OT: Putin's War in Ukraine

[swaghauler]

Originally Posted by Raellus

The Russians are bringing back the armored train.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zon...ion-of-ukraine

Speaking of recommendations, you may have noticed that I post a lot of articles from Warzone on The Drive. It's pretty much my go-to for contemporary military-related news. If you haven't already, check it out.

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Actually, according to people in open source info forums, they apparently used one or both of the armored trains in Grozny too. I heard they are often used to haul Thermobaric missiles as well as larger artillery "stores" like 140mm rocket reloads. I guess they were a much-needed resource there during the siege of Grozny. Of course, Chechnya has rail lines to Russia so they were able to move in by rail. Ukraine severed her rail lines before the invasion started. That might have thrown the Russians off their game a bit too.

[Vespers War]

I'd missed seeing this thread until today, so I'm catching up a bit and commenting on things that I think aren't duplicating anyone else's comments.

Originally Posted by swaghauler

Actually, according to people in open source info forums, they apparently used one or both of the armored trains in Grozny too. I heard they are often used to haul Thermobaric missiles as well as larger artillery "stores" like 140mm rocket reloads. I guess they were a much-needed resource there during the siege of Grozny. Of course, Chechnya has rail lines to Russia so they were able to move in by rail. Ukraine severed her rail lines before the invasion started. That might have thrown the Russians off their game a bit too.

The two armored trains were both used in Grozny, and at least one was used in Georgia as well. Amur and Baikal may have been activated because of drone strikes on conventional rail transport; since Russian logistics are more rail-dependent than many other countries, the armored trains might have been called up because of their anti-air artillery and protection against light weaponry. The imagery I've seen is pretty grainy, but it looks like the electronic warfare cars have been removed from the trains, and they have just the locomotives, anti-air cars, and flatbeds for transport. That's a lot simpler and more cargo-oriented than the earlier configurations that included jammer cars and passenger cars for desantniki.

Originally Posted by swaghauler

That Russian ship was sunk off of Crimea. Open Source Intelligence posted a Google satellite photo of it.

And apparently it was sunk by a truck. A BM-21 Grad was pre-ranged on a set of coordinates and a pair of speedboats lured the Vasily Bykov onto those coordinates.


One thing I've noticed with the armor in particular is that Russia's including some seriously old equipment in the invasion. There have been some T-90A, but also T-72A and T-72B, and no signs that I've seen of T-72B3M or T-90M - they're sending tanks with no ERA or with Kontakt-1 or Kontakt-5, but nothing that would be equipped with Relikt. I'm not sure what that means (if anything), but it struck me as odd.

[CraigD6er]

Whilst I like armoured trains, I wonder if these may prove vulnerable in a country that has by no means been pacified?

I too wondered at the lack of much modern kit in the Russian front line. We see a lot of light vehicles, Tigr's etc, and slightly older MBT's. I wonder if the better kit is being held back. Let the Ukrainians use up their stocks of ATGW's on the older kit and even on some conscripts 'accidentally' deployed forward, then roll in with the better units once the defenders are worn down. Of course that falls apart when the west, and even neutral nations, keep topping up the defenders stocks with modern and it appears very effective weapons.

[swaghauler]

Originally Posted by CraigD6er

Whilst I like armoured trains, I wonder if these may prove vulnerable in a country that has by no means been pacified?

I too wondered at the lack of much modern kit in the Russian front line. We see a lot of light vehicles, Tigr's etc, and slightly older MBT's. I wonder if the better kit is being held back. Let the Ukrainians use up their stocks of ATGW's on the older kit and even on some conscripts 'accidentally' deployed forward, then roll in with the better units once the defenders are worn down. Of course that falls apart when the west, and even neutral nations, keep topping up the defenders stocks with modern and it appears very effective weapons.

They ARE using the modern stuff with veteran troops in the South and West and those guys are doing moderately well. The issue is that even the newest Russian equipment is underperforming. Combine that with Russia's apparent lack of C3, and you have a recipe for disaster. Modern SU fighters are being shot down because Russia appears to be afraid to put their AWACS in the air (they are sitting in Belarus right now) forcing those fighters to fly low in order to acquire targets. Putin may also be holding back his best equipment in case of a NATO intervention but I think what we are seeing is the ACTUAL PERFORMANCE of the Russian army on whole.

In the 80s and 90s, we (the US Army) were tasked with being able to "Shoot, Move, & Communicate simultaneously" on demand. It took us MANY years of training to figure that third ability out. Russia seems to be still operating on a Cold War standard. I guess something had to give in the budget and new tanks and jets can be sold abroad. We now know that Kontakt and Relikt and SHORTA systems are completely WORTHLESS against NATO missiles and that many units are equipped with reactive armor "bags" or panels stuffed with egg crates or foam (indicating a budgetary issue). The cage armor (developed in the 2nd Chechen War) is useless against JAVELIN and Ukrainian fighters have flown explosive-laden drones right under the cage into the commander's hatch cover (which causes the tank to "pop its top").

In addition, Ukraine has not only utilized the intelligence they are getting from open Russian comms, but they are also concentrating their attacks on the Russian convoys, destroying Russian resupply. A Russian tank without fuel is just a target. We may also be seeing a STRATEGIC LOGISTICS issue. Airliners landing at Moscow airport are being denied jet fuel. Cars, trucks, and buses are being requisitioned. This speaks to Russia not having enough logistics left to keep a fully functioning army on the move. BUT... this is just "phase I" of the operation. The coming "counter-insurgency operation" in Ukraine will have to be massive. I wonder what Putin is thinking now? Will we see his "shirt allergy" reemerge as he tries to play tough?

