Russia's War Against Ukraine

[FarAway Sooner]

Random responses on a lot of topics:

1) Interesting proposal, Jason.  One of the biggest hurdles to clear:  The Russians have already conducted a lot of "ethnic/nationalist cleansing" in the occupied regions.  I'm not sure that the pro-Ukrainian folks who fled the Crimea and Donbas would sit well with that.  The unlimited immigration proposal is very interesting, but I think something the Russian leadership would never accept.  I think Putin viewed the Ukrainians as a really powerful cultural threat to Russia, but that's a more complicated topic.

2) Skoop, it's really hard to evaluate the effectiveness of any foreign leader's efforts to rein in Moscow, because Putin's been utterly unpredictable.

3) There are two major sanctions left in the Western bag:  A) Full stop on buying anything Russian, including energy exports;   B) Extend the embargo to all countries who still trade with Russia.  If push comes to shove, would China choose to keep trading with Russia or Europe and North America?  Would India?  It's unclear what role the Russian public might play.

4) Gus, I also am puzzled at the Russians' cost tolerance in a war of aggression.  Especially one that they seem to be losing in fairly dramatic fashion.  Lord knows it doesn't matter how badly they lose when they're invaded, they just keep starving and killing off their occupiers until they leave.

[GDS_Starfury]

no one is invading russia.

[GDS_Starfury]

meanwhile in russia....

[Crossroads]

What do T-62s look like with new paint and maybe some bells and whistles for comfort?

We will soon know. Russia is going to working on 800 of them over the next three years.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/russia-to-modernize-800-vintage-t-62-tanks-due-to-ukraine-losses-report/ar-AA12SQPr?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=1685c28e29f849e98c8d246a2a68ba2c

The article links to a Russian article that gives a few more details. I was able to read it with MS Edge's translate feature:
https://anna-news.info/deputat-guravlev-800-tankov-t-62-popolnyat-rossijskuyu-armiyu-v-techenii-3-let/

Meanwhile, I've seen a few tweets there being one (1) T-14 Armata at field tests at Luhans region, serving as a command tank, in the more static area of the front where they have no risk of losing it should it break down or something. T-14 after all was the tank that got so many mil bloggers declare the death of Abrams and Leopard MBTs. And now we are here.

Marek Meissner who's got a solid reputation for details about Russian tanks manufactured and in storage, doubts even this news item:

https://twitter.com/MarekMeissner/status/1580250236710100993

I am able to believe in the 800 T-62 bodies, even with turrets and propulsion system. But where the motors with gears, optoelectronics and communication systems will come from, I have no idea

Yes, but unaware of how much is left and in what condition, the info from deep storage warehouses in the Far East where the older types of tanks were stored are terrible. Most are just shells. A further 800 cars per plant is a job for 2-3 years. 1/2

Meanwhile, the level of tank losses in Ukraine is horrible, at such a pace will happen to the situation of the "Third Reich 1945" where what left the factory went to the front and was immediately scrapped. But also the 800 T-62 proves that there is no T-72 anymore. Even in deep warehouses. 2/2

Worth to notice indeed is that we're down to T-62s now. Stocks of T-90s-80s-72s seemingly depleted now. That is quite something.

And it's not better with artillery either, seeing lot of tweets they are now deplyoing their 1940s stock of D-1 152mms to front. I have no idea what was the steel quality at the time, how tubes are affected after 70 years in storate, and if they even are compatible with their more modern 152 shells.

I have no glee about people losing their lives in this senseless, brutal invasio either, but I am quite happy witnessing Russians destroy their heavy weaponry for decade(s) to come. In future, no kind of any Soviet era massive stocks anywhere. Modern heavy weaponry is crazy expensive, good luck with that.

Again, Putin's a very sane operator, he's intimidated his smaller neighbours one at a time so far. There's been a reason, he's been aware about the general limits of his army.

With historical comparisons, if Crimea 2014 was his "Peace in our time" moment when he could have been stopped, Vladolph's "invasion of Poland" is not going to plans at all.

I do not see this as a forever war, there's been plenty of historical examples of a nuclear power losing and calling it the quits, from Vietnam to Afganistan in 1980s and Afganistan in recent times too.

Let us ensure the brave Ukrainians get to call when they want to end defending their country against Russia's invasion and let us keep stocking them up. Stopping Putin would have been easier in the past, it is costly at the moment, and the future war he's wage if allowed to regroup and restock would be even costlier.


Edit: here's a good look at their T-62 factory:

Russia is modifying 800 T-62 tanks for the war in Ukraine. This means that all newer T-64, T-72 and T-80 tanks are over, and new ones cannot be produced quickly.

