The Ukraine war thread
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The obscenity of the Russian referenda:
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From the Institute for the Study of War's Sept 21 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment:
"Russian President Vladimir Putin’s announcement of “partial mobilization” on September 21 reflected many problems Russia faces in its faltering invasion of Ukraine that Moscow is unlikely to be able to resolve in the coming months.
"Putin’s order to mobilize part of Russia’s “trained” reserve, that is, individuals who have completed their mandatory conscript service, will not generate significant usable Russian combat power for months. It may suffice to sustain the current levels of Russian military manpower in 2023 by offsetting Russian casualties, although even that is not yet clear. It will occur in deliberate phases, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said in an interview on September 21, likely precluding any sudden influx of Russian forces that could dramatically shift the tide of the war.
"Russia’s partial mobilization will thus not deprive Ukraine of the opportunity to liberate more of its occupied territory into and through the winter."
From the Institute for the Study of War's Sept 22 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment:
"The Kremlin’s heavy-handed approach to partial mobilization may successfully meet the Kremlin’s internal quota of mobilized personnel but is unlikely to generate effective soldiers and is prompting significant domestic backlash for little gain.
"Russian authorities are forcibly recruiting Russian citizens to fight in Ukraine on flimsy pretexts, violating the Kremlin’s promise to recruit only those with military experience. Russian authorities are also demonstrably mobilizing personnel (such as protesters) who will enter the war in Ukraine with abysmal morale.
"The Kremlin's heavy-handed approach to partial mobilization will likely exacerbate domestic resentment of a measure that would have been unpopular even if implemented without the harsh approaches observed in the last 24 hours.
Success is measured by your discipline and inner peace. – Mike Ditka
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A collection of stuff from various twitter sites:
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Ukraine's Armed Forces Commander Valery Zaluzhny: “We finished up with the Russian professional army, and now it’s time to defeat unprofessional”
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Former NATO Secretary General Rasmussen on Macron; "Macron astonished us at the beginning of the crisis with his, to say the least, unique and critical statement that Putin should not be humiliated and offered an exit ramp. Such statements were disastrous and deeply harmful"
BREAKING: Finland will prohibit Russian tourists from crossing its borders This is likely to be a temporary measure as Finland refused to follow Poland and the Baltic States by banning Russian tourists, and faced an influx of Russian men fleeing mobilization
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From the Institute for the Study of War's Sept 22 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment:
"The Kremlin’s heavy-handed approach to partial mobilization may successfully meet the Kremlin’s internal quota of mobilized personnel but is unlikely to generate effective soldiers and is prompting significant domestic backlash for little gain.
"Russian authorities are forcibly recruiting Russian citizens to fight in Ukraine on flimsy pretexts, violating the Kremlin’s promise to recruit only those with military experience. Russian authorities are also demonstrably mobilizing personnel (such as protesters) who will enter the war in Ukraine with abysmal morale.
"The Kremlin's heavy-handed approach to partial mobilization will likely exacerbate domestic resentment of a measure that would have been unpopular even if implemented without the harsh approaches observed in the last 24 hours.
From the Institute for the Study of War's Sept 23 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment:
"The Russian mobilization system is struggling to execute the task Russian President Vladimir Putin set and will likely fail to produce mobilized reserve forces even of the low quality that Putin’s plans would have generated, unless the Kremlin can rapidly fix fundamental and systemic problems.
"Putin and Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu announced that the Russian Armed Forces would mobilize combat-ready reservists to quickly stabilize the frontlines and regain the initiative on the battlefield. Milblogger and social media reports, however, show that Russian military recruitment centers, enlistment officials, and local administrations are mobilizing men who do not meet the Kremlin’s stated criteria, especially Shoigu’s promise that mobilization would prioritize men with “combat experience.” Russian opposition outlets and Telegram channels leaked information suggesting that the Kremlin aims to complete this partial mobilization by November 10 and that the Kremlin is seeking to mobilize 1.2 million men instead of the publicly announced 300,000.
"ISW cannot verify these reports, but significant available information suggests that this mobilization campaign (the first in post-Soviet Russia) is overwhelming an ineffective and unmotivated bureaucratic system and could fail to generate the much-needed combat-ready reserve force in a short time or at all."
Success is measured by your discipline and inner peace. – Mike Ditka
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@Mik said in The Ukraine war thread:
They can raise all the troops they want, but they won't be able to supply them.
And, as I said above, they get two weeks of training.
Fourteen days (of which they'll probably spend at least 6 dead-drunk).
"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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Photos circulated on Russian social media channels on Wednesday, Sept. 21, showing an unusual, unmanned boat that washed up on a beach near a Russian navy base in the city of Sevastopol, within occupied Crimea. Shaped like a kayak, the vessel is painted in a subdued color scheme and equipped with a white fixture, somewhat resembling a periscope, that holds a forward-facing sensor. In the available photos from social media, there are no visible markings that identify the craft’s nationality.
