The Ukraine War: Casus Belgorod

[Werthead]

5 hours ago, Maithanet said:

Not clear where this goes from here, but Shoigu has been the consummate survivor in Russian politics, and this kind of conflict (as opposed to the actual battlefield) is where he excels. 

Shoigu's career has been linked to his unyielding, subordinate loyalty to Putin even when Putin's clearly lost the plot. Shoigu's survival relies fully on him retaining Putin's confidence and loyalty. If that falters, he'll be toast. His political skills without Putin's backing are lacklustre at best.

[Denvek]

3 hours ago, SeanF said:

Doesn’t he mean “remilitarising Ukraine?”

Nah, once the task has been fulfilled there won't be a single member of the Russian Armed Forces anywhere inside Ukraine - fully demilitarised!

[A Horse Named Stranger]

7 hours ago, Maithanet said:

Shoigu and his allies have been making statements that Wagner was receiving illegal quantities of fuel in the war zone, which is seemingly setting the stage to declare Wagner guilty of theft.  I haven't heard of any actual fighting beyond the little skirmish last week where Wagner captured and tortured a Russian Lt. Colonel for "shooting at Wagner troops".  Shoigu can't easily oust Prigozhin without Putin's go ahead, and Shoigu is not a popular man at the moment. 

 

The Lt.-Col. has released another video since his release. And what he said there was wild, even by Russian-Wagner military standards.

No, not just Wagner regularly pointing guns at RDF members. He accused Wagner of abducting RDF officers and regulars to ransom them for fuel, arms, and other equipment. Or forcing their captives to sign contracts with Wagner. Thus undermining the RDF's ability to do its job. He himself claims to have been beaten and tortured to record that Wagner video, and suffered a concussion due to their hospitality. Other soldiers in their care have had it worse, with one guy having acide sprayed into his eyes and temporarily losing his eyesight. He points out that Wagner has no legal authority and asks Moscow (Putin) to restore some semblence of order by getting Wagner in line. 

So I am kinda waiting for the Russian army to become actively engaged into combat with Wagner.

Edited June 13, 2023 by A Horse Named Stranger

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

1 hour ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

The Lt.-Col. has released another video since his release. And what he said there was wild, even by Russian-Wagner military standards.

No, not just Wagner regularly pointing guns at RDF members. He accused Wagner of abducting RDF officers and regulars to ransom them for fuel, arms, and other equipment. Or forcing their captives to sign contracts with Wagner. Thus undermining the RDF's ability to do its job. He himself claims to have been beaten and tortured to record that Wagner video, and suffered a concussion due to their hospitality. Other soldiers in their care have had it worse, with one guy having acide sprayed into his eyes and temporarily losing his eyesight. He points out that Wagner has no legal authority and asks Moscow (Putin) to restore some semblence of order by getting Wagner in line. 

So I am kinda waiting for the Russian army to become actively engaged into combat with Wagner.

Can… the Russian Military… outside of a seriously large scale commitment of troops and equipment… beat Wagner?

[Derfel Cadarn]

15 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Can… the Russian Military… outside of a seriously large scale commitment of troops and equipment… beat Wagner?

Doesnt Wagner have about 50k troops in ukraine (albeit of dubiois origin)? Mornelikely they woukd leak the locations to Ukraine 

[Werthead]

37 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Can… the Russian Military… outside of a seriously large scale commitment of troops and equipment… beat Wagner?

Probably not in open combat, but Wagner is also reliant on the Russian military for equipment and supplies, so they could be starved out. But they could cause a fuckton of damage in the process.

That really would be insane though, Russia would have to divert considerable resources to taking out Wagner and Ukraine could exploit that like anybody's business. And you could have alliance of convenience forming, the new partisan brigades and Wagner agreeing not to fight one another and carving up some kind of deal, the Chechens probably making angry noises but then staying out of it, Wagner sympathisers causing chaos in Moscow.

It could either blow up out of all proportion and trigger civil war or it could be a massive damp squib and die out quickly. But Prigozhin fucking hates Shoigu and Gerasimov with the heat of ten million suns, and probably isn't entirely rational in his thinking about how to deal with them (or...on any other basis, really).

The smart money here is Prigozhin doing some wetwork for Putin in the past, being very useful, Putin helping him put together this mad venture, almost certainly over Shoigu's objections, and letting Wagner and the Russian MoD play off one another to become stronger whilst he reaps the benefits. The two of them escalating to almost open warfare wasn't on Putin's list of things he wanted to happen, but he may now lack the means to stop them (Putin's personal army, the Rosvgardia, having suffered huge losses themselves in Ukraine).

