How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Zeleban]

 

Mobilization in Dagestan is experiencing some difficulties

[Haiduk]

1 hour ago, The_MonkeyKing said:

Also there is also lost of speculation because of the seeming scope of the mobilization. Age dispersion seems to be huge.

Russian social media are writing that this is terrible and not "partial mobilization" - they take all. Especially many conscripts from national repuplics. In Buriatia, for example, from villages of 300-400 inhabitants, they take in average 30-35 men. There was example from Buriatia, enlistment office took 38 y.o. man, father of six children, who never served in army.

Reportedly all conscripts below 30 y.o. will be sent to from immediately, "because they hadn't time to lose own army skills yet". Even some Russian propagandists grumble that this is stupid idea, because before a war conscripts were more involved in territory cleaning and loading-unloading workd, than combat training, so their "army skills" about zero level. They also say even those thousands of contractors, who payed bribes to be included in Syria operation for short-term contracts, indeed most time sat on own bases or patrolled around, when most of work made Spetsnaz, PMC and artillery. So, those who retired after Syria now will be mobilized with minimal experience 

Edited September 22, 2022 by Haiduk

[Haiduk]

If this is not a joke, that after the war we will know many cool stories about SOF deep raids.

Behind the soldiers the road sign with name of the city - Enerhodar

 

Edited September 22, 2022 by Haiduk

[FancyCat]

Bad thing about brinkmanship of course is it is actually beneficial to seem irrational. Whether Putin is irrational or not is almost not a big deal, if Putin thinks looking irrational is needed, then so be it. These red lines where it is asserted that the territory of Russia will be guarded with nuclear fire is diluted with the reality that Ukraine can't very well be afraid of the red line, as their own existence is now tied to pushing these red lines and proving them fake.

As a aside I find it interesting, the need to remove emotion in order to look at a situation objectively. Can that be possible when brinkmanship requires such levels of emotional work?

 

 

[FancyCat]

Props to the person on this thread who brought up World War 2 and Japanese demise and how it really boiled down to at what point who blinks first? U.S conditions were unconditional surrender, there were hardliners in Japan intent on driving the Japanese people to their deaths, civilians or not be damned. There were those who argued in order to preserve Japan (or the Emperor), Japan needed to secure one condition before being able to surrender and it was possible to get that condition. And of course on the Allied side, the expression of unconditional surrender was envisioned as essential to breaking the power of Axis states to return to wage war in the future but that entails the dismantling of the enemy state and tho possible, would it be worth, something that needed to be decided and held to by all major Allied partners.

Nukes have changed much of the game but the basics are the same tho the goals aren't unconditional surrender per say.

Guess I classify as a hardliner.

 

[keas66]

I asked back on August 8th ( and even earlier in the year  )  when Ukraine started  striking targets in Crimea  - about the risk of Nuclear response ... and the general response  was  of the form of more Russian Noise . So whats changed so radically now - that key members of this forums are pulling back   in front of more noise from the Russians ?  Suddenly the Nuclear threats are real ? Someone from better informed sources  been whispering to a few folks  to  calm the troops down  ?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/21/putin-ukraine-threats-response/

Edited September 22, 2022 by keas66

[The_Capt]

10 minutes ago, FancyCat said:

Bad thing about brinkmanship of course is it is actually beneficial to seem irrational. Whether Putin is irrational or not is almost not a big deal, if Putin thinks looking irrational is needed, then so be it. These red lines where it is asserted that the territory of Russia will be guarded with nuclear fire is diluted with the reality that Ukraine can't very well be afraid of the red line, as their own existence is now tied to pushing these red lines and proving them fake.

As a aside I find it interesting, the need to remove emotion in order to look at a situation objectively. Can that be possible when brinkmanship requires such levels of emotional work?

 

 

I think the other thing we are missing are a lot of the indicators and warnings that those in power have access to.  The US and other western nations have enormous intelligence and surveillance apparatus, which right now is heavily pointed into the region looking for far more signs and signals than we have access to.

Putin can say whatever he wants but the US can see what is being gassed up and positioned, it likely has ears into the C2 structure in the RA that controls the systems.

So on the outside, here, it is hard to see what is really brinksmanship and what is just posturing.  Clearly the US has signaled that strikes deeper into Russia are off the table, and they likely have some good reasons for this, ones that are nothing to do with Putin.

That all said, we are all still people and human error is a nasty reality. 

[DesertFox]

That´s the way to go.

