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#91
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This story's been a rollercoaster from the start. The Pentagon has apparently shot down Poland's plan for a third-party transfer of its MiG-29s to Ukraine.
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zon...29s-to-ukraine I'm not sure how much good two dozen MiGs would have done the UAF, militarily speaking, but it would have signaled the strength of NATO's support for Ukraine, and likely boosted morale there. CNN reports that the White House has suggested that Putin might be prepared to use chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine. It's not clear what evidence this warning is based on, other than some unsupported allegations Putin supposedly made that the US was developing bio-weapons in Ukraine. To be fair, he has a well-established pattern of accusing his opponents, falsely, of things that he's about to do himself. Frankly, I don't see Russian use of chemical or biological weapons at this point in the war as likely, but I certainly wouldn't put it past Putin. He's seen Assad get away with it in Syria, and remain in power, so perhaps he's calculated that he can get away with it too. Considering the intensifying economic sanctions against Russia, he might believe he has nothing more to lose. Finally, I've been a Sebastian Junger fan since A Perfect Storm. His book, War, which follows a platoon of the 173rd ABCT during its deployment in the Korengal Valley is a powerful portrait of men at war (the companion documentary film, Restrepo, is very good too). He recently penned a brief essay for Vanity Fair in which he asserts that Ukraine can win this war because has the three things that an underdog needs in order to defeat a more powerful foreign aggressor. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022...ssian-military Slava Ukraini! -
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Author of Twilight 2000 adventure modules, Rook's Gambit and The Poisoned Chalice, the campaign sourcebook, Korean Peninsula, the gear-book, Baltic Boats, and the co-author of Tara Romaneasca, a campaign sourcebook for Romania, all available for purchase on DriveThruRPG: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...--Rooks-Gambit https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...ula-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...nia-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...liate_id=61048 https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/...-waters-module Last edited by Raellus; 03-09-2022 at 08:56 PM. |
#92
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Putin directed the Russian military to employ 16000 "volunteers" from the Middle East (Syria). This underscores that the Russian army has poor training/morale/leadership and is unprepared for urban combat operations, not to mention that the national leadership is casualty adverse. Vlad: Go Home.
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#93
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#94
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I love the smell of napalm in the morning. You know, one time we had a hill bombed, for 12 hours. When it was all over, I walked up. We didn't find one of 'em, not one stinkin' body. The smell, you know that gasoline smell, the whole hill. Smelled like... victory. Someday this war's gonna end... |
#95
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Putin claims that Ukraine gave Russia no choice. Invasion had to happen in order to protect the Russian state and citizens.
AFAIK, this is almost true. At least in a very cynical way. Let me explain. 1. Russia is a petro-state. Its only real money-maker is pulling hydrocarbons out of the ground and selling the stuff to Europe. 2. A major Russian pipeline to Europe goes through Ukraine and the Ukrainians used to charge a large fee to allow this transit. So, the Russians stopped using it and have built new pipelines (and are trying to build even more). However, if Russian troops take control of this pipeline, Putin gets a much simpler/cheaper solution than building a NEW pipeline (Nordstream 2 will be eye-wateringly expensive) 3. MASSIVE oil and gas deposits have recently been discovered off the coast of Ukraine. If these were to be exploited... there would be no need for Europe to buy Russian oil. Russia would soon be bankrupt. However, Russia now has troops on most of the relevant shorelines... 4. Crimea gets 85% of its fresh water from one specific Ukrainian river. Or rather... it used to. Ukraine built a dam in revenge for the Russian takeover of Crimea. Crimea has water rationing - but its economy is being destroyed. However, Russian troops have now reached that dam... 5. Before the invasion, there was only one land-based link between Russia and Crimea. And that's a single bridge that could be easily destroyed. Of course, this is assuming that it doesn't fall down without anyone's help. (seismic activity and shoddy Russian construction are not a good combination). Russian troops have now linked Crimea with Mother Russia. 6. Putin is greedy but he's not stupid. It is quite possible that the Invasion was intended to protect the Russian hydrocarbon industry. So, if we're optimistic, it may be that Putin could be content with: a) keeping Ukraine out of the oil and gas business, b) seizing road and rail links to Crimea, c) re-opening the old pipelines. Anything else would be "nice to have" but those 3 things would protect the Russian economy and safeguard the vast wealth of Putin and the other kleptocratic Oligarchs. Oh, and the Russian citizens in Crimea (including sailors in one of the Russian Navy's two warmwater ports) wouldn't inconveniently die of thirst. Last edited by Matt W; 03-11-2022 at 07:38 PM. |
#96
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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.
