How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Calamine Waffles]

Quote

It is worth considering an alternative path of events. Russia pursues a realistic strategy to fatally weaken Ukraine, rather than rapidly seize it. It appoints one commander to lead the operation. It develops a plan to seize limited objectives like the Donbas that follows its doctrine and exploits its advantages in firepower and massed armor and minimizes its logistical shortcomings. It informs its troops about the upcoming operation and trains them realistically. It does, essentially, what it has belatedly started doing now after abandoning its initial plan. Russia might still have failed following this more reasonable course, but it likely wouldn’t have performed like a laughingstock.

This counterfactual sounds like a justification for flawed analysis, but it’s crucial to understanding warfare and how U.S. defense analysts think about it.

Which...it is? You're imagining a fight against an enemy that doesn't exist, and who has a goal that the real one is not pursuing?

Your job as an analyst is to get things right as much as possible, and to have a realistic appraisal of your enemy's intentions and capabilities. If you have a platform, your views have an influence on what governments may do based on your assessments. Why were people like Stanimir Dobrev or Kamil Galeev or O'Brien able to get a better picture of Russia, its military, and the likely course of the war?

Edited June 17, 2022 by Calamine Waffles

[LongLeftFlank]

[Pfarrer] SIEVERODONETSK /1600 UTC 15 JUN / RU continues to commit to a bloody urban fight-- sacrificing its advantages in maneuver warfare. FEBA reported as stable. Reports indicate ~500 civilians are sheltering under the AZOT chemical plant. RU would prefer to capture AZOT intact

1.  Rust belt maze from hell.  And another one is waiting across the river, the refinery complex at Novodruzhesk, now heavily fortified. And there's another further back at Siversk.

2.  And here again are the Big Red Arrows of Doom! (Those are the ragtag separs I showed 2 days back using antique RCLs and LMGs)

 

3. Foreign legion still east of the river? My guess is no. 

 

 

Edited June 17, 2022 by LongLeftFlank

[Battlefront.com]

21 minutes ago, LongLeftFlank said:

Western defense analysts have long debated the efficacy of battalion tactical groups, but no credible analyst would have predicted that the Russians wouldn’t use them, opting instead to send unsupported small units into a gantlet of ambushes. When Russian forces have deployed in these groups, they’ve been badly understrength....

If Western analysts erred regarding Russian logistics and command and control, it was in assuming Russia was aware of its limitations and would craft limited war plans to minimize them, rather than exacerbate them by launching a massive multi-pronged invasion of the second-largest country in Europe.

But here comes the punch....

The obvious temptation is to discount the potential performance of Russian forces. While tempting, this would be foolhardy.

In the near term, this approach would likely underestimate Russia’s capacity to resist Ukrainian counter-offensives.

And yet, in the June 16th ISW report...

Ukrainian General Staff Main Operations Deputy Chief Oleksiy Gromov noted that Russian forces are committing smaller elements (company or platoon-sized assault groups) rather than full-fledged battalion tactical groups (BTGs) for offensive operations. Gromov added that Russian forces are not conducting offensive operations at night. The UK Defense Ministry also stated that Russian forces are operating in “increasingly ad hoc and severely undermanned groupings” in Donbas that typically advance by foot.

To me this indicates that in the near term thinking that Russia is both capable of fighting this war in a fundamentally different way is to likely continue overestimating Russia's capacity in this war.

While I agree with the author that just because Russia clearly sucks at waging war today it would be a mistake to assume they will always suck, we should grasp the full lessons of the faulty pre-war analysis.  Which is that Russia is fighting the war it was prepared to fight in the way it was capable of fighting it.  It just so happens that way is terrible and the capability to do otherwise doesn't exist. 

At the bottom of the article the author makes five recommendations for addressing the past failings of analysts.  His last one is something I've been particularly been critical of for many years:

Quote

Fifth, analysts should be explicit about their assumptions and the limitations of their understanding. In my experience, analysts were loath to revisit assumptions, which were often sensitive topics that required months or years of deliberation to develop. Opening them up for debate can feel like unraveling a precisely woven tapestry, but it’s key to uncovering potential flaws in our thinking. Likewise, being explicit about what analysis cannot or does not say is crucial. Senior policymakers often press for clear answers, and replying with “it depends,” or “I don’t know” can feel like failure, but it’s important for leaders to have a clear sense of the uncertainty they face.

When I saw pre-war professional gaming that came to conclusions that I felt portrayed Russian capabilities in way too positive a light, I tried to figure out some of the assumptions they used.  This was based on my experience with Combat Mission (creating and playing) as well as my reading of Russian tea leaves. Not surprisingly, they were not made available to me   Now that the war has proven my criticisms valid, my guess is some of those assumptions I questioned years ago were, in fact, wildly out of whack with reality.

Oh, and about the "loath to revisit assumptions" part in the above quote.  A couple of weeks into the war a professional group did a wargame that showed Russia winning after initially being stalled.  They published the results a couple of days after Russia retreated from the north.  The wargame showed Russia taking Kyiv.  Someone seems to have been loath to change modeling assumptions.