Assess the situation of the tank factory in the video, by the way

https://twitter.com/ian_matveev/status/1580216195546243072


Edit2: here's a Feb 2020 article on how Russian Armed forces saw their use of MBTs in 2027: 500 T-14 Armatas, 400 T-90Ms, 2000 T-72B3+s. T-14 fleet not gonna happen, T-72s all but gone(?), T-90s (glorified T-72s) maybe 200-300 left?

https://bmpd.livejournal.com/3935520.html

[Jarhead0331]

^it must be cold for her to be wearing that Papakha inside.

[Crossroads]

Chemical weapons here we go then. That did not take long  :(

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1580168586626494465.html

(yes, "only" tear gas, but read the thread)

[JasonPratt]

Well if deploying one kind of WMD might get your entire remaining force, air land and sea, blotted out of reality 48 hours later by conventional super-power, try deploying another kind of WMD I guess... ask Saddam how well that worked for him.  :P

(I fully encourage Putin meeting with Saddam on this to compare notes, soon.  >:D Though come to think of it, his replacement options look even worse than he is...)

[JasonPratt]

After Russia failed to sail a private vote on the matter, the public UN vote has been made.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/143-un-countries-vote-to-condemn-russia-s-annexation-of-ukrainian-territory/ar-AA12TyJ4?ocid=entnewsntp&pc=U531&cvid=892b44fd9f36432daf9811d1caff4d70

The negative votes, as pretty much expected from prior diplomatic signals, were Russia, Belarus, North Korea, Syria, and Nicaragua.

33 nations abstained however, including India, China, Cuba, Vietnam, and Pakistan.

No doubt the Russians will take this under advisement.  ::) (To be fair, I kind of prefer the UN to be practically useless for anything other than being a diplomatic middle-ground.)

And yes, I have that line from Hans Gruber in Die Hard in mind, but I'm lazy this morning so I didn't try to find a snapshot meme.

[JasonPratt]

Not much new here from the Daily Mail (via MSN which has way less pop-up ads than the Mail -- I checked. ;) )

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/us-supplied-underwater-drone-may-have-caused-crimean-bridge-explosion-military-analysts-claim/ar-AA12Sz0H?ocid=entnewsntp&pc=U531&cvid=892b44fd9f36432daf9811d1caff4d70

Two bits of information: 1. there's no sign of a crater in the bridge, which would be expected from a truck bomb that size. (I hadn't heard or seen anyone talk about that before.)

2. this is the second time I've seen the report of 5 Russians and 3 remaining mix of Ukrainian and Armenian (supposed) suspects arrested, now changed to 5 Ukrainians and a mix of 3 of the other 2.

The first time I saw it (in another article this morning I haven't posted because it had no new information at all otherwise), I thought it might be a typo. It still might be a typo being propagated from a shared source (perhaps the underlying Russian source report). But it smacks of Russian disinformation: the first report looked too embarrassing, like they were even trying to hide that they only arrested one Ukrainian but a strong majority of Russians. So now they changed it to arresting 5 Uks and maybe only one Russian (while similarly hinting there were two Russians arrested which they're trying to 'hide'.)

[ArizonaTank]

Chemical weapons here we go then. That did not take long  :(

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1580168586626494465.html

(yes, "only" tear gas, but read the thread)

I could be completely wrong, but I just don't see the Russians opening the bottle on the 'green genie' as a tactical weapon.

Without proper training, support and coordination, chem weapons can be just as dangerous to your own forces as they are to the enemy.

But maybe I am over thinking this. The Russians are starting to send in barely trained infantrymen...and they don't seem to care these guys are walking into a meatgrinder. So maybe the Russians don't care that in a gas attack some of their own guys do the 'chokin chicken' along with the Ukrainians.

The terrifying thought is that the Russians use chem weapons to go after civilian targets.

[Gusington]

Thanks D...I did not know the history between Poland and Belarus. If Lukashenko really thinks Putin will help him in any meaningful way against Poland I have a bridge to sell him.

I was also going to say 'nice hair hat' to the above...thing.

[Sir Slash]

Do you get the feeling maybe Putin's really a secret Western agent planted decades ago to one day totally destroy Russia when the time was right?    I bet his real name is something like, 'Bernie Schwartz' and he was born in Philly.

[Gusington]

^That cover name is dangerously close to my Gramps' name. Putin is not my Gramps.

[GDS_Starfury]

why Bernie Schwartz?   why not Malcom Richardson?

[Gusington]

Why not Gladys Pimpernel?