Blyatskrieg

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by Woodchopper » Wed May 11, 2022 7:21 pm

lpm wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 6:58 pm
This is an interesting thread. The Russian tank that suffered a slight malfunction was deep inside Russian held territory, where soldiers would be considering themselves safe:

https://twitter.com/ChrisO_wiki/status/ ... 5539393539
Yes, I hadn't picked up on the location of that explosion. If Ukraine is able to mount frequent successful attacks on Russian vehicles etc that far from the front lines then one effect would be a serious drain on Russian personnel. It could reduce at least the effectiveness of Ukrainian partisans or special forces. However, doing that would require huge numbers of troops to set up checkpoints and patrol vulnerable areas.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by jimbob » Wed May 11, 2022 7:23 pm

Woodchopper wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 7:12 pm
lpm wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 5:32 pm
EACLucifer wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 3:58 pm


Aerial (presumably drone) pictures of the aftermath have emerged. Russian losses here are catastrophic. At least four tanks, among a total of >30 AFVs destroyed. For context, a Battalion Tactical Group has a nominal strength of ten tanks and forty infantry fighting vehicles, so we're looking at an under strength BTG, or a portion of a BTG either assigned to the attack, or the part thereof that reached the Ukrainian side before the pontoon bridge was destroyed - reportedly this occured while the Russians were crossing.

Reportedly it was the Ukrainian 17th Separate Tank Brigade that inflicted this defeat on the Russians.
That's insane.

There's no way anyone can build a bridge under artillery fire. They should have scrambled for cover at the first hit, waiting for counter artillery. Or called in air strikes.
Just speculating, but that could be another example of poor leadership. If the soldiers who might do that have been told that they'd get court-martialed for cowardice in the face of the enemy, then they may well just line up and get shelled. They could have a higher chance of surviving the Ukranian artillery than their own officers.
It seems that the Western military train their troops how to do something and then in action, their officers tell them to do the tasks.

And the Russian military seems to train their troops to obey orders and in action their officers tell them what to do and how to do it.
Have you considered stupidity as an explanation

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Wed May 11, 2022 7:46 pm

lpm wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 5:32 pm
EACLucifer wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 3:58 pm
EACLucifer wrote:
Tue May 10, 2022 5:26 pm
Near Bilohorivka, the Russians tried to bridge the Seversky Donets. A number of vehicles were destroyed along with the pontoon bridge, and it appears the attack was thwarted.
Aerial (presumably drone) pictures of the aftermath have emerged. Russian losses here are catastrophic. At least four tanks, among a total of >30 AFVs destroyed. For context, a Battalion Tactical Group has a nominal strength of ten tanks and forty infantry fighting vehicles, so we're looking at an under strength BTG, or a portion of a BTG either assigned to the attack, or the part thereof that reached the Ukrainian side before the pontoon bridge was destroyed - reportedly this occured while the Russians were crossing.

Reportedly it was the Ukrainian 17th Separate Tank Brigade that inflicted this defeat on the Russians.
That's insane.

There's no way anyone can build a bridge under artillery fire. They should have scrambled for cover at the first hit, waiting for counter artillery. Or called in air strikes.

If the bridge was built and Ukraine waited for some to cross then that was a pretty confident move by Ukraine’s leaders.
Bridgebuilding under fire is in fact something that has been done before, it is, however, extremely difficult. There is a reason armoured bridgelayers exist - basically tanks that carry a bridge instead of a turret and can deploy it in front of them - however these have definite limits on how far they can bridge.

The reports I've seen suggest Ukraine waited for some of the Russians to cross before destroying the bridge, however, it could be that it took them a while to bring their artillery to bear, instead of a deliberate move.

Either way, a substantial quantity of Russian vehicles - mostly troop carriers - found themselves on the wrong side of the Seversky Donets and in combat with a tank brigade. It's a Russian defeat on a par with Trostyanets.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by TopBadger » Wed May 11, 2022 8:28 pm

jimbob wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 7:23 pm

It seems that the Western military train their troops how to do something and then in action, their officers tell them to do the tasks.
In my experience Officers do strategy (deciding what to achieve) and NCO's do tactics (deciding locally how to achieve it). It's leadership from Corporals and Sergeants that win battles. Leadership from Officers can win wars... but only if they've got good NCO's beneath them, without those all you've got is a plan.

