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Ukraine 14 - Back to the Mud


Maithanet

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52 minutes ago, SeanF said:

Compared to the Chinese or Iranians, they still suffered less at Mongol hands.  Between 1211 and 1241, the population of Jin (Northern China) was cut from 30m to 9m, a significant proportion of the world’s population at the time.

Famine and disease rode with the Mongol armies, which helped.  Plus the Chinese campaign went on for years. They got to Poland and Hungary in 1241 and left in 2142 (though the campaigns that defeated Rus, Bulgaria, etc. went on for about two decades).

As the populations of Poland and Hungary were a lot smaller, cities fewer and further apart, disease not as much, though, of course famine there too.  And, unlike China and Rus (and Persia and Syria), they didn't stay:

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The evidence does indicate that Batu Khan was primarily interested in securing the western frontiers of his Russian conquests, and only after the swift destruction of both the Hungarian and Polish armies did he begin thinking about the conquest of Western Europe. Mongolian records indicate that Subutai was planning a complete conquest of the remaining European powers, beginning with a winter attack on Austria and other states of the Holy Roman Empire, when he was recalled to Mongolia upon the death of Ögedei Khan.

But with Crimea and Ukraine, of what population was left, and those of many other places, famine, famine, famine, as the world's great bread basket was out of commission, along with the lack of farmer.  As we're seeing on this very day, to the great hunger already arriving in many countries as in Africa.  (And for other reasons in other countries as well, as exports of foodstuffs from Malayasia and other parts of the world are being cut back.  How often though, have we seen this effect from invasion of Ukraine?  Long, long, long before the Mongols already! From before Alexander, even.  My mind is grappling with this scale of invasion of this particular place's effect throughout history.

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Ukraine's artillery teams are excellent, and it'll be interesting to see what happens when they get the new stuff (they already have some of it, and some rumours it's been deployed). The stuff they have arriving outranges most Russian equipment. Some of the stuff they have now does as well, but they don't necessarily have a lot of it.

 

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Ukrainian accuracy of their artillery (and Russian failures) are likely also partially attributed to western drone and intel sources. Drones as forward observers is probably one of the biggest changes to how fires are done and how armies are going to fight. 

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Speaking of world famine as consequence of Russia-Putin attack on Ukraine -- which also contributes to the destabilization of democracy world wide (i.e. not a bug of the invasion but an intentional feature):

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/04/30/united-states-must-prevent-global-famine/

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... “This is a lot worse than what we saw in 2008 or 2011,” warned Arif Husain, chief economist of the U.N. World Food Program. His organization says 44 million people in 38 countries are “teetering on the edge of famine,” and 276 million are food insecure, double the number of people from the year before the pandemic began.

Whether this precarious situation turns into a true global famine depends largely on what the United States, European Union, China and other large and wealthy nations do now. The United States must lead by example.

The war in Ukraine is triggering a global food crisis. Here’s how the U.S. can help.

Food supplies are running low because of Russia’s unjustified war in Ukraine. Both Russia and Ukraine are large exporters of wheat, corn, sunflower seeds and fertilizer, among other agricultural products. Many of their exports went to parts of Africa and the Middle East, and there simply aren’t a lot of other extra food supplies to make up for the losses. It takes months to ramp up crop production elsewhere in the world. It doesn’t help that China is hoarding key food products, stockpiling corn and wheat to safeguard its own population.

Food prices were high even before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as demand surged coming out of the pandemic. Prices have only become more exorbitant now that there’s less supply. People in developing countries don’t have enough money to pay the high costs, and their governments are struggling to come up with the funds to help. Many poorer nations spent heavily before and during the pandemic and already have massive debt loads. It’s a textbook perfect-storm scenario.

In the short term, richer countries need to stop hoarding and provide more money to aid developing nations and organizations such as the World Food Program.

U.S. leaders, including Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen, have spoken powerfully in recent days about the need to step up with more aid. Congress must back that up. Sadly, President Biden made things worse with his recent push to have more ethanol in gasoline this summer. That takes even more crops out of the global food supply. The World Resources Institute estimates that if the United States and Europe reduced grain used for ethanol by half, it “would compensate for all the lost exports of Ukrainian wheat, corn, barley and rye.”

The United States and other major world powers have the ability to prevent a global famine. This is as urgent and morally necessary as sending tanks to Ukraine.

 

 

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3 hours ago, Kalibuster said:

Ukrainian accuracy of their artillery (and Russian failures) are likely also partially attributed to western drone and intel sources. Drones as forward observers is probably one of the biggest changes to how fires are done and how armies are going to fight. 

