How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Harmon Rabb]

1 minute ago, Huba said:

So the latest Russian position regarding ceasfire:

 

If Peskov really thinks that Kyiv will accept these terms he's probably not sober himself.

Of course he knows that these demands will never be accepted by Kyiv.

[Kinophile]

55 minutes ago, kraze said:

while NATO gets an experienced, battle hardened force that will be more than happy to play ball with all the NATO requirements and demands once this is all over.

This alone is worth admission to NATO.

Ref joining EU, the corruption with Ukraine has been rampant for the last few decades. However, a national war of survival and a society-wide commitment to pivoting Westward has the ingredients to reign in that culture of graft. Russia being effectively locked out of Ukrainian society definitely helps with that.

It suggests (to me) that the wartime military imperatives such as DONT STEAL & SELL THE GODDAMN WEAPONS/SUPPLIES OUR BOYS NEED, and the crushing social opprobrium of being accused/convicted of that kind of thing (i.e. helping an enemy that rapes children and tortures civilians) could translate into greater commitment to the socio-economic health of the State, rather than the wealth of one's bank account. It gives Ukrainian society a better set of socio-political behavioral standards, with a lot less tolerance for private enrichment at the expense of the state/populace.

Due to the sheer percentage of the population engaged in the military effort a lot of future politicians and civilian leaders are going to be veterans of the war, will have seen and endured terrible hardship at the hands of the Ivan and will be very intolerant of people who corrode the national defense through personal graft.

Military corruption is a form of treason. Taking money or selling military assets could easily be classified a crime against the state during wartime. NATO et al are deeply intolerant of military aid being sold off and will bear down the Ukrainian Gov to not waste or lose the assets given; I assume there will be very strong UKR military support for that also. Its far harder to give aid to a military that turns it into a personal enrichment process, a la Afghanistan/Iraq.

But Ukraine is in a very much higher intensity conflict, with a lot more at stake and a lot of people dying every day and with extremely bad consequences for everyone if they lose; so the society as a whole has a very clear and definitive mission - survive as a nation. Its an easy moral test with a binary answer.

Finally, a critical part of the EU onboarding process is dealing properly with government and institutional corruption. Ukraine has been working on this but political factionalism, russian influence and oligarchic intrusion have hampered and hobbled the process.  Given Zelensky's personal leadership example (despite his own clumsy abuse of the anti-corruption office) and the priorities of war I suspect this project will gain a lot more momentum and political capital.

Edited May 26, 2022 by Kinophile

[Battlefront.com]

4 minutes ago, Huba said:

So the latest Russian position regarding ceasfire:

 

I don't have reason to say this very often, however I think it is appropriate to do it now:

Thank you Russia!!

It is very helpful to have Russia tossing aside its normal shifty, double crossing ways and instead make it crystal clear up-front that it's official position is not nuanced at all.  Russia has stated it expects unconditional surrender from its victim of naked aggression.  This makes it so much more difficult for countries like Germany, Italy, Hungary, and France to say there's a way to settle this diplomatically because Russia just said there isn't.  Well played, Russia

Steve

[Huba]

Just now, Kinophile said:

It suggests (to me) that the wartime military imperatives such as DONT STEAL & SELL THE GODDAMN WEPAONS OUR BOYS NEED, and the crushing social opprobrium of being accused/convicted of that kind of thing (i.e. helping an enemy that rapes children and tortures civilians) could translate into greater commitment to the socio-economic health of the State, rather than the wealth of one's bank account. It gives Ukrainian society a better set of socio-political behavioral standards, with a lot less tolerance for private enrichment at the expense of the state/populace.

Just an anecdote, but I saw my Ukrainian friend commenting her friend's thread on FB, that showed a photo of some cans of food on a store shelve, that allegedly came from humanitarian help and should't be sold, which ended by the OP calling SBU on the storeowner.  Of course this is just a story, but you could imagine that tolerance to corruption has to be on the all time low right now.

[Kinophile]

18 minutes ago, Huba said:

So the latest Russian position regarding ceasfire:

 

Man they really are just a shower of pr!#ks.

Edited May 26, 2022 by Kinophile

[Huba]

Did he have a change of heart regarding the war? Ukraine might need those reserves sooner then expected...

 

[Kinophile]

24 minutes ago, Huba said:

Just an anecdote, but I saw my Ukrainian friend commenting her friend's thread on FB, that showed a photo of some cans of food on a store shelve, that allegedly came from humanitarian help and should't be sold, which ended by the OP calling SBU on the storeowner.  Of course this is just a story, but you could imagine that tolerance to corruption has to be on the all time low right now.

