How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[The_Capt]

3 minutes ago, dan/california said:

Russia is burning its seed corn to stay warm in five different ways. Indeed they seem to be shoveling it on the fire faster in the effort to intimidate everyone into giving up. If we don't give up the Russians are going to be spectacularly bleeped. Someone mentioned in the last hundred pages that Russian airline have had four or five extremely close calls, like airplanes landing in wheat fields that will probably never leave close calls. That string and a great many others are going to run out. 

Tightening up high tech/machine tool exports seems to have finally become a priority, it is criminal that it hasn't happened sooner. The other thing that STILL needs doing is an actual travel ban. Sending all the oligarchs kids home from Oxford and Columbia, too. The travel ban is the perfect sanction, because poor Russians aren't traveling anyway, and the rich ones will really care.

 

Travel ban is a serious escalation.  We have an international framework of visas etc.  To stop an average Russian citizen you basically are saying that they are all a national security risk.  Without a blanket restriction like we saw in CODIV that is a pretty major step.  It normally comes with breaking off diplomatic relations etc.

You may see a tightening or bordering nation bans but you are basically looking at closing off the sky to Russian flights and the seas to Russian passenger ships.  Now you can ban individuals on NS grounds.  But every Russian citizen is basically dropping an Iron Curtain.  Then you get into the humanitarian angle - families separated, health travel.  Any and all trade by Russian's themselves.

A mass travel ban is something I do not think we would see unless a NATO Article 5 were triggered in the run up to WW3.  Enhanced restrictions for some individuals and groups but not wholesale.  Again, we do not need to prove Putin correct in all this to contain him.  The West is fighting to re-assert rules based international order, not crush Russia.  The second we do look like we are crushing Russia (more so than we already are) it drives more support into Putin's camp.

[sburke]

 

2 hours ago, Zeleban said:

 

Pekka Kallioniemi is one of the most ardent supporters of Ukraine, why would he spread false information? Western firms are gradually returning to Russia. Without even waiting for the end of the war. Many on this forum argued that Western businesses would never return to Russia due to reputational risks, as well as fear of their business being confiscated by the Russian government. However, we see today that many companies have returned to the Russian market in one way or another. If a Western firm trades with Russia, it loses nothing, and vice versa, if a Western firm refuses to do business in Russia, it loses millions.

If that were true, then why did they take the huge financial hit to leave in the first place?  The reality is if you are caught violating sanctions, you are gonna get smacked for it.  If even Chinese banks are loathe to get too involved with Russia it would seem there are still teeth in the sanctions regime.  Do some move to get around it, maybe.  Are many of these products actually knock offs?  Probably.. especially from China.

A few luxury items don't make for an argument that western businesses are returning to Russia.  One need only look at their aircraft industry to understand that.

On the other hand it wouldn't hurt to make more exposure of the duplicity of these companies that are skirting the sanctions.  In the age of social media that doesn't seem to be a difficult thing to do.

Edited December 20, 2023 by sburke

[poesel]

There were questions about how to shield drones vs EMP. This can be achieved by putting the electronics of a drone into a Faraday cage. This cage must be built of conductive materials like aluminum or copper. The holes in the cage must be <10% of the wavelength you want to shield against. Let's assume 5 GHz and you are at 60 mm wavelength, so the holes should be less than 6 mm or smaller (if any).

The thickness of the cage is not that important. 1mm alu sheet metal has saved people from lightning. But conductivity is. Gold foil would be best, but copper or alu will do.

One problem is that you obviously don't want to put your antenna inside the cage, so that's a hole. The power supply for the motors will also create holes. And you need to make sure that you don't catch a spike through the antenna itself.

This is doable with a bit of effort. I haven't seen anyone doing it for the cheapo quads I guess it is not worth it (yet). Military drones will have that and probably a lot more.

[Sojourner]

9 minutes ago, sburke said:

One need only look at their aircraft industry to understand that.

Assuming you meant aviation industry, one need only look at that prior to the war to see that not much has changed. 

Pekka Kallioniemi's comment about "absolutely every brand" was clearly hyperbole, I took it to mean many brands, if not most, are readily available.

I can't accept the assertion that sanctions are effective until I see bread lines and Muscovites eating their young.

