How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[sburke]

2 minutes ago, Armorgunner said:

You have inside information, that they are ready for Red Square parade now? 

It seems the parade may be a bit smaller this year.

[akd]

52 minutes ago, Armorgunner said:

Very true. But I was impressed of how many "layers" there was in the turret side ERA panels of the earlier showed, abandoned T-72B3M, or T-80BVM I dont remember wich. Where the Ukrainians had picked up the cassette with ERA out of the box. And put it on top of the forward part of the turret. I think you comented on that? Is that "Relikt" ERA?

Believed to be 2S24 Kaktus or something similar.  It is a lower energy ERA than Relikt, so can be mounted to thinner armor plate.  Also illustrated in the patent drawing I attached earlier. The T-72B3M (T-72B3 obr. 2016) does have 2S23 Relikt side skirts like the T-90M and T-80BVM.  There may also be different explosive inserts in the original 2S22 Kontakt front turret ERA array, possibly related to Relikt.  No idea what the side “bag” ERA is called.

Edited March 3, 2022 by akd

[Battlefront.com]

5 hours ago, akd said:

Meh, even Russia acknowledges these are still in trials, with dates of introduction pushed further and further back.

Heh, that was my point.  The trolls told us by 2020 there would be endless fleets of them to challenge the NATO Nazis.  I and others said that was unlikely and we were dressed down for not knowing what we're talking about.  I wish some of the trolls were back here so they could apologize  

5 hours ago, akd said:

 My curiosity is about the T-90Ms that were supposedly introduced into active service recently.

That and BMP-3.  I expected to see a lot of them, but in fact there are very few.

Steve

[Bulletpoint]

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, March 3

The Russian military has continued its unsuccessful attempts to encircle Kyiv and capture Kharkiv. The Russians continued to attack piecemeal, committing a few battalion tactical groups at a time rather than concentrating overwhelming force to achieve decisive effects. Russian commanders appear to prefer opening up new lines of advance for regiment-sized operations but have been unable to achieve meaningful synergies between efforts along different axes toward the same objectives. They have also continued conducting operations in southern Ukraine along three diverging axes rather than concentrating on one or attempting mutually supporting efforts. These failures of basic operational art—long a strong suit of the Soviet military and heavily studied at Russian military academies—remain inexplicable as does the Russian military’s failure to gain air superiority or at least to ground the Ukrainian Air Force. The Russian conventional military continues to underperform badly, although it may still wear down and defeat the conventional Ukrainian military by sheer force of numbers and brutality. Initial indications that Russia is mobilizing reinforcements from as far away as the Pacific Ocean are concerning in this respect. Those indications also suggest, however, that the Russian General Staff has concluded that the forces it initially concentrated for the invasion of Ukraine will be insufficient to achieve Moscow’s military objectives.

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-march-3

 

Edited March 3, 2022 by Bulletpoint

[Commanderski]

Here's an article about the tires the Russians are using and may be part of the problem of that stalled convoy. They're cheap Chinese tires and not maintained.

https://theweek.com/russo-ukrainian-war/1010857/how-cheap-chinese-tires-might-explain-russias-stalled-40-mile-long

[Cobetco]

the few BMP-3 images I have seen so far have either been captures or fields of twisted metal, kinda how I assumed the BMP-3 would function.

[MikeyD]

I'm a bit (but not very) surprised we've seen no hint of Arena APS on any of the vehicles to date. That was one of the complaints about CMBS, the unlikely prevalence of APS in the (near future) 2014 timeline. So where is Arena in 2022?

[Commanderski]

I don't know if this has been reported here but a top Russian general was killed by a sniper Wednesday:

https://extra.ie/2022/03/03/news/world-news/top-russian-general-killed-by-ukrainian-sniper-as-conflict-continues

[akd]

2 minutes ago, MikeyD said:

I'm a bit (but not very) surprised we've seen no hint of Arena APS on any of the vehicles to date. That was one of the complaints about CMBS, the unlikely prevalence of APS in the (near future) 2014 timeline. So where is Arena in 2022?

