How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Zeleban]

Mashovets published the second post today. 

- In Lugansk, from the local pre-trial detention center, the Russian command, by coercion, sends the captured local, as well as Russian military deserters, "refuseniks" and various evaders to the assault squads of the Wagner PMC and special "penal units" from the 1st and 2nd AK. So, the 3rd and 4th "rifle battalions" of the 202nd rifle regiment were turned by the Russian command into "penalty" ones (they are used as the vanguard of assault units in the Belogorovka area).

 

- As I wrote earlier, the consequences of stubborn, but significantly dispersed "counterattacks" organized by the Russian command by the forces of 3 BTGr of the 144th Motorized Rifle Division of the 20th CAA, replenished with "Chmobiks", northwest of Kremennaya, are beginning to affect the situation in the areas, both in Svatovo and Kremennaya...

Significantly "shabby" battalion of the 254th Guards. The MRR, as a result of its near-continuous involvement in hard, close combat with the forward units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, is forced to withdraw towards Svatovo due to the inability to hold its positions.

In turn, the 2nd company of the 288th Guards MRR of the same 144th Motor Rifle Division, as a result of falling under double fire from the Armed Forces of Ukraine, over the past 2 days, ended up in this sector in a semi-encirclement and almost without communication ...

The 3rd Motorized Rifle Corps of the 488th Motorized Rifle Regiment received a "reinforcement" - from 13 "chmobiks", who, according to the battalion command, can't do anything.

Two battalions of the 488th Guards MRR (probably the 1st and 2nd, more precisely, the "consolidated BTGr", made up of the remnants of these units), the Russian command was generally forced to withdraw to Kremennaya, due to the fact that most of the personnel of these units , consisting of the same "chmobiks", refused to carry out combat missions at the forefront.

The only more or less combat-ready unit capable of performing tasks in this direction today is the BTGr of the 752nd MRR of the 3rd Motor Rifle Division of the 20th CAA, which is defending in the Krasnopopovka area.

- In the Bakhmut direction, 2 assault detachments of the Wagner PMC (about 2 reinforced platoons each) are trying to break through to the private sector of Bakhmut on its southern outskirts from the south at any cost, which will allow them to "catch on to the city." Most likely, the local Russian command hopes in the near future to "report to the top" about the "implementation of the assigned task." So south of Bakhmut there are tough close fights...

 

[dan/california]

There appears to be an organized campaign using Excalibur to thin out the Russian's best armor. Or at least a general order that T-90s are worth the good ammo.

Edited October 28, 2022 by dan/california

[Huba]

1 minute ago, dan/california said:

There appears to be an organized campaign us Excalibur to thin out the Russian's best armor. Or at least a general order that T-90s are worth the good ammo.

I'm too lazy to look for the source now, but today there were news that Germans intend to re-start the production of SmArt shells, as they are reportedly not happy with the existing stock of IIRC 9000. There are multiple  videos of these being fired in Ukraine, I bet Russians are not amused.

[dan/california]

1 minute ago, Huba said:

I'm too lazy to look for the source now, but today there were news that Germans intend to re-start the production of SmArt shells, as they are reportedly not happy with the existing stock of IIRC 9000. There are multiple  videos of these being fired in Ukraine, I bet Russians are not amused.

Need to build them and shoot them until the Russians are cowering in terror, THEN they will go home. 

It is an interesting data point on the are tanks obsolete debate. I don't there is ANY existing APS that can stop a guided 155 round.

[Zeleban]

In the area of Novogorovka (Vasilkovsky district, Zaporozhye region), a fresh BTGr of the 136th Motorized Rifle Brigade of the 58th CAA is deployed, which arrived from the "recovery" in the reserve of the first stage. However, its staffing level has been somewhat "reduced" (less than 400 people) ... the staffing level with the main types of regular weapons and military equipment is also incomplete.

In the area of Mikhailovka - Rozdol - Prishib (Zaporozhye region), a combined tactical group of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Chechnya is deployed ... performing the role of a "detachment" in relation to units and subunits of the RF Armed Forces and other formations stationed in the Vasilyevka area ...

