Russia's War Against Ukraine

Started by ArizonaTank, November 26, 2021, 04:54:38 PM

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Jarhead0331

Anyone who thinks this war is anywhere close to ending is seriously misguided. The worst is yet to come. Undoubtedly. Russia is nowhere close to collapse or coup.
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GDS_Starfury

Quoteand refusal to fight are early signs, and we aren't seeing that yet.

there are videos weekly of different units refusing to fight for all kinds of reasons.  usually its lack of support and equipment.
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MikeGER

so whats next, my guesstimate...

Ukraine will sign a pure-bilateral contract with Poland to allow Poland  "deep propositioned border security forces" in their country.
The Polish brigades will deploy along the Polish border in the West and in the North at the border to 'neutral' Belarus, maybe all the way up short to north of Kiev.
This will free up Ukrainian boots for to stop the red flood and stomp in the South.
NATO will declare that it is purely bilateral and that happenstance Polish losses on Ukrainian turf will not be seen as an attack on a NATO state member - de jure.   

Russia will continue to trade in 3-9 "surplus"-Russians" (criminals, drunks, and people they don't think valuable for their society anyway - not even as low trained workforce) and especially "non Russians"-Russians (according the lines of unspoken inner Russian racism) as cannon fodder for one battle hardened Ukrainian soldier until Ukraine is not able to man the long stretched border anymore to counter several simultan Russian Schwerpunkt attacks, even if they shift their troops in a hurry.

Crossroads

Quote from: GDS_Starfury on January 30, 2023, 12:28:11 AM
Quoteand refusal to fight are early signs, and we aren't seeing that yet.

there are videos weekly of different units refusing to fight for all kinds of reasons.  usually its lack of support and equipment.

... corrupt officers, lack of training, bad food, obsolete equipment, ... I've not seen any refusals due to anyone being against the war. The good Tsar calls you to help secure your Motherland, you go. Rallying around the flag.

In another news, this is from a couple of days ago, an Estonian intel officer presuming what we are seeing now is already at least the beginning of their big offensive. With a grain of salt.

Quote"People are talking about an upcoming large-scale Russian offensive. I am moderately confident that Russia itself already thinks it is conducting one. It's just that none of the others see it as large."

"I am doubtful how good a picture Putin has about the status and readiness of its units."

"Besides Bakhmut and Soledar, Russia is trying something near Vuhledar and Pavlivka about 30km southwest of Donetsk. Also, they have been conducting offensives north of Vasylivka (where the Dnipro river turns straight north and where there would be direct route to Zaporizhzhia)."

"But all of this seems to be largely resultless."

"Last time they tried in Vuhledar was 2-3 months ago and they had 2 battalions worth of their marines killed in 3 days. They are also without any success in Kreminna and, if anything, Ukraine is really slowly advancing there."

https://twitter.com/michaeldweiss/status/1618991902514360320

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1618991902514360320.html

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MengJiao

Quote from: Jarhead0331 on January 30, 2023, 12:15:30 AMAnyone who thinks this war is anywhere close to ending is seriously misguided. The worst is yet to come. Undoubtedly. Russia is nowhere close to collapse or coup.

  I'm beginning to think it might already be winding down (to a level that Russia can sustain for decades of course).  With Putin putting some serious generals in command and downplaying Wagner and co.,  it seems that Putin and his
associates are building up a case for one last hurrah that is never going to come.  If there was a major real attack
left in the Russian assessment of the situation they would need to make it right now, not in six months when the Ukrainians are heavily resupplied and upgraded.
Notice also that the Russians are saying "There's no point in negotiating now that NATO is supplying a lot
of major weapons."  Translating this from Russian rhetoric, it really means -- "We want to negotiate.  we see what is happening."
Notice also that Turkey is saying Finland can come into NATO.  This is more pressure on Russia to wind things down before they lose their leverage in Syria and Iran.
Notice also that Russian forces are pulling out of Belarus.  That sort of clinches the picture of a basic Russian intention of winding down this war -- sure it will go on for many years, but just to show that Putin is still running things.  Clearly, collapse is on Putin's mind.  If he can avoid collapse, he can stay in power, but the best way to avoid collapse is to wind down the war gradually.
And if that's true, you can see why the Ukrainians are asking for everything right now because as the actual threat from Russia fades, Western support will fade.
Anyway, that's my take on things and I've been totally wrong about this war from day 1.

JasonPratt

Speaking of downplaying Wagner: is that Group even a thing anymore? I haven't been where I can keep up with their shennanigans, but I recall them taking boocoos of losses in the past few weeks, and I even posted a report that a (chief?) leader had defected to the West somewhere -- which I didn't have time to vett, so I was hoping someone would pro or con that.
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Tripoli

Quote from: JasonPratt on January 30, 2023, 08:27:37 AMSpeaking of downplaying Wagner: is that Group even a thing anymore? I haven't been where I can keep up with their shennanigans, but I recall them taking boocoos of losses in the past few weeks,...

Wagner has taken huge losses in the conscript portion of its force, in (I believe) an effort to attrite and/or prevent the reconstitution of Ukrainian forces.  It also has mercenaries who are better trained, some of whom operate their more sophisticated gear (such as aviation assets).  I'm not sure what the losses of these forces are, but I assume they are substantial as well.

