Kiev Is Burning

[Josh]

41 minutes ago, Strannik said:

I find the reasons, sounded so many times, fir almost two years now, quite self serving.

Europe is supposedly allocated untold billions, so $5-6 blns in jets/training/support/munitions is not a huge sum.  Washington already as crossed many red lines, but was reluctant to pool provide few hundred M1s?

Either they are generally afraid Rus go nuclear (in UA) and according to your much earlier statements:

1. They are not afraid of this escalation 

2. Would benefit West anyway

OR

there is something else here.

P.S.

Even if one buys reluctance re: F-35, what about providing 5-600 M1s and 1500 M2s?

 

There are plenty of people in the US that are very underwhelmed with the Administration's equipment donations as well, both in terms of quantity and quality. I certainly would have begun the training process for donated M1s and F16s from the start had I been in charge, and I don't see why most any M1 or M2 in storage shouldn't be donated - there is no shortage and new vehicles are still in production for the M1. The M2/3 lives on sorta as the AMPV, though there isn't a modern turreted version.

[Strannik]

34 minutes ago, glenn239 said:

I think on the M1's they were afraid that they'd get plinked for bad PR, like happened to the Leopards.

Yes, that was a theory in a kerfuffle when Scholtz was saying "we will send ours if you send yours".  But M2s got plinked anyway  so why so relatively few?

[Roman Alymov]

RusMarines Lancet vs. Caesar SPG (second video) https://t.me/boris_rozhin/105738

[Strannik]

20 minutes ago, Josh said:

There are plenty of people in the US that are very underwhelmed with the Administration's equipment donations as well, both in terms of quantity and quality. I certainly would have begun the training process for donated M1s and F16s from the start had I been in charge, and I don't see why most any M1 or M2 in storage shouldn't be donated - there is no shortage and new vehicles are still in production for the M1. The M2/3 lives on sorta as the AMPV, though there isn't a modern turreted version.

So this makes me think that US admin was/is afraid of Rus going nuc and not by not responding (and I think all of you who think that US would military respond are living in another world) to that looking weak and opening NATO 5th article doubts.  No other logical explanation, short of exotic ones.

[Strannik]

Btw, the serious Rus/UA mil experts all agree that the recent big WP article is basically a "we gave the natives good stuff and told how/when to use it and yet they did not listen and screw it up" blame game piece.

With the only caveat that Bachmut was a waste and took a very serious toll on UA veteran forces.

Edited December 6, 2023 by Strannik

[glenn239]

15 hours ago, Josh said:

Let us simply hope we never see it.

War seems fairly certain should the United States insist upon itself in Taiwan.  The question I guess then is whether it would prove a serious one, or a passing fancy.  

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The Ukraine war exposed a wealth of weaknesses, some easily/already fixed, some in progress that will take some time, and some that show technological and political/military cultural limitations that likely cannot be fully addressed.

Of course, hard lessons learned is why the Russian military will emerge stronger from the war than when it entered it.  These doctrinal lessons are far more important than the loss of some thousands of tanks.

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My view is that increasing weapons performance in terms of speed, accuracy, and automation is going to favor the side that can more rapidly identify targets and dispense PGMs to deal with them.

Mine is that the West does too much supposing about war as an elegant Samurai sword fight, and not enough of it as a down and dirty Monty Python Battle of Pearl Harbor reenactment.

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Even if we assume Russia undergoes some kind of military revolution in UAVs, its weakness in ISR above the tactical level is on full display. Say what you will about US logistical bloat (which I agree is a thing), but is efforts to diversify and expand its ISR, C3, and PNT capabilities are broad and bearing fruit.

All of NATO's intelligence gathering abilities will be in play in Ukraine already.

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The US has already tested Tranch 0 of its L band Link 16 satellites than will connect its future com layer satellites down to the individual platform level. It has AI systems developed to map its own communications network, detect latencies and failures, and map around them with cross links. It is fully linking its transport satellite layer to the existing commercial EO providers so their content can be downloaded via link 16 in near real time, and having AIs process all the resulting data for targets, prioritize them, and create fire plans based on known available resources. Russia is operating on two cups connected by a string in comparison.

That's quite the paragraph, ending with you talking of Russian communications and satellite capabilities, but for some reason not the Sino-Russian ones.  The Russians cannot possibly compete with the USA in these fields, that's why they are partnering with the Chinese. 

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But even assuming they are built in bulk, ground launching these munitions gives them a short range and their low speed means they aren't especially hard targets for point defense weapons (the Western ones as well). You see it as revolutionary development and potentially air force neutralizing*; I think it is an evolving threat that can be managed.