Steve

 

[LongLeftFlank]

1980s vintage tanks in action..... 

....

 

 

 

[Battlefront.com]

13 minutes ago, Calamine Waffles said:

Your job as an analyst is to get things right as much as possible, and to have a realistic appraisal of your enemy's intentions and capabilities. If you have a platform, your views have an influence on what governments may do based on your assessments. Why were people like Stanimir Dobrev or Kamil Galeev or O'Brien able to get a better picture of Russia, its military, and the likely course of the war?

Yes, that's a key part of the reason the professionals largely missed the boat.

I agree with the thinking that you should prepare to fight the worst case scenario and hope that it doesn't happen.  However, it seems that the professional analysts think that's ALL they need to do.  I disagree.  They should game out various different scenarios with various different assumptions, examine the results, and design responses that are appropriate for each.

For example, when this war started analysts should have seen in the first few days (as I did) that Russia's fighting performance was crap, it's logistics were crap, it's air support crap, etc.  There should have been some past study that would fit the reality more closely than the flawed analysis that Russia was going to win this in a few days.  If such a study had existed, analysts could have dusted it off and said "OK, it looks like Russia went the stupid route.  Here's how we think it will play out".  Political and military leadership would be apprised of the change in assessment, which would have allowed them to adjust their responses accordingly. 

Instead we had shell shocked analysts doggedly telling us that Russia was on the cusp of winning, their best forces are not yet committed, the airforce is holding back for some reason, etc.  This insistence on keeping Russia up on a pedestal cost Ukraine lives and retarded the West's initial response.

So by all means game out the worst case, but game out other cases and be prepared to switch gears to evaluate the enemy's actions instead of fantasizing about what could have been.

Steve

[Calamine Waffles]

5 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Yes, that's a key part of the reason the professionals largely missed the boat.

I agree with the thinking that you should prepare to fight the worst case scenario and hope that it doesn't happen.  However, it seems that the professional analysts think that's ALL they need to do.  I disagree.  They should game out various different scenarios with various different assumptions, examine the results, and design responses that are appropriate for each.

For example, when this war started analysts should have seen in the first few days (as I did) that Russia's fighting performance was crap, it's logistics were crap, it's air support crap, etc.  There should have been some past study that would fit the reality more closely than the flawed analysis that Russia was going to win this in a few days.  If such a study had existed, analysts could have dusted it off and said "OK, it looks like Russia went the stupid route.  Here's how we think it will play out".  Political and military leadership would be apprised of the change in assessment, which would have allowed them to adjust their responses accordingly. 

Instead we had shell shocked analysts doggedly telling us that Russia was on the cusp of winning, their best forces are not yet committed, the airforce is holding back for some reason, etc.  This insistence on keeping Russia up on a pedestal cost Ukraine lives and retarded the West's initial response.

So by all means game out the worst case, but game out other cases and be prepared to switch gears to evaluate the enemy's actions instead of fantasizing about what could have been.

Steve

Yeah, he's talking about "oh, Russia is not pursuing a realistic strategy like just going into Donbas, who could have imagined that..."

Did he see the military build up occurring in Belarus, Russia, and Crimea in the months leading up to the war? What *did* he think was Russia going to do with those forces? Were they just going to sit around with thumbs up their asses while the Donbas group goes in?

For that matter, O'Brien freely admits he was wrong because he thought Russia was not going to invade. But the reason he thought that was because it would be incredibly foolish and self-destructive.

I also think something that is not talked about but should very much be discussed is how these analysts also *underestimated* the Ukrainian military.

Edited June 17, 2022 by Calamine Waffles

[Battlefront.com]

25 minutes ago, Calamine Waffles said:

Yeah, he's talking about "oh, Russia is not pursuing a realistic strategy like just going into Donbas, who could have imagined that..."

Did he see the military build up occurring in Belarus, Russia, and Crimea in the months leading up to the war? What *did* he think was Russia going to do with those forces? Were they just going to sit around with thumbs up their asses while the Donbas group goes in?

For that matter, O'Brien freely admits he was wrong because he thought Russia was not going to invade. But the reason he thought that was because it would be incredibly foolish and self-destructive.

Count me as part of this group of people who didn't think Putin would be stupid enough to invade, especially after it was clear the US had his whole warplan printed out and put into a three ring binder.  However, I didn't discount the possibility, just didn't think it was as likely as Russia's many intimidation of massing forces on the border.

The turning point started coming to me around the beginning of February, maybe a little earlier.  I remember telling someone "this doesn't have the same feel". Specifically it was how long the troops were staying in forward positions in the middle of the winter.  At first I thought this indicated they would be there to cover for an offensive limited to expanding DLPR.  Which would be logical.  Then a couple of days before the war launched a couple of things happened that made me switch to thinking the war would be hot and large scale.

Now, had I been a high level professional analyst I would have a) been following the details on an hour by hour basis and b) likely had access to better intel than I was looking at.  This would have caused me to go to the shelf and pluck out the "full war scenario" analysis and brushed up on it.  Then after a few days of the war I would have flipped to the section entitled "Russian Sucks Scenario" and started preaching from it.  But I am not sure such resources existed.  Clearly they weren't used if they did.