It seems the Russians don't have a professional NCO cadre.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by Woodchopper » Wed May 11, 2022 10:05 pm

TopBadger wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 8:28 pm
jimbob wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 7:23 pm

It seems that the Western military train their troops how to do something and then in action, their officers tell them to do the tasks.
In my experience Officers do strategy (deciding what to achieve) and NCO's do tactics (deciding locally how to achieve it). It's leadership from Corporals and Sergeants that win battles. Leadership from Officers can win wars... but only if they've got good NCO's beneath them, without those all you've got is a plan.

It seems the Russians don't have a professional NCO cadre.
The Russians don’t.

Interesting thread here: https://twitter.com/jack_watling/status ... zl3FBFKogw

Argues that the Ukrainians didn’t either. But they did have a pool of skilled veterans who could be brought into units at short notice and who played a similar role.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Wed May 11, 2022 11:50 pm

TopBadger wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 8:28 pm
jimbob wrote:
Wed May 11, 2022 7:23 pm

It seems that the Western military train their troops how to do something and then in action, their officers tell them to do the tasks.
In my experience Officers do strategy (deciding what to achieve) and NCO's do tactics (deciding locally how to achieve it). It's leadership from Corporals and Sergeants that win battles. Leadership from Officers can win wars... but only if they've got good NCO's beneath them, without those all you've got is a plan.

It seems the Russians don't have a professional NCO cadre.
Russian doctrine puts tactical decisions in the hands of junior officers, but their doctrine is very top down, and units are reportedly doing very badly when they lose their commanders.

They are clearly aware this is a problem, as they announced a change to it a few years back, but not far enough back for any change in culture to have taken effect yet.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Thu May 12, 2022 12:02 am

This footage shows an M777 in action, reportedly destroying a Russian self-propelled gun. It's combat footage, and be advised it does include footage of the target, too.

Reportedly - and I can't verify anything other than a howitzer fires and in separate footage something explodes catastrophically - they fire one shot, miss, and then get a direct hit with their second shot after correcting their aim, with a spotting drone allowing them to do that. The two shots are 77 seconds apart, at that elevation most of that will be flight time. Guided shells are not always needed for accurate fire.

A trick snipers use is to fire a ranging shot some distance from their target, as that will allow them to correct their scope settings before taking their shot. This is also possible with artillery, should they be worried about spooking their target before they hit it.

And western forces really need to understand just how capable artillery is, and just how short-sighted it is to rely so heavily on airpower and neglect artillery.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by Grumble » Thu May 12, 2022 5:54 am

EACLucifer wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 12:02 am
And western forces really need to understand just how capable artillery is, and just how short-sighted it is to rely so heavily on airpower and neglect artillery.
Isn’t it Western artillery the Ukrainians are using?
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by TopBadger » Thu May 12, 2022 6:46 am

Grumble wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 5:54 am
EACLucifer wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 12:02 am
And western forces really need to understand just how capable artillery is, and just how short-sighted it is to rely so heavily on airpower and neglect artillery.
Isn’t it Western artillery the Ukrainians are using?
Quite.

That Artillery hasn't featured much in recent theatres for western forces says more about the theatre (spread out counter insurgency without a clearly defined FEBA [forward egde of battle area]) than it does about our view of the capabilities of Artillery.

In a conventional war with two armies facing off, Artillery is huge.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by Woodchopper » Thu May 12, 2022 7:52 am

TopBadger wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 6:46 am
Grumble wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 5:54 am
EACLucifer wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 12:02 am
And western forces really need to understand just how capable artillery is, and just how short-sighted it is to rely so heavily on airpower and neglect artillery.
Isn’t it Western artillery the Ukrainians are using?
Quite.

That Artillery hasn't featured much in recent theatres for western forces says more about the theatre (spread out counter insurgency without a clearly defined FEBA [forward egde of battle area]) than it does about our view of the capabilities of Artillery.

In a conventional war with two armies facing off, Artillery is huge.
I agree, the focus upon counter-insurgency and peacekeeping over the past three decades has left Nato members lacking forces suited for a war against a large developed state's armed forces (with the partial exception of the US).

