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Ukraine: Slava Ukraini!!!


Ser Scot A Ellison

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I saw something that Wagner was as large as 50k men at its height in fall of 2022.  It is now down to somewhere like 5-10k.  That is not from contracts expiring, but instead illustrates how quickly they chew through men. 

FYI, Shoigu has his own competing mercenary company, which apparently pays better than Wagner.  And Shoigu has also cut off many of Wagner's avenues for recruitment, so it is getting more and more difficult for them to replace their losses.  If they continue these attacks much longer they may cease to exist as a meaningful military unit.  Which might be exactly what the Russian military higherups would prefer.

Another thing to note is that many biggest Russian companies like Gazprom are also forming their mercenary companies as well.  Which indicates that they might be planning for coming instability in Russia and thinking that having your own army might be a good idea.  

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Scot, do you want the US to bring down the Su-29 in that situation?  I'm not at all sure I like that idea.  The price (to the US) of losing an unmanned drone seems pretty small in the grand scheme of this war. 

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15 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

Scot, do you want the US to bring down the Su-29 in that situation?  I'm not at all sure I like that idea.  The price (to the US) of losing an unmanned drone seems pretty small in the grand scheme of this war. 

So… the Russians start taking down allied UAVs in international airspace regularly?  If there is no response… you know that’s what they will do.

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Direct response? Not gonna happen. Ukraine suddenly receiving a new, previously unannounced weapon capable of hitting the airfield from which the offending airplane was launched? That's the way the message will be sent.

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11 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

So… the Russians start taking down allied UAVs in international airspace regularly?  If there is no response… you know that’s what they will do.

I don't know that's what they're going to do.  The US has a lot of options  to deter the Russian military from doing something that don't involve shooting a Russian plane (and very likely killing the pilot). 

10 minutes ago, Gorn said:

Direct response? Not gonna happen. Ukraine suddenly receiving a new, previously unannounced weapon capable of hitting the airfield from which the offending airplane was launched? That's the way the message will be sent.

That is one good example, but there are plenty of others.  The US needs to communicate that shooting US equipment over neutral waters is unacceptable, and that the US will respond in a way proportionate to the threat.  Most of those responses are not going to happen within a few hours of the reaper getting downed, but so long as you view this with a bit of patience I have little doubt a response is coming. 

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37 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

That is one good example, but there are plenty of others.  The US needs to communicate that shooting US equipment over neutral waters is unacceptable, and that the US will respond in a way proportionate to the threat.  Most of those responses are not going to happen within a few hours of the reaper getting downed, but so long as you view this with a bit of patience I have little doubt a response is coming. 

I appreciate that.  I still would like to be more involved in defending Ukraine.  Additionally, the Russians like to push the envelope… they’re probing to see how we will respond.  If we respond too lightly or delicately they’ll push further.

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52 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

So… the Russians start taking down allied UAVs in international airspace regularly?  If there is no response… you know that’s what they will do.

The Russians buzzed a British recon plane a while back so now British drone and manned recon flights over the Black Sea are accompanied by 2 Typhoons. However, British drone flights are usually a bit further south of Crimea. The US drones toe the line of the airspace (allowing the Russians to claim violations even if they do not occur).

A few weeks back a US B-52 flew almost down the border between Finland and Russia, turned directly towards St. Petersburg, identified itself to St. Petersburg air traffic control, then flew over the Baltic States, came within a few miles of the Kaliningrad border and flew right back to the US. This isn't completely unusual - the US flexing and showing its capabilities - but they've never flown so close to the border before. Possibly the Russians were looking to find some way of retaliating and found the most inept way possible of doing it.

It sounds like one of the Su-27s managed to severely damaged itself in the incident, which is quite something.

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1 hour ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

So… the Russians start taking down allied UAVs in international airspace regularly?  If there is no response… you know that’s what they will do.

Trump would have punched it out of the sky himself with his bare, tiny hands. 

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21 hours ago, Maithanet said:

FYI, Shoigu has his own competing mercenary company, which apparently pays better than Wagner.  And Shoigu has also cut off many of Wagner's avenues for recruitment, so it is getting more and more difficult for them to replace their losses.  If they continue these attacks much longer they may cease to exist as a meaningful military unit.  Which might be exactly what the Russian military higherups would prefer.

Yes, the PMC, which have been part of the defeat at Vulhedar. So paying better still isn't good enough.

