Ukraine War Part 7: Delete your army

[Zorral]

Nuclear deterrence and theory thereof 101.  Bret provides yet again.

https://acoup.blog/2022/03/11/collections-nuclear-deterrence-101/

[Martell Spy]

Armed men detain Ukrainian mayor in Russian-occupied city

https://www.cnn.com/europe/live-news/ukraine-russia-putin-news-03-11-22/h_722529676279d7b0f3933d94b6cbbca4

Quote

 

The mayor of Melitopol, Ivan Fedorov, was seen on video being led away by armed men from a government building in the city on Friday, and the prosecutor's office for the separatist Russia-backed Luhansk region now says they are weighing terrorism charges against him. 

Fedorov's detention by the armed men is the first known instance of a Ukrainian political official being detained and investigated by Russian or Russian-backed forces since the invasion began.

 

 

[Werthead]

Ukrainian intelligence reporting 13 Russian Battalion Tactical Groups completely destroyed, 18 more degraded to the point where they are no longer combat-effective. Many more damaged to varying degrees. Total Russian deployment was 120-125. On that criteria, Russia's military forces deployed for this operation have lost their combat effectiveness by 25% in two weeks. That's not counting the problems with the expenditure of most of Russia's cruise missiles and switching to inferior weapons, and the increasingly disproportionate losses of tanks and aircraft.

Russia can still win this and might even win it with what's left of their troops they originally deployed (plus some nominal Belarusian/Syrian reinforcements) but it's going to be a grinding slog.

Also some reports that more S300 AA systems are now up and running in Kyiv itself.

[Fez]

28 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Russia can still win this and might even win it with what's left of their troops they originally deployed (plus some nominal Belarusian/Syrian reinforcements) but it's going to be a grinding slog.

Also some reports that more S300 AA systems are now up and running in Kyiv itself.

Seems like the big question mark, or one of them at least, is how quickly can the latest round of US equipment get to Ukraine and how much of it will be anti-air.

[Werthead]

Looks like Hostomel Airport is being contested again. A massive fire is consuming one of the hangers. The UK MOD has also confirmed that Russian aircraft are now almost exclusively relying on dumb-bombs. Their PGM stock seems to have been utterly exhausted, at least for aircraft. The odd Kalibr is still buzzing around but nothing like in the opening days of the conflict.

This Russian airliner captain is being very brave:

 

[Kalbear]

26 minutes ago, Fez said:

Seems like the big question mark, or one of them at least, is how quickly can the latest round of US equipment get to Ukraine and how much of it will be anti-air.

Kinda?

The real question is how much food Ukraine has and can distribute before their population starves and/or is forced out of the cities and is slaughtered. 

[Werthead]

More on Russian TV criticisms of the invasion.

[Werthead]

6 minutes ago, Kalibuster said:

Kinda?

The real question is how much food Ukraine has and can distribute before their population starves and/or is forced out of the cities and is slaughtered. 

Yup, this is a very major problem for Mariupol and Chernihiv, which are now completely cut off. Kharkiv is still being supplied, somehow.

Kyiv, insanely, still has food delivery apps working, so you can order a pizza or whatever and it'll show up. However, the apps have now been tied into the air warning system, so if the air warning goes off and everybody has to go to a shelter, the app will automatically delete the order and refund you.

I'm pretty certain that's the most WTF thing I've heard out of all this.

[Fez]

1 minute ago, Kalibuster said:

Kinda?

The real question is how much food Ukraine has and can distribute before their population starves and/or is forced out of the cities and is slaughtered. 

In terms of the humanitarian crisis, absolutely. In terms of how of the war ends, that seems less likely. There are "only" a handful of cities right now where it seems like starvation is a real possibility, and Kyiv isn't one of them. And with more air defenses it'd be easier for Ukrainian forces to relieve those cities before they starve.

[Werthead]

Yup, Hostomel Airport's fuel depot is ablaze after Ukrainian forces hit it. The Russians seemed to give up on getting it operational after recapturing it - the surrounding countryside is crawling with Stingers waiting to take down incoming cargo planes - but I guess this is not helping their continued occupation at all.

If the Ukrainians could recapture Hostomel in the rear of the Russian lines deploying on the northern approaches to Kyiv, that would throw Russian plans into disarray again.

 

[Kalbear]

Just now, Fez said:

In terms of the humanitarian crisis, absolutely. In terms of how of the war ends, that seems less likely. There are "only" a handful of cities right now where it seems like starvation is a real possibility, and Kyiv isn't one of them. And with more air defenses it'd be easier for Ukrainian forces to relieve those cities before they starve.

I dunno; it's hard to say no to an army when literally millions of people are dying. I'm not saying that it will force Ukraine to end the war, but my suspicion is that this is what Russia is going after strategically - simply attempting to kill as many people and ruin as many cities as it can to make Ukraine capitulate, because they will be functionally unable to actually end the war by destroying Ukraine's army. 

