How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[dan/california]

2 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

I don't

Steve

OMG, OMG we got bone! OK it is a micro fragment, but beggars can't be choosers.

[benpark]

From the BFC Home Office, Skunk Werks Room:

[dan/california]

Now imagine being shot at while having this wonderful experience. There is a reason Ukraine is waiting for the ground to freeze.

[danfrodo]

Summary from Mark Sumner (dailykos) today.  Nothing ground breaking, but does report continued small gains for UKR on Svatove-kremmina front.  As most of you know, the road net is mostly north-south in this area, and w mud it's tough to move east for UKR.  Also he provides more summary of the NYTimes article mentioned in above posts, for those stuck by paywall. 

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/12/17/2142397/-Ukraine-update-Putin-s-war-may-be-destroying-Ukrainian-cities-but-it-s-killing-the-Russian-nation

 

[chrisl]

2 minutes ago, dan/california said:

Now imagine being shot at while having this wonderful experience. There is a reason Ukraine is waiting for the ground to freeze.

FWIW, cyclocross in icy conditions is a nightmare of a different sort.  Decades ago, when I lived in a cold place, there was CX in the early winter and late winter.  Early winter was mud and wet snow.  Late winter was snow and ice.  The fun part is that the ice develops ruts and if you're going down a hill you have to get into the correct rut out of a horrible mishmash of ruts, because once you were in, you were following it like a rail.   Some ruts led to the continuation of the course, and others led to things like trees and picnic tables. 

[Battlefront.com]

4 hours ago, The_Capt said:

Minor quibble but I think we have seen two operational collapses - the first drive at Kyiv out of the North, and Kharkiv.  Kherson was not a collapse so much as a withdrawal.  The three of these combined could be taken as strategic collapse but I would want to see more stuff happening deeper in Russia to call it.  All them folks - most well educated and rich - running for the border is a pretty good sign that not everyone in Russia in on board.

Actually, it's not a minor quibble but rather a solid point to make

At what point does a weakened force proactively removing itself from a battlefield constitute a collapse vs. a withdrawal/retreat?  In my view it has to do with the degree of control over the withdrawal conditions.  Kinda like the difference between an unsafe skyscraper being brought down with controlled demolition vs. it falling over one day because one to many rats in the basement farted.

I think the inability to hold a section of front or to maintain the war is a defeat of some type, but not collapse in my humble view.  Collapse also involves giving up land, but with far more chaos and losses than with a withdrawal/retreat.

This is why I caveat my comments about the northern Ukraine outcome.  If Russia tried to hold on much longer than it did I think there would have been a collapse.  The forces around Kyiv were withdrawn largely intact, which is not what I'd expect to see in a collapse situation.

However, effectively Russia's ability to hold that terrain had been fundamentally undermined by systemic losses, logistical chaos, and leadership concepts that borderline on insane.  So a collapse of ability to hold the front more than a collapse at the front.

That sound fair?

Kherson was similar.  Russia had no desire to lose that terrain and it fought for many months to hold it.  The resources diverted there were desperately needed elsewhere, yet they weren't enough to keep them on the right bank of the Dnepr.  Staying much longer would have resulted in collapse, which would have been evidenced by thousands of prisoners and WAY more abandoned equipment.  Therefore, like Kyiv they buggered out at just the right time.

Ukraine's first push around Kharkiv, however, was a collapse for Russia.  Ukraine punched with a fairly minor force and everybody in front of them routed back to Russia.  I doubt they were ordered to do that, so it was both a collapse and a route.

Ukraine's second push around Kharkiv was... a collapse of sorts because technically for something to collapse it has to exist Russia basically didn't have more than a few pickets and a couple of mobile reserves.  The front got wiped out more than it collapsed. 

Izyum, which was a part of the Kharkiv offensive, was an example of sizeable collapse.  The units there didn't put up much of a fight once Ukraine started to move.  They were a Potemkin Army.  They knew it and they knew Ukraine knew it.  Leaving behind their uniforms, wheeled vehicles, and something like 40% of their heavy equipment attests to that.  When we see something like that happen at an operational or (please, pretty please!) strategic level, that's when we can safely talk about Russia's ability to wage war has having collapsed.