One F-35 costs about as much as 2,800 Lancet type drones.  IMO, there is no air defense capability that's making up for that disparity in basic costs.  

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The bigger risk in my mind is to front line ground forces rather than air forces. Increasingly smaller, cheaper UAVs that also can be given sufficient automation mean they hit soft or even armored targets randomly all over the FLOT, within their endurance/range. It likely will be perfectly cost effective to expend a single micro UAV per soldier in the future. That seems more game changing than smart moped drones to me.

These drones are currently being used in raids of up to maybe 80.  But the cheap production costs allow for that to scale to raids of 800, even 8,000, once production means permit.  So, in your paragraph above you are asking to pick between two options, but this is a false choice.   An S-400 battery costs 600 million.  If they build two less S-400 batteries and use the money to build drones instead, that's about 60,000 drones.   
 

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* Would US autonomous UAVs presumably be able to do the same thing to the PLA-AF then? That would rather change things...

Interesting how quickly you go from China will never enter a war for Russia to China is a full-blown combatant in an NATO-Russian war.  In any case, hard to see why Russia would be deterred by the prospect of more Chinese help.

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You speak as if S-70 was an operational system and Su-57 existed as more than a squadron (non US NATO F-35s already greatly outnumber them). Russia doesn't even build its own RQ-1 class drones (see: Israel Searcher and Iranian Mohajer 6); how is it going to whip up some X-47B class UCAVs?

During this discussion I've seen a number new Russian reports on drone programs.  Off the top, two programs to integrate drone swarms with SU-57 and S-70, a new Lancet model with some swarm capability, a cheaper version of Lancet entering combat, a cheap night-capable FPV kamikaze drone, two new Russian navy drone systems, and an improved Russian version of the Shahed 131.  Looks like a massive industrial effort across the entire spectrum of drones to me.

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Even if we assume that someone can neutralize GPS (and note that the future proliferated satellites layers in the next few years will have a secondary fallback PNT capability as well), what makes you think that Russian and Chinese UAVs are any less dependent on satellite navigation?

If the USAF loses its precision strike capacity and Russia loses its Shahed drone precision strike capacity, which of those two strikes you as the bigger thing to have lost?  The thing that the Americans require to fight any war at all, or the expendable trinkets?

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ETA: per wiki, of the 24 GLONASS satellites still operational or in testing, 12 are at or past their seven year expected lifetime. Three more satellites are partially operational with no L2 signal (reduced accuracy) and these are some of the oldest still functioning.

What access does China grant Russia to its BeiDou system?
 

[glenn239]

48 minutes ago, Strannik said:

Yes, that was a theory in a kerfuffle when Scholtz was saying "we will send ours if you send yours".  But M2s got plinked anyway  so why so relatively few?

There are so many bizarro world things going on with Biden's policy in this war, it's hard to pin down just one question to ask....

[Strannik]

3 hours ago, glenn239 said:

An S-400 battery costs 600 million.  If they build two less S-400 batteries and use the money to build drones ..

This is an export price of a four battery "division" iirc, not what RU pays to Almaz and in any case Lancets are made by the different mfr.  At the different factories.  So can and will have both...

The more important point is that in the disposable drone warfare you can rely on off the shelf systems (with certain mods) and if you achieve critical mass you will overwhelm current level AA defences, which btw West have much less than Russia (which ironically some are making fun of, pointing fingers at this or that missile that got through).

Rus now are even using FPV drones on the individual Uke soldiers -  the math is compelling: 1-2k (and they are much cheaper)  per enemy soldier is a good deal.

And China can certainly build (and likely doing it now) 10 times what West would be able to if it's gotten its act together, which it can't do so far.  Imagine what all these drones will do to let's  say Japan's infrastructure, let alone fleet if it chooses to enter the war.

Edited December 6, 2023 by Strannik

[Yama]

3 hours ago, Strannik said:

Btw, the serious Rus/UA mil experts all agree that the recent big WP article is basically a "we gave the natives good stuff and told how/when to use it and yet they did not listen and screw it up" blame game piece.

With the only caveat that Bachmut was a waste and took a very serious toll on UA veteran forces.

Partly agree...I am not convinced earlier start date would have made a difference. Russians did probably fortify quite a bit during April-May, but given how many Ukrainian troops complained about lack of training as it was, troop quality issues would have been lot worse in April.

And really, hmm, do we start the offensive soon with less forces, or wait for more, but with enemy also gaining more time to prepare...sounds familiar.