Still in trials (Arena-M has been seen in service testing on T-72s in a small number of images).  I don’t think they want to spend the money.

Edited March 3, 2022 by akd

[Armorgunner]

1 hour ago, The_Capt said:

So it is still going below zero C at night around Kyiv, which means those troops are going to be running their engines to stay warm.  The longer that "convoy" stays there the more gas it uses.  If it stays too long, now you have to re-fuel a 64km parking lot full of empty vehicles and cold troops.

A good plan would be to harass the convoy to keep them awake and focus on hitting the "resupply to the resupply".

Kyiv weather forecast

https://www.klart.se/ua/misto-kyyiv/väder-kiev/timmar/

Edited March 3, 2022 by Armorgunner

[Vacillator]

BBC still going on about the 'Sword of Damocles 40-mile column'.  Are they just a bit behind the curve or is it still capable of doing anything?

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, womble said:

Why would they be parked so close together in an open area? Surely, if they're "active air defense", they'd be at least a bomb crater's width apart, and if they were laagered and off-duty, they'd've sought some overhead cover, and be camped in scattered locations to similarly avoid getting mass-killed... And if the Ukrainians parked them together to make them easier to molotov, surely they could move them somewhere the UA could use them...

No, Ukrainians wouldn't have torched functioning vehicles, nor would they put the effort to relocate them for destruction even if they weren't serviceable.

Most likely scenario is their Russian crews parked them there and torched them, hoping that by grouping them they might be more assured they'd all be destroyed.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

2 minutes ago, Vacillator said:

BBC still going on about the 'Sword of Damocles 40-mile column'.  Are they just a bit behind the curve or is it still capable of doing anything?

They aren't the only ones.  Experts have been trying to correct the journalists about this for days now, but no luck.

Whatever that column was supposed to be is now nothing more than meme material waiting to happen because it is a joke already.

Steve

[akd]

3 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

No, Ukrainians wouldn't have torched functioning vehicles, nor would they put the effort to relocate them for destruction even if they weren't serviceable.

Most likely scenario is their Russian crews parked them there and torched them, hoping that by grouping them they might be more assured they'd all be destroyed.

Steve

No, locals found them intact and set them on fire.  They are probably behind enemy lines and out of gas.  Which again raises the question of whether the crews just ditched them and walked away.

Edited March 3, 2022 by akd

[TheVulture]

5 minutes ago, Vacillator said:

BBC still going on about the 'Sword of Damocles 40-mile column'.  Are they just a bit behind the curve or is it still capable of doing anything?

BBC News is about 24 hours behind compared to updates you'll find in this thread, except for big, easily verifiable stories.

[BeondTheGrave]

10 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Heh, that was my point.  The trolls told us by 2020 there would be endless fleets of them to challenge the NATO Nazis.  I and others said that was unlikely and we were dressed down for not knowing what we're talking about.  I wish some of the trolls were back here so they could apologize  

That and BMP-3.  I expected to see a lot of them, but in fact there are very few.

Steve

According to Wikipedia, for rough #s there are 2500 T-90s in service, another 2000 BMP-3s. My assumption has been that the same Tank/MRDs that have one would have the other, after all why would you pair a T-90 with a BMP-1 platoon? So I suspect that the BMP-3 is wherever all the T-90s are. 

I have seen on the Oryx blog theyre reporting one killed T-90, one mission killed T-90 (it fell off a bridge apparently) and three abandoned (!!!), with at least one of those being stripped. Compare this to 30 T-72s and 25 T-80s, seems to suggest that either A) the T-90 hasn't been employed or B ) it has but its just SO GOOD that it hasn't taken casualties. I suspect a little from both, thats its being saved for something special and perhaps many units weren't shipped to Kyiv at front. Judging from the losses maybe a battalion or regiment of T-90s, which have been kept in operational reserve? If you've followed what I've been saying for the last probably week now this has been more or less what I've said. But I will admit that increasingly it looks like its not the case, that the T-90 was never deployed in the first place. 

