War in Ukraine, technical and military aspects only

[Soldier36]

Video of the study of Ukrainian Storm Shadow/SCALP cruise missiles in Russia. This is the most detailed video footage of the internals of the Shadow and SCALP missiles to date. The Storm Shadow and SCALP missiles were developed by the French company Matra and the English British Aerospace, and are now produced by the European company MBDA. In the video, Russian specialists show the cumulative part of SCALP missiles, the engine, control equipment, electronics, servos, rudders and various missile design elements.

 

 

[glenn239]

9 hours ago, Roman Alymov said:

I think it is illusion that it is possible to defeat NATO's airpower by strikes on bases etc. If it comes to war (o war-like situation) it is far more reasonable to use the same strike capability not in useless attempts to hit Western airbases, but reserve them for strikes on high-value infrastructire targets like electric grids etc. that would if not halt white people's economy then at least significantly disrupt it.

Given the efforts being made to expand missile production, I think the aim surely must be to do both.

[glenn239]

8 hours ago, Josh said:

I find it rather unlikely Russia was not preparing to engage NATO airbases in a notional war. It seems far more likely they drastically over estimated their recon-strike complex capability to do so.

Seems to me that Russian missile production pre-war was lackadaisical compared to what is happening now.  Recently, the figure of 3 Kinzhal / Iskanders per day being touted, compared our prewar guesses of maybe 1,500 Iskanders produced in total in the decades prewar.

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The fact that Ukraine still sorties aircraft seems to directly contradict your assessment.

NATO's intended tempo of sorties presumably being between two and three orders of magnitude greater than what the Ukrainians can muster.

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Your theory that Russia could ultimately develop a more threatening anti airfield capability seems to hinge on NATO air defense development holding still while Russia rearms post war. NATO is learning all about UAV capabilities as well, without actually having to suffer the costs associated with that learning curve.

The larger issue being that recent trends in missiles and drones appear to be supplanting the previous dominant role of airpower.   If airpower requires exceptionally expensive measures for protection against much cheaper (but deadly) new methods, then chances are these new means will become dominant and NATO's investment in airpower may start to resemble Britain's mighty battleship fleet of December 1918.

 

[bojan]

8 hours ago, txtree99 said:

What does racial tensions have to do with Ukraine technical or military aspects?   Should this not be in the ffz threads

Lol, first time I agree with you on something

[urbanoid]

1 hour ago, glenn239 said:

NATO's intended tempo of sorties presumably being between two and three orders of magnitude greater than what the Ukrainians can muster.

No idea what is 'an order of magnitude' in your glennfinition, but 20-30 times more than the Ukrainians might be an underestimation.

[sunday]

7 hours ago, urbanoid said:

No idea what is 'an order of magnitude' in your glennfinition, but 20-30 times more than the Ukrainians might be an underestimation.

An order of magnitude more is 10 times more, two orders of magnitude is 100 times more.

[KV7]

How did the Russians get into such difficulty around Hyboke ? They have lost one supply road to some Ukrainian attacks that just seems really bold, with some really precarious supply line (some line of trees) that should be quite easy for Russia to pinch off or interdict.

Strategically opening this northern front seems to have been a good move by Russia as the incursion has led to Ukraine to counterattack in a difficult position, which favors Russia in terms of exchange ratios, but this particular part of the line seems to be not be going so well.

Vovchansk fits with the overall pattern but it is quite a bit better for Russia, as Ukraine has been trying desperately to hold onto positions north of the river that seem untenable, and have seemingly taken large losses attempting it.

[Perun]

 

[bojan]

North Korean and Iranian ammo with Ukrainians this time:

Considering that NKor ammo is widespread in Africa, this must be part of Czech led "ammo initiative". Iranian is a bit harder to find out how it came, it appears a bit too often among Ukrainians to explain "captured rockets intended for Yemen". Iraq is user and potential source, but there are probably other users as well.