There is IMO too much 'lolpointing' (pointing one's finger and going 'LOL') among armchair strategists directed at Ukrainian and NATO generalship. Ukrainians really did not have many good options. All the low-hanging fruit were picked last year, and last of them, Kherson, was already hard and grueling fight. It was blatantly obvious that it was only going to get harder. There was no surprise whatsoever, even without all the drones, satellites, spies, signals intelligence, anyone could predict that Ukrainians were going to attack at Zaporižžia direction. Only question was whether they were going to attack elsewhere as well.

[Strannik]

40 minutes ago, Yama said:

Partly agree...I am not convinced earlier start date would have made a difference. Russians did probably fortify quite a bit during April-May, but given how many Ukrainian troops complained about lack of training as it was, troop quality issues would have been lot worse in April.

And really, hmm, do we start the offensive soon with less forces, or wait for more, but with enemy also gaining more time to prepare...sounds familiar.

There is IMO too much 'lolpointing' (pointing one's finger and going 'LOL') among armchair strategists directed at Ukrainian and NATO generalship. Ukrainians really did not have many good options. All the low-hanging fruit were picked last year, and last of them, Kherson, was already hard and grueling fight. It was blatantly obvious that it was only going to get harder. There was no surprise whatsoever, even without all the drones, satellites, spies, signals intelligence, anyone could predict that Ukrainians were going to attack at Zaporižžia direction. Only question was whether they were going to attack elsewhere as well.

Key issues were (in addition to forces spent in Bachmut): insufficient training, late/insufficient hardware transfer, impossibility of the force concentration/attack on the single vector due to Rus mining/counterstrikes and Rus reserves (two VDV divisions) availability

Edited December 6, 2023 by Strannik

[Josh]

3 hours ago, glenn239 said:

War seems fairly certain should the PRC insist upon itself in Taiwan despite never previous controlling the region.  The question I guess then is whether it would prove a serious one, or a passing fancy.

Fixed it for you.

 

3 hours ago, glenn239 said:

All of NATO's intelligence gathering abilities will be in play in Ukraine already.

Quite provably not. There are no NATO aircraft over Ukraine, for starters. There also is likely intelligence that is too sensitive to share. In top of that, the lag time between intelligence being collected, cleaned, and disseminated to the Ukrainians is probably much more long winded than a NATO member, especially for US sources distributing to US platforms. Additionally, Ukraine likely has less capacity to communicate that information to tactical units. The U.S. howitzers and Himars seen in Ukraine are visibly missing their datalink antenna for instance.

 

3 hours ago, glenn239 said:

That's quite the paragraph, ending with you talking of Russian communications and satellite capabilities, but for some reason not the Sino-Russian ones.  The Russians cannot possibly compete with the USA in these fields, that's why they are partnering with the Chinese.

I think it would be a hell of a leap of faith to assume the Chinese are going to patch Russian tactical units into their data network. It seems more likely we’ll see a more round about cleaning/dissemination efforts like US-Ukraine at most, assuming the Chinese have equivalent capabilities and are willing to share/retask assets.

 

3 hours ago, glenn239 said:

One F-35 costs about as much as 2,800 Lancet type drones.  IMO, there is no air defense capability that's making up for that disparity in basic costs.

So all the US has to do is produce a Lancet equivalent and it can devastate Chinese regional air superiority as well then.

 

3 hours ago, glenn239 said:

These drones are currently being used in raids of up to maybe 80.  But the cheap production costs allow for that to scale to raids of 800, even 8,000, once production means permit.  So, in your paragraph above you are asking to pick between two options, but this is a false choice.   An S-400 battery costs 600 million.  If they build two less S-400 batteries and use the money to build drones instead, that's about 60,000 drones.

This kind of begs the question why aren’t the Russians saving up their drones for one large attack now? They have been stockpiling all summer, or at least they could have been. It seems likely there is some kind of bottleneck in either production or in launch equipment.

 

3 hours ago, glenn239 said:

Interesting how quickly you go from China will never enter a war for Russia to China is a full-blown combatant in an NATO-Russian war.  In any case, hard to see why Russia would be deterred by the prospect of more Chinese help.

My question did not concern Chinese involvement. I am merely asking if you think the U.S. can use drones to destroy Chinese airpower as easily as Russia can use them to destroy  NATO air power? The U.S. if anything has a couple of orders of magnitude more UAV production capacity than Russia and has already mastered all of the tech on your wish list. An SDB II is a trimode terminal seeker with autonomous target recognition, GPS, and link 16. There are already a couple thousand in service. If the U.S. just scales it up to include a motor and piston engine good for a thousand mile trip and makes ten thousand of them and bases them throughout the first island chain, is that the end of the PLAAF?
 