The Dutch, known for their pragmatism, have found a way to solve this Russia nonsense once and for all: the Russian Federation will become a province of the Netherlands.

 

 

[billbindc]

38 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Gotta be honest, I am old fashion in a lot of ways, I really prefer my nuclear brinksmanship to be crystal clear for all parties.  I read the transcript from that speech as well:

http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts/69390

I have no doubt it was for domestic consumption; however, it is what they are consuming that makes me nervous.  The logic chain is pretty simple: IF -Ukraine (or at least great swaths of it) are really Russian territory - they are going through legal show-elections to make it appear legit.  THEN - any attacks on Russian sovereign territory, including the ones we say so, justify escalation in their defence.  Booya, booya - nuclear weapons and hypersonic nonsense.

I still believe that the Russian mechanism that actually controls these weapons is not so deluded as to start smoking its own supply, and that the specter of an actual nuclear exchange is low.  However, we do know that Russia has a "red-line" somewhere - the reticence to provide the UA with weapons that can hit Moscow is wrapped up in this. [Aside: I think this is overly cautious to be honest.  The US is likely so nested in the UA targeting cycle right now that any strategic strikes like that are not going to happen, and if they did there would be political repurcutions.  In short, giving the UA capability to hit the entirety of occupied Ukraine and SLOC nodes within Russia is manageable.]

Further that "red-line" is currently manned by people who thought it was a good idea to try a conventional war in Ukraine.  I think our greatest concern is trying to determine where that "red-line" actually is, or is not.  And finally, remove Putin and his power bloc, and the "red-line" also moves - hopefully not onto the floor.

The truth is that whatever the Russian doctrine governing nuclear use may happen to be, under stress the decision makers will do whatever they feel they need to given the political and military conditions.

That said, Russia is *very* unlikely to use nuclear weapons to escape a military jam because the negatives of use far outweigh the positives and a truly existential military crisis is incompatible with reality. The danger is political. Putin was quite careful, as ISW notes, to fence the nuclear language off in his speech. That's almost certainly to keep his options open, to not be committed to a potentially fatal course of action and to reassure Modi, Xi and his own boyars. He was also careful to deploy the threat in an attempt to overawe the West and Ukraine with his will to escalate. All of those are to varying degrees political decisions. What's worrying is what happens if the ruling clique's political situation deteriorates to the point that a military loss would precipitate their (Iikely fatal) political downfall. Desperate people do desperate things and such a situation in Russia...a dictator with nuclear weapons, a conspiratorial mindset and few institutional controls losing power...is new. We simply don't know how that turns out.

[Bulletpoint]

3 minutes ago, DesertFox said:

That´s the way to go.

The Dutch, known for their pragmatism, have found a way to solve this Russia nonsense once and for all: the Russian Federation will become a province of the Netherlands.

 

 

I am sure Putin would be more reasonable if he spent a little time in a Dutch coffeeshop.

[FancyCat]

2 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

I think the other thing we are missing are a lot of the indicators and warnings that those in power have access to.  The US and other western nations have enormous intelligence and surveillance apparatus, which right now is heavily pointed into the region looking for far more signs and signals than we have access to.

Putin can say whatever he wants but the US can see what is being gassed up and positioned, it likely has ears into the C2 structure in the RA that controls the systems.

So on the outside, here, it is hard to see what is really brinksmanship and what is just posturing.  Clearly the US has signaled that strikes deeper into Russia are off the table, and they likely have some good reasons for this, ones that are nothing to do with Putin.

That all said, we are all still people and human error is a nasty reality. 

Wouldn't be much brinkmanship if the U.S wouldn't square up. I remember prepping myself for a argument and a essential part of it was the expression of unreasonableness as part of achieving my goal. Even tho I understood it was unreasonable on some moral level, my goal which I pursued required it and which I accepted what I needed to do.

Luckily we got thru the cold war with escalation handbooks and Biden has shown enough recognition of the need to be cautious that I'm not worried about the U.S side and end of day, this exercise in gaming out what the end result of this conflict is, is as you said, missing the essentials the people in charge of us have. Fingers crossed we see the light past the tunnel.

[LongLeftFlank]

1 hour ago, The_MonkeyKing said:

Zerg rush incoming (or should I say Sergey rush)

(my favourite game pre-CMBO)

Redrawing the map? 

