Ukraine 12: When is this an existential threat?

[Werthead]

Interesting analysis of the invasion. Galeev notes many Russian sources as saying the operation was modelled after Czechoslovakia 1968, and even notes some moderate Russian media grumbling that they tried to do the same mission but to a much bigger, more populous and better-prepared country with around a third of the number of troops and no second or third echelons, hence the operation was probably doomed to failure.

What is interesting are the Russian sources he quotes. As well as the usual "failure is not an option" etc, there's a lot pushing the idea that this was all planned, including the withdrawal from the north, and a peace once the Donbas is secured is possible. There's even a lot of Russian media backing the idea of a withdrawal and regrouping, with the mission objective of securing Ukrainian neutrality confirmed.

Obviously there's still a lot of insane rhetoric from other media, including withdrawing and nuking Ukraine, completing a genocide by any way possible, or attacking Poland and the Baltics (with what manpower is not exactly clear) etc, but that's not the entire story.

What is astonishing is the Russian report that they did not know Mariupol was being reinforced from the air. Ukrainian helicopters were flying out to sea, swinging around and landing at the main seaport, bringing in 10 tons of ammunition and food at a time and airlifting out reinforcements. This carried on for weeks on end and the Russians only twigged it when they shot down one of the helicopters. It looks like Ukrainian chopper pilots have perfected flying so close to the ground/sea that they can evade radar.

[IlyaP]

17 hours ago, Gorn said:

RIA Novosti, a Russian state media, literally published an article about how Ukrainians should no longer have a national identity, that they are an artificial anti-Russian construct, and that their elite must be eliminated: https://ria.ru/20220403/ukraina-1781469605.html

Here's the English version for those who would like to read it: 

https://medium.com/@kravchenko_mm/what-should-russia-do-with-ukraine-translation-of-a-propaganda-article-by-a-russian-journalist-a3e92e3cb64

This is particularly painful for me to read, as it's basically the same swill that flies out of the mouths of my parents over in Moscow every day, which has alienated them from almost everyone they know, including me and my older brother. Everything in this article is completely and utterly bug-fuck crazy. And yet the author by all accounts believes in it. It took me over half an hour to process what I was reading, to convince myself it wasn't satire. 

[Padraig]

3 hours ago, Rippounet said:

I'm not sure we should say that.

It’s dishonest in so far as it’s not true.  Does Putin believe some of it is true?  Probably.  But I would be shocked if he isn’t aware that some of it is self interested spin.

Spin is very rational.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

19 hours ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

The remains of Russian soldiers coming home has to be producing that too.

Problem is, the Russians don't want to take those bodies back. For now they are content with letting them lie dead in the streets of Ukraine.

[Werthead]

500 people have escaped Mariupol and been escorted to safety by International Red Cross personnel. Some good news, if limited.

NATO's assessment is that Russia is preparing for a renewed offensive in the east which they believe will be hard-hitting, but there is a limit to how many forces Russia can prepare and unleash before committing to an operation with the view of declaring victory by around 9 May (the anniversary of Russia's victory over Nazi Germany). The longer Russia waits, the more forces they can deploy, the greater likelihood of success, but the decreased probability of hitting that date. Conversely, the sooner the attack, the greater the chance of hitting that date but also the greater the possibility of failure. At the moment there is no sign of the Russians pausing and every sign they are simply sending units straight back into combat piecemeal (as mentioned previously), which is nuts.

[Maithanet]

26 minutes ago, Werthead said:

The longer Russia waits, the more forces they can deploy, the greater likelihood of success, but the decreased probability of hitting that date. Conversely, the sooner the attack, the greater the chance of hitting that date but also the greater the possibility of failure. At the moment there is no sign of the Russians pausing and every sign they are simply sending units straight back into combat piecemeal (as mentioned previously), which is nuts.

There is fairly compelling evidence (in spite of fog of war) that Russian units deployed around Kyiv, Sumy, etc were badly mauled before being pulled out.  The retreat itself has been fairly well conducted, but nonetheless some equipment had to be left behind, in addition to all the losses of the past 6 weeks of fighting.  A lot of military observers are describing the forces to be "combat ineffective", the kind of troops that cannot be relied upon to perform complex military tasks that an offensive would require. 

One thing that Russia could do, but thus far hasn't, is rotate these troops out for other units.  Estimates are that around 60% of Russian military units have been deployed into Ukraine, with the remainder guarding the border, and military/embassy installations worldwide.  Those exhausted units from Kyiv could be sent to guard the border in Kaliningrad or something, and instead those troops sent into harm's way.  The fact that Russia is not doing that indicates that either they don't feel they have time for that kind of reshuffling or the troops guarding the borders/installations are of questionable quality/loyalty and cannot be sent to Ukraine.  Either way, it's another sign that the Russian military is not doing the things that western militaries do to keep their troops combat capable.  Instead they are just plowing forward and hoping that troops who were exhausted and defeated in the north will suddenly achieve a breakthrough in the east. 