According to Russian social media posts, the unusual craft washed up on a beach not far from the entrance to Sevastopol’s harbor — roughly 150 miles from coastline under Ukrainian government control.
Ukraine has not yet claimed ownership of the unmanned craft. From the available photos, it’s not clear whether the small boat contained an explosive device. However, Russian authorities reportedly took the drone boat out to sea and blew it up — a decision that subsequently led some open-source intelligence investigators to assume the craft was carrying an explosive warhead.
A photo published to the Russian Telegram channel “Military Columnist” on Wednesday, Sept. 21, 2022, purportedly shows the detonation of a maritime drone on the Black Sea. Photo via Telegram.
In Russian-language Telegram channels, Mikhail Razvozhayev, the governor of Russian-occupied Sevastopol, is quoted as saying: “A part of an unmanned vehicle was discovered, which was examined by experts. After the survey was completed, this apparatus was destroyed at sea by an explosion. No one was hurt.”A photo published to the Russian Telegram channel “Military Columnist” on Wednesday claimed to show the drone’s detonation over open water “in the Black Sea near Sevastopol.”
If the beached mystery craft were, in fact, an armed Ukrainian aquatic drone, it would be another headache for Russian forces on the illegally annexed Ukrainian peninsula. Over the past several months, the expanding reach of Ukrainian missiles and airborne drones have put Russian forces in Crimea on the defensive and forced the transfer of some key Russian military hardware out of the area.
@George-K said in The Ukraine war thread:
Photos circulated on Russian social media channels on Wednesday, Sept. 21, showing an unusual, unmanned boat that washed up on a beach near a Russian navy base in the city of Sevastopol, within occupied Crimea. Shaped like a kayak, the vessel is painted in a subdued color scheme and equipped with a white fixture, somewhat resembling a periscope, that holds a forward-facing sensor. In the available photos from social media, there are no visible markings that identify the craft’s nationality.
According to Russian social media posts, the unusual craft washed up on a beach not far from the entrance to Sevastopol’s harbor — roughly 150 miles from coastline under Ukrainian government control.
Ukraine has not yet claimed ownership of the unmanned craft. From the available photos, it’s not clear whether the small boat contained an explosive device. However, Russian authorities reportedly took the drone boat out to sea and blew it up — a decision that subsequently led some open-source intelligence investigators to assume the craft was carrying an explosive warhead.
A photo published to the Russian Telegram channel “Military Columnist” on Wednesday, Sept. 21, 2022, purportedly shows the detonation of a maritime drone on the Black Sea. Photo via Telegram.
In Russian-language Telegram channels, Mikhail Razvozhayev, the governor of Russian-occupied Sevastopol, is quoted as saying: “A part of an unmanned vehicle was discovered, which was examined by experts. After the survey was completed, this apparatus was destroyed at sea by an explosion. No one was hurt.”A photo published to the Russian Telegram channel “Military Columnist” on Wednesday claimed to show the drone’s detonation over open water “in the Black Sea near Sevastopol.”
If the beached mystery craft were, in fact, an armed Ukrainian aquatic drone, it would be another headache for Russian forces on the illegally annexed Ukrainian peninsula. Over the past several months, the expanding reach of Ukrainian missiles and airborne drones have put Russian forces in Crimea on the defensive and forced the transfer of some key Russian military hardware out of the area.
Probably semi-submersible. The U.S. Navy has been fooling around with drone midget subs for awhile. Inspired by the drug smuggler's subs, the Navy had noticed just how hard these things were to identify in the water, even using their best detection techniques.
War begats new ideas...
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@Mik said in The Ukraine war thread:
They can raise all the troops they want, but they won't be able to supply them.
And, as I said above, they get two weeks of training.
Fourteen days (of which they'll probably spend at least 6 dead-drunk).
@George-K said in The Ukraine war thread:
@Mik said in The Ukraine war thread:
They can raise all the troops they want, but they won't be able to supply them.
And, as I said above, they get two weeks of training.
Fourteen days (of which they'll probably spend at least 6 dead-drunk).
Supposedly, these are guys who have served before. One day for in-processing, clothing and weapons issue, etc., and assignment to barracks. Then, weapon re-familiarization and what little training they can do.
They're going to be out of shape, have poor unit cohesion, slow to react and have piss-poor morale.
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@George-K said in The Ukraine war thread:
@Mik said in The Ukraine war thread:
They can raise all the troops they want, but they won't be able to supply them.
And, as I said above, they get two weeks of training.
Fourteen days (of which they'll probably spend at least 6 dead-drunk).
Supposedly, these are guys who have served before. One day for in-processing, clothing and weapons issue, etc., and assignment to barracks. Then, weapon re-familiarization and what little training they can do.
They're going to be out of shape, have poor unit cohesion, slow to react and have piss-poor morale.
