Ukraine War Part 7: Delete your army

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

27 minutes ago, broken one said:

Russians allegedly attacked Belarusian town or village near border from Ukraine's territory.

What?  Are they “foraging”?

[Zorral]

Photos like that recall the gloating photos in the papers in the early 1900's of horses pulling motorized vehicles out of mud, etc.

[broken one]

2 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

What?  Are they “foraging”?

Possible provocation (casus belli for Belarus attacked by "Ukrainian" aircrafts). Or just misinformation.

[Maithanet]

8 minutes ago, Corvinus85 said:

Definitely looks like an Onion style post.

Ukrainian farmer steals St. Basil's Cathedral.

[IheartIheartTesla]

17 minutes ago, 3CityApache said:

What logistic problems have they solved, exactly?

I personally dont know, it was just an impression I got from reading articles on the Guardian -which themselves werent very specific but mentioned that air cover now had caught up with the troop movement, and the 'logistics' problem was more of a traffic jam problem with vehicles running out of fuel, exacerbated by muddy countryside and few roads. It would just take a while to disentangle (and the problems in the north west were not replicated elsewhere).

Wert's post has given me a fair bit of knowledge as to why Zelensky was bullish though.

[Toth]

There some pictures that you can just hear: https://abload.de/img/aog3nax_700bwpeej4i.jpg

[Fez]

57 minutes ago, IheartIheartTesla said:

Also, a third Russian major general died in Ukraine, another data point regarding poor planning by the Russian military (one is a point, two is a line, three is a trend as we scientists say)

Major generals just aren't supposed to be in harms way like this anymore. One of the most damning aspects of Russian planning is that they can't keep these guys safe.

[Zorral]

From the Guardian 20 minutes ago:

Quote

 

Russian officials tried to enter and take full operational control of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, according to the head of Ukrainian state nuclear company Energoatom.

Russian forces had told the plant’s Ukrainian staff that the plant now belonged to Russian state nuclear company Rosatom after its capture last week, Energoatom chief Petro Kotin said.

In a televised interview, Kotin said 10 Rosatom officials, including two senior engineers, then unsuccessfully attempted to enter the plant and take control of operations.

On the territory (of the plant) there are around 500 Russian soldiers with automatic weapons. Our staff are in an extremely bad psychological state.

 

 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

11 minutes ago, Zorral said:

From the Guardian 20 minutes ago:

 

So… military conquest as corporate takeover…

[IheartIheartTesla]

Ukrainians seem to think Belarus will invade Ukraine tonight (9 PM local time), post Lukashenko-Putin meeting. Coupled with the chemical/biological false flags the Russians are planting everywhere including the UN, its probably 'kitchen sink' time for the invasion.

[Zorral]

One does feel that Zelensky and his people may have worked out a real strategy in case of Russian invasion, at least if the invasion happened when it did/does happen.  Stall them long enough, and by golly, Ukraine might just, as -- was it Scott? above suggested, win.  Greatly due to General Mud.

Good piece on that here.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/03/mud-in-ukraine-history-of-russian-army-and-rasputitsa.html

 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

2 minutes ago, Zorral said:

One does feel that Zelensky and his people may have worked out a real strategy in case of Russian invasion, at least if the invasion happened when it did/does happen.  Stall them long enough, and by golly, Ukraine might just, as -- was it Scott? above suggested, win.  Greatly due to General Mud.

Good piece on that here.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/03/mud-in-ukraine-history-of-russian-army-and-rasputitsa.html

 

General mud the immediate follow on to Marshal Winter.

[A True Kaniggit]

1 hour ago, Werthead said:

There was a Ukrainian counter-attack yesterday which I think isolated two parts of the Russian front away from one another and the Russians were simply unable to plug the gap. Where Ukrainian counter-attacks have taken place previously, they have been hitting extended ends of the line and rolling Russians back into a mass of troops or formations too dense to continue attacking (i.e. why they were able to recapture the Mykolaiv airport and help relieve Mykolaiv, but they couldn't counter-attack into Kherson the way they'd wanted; however, the counter-attack in the first place may have sapped the Russians' willingness to attack Odesa). That no longer seems to be the case, the Russians are literally overextending.

