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  • Originally posted by Albany Rifles View Post

    Not at all. Standard doctrine. Seize an airfield by airborne/air assault. Bring in reinforcements by air landing. You can be in a metric shit ton of equipment and vehicles in AN-124s & 225s. If you notice the Ukrainian air defense networks were early targets.
    The sole An-225 was caught at the Antonov Airport and supposedly it's still intact. I wonder if the Russians will try to fly it out as war loot.

    The Russian Air Force currently has 12 An-124's in service with 14 in reserve according to Wiki, plus 3 An-22's and over 100 IL-76's.

    I wonder if they could be only partially fueled and then overloaded with gear to maximize their MTOW limits.
    “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

    Comment


    • Originally posted by TopHatter View Post

      The sole An-225 was caught at the Antonov Airport and supposedly it's still intact. I wonder if the Russians will try to fly it out as war loot.

      The Russian Air Force currently has 12 An-124's in service with 14 in reserve according to Wiki, plus 3 An-22's and over 100 IL-76's.

      I wonder if they could be only partially fueled and then overloaded with gear to maximize their MTOW limits.
      Absolute likely approach to get more in on short flights. Probably going to be cubed out before weighting out.
      “Loyalty to country ALWAYS. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it.”
      Mark Twain

      Comment


      • Originally posted by Albany Rifles View Post

        Which is why the Russians learned their lessons and applied combined arms operations in follow on combat. They got the Infantry out of the APCs and on foot backed by tanks & artillery. That is what the US did in several cities in Iraq...same with the Iraqis themselves when going after Daesh.

        And light infantry is exactly what you want in a city, backed by firepower which the Russians will have. Any scenario of US light forces fighting in EUrope had them fighting either in built up areas or on reverse slope of heavy wooded areas. Plus the Belarus border is not too far away and can reinforce rather quickly.

        And a 100 killed...that is nothing to the Russian calculus.
        Sir, I just recently read a piece that argued that at least for US forces in Iraq the USAR troops doing MOUT ops in Sadr City took far fewer causalities than the USMC light infantry in Fallujah.

        Comment



        • To my earlier post, some ideas of knowing what you are reading and posting are accurate.

          https://www.poynter.org/reporting-ed...mN78vVKl2EN5Go


          How to spot video and photo fakes as Russia invades Ukraine

          A look at the techniques that journalists and other investigators use to verify whether images and videos are real and in accurate context.

          A man takes his things out of the house after damaged by artillery shelling in Novoluhanske, eastern Ukraine, Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
          By: Al Tompkins
          February 24, 2022

          In the first hours of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, internet watchdogs pored over images shared on Russian media that claimed Ukraine struck first and Russia merely responded.

          The Biden administration has been warning for weeks that, in the days and hours leading up to the invasion of Ukraine that arrived before dawn on Thursday, Russian sources would release “false flag” photos and videos to make it appear that the Ukrainian military attacked Russian forces unprovoked.

          To understand how these investigators do their work, you should first understand a few basics.
          Understanding metadata


          Everything created on a digital device — whether it is a smartphone, a laptop or tablet — includes a digital fingerprint that rides with the file. That digital fingerprint, called metadata, sticks with the document — whether it is a video, photo, spreadsheet or other document — until somebody or some program removes it.

          Let me give you an example before we explore images from the Russia/Ukraine border.

          I took a photo of my office at Poynter. When I pull that photo into a metadata viewer like the one shown below, you can see the data behind the file. The data shows that I used my iPhone 11 Pro Max to take the photo on Feb. 22, 2022, at 11:56 a.m.

          (Al Tompkins/Poynter)

          You will also see that my phone embedded my latitude and longitude in the metadata. It says the phone was pointed toward the west. Drop the latitude and longitude into Google Maps and you will see precisely where I was standing when I took the image. The tag is correct within about 50 yards.

          (Screenshot/Google Maps)
          Metadata isn’t foolproof


          It is possible to change metadata. I could pull my photo into Photoshop, for example, and edit the metadata to make it appear that I was anywhere else I could dream of. Think of metadata as a clue and not an ironclad answer. That is why it is important to triangulate metadata with other elements to debunk or confirm an image.

          If I shared that photo on Twitter or Facebook, those social media sites would not pass along the metadata. But there is a social media platform called Telegram that is very popular outside of the United States because of its speed and its functionalities, which include encrypted video calling.

          Telegram has another unique quality: It does not remove metadata on videos and photos that are shared on it. So, it is possible to easily find out where images or videos from Telegram were captured.
          Metadata in action


          Let’s apply this technique to a video that the Russian news agency Tass ran on-air and online.