Steve

 

[Battlefront.com]

13 minutes ago, chrisl said:

FWIW, cyclocross in icy conditions is a nightmare of a different sort.  Decades ago, when I lived in a cold place, there was CX in the early winter and late winter.  Early winter was mud and wet snow.  Late winter was snow and ice.  The fun part is that the ice develops ruts and if you're going down a hill you have to get into the correct rut out of a horrible mishmash of ruts, because once you were in, you were following it like a rail.   Some ruts led to the continuation of the course, and others led to things like trees and picnic tables. 

I've never done that on a bike, but I've done my fair share of driving sideways in 4WD on frozen roads that have ruts.  All it takes is a couple of degrees too warm with too much sun and the top few centimeters become like grease and the ruts like tracks.  Slip and slide in and out of the tracks into other tracks.  If you know the road and you know your vehicle and you're not a dumbass, everything is fine.  If you're a young male in your first truck, dumbassery is pretty much guaranteed!

Steve

[kevinkin]

Kissinger speaks (again):

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-push-for-peace/

If the pre-war dividing line between Ukraine and Russia cannot be achieved by combat or by negotiation, recourse to the principle of self-determination could be explored. Internationally supervised referendums concerning self-determination could be applied to particularly divisive territories which have changed hands repeatedly over the centuries.

err; same old, same old (man)

The preferred outcome for some is a Russia rendered impotent by the war. I disagree. For all its propensity to violence, Russia has made decisive contributions to the global equilibrium and to the balance of power for over half a millennium. Its historical role should not be degraded. Russia’s military setbacks have not eliminated its global nuclear reach, enabling it to threaten escalation in Ukraine. Even if this capability is diminished, the dissolution of Russia or destroying its ability for strategic policy could turn its territory encompassing 11 time zones into a contested vacuum. Its competing societies might decide to settle their disputes by violence. Other countries might seek to expand their claims by force. All these dangers would be compounded by the presence of thousands of nuclear weapons which make Russia one of the world’s two largest nuclear powers.

double err

[sburke]

Russia’s Shadowy Mercenary Air Force Is Losing More And More Jets In Ukraine (msn.com)

[billbindc]

25 minutes ago, kevinkin said:

Kissinger speaks (again):

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-push-for-peace/

If the pre-war dividing line between Ukraine and Russia cannot be achieved by combat or by negotiation, recourse to the principle of self-determination could be explored. Internationally supervised referendums concerning self-determination could be applied to particularly divisive territories which have changed hands repeatedly over the centuries.

err; same old, same old (man)

The preferred outcome for some is a Russia rendered impotent by the war. I disagree. For all its propensity to violence, Russia has made decisive contributions to the global equilibrium and to the balance of power for over half a millennium. Its historical role should not be degraded. Russia’s military setbacks have not eliminated its global nuclear reach, enabling it to threaten escalation in Ukraine. Even if this capability is diminished, the dissolution of Russia or destroying its ability for strategic policy could turn its territory encompassing 11 time zones into a contested vacuum. Its competing societies might decide to settle their disputes by violence. Other countries might seek to expand their claims by force. All these dangers would be compounded by the presence of thousands of nuclear weapons which make Russia one of the world’s two largest nuclear powers.

double err

Kissinger's essentially a bot at this point. And still a war criminal in my book.

[paxromana]

5 hours ago, dan/california said:

People in combat for long enough literally go more than a little nuts. The was a scandal during the Korean war where U.S. soldiers had taken to putting the SKULLs of North Korean soldiers on their tanks, they were quite pleased with the effect. The Pentagon was much less so....

Evidently during WW2 in the Pacific the US Armed Forces Post Office routed all packages coming from US forces in the region back throgh Hawaii because it was not uncommon for them to contain Japanese body parts as souveniers.

Also, when I was teaching we had a regular '"Sixties Day" each year for our Year 10 students studying (amongst other things) Australian involvement in Vietnam and, one year, we had a parent come in to talk to them ... he had been in the US Marines in Vietnam and, after he'd spoken to them, he was chatting with us and broke down in tears commenting how he had kept a wire loop strung with VC ears on his belt for a time before he realised just how wrong this was.

So, yes, I have no doubt at all that a small, hopefully tiny in Western style armies, portion of soldiers do come under such psychological pressure that they do things that would simply not be understandable (let alone acceptable) in peacetime - and it takes really high quality and motivated leadership to keep a lid on this sort of thing.

Something the UA has much more of that the Orcs.

