History in the Making: Russian Invasion

eastsideTim said:

NOHOME said:

Russia on the other hand, is going to be running out and, due to sanctions and lack of skilled techs,  not have the technology to make even the old-school stuff.  At what point do the russians start to take consumer electronics from the population so that they harvest chips to make a missile?

I was thinking about this.  The longer the war lasts, the better the Russians will get at evading sanctions.  I suspect China will happily surreptitiously supply components as long as they have some plausible deniability.  Or sell them to third parties who will get them to North Korea or Iran, who can build and ship weapons to Russia.  It is unlikely anyone will attempt to destroy factories deep in Russia for fear of provoking a nuclear response.  If this sad assessment is correct, the war can last as long as Putin (or those who have the same beliefs) can hold onto power, because no one outside the country can stop them from lobbing missiles.  They may not be able to hold onto ground in Ukraine, but they can make it effectively uninhabitable.

By the time they get to that point, will there be anyone left to pull the triggers of those devices?

And given the rebuilding post wwii, the only way vlad can make Ukraine uninhabitable is to use dirty bombs or something similar. There is certainly a lot of destruction in Ukraine, but it has a LONG way to go to match what happened 80 years ago. 

tuna55 said:

02Pilot said:

Putin is all-in until he isn't. There's no point in equivocating while you're in the middle of an active conflict, the outcome of which remains uncertain. Russia has vast resources on which to draw in the long run, something Ukraine lacks. If the war drags on without a definitive result and Western support wavers - a very real possibility - Russia could easily end up with territorial gains over and above those it made in 2014.

The article I linked earlier today presents a pretty good outline of the dynamic.

We've been talking about the west lacking the will to support Ukraine since late February. Honestly this has brought the west together more than anything else could have, and it doesn't look noticeably weaker than it did in February either.

I agree that NATO is more unified and motivated than it has been in years, but bringing it together for mutual defense is not the same as pouring money into Ukraine. Sooner or later, contracts are going to have to be issued to pay the bills for restocking arsenals and upgrading and expanding their own forces; once those start to come into force, money is going to be a lot tighter than it is now. This is less an issue in the US, where defense budgets have remained a significant portion of domestic spending, but if you look at some major European players it's going to be an ugly surprise. Here's the NATO data for 2014-22 straight from the source. There are more than a few governments that are going to have to make choices that could be hard for voters to swallow, which could in turn have domestic political ramifications (i.e., electing leaders who are willing to cut aid to Ukraine).

NOHOME said:

Russia leveled Syria over years. However russian body-bags were in the hundreds, not the tens of thousands that they are filling now.

How much russian hardware was lost over the years as the russians leveled Syria? 100 armored vehicles maybe?

Russia is banking on NATO running out of weapons. The thing is, I have a feeling that what NATO is going to run out of, is the old-school stuff that has been stored and maintained since WW2.  Putin should pray that NATO does not run out of this old stuff because there is a good chance the new stuff is going to be much more effective.

Russia on the other hand, is going to be running out and, due to sanctions and lack of skilled techs,  not have the technology to make even the old-school stuff.  At what point do the russians start to take consumer electronics from the population so that they harvest chips to make a missile?

There is a significant difference between Russia continuing offensive operations against Ukrainian infrastructure targets and simply holding on to what it has. The former requires high-tech that is increasingly hard to come by, yes, but the supply of Iranian drones (and possibly missiles from there and NK) doesn't have to be huge to continue to pose a threat. Even if the strikes slow way down, Ukraine still has to keep the air defense capability in place near those targets, rather than at the front. Often a force-in-being is a more useful tool than actually employing it (though admittedly the Russians have been very slow to recognize this).

Holding ground is easier. Very little tech is needed; just warm bodies and a modicum of ammunition. If Ukraine wants to take back every inch, they will have to do it the hard way. That takes time and costs lives. Where is the threshold at which Ukrainians start to wonder if the losses are worth it? I know there are plenty of them who will go on fighting forever, but without Western aid the economy cannot sustain that. Thus, once again we return to the point that everything is contingent not on Ukrainian will to fight, but on Western will to continue to facilitate it. If this goes on for another year or so without resolution (and perhaps a significantly shorter period, depending on external factors), I don't see how Western support doesn't start to waver as the bills pile up. When it does, whatever Russia is holding on to becomes de facto Russian territory. Putin isn't waiting for NATO to run out of weapons; he's waiting for them to decide that they have other priorities that take precedence, and start looking for a way out so they can redirect their resources.

