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Kiev Is Burning


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5 minutes ago, crazyinsane105 said:

Finland’s geography sucks for an invader, but the same will apply if they wanted to invade Russia. A huge chunk of their land is covered in forests and not necessarily suitable for large scale armored maneuvers or supply convoys, so the actual threat to the Russian mainland isn’t as substantial as people seem to think. 

Russia has no reasons to fear invasions. Irrelevance OTOH...

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54 minutes ago, Huba said:

Some news from the NATO summit:

"Tanks" is a translation mistake, the meant French VABs. Still, not too shabby at all, RU artillery dominance will soon be no more :)

 

Where is NATO getting 500 artillery systems and 600 tanks? Is this list including everything to date?

aedit: ok, VABs not tanks. But 500 artillery?

Edited by Josh
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25 minutes ago, Josh said:

Where is NATO getting 500 artillery systems and 600 tanks? Is this list including everything to date?

Like I mentioned, it's not about tanks but VABs - apparently French are bad at English, shocker, isn't it? :D
And regarding the artillery systems, if Uncle Sam decides to step in, 500 would dent the stockpile of older M109 and M198, but hardly exhaust it. France itself has around 200 AMX-30 Auf1 in storage, and a lot of towed pieces too. Also it might include the 105mm systems, UK already pledged 50 M119 bought from the market, a bunch of Kiwis is training Ukrainians soldiers on them in UK.

If we look closer, there appears to be quite a lot of older stuff lying around.

Edit: but in fact all those numbers come primarily from Biden's speech, there wasn't any more details yet, so it's a bit unclear what the numbers actually mean. But regarding the artillery systems, the total number of pieces delivered or pledges previously was already above 400, so the 500 would hardly be something to brag about.

Edit2: the "armoured vehicles" part is also unclear, probably won't consist only of VABs, as LAVs are on the way too:

 

Edited by Huba
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Artillery donations are already 400? I know the US probably accounts for I20-150 but the devs and drabs from everything else didn’t seem to be 200+.
 

fair point about M198/109; there probably are even mothballed M109A6 post A7 upgrade.

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21 minutes ago, Josh said:

Artillery donations are already 400? I know the US probably accounts for I20-150 but the devs and drabs from everything else didn’t seem to be 200+.
 

fair point about M198/109; there probably are even mothballed M109A6 post A7 upgrade.

I recommend this guy's page, it lists everything very nicely https://jamesrushton.substack.com/p/western-heavy-materiel-support-to

-  he's missing 50 M119s made official today. On top of that we have:

- 72 Krabs (18 donated, 54 being build, probably will go from Polish army active stock anyway)

- 18 PzH2000

- 8 Zuzana

- at least 42 M109s

- at least 10 FH70, probably many more

- 18 (or is it 24 already?) CAESAR

- and of course 126 M777

After recounting, it adds up to  ~350, so a bit fewer then I thought, but if you add 2S1s and Danas , we reach 400 easily.

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1 hour ago, Huba said:

Like I mentioned, it's not about tanks but VABs - apparently French are bad at English, shocker, isn't it? :D
And regarding the artillery systems, if Uncle Sam decides to step in, 500 would dent the stockpile of older M109 and M198, but hardly exhaust it. France itself has around 200 AMX-30 Auf1 in storage, and a lot of towed pieces too. Also it might include the 105mm systems, UK already pledged 50 M119 bought from the market, a bunch of Kiwis is training Ukrainians soldiers on them in UK.

If we look closer, there appears to be quite a lot of older stuff lying around.

Edit: but in fact all those numbers come primarily from Biden's speech, there wasn't any more details yet, so it's a bit unclear what the numbers actually mean. But regarding the artillery systems, the total number of pieces delivered or pledges previously was already above 400, so the 500 would hardly be something to brag about.

Edit2: the "armoured vehicles" part is also unclear, probably won't consist only of VABs, as LAVs are on the way too:

 

armored-combat-support-vehicles-acsvs.jp

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I thought all you Euros would have learned about entangling alliances from the mass slaughters of previous continental wars.  And yet you keep doing the same stupid shit.  S/F....Ken M  

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9 hours ago, EchoFiveMike said:

I thought all you Euros would have learned about entangling alliances from the mass slaughters of previous continental wars.  And yet you keep doing the same stupid shit.  S/F....Ken M  

Uh, and what 'mass slaughter' are you talking about? Russia is unable to crush Ukraine, one of the poorer countries in Europe, and all it took to achieve it was modest and indirect Western help. The only 'entangling alliance' of 'the Euros' is the one with the United States and thank the nonexistent gods for that, without it we wouldn't find our own ass with two hands. Modern Russia isn't an enemy of the Kaiser's/Nazi Germany's or USSR's caliber. Sure, they can kill the planet or... do fuck all. The purpose of this shitshow is to bury their imperial ambitions and reduce them to near-irrelevance and on the whole it's being done rather cheaply.