Quite actively go to contact and communicate with local residents, complain to them about a significant number of deserters and state the existence of a "conflict" with the military from Buryatia and Russia, accuse the latter of "cowardice", and also state "the inconvenience of war in your steppe."

The command of the enemy troops began to actively withdraw their field camps and places of concentration of weapons and military equipment and personnel in the Belgorod region to a distance exceeding the zone of effective action of the weapons of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (up to 75 km), and partially these forces are moving to the neighboring Kursk and Rostov regions of the Russian Federation. Apparently, the Russian command considers it quite likely that the Armed Forces of Ukraine will launch massive rocket and artillery strikes against their military infrastructure, which was previously deployed close to the border of Ukraine.

 

It should be emphasized that these measures objectively increase and complicate the logistics system of units and subunits from the Russian Federation operating in the northern part of the Luhansk region of Ukraine.

In particular, the railway junction in Valuyki works exclusively for loading. At present, only one branch - Valuyki - Alekseevka - Leski - is relatively safe from the fire control of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in this area.

 

In turn, at the Urazovo station it was constantly found that the tracks were completely filled with echelons (also mainly "for loading").

Obviously, the enemy is withdrawing equipment as quickly as possible from the bases that are at risk of being hit by Ukrainian cannon artillery (less than 40 km from Valuyki to the border, less than 15 km from the border to Urazovo).

Thus, as a result of these actions, some field camps are completely empty at the moment (as in the tent camp near Yakovka), and in most the number of vehicles decreases significantly (camps near Shalaevo, Urazovo, Ryabka ...).

Also, at the end of August, units of the 6th CAA of the RF Armed Forces left Belgorod, which since the beginning of the invasion were based in the village of Vodyanoy and Veselaya Lopan, Belgorod Region.

An exception in the Belgorod region is the camp in Rovenky, which is 75km from the line of contact, and thus inaccessible to most Ukrainian weapons. To date, there is a continuation of the formation of units with a volume of up to BTGr.

[Huba]

4 minutes ago, dan/california said:

Need to build them and shoot them until the Russians are cowering in terror, THEN they will go home. 

It is an interesting data point on the are tanks obsolete debate. I don't there is ANY existing APS that can stop a guided 155 round.

I guess Trophy could perhaps intercept a round like Excalibur, assuming the projected fragments can detonate the round mid-air. Iron Fist is more promising, as it fires a grenade that's supposed to use the blast effect on the targeted round. But how could any of these be effective against an EFP projectile from something like BONUS or SmArt is not that clear  Iron Fist initially was supposed to be able to protect against high speed threats like APFSDS too, but the version US Army bought reportedly does not have the capability as of now.

Edited October 28, 2022 by Huba

[Beleg85]

53 minutes ago, acrashb said:

Agreed that we can't and Russia lies.  So what does this mean?  Is it to prepare Russians for exiting Ukraine because nukes are the only way and now they are off the table?  Is it setting conditions for a false flag attack?  Is it backing away from previous statements to create strategic ambiguity, only to ratchet up later?  Is it for Russophile consumption so they can say "you see, Russia is reasonable and NATO is an aggressive alliance"?

All of it?

Naah, it was at Valdai club, it is specific audience chiefly made of various oportunists from "Third World" countries, Putin is playing the same tune there every year, but this time his speech was just much sharper because of the war...oh sorry SMO.

Note that brotherly help to "victims of Western Imperialism" is very important legacy of Soviet foreign policy and Kremlin self-image. While normally Russia has no allies but subjects and clients whom she threats with cold-hearted cynicism, in current circumstances I am inclined to believe Putin is starting to genuinly believe he has this mission of breaking "West-dominated" world order for the greater good, and thus is a spearhead of positive changes in the world. He probably counts that Iranians, some Africans and generally dictators and authoritarians from around the world will follow him into the breach on his St.Crispin Day.

45 minutes ago, Zeleban said:

Just got back from an 8 hour blackout and found that my post offended someone. Well, I apologize for my stunt and I promise from now on, despite any troubles created for me by the Russians, I will not offend your feelings for the Russians.

It's not about feeling towards the Russians mate, some drunken party-goers without context are simply not relevant to this discussion. There is enoguh serious stuff we can blame Russian for in this topic.

