How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Battlefront.com]

Tom Cooper says the crossing was attempted closer to Izyum, which isn't in the area of the other crossings.  Town of Yaremivka.  This appears to have been an attempt to get in behind Ukrainian forces defending M-03 on the way to Slavyansk.  Not the sort of thing that directly supports the move up from Popasna.

Now I see that there are two separate crossings being reported.  The above mentioned on at Yaremivka (found a second report of this), the other once again at Serebryanka.  Status of Serebryanka is crossing prevented, Yaremivka unclear.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Czech weaponry being put into action:

 

[Battlefront.com]

Oh this is funny.  Remember the Russian propaganda video of the Russian 240mm mortar firing a couple of rounds in front of a "journalist" bedecked in Zs?  Well, it seems there won't be any more videos of that particular vehicle:

 

[Kinophile]

Kherson should not be assaulted. RUS has had months to dig in, it is a large city and still heavily populated. Its close to crimea and has regular army units embedded. Its shoreline is difficult to attack and any defense will have a clear center of gravity that it can fall back into hardening as it goes. 

Ukrainian civilians would bear the brunt of the fighting, the shelling and I can easily see large scale RUS use of human shields in various formats. RUS forces would turn on the populace at the drop of a hat, fearing saboteurs, spies, informants, etc. RUS would turn the city into a gigantic cemetery 

Kherson must be threatened, semi isolated but it absolutely should not become a cheese-grater for the new UKR forces or its civilians.

I suspect that if UKR can hold/defeat the Donbass front, that a hard push to the Azov coast, eg Melitopol, with sone partisan help, could be the crucial stroke of the war. Cut the RUS line there, to the coast, and UKR can steadily advance towards Crimea, threatening Putins crown jewel. This could distract attention (read, resources) from the Donbass, as RUS absolutely cares more about Sebastopol than Donetsk. If UKR actual gets close enough to vutting through to Azov coast then Kherson will start to be drained of units.  Only when Kherson defense is a thin shell should any attack be attempted.

Edited May 21, 2022 by Kinophile

[Battlefront.com]

From the 4 part interview of Russian volunteer:

Quote

Another story I was told. Eight helicopters were given an order to strike the enemy positions. Only two of the eight helicopters took off. Others were either broken or had no fuel. Only one of the helicopters successfully fired at the objective. Not all the targets were hit. Or in fact, 80% of the targets were not hit. Yet this operation's commander reported to his leadership that all is well and all the targets were hit. I don't know if it's true or not. I think - yes (note: he probably means that the report to the leadership said all objectives were hit). And I understand how these huge losses of human lives and vehicles can happen. Do you want to know, how? The superior commander believes that if all the targets were hit then he can send infantry with tanks to assault this area. As a result, infantry with tanks moves out and gets shelled with every weapon possible...

We've talked quite a bit about the corruption and lying that goes on within Russia's armed forces.  This section above shows yet another way that culture leads to dead Russians and failed attacks.

Steve

[JonS]

https://rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/whitehall-reports/uk-joint-methodology-assuring-theatre-access

The first section - on dependencies- is a nice primer on the components of capability. We've talked here, a lot, about providing Ukraine with new weapons systems, but there is a ton more that goes into capability than just the hardware.

[akd]

Welp, the battle of New York begins:

 

[danfrodo]

1 hour ago, Battlefront.com said:

From the 4 part interview of Russian volunteer:

We've talked quite a bit about the corruption and lying that goes on within Russia's armed forces.  This section above shows yet another way that culture leads to dead Russians and failed attacks.

Steve

Classic issue in any organization -- if you punish people for telling the truth, you won't get the truth anymore.

[Calamine Waffles]

4 hours ago, Livdoc44 said:

Funny, I just today, in an effort to be a bit more realistic, I swapped out the Oplots for the more ubiquitous T-64bvs in the "Dueling Shashkas" scenario. I originally was going to use Bulats but decided against it as I hadn't seen any in the conflict as yet. Good catch! Bulats here I come!

In the original play through this morning, even switched the leadership, morale, and fitness of the Russians to be a bit more - ahem - appropriate. Ha, still got smoked. 

There have been a few Bulat pictures (at least 3 captured/destroyed in this war), but this is the first video I've seen of the newest BM2, which was only first shown in the 2021 Independence Day Parade.