This particular battlefield tactic (cheap commercial recon drones at frontline platoon/company level + artillery) is something Ukrainians came up with on their own, and I've seen US ex-SOF people praise their use of drones as superior to that of the western armies.

It's a case of necessity breeding innovation - a NATO army would simply call in an airstrike. For Ukrainians, that's not an option, so they used lemons (a shitload of artillery they inherited from USSR) to make lemonade (a poor man's guided missile strikes).

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Putin about to undergo cancer surgery, supposedly not all that serious.  Meanwhile, some petty sycophant takes over the Ukrainian war.

I am reminded of the old quip: 'the Pope is either in perfect health...or he is dead.'

Russia’s Putin To Hand Over Keys To War While He Has Cancer Surgery: Report (msn.com)

 

Putin will reportedly put hardline Security Council head and ex-FSB chief Nikolai Patrushev in power while he is dealing with surgery. Patrushev, 70, has played a big role in the Ukraine war thus far and convinced Putin that Kyiv is overrun by neo-Nazis, the Daily Mail reports.

A year and a half ago, General SVR reported that Putin is suffering from abdominal cancer and Parkinson’s. The Daily Mail reports that Putin has put off the surgery and it won’t happen before the Victory Day commemoration of Russia’s World War II victory in Red Square on May 9.

The surgery was originally scheduled for the second of April but has been pushed back, SVR reports.

“Putin was recommended to undergo surgery, the date of which is being discussed and agreed,” the outlet stated. “There seems to be no particular urgency, but it cannot be delayed either.”

 

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13 minutes ago, ThinkerX said:

Putin about to undergo cancer surgery

Unfortunately I suspect Putin will live many years to come. The evil die old because they live their best lives.

Also should be noted this surgery hasn’t been confirmed. At best it’s just gossip peddled by the daily Mail.

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37 minutes ago, ThinkerX said:

Putin about to undergo cancer surgery, supposedly not all that serious.  Meanwhile, some petty sycophant takes over the Ukrainian war.

I am reminded of the old quip: 'the Pope is either in perfect health...or he is dead.'

Russia’s Putin To Hand Over Keys To War While He Has Cancer Surgery: Report (msn.com)

 

Putin will reportedly put hardline Security Council head and ex-FSB chief Nikolai Patrushev in power while he is dealing with surgery. Patrushev, 70, has played a big role in the Ukraine war thus far and convinced Putin that Kyiv is overrun by neo-Nazis, the Daily Mail reports.

A year and a half ago, General SVR reported that Putin is suffering from abdominal cancer and Parkinson’s. The Daily Mail reports that Putin has put off the surgery and it won’t happen before the Victory Day commemoration of Russia’s World War II victory in Red Square on May 9.

The surgery was originally scheduled for the second of April but has been pushed back, SVR reports.

“Putin was recommended to undergo surgery, the date of which is being discussed and agreed,” the outlet stated. “There seems to be no particular urgency, but it cannot be delayed either.”

 

Nothing trivial, I hope.

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4 hours ago, ThinkerX said:

Putin about to undergo cancer surgery, supposedly not all that serious.  Meanwhile, some petty sycophant takes over the Ukrainian war.

I am reminded of the old quip: 'the Pope is either in perfect health...or he is dead.'

Russia’s Putin To Hand Over Keys To War While He Has Cancer Surgery: Report (msn.com)

I'd say the source is unreliable: the FSB Winds of Change insider, who appears to be more legit, has made no mention of Putin being ill. He may be suffering from something, with the half-concealed hand tremor and his puffy appearance, but it could be a virus or maybe just stress.

One of the problems is that if Putin popped his clogs tomorrow, there's no guarantee things would suddenly improve, Russia would withdraw and become more reasonable etc. This anointed successor is even more hardline than Putin, and several of the other viable replacements are more hawkish than he is as well. Others do appear more moderate and some are unknown: it's very hard to get a reading on Shoigu, who was seen as a Doenitz-style compromise choice a while back, as he just tows Putin's party line on everything. You also have Kadyrov, a complete wild card who is more than capable of thinking he could come in and take over (Lukashenko used to harbour ambitions in that direction as well, despite his outsider status).

One thing that is notable is that most of the successors are almost as old as Putin or even older. There's not much sign of fresh blood in the younger generations coming through, but it does mean the successor should not last anywhere near as long.

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Small numbers of successful civilian evacuations from Mariupol, apparently in response to the UN visit last week. Only a few dozen so far, but encouraging.