Difficult to say if this is accurate info but if it's even approximately close to reality then things aren't going as Vlad hoped. 

https://www.google.com/amp/s/news.yahoo.com/amphtml/putin-preparing-flee-russia-implodes-162403585.html

In reply to 02Pilot :

While that might make sense in a world that made sense, what has changes is that russia has gone from being an evil looking tumor on the body of civilization, and declared itself as malignant. I don't see where russia goes back to being the berkeleyed up  failed socialist experiment that could be ignored by the rest of the world.

In reply to Jay_W :

"Russians don't take a dump son without a plan..."

NOHOME said:

In reply to 02Pilot :

While that might make sense in a world that made sense, what has changes is that russia has gone from being an evil looking tumor on the body of civilization, and declared itself as malignant. I don't see where russia goes back to being the berkeleyed up  failed socialist experiment that could be ignored by the rest of the world.

I would argue that Russia hasn't changed in any fundamental way. Western views may have, but right now they have the luxury of focusing on the situation in Ukraine; that will not continue indefinitely. Even if Russia remains the sort of prolonged focus that it was between 1946 and, say 1965 (and then again between 1980 and 1991), what exactly is the West going to do about it? During the height of anti-Russian, anti-communist fervor in the US, the Soviets successfully launched a coup in Czechoslovakia (1948), blockaded West Berlin (1948), supported the invasion of South Korea (1950-53), put down riots in East Berlin (1953), crushed a popular uprising in Hungary (1956), built the Berlin Wall (1961), and placed nuclear weapons in Cuba (1962). It was aggressive and directly targeted US and Western interests, but there were limited options available to counter its actions due to the threat of escalation, intended or not. The very same problem still exists.

Jay_W said:

Difficult to say if this is accurate info but if it's even approximately close to reality then things aren't going as Vlad hoped. 

https://www.google.com/amp/s/news.yahoo.com/amphtml/putin-preparing-flee-russia-implodes-162403585.html

I would not be terribly surprised with this.  I am pretty sure Putler is well aware that in the "game" he is playing the most difficult move is the exit.  Even if he was just voted out and "retired" there is a great potential of the next guy looting the body (after throwing it off the roof).  This was very much a concern with Yeltsin when he transitioned out. 

Even if Putin exited somewhat peacefully, he would still be in great danger from any following leader who would suddenly have great power.... as he glances over at Putin sitting on his HUGE pile of wealth....

In reply to 02Pilot :

The "risk" is that they become north korea. The russian relationship with putin has been that "you and your mobsters can do whatever you want as long as you leave us out of the equations". "If we have enough to drink and enough to eat, you do you". That worked well for a while.  Oligarchs get $$$$ and the population gets Vodka and tuberculosis. All good.

Now they need hundreds of thousands of body bags. That is a game changer. The planet was used to losing tens of thousands of people to WW2, but in today's world where the americans freak out over every single death, the russians are not far behind; too many years of peace.

NOHOME said:

In reply to 02Pilot :

*SNIP*

Now they need hundreds of thousands of body bags. That is a game changer. The planet was used to losing tens of thousands of people to WW2, but in today's world where the americans freak out over every single death, the russians are not far behind; too many years of peace.

Ummm, sorry, I do not agree.  

a) Plenty of people die in the USA everyday from violence and except for a few family members and maybe a blip on the news, no one cares.

b) Russia has not had lasting peace in this century or the last.  This is just the first time someone has been able to hit back and leave an impression.

Agree or disagree, does not matter.   This is my opinion, and I am sticking to it.

Back to the topic of "History in the Making: Russian Invasion"

As I've mentioned, there's no guarantee that whomever take Putin's place will be an improvement. Might even go worse. People like Putin tend to surround themselves with flawed sycophants. Such an individual might be even more aggressive yet stupider.

Nothing really surprising here really.  It's starting to look like the "realities on the ground" may be getting a bit dynamic and may be right back where they started at some point.  That is where it will get very interesting.  Despite Ukraine's claim of taking over Crimea at some point, the realities (mostly that it's an island with a small land bridge) make that rather unlikely.

The Russians have been putting a lot of effort (and mobilized pawns bodied no doubt) in trying to capture Bakhmut (eastern front), which has very little value other then maybe, saying they captured it.  Not really sure what they are doing there other than making it look like they are doing "something".