 

[chuckdyke]

Yes they beat the Russians too in Judo. putin is a fake shodan his technique is rubbish. Russia is not the only one. In the good old days when men of iron crewed wooden ships the Marines declared war to China over Taiwan (Formosa) and beat them too. Nowadays we have wooden men as the crew of iron ships.

[Aragorn2002]

39 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Anything beyond that is a revenge fantasy that serves no real purpose in discussing this war.  Now are we able to continue on in peace and harmony?

Oh yes. As long as Germans are called Germans, instead of "self-pitying Huns" and there's no gloating about flat bombed cities. Since that was my point.

[The_Capt]

Just now, keas66 said:

I asked back on August 8th ( and even earlier in the year  )  when Ukraine started  striking targets in Crimea  - about the risk of Nuclear response ... and the general response  was  of the form of more Russian Noise . So whats changed so radically now - that key members of this forums are pulling back   in front of more noise from the Russians ?  Suddenly the Nuclear threats are real ? Someone from better informed sources  been whispering to a few folks  to  calm the troops down ?

 

 

No whispers on my end and I could not use them even if there were.

Striking back and taking back are two very different things.  I stated this way back, btw, but it got lost.  I have always been concerned over the Crimea and how it fits into a Ukrainian victory.  I think the UA can hammer away at clear military targets in Crimea with abandon.  It is when/if the UA actually arrives in Sevastopol that I start to wonder.

Again, if Russia collapsed as a state or a new government come in, well all bets are off.  However, with the current regime in power the loss of Sevastopol is about as palatable as the loss of Norfolk would be to the US. That has nothing to do with the noises coming out of the Kremlin, it is a real consideration going into this war.  It has been from the start.

Look, lets go absurdum here for a moment.  Let say the UA rolls right over the border and Belgorod.  Based on the law of armed conflict, they are perfectly within their rights to attack legitimate military targets that support or act as staging bases in that city.  Belgorod is about 30km from the border and well within what the UA has demonstrated it is capable of - then why aren't they?  Well, likely because they know it would risk triggering an escalation that no one wants.  Ok, maybe the Russians are full of crap and the UA takes Belgorod and Russia does nothing...onto Moscow?  I know it is stupid and never going to happen but the point is that Russia does have an existential line somewhere that leads us into very dark places.  Places where the cost of admission far outstrips this entire war.

So, is Crimea one of those places?  I honestly do not know.  Even before 2014, when Crimea was part of the Ukraine, the Russians had freedom to use Sevastopol.  I am pretty sure that deal is off the table, so Crimea back in Ukraine very likely means no Sevastopol for Russia, which makes me very nervous and always did.  We can debate back and forth on this; however, we will not solve it here. This will be part of some very cold calculations in capitals across the west and the Kremlin itself.

And again, I could be totally wrong.  Maybe it is all bluster and BS, and Russia knows its nuclear arsenal is as effective as its mob of tanks in storage were.  Or maybe there is no "red-line" for Russia and we are self-restraining for zero reason.  However, from my point of view at least, there is a seed of doubt/concern, and I would be remiss not to put it out there so people can stay informed and use it, or not, in how they come to terms with this war for themselves. 

I would close this off with a bit of advice - avoid people who always and only tell you what you want to hear, they are most likely lying to you.

 

[Taranis]

For History, a sum up of the 6th month :

 

[billbindc]

 

54 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Ok, so let's try and have an actual conversation about all this.  Why not?  It is "forbidden discussions" week on the thread while we wait for the UA to reload.

First, lets put the emotion to one side for a moment - we saw how well that worked last time - and try to arrive at common ground.  I am not going to comment on forum policy or poor BFCElvis' endless and thankless work in trying to keep this place from become another internet cesspool - if you have a problem with forum policy, or felt you have been wronged in some way, take it up with him and BFC.

So what to do about Russia?  Russians everywhere?  They started a land war in Europe and they are supporting it, to some extent, for 6 months while their military is, in part, committing what is pretty much confirmed as systemic war crimes.

So how will justice be served in the prosecution of this war?  How will the offenders be made to pay so that it serves as an example to those that would re-offend?

Legally.  

The whole point of this war, and one of the big reasons why we care so much is that this is not just an unjustified invasion of Ukraine, it is an attack on the entire rules based international order.  In 1949, we all sat down, even Russia within the USSR, and said that this sort of action was illegal.  Its premise and definitely in its prosecution, by Russia, have been illegal with international law and the Law of Armed Conflict.  Russia's position, beyond some very weak tea technical arguments - SMO, has been - "ya, so what are you going to do about it...we are Russia and have nukes?"