3 hours ago, glenn239 said:

During this discussion I've seen a number new Russian reports on drone programs.  Off the top, two programs to integrate drone swarms with SU-57 and S-70, a new Lancet model with some swarm capability, a cheaper version of Lancet entering combat, a cheap night-capable FPV kamikaze drone, two new Russian navy drone systems, and an improved Russian version of the Shahed 131.  Looks like a massive industrial effort across the entire spectrum of drones to me.

It looks like an effort with a lot of breadth but not necessarily much depth. Presumably if this effort bears fruit in mass, we will see it on the battlefield.

 

3 hours ago, glenn239 said:

If the USAF loses its precision strike capacity and Russia loses its Shahed drone precision strike capacity, which of those two strikes you as the bigger thing to have lost?  The thing that the Americans require to fight any war at all, or the expendable trinkets?

A fighter can still guide a JDAM to a target using an INS mode (with decreased accuracy) and there’s plenty of weapons with terminal seekers. But slow moving UAVs are going to generate a lot of drift over hundreds or even thousands of miles. What if the Russian UAV revolution fails overnight as a result of satellite navigation interference?

 

3 hours ago, glenn239 said:

What access does China grant Russia to its BeiDou system?
 

Presumably they can use the civilian signal, if it’s not jammed or spoofed.

[seahawk]

10 hours ago, Strannik said:

Btw, the serious Rus/UA mil experts all agree that the recent big WP article is basically a "we gave the natives good stuff and told how/when to use it and yet they did not listen and screw it up" blame game piece.

With the only caveat that Bachmut was a waste and took a very serious toll on UA veteran forces.

It is the beginning of the end of Western help. Same as the South Vietnamese, who also were "unable to fight, even with glorious western kit" and therefore deserved to loose and were to blame that the other side won.

[Stuart Galbraith]

That isnt why they lost. They lost because Nixon gave them a peace treaty to sign that effectively fucked them because it allowed the NVA to remain in the country, and because Congress post Watergate cut the ammunition allocation.

These are the same myths like the 'Afghan's cant fight'. Which of course overlooked that America single handedly kept their airforce running, and when their contractors went home, was suddenly unable to fight without air support, the precise method of fighting America had drilled into them for 20 years.

If Ukraine loses, its because America and the Europeans want them to lose. Quite why, I dont know. Its clearly nobody whom remembers what happened between 1945 and 1989.

Edited December 7, 2023 by Stuart Galbraith

[Stuart Galbraith]

15 hours ago, Roman Alymov said:

Moscow is too far away (direct distance between Vladivostok and Moscow is 6417 km, much longer by road) over very uncomfortable terrain. So it is more reasonable for NKoreans to conduct some sort of amphibious attack on some small island nation with capital next to sea and in the middle of busy sea routes few Ro-Ro ships could sneak to as regular transports....  But, again, what's next? Gain some short-living popularity by returning stolen marbles to another small but proud nation? 

Relax Roman, I was just messing with you. Only Russian Mercenaries aspire to take Moscow, and as we saw, it was  a city too far for them too.

As for why... Is Bestest Korea! Who needs reasons when you are Magnificent Kim?

[seahawk]

1 hour ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

That isnt why they lost. They lost because Nixon gave them a peace treaty to sign that effectively fucked them because it allowed the NVA to remain in the country, and because Congress post Watergate cut the ammunition allocation.

These are the same myths like the 'Afghan's cant fight'. Which of course overlooked that America single handedly kept their airforce running, and when their contractors went home, was suddenly unable to fight without air support, the precise method of fighting America had drilled into them for 20 years.

If Ukraine loses, its because America and the Europeans want them to lose. Quite why, I dont know. Its clearly nobody whom remembers what happened between 1945 and 1989.

And why was the help stopped and the peace treaty signed? "Because the corrupt South Vietnamese do not fight."

That is exactly what I have been saying from day one. Never trust the West as a small country and if you do not own valuable natural resources.

Edited December 7, 2023 by seahawk

[Stuart Galbraith]

No, the narrative was chosen as an excuse. You are mixing the narrative with the reality. The South Vietnamese fought fairly well in 1972, and select units fought well to the end. The idea that the US was going to turn from the Johnson policy, which was winning the war with the South Vietnamese as an afterthought,  to the Nixon policy, which was prop them up long enough to get the hell out, and expect it was going to be a success, was somewhat naive. And Nixon and Kissinger that sprung it on South Vietnam were anything but naive.