[dan/california]

 

Quote

 

https://abcnews.go.com/International/xi-warns-biden-china-plans-back-taiwan/story?id=105815520

Xi told Biden at summit that China will reunify with Taiwan

The blunt language came during last month's meeting, sources said.

 

We won't be able to say we weren't warned. The entire West needs to go to wartime level munitions production NOW. That would be between five and twenty five times more than we are producing now.

[Tux]

4 hours ago, The_Capt said:

So lets say we have three 500m minefield belts in front of us in say 5km of depth.  Specifically designed to slow and attrit.  Defended by all the stuff I posted earlier.

Phase 1 - Recon.  ISR the living crap out of the place.  Do not prosecute targets yet, map them.  Map networks, control nodes and c-move routes in depth.

Phase 2 - Suppress.  C-UAS, C-EW, C-everything you can see.  You need to do this in multiple places or the enemy is going to know exactly where to prepare. Here CB will be critical.

Phase 3 - Isolate.  You want to cut off the 5x1 breaching operation, so think 5x10.  You need to cut C4ISR and c-moves.  Here our own FASCAM and Deep Strike will be critical.

Phase 4 - Bridgehead X-ing.  Combination of air mobility systems - jetpacks, quadcopters etc.  Push JTA(G)Cs, UGVs and weapons to the far side of first minefield.  Out to 1-2 kms.  Night, smoke and suppression anyway one can.

Phase 5.  Establish bridge head.  Set those JTA(G)Cs loose and hunt every ATGM team.  Cut off any c-moves.

Phase 6.  Breach.  Main ground force has about 5 mins to crack that minefield.  Explosive and mechanical.  And this would be after a thorough recon.

Phase 7 - Rinse and repeat.  You have already set local conditions.  Sustain them and move fast. Next bridge head force bounces next minefield.  Next breaching wave  (another 5 mins).  

Add that all up and theoretically one could do it in maybe an hour so now you have the isolation window.  You are basically killing anything looking to move into that box from well out.  HIMARs and deep strike on logistics nodes.  Good news is most RA are moving by trucks.  Tanks and IFVs are still out there so those UGVs need Javelins. 

Trickiest part is enemy ATGM teams.  If you miss a few (and you will) you will need redundant breaches built in.  But more importantly you need to be able to spot and kill those teams, likely with FPVs very quickly.

This whole dance is not easy or cheap. But if you can sustain momentum, you could have a mounted breakout force on the outer edge of this belt in about 60 mins by my calcs.  You would need to drill it.  You would need to enable it and empower it.  It would cost a helluva lot of money.

And it still may fail.  But so far it is the best idea I have heard.  One might be able to do it from afar with nothing more than a swarm of UAS, but I am not sure the tech is there yet with respect to endurance.  Human and UGV pairing gives the ability to hold those bridge heads.  C2 forward means you can react faster.  

Finally...and here is the real rub:  you need to do this in several places at the same time.  Overload RA C2 which is likely very comfortably static right now.  Force a manoeuvre decision on them and then layer it with friction.  Let them make the mistake.  Once you get break out, you have  whole new set of problems but minefields might not be one of them.

And damn won't the post-war movie be epic.  Now whether it is a drama, tragedy or comedy is up to the Red God.

 

Here's where my lack of relevant experience bites:  what are 4 and 5 getting you, here, which can't currently be achieved?  If you've carried out 1-3 and breaching is to be completed in 5 mins anyway, can't you roll straight from 3 to 6?

Or are you thinking that the bridgehead JTA(G)Cs will be able to do something which the forces on the 'friendly' side of the mine belt couldnt just by flying recon drones?

Edited December 20, 2023 by Tux

[sburke]

34 minutes ago, Sojourner said:

Assuming you meant aviation industry, one need only look at that prior to the war to see that not much has changed. 

Pekka Kallioniemi's comment about "absolutely every brand" was clearly hyperbole, I took it to mean many brands, if not most, are readily available.

I can't accept the assertion that sanctions are effective until I see bread lines and Muscovites eating their young.

Well with that standard I doubt you will ever be satisfied.  And yet the Russian aviation industry (  ) is still cratering and yes it has changed.  This is from a year ago.  Things have continued to get worse.

