Blyatskrieg

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by TopBadger » Tue Nov 22, 2022 11:46 am

lpm wrote:
Tue Nov 22, 2022 10:59 am

... which is why it was bad news when Russia surrendered Kherson. There's no longer any obvious area where Ukraine can achieve accelerated attrition.
I understand the point you're making but Russians going backwards and surrendering territory will always be 'good news' in my book. Attrition isn't required, the best win all around would be for Putin to accept defeat and pull all his troops home so there be no further attrition on either side.

The Ukrainians have home field advantage and western support - they'll find an advantage to press somewhere. And 'General Winter' will be joining the battle soon, and likely inflict more casualties on poorly equipped Russians than Ukrainians. One wonders how many Russian conscripts would quite like a freezing injury to get out of the fighting...
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by jimbob » Tue Nov 22, 2022 12:08 pm

TopBadger wrote:
Tue Nov 22, 2022 11:46 am
lpm wrote:
Tue Nov 22, 2022 10:59 am

... which is why it was bad news when Russia surrendered Kherson. There's no longer any obvious area where Ukraine can achieve accelerated attrition.
I understand the point you're making but Russians going backwards and surrendering territory will always be 'good news' in my book. Attrition isn't required, the best win all around would be for Putin to accept defeat and pull all his troops home so there be no further attrition on either side.

The Ukrainians have home field advantage and western support - they'll find an advantage to press somewhere. And 'General Winter' will be joining the battle soon, and likely inflict more casualties on poorly equipped Russians than Ukrainians. One wonders how many Russian conscripts would quite like a freezing injury to get out of the fighting...
Yup, if there was no political element to it, the calculus would be different, but Russian political will is not infinite, nor is Putin's grip on power.

Also, making Crimea less viable is good
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Wed Nov 23, 2022 7:27 am

So I'd been planning to do a post about Crimea, supply lines, and long range weapons. Turns out a lot of people are talking about this (I've been out of the loop for a couple of days). So anyway, I'll save time by stealing referencing their work.

I mentioned on the other thread the apparent provision of the Turkish TLRG 230 MLRS. I've not seen evidence for this myself, but Oryx is reporting it. This is often described as having a 20-70km range, but some sources place it at 150km.

Additionally, Ukraine have requested the GL-SDB (Ground Launched Small Diameter Bomb - it uses the motor of the now out of favour M26 cluster rocket to launch an American Small Diameter Bomb - a glide bomb in standard service with America and others - out to around 150km. The Small Diameter Bomb is an excellent weapon, very accurate and carrying a warhead capable of both airburst and penetrating (ie bunker busting/demolition) attacks). The consortium producing the GL-SDB - which is not yet in service anywhere but has been tested and combines proven available components - announced that they were expecting contracts last month. There's no evidence of this weapon being in service with Ukraine, so please don't take this as more than speculation, but if it were to be provided, it would have a major impact, as shown on this map from DefMon3.

Assuming that TLRG 230 has been supplied and the 150km figure is correct, this map also works for that system. As one can see, the whole of southern Ukraine, save for Crimea is in range, including all the routes in and out of Crimea. This includes Dzhankoi, which has been struck several times with something.

Image

M30/31 GMLRS rockets can't reach all the routes into and out of Crimea, but they can reach Armiansk, thus interdicting traffic across the Isthmus of Perekop, which is the main, and easiest routes into Crimea. WarTranslated had a clip recently with Russians talking about evacuating Armiansk - my presumption is that this means reducing their presence for fear of HIMARS, not fully abandoning southern Kherson oblast.

Meanwhile the Russians are apparently trying to improve the road along the Arabat spit, which separates the Sea of Azov from the lagoons to the west of the spit, right along the very eastern edge of Crimea. It's extremely exposed, but it does have the advantage that it doesn't rely on a bridge, like the route via Chonggar, and doesn't go within M30/31 range of Ukrainian-held right-bank Kherson like the route via the Isthmus of Perekop.

There was also a lot of chatter last night about explosions in Sevastopol, and talk of drones. More clarity might follow, or it might not.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Wed Nov 23, 2022 8:31 am

Quick update: I have now seen what looks to be evidence of Turkish GMLRS in service Tpyxa can't be trusted, but the footage very clearly shows a TRLG-230 launching a missile from beside what looks exactly like the sort of treeline that is everywhere in Ukraine (albeit also in a lot of other places, but it doesn't look like a testing range, at least).

