How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[The_Capt]

7 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Don't forget we've seen quite a number of instances where the Russian behavior was tailored to how safe they felt. Air bases with minimal prep for artillery, ships casually sitting in docks, supply bases with everything packed in one building, unloading trains close to the front, barracks with hundreds of troops hanging out, HQs that were acting as if they didn't need to be in bunkers, etc.  So it seems the trend here continues where units are moving around Mother Russia without any consideration for combat spacing because they thought they were out of range.

If this incident is like all the others I mentioned, Russia will learn not to do this after a couple of smack downs.

Steve

To my mind this is not about complacency, it is about a moving threat yardstick.  I mean given this environment, where is a safe rear area?  We have ISR everywhere and linked shooters that can reach 100s of kms. In the past the air picture at least gave warning. Now strikes can happen pretty much anywhere.  I suspect the UA has gone through a similar hard learning curve as well, but Russian ISR has always lagged in this conflict. They do not have the same architecture and their space based is particularly lacking.  I think it is that ISR asymmetry that explains a lot of observations in this war.

[Letter from Prague]

Which is super important because when (or if, if you're optimistic) the Orange Man gets second term, the US-provide ISR will surely stop.

That's why Sweden gave Ukraine those AWACS/spy planes.

[The_Capt]

15 minutes ago, Letter from Prague said:

Which is super important because when (or if, if you're optimistic) the Orange Man gets second term, the US-provide ISR will surely stop.

That's why Sweden gave Ukraine those AWACS/spy planes.

That is my single largest fear.  US military ISR is at the discretion of the CinC and can be withdrawn with a pen stroke.  We know Ukraine has built a version of a JADC2 system but a lot of what it pulls is from the larger US C4ISR architecture.  Of that, strategic ISR, which is becoming extremely high resolution and real time, is the thing Ukraine cannot do on its own.  The good news is that operational and tactical ISR are now extremely cheap and effective.

In other news…this is where my country is at:

https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/ambassador-says-interactions-with-russia-quite-limited-but-not-unfriendly-1.6910126

“The Russians term us an ‘unfriendly’ country, that's the expression they use,” she said. “But I mean, from my perspective, we're not unfriendly, we're just waiting for them to change their policy.”

As if this was simply an issue of “policy”.  We are engaged in a proxy war where Canadian donated weapons are killing Russians and all we need is a “policy change” in Russia and everything will be all hunky d.  This is what 30 years of post Cold War thinking bought us.

Edited June 2 by The_Capt

[Astrophel]

The Canadian Ambassador is doing what she can to persuade russians to stop fighting and my conviction has always been that this is the only way to win this war.  What else should she be doing?  Insisting on unconditional surrender would not be taken seriously by anybody.

One plausible way to end this war is for Putin to be "retired".  It is in essence Putin's war.  The rest of the russian management might welcome the chance to get back to enriching themselves and taking nice holidays.

There is a lots we do not know about the military facts on the ground.  Maybe the russian retreat is just around the corner.  I believed that for a while after listening to experts.  Dealing with the realities in front of us it would be a bold expert predicting a military victory right now.

[OldSarge]

With all due respect to the Canadian Ambassador, I don't think Putin's regime is going to accept anything less than victory. They're now increasing defense spending to 6% GDP, and doing a major shuffling of the major MOD players. This all looks to me like they're in it for the long haul - at least until Putin receives a well deserved retirement.

"In Putin’s Russia the president remains laser focused on winning in Ukraine, but recent overtures have shown that the supporting cast may change and the president is ready to be ruthless in his search of victory."

With shake-up at defense ministry, ‘Putin’s chef’ gets his wish from beyond the grave

Edited June 2 by OldSarge
fat fingered typos

[Haiduk]

Solovyove village (Avdiivka area), Bradley of 47th mech.brigade shoots out two Russian BTR-82A with infantry on the top

On the first video is a cutting where two bodies fly after direct hit of 25 mm shell

 

[Haiduk]

Great clip about warfare around Chasiv Yar

 

[Haiduk]

M88 ARV evacuates damaged Bradley

 

[Haiduk]

One more ZALA downed by unknown UKR FPV interceptor

 

[Battlefront.com]

6 hours ago, Yet said:

opportunism, 

Take the most out of it as you can as long as the rules of the game are like this. Ever noticed that when people play poker for real money (how Ukr values its troops) they play different than when its with beads (how RU seems to value its troops).

