(Thread IKs:
fatherboxx)
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BougieBitch posted:Just because the equipment was added on a certain date doesn't mean that it was disabled on or around that date. We can be reasonably certain that things aren't being double-counted, so the total numbers are right, but that doesn't mean that we can be sure that we are finding destroyed equipment in a timely manner. It's possible that either: Probably part of the equation. I would expect Ukraine to have better intel gathering and analysis capabalities like satelite surveillance and drones along with trained specialists to analyze the data. I don't think the Pentagon is exactly telling Ukraine where Russian gear is parked but I'm sure they provide plenty of training and coaching to Ukrainian analysts. In that light I expect Ukraine to more frequently locate targets. If you can't directly identify targets you are left with "They are dug into that treeline over there so let's shell it and hope we hit something" which certainly has value but is bound to be less effective.
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Jul 13, 2023 21:07
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We know from both leaks and statements that US assistance to Ukraine extends (at least at times) to quite precise targeting data eg 'xyz asset is at x.xxxxxxx, y.yyyyyyyy' -- WRT tracking of destroyed vehicles, most of the factors inhibiting documentation of losses apply to both sides and at least when I have looked previously, there have not been particularly significant differences in documented losses between russian and pro-ukraine tracking efforts. for instance oryx lists 34 destroyed, damaged, captured, or abandoned bradleys and russian loss tracker lost armour lists 35 destroyed, damaged, captured, or abandoned bradleys oryx does not only source loss data from Ukrainians. there is some latency around when various losses end up listed (expect to see waves of new documented losses most often when territory changes hands), but I generally wouldn't read too much into the timing of losses showing up on there in really any particular direction
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Jul 13, 2023 21:29
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Kommersant (established Russian newspaper of record, not super loyalist, but clearly broken with years of censorship) managed to get some rambling words from Putin regarding the meeting with Wagner leadership https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/6098572 quote:- On the one hand, at the meeting with them, I assessed what they had done on the battlefield and, on the other hand, what they had done during the events of June 24. Thirdly, I showed them possible options for their further service, including combat application. That was it. nice loving functioning state you have here indeed
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Jul 13, 2023 22:02
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Hannibal Rex posted:Now that Ukraine seems to have anough artillery ammunition to keep up the pressure, things might break. When did this happen? I haven’t really followed things as close as I used to because life and work got busy. I remember earlier this year there was some interview with *someone* (I know how useless this statement is) and they were saying as much as UA would like having planes, the biggest and most immediate pain points were around artillery and the constant need for a steady supply of it. I guess artillery is like, second compared to rifle ammunition in terms of what’s required to wage war? Has that hole been plugged for now? What about tanks and aircraft? I remember reading something about a couple hundred tanks being sent to UA, and more recently, cluster munitions which sound like artillery but a lot more useful somehow. But I haven’t heard anything about aircraft. Sorry for this stinker of a post I’m just really out of the loop battlefield wise and am trying to catch up.
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Jul 13, 2023 22:19
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fatherboxx posted:Kommersant (established Russian newspaper of record, not super loyalist, but clearly broken with years of censorship) managed to get some rambling words from Putin regarding the meeting with Wagner leadership That last bit is so pathetic, you almost feel sorry for Putin. Everyone agreed with me, but nobody saw it, and then all Wagner officers texted me and wanted to be friends and hang out, but I dropped my phone in the toilet, so can't show you the texts.
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Jul 13, 2023 22:24
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fatherboxx posted:Kommersant (established Russian newspaper of record, not super loyalist, but clearly broken with years of censorship) managed to get some rambling words from Putin regarding the meeting with Wagner leadership I read this and all I can see is how much he's trying to bend reality around his decrees. It sure as poo poo isn't bending itself around his words anymore.
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Jul 13, 2023 22:42
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HolHorsejob posted:I read this and all I can see is how much he's trying to bend reality around his decrees. It sure as poo poo isn't bending itself around his words anymore. Truly horrible way to live when you have terminal Lawyer Brain and wish for Rules and Epic Logic to win but the only way you can affect reality is with cop batons and missiles
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Jul 13, 2023 22:51
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Maybe if he'd spent the last 20 years building a democratic country based on the rule of law, he could tell Prigozhin & co that they have to file their complaints in triplicate forms and the problem would solve itself quietly. No rules lawyering your way out of problems in a mob state.
