How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Letter from Prague]

14 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

My instincts say consolidation will win out, but only richer nations will have the means to do so somewhat effectively.  However, for a longer war in the stage the current Ukraine war is in, spreading out might be the better solution.  At least for Russia as it doesn't seem Ukraine has the same degree of vulnerability as Russia does.

Steve

Hmm.

It seems that just as you can't do traditional armored mass in face of modern anti-tank weapons and precise arty with drone ISR, you also can't do "mass logistics" in face of PGM. We just haven't seen that up until now - not like we've seen highway to Kyiv and river crossing - since neither Ukraine nor Russia really had PGMs. 

But would Ukraine still be vulnerable if Russia had (effective) PGMs and ISR to drive it, or is Ukraine's logistics more dispersed / disprersed inherently? Give their distributed command we heard about and self-organizing "Uber for artillery" and other stuff, it might be.

It seems we are for once again looking at what the Russians are doing wrong (and there's a lot to look at) as opposed on what is Ukraine doing right  

 

[Grigb]

Today Girkin commented about police checking on Murz (somebody wrote complaint and police checked his residence permit address). What is more interesting though, he confirmed that the FSB team most likely caused the disappearance of Alexei Selivanov.

Selivanov is hardcore UKR traitor who was working as RU policeman at recently captured territories. Being traitor, he is extremely hardcore and cannot be satisfied with anything less than the destruction of UKR. And according to rumors he disappeared after the visit of a special team from Moscow. Later somebody claiming to be him posted in telegram message Wow, friend it was just food poisoning, I am in hospital but left my phone in the office!

This RU Nats cleanup is another indication that Putin is planning to offer a compromise.

 

[Battlefront.com]

7 minutes ago, IanL said:

Indeed. However we have seen examples right here on this forum. Russian citizens saying don't worry we know we cannot believe our government propaganda, we are not fooled. Next sentence is about how bad western media is. Next post or sometimes the next few sentences sound just like the talking points of the government propaganda the just claimed not to believe. Makes your head spin.

BTW thanks for the perspective and information you have been posting. Many here really appreciate it.

We have the same problem in all Western countries.  Think about the Q-Anon people.  You can find plenty of interviews with them rejecting all kinds of super crazy Q-Anon stuff (like Democrats eating babies), yet fundamentally believe that Q is real and that the mainstream media is a bunch of liars.  Selective cognitive activity is at work because it is necessary to maintain a belief structure.  This is true for many people's political, cultural, and religious beliefs.  Few believe everything that their chosen system presents, but they don't let the details get in the way of their beliefs.

In the case of Russian culture we can see the same thing.  "Sure, I know Putin is an autocrat.  I also believe our civil liberties are crap, our government is incompetent, and the oligarchs are getting rich while we get poorer.  Our media is controlled by those who have the most to gain by exploiting the population.  But I'm going to put up with all of that because the alternative is NATO is going to invade and make change our gender and force us to speak English."

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

14 minutes ago, Letter from Prague said:

Hmm.

It seems that just as you can't do traditional armored mass in face of modern anti-tank weapons and precise arty with drone ISR, you also can't do "mass logistics" in face of PGM. We just haven't seen that up until now - not like we've seen highway to Kyiv and river crossing - since neither Ukraine nor Russia really had PGMs. 

Correction... you can't do massed armor maneuvers or massed logistics the "old way" because of PGMs and other smart capabilities.  However, smart people are working out how to do things a "new way" so that they can.  The weaponry that Grigb posted in the previous page, EW, lasers, defensive drones, UGVs, etc. are all being examined to see what combination might be able to counter the new threats.

14 minutes ago, Letter from Prague said:

But would Ukraine still be vulnerable if Russia had (effective) PGMs and ISR to drive it, or is Ukraine's logistics more dispersed / disprersed inherently? Give their distributed command we heard about and self-organizing "Uber for artillery" and other stuff, it might be.

It seems we are for once again looking at what the Russians are doing wrong (and there's a lot to look at) as opposed on what is Ukraine doing right  

 

I thought about this when I was pondering during my previous post.  I think Ukraine is largely benefiting from Russia having terrible ISR and PGM capabilities.  Even if Russia finds out about a supply point to hit they wind up smashing whatever is next to it.