          Tass said that five Ukrainian soldiers had crossed the border into Russia riding two armored personnel carriers. It just so happened, Tass reported, that the intruders were wearing helmet cameras and rolling video when they attacked Russian soldiers and the Russians killed them. The video had been posted on Telegram, and the metadata indicated it was not actually from inside Russia but instead from the occupied area of Eastern Ukraine.

          That detail is critically important because, if the metadata is accurate, it indicates that the video was not an attack inside of Russia that would justify a counterattack.

          The metadata indicates the armored vehicles were blown apart very near another alleged attack by Ukrainian forces against what was reported in Russian media to be a Russian military outpost. The metadata of those two images map to a location five farm fields away from each other.

          All of this evidence would seem to indicate that both images are at least questionable. The metadata does not match the claims, and skeptics believe they were both staged — or “false flag” — attacks meant to make Ukraine appear to be the aggressor.

          Bellingcat journalists lead the way in using forensic analysis like metadata to verify or debunk images and videos. Bellingcat posted a spreadsheet showing the date and content of the footage and provided an analysis of what debunkers have found.

          (Bellingcat)

          Bellingcat reported:
          In another illustrative case from February 20, a pro-Russian militia from Luhansk posted a video to its Telegram channel claiming to show a man in the village of Pryshyb whose leg had to be amputated after shelling by Ukrainian forces.

          This video includes an initial clip of a man on the ground allegedly at the scene of his injury. A man is then shown in hospital where he is said to be recovering after an amputation.

          Although it cannot be established that these two men are the same, the video appears easily disprovable as the man’s prosthesis seems clearly visible in the initial clip (hence his leg had already been amputated).

          In addition to examining metadata, researchers look at the smallest details to see if they add up. For example, on Monday, Russian media said Russian President Vladimir Putin scheduled an emergency Security Council meeting after leaders of two contested regions in Eastern Ukraine requested Russia recognize their independence. Russian TV showed Putin signing an action doing just that.

          But debunkers noticed that people in the video were wearing watches. The Security Council meeting reportedly took place at 5 p.m. local time, but the watches all read noon. And watches at the signing ceremony read 10:15 a.m., so either everyone had the wrong time, or the signing took place before the Security Council meeting. In other words, it was all cinema.
          Be careful


          While doing this kind of debunking work, journalists and other researchers should be careful not to overstate the certainty of what they undercover. For example, while I have cited inconsistencies in state media claims and the misaligned metadata behind videos and photos, we cannot say with certainty who captured the video and who posted it. But the fact that Russian government media is running it and claiming definitively that it is proof of Ukrainian aggression makes it important enough to question.
          “Loyalty to country ALWAYS. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it.”
          Mark Twain

          Comment


          • Originally posted by zraver View Post

            Sir, I just recently read a piece that argued that at least for US forces in Iraq the USAR troops doing MOUT ops in Sadr City took far fewer causalities than the USMC light infantry in Fallujah.
            2 totally different kinds of a fight. In Fallujah you had an enemy who had several weeks to dig in an prepare their defense of the city. It was also a much more Sunni Al Qaeda cadre there which is why it was an international fight...a lot of those Chechen fighters you mentioned earlier. The fight in Sadr City was against the Shia Jaysh al-Mahdī (JAM), or the Mahdī Army of cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. They were a militia force and not the tough dedicated suicidal fighters found in Fallujah. 2 different fights against 2 different enemies.

            Also in Fallujah, a primarily Marine fight, there was one Army task for...TF 2/2 INF from 1 ID. The Bradleys and M1s were more effective in MOUT than the Marine Amphibs.

            As the war progressed you would see much better combined arms efforts by Army, Marines as well as Iraqis.

            The Modern War Institute at West Point has a ton of great resources. They also have an awesome podcast called The Spear...interviews with Soldier, Airmen, Sailors & Marines who fought in specific times and place. I have heard everything from the Ranger Battalion commander at Mogadishu to an Army Medical Service Corps Captain who deployed with a team to support efforts in fighting an Ebola outbreak in 2015/16 to an Air Force F-16 pilot over Baghdad. The Spear is available on all podcast platforms.

            https://mwi.usma.edu/
            “Loyalty to country ALWAYS. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it.”
            Mark Twain

            Comment


            • Per Kyiv Post, Russian Airborne troops at Hostomel/Antonov airfield have been destroyed. Also in Kyiv, it has been reported that over 10,000 automatic rifles have been distributed to the civilian militia.
              "Draft beer, not people."

              Comment


              • Originally posted by Parihaka View Post
                Two questions:
                Does anyone expect Europe to stop buying Russian gas?
                Does Putin look quite sick to anyone else?
                Cancelling approval for a pipeline that isn't delivering & making a big song and dance about it does no bode well. It's over stating the importance when it's vastly outshone by what is being delivered, already.