Also Britain is sending several Sea King helicopters. I expect they'll be used for logistics, but we can't copletely rule out the Ukrainians strapping rocket pods to the sides of them. I think this is the first provision of western helicopters, and hopefully it will pave the way for more combat-oriented models too.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Wed Nov 23, 2022 8:57 am

EACLucifer wrote:
Wed Nov 23, 2022 8:31 am
Also Britain is sending several Sea King helicopters. I expect they'll be used for logistics, but we can't copletely rule out the Ukrainians strapping rocket pods to the sides of them. I think this is the first provision of western helicopters, and hopefully it will pave the way for more combat-oriented models too.
First saw this illustrated with search and rescue variant (and paywalled), but now seeing suggestions that it's the anti-submarine warfare (ASW) that's going. Not sure if they'll try and use them for that role, though - they'd be quite vulnerable over the Black Sea.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by TopBadger » Wed Nov 23, 2022 10:34 am

I wont lie - I was disappointed when I saw the heli's were Sea Kings...

They'll be good for casevac, which in turn will be good for morale, but unlikely to be much use in taking the battle to the Russians.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Wed Nov 23, 2022 10:43 am

TopBadger wrote:
Wed Nov 23, 2022 10:34 am
I wont lie - I was disappointed when I saw the heli's were Sea Kings...

They'll be good for casevac, which in turn will be good for morale, but unlikely to be much use in taking the battle to the Russians.
Main thing going for them is they are surplus to requirements here. A decent platform for their intended jobs as transport, evac and submarine warfare - though suspect they'd be vulnerable there. Also useful to break the seal on western helicopters, and probably less politically fraught than going straight to Apaches or similar. Hopefully they can pave the way for that sort of platform, though.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by TopBadger » Wed Nov 23, 2022 10:57 am

Maybe - since Wildcats have replaced Lynx I wonder if there are some older Lynx's mothballed somewhere...
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by jimbob » Wed Nov 23, 2022 11:18 am

Are there any platforms we know that Ukraine has that can air launch Brimstone? Because that could be potentially useful.
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Wed Nov 23, 2022 11:27 am

jimbob wrote:
Wed Nov 23, 2022 11:18 am
Are there any platforms we know that Ukraine has that can air launch Brimstone? Because that could be potentially useful.
If they can mount it on a truck, they can mount it on a transport helicopter. Rail adaptors might need be constructed, and the interface might be clunky, but it could be done. As long as communications were good to avoid the risk of friendly fire - Brimstone doesn't know whether a given Warsaw Pact tank is Russian or Ukrainian, so it all comes down to target area - it could give Ukraine an extremely effective rapid response to armoured/mechanised attacks. And of course it would work just as well against counterattacks, in order to enable offensives.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Thu Nov 24, 2022 2:58 pm

TopBadger wrote:
Wed Nov 23, 2022 10:57 am
Maybe - since Wildcats have replaced Lynx I wonder if there are some older Lynx's mothballed somewhere...
Hold onto the Lynxes and send the Wildcats! I want to see how the "There is no such thing as too many Martlets" loadout works in practise.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Fri Nov 25, 2022 6:36 am

Ukraine General Staff's update apparently included Ukrainian forces repelling an attack on Dibrova, about 10km of Kreminna (via AndrewPerpetua). It looks like the frontline there is still moving. It's been creeping slowly for some time, in Ukraine's favour.

Further south footage from Bakhmut - which I will not link - is chillingly reminiscent of the first world war. Russia's casualties in the continual assaults look to be appalling.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Fri Nov 25, 2022 7:08 am

It's hardly surprising given the state of the Kerch Bridge that Russia has resorted to using landing ships for supply runs.

Back in March, a landing ship was destroyed and another damaged in Berdyansk when Ukraine hit them with what was almost certainly a Tochka-U. Even the Tochka-U - with it's range of 120 or so km and CEP* of a little under a hundred metres - was up to the task, in this case a cluster warhead was used as the layout of Berdyansk's harbour meant that the bomblets would either hit a Russian ship or go in the sea. There are numerous more suitable weapons available, most obviously the MGM-140 ATACMS, with a range of around 300km and a CEP of less than 10M, for the most recent version.

