Hmph, guess I'll retract those bids!

There's something incredibly funny to me about the fact that no one had any idea where this thing was going until they decided to check a shipping label on the barrel.

I agree. Finnish public opinion following the Continuation War was to look West while balancing being wary of the USSR/Russian Federation. We know that as early as the 1950's there were quiet contacts between Finnish military officials and NATO. Then, Bad Vlad did what eighty years of the former Soviet Union and Russian policy could not do.
Even better the Finnish Defense Forces were not drawn down the way Sweden or even Norway's militaries were following the end of the Cold War. NATO has gained a very effective partner with a robust total defense concept. Can't think of a better dictator for it to happen to.

There's also the new plan to have a new allied command for the Scandinavian air forces. This includes Sweden even if Turkey and Hungary keep blocking their NATO application. So now all of Russia's arctic routes to open ocean are covered by powerful air forces. You're doing great guys, keep up the fantastic work.

Ukrainian Hornets?
 

This piece makes a strong case for Australia and other operators to send F/A-18 Hornets to Ukraine.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zon...ven-to-ukraine

I'm especially interested in our Aussie members' thoughts on this proposal.

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According to the Ukrainian MOD, it sounds as though some of the early work in preparation for the counteroffensive is already underway:

https://www.newsweek.com/ukraine-com...nister-1795402

I'd take this next piece with a huge grain of salt, but there's also some rumors starting to float around that Ukraine has been starting some probing attacks all along the lines in the Zaporizhia direction.

I have a feeling that recent UAF talk about Crimea and Zaporizhia is Maskirovka to focus Russian defensive preparations and reserves in that region, while the main counter-offensive takes place elsewhere. That said, I'm not sure where the UAF's new maneuver brigades, armed with superior Western AFVs is best suited to operate, but I'd hate to see them smash themselves to pieces against Russian fixed defenses. Maybe the salient around Bakhmut. If the UAF could punch through the front lines there, they'd have room for operational maneuvers and could precipitate a route than might result in Russian withdrawals from other regions as well. On the other hand, UAF statements re Crimea and Zaporizhia could be a double-bluff. The suspense is getting to me.

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I've had that same thought! Looking at the strategic map, pushing toward Mariupol or Melitopol makes the most sense. If they can isolate Crimea it would be an enormous strategic win. They could also do so without widening their own lines too much. But that's also so clearly the obvious move that Russia has to be anticipating it.

From a political standpoint, cutting off and retaking Bakhmut would be a crippling move to make against the Russians for morale and domestic propaganda purposes. Imagine Russia spends six months and tens of thousands of troops slowly trying to take over this non-important town in eastern Ukraine, only to have Ukraine go in over a matter of days and retake all of that lost ground? There's no way Russian milbloggers or the Russian MOD could spin that as a positive development, and it could seriously hurt Putin's ability to generate future support for the war effort.

Or as a third option, perhaps Ukraine is waiting to see how Russia reacts to their probes before deciding on which direction to send the counteroffensive. I'm really curious to see how this all plays out.

I'd welcome it. To be frank, I'm not in favour of any limits on what (legal) vehicles and weapons are sent to Ukraine.

Counterattack?
 

Probing attacks across the Dnieper near Kherson were not the first thing I suspected to happen. (Contested river crossing, with too much artillery in the area)

Probably a feint to pull troops away from Melitopol, but if the Russians collapse and a bridgehead is formed, who knows.


edit added link
https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/04/23/7399048/

Yesterday -> Today

Yeah, the Ukrainians better have something else planned besides attacking well prepared defensive positions head-on.

I really hope that the UAF HQ staff has studied the failure of Operation Citadel, and don't end up making the same mistakes that the Germans did at Kursk back in 1943.

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Russian Defenses
 

Reuters did an awesome piece about Russian fortifications in Ukraine, featuring maps, satellite imagery, and really cool sketches (including cutaways).

https://www.reuters.com/graphics/UKR...E/mopakddwbpa/

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The illustrations are awesome and the piece overall was very good. I wonder though how well Russia's defenses are actually put together. I've seen a lot of videos of the fighting around Bahkmut and the Russian trenches are a far cry from the Platonic ideal of US trench warfare manuals.

Im sure not all Russian fortifications will be as bad as the more hastily dug ones in the Bahkmut region. However there's likely to be highly variable quality across the front. If Ukraine has some good intelligence on the quality of the defenses it will likely inform their avenues of attack.

All things being equal it seems you want to attack the area defended by the 401st Lazy Diggers instead of the 302nd Defensive Position Experts.

I seem to recall an article a week or two ago about Cavoli stating explicitly that the US has been helping Ukraine with counteroffensive planning. Which I suppose is probably to have been expected, but it was nice to hear it called out so plainly.