I hope you are relatively well folks, I mean considering the circumstances. I just watched some document how life in Ukraine cities saving on power looks, and this is not pleasant thing, especially in smaller towns and villages.

Edited October 28, 2022 by Beleg85

[billbindc]

1 hour ago, acrashb said:

Regards your "It's interesting...", this is a well-studied phenomenon of risk management.  Most people overestimate tiny risks (plane crashes) and underestimate common risks (automobile crashes).  Schneier has a neat summary: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/03/fear_and_the_av.html

 There is a classic case of this happening in American politics right now. Urban America is typically safer from all varieties of mortality than rural America. That's especially true for kids and yet it's close to heretical for a politician to say it.

Edited October 28, 2022 by billbindc

[dan/california]

10 minutes ago, Huba said:

I guess Trophy could perhaps intercept a round like Excalibur, assuming the projected fragments can detonate the round mid-air. Iron Fist is more promising, as it fires a grenade that's supposed to use the blast effect on the targeted round. But how could any of these be effective against an EFP projectile from something like BONUS or SmArt is not that clear  Iron Fist initially was supposed to be able to protect against high speed threats like APFSDS too, but the version US Army bought reportedly does not have the capability as of now.

We will now that the Pentagon is getting worried about Russian/Chinese APS when this system or something like it suddenly goes into high rate production.

https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/hatm.htm

[Huba]

Just now, dan/california said:

We will now that the Pentagon is getting worried about Russian/Chinese APS when this system or something like it suddenly goes into high rate production.

https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/hatm.htm

Talk about a blast from the past! CKEM always seemed a great idea to me, there's hardly an option to defend against it. I was also imagining that air-launched version working similarly to Brimstone would be even more awesome.
But the Future Combat System... it was pure madness, given what we are seeing in Ukraine. On a related note, during last decade Poland developed perhaps the best SWIMMING IFV in the world, Borsuk. And just as we were to finish tests and start buying it, the war in UA broke out and now it turns out that swimming, <30 tons IFV is not that good an idea, and something heavy would be much more desired... Hence we'll be getting the off-the-shelf AS21s probably, at least for the division that will operate M1s. As you could imagine the Borsuk producer, on whom MoD forced the swimming ability as core requirement for Borsuk, is not amused.

[poesel]

31 minutes ago, Huba said:

I'm too lazy to look for the source now, but today there were news that Germans intend to re-start the production of SmArt shells, as they are reportedly not happy with the existing stock of IIRC 9000. There are multiple  videos of these being fired in Ukraine, I bet Russians are not amused.

This one, for example:

https://en.defence-ua.com/industries/germany_to_resume_the_production_of_smart_155_projectiles_in_5_years_which_have_shown_themselves_really_well_in_ukraine-4676.html

We spend about 100m€ just to be able to produce them again in 5 years. That's a crazy long lead time to re-establish a manufacturing line from about 15 years ago. I wonder what components have to be recreated.

That is really a problem. If you don't have customers who continually buy your stuff, you cannot just mothball an assembly line and unpack it whenever you need it. The supply chain is gone, as well as the skill required to run that line.

[JonS]

23 hours ago, dan/california said:

an interesting data point on the are tanks obsolete debate

Like us all, I've been pondering the 'death of tanks' idea, and I can't help thinking that the entire premise of the question is wrong.

• On 20 Nov 1917 the British lost 50% of the almost 500 tanks employed
• At dawn on 8 Aug 1918 the British had almost 600 tanks, but by the 12th that was down to just six (6)! 99% casualties, in 4 days.
• In late 1939 the Germans lost around 10% of their tanks in a campaign lasting just over a month
• In mid 1940 the Germans lost 33% of their tanks in a campaign lasting just on 6 weeks.
• In 1967 the Israelis lost 50% of their tanks in just six days
• In 1973 the Israelis lost 25% of their tanks in a war lasting 19 days

And yet, every one of those battles and campaigns were considered wildly successful.

Tanks have always been vulnerable. They are protected, far more than the PBI wandering around in just a cotton shirt, but that isn't a free pass away from the realities of high-intensity peer-level warfare. The question is - or should be - whether they are effective, and whether they bring capabilities that can't otherwise be realised. The answer to that was, and still is, yes.