Also, mixing rockets of different manufacturers in the same load is not advisable (even different batches from same manufacturer should be avoided), so video is either for show or crew is  not aware of that.

Edited July 10 by bojan

[glenn239]

12 hours ago, urbanoid said:

No idea what is 'an order of magnitude' in your glennfinition, but 20-30 times more than the Ukrainians might be an underestimation.

If the Ukrainians are flying 10 missions a day, NATO might want to fly a thousand type thing.  Another bit of Glennmath would be that if, hypothetically, Ukraine were flying 10 missions a day from 10 bases, that would be an average of 1 sortie per base per day.  If NATO hypothetically were flying 1,000 missions from 30 bases a day, that would be an average of 33 sorties per base per day.  Which case would be more vulnerable to drone and missile attack?

Edited July 10 by glenn239

[glenn239]

4 hours ago, KV7 said:

How did the Russians get into such difficulty around Hyboke ? They have lost one supply road to some Ukrainian attacks that just seems really bold, with some really precarious supply line (some line of trees) that should be quite easy for Russia to pinch off or interdict.
 

Report I just watched says that the Ukrainians have v. good drone coverage in this region, making Russian supply by anything except drone somewhere near impossible.

[KV7]

42 minutes ago, glenn239 said:

Report I just watched says that the Ukrainians have v. good drone coverage in this region, making Russian supply by anything except drone somewhere near impossible.

I see, but there is still the question of how Ukraine can sustain this pencil thin salient.

[JWB]

 

[Josh]

17 hours ago, glenn239 said:

Seems to me that Russian missile production pre-war was lackadaisical compared to what is happening now.  Recently, the figure of 3 Kinzhal / Iskanders per day being touted, compared our prewar guesses of maybe 1,500 Iskanders produced in total in the decades prewar.

But 1500 was a much larger starting point than now.

 

17 hours ago, glenn239 said:

NATO's intended tempo of sorties presumably being between two and three orders of magnitude greater than what the Ukrainians can muster.

well an order or two anyway. I’m assuming the bulk of the USAF is reserved for China.

 

17 hours ago, glenn239 said:

The larger issue being that recent trends in missiles and drones appear to be supplanting the previous dominant role of airpower.   If airpower requires exceptionally expensive measures for protection against much cheaper (but deadly) new methods, then chances are these new means will become dominant and NATO's investment in airpower may start to resemble Britain's mighty battleship fleet of December 1918.

 

It remains to be seen how expensive defensive measures get. The U.S. already has vehicles with sensors and canons, along with short ranged missiles/C-UAVs for this purpose. They are if anything simpler and lighter than Pantsir. It also has developed a number of directed energy weapons than are probably significantly more expensive but have essentially no ammunition costs. The U.S. has also order palletized sensor/effector kits for static bases with the same capabilities. Given the 80 million cost of a fighter plus the costs associated with training and maintaining it and its crews, it seems to me defensive costs are not prohibitive. The threat was just not seriously considered previously.

What NATO likely cannot afford is a defense of all of its infrastructure against UAVs. Perhaps key resources can be defended but there are likely just too many targets to protect for something like the electrical grid. Deterrence will have to suffice.

[TrustMe]

Has anyone see the Kalibr missile launched in recent videos, I haven't?

[Yama]

4 hours ago, TrustMe said:

Has anyone see the Kalibr missile launched in recent videos, I haven't?

Few weeks ago video was released of a frigate launching Kalibrs, but of course I can't say if it actually was recent, or archival.

[crazyinsane105]

Anna Gvozdiar, Ukraine's minister of strategic industries, told The Wall Street Journal that she was frustrated that these systems were not being adapted to catch up.

In contrast to this, she said Ukrainian forces "learn faster because we are on the front line."

Excalibur artillery rounds — which had a huge impact on Ukraine's fighting ability well into 2023 — had been all but abandoned by this spring after Russian forces repeatedly foiled them with advanced electronic warfare techniques, as The Washington Post reported.

