Russia-Ukraine war and related tensions Megathread

[Hindsight was 2020]

https://twitter.com/defmon3/status/1693580139760619768?s=12
https://twitter.com/faytuks/status/1693581607158919407?s=12
Looks like the Russians released a fake report this morning along with a staged video of them “capturing” the town of Syn'kivka. Likely as a cope due to Robotyne and Staromlynivka looking grim

[Woody]

Ukrainians will lose Kupiansk in the long run and everything east of the Oskil. Which means the LPR will be under firm Russian control.

[Hindsight was 2020]

https://twitter.com/Danspiun/status/1693548768166088788
https://twitter.com/KofmanMichael/status/1693588164890259589?s=20
Robotyne hour of liberation looks to be upon us 🇺🇦🫡

[Florida Man for Crime]

Seeing as Rabotino is only a small village standing between the first line of defense behind Novoprokovka, this isn't a "collapse".

The part you conveniently neglect to mention is that this advance is bringing the east-west rail line and highway into Ukrainian artillery range. Which means that subsequently Ukraine will start hitting that, which will make it much more difficult for Russia to supply the entire southern direction of the front.

Whereas, on the other hand, the village of Synkivka which you are so excited about doesn't have any particular strategic significance. So even if it is true that Russia took it (and often these Russian claims turn out to be misleading, but we shall see), it doesn't really matter in the larger scheme of things.

Feel bad for the conscripts who have to attack those trenches and mines. If it took 3 months to take Rabotino, imagine the hell they have to face when they reach the main defenses.

82nd air assault brigade is not where unwilling conscripts go, bruv.

[Woody]

Seeing as Rabotino is only a small village standing between the first line of defense behind Novoprokovka, this isn't a "collapse".

The part you conveniently neglect to mention is that this advance is bringing the east-west rail line and highway into Ukrainian artillery range. Which means that subsequently Ukraine will start hitting that, which will make it much more difficult for Russia to supply the entire southern direction of the front.

Whereas, on the other hand, the village of Synkivka which you are so excited about doesn't have any particular strategic significance. So even if it is true that Russia took it (and often these Russian claims turn out to be misleading, but we shall see), it doesn't really matter in the larger scheme of things.

Feel bad for the conscripts who have to attack those trenches and mines. If it took 3 months to take Rabotino, imagine the hell they have to face when they reach the main defenses.

82nd air assault brigade is not where unwilling conscripts go, bruv.

Russians have other means of transportation you know, and that highway you're talking about is not some just some dirt road, it's a highway spanning several oblasts, which is out of range for their ordinary arsenal. Good luck hitting a moving target there.

And FYI a single brigade is not the only participant here lol.

When and if Novapakrovka falls, that's when we'll be talking.

Same for Petropavlivka near Kupyansk.

[Hindsight was 2020]

Putin should seriously consider hiring Woody as a propagandist account because he does a much better job than the regular accounts most of whom are all depressed and dooming over Robotyne’s liberation

[Florida Man for Crime]

Russians have other means of transportation you know, and that highway you're talking about is not some just some dirt road, it's a highway spanning several oblasts, which is out of range for their ordinary arsenal. Good luck hitting a moving target there.

The rail line is more important than the highway, dummy.

And yes, Ukrainians have in fact shown themselves to be adept at hitting moving targets with artillery. It is not that difficult when you have high quality precision NATO artillery systems and when you have good intelligence to identify the targets.

I can understand why you would think it is difficult though, if you are used to having low quality Russian systems instead, which rely on mass fire rather than accuracy. So I suppose for you Russkies it is more difficult.

On that point, here's a new example. It is from near Bakhmut. Interesting btw that Bakhmut Bob is no longer talking about Bakhmut, and instead is turning to the Kupyansk area for fake reports of Russian successes.

Anyway, here you can see moving Russian targets being obliterated by precision Ukrainian artillery strikes coordinated with drone surveillance:

https://twitter.com/astraiaintel/status/1693371559518347367

Another view:

https://old.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/15wtw0d/different_angle_of_the_russian_armored_column/

[Florida Man for Crime]

Putin should seriously consider hiring Woody as a propagandist account because he does a much better job than the regular accounts most of whom are all depressed and dooming over Robotyne’s liberation

TBH I have suspected for a while that at least some of the accounts on Atlas are probably paid trolls. Probably some of them are actual Americans or Europeans or whatever, but I doubt they all are.