Edited June 13, 2023 by Werthead

[Stego]

On 6/12/2023 at 12:49 PM, Wilbur said:

All the munitions, especially the mines, swept down the Dnipro by the water hammer and set loose at random as a result of the dam's destruction are going to pose a terrible risk to human life and property for the next few decades.  Going to the beach is going to be a risky proposition for years to come.

NATO has the ability to clear all munitions with enough resources; it's just going to depend on the 'Rebuilding Ukraine' budget.

[The Anti-Targ]

13 hours ago, Zorral said:

"Dilemma for UK authors as Russia offers huge sums for escapist fiction
Writers are receiving enticing bids for foreign rights to their books this spring, but many feel they cannot accept the money while the war continues"

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/jun/11/dilemma-for-uk-authors-as-russia-offers-huge-sums-for-escapist-fiction

 

You mean escapist fiction like Russia is totally winning this war re-liberation of territory that is, was and will always be Russia?

[Gorn]

 

Not that there was any reasonable doubt before this, but hopefully this will end that particular discussion.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Has Ukraine managed to off Delimkhanov?

At least it looks like it.

[Maithanet]

There's reporting all over the map on Delimkhanov.  Some say he was injured, some say injured severely, some say killed.  Kadyrov says his dear friend is "cannot be located" and is asking Ukraine to tell him the coordinates of their missile strikes so they can help find him.  I'm sure the Ukrainian military will move heaven and earth to make sure Delimkhanov can be located. 

There was also another screwup by the Russians around Kreminna.  Apparently one of the less talented Russian generals brought a bunch of troops together to give an inspirational speech prior to a big attack.  The Ukrainians spotted it with a drone and immediately sent a bunch of artillery their way.  Reports of hundreds of casualties in just a few volleys. 

[Gorn]

Delimkhanov had previously threatened Prigozhin over social media.

 

[timmett]

2 hours ago, Maithanet said:

Apparently one of the less talented Russian generals brought a bunch of troops together to give an inspirational speech prior to a big attack.  The Ukrainians spotted it with a drone and immediately sent a bunch of artillery their way.  Reports of hundreds of casualties in just a few volleys. 

"We few, we happy f..."

[Werthead]

3 hours ago, Gorn said:

Delimkhanov had previously threatened Prigozhin over social media.

The perfect response in the replies (thanks to Zelensky's previous career).

Meanwhile, Ukraine has destroyed an entire MSTA-S SPG battery in one hit thanks to their much more precise artillery fire, something that Russian troops on the ground are now getting really pissed off about (complaints about them firing off a hundred rounds which seem to hit nothing and then one single shot comes back and obliterates an important target).

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Going back to this Wagner vs. Russian MoD.

Shoigu seems to win this confrontation, with Putin doing the reasonable thing and backing the MoDs demand of Wagnerites in Ukraine having to sign contracts with the Russian army - until the end of the month I think. 

Prigozhin is huffing and puffing, but hard to see him defying Putin. 

Edited June 15, 2023 by A Horse Named Stranger

[Werthead]

A Russian soldier was so desperate to escape a battle where the rest of his unit was wiped out (and two comrades committed suicide) that he surrendered to a drone. Fortunately, the drone operator was able to arrange for him to be taken prisoner.

[Wilbur]

This is an excellent article on the Ukrainian offensive.

Quick Explainer: Why Ukraine can Punch Through a Defense Line, but Russia Couldn't (dailykos.com)

[Maithanet]

Not passed yet, but it looks like Atacms might be on the way.

 

 

Edited June 16, 2023 by Maithanet

[Werthead]

Perfectly normal.

[Zorral]

What we’ve misunderstood about Russian motivations for the war in Ukraine
Two new books by Jade McGlynn make the disturbing case for why Russia’s invasion had a convincing historical logic to it

https://www.washingtonpost.com/books/2023/06/12/russia-war-ukraine-mcglynn/

Quote

 

... In “Memory Makers: The Politics of the Past in Putin’s Russia,” she argues that the invasion was “perhaps the only possible outcome of Russia’s preoccupation with policing the past.” In “Russia’s War,” she shows how deeply and fully the Russian people have accepted the historical narrative justifying this war. Taken together, the two books suggest that we have been looking in the wrong places to understand Russian motivations.

The Russian historical narrative, according to McGlynn, posits that when the state is strong and the people united, Russia achieves greatness, such as defeating Nazi Germany and launching Sputnik. When the state is weak and the people disunited, as under Boris Yeltsin, the West exploits and weakens Russia and its people. Russian media outlets thus treat Western support for Ukraine not as a response to the invasion of Crimea in 2014 but as a long part of a Western “war” to keep Russia weak and therefore exploitable. Why else, Russians ask, would a debauched West support Ukrainian Nazis if not to use Ukraine as a proxy for perpetuating the West’s centuries-long quest to keep Russia weak and divided?