Exactly this.  No nation, and I mean zero, does anything different.  No level of government either.  Neither do corporations.  And of course, personal households.

It is simply impossible, or at a minimum impractical, to proactively avoid every single threat.  Resources are never infinite and there's almost always some costs involved in preparing for something, whether it ever comes or not.

Russia has been able to move its ground forces around within its boundaries without any consequences for 2+ years.  Either because they were out of range of what Ukraine had available to it (including US restrictions) or because those weapons weren't plentiful enough to be used against relatively unimportant tactical targets.  That means for 2+ years they have avoided the costs associated with moving more carefully near the border.

In my view, Russia wasn't stupid any more than anybody else.  Until they heard that weapons restrictions had been loosened up explicitly in this area of front.  That's where typical Russian reactive thinking kicked in.  Specifically, they keep doing the easy way until they've suffered for it.  Sometimes more than once.

Steve

[Haiduk]

Russian milbloggers report about some counter-attacks of Ukrainian side in Vovchansk and in Lukyantsi areas and about UKR armored troops concentration for countr-strike there. No clear information about this. Kostianntyn Mashovets assumes Russians just try to expain own dead end in "Kharkiv offensive" thay they now will "heroically repell Ukrainian counter-attacks" after that will be claimed "we didn't want to seize Kharkiv at all"

But some limited advances of UKR troops really take place - they turned back some quarters in northern part, approaching to town hospital and meat factory

On other hand, as Mashovets predicted two days ago Russians started attack on western flank of Vovchansk toward Starytsia village. This is western bank of Siverskyi Donets river water reservoir and Russians try to unite two bridgeheads in nortehrn part of Kharkiv oblast. 

42nd mech.brigade repelled Russians attack there. Enemy used old T-62 tanks

Vovchansk view from UKR drone of National police assault brigade "Liut' "

 

[Battlefront.com]

21 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

Great clip about warfare around Chasiv Yar

 

Yes, a good clip.  Two fun things to see:

[Battlefront.com]

8 minutes ago, Haiduk said:

Russian milbloggers report about some counter-attacks of Ukrainian side in Vovchansk and in Lukyantsi areas and about UKR armored troops concentration for countr-strike there. No clear information about this. Kostianntyn Mashovets assumes Russians just try to expain own dead end in "Kharkiv offensive" thay they now will "heroically repell Ukrainian counter-attacks" after that will be claimed "we didn't want to seize Kharkiv at all"

But some limited advances of UKR troops really take place - they turned back some quarters in northern part, approaching to town hospital and meat factory

On other hand, as Mashovets predicted two days ago Russians started attack on western flank of Vovchansk toward Starytsia village. This is western bank of Siverskyi Donets river water reservoir and Russians try to unite two bridgeheads in nortehrn part of Kharkiv oblast. 

42nd mech.brigade repelled Russians attack there. Enemy used old T-62 tanks

Vovchansk view from UKR drone of National police assault brigade "Liut' "

 

The overview video of Vovchansk gives the best sense of scale of the city and its destruction I've seen so far.  Unfortunately, not surprising nor unusual for this war. 

Some amount of confirmation to the rumored counter attacks is good to see.  This gets back to something we concluded a while back, which is Russia most likely launched this attack in order to draw Ukrainian forces away from the Donbas.  However, it appears just as likely to draw Russian forces away from the Donbas because the operation when to poorly and if there's one thing that Russia has clearly established... it is unwilling to give up ground until the breaking point. 

Now that their small gains are threatened, they will most likely pour resources into defending it that they never intended to commit outside of the Donbas.

This will be an interesting indication of how strained their force regeneration is.  It seems the failure with the Kharkiv offensive already cost them a planned Sumy offensive, but will it cost them their larger (likely) summer offensive?  Does Russia have the strength to do both, or will it be a typical Russian attempt to do too much with too little and cause a critical failure somewhere (presumably Kharkiv area)?

