How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[sburke]

Just now, CHARLIE43 said:

@sburke I thought about that but it's always right there.. right in front of me kinda like a moth to a flame type deal.

I'd say that is your problem then, not ours to change the location (based on relevance to the specific game which is about Russia vs Ukraine).  Apparently, the owner of the forum and game liked it here.

[CHARLIE43]

@LongLeftFlank I have nothing but goodwill towards Ukraine, but what happens when they run out of Ukrainians? That can't be good for anyone else, right?

[danfrodo]

6 minutes ago, CHARLIE43 said:

@danfrodo What you or I think, decide or talk about doesn't matter in the least. It's all talk on a cereal box as far as anyone of any importance is concerned.

BTW, don't put word in my mouth with you, you, and you spiel.

You jump on the forum, tell us we don't know anything and there's no point in discussing things.  Yet, here you are.  We know our talk doesn't matter, you arrogant ***.  It's just people talking.  

If there's no point talking about this war then why are you here, talking about this war?  

[billbindc]

31 minutes ago, CHARLIE43 said:

Again, this thread is nothing more than re-posting what is already available via other social and media platforms and then dancing around the fire light... sprinkled with supposed educated guesses as to what is coming next.

It can't be moved to say the General Forum. Doesn't really have much to do with where it's at (CMBS).

And yet you are here. Ok, then.

[CHARLIE43]

@sburke OK. Fair enough, but where are the Americans? Didn't figure on that one, did they.

[LongLeftFlank]

4 minutes ago, CHARLIE43 said:

@LongLeftFlank I have nothing but goodwill towards Ukraine, but what happens when they run out of Ukrainians? That can't be good for anyone else, right?

I definitely hear ya -- I was gobsmacked by the tweet from RobLee talking about something like half the UA (everyone, NOT just combat infantry) walking around with some kind of wound, or worse.  And if he's walked that back since, I haven't heard.

 

[sburke]

Just now, CHARLIE43 said:

@sburke OK. Fair enough, but where are the Americans? Didn't figure on that one, did they.

okay now you are just getting weird. It is a game.

and personally I am getting real suspicious.  You and Eug have the same naming convention, you both join Mid august, you both are highly disruptive.  I am not a big believer in coincidence.  I'm getting an itch that something is going on here.

[billbindc]

17 minutes ago, CHARLIE43 said:

@danfrodo What you or I think, decide or talk about doesn't matter in the least. It's all talk on a cereal box as far as anyone of any importance is concerned.

BTW, don't put word in my mouth with you, you, and you spiel.

For the record, still doesn’t read like Google translate to me. 

[LongLeftFlank]

4 minutes ago, sburke said:

okay now you are just getting weird. It is a game.

and personally I am getting real suspicious.  You and Eug have the same naming convention, you both join Mid august, you both are highly disruptive.  I am not a big believer in coincidence.  I'm getting an itch that something is going on here.

Jeez Louise brod, what's next, witch burning?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_Serdica

[sburke]

2 minutes ago, LongLeftFlank said:

Jeez Louise brod, what's next, witch burning?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_of_Serdica

Hey if you think you notice a pattern starting when are you supposed to say you see a pattern starting?  Or do you often believe in coincidence?

[billbindc]

I think we can pretty confidently now say the Trofimova film was propaganda: 

 

Edited 12 hours ago by billbindc

[CHARLIE43]

@sburke Same naming convention? Eug is not in the phonetic alphabet the last I checked. But it has been over 23 years!

Charlie 43 was the tank's designation. Thought about Cap n Crunch (on the bore evacuator) but went with that instead. Who knew it might link me to a crime of which I know nothing about, or that there even was a crime in the 1st place.

[LongLeftFlank]

1 minute ago, sburke said:

Hey if you think you notice a pattern starting when are you supposed to say you see a pattern starting?  Or do you often believe in coincidence?

Hey, if our new guy's version of 'caring about Ukraine' DOES end up amounting to 'wouldn't it be best if they just roll over and become Little Russians again in Putin's zombie NewSSR, cuz We Promised No NATO' then fine, but so far I haven't heard him say that.

Until that happens, some folks here are leaping to judgment and adding two and two to get seven. And I think that's not serving us well.

[sburke]

1 minute ago, LongLeftFlank said:

Hey, if our new guy's version of 'caring about Ukraine' DOES end up amounting to 'wouldn't it be best if they just roll over and become Little Russians again in Putin's zombie NewSSR, cuz We Promised No NATO' then fine, but so far I haven't heard him say that.

