|
So a newbie question: When people talk about "Russian Army Doctrine," are they talking about a body of books or something? How exactly do we know if the Russian army has a set tactical approach it always uses and what it is? Are we just summarizing what we can see from past actions in places like Chechnya, Georgia and Syria?
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:23
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 4, 2024 15:53 |
|
|
Blorange posted:Throwing down multiple, conflicting stories is a common technique to sow controversy. It gets people talking about the subject, creating artificial pressure for the target to respond. Alas, it's no comfort to me that they are poo poo posters too. Maybe they'll get a new mod.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:24
|
|
|
Rad Russian posted:UK has been the country of choice for all the oligarchs for some reason. Almost every single rich Russian has property, boats, and various companies registered in the UK. Even one of the most storied futbol teams there was owned by an oligarch. I'm not sure why they all specifically picked UK, however, there must have been favorable conditions for them all to pile there and not any other European country. It's also been a very long trend of 10-15 years, not something super recent. Isn't the City of London a tax haven of sorts?
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:24
|
|
|
HappyHippo posted:I think you're describing air supremacy? There's a scale from supremacy to superiority to parity: Hand Row posted:That’s supremacy. But I wouldn’t say Ukraine has superiority either. If you look at the definition, air superiority is having freedom of action. NATO posted:Air superiority is the second level, where a side is in a more favorable position than the opponent. It is defined in the NATO glossary as the "degree of dominance in [an] air battle ... that permits the conduct of operations by [one side] and its related land, sea and air forces at a given time and place without prohibitive interference by opposing air forces".[3] I highly doubt that the Ukranians have a degree of dominance that permits the conduct of operations at a given time and place without prohibitive interference by opposing air forces. The Ukranians are having to pick and choose; with air superiority you do not have to. Air supremacy is indeed something else, it means you do what you want whenever you want without any interference. That's clearly not the case.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:24
|
|
|
Rad Russian posted:UK has been the country of choice for all the oligarchs for some reason. Almost every single rich Russian has property, boats, and various companies registered in the UK. Even one of the most storied futbol teams there was owned by an oligarch. I'm not sure why they all specifically picked UK, however, there must have been favorable conditions for them all to pile there and not any other European country. It's also been a very long trend of 10-15 years, not something super recent. TulliusCicero posted:Personal theory? UK (and Ireland I guess, but who wants to live in Dublin) is the english-speaking country in western europe, and in my experience college graduates from Russia with some money can usually converse in english.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:24
|
|
|
KitConstantine posted:Okay this is loving wild. The poster is a pentagon reporter with Foriegn Policy magazine so I'm sure he's reporting what was said, but it's still insane. Not really. As I said before they are likely basing most of the air assets in Western Ukraine which is safer and easier to resupply fuel/weapons and maintenance. When you have real time intel and early warning provided by NATO you don't have to have your own anti-air and radar on and you don't need to have airframes in the air searching for the enemy. It is a very savvy strategy and gives the Ukrainians control over the air or at least keeps it contested. This is also why you aren't seeing a ton of Russian air in the theater because they are well aware it is not safe for them. What limited air they are bringing in are in areas they largely control and are still taking high attrition rates.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:25
|
|
|
CommieGIR posted:They do not have superiority, but they also still have these assets because they have not been reckless in trying to get into duels with Russian SAMs and aircraft. So they've been holding them back most likely on purpose. Contested airspace is a win for Ukraine, not disagreeing with that. It's a huge win for Ukraine and well beyond what anyone thought would happen. I just think it's a bit ridiculous to pump the tires on that one all the way to "UkAF has air superiority!"
