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Originally posted by Officer of EngineersView Post
It's the modern version of the faint retreat. Lure lead elements of a Russian advance into a KZ while counter-attacking the Russian immediate rear to trap Russian lead elements in that KZ, denying a line of retreat for the Russian lead elements.
And to be sure...KZ is kill zone. A place where fires...both direct and indirect...can mass against an enemy formation and destroy. It is reinforced with obstacles to slow down and break up enemy formations.
In Russian doctrine it is referred to as a fire sack. In US it is called an engagement area.
“Loyalty to country ALWAYS. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it.”
Mark Twain
Kyiv is claiming to have shot down another A-50 Mainstay AEW&C aircraft, no independent confirmation yet, although Russian mil-bloggers are saying it's true.
Ukrainian media carried footage purportedly showing a massive blaze that erupted when the downed warplane crashed in the Krasnodar region near the east coast of the Sea of Azov. Russian officials didn’t comment on the Ukrainian claim, but several Russian military bloggers confirmed the plane’s loss.
If accurate, then this could leave Russia with as little as one serviceable A-50 left.
“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.”
Kyiv is claiming to have shot down another A-50 Mainstay AEW&C aircraft, no independent confirmation yet, although Russian mil-bloggers are saying it's true.
Ukrainian media carried footage purportedly showing a massive blaze that erupted when the downed warplane crashed in the Krasnodar region near the east coast of the Sea of Azov. Russian officials didn’t comment on the Ukrainian claim, but several Russian military bloggers confirmed the plane’s loss.
If accurate, then this could leave Russia with as little as one serviceable A-50 left.
Great news. They may not have the firepower and equipment to go on the offensive but they can use the limited number of PGMs and drones they do have to peck the eyes out of key Russian enablers like AWAC's aircraft and landing ships. If I had to guess? I'd suspect some 'friend' spotted it for them and passed on advice on the best lines of approach for reaching it.
Visegrad is reporting that another IL 22M has also just been shot down...and maybe another SU 34 today?
It's certainly a thing right now.
"This aggression will not stand, man!" Jeff Lebowski "The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you're uncool." Lester Bangs
Does anyone know the exact number of flyable A-50 Mainstay air-frames Russia still has on it's books? From memory there were a couple that had been out of service for years so they are probably only good for spare parts and I think one was damaged by a drone attack as well or am I mistaken? Anyway what does that leave them now.
A Ukrainian tank fires towards the Russian position as Ukrainian soldiers from the artillery unit wait for ammunition assistance at the front line in the direction of Avdiivka as the Russia-Ukraine war continues in Donetsk on December 28, 2023.
IN THE TWO YEARS SINCE THAT PRE-DAWN FEBRUARY MORNING when Russian troops smashed across the border and missiles began to fly, the war in Ukraine has changed our world. It has given new names and faces to heroism, from Volodymyr Zelensky’s defiant dignity to the desperate Mariupol defenders taking their last stand in the catacombs of a gigantic Soviet steel factory to the captured Ukrainian soldier saying Slava Ukraini before being shot dead. It has given new addresses to evil—above all, Bucha, the once-quiet and prosperous Kyiv suburb that became a killing field under Russian occupation. It has resurrected grim, World War I-style images of the sort of fighting long thought to have disappeared from Europe: stalemated or nearly stalemated combat in which every square foot of ground is contested in brutal combat.
Where does it go from here?
For all the speeches and rallies to show solidarity with embattled Ukraine, the war’s second anniversary is shadowed with pessimism among many Ukraine supporters, after the failure of Ukraine’s summer counteroffensive and Russia’s capture of Avdiivka, a Russian target since 2014. It is widely believed that Western democracies are suffering from “Ukraine fatigue” and that Ukrainians themselves are exhausted and demoralized by massive losses of life. Meanwhile (so the narrative goes), the Russian economy is thriving instead of collapsing under the weight of Western sanctions, no wave of popular discontent threatens Vladimir Putin’s rule, Kremlin-friendly dictatorships have turned out to be far more reliable suppliers of weapons to Russia than Western democracies to Ukraine, and time is on Putin’s side.
This pessimistic narrative should be put in perspective, especially given the early days of the war, when the Russian propagandists’ exuberant talk of taking Kyiv in three days and holding a victory parade was matched by grim Western expectations—before Ukraine managed to turn things around even without any significant deliveries of advanced Western weapons. (One event whose importance in those early Ukrainian successes is often underestimated is the battle at the Hostomel Airport, where an assault by Russian forces on the first day of the invasion ran into ferocious Ukrainian resistance; the pitched battle not only delayed the airport’s capture but inflicted so much damage that it could not be used for airlifting more troops to the area. The airport was liberated at the end of March or the start of April when Russian troops pulled back from Kyiv.)