Until that happens, some folks here are leaping to judgment and adding two and two to get seven. And I think that's not serving us well.

I'll be happy to say mea culpa if the direction changes.

[Holien]

1 hour ago, CHARLIE43 said:

t can't be moved to say the General Forum. Doesn't really have much to do with where it's at (CMBS).

He had me convinced with this.

But hey I am enjoying the popcorn..

[Eug85]

32 minutes ago, sburke said:

okay now you are just getting weird. It is a game.

and personally I am getting real suspicious.  You and Eug have the same naming convention, you both join Mid august, you both are highly disruptive.  I am not a big believer in coincidence.  I'm getting an itch that something is going on here.

And so the theories of the conspiracy are developing. Name, date of connection, which is still needed to begin the next theory of conspiracy

Edited 12 hours ago by Eug85

[CHARLIE43]

About all those videos coming from the front.... It simply amazes me that these are even being posted. Imagine if during Desert Storm someone posted a video of VII corp moving way west? Someone's head would've rolled for sure. But here we are in the digital age and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the SALUTE with each passing snapshot. Agree? Or am I missing something.

[chrisl]

4 hours ago, Holien said:

Anyone on here want to take a guess at why the ammunition dumps seemed to fail so badly?

From the satellite images the hardened bunkers seem to be similar to those that we see here in the UK like Greenham Common, Upper Heyford or other such places.

Is it just the Soviet design sucks or is there something else at play?

Ukraine has scored some major hits and the dumps are going up, even the better bunkers?

Would NATO fair better with our dumps? I would hope they have decent design specs?

Probably the same way that the LAPD bomb squad blew up a neighborhood while disposing of some homemade fireworks.

Bad (or lazy) arithmetic and failure to follow procedure overloaded the bunkers.

LAPD didn't bother using a scale when loading up their bomb disposal truck and grossly underestimated the amount of explosive they put inside.  Then they detonated it and it blew up the truck and neighborhood.

The Russian military hasn't shown that it's all that great at following the kind of procedures that one does to maintain things at storage bases, so it's entirely likely that they've just been shipping tons and tons of materiel to the staging dumps. The people at the dumps just stick it wherever.  Even if it started within spec, if stuff keeps shipping in faster than it ships out, then they have to put it somewhere.  Overfill the bunkers then store it between them.  Then boom.

 

Edited 12 hours ago by chrisl

[LongLeftFlank]

15 minutes ago, CHARLIE43 said:

About all those videos coming from the front.... It simply amazes me that these are even being posted. Imagine if during Desert Storm someone posted a video of VII corp moving way west? Someone's head would've rolled for sure. But here we are in the digital age and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the SALUTE with each passing snapshot. Agree? Or am I missing something.

Yes, there's a lot of sense in this.

The useful battlefield innovations in this war have overwhelmingly (except ISTR for aerial/helo skip bombing, and the much mocked 'cope cages') been from the UA side. These subsequently have been imitated by the Russians.

....And given that Russia is to some extent  backstopped by the Chinese Arsenal of WhateverPeoplePayUsToKnockOffAndMakeInBulk, accelerating that process for purposes of morale-boosting may not be, ahem, entirely wise.

Edited 12 hours ago by LongLeftFlank

[CHARLIE43]

Well, I couldn't imagine, sitting in a trench or foxhole and all of the sudden out of nowhere, plop! There's a freakin grenade in your lap. And then, if you happen to survive somehow, being able to watch the whole ordeal on youtube. Unreal!

[chrisl]

3 hours ago, billbindc said:

Agree with all of that but his problem is that tradecraft-wise he's a bloody disaster. He said he used Google Translate to bring his prose into English and Google Translate won't pop in the odd colloquialism like that. Just like my insertion of 'bloody' in front of 'disaster' wouldn't happen were I doing the same thing. 

I work with a Serbian woman who speaks perfect english.  But I began to suspect she learned it from Scooby Doo when she correctly used "bamboozle".

[dan/california]

4 hours ago, hcrof said:

Ukraine also waited until an ammunition train was being unloaded so a large number of explosives were totally exposed.

Think about the intelligence, C4SIR, and planning that sentence implies. Either Ukraine knew an an ammo train was going to be in the best possible spot at certain time in advance, which implies Russian communications are BEYOND compromised. Or they organized the whole strike when the saw the train on site. Either one has incredibly bad implications for Russia

5 hours ago, KoopCL said:

Hello everyone, long time lurker, wanted to drop my 2 cents when it comes to this quote in particular.