Anyways LASER PIG the YouTuber has a funny video on Ukraine right now. Enjoy!

https://youtu.be/ZPBU_MX1fYE

Swag

[Vespers War]

Originally Posted by swaghauler

They ARE using the modern stuff with veteran troops in the South and West and those guys are doing moderately well. The issue is that even the newest Russian equipment is underperforming. Combine that with Russia's apparent lack of C3, and you have a recipe for disaster. Modern SU fighters are being shot down because Russia appears to be afraid to put their AWACS in the air (they are sitting in Belarus right now) forcing those fighters to fly low in order to acquire targets. Putin may also be holding back his best equipment in case of a NATO intervention but I think what we are seeing is the ACTUAL PERFORMANCE of the Russian army on whole.

Playing devil's advocate, Russia only has something like 6 AWACS-equivalents, so they're far more valuable than the Sukhoi aircraft; on the other hand, if this isn't when you're going to risk them to make your air forces more effective, then when?

In the 80s and 90s, we (the US Army) were tasked with being able to "Shoot, Move, & Communicate simultaneously" on demand. It took us MANY years of training to figure that third ability out. Russia seems to be still operating on a Cold War standard. I guess something had to give in the budget and new tanks and jets can be sold abroad. We now know that Kontakt and Relikt and SHORTA systems are completely WORTHLESS against NATO missiles and that many units are equipped with reactive armor "bags" or panels stuffed with egg crates or foam (indicating a budgetary issue). The cage armor (developed in the 2nd Chechen War) is useless against JAVELIN and Ukrainian fighters have flown explosive-laden drones right under the cage into the commander's hatch cover (which causes the tank to "pop its top").

It looks like Kontakt might still be useful against older/lighter stuff - Kontakt-5 was surviving TOW hits in previous wars, and RPGs and (older) LAWs are probably still mostly ineffective. It's almost useless against top-attack missiles, though, and those are becoming more and more common.

I haven't seen any examples of Relikt in the conflict, but it's probably going to have similar issues with top-attack. Maybe they're being used in the south and I just haven't seen pictures of them, but so far the armor I've seen has either had Kontakt or no ERA.

I also haven't seen Arena (probably because it's incompatible with ERA), but Arena can't engage Javelin anyway because of its maximum elevation angle.

Shtora has been mostly useless for a while, and the cage armor does very little against tandem-charge warheads.

The bags and foam were explained to me as the holding system for an ERA application, which seems like an odd system to me, but I don't have direct experience with them. The number that are empty makes me agree that it looks like a budgetary issue (which really shouldn't be surprising - Russia's GDP is often somewhat less than that of the State of New York).

In addition, Ukraine has not only utilized the intelligence they are getting from open Russian comms, but they are also concentrating their attacks on the Russian convoys, destroying Russian resupply. A Russian tank without fuel is just a target. We may also be seeing a STRATEGIC LOGISTICS issue. Airliners landing at Moscow airport are being denied jet fuel. Cars, trucks, and buses are being requisitioned. This speaks to Russia not having enough logistics left to keep a fully functioning army on the move. BUT... this is just "phase I" of the operation. The coming "counter-insurgency operation" in Ukraine will have to be massive. I wonder what Putin is thinking now? Will we see his "shirt allergy" reemerge as he tries to play tough?

Anyways LASER PIG the YouTuber has a funny video on Ukraine right now. Enjoy!

https://youtu.be/ZPBU_MX1fYE

Swag

Road logistics has always been a shortcoming of the Russian system. One estimate I saw was that their road resupply range was only around 90 miles from their supply depot, and they were heavily reliant on rail.

As far as COIN goes, Russia just flat doesn't have the number of soldiers needed. To hold all of Ukraine, following the rule of thumb that you need approximately 1 counter-insurgent per 20 inhabitants, they'd need over 2.2 million soldiers to occupy Ukraine. Their entire active army is just over 1 million on paper, and only around 3 million including all their reserve forces. Even if they got assistance from secessionist forces in Donbas and whatever Syrian troops Assad wants somewhere far away from him, I don't think they can get anywhere near the needed numbers. They might be able to split the country and hold part of it, but even that would be difficult.

[bash]

Originally Posted by Vespers War

It looks like Kontakt might still be useful against older/lighter stuff - Kontakt-5 was surviving TOW hits in previous wars, and RPGs and (older) LAWs are probably still mostly ineffective. It's almost useless against top-attack missiles, though, and those are becoming more and more common.

Even if NATO is just dumping old LAWs on Ukraine, their tactics of going after relatively soft trucks and APCs seem to be having great effect. Save the Javelins for tanks but target everything else with LAWs and guns. The front lines are burning supplies every minute so even just slowing resupply convoys is helpful for Ukraine.

For their firepower Russian forces seem to have a very steep loss of strength gradient. Their lack of air superiority means their power looks like it drops off pretty significantly from behind their front lines and well traveled corridors. They do not have a secure rear area inside Ukraine anywhere but the south.

So long as the Ukrainians can keep resupplied around and behind the Russian lines, Russian advances will be very expensive. Full occupation will be even more expensive.

[swaghauler]

It seems that the Russian Oligarchs are beginning to target Putin

https://youtu.be/QTQ4O4_a_Mo

Swag