Blyatskrieg

[Woodchopper]

Another Russian AEW&C A-50 shot down last night.

It was about 240km from the frontline so it’s an interesting question as to what hit it.

Also, people are quoting a financial value of $350 million.
That’s beside the point, as all of Russia’s A-50s are Soviet manufactured and so they’re irreplaceable in a practical sense.

[TimW]

TASS have the full story:

Two flight vehicles fall in Krasnodar Region

No casualties reported

KRASNODAR, February 23. /TASS/. Two aerial vehicles fell in the Kanevsky district of the Krasnodar Region, one of them caught fire, which has spread to nearby reeds, the regional emergency services reported, adding that there were no casualties reported.
"According to information from the Kanevsky district, at about 8:00 p.m. local time, two aircraft fell near the Trudovaya Armenia farm in the Kanevsky district. After fire brigades arrived, it was established that the aircraft and reeds are on fire and that the fire has spread to an area of about 250 square meters. Residential buildings are not in danger, there are no casualties among the residents of the farm," the statement said.
Forty personnel and 14 pieces of equipment are involved in the firefighting efforts. Law enforcement agencies and special services are working on the site.

Top detail is: reeds are on fire.

[TimW]

Update!

Fire caused by crash of flight vehicles contained in Krasnodar Region

The fire has been localized on an area of 2,500 square meters

MOSCOW, February 23. /TASS/. The fire that started after the fall of aerial vehicles in the Kanevsky district of the Krasnodar region has been contained on an area of 2,500 square meters, the emergency services told TASS.

"As of now, the fire has been localized on an area of 2,500 square meters where flight vehicles fell," the statement said.

That's a lot of reeds.

[Martin Y]

That's a lot of reeds.

Won't somebody think of the buntings?

[Woodchopper]

Another Russian AEW&C A-50 shot down last night.

It was about 240km from the frontline so it’s an interesting question as to what hit it.

Speculation that it was shot down by an 5V28 missile, which is fired by the S-200 system. Two interesting points with that. Firstly, that Ukraine's S200 systems had been withdrawn from service before 2022 and secondly, as the missile dates back to the 1960s it should have been possible for the A-50 to evade being shot down using a mixture of jamming and chaff decoys.

So there lies the possibility that the 5V28 had been upgraded with modern electronics and perhaps linked to a different air defence system (Ukraine has many). In the last point, Ukraine has already developed so called 'FrankenSAMs' which involve a combination of Nato and Soviet elements in a single system (eg western missiles and soviet pattern radar).

If they exist, one big question is how many upgraded 5V28 based systems exist.

[Woodchopper]

Long thread on Russian artillery stocks and losses.
https://x.com/bentanmy/status/1762117582935687218?s=20

tl;dr Russia can sustain the current rate of losses for about two years until it runs out of artillery.

[TopBadger]

Ukraine claiming to have taken down yet another Russian plane... Su-34... 8th aircraft in 10 days.

Meanwhile I saw somewhere that Russia has claimed a kill on an M1 Abrams.

And now the path is clear for Sweden to join NATO it looks like some Grippens will be heading the way of the UAF - still expected to take the best part of a year though.

[TopBadger]

Russians lose another boat to drones...

Ukraine-Built MAGURA V5 Naval Drones Sink Russian Patrol Ship 'Sergey Kotov'

https://www.kyivpost.com/post/29016?utm ... NEWS%2FWAR

[bjn]

The good news is that it looks like at least one more A-50 got taken out on the ground. The factory that was refitting it was hit in the same strike.

https://www.businessinsider.com/russia- ... ?r=US&IR=T

The (unsurprising) bad news is that Trump is going to throw Ukraine under a Russian tank if voted in as President, as confirmed by Orban (another sh.t-weasel).

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... ktor-orban

[headshot]

According to Orbán, Trump has a “detailed plan” to end the Ukraine war…

Calling Trump “a man of peace”, Orbán said: “If the Americans don’t give money and weapons, along with the Europeans, the war is over. And if the Americans don’t give money, the Europeans alone can’t finance this war. And then the war is over.”