Punished By Western Sanctions, Russia's Airlines Are Showing More Cracks And More Problems (rferl.org)

Edited December 20, 2023 by sburke

[hcrof]

4 hours ago, The_Capt said:

Ah you hit on the critical part of all this.  Main ground force breach and link up.  I am not even sure what that ground force would look like - could be IFVs and tanks, could be medium/light but it needs to be mounted and ready to move quickly. 

So lets say we have three 500m minefield belts in front of us in say 5km of depth.  Specifically designed to slow and attrit.  Defended by all the stuff I posted earlier.

Phase 1 - Recon.  ISR the living crap out of the place.  Do not prosecute targets yet, map them.  Map networks, control nodes and c-move routes in depth.

Phase 2 - Suppress.  C-UAS, C-EW, C-everything you can see.  You need to do this in multiple places or the enemy is going to know exactly where to prepare. Here CB will be critical.

Phase 3 - Isolate.  You want to cut off the 5x1 breaching operation, so think 5x10.  You need to cut C4ISR and c-moves.  Here our own FASCAM and Deep Strike will be critical.

Phase 4 - Bridgehead X-ing.  Combination of air mobility systems - jetpacks, quadcopters etc.  Push JTA(G)Cs, UGVs and weapons to the far side of first minefield.  Out to 1-2 kms.  Night, smoke and suppression anyway one can.

Phase 5.  Establish bridge head.  Set those JTA(G)Cs loose and hunt every ATGM team.  Cut off any c-moves.

Phase 6.  Breach.  Main ground force has about 5 mins to crack that minefield.  Explosive and mechanical.  And this would be after a thorough recon.

Phase 7 - Rinse and repeat.  You have already set local conditions.  Sustain them and move fast. Next bridge head force bounces next minefield.  Next breaching wave  (another 5 mins).  

Add that all up and theoretically one could do it in maybe an hour so now you have the isolation window.  You are basically killing anything looking to move into that box from well out.  HIMARs and deep strike on logistics nodes.  Good news is most RA are moving by trucks.  Tanks and IFVs are still out there so those UGVs need Javelins. 

Trickiest part is enemy ATGM teams.  If you miss a few (and you will) you will need redundant breaches built in.  But more importantly you need to be able to spot and kill those teams, likely with FPVs very quickly.

This whole dance is not easy or cheap. But if you can sustain momentum, you could have a mounted breakout force on the outer edge of this belt in about 60 mins by my calcs.  You would need to drill it.  You would need to enable it and empower it.  It would cost a helluva lot of money.

And it still may fail.  But so far it is the best idea I have heard.  One might be able to do it from afar with nothing more than a swarm of UAS, but I am not sure the tech is there yet with respect to endurance.  Human and UGV pairing gives the ability to hold those bridge heads.  C2 forward means you can react faster.  

Finally...and here is the real rub:  you need to do this in several places at the same time.  Overload RA C2 which is likely very comfortably static right now.  Force a manoeuvre decision on them and then layer it with friction.  Let them make the mistake.  Once you get break out, you have  whole new set of problems but minefields might not be one of them.

And damn won't the post-war movie be epic.  Now whether it is a drama, tragedy or comedy is up to the Red God.

 

What I am not seeing here is how to deal with the fact that if you mass for a breach you will get spotted, then the enemy has time to prepare (by shelling the breaching vehicles and/or fuelling up helicopters). 

It seems to me the jump teams (which can start dispersed) have got to be doing quite a bit of work sanitising the area before you can breach, then you end up breaching slowly because you just can't concentrate valuable equipment before it becomes himars/lancet fodder. Your drone defence will have to be airtight too. 

[The_Capt]

1 hour ago, Tux said:

Here's where my lack of relevant experience bites:  what are 4 and 5 getting you, here, which can't currently be achieved?  If you've carried out 1-3 and breaching is to be completed in 5 mins anyway, can't you roll straight from 3 to 6?

Or are you thinking that the bridgehead JTA(G)Cs will be able to do something which the forces on the 'friendly' side of the mine belt couldnt just by flying recon drones?

You could try, however the role of a bridgehead is to control the far side as much as possible in order to allow for a 5 min bounce breach.  Normally we would do a silent patrol path breach and punch infantry up to sweep for ATGM but this is the 21st century.  Infantry get detected and killed by UAS.  Now if you sweep all UAS then you might be able to get away with it.

