Russia's War Against Ukraine

[JasonPratt]

Not much new to see here, but discusses some stats and capabilities on each platform. Might connect some dots for other people...? Does (seem to) have the advantage of the guy having walked the deck of the Moskva personally during a good will tour years ago.

The video shows a very clear side-shot of the smokestack, by the way, for comparison to the ship being blasted, illustrating Tripoli's comparison even better.

Meanwhile, I agree obviously that can't be the Moskva being hit in the video. For one thing, it was night-time, right? -- not only a heavy storm (also missing)? (I'm not totally sure about the night-time, but I've seen that several places, including "Sub Brief" again.) Then who exactly would have phone-filmed and uploaded it?? This is aside from design problems mentioned by Tripoli, to which I'd add the total lack 'fck-off carrier!' missile tubes on the side. ;) There should also be a.... well, not sure what that is, kind of like a large globe, on the back of the Moskva, not at all there for the ship being sunk-ex'd.

[ComradeP]

I was wondering whether that footage might have been from the earlier missile strike, but the ship the Ukrainians hit in Berdyansk was an Alligator-class LST that was berthed and not at sea.

[GDS_Starfury]

some really interesting heat maps.

[Tripoli]

Not much new to see here, but discusses some stats and capabilities on each platform. Might connect some dots for other people...? Does (seem to) have the advantage of the guy having walked the deck of the Moskva personally during a good will tour years ago.

The video shows a very clear side-shot of the smokestack, by the way, for comparison to the ship being blasted, illustrating Tripoli's comparison even better.

Meanwhile, I agree obviously that can't be the Moskva being hit in the video. For one thing, it was night-time, right? -- not only a heavy storm (also missing)? (I'm not totally sure about the night-time, but I've seen that several places, including "Sub Brief" again.) Then who exactly would have phone-filmed and uploaded it?? This is aside from design problems mentioned by Tripoli, to which I'd add the total lack 'fck-off carrier!' missile tubes on the side. ;) There should also be a.... well, not sure what that is, kind of like a large globe, on the back of the Moskva, not at all there for the ship being sunk-ex'd.

The globe/cupcakie-looking thing is the "TOP DOME" FCR for the SS-N-6 SAM missiles.  https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/russia/top-dome.htm.  The "Sub Brief" Youtube channel is a good open source for Naval information.  The guy who runs it is a retired enlisted USN submariner (I believe he was a sonarman), and he has good insight on undersea warfare topics.

[ArizonaTank]

and another Russian general killed...

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/another-russian-general-has-been-killed-in-ukraine/ar-AAWi2iw?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=c59b6cb8c33949678f0b6a3966442d8f

[GDS_Starfury]

 <:-)

[GDS_Starfury]

can someone lay it down barney style as to why Kaliningrad is a thing.

[Pete Dero]

can someone lay it down barney style as to why Kaliningrad is a thing.

Translation of a article in french (https://www.rtbf.be/article/geopolitique-et-guerre-en-ukraine-kaliningrad-et-le-corridor-de-sulwalki-deux-grands-points-faibles-de-lotan-10975442)


Geopolitics and war in Ukraine: Kaliningrad and the Suwalki "corridor", two major weak points of NATO?

The railway line is the last that carries passengers in operation between Russian territory and that of the European Union. Until the end of March, there was also the Saint-Petersburg–Helsinki, high-speed train linking the two cities in three and a half hours . But the Finnish railway company stopped running it. The Moscow-Kaliningrad continues. 100 trains per month still connect the two cities, according to a route that passes through Minsk, in Belarus.

Kaliningrad... Where does this territorial curiosity come from? This little piece of Russia wedged between the Baltic Sea, Lithuania and Poland? About 15,000 km2 of Russia (a little less than half the area of ​​Belgium) which is also a serious thorn in the side for NATO. An oblast – Russian administrative region – of high strategic value, full of weapons, whose threat hangs over the future of this war in Ukraine.


An "exclave" with historical contours

A small million inhabitants live in the Kaliningrad Oblast. This land has a rich history. Land of the Teutonic Knights in the 13th century, they founded Prussia there. In 1807, this is where the Treaty of Tilsit was signed, between the French Empire and Tsar Alexander. The city on the Nemen is now called Sovetsk.

The main city of this territory is Königsberg. A "king's mountain" (named in honor of Ottokar II of Bohemia), inherited from the Crusades, strongly defended, which flourished over the centuries.