One data point that might give some insight into the current status of Wagner: In the NYT article "To Fix Its Problems in Ukraine, Russia Turns to the Architect of the War" https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/28/us/politics/russia-generals-ukraine.html there is this paragraph: "Gen. Valery V. Gerasimov, the architect of President Vladimir V. Putin's invasion of Ukraine, took over the day-to-day running of Russia's war effort this month...Since General Gerasimov replaced Gen. Sergei Surovikin, who was in the job for only three months, Russia's military leadership has focused on tactical issues...Promoting General Gerasimov, U.S. and other Western military officials say, was intended to both deflect criticism of the war effort from the military bloggers and to check the rising power of Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the mercenary group Wagner that has spearheaded the bloody Russian offensive at Bakhmut in the Donbas. Mr. Prigozhin has also been a staunch supporter of General Surovikin. "The recent shake-up in commanders of the war effort seems like the result of political infighting and cronyism," ... "
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Sir Slash

Interesting. I was thinking the Ukrainians should have at the ready a Psy Ops plan that as close to the beginning of a new Spring Offensive as possible, that put into effect that Putin has died. If it was believable enough, maybe a really good video of Putin in a casket or a secret message they intercept announcing it to the Generals, the whole Russian military MIGHT just drop their rifles and walk home, like in 1917. Probably even the Generals wouldn't know whether it was true or not. It might start a fight for power, revolt or civil war or who-knows what. At the very least, Putin would have to come out into the open to refute it and reveal his real health status which probably ain't good.

Maybe it would forestall or prevent altogether a Russian offensive for weeks or months until things get cleared-up by them. The Russian conscripts aren't fighting for Mother Russia, they're fighting because they fear Putin and his thugs. If that threat is gone in their eyes, then this war might be as well. Just the thoughts of an addled old man.  :grumpy:
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Gusington

Well does the West really want a Russian civil war? If Russia disintegrated that would not be good for anyone either. Regime change - great - but a total collapse of the entire country...not so great.


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JasonPratt

Regime change looks to be a toss-up at best, too.

Meanwhile, Russia is practicing for the eventual arrival of the M1s by pretending they already killed one. In the summer desert of... Ukraine....?

https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/10nregf/russians_claim_their_first_abrams_tank_by_using_a/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
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FarAway Sooner

Quote from: Jarhead0331 on January 30, 2023, 12:15:30 AMAnyone who thinks this war is anywhere close to ending is seriously misguided. The worst is yet to come. Undoubtedly. Russia is nowhere close to collapse or coup.

The big unknown here is Putin's health.  Like you, I think it's unlikely that he's overthrown.  But if he dies, then we'll have a major guessing game about who inherits the mantle next?

As Gus suggests, an extended civil war within a country holding 6,000 nuclear weapons is a recipe for all sorts of problems.  To be sure, even if he's surprised us in the last few years (in part because he's done such a crappy job in many respects), he is still The Devil that We Know.

SirAndrewD

Quote from: JasonPratt on January 29, 2023, 04:07:27 PMRe bringing 500K the first time instead of 250K: I WISH THEY HAD! They were almost completely incapable of logistically supporting 250K (including in C&C), and would have fallen apart even more quickly with 500K.

Logistically, no, they never had a way of supporting that number with the equipment and plan they had. 

That's the point.  The Russians, for what they had, should've had a much more limited plan that could've been supported better with short, controlled line of supply. 

The initial invasion plan was wildly over ambitious for the number of Russian troops and Russia's ability to supply them. 

To have won this war in the "first week" if that was even possible, the Russians needed a different plan.


And, 500k troops available doesn't mean you use that in the invasion.  The reason the UAF was so effective in its counterattacks was that the Russians by mid summer had no reserves.  Had they planned for the potential of a longer war and already mobilized those reserves by February 2022, they would've gone a long way to plugging the gaps against future counterattacks like they're doing now. 

Anyway, as JH said, this thing is a LONG way from over and a long way from being decided in the Ukrainian's favor.  Russia could very well start a war winning campaign in the Spring if they do it smartly and understand it's not going to be done in a week. 

I'm not holding my breath for anything decisive though.  Not as they sit.
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JasonPratt

To be fair, if they insisted on trying to win in a week, with only the forces currently available, on the basis that they estimated the government and its military would implode (i.e. 'kick in the door and the whole rotten structure will collapse'), a shock and awe by envelopment of all attack vectors was the only thing to do.

Putin (apparently?) didn't want to take another long-term nibble, hoping for political acceptance of a fait accompli as in Crimea and the Donbas, even if that nibble was Kiev. That would only trigger the NATO addition he didn't want to happen; only a full fast collapse of Ukraine per se would minimize any risk of NATO picking up Ukraine as a team-member. So politically, I get why they had to try it that way.

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JasonPratt

Say, remember the VDV? Haven't seen them much since summer last year. Wonder why that is?

Well by September, half of Russia's entire VDV force had been wiped out. So.... wondering how they're doing as January ends... ;)  :martini:

https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/10pz1pg/the_creator_of_rybar_channel_who_now_has_a_live/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
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Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
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PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
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GDS_Starfury

Toonces - Don't ask me, I just close my eyes and take it.

Gus - I use sweatpants with flannel shorts to soak up my crotch sweat.

Banzai Cat - There is no "partial credit" in grammar. Like anal sex. It's either in, or it's not.

Mirth - We learned long ago that they key isn't to outrun Star, it's to outrun Gus.

Martok - I don't know if it's possible to have an "anti-boner"...but I now have one.

Gus - Celery is vile and has no reason to exist. Like underwear on Star.