In fact in the early 1970's, oil was found off the coast of South Vietnam. It may well have been if the US hadnt cut and run, whcih is what essentially they did, the South Vietnamese may have been increasingly able to fund their own security, perhaps even employing mercenaries as the more wealthy African nations did. Its the road not travelled, because Nixon, fearing the political consequences of hanging around, cut and run.

Doesnt anyone get suspicious of the lie 'our allies wouldnt fight?'. Its desperately close to the narrative the US was selling to itself through the first 2 years of the second world war, and it was with as much surprise as embarrasment that they joined the fight when they found Britain did stand after all. If the Afghans had stood up to the Taliban, it might actually have been a bad thing for Biden. He wouldnt have been able to sell the lie of cutting and running because his allies wouldnt fight. He, and Trump, stacked the deck, and he got the result he wanted. Nobody should be surprised.

I predict, if Ukraine does lose the war (I doubt it, but it remains conceivable), the narrative in a few short years was 'well we did our best, but he Ukrainians couldnt fight'. Which will remain an obscene fucking lie, as it was every time US Politicians have used to to exculpate failure.

 

[Roman Alymov]

5 hours ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

Relax Roman, I was just messing with you. Only Russian Mercenaries aspire to take Moscow, and as we saw, it was  a city too far for them too.

As for why... Is Bestest Korea! Who needs reasons when you are Magnificent Kim?

Untill now, "Magnificent Kim" have proved to be far more reasonable politician than his Western counterparts. 

[Roman Alymov]

Lancet (with target lock function) vs. vz.77 "Dana" SPG https://t.me/NeoficialniyBeZsonoV/31392

[Roman Alymov]

Pro-Russians (probably mobilized soldiers, as they are too old for regular army)  with abandoned Leopard 2 with extra Kontact ERA https://t.me/infomil_live/2195

[Roman Alymov]

Wreck of M777 gun, probably result of own shell explosion in barrel https://t.me/boris_rozhin/105829

[JWB]

 

[seahawk]

7 hours ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

No, the narrative was chosen as an excuse. You are mixing the narrative with the reality. The South Vietnamese fought fairly well in 1972, and select units fought well to the end. The idea that the US was going to turn from the Johnson policy, which was winning the war with the South Vietnamese as an afterthought,  to the Nixon policy, which was prop them up long enough to get the hell out, and expect it was going to be a success, was somewhat naive. And Nixon and Kissinger that sprung it on South Vietnam were anything but naive.

In fact in the early 1970's, oil was found off the coast of South Vietnam. It may well have been if the US hadnt cut and run, whcih is what essentially they did, the South Vietnamese may have been increasingly able to fund their own security, perhaps even employing mercenaries as the more wealthy African nations did. Its the road not travelled, because Nixon, fearing the political consequences of hanging around, cut and run.

Doesnt anyone get suspicious of the lie 'our allies wouldnt fight?'. Its desperately close to the narrative the US was selling to itself through the first 2 years of the second world war, and it was with as much surprise as embarrasment that they joined the fight when they found Britain did stand after all. If the Afghans had stood up to the Taliban, it might actually have been a bad thing for Biden. He wouldnt have been able to sell the lie of cutting and running because his allies wouldnt fight. He, and Trump, stacked the deck, and he got the result he wanted. Nobody should be surprised.

I predict, if Ukraine does lose the war (I doubt it, but it remains conceivable), the narrative in a few short years was 'well we did our best, but he Ukrainians couldnt fight'. Which will remain an obscene fucking lie, as it was every time US Politicians have used to to exculpate failure.

 

Obviously it was not the truth, but still the excuse to end the aid and leave them on their own. The official statements in the West are already turning into that direction. And make no mistake Russia notices this as well and Putin has studied history.

Xi is probably just waiting for the chip factories in the West to be ready and start producing to make his move, because if the economical impact is not catastrophic, the West will not protect Taiwan either.

[Stuart Galbraith]

3 hours ago, Roman Alymov said:

Untill now, "Magnificent Kim" have proved to be far more reasonable politician than his Western counterparts. 

Yeah, you keep telling yourself that when they hold their big tank Parade in Red Square.

 

[Stuart Galbraith]

10 minutes ago, JWB said:

 

Maybe so, but he will never beat killing 7 with one shot.

 

[Josh]

1 hour ago, seahawk said:

Xi is probably just waiting for the chip factories in the West to be ready and start producing to make his move, because if the economical impact is not catastrophic, the West will not protect Taiwan either.

The US will never produce more than marginal amount of its own microchip consumption. I think the main goal of reshoring is to keep some marginal strategic capacity for military needs only in an emergency. There will be a Taiwan chip dependency for both the US and PRC for the foreseeable future, unless Taiwan changes hands or has its industry destroyed.