Exactly. Even with COVID here in Canada, once the society (generally)  accepted the need for masks, distancing, etc the social pressure to observe was strong. I personally know of people who reported house parties, events, etc where no masks were evident, then Ontario provincial limits were immediate household only and large gatherings above (i think) 6 people were prohibited. This was before vaccines became available so there was no "snitches get stitches" crap. Once vaccines hit 80% of 2nd dose and the danger of covid was receding then those reportings seem to have declined.

But for me, there was a definite sense of Dont **** Over Your Own Health Care System messaging.  Our own protocol observances on Film/TV sets were very strict and disciplined.

Perhaps I'm wrong and some other moose-humpers can corroborate. 

Edited May 26, 2022 by Kinophile

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, LongLeftFlank said:

2. Javs on the steppe

Good examples about how hard it is to spot a Javelin launch.  Not much smoke profile at any point.  And if the gunner is behind something to further obscure the backblast, well... the victim isn't likely going to see it coming and the survivors aren't going to know where it came from.

Steve

[LongLeftFlank]

20 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Video that has been mentioned a few times now with English translation.  It's from a DPR battalion that is basically saying they've had it with this war as they are physically and emotionally exhausted:

https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarRoom/comments/uxgks0/dpr_statement_as_of_230522_only_60_of_the/

 

Galeev describes vividly how these levies use the USSR era bureaucracy against it. "Collapse" may be Kafkaesque....

"Procedure of mobilisation requires a compulsory medical examination. Nobody examined us. Many have chronic illnesses"

Btw: every young Russian male with an IQ above the room temperature collects as many certificates about chronic illnesses as possible. For this very reason.

 

Galeev also points out elsewhere that Kafka was an experienced bureaucrat, highly valued by his superiors.

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, The_Capt said:

- Based on WW1 metrics, Russia would need approximately 2.5 million men in those trenches to achieve the same deadlock...and then have the architecture behind them to sustain it, which at a very generous 1:1 (which means a very slow burn war) means roughly 5 million men to dig in and hold that front a la WW1.  But as I noted we are not in WWI - although if the Russians tried to force generate these numbers they would probably start looking like they were from that era equipment-wise. 

- Actual Russian troop numbers as of today are hard to find; however, with the 200k they brought with them and assuming they have kept that force level (big assumption), Russia currently has a troop density of 250 men per km of frontage.  This is less than ten percent than the WW1 number. But as we noted modern forces can cover more ground, which makes this a weak analogy.  The question is, "versus a very well armed attacker, how much troop density does Russia need to "freeze" this front?"  My bet is a lot more than 200k troops, but how much more?

Like you, I believe that numbers are useful for framing a discussion.  The more theoretical numbers are "in the ballpark" with reality, the more deference should be given to reality vs. theory.  The more reality is at odds with theory, the opposite.

When looking at this war before it even started the conclusions I, and others, came to was that Russia simply didn't have the means of defeating Ukraine permanently.  The primary reason is that unlike the Russians, I didn't think Ukraine would ever truly surrender.  Everything in this war so far has taken my assumption and solidified it as fact.

So, we're back to the math of it and the math doesn't look very good for Russia at all.  Even The_Capt's figures, as depressing as they are for the Russian cause, are still way too rosy.  The 200k troop figure he used to decide frontline density is incorrect since that 200k included logistics and support.  If we take a more modest figure of 80k for frontline use, that is just 10 soldiers per KM of frontage.  Even less when one factors in secondary defensive positions and mobile reserves. 

If anybody was wondering why the Russians had such a difficult time controlling the northeastern portion of Ukraine and did not take cities such as Sumy, the math should give you a hint.

1 hour ago, The_Capt said:

So let's tackle this from another direction.  Things in this war are challenging a lot of our rules of thumb; however, we can go with the 1:3 ratio of defender to attacker, at least locally.  So Russia likely needs to put at least a Company per km frontage.  This forces the UA to concentrate a BG on the attack, with all the support bells and whistles in order to make an effective shot at it.  This makes sense from a force-space-time perspective for both attacker and defender but I am not sure about firepower in the least

This scenario, which is predicated on massive Russian mobilization, is not enough to defend the line.  Putting aside the attrition from Ukrainian artillery fire for a sec, the troop density of even this rosy scenario is still quite practical for Ukraine to perform limited "smash and grab" attacks.  Ukraine has already shown it is more than capable of counter attacks at the battalion scale, so even if Russia manages to beef up its defensive forces by a HUGE amount, Ukraine will still retain the ability to successfully attack any one place on the Russian lines.  Which gets me to the attrition point.