I doubt though that in Europe it would have been politically feasible to maintain the kinds of force necessary to do both roles.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by lpm » Thu May 12, 2022 8:54 am

But Nato has the force. We're giving a small fraction of it to Ukraine and they're winning engagements with it, despite only having a few hours training on the new equipment.

We can't let ourselves be fooled by arms manufacturers in the coming years. They're going to claim Nato is ill-equipped and we need to divert resources to their pockets. But we can probably reduce defence expenditure long term. What we've got is great. A simple change in the mix of spending, maybe, to learn from what works brilliantly vs what works OK.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by El Pollo Diablo » Thu May 12, 2022 9:21 am

This article reckons the Russians have lost around a fifth of their entire national tank set in Ukraine. Also that they don't really have a lot else to play with other than tanks.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by lpm » Thu May 12, 2022 9:29 am

Mate, that's from 11 April. You're way behind on the news, it's now 12 May.

Oryx are the ones running the scoring. Currently at 664 tanks, vs 460 in that 11 April article.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by TopBadger » Thu May 12, 2022 9:30 am

Yes - many NATO members individually have historically been shrinking their armed forces... being in an alliance like NATO permits that, as does increasing effectiveness of weapons meaning fewer are required for the same impact.

It's been said that "Quantity has a quality of its own" but another (quite old I think) quote I dimly remember goes along the lines of "no sooner than we are at peace the country wishes to reduce the size of the army" (I think it was a Boer war quote). Armed Forces are expensive so countries try to get by with the minimum.

I was astonished to hear how many soldiers Finland can muster, if they join NATO that alone adds over 200,000 troops to the roster (about 3x more than the British Army). But that's the benefit of mandated service, it creates a pool of civilians that are only one step away from mobilizing as defenders. Perhaps that's something other NATO members should consider doing more of.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by El Pollo Diablo » Thu May 12, 2022 9:32 am

lpm wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 9:29 am
Mate, that's from 11 April. You're way behind on the news, it's now 12 May.

Oryx are the ones running the scoring. Currently at 664 tanks, vs 460 in that 11 April article.
Ah balls, sorry, google said it was from four days ago. f.cking google.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by Woodchopper » Thu May 12, 2022 9:34 am

lpm wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 8:54 am
But Nato has the force. We're giving a small fraction of it to Ukraine and they're winning engagements with it, despite only having a few hours training on the new equipment.
I don't have time to look up the numbers which are in previous posts, but as far as I remember of mid-April the US had sent about a third of its stocks of Javelins and a quarter of its stocks of Stingers. About $3.5 billion of the aid to Ukraine is being spent on restocking the US inventory, which is going to take years. So its not a small fraction. As far as I know similar numbers apply to the UK etc.
lpm wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 8:54 am
We can't let ourselves be fooled by arms manufacturers in the coming years. They're going to claim Nato is ill-equipped and we need to divert resources to their pockets. But we can probably reduce defence expenditure long term. What we've got is great. A simple change in the mix of spending, maybe, to learn from what works brilliantly vs what works OK.
That really depends upon a) how much equipment Russia will have left and b) how much it can produce. Certainly paper estimates that before the war it had circa 30 000 armored vehicles and artillery pieces are exaggerated and don't take into account how much is in a serviceable condition.

But I doubt that anyone outside Russia has an accurate estimate. The Russian leadership themselves may not know either so long as they depend upon information produced by corrupt officials.

The haste with which the Swedes and Finns are joining NATO is due to their assessment that Russia poses a serious long term threat.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by lpm » Thu May 12, 2022 9:39 am

TopBadger wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 9:30 am
But that's the benefit of mandated service, it creates a pool of civilians that are only one step away from mobilizing as defenders. Perhaps that's something other NATO members should consider doing more of.
WTF? Forced conscription? We don't even have enough people to drive lorries, become nurses and pick vegetables.

If we're going to have conscription, as a society we'd be better off forcing 18 year olds to do one year of nursing home care.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by TopBadger » Thu May 12, 2022 9:46 am

It works for Finland - but they've a different set of values as a society. Probably wouldn't work as well here.

