Plus Russian pioneer troops seem reasonably efficient at repairing, or laying detour pontoon/corduroy sections (for roadways).

But if you can create traffic holdups which further strain the extended logistics chain (and might also provide juicy targets on occasion), that's all to the good.

I guess it's really a question of what you spend your heavy rounds on.

[Offshoot]

After all the drone videos, some old-fashioned bravery doing things the old-fashioned way

 

[Carolus]

Russia transporting more iron to the war zone. Might be autumn, might also be from earlier this year. 

[LongLeftFlank]

On 10/16/2023 at 10:22 PM, LongLeftFlank said:

Four man SSO team whacks a RU truck behind enemy lines. Location undetermined. Nice long drone shots of (night) tactical movement.

1. So Ukrainian SSO rozvidnyks *seem* to have performed vastly better than Russian spetsnaz in this war, although we don't really know owing to Opsec on both sides.

It may be that ordinary Ukie grunts are in the habit of acting as commandos (doin' what needs doin').  Plus Ivan's lovely habit of squandering elite troops as ordinary grunts has probably drained the pool.

2.  There's some high priority missions like, oh, blowing up rail and road bridges -- and I mean, in a way that can't be easily patched -- where if you can't use aerial bombs then can you send guys with explosives? Main problem is, getting in and out.

3. And we now see these gizmos entering into use, at first scarce but then increasingly common (and over time, on both sides)

https://www.armadainternational.com/2023/08/ukraines-unmanned-robotic-battlefield-casualty-evacuation/

The Ukrainian sources did not identify the UAV model that they are employing, however, it was indicated that it is a commercially available system. It is, however, understood to carry up to 397 pounds (180 kilograms) with a range of more than 43 miles (69 kilometers).

4.  So yeah, I think you folks know where I am going with this.....

We just watched the Hamasholes doing this stuff, lo-tech.

5. Sure, MANPADS and blah blah blah, choose your routes across the front carefully, but the military 'economics' of killing one saboteur doing a low level hop at night over your minefields and into your backfield are a lot poorer than killing a big helo + crew + passengers.

Next iteration? (a lot shorter range of course, but in some situations one might choose getting shot at over stepping on mines)

6. ...And of course, 180kg payload also makes rather a big BOOM if you want to cut out the fleshy middleman and lay a charge remotely, e.g. by a bridge abutment.

Edited October 18, 2023 by LongLeftFlank

[The_MonkeyKing]

current frontline with thick blue and frontline from 31.8 with thin blue

 

[TheVulture]

4 minutes ago, The_MonkeyKing said:

current frontline with thick blue and frontline from 31.8 with thin blue

 

If that front line map is correct,  Russia has captured the infamous slag heap.