Russia is in the unenviable position of having to defend the terrain it has seized.  Losing terrain is akin to losing the war.  Ukraine, on the other hand, is largely expected to lose terrain.  It doesn't WANT to lose it, but its people and allies don't use terrain loss as a metric for determining if Ukraine is going to win the war or not.  Russians will (they already are).

What happens in the event that the lines freeze and stalemate occurs?  Ukraine can continue to pepper Russian positions with artillery and drone strikes, probably causing upwards of 50-100 casualties a day.  Russia can do this as well, but again... Ukraine is expecting to lose people in this fight and is more likely to accept those losses than Russia is.  So even if they kinda keep attriting each other at roughly the same pace, Russia is likely to break sooner than Ukraine.

Then comes the other factor.  Russia will find it difficult to sit idly by as its forces get picked off, so they are likely to try offensive activities on at least a limited basis.  What will they achieve?  Nothing good.  Even if they are tactically successful, it doesn't change the overall picture one bit because the factors that matter are not tactical in nature.  However, the opposite is true for Ukraine.  Doing limited attacks here and there that puts another couple hundred Russians out of action per week is strategically significant because it degrades the perception in Russia that the war is winnable.

I've said it since the first few days of the war and I'll keep saying it.  For Russia to win it has to successfully achieve a series of complex objectives.  For Ukraine to win it just has to kill Russians and retain the ability to do so.  My money has always been on Ukraine, before the war, now, and under any scenario for the future.  Russia has lost, Ukraine will win.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, Huba said:

Just an anecdote, but I saw my Ukrainian friend commenting her friend's thread on FB, that showed a photo of some cans of food on a store shelve, that allegedly came from humanitarian help and should't be sold, which ended by the OP calling SBU on the storeowner.  Of course this is just a story, but you could imagine that tolerance to corruption has to be on the all time low right now.

Ukraine has a serious problem with endemic, culturally ingrained corruption.  This is something every single ex-Soviet dominated state has had to deal with.  Some have done it better or faster than others, but the ones that are influenced by the West have all made major improvements.  Even Bulgaria, considered one of the least progressed countries formally under Soviet domination, is still vastly better than where it started in 1990.

The 2014 war put Ukraine on the right path already.  When war broke out there were all kinds of "business as usual" behavior that suddenly had negative consequences for the perpetrators.  I remember one instance where a company making body armor put foam (or some sort of plastic) inside the vest carriers.  This was discovered, there was obvious outrage, and the company was shut down (I don't remember what specifically happened to them).  Under previous times there would have been no coverage of the problem, and if it had happened it wouldn't have resulted in any action against the company.  I don't think that there's many companies in Ukraine now that would try such a stunt today.

This is why I have faith that Ukraine can move towards a more just civil society faster because of this war.  It definitely has the motivation to do so.

Steve

[Centurian52]

11 hours ago, chuckdyke said:

Yes, I agree.

For the Ukraine there's no such a thing as something for nothing. The people who finance their military will decide the war. Their hope Russia will run out of resources before the West does. putin gambles about the democratic countries voting the financiers out. I hope Ukraine will achieve a decisive victory this summer, I am not holding my breath. 

The West massively outmatches Russia to an almost comical degree. There is no danger of the West running out of resources before Russia does. There may be a danger of the West running out of will before Russia runs out of resources though. I'm not sure people have yet fully grasped the level of commitment that will be necessary to guarantee Ukrainian victory, and I am concerned that people will lose interest before we have committed a decent fraction of the aid that is needed. But the West absolutely has the resources to guarantee Ukrainian victory. If the West decides they are in it to win, then Russia has already lost.

I think my biggest fear right now is that the West will try to achieve peace at any price, and demand a ceasefire along the current front lines. This would effectively allow Russia to get away with a bite and hold operation. It would send the wrong message to potential future aggressors.

[Battlefront.com]

One more thing about the demographics problem for Russia.  One of the reasons, maybe the primary reason, that Putin doesn't want to do mobilization is that he will need a significant contribution from the ethnic Russian population.  In particular Moscow and St. Petersburg.  There's really no way to avoid it.  Having body bags coming back to the core of his power center is a potential threat to regime stability. 

The 2011 election protests were a sobering moment for Putin and the lesson he (correctly) took away from that is the outlying republics are far less likely to mass against him than the urban areas of European Russia.  Which is why he's made sure this war has, so far, disproportionally sheltered European Russians from the horrors of his incompetence.

Steve

[BlackMoria]

Centuran53 wrote:   "I think my biggest fear right now is that the West will try to achieve peace at any price, and demand a ceasefire along the current front lines. This would effectively allow Russia to get away with a bite and hold operation. It would send the wrong message to potential future aggressors."