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Russian President Vladimir Putin continues to discuss negotiations with Ukraine as a means of separating Ukraine from its Western supporters by portraying Kyiv as unwilling to compromise or even to engage in serious talks. During a news conference at the Eurasian Economic Union summit in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, on December 9, Putin clarified his December 7 statements wherein he suggested that Russia was preparing for a “lengthy” war and stated that he meant the settlement process would be protracted.[1] Putin emphasized that the settlement process will be challenging and take time, and that all participants will need to agree with realities on the ground in Ukraine (by which he presumably means recognizing Russian control of any territories it has annexed), but that at the end of the day, Russia is open to negotiations.[2] Putin also criticized statements made by former German chancellor Angela Merkel that the 2014 Minsk Agreements were an attempt to “buy time for Ukraine” and accused Merkel and the West of propagating distrust in negotiating future settlements.[3] Putin remarked that based on this understanding of the Minsk Agreements, perhaps Russia should have begun military operations earlier.[4] Despite the constant employment of adversarial rhetoric regarding the settlement process, Putin continued to claim that Russia remains open to the possibility of negotiations.[5]

Putin has consistently weaponized invocations of the negotiation process to isolate Ukraine from partner support by framing Ukraine as refusing concessions and likely seeks to use any ceasefire and negotiation window to allow Russian troops time to reconstitute and relaunch operations, thus depriving Ukraine of the initiative. A ceasefire agreement that occurs soon enough to allow Russian forces to rest and refit this winter is extremely unlikely, however. Negotiating a protracted, theater-wide ceasefire takes time. Russia and Ukraine are extremely far apart on the terms of any such agreement, and it is almost impossible to imagine a ceasefire being agreed to, let alone implemented, for some months, which would deprive Russia of the opportunity to pause Ukrainian winter counter-offensives and reset before spring.

Putin may be overly optimistic about the prospects for a more immediate cessation of hostilities, but that is also unlikely given his rhetoric as well as statements by Ukrainian leaders and the West, of which he is well aware. It is more likely that Putin is fanning discussions of a ceasefire primarily as part of an information operation designed to expand cleavages between Ukraine and its backers by portraying Kyiv as unwilling to talk. Putin is likely secondarily setting conditions for actual negotiations sometime in 2023, presumably after Russian forces have secured more of the territory he claims to have annexed.

Great progress from the Ukranians in the last days despite the Russians continuing to knock out power at every opportunity.

Wagner HQ taken out ala Himars.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-63933132

Resistance fighters causing havoc in Crimea

https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/12/11/7380234/

Russians still afraid of the affect of smoking

https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/12/11/7380245/

An interesting update, particularly the first one.  Seems entirely reasonable, but I am sure Russia will frame it as escalatory.  I am guessing they are still restricting the use of US weapons in those attacks though.

• The Times reported that an unnamed US Defense source stated that the Pentagon is no longer insisting that Ukraine refrain from striking military targets in Russia given the ongoing Russian campaign of systematically destroying Ukrainian critical infrastructure.
• Russian forces conducted attacks against Ukrainian infrastructure using a higher number of Iranian-made drones than in previous weeks.
• Putin risks losing support from proxy leaders in Donetsk Oblast due to Russian forces’ failure to push Ukrainian forces out of artillery range of Donetsk City.
• Russian authorities are increasingly importing Chechen officials and forces to man administrative regimes of occupied areas.
• Ukrainian forces continued counteroffensive operations toward Svatove, and Russian and Ukrainian forces conducted ground attacks near Kreminna.
• Russian forces continued attempts to advance toward Bakhmut and in the Avdiivka-Donetsk City area and to defend their positions in western Donetsk Oblast.
• Russian authorities plan to launch programs in Russia and occupied Ukrainian territories to prepare children for military service.
• Russian forces in occupied Donetsk Oblast are reportedly commandeering civilian utility equipment to construct defensive structures.

An unnamed US defense source told The Times that the Pentagon is no longer insisting that Ukraine should not strike military targets within Russia.[1] The source noted that the Pentagon has changed its perspective on this matter following the recent intensification of Russian missile strikes on Ukrainian civilian infrastructure over the last few months and that the Pentagon has become less concerned regarding the risk of escalation, including nuclear escalation, with Russia.[2] The Times suggested that this development is a “green light” for Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian territory.[3] Ukrainian commitments to Western partners previously stipulated that Ukraine had the right to use force to regain all its territory, including territory seized by Russia in 2014.[4] The US has previously not made an effort to prevent Ukraine from striking legitimate military targets located on sovereign Ukrainian territory, and the alleged statement made by the undisclosed US source is an extension of the previous policy. International law allows Ukrainian forces to strike legitimate targets even in Russian territory, especially targets from which Russian forces are launching attacks on Ukrainian civilian infrastructure.