As for the counteroffensive, assuming one really happens, I imagine it will be picking up speed before long.

In southern Ukraine, the soil will be dry from around mid-April, then two weeks later in the Donetsk region, and from mid-May in the Russian-occupied Luhansk region further north...

Ukraine looks like they're using the end of Mud Season to chip away at Russian logistics by striking oil depots with drones. Beyond limiting fuel availability for combat vehicles, it could also harm resupply by limiting the availability of trucks for final mile haulage from railheads to units. Logistics isn't flashy like a fighter jet or a new tank, but it's a critical function.

The Ukrainian MOD has been reporting a fairly large daily uptick in destroyed Russian artillery and MLRS systems for the last couple of weeks. Seems like Ukraine is focused on counterbattery operations and destroying Russian supply lines at the moment.

There's also been reports of limited counterattacks / recon in force probes happening in various areas along the southern front, around Bakhmut, Vuhledar, and Avdiivka. Efforts are likely to help shape the battlefield as Ukrainian operations continue to ramp up.

Ukrainian Falcons?
 

The UK is preparing to host a Ukrainian pilot training program, reportedly to prepare them to fly the F-16. Belgium is reportedly following suit. The latter makes more sense, as Belgium has operated Falcons since the 1980s. The UK, on the other hand, never operated the type, making their contribution somewhat curious.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zon...raining-in-u-k

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zon...s-to-fly-f-16s

It's still not certain that Ukraine will receive F-16s and, if so, what type and from whom. Even if the UAF is given F-16s, the transfer won't occur anytime soon- it will be several months, at the earliest- definitely too late to assist in Ukraine's long-awaited spring offensive.

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F-16 availability
 

How many F-16 are available on the world market at the moment?

I know that Norway just retired theirs at the beginning of last year and I am sure that there a quite a few at Davis-Monthan AFB under the care of the 309th. My tally from Google Maps was in the vicinity of 284 airframes. I am not sure if these are included in the Flight Global, which was 922 airframes.

The balance of the world's users have (excluding Venezuela) is 1746 airframes, and I would look at the F-16AM/BM that have spread from the RNAF worldwide as a potential source such as Chile, Jordan and Thailand for small counts of airframes in the same configuration

The real need is for pilots and platforms to fly in a short amount of time.

IIRC (although it could have been a different one), one of the pieces I linked to reported that Norway has already shot down the idea of donating its Falcons, which are presently being retired, to Ukraine. AFAIK, so far, no nation has come forth and definitively declared that it will be donating/selling Falcons to Ukraine. The answer to that vital question remains up in the air. That said, I doubt that NATO members would be preparing to train UAF pilots on the F-16 as they are if a plan to provide them with the aircraft isn't already more or less in place.

Yesterday, I read somewhere that the US has dropped any objections to third party nations passing their F-16s along to Ukraine, so that's a positive development. The piece linked below has some details about what a pilot training program might look like, and puts a surprising four month timeline on the process.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zon...st-four-months

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Norway only has 28 (retired) F-16 left, IIRC. They sold 12 to Draken for that company's DACT flights, and Romania bought 32 last year.

The Dutch are in the process of retiring their last 68 F-16 and have said they're open to providing aircraft to Ukraine.

Belgium is starting to retire their F-16s this summer, although that process will take until 2028 and they're not expected to sell them on because the airframes are extremely close to their maximum service lives.

The Danes were going to retire their F-16s next year, but have extended their service life through 2027.

I don't know of anyone else who's in the middle of retiring their F-16. Many (if not most) of the countries that have them don't have anything newer to serve as a replacement. Particularly for countries that aren't geographically close to the conflict, I have a hard time seeing them weakening their own defenses to bolster Ukraine without assured replacement of the provided aircraft.

UAE is in the process of replacing part of their F-16s with F-35s. It may one of the reasons Zelinskyy is visiting the Arab League right now.

UAE F-35
 

I believe the UAE government cancelled the order for the F35 in favor of the Dassualt Rafale F4. This seems to make sense as they are already a high end F16 operator (Block 60, which they funded development of), and they have experience with the Mirage 2000.

Has Bakhmut Fallen?
 