25 minutes ago, Calamine Waffles said:

I also think something that is not talked about but should very much be discussed is how these analysts also *underestimated* the Ukrainian military.

Huge one right there.  I didn't underestimate Ukraine by any significant amount, nor did I misunderstand what this would mean to the Russian's plans.  Even if Russia performed up to Western expectations the Ukrainian forces would have bloodied its nose pretty good.

Another failing with the pre-war analysis is that they didn't appear to consider a scenario where Russia sucked and Ukraine rocked.  This produces a very different dynamic than Russia sucked and Ukraine sucked or was just so-so.

Steve

[Calamine Waffles]

9 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Count me as part of this group of people who didn't think Putin would be stupid enough to invade, especially after it was clear the US had his whole warplan printed out and put into a three ring binder.  However, I didn't discount the possibility, just didn't think it was as likely as Russia's many intimidation of massing forces on the border.

The turning point started coming to me around the beginning of February, maybe a little earlier.  I remember telling someone "this doesn't have the same feel". Specifically it was how long the troops were staying in forward positions in the middle of the winter.  At first I thought this indicated they would be there to cover for an offensive limited to expanding DLPR.  Which would be logical.  Then a couple of days before the war launched a couple of things happened that made me switch to thinking the war would be hot and large scale.

Now, had I been a high level professional analyst I would have a) been following the details on an hour by hour basis and b) likely had access to better intel than I was looking at.  This would have caused me to go to the shelf and pluck out the "full war scenario" analysis and brushed up on it.  Then after a few days of the war I would have flipped to the section entitled "Russian Sucks Scenario" and started preaching from it.  But I am not sure such resources existed.  Clearly they weren't used if they did.

Huge one right there.  I didn't underestimate Ukraine by any significant amount.

Another failing with the pre-war analysis is that they didn't appear to consider a scenario where Russia sucked and Ukraine rocked.  This produces a very different dynamic than Russia sucked and Ukraine sucked or was just so-so.

Steve

The other thing is that these people continuing to be throw about "well, who could have known that Russia would get this so wrong" is not only intellectually dishonest, it is downright unhelpful. It doesn't help the Ukrainians in terms of encouraging Western aid and keeps sowing doubt. Save your defensive petulence for after the war is over. Then we can do a proper post mortem.

Edited June 17, 2022 by Calamine Waffles

[dan/california]

43 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Huge one right there.  I didn't underestimate Ukraine by any significant amount, nor did I misunderstand what this would mean to the Russian's plans.  Even if Russia performed up to Western expectations the Ukrainian forces would have bloodied its nose pretty good.

Another failing with the pre-war analysis is that they didn't appear to consider a scenario where Russia sucked and Ukraine rocked.  This produces a very different dynamic than Russia sucked and Ukraine sucked or was just so-so.

Steve

So much of NATOs pre war analysis was distorted by the extent to which we were apparently reading the Russian General Staffs email in real time, or something of equivalent effectiveness. The problem was that we believed what the Russians were telling themselves. We had given the Russians. a fundamental presumption of competence for forever, so when they said the fix was in for a coup, we believed them. When they sad they were ready to do this crazy thing, we believed them. When they said the Ukrainian military would fold, we believed them. We believed them because THEY really believed these things. It just so happens they were dead wrong. The intelligence agencies just did not do enough of their own homework on Russian readiness, training, logistics and so on. Why would they when they were reading the Russian General Staff's email. Except.....

[Suleyman]

Ukrainians did very well for a while, but from what was said about the 200-1000 casualties a day depending on intensity, there is a momentum in favor of Russia right now, in the Donbas. UKR will always have the defender advantage but those casualties are terrible, I truly feel bad for those soldiers who get injured or lose their life.
 

They’re purposefully not advancing in the Azot to avoid heavy casualties, they want to get the civvies out and then bombard it or encircle it. If they decided to assault Azot directly the Ukrainians would inflict some heavy casualties. The Russians as I said previously when they took Popasnaya, they have no choice but to slow grind. This war might be longer than we thought. Russia lost in Kiev but they could win in Donbas, and I say this with no bias I obviously don’t support Russia in this war.
 

Then there is the battle around Kherson and Kharkov which would be major too. My prediction is that the Russians will try to secure Donbas, try to stabilize Kherson region and push a little towards Kharkov. After that they’ll either hold ground for a while or call an end to the operation. The sad part about it is, it seems their main goal is to inflict as much as damage as possible to the UKR military. 

[kraze]

15 hours ago, Hapless said:

Another friendly reminder that 99% of the internet is not a reliable source and anyone can write a caption. In the words of Sergeant Hamlet from the CM Discord, this is Shroedinger's Hind.

Never seen two blatantly contradictingly titled clips of the same footage pop up next to each other in the feed before.

it's a typical russian tactic - whenever there is a good video of Ukraine screwing them in some epic way - they immediately rebrand it as their own. One of the prime examples is a news report on their primary state TV channel Rossiya 24 where they talked about how they completely obliterated Ukrainian forces at Snake Island, while showing... Bayraktar footage with Ukrainian planes smashing their troops and Bayraktar itself dropping a chopper on top of russians, complete with now very recognizable Bayraktar UI perfectly seen.