Edited December 18, 2022 by paxromana

[The_Capt]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

Actually, it's not a minor quibble but rather a solid point to make

At what point does a weakened force proactively removing itself from a battlefield constitute a collapse vs. a withdrawal/retreat?  In my view it has to do with the degree of control over the withdrawal conditions.  Kinda like the difference between an unsafe skyscraper being brought down with controlled demolition vs. it falling over one day because one to many rats in the basement farted.

I think the inability to hold a section of front or to maintain the war is a defeat of some type, but not collapse in my humble view.  Collapse also involves giving up land, but with far more chaos and losses than with a withdrawal/retreat.

This is why I caveat my comments about the northern Ukraine outcome.  If Russia tried to hold on much longer than it did I think there would have been a collapse.  The forces around Kyiv were withdrawn largely intact, which is not what I'd expect to see in a collapse situation.

However, effectively Russia's ability to hold that terrain had been fundamentally undermined by systemic losses, logistical chaos, and leadership concepts that borderline on insane.  So a collapse of ability to hold the front more than a collapse at the front.

That sound fair?

Kherson was similar.  Russia had no desire to lose that terrain and it fought for many months to hold it.  The resources diverted there were desperately needed elsewhere, yet they weren't enough to keep them on the right bank of the Dnepr.  Staying much longer would have resulted in collapse, which would have been evidenced by thousands of prisoners and WAY more abandoned equipment.  Therefore, like Kyiv they buggered out at just the right time.

Ukraine's first push around Kharkiv, however, was a collapse for Russia.  Ukraine punched with a fairly minor force and everybody in front of them routed back to Russia.  I doubt they were ordered to do that, so it was both a collapse and a route.

Ukraine's second push around Kharkiv was... a collapse of sorts because technically for something to collapse it has to exist Russia basically didn't have more than a few pickets and a couple of mobile reserves.  The front got wiped out more than it collapsed. 

Izyum, which was a part of the Kharkiv offensive, was an example of sizeable collapse.  The units there didn't put up much of a fight once Ukraine started to move.  They were a Potemkin Army.  They knew it and they knew Ukraine knew it.  Leaving behind their uniforms, wheeled vehicles, and something like 40% of their heavy equipment attests to that.  When we see something like that happen at an operational or (please, pretty please!) strategic level, that's when we can safely talk about Russia's ability to wage war has having collapsed.

Steve

 

I guess the main reason I would call the northern Kyiv offensive a collapse - or perhaps controlled collapse - is also based on the amount of hardware they left behind.

To my mind a collapse is when the weight of the system can no longer be supported by the system.  There are multiple dimensions to this - equipment, material and physiological, to name three big ones.  This all creates a collapse in viable military options space, which we clearly saw in all three cases.  

I guess the violence and momentum of the collapse is the key consideration.  Does a collapse become autocatalytic?  Does it create a runaway feedback loop?  Or can the RA C2 tie it off and isolated it.  I think you are correct in that in these cases, except possibly Kharkiv, the RA managed to collapse in manageable condition.  Of course this is an incredibly dangerous game.  How many times can the RA roll that dice before the come up with a natural 1?
 

[Huba]

Just read a report saying that RU has abandoned Zhytlivka with heavy losses, and UA is making a push around Chervonopopivka, having already crossed Krasna river there. Kreminna is to be under very heavy bombardment since Saturday morning.
UA reportedly has been also making progress in the northern sector of the front, working on encircling Kuzemivka north-west of Svatove.

It will be a moment till we get any confirmation, but it looks like UA is again seriously attempting to move the front in the Luhansk sector.

 

Edit:

Also, I've just discovered that Julia David's excellent Russian Media Monitor now has a Youtube channel. Now we can enjoy the russian media madness in full length!

https://www.youtube.com/@russianmediamonitor/videos

Edited December 18, 2022 by Huba

[Battlefront.com]

2 hours ago, billbindc said:

Kissinger's essentially a bot at this point. And still a war criminal in my book.

He doesn't have much longer on this Earth, but that new AI writing program could probably keep cranking out equivalent BS forever.

Cripes, I could write Kissinger's stuff for him.  Take whatever I believe to be true about the world, turn it around, change a few DOs to DONTs, a few WESTs to RUSSIA, and that's all it takes.

Steve

[Kinophile]

Something going on with the Kerch? Or is it bad weather screwing with repairs and limiting traffic on a damaged spans? 

[Battlefront.com]

2 hours ago, The_Capt said:

I guess the main reason I would call the northern Kyiv offensive a collapse - or perhaps controlled collapse - is also based on the amount of hardware they left behind.

