JonS Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 (edited) 6 hours ago, Kraft said: Training for Leopard started in February 2023. They were in active combat, in June 2023. Had there been the will to send these tanks in 2022, they could have been ready by the time the Kherson/ offensive took place/had commenced. It started even later. This is analog to every other weapons system. If you really wanted Leos why did you not buy some after 2014? I mean - you had EIGHT YEARS! What were you doing, aside from sitting on your thumbs? Edited March 4 by JonS 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ASL Veteran Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 2 hours ago, Kraft said: I thought this was the leading theory as to how the situation can and will be resolved in the end? How would they even pressure him if they cant go around his block? The Pentagon's budget will need a continuing resolution passed sometime around March 22 if a regular budget can't be agreed upon (which is doubtful so they have to keep passing continuing resolutions to keep last year's budget going). More than likely the Ukraine / Israel / random other stuff aide package will be resolved around that time since it's likely going to be folded into all the other defense spending (that's what I've read anyway and it makes sense). 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cesmonkey Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 2 hours ago, Kraft said: I thought this was the leading theory as to how the situation can and will be resolved in the end? How would they even pressure him if they cant go around his block? There was a hope for the discharge petition route, but it hasn't gained sufficient momentum yet. Most of the Republicans that want to support Ukraine also seem to want to try to still go for a census approach, if that's possible. And whenever Trump says something, things get off track again. There are some that that are tired of waiting, and on the other side, some that are 100% opposed. The struggles they are having to reach a compromise on the budget bills doesn't help, either. But it's all painfully slow. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kinophile Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 "Using incomplete Soviet-era drawings, specimen track links from Ukraine, then the inspection of vehicles, manuals and the loan of track specimens from the Tank Museum, Cook reverse-engineered the tracks and drive sprockets for MTLB, BMP, and T72 vehicles... " 7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Murauder Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 I do hope the war could end soon,so that we can get our CMBS DLC. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Haiduk Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 5 hours ago, JonS said: If you really wanted Leos why did you not buy some after 2014? I mean - you had EIGHT YEARS! What were you doing, aside from sitting on your thumbs? To buy? Would Germany really agree to sell them in that time, when in 2014 they rejected to supply engines for BTR-4, because "it may cause more civilian deaths". And even in 2022 there were half years of discussions "will Russia nuke us if we give Leos?" 14 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rokko Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 6 hours ago, JonS said: If you really wanted Leos why did you not buy some after 2014? I mean - you had EIGHT YEARS! What were you doing, aside from sitting on your thumbs? This has be to be a joke, right? No way Germany would have sold any weapons to Ukraine pre-02/22. Even the second hand sale of a handful ancient East German howitzers was through Latvia was out of the question. Best we were willing to do was sending 5000 helmets. Supplying arms to "conflict zones" was simply not a possibility in pre-war German politics. 7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beleg85 Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 7 hours ago, JonS said: If you really wanted Leos why did you not buy some after 2014? I mean - you had EIGHT YEARS! What were you doing, aside from sitting on your thumbs? Could be a little difficult. "Guys, I am going for shopping to newest Krauss-Maffei Wegmann tank dealer saloon, do you need anything?" Most countries by that time were discouraged from selling any serious, top-shelf military eqipment to UA. I think we all agreed it was wrong policy, so no point in further beating dead horse. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 10 minutes ago, Beleg85 said: so no point in further beating dead horse. Yep... Hindsight a wonderful thing.... As if we even knew Russia WAS going to invade... Going forward Europe is showing every intention of upping it's support despite some folk saying otherwise... Ukraine is NOT out of the fight and if it addresses some weaknesses it will certainly stay in the fight longer than Russia has... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 (edited) 2 hours ago, Rokko said: This has be to be a joke, right? Yep Jon has a very dry sense of humour. It is the same level of Joke that with Leopards earlier the war would be already be over... We are where we are. Hindsight and rewritten history is inevitable, humans being human. Doesn't mean that there shouldn't be pushback on those spinning a message so it does have to be countered. Edited March 4 by Holien 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M.Herm Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 11 minutes ago, Holien said: Going forward Europe is showing every intention of upping it's support despite some folk saying otherwise... With intentions you will not win a war. Here in Germany, I can not see anything like "showing every intention". The economy is declining with no end in sight. The interest in the Ukrainian cause is equally declining. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holien Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 Well then I suggest that those Germans who are reading this, and want Ukraine to be supported get involved and get in touch with their elected representative. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carolus Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 Regarding Poland and imports from Belarussia 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Capt Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 4 hours ago, Rokko said: This has be to be a joke, right? No way Germany would have sold any weapons to Ukraine pre-02/22. Even the second hand sale of a handful ancient East German howitzers was through Latvia was out of the question. Best we were willing to do was sending 5000 helmets. Supplying arms to "conflict zones" was simply not a possibility in pre-war German politics. I think the broader point is that Ukraine is not a teenager - all the tragedy but no accountability or responsibility. There were a lot of strategic failures in the run up to this war and they do not all lay at the feet of Europe or the US. The global arms industry is incredibly large and Ukraine could have leveraged that to be much better prepared for what was a pretty obvious threat on its eastern border. (https://www.brookings.edu/articles/its-time-to-stop-us-arms-sales-to-saudi-arabia/#:~:text=A total of 73% of,averaging %2410.7 billion per year.) Of course hindsight being 20/20 it is also fair to admit that no one really thought Russia would go this far. We pretty much expected another nibble in the Donbas, maybe consolidate that strategic corridor. A full on grab was not the assessed most likely COA. Further Ukraine did move mountains within its military in those 8 years, the most important of which was to set themselves up for integration into western C4ISR. As has been noted, we are where we are, which is here. And all that really matters is what we do now. 