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:25
|
|
|
KitConstantine posted:Okay this is loving wild. The poster is a pentagon reporter with Foriegn Policy magazine so I'm sure he's reporting what was said, but it's still insane. i suspect its because of those 70 planes that the EU won't talk about now. that or really poo poo targeted strikes.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:25
|
|
|
SaTaMaS posted:Not to internet tough guy too much, but there haven't been many videos of all those molotov cocktails being used. Are they waiting for the conventional warfare phase to end before using insurgent tactics? I work with two teams of Ukrainians developers and a few of the Kyiv guys who share an apartment have a crate of Molotov's in the corner of the room just in case. They had a production line going a few days ago. They are also working like normal despite the fact we've told them they are on paid leave for the duration of this. It's a really weird situation.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:26
|
|
|
KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:Contested airspace is a win for Ukraine, not disagreeing with that. It's a huge win for Ukraine and well beyond what anyone thought would happen. I just think it's a bit ridiculous to pump the tires on that one all the way to "UkAF has air superiority!" Yeah fully agreed. It at least shows Zelensky and the Air Force appear to know they are better off with those assets on hand and available and not as craters across Ukraine. That's a very cautious and good move.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:27
|
|
|
Eric Cantonese posted:So a newbie question: yes, doctrine is literally written down and widely taught. the point of a doctrine is everyone knows what it is, because it informs how you design and organize your army (if your doctrine calls for massed artillery, you want more artillery), and it acts as a baseline for how units will act in a crisis so they know what to do quickly and will be relatively coordinated in their approach. how you apply a specific doctrine will depend on the circumstances, doctrine is broader than specific operational plans.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:27
|
|
|
https://mobile.twitter.com/GarbageApe/status/1499753651660800006Eric Cantonese posted:So a newbie question: More like collective understanding based on everything we’ve know about them. Russia, much like any other country, doesn’t have a prescriptionist Bible for war fighting. Edit: Not to confused with specific literature, like “this is how we set up for shelling cities”. cinci zoo sniper fucked around with this message at 17:30 on Mar 4, 2022 |
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:27
|
|
|
Eric Cantonese posted:So a newbie question: There are lots of publicly available documents, like: https://www.researchgate.net/public...n_Ground_Forces https://silkroadstudies.org/resources/pdf/SilkRoadPapers/2018_01_Nilsson_Hybrid.pdf You can see from the references in these pieces how this is pieced together, but it comes from a lot of different sources, observations of conflict, equipment, 1st hand documentation of Russian source materials, its a hodepodge that comes together and not a single definitive book, Russia doesn't print a singular master plan but there is strong scholarship on the subject people aren't just making poo poo up.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:28
|
|
|
Luigi's Discount Porn Bin posted:I wonder about this. The video a few pages ago made what sounded like a pretty plausible case that the siege setup is proceeding reasonably well - rather than being out of fuel or stranded behind a couple burnt-out BMPs or whatever, the big column has stopped where it wanted to stop and is now carrying out the standard Russian army doctrine of setting up a forward operating base within range of the target and securing supply lines. Is there reason to think that isn't the case? I mean besides general statements from Western governments about how they're disorganized. There's no satellite imagery recently, and I haven't seen Ukrainian ground footage besides a video of a plane dropping flares a couple days ago. i mean, it just seems like an absurd case to me. clearly, there is some stuff going well for russia - the entire eastern front minus kharkiv, particularly the southeast is near done and dusted. mariupol will likely fall and large portions of the ukrainian military will eventually be trapped in a russian encirclement. it's unclear to me if they succeeded in withdrawing any of their forces. but the kyiv front is unambiguously poor, it's just the reality right in front of our eyes. they aren't really making much ground in the encirclement, they're unable to hold onto the hostomel airport which is an important strategic objective that they laid out on day one, they continue to incur significant losses of material and they've been unable to gain air superiority there. even ISW's generally very even-keeled assessments outright call it "inexplicable." the overall strategic situation for ukraine is very poor, that much is very obvious. eventually, the russians will be able to surround kyiv with overwhelming force from all sides. but for now, i really can't buy at all that Russian Doctrine is the reason why they're stalled north of kyiv when they have clearly attempted multiple times to push south, and then got repelled or (more recently) cut off entirely.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:28
