Ukraine Invasion - Please do not post videos showing attacks/similar

[I_M_Weasel]

Yeah me too if I'm honest, I know there's a lot of flag waving and chest thumping at "Western Weapons" help liberate parts of Ukraine but it feels like Russia is up to something

I don't think there is any clever tactic here. If I was Ukraine I would try and get all that abandoned kit over the dneiper - or make sure it is perminantly unusable, don't want it getting back into russian hands if they somehow counter attack.

 

[I_M_Weasel]

Surely there needs to be some sort of negotiated settlement eventually, or is that not possible after the way Putin has behaved thus far?

who knows - countries don't always do the sensible thing for themselves.

 

[GreatAuk]

Surely there needs to be some sort of negotiated settlement eventually, or is that not possible after the way Putin has behaved thus far?

There will be at some point, all wars which end in anything other than total conquest end in some kind of negotiation.

Putin has made it very difficult to trust any agreement Russia makes because of how untrustworthy they have been, and how little they have respected agreements in the past. It's clear that Putin is not trustworthy, and that if he sees an option to do something in his advantage he will. Therefore any agreement can only be made from a position of strength and cannot rely on promises such as 'OK we'll disarm as long as you pinkie promise not to invade us again afterwards' which was one of the things Russia claimed to want earlier on in the war (they have claimed various different goals at different time
...).

In addition, Russia's actions and the war crimes they have perpetrated mean that the Ukrainian population really don't have much appetite for peace if it involves any significant concessions to Russia.

Unless the war starts going very badly for Ukraine (which seems unlikely at this point) it seems likely any peace deal acceptable to Ukraine will involve the complete withdrawal of all Russian troops from all occupied areas.

Who knows what Russia would actually agree to...

 

[Hagar]

Russia need defeating so that it's army won't take the field. Then negotiations can start.

 

[Mr Jack]

You're perpetuating the 'they haven't sent in their best troops/gear/hardware' myth. They are scrapping the bottom of the barrel now.

No, I'm absolutely not claiming that - that's stupid. But Russia hasn't gone full mobilisation, and it still has a lot of forces and capability it hasn't committed. Russia has about two million soldiers (although that depends a lot on what you're calling a soldier) and sent in about 150,000 originally. That's not because they were sending in chumps and holding back the elites or something stupid like that, but because Russia has a lot of different things that army is supposed to do.

But priorities can change. Putin could call for full mobilisation and conscript an army to throw in next year, he could pull forces away from defensive positions around the country, etc.

 

[Grim5]

Russia continues to do some strange things.

Like abandoning towns that the Ulranians are apparently not yet close to.

This town is 25km north of Severdonetsk, but the Ukrainians are still in Lyman.

Likely suggests either they are retreating or they are so short on manpower they are having to pull troops from less important towns/villages to defend cities

https://twitter.com/x/status/1569620011454439424

 

[CapitalOne]

It's all gone a bit fog of war at the moment. Logically though there are only a couple of explanations:

1) The Russian troops are being asked to give up
2) The Russian troops are giving up without being asked

Further to 1 - why?

1) Putin has a nasty plan to enact
2) Putin is giving up (maybe only temporarily)

What would Occam's Razor suggest?

I know that's not a very sophisticated analysis, but there you go I'm no expert.

 

[Alex_6n2]

I read that ammunition is a big problem for Russia

Most of the kit/armour they're leaving behind also seems to validate the view that it's old/rusty/broken

 

[Deleted User 298457]

It's all gone a bit fog of war at the moment. Logically though there are only a couple of explanations:

1) The Russian troops are being asked to give up
2) The Russian troops are giving up without being asked

Further to 1 - why?

1) Putin has a nasty plan to enact
2) Putin is giving up (maybe only temporarily)

What would Occam's Razor suggest?

I know that's not a very sophisticated analysis, but there you go I'm no expert.

First sentence I think is the end of this post (not in a rude way, just hard to draw conclusions).

I imagine the propaganda war is at peak. I don't doubt they're making progress but this feels too precisely like David and Goliath.

 

[Jester*]

Yes the Russians can mobilise more troops. But they, cannot arm, supply or train them. This is supported by the vast amount of abandoned kit, that the Ukrainians are towing away.

Don't forget you now have Ukrainian forces that are battle hardened, being continually armed by the west and have troops being cycled through training. If I were a fresh Russian infantryman, being booted up the arse to go to the front just before winter hits against an extremely dedicated adversary, I'd cack myself. Let alone all the stories of Russian troops just turning around and hopping out of there. Morale must be in the gutters.

 

[Rroff]

Yes the Russians can mobilise more troops. But they, cannot arm, supply or train them. This is supported by the vast amount of abandoned kit, that the Ukrainians are towing away.

It is an odd one really - they have vast stores of AK pattern rifles, in varying condition, no shortage of small arms ammo, etc. despite many of the what were essentially conscripts being deployed to Ukraine with little more than 3 magazines and 3 days worth of supplies. They could retool production of AK12s for a much cheaper, quicker to make and more material efficient design. I think people underestimate what could happen with a large scale general mobilisation in terms of getting mothballed and reserve hardware back into service.