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Jul 13, 2023 22:55
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Hannibal Rex posted:https://twitter.com/MassDara/status/1679528294943735808?s=20 this got buried at the end of the last page but it's a very good read and reflects a very wide spread sense of 'what the gently caress is going on with russian military leadership' from nearly all sides right now of particular note I've seen russian military accounts that were steadfastly pro-MoD during the wagner mutiny that are clearly unhappy about how Popov was treated Herstory Begins Now fucked around with this message at 00:06 on Jul 14, 2023 |
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Jul 13, 2023 23:52
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steinrokkan posted:I think widespread bullshit reports of "zombie" soldiers (i.e. dazed and confused soldiers whose actions seem bizarre from the other side's point of view) and "invincible" soldiers who took 20 rounds because they were on drugs (i.e. soldiers who actually weren't hit at all) have been part and parcel of every modern war. It seems to be a kind of naturally emerging war mythology. Yeah, and most of the truth behind the "invincible enemy soldiers" was that the soldiers shooting at them missed, from the old "American bullets couldn't penetrate Chinese coats" in Korea to myriad accusations of specific models of gun being defective or inaccurate.
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Jul 14, 2023 00:02
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Does anyone have a link to whatever online map is in this tweet? https://twitter.com/secretsqrl123/status/1679537171890331668?t=p1iEfhylZoAncqqk5Ht07g&s=19
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Jul 14, 2023 00:16
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Ynglaur posted:Does anyone have a link to whatever online map is in this tweet? https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/viewer?mid=180u1IkUjtjpdJWnIC0AxTKSiqK4G6Pez&ll=47.52421795238474%2C40.91944261844622&z=8
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Jul 14, 2023 00:22
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Snowy posted:I don’t remember this part, was this on video? I have a terrible memory, but I think it was this I was thinking of. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1J6LpkG9zo They didn't last much longer after stepping off camera from what I heard.
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Jul 14, 2023 00:28
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I think there's something wrong with that map because there are no lines for Ukrainian fortifications.
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Jul 14, 2023 00:29
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MikeC posted:https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/viewer?mid=180u1IkUjtjpdJWnIC0AxTKSiqK4G6Pez&ll=47.52421795238474%2C40.91944261844622&z=8 
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Jul 14, 2023 01:22
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Cpt_Obvious posted:I think there's something wrong with that map because there are no lines for Ukrainian fortifications. Well, a complaint I've seen from more pessimistic ua twitter accounts is that the leadership hasn't been devoting enough resources to fortifications 
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Jul 14, 2023 01:34
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buglord posted:When did this happen? I haven’t really followed things as close as I used to because life and work got busy. I remember earlier this year there was some interview with *someone* (I know how useless this statement is) and they were saying as much as UA would like having planes, the biggest and most immediate pain points were around artillery and the constant need for a steady supply of it. I guess artillery is like, second compared to rifle ammunition in terms of what’s required to wage war? Has that hole been plugged for now? What about tanks and aircraft? I remember reading something about a couple hundred tanks being sent to UA, and more recently, cluster munitions which sound like artillery but a lot more useful somehow. But I haven’t heard anything about aircraft. I'm referring to the cluster munitions that are now being sent, and are allegedly already arriving in Ukraine. This should extend the ammunition supply for the counter-offensive by at least several months. Beyond that, it's still a matter of production ramping up.