Strangling Russia's logistics lead to victory in Kherson, and there aren't good supply routes to most of the occupied south, save for the Donbas itself. A lot of territory could be liberated, and a lot of pressure placed upon Russia, if suitable weapons were supplied to hit these landing ships as they offload - it is not a quick process to unload them, and as they are unloading, they are a static target. A sitting duck for missiles like ATACMS.


*Circular Error Probable, a method for measuring accuracy - if a munition has a CEP of 100m, for example, one would expect half the rounds to land within a circle of 100m radius around the target.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Fri Nov 25, 2022 10:34 am

Captured T-62 now in Ukrainian camouflage

If Ukraine are putting T-62s into service, we can stop debating about whether or not upgraded Leopard 1s (or older model Leopard 2s and older model Abrams) are up to the job. They were built to kill T-62s like this, and have been upgraded heavily since. And adding T-62s to Ukraine's logistics complicates them nearly as much as adding western tanks would - especially as they are already adding some 105mm L7 armed tanks in the form of the M-55S.

Tanks aren't the top priority right now, realistically. Ukraine really needs IFVs more than anything else on the ground, as well as long range precision strike capability ideally without needless restrictions on its use and of course air defence. That said, they clearly don't have enough, or they wouldn't be putting the few dozen T-62s they captured into service.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by headshot » Sat Nov 26, 2022 8:14 am

Just heard a report on Radio 4 that Russia are removing nuclear warheads from missiles so that they can use them as unarmed munitions against Ukraine.

So Putin's latest master stroke is a reduction of the nuclear arsenal.*

Not the outcome I was expecting from this...

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/br ... 022-11-26/





*I know, I know...they have so many nuclear warheads that this will make no difference.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Sat Nov 26, 2022 9:23 am

headshot wrote:
Sat Nov 26, 2022 8:14 am
Just heard a report on Radio 4 that Russia are removing nuclear warheads from missiles so that they can use them as unarmed munitions against Ukraine.

So Putin's latest master stroke is a reduction of the nuclear arsenal.*

Not the outcome I was expecting from this...

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/br ... 022-11-26/





*I know, I know...they have so many nuclear warheads that this will make no difference.
Ukraine's air defences are taking down most of the missiles, it seems, so adding additional missiles, even unarmed, will assist the armed ones getting through. A similar philosophy has been used over the years with ICBMs that carry multiple warheads, where a couple of the warheads are replaced with a large number of "Penetration Aids" designed to appear as warheads and make it harder to intercept the real ones.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by Woodchopper » Sun Nov 27, 2022 11:34 am


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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by atled » Sun Nov 27, 2022 3:32 pm

I just seen a tweet from the UK MOD about them providing Ukraine with Brimstone 2 missiles,https://twitter.com/DefenceHQ/status/15 ... 9751050240. I know nothing of the missiles capabilities and I will leave that to other forum members to comment on.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by bjn » Sun Nov 27, 2022 3:50 pm

Fire and forget air launched anti-tank missile designed to take out tanks with Soviet style reactive armour.

Waiting to be accused of thigh rubbing.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Sun Nov 27, 2022 3:56 pm

atled wrote:
Sun Nov 27, 2022 3:32 pm
I just seen a tweet from the UK MOD about them providing Ukraine with Brimstone 2 missiles,https://twitter.com/DefenceHQ/status/15 ... 9751050240. I know nothing of the missiles capabilities and I will leave that to other forum members to comment on.
I am not an expert, so some of these details may be wrong, especially regarding targetting procedure, but as far as I can tell this is the general gist of it.

Brimstone is an advanced and modern piece of kit. It was originally developed for air to ground use, and saw service with the RAF in Libya, and later against IS. It was originally designed to destroy tanks, and it has a warhead capable of taking out more or less any vehicle on the battlefield. While originally designed for air-to-ground use, there was already work underway to make naval anti-boat versions and tests of ground launched versions, and there's various proposals for armoured vehicles with multiple launchers and so on in the works. Ukraine have been launching Brimstone-1s from the original aviation mountings mounted at an angle in the side of a small cargo vehicle, and one would expect a similar setup for Brimstone-2s.

