How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[dan/california]

4 minutes ago, LongLeftFlank said:

 

Yup, this is exactly the grim near future I expect.

Resulting in an uninhabitable no-mans land, what, dozens of kms deep? Hundreds of kms?

And then a very great deal comes down to which side's AI crunches the data best. There are not even afraction of the needed people to go through all the data.

 

Quote

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gorgon_Stare

They couldn't come close to getting through the data for single system, looking at a single city, otherwise.

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, ArmouredTopHat said:

It is good that the Russians remain incapable of properly sealing pockets and inflicting far more severe damage to units. 

This is another interesting and rather puzzling aspect of this war.  Surrounding enemy forces has been extremely rare and when it does happen extraction by the defender is usually complete or nearly so.

ISR is likely the primary reason for this.  In the old days it was easier for a unit to be surrounded in part because nobody knew it had happened until it was too late.  Now?  There's real time information coming in to the higher levels and potentially local levels.

Another probable element is the caution units are showing because they know speed doesn't produce surprise, and surprise is really useful when the enemy can zap things from great distances with great precision.  In the old days a small breakthrough force could secure a road junction and cause all kinds of problems.  Now, the chances are that a) the defender would know about it before running into an ambush and b) has a variety of precision means of putting the hurt on any such attacking force.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

8 hours ago, ArmouredTopHat said:

This is very much early days that hold a lot of maybes, though this sort of testing is clearly a step in the right direction that shows that the US at least is taking this very seriously, both with current capability and future capability of drone munitions.

Yup, and to be clear I'm not being critical of the test at all.  The proper way to do this is to start simple and work up from there.  I should know because this is the sort of thing I do for a living, even if virtually

So as long as people see these tests for what they are (carefully crafted proof of concept study with low stress), all is good.  If someone starts looking at tests like this as evidence that the problems with drones are soon to be solved, they would be quite wrong.

8 hours ago, ArmouredTopHat said:

 I personally do wonder if we are seeing something akin to the 'happy time' experienced by Second world war Uboats, IE drones are enjoying a brief moment of unparalleled success against unprepared targets that can only offer improvised and adhoc responses currently before the defence catches up and suddenly something like an FPV drone is facing a lot more effective systems designed from the ground up to counter them. The future is scary and its very hard to say where we are going to end up.

While it is difficult to say where we will wind up, the preponderance of evidence is that the C-UAS capabilities are lagging way, way, way behind the development curve of UAS (and unmanned in general).  This test is an example of how bad things are.  These sorts of proof-of-concept tests should have been done many years ago, but now it's a scramble because the military and its industrial partners dropped the ball.

I've been studying this topic very intensely since the war started.  My opinion is that the problem with UAS is going to get much worse before there's any sort of breakthrough in C-UAS to establish parity.  I say this very confidently based on the fact that UAS is adapting and adopting with existing technology that is very easy to evaluate, whereas C-UAS is struggling to deal with what is already on the battlefield.

8 hours ago, ArmouredTopHat said:

What I found curious most of all was that none of the systems were directed energy types at all, which is very interesting.

I found it interesting as well, but completely expected for two reasons:

1.  directed energy is extremely expensive to be playing around with

2.  physics indicates that it is a dead end

If I had $100m to invest in a C-UAS system, directed energy would be extremely low on my list.  Guys with shotguns would be higher up.

Steve

 

[LongLeftFlank]

55 minutes ago, dan/california said:

And then a very great deal comes down to which side's AI crunches the data best. There are not even afraction of the needed people to go through all the data.

They couldn't come close to getting through the data for single system, looking at a single city, otherwise.

I found myself wondering whether Putin might rely on the diffidence and divisions in the bourgeois West to deploy a Sampson option in Ukraine to break the deadlock.... cook off a chain of high altitude EMP nukes along the Dnpr that fry all unhardened electronics and telcoms in a 300-400km strip, effectively returning that zone to the 1950s (yes, their own troops could be affected too). Goodbye for now to drones, cellphones, computers, anything not EMP hardened.

And since he's already crossed all Big Red Lines with that act, unleash chemical rockets (hey, we've got 'em, might as well use 'em!) on every fixed Ukrainian position they can touch, to kill as many hohols as possible and treble the UA manpower crisis overnight. Even if some mobiks choke to death too, who cares?