Ukrainian victories, particularly in the fall of 2022, raised expectations, aided by apparent disarray in the Russian armed forces; the conflict between the Wagner mercenary forces and Russia’s Ministry of Defense culminated in the Wagner mutiny last June. But the rebellion fizzled (and we all remember how it turned out for its leader, Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, once touted as a possible Putin rival). Meanwhile, Russia was able to fortify its defenses in occupied Ukrainian territories enough to largely thwart the Ukrainian counteroffensive—and then seize the initiative and go on the offense, forcing Ukraine into a defensive position. The fall of Avdiivka was the result—though many observers also blame it on ammunition shortages caused by interruptions in American aid due to the Republicans’ sabotage of military support for Ukraine.
So now we’re seeing not only everyone-knows-Ukraine-can’t-win gloating from such habitual Kremlin-talking-point amplifiers as David Sacks and Glenn Greenwald, but also such headlines as “Why Ukraine Is Starting to Lose” from people sympathetic to Ukraine’s cause.
Still, some commentators—such as Russian-American journalist Michael Nacke, an analyst who, while unabashedly sympathetic to the Ukrainian cause, is sufficiently sober and fact-based to have warned about the overhyping of the Ukrainian counteroffensive last summer—argue that this new pessimism is in large part the product of Russian propaganda intended to undercut Western support for Ukraine and force Ukraine into peace talks on unfavorable terms. In a video he posted over the weekend, Nacke derided the illusion of Russian success as a Kremlin-sponsored “global bluff” and, even more colorfully, as a “castle of sand and shit.”
The pyrrhic victory at Avdiivka, a ravaged and depopulated town taken at massive cost (videos shot by Russians themselves show the ground literally littered with dead bodies of Russian soldiers), is a case in point. Last week, Russian war blogger and ex-soldier Andrei Morozov (“Murz”) committed suicide after state media propagandists savaged him for talking about the huge losses in the four-month battle for Avdiivka. This conflict, and its tragic results, suggests that societal consolidation around the war is an illusion—and these tensions can only grow if there’s a new round of mobilization.
It is, finally, far from clear that time is on Putin’s side at this point in the war. Ukraine is already taking a leaf from the Russian playbook and building its own fortifications and defenses. While Ukraine may be outmanned (and has its own internal conflicts surrounding the issue of mobilization), it is vastly more committed to avoiding unnecessary losses than Russia and has focused on building up strong reserves and finding flexible ways to boost recruitment, such as allowing people to serve in the units of their choice. Meanwhile, promised deliveries of Western weapons, ammunition, and machinery may have been frustratingly slow, but Ukraine will receive important resources this year (including F-16s), and the production of essential armaments is likely to be ramped up to meet previously stated commitments. The impasse over U.S. aid to Ukraine may be resolved as well, thanks partly, perhaps, to revulsion at Putin’s murder of opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
Which brings us to another important reason time may not be on Putin’s side. Every day that goes by is another opportunity for either Putin or the henchmen around him to say or do something sufficiently reprehensible to set off a wave of international outrage at the regime’s inhumanity. The Navalny murder has turned out to be a line in the sand even for Ukraine-skeptic Andrew Sullivan, who responded by calling for more and faster aid to Ukraine as well as steps to strengthen NATO in order to rein in Putin. Other developments—such as Russia’s continuing war crimes, including the recently reported executions of Ukrainian POWs, and Russia’s ongoing interference in American politics—may likewise wake up more U.S. commentators and policymakers not only to the barbarity of Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine, but to the reality that the menace of Putin reaches far beyond Ukraine.
As the war moves into its third year, the lies and vicious depravity of Vladimir Putin continue to appall, the resilience of the people of Ukraine continues to impress, and the links between the future of the war and the future of American democracy become harder to miss.
______
“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.”
Emmanuel Macron floating the idea of 'boots on the ground' in Ukraine. Shot down by a bunch of other European nations, but it sounds to me like he is trying to shift the terms of the discussion in the same way it shifted on supplying a variety of weapons systems. I'm not convinced any European nations will be sending ground combat formations any time soon, but I wonder what might be possible other than that - possibly air support.
It would require a lot of nations to stop objecting and Poland (at a minimum) to agree to let forces & supplies to transit and it would require a few other nations to join in with France (I could see the UK and maybe a few smaller nations) to even begin to assemble a credible force. Low expectations, but yet another interesting shift in the discussion.