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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.
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The poster formerly known as The Dark The Vespers War - Ninety years before the Twilight War, there was the Vespers War. |
#97
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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. |
#98
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Slave to 1 cat. |
#99
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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 Last edited by swaghauler; 03-12-2022 at 02:27 PM. |
#100
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Also, many Reserve units have members that do the same jobs in the civilian world (ie Transport units with CDL truckers in them, Medical units populated by nurses and X-ray techs, Construction units with welders, ironworkers, etc... in them). This gives US reserve units a knowledge base that they would never receive from straight military service. |
#101
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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). Quote:
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.
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The poster formerly known as The Dark The Vespers War - Ninety years before the Twilight War, there was the Vespers War. |
#102
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Slave to 1 cat. |
#103
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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. |
#104
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#105
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#106
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A panel discussion on the Operations In Ukraine by the Modern War Institute:
https://youtu.be/zXEvbVoDiU0 Swag |
#107
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The sad thing is, regardless of what happens, from a decades-long insurgency to a NATO intervention (I think a no-fly zone is going to happen, regardless of Biden's words to the contrary) -- the sad thing is that Ukraine is going to be a mass of rubble for decades, dependent on outside help.
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I'm guided by the beauty of our weapons...First We Take Manhattan, Jennifer Warnes Entirely too much T2K stuff here: www.pmulcahy.com |
#108
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#109
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Ukraine is already suggesting they get at least get a portion of the $400 billion in frozen Russian assets to rebuild.
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#110
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That would be justice.
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I'm guided by the beauty of our weapons...First We Take Manhattan, Jennifer Warnes Entirely too much T2K stuff here: www.pmulcahy.com |
#111
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Russia denies it, but multiple outlets are reporting that Russia has approached China for spare aircraft parts. The U.S. has warned that any country trying to evade Russian sanctions will pay a price.
China is paying lip service to Russia, but notably is NOT propping up the Rubble in relation to the Yuan, and several Chinese companies have stopped doing business in Russia. There are whispers of Russia trying to get China to move on Taiwan to take pressure off the Ukrainian war. A third Russian general in reported to have been KIA in Ukraine. |
#112
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Some Americans, including at least one former member of Congress are busy selling the Russian-led narrative that the U.S. has numerous secret bio-weapons labs in Ukraine. It is suspected by our intel community that Russia is using this narrative to cover their own planned use of bio-weapons, which they can then blame on 'breached' U.S. bio-labs.
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#113
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A video of Ukrainian soldiers being trained on how to operate Polish-donated RPG-76 Komar LAWs.
https://twitter.com/UAWeapons/status...16426783416320 Of all the LAWs, this one looks the sketchiest, but one would no doubt encounter it in a Poland-based T2k campaign. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RPG-76_Komar -
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Author of Twilight 2000 adventure modules, Rook's Gambit and The Poisoned Chalice, the campaign sourcebook, Korean Peninsula, the gear-book, Baltic Boats, and the co-author of Tara Romaneasca, a campaign sourcebook for Romania, all available for purchase on DriveThruRPG: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...--Rooks-Gambit https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...ula-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...nia-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...liate_id=61048 https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/...-waters-module |
#114
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#115
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Author of Twilight 2000 adventure modules, Rook's Gambit and The Poisoned Chalice, the campaign sourcebook, Korean Peninsula, the gear-book, Baltic Boats, and the co-author of Tara Romaneasca, a campaign sourcebook for Romania, all available for purchase on DriveThruRPG: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...--Rooks-Gambit https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...ula-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...nia-Sourcebook https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product...liate_id=61048 https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/...-waters-module |
#116
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The poster formerly known as The Dark The Vespers War - Ninety years before the Twilight War, there was the Vespers War. |
#117
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That's why the 66mm LAW made a return to the battlefield in Afghanistan. It was a COMPACT (fits across a soldier's shoulders on top of a patrol or assault pack), LIGHTWEIGHT, and effective bunker buster. |
#118
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Cappy at Task & Purpose tries to get a look at the Russian perspective.
https://youtu.be/Igq2fqa7RY4 Swag |
#119
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#120
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The US-made "loitering munition" known as the switchblade, which was introduced to much controversy during the Arab Spring era is going to be headed to Ukraine. America's "slaughterbots" are autonomous and can be programmed with a type of facial recognition software that allows them to discriminate friendly vehicles from the enemy by flags, markings, and camo. They can also be manually flown to a target. These are designed as a "swarming munition."
https://youtu.be/h5TTaNpQuWI Swag |
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