ETA: Kaiser's Germany obviously, not Weimar, had a late night brainfart.

Edited by urbanoid
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1 hour ago, EchoFiveMike said:

I thought all you Euros would have learned about entangling alliances from the mass slaughters of previous continental wars.  And yet you keep doing the same stupid shit.  S/F....Ken M  

Some of ours will suffer Cassandra's fate, on top of that.

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3 hours ago, EchoFiveMike said:

I thought all you Euros would have learned about entangling alliances from the mass slaughters of previous continental wars.  And yet you keep doing the same stupid shit.  S/F....Ken M  

It seems safer when there are no dissenting voices and everyone is doing it. It reeks of fun in the Euro Capitals. 

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2 hours ago, urbanoid said:

Uh, and what 'mass slaughter' are you talking about? Russia is unable to crush Ukraine, one of the poorer countries in Europe, and all it took to achieve it was modest and indirect Western help. The only 'entangling alliance' of 'the Euros' is the one with the United States and thank the nonexistent gods for that, without it we wouldn't find our own ass with two hands. Modern Russia isn't an enemy of the Weimar/Nazi Germany's or USSR's caliber. Sure, they can kill the planet or... do fuck all. The purpose of this shitshow is to bury their imperial ambitions and reduce them to near-irrelevance and on the whole it's being done rather cheaply.

Not unable to crush Ukraine, just going about it with one hand tied behind their back. They have committed a limited amount of their forces and air forces. The Russian plan b seems to primarily be a frontal assault of the most heavily defended area of the front, namely Donbass. They began the war with around 130-150k troops, and indications are they have substantially increased personnel flow. The Ukrainians had around 220k in the regular army and 300k in the territorial defense at the star;  and since been supported by complete western intelligence as well as increasing material support. 

I agree, "the how" the Russians are conducting their war has me scratching my head and it appears weak and misguided. The Ukrainians also appear inept and unorganized. With that, you hit on a point. I would argue the main reason the Ruskies were able to defeat the Nazis was due to virtually unlimited allied material support. It also appears the USSR threat was also sheer numbers. I don't think it was ever expected the Red Army would be able to out maneuver Nato. It was expected that the Red Army would be able to make good losses quicker.

With all that, the destruction or removal of "Russia's ambitions" has not occurred as of yet. The war appears far from over. Russian leadership is stating they are still in the game. I would argue the risk increases the longer the war drags on. 

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5 hours ago, EchoFiveMike said:

I thought all you Euros would have learned about entangling alliances from the mass slaughters of previous continental wars.  And yet you keep doing the same stupid shit.  S/F....Ken M  

What is your recommendation?

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5 hours ago, urbanoid said:

Uh, and what 'mass slaughter' are you talking about? Russia is unable to crush Ukraine, one of the poorer countries in Europe, and all it took to achieve it was modest and indirect Western help. The only 'entangling alliance' of 'the Euros' is the one with the United States and thank the nonexistent gods for that, without it we wouldn't find our own ass with two hands. Modern Russia isn't an enemy of the Weimar/Nazi Germany's or USSR's caliber. Sure, they can kill the planet or... do fuck all. The purpose of this shitshow is to bury their imperial ambitions and reduce them to near-irrelevance and on the whole it's being done rather cheaply.

+1

Russia is being decimated on the cheap, and all NATO had to do was dust off some old equipment and empty some equipment warehouses.

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2 hours ago, Josh said:

+1

Russia is being decimated on the cheap, and all NATO had to do was dust off some old equipment and empty some equipment warehouses.

And NATO is being decimated on the Cheap. Britain gives another Billion pounds to Ukraine, but its not funding its Army to the same degree. Its entirely possible that the British Army will be undeployable for a generation, because of the kit we are dropping on Ukraine. Im seeing no serious intent to replace the NLAW's and Javelin's we just passed over.

By contrast, Russia still has masses of kit that it moved to the East of the Ural mountains in the 1980's. They still have lots of stupid young men to throw into battle. They still have masses of 152mm rounds. We really must get over the idea that Russia is no longer a problem. This is going to be a generational security problem, till NATO starts funding a proper defensive prospect against Russia, and Russia finally decides to reject the paranoid oligarchy it calls a leadership.

I noticed on CNN, the pledge to stand up 300000 troops in the East was swiftly abandoned. Supposedly it got the drop on a number of European nations, and nobody stepped up to fulfill it. Its been successfully fudged on the back of the new members, but what is the point of having Finland as a NATO member, unless there are NATO members that can defend it?

 

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12 minutes ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

I noticed on CNN, the pledge to stand up 300000 troops in the East was swiftly abandoned. Supposedly it got the drop on a number of European nations, and nobody stepped up to fulfill it. Its been successfully fudged on the back of the new members, but what is the point of having Finland as a NATO member, unless there are NATO members that can defend it?