[FancyCat]

Several things to consider, OBrien had brought up in his view, that historians (I think he also included military officers) seemed to have better aligned with the course of the war so far than analysts who specialized in the Russian military, and to me, I was a bit dumbfounded at his tweet, for me the idea of not considering historical performance and broader strokes of history in the view of military performance was just silly. But I'm not a analyst nor even looked into it so I dunno what they learn or use.

I think a important part of what has allowed historians to gauge this conflict easier than the analysts is the essential tenet when reviewing source material that it may be wrong or false or biased. (Which I assume analysts would have factored it but guess not?)

I love bringing up that the release of the Soviet archives from World War II advanced our perception of the Soviet and German militaries in deep fundamental ways. Western historians, only largely able to access primary sources on the Nazi side, plus cold war egotism, were overestimating the Germany and underestimating the Soviet Union.

These analysts should have understood how Russian corruption works yet it never seemingly occurred to them that it would impact their military, despite the 90s disastrous performance.

Now General Mark Hertling got stuff right in stating Russia was going to lose, Ukraine was going to hold, but a key aspect of his perspective came from personally working with Russian military. I gotta ask, what have the analysts been eating for 20 years? Just reports from the Russian military to Putin? What happened to human intel?

On Ukraine, I guess one cannot fault military focused analysts for being unable to gauge how Ukrainian civil society, a vanguard in the country since at least 2014, would influence the invasion

(in one essential sense, maybe the analysts should have realized when Russia was writing out kill lists of Ukrainian civil society, that for Ukraine it was a war of survival and well, a lot of people thought the Soviet Union would just collapse in short order due to Operation Barbarossa no? Look how that turned out)

but that just speaks to the need for the involvement of a multi-faceted approach to study of war, instead of focusing on numbers, recognizing social and political structures are essential for understanding conflict. Now someone correct me, but I think historians as a bunch are a bit wired since the swing occurred in the late half of the century to delve deeper beyond military and numbers and see culture and society, etc.

Also I've been scratching my head at how Russia looked at the U.S getting its head utterly kicked in the most "fall of Saigon" moment akin to the actual Fall of Saigon in Kabul and figured they would do better seizing a country but upon seeing analysts misjudging Ukraine and Russia after seeing the U.S get routed completely in Afghanistan and then acting surprised as hell that a gun run to Kiev ended in failure, maybe im being too harsh on Russia.

Now one defense of analysts I've seen was the fact that Russia didn't follow their doctrine or their manuals, and that just sorta comes as excuses? What the hell is your job for if not to give decision makers in the west predicted paths and outcomes? I mean sure, it was surprising, but at that point, rip up the manual and go back and rewrite it. 

That analysts could look at a invasion of Ukraine occurring full-scale and being prepped and say "nah" and then have it occur is simply a failure. It doesn't matter if Putin suddenly went cuckoo, you should have been able to recognize the prep taking place all along the border, the signals coming from the Kremlin speeches and we still had analysts saying the U.S was incorrect and then look idiotic.

And then the gun run to Kiev happened and analysts looked like fools as basically the invasion failed in the north. What's the point of having analysts when they can't predict anything well? So yeah, the Russians threw out their manual for Ukraine but instead of throwing your hands in the air, figure out why Russia thinks Ukraine is a cakewalk? Instead of a analysis of why Russian leadership thought that Ukraine was gonna roll over dead (I'm leaning towards racism and Russian superiority complex) we get analysts making mealy mouthed warnings about the worse to come. Where's the analysis on why the worst hasn't come?

If the decision to invade Ukraine in the manner it did, came down to "political, cultural, social" aspects influencing the military decision, then clearly the failure of insight into Russian military decision making is at least partly due to focusing on military numbers and not social, cultural, political aspects and instead of stubbornly saying it's out of our wheelhouse, analysts should probably ask why a wargaming forum gave better analysis. (Maybe the U.S failure in Afghanistan comes down to the same sort of failure in predicting Russia?)

Now, U.S Intelligence Community, seems to have gotten Russia's capability completely misjudged so one cannot be mean to analysts too much but only one or two members got Ukraine's resistance down pat. State Dept's INR. According to CNN, it made it predictions based on public opinion polling on Ukrainians in the months leading up to the invasion. On one hand, sounds pretty mundane, but if it was so mundane, why was INR the only one to predict Ukraine would hold out longer? 

I will say Afghanistan makes it clear why Russia has failed in Ukraine. The inability for the U.S to win or even stalemate the conflict in Afghanistan, I think illustrates well how Russia is currently shoving it's hand into a alligator mouth right now.