[Florida Man for Crime]

Enough with minor tactical things though. Let's step back and take a bigger picture look at the broader trend.



Here are some graphs of Russian equipment losses. Keep in mind this is tabulated from the official daily Ukrainian reports, but these have seemed broadly consistent over time with verifiable OSINT sources like Oryx:





What is interesting here is that in the past few months, have started to be destroyed at an increasingly rapid pace. This is visible from the fact that the slopes of their lines are increasing. In particular, these include "Special Equipment," "Anti-Aircraft Warfare Systems," "Artillery Systems," and "Unmanned Aerial Vehicles." Whereas Russian losses of other sorts of equipment have continued at more or less the same pace as before.

So take a minute to think about what this means. "Special Equipment" is a broad category, but it includes vital equipment like counter-battery radar, electronic warfare jamming equipment, intelligence gathering and surveillance equipment, mine laying equipment, and bridging equipment. The thing about this sort of equipment is that since it is so specialized, it is more difficult to replace losses of this equipment. These sorts of things have more limited production runs and are more difficult to produce, and often may require specialized highly technical components that Russia has difficulty producing themselves.

Artillery losses are obviously of vital importance because artillery forms the backbone of the Russian defense. If Russian infantry in the future no longer has artillery support (or has less of it), they will have a very difficult time defending. There have started being reports of this happening at least in local areas on the Zaporizhzhia front, and this is why the Russian sources on telegram have been wailing so much about counter-battery artillery fire.

Anti-air losses are likewise important because the more they are degraded, the more Ukrainian drones will have free reign. And eventually, theoretically the Ukrainian air force could start doing more ground strikes, but I wouldn't hold my breath too much for the West to provide them with sufficient planes for that any time soon.


The question is really how long can Russia continue to sustain these equipment losses. And what ability do they have to build enough replacement systems, particularly of artillery? And will the west provide Ukraine with enough Ammo so that they can keep this up? As long as we do give them enough ammo so that they don't have to stop firing, this dynamic will continue, and as Russian stockpiles are worn down, the situation will continue to get worse for the Russians.

[Woody]

Russians have other means of transportation you know, and that highway you're talking about is not some just some dirt road, it's a highway spanning several oblasts, which is out of range for their ordinary arsenal. Good luck hitting a moving target there.

On that point, here's a new example. It is from near Bakhmut. Interesting btw that Bakhmut Bob is no longer talking about Bakhmut, and instead is turning to the Kupyansk area for fake reports of Russian successes.
Another view:

https://old.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/15wtw0d/different_angle_of_the_russian_armored_column/

What's there to talk about? Ukraine lost the city and hasn't retaken a single settlement around it since then.

Ukraine and Russia can hit moving targets near the front due to it's drones being near the area to locate and stalk vehicles. Not highways dozens of kilometers away from the front lines. Russians are not using railways as much since Ukrainians keep striking them with missiles, at least not in the south, Russia proper and heartland Donbass perhaps. Do you think this is WW2?

[Florida Man for Crime]

Some footage from Robotyne:

https://www.twitter.com/YWNReporter/status/1693602607133045031

[Woody]

-snip-

You're talking about this like Russians are just going to be sitting on their asses, I know this might be hard to realize, but they're still humans and not NPCs, so they are capable of adapting to the war too.

You're forgetting that Ukraine has next to no domestic production when it comes to armored vehicles & tanks. They rely predominantly on imports from NATO, that's not a sufficient way to conduct a prolonged-war when those you're depending on can barely scramble to give up it's own ones the first round. Ukrainians are facing the same dilemma, that's why the inevitable collapse of the Russian Army I have been hearing about for the past year has not happened.

[jaichind]

https://www.eurointegration.com.ua/eng/news/2023/08/21/7167927/

"Sweden Currently Does Not Plan to Send Gripen Fighter Jets to Ukraine"

The Prime Minister of Sweden, Ulf Kristersson, stated that his country itself requires Gripen fighter jets, noting that there are no plans for sending them to Ukraine at the moment

[Florida Man for Crime]

What's there to talk about? Ukraine lost the city and hasn't retaken a single settlement around it since then.