Logistics is a big problem for them despite having a lot of light trucks still as almost anything beyond light equipment still relies heavily on rail and as noted earlier in the thread Russia doesn't tend to make effective use of things like pallets for loading, etc.

Training seems to be a huge issue for Russia and may be more prohibitive on several levels than almost any other factor - especially they seem to lack the military institutional structure, knowledge, experience and mindset for conducting large scale complex combined arms operations against near peer adversaries.

 

[NinjaCool]

General update as of today!

 

[ANDREW GREEN]

It's all gone a bit fog of war at the moment. Logically though there are only a couple of explanations:

1) The Russian troops are being asked to give up
2) The Russian troops are giving up without being asked

Further to 1 - why?

1) Putin has a nasty plan to enact
2) Putin is giving up (maybe only temporarily)

What would Occam's Razor suggest?

I know that's not a very sophisticated analysis, but there you go I'm no expert.

Russian troops have just allowed the largest transfer of weapons since WW2 from Russia to Ukraine. If this was planned from high up they would not have wasting those resources and would instead would take them. This seems like sheer panic. I think it shows artillery like HIMARs are accurately destroying every military unit they target. The troops see their fellow troops blown up with their own eyes and don't want to be next. Perhaps Ukrainian communications have also been able to tell Russian troops that surrender will mean no consequencies

 

[Grim5]

It is an odd one really - they have vast stores of AK pattern rifles, in varying condition, no shortage of small arms ammo, etc. despite many of the what were essentially conscripts being deployed to Ukraine with little more than 3 magazines and 3 days worth of supplies. They could retool production of AK12s for a much cheaper, quicker to make and more material efficient design. I think people underestimate what could happen with a large scale general mobilisation in terms of getting mothballed and reserve hardware back into service.

Logistics is a big problem for them despite having a lot of light trucks still as almost anything beyond light equipment still relies heavily on rail and as noted earlier in the thread Russia doesn't tend to make effective use of things like pallets for loading, etc.

Training seems to be a huge issue for Russia and may be more prohibitive on several levels than almost any other factor - especially they seem to lack the military institutional structure, knowledge, experience and mindset for conducting large scale complex combined arms operations against near peer adversaries.

Even though the number of vehicles sounds impressive on paper, it's not - Russia is well short on the volume of trucks and supply vehicles one would actually need, without rail link they find it tough. It's worth remembering Ukraine is a large country

 

[Grim5]

Russian troops have just allowed the largest transfer of weapons since WW2 from Russia to Ukraine. If this was planned from high up they would not have wasting those resources and would instead would take them. This seems like sheer panic. I think it shows artillery like HIMARs are accurately destroying every military unit they target. The troops see their fellow troops blown up with their own eyes and don't want to be next. Perhaps Ukrainian communications have also been able to tell Russian troops that surrender will mean no consequencies

It's not just for them, they actually had the largest one day transfer of military equipment from one nation to another since ww2 period

 

[Jester*]

It is an odd one really - they have vast stores of AK pattern rifles, in varying condition, no shortage of small arms ammo, etc. despite many of the what were essentially conscripts being deployed to Ukraine with little more than 3 magazines and 3 days worth of supplies. They could retool production of AK12s for a much cheaper, quicker to make and more material efficient design. I think people underestimate what could happen with a large scale general mobilisation in terms of getting mothballed and reserve hardware back into service.

Logistics is a big problem for them despite having a lot of light trucks still as almost anything beyond light equipment still relies heavily on rail and as noted earlier in the thread Russia doesn't tend to make effective use of things like pallets for loading, etc.

Training seems to be a huge issue for Russia and may be more prohibitive on several levels than almost any other factor - especially they seem to lack the military institutional structure, knowledge, experience and mindset for conducting large scale complex combined arms operations against near peer adversaries.

The problem isn't the small arms. It'll be the Grads/Msta's that seem to be littered all over the place. Warfare has now gone beyond just giving a man a rifle and saying crack on, heck that was true in WW2!

If Russia cannot provide support to the troops on the ground, it doesn't matter how many guys they send over the top. As long as Ukraine remains organised and supplied, the Russians will just meat grinder the men.

 

[Turn]

 

[Twinz]

Pervasive corruption is the only thing I can think of that explains the Russian military's (lack of) performance.

It's bad enough that the people at the top, all the way up to Putin himself, must know they cannot trust the information the are getting from those under them. This must feel like a game of "Marco Polo". All they can do is bark orders and wait for results on the battlefield before they have any idea what the real situation is.

 

[ChrisLX200]

Truth is, the ruskies didn't have room in the trucks to transport the military stuff back because they were already full of washing machines and fridges...

 

[Rroff]

The problem isn't the small arms. It'll be the Grads/Msta's that seem to be littered all over the place. Warfare has now gone beyond just giving a man a rifle and saying crack on, heck that was true in WW2!

If Russia cannot provide support to the troops on the ground, it doesn't matter how many guys they send over the top. As long as Ukraine remains organised and supplied, the Russians will just meat grinder the men.

I've been following a few OSINT analysis of various reserve and retired equipment depots including 2S7s, MSTAs, etc. while there are limits as to what can be inferred from things like satellite generally 20-30% of what is thought to be serviceable stock has disappeared, assumed sent to Ukraine, from before this kicked off.