Steve

[danfrodo]

Thanks @Haiduk for the great clips today, much appreciated.  So RU defending while also trying to move in new direction to link up the two widely separated incursions -- interesting.  Video (if actually what claims to be) shows the new RU advance taking a beating.  And it's led by T62 tanks - another piece of evidence that RU has burned up so much of its tank force that it's forced to scrape the bottom of the barrel more & more often.  

[Haiduk]

Some OSINTers assume Ukraine strike has destroyed "Iskander" launcher, which was hide in the facility of Shebekino town market in Belgorod oblast.

 

Edited June 2 by Haiduk

[Haiduk]

Russians reportedly activated near Nesterianka village NW from Robotyne. Russians probably have plans to advance to Orikhiv and Nesterianka is closest point to reach it. As UKR serviceman told in twitter, Russians several days shelled this direction with artillery and made false movements and at last tried to make probe attack with armored column east from the village, but their column was mostly destroyed.

Robotyne on this map marked under Russian control, but this guy says it's a grey dead zone - anybody, who comes there perishes almost immediately

 

Edited June 2 by Haiduk

[The_Capt]

3 hours ago, Astrophel said:

The Canadian Ambassador is doing what she can to persuade russians to stop fighting and my conviction has always been that this is the only way to win this war.  What else should she be doing?  Insisting on unconditional surrender would not be taken seriously by anybody.

One plausible way to end this war is for Putin to be "retired".  It is in essence Putin's war.  The rest of the russian management might welcome the chance to get back to enriching themselves and taking nice holidays.

There is a lots we do not know about the military facts on the ground.  Maybe the russian retreat is just around the corner.  I believed that for a while after listening to experts.  Dealing with the realities in front of us it would be a bold expert predicting a military victory right now.

Who is predicting military victory?  And your counter-offer is to somehow suggest the elimination of national leader...oh yes that is far more reasonable.

First rule of war is to understand the war you are in.  She in not convincing the Russian of Sweet FA by framing this thing as a "policy" issue.  My point is that this entire narrative is what is wrong within the western world right now. This is not some unfortunate divergence on a policy point, it is a war...we are in it.  It is a limited war.  It is a proxy war. But right now if Russia went "whoops, sorry" and magically pulled all its troops out deluded western politicians thinking along these lines would convince themselves it is ok to normalize with Russia the next weekend.

It is narrative that reinforces the idea that once this "unpleasantness" is over we can go back to a status quo.  A status quo that has sailed away into the history books and does no one any favours by trying to cling onto it.  We are currently negotiating a new status quo, violently.

[FancyCat]

4 hours ago, The_Capt said:

As if this was simply an issue of “policy”.  We are engaged in a proxy war where Canadian donated weapons are killing Russians and all we need is a “policy change” in Russia and everything will be all hunky d.  This is what 30 years of post Cold War thinking bought us.

Tbh it’s not like the Russians care a lot about their dead. 

[FancyCat]

Honestly I feel it’s not unlikely that if Russia were to suddenly have elite decision makers choose to withdraw from Ukraine, that Russians would accept the new status quo without too much fuss. It’s absurd how Russia just slid past the Afghan-Soviet death toll without so much as a peep. 

[Ts4EVER]

3 minutes ago, FancyCat said:

Honestly I feel it’s not unlikely that if Russia were to suddenly have elite decision makers choose to withdraw from Ukraine, that Russians would accept the new status quo without too much fuss. It’s absurd how Russia just slid past the Afghan-Soviet death toll without so much as a peep. 

Not sure about that, in contrast to the Soviet Union, Putinist Russia is a classic bonapartist regime that needs diplomatic or military victories to suggest to the population that despite rampant inequality and bad living conditions, they at least live in a powerful and respected state. So a defeat could well destabilize the regime more than the Soviet one.