Taking or not taking some random settlements is of little long term significance. What is of actual longer term significance are the cumulative equipment losses, and which side can replace the losses. If at some point one side can no longer replace the losses, particularly of artillery and AA equipment, they will be at risk of collapsing.

It happens slowly, then suddenly. It happens from the cumulative effect of destroying enemy equipment over time with long range artillery and drone strikes, while avoiding taking losses yourself, for example in the video of the Russian column that was destroyed by Ukrainian artillery. In this case, that is a lot of Russian losses for 0 Ukrainian losses. That is btw similar to how the Kherson offensive went last year.

So rather than talking about settlements and villages, perhaps you should talk about the graphs I posted in the other post and the bigger picture.

Ukraine and Russia can hit moving targets near the front due to it's drones being near the area to locate and stalk vehicles. Not highways dozens of kilometers away from the front lines.

You must have not been paying attention a week ago when, for example, Ukrainian drones flew around way behind the Russian lines (not "near the front") and were used to provide real time targeting intelligence for long range artillery (HIMARS) to destroy a Russian training camp 50 km behind the front:

Ukraine will be able to start doing this sort of thing around Tokmak as they are nearing it.

This is also possible due to the escalating losses Russia is taking of AA equipment, which is visible on the big picture level in the graphs I posted above.

Russians are not using railways as much since Ukrainians keep striking them with missiles, at least not in the south, Russia proper and heartland Donbass perhaps. Do you think this is WW2?

That is literally exactly the point, Ukraine can start hitting the railways more easily, more cost effectively, and with more quantity by using artillery rather than having to use missiles, bruv.

[jaichind]

https://m.sundayworld.com/news/irish-news/ukrainian-refugees-push-back-against-paying-for-their-meals-and-risk-eviction/a1548399051.html

"Ukrainian refugees push back against paying for their meals - and risk eviction"

Ireland government says that going forward Ukrainian refugees will have to pay for their own food and laundry.  Ukrainian refugees pushed back.

[Florida Man for Crime]

You're forgetting that Ukraine has next to no domestic production when it comes to armored vehicles & tanks. They rely predominantly on imports from NATO, that's not a sufficient way to conduct a prolonged-war when those you're depending on can barely scramble to give up it's own ones the first round. Ukrainians are facing the same dilemma, that's why the inevitable collapse of the Russian Army I have been hearing about for the past year has not happened.

Ukraine has taken hardly any losses of western armored vehicles and tanks. Meanwhile the USA has vast stockpiles of many thousands of unused vehicles:



There is no lack of vehicles we could give Ukraine, the only thing that is at all in question is if we have the political will to give them.

Meanwhile, Russia is getting to the point where all they have left in their own armored vehicle/tank storage are IS-3s left over from the tail end of WW2.



And as I posted yesterday, as far as artillery goes, Ukraine has taken virtually no losses of the high quality NATO long range precision self-propelled artillery systems... Literally only 4 documented losses in all this time out of the 100+ PzH, and HIMARS that Ukraine has received.

Even if we assume there are also some undocumented losses, those losses are easily sustainable and way lower than the Russian documented losses.

We could also produce more of those and give more of them to Ukraine. We have factories. The only question is if we have the political will to mobilize them to increase production.

They may not even really need that many more of the high quality artillery systems per se though. What they really need is just enough ammo to be able to use the ones they already have. All they need to do is keep firing, moving, destroying the Russians from a safe distance and taking virtually 0 losses in the process of doing so, as they have been doing with those systems.

[Woody]

You're forgetting that Ukraine has next to no domestic production when it comes to armored vehicles & tanks. They rely predominantly on imports from NATO, that's not a sufficient way to conduct a prolonged-war when those you're depending on can barely scramble to give up it's own ones the first round. Ukrainians are facing the same dilemma, that's why the inevitable collapse of the Russian Army I have been hearing about for the past year has not happened.

Ukraine has taken hardly any losses of western armored vehicles and tanks...

Okay bro

[Florida Man for Crime]

Ukraine has taken hardly any losses of western armored vehicles and tanks...

Okay bro

Exercise for you:

Try counting up the documented Ukrainian western AFV and tank losses.

https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-ukrainian.html

Then compare them to Russian losses of Russian AFVs and tanks.

https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-equipment.html

I await your report on the comparative numbers with baited breath.