The big big question IMO is how badly Ukraine is suffering from that same battle exhaustion and degradation.  Morale is higher, which helps, but even with high morale troops cannot fight forever without rest and refit.  We have virtually no information on the status of Ukrainian forces and whether they are similarly wearing out.  If they are able to maintain combat effectiveness (or even get stronger as volunteers who joined the war 6 weeks ago gain training and experience), then there's every reason to think that Russia will fail in the east just as it did in the north.  But that's a big if, and the Ukrainians could be nearing exhaustion as well.  

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

7 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

There is fairly compelling evidence (in spite of fog of war) that Russian units deployed around Kyiv, Sumy, etc were badly mauled before being pulled out.  The retreat itself has been fairly well conducted, but nonetheless some equipment had to be left behind, in addition to all the losses of the past 6 weeks of fighting.  A lot of military observers are describing the forces to be "combat ineffective", the kind of troops that cannot be relied upon to perform complex military tasks that an offensive would require. 

One thing that Russia could do, but thus far hasn't, is rotate these troops out for other units.  Estimates are that around 60% of Russian military units have been deployed into Ukraine, with the remainder guarding the border, and military/embassy installations worldwide.  Those exhausted units from Kyiv could be sent to guard the border in Kaliningrad or something, and instead those troops sent into harm's way.  The fact that Russia is not doing that indicates that either they don't feel they have time for that kind of reshuffling or the troops guarding the borders/installations are of questionable quality/loyalty and cannot be sent to Ukraine.  Either way, it's another sign that the Russian military is not doing the things that western militaries do to keep their troops combat capable.  Instead they are just plowing forward and hoping that troops who were exhausted and defeated in the north will suddenly achieve a breakthrough in the east. 

The big big question IMO is how badly Ukraine is suffering from that same battle exhaustion and degradation.  Morale is higher, which helps, but even with high morale troops cannot fight forever without rest and refit.  We have virtually no information on the status of Ukrainian forces and whether they are similarly wearing out.  If they are able to maintain combat effectiveness (or even get stronger as volunteers who joined the war 6 weeks ago gain training and experience), then there's every reason to think that Russia will fail in the east just as it did in the north.  But that's a big if, and the Ukrainians could be nearing exhaustion as well.  

The potential exhaustion of Ukrainian forces worries me too.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

From OSINT UK.  Russians are burning civilian bodies in Mariupol:

 

[Werthead]

Interesting. Orban has put together a peace proposal and put it to Putin directly by telephone. His suggestion was for a ceasefire followed by talks in Budapest between Ukrainian and Russian leaders, with Hungary, France and Germany providing guarantees.

Putin was apparently positive on the idea, with unspecified preconditions.

Sounds like Orban is trying to gee up his relationship with Putin to appear statesmanlike. However, it's unclear if there is anything in the Hungarian plan which was not in the pre-existing Turkish plan.

35 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

The big big question IMO is how badly Ukraine is suffering from that same battle exhaustion and degradation.  Morale is higher, which helps, but even with high morale troops cannot fight forever without rest and refit.  We have virtually no information on the status of Ukrainian forces and whether they are similarly wearing out.  If they are able to maintain combat effectiveness (or even get stronger as volunteers who joined the war 6 weeks ago gain training and experience), then there's every reason to think that Russia will fail in the east just as it did in the north.  But that's a big if, and the Ukrainians could be nearing exhaustion as well.  

Ukraine is certainly suffering from some of the same issues, but their losses have not been as high and there has been some reshuffling going on. There's also the possibility of relieving units coming in from the west.

There's also a big difference from units on the offensive versus the defensive. The former become combat-incapable and exhausted more quickly than the latter (although it depends on the exact situation).

[Maithanet]

13 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Ukraine is certainly suffering from some of the same issues, but their losses have not been as high and there has been some reshuffling going on. There's also the possibility of relieving units coming in from the west.

There's also a big difference from units on the offensive versus the defensive. The former become combat-incapable and exhausted more quickly than the latter (although it depends on the exact situation).

In addition, victories can help propel an army forward to some extent.  Ukrainian and Russian forces both know who won the Battle of Kyiv.  It is hard to imagine that the Russians are going to be able to cobble some of their mauled battalions together and make it an effective force on the fly.  Issues of coordination and equipment failure were already a huge problem. 

Fighting in the east and south should be easier from a logistical perspective, although easier is still a long way from easy.  If the Russians do indeed make a large sweeping thrust to encircle the JFO, the issue of exposed supply lines will come back with a vengence.  At the moment it looks like they're trying to do a small encirclement of Sieverodonetsk, which would be less vulnerable to overreach. 

 

[Fez]

17 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Ukraine is certainly suffering from some of the same issues, but their losses have not been as high and there has been some reshuffling going on. There's also the possibility of relieving units coming in from the west.

Yeah. Very early on I saw an estimate that perhaps 1/5th of Ukraine's armed forces were being kept in reserve in Lviv. With the idea that they could be rushed to any front that was in danger of collapsing or to provide a last-ditch defense of the western third of the country so that Russia wouldn't simply overrun everything if their initial attacks had succeeded.