I think this might have been more due to logistics limitations and general Russian lack of concern for the stuff in their care.  In other words, the same stuff that would happen even they were winning the war

What we didn't see was large concentrations of intact vehicles that had no obvious signs for being abandoned.  Believe me, I know because I was expecting it!  I was hoping to see it in Kherson too.  But no, it seems most of the stuff that could roll was rolled out.  To me that's not a symptom of collapse.

2 hours ago, The_Capt said:

To my mind a collapse is when the weight of the system can no longer be supported by the system.  There are multiple dimensions to this - equipment, material and physiological, to name three big ones.  This all creates a collapse in viable military options space, which we clearly saw in all three cases.  

This is where I quibble a bit with your assessment.  I think on a scale of 0-10, with 10 being collapse, all three of those factors you named were at 8 or 9.  If Putin insisted they spend another couple of days fighting there I think it would have gone to 10.  Which is why I view northern Ukraine as having been an inch away from being a collapse, but not a collapse. 

2 hours ago, The_Capt said:

I guess the violence and momentum of the collapse is the key consideration.  Does a collapse become autocatalytic?  Does it create a runaway feedback loop?  

In my mind yes.  This is similar to the characterizing something as a Route vs. a Retreat.  The less control, the more it's a route.  During a retreat al commanders fear a tipping point may be hit where the struggle to maintain a disciplined retreat completely fails and control ceases.  The Germans did not retreat from places like Orel in 1944, they routed.  But for many of the pocket battles during the winter of 42/43 and 43/44 the Germans did not route even though the lost massive numbers of men and equipment.

2 hours ago, The_Capt said:

Or can the RA C2 tie it off and isolated it.  I think you are correct in that in these cases, except possibly Kharkiv, the RA managed to collapse in manageable condition.  Of course this is an incredibly dangerous game.  How many times can the RA roll that dice before the come up with a natural 1?

Exactly this.  You know I have very little praise for the Russians, but their ability to retreat instead of collapse is damned impressive.  I know you want to see a dozens of multiple hundred reports on how Ukraine beat the snot out of Russia so thoroughly.  I do too, but I also want to see credible accounts for how the Russians managed to get their forces out of so many tough spots so well so many times as they have.

Here's the primary thesis I've got in my head...

Russia has a long tradition, going back decades, of covering retreats with all kinds of clever forms of "booby traps".  This is one of the few aspects of Russian doctrine that units seem to have a reasonable degree of skill in executing.  It is also something that the Russians are willing to prioritize in their logistics stream.  Which means they have the concepts, the training, and the means to carry out effective stalling tactics.

Coupled with this is Ukraine still trying to get its footing for offensive operations.  We've seen plenty of evidence that their attacks are slow, methodical, and sometimes poorly executed.  It is no wonder that a unit will slow down after has just lost soldiers to a tripwire or a truck to a mine on a route they thought was clear.  Even if the unit is bold and pushed forward, the Russian belts of booby traps are so thick that they're are obligated to become cautious or risk being combat ineffective.  Either way, Russia buys its guys time to withdraw.

Compare Kherson with Kharkiv.  What is the big difference?  Kherson had a relatively high density of infantry and that infantry was the best Russia had in the field.  Many of these units are the ones explicitly trained for carrying out such delaying actions.  Kharkiv?  Low infantry density of low quality units with no backup.  There simply wasn't the time or resources for Russia to conduct a delaying action there, so Ukraine was able to advance rapidly because when a unit went into Village A it didn't go BOOM and so was able to drive onto Village B.

This is just a theory, but it does seem to fit the facts.

Steve

[Kinophile]

It's IE,  so a pallet of buckets of salt, but...

https://interestingengineering.com/innovation/tank-like-drones-to-battle-russia

 

[Battlefront.com]

4 hours ago, Huba said:

Just read a report saying that RU has abandoned Zhytlivka with heavy losses, and UA is making a push around Chervonopopivka, having already crossed Krasna river there. Kreminna is to be under very heavy bombardment since Saturday morning.
UA reportedly has been also making progress in the northern sector of the front, working on encircling Kuzemivka north-west of Svatove.

It will be a moment till we get any confirmation, but it looks like UA is again seriously attempting to move the front in the Luhansk sector.

So, looks like the reports coming in from the past few days, hinting at some movement, may be quite significant afterall.  It will be good to see the line move, though I don't expect any quick breakthrough here.  I think Russia has done a credible job firming up the line generally.  I also don't see Ukraine rushing units from Kherson into this area or much of anywhere.  I suspect Russia knows where Ukraine's reserves are, so watching where Russia builds up is going to tell us a lot about where Ukraine plans on striking next.  Seems it is in the "land bridge" area somewhere.

 

4 hours ago, Huba said:

Edit:

Also, I've just discovered that Julia David's excellent Russian Media Monitor now has a Youtube channel. Now we can enjoy the russian media madness in full length!

https://www.youtube.com/@russianmediamonitor/videos

I really wonder how much of any of this these guys believe.  Even if it is 1/100th of what they utter, it's an indication of insanity.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Here's something that future people watching conflicts unfold should take note of.  ISW just summarized an indepth NY Times article that used Russian documents and interviews to better understand what happened in the first few days of the war.  I'm posting ISW's summary.  Find me one thing on here that we did not talk about, in depth, as it happened

Quote

A New York Times (NYT) investigation of Russian military documents supports ISW’s longstanding assessments about how flawed Russian planning assumptions and campaign design decisions plagued Russia’s invasion of Ukraine from its onset. ISW has long assessed that faulty Russian planning assumptions, campaign design decisions, and Russian violations of Russia’s own military doctrine undermined Russian operations. The NYT acquired and published logbooks, timetables, orders, and other documents of elements of the 76th Airborne Division and 1st Guards Tank Army related to the early days of the war on December 16.[11] The documents demonstrate that Russian military planners expected Russian units to be able to capture significant Ukrainian territory with little to no Ukrainian military opposition. The documents indicate that elements of the 76th Airborne Division and Eastern Military District were ordered to depart Belarus and reach Kyiv within 18 hours against little resistance; Russian planners placed OMON riot police and SOBR Russian National Guard (Rosgvardia) special police elements (essentially a Russian SWAT equivalent) within the first column of a maneuver element of the 104th Air Assault Regiment of the 76th Airborne Division.[12] Riot police are not suitable lead elements for a large maneuver force in a conventional force-on-force war because they are not trained to conduct combined arms or mechanized warfare. The decision to place riot police in the lead column is a violation of Russian (or any normal) doctrine and indicates that Russian planners did not expect significant organized Ukrainian resistance. A separate set of orders indicates that Russian planners expected unsupported elements of the Russian 26th Tank Regiment (of the 47th Tank Division, 1st Guards Tank Army) to conduct a mostly uninhibited, 24-hour dash from Ukraine’s border with Russia to a point across the Dnipro River, about 400 kilometers away.[13] Ukrainian forces destroyed elements of the 26th Tank Regiment in Kharkiv Oblast, hundreds of kilometers short of its intended destination on March 17.[14]

The NYT investigation also supports ISW’s assessments that Russian strategic commanders have been micromanaging operational commanders' decisions on tactical matters and that Russian morale is very low. The investigation supported existing reporting that Russian soldiers in Belarus did not know they were going to attack Ukraine until February 23—the day before the invasion—and that some soldiers did not know about the invasion until one hour before the invasion began.[15] A retired Russian general told the NYT that the lack of a unified Russian theater command meant there was “no unified planning of actions and command [and control].”[16] A Ukrainian pilot told the NYT he was amazed that Russian forces did not conduct a proper air and missile campaign at the beginning of the war to target Ukrainian airfields—as Russian doctrine prescribes. The NYT reported a Russian tank commander deliberately destroyed a Rosgvardia checkpoint in Zaporizhia Oblast over an argument and that many Russian soldiers sabotaged their own vehicles to avoid combat.[17] The NYT's findings support ISW’s assessments and body of research on why the Russian military has been experiencing significant failures since the beginning of the invasion.

The speed and quality of OSINT in this war has been stunningly good.  Highly accurate, at least for those looking in the right places, NOT looking in the wrong places, and accepting the information as credible instead of dismissing it because it didn't fit prewar assumptions.

Kudos to us for digging into this stuff so well, but a virtual round of applause for the hundreds of people who did their part to provide us with the information that allowed for such an accurate assessment of Russia's war within hours of it starting.

The NYT article was linked to a page or two ago, but here it is again:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/12/16/world/europe/russia-putin-war-failures-ukraine.html

Steve

[dan/california]

Well that is just a tad embarrassing...

[NamEndedAllen]

(How do you guys get quotes from other sources displayed in the forum’s quote blocks? I used the link option but only see underlining! Probably stating he in the face!)