Edited October 29, 2022 by JonS

[NamEndedAllen]

18 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Well, he did have the bright idea to invade Ukraine and steal its children. 

Ahhh! The REAL reason for the invasion emerges.  It seriously, the balance sheet at this point, and with what know, still looks quite negative for Russia. 

[Zeleban]

 

47 minutes ago, Beleg85 said:

Я просто просмотрел какой-то документ, как выглядит жизнь в украинских городах, экономящих энергию, а это не очень приятно, особенно в небольших городах и селах.

I must say that my current life is a paradise compared to what it was at the end of February, beginning of March. Then, in the current situation with electricity, I am daily exposed to artillery shelling and air bombing. I was in my apartment and just moved away from the window, when a 152-mm shell fell right in front of my window, at a distance of about 100 meters. They threw shards of glass at me, later I found one of the shards in my apartment. Miraculously, I didn't come back. But this is a trifle. It all happened so suddenly that I didn't even have time to get scared.

Air bombardment of senior artillery. When you sit in the basement and hear the rapidly growing whistle of a Russian jet engine. With this blood in your veins, you literally freeze with fear, you understand that now he will drop bombs and, perhaps, you will find yourself under the rubble. When the FAB-500 bomb explodes a kilometer away from you. A building in the basement that literally shakes like an earthquake.

But I experienced the greatest fear when, in the conditions of street fighting, I traveled from Irpen (I had the stupidity to wait until the last, hoping that the Russians were not going to my city, because the bridge to Kyiv had already been blown up). As I was walking towards the bridge along the main street on the next street, literally 200 meters away from me, a heavy firefight broke out. I saw tracers flying across the intersection that I had to cross to get to the bridge. I waited until the Russian turned the fire in the other direction, and with all my might ran across the intersection. Despite this, thanks to adrenaline, I had more energy than ever. I ran a mile and a half with large and heavy bags. Normally I wouldn't be able to do this.

 

Edited October 28, 2022 by Zeleban

[Zeleban]

[dan/california]

20 minutes ago, Huba said:

Talk about a blast from the past! CKEM always seemed a great idea to me, there's hardly an option to defend against it. I was also imagining that air-launched version working similarly to Brimstone would be even more awesome.
But the Future Combat System... it was pure madness, given what we are seeing in Ukraine. On a related note, during last decade Poland developed perhaps the best SWIMMING IFV in the world, Borsuk. And just as we were to finish tests and start buying it, the war in UA broke out and now it turns out that swimming, <30 tons IFV is not that good an idea, and something heavy would be much more desired... Hence we'll be getting the off-the-shelf AS21s probably, at least for the division that will operate M1s. As you could imagine the Borsuk producer, on whom MoD forced the swimming ability as core requirement for Borsuk, is not amused.

My understanding is that CKEM had successfully completed engineering development, and worked beautifully, It is just that the Javelin did too. The Javelin is smaller, and more convenient to use in various ways. Since the Javelin kills anything the Russians have at the moment, they went with it.

[Huba]

1 minute ago, Zeleban said:

 

Должен сказать, что моя нынешняя жизнь — это рай по сравнению с тем, что было в конце февраля, начале марта. Затем, в результате сложившейся ситуации с электричеством, я ежедневно подвергаюсь артиллерийским обстрелам и бомбардировкам авиации. Я был в своей квартире и только отошел от окна, как прямо перед моим окном, на расстоянии около 100 метров, упал 152-мм снаряд. Меня забросали осколками стекла, позже я нашел один из осколков у себя в квартире. Чудом я не вернулся. Но это мелочь. Все произошло так внезапно, что я даже не успел испугаться.

Воздушная бомбардировка старшей артиллерии. Когда сидишь в подвале и слышишь стремительно нарастающий свист русского реактивного двигателя. При этой крови в ваших жилах буквально стынет от страха, вы понимаете, что сейчас он сбросит бомбы и, возможно, вы окажетесь под завалами. Когда бомба ФАБ-500 взорвется в километре от тебя. Здание в подвале, которое буквально потрясает, как при землетрясении.