BUT, even if much of the Ukrainian front is thereby dissolved by these mad dog acts (which, absent a mass civilian casualty event, I'm still not convinced would trigger a NATO armed intervention), what then? The Ukes promptly revert to 2022 (or 1944) partisan tactics.

...Could the Russian army even sustain a leg infantry march to the Dnpr, much less Odesa? They could probably take Kharkiv and the Donetsk environs.

****

Please note, all the above is purely rhetorical, Putin shows no sign of being that far gone.

All Unthinkable, sure, but what passes for 'thinking' among world leaders these days?

Edited July 25 by LongLeftFlank

[Battlefront.com]

We should make sure that when we talk about UAS and C-UAS that we mentally compartmentalize it into the various different types. 

Very high level assets, like the fast and high flying jet propelled UAS that the US operates, are no more vulnerable to C-UAS now than they were when this war started.  So they appear to be unchanged.

Other high level assets, like our friend the Bayraktar, seem to be having a rough go of it.  I'm not exactly sure why, but EW certainly has been cited as a problem.  If that's the major reason for their difficulties, then AI will likely put them back into the game again.  If it is traditional AAA, then maybe not.

Mid level, fixed wing, propeller driven loitering ISR drones are the ones that seem to be the most at risk of C-UAS right now.  These are few in number, slow as Hell, and can be easily tracked by radar.  Going after them with drone interceptors seems to be evolving into a pretty good counter.  Ramming with a stick... holy hell.

It seems mid level large rotary UAS (octocopters) have already largely figured out how to work around EW, but are vulnerable to being rammed or shot at because they are large enough to be engaged by fairly simplistic forms of AA.  But those capabilities are difficult to field everywhere all the time in all conditions, so these still are quite effective.

At the low level there's EW to contend with and back tracing the control source.  These are problems that have already been technically solved, but not yet implemented on mass scale.  AI, spoofers, repeaters, etc. are all available.

We've not seen much at the micro level so far, but these are tactical ISR and extremely expensive so not worth bothering with.

Nano is still in the lab, thankfully.  Hopefully it will stay there for my lifetime!

Steve

 

[Battlefront.com]

A cheap, easy, and immediate way for China and Russia to rattle the US' cage:

https://thehill.com/policy/defense/4792531-austin-chinese-russian-aircraft-joint-flight-alaska/

Steve

[LongLeftFlank]

5 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Nano is still in the lab, thankfully.  Hopefully it will stay there for my lifetime!

'Gray Goo', ftw!

(for some definition of 'win')

[kimbosbread]

5 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Very high level assets, like the fast and high flying jet propelled UAS that the US operates, are no more vulnerable to C-UAS now than they were when this war started.  So they appear to be unchanged.

Operating altitude is 12000m, with satellite comms.

5 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Other high level assets, like our friend the Bayraktar, seem to be having a rough go of it.  I'm not exactly sure why, but EW certainly has been cited as a problem.  If that's the major reason for their difficulties, then AI will likely put them back into the game again.  If it is traditional AAA, then maybe not.

Operating altitude is 5500m, and it uses a LOS radio link with < 300km range.

5 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Mid level, fixed wing, propeller driven loitering ISR drones are the ones that seem to be the most at risk of C-UAS right now.  These are few in number, slow as Hell, and can be easily tracked by radar.  Going after them with drone interceptors seems to be evolving into a pretty good counter.  Ramming with a stick... holy hell.

Orlan-10 operating altitude is 1000-5000m, and same LOS radio link, but less range depending on altitude and base station.

5 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Nano is still in the lab, thankfully.  Hopefully it will stay there for my lifetime!

The future is now old man: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40989075. We’ve had very small fast drones in the lab for at least 25 years (we talked about coin sized turbines MIT has been working on for 3+ decades hundreds of pages ago). Cell phone cameras + efficient chips + batteries make this all but inevitable.

In general, I think your assessment of high altitude and fast (10000m and 300kmh) or very low altitude (< 1000m) being less at risk are basically correct.

That said, there’s no reason you can’t build smaller cheaper autonomous ISR drones that only phone home when they see stuff that’s interesting, and loiter over target areas for hours.

 

[The_Capt]

36 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

We should make sure that when we talk about UAS and C-UAS that we mentally compartmentalize it into the various different types. 