Emmanuel Macron floating the idea of 'boots on the ground' in Ukraine. Shot down by a bunch of other European nations, but it sounds to me like he is trying to shift the terms of the discussion in the same way it shifted on supplying a variety of weapons systems. I'm not convinced any European nations will be sending ground combat formations any time soon, but I wonder what might be possible other than that - possibly air support.
It would require a lot of nations to stop objecting and Poland (at a minimum) to agree to let forces & supplies to transit and it would require a few other nations to join in with France (I could see the UK and maybe a few smaller nations) to even begin to assemble a credible force. Low expectations, but yet another interesting shift in the discussion.
Macron's a tool that fancies himself as EU Commission President replacing Von der Leyen one day. Italy hosted a G7 meeting on the topic that Macron invented a weak excuse not to attend (I think it was attending an agricultural festival) then shortly after had his own meeting at Champs Elysses because he wants himself to be seen as the leader. Meanwhile the French have stood in the way for a long time on buying artillery shells from outside the bloc for Ukraine because if they buy inside the bloc that's heavily pro-French by default.
I'll believe Western and Central European troops will deploy ground troops to Ukraine when I see it. Eastern European deployment? Yeah, I can see that.
Agree with the take from the end of this podcast kind of grand synopsis reviewing this conflict from the start. The Ukrainians mobilized immediately. The Russians thought they could win quick, when they realized they couldn't, they switched into mobilizing preparing for the long haul war. The West however just never mobilized.
On the second anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Ryan and Mike Kofman sit down to chat about where the war stands today and where things are heading. It is, to be candid, a pessimistic conversation. They cover the fall of Avdiivka, military leadership changes, Ukraine's mobilization challenges, Congressional dysfunction, European defense spending, and more.
The bits in there about the draft bill and the demographics of Ukraine are must-hears. They need men, young men in fact, but they're not drafting young men to not kill the economy but also because the nation's demographics are horrendous and if they die that's the country's future gone. It's something I've wondered about the long-term futures of say the Baltic states. Long before this war occurred I was reading a complaint of how free movement inside the EU has led to all these people the future of Latvia getting educated there, and the ones with future aspirations all leave Latvia to go elsewhere in the EU to work and live. It's kind of how rural-to-urban mobility is in the U.S. So Latvia gets minimal benefit out of its education system unless you take a Honduran/Guatemalan/Salvadoran economic approach of remittances back home. But if the brain drain is sustained over a long period of time, the country's just slowly getting older and dying, and birthrates in Eastern Europe were hardly at replacement level to start with. Russia has the same challenges, but it's massively huge in comparison to where staffing the government and military is not a problem.
Eastern Europeans to guard against Russia in the future better start having lots of sex. In the long-term though I can see Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia all merging by necessity into a "Baltica" state. This Ukrainian War is the first modern war where these hypothetical demographic challenges to a state's livelihood have become more actual, because Ukraine should've done a draft a long time ago.
Emmanuel Macron floating the idea of 'boots on the ground' in Ukraine. Shot down by a bunch of other European nations, but it sounds to me like he is trying to shift the terms of the discussion in the same way it shifted on supplying a variety of weapons systems.
it sounds to me like he's talking a big game to try to distract from the fact that France hasn't given Ukraine all that much, comparatively.
There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "My ignorance is just as good as your knowledge."- Isaac Asimov
Emmanuel Macron floating the idea of 'boots on the ground' in Ukraine. Shot down by a bunch of other European nations, but it sounds to me like he is trying to shift the terms of the discussion in the same way it shifted on supplying a variety of weapons systems. I'm not convinced any European nations will be sending ground combat formations any time soon, but I wonder what might be possible other than that - possibly air support.
It would require a lot of nations to stop objecting and Poland (at a minimum) to agree to let forces & supplies to transit and it would require a few other nations to join in with France (I could see the UK and maybe a few smaller nations) to even begin to assemble a credible force. Low expectations, but yet another interesting shift in the discussion.
European voters across most of the EU and certainly the Germans wouldn't stand for it, Poland and the Baltic states being the only likely exceptions. It would take direct attacks on NATO members and probably even then fairly extensive ones (not just the odd poke or two here and there) to change that calculation.
European voters across most of the EU and certainly the Germans wouldn't stand for it. Poland and the Baltic states being the only possible exceptions. It would take direct attacks on NATO members and probably even then fairly extensive ones (not just the odd poke or two to here and there) to change that calculation.
As I said, I don't expect any significant boots on the ground, but there are other things short of that which may be doable. Even if this sort of talk just increases support from European nations I'm fine with it.
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