A prosperous city, an important trading port, it would become the capital of Eastern Prussia. Being part of German territory, it is the birthplace of the great philosopher Emmanuel Kant as well as many doctors and mathematicians. Main city of a region of German culture, they will both fall into the Soviet fold after the Second World War.


Window on the Baltic...

Following the Yalta and then Potsdam agreements in 1945 , the USSR was thus to be awarded the northern part of this German East Prussia. The south will be for Poland. Königsberg is renamed Kaliningrad. Named after Michaïl Kalinine, figurehead of the Supreme Soviet between 1919 and 1946. The German population was driven out of the territory (oblast which also took the name of its capital, as is customary) and replaced by Russians. 80% of the inhabitants are now of Russian origin. Stalin wants to make the city a Soviet model city.

After a brief independence and crushed resistance, the Baltic countries are annexed by Stalin as Soviet socialist republics.

Kaliningrad Oblast, for its part directly attached to Soviet Russia, was to become, during the Cold War, the headquarters of the Russian fleet in the Baltic. A strategic outpost, also called "Little Russia" far from being devoid of interest, because the main ports of the region (Kaliningrad and Baltiisk – formerly Pillau-), unlike other large Russian ports overlooking the Baltic, St. Petersburg (then Leningrad) or Kronstadt, are ice-free all year round. Closed to foreigners and even to a majority of Soviets, "Little Russia", it lives on oil and amber .

Suddenly, in 1991, everything changes. The Soviet Union implodes. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania gain independence, Poland leaves the bosom of the Warsaw Pact, a new era begins. Kaliningrad becomes isolated from the rest of the territory of the Russian Federation. The "enclave" becomes "exclave".


...And on Europe

To remedy this, and as the time has passed for the Cold War, the local authorities thought in the 1990s of making the area a kind of "Hong Kong on the Baltic". Moscow does not hear it that way. It fears separatist desires and would like to continue to benefit from its geographical and strategic position in the heart of northern Europe. It will however reduce military contingent and armament. The oblast becomes a defensive counter.

We are trying to develop tourism in Kaliningrad in the course of the 2000s , we are celebrating the 750th anniversary of its erection, we are even playing World Cup matches there in 2018.

But since 2014 and the capture of Crimea by Vladimir Putin, the time of tensions has indeed returned... In the meantime, the European Union has extended to the Baltic and Eastern countries and NATO is getting closer, also little by little also from Moscow...


Arsenal

The Kremlin will strengthen its control over the oblast. And we're going to remilitarize it. S-400 missiles, an anti-aircraft defense system with a range of 400 km are present. Ballistic missiles with Iskander nuclear warheads were deployed in the exclave five years ago . These have a range of 500 km and can therefore affect large parts of Poland, Sweden, and the Baltic countries.

NATO, meanwhile, wants to be reassuring towards the countries of the region (American anti-missile shield, military contingents on the spot, etc.). Exercises were conducted by the organization. The Russians showed their muscles during the ZAPAD exercises in 2017 (troops in Russia, Belarus and Kaliningrad). On February 8, the Russians deployed MIG 314 aircraft carrying hypersonic missiles to the enclave. These would have a range of... 2400 km.

A Russian strategic bastion on the Baltic coast , Kaliningrad would contain today 30,000 men.


The Suwalki Corridor

This largely misunderstood "Suwalki Corridor" is currently in the spotlight. Because it is a famous weak link for NATO. 35 kilometers long, it is located on either side of the border between Lithuania and Poland . This area, named after a Polish town near the border, is also the shortest point between the enclave of Kaliningrad and Belarus.

Thus, if they had the idea of ​​continuing the war in Europe, for the Russians, conquering this "corridor", with its rural aspects of small green hills, would be of a use... more than not negligible... Because if Moscow succeeds in territorially linking Kaliningrad to its faithful Belarusian ally, the Baltic States would be, de facto, isolated from Poland, and therefore from the rest of NATO. From NATO but also from the European Union.


Isolation

This scenario is the nightmare of the Baltic States. They would find themselves on an island , as aid could only be provided by air or by sea. Not so simple, especially since Sweden and Finland (the port of Helsinki is opposite that of Tallinn, Estonia), are still not members of NATO. Stockholm and Helsinki are in deep reflection at the moment regarding a possible future within the Atlantic alliance . The Lithuanians, like their close neighbours, are in panic fear of suffering the fate of Ukraine and seeing the Russians invade them again.