It also appears that Ukraine is using more of the depth of its country to resupply the front.  Especially the TD units and in particular at the early stages of the war.  There was plenty of evidence that supplies were being organized as far away as Lviv and being driven straight to the front in small civilian vehicles, sometimes as small as compact cars.  This was out of need, so I don't think it's a model anybody wants to deliberately repeat.  But maybe some will find they have to.

Steve

[Harmon Rabb]

I'm not an expert in Ukrainian politics but I have heard critics of Zelensky claim that Zelensky is like Kolomoisky's puppet so this is indeed interesting news. 

[womble]

7 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

supplies were being organized as far away as Lviv and being driven straight to the front in small civilian vehicles, sometimes as small as compact cars.  This was out of need, so I don't think it's a model anybody wants to deliberately repeat.

It might be that it's (part of) the way forward. Maybe an early role for autonomous transports once they become viable. A different slant on "the Internet of things": multipath routing of packets of supplies... Can't stop 'em all.

[Letter from Prague]

2 minutes ago, Harmon Rabb said:

I'm not an expert in Ukrainian politics but I have heard critics of Zelensky claim that Zelensky is like Kolomoisky's puppet so this is indeed interesting news. 

Doesn't the UN Human Rights charter say you shouldn't make people stateless? Or does he have Russian citizenship as well?

I'm looking it up, and it seems Ukraine did the same thing to Saakashvili. Huh. Interesting story.

[Battlefront.com]

8 minutes ago, womble said:

It might be that it's (part of) the way forward. Maybe an early role for autonomous transports once they become viable. A different slant on "the Internet of things": multipath routing of packets of supplies... Can't stop 'em all.

Yup, UGVs (autonomous or controlled) are for sure going to play a big role in whatever comes next.  On the supply side it's pretty much a no brainer for the most forward resupply missions.  There's all kinds of problems with it extending way to the rear, however civilian uses are advancing those areas dramatically.  I expect we'll see massive emphasis on the supply side of UGVs by anybody advocating for modernizing logistics because supply ops can be run 24/7 without legions of drivers.  Huge.

Steve

[Haiduk]

1 hour ago, Grigb said:

Selivanov is hardcore UKR traitor

He wasn't a traitor. He always and openly declared own pro-Russian position. Weird mix of Orthodox faith, monarchism and sovietism. He was leader of cossack organisation "Faithful cossackship" in Kyiv before Maidan. He openly provided pro-Russian activity (one of his directions was the work with teenagers) with open support of Russian embassy and many Russian organisations like "Russian house" being led by Russian political technologist Gleb Pavlovskiy . But neither in time of Yushchenko, nor in time of Yanukovich (of course!) SBU didn't want to pay attention to Selivanov's activity. Since 2014 he went to Luhansk oblast. 

Edited July 21, 2022 by Haiduk

[Haiduk]

15 minutes ago, Letter from Prague said:

Doesn't the UN Human Rights charter say you shouldn't make people stateless? Or does he have Russian citizenship as well?

I'm looking it up, and it seems Ukraine did the same thing to Saakashvili. Huh. Interesting story.

Kolomoyskyi told he has three citizenship except Ukrainain - Israel and probably Cyprus. Kolomoyskyi is not only reach and cynical oligarch, he also influent head of Jewish community in Ukraine and Dnipro now is a center of this community, so naturally he has Israel citizenship 

Edited July 21, 2022 by Haiduk

[Battlefront.com]

5 hours ago, FancyCat said:

Been very interested on seeing whether Ukraine has been rotating units in and out of the front, which is essential (imo) for determining whether the Ukrainian military is close to breaking (as many Russians hope) or not.

Found this post from within the last day:

https://militaryland.net/ukraine/ukraine-moves-fresh-brigades-to-donbas/

Steve

[danfrodo]

2 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Found this post from within the last day:

https://militaryland.net/ukraine/ukraine-moves-fresh-brigades-to-donbas/

Steve

great news.  Four months in or near the front lines?  Ouch.