In the same sense we know there are Russians analyzing and warning of the impending failure occurring in Ukraine, we long had warnings of the same relayed about Afghanistan and yet a complete inability to change paths or effect a outcome to change, what is well, is pretty much complete defeat I think is pretty good contrast to Russia's lack of making decisions to at least change the course of the conflict from its utter defeat in Ukraine. (obviously both scenarios have factors explaining why changing course is problematic but my point is to emphasize that Russia may be ****ing up hard in Ukraine but the U.S literally had the same happen not long ago. This is not unique to Russia in the modern age, and I'll just say that if we can **** up that badly, than there isn't any reason Russia will not lose this war.)

Of course maybe that isn't gonna happen and Russia gets to a stalemate. But we will see.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/13/politics/us-intelligence-review-ukraine/index.html

 

[Haiduk]

10 hours ago, Suleyman said:

Those are gonna be more of a pain than TB-2s because of the small size, it would make it very hard to detect. How much armor does the bomb they drop penetrate? I'd assume at worse it would hurt the sensors and optics on AFVs, and take out the engine if it hits it. 

R18 can carry 2-3 RKG-1600 HEAT bombs - reworked old HEAT hand grenade RKG-3, adopted in 1950. Depending on modification (RKG-3/3E/3EM) grenade can penetrate 150/170/220 mm RHa under 30 degrees angle. So if the bomb falls vertically, penetration can be much more. 

[Aragorn2002]

11 hours ago, Huba said:

Great job, thank you! 

Regarding RU aviation, I wonder what can be done about it? Apart from the Gepards, West doesn't really have any mobile AD that can keep up with mechanized forces. Hopefully Macron is not right about the fighter jets... 

Apparently I did miss that. What did Macron say?

The Netherlands has Gepards (100 vehicles) in storage, if I'm correct. If they are available, they should be send.

Edited June 17, 2022 by Aragorn2002

[LongLeftFlank]

9 minutes ago, Suleyman said:

Ukrainians did very well for a while, but from what was said about the 200-1000 casualties a day depending on intensity, there is a momentum in favor of Russia right now, in the Donbas. UKR will always have the defender advantage but those casualties are terrible, I truly feel bad for those soldiers who get injured or lose their life.

They’re purposefully not advancing in the Azot to avoid heavy casualties, they want to get the civvies out and then bombard it or encircle it. If they decided to assault Azot directly the Ukrainians would inflict some heavy casualties. The Russians as I said previously when they took Popasnaya, they have no choice but to slow grind.

This war might be longer than we thought. Russia lost in Kiev but they could win in Donbas, and I say this with no bias I obviously don’t support Russia in this war.

Then there is the battle around Kherson and Kharkov which would be major too. My prediction is that the Russians will try to secure Donbas, try to stabilize Kherson region and push a little towards Kharkov. After that they’ll either hold ground for a while or call an end to the operation. The sad part about it is, it seems their main goal is to inflict as much as damage as possible to the UKR military. 

That's where I am too.  I worry that for all our confident theorising, the front 'freezes' along the Dnepr land corridor and Sievertsi Donets (yes, no doubt the Russians will eventually vacate Kherson and east of Kharkiv). Ivan will dig in, revert to 1980s tech and mine the sh%t out of everything. So by fall, the sheer human cost of retaking the lost lands becomes higher than even the hardest line Ukrainians can stomach. While Putin manages to keep the lid on far longer than any non-Russian could possibly imagine.

I could absolutely be wrong, sure and the Russian collapse could be sudden, and astonishingly rapid. I absolutely hope so.

...But for all the fog of war, I am still seeing Dmitro struggle to hurt Ivan on the attack for longer than a day or two.  

Even the many far better military minds on this board have not been confident enough to articulate the likely tipping point and its key catalysts. 250 NATO guns? Drones all grounded by date x? Ball bearings? Multiple causation? No doubt it will all be perfectly obvious in hindsight.

1.  In WW1, the French were fighting in their heartland as well, against a hated foe, and did it skilfully and bravely, but their army eventually cracked under the sheer weight of firepower plus failed counteroffensives. In this technological era, the meat grinder is sped up; we don't yet know how fast. And the Yanks are not coming.

2. Like Russia, Ukraine is not a young country demographically. Deaths and permanent injuries that go far north of 100k are going to be a generational debilitation.

3.  Russia's 'best and brightest' are heavily dodging service, letting the weight fall on non-Slavs, rural folks and the unfortunate separ populations. In contrast, the entirety of Ukrainian society is serving (except for the nearly 15% who are refugees). This is tremendous, except when the flower of their society perishes or is broken physically and/or emotionally.

4.  At the end of the day, Russia's population is still 3.5 times as big as Ukraine's, even with all the disunion and cavils.  In short, there's a *lot* of ruination in them still, at very basic levels.

So in the gruesome math of this war,  Ukrainian kids must find a way to resume material outpacing in terms of killing Russian kids, who aren't obligingly rolling forward in their zinc coffins so much any more.  Or else, we are looking at a terrible stalemate where all the small victories and enemy blunders won't reverse the losses of the first 2 weeks.

[/rollercoaster]

[Grigb]

Had a spare time and checked interview of T-80 tanker from the tweet above and I think it is interesting.

