Russia's War Against Ukraine

[SirAndrewD]

Considering the Russians are taking T-62's out of mothballs at increasing rates, I'd imagine even the old 105's should do pretty well. 

[GDS_Starfury]

and that their ERA is filled with wood or rubber...

[Crossroads]

Every good Dictator drops a bomb or two on his people on occasion just to let them know...I AM WATCHING. 

I've seen quite a few mil twitters posting what happened was a guided bomb failing to expand its winglets while being targeted to fly towards Kharkiv. RuAF mostly flies over friendly territory for launches, but why they chose to launch above a city is anyone's guess.

Now there's been a second bomb found in Belgorod, of similar build it seems. If so, apparently it failed to get its winglets out, and not only that, then failed to detonate on top of the previous failure.

Ignorance is bliss, they say. Apparently, utter incompetence can be bliss, too.

[GDS_Starfury]

https://twitter.com/i/status/1650026456540409856

[Crossroads]

Charming.

Also a good reminder the propaganda they spout is for internal consumption with little regard how it is seen in Europe or in the US. Seems to work well too, unfortunately. Everyone's attacking poor Russia.

https://twitter.com/TheKremlinYap/status/1650018439761674240

[GDS_Starfury]

without nukes this would have been done with last summer.

[GDS_Starfury]

found this to be a pretty good summation of things.

https://twitter.com/BrynnTannehill/status/1650152039421296642

[FarAway Sooner]

Ukrainians are announcing that they've established a presence on the Eastern shore of the Dnipro River near Kherson. 

https://www.businessinsider.com/ukraine-established-positions-east-bank-of-dnipro-river-isw-2023-4

The released footage was supposedly taken on 4/18.  I have three thoughts about the Ukrainians' announcement of this:

1) The bridgehead is now sufficiently expanded that they feel confident that they can hold it against Russian counterattack.

2) It's fake news, intended to create more background noise for the Russian intel operations but of no other consequence.

3) The Ukrainians are announcing this in an effort to sucker the Russians westward, with an eye towards attacking somewhere else.

From where I stand, pushing the Russians out of the southwestern portion of Kherson Oblast is a win (any liberation of territory is a win), and it does get them closer to Crimea, it's among the least strategically important pieces of the current conflict.  I don't expect Ukraine to chase the Russians out of Ukraine this year (or ever, really, although I can always hope).  But the real military victories come not from seizing land but from cutting off Russian military units (or at least threatening to cut them off).

[GDS_Starfury]

from what Ive been seeing its option 2 and 3.

[FarAway Sooner]

Yeah.  That post by Tannehill was very specific and very detailed.  I've not had the patience to plow through Twitter trying to separate the wheat from the chaff, but she seems to make very detailed and specific points. 

It's interesting to note that Zaphorizia could be the jumping-off point for almost any of the attacks.

It's also interesting to me how much military analysis lends itself to systems theory analysis.  It's not just about stocks (e.g., how many soldiers, how many weapons), but it's also about flows (logistics:  ammunition, replacements, etc.) and the likely bottlenecks in those flows. 

[GDS_Starfury]

https://www.19fortyfive.com/2023/04/artillery-paradox-how-ukraine-does-more-damage-with-fewer-rounds-than-russia/

[Crossroads]

Waffen ZZ gonna Waffen ZZ

https://twitter.com/DGisSERIOUS/status/1650284788706684929

[JasonPratt]

"First, with an iron hand crush the enemy classes..." 

[Sir Slash]

Like they ever, 'captured' an enemy prisoner. 

[FarAway Sooner]

Yeah.  My understanding is that this was framed in response to a broadcast clip of captured audio where two Ukrainian soldiers were saying that they were going to execute a POW.  I'm sure that Prigozhin was totally respecting every miniscule detail of the Geneva Convention prior to that...