That will not stand.  It cannot stand.  It threatens the entire scheme at its heart.  That scheme, btw, pays for our lifestyles and guarantors the stability and security we need to thrive, get richer and fatter, and have the freedom to yell at each other over all sorts of stuff.

So how will we put Russia back in the box.  Well first steps are to ensure it gets the spanking it so much deserves on the battlefield.  The next step, and it is very important, is to prosecute those responsible in Russia for this atrocity, within the frameworks of the law.

"Oh but the law is so "woke", we need to get medieval here to send a real message!"

1.  Shh, grown ups talking.

2.  If we step outside the legal framework, the one we built, we will break it ourselves, which in many ways is worse.

Don't believe me, well we have a convenient historical example - Iraq 2003. 

And before anyone freaks out, let me start by saying that the invasion of Iraq in 2003 is not anywhere near what is happening in Ukraine.  The legal justification for that war was "thin" but it adhered to the rules far closer than what we are seeing today.  It was unsanctioned by UN, the evidence for the whole thing turned out to be incorrect; however, the US made a case for self-defence against a known international offender, one who had not only invaded another country but also threatened "the great Satan" repeatedly.  Further the US prosecuted that war under the LAOC.

However the repurcutions of that action, one the edge of legality in some places are still being felt today.  In Putin's last speech he references "terror/terrorism" 5 times as as a justification for this war.  The lesson here is that if we fracture to system of order, very bad things start to happen.

So we will hold Russia accountable.  We will demand reparations for lifting sanctions.  We will demand the turning over of war criminals for prosecution.  We will employ national security mechanisms to find and arrest anyone who supported Russia's war outside of the laws of whatever country they are in.  And we will do so within the defined limitations of the law.

Anything beyond that is a revenge fantasy that serves no real purpose in discussing this war.  Now are we able to continue on in peace and harmony?

Captain, stop this avalanche of clear thinking and common sense,. You're running me clear out of likes.

[keas66]

3 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

So, is Crimea one of those places?  I honestly do not know.  Even before 2014, when Crimea was part of the Ukraine, the Russians had freedom to use Sevastopol.  I am pretty sure that deal is off the table, so Crimea back in Ukraine very likely means no Sevastopol for Russia, which makes me very nervous and always did.  We can debate back and forth on this; however, we will not solve it here. This will be part of some very cold calculations in capitals across the west and the Kremlin itself.

Could be that that actually becomes one of the points of Discussion   when both sides finally sit down to discuss terms

Maybe Sevastopol  becomes a  New Danzig for this century .  Everyone has access to it  - The Russians need to move their Fleet headquarters elsewhere .

[kevinkin]

With summer ending ... why not take a dip in the deep blue sea:

https://www.usmcu.edu/Outreach/Marine-Corps-University-Press/MCU-Journal/JAMS-vol-13-no-2/The-Army-and-Sea-Control/

""General Mark A. Milley, the 20th chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently argued that the U.S. military aims to “shift from battles of attrition to battles of cognition, where we think, direct, and act at speeds the enemy cannot match in order to achieve a perfect harmony of intense violence.”"

Milley is using attrition to describe physical mass. However, attrition warfare will soon enter the information domain as well. Sending 24 expensive MALDs into contested air space will overload the enemy's sensor systems without hitting anything and one can argue that this is a form of attrition warfare. Electronic mass vs physical mass. The Pentagon tries to embrace maneuver warfare without actually knowing what it is. It is not just movement and in a given situation attrition might be the correct approach. Attrition gets a bad rap e.g. visions of WW1 trench warfare.  

[Kinophile]

Quote

"Ceterum autem censeo....

I disagree that the Donbass is not a critical strategic objective. 

To my mind it has an equivalence to Crimea in importance but for very different reasons. Both are doors into Ukraine's future that must be blocked off forever, with no ambiguity.

1. If the LDPR remain geographically connected to Russia then UKR will just pass on the next stage of the war to their grandkids. That's already happened with the 2014 war and I'm pretty sure UKR has no intention of allowing a repeat. The Donbass is a door that the Ivan will keep pushing through, forever.
2. If Crimea is left as Russian controlled then Ukraine's economic and political future will never be secure - it is a knife at the throat of the Ukrainian nation. Dropping the Kerch bridge is not enough.