Do we know what units use both systems? I assume theyre concentrated in the best divisions.

If theyre not deployed to Kyiv I think that says a lot about the botched operational planning. It would be like committing the National Guard to the 2003 invasion while holding the regular US Army back at home. That could tell us one of three things. 1) What we already know, Vladdy thought it would be a walkover and planned for that 2) Vladdy was expecting a weak US response and an opportunity to attack NATO and wanted a corps of decision there 3) Vladdy genuinely expected either a NATO counterattack or a serious insurrection at home and kept the guard close to protect him. If we assume that he made the decision to keep most of his best units in strategic reserve that has very interesting implications for what Vladdy thought he was going to do and what the outcomes would be. 

There is a secret fourth choice to this as well. The T-90 in testing and Syria somehow, unknown to most western observers, turned out to be a bad tank. Or at least no better than a T-72B obr. 2016, and so kept them at home to avoid the embarrassment of losing a bunch of his fear weapon in an single action. Thinking here of the tremendous deflation the T-72 suffered after the US got hold of them in Iraq. 

[Battlefront.com]

6 minutes ago, akd said:

No, locals found them intact and set them on fire.  They are probably behind enemy lines and out of gas.  Which again raises the question of whether the crews just ditched them and walked away.

Well... yeah, didn't think of that possibility.  Better to torch them before a possible Russian recovery.

Still begs the other question why they parked them so tightly together with whatever was the last of their fuel.

I don't get it.

Steve

[BeondTheGrave]

6 minutes ago, akd said:

No, locals found them intact and set them on fire.  They are probably behind enemy lines and out of gas.  Which again raises the question of whether the crews just ditched them and walked away.

I think this explanation is equally plausible. Locals, maybe not plugged in to General Staff planning, took matters in to their own hands and made sure to ruin the gear they found.

Possibility though, a lot of these tanks have been listed as 'captured.' Are we sure the troops just walked away (probably true in many of the cases) or were they 'liberated' first? I could just a bunch of guys trying to heat up something to eat, a few walk away to take a piss, and a bunch of Ukrainians descended on the group and catch them unawares. 

[Fenris]

Seems like tires really are going to be one of the things that need some detailed discussion when this is all over.

 

[Lethaface]

9 minutes ago, akd said:

No, locals found them intact and set them on fire.  They are probably behind enemy lines and out of gas.  Which again raises the question of whether the crews just ditched them and walked away.

Maybe there is Techno House nearby?

[Vacillator]

11 minutes ago, TheVulture said:

BBC News is about 24 hours behind compared to updates you'll find in this thread, except for big, easily verifiable stories.

Yes that was my estimate as well.

[Battlefront.com]

1 minute ago, Lethaface said:

Maybe there is Techno House nearby?

Oh that is too funny!

Steve

[Fenris]

What's firing here?  A battery of some sort of BMP?  Turrets look too small for SPA.

 

No it is SPA, here's a better view

 

Edited March 3, 2022 by Fenris

[Cobetco]

those are the 122mm 2S1 Gvozdika, and if a civillians phone has captured images of them firing, I doubt they are long for this world. geotagging being what it is.

Edited March 3, 2022 by Cobetco

[akd]

18 minutes ago, BeondTheGrave said:

According to Wikipedia, for rough #s there are 2500 T-90s in service, another 2000 BMP-3s

Hahaha, no. I think there is something like 500-600 T-90As at most, plus maybe a battalion set of T-90Ms.  That said, they have been focusing on T-72B3 upgrades in significant numbers (1,500+, IIRC), and these are not really significantly less effective than T-90A.  They may actually be more operationally effective by virtue of being recent rebuilds with new engines.

Edited March 3, 2022 by akd