Author:
— A question about the mobility of the tank: GTD [Gas-Turbine engine] – "hell for suppliers" or a thing? Are they reliable enough? Problems on the fuel march? Smooth running, shaking, acceleration in comparison with diesels. What are the main disadvantages of the T-80 BVM?

Tankman:
— It all depends on what role the tank group plays. As practice has shown, the speed of the "box" directly affects its survival. The T-72B and T-72B3 had very impressive losses during the battles in urban areas, while the group of the 80s lost only one tank in 3 months of operation.

Of course, serving mixed groups is hell for rear echelon, but there is no need for them [mixed groups]. In the later stages of the operation, the machines were used for completely different tasks. There were no complaints about the reliability of the machines, they withstood more than they should have. The movement on the T-80 BVM is much quieter and smoother, which made it possible to carry out lightning attacks.

The main drawback of the tank is an outdated thermal imaging sight on which any landfill makes excessive background noise, and high fuel consumption.

 

Author:

— Nuances in use? Ammunition? Was the ammo put only in mechanized laying [autoloader]? Typical composition of ammo (proportion: HE, HEAT, APFSDS)? Or were they filled in for a specific task? What type of ammunition was used most often? Is the main APFSDS still 3B42?

ATGM — a suitcase without a handle or a really useful thing? Is it really possible to implement the "long arm" [feature] of our tanks in the conditions of combat in the current theater of operations [Not sure what he means as usually long arm of RU tanks is barrel launched ATGM with range longer than NATO cannons range, but given answer from tanker he might mean indirect long range cannon fire to counter NATO ATGMs]? Have you ever used it? If yes, then the nuances, reliability, were there any failures of guidance and what is their reason? From personal experience: what kind of ammunition would need to be modified or created?

Tankman:

— There have never been more than 10 shells in the armor [means inside tank]. From the experience of fighting around Donetsk airport, I know what happens to a combat vehicle when it is packed to capacity with ammunition. When a shell from an RPG arrives from the building above into the commander's hatch,  the turret flies to the 3rd floor of the [Donetsk airport] terminal. Our counterparts decided to ignore this simple truth and were always packed to capacity, for which they were nicknamed among the [men of our] unit "lemming herd".

There was nothing but Mango at the beginning of the operation, ammunition was spent so quickly that it was not possible to replenish it. As for the "long arm", I will answer as concisely as I can.

You can, but it is difficult. It is extremely inconvenient to make a calculation in order to hit a hidden standing target (God forbid, also moving), and forces you to invent a bicycle on the spot, based on the terrain features.

Concrete-piercing types of weapons are urgently needed, taking into account the NATO guidelines for the construction of fortifications.

 

Author:

— Observation. Did you perform any tasks at night? How does the commander conduct surveillance at night? How did the sighting equipment manifest itself? At what distances, on average, was it possible to detect the enemy?

Tankman:

— Performing tasks in the dead of night by armored formations is effective only when working from closed [hidden] positions. In an ideal scenario, if a tank group is advancing to the assault, it is better to do it at 2-3 o'clock in the morning and reach the point of the beginning of the battle by dusk. The sighting equipment is outdated, needs to be replaced. But for the fight against the tanks of the USSR, although modernized, this is not critical. Thanks to the infantry and the coordinated work of "Akhmat" [I think he means Chechen battalion Akhmat], we always knew where the enemy was and how he moved.

 

Author:

— General awareness of the situation. Connection. Communication in combat with an infantry unit? Were automated control systems used (according to the ESU TK type) or all only through radio communication?

Tankman:

— I'm not disclosing the communication details.[It may be because Comms are always real embarrassment for Soviet/RU army]

 

Author:

— Tank duels? Or are tanks not fighting tanks (with)[It is RU historical meme which caused a lot of arguments in RU mil history community]? Are there any problems with the defeat of enemy tanks? How do you assess the resistance of the T-80BV M to modern anti-tank weapons? What is the opponent's skill?
Tankman:

— Tank duels in this theater are very much in demand from our side, and we are trying to impose them. The superiority in reverse speed and the ability to enter the enemy's sides gives us the opportunity not to lose these duels at all ever. And since the Ukrainian tanks are completely packed with ammunition to the point of failure, you do not need more than one hit.

As for resistance against domestic weapons — a solid 5 [top mark]. As for the Western ones, it is more difficult, since we did not give the opportunity to use them against us. But, it seems to me, tandem shells could be a problem for us, but there is always a good old grid [mesh armor] for this.

Fortunately for us, competent Ukrainian tankers are gone, most of the experienced commanders and gunners were knocked out as a result of the fighting of the 14-15s.

Author:

— And the last question. How did the additional fabric screens perform [The egg shell armor but obviously he means working one not empty]?

Tankman:

— By the current moment, there are no more of them left on our tank. [RU Addon side armor packages are easily damaged and tend to fall off quickly]  But, apparently, we were hit with something during the cleaning of the village of "Z.", and they saved us. Works.