Very high level assets, like the fast and high flying jet propelled UAS that the US operates, are no more vulnerable to C-UAS now than they were when this war started.  So they appear to be unchanged.

Other high level assets, like our friend the Bayraktar, seem to be having a rough go of it.  I'm not exactly sure why, but EW certainly has been cited as a problem.  If that's the major reason for their difficulties, then AI will likely put them back into the game again.  If it is traditional AAA, then maybe not.

Mid level, fixed wing, propeller driven loitering ISR drones are the ones that seem to be the most at risk of C-UAS right now.  These are few in number, slow as Hell, and can be easily tracked by radar.  Going after them with drone interceptors seems to be evolving into a pretty good counter.  Ramming with a stick... holy hell.

It seems mid level large rotary UAS (octocopters) have already largely figured out how to work around EW, but are vulnerable to being rammed or shot at because they are large enough to be engaged by fairly simplistic forms of AA.  But those capabilities are difficult to field everywhere all the time in all conditions, so these still are quite effective.

At the low level there's EW to contend with and back tracing the control source.  These are problems that have already been technically solved, but not yet implemented on mass scale.  AI, spoofers, repeaters, etc. are all available.

We've not seen much at the micro level so far, but these are tactical ISR and extremely expensive so not worth bothering with.

Nano is still in the lab, thankfully.  Hopefully it will stay there for my lifetime!

Steve

 

Next step to my mind is distribution of autonomy.  EW jams up the signal from human to machine which can be extended out to kms.  Jamming the chirping these things can do to each other is much harder to do, and impossible for low energy short range laser comms.  Once a swarm of UAS are talking to each other you basically have airborne distributed AI buzzing around and able to self-synchronize.  The only link back to a human is ISR and basic barrel space management commands “go there and kill”.

This flying brain has much more powerful processing power than any single unit. Making able to sense and target while plotting evasion patterns much more viable.

Nano is terrifying but we will likely see it in much more practical applications before it turns into Grey Goo.  The enhancement of explosives with nano-materials such as aluminum looks like it can do dramatic things in the weight to yield department.

https://www.mdpi.com/2079-4991/13/3/412

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-26390-9

HEAT power can go up pretty dramatically without any real additional weight.  This means that a 1kg round treated with nano-additives can yield what a 1.5-2kg round normally does. Add this to autonomous air and ground systems…and you get the picture.

I find this pining for the old days perverse to be honest.  Is best idea to go back to spending billions on human-centric systems that also cost thousands of lives?  Is that the dream?  Why would we not embrace unmanned systems as a natural and logical evolution in the nature of warfare.  The bulk of the problem of warfare is the human being.  Most of Clausewitzian friction is based on human factors, we spend billions on trying to keep humans alive and functioning in warfare, and billions more on salaries and benefits over their careers…and we always pay political costs when we take casualties. Why on earth would we ever want to go back towards this as a primary methodology in fighting wars? 

Edited July 25 by The_Capt

[ArmouredTopHat]

If fighter pilots are not even getting water, god knows what the men in the trenches are getting.

It amazes me how dysfunctional the Russian military is sometimes. 

[Battlefront.com]

45 minutes ago, kimbosbread said:

The future is now old man: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40989075. We’ve had very small fast drones in the lab for at least 25 years (we talked about coin sized turbines MIT has been working on for 3+ decades hundreds of pages ago). Cell phone cameras + efficient chips + batteries make this all but inevitable.
 

Oh, I am well aware of these.  They are still in the lab   Nanos will likely best be used for ISR, but mate these with a stinger and some poison... as I said, I hope they stay in the lab for my lifetime!

45 minutes ago, kimbosbread said:

In general, I think your assessment of high altitude and fast (10000m and 300kmh) or very low altitude (< 1000m) being less at risk are basically correct.

That said, there’s no reason you can’t build smaller cheaper autonomous ISR drones that only phone home when they see stuff that’s interesting, and loiter over target areas for hours.

Yes, there's so many ways around EW if one just decides to make it happen.

Another thing, which is also terrifying, is having loitering drones in the 12km range waiting for satellites or other things to designate targets and then, when identified, drop an an autonomous munition.  In theory a "bomber" type drone could have dozens of these and stay aloft for extremely long periods of time.  Because of their high altitude they could probably cover 10s of thousands of km2 without having to shift position.