Reserve service could be incentivized more though rather than forced. And again we're back to cost.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by lpm » Thu May 12, 2022 10:05 am

Woodchopper wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 9:34 am
lpm wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 8:54 am
But Nato has the force. We're giving a small fraction of it to Ukraine and they're winning engagements with it, despite only having a few hours training on the new equipment.
I don't have time to look up the numbers which are in previous posts, but as far as I remember of mid-April the US had sent about a third of its stocks of Javelins and a quarter of its stocks of Stingers. About $3.5 billion of the aid to Ukraine is being spent on restocking the US inventory, which is going to take years. So its not a small fraction. As far as I know similar numbers apply to the UK etc.
But Javelins and Stinger are a tiny fraction of total Nato power. We've used zero of our cruise missiles, aircraft carriers, submarines...

We've obviously got to spend short term to replenish and get the mix right. But long term? With an enlarged Nato? And a badly bruised opponent? And outside the Nato arena China is learning some startling lessons about how hard it is to attack.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by bjn » Thu May 12, 2022 11:11 am

lpm wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 10:05 am
Woodchopper wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 9:34 am
lpm wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 8:54 am
But Nato has the force. We're giving a small fraction of it to Ukraine and they're winning engagements with it, despite only having a few hours training on the new equipment.
I don't have time to look up the numbers which are in previous posts, but as far as I remember of mid-April the US had sent about a third of its stocks of Javelins and a quarter of its stocks of Stingers. About $3.5 billion of the aid to Ukraine is being spent on restocking the US inventory, which is going to take years. So its not a small fraction. As far as I know similar numbers apply to the UK etc.
But Javelins and Stinger are a tiny fraction of total Nato power. We've used zero of our cruise missiles, aircraft carriers, submarines...

We've obviously got to spend short term to replenish and get the mix right. But long term? With an enlarged Nato? And a badly bruised opponent? And outside the Nato arena China is learning some startling lessons about how hard it is to attack.
The AT4s, NLAWs, Stingers and Javelins are doing exactly what they were designed to do, which is destroy Russian aircraft and armoured vehicles. It's just that the Ukranians are doing it and not NATO troops, send them over now to do their job so we don't have to do it later. Who else are they meant to be used on? Possibly the Chinese, but they are going to think twice before they do anything given what is going on. And as LPM says, they are only a fraction of the arms the west has.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by lpm » Thu May 12, 2022 11:22 am

I think we should be ratcheting up faster. Today it's Finland. Tomorrow some naval weapon. Next day send in training personnel. Day after send in more drones...

Do it all on one day and an enraged Putin will be phoning his nuke guys. Needs to be salami slices. But slice faster - we can't count indefinitely on Ukrainian citizens offering their lives. It's brutal realpolitik but we've an opportunity to exploit Ukrainian victims to worsen the defeat of our enemy.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by Woodchopper » Thu May 12, 2022 12:23 pm

lpm wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 10:05 am
Woodchopper wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 9:34 am
lpm wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 8:54 am
But Nato has the force. We're giving a small fraction of it to Ukraine and they're winning engagements with it, despite only having a few hours training on the new equipment.
I don't have time to look up the numbers which are in previous posts, but as far as I remember of mid-April the US had sent about a third of its stocks of Javelins and a quarter of its stocks of Stingers. About $3.5 billion of the aid to Ukraine is being spent on restocking the US inventory, which is going to take years. So its not a small fraction. As far as I know similar numbers apply to the UK etc.
But Javelins and Stinger are a tiny fraction of total Nato power. We've used zero of our cruise missiles, aircraft carriers, submarines...
That's one of the problems with military forces. Elements have very specific uses and its often impossible, difficult or expensive to adapt them for other roles. A huge amount of it is redundant in any given war. All the investment in building up counter-insurgency capability over the past decades hasn't been relevant to the war in Ukraine. Excepting a situation like WW2 NATO members aren't going to use more than a fraction of their forces in a specific war. All of NATO's submarines, aircraft carriers and submarines just aren't very relevant to the current battles in the Donbas.
lpm wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 10:05 am
We've obviously got to spend short term to replenish and get the mix right. But long term? With an enlarged Nato? And a badly bruised opponent? And outside the Nato arena China is learning some startling lessons about how hard it is to attack.
There's two very different questions to ask about Russia. One is whether it would win a war against NATO. I don't think it could. The second is whether it could devastate NATO members in the process of not winning, and that is much less certain. You should look at what forces are actually deployed in the Baltic states, and how they'd be reinforced or resupplied.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by Martin Y » Thu May 12, 2022 12:55 pm

EACLucifer wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 12:02 am
This footage shows an M777 in action, reportedly destroying a Russian self-propelled gun. It's combat footage, and be advised it does include footage of the target, too.