By pushing JTA(G)Cs forward you get a C2 and targeting node forward.  It can push your unmanned even further out.  UGVs are not ready for fully autonomous so ground control forward will be better, especially as at ground level LOS gets trickier.  They will likely push through UAS but why take the risk.  Nothing stopping you from pushing human ATGM teams into the bridge head either.  

My sense is that UAS are not quite there and cannot be relied on to sweep the bridge head and contain it on their own.  If they were the UA likely would have done it.  Also as we get into comms lasers systems to avoid EW LOS becomes more important. 

Once the breach goes in the far bank crew become very important.  They act as recon and guides to make sure the assault force does not wind up in another minefield and on preset rally positions.  Next wave for next bridgehead would likely have to go out right after first one and possibly third.

In the middle of combat one cannot have too many eyes or brains as far forward as possible.  Coordinating and communicating, as well as seeing and understanding opportunity is key in all the chaos.  

If you wanna see what a breach without a bridgehead looks like just go back to that suicidal Russian assault back in November near Adviivka.

Edited December 20, 2023 by The_Capt

[The_Capt]

7 minutes ago, hcrof said:

What I am not seeing here is how to deal with the fact that if you mass for a breach you will get spotted, then the enemy has time to prepare (by shelling the breaching vehicles and/or fuelling up helicopters). 

It seems to me the jump teams (which can start dispersed) have got to be doing quite a bit of work sanitising the area before you can breach, then you end up breaching slowly because you just can't concentrate valuable equipment before it becomes himars/lancet fodder. Your drone defence will have to be airtight too. 

Ya that is a really tricky point.  Bridgehead teams can go in distributed so that is covered.  Massing breaching teams is going to have to go in distributed and then concentrate rapidly.  They will likely get picked up but signal might be hard to pull from noise.

You can likely erode tac ISR but operational and strategic are too far back.  As to guns, this will be the mother of all CB campaigns.  

So multiple breaches along the line, deception and decoys.  Smoke.  Still a mystery why they did not employ more smoke last summer.  

One can’t really hide AFVs, so put them in many places and leave the enemy guessing which one is the crossing.  Hell you may have to put out decoy bridgehead teams.  

This is no small operation.  And a lot of moving parts.  Think Vimy Ridge are Cambrai - months to prepare for.  And like those battles, it still might now work.

Single biggest problem that is shutting all this down are UAS and transport platforms.  I just don’t think the scale is available.

[kimbosbread]

26 minutes ago, hcrof said:

What I am not seeing here is how to deal with the fact that if you mass for a breach you will get spotted, then the enemy has time to prepare (by shelling the breaching vehicles and/or fuelling up helicopters). 

It seems to me the jump teams (which can start dispersed) have got to be doing quite a bit of work sanitising the area before you can breach, then you end up breaching slowly because you just can't concentrate valuable equipment before it becomes himars/lancet fodder. Your drone defence will have to be airtight too. 

Loitering munitions and long range artillery/airstrikes sanitize the area first, jump troops establish positions and continue sanitizing, and force enemy to focus on them and not the breach.

[hcrof]

12 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Ya that is a really tricky point.  Bridgehead teams can go in distributed so that is covered.  Massing breaching teams is going to have to go in distributed and then concentrate rapidly.  They will likely get picked up but signal might be hard to pull from noise.

You can likely erode tac ISR but operational and strategic are too far back.  As to guns, this will be the mother of all CB campaigns.  

So multiple breaches along the line, deception and decoys.  Smoke.  Still a mystery why they did not employ more smoke last summer.  

One can’t really hide AFVs, so put them in many places and leave the enemy guessing which one is the crossing.  Hell you may have to put out decoy bridgehead teams.  

This is no small operation.  And a lot of moving parts.  Think Vimy Ridge are Cambrai - months to prepare for.  And like those battles, it still might now work.

Single biggest problem that is shutting all this down are UAS and transport platforms.  I just don’t think the scale is available.

I think that specialised breaching vehicles are more or less non-viable right now. They will likely be spotted and become target number 1 for a whole suite of very long range precision weapons even before the breach gets started. 