Но самый большой страх я испытал, когда в условиях уличных боев ездил из Ирпеня (имела глупость ждать до последнего, надеясь, что русские не едут в мой город, ведь мост на Киев уже был взорван). Когда я шел к мосту по главной улице на соседней улице, буквально в 200 метрах от меня, началась сильная перестрелка. Я видел, как трассеры летели через перекресток, который мне нужно было пересечь, чтобы добраться до моста. Я дождался, пока русский перевел огонь в другую сторону, и изо всех сил перебежал через перекресток. Несмотря на это, благодаря адреналину у меня было больше сил, чем когда-либо.Я пробежал полторы мили с большими и тяжелыми сумками. Обычно я бы не смог этого сделать.

 

Man, I don't even know how to respond to that. I spent almost my whole life in your typical communist/ 90s' apartment block, and the videos of ruzzian rockets hitting these in Kyiv were perhaps the most moving and frightening from all the emerging footage that I saw, as I could directly relate to what was going on. I can only say that I'm happy you managed to survive all of that without getting hurt. Shame that many weren't that lucky. Fiery death to the ****ers that did it to you.
Also, I imagine it's to early to really worry about that, but I hope you will be able to work through the emotional scars all of that must've left on you. Honestly, I wish you all the best!

3 minutes ago, dan/california said:

My understanding is that CKEM had successfully completed engineering development, and worked beautifully, It is just that the Javelin did too. The Javelin is smaller, and more convenient to use in various ways. Since the Javelin kills anything the Russians have at the moment, they went with it.

This were the crazy times of Rumsfeld, FCS and all that crap. I imagine that as a anti-tank Hellfire alternative for Apache, aircraft and perhaps vehicle-launched tank testroyers, this would be really unmatched. Also, imagine the kinematically similar missile, but with AHEAD type warhead, spewing little tungsten pellets against aircraft, drones, light vehicles and poor bloody infantry guys...

[hcrof]

33 minutes ago, JonS said:

Like us all, I've been pondering the 'death of tanks' idea, and I can't help thinking that the entire premise of the question is wrong.

On 20 Nov 1917 the British lost 50% of the almost 500 tanks employed
At dawn on 8 Aug 1918 the British had almost 600 tanks, but by the 12th that was down to just six (6)! 99% casualties, in 4 days.
In late 1939 the Germans lost around 10% of their tanks in a campaign lasting just over a month
In mid 1940 the Germans lost 33% of their tanks in a campaign lasting just on 6 weeks.
In 1967 the Israelis lost 50% of their tanks in just six days
In 1973 the Israelis lost 25% of their tanks in a war lasting 19 days

And yet, every one of those battles and campaigns were considered wildly successful.

Tanks have [i]always[/i] been vulnerable. They are [i]protected[/i]. and certainly more so than the PBI wandering around in a cotton shirt, but that isn't a free pass away from the realities of high-intensity peer-level warfare. The question is - or should be - whether they are effective, and whether they bring capabilities that can't otherwise be realised. he answer to that was, and still is, yes.

I am also moving away from a "tanks are obsolete" position, but given the high attrition rates of tanks I am not very keen on 70tonne monsters with 4 crew members which will just be knocked out by a hundred types of modern weapon (aps is a distraction imo). We need larger numbers of lighter tanks, preferably with fewer crew (or none!).

[JonS]

23 hours ago, poesel said:

That is really a problem. If you don't have customers who continually buy your stuff, you cannot just mothball an assembly line and unpack it whenever you need it. The supply chain is gone, as well as the skill required to run that line.

That reminds me of people who're trying to build/rebuild Mosquitos. Nearly 8,000 of the things were built over a 10 year period, but then the tools, technology and skills all just evaporated when production ceased. Now trying to build Mosquitos, despite 70-odd years of incredible technological advances, is an almost impossible task.

"Just in case" manufacturing is a wicked problem, and restricted ammo supply - especially artillery ammo - is a feature of all wars that go longer than a few weeks. The basic problem is that consumption rises from essentially zero rounds per day (well, maybe 10-50/day, depending on the size of the army) to several thousand per day in the space of an afternoon. You can't realistically store enough rounds to last a war, and you can't just start up a production line and expect magic immediately.