Reportedly - and I can't verify anything other than a howitzer fires and in separate footage something explodes catastrophically - they fire one shot, miss, and then get a direct hit with their second shot after correcting their aim, with a spotting drone allowing them to do that. The two shots are 77 seconds apart, at that elevation most of that will be flight time...
The claim may be accurate but the video illustrates the story rather than showing it accurately.

There's an edit in the video about halfway through, so although it does show two shots (it's not the same bit of video repeated twice) we've no info about the time between shots or even which one came first. The cutaway video of the explosion shows smoke already rising from the target and it's possible the big explosion is not a second shell hit but rather ammunition cooking off in a fire caused by a hit we aren't shown.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Thu May 12, 2022 6:03 pm

Martin Y wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 12:55 pm
EACLucifer wrote:
Thu May 12, 2022 12:02 am
This footage shows an M777 in action, reportedly destroying a Russian self-propelled gun. It's combat footage, and be advised it does include footage of the target, too.

Reportedly - and I can't verify anything other than a howitzer fires and in separate footage something explodes catastrophically - they fire one shot, miss, and then get a direct hit with their second shot after correcting their aim, with a spotting drone allowing them to do that. The two shots are 77 seconds apart, at that elevation most of that will be flight time...
The claim may be accurate but the video illustrates the story rather than showing it accurately.

There's an edit in the video about halfway through, so although it does show two shots (it's not the same bit of video repeated twice) we've no info about the time between shots or even which one came first.
Ah, missed that as I was in a hurry.
The cutaway video of the explosion shows smoke already rising from the target and it's possible the big explosion is not a second shell hit but rather ammunition cooking off in a fire caused by a hit we aren't shown.
The big explosion is definitely the ammunition cooking off, there isn't an artillery piece in the world these days that hits that hard.

In general re: my comments about the west neglecting artillery.

Western formations generally have a lot less artillery than Russian ones, as Western forces tend to assume they'll have air supremacy - which of course they have against Iraq/Libya/Various Insurgents in the last few decades. It's not that Western artillery is bad as such, it's that its use is downplayed compared to air-launched PGM usage. Compared to attack aircraft, artillery is very cheap, especially if we insist that all attack aircraft must be stealth fighters.

The other issue is one of escalation. In the Donbas war, Ukraine was able to use the very long range of the 203mm 2S7 Pion as a workaround for restrictions on heavy equipment near the frontline (the Russians, incidentally, just ignored those Minsk treaty restrictions). To rely on airpower means assuming that it will always be possible to conduct full scale SEAD/DEAD operations. Western forces also assume airpower will be available to deal with aerial threats. Re-introducting SPAAG/SHORADS allows smaller forces to be deployed without relying on full scale air cover, and using more artillery means being able to respond quicker, within the range of the guns, and more cheaply - even guided shells are a lot cheaper than aircraft+PGMs, and often guided shells won't be needed.

While we're on the subject of artillery, apparent accounts of the Battle of Bilohorivka - where I massively underestimated Russian losses, which have now been counted as 73 pieces of heavy equipment - - talk about the Ukrainian use of heavy artillery (I'm not if this refers to 152mm, 155mm or 203mm or heavy MLRS like the BM-27 and BM-30) and even Ukrainian airpower against the Russian bridging attempt. However they did it, the ability of the Ukrainians to identify where the Russians would cross and quickly bring overwhelming firepower to bear against the Russians at the point when they were most vulnerable was decisive.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Thu May 12, 2022 6:35 pm

While we're on the subject of things the west should do, this is one of them.

Obviously Brimstone is very effective when deployed from aircraft, but being able to take a relatively small vehicle and give it that much precision firepower allows ground forces to very effectively control a wide area against all sorts of vehicles. This is a stopgap, but I know there's proposals to mount similar on a Boxer chassis, and it seems to be a good idea.

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