The alternative is small cheap (obviously) drone breachers that can clear mines with explosive charges. They can be moved up in secret and if you lose a bunch then just employ more and then push the wrecks out of the way with a dozer tank/ifv when you actually move through. They can also be kept on hand in a distributed fashion to deal with artillery laid mines. 

Edited December 20, 2023 by hcrof

[The_Capt]

12 minutes ago, hcrof said:

I think that specialised breaching vehicles are more or less non-viable right now. They will likely be spotted and become target number 1 for a whole suite of very long range precision weapons even before the breach gets started. 

The alternative is small cheap (obviously) drone breachers that can clear mines with explosive charges. They can be moved up in secret and if you lose a bunch then just employ more and then push the wrecks out of the way with a dozer tank/ifv when you actually move through. They can also be kept on hand in a distributed fashion to deal with artillery laid mines. 

Absolutely, if they exist.  An unmanned UGV team - GPR to do recon and mapping.  And follow ups to place shaped charges is a way better way to go but I don't think the tech is there. 

The breakout force for Kharkiv was Light and SOF, so that may be a better way to go if you could get them past the minefields.  Or the heavy breaching stuff get a one time shot type of thing.  Explosives still work but line charges are heavy and visible.

The Soviet plan back in the day was tac nukes, but pretty sure that one is off the table.

[Sojourner]

58 minutes ago, sburke said:

with that standard I doubt you will ever be satisfied

<Cue LLF for Rolling Stones meme.>

Interesting article, thanks. But is it really getting worse or are the incidents just getting more attention now?

Photo caption in the article: "An Aeroflot Sukhoi Superjet 100 passenger plane after it made an emergency landing at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport on May 5, 2019. Forty-one people were killed." [emphasis added]

The only fatal civil aviation incident post February '22 that I can recall was Prigoshin, but I don't think that had anything to do with sanctions.

So yeah, maybe starvation is setting the bar too high, I'll settle for a mass revolt because people can't get iPhone 15s.

[sburke]

24 minutes ago, Sojourner said:

<Cue LLF for Rolling Stones meme.>

Interesting article, thanks. But is it really getting worse or are the incidents just getting more attention now?

Photo caption in the article: "An Aeroflot Sukhoi Superjet 100 passenger plane after it made an emergency landing at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport on May 5, 2019. Forty-one people were killed." [emphasis added]

The only fatal civil aviation incident post February '22 that I can recall was Prigoshin, but I don't think that had anything to do with sanctions.

So yeah, maybe starvation is setting the bar too high, I'll settle for a mass revolt because people can't get iPhone 15s.

It is getting worse because they can't get parts that pass international regs so even places like China and India are refusing flights for planes that don't meet inspection standards.  Was Russian aviation bad before, yes, but there were a lot of carriers flying to Russia that were safe before the war.  Those carriers no longer fly there so by default, Russians are now forced to fly on carriers with bad records that are getting worse. 

Now the iphone 15 is a whole other matter.  Maybe that will be the next mobilization lure- Get an iPhone 15 for your family, serve in the SMO!

[dan/california]

 

Quote

https://www.kyivpost.com/post/24965

There have two REAL emergency landings, and what appears to be spiraling mechanical delays in the last few months. Russia bought quite a few newish planes over the last twenty years, and they are just really hard to keep going without manufacturer support.

[dan/california]

2 minutes ago, sburke said:

Now the iphone 15 is a whole other matter.  Maybe that will be the next mobilization lure- Get an iPhone 15 for your family, serve in the SMO!

They did that add a year ago. Truly maximum cringe...

[OBJ]

4 hours ago, poesel said:

There were questions about how to shield drones vs EMP. This can be achieved by putting the electronics of a drone into a Faraday cage. This cage must be built of conductive materials like aluminum or copper. The holes in the cage must be <10% of the wavelength you want to shield against. Let's assume 5 GHz and you are at 60 mm wavelength, so the holes should be less than 6 mm or smaller (if any).

The thickness of the cage is not that important. 1mm alu sheet metal has saved people from lightning. But conductivity is. Gold foil would be best, but copper or alu will do.

One problem is that you obviously don't want to put your antenna inside the cage, so that's a hole. The power supply for the motors will also create holes. And you need to make sure that you don't catch a spike through the antenna itself.