Maybe that will be the case but I think we are far from that "bridge to cross".  The "peace at any price" pearl clutching rabble has always been around and have been vocal in the last several weeks but anyone with any real insight into the conflict will brush off their rhetoric as uninformed and short sighted.  

[Battlefront.com]

This begs the question... why?

https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarRoom/comments/uy3ml5/not_sure_about_these_ukrainian_coconuts/

Steve

[akd]

Thermite showers:

 

[Battlefront.com]

9 hours ago, SeinfeldRules said:

Some points I found relevant:

I thought there might be something in there for you to sink your teeth into

9 hours ago, SeinfeldRules said:

It seemed the commander was doing his own observing and calls for fire. This is contrary to a lot of Western Doctrine, where artillery units are a delivery service to support a maneuver unit’s request for fire. Here there doesn’t seem to be any “land owner” that’s dictating fire. 

This seems to be an advantage for Ukraine in the war it is currently fighting.  The artillery commander takes requests from whomever and makes decisions based on local knowledge.  Russians complain that their centralized control system is inefficient and curtails effective use of artillery.  We've cited that here as one of the possible reasons for evidently poor Russian counter battery fire.

With Ukraine using artillery more like snipers, this seems to be a pretty effective setup.  But how good is Ukraine's ability to use massed fire as part of a coordinated attack?  That's an unknown.

9 hours ago, SeinfeldRules said:

They talk about their observation platforms, and that they can only use it when wind and Russian EW allow it. Wind and it’s ability to limit UAV operation is often overlooked. They also said it started to become unstable the higher they got in altitude, and was harder to observe fire.

Yup, saw that and made a special note of it.  I know I've not been taking this into account enough when discussing drone capabilities.

Steve

[dan/california]

3 hours ago, Kinophile said:

Turkey and the non-member Balkans current elites arent in some unfair purgatory - theyve repeatedly refused to guarantee media freedom, open trade, patent protection and crucially clean government through structural reforms or legal protection, etc. Stupid chauvinism ego and power protection seems mostly to blame.

Other countries, notably Romania, did accept terms, got in and have steadily improved. 

 

 

This, exactly this! The countries that have not gotten in have refused to comply with the rules to get in. I REALLY don't think Ukraine is going to argue about those sorts of details. The preexisting power centers with interests to protect have just been obliterated by the war. Azovstal is actually an excellent, though very sad, example, it was the crown jewel of a powerful oligarch, who really didn't have to take orders from Kyiv he didn't like. Its just gone....

[kraze]

2 hours ago, Kinophile said:

This alone is worth admission to NATO.

Ref joining EU, the corruption with Ukraine has been rampant for the last few decades. However, a national war of survival and a society-wide commitment to pivoting Westward has the ingredients to reign in that culture of graft. Russia being effectively locked out of Ukrainian society definitely helps with that.

It suggests (to me) that the wartime military imperatives such as DONT STEAL & SELL THE GODDAMN WEAPONS/SUPPLIES OUR BOYS NEED, and the crushing social opprobrium of being accused/convicted of that kind of thing (i.e. helping an enemy that rapes children and tortures civilians) could translate into greater commitment to the socio-economic health of the State, rather than the wealth of one's bank account. It gives Ukrainian society a better set of socio-political behavioral standards, with a lot less tolerance for private enrichment at the expense of the state/populace.

Due to the sheer percentage of the population engaged in the military effort a lot of future politicians and civilian leaders are going to be veterans of the war, will have seen and endured terrible hardship at the hands of the Ivan and will be very intolerant of people who corrode the national defense through personal graft.

Military corruption is a form of treason. Taking money or selling military assets could easily be classified a crime against the state during wartime. NATO et al are deeply intolerant of military aid being sold off and will bear down the Ukrainian Gov to not waste or lose the assets given; I assume there will be very strong UKR military support for that also. Its far harder to give aid to a military that turns it into a personal enrichment process, a la Afghanistan/Iraq.

But Ukraine is in a very much higher intensity conflict, with a lot more at stake and a lot of people dying every day and with extremely bad consequences for everyone if they lose; so the society as a whole has a very clear and definitive mission - survive as a nation. Its an easy moral test with a binary answer.

Finally, a critical part of the EU onboarding process is dealing properly with government and institutional corruption. Ukraine has been working on this but political factionalism, russian influence and oligarchic intrusion have hampered and hobbled the process.  Given Zelensky's personal leadership example (despite his own clumsy abuse of the anti-corruption office) and the priorities of war I suspect this project will gain a lot more momentum and political capital.

Restoration money in exchange for reforms works wonders, always.