McGlynn argues that it is a mistake to dismiss this policing of the past as mere propaganda or brainwashing. She argues that the regime uses history to “develop cognitive filters and heuristics” that create comfortable spaces for framing the present. Key themes include the insistence that Ukraine has always been an extension of Russia, never a nation in its own right, and that the Russian state has played a key role in protecting the Russian people from the persistent existential dangers that lurk outside the country’s borders.
The Russian state has used a heavy hand to enforce its view of the past, firing or imprisoning many of those who disagree with it. But as McGlynn shows in “Russia’s War,” the most effective methods are much more subtle. What she describes as “agitainment” in television news and a tightly controlled internet blur the line between fact and fiction. Popular literature and entertaining feature films, many of them funded by the state or developed by influential figures including the media star Vladimir Solovyov and the former culture minister Vladimir Medinsky, promote “correct” historical themes such as Russian heroism and sacrifice. Multiple generations have internalized these narratives through school curriculums laden with tales of Western perfidy and historically grounded messianic narratives from the Russian Orthodox Church. This framing resonates with ordinary Russians, in part because it offers a heroic past to a people whose present and future are so precarious. It also offers a neat and tidy explanation (namely, the consistent enmity of the West) for Russia’s numerous shortcomings.

As McGlynn points out in “Memory Makers,” when history is rooted in an aberrant view of the past, the present is turned on its head. The Russian “heroes” fighting in Ukraine today are marching in the footsteps of the heroes of past generations and restoring Russia to the greatness that is — because of its glorious history — its true birthright. Russia becomes David, fighting the Goliath of Ukrainian Nazism masterminded by an all-powerful and incurably Russophobic West. History “proves” that the West is in terminal decline, while Russia is on a path to return to its natural position of global leadership. Russian soldiers are not agents of aggression and mass murder; rather, they are heroically defending Russians everywhere from a genocidal Ukrainian regime intent on killing them with bioweapons provided by the CIA. Taken to its illogical extreme, Russia is liberating Ukrainians from the degenerate Westerners tricking them into turning against their Russian brothers.

The war in Ukraine that McGlynn ruefully describes is therefore “Russia’s war,” not just Putin’s war. The Russian people, like those she came to know during her many years of studying Russia and living there, either support the war or at least identify with the historical justifications underpinning it. In the end, however, public support does not really matter. Unlike the West, where democratically elected leaders seek the support of the people they lead into war, Putin needs only their apathy or political neutrality. Their agreement with a common narrative of events is a more-than-adequate substitute for their active support.

In a tightly controlled dictatorship like Putin’s Russia, there is no possibility for an independent civil society to present alternative viewpoints, engage citizens in free discussion or search for sources to assess the government’s messaging. The result is not history as debate but history as a performative act of patriotism and a weaponized justification for an unprovoked war against a neighbor. As if to prove McGlynn’s point, historically based justifications for Russian policy and alleged plots by the West form terrifyingly explicit parts of Russia’s most recent National Security Strategy. Her insightful and creative analysis suggests that we are in for a long conflict not just over the fate of Ukraine but also over how differing memories of the past will continue to shape the future.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Russia, Learning From Costly Mistakes, Shifts Battlefield Tactics
Moscow’s forces remain uneven. But while bracing for a counteroffensive, they have improved discipline, coordination and air support, foreshadowing a changing war.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/17/world/europe/russia-ukraine-war-tactics.html

Quote

 

.... Russian armored columns, for instance, no longer rush into areas where they can be quickly damaged or destroyed. Troops are more often using drones and probing attacks — and sometimes just shouting — to find Ukrainian trenches before striking. And the mercenary Wagner Group has shown an ability to outpace Ukrainian defenders with a combination of improved tactics and disposable ranks.

As it begins its long-awaited counteroffensive, Ukraine is well armed, backed by improved communication technology and American and European weaponry.

But Moscow’s forces have improved their defenses, artillery coordination and air support, setting up a campaign that could look very different from the war’s early days. These improvements, Western officials say, will most likely make Russia a tougher opponent, particularly as it fights defensively, playing to its battlefield strengths. This defensive turn is a far cry from Russia’s initial plan for a full-scale invasion and Ukrainian defeat. ....

.... American officials acknowledge that Russian tactics have improved. But those officials believe, based on battlefield intelligence reports, that the success in Bakhmut was largely because of Wagner’s willingness to throw prisoners into the fight, no matter the cost in lives.

But the soldiers on the ground saw something else happening.

Soldiers fighting for Ukraine in Bakhmut described a fight that ended much differently from how it began. Prisoners were not as prevalent. Instead, they said, Wagner’s professional fighters coordinated ground and artillery fire on Ukrainian positions, then quickly outflanked them using small teams. ....

 

 

Edited June 17, 2023 by Zorral