[gregb41352]

On 5/19/2022 at 4:45 AM, dan/california said:

This is the letter/email I just sent my Congressman, and senators. Fell free to copy and paste to your hearts content. Open to suggestions for the next one.

 

The Biden Administration has generally done a decent job of navigating the war in Ukraine, But some faction in the Administration is apparently still trying split hairs on what support to give and not give Ukraine. Ukraine needs several different kinds of MLRS systems to win the artillery duel that is currently the heart of the war with Russia. According to various news reports the Administration is withholding these because they think it would be too provocative, or that the Ukrainians might launch a few at Belgorod. Just to state the obvious, the Russians are ALREADY mad, they have suffered tens of thousands of casualties due to the combination of western support and Ukrainian courage. They can't get any more upset. the only possible goal now is a complete Ukrainian victory. Send the Ukrainians anything they ask for. Send the MLRS systems, now today, send them better surface to air systems now, today. Biden can't run for a second term on some ugly compromise in Ukraine, He can WIN a second term with the world celebrating Eurovision next year in a liberated Mariupol.

 

Sent to both of my senators.  Thanks.

Slava Ukraini !

Edited May 22, 2022 by gregb41352

[Kinophile]

https://www.armyrecognition.com/defense_news_may_2022_global_security_army_industry/rheinmetall_from_germany_prepares_the_supply_to_ukraine_of_88_leopard_1a5_tanks_and_100_marder_ifvs.html

Eh, what? 88 Leopard 1s and 100 Marders to UKR? It quotes a leftist nonsense place, so not sure.

Anyone else seeing similar?

[Kraft]

35 minutes ago, Kinophile said:

https://www.armyrecognition.com/defense_news_may_2022_global_security_army_industry/rheinmetall_from_germany_prepares_the_supply_to_ukraine_of_88_leopard_1a5_tanks_and_100_marder_ifvs.html

Eh, what? 88 Leopard 1s and 100 Marders to UKR? It quotes a leftist nonsense place, so not sure.

Anyone else seeing similar?

No such information in the official german news channels, so either this is ahead of the news or not true. 

Edited May 22, 2022 by Kraft

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, Kinophile said:

https://www.armyrecognition.com/defense_news_may_2022_global_security_army_industry/rheinmetall_from_germany_prepares_the_supply_to_ukraine_of_88_leopard_1a5_tanks_and_100_marder_ifvs.html

Eh, what? 88 Leopard 1s and 100 Marders to UKR? It quotes a leftist nonsense place, so not sure.

Anyone else seeing similar?

Army Recognition.com just took a credibility hit in my eyes.  Putting out a statement like that with only a hardcore, agenda driven, political extremist website as a source?  Bah, what were they thinking?

Sure, it might turn out to be true.  As the old saying, even a broken clock is correct twice a day.  However, consulting a broken clock isn't very smart.

Steve

[dan/california]

1 hour ago, Kinophile said:

https://www.armyrecognition.com/defense_news_may_2022_global_security_army_industry/rheinmetall_from_germany_prepares_the_supply_to_ukraine_of_88_leopard_1a5_tanks_and_100_marder_ifvs.html

Eh, what? 88 Leopard 1s and 100 Marders to UKR? It quotes a leftist nonsense place, so not sure.

Anyone else seeing similar?

I THINK I saw something about that equipment going to either the Czechs or the Poles to backfill them for the entirety of their armor that THEY just sent/are about to send to the Ukrainians. But it is quite possible that google translate screwed that up, either for me or someone else.

[Kinophile]

No youre correct, but the numbers are different (14 Leo 1s to replace 20 T72s) and no Marders.

Im curious at the specificity of the amounts.

[fireship4]

Looks like (before the thread hurtles past it) we are touching upon a fundamental of warfare: hills!  How should they be considered in modern war?  An amateur's thoughts:

• They are hard to get up.
• You can see the surrounding land.
• You can be seen from the surrounding land.

That's it.  That's all I can think of.  These broadly mean:

• Being hard to get up makes them harder to take with infantry and vehicles, and easier to defend.  They are harder to supply and harder to place heavy weapons upon.
• Once under your control, you can use them (as in the past) to control the surrounding area, through spotting and direct fire.
• Every bastard in the area around you can see the hill.  And since the hill is always smaller than it's surroundings, all other things being equal, this means more people will be able to see and hit the hill than are able to see and hit from it.