Plus, unlike Afghanistan, which is a very alien culture and is, indeed, more than happy to have hardcore muslims running the show (no insurgency can survive for 20 years without local support - and then take over the state) - Ukraine is still closer in mentality. Although admittedly still quite Stockholm-syndrome traumatized by pre-1991 russian occupation.

And yeah - our military guys are the ones that people trust the most right now. For the first time they have a very heavy voice and if NATO pushing reforms will support and rely on people like Zaluzhny - people will actually pay attention this time.

In fact our military having an all-time high respect among people already makes a lot of corrupt politicians extremely uncomfortable and yet impotent to do anything about it. So at least in terms of military / security reforms - it will be very different from Afghanistan.

Edited May 26, 2022 by kraze

[danfrodo]

Great posts, everyone.  What a crew this is! 

I am seeing a couple things:

1.  it doesn't matter very much whether RU has BMP1,2,3 or whatever.  It doesn't matter very much whether it's terminators or t62s or what flavor of T72.  What matters the most seems to be artillery.  It's the only thing allowing RU to make its advances.  And it's the main thing that will keep it safe when it digs in to hold all its stolen territory.  So what matters most for Ukraine is having the ability to reduce RU artillery via counter battery and interdicting LOCs to bring up the shells at the req'd rate.  So the donor nations need to send MLRS, switchblades, etc, anything that can reduce RU arty.

2.  Lukashenko is going to attack?  Even more reason for donor nations to pitch in more.  I personally hope Poland will have had enough and will hit Lukashenko's columns if they cross the border (hey, let a fella dream, OK?)

3.  The foot dragging of various powers on military supplies (Germany, others) is frustrating as hell.  But why aren't they at least making up for it by sending non-lethal aid?  Rations, medical supplies, tents, etc?  The damn least thing they could do.

[Battlefront.com]

While we're on the topic of neutral nations rethinking, or already having rethought, their status... Moldova is thinking it might be better off being directly tied to the West:

https://www.rferl.org/a/moldova-russian-threat-neutrality-invasion-ukraine/31868367.html

But Putin is the master strategist

Steve

[The_Capt]

2 minutes ago, danfrodo said:

Lukashenko is going to attack? 

Haven't they been saying that for 3 months now?  That would be monumentally stupid, so of course it is possible.  Belarus's best play is to lay low and stay out of this thing and maybe we will all forget their role in all this.  Lukashenko has to be doing the calculus on this and his chances vs Putin's right now (I am betting a lot of people are doing this).

Belarus is already shackled to a corpse that is Russia from a geopolitical perspective, doubling down is just insane.  Maybe back in Feb when Ukraine was just getting started but now that they are armed to the teeth?

[Huba]

Especially juicy excerpt from Solovyov's talk show - guest throws a tantrum about NATO support and Scholz saying Russia's terms are unacceptable. I'm not sure if it's scary or funny, for sure shows that they are more and more afraid of the outcome:

 

[dan/california]

9 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Haven't they been saying that for 3 months now?  That would be monumentally stupid, so of course it is possible.  Belarus's best play is to lay low and stay out of this thing and maybe we will all forget their role in all this.  Lukashenko has to be doing the calculus on this and his chances vs Putin's right now (I am betting a lot of people are doing this).

Belarus is already shackled to a corpse that is Russia from a geopolitical perspective, doubling down is just insane.  Maybe back in Feb when Ukraine was just getting started but now that they are armed to the teeth?

Lukashenko is in a tightening vise. His own people hate him, and want NOTHING to do with this war, but Putin all but owns him. Putin wants Belarus in the war. This is just not a stable situation with rebellion on one side, and Polonium tea on the other. I am sort of a broken record on this, but if NATO really could kick off a rebellion/revolution/collapse in Belarus it really is the biggest blow we could deal Putin short of getting in the war. 

[Huba]

2 minutes ago, dan/california said:

Lukashenko is in a tightening vise. His own people hate him, and want NOTHING to do with this war, but Putin all but owns him. Putin wants Belarus in the war. This is just not a stable situation with rebellion on one side, and Polonium tea on the other. I am sort of a broken record on this, but if NATO really could kick off a rebellion/revolution/collapse in Belarus it really is the biggest blow we could deal Putin short of getting in the war. 

He is in a predicament indeed. If he was sure that his involvement would win the war for Russia, he'd got in I think. OTOH if he does and Russia loses, he'll be hanging from a lamppost in a fortnight. Stalling is a best tactic, but also risky - no matter the outcome of the war, somebody will be really pissed at him at the end.

If I was him, the Free Belarusan units in UA army would scare the crap out of me.