You are right. These can hardly be described as reservists by any definition other than they completed their one or two years of conscripted service sometime in the past decade or so. They probably know how to salute, parade drill and some basic small arms familiarisation. Sure the odd one might even have some very stale specialised combat arms training. Beyond that, not much.
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We haven't even touched on motivation and morale. I'm thinking if these guys were suitable and supportive of Putin's war, they might well have already enlisted. And they didn't. You're going to have a whole army that doesn't want to be there and doesn't think they should be.
Planning to fail is a rare occurrence, but that is what we are seeing.
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I guess Putin still thinks he can just grind the Ukranians down through sheer numbers and hope for an eventual slackening of support from the West for Ukraine.
OTOH, Russia is being bled men and materials, both of which may be impossible to replace.
Wonder when the internal political tipping point will be reached?
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I guess Putin still thinks he can just grind the Ukranians down through sheer numbers and hope for an eventual slackening of support from the West for Ukraine.
OTOH, Russia is being bled men and materials, both of which may be impossible to replace.
Wonder when the internal political tipping point will be reached?
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From the Institute for the Study of War's Sept 23 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment:
"The Russian mobilization system is struggling to execute the task Russian President Vladimir Putin set and will likely fail to produce mobilized reserve forces even of the low quality that Putin’s plans would have generated, unless the Kremlin can rapidly fix fundamental and systemic problems.
"Putin and Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu announced that the Russian Armed Forces would mobilize combat-ready reservists to quickly stabilize the frontlines and regain the initiative on the battlefield. Milblogger and social media reports, however, show that Russian military recruitment centers, enlistment officials, and local administrations are mobilizing men who do not meet the Kremlin’s stated criteria, especially Shoigu’s promise that mobilization would prioritize men with “combat experience.” Russian opposition outlets and Telegram channels leaked information suggesting that the Kremlin aims to complete this partial mobilization by November 10 and that the Kremlin is seeking to mobilize 1.2 million men instead of the publicly announced 300,000.
"ISW cannot verify these reports, but significant available information suggests that this mobilization campaign (the first in post-Soviet Russia) is overwhelming an ineffective and unmotivated bureaucratic system and could fail to generate the much-needed combat-ready reserve force in a short time or at all."
From the Institute for the Study of War's Sept 24 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment:
"Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu’s declarations about which categories of Russian males will be exempted from partial mobilization may not reflect Russian President Vladimir Putin’s intentions or orders. A Russian media insider claimed on September 24 that officials of the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) reprimanded military commissars in person for negligence in carrying out mobilization and sending out summonses in “excess,” and contrary to the explicit MoD guidance regarding exemptions for age, disability, or other limiting factors. Another Russian source claimed that certain heads of federal subjects acknowledged that they have mobilized citizens who are technically ineligible.
"Responsibility for the partial mobilization appears to be divided and complex, possibly contributing to confusion, disorganization, and violations of Shoigu’s commitments regarding exemptions."
Success is measured by your discipline and inner peace. – Mike Ditka
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An overlooked aspect of warfare, weapons maintenance and repair:
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From the Institute for the Study of War's Sept 24 Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment:
"Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu’s declarations about which categories of Russian males will be exempted from partial mobilization may not reflect Russian President Vladimir Putin’s intentions or orders. A Russian media insider claimed on September 24 that officials of the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) reprimanded military commissars in person for negligence in carrying out mobilization and sending out summonses in “excess,” and contrary to the explicit MoD guidance regarding exemptions for age, disability, or other limiting factors. Another Russian source claimed that certain heads of federal subjects acknowledged that they have mobilized citizens who are technically ineligible.
"Responsibility for the partial mobilization appears to be divided and complex, possibly contributing to confusion, disorganization, and violations of Shoigu’s commitments regarding exemptions."
From the Institute for the Study of War:
"This campaign assessment special edition focuses on Russian military mobilization efforts. Significant inflections ISW would normally cover in its regular sections will be summarized briefly today and addressed in more detail tomorrow.
"Russian President Vladimir Putin is unlikely to overcome fundamental structural challenges in attempting to mobilize large numbers of Russians to continue his war in Ukraine. The “partial mobilization” he ordered on September 21 will generate additional forces but inefficiently and with high domestic social and political costs. The forces generated by this “partial mobilization,” critically, are very unlikely to add substantially to the Russian military’s net combat power in 2022. Putin will have to fix basic flaws in the Russian military personnel and equipment systems if mobilization is to have any significant impact even in the longer term. His actions thus far suggest that he is far more concerned with rushing bodies to the battlefield than with addressing these fundamental flaws.
"The Russian Armed Forces have not been setting conditions for an effective large-scale mobilization since at least 2008 and have not been building the kind of reserve force needed for a snap mobilization intended to produce immediate effects on the battlefield. There are no rapid solutions to these problems."