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12 minutes ago, Werthead said:

It sounds like one of the Su-27s managed to severely damaged itself in the incident, which is quite something.

I was wondering if we were going to get news of that.  Ramming anything with a Su-27 (or basically any military jet) seems like a very bad idea.

Just now, Corvinus85 said:

Yes, the PMC, which have been part of the defeat at Vulhedar. So paying better still isn't good enough.

It's almost as if Shoigu isn't as competent as his pre-war reputation indicated. 

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Just now, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

I appreciate that.  I still would like to be more involved in defending Ukraine.  Additionally, the Russians like to push the envelope… they’re probing to see how we will respond.  If we respond too lightly or delicately they’ll push further.

You know, it's statements like the above that make you look quite... recklessly jingoistic. Let's focus on supporting Ukraine the way we do without anything that would be direct acts of war.

Though looking at it, maybe putting some nasty spikes onto the drones may already get the desired results...

 

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13 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

It's almost as if Shoigu isn't as competent as his pre-war reputation indicated. 

Shoigu's pre-war reputation was dogshit anyway ;) Still true, though. He had never fought in the military himself and had no front-line experience, he was basically put into the position because he's a Putin yes-man. Gerasimov actually does have experience.

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16 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

I was wondering if we were going to get news of that.  Ramming anything with a Su-27 (or basically any military jet) seems like a very bad idea.

Mmh... reading the statement put out by the US military, "ramming" is maybe too strong of a word. Sounds more like the jet 'just' got nicked by the drone's propeller. I somehow doubt the plane got more than a nasty cut, but it could just as well have spiraled into a total collision due to the pilot's idiocy.

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2 hours ago, Toth said:

You know, it's statements like the above that make you look quite... recklessly jingoistic. Let's focus on supporting Ukraine the way we do without anything that would be direct acts of war.

Though looking at it, maybe putting some nasty spikes onto the drones may already get the desired results...

 

As to the first point… yeah.  I’m biased in favor of more direct help for Ukraine.  I’m not shy about that.  So… your call is fair.  

As to the second… hmmmmm… ;)

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Poland and Slovakia prepared to transfer potentially all of their Mig-29 jets to Ukraine. That's 39 aircraft in good repair. Poland is getting F-16s from the US to replace them, but I believe they were not due for a while. Slovakia I am not sure is getting any, at least at the moment.

Poland appears to made the final decision, Slovakia is expected to this week.

 

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25 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Poland and Slovakia prepared to transfer potentially all of their Mig-29 jets to Ukraine. That's 39 aircraft in good repair. Poland is getting F-16s from the US to replace them, but I believe they were not due for a while. Slovakia I am not sure is getting any, at least at the moment.

Poland appears to made the final decision, Slovakia is expected to this week.

 

Are MIG-29s 4th generation fighters?

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7 hours ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Are MIG-29s 4th generation fighters?

They are from the same era as the F-16, i.e. they were designed in the 1970s. Not sure if they got any upgrades, though. The F-16 certainly have. 

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Here's an article from WaPo about Russian oil revenues. 

 

Quote

 

Moscow earned $11.6 billion from oil exports last month, down from $14.3 billion in January and a 42 percent drop from $20 billion earned in February 2022, according to the IEA.

 

IMO this article kind of misses the mark on what is going on.  The sanctions and price caps on Russian oil are seeking to cut Russian profits on energy while simultaneously maintaining Russian energy in the market.  Even if they had the power (which they don't), the US/EU would not want Russian energy to completely disappear from the market, because it would cause energy prices to skyrocket and potentially trigger a recession. 

What they are instead trying to do is prevent Russian profits on energy from financing the war.  That means they want to set a global price for Russian oil that is only slightly higher than the production costs.  Right now, a lot of Russian crude oil is going to India, being mixed with some other oil from the middle east, and then called Indian blend and then sold on the market (including to Europe).  You might argue that this is "getting around" the sanctions, but because these extra steps are required, it drives down the value of Russian oil.  Instead, India is making a ton of profit and Russia is barely covering its costs.  Which is exactly what the sanctions are meant to do. 

Russia made a killing in the first 6 months of 2022 because energy prices spiked and there weren't a lot of sanctions on energy commodities in place yet.  But since then, Russian profits have been declining steadily.  Russia can run a big deficit for quite some time (modern economies are robust like that) but its energy exports are no longer the cure-all that they were in the early days of the war. 

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