[Haiduk]

UKR Naval forces hit with two missiles newest Black Sea Fleet resque tug "Spasatel' Vasiliy Bekh" (brought to service in 2017) of 145th BSF resque vessels detachment, which sailed to Zmiinyi island with cargo of ammunition and supply, also carring TOR on board either for deployment to the island or for self AA-protection. TB2 Bayraktar maintained tracking of the target

"Spasatel' Vasiliy Bekh", pr.22870, 57 m length, 1670 tons displacement

Also there are photos were issued, on which two tugs tow damaged Russian small missile corvette pr.21631 "Buyan-M" class on Volga river. Maybe this is corvette "Velikiy Ustiug", belonged to Caspian flotilia, which was deployed recently on Black Sea. There is a lot of shell-holes are visible. There is unknown were this ship was damaged. Maybe this a that case, when UKR Grad hit some target in the sea near Odesa in the night at the beginning of war, but that ship was burning, but this one hasn't traces of fire

"Velikiy Ustiug" before...

Edited June 17, 2022 by Haiduk

[Huba]

33 minutes ago, Aragorn2002 said:

Apparently I did miss that. What did Macron say?

The Netherlands has Gepards (100 vehicles) in storage, if I'm correct. If they are available, they should be send.

During press conference he said that there's an informal agreement in NATO not to deliver tanks and aircraft. If that is true, and there are no fighters in the pipeline, there is no way to help protect UA mechanized forces except the Gepards. UA has to have a number of Soviet, and captured RU systems OTOH, but if reports about Davidyv Brid counterattack are correct, didn't use them successfuly. 

[Grigb]

10 minutes ago, Huba said:

During press conference he said that there's an informal agreement in NATO not to deliver tanks and aircraft. If that is true, and there are no fighters in the pipeline, there is no way to help protect UA mechanized forces except the Gepards. UA has to have a number of Soviet, and captured RU systems OTOH, but if reports about Davidyv Brid counterattack are correct, didn't use them successfuly. 

Most likely RU aviation protection suites work well against RU own weapons. They test everything using first and foremost their own weapons.

I believe what is needed is these babies.

RU Tack Air relies heavily on unguided ammunitions dropped using Gefest. But for that they need to enter Startstreak range. Also LMM will handle Orlans perfectly well.

Edited June 17, 2022 by Grigb

[Grigb]

3 minutes ago, Grigb said:

Most likely RU aviation protection suites work well against RU own weapons. They test everything using first and foremost their own weapons.

I believe what is needed is these babies.

RU Tack Air relies heavily on unguided ammunitions dropped using Gefest. But for that they need to enter Startstreak range. Also LMM will handle Orlans perfectly well.

[EDIT] Probably you are not aware but RU considered UK MANPAD Javelin as the most dangerous MANPAD of Afghan war and were really concerned about them. 

[Huba]

11 minutes ago, Grigb said:

[EDIT] Probably you are not aware but RU considered UK MANPAD Javelin as the most dangerous MANPAD of Afghan war and were really concerned about them. 

I wonder though if MANPADS based systems are enough? Sure those have to be more  effective than handhelds, having surveilance radars at hand etc. but basic parameters like range are unchanged.

Maybe RU fixed wing aviation does not to have sufficient standoff PGM capability, but at least Ka-52 with Vikhr should be able to easily avoid getting in range of ecen Starstreak or Mistral, and pound the AFVs in the open with impunity. Or this is my understanding at least. 

[DesertFox]

38 minutes ago, Huba said:

During press conference he said that there's an informal agreement in NATO not to deliver tanks and aircraft. 

If I understood him correctly this refers to tanks and planes of western origin. Delivery of former WARPAC stuff, as already has happened (T-72s, BMPs, etc.) is not excluded.

[Grigb]

1 minute ago, Huba said:

Maybe RU fixed wing aviation does not to have sufficient standoff PGM capability, but at least Ka-52 with Vikhr should be able to easily avoid getting in range of ecen Starstreak or Mistral, and pound the AFVs in the open with impunity. Or this is my understanding at least. 

Vikhr only slightly outrange Starstreak. Also we do not know the real Starstreak range. OTH Starstreak is much faster and as result it can deal with Vikhr armed Helis much better than other AAs.

AFAIK SS was designed to deal specifically with ATGM armed Helis.   

[LongLeftFlank]

1 hour ago, Grigb said:

Had a spare time and checked interview of T-80 tanker from the tweet above and I think it is interesting.

Author:
— A question about the mobility of the tank: GTD [Gas-Turbine engine] – "hell for suppliers" or a thing? Are they reliable enough? Problems on the fuel march? Smooth running, shaking, acceleration in comparison with diesels. What are the main disadvantages of the T-80 BVM?

Tankman:
— It all depends on what role the tank group plays. As practice has shown, the speed of the "box" directly affects its survival. The T-72B and T-72B3 had very impressive losses during the battles in urban areas, while the group of the 80s lost only one tank in 3 months of operation.

Of course, serving mixed groups is hell for rear echelon, but there is no need for them [mixed groups]. In the later stages of the operation, the machines were used for completely different tasks. There were no complaints about the reliability of the machines, they withstood more than they should have. The movement on the T-80 BVM is much quieter and smoother, which made it possible to carry out lightning attacks.