With this sort of on demand killing capability I don't know how any high value target would manage to survive while performing it's role.

Steve

 

[holoween]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

This is another interesting and rather puzzling aspect of this war.  Surrounding enemy forces has been extremely rare and when it does happen extraction by the defender is usually complete or nearly so.

ISR is likely the primary reason for this.  In the old days it was easier for a unit to be surrounded in part because nobody knew it had happened until it was too late.  Now?  There's real time information coming in to the higher levels and potentially local levels.

Another probable element is the caution units are showing because they know speed doesn't produce surprise, and surprise is really useful when the enemy can zap things from great distances with great precision.  In the old days a small breakthrough force could secure a road junction and cause all kinds of problems.  Now, the chances are that a) the defender would know about it before running into an ambush and b) has a variety of precision means of putting the hurt on any such attacking force.

Steve

ISR should cut both ways though. A breakout should be quite easily discovered.

It might also be that with NVGs being relatively rare and force densities relatively low it becomes relatively easy to escape during nighttime.

[cesmonkey]

 

[ArmouredTopHat]

I have no words.

[LongLeftFlank]

2 hours ago, The_Capt said:

Why on earth would we ever want to go back towards this as a primary methodology in fighting wars? 

 

Where's the fun in that?

[poesel]

2 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Mid level, fixed wing, propeller driven loitering ISR drones are the ones that seem to be the most at risk of C-UAS right now.  These are few in number, slow as Hell, and can be easily tracked by radar.  Going after them with drone interceptors seems to be evolving into a pretty good counter.  Ramming with a stick... holy hell.

I would not generally count this class out. The current generation is IMHO too complicated and visible. But you can make VERY cheap fixed wing UAS out of foam, cardboard or wood. Very difficult to detect by radar, long loitering time and (relatively) good payload capacity.

I guess they are a bit behind on the control side. Quadcopters are cooler and more of a mass product than RC-planes. So more effort has been put into the quads, but there is no reason why planes can't play a more prominent role in the future.

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, holoween said:

ISR should cut both ways though. A breakout should be quite easily discovered.

It might also be that with NVGs being relatively rare and force densities relatively low it becomes relatively easy to escape during nighttime.

I think ISR benefits the defender more than the attacker.  First, the defender likely has more warning about an impending crisis.  Back in the old days sometimes the first time they found out about it was when their rear units got wiped out or supplies got intercepted or something else.  This is less likely to happen, especially with Russia's advances being done at a glacial pace overall.

ISR also allowed the defender to develop a well informed evacuation plan.  Maneuvers at night, even with NVG, are very difficult to do anyway, but without a solid plan of where it's safe to go it's so much worse.  Following a solid plan at night is way easier and less likely to result in disaster.

I think back to a postwar book published by the US Army about lessons learned from the Eastern Front.  One anecdote was about a winter withdrawal of a platoon or company sized unit.  A few guys went out at night and found a successful path.  They packed the snow down with snowshoes.  When the time came the unit evacuated quickly and effectively because there was a trail to follow.  ISR from drones, combined with on the ground pathfinders, seem to be a pretty awesome combination.

Steve

[A Canadian Cat]

4 hours ago, dan/california said:

There is something to be said for a desert proving ground with essentially nothing but sand for ten or fifteen miles. 

You would have to watch the show from a surveillance drone as it might be a bit dangerous on the ground. Oh wait that wouldn't work either

[Offshoot]

4 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

This is another interesting and rather puzzling aspect of this war.  Surrounding enemy forces has been extremely rare and when it does happen extraction by the defender is usually complete or nearly so.

The much vaunted dispersion might also be a factor. Given the reports of numbers of troops involved in attacks, it's possible the Russians had enough forces here to properly surround a building or a small village but not an area of several square kilometres.

[ArmouredTopHat]

Interesting...

[ArmouredTopHat]

A little macabre but I suppose it gives good preparation for both parties. 

[Battlefront.com]

4 hours ago, ArmouredTopHat said:

Interesting...

Beware of any breaking news reported by Visegard 24 as it often turns out to be overstated or misinformation.