|
|
|
KitConstantine posted:Well Ukrainians got another airfield back Isn't this a city/airfield the Russians have been attacking rather than one they hold? KitConstantine posted:Okay this is loving wild. The poster is a pentagon reporter with Foriegn Policy magazine so I'm sure he's reporting what was said, but it's still insane. Considering we've seen quite a few videos of Russian aircraft lately and just about zero Ukranian I'm going to have a hard time believing this one.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:29
|
|
|
Eric Cantonese posted:So a newbie question: It is how Russian Military plans, trains and thinks effectively. Most militaries have a philosophy so to speak and their hardware and tactics help enable that.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:29
|
|
|
Rad Russian posted:UK has been the country of choice for all the oligarchs for some reason. Almost every single rich Russian has property, boats, and various companies registered in the UK. Even one of the most storied futbol teams there was owned by an oligarch. I'm not sure why they all specifically picked UK, however, there must have been favorable conditions for them all to pile there and not any other European country. It's also been a very long trend of 10-15 years, not something super recent. It's because the city of London is very good at laundering money. HappyHippo posted:Isn't the City of London a tax haven of sorts? Think of it like a router. It takes cash and layers it through city of London properties, the UK dependencies like the channel Islands / Isle of man, the offshore colonies that the UK still holds, and then back spick and span in the most tax efficient way possible. keep punching joe fucked around with this message at 17:33 on Mar 4, 2022 |
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:29
|
|
|
wilderthanmild posted:Jet fighters are "fixed wing" aircraft. Not after the Ghost is done with them.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:29
|
|
|
the popes toes posted:Here's an interesting comparison (from Bloomberg) I think that 'entities sanctioned' is a poor metric for effectiveness. By the accounts I've seen the potentially most damaging sanction is the US sanction on the Russian banks. This is something that hasn't really been done before. "Russia’s large financial services sector is heavily dominated by state-owned actors that rely on the U.S. financial system to conduct their business activities both within Russia and internationally. The sanctions the United States is imposing today cut off major parts of the Russian financial system and economy from access to this important financial infrastructure and the U.S. dollar more broadly."
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:30
|
|
|
Valtonen posted:Not after the Ghost is done with them. We are like this close to running that into the ground. Much like the Ghost does with enemy planes.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:31
|
|
|
Dapper_Swindler posted:i suspect its because of those 70 planes that the EU won't talk about now. that or really poo poo targeted strikes. The strikes were poo poo, and had a meaningful number of misses, or hits on wrong targets and empty places, from what we can tell.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:31
|
|
|
Eric Cantonese posted:So a newbie question: militaries will publish their doctrine for consumption within the military. think of it like a company handbook of rules and regulations. its not exactly a secret but its also not easy to get your hands on, russia isn't publishing english-language doctrine for foreign consumption like press releases most top tier militaries will have an internal branch dedicated to sniffing out, reviewing, and developing countermeasures for foreign military doctrine. both america and china definitely do this. its almost like an academic branch of the military, america has a war college where professional military science academics will review and publish and have conferences about things like, "what would russia do if they had to attack turkey via water?" and so on, just working out the theory. this kind of stuff is going to be the most immediate source for how russian doctrine works. also yes, reviewing how countries fought wars is a source of doctrinal review in practice and not just in theory. all kinds of militaries were keeping a super close eye on how america behaved in afghanistan, for example VVV this is a great example and i want to point out that it is published by basically the war university run by the american military. there are people who get paid to do academic research on war stuff, there's at least one goon who does this for a living Mr. Fall Down Terror fucked around with this message at 17:39 on Mar 4, 2022 |
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:31
|
|
|
Eric Cantonese posted:So a newbie question: Here have a book: https://www.armyupress.army.mil/portals/7/hot%20spots/documents/russia/2017-07-the-russian-way-of-war-grau-bartles.pdf
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:32
|
|
|