In reply to aircooled :

Russian authorities plan to launch programs in Russia and occupied Ukrainian territories to prepare children for military service.

Wow, they are taking this Fourth Roman Empire thing seriously. They are speedrunning the last one's history.

Go home russia, you are drunk. 

TJL (Forum Supporter) said:

Go home russia, you are drunk. 

Has Russia ever NOT been drunk throughout recorded history?

aircooled said:

An interesting update, particularly the first one.  Seems entirely reasonable, but I am sure Russia will frame it as escalatory.  I am guessing they are still restricting the use of US weapons in those attacks though.

 

• The Times reported that an unnamed US Defense source stated that the Pentagon is no longer insisting that Ukraine refrain from striking military targets in Russia given the ongoing Russian campaign of systematically destroying Ukrainian critical infrastructure.

I thought that the Pentagon specifically requested that US supplied weapons not be used to target into Russia proper.  

To follow up on the death tolls, a note from our missionary in Ukraine said he was going to the front line last weekend (he's a chaplain) to delivery various supplies but specifically mentioned body bags.

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

No. A freind of mine who has been studying russia since the cold war has long said 2 things about russia. Putin is a gypsy con artist who is scary as hell and should never be trusted, and that russia would be far far more advanced than it is, but they are literally drunk off vodka all the time. 

Alcohol, Russian.... it's a thing.

... one of their bombers used alcohol in the AC system.... needless to say, there tended to be a lot of hot pilots in those planes....

Air for the crew was provided by a bleed air system on the engine compressors. This air was hot and had to be cooled before being pumped into the cockpit. This cooling was provided by a large total-loss evaporator running on a mixture of 40% ethanol and 60% distilled water (effectively vodka). This system garnered the aircraft one of its many nicknames, the "supersonic booze carrier". As the system vented the coolant after use, the aircraft could run out during flight, and comfort had to be balanced by the possibility of running out of coolant.[23] Numerous cases of Tu-22 crews drinking the coolant mixture and becoming paralytically drunk led to a crackdown by Soviet Air Force authorities. Access to the bombers after flights was restricted, and more frequent checks were made on coolant levels. This higher level of security, however, did not end the practice outright.

I have a lifelong friend who worked at the N*A for about 15 years.  He told me stories of Russian troops spreading their boot polish on bread because it was thinned with ethanol.  They'd put the bread in sunshine, which would cause the ethanol to soak into the bread, then scrape the boot polish off the bread and eat it.  I have no way of knowing if it was true, but given the historical documentation (per above) I'm inclined to believe it.

In reply to stroker :

One of the MiGs had liquid cooled radar or something.  400 liters of methanol.

Servicemen determined that one could drink one shot of methanol per day with no ill effects.  At least, no permanent effects... or none they cared about.

I remember in the old movie The Beast (about a Russian tank crew in Afghanistan) there was a line that was something like "...and we have to brakes since Yuri drank them".   Yuri (or whatever his name was) claimed it wasn't too bad if you filtered it through bread.

It's not just the Russians.  During WW2 the German V2 rocket was fueled with 75% ethanol (plus liquid oxygen) and they had a lot of problems with the techs drinking the fuel.

Ukrainian defense minister announces they will attack once the ground freezes. (maybe January?)

Ukraine’s Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov on Sunday said Ukrainian forces will resume “active counteroffensive actions” when the ground freezes and “becomes firmer for easier passage of equipment”, at a press conference with his Swedish counterpart, Defense Minister Pal Jonson, in Odesa.

https://edition.cnn.com/europe/live-news/russia-ukraine-war-news-12-12-22/h_71a06560f0d294ac30a49a030ac63a84

The Ukrainians may have struck a Russian troop barracks in Metropol.  Results vary wildly on who you ask, but potentially 100's killed.  The Ukrainians (and local partisans) have been doing a LOT of work in the Metropol areas (central south) and just blew up a bridge that connects it to the east, clearly affecting Russian ability to reinforce that area.  The Russian positions there have to be degraded significantly.

Ukraine is at least making it very much like they will be attacking Metropol, but who knows, maybe a large diversion?

https://www.businessinsider.com/ukrainian-hits-russian-barracks-in-occupied-melitopol-with-himars-reports-2022-12?op=1