Prick-ozhin claims that Wagner forces have captured Bakhmut. The head of the UAF denies this.

https://apnews.com/article/bakhmut-r...decd40b17d2d8b

Obviously, take Prick-ozhin's claims with a grain of salt. However, if what he says is true, that's not necessarily a bad thing for Ukraine, strategically-speaking. Reports earlier this week (confirmed) indicated that the UAF had gained ground on both Russian flanks, north and south of the city. If Bakhmut has indeed been captured, Wagner and the Russians may have laid a trap for themselves in the salient they've created. I'd love to see the long-awaited Ukrainian counter-offensive slice through the shoulders of the bulge, trap Wagner and the Russian forces now in the Bakhmut salient, and tear a huge hole in the Russian's lines. From what I've read over the past couple of months, the Russians haven't fortified the front lines around Bakhmut has much as they have the neck of the Crimean peninsula. If that is indeed the case, it makes a lot of sense for Ukraine to try to breach the Russian lines around Bakhmut and exploit same with deep penetrations where their new, Leopard II-equiped maneuver brigades can take advantage of the open ground.

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Yeah, the UAE has 80 Rafale F4 on order for delivery starting in 2027. Reports from around the time the deal was signed in late 2021 were that the Rafale would replace UAE's remaining Mirage 2000 and serve alongside the F-16.

This is precisely what I've assumed the Ukrainians are doing. Wagner are now in complete control of... what? A giant pile of rubble? Meanwhile they're about to be completely cut off from resupply and quite possibly wiped out to a man. Which will no doubt be thoroughly satisfying for both the Ukrainians and the Russian Army.

The news around Bakhmut seems incredibly... dynamic, at the moment, so I'd take just about everything with a grain of salt. According to most every mapping group I've seen, Russia has indeed taken Bakhmut itself. But, there's also evidence that Ukraine is pushing in from no less than 4 different directions in local counterattacks on Bakhmut's flanks. You have Prigozhin stating that Russia is in control of Bakhmut, but then Ukraine claiming that Russia isn't, and even supposed videos of Ukrainian SpecOps just openly patrolling through areas of Bakhmut in the daytime. And Prigozhin is also claiming that Wagner is now going to leave Ukraine entirely? Indeed, dynamic.

In all likelihood, I do think Bakhmut has likely fallen to Russia. Whether or not it will stay that way will probably depend a lot on where the counteroffensive happens. There's a part of me that would love to see Ukraine slash in to encircle Bakhmut to further erode Russia's already terrible morale, but whether that's a higher priority target than places elsewhere - we'll have to wait and see.

So, pro-Ukrainian Russian combatants have entered the Russian oblast of Belgorod, meeting few initial resistance and capturing several border villages. Apparently, the Russians are still coordinating their resistance, but front line aviation, including jets and helicopters have been attacking the attackers. Currently, it looks like a raid to former US Army general Mark Hertling (https://twitter.com/MarkHertling/sta...38470037422080), who again laid out some thought on the operation today. Yesterday, he wrote that the operation is likely part of Ukrainian battlefield shaping, forcing Russian Armed Forces to react at a point along the front, which is unlikely to be the focus of upcoming Ukrainian counter offensive actions. It seems, the Ukrainian Armed Forces are trying to put their Russian counterparts into a bind, by either having to allocate precious forces from along their front in Ukraine or have a raiding party in their back, wreaking havoc on an oblast with major GLOCs running into Donbas.

The raiding party seems to consist mainly or solely of two detachments. One being the Russian Volunteer Corps (RVC, sometimes also abbreviated RDK for Russian "Russkiy dobrovol'cheskiy korpus"), an organization with right-wing extremist influences allegedly still led (and founded) by neo-nazi Denis Nikitin. The other being the socially liberal oriented Freedom of Russia Legion (FRL, sometimes also abbreviated LSR for Russian "Svoboda Rossii"; hence also known as Svoboda). Both combat units allegedly are part of the larger movement named "Irpin Declaration", but only Svoboda openly commits to the cause.

So far, this raid looks like a text book operation in what 18th century warfare called "Kleiner Krieg" (petty warfare), i. e. operations conducted by small elements of troops in reconnaissance, sabotage, guerrilla, and terrorism in order to demoralize, confuse and exhaust the enemy, destroy specific goods, inhibit logistics, liberate POWs (probably not in this case), kill specific enemy personnel (unclear at this moment), gather intelligence and capture enemy assets.

Currently, several armored vehicles of the RuAF have been captured and repurposed by the raiders, with own losses kept disclosed. A single American made infantry mobility vehicle as been confirmed lost by OSINT. Traditional doctrine for a raid calls for the party to keep their operation short, bring all their supplies themselves or use captured supplies if need be and then egress behind friendly lines before heavier enemy reinforcements can be brought in to destroy the raiders.

Naturally, Russian social media is running hot. Especially since the raiders allegedly captured Russian police vehicles and uniforms and are now feared to extend their correctly flagged raid into possible false flag operations or in other forms might try to infiltrate and seep into the territory or even the security apparatus of the Russian Federation.

An interesting, and possibly thought-giving (at least for referees), operation!