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Jul 14, 2023 02:03
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buglord posted:When did this happen? I haven’t really followed things as close as I used to because life and work got busy. I remember earlier this year there was some interview with *someone* (I know how useless this statement is) and they were saying as much as UA would like having planes, the biggest and most immediate pain points were around artillery and the constant need for a steady supply of it. I guess artillery is like, second compared to rifle ammunition in terms of what’s required to wage war? Has that hole been plugged for now? What about tanks and aircraft? I remember reading something about a couple hundred tanks being sent to UA, and more recently, cluster munitions which sound like artillery but a lot more useful somehow. But I haven’t heard anything about aircraft. NATO militaries rely heavily on air power to blow things up and are built around the assumption that they will have (or will gain) air superiority in basically any conflict they fight because they have a fuckton of very expensive, advanced airplanes and missiles with a fuckton of expensive, well-trained pilots and crew to operate them. Soviet armies assumed they would not be able to match NATO in the air and planned on not having air superiority. They focused on using artillery to blow stuff up and on using ground based air defenses (GBAD) to limit NATO's ability to blow them up. The Russian and Ukrainian armies are both still very much descendants of the Soviet army, especially in the equipment they have available. Airplanes and pilots are expensive af to build/train and hard and expensive to maintain. Artillery is cheap to make and maintain and a gun crew can be trained in a few months vs a few years for a pilot. GBAD has worked for the Russians and Ukrainians-neither has used air power very much and each side has largely denied their enemy's ability to use air power to effectively blow things up, so the only way they have to blow things up is with artillery. Even if Ukraine got 30 F-16s and trained pilots and crews to operate them tomorrow, they would still be at the mercy of highly effective Russian GBAD and would probably be limited to doing what the Russians have been doing most of this war-shooting missiles or rockets from beyond the range of enemy air defenses. Not exactly game changing stuff unless they spend a long time degrading Russian air defenses, something which would take even the USAF a month or three-and they have trained extensively for exactly that task. Because NATO assumed it would do most of it's blowing stuff up with bombs and missiles, it doesn't have huge stockpiles or production capacity for artillery ammunition. It was pretty well assumed that if the Cold War went hot that any conflict would be relatively short before it went nuclear or stopped. Nobody thought a Soviet invasion of western Europe was going to involve blasting each other with artillery for 18 months, and the GWOT also didn't require much in the way of artillery compared to air power. Nobody who really knows exactly how large the US stockpile of artillery ammunition is vs. how much has been donated to Ukraine can say, but the US's donations to Ukraine have definitely been a large chunk of the US stockpile. Much of what was donated recently, the US actually purchased or swapped from South Korea. Because the US decided a while ago to mostly stop using cluster munitions there is a large stockpile of them which has now been made available to Ukraine. NATO countries have donated a fair many armored vehicles of various types, including tanks, to Ukraine. Some have started being used, some have been blown up by Russians (especially by mines). Some of these have been recovered and their crews have survived much better than in similar types of Soviet vehicles, but running over a mine will disable a Bradley or Leopard just as well as it will disable a BMP or T-72. Western equipment is not the wonder weapon some people on the internet had imagined it would be, but it is a good backfill for casualties Ukraine has suffered and will continue to suffer.
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Jul 14, 2023 02:05
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Ynglaur posted:Does anyone have a link to whatever online map is in this tweet? People in that Twitter thread are saying that Ukraine has their US cluster munitions. They can't have gotten those munitions that quickly, right?
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Jul 14, 2023 02:40
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Eric Cantonese posted:People in that Twitter thread are saying that Ukraine has their US cluster munitions. They can't have gotten those munitions that quickly, right? Pentagon confirms delivery of cluster munitions to Ukraine
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Jul 14, 2023 02:43
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Eric Cantonese posted:People in that Twitter thread are saying that Ukraine has their US cluster munitions. They can't have gotten those munitions that quickly, right? They could have some of them already, I'm sure it was planned in advance and moving ammo is a lot easier than moving heavy equipment. efb
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Jul 14, 2023 02:44
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Eric Cantonese posted:People in that Twitter thread are saying that Ukraine has their US cluster munitions. They can't have gotten those munitions that quickly, right? I am sure the US has bases with this type of stuff in stock all over Europe. Doesn't have to necessarily come from the continental US. https://twitter.com/sambendett/status/1679468509498073088 Thread about Ukranians getting trained by Western soldiers not understanding how the West is actually behind in drone usage and information tech on the battlefield.
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Jul 14, 2023 03:09
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MikeC posted:I am sure the US has bases with this type of stuff in stock all over Europe. Doesn't have to necessarily come from the continental US. https://twitter.com/sambendett/status/1679470731808186368 "Aboriginies." Jeez. I do wonder if there are people in the US trying to get the American military up to speed on drone usage. I also wonder who might be resisting.
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Jul 14, 2023 03:29
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MikeC posted:I am sure the US has bases with this type of stuff in stock all over Europe. Doesn't have to necessarily come from the continental US. I really think the key point is "rely". The GPS maps and tablets are definitely used but they're value-added. The basic navigation really should be maps and compasses, since you can never be sure if the information you're getting from your network is accurate enough or compromised or goes down. Like, remember when the Russians made an artillery calculator app for smartphones, which the Ukrainian soldiers downloaded and didn't realize until it was too late the app was broadcasting their positions to Russian counterbatteries?