A similar story has played out with US-made HIMARS missiles, whose precision has also been somewhat blunted, the Journal reported.

Ukraine has also given up using Ground-Launched Small Diameter Bombs, pending a review, according to the Journal.

Sent to Ukraine with some fanfare in February, by this spring their effectiveness was already on the wane, again due to Russian jamming, Reuters reported.

It could take months for manufacturers Boeing and SAAB AB to create a fix, one source told Reuters.
 

 

https://www.yahoo.com/news/ukrainian-minister-says-shes-frustrated-124208828.html

[seahawk]

Yes, Russia has neutralized most western weapons.

[Soldier36]

Ukrainian fleet exercises on Finnish Watercat M11 boats. The Ukrainian Navy conducted an exercise on the Dnieper River. Finnish landing assault boats Marine Alutech Watercat M11 of the Uisko 300 and Uisko 200 series were used in the exercises. The displacement of the Watercat M11 boat is 10 tons, the power plant is diesel with a power of 660 hp. and a water cannon, lifting capacity 2.5 tons, speed when fully loaded up to 56 km/h. The Watercat M11 boat can be equipped with a 12.7 mm machine gun and a 40 mm grenade launcher. During the exercises, they practiced the conduct of combat operations by river forces, including as part of boat groups, interaction with units operating on the river banks, and the delivery of personnel to certain sections of the coast. Also used in the exercises were the Ukrainian small armored artillery boat of Project 58155 type “Gyurza-M” and the American landing boat SHERP the SHUTTLE.

 

 

[Soldier36]

Russian drone operators received the Nebo-22 VR simulator. The Russian armed forces began to receive the Nebo-22 VR simulator for training FPV drone operators. The equipment began to arrive at military units and training centers of the Russian Ministry of Defense. The development and creation of specialized Sky-22 helmets was carried out by existing drone operators and engineers of the commercial company Virtual Training Systems Era. The Sky-22 program introduces real satellite maps of the area, real military equipment and ammunition used on FPV drones. A drone designer function was also added to the simulator so that the operator could set the tactical and technical characteristics of any type of UAV and practice its control skills. The simulator has 25 training modules for different types, it allows you to simulate weather conditions, takeoff, landing, flight and everything that is currently used by FPV drone operators.

 

 

[Soldier36]

The first footage of the use of the new Russian radio intelligence complex "Thorn-MDM", an interview with the operator at the end of the video. "Thorn-MDM" entered service with the Russian army in 2019, there is very little information about it. The Torn-MDM radio reconnaissance complex is designed to search, analyze and record signals in the range from 1.5 to 3000 MHz, as well as direction finding and goniometric location determination of their sources located at a distance of up to 70 kilometers. Once installed, the antennas of the complex operate automatically around the clock. A special feature of the Thorn complex is the ability to intercept not only radio communications, but also cellular communications and instant messengers used on phones. The Torn-MDM complex can be produced in both mobile and stationary versions. The Thorn-MDM complex consists of a hardware machine on a Kamaz chassis and a rigging

machine.

 

[txtree99]

 

[Josh]

17 hours ago, txtree99 said:

 

There was an RFI for this, nothing more.

[txtree99]

1 hour ago, Josh said:

There was an RFI for this, nothing more.

Further along then RFI.   They are at the RFP stage.  But, yes it probably will not be this year.    
 

 

[Soldier36]

A story about the rescue of the Russian 152-mm self-propelled gun “Msta-S” from a massive attack by Ukrainian FPV kamikaze drones. The Msta-S self-propelled gun was adopted for armament in 1989, the firing range of the Msta-S self-propelled gun with a conventional projectile is up to 25 km, technical information about it is on the channel. The Msta-S self-propelled gun is equipped with homemade protection and nets for protection against drones. According to the crew of the self-propelled gun, the installation withstood the attack and was sent for repairs; the extent of damage to the self-propelled gun is not clear. Details in the video.

 

 

Edited July 12 by Soldier36