I have a feeling we are going to be hearing a lot about the
Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant
in the next few days.

Multiple sources say it is destroyed.

It is

• The source of water for the Crimean Peninsula
• The reservoir for the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant
• A major source of electricity in the Russian controlled regions.

The effects are massive for and against both sides of this conflict.

• Slowing potential Ukrainian Advances
• Adding difficulty to Dnieper river crossings
• Flooding Russian defensive fortifications and mine fields
• Losing power and water supplies to vast regions of Russian controlled Ukraine
• Further disrupting nuclear plant operations.

And to complicate things even more it could be an engineering failure rather than as a result of a controlled demolition or attack. I am going to be watching this one closely.

Dam Mystery
 

Yeah, both sides stand to both profit and lose by the destruction of the dam. Both sides are claiming innocence and blaming the other. Another possibility, although remote, IMHO, is that the dam somehow gave out on its own, without "help" from either side- either as a result of poor maintenance, age, previous damage, etc. Time will tell.

It looks like Ukraine's long awaited "Spring" offensive is finally getting underway. So far, no one in the Western media seems to know what's going on. Again, there are conflicting reports. The fog of war is thick today.

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All told, it seems like Ukraine is doing a pretty decent job with information management. We've heard they've been pushing in no less than three areas on the front, but there's very little information available about successes or failures short of what's coming from Russia, which is all highly suspect.

Agreed, the dam may have failed from fatigue. But by starting a war, Russia prohibits any normal maintenance that may have taken place, and increases their responsibility to any dam failure.

If the dam had failed in an alternate timeline (ie no war), then responsibility would rest with Ukraine. My reading of the article is that Russia may have controlled "most" of the dam or at least been able to prevent any maintenance. So even if russia didn't deliberately blow up the dam, by having most of the control they inadvertently are responsible.

Whatever the cause, another tragic event.

I'll carve out the possibility that the dam very well may have collapsed on its own, but the circumstances do seem highly suspect.

First, Russia has damaged the dam previously about six months back with mines, which means they're more than capable of something like this. Secondly, Russia allegedly turned off the flow recently which caused the reservoir to fill quite a bit. And third, the fact that this happened right as the counteroffensive gets underway...

They certainly seem to have both motive and opportunity here.

Fourth, Russia also blew up retention ponds near Peremozhne and Annovka to flood the M-14 highway between Kherson and Melitopol.

In other news, the Czech Republic will be refurbishing and modernizing Ukrainian T-64 tanks. No specifics on upgrades, although optics and radios are mentioned in the article. I wouldn't be surprised if they get a power pack upgrade as well, since old T-64 will have a 5TD diesel that's no longer in production. Ukraine has managed to shoehorn T-72 engines into the T-64, and Czech Republic has more experience with T-72 engines.

Ukraine, Russia and Count Ciano
 

During World War II Count Ciano of Italy observed in his diary "Every time the Germans issue a communique saying how well things are going on the Eastern Front, they get a thrashing."

I get a similar impression from Russian comments both from the Russian Defense Ministry and Foreign Ministry. Tiny kernels of truth perhaps but mostly disinformation.

General Mud
 

Looks like the Russians are trying to bring back General Mud to slow the Ukrainian offensive down, and keep them fixed to roads at least in the mentioned regions.
Hopefully, the Russian Forces don't pull a 'Hail Mary" flank attack out of Belarus by Russian Forces, and take them from the rear, while the Ukrainians are fixated on the little green men of Wagner Group.

Latest theory is the Russian were placing charges for future use (perhaps this week or next) and there was an unintentional explosion. Explains the odd timing which did not isolate any Ukrainian units (I would have done it after a major crossing), and led to manned Russian positions getting flooded out.

Works well with the general incompetence the Russians have shown so far.

If this was semi planned and the Crimean implications were dismissed or ignored, the Russians seem to really be grasping at straws for the most minimal short term advantages.

An accidental demolition would be hilarious, if civilians weren't affected. Russian incompetence seemingly knows no bounds.

I other finger pointing news, the Washington Post is reporting that, three weeks before the Nord Stream Pipeline beneath the Baltic Sea was damaged, a "close ally" informed US intel that the Ukrainians had a plan in place to sabotage it.

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I bet they used one of their submarines!

From my understanding, most of the border between Belarus and Ukraine is thick marshland. Between western satellite imagery available and the unfavorable terrain conditions on the border, I'm not expecting much of a push from the north anytime soon.

Heffe...that is why it makes perfect sense....could be the Ardennes all over again and the Wehrmacht caught the Allies 1-1/2 times with that one during World War 2. This would also explain the lack of the top tier Russian gear in Eastern Ukraine as well (and yes I have read the casualty reports provided by the Ukraine).