There wasn't any plan to "stand up 300,000 troops in the East", just to put that number into high alert categories equivalent to or exceeding NRF's, and at least locally that's the new base of business - 1st Panzer Division will be the framework formation with one Dutch and two German mechanized brigades plus an airmobile unit rotating through 10, 30 and 50 days readiness for the Baltic States (and that's Notice to Effect, not To Move as previously). Also about 60-65 aircraft and 20 naval vessels. Where did you see that was abandoned?

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9 minutes ago, BansheeOne said:

There wasn't any plan to "stand up 300,000 troops in the East", just to put that number into high alert categories equivalent to or exceeding NRF's, and at least locally that's the new base of business - 1st Panzer Division will be the framework formation with one Dutch and two German mechanized brigades plus an airmobile unit rotating through 10, 30 and 50 days readiness for the Baltic States (and that's Notice to Effect, not To Move as previously). Also about 60-65 aircraft and 20 naval vessels. Where did you see that was abandoned?

On CNN (No snickering at the back there!). They were claiming that it had planned to stand up troops in the region of 300000 that could be based semi permamently to the east, but that after discussion it had been decided that there would be no further troops raised, and stuch troops as they were would be based in their home countries.

I will admit I was working at the time and only heard it in passing, but as far as the surprise among NATO nations, the Washington Post seems to have confirmed it. Nobody really knew what 300000 was, or where exactly it was coming from.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/06/29/those-300000-high-readiness-nato-troops-concept-not-reality/

Stoltenberg’s announcement caught the top defense officials of many NATO members off guard, leading them to question which of their forces, if any, were being included in the 300,000 figure.

“Maybe it’s number magic?” said one senior European defense official, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk frankly about the confusion.

 

Several senior European security policymakers said they were taken by surprise, with no advance notice of the plan to expand NATO’s quick-response force from its current size of 40,000 in light of the Ukraine war and Russia’s ongoing military threats to NATO territory.

A senior defense official from a different alliance country said its leaders had not been consulted about the figure ahead of time. The official wondered which of his nation’s troops were being counted toward the force — and whether it included personnel from a volunteer national guard who have civilian day jobs.

Asked at a news conference on Wednesday about the mystery of the missing troops, Stoltenberg said the “majority” will be based inside their home countries and will build on existing personnel — code, in some ways, for simply reclassifying troops that currently exist and making them more available for fast deployment under NATO command in the event of a security crisis.

 

Abandoned was bad grammar on my part. The exact word I think CNN used was 'Backpeddling', which seems about right.

 

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15 hours ago, alejandro_ said:

Is there any way of confirming that Bogdana used a 155mm gun. Sole prototype (see matching cammo below) seemed to use a 2A65 gun derivative and a D-20 muzzle brake.

8935946_original.jpg

Detali-pro-2S22-Bogdana-1024x768.jpg

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14 hours ago, Huba said:

Some news from the NATO summit:

"Tanks" is a translation mistake, the meant French VABs. Still, not too shabby at all, RU artillery dominance will soon be no more :)

 

Is there any details on +50 countries and weapons type / quantity

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14 minutes ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

On CNN (No snickering at the back there!). They were claiming that it had planned to stand up troops in the region of 300000 that could be based semi permamently to the east, but that after discussion it had been decided that there would be no further troops raised, and stuch troops as they were would be based in their home countries.

I will admit I was working at the time and only heard it in passing, but as far as the surprise among NATO nations, the Washington Post seems to have confirmed it. Nobody really knew what 300000 was, or where exactly it was coming from.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/06/29/those-300000-high-readiness-nato-troops-concept-not-reality/

Stoltenberg’s announcement caught the top defense officials of many NATO members off guard, leading them to question which of their forces, if any, were being included in the 300,000 figure.

“Maybe it’s number magic?” said one senior European defense official, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk frankly about the confusion.

 

Several senior European security policymakers said they were taken by surprise, with no advance notice of the plan to expand NATO’s quick-response force from its current size of 40,000 in light of the Ukraine war and Russia’s ongoing military threats to NATO territory.

A senior defense official from a different alliance country said its leaders had not been consulted about the figure ahead of time. The official wondered which of his nation’s troops were being counted toward the force — and whether it included personnel from a volunteer national guard who have civilian day jobs.

Asked at a news conference on Wednesday about the mystery of the missing troops, Stoltenberg said the “majority” will be based inside their home countries and will build on existing personnel — code, in some ways, for simply reclassifying troops that currently exist and making them more available for fast deployment under NATO command in the event of a security crisis.

 

Abandoned was bad grammar on my part. The exact word I think CNN used was 'Backpeddling', which seems about right.

 

NRF, either the current 40k or the planned 300k soldiers, isn't deployed 'to the front' in peacetime, those are just high readiness forces - there will be more of them and that's all. Looks like some journo assumed they will be sent East and now is arguing with himself.

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