Lithuania and barbed wire

A junction between Belarus, whose troops are massed on the border, in Lida, and an over-armed Kaliningrad oblast which worries Vilnius a lot. The Lithuanian authorities fear an even greater reinforcement of Russian troops in Kaliningrad after the operations in Ukraine.

Shelters are set up for civilians, sirens tested, Russian media banned ... We are preparing in Lithuania and locking the Belarusian border. As this border guard commander told the Arte teams , 23 kilometers of barbed wire have already been installed and 17 kilometers already well fenced. The barrier was originally a device built to prevent the passage of migrants following the crisis between Europe and Belarus late last year .

Now the goal has changed. And it is towards the east and the tanks coming from the Belarusian and Russian plains that the Baltic eyes, worried, are turned...


Threats at sea

But not only. They are also turned towards Kaliningrad, a veritable powder keg in the center of the region, from which could come military attacks, but also attempts at destabilization (with cyberattacks, disinformation, manipulation of Russian-speaking minorities, etc.). A kind of "hybrid war" led by Moscow against NATO.

The region is therefore of crucial strategic importance. Moscow uses Kaliningrad and its armaments (including nuclear weapons) to put pressure on NATO. A threat due to history, on the shores of the calm waters of the Baltic...

[GDS_Starfury]

I love being immature!

celebrating the 750th anniversary of its erection

must have been quite the erection!  :bd:  <:-)  :DD

[MengJiao]

I love being immature!

celebrating the 750th anniversary of its erection

must have been quite the erection!  :bd:  <:-)  :DD

  Meanwhile -- Zelensky may be worried that the Russians are going to declare victory and a ceasefire and then sit where they are (assuming they get Mariupol soon) and demand that
Ukraine negotiate on those terms.  If the Russians were wise (and that hasn't happened lately) they could do that.  It doesn't sound great, but it would put Ukraine in a bad position since
they would seem to be the ones bent on continuing the war (and they would be) and the burden of an offensive would be on them.  This would be a good short-term stop for the Russians
and they could even possibly back out of the whole mess without losing too much except the neutrality of Ukraine, Finland and Sweden and an unimaginable amount of prestige and maybe being
kicked out of the UN Security Council.  Still, the smart thing for the Russians (and I'm sure Zelensky can see this) would be to stop now.  Will they stop?  Probably not and they run the risk
of total collapse on all fronts even if they take most of the Donbas just before that happens.



  From CNN: Zelensky: Civilian deaths and Mariupol assault makes talks with Russia unlikely

Russia's unrelenting assault on the city of Mariupol and the likely discovery of more Russian crimes against civilians will make further diplomatic talks impossible, said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Saturday.

"The destruction of all our guys in Mariupol -- what they are doing now -- can put an end to any format of negotiations," he said, according to an article posted on the presidential website.
It added that while Zelensky was open to discussions with Russian President Vladimir Putin, that is becoming less likely as Russia continues to escalate its war. If more apparent Russian war crimes surface, "there will be no chance that negotiations will be held," Zelensky said.

The article was titled: "The more Russia escalates, the less likely the President of Ukraine is to negotiate."

[GDS_Starfury]

I want!

[Gusington]

^You mean that shot wasn't taken in your living room?

[ArizonaTank]

I want some of those new Ukrainian postage stamps with a Ukrainian soldier giving the 'Snake Island Salute' to the Moskva...

https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/russia-ukraine-latest-news-2022-04-14/card/russian-warship-moskva-is-featured-in-new-ukrainian-postage-stamp-6qEW3wsyWdSsEP7CeVWq

But looks like they are wildly popular in the Ukraine so may be hard to get.

https://www.voanews.com/a/russian-warship-stamp-becomes-collector-s-item-in-ukraine-/6531713.html

[JasonPratt]

more than not negligible

This Franglish phrase could replace "progress is being occurred" as my favorite semi-English quip of all time! (I realize, as a geek, that "All your base are belong to us" should always be in the top five; so it's still #3.  :nerd: )


More seriously, ohhhhh -- I thought that might be a leftover piece of East Germany somehow, but I didn't realize it was directly assigned as a piece of Russia so far back as 1945. (?? really? is that right?!) Also I didn't realize it actually included Konigsberg -- I thought it was just really close next door to it (sort of like Danzig and Gdansk). Probably because I thought Kalinin was a distinct city up there somewhere in the Baltic already before WW2. (I wonder why I thought that...?)

[bobarossa]

I imagine the soviets wanted at least one piece of former German territory to piss on.