TheRat posted:Considering we've seen quite a few videos of Russian aircraft lately and just about zero Ukranian I'm going to have a hard time believing this one. It's very easily true. We've seen very little of aircraft being used or implemented Ukranian or Russian, it could be that with all the AA in the theater that its just created a relative stalemate, no one can do much in the sky without major losses.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:32
|
|
|
cinci zoo sniper posted:More like collective understanding based on everything we’ve know about them. Russia, much like any other country, doesn’t have a prescriptionist Bibel for war fighting. that is not true. every country with a military has a doctrine. it doesn't mean people never deviate from doctrine, but it is the general theory about how your military is built to fight and how it will, in general, fight a good book that covers what military doctrine is is Shattered Sword, which also happens to be a really interesting book about history (as it debunks widely-held beliefs about the battle of midway and also specifically traces how those beliefs came to be), and just about an incredibly interesting battle (did you know that one guy personally knocked out one of the four japanese carriers, as in his bomb was the only one that hit it and that bomb sunk it, and he only hit that carrier at the last minute because someone else hit the one he was first going to bomb, which given how vital and important those carriers were is absolutely insane that one guy managed to knock one out...and then followed it up by bombing another carrier that sunk later in the battle)
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:32
|
|
|
TulliusCicero posted:Personal theory? Cambridge Analytica also had dealings with Lukoil, and the person who came up with their Facebook harvesting algorithms was an associate professor at St. Petersburg University who had government grants for research into social media ( source ). Whether that translates into a reason to help with Brexit or is just a convenient coincidence is, admittedly, speculation.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:33
|
|
|
Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:there was definitely attempt, russia nailed ukrainian air bases with cruise missiles KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:They did a bunch of SEAD work, they popped a bunch of Kh-58s at radar sites and air defense systems that were emitting, they fired short range ballistic missiles at airbases, etc. It just appears that they don't have the assets or capabilities to keep up the necessary SEAD work until it's done. But it wasn't followed up on is more to my point. It's like they did a handful of sorties and said "eh, gently caress it". One would think that they'd want to clear the way for Frogfoots (at the very leats) to ingress and do some CAS/surgical strikes. Like did they even throw runway-wreckers at the airbases? I guess Putin really just expected to be hailed as liberators after the "neonazi" government was overthrown by a grateful populace.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:33
|
|
|
Eric Cantonese posted:So a newbie question: Yes, we're partly summarizing based on past experiences. It's easy to say that Russia will do the things it did in the past. There's also a body of Russian military theorists going back to before the Second World War, whose texts and direct teaching of the modern military leadership are assumed to be huge experiences. It's important to stick to doctrine because different units often have specialized roles, and if you can't rely on your supporting elements to fulfill their specialized roles then you become far less effective. Militaries also spend decades appropriating the right equipment for their doctrine: there's more of a reliance in Russian doctrine on intermediate air defense than air to air combat, for example, so they're going to have more of those SAM systems than a contemporary Western force. When you don't stick to doctrine, you often have significant issues as your tools and tactics are inappropriate for the fight you're waging. The early days of the war are a prime example of this as we saw light infantry getting ambushed without fire or air support as they tried to seize key political objectives. Now the Russian military is falling back on existing doctrine, which focuses on its powerful land-based artillery.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:33
|
|
|
It's going to be great when Kyiv gets put under siege and we have to start flying in supplies to the civilians in Berlin Airlift 2: The Russian Connection because time is a flat circle
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:33
|
|
|
Ciprian Maricon posted:It's very easily true. We've seen very little of aircraft being used or implemented Ukranian or Russian, it could be that with all the AA in the theater that its just created a relative stalemate, no one can do much in the sky without major losses. It's certainly true that the Russians don't control the airspace and can't use their overwhelming air advantage freely. There's a very long road from that to Ukraine having air superiority, though.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:33
|
|
|
evilweasel posted:that is not true. every country with a military has a doctrine. it doesn't mean people never deviate from doctrine, but it is the general theory about how your military is built to fight and how it will, in general, fight What I’m saying is that the Russian military doctrine is not defined by a single literary work.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:35