As far as I can tell there's nothing new from what was generally reported:

https://www.politico.eu/article/romania-confirms-russian-drones-air-space-debris-ukraine-attacks/

Steve

[cesmonkey]

Today, Mashovets speculates that Russia will have to perform another round of mobilization to fulfill their plans for increased troop numbers:

https://t.me/zvizdecmanhustu/2060

Quote

️Today's review will be devoted to the figure of the "prospective" number of the Russian "Joint Group of the Russian Armed Forces in the South-Western Theater of Operations", voiced by the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine General Syrsky in his interview with the British publication "The Guardian".

According to him, by the end of this year (2024), the Russian military-political leadership, and in particular the military command, plans to increase the number of this strategic group of the Russian army to 690 thousand servicemen.

Therefore, in my opinion, it is worth figuring out how this can happen, why this can happen and, in general, how this can affect the general course of the war.

Quote

- at the moment the number fluctuates between 525 thousand and 530 thousand, depending on the volume and scope of the tasks performed by this group in a given period of time (moreover, the reserve component has not increased much - 60-65 thousand armed forces);

- the end of 2024 - 690 thousand armed forces are PLANNED, of which, as far as I understand, the reserve component (including both operational and strategic levels) should make up - at least 100 thousand armed forces.

- Further... In my opinion, in order to ensure this kind of increase in the number of active troops (yes, only PART of the Russian Armed Forces is active in Ukraine), the military-political leadership of the Russian Federation (the Kremlin) will need to implement the next stage of mobilization deployment (aka "in the world" - mobilization) of its army. Another possible "methodology" for increasing the size of the "active army" simply will not give the desired result... ".

Quote

Moreover, in the context of increasing the numbers of the Russian strategic group operating in Ukraine, it is necessary to take into account the level of its LOSSES. It, of course, fluctuates. However, due to the special methodology used by the Russian military command in organizing and conducting military operations (to attack everywhere and always), this level remains stably comparatively high.

In other words, in order to DAILY (and 150-160 thousand ADDITIONAL "jerboas" is, whatever one may say, significant) increase the numbers of this group, the Russian command needs to do at least two things:

- have the ability to constantly compensate for current losses;
- and,SIMULTANEOUSLY, on a regular basis (or "in a jerk") ADD a certain number of personnel.

That is why, when we talk about increasing the number of 150-160 thousand, we must keep in mind that in reality the need is at least 1.5-2 times more.

That is why I claim that this is possible only by "mobilization" (i.e. forced) means, because other methods simply will not give the opportunity to achieve the result desired by the Kremlin (according to General Syrsky). I do not believe in loud statements about "30-35 thousand monthly volunteer contract soldiers", even if you kill me. That's

all for today.
The day after tomorrow - Part Two.

Let's try to figure out why the pigdogs are so tense with this increase in numbers, when they can attack anyway.

 

[cesmonkey]

Russian telegram channel Two Major says:
https://t.me/dva_majors/48116
 

Quote

In the Pokrovsk direction, the Ukrainian Armed Forces suffered significant losses near the village of Progress, having been caught in a pincer movement by our troops. Ukrainian officers directly accuse the command of incompetent and politically motivated orders. The scandal made it into the Western press: Forbes notes that the attempt by the elite 47th mechanized brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, equipped with American armored vehicles, to close the gap and prevent further advance of Russian troops was unsuccessful. Over the course of 24 hours, the Russian Armed Forces in the direction again advanced westward near a number of populated areas.

 

[chrisl]

12 hours ago, holoween said:

ISR should cut both ways though. A breakout should be quite easily discovered.

It might also be that with NVGs being relatively rare and force densities relatively low it becomes relatively easy to escape during nighttime.

Only between technologically comparable belligerents.

The goal is always to maintain as much asymmetry as possible, and be on the more advanced side of the asymmetry.

Going back to space based systems as an example for strategic ISR: the US launched its first electro-optical ISR satellite in 1976.  It could take digital snapshots of anything it passed over and download them without having to send a film capsule back to earth. Earlier satellites had a limited number (like 4) reentry capsules and would drop them periodically if making surveys or on demand in case of an urgent imaging mission.  It didn't take long for the Soviet Union to figure out the general capabilities of the KH-11.  What didn't get out though, is that there was a second satellite constellation that enabled the KH-11 to downlink images nearly instantly.  That took many more years to come out.

In the meantime the USSR, and later Russia, were still launching satellites that use film capsules until ~2015 or so.