This is doable with a bit of effort. I haven't seen anyone doing it for the cheapo quads I guess it is not worth it (yet). Military drones will have that and probably a lot more.

Thank you and congratulations @poesel. I think you just self nominated yourself to be our resident forum Drone EMP/counter EMP expert. And congratulations, you explained this in a way I think I can understand it. Not everyone can do that.

On the flip side of your info above, if you have thoughts on use of non-nuclear EMP weapons to establish, and maintain, local 'drone supremacy,' please share.

My sense is we've collectively concluded dominating the 'drone battle space,' or the 'air littoral' as they called it in one of interesting Air Power articles @The_Capt shared earlier today, will be required either right before or right at the start of the attack and it will need to be maintained locally throughout attack, breakthrough and exploitation. 

[buena]

11 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

What this boils down to is the breaching force having four options for a defensive war like we're seeing now:

1. Go around
2. Go through
3. Go over
4. Go home (stop fighting)

Option 1 is probably non-existent or, if it does exist, not of practical value.

Option 2 is apparently no longer viable thanks to a combination of UAS and various PGMs.

These are the two options that traditional maneuver warfare promotes, whether it be NATO or Soviet based doctrine.  That leaves us the remaining two.

Option 3 used to be incorporated into maneuver warfare but, in the past few decades, has been largely ruled out as impractical due to the earliest forms of PGMs... heat seeking air defense missiles.  And like we're seeing now, concentration of mass (i.e. big aircraft with dozens of paras) was found to be too risky.  Even moderate concentrations of mass (i.e. helicopters with a dozen soldiers) seem to be too risky.

Option 4 is the only option right now that doesn't involve a lot of losses for little gain.

Thinking about traditional airborne ops in the context of our jetpack discussion, should we really be so surprised that ground based maneuver warfare has suffered so horribly at the hands of the combination of detection and PGMs?  Air and airborne force projection has been under strain from this combo for decades, to the point where helicopters are largely held back from the frontlines and airborne ground forces are largely restricted to SpecOps and rear logistics.

Steve

5. Go underground

Edited December 21, 2023 by buena

[kimbosbread]

19 minutes ago, buena said:

5. Go underground

Yeah I think we covered that with the badgers

EDIT: A robot mole would be cool, but I don’t think it’d have the power to dig through a few km to pop up and then kill things. Maybe to find mines?

Edited December 21, 2023 by kimbosbread

[dan/california]

1 hour ago, kimbosbread said:

Yeah I think we covered that with the badgers

EDIT: A robot mole would be cool, but I don’t think it’d have the power to dig through a few km to pop up and then kill things. Maybe to find mines?

Something like this might be worth half a look, particularly given that a lot of southern Ukraine has relatively soft soil. If you could shove a MICLIC charge underneath the minefield without being noticed you might be able to open several parallel breaches with the element of surprise. The manufactures are quoting boring rates of one to two meters per minute. it would possible to do a full five hundred meters in one or two episodes of bad weather, then trigger the charges when things were more optimal for operations. Yes you would get the the bleep shelled/droned out of you if the Russians noticed. But the tech more or less exists. It seems like it would at least be worth a few training range experiments. I think you could buy about a hundred of these for the cost of one Abrams based breaching vehicle.

If nothing else you could irritate the Russians by setting up fake attempts, and counter batterying whatever they used to shoot at them.

[Sojourner]

You need to think more bigly

 

https://www.boringcompany.com/prufrock

[cesmonkey]

 

[Zeleban]

4 hours ago, cesmonkey said:

 

"border security" is just a hoax to the public. The real reasons for blocking aid to Ukraine is the decline in the popularity of Biden and the Democrats. Democrats know full well that even after they agree to Republican demands for border security, Republicans will still block aid to Ukraine for new flimsy reasons. For example, Ukraine does not have a plan for victory, show us the plan. That's why Democrats are in no hurry to agree to demands for border security.

[dan/california]

 

Quote

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/21/business/china-russia-trade.html

War in Ukraine Has China Cashing In

The country’s trade with Russia this year has exceeded $200 billion, and makers of cars and trucks are the big winners.

 

The times really is on a maximum pessimism campaign.

And Russia really is in the process of becoming a Chinese colony.