ETA: Apparently now a mass evacuation is underway at Mariupol under the auspices of the UN.

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Several threads like this one seem confident that the Russian offensive in the east will run out of steam in the next week.  This big Donbas offensive has mostly gone nowhere.  They're still weeks away from any meaningful encirclement, and the Ukrainians have reserves available in the event they are needed.  Instead they've taken a few bombed out towns at the expense of most of thier best remaining equipment.  

I hope these sorts of prognostications are right (I think they are) because then it's just a matter of when the Ukrainians go on there counteroffensive, and how effective that will be.

 

 

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26 minutes ago, Maithanet said:
 

Several threads like this one seem confident that the Russian offensive in the east will run out of steam in the next week.  This big Donbas offensive has mostly gone nowhere.  They're still weeks away from any meaningful encirclement, and the Ukrainians have reserves available in the event they are needed.  Instead they've taken a few bombed out towns at the expense of most of their best remaining equipment.  

I hope these sorts of prognostications are right (I think they are) because then it's just a matter of when the Ukrainians go on there counteroffensive, and how effective that will be.

I saw one analyst this morning pointing out that Ukraine has transferred two offensive armoured brigades into the Donbas and is actually counter-attacking with large numbers (a Ukrainian brigade equals about 4-5 Russian BTGs, IIRC, they're huge) in several places.

However, some reports that the Russians have reconstituted an additional ~12 BTGs on the Donbas line but in Russian territory, and will try to use these to punch through the heavily contested region in the next couple of days. But these look like a mix of mauled units that have been combined into new forces. Their effectiveness is doubtful.

Then all eyes will be on the victory parade on 9 May and what the Russians decide to do then. I've seen one suggestion they'll go for full mobilisation and then send conscripts straight into combat with barely any training to try to achieve a quick victory in the summer, which seems an excellent recipe for revolution.

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17 minutes ago, Werthead said:

which seems an excellent recipe for revolution.

Hmmm… would that be a nationwide overthrow of the existing political structure… a fragmenting of the Russian federation?  Or something we simply cannot predict?

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3 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Hmmm… would that be a nationwide overthrow of the existing political structure… a fragmenting of the Russian federation?  Or something we simply cannot predict?

I think we'll see some civil disobedience, but probably passively to start with, with people refusing to sign up or be conscripted. If you look at China, where there hasn't been any major demonstrations (Hong Kong excepted) for twenty years, but the current COVID situation has pushed people to breaking point. 

If they do feed people straight into the meat grinder and people start coming home in bodybags to the big cities, then like Afghanistan, you'll see more problems and dissent then.

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Using warships in new ways:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2022/04/28/ships-moskva-future-navy/

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.... The final change for the future of the warship will come from bringing increasingly capable and intelligent robotics from the air to the waves. Indeed, future naval historians may view other developments in April 2022 as more momentous than the sinking in the Black Sea. For instance, the U.S. Navy delivered to Congress its 30-year shipbuilding plan, which, depending on which path is taken, envisions a fleet with 81 to 153 unmanned surface ships and 18 to 50 unmanned submarines.

The Navy had the confidence to make this move because of the successes of tests involving unmanned vessels that it has collectively dubbed its Ghost Fleet. A novel Navy organization working in the Persian Gulf, Task Force 59, is now taking those tests to a new level, exploring how best to use robotic warships in a range of scenarios, both on their own and integrated into new kinds of units made up of unmanned and manned ships. In a sense, these exercises echo the learning experiments of the 1920s — in which strategists found that the airplane actually hadn’t rendered the warship obsolete but instead revealed the need for new types of ships as well as new tactics.

The same day that the Moskva’s sinking prompted questions for so many, the Pentagon announced a package of military equipment being sent to Ukraine. Alongside the old howitzer cannons and Soviet-era helicopters was a set of new “unmanned coastal defense vessels.” Ukraine had already shown that it was quite capable of fighting today’s battles at sea. The coming task, not just for Ukraine but for the United States, is to get ready for tomorrow’s.

 

 

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A military warehouse has been destroyed in Belgorod, some suggesting a Ukrainian helicopter raid, and a railway bridge in Kursk Oblast has been sabotaged and collapsed, the latter apparently by Russians themselves. There have now been twelve reported Ukrainian attacks on Russian territory in the last week (not counting suspicious, possible false flag attacks on civilians).

Some reports that Gerasimov was transiting through Belgorod at the time on his way to the front. Taking him out would have been monumental (reportedly he's going to Izium, so they might get a few more chances).

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