Also could explain lack of UKR counteroffensives thus far.  The frontline soldiers need to rotate out for extended rest, refit, & possibly some re-training.

[Battlefront.com]

Some more documentation of the bridge damage.  This was posted prior to the early morning attack today:

 

[Chibot Mk IX]

Talking about rest & refit. I read this somewhere in June but forgot to save the link. It says UKR keep as many as 7 brigades in the rear for R&R and training.   And even for the standard brigades in the frontline, many of them leave a significant portion at the rear, helps TD and reserves on the training. Is that correct?

[Battlefront.com]

Moscow Times article about Russia's accelerated training program for new contract soldiers.  It's roughly 5 days then off to the front.  The article was "updated" in the last day, however it appears to be from March and/or April.  Still, it is interesting:

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2022/07/20/russia-sends-army-recruits-to-fight-in-ukraine-after-just-days-of-training-a78314

Steve

[Taranis]

"Two women pose for a selfie in front of a Russian T-72 tank destroyed by the Ukrainian army, displayed on the Royal Castle Square in Warsaw, Poland, July 6, 2022. WOJTEK RADWANSKI / AFP"

 

"A car damaged by a Russian strike, in Kharkiv, July 21, 2022. NACHO DOCE / REUTERS"

[Haiduk]

32 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Found this post from within the last day:

https://militaryland.net/ukraine/ukraine-moves-fresh-brigades-to-donbas/

Steve

115th mech.brigade. Those guys, battalion of which after first wounded conducted "council" with own company comamnders and decided to abandon positions on Siverodonetsk outskirts - as a result Russians seized "Myr" hotel and old airport area and entered to the city, which before this successfully was repelling all atatcks. Then they were confused with 115th TD brigade (who gives the same numbers to different military units! We already have 45th arty brigade and 45th air-assault, 46th sep. rifle battalion and 46th air-assult brigade, etc)

Command ordered them to turn back and dig in, but battalion rejected because "we are former civilians and havn't combat experience, so we just will die there".  In twitter then wrote, almost all battalion was arrested in Bakhmut. But soldiers and comamnders of this unit claimed they are not deserters, but just "saved personnel from 100 % death from Russian artillery strikes and helicopter atatcks". Fighters of volunteer unit "Legion of Svoboda", which fiercly fought without heavy weapon in Rubizhe and Siverodonetsk were very angry on this unit. Because they also were under heavy shellings and without artillery and tanks, and many of them - the same civilians, who have taken a weapon on 24th Feb. Though they also criticized the Command, which instead move unexperienced soldiers to old combat units, just created a brigade, composed mostly of unexperienced conscripts and officer-reservists, which turned out psychically not ready to fight, though they got at least three weeks training. So, I don't know whar a situation in this brigade now and what their combat capabilities and motivation now. 

Edited July 21, 2022 by Haiduk

[Haiduk]

22 minutes ago, danfrodo said:

great news.  Four months in or near the front lines?  Ouch.

I posted several days ago about 24th mech.brigade - 13 months on frontline (9 before a war and 4 after war began). And the same can say about at least third part of our units  

[dan/california]

1 hour ago, acrashb said:

And logistics.  High rate of fire == lots of resupply trucks.  This assumes that our laser is powered electrically, not by buckets of corrosive / toxic chemicals (e.g., COIL lasers). Also affects cost per shot / pulse.

Lasers have range limits as well, don't know how they compare with kinetics for a reasonably-sized emitter / mirror.  The emitter size and frequency determine focusability, which is the limit in a vacuum, then atmospheric interference sets other limits.

Where lasers excel is insensitivity to barrel wear, variance in charges weight, windage, gravity.  Generally getting rid of internal and external ballistics is a huge win for accuracy.

Shooting lasers at fast missiles/ artillery shells has some inherent limitations involving dwell time. The engagement window is very short and it take a LOT of laser power to apply enough energy in the time available.  Drones though are the perfect laser target, since they are, at least in their current incarnation, mostly light weight and slow moving. Doubly so since blinding the optics is essentially as good as blasting it out of the sky. it doesn't matter that much if a slow moving drone at twenty kilometers range and six or eight thousand meters altitude takes tens seconds or twenty seconds for the laser to kill. What matters is being able to kill drones at those kinds of ranges, doing it for few hundred dollars a shot, and being able to do it all day long if the diesel holds out.