Assuming that's true, since those forces were never needed it gives Ukraine a fair amount of flexibility to rotate out exhausted units. There's also a large number of forces defending Odesa that haven't seen combat either. They need to be more alert than troops in Lviv, and have certainly been busy building fortifications; but that's certainly an easier posting than something out east. Although I also wouldn't be surprised if troops in Odesa have already been rotating with the ones in Mykolaiv.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

What does the acronym “JFO” stand for?

[Werthead]

2 minutes ago, Fez said:

Assuming that's true, since those forces were never needed it gives Ukraine a fair amount of flexibility to rotate out exhausted units. There's also a large number of forces defending Odesa that haven't seen combat either. They need to be more alert than troops in Lviv, and have certainly been busy building fortifications; but that's certainly an easier posting than something out east. Although I also wouldn't be surprised if troops in Odesa have already been rotating with the ones in Mykolaiv.

Yup. But in addition there's the threat from Transnistria and Belarus which, although remote, could pin down Ukrainian forces in the west of the country that would be otherwise free to reinforce the JFO.

[Werthead]

Just now, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

What does the acronym “JFO” stand for?

Joint Forces Operation, it's the name for the Ukrainian military forces based in the east of the country on the line of contact with the breakaway republics. Formerly known as the ATO (Anti-Terrorist Operation).

[Corvinus85]

Lol, on Wikipedia's page for the Battle of Kyiv, Kadyrov is listed as the Russian commander alongside Gerasimov. No mention of Putin. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Kyiv_(2022) 

The number of presumed dead Russians is quite low, especially considering it's per Ukrainian sources. But no mention of number of ground vehicles destroyed.

 

[Zorral]

4 hours ago, broken one said:

 I am - like Putin - not a historian, just an enthusiast, so like him I could take some books, sit, think and prepare my own article claiming that Ukraine's fate is forever braided with Poland.

Whereas a historian looks at these materials and the documentation, the archaeology, culture, language and literature and sees how often these arguments have been made and attempted to be implemented right down to committing mass genocide and come to very different conclusions based on previous history, and come to the conclusion, IT DOESN'T WORK.  Not even mass murder, ethnic cleansing and genocide realize the objective of unitary 'race.'  For just one example, how often in the last three centuries have the powers of the time, including Russia, been determined to wipe Poland from the map and the Polish language and culture from use and memory?  Not to mention Jewish genocide.  Not to mention Native Peoples erasure from the North American continent.

In fact the only real success in these matters seems to be, over and over and over, erasing women from history's record of achievement, power and agency.  Yet, somehow, even that history get  rediscovered.

 

[Werthead]

The UN will vote to expel Russia from the Human Rights Council on Thursday. They need about 130 votes, which they think they'll get, though it might be tight (141 voted to denounce the invasion of Ukraine last month).

US and UK analysts seem to agree that Russia has "lost the initiative" in Ukraine and Russia is "redefining" what success means, and by default that will be a lot less than what they wanted on 23 February. So far the numbers reinforcing eastern Ukraine are too low to sustain a major offensive, putting a renewed attack there "at least" a week away and maybe "a number of weeks" away until they see larger numbers coming in (so far, little or no sign of the promised Syrian mercenaries, who have either not materialised, have been dismissed for lack of military value or are being held back for this offensive). The forces formerly around Kyiv, Chernihiv, Sumy and Makariv seem to have been withdrawn into Belarus or Russia directly, but there may be stragglers in the area who have not yet left. There is also the continued possibility of long-range missile attacks on Kyiv.

The Ukrainians also seem to have retaken wide swathes of territory W and NR of Kharkiv, in some cases right up to the Russian border. That seems odd, as it could allow Ukrainian forces to regroup and advance on the NW flank of the Russian lines threatening the northern Donbas. If they can get momentum down south for a push on Kherson (analysts seem divided on if this is possible, with some warning of a renewed but localised Russian offensive back towards Mykolaiv, possibly to forestall such a move), the Russian lines contracting around the Donbas could themselves come under pressure.

[JGP]

1 hour ago, Werthead said:

The UN will vote to expel Russia from the Human Rights Council on Thursday. They need about 130 votes, which they think they'll get, though it might be tight (141 voted to denounce the invasion of Ukraine last month).

Abstentions don't count against the 2/3 majority in general assembly votes, iirc.

[HoodedCrow]

I read a book by the Sperlings( ?) that talked about the crazy reporting around Cixi. It is interesting to see how women can be vilified during or after events. In todays world we have someone like Piers Morgan…who is worse on camera than someone like Megan Markle has ever shown for 10 seconds. People eat it up.
Hillary Clinton was a murderer, Pizzagate.etc.  ( wow )Anne Boleyn was a “ goggle eyed” temptress, never mind that she tried very hard to be married to someone else( probably knowing what a creep Henry was).

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Something heartwarming in the face of all the grim news.  A dog found his person in Kyiv: