Military observations on Ukraine invasion

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Russia is going to have to rely largely on China for imports of materials, but the longer this goes on, the more it will drag on the global economy. I wonder how much China will tolerate that?

China will cooperate for a while. Then it will get too hot for them. China is owned by the West. They could survive a collapse of their trading but it would be hard for them to bear.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I really am wondering if even a third of their nukes actually would launch. They are using vehicles and tanks literally from the 1980s.
What a third rate military power.

Probably more than half would not launch and maybe half of those would miss their targets. We would still be hit really hard though.


On a conventional basis, there is no country that can fight us now. Certainly not Russia. Iraq was stronger on a conventional basis. Now if we were invading Russia, I would expect the troops to fight harder for their homeland. But they are no conventional threat.

[Anonymous]

This has been a great reminder of the importance of functional military bureaucracy. Logistics, maintenance, supplies and supply lines, contingency planning, and so on are all bureaucratic and chain of command responsibilities that require a functioning organization that assigns specific tasks to specific people at every level including the management and oversight responsibilities to verify that every task is done properly.

[Anonymous]

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I really am wondering if even a third of their nukes actually would launch. They are using vehicles and tanks literally from the 1980s.
What a third rate military power.

Russians military power has always been over rated and built up by the defense industry. I know military experts who did war games after the collapse of the Soviet Union. They went to each country inspected the military and were just shocked. The common theme was the West wasted so much money because the Russians military was a paper tiger.

Not quite wasted. The world is a very dangerous place. That Russia can't compete means nothing if we are at war with China which is pretty darn likely.

To PPP, Russian/Soviet military equipment hasn’t always been overrated. During WW II the T-34, especially later variants with the 76mm, was probably the best tank ever produced up until that time and set the standard for what a mbt was to be and how to operationally employ them. The Il-2 was the best ground attack aircraft of the war and later models of the Yakolevs could hold their own against any other fighters especially at lower altitudes. After the war the MiG-15 was the best of the first generation jet fighters. The Soviet’s Alpha class submarine was a shock to the West. The Borei class is really good as far as boomers go. The later variants in the Su-27 family are very capable. They’ve always had very good ground based AD systems - ask our flyers in Vietnam what they thought of those missiles; the S-400 is still very capable and the S-500 system may be the best ever in its class. Russian artillery also has always been very potent, both canon and rocket systems. I agree the MIC and the Pentagon do overplay the overall threat because they need to get paid but to just dismiss it all out of hand is wrong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How sick (deliberately breaking the ceasefire, targeting civilians, and lining the evacuation route with explosives). So basically, at this point the Russian soldiers are either cowards, or drooling idiots.

Either way, I don't buy that they are victims of this war anymore. I would literally rather organize a mutiny against my officers than decimate Ukrainian homes and families, and terrorize an innocent people.

I'm SO DONE with the "I'm so sorry for those sad conscripted underfed Russian teenage soldiers" bullshit. No. You don't get to avoid accountability for participating in this, for following evil orders.

+1

[Anonymous]

Apparently Russia is now offering ceasefires and peace corridors to Lviv, in addition to the routes to Russia and Belarus.

Pretty sure they're still lying, but it's interesting to see they added that on.

From CNN live updates -

"Russia has proposed a new ceasefire starting 10 a.m. Moscow time, which is 2 a.m. ET Tuesday, which indicates it’s ready to open evacuation corridors from Kyiv, Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv and Mariupol, Russian media reports quoting the Russian Coordination Headquarters for Humanitarian Response in Ukraine.

Ukraine has yet to formally agree to the ceasefire proposal.

"Russia declares a ceasefire from 10 a.m. (Moscow time) on March 8, and is ready to provide humanitarian corridors: from Kyiv and adjacent settlements to the Russian Federation through the territory of the Republic of Belarus to Gomel," Russian media quotes the statement.

The Russian statement added that evacuation corridors "will also be open from Chernihiv through the territory of Belarus, from the city of Sumy along two routes to Poltava and to the territory of Russia, from Kharkiv to the territory of Russia or to Lviv, Uzhgorod, Ivano-Frankivsk. Also, a humanitarian corridor will be opened from Mariupol along the two routes to the territory of Russia and Zaporizhie.”

Russia said it is offering to agree on the plan for the evacuation corridors with Ukraine by 3 a.m. ET Moscow time on Tuesday, ahead of the ceasefire starting at 10 a.m. ET local time."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How sick (deliberately breaking the ceasefire, targeting civilians, and lining the evacuation route with explosives). So basically, at this point the Russian soldiers are either cowards, or drooling idiots.

Either way, I don't buy that they are victims of this war anymore. I would literally rather organize a mutiny against my officers than decimate Ukrainian homes and families, and terrorize an innocent people.

I'm SO DONE with the "I'm so sorry for those sad conscripted underfed Russian teenage soldiers" bullshit. No. You don't get to avoid accountability for participating in this, for following evil orders.

+1

Not all Russian soldiers are 18 and uninformed. But there are some, and they are victims too.

[Anonymous]

They broke the previous two immediately and are running out of fuel, food and missiles.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I really am wondering if even a third of their nukes actually would launch. They are using vehicles and tanks literally from the 1980s.
What a third rate military power.

Russians military power has always been over rated and built up by the defense industry. I know military experts who did war games after the collapse of the Soviet Union. They went to each country inspected the military and were just shocked. The common theme was the West wasted so much money because the Russians military was a paper tiger.

And yet! They are currently murdering hundreds of Ukrainians!!! It doesn't matter how bad their army is, if they're willing to fight dirty, they will manage to massacre the population.

They are not fighting dirty they are fighting the only way they are capable of fighting. It’s a WW2. Just line troops up and have them attack. If the Ukraine can hold the cities and can get resupplied the the casualties could be in the 100k. Russia will most likely over run the country and at that point it will become a pacification operation. The Russians will kill civilians and de- people towns and cities. It is going to get much much worst. This will go on for 10 years or until, Putin is removed.

I imagine that the economic sanctions will only get worse as Russia increases the brutality. How long can they afford to maintain the occupation of Ukraine under these crushing sanctions?

There is no end to that. Look at Venezuela, North Korea, Iran, or any other place that was subject to sanctions. Sanctions are ineffective against authoritarian regimes. I'm not saying we shouldn't implement them, just that it's not likely Putin will give in due to sanctions.

None of those countries you listed are trying to fight a war against a determined neighbor backed up by essentially unlimited resources that will be coming in over a border they can't control.

If Russia is having this much trouble in Ukraine after two weeks, how long do you think they can maintain this war if their economy goes into total freefall?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Russia is going to have to rely largely on China for imports of materials, but the longer this goes on, the more it will drag on the global economy. I wonder how much China will tolerate that?

China will cooperate for a while. Then it will get too hot for them. China is owned by the West. They could survive a collapse of their trading but it would be hard for them to bear.

Funny. I thought that it was the other way ‘round.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How sick (deliberately breaking the ceasefire, targeting civilians, and lining the evacuation route with explosives). So basically, at this point the Russian soldiers are either cowards, or drooling idiots.

Either way, I don't buy that they are victims of this war anymore. I would literally rather organize a mutiny against my officers than decimate Ukrainian homes and families, and terrorize an innocent people.

I'm SO DONE with the "I'm so sorry for those sad conscripted underfed Russian teenage soldiers" bullshit. No. You don't get to avoid accountability for participating in this, for following evil orders.

+1

Not all Russian soldiers are 18 and uninformed. But there are some, and they are victims too.

Tell that to the kids who lost their civilian parents. Or to the parents who had to watch their tiny kids die in apartment bombings.

At some point even a victim of abuse becomes accountable if they are perpetuating abuse. We see this all the time in civilian life - every murderer and rapist has a horrific story of childhood abuse, learned powerlessness, brainwashing and grooming.

If you are a brainwashed young Russian soldier in Ukraine right now, it's obvious that your superiors lied to you. We know that because tons of Russian soldiers are deserting. Tons of Russian soldiers are spilling the beans to Ukraine and feeling very bad about all of this. So...who is still bombing Ukrainian residential neighborhoods? Who is opening fire on families in cars?

Ask yourself this. If some Russian soldiers have recognized that they were duped and stopped fighting, why are other Russian soldiers still fighting? And at this point, they're not "fighting'; they're terrorizing civilians and deliberately breaking ceasefires. They're trying to level cities because they can't get the upper hand any other way.

So yeah, these guys are not victims. They took this fight to a whole new level of dirty and they are absolutely going face the consequences for it. No mercy.

[Anonymous]

[Anonymous]

More on Gerassimov here, and a big uh-oh for Russia’s comms:

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Yes! Serves him right.