[dan/california]

3 hours ago, Haiduk said:

Solovyove village (Avdiivka area), Bradley of 47th mech.brigade shoots out two Russian BTR-82A with infantry on the top

On the first video is a cutting where two bodies fly after direct hit of 25 mm shell

 

It is more spectacular film this way, but I am pretty sure A Bradley's gun can punch through a BTR-82 99% of the time. They would have been just as dead on the inside.

27 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Who is predicting military victory?  And your counter-offer is to somehow suggest the elimination of national leader...oh yes that is far more reasonable.

First rule of war is to understand the war you are in.  She in not convincing the Russian of Sweet FA by framing this thing as a "policy" issue.  My point is that this entire narrative is what is wrong within the western world right now. This is not some unfortunate divergence on a policy point, it is a war...we are in it.  It is a limited war.  It is a proxy war. But right now if Russia went "whoops, sorry" and magically pulled all its troops out deluded western politicians thinking along these lines would convince themselves it is ok to normalize with Russia the next weekend.

It is narrative that reinforces the idea that once this "unpleasantness" is over we can go back to a status quo.  A status quo that has sailed away into the history books and does no one any favours by trying to cling onto it.  We are currently negotiating a new status quo, violently.

You are of course 100% correct, but many Western governments have been very reluctant to explain what that actually means to their populations. Defense spending more or less doubling, more or less forever, real economic cost as we separate from China in critical areas, and, and and...

The extent of the problem seems to correlate with how far your capital city is from the Russian border, and to be fair, in Canadas case that is a long way.

[The_Capt]

31 minutes ago, FancyCat said:

Tbh it’s not like the Russians care a lot about their dead. 

I call BS on this and frankly it is dehumanizing Russians to an unhealthy level. Sure, a lot of the RA KIA are criminals and excess human capacity, but every KIA has a mother. Many have wives and children.  My point here is not to have sympathy for the Russian soldier, they signed onto an illegal war and paid for it.  I do not even propose sympathy for the average Russian who may have lost a loved one. 

My point is that all war is personal and we likely now have millions of Russians who are taking this war personally.  These are not robots, they are people. And people do not forget personal stuff easily. They do not frame it as "policy".  War is a garden of grudges, and the ones about this war are in full growth. 

So while we in the West may pretend like it is all political, it really isn't. And the effects of this war will not be contained solely to a political arena.  Finally, politics is personal too.  We are going to be a very long time to renormalization with Russia. The status quo is broken...get used to it.

[Battlefront.com]

2 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

I call BS on this and frankly it is dehumanizing Russians to an unhealthy level. Sure, a lot of the RA KIA are criminals and excess human capacity, but every KIA has a mother. Many have wives and children.  My point here is not to have sympathy for the Russian soldier, they signed onto an illegal war and paid for it.  I do not even propose sympathy for the average Russian who may have lost a loved one. 

My point is that all war is personal and we likely now have millions of Russians who are taking this war personally.  These are not robots, they are people. And people do not forget personal stuff easily. They do not frame it as "policy".  War is a garden of grudges, and the ones about this war are in full growth. 

So while we in the West may pretend like it is all political, it really isn't. And the effects of this war will not be contained solely to a political arena.  Finally, politics is personal too.  We are going to be a very long time to renormalization with Russia. The status quo is broken...get used to it.

Yes.  The reason things haven't boiled over within Russia is that, unfortunately, there is a culture of staying quiet.  Even then, the Putin regime has had to crank up its repression quite a lot over since the war started.  If the populace genuinely didn't care, they wouldn't have had to do that.

I think many are quite unhappy to have lost family members and relations, either to the war or to exile.  However, a good chunk of them have "drunk the Koolaid" and believe the sacrifice was worth it.  If Putin's regime pulls out of Ukraine tomorrow, there's going to be a lot of people that will be in shock and anger about it.  That doesn't usually end well.

An analogy is someone in the West working hard all of their life with taxes removed from their pay to fund their eventual retirement.  Sure, they complain about the taxes, sure they complain about the benefits not being enough, sure they blame someone for it instead of taking responsibility for their own life decisions (like expensive stupid purchases instead of putting more aside).  However, they do not riot or seek to destroy the government.