29 minutes ago, Harmon Rabb said:

I'm not an expert in Ukrainian politics but I have heard critics of Zelensky claim that Zelensky is like Kolomoisky's puppet so this is indeed interesting news. 

Zelensky is EXTREMELY aware that the Ukrainian economy is going to be rebuilt by the European Union or nobody. Furthermore what ever assets most of the pre-existing Oligarchs held in Ukraine are pretty much rubble. The Azov steel mill being exhibit A. Both the mill and the private army that went with are casualties of this war. So not only is it now or never to reduce the oligarchs' power, but there are active economic rewards for doing so.

[Haiduk]

Looks like UKR forces expanded own bridghead beyond Inhulets river. In evening report of General Staff claimed Russian troops counter attacked from Sukhyi Stavok to Andriivka, but without success. So, probably Andriivka and Lozove again under UKR control.

 

Edited July 21, 2022 by Haiduk

[Gpig]

That's some pretty flat ground to attack across. In either direction . . .

[acrashb]

34 minutes ago, dan/california said:

Shooting lasers at fast missiles/ artillery shells has some inherent limitations involving dwell time.

[...]

Drones though are the perfect laser target, [...] Doubly so since blinding the optics is essentially as good as blasting it out of the sky.

[...]

being able to do it all day long if the diesel holds out.

[...]So not only is it now or never to reduce the oligarchs' power, but there are active economic rewards for doing so.

1) dwell time is solved with pulse lasers.  The kill mechanism is not relatively slow heating, but near-instantaneous explosion repeated many times in a split second.  Rapid Pulse Laser Weapons Could Be The Pentagon's Future Edge - Breaking Defense Having said that, for right-now and near-future, yes dwell time is a thing.

2) yes; blinding is good for drones and any other optics (rangefinders, FLIR, etc).

3) for electrically-powered lasers.   AFAIK this is very new, but may be available near-future. US Navy ‘kills’ drone with electric-powered laser for first time (nypost.com) Current weapon lasers, again AFAIK, are chemical.

4) Anti-corruption drives are often cover for purging one's political enemies  - see recent examples all over the world, including Saudi Arabia.  Perhaps Ukraine will be smarter about it and actually improve.  Certainly it was trending the right way in the pre-war Zelensky administration, so that's hopeful.

Edited July 21, 2022 by acrashb

[poesel]

2 hours ago, acrashb said:

Where lasers excel is insensitivity to barrel wear, variance in charges weight, windage, gravity.  Generally getting rid of internal and external ballistics is a huge win for accuracy.

Don't think that electronics or lasers have no wear. High currents, high temperatures etc... all take their toll over time.
Aiming is also not that easy: you have to hold a thin ray on fast moving targets for at least a few seconds. The most obvious targets are small drones - equipping them with laser detectors is cheap and easy. They will evade automatically, making the targeting even harder.
I get the fascination for lasers and of course they have to look into it, but I don't think they will play a significant role in the near future.

1 hour ago, womble said:

It might be that it's (part of) the way forward. Maybe an early role for autonomous transports once they become viable. A different slant on "the Internet of things": multipath routing of packets of supplies... Can't stop 'em all.

OTOH autonomous transports will be a game changer for logistics. Like 'just in time' moved wares from the warehouse to the road, autonomous transports will move the depots into the landscape.
It will be hard to shell mechanical mules that run criss cross around the country.

[Haiduk]

New batch of UK support

 

[Haiduk]

23 hours ago, Beleg85 said:

Interesting, it wasn't posted before so worth to note Ukrainians hit something (probably EW/radar device) in Enerhodar using Warmate drones. Their appearance is relatively rare so it was probbaly high-value target. Loitering ammo start to be slowly seen over battlefields.

Here the result of strike. Locals tell there were tents for personnel. Looks like one drone burned the tent with canteen. This happened several days ago - I've seen posts of locals in twitter, about some unknown mess in Russian deployment near nuclear plant and as if they suffered some losses  

 

Edited July 21, 2022 by Haiduk