                Ego Numquam

                Comment


                • Originally posted by Red Team View Post
                  Per Kyiv Post, Russian Airborne troops at Hostomel/Antonov airfield have been destroyed. Also in Kyiv, it has been reported that over 10,000 automatic rifles have been distributed to the civilian militia.
                  If true that means the butcher's bill Russia has too pay just went way up.

                  Still without other verification I have my doubts. Russian airborne forces are "muscular".

                  Comment


                  • Originally posted by Red Team View Post
                    Per Kyiv Post, Russian Airborne troops at Hostomel/Antonov airfield have been destroyed. Also in Kyiv, it has been reported that over 10,000 automatic rifles have been distributed to the civilian militia.
                    "Ukrainian presidential advisor corrects his statement, says the battle in Hostomel is still ongoing. Artillery and tanks involved"

                    Ukraine needs this win, badly
                    “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

                    Comment


                    • Originally posted by TopHatter View Post

                      "Ukrainian presidential advisor corrects his statement, says the battle in Hostomel is still ongoing. Artillery and tanks involved"

                      Ukraine needs this win, badly
                      Yeah it's been a back and forth affair with the airport, the latest reports stated that Russian Airborne survivors retreated into the surrounding forest---maybe that's the fighting that's still ongoing. I would consider the action to be a critical setback for Russia since the planned Russian landings at the airport were apparently called off due to the ongoing fighting.

                      Looks as if they're going to have to march to Kyiv the hard way.

                      Update: Ukrainian military official has stated that the option of destroying the airfield is on the table.
                      Last edited by Red Team; 24 Feb 22,, 22:21.
                      "Draft beer, not people."

                      Comment


                      • Originally posted by TopHatter View Post

                        "Ukrainian presidential advisor corrects his statement, says the battle in Hostomel is still ongoing. Artillery and tanks involved"

                        Ukraine needs this win, badly
                        They have until morning to do it. Russia has control of the skies so when the sun comes up UA armor won't be able to move.

                        Comment


                        • Reports coming in that Germany, Cyprus & Italy are trying to veto consideration of Swift monetary measures.

                          Update: https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...payment-system
                          Last edited by Chunder; 24 Feb 22,, 23:05.
                          Ego Numquam

                          Comment


                          • Originally posted by Red Team View Post
                            Yeah it's been a back and forth affair with the airport, the latest reports stated that Russian Airborne survivors retreated into the surrounding forest---maybe that's the fighting that's still ongoing. I would consider the action to be a critical setback for Russia since the planned Russian landings at the airport were apparently called off due to the ongoing fighting.
                            I wouldn't. The whole concept of Operations is that no one single battle can derail the Objectives. Contingencies are in place for any one single loss. What those are remains to be seen but the Russians are far from being out of the fight for Kiev.
                            Chimo

                            Comment


                            • Originally posted by Officer of Engineers View Post
                              I wouldn't. The whole concept of Operations is that no one single battle can derail the Objectives. Contingencies are in place for any one single loss. What those are remains to be seen but the Russians are far from being out of the fight for Kiev.
                              Losing an airborne brigade and attached spetsnaz forces would be a huge loss of morale and prestige and propaganda defeat. Those two get the best of the litter. Combining a solid defeat at the airport and all the antiwar protests at home and it could cause Putin serious problems at home and make him look for a way to "declare victory" and get out. He has never really had to take a punch

                              Comment


                              • Originally posted by Albany Rifles View Post

                                1. I know right now the US is the #1 producer of natural gas but our export capabilities are currently are maxed out...heard a report on NPR last night on that very topic. Some pipelines are in construction but I don't know of other sources. Hope someone here can be more enlightening.

                                Here is the link:

                                Ukraine crisis drives up global energy prices : NPR

                                2. Thought the same but thought I was wrong. Good eye, Iain.
                                I've read some speculation (In Reuters I think) on the issue of gas. The thinking was something along the lines that America and its Allies may have been sounding out major gas producers about trying to 'shuffle the deck' on gas contracts in the event Russia shuts off the tap. The idea would be for producers closer to Europe (say the middle east) to temporarily 'switch' some sales to Europe and then have other global suppliers step in to handle contracted deliveries the middle eastern suppliers might 'default' on as a result. Presumably the idea is that when (or if) the sanctions end everything shuffles back to previous settings.).

                                Two big issues I see; 1) Logistics. Do Europe's existing seaport gas terminals have the capacity to handle the extra tankers required?
                                2) Organization: How easy would it be to coordinate the switch over? I can see most of the big players including Australia being on board but in the end how practical is it?
                                Last edited by Monash; 24 Feb 22,, 23:12.
                                If you are emotionally invested in 'believing' something is true you have lost the ability to tell if it is true.

                                Comment

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