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kinophile Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kinophile Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kinophile Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 Now this would be an interesting development... 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kinophile Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 Damn right. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kinophile Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 On 3/2/2024 at 7:04 PM, Kinophile said: Feodesia Following up: 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 26 minutes ago, Kinophile said: Now this would be an interesting development... Cooper may very well be correct, or at least it's part of the puzzle. Clearly SOMETHING has changed on the Ukraine side in terms of capabilities. I suspect it is a combination of things, but here are the elements I see in play: Need - the glide bomb threat has upped the importance of doing something significant and immediate about Russia's fixed wing aircraft. "Where there is a will, there is a way" with will in this case being focused determination. Better air defenses - it seems Ukraine now has sufficient capabilities to defend it's skies from Russian terror attacks, allowing the diversion of some systems to offensive activities. Something brand new - clearly there's some new capability at play here, even if the other two are also important. Lots of possibilities: it is recently reverse engineered EW (as Tom Cooper suggests) something the US already had and is only now putting it in play to compensate for Congress' hold on funding a new trick with existing equipment. You know, the sort of thing where a junior officer comes in and makes a suggestion and it gets to the right people who then say "wow! Why didn't we think of that before?!?". Think hedgerow cutters on Allied tanks in Normandy. The idea is what mattered, the rest was just muscle power Russian failure - it is possible that cumulative losses of EW and AD equipment has reached the point that Ukraine was able to find "a hole" to punch into with its existing equipment. Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vanir Ausf B Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 (edited) A (probably paywalled) WaPo article about Ukrainian recruitment efforts. It largely echoes @Haiduk's comments from yesterday. _____ Syrsky has been tasked with auditing the existing armed forces to find more combat-eligible troops, after Zelensky’s office recently announced that of the 1 million people who have been mobilized, only about 300,000 have fought at the front lines. But nearly a month after his promotion, no one in the military leadership or the presidential administration has explained where those 700,000 are — or what they have been doing. More than 4,000 amendments have been made to the mobilization bill, and some lawmakers see the measure as an attempt by Zelensky to pass off responsibility to parliament for inevitably unpopular decisions. “It’s time to start an adult conversation with society and not to be afraid of it, ” Bobrovska said. “It’s not 2022, when emotions took over.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/03/04/ukraine-mobilization-zelensky-russia/ Edited March 4 by Vanir Ausf B 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan/california Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 17 minutes ago, Kinophile said: "Using incomplete Soviet-era drawings, specimen track links from Ukraine, then the inspection of vehicles, manuals and the loan of track specimens from the Tank Museum, Cook reverse-engineered the tracks and drive sprockets for MTLB, BMP, and T72 vehicles... " This is an outstanding example of getting the little stuff right. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
poesel Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 6 hours ago, M.Herm said: With intentions you will not win a war. Here in Germany, I can not see anything like "showing every intention". The economy is declining with no end in sight. The interest in the Ukrainian cause is equally declining. Germany never showed "every intention". We have discussed that at length, and we are in line with most of the rest of the West, unfortunately. The economy is declining as it sometimes does. "no end in sight" is a bit over the top IMHO. The interest in Ukraine has declined. Of course, modern society is easily bored. The amount of newsworthy items has gone down. But look at us: downing an A-50 has even us only occupied for a few days until we derailed again. But: the amount of support given by Germany is pretty stable, and I don't see that changing (see below). 6 hours ago, Holien said: Well then I suggest that those Germans who are reading this, and want Ukraine to be supported get involved and get in touch with their elected representative. That may not be necessary. The political constellation is currently, that the biggest supporters of Ukraine are both in the government (greens & liberals(*)) and the opposition (conservatives). The next government will most likely include one or two of those parties. Thus, it is most unlikely that support for Ukraine will falter. (*) not 'liberal' in the US sense of the word 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan/california Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carolus Posted March 4 Share Posted March 4 (edited) First German FPV drone for military purposes, delivieries will go to Ukraine. Called "tank destroyer" Maus. We will see if it will turn out to be over-engineered and unnecessarily maintenance intensive. But the manufacturer claims to have been in communication with Ukrainian soldiers during the design process. Released features: - Weaponry: modular via "clamp-on" system - Effective range (combat): 5-7 km (3-4 miles) - Effective range (recon): 12-17km (7-10 miles) - Max. flight time: 25 min - vertical speed: 17,5-22.0 m/s - Weight (empty): 700g - Max. total weight: 6,5kg - Frame: Donaustahl-M-V1 (inspired by "De Havilland DH.98") - Max. speed: 140 km/h (86mi/h) based on 10.000mAh battery. Seems like a speedy but low-range drone. Maybe it will have good electro-magnetic shielding? I would hope so. Edited March 4 by Carolus 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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