The sheer mass of supplies and firepower coming into the country is also now believed to be exceeding Russian equipment coming into the country. The Ukrainians also have more fighting power within the country than the Russians and the Russians are getting desperate for manpower (hence the mercenary recruitment and trying to get Belarus involved).

I have seen optimism rising that a straight-up Ukrainian military victory is now possible. As in, Ukraine can flat-out beat Russia if Russia is unwilling to put a million troops into the country or use WMDs. I think we can assume that Putin's reaction on being told his military has been defeated in the field would be apoplectic.

(Checks how far away house is from Barksdale AFB, just in case)

…..17 miles. I should survive that right? The winds usually blow the other direction. 
 

Oh. Apoplectic, not apocalyptic .

[Filippa Eilhart]

19 minutes ago, IheartIheartTesla said:

Ukrainians seem to think Belarus will invade Ukraine tonight (9 PM local time), post Lukashenko-Putin meeting. Coupled with the chemical/biological false flags the Russians are planting everywhere including the UN, its probably 'kitchen sink' time for the invasion.

I admit my military knowledge consists of reading news articles for the past 2 weeks but doesn’t it seem like a totally dumb move on the part of Lukashenko?

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

5 minutes ago, Filippa Eilhart said:

I admit my military knowledge consists of reading news articles for the past 2 weeks but doesn’t it seem like a totally dumb move on the part of Lukashenko?

The Russian dictator’s invasion of Ukraine was a dumb move… see where we are.  More dumb moves seem par for the course at this point.

[Werthead]

13 minutes ago, Filippa Eilhart said:

I admit my military knowledge consists of reading news articles for the past 2 weeks but doesn’t it seem like a totally dumb move on the part of Lukashenko?

Lukashenko is not the smartest guy in the box. I do think he is in a bind, though. The recent protests showed that Belarus is willing tolerate him up to a point, and he may not be that far from a full-scale revolution. So he doesn't want to fuck around and stir up more problems (at least until the next election). But he is also basically owned body and soul by Vladimir Putin, and doesn't want to piss him off either.

It does look like he was asked to send in troops earlier but refused, and instead sold Putin on the idea of a diplomatic initiative. But if Putin has said enough of that and basically ordered him to comply, it would take cajones of steel to say no.

I would note that Belarusian troops are unlikely to be any more motivated than their Russian counterparts, perhaps considerably less so. There are reports that a Belarusian general resigned rather than take part in any incursion into Ukraine. Their numerical strength is also limited: they barely have 40,000 troops in their front-line army and I suspect most of them are of poor quality. Unless they're basically being used to stand in for Russian conscripts, which again would mean their willingness to fight would be very dubious.

[broken one]

Belarusian army is said to be less corrupt than russian because it is well paid... But thats the only good thing about it Ive heard of.

SB said it is the last remnant of the Red army, not sure if that's supposed to be compliment.

[IheartIheartTesla]

From some tweets (not my favorite source of info) I gather the Ukrainian MoD is offering Russian pilots $1M for defecting with a plane and $500k for a helicopter (USD). Not sure if this money would come from the aid they have been receiving so far or where, but one thing this conflict has taught me is that all kinds of offers are on the table that we havent traditionally seen in warfare.

[A True Kaniggit]

12 minutes ago, IheartIheartTesla said:

From some tweets (not my favorite source of info) I gather the Ukrainian MoD is offering Russian pilots $1M for defecting with a plane and $500k for a helicopter (USD). Not sure if this money would come from the aid they have been receiving so far or where, but one thing this conflict has taught me is that all kinds of offers are on the table that we havent traditionally seen in warfare.

War, war never changes. 
 

Bribes have been used for thousands of years to convince people to open the gates during sieges, or to betray a position. 
 

Not really that new. 

[Derfel Cadarn]

22 minutes ago, IheartIheartTesla said:

From some tweets (not my favorite source of info) I gather the Ukrainian MoD is offering Russian pilots $1M for defecting with a plane and $500k for a helicopter (USD). Not sure if this money would come from the aid they have been receiving so far or where, but one thing this conflict has taught me is that all kinds of offers are on the table that we havent traditionally seen in warfare.

I could see a particularly ballsy Russian pilot selling their plane, and returning to their base claiming they were shot down and ejected.

And then selling their replacement plane the next day.