So we have some nuance.  You can say a drone with FLIR negates the benefits of a hill, but how many pairs of eyes are on the hill and how many are staring at the monitor?  Who or what are you going to put on the hill?  Who or what is in the surrounding area?  Anyway, having my mind on the subject led me to starting up Google Earth.  It's amazing what we can do at home with modern tools:

Quote

 

Topographical map from John Helin's Twitter thread as an overlay in Google Earth.  Works only with atmosphere visualisation enabled for some reason.

 

The 'Ukraine Control Map' and'Russio-Ukranian War' maps on Google MyMaps are easily downloaded as .kml files.

 

The view of 'Hill 311' (marked with a yellow pin) looking NW from the N edge of Popasna.

 

The same view with a topographical map found via the online-available: 'map-overlays-for-google-earth-combined.kml'.

 

 

Edited May 22, 2022 by fireship4

[Battlefront.com]

The power of social media and skilled searchers is making this the not only best documented war in Human history, but the most accountable one as well.  Even if none of the Russian murders see a courtroom and verdict, we at least know who they are.

https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarRoom/comments/uuz25g/one_of_the_russian_soldiers_who_killed_eight/

 

[Battlefront.com]

9 minutes ago, Kinophile said:

No youre correct, but the numbers are different (14 Leo 1s to replace 20 T72s) and no Marders.

Im curious at the specificity of the amounts.

I think that site misunderstood or is misrepresenting Rheinmetall's announcement more than a month ago about what it COULD provide Ukraine rather than it WOULD provide.

Steve

[Kinophile]

7 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

I think that site misunderstood or is misrepresenting Rheinmetall's announcement more than a month ago about what it COULD provide Ukraine rather than it WOULD provide.

Steve

That could be it.

Or would it?

>:P

Edited May 22, 2022 by Kinophile

[Battlefront.com]

Old video from the first couple of days of the war.  This of LPR forces crossing the Siverskyi Donets somewhere.  Look at this mess!!  Imagine that at any minute Ukraine could have attacked and what that would have meant.  Oh wait, I think we already know what that would look like

 

[Battlefront.com]

I've only seen a brief summary of this video, which means I'm likely missing a lot of interesting details.  The basics of it is this is a Chechen dissident group (outside of Russia, of course), that says Kadyrovites took about 300 losses and have not found replacements.  So they did forced conscription of 250 men who could not afford the $7200 (450,000 Rubles) bribe to avoid being hauled off for service.  If accurate, this is quite interesting.

Here's an article I found talking about losses:

https://news.yahoo.com/kadyrovites-suffer-daily-heavy-losses-132657662.html

And the video:

 

[dan/california]

41 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Old video from the first couple of days of the war.  This of LPR forces crossing the Siverskyi Donets somewhere.  Look at this mess!!  Imagine that at any minute Ukraine could have attacked and what that would have meant.  Oh wait, I think we already know what that would look like

 

I keep coming back to my theory that Russian company/battalion grade officers simply won't let their men out of their sight. Presumably because they know things will just stop, or rather the looting raping, raping, random murdering, and drinking will immediately get out of hand, oh and desertion. This is unacceptable because senior officers are supposed to get first pick, among other reasons. Some of those other reasons might even include trying to fight the war, but that is less clear every day....

Edited May 22, 2022 by dan/california
spelling

[sburke]

4 minutes ago, dan/california said:

This is unacceptable because senior officers are supposed to get first pick, among other reasons. Some of those other reasons might even include trying to fight the war, but that is less clear every day....

I have this vision of a free for all starting amongst Russian units when they stumble across a laundromat.

[Battlefront.com]

Long time followers of this thread might remember a LONG time ago there was some confusion about the death of V. S Gerasimov being that of the Russian Army chief.  It was quickly determined that it wasn't and was in fact a Lt Colonel with the same last name.  Just ran into this article about his body being exhumed and returned to Russia as part of an exchange:

https://news.yahoo.com/bodies-6-russian-servicemen-including-104408563.html

Steve

[chrisl]

15 minutes ago, sburke said:

I have this vision of a free for all starting amongst Russian units when they stumble across a laundromat.

Instead of paratroop drops, pallets of washers and dryers pushed out the back of cargo planes behind Russian lines might get them to just abandon their positions and rush after them like it's a Black Friday sale.