The main drawback of the tank is an outdated thermal imaging sight on which any landfill makes excessive background noise, and high fuel consumption.

Author:

— Nuances in use? Ammunition? Was the ammo put only in mechanized laying [autoloader]? Typical composition of ammo (proportion: HE, HEAT, APFSDS)? Or were they filled in for a specific task? What type of ammunition was used most often? Is the main APFSDS still 3B42?

ATGM — a suitcase without a handle or a really useful thing? Is it really possible to implement the "long arm" [feature] of our tanks in the conditions of combat in the current theater of operations [Not sure what he means as usually long arm of RU tanks is barrel launched ATGM with range longer than NATO cannons range, but given answer from tanker he might mean indirect long range cannon fire to counter NATO ATGMs]? Have you ever used it? If yes, then the nuances, reliability, were there any failures of guidance and what is their reason? From personal experience: what kind of ammunition would need to be modified or created?

Tankman:

— There have never been more than 10 shells in the armor [means inside tank]. From the experience of fighting around Donetsk airport, I know what happens to a combat vehicle when it is packed to capacity with ammunition. When a shell from an RPG arrives from the building above into the commander's hatch,  the turret flies to the 3rd floor of the [Donetsk airport] terminal. Our counterparts decided to ignore this simple truth and were always packed to capacity, for which they were nicknamed among the [men of our] unit "lemming herd".

There was nothing but Mango at the beginning of the operation, ammunition was spent so quickly that it was not possible to replenish it. As for the "long arm", I will answer as concisely as I can.

You can, but it is difficult. It is extremely inconvenient to make a calculation in order to hit a hidden standing target (God forbid, also moving), and forces you to invent a bicycle on the spot, based on the terrain features.

Concrete-piercing types of weapons are urgently needed, taking into account the NATO guidelines for the construction of fortifications.

Author:

— Observation. Did you perform any tasks at night? How does the commander conduct surveillance at night? How did the sighting equipment manifest itself? At what distances, on average, was it possible to detect the enemy?

Tankman:

— Performing tasks in the dead of night by armored formations is effective only when working from closed [hidden] positions. In an ideal scenario, if a tank group is advancing to the assault, it is better to do it at 2-3 o'clock in the morning and reach the point of the beginning of the battle by dusk. The sighting equipment is outdated, needs to be replaced. But for the fight against the tanks of the USSR, although modernized, this is not critical. Thanks to the infantry and the coordinated work of "Akhmat" [I think he means Chechen battalion Akhmat], we always knew where the enemy was and how he moved.

Author:

— General awareness of the situation. Connection. Communication in combat with an infantry unit? Were automated control systems used (according to the ESU TK type) or all only through radio communication?

Tankman:

— I'm not disclosing the communication details.[It may be because Comms are always real embarrassment for Soviet/RU army]

Author:

— Tank duels? Or are tanks not fighting tanks (with)[It is RU historical meme which caused a lot of arguments in RU mil history community]? Are there any problems with the defeat of enemy tanks? How do you assess the resistance of the T-80BV M to modern anti-tank weapons? What is the opponent's skill?
Tankman:

— Tank duels in this theater are very much in demand from our side, and we are trying to impose them. The superiority in reverse speed and the ability to enter the enemy's sides gives us the opportunity not to lose these duels at all ever. And since the Ukrainian tanks are completely packed with ammunition to the point of failure, you do not need more than one hit.

As for resistance against domestic weapons — a solid 5 [top mark]. As for the Western ones, it is more difficult, since we did not give the opportunity to use them against us. But, it seems to me, tandem shells could be a problem for us, but there is always a good old grid [mesh armor] for this.

Fortunately for us, competent Ukrainian tankers are gone, most of the experienced commanders and gunners were knocked out as a result of the fighting of the 14-15s.

Author:

— And the last question. How did the additional fabric screens perform [The egg shell armor but obviously he means working one not empty]?

Tankman:

— By the current moment, there are no more of them left on our tank. [RU Addon side armor packages are easily damaged and tend to fall off quickly]  But, apparently, we were hit with something during the cleaning of the village of "Z.", and they saved us. Works.

You are awesome, brother!  Very glad you have joined our conversation.

That said, we naturally note that 'anecdotes' do not themselves create 'data'.... and the bit about the mad fieldcraft skilz of 'Achmat'.  Wow, talk about brand endorsement.  Why not throw in an obligatory genuflection to the 'paramount importance of Party political work' while you're at it?

...Also, even if he's being dead candid in most of his opinions, nobody really knows what the enemy's condition is, so the conclusion about all the first line UKR crews being dead and gone, yeah, we shall see about that one, boychik.

Edited June 17, 2022 by LongLeftFlank

[Huba]

11 minutes ago, DesertFox said:

If I understood him correctly this refers to tanks and planes of western origin. Delivery of former WARPAC stuff, as already has happened (T-72s, BMPs, etc.) is not excluded.

Right, but WARPAC planes are not an option if the task is fighting for air superiority to cover advancing mechanized forces. Old Mig-29s wont cut it against VVS aircraft with R-77.