The Donbass has a notional economic value, yes. But that pales in comparison to Ukraine's strategic requirement that it control its original borders. If anything has been learned about the Russian regime it's that if you give them an inch they will inevitably come back for the mile. The original ATO plan recognized the need to cut off Russian supply; it was the success of that operation that precipitated the direct involvement of RUS army/Air force. 

The two rebel "states" are not self-sustaining and will be extremely vulnerable to SOF operations, propaganda, HIMARS, etc. The UA will not need to do some grand assault, let the regimes self-implode under their own weight.

Ukraine must isolate the LDPR from Russia and close that door forever.

The Crimea has proven that the RUS BSF is enormously dangerous even as a fleet-in-being. A properly modernized BSF would be a killer blow in any future war against Ukraine. The odds of modernizing are low in the medium-longish term, but as a strategic threat, modern or no, it is un-ignorable. Russia could easily, at anytime, start sinking trade ships and Ukraines economy will immediately go down the tubes. Ukraine has managed to somewhat neutralize the threat, but has it really? Its more that a political agreement has forestalled Russian naval aggression. If the RU Navy grows some balls it could very easily crunch UKRs economic artery, theoretically at any point.

Ukraine must take Sebastapol and build its own BSF.

But of the two objectives, Donbass & Crimea, only one is reasonably achievable within the next 6-9 months. 

Cutting off the Donbass would utilize the existing and improving Ukrainian Army/Airforce, within a theater they are already familiar, against a foe that they have the measure of and over terrain they know how to operate on.

Taking Crimea is a different beast, and I doubt solvable by Air/Ground assault alone. No matter the local Rus population morale, the peninsula itself is hard nut to crack, militarily. Only specific conditions will give a relatively easy victory, and while achievable, will take a long time to mature.

Plus, I believe that Russian national ego is deeply attached to Crimea; any ground assault on the peninsula will garner far more attention and repercussions than the destruction of the LDPR ever will. In some ways, its far better for UKR to steadily corrode the Crimea into military uselessness while waiting for the Russian state to become internally distracted with civil conflict. Once that is fully in swing, then UKR takes the Crimea -  a  mirror of RUS's own original invasion.

So, for 2022-2023 (spring), my bet is there is one operational objective - Kherson - and one strategic objective - Cut  Off The Donbass.

Quote

...delendam esse Donbassum"

 

 

Edited September 22, 2022 by Kinophile

[LongLeftFlank]

10 minutes ago, keas66 said:

Could be that that actually becomes one of the points of Discussion   when both sides finally sit down to discuss terms

Maybe Sevastopol  becomes a  New Danzig for this century .  Everyone has access to it  - The Russians need to move their Fleet headquarters elsewhere .

Novorossiysk has become a major commercial port.

[The_Capt]

6 minutes ago, keas66 said:

Could be that that actually becomes one of the points of Discussion   when both sides finally sit down to discuss terms

Maybe Sevastopol  becomes a  New Danzig for this century .  Everyone has access to it  - The Russians need to move their Fleet headquarters elsewhere .

Admitting this makes me a little sick, like watching a Devo concert, but both Crimea and Donbass may require an international UN led post-conflict action.  Putin has to go; however, if we got a "reasonable" Russian government (big "if"), there is likely scope for UN missions to guarantor peace and security in these regions until things can be sorted out.  For example, these regions need free, fair and UN monitored elections in order to determine their fates, not more artillery.

Access to Sevastopol should ultimately be decided by the people who live there. If they decide that they are Ukrainian and that Russia should be expelled to the end of time, so be it.  If they decide the other way, also so be it; however, that choice must be made free from guns from either side in the end, and here an international body like the UN (shudder) may have its day.

So yes, and it hurts me to say it, a ZOS and peacekeeping mission, along with DDR and elections monitoring/support is one way that thing thing could be defused.  Again, both parties need to agree though.  Ukraine will get a lot of pressure from the West but Russia is the crazy in the room and needs to stop being all "rabbit boiling-girlfriend" about this.  

[kraze]

Meanwhile russians have announced another anti-mobilization protest. But because it's taking the evening primetime slot of an anti-war protest that should've happened for the past 8.5 years - the anti-war protest had to be cancelled.

[billbindc]

Girkin  about as happy as you'd expect: 

[Aragorn2002]

33 minutes ago, billbindc said:

 

Captain, stop this avalanche of clear thinking and common sense,. You're running me clear out of likes.

Yeah, he completly missed my point, but well done.