|
|
|
Eric Cantonese posted:So a newbie question: IIRC a few fairly knowledgeable posters a ways back in the thread suggested that Russian military doctrine is pretty much a continuation of Soviet doctrine, Soviet doctrine being well established and known. We've also seen Putin use the same overall playbook again and again. There are some interesting contrasts between NATO/USSR doctrine. IIRC, one example I read highlighted years ago was the use of artillery support. Say you're attacking an enemy position with three elements and have artillery support available to use for any/all of the three elements. Suppose #1 is making significant gains, #2 is encountering strong resistance and therefore stalled in their advance, and #3 is getting pushed back. If you're NATO, doctrine says you use your artillery support primarily to help #3 recover and resume their advance. Soviet doctrine says you devote all artillery assets to #1 and tell #2 and #3 to get their poo poo together. CommieGIR posted:Yeah fully agreed. It at least shows Zelensky and the Air Force appear to know they are better off with those assets on hand and available and not as craters across Ukraine. That's a very cautious and good move. Wise especially given that they're maintaining their Air Force while every day the number of capable Russian AA platforms in the area diminishes. Unless of course you're counting the number of capable AA platforms that have been repossessed by angry giggling Ukrainians.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:35
|
|
|
evilweasel posted:that is not true. every country with a military has a doctrine. it doesn't mean people never deviate from doctrine, but it is the general theory about how your military is built to fight and how it will, in general, fight yeah, it went through the deck and into the fuel and plane filled hanger and the whole thing went up.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:35
|
|
|
Doctrine is also something that can be observed in exercises, so you can build a fairly good idea of what doctrine will be in combat from how exercises are conducted. The problem is: Russia does a lot of exercises that are largely for show, and its pretty apparent now...
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:36
|
|
|
CuddleCryptid posted:It's going to be great when Kyiv gets put under siege and we have to start flying in supplies to the civilians in Berlin Airlift 2: The Russian Connection because time is a flat circle my guess would be that in the event of an actual siege of kyiv, there would be periodic ceasefires with humanitarian corridors for food/medicine to get in and civilians to evacuate out, as that has been the practice in the past for russia.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:37
|
|
|
TheRat posted:It's certainly true that the Russians don't control the airspace and can't use their overwhelming air advantage freely. There's a very long road from that to Ukraine having air superiority, though. Yes, I just mean that, the very low number of losses could absolutely be true. If your Air Force can't really deploy, you won't have a lot of losses.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:37
|
|
|
D34THROW posted:But it wasn't followed up on is more to my point. It's like they did a handful of sorties and said "eh, gently caress it". One would think that they'd want to clear the way for Frogfoots (at the very leats) to ingress and do some CAS/surgical strikes. most likely russia just didn't have the amount of ordnance necessary to really knock out ukraine's air force and keep it knocked out. these kind of munitions are expensive and you need a LOT of them. meanwhile, it's looking like russia couldn't even afford to keep their trucks in good repair
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:37
|
|
|
Dapper_Swindler posted:yeah, it went through the deck and into the fuel and plane filled hanger and the whole thing went up. I may be thinking of another carrier, but I believe that was the one where they were actively arming and prepping to launch planes and therefore the armored doors protecting the magazine were open at what turned out to be not a good time.
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:39
|
|
|
Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:its almost like an academic branch of the military, america has a war college
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:39
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 4, 2024 15:53 |
|
|
cinci zoo sniper posted:What I’m saying is that the Russian military doctrine is not defined by a single literary work. i mean, it might be true that its doctrine is seperated into multiple documents. and it is certainly not a hard and fast "this is the only way to do it" document. but it is absolutely correct there are documents that describe russian military doctrine that inform how their army was built and trained to fight, and that doctrine is what they will likely default to when trying to do something creative didn't work - because that is, after all, what they were built and trained to do. and, because those doctrine documents need to be relatively widely circulated it's pretty likely that plenty of analysts know what they say, even if the documents are not themselves public
|
|
#
?
Mar 4, 2022 17:40
|
|