Cool. Good plan. Seems legit.

[Woodchopper]

From about 53 minutes in the discussion: https://www.youtube.com/live/L8IBwse5sg ... W6cRUKfCgZ

Apparently the Ukrainians found that the GLSDB didn’t work very well.

[TopBadger]

Disappointing... did they say why?

[Woodchopper]

Disappointing... did they say why?

Several reasons but Russian GPS jamming seems to be the big problem. That’s also why guided artillery rounds don’t appear to have been as decisive as people thought they’d be.

I wonder how GMLRS and Stormshadow etc are managing. I assume that they are able to function despite the jamming.

[Woodchopper]

Another thing that isn’t as decisive as expected:

Ukraine has sidelined U.S.-provided Abrams M1A1 battle tanks for now in its fight against Russia, in part because Russian drone warfare has made it too difficult for them to operate without detection or coming under attack, two U.S. military officials told The Associated Press.

[…]

But the battlefield has changed substantially since then, notably by the ubiquitous use of Russian surveillance drones and hunter-killer drones. Those weapons have made it more difficult for Ukraine to protect the tanks when they are quickly detected and hunted by Russian drones or rounds.

Five of the 31 tanks have already been lost to Russian attacks.

The proliferation of drones on the Ukrainian battlefield means “there isn’t open ground that you can just drive across without fear of detection,” a senior defense official told reporters Thursday.

https://apnews.com/article/ukraine-russ ... 0063a8fb7a

Everyone is learning how to operate in that kind of environment.

It may be that tanks need an active protection system to destroy drones on the battlefield.

[Imrael]

It may be that tanks need an active protection system to destroy drones on the battlefield.

At the beginning people were asking if tanks were now obsolete due to success of Ukrainian Javelin/NLaw and artillery. That was probably more of a training/doctrine issue, but what we've seen of drone warfare might, at the extremes, make several profound differences including hugely reduced role for tanks, great difficulty in operating artillery systems.

Its notable that the picture for obtaining air superiority is a bit muddy. The Russians certainly haven't achieved it, but drone ability to locate and strike ground based air defences might change that. I think I read that the Ukrainians lost a Patriot battery that got spotted?

(And I also wonder about the vulnerability of surface ships including our 2 aircraft carriers to the sort of attacks we're seeing developed. But I'm sure smarter people than me are totally "on" this concern)

[jimbob]

It may be that tanks need an active protection system to destroy drones on the battlefield.

At the beginning people were asking if tanks were now obsolete due to success of Ukrainian Javelin/NLaw and artillery. That was probably more of a training/doctrine issue, but what we've seen of drone warfare might, at the extremes, make several profound differences including hugely reduced role for tanks, great difficulty in operating artillery systems.

Its notable that the picture for obtaining air superiority is a bit muddy. The Russians certainly haven't achieved it, but drone ability to locate and strike ground based air defences might change that. I think I read that the Ukrainians lost a Patriot battery that got spotted?

(And I also wonder about the vulnerability of surface ships including our 2 aircraft carriers to the sort of attacks we're seeing developed. But I'm sure smarter people than me are totally "on" this concern)

Swarming attacks with submersible or semi submersible drones, in conjunction with air based drones would probably be quite unpleasant. Hard to target something just below the surface.

[Martin Y]

If there's a common theme to what's changed in this conflict it's that abilities to deny an opponent the use of a space have advanced, but they don't give you the ability to exploit the space yourself as the other side can do that too. Ukraine has effectively denied Russia the free use of the Black Sea but hasn't gained control of the sea for itself. Russia suppressed Ukrainian air power but without gaining air supremacy; it has to keep its arcraft back and use long range standoff weapons. Tanks can't move in the open without being spotted and swarmed by weapons which are small and cheap but a real threat.

[TopBadger]

None of which augers well for conventional western forces, based around reduced manpower but operating with better (i.e. more expensive) vehicles and equipment as force multipliers.

At least not until they all get fitted with anti drone laser systems (which I understand are being developed).