 

Two problems with the logic; the first may seem counterintuitive, but Russia's populace at large seems to be rather apathetic to politics in general (which, to be fair, seems to be by design: if your populace in not interested in politics they will not vote you out, or ask too many questions, or worry that all opposition seems to be in jail or exiled; we had a similar phenomenon with Pinochet eroding trust in "politicians" as their own separate class of people, better to leave it to the army, because an apathetic populace is a calmed populace). If suddenly you dedicate all your propaganda efforts to show the average Russian "looks how **** your life is! Looks how it compares to ours! Look how the mafia in charge takes advantage of you!" you may have the unintended consequence of having these people pushed further in denial or towards support for the regime because you force them to ask the very uncomfortable question of "why did we let it go this far? Why did we silently support ourselves being lied to?". Its easier to go further into denial than to admit that your life sucks because you haven't taken the steps to improve it and instead relied on the comfort of familiarity, its the same twisted train of thoughts that happens with conspiracy theorists faced with undeniable evidence that they are nuts, or with victims in abusive relationships. Add how proud of their nation the average Russian seems to be and its a recipe for disaster.

 

The second issue, is that it already happened. Post Yeltsin, arguably until 2022 and for sure until 2014, Russia was part of the world at large same as Poland, or Germany, or China. Russians could (and would, and still do) visit other countries, have expat communities, access to the internet, migrant family members living abroad, visitors and tourists coming to Russia, etc. They don't discredit stuff like "they have political participation!" and "there's opposition parties" and "there's international cooperation" and "everyone has indoor plumbing!" because they think it's a bunch of unbelievable lies; they have been able too see that with their own eyes; putting it as an ad on a hacked Russian TV channel wont do anything to "motivate the populace". There's no point to tell them "if you rebel against Putin, your living standards may reach those of the average German!" when you have a huge community of Russians living in Germany, enjoying their standards of living, and still fervently supporting Putin (if they express an opinion at all). 

 

You know what the West didn't do for all those years that they were "showing his people it shouldn't be like this"? "Play army". And what were the consequences? Putin felt emboldened to go to ever larger and larger military expeditions until the straw broke the camels back.

 

This is all time top three for a first post on the forum. We hope you stick around!

Edited 11 hours ago by dan/california

[LongLeftFlank]

1 minute ago, CHARLIE43 said:

Well, I couldn't imagine, sitting in a trench or foxhole and all of the sudden out of nowhere, plop! There's a freakin grenade in your lap. And then, if you happen to survive somehow, being able to watch the whole ordeal on youtube. Unreal!

Haven't 'seen the elephant' myself (although I've been stupid enough to look down the wrong end of an M16 and been on recent battlefields without being paid to do so).

But I suspect that video-induced PTSD is  less traumatic than nightmares recalling, to use  Patton's example:  'when you put your hand in a pile of goo that a moment before was your best friend's face...'

[dan/california]

3 hours ago, FancyCat said:

Are these depots guarded by anti-air assets? I’m assuming the answer is yes but it seems concerning that these depots are turning into mini nukes without much fuss? Seemingly? 

Someone on Ukraine Today said the the Ukrainian sent a hundred pus drones to get five through to one of the ammo depots. I don't think these are strikes are random, or easy. This is an extremely well planned strategic campaign designed to take advantage of some new Ukrainian advantage. Now whether that is advantage is more drones, better drones, better intelligence, or the Russians running critically low on air defense assets? Well we might not know that for a while.

1 hour ago, danfrodo said:

Um, that's what all discussions of this war are among the general public.  People looking at available information and discussing and guessing and hypothesizing and talking tactics and strategy and logistics.  You have some greater, more enlightened discussion in mind, clearly.

You have decided that Ukraine should submit to Putin because you are concerned about escalation.  For UKR, it already is in escalation, as they are being facing new mass murders every day.  Perhaps they should just submit.  We know RU has always been nice to UKR, like back in the 1930s.

Perfectly said.

1 hour ago, billbindc said:

I think we can pretty confidently now say the Trofimova film was propaganda: 

 

We know it is propaganda because she was allowed to make it. People wandering around the Donbas publicly doing things the FSB doesn't like get dead in unpleasant ways.

Edited 11 hours ago by dan/california

[fry30]

1 hour ago, CHARLIE43 said:

@sburke I thought about that but it's always right there.. right in front of me kinda like a moth to a flame type deal.

No, that's literally what it is. If you feel drawn to this post (???) then contribute. No one's forcing you to come here and post, especially when your contributions consist of ... whatever the hell it is you're doing here.

It's an insane take to interject yourself into a conversation that you claim you are drawn to and then tell people it's all nonsense.