I think that if Russia had gone guns blazing early on and attempted to roflstomp Kyiv with fires and whatnot they might have been able to force a war end, but those days are gone; even if they had the munitions and capabilities to do so, I'm not convinced it would significantly affect Ukrainian military power, and Ukraine's ammo and logistics are probably better than they were at the start of the war in many capabilities (specifically MANPADS and anti-tank weapons, which as far as I can tell are about as common a drop as you can get and come with those aforementioned pizza deliveries). Vehicles are just going to get completely crushed now, meaning all that is left is mass casualty events.

[Werthead]

7 minutes ago, Kalibuster said:

I dunno; it's hard to say no to an army when literally millions of people are dying. I'm not saying that it will force Ukraine to end the war, but my suspicion is that this is what Russia is going after strategically - simply attempting to kill as many people and ruin as many cities as it can to make Ukraine capitulate, because they will be functionally unable to actually end the war by destroying Ukraine's army. 

I think that if Russia had gone guns blazing early on and attempted to roflstomp Kyiv with fires and whatnot they might have been able to force a war end, but those days are gone; even if they had the munitions and capabilities to do so, I'm not convinced it would significantly affect Ukrainian military power, and Ukraine's ammo and logistics are probably better than they were at the start of the war in many capabilities (specifically MANPADS and anti-tank weapons, which as far as I can tell are about as common a drop as you can get and come with those aforementioned pizza deliveries). Vehicles are just going to get completely crushed now, meaning all that is left is mass casualty events.

This is the Battle of Britain tactic. Germany tried to hit military airfields to destroy the RAF and force the government to surrender. There were some in Parliament who wanted to cut a deal. At the moment the Luftwaffe was close (far closer than they realised at the time, and Goering was fucking horrified when he found this out at the end of the war) to breaking the back of the RAF, they were ordered to switch to terror bombing British cities. That made defiance go through the roof, all political avenues closed down and Churchill was basically given the power to prosecute the war as he wished. This allowed the RAF to rebuild and then strike back at them almost unimpeded, and made the Germans give up the idea of an invasion altogether (as half-bluffed as that was) in favour of attacking Russia. 40,000 dead civilians didn't make Britain flinch.

There are of course significant differences here in that it's a ground assault and siege, and in some places the Russians are just shooting people for no reason, but the defiance angle is as strong, if not stronger, since civilians can also fight back in places.

I think the Ukrainian government may have also made a terrible decision that they will tolerate civilian casualties in a few isolated spots if it is militarily advantageous to them, which it clearly is. That's a horrific decision to make, but also one that might buy them either victory or a much more advantageous negotiated settlement than seemed likely three weeks (!) ago.

[Lord of Oop North]

35 minutes ago, Werthead said:

There are of course significant differences here in that it's a ground assault and siege, and in some places the Russians are just shooting people for no reason, but the defiance angle is as strong, if not stronger, since civilians can also fight back in places.

There is no clear connection between bombing and defiance. Sure, Battle of Britain is one example. But then there is also the bombing of Germany that helped break Germany.

It is just as possible that a population bombed extensively gives up as shows total defiance.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

15 minutes ago, Lord of Oop North said:

There is no clear connection between bombing and defiance. Sure, Battle of Britain is one example. But then there is also the bombing of Germany that helped break Germany.

It is just as possible that a population bombed extensively gives up as shows total defiance.

Germany was already largely broken at that point. 

[SpaceChampion]

I've wondered if these Syrians are an assassination squad sent to hunt down Zelenskyy but I can't imagine they'd be more successful than the Chechens who repeatedly failed at that.  So more like they're being sent to commit atrocities against civilians. 

[Darzin]

On 3/12/2022 at 8:58 AM, SpaceChampion said:

I've wondered if these Syrians are an assassination squad sent to hunt down Zelenskyy but I can't imagine they'd be more successful than the Chechens who repeatedly failed at that.  So more like they're being sent to commit atrocities against civilians. 

Well 16,000 seems a bit big for a hit squad. I'd guess they are being hired as urban warfare specialists/shock troops. There are a lot of highly experienced fighters in Syria with years of experience in urban combat and few marketable civilian skills. With the war in Syria over imagine it won't be too hard to get several thousand mercs. I think that's the idea but with the higher tech war in Ukriane I'm not sure how well they will actually do, not to mention the climate difference ect. 

[Corvinus85]

I wonder how many of these Syrian mercenaries are associated with militant groups on the US's terrorist watch list. 

[Makk]

At about 9:10 of this , Ukraine claim they have intercepted chatter from the Syrians and a large number of them plan to desert and sneak into the EU as refugees.

[DireWolfSpirit]

That is awesome!

[Toth]

I'm sure Poland will be super welcoming to them.