It uses a millimetric radar primary seeker, and is capable of engaging and attacking targets on its own. As far as I can tell, the missile is told where it can look for targets, and given a priority order of what to attack. It then hunts for the targets on its own, using its radar to differentiate between different types of vehicles and so on. That's the most likely role for it in Ukraine, as it can counter Russian tactics where tanks stay behind cover and use drones to direct their gunfire.

One of the changes between Brimstone 1 and Brimstone 2 was the addition of a secondary laser-guidance system. Unlike most laser guidance systems, apparently it is sufficient to briefly designate the target so the missile knows what you want it to target, and the radar does the rest. I'd be surprised, though, if that was used much in Ukraine, as it is Brimstone's ability to seek its own targets out of sight of the launcher that makes it so different to other weapons in the Ukrainian arsenal. The other differences mostly relate to range, which is improved but it isn't clear exactly what the range would be when ground launched - I'd guess between ten and twenty kilometres.

So compared to something like a Javelin, Brimstone is very useful as it doesn't need the operator to lock it on to a target; as long as the targets rough location is known, the missile can be sent to hunt for it. Though it has a much shorter range and smaller warhead than things like the M31 guided rocket used with HIMARS, it is designed for a different job, and is more than capable of tracking and engaging moving targets.

So the short version is it kills tanks and vehicles, it does so at a range that keeps the launcher much safer than traditional anti-tank missiles, and it is one of the most advanced weapons sent to Ukraine by the west.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by jimbob » Sun Nov 27, 2022 4:52 pm

Woodchopper wrote:
Sun Nov 27, 2022 11:34 am
Thread on the effects of winter: https://twitter.com/jack_watling/status ... yExoe7SwPA
The hygiene one is going to cause Russia problems

https://twitter.com/ChrisO_wiki/status/ ... hI9uo8NoXg

Even before they get to the front
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by TopBadger » Tue Nov 29, 2022 11:43 am

Telegraph reporting Pentagon considering supplying longer range GLSDB (about 2x range of existing HIMAR's ammo and "quick and cheap" to produce)

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/us ... 0970fecc6e
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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Tue Nov 29, 2022 3:13 pm

TopBadger wrote:
Tue Nov 29, 2022 11:43 am
Telegraph reporting Pentagon considering supplying longer range GLSDB (about 2x range of existing HIMAR's ammo and "quick and cheap" to produce)

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/us ... 0970fecc6e
The estimates I've seen for this are for the spring, which is only a few months away.

It's a simple concept - take the motor section of the old and largely unused M26 cluster rocket, bodge an adaptor onto it to carry a Small Diameter Bomb - a very accurate glide bomb used by the Americans and others. Both major components are already available, so it ought to be quick to produce.

It's also more capable of demolition work than the M31 rocket currently in use. The current ripple in journalism where all the journalists feel the need to copy each other is concerns over supply of munitions - if the US were so worried about that, they should have supplied something more effective rather than watching M31 after M31 slowly chew their way through the Antonivsky bridge when it could and should have been decisively dropped.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by EACLucifer » Tue Nov 29, 2022 3:58 pm

Image

Reportedly these are brand new 152mm shells in Ukrainian service. I haven't bothered to translate them, but if these are reaching the frontlines, it takes the strain off 155mm supplies and keeps Ukraine's older artillery in the fight.

Might be worth seeing if the Small Diameter Bomb can be paired with an Uragan or Smerch motor, for that matter.

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Re: Blyatskrieg

Post by Woodchopper » Tue Nov 29, 2022 4:25 pm

EACLucifer wrote:
Tue Nov 29, 2022 3:58 pm

Reportedly these are brand new 152mm shells in Ukrainian service. I haven't bothered to translate them, but if these are reaching the frontlines, it takes the strain off 155mm supplies and keeps Ukraine's older artillery in the fight.

Might be worth seeing if the Small Diameter Bomb can be paired with an Uragan or Smerch motor, for that matter.
They aren't just new shells, it appears that Ukraine has recently restarted production of 152mm ammunition, which means that it won't be so reliant upon external supplies. I hope Russia isn't able to attack the production line.

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