Assume you figure you're going to need 5,000 rounds per day, and your hypothetical war is going to last 12 months. 365 x 5000 is 1,825,000 rounds. Ok, well, good luck finding that much safe storage space. But lets assume you do that. Sweet. You are good to go. Oh, but wait - time keeps moving forward, that's what it does. In 10 years those 1.8M rounds need to be fired or destroyed because they're at the end of their useful storage life (dumb rounds will probably last longer, but even 10 years is probably ambitious for smart munitions.) In order not to 'waste' the rounds you need to use 180,000 rounds in training each year, and also scale production to 180,000 to maintain a steady flow. But 180,000/yr is a hell of a lot of 'training', it's about 500 rounds per day. Every day, including Easter and Christmas. So, ok, lets say we'll store a quarter of our assumed requirement - a bit less than half a million rounds. That makes the storage problem more plausible, and also makes low rate production more realistic; about 45,000 rounds per year. That is still a lot, but it's not A LOT. And the assumption is that you'll be able to spin up production from 120 rounds per day to 5,000rpd within 3 months, so just as the initial stockpile of 500,000 is exhausted new production is up to speed and delivering the required volume. Except now you have 3 assumptions to manage - duration, consumption, and ability to spin up production. Get anyone of those wrong and you have a glut (an issue, but not a problem exactly) or a shortage (eek!).

For low use stuff, like SmArt rounds, the problem is way worse, because you're dealing with much smaller numbers. The Germans built 9,000 rounds for storage, so assuming they can be stored for 10 years that means 900 replacements needed each year, or about 3 new rounds per day. At that level you're essentially talking artisanal production - old bearded guys lovingly rolling shell cases on their naked thighs to get the calibre juuuust right, and soldering the circuit boards by hand over scarred old hardwood workbench under a flickering fluorescent tube, which really doesn't scale to mass production in any sensible way.

And then all you need to do is solve those three assumptions for every other line-item used by the military.

Edited October 29, 2022 by JonS

[Artkin]

I think APS is a game changer if Trophy is as good as they say it is.. 360 degree protection, even able to intercept top attack munitions... Pair that with an anti-drone suite and you're going to have a vehicle that you can barely look at without dying. The only way to fight these monsters will be with overwhelming numbers, artillery, or insurgency style tactics (Blending in with the population). In a near peer conflict I.E. the US, I would expect military satellites would also be targeted. So you're going to have armored forces driving across the country without having decent ISR against it.

[Zeleban]

 

[Huba]

4 minutes ago, JonS said:

That reminds me of people who're trying to build/rebuild Mosquitos. Nearly 8,000 of the things were built over a 10 year period, but then the tools, technology and skills all just evaporated when production ceased. Now trying to build Mosquitos, despite 70-odd years of incredible technological advances, is an [i]almost[/i] impossible task.

"Just in case" manufacturing is a wicked problem, and restricted ammo supply - especially artillery ammo - is a feature of all wars that go longer than a few weeks. The basic problem is that consumption rises from essentially zero rounds per day (well, maybe 10-50/day, depending on the size of the army) to several thousand per day in the space of an afternoon. You can't realistically store enough rounds to last a war, and you can't just start up a production line and expect magic immediately.

Assume you figure you're going to need 5,000 rounds per day, and your hypothetical war is going to last 12 months. 365 x 5000 is 1,825,000 rounds. Ok, well, good luck finding that much safe storage space. But lets assume you do that. Sweet. You are good to go. Oh, but wait - time keeps moving forward, that's what it does. In 10 years those 1.8M rounds need to be fired or destroyed because they're at the end of their useful storage life (dumb rounds will probably last longer, but even 10 years is probably ambitious for smart munitions.) In order not to 'waste' the rounds you need to use 180,000 rounds in training each year, and also scale production to 180,000 to maintain a steady flow. But 180,000/yr is a hell of a lot of 'training', it's about 500 rounds per day. Every day, including Easter and Christmas. So, ok, lets say we'll store a quarter of our assumed requirement - a bit less than half a million rounds. That makes the storage problem more plausible, and also makes low rate production more realistic; about 45,000 rounds per year. That is still a lot, but it's not a LOT. And the assumption is that you'll be able to spin up production from 120 rounds per day to 5,000rpd within 3 months, so just as the initial stockpile of 500,000 is exhausted new production is up to speed and delivering the required volume. Except now you have 3 assumptions to manage - duration, consumption, and ability to spin up production. Get anyone of those wrong and you have a glut (an issue, but not a problem exactly) or a shortage (eek!).