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Jul 14, 2023 03:40
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The U.S. army has made a strong push to regain basic Soldiering skills used in LSCO that atrophied during OIF/OEF. We train very hard on "analog" skills for the very real possiblity that the networks will go down. Map reading, battle tracking, multiple redundancy for communication are all prioritized. The gee-whiz technology is still common place in higher echelons and during war time deployments but during training it's generally sidelined to ensure Soldiers know how to do the basics. I mean, yeah, we don't use drones and tablets as much at lower levels compared to other countries we train with but I think there could be a misunderstanding about the methodology the trainers are using. I also agree that the U.S. has not experienced LSCO in the current generation of Soldiers so there is a disconnect there as well.
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Jul 14, 2023 04:04
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Note that the thread also points out that a lot of training days were wasted, with lots of time spent sitting around doing nothing.
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Jul 14, 2023 04:12
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I think also with the US military there is a VERY serious vetting process for every piece of equipment. They rarely use anything off the shelf because it can easily be compromised in various ways. I am quite surprised that they haven’t invested heavily in small drones that can be used on the platoon/squad level. As we have seen in this conflict they are basically invaluable in modern warfare. Something like this can be made for military use that has modularity to allow it to do things like drop munitions like that Ukrainians have modified theirs to do. Maybe add stuff in like laser designation or even small arms fire capability. It is all pretty cheap off the shelf tech. Small, cheap and disposable.
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Jul 14, 2023 04:26
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Djarum posted:Something like this can be made for military use that has modularity to allow it to do things like drop munitions like that Ukrainians have modified theirs to do. Maybe add stuff in like laser designation or even small arms fire capability. It is all pretty cheap off the shelf tech. Small, cheap and disposable. The US Army needs a milspec quadcopter immediately. Hardened comms, completely reliable, and cheap enough to be expendable (that's still expensive by civvie standards). Several models, for recon, artillery spotting, grenade dropping, and all the other options. Half of every squad should have a drone in the backpack and they should all have controllers. The catch is operating the drones with the good sensors over enemy territory, you'd hate to give an adversary samples of a thermal optic that can be put in in a small drone.
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Jul 14, 2023 05:02
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yeah and they'll probably cost $100k each
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Jul 14, 2023 05:18
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Kaiser Schnitzel posted:tl;dr: The release of the US's large stockpiles of cluster munitions is what has plugged the artillery munitions hole for the next ~3-6? months. There was like 10 pages of argument about the morality/practicality of the decision to send those munitions a few pages ago (and the mods asked that the discussion be stopped because it had become circular). War is mostly about blowing stuff and people up, not about shooting people with bullets, so yes, explosive munitions are hugely important-more important than rifle ammunition. Hannibal Rex posted:I'm referring to the cluster munitions that are now being sent, and are allegedly already arriving in Ukraine. This should extend the ammunition supply for the counter-offensive by at least several months. 
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Jul 14, 2023 05:19
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mllaneza posted:The US Army needs a milspec quadcopter immediately. Hardened comms, completely reliable, and cheap enough to be expendable (that's still expensive by civvie standards). Several models, for recon, artillery spotting, grenade dropping, and all the other options. Half of every squad should have a drone in the backpack and they should all have controllers. The catch is operating the drones with the good sensors over enemy territory, you'd hate to give an adversary samples of a thermal optic that can be put in in a small drone. Well you don’t need great poo poo in it. Like I said off the shelf parts are fine. You are using it for simple recon, artillery spotting and the like. It needs to be cheap, reliable and expendable. The US military has plenty of UAVs and whatnot that have better sensors. You want something to see if there is someone over the ridge, in the tree line in front of you or to scope out a building if you are a squad.
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Jul 14, 2023 05:24
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Dirt5o8 posted:The U.S. army has made a strong push to regain basic Soldiering skills used in LSCO that atrophied during OIF/OEF. We train very hard on "analog" skills for the very real possiblity that the networks will go down. Map reading, battle tracking, multiple redundancy for communication are all prioritized. The gee-whiz technology is still common place in higher echelons and during war time deployments but during training it's generally sidelined to ensure Soldiers know how to do the basics. For anyone else, LSCO = Large-Scale Combat Operations, I'm guessing. mllaneza posted:The catch is operating the drones with the good sensors over enemy territory, you'd hate to give an adversary samples of a thermal optic that can be put in in a small drone. Uh, they've been COTS for years, the higher end stuff just has export restrictions. Russia wasn't importing optics for their tanks because they didn't know how to make them, they did it because didn't have the industrial equipment to make them (because, again, export controls). Capturing them wouldn't change that. Physics is universal; engineering at scale is the hard part.