Remember those upgunned, upgraded very old M-55 tanks from Slovenia?

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2022/12/17/ukraines-super-upgraded-m-55s-tanks-have-equipped-a-new-kind-of-brigade/?sh=1061d27b739b

We finally know which Ukrainian army unit took ownership of those super-upgraded, but very old, M-55S tanks that Slovenia donated to Ukraine.  It’s the 47th Assault Brigade. A new kind of unit with a very special leader. A famous veteran and author named Valery Markus.  The M-55S is a deeply modernized Soviet T-55, a tank type that first entered service in the late 1950s. In the 1990s, the Slovenian army paid Israeli firm Elbit and STO RAVNE in Slovenia to modify 30 of its 36-ton T-55s.  Among other enhancements—including reactive armor, an uprated engine and a new fire-control system—the M-55S has a stabilized, British-made L7 105-millimeter main gun in place of the original Soviet 100-millimeter gun.  The gun is what makes the M-55S valuable to Ukraine. The British gun is compatible with a wide range of modern ammunition, including armor-piercing sabot rounds that can penetrate the armor of a Russian T-72. As recently as a week ago it still was unclear which Ukrainian unit would operate the M-55Ss. A video that circulated online on Dec. 9 depicts crews training on the new-old tanks in the thick, cold mud that’s typical of early winter in eastern Ukraine.  The news finally broke on Saturday, when Markus shared photos with the M-55Ss in the background. The tanks now belong to the 47th Assault Brigade.  The 47th is a young unit—and unique in the Ukrainian order of battle. It’s an entirely volunteer formation—no conscripts—and it is, for lack of a better term, more Western than sister brigades are. It reportedly leans heavily on its non-commissioned officers, like brigades in NATO armies do.  The 47th also possesses a greater proportion of NATO-style weaponry than other Ukrainian brigades do. The M-55S itself is a hybrid: a Soviet hull with a NATO main gun.  Markus, a famously-mustachioed veteran of the fighting in eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region in 2014 and 2015 who wrote a popular book about his wartime experience, helped to recruit volunteers for the 47th and also serves as its sergeant major. “In the 47th Brigade, we are trying to create the principles of a truly new Ukrainian army,” Markus wrote on social media.  The 47th was a battalion with around 400 soldiers when it first formed back in April. Over the summer it expanded to a regiment with 2,000 or so troops. The addition of a tank battalion with M-55Ss apparently compelled the Ukrainian general staff to redesignate the regiment as a brigade.

Edited December 18, 2022 by NamEndedAllen

[Pete Wenman]

24 minutes ago, NamEndedAllen said:

(How do you guys get quotes from other sources displayed in the forum’s quote blocks?

Use the quote tool     

 

Quote

and paste text inside 

P

[poesel]

3 hours ago, dan/california said:

Well that is just a tad embarrassing...

Just a bit... Since the Pumas won't be repaired until April '23, we will have to use Marders for our NATO obligations. Now you know why we don't give them to Ukraine.

If you needed to know how ****ed up the Bundeswehr is - now you do.

[Huba]

25 minutes ago, Pete Wenman said:

Use the quote tool     

 

P

Also "paste as plain text" from browser context menu ( or Ctrl+SHift+V instead of Ctrl+V) allows you to drop the external formatting and instead displays forum's standard font - much easier on the eyes in general

[Kraft]

46 minutes ago, poesel said:

Just a bit... Since the Pumas won't be repaired until April '23, we will have to use Marders for our NATO obligations. Now you know why we don't give them to Ukraine.

This is only a partial truth. Marders in storage of private firms are not in use of the Bundeswehr, yet cannot be sold to Ukraine because of political decisions. Or Leo1s to be sold by other countries, who lack the permission by whom?

It is a fair question to ask the people in charge, who would the Bundeswehr defend against? France? New Austria-Hungaria? Any and all military equipment with the intend of keeping Europe peaceful has the highest marginal use in Ukraine right now where it would be able to put Russias military back decades, and safe Ukrainian lifes instead of dusting and rusting.

NATO obligations are a nice throwaway line to say its not in the hands of the politicans, who for the last how many decades couldnt care less about NATO obligations of >2% GDP, 30days of ammo storage, actually working vehicles,... but it sure is a nice excuse right now. The same one that was used for the Dingos, who then suddenly could be sent quite easily (even though the Bundeswehr does not have a surplus..) after enough political pressure was felt.

Edited December 18, 2022 by Kraft