I'll even get you started.

For example, Ukraine has lost 51 Bradleys (mostly damaged and many being repaired btw).

How does that compare to Russian losses of, for example, 933 BMP-2(K)s?

All you have to do is add in the other western AFVs like CV-90s and tanks like Leopards on the one hand (both of which have substantially lower losses than the Bradleys), and the many thousands of Russian AFV and tank losses on the other hand.

Should be simple for you.

[Florida Man for Crime]

Also for extra credit in the exercise, you can try to take into account the fact that western AFVs like Bradleys are highly survivable, whereas when a BMP or a T-72 or whatever gets hit, most or all of the crew normally dies. Estimate the comparative losses of trained crews in western vehicles vs Russian/Soviet vehicles, and you can earn up to +5 bonus points.

[pppolitics]

Putin should seriously consider hiring Woody as a propagandist account because he does a much better job than the regular accounts most of whom are all depressed and dooming over Robotyne’s liberation

No need. Our resident Vatnik, Woody, does it for free.

[bilaps]

NYT: “On the Front Line, Ukrainian Commanders Are Buoyed to Be on the Offensive”

Despite grueling fighting, Ukrainian forces along much of the 600-mile front are moving forward, and commanders and veteran soldiers say they are in better shape now than six or 12 months ago.
“If a year ago we were conducting defensive operations and we had the task of holding back the enemy, now we have the ability to attack,” Col. Dmytro Lysiuk, commander of the 128th Mountain Assault Brigade, said in an interview in his frontline bunker last week.
Ukrainian officers are almost invariably upbeat in interviews. Even if the counteroffensive has yielded only mixed results so far, with Ukrainian troops slowed by dense Russian minefields and sustained firepower, they describe previous periods as being tougher than this one.

A different tone than most recent NYT doom article
https://archive.li/DAiLp

Because colonel with a full name is going to give a doom and gloom situation at the front. Sounds legit.

Truth is two months into counter-offensive Ukraine has failed to make any strategic gains. They could eventually maybe and just maybe grind out some territorial gains but with a huge cost. It is pretty easy to predict that no Russian line is going to crumble like it did in the Kharkov offensive. And even those gains don't mean they won't lose territory anywhere else, especially around Kupyansk.

So, if you look at the bigger picture, Ukraine has already failed in it's counter offensive, just like Russia has failed at the start of the invasion. All those territorial gains were at such cost that were unsustainable, just like Ukrainian are now.

[jaichind]

https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/placating-russia-elon-musk-told-pentagon-he-spoke-to-vladimir-putin-directly-101692634243530.html

"‘Placating Russia’: Elon Musk told Pentagon he spoke to Vladimir Putin directly"

It seems back in Oct last year Musk spoke directly about Putin about Starlink being used by Ukraine.

[pppolitics]

https://twitter.com/business/status/1693692017652470186

[emailking]

Domino’s Pizza will close all 142 stores in Russia

Domino’s Pizza will close all its outlets in Russia, becoming one of the first major Western fast-food chains to exit the country since McDonald’s and Starbucks left more than a year ago.

DP Eurasia — the company that owns franchise rights for the Domino’s Pizza brand in Russia, Turkey, Azerbaijan and Georgia — said Monday that it would file for bankruptcy for its Russian unit, DPRussia.

The move highlights the increasingly hard choices facing Western firms that stayed in Russia after the start of the Ukraine war. The Kremlin has made it vastly more difficult and more costly for Western companies to sell their Russian businesses. And it has in some cases seized control of firms’ local assets, as with Danish brewer Carlsberg (CABGY) and French yogurt maker Danone (DANOY).

“With the increasingly challenging environment, DPRussia’s immediate holding company is now compelled to take this step, which will bring about the termination of the attempted sale process of DPRussia as a going concern and, inevitably, the group’s presence in Russia,” DP Eurasia said in a statement.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/21/business/dominos-pizza-closing-russia/index.html

[jaichind]

https://euro.dayfr.com/world/716603.html

"Blackout on the Ukrainian front line"

the front line is now completely forbidden to them, unless of course they have written authorization from Valeri Zalouzhny, the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. This is not the first time that media representatives have been prevented from accessing outposts: the last total restriction of access to the battlefield had shortly preceded the flash offensive of September 2022 in the oblast of Kharkov.