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Jul 14, 2023 05:43
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OddObserver posted:Note that the thread also points out that a lot of training days were wasted, with lots of time spent sitting around doing nothing. Can't read the thread because Twitter, but that's a interesting bit of mismanagement if so - the UK based training schemes all talked about how they are very intense, both to fit lots of stuff into 6 weeks and also because the Ukrainians had a very high work ethic and were putting the effort in 12 hours a day 6 days a week. Wonder if the US isn't modifiying then to Ukrainian needs and sticking more with a "standard" schedule they'd do in the US?
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Jul 14, 2023 08:55
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OddObserver posted:Note that the thread also points out that a lot of training days were wasted, with lots of time spent sitting around doing nothing. How to tell that the writer has never served in military
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Jul 14, 2023 09:23
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OddObserver posted:Note that the thread also points out that a lot of training days were wasted, with lots of time spent sitting around doing nothing. That’s the training schedule I remember across basic training, the basic officer leadership course, and the infantry officer course, and even on into my unit itself  My best guess is that it’s harder than anticipated to break out of the “we’ve always done it this way!!” habit. Dirt5o8 posted:The U.S. army has made a strong push to regain basic Soldiering skills used in LSCO that atrophied during OIF/OEF. We train very hard on "analog" skills for the very real possiblity that the networks will go down. Map reading, battle tracking, multiple redundancy for communication are all prioritized. The gee-whiz technology is still common place in higher echelons and during war time deployments but during training it's generally sidelined to ensure Soldiers know how to do the basics. Expanding here a little bit: the US Expert Infantry Badge is fairly low-tech. These are all things that we would expect a kid fresh out of basic training (who may have barely graduated high school) to at least be trainable on. This is the very basics of being in the infantry, there are also systems specific to your unit (bradleys, strikers, tanks, airborne/air assault, etc) that are more high tech and do use some of the cooler stuff, but an EIB holder showed some mastery of the very basics at one point in their career. I got knocked out of it on land nav, but only like 20% of everyone passed that and the course was a mucky mess. Turns out the spring thaw in Alaska is a bad time to do that kind of thing, not that our brigade leaders cared much for something like that. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expert_Infantryman_Badge quote:EIB Physical Fitness Assessment: Each candidate (regardless of sex or age) is required to complete 49 push-ups, 59 sit-ups and finish a 4 mile run in 32 minutes or less.
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Jul 14, 2023 09:26
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Djarum posted:It is all pretty cheap off the shelf tech. Small, cheap and disposable. I mean, I agree, but the military–industrial complex doesn't like any of what you just said.
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Jul 14, 2023 11:48
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The problem for the US is its likely adversary is also the one completely dominating drone production
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Jul 14, 2023 12:16
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Huggybear posted:What KO'd the vehicles in question? Interesting that the Russians did not have the wherewithal to recover them first Ynglaur posted:
The purpose is to fit more HE, more fragmentation, and fancy fuzes into the shell, not more armor penetration.
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Jul 14, 2023 12:32
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Second, firepower. The original XM30 requirements asked for a 30mm autocannon, with an option to later upgrade to a 50mm. Both GDLS and Rheinmetall are proposing 50mm out of the gate, likely both using the
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Speaking of KO'd vehicles. There was a video posted on Russian telegram that was supposed to show another destroyed Leopard, but turns out on the same day a Ukrainian channel had a video of the same Leopard just demining a field. Linking the video, since nobody apparently was hurt, but let me know if I need to tag/remove it. https://t.me/gachi_defence/13815 The Russian video from a drone cuts right after the first explosion. Makes me wonder how often OSINT misidentifies destroyed vehicles, if a huge explosion like that might not even make a dent. Obviously, must happen sometimes to Russian vehicles, too.
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Jul 14, 2023 13:11
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Reading a review of Emmanuel Carrère's book Yoga, it mentions two letters he cites: The voices of stolen children are the same eight decades later.
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Jul 14, 2023 13:32
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