For low use stuff, like SmArt rounds, the problem is way worse, because you're dealing with much smaller numbers. The Germans built 9,000 rounds for storage, so assuming they can be stored for 10 years that means 900 replacements needed each year, or about 3 new rounds per day. At that level you're essentially talking artisanal production - old bearded guys lovingly rolling shell cases on their naked thighs to get the calibre [i]juuuust[/i] right, and soldering the circuit boards by hand over scarred old hardwood workbench under a flickering flourescent tube, which really doesn't scale to mass production in any sensible way.

And then all you need to do is solve those three assumptions for every ever other line-item used by the military.

I can imagine that for "dumb" artillery rounds, keeping the whole production lines mothballed should be more or less doable, if you are really willing to do so. At the end it is only steel and a few chemicals, mostly produced from natural gas, right?  Plus maybe some simple, purely mechanical contact fuses.
But the moment you jump to anything requiring fancy electronics you really can't do that that easily. I wonder if though if we are not approaching times where a self-respecting military should have it's own chip factory?

3 minutes ago, Artkin said:

I think APS is a game changer if Trophy is as good as they say it is.. 360 degree protection, even able to intercept top attack munitions... Pair that with an anti-drone suite and you're going to have a vehicle that you can barely look at without dying. The only way to fight these monsters will be with overwhelming numbers, artillery, or insurgency style tactics (Blending in with the population). In a near peer conflict I.E. the US, I would expect military satellites would also be targeted. So you're going to have armored forces driving across the country without having decent ISR against it.

But Trophy can't really protect you against fast moving threats like APFSDS, EFPs or the above-mentioned CKEMs. Unless you solve for this, there's still plenty of deadly threats on the modern battlefield that you are defenseless against. 
What APS would do though is make AFVs way more impervious against infantry, rendering most of the light anti-tank weapons useless.

Edited October 28, 2022 by Huba

[hcrof]

3 minutes ago, Artkin said:

I think APS is a game changer if Trophy is as good as they say it is.. 360 degree protection, even able to intercept top attack munitions... Pair that with an anti-drone suite and you're going to have a vehicle that you can barely look at without dying. The only way to fight these monsters will be with overwhelming numbers, artillery, or insurgency style tactics (Blending in with the population). In a near peer conflict I.E. the US, I would expect military satellites would also be targeted. So you're going to have armored forces driving across the country without having decent ISR against it.

The problem is that mines and artillery probably account for the majority of kills in this war. Also doesn't trophy use radar? So now you are just broadcasting "kill me" for any sensor in the area. And that is before we talk about swarms, hypervelocity rockets etc

[Zeleban]

Just now, Artkin said:

I think APS is a game changer if Trophy is as good as they say it is.. 360 degree protection, even able to intercept top attack munitions... Pair that with an anti-drone suite and you're going to have a vehicle that you can barely look at without dying. The only way to fight these monsters will be with overwhelming numbers, artillery, or insurgency style tactics (Blending in with the population). In a near peer conflict I.E. the US, I would expect military satellites would also be targeted. So you're going to have armored forces driving across the country without having decent ISR against it.

I don't think that APS will have a significant impact on the situation on the battlefield. Most tank losses come from artillery fire and APS does not protect against artillery fire. At the beginning of the war, the Russians used several T-80UM2 tanks with APS "Drozd-2" This did not have any effect on the battlefield

[acrashb]

6 minutes ago, JonS said:

In 10 years those 1.8M rounds need to be fired or destroyed because they're at the end of their useful storage life (dumb rounds will probably last longer, but even 10 years is probably ambitious for smart munitions.)

You can empty and refill them with explosives, and same with the fuzes.  The steel and other metal bits don't age in proper storage.  And you don't do it all at once, it's like MREs - you do ten percent a year for ten years.

Smart rounds are another matter - electronics have shelf lives (e.g., tin solder whiskers).  Once the chips are out of production, you just can't get them.  So modularity - chip not available?  Redesign the board and plug it into the fuse through your milspec / unchanging interface.