Imagine instead that the retirees find out that there is no retirement money because the retirement system was really a giant Ponzi Scheme to fund lavish lifestyles of government elites.  Name me any country in the West and tell me that civil society wouldn't collapse overnight.  Because I am sure it would.  In many countries even the mere DISCUSSION of touching the retirement system results in major problems (no more so than France IMHO).

The point is that the Russians have been sold a very expensive lie.  As long as they aren't confronted by how bad the lie is, they'll grumble and stay largely compliant.  Putin needs to keep it that way because a withdrawal from Ukraine would be that sort of confrontation.

Steve

[dan/california]

2 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Yes.  The reason things haven't boiled over within Russia is that, unfortunately, there is a culture of staying quiet.  Even then, the Putin regime has had to crank up its repression quite a lot over since the war started.  If the populace genuinely didn't care, they wouldn't have had to do that.

I think many are quite unhappy to have lost family members and relations, either to the war or to exile.  However, a good chunk of them have "drunk the Koolaid" and believe the sacrifice was worth it.  If Putin's regime pulls out of Ukraine tomorrow, there's going to be a lot of people that will be in shock and anger about it.  That doesn't usually end well.

An analogy is someone in the West working hard all of their life with taxes removed from their pay to fund their eventual retirement.  Sure, they complain about the taxes, sure they complain about the benefits not being enough, sure they blame someone for it instead of taking responsibility for their own life decisions (like expensive stupid purchases instead of putting more aside).  However, they do not riot or seek to destroy the government.

Imagine instead that the retirees find out that there is no retirement money because the retirement system was really a giant Ponzi Scheme to fund lavish lifestyles of government elites.  Name me any country in the West and tell me that civil society wouldn't collapse overnight.  Because I am sure it would.  In many countries even the mere DISCUSSION of touching the retirement system results in major problems (no more so than France IMHO).

The point is that the Russians have been sold a very expensive lie.  As long as they aren't confronted by how bad the lie is, they'll grumble and stay largely compliant.  Putin needs to keep it that way because a withdrawal from Ukraine would be that sort of confrontation.

Steve

This is the complication with the idea of beating Russia slowly, in a way that doesn't cause it to collapse. The entire system has rebuilt itself to commit to this war. There is zero chance of a course change with Putin in power, and very little chance of one if the is wider regime continuity when Putin leaves. So this is going to go on until Russia obliterates its capacity to function as a coherent state. 

 

[The_Capt]

7 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Yes.  The reason things haven't boiled over within Russia is that, unfortunately, there is a culture of staying quiet.  Even then, the Putin regime has had to crank up its repression quite a lot over since the war started.  If the populace genuinely didn't care, they wouldn't have had to do that.

I think many are quite unhappy to have lost family members and relations, either to the war or to exile.  However, a good chunk of them have "drunk the Koolaid" and believe the sacrifice was worth it.  If Putin's regime pulls out of Ukraine tomorrow, there's going to be a lot of people that will be in shock and anger about it.  That doesn't usually end well.

An analogy is someone in the West working hard all of their life with taxes removed from their pay to fund their eventual retirement.  Sure, they complain about the taxes, sure they complain about the benefits not being enough, sure they blame someone for it instead of taking responsibility for their own life decisions (like expensive stupid purchases instead of putting more aside).  However, they do not riot or seek to destroy the government.

Imagine instead that the retirees find out that there is no retirement money because the retirement system was really a giant Ponzi Scheme to fund lavish lifestyles of government elites.  Name me any country in the West and tell me that civil society wouldn't collapse overnight.  Because I am sure it would.  In many countries even the mere DISCUSSION of touching the retirement system results in major problems (no more so than France IMHO).

The point is that the Russians have been sold a very expensive lie.  As long as they aren't confronted by how bad the lie is, they'll grumble and stay largely compliant.  Putin needs to keep it that way because a withdrawal from Ukraine would be that sort of confrontation.

Steve

Exactly.  Putin is working very hard to keep Russian misery pointed at the West and not him…and on this one he may be winning. Now whether Russia hits a boiling point is a good question, and like so many of these things unpredictable.