Ukraine War: David And Goliath

[Arakasi]

I read that first as stepped on a mime.

[Werthead]

Some weird things going on in Chechnya (well, weirder than normal). Kadyrov has put one of his sons in charge of an "elite" new military unit, and anti-Russian rhetoric in media and circles has been allowed to increase. Kadyrov continuing to flout Putin's edicts on not buying European cars with his own fleet of new European and Japanese vehicles, and continuing to ensure that Chechen units are not fighting on the front line directly in Ukraine.

We perhaps shouldn't expect Chechen War III imminently, but there's definitely some odd things going on there.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

48 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Some weird things going on in Chechnya (well, weirder than normal). Kadyrov has put one of his sons in charge of an "elite" new military unit, and anti-Russian rhetoric in media and circles has been allowed to increase. Kadyrov continuing to flout Putin's edicts on not buying European cars with his own fleet of new European and Japanese vehicles, and continuing to ensure that Chechen units are not fighting on the front line directly in Ukraine.

We perhaps shouldn't expect Chechen War III imminently, but there's definitely some odd things going on there.

How would Kadyrov’s Tik Tok warriors stand up to Moscow’s elete draftees?

[Maithanet]

If the Chechens are fighting for something they actually care about (ie independence), there is every reason to think they'll fight well.  They certainly did in the 90s, and they're better equipped now.

[Makk]

Real Chechen independence means getting rid of Kadyrov as well though. I think Kadyrov is just looking to distance himself a little bit from Putin so he has a chance to survive if/when Putin falls.  

[SeanF]

4 hours ago, Corvinus85 said:

It appears another Russian general has been killed in Ukraine. Major General Vladimir Zavadsky, deputy commander of the 14th Army Corps, is said to have stepped on a mine.

What a pity.

It ought to have happened two years ago.

[Werthead]

1 hour ago, Makk said:

Real Chechen independence means getting rid of Kadyrov as well though. I think Kadyrov is just looking to distance himself a little bit from Putin so he has a chance to survive if/when Putin falls.  

I'm not sure, if Kadyrov turned on Moscow I suspect the Chechen factions who are lukewarm on him to outright hating him might fall in line for the lure of Chechen independence.

Kadyrov professes loyalty to Putin but that loyalty was bought. If Kadyrov feels Putin's chequebook is no longer worth anything, and if Russia is at a point of weakness where it cannot sustain campaigns against Ukraine and a well-equipped Chechnya simultaneously, he may be inclined to make a move, especially after Prigozhin showed how poor Russia's defences are inland from the front.

Kadyrov may also feel he can make significant gains in his status even without fully rebelling or declaring independence. Arguably he has already achieved that, but he may feel he can achieve more autonomy and more freedom to enrich himself.

Edited November 29, 2023 by Werthead

[Werthead]

Russia attacked the Kryvyi Rih airbase in Ukraine with Lancet drones, destroying at least one Ukrainian Su-25. Entertainingly, this turned out to be a decoy to deliberately lure in Russian drones (which had been hovering around the base for a while) to eliminate them.

Russia has deployed additional AA assets to Kherson Oblast and Ukraine has promptly destroyed them, most notably a Buk-M2. An American-donated AGM-88 HARM anti-radar missile took it out. A Buk-M3 TELAR was also destroyed in the same region a few days earlier.

Krynky in Russian-occupied Kherson Oblast seems to have been pretty much levelled during recent fighting, without much coverage of it. Ukraine has been bombarding the hell out of it, dislodging Russian forces only after heavy losses. Ukrainian forces have been trying not to engage directly to preserve numbers for further pushes away from the Dnipro. This area is particularly hard to pin down for news (previous reports had Ukraine taking the town altogether and pushing east into forested areas, but it looks like now the town is still contested but other Ukrainian units have crossed the river and engaged further to the east).

[Makk]

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2023/11/30/europe/russia-train-fire-ukraine-intl/index.html

Ukraine may have severely damaged an important tunnel between Russia and china. There was a bit of false information about the size of the explosion on Twitter so we might have to wait a little to verify 

[3CityApache]

9 hours ago, Werthead said:

Russia attacked the Kryvyi Rih airbase in Ukraine with Lancet drones, destroying at least one Ukrainian Su-25. Entertainingly, this turned out to be a decoy to deliberately lure in Russian drones (which had been hovering around the base for a while) to eliminate them.

So they sacrified their own Su-25 to do that or what?

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Yep, was wondering the same. Two options, Ukraine is bsing after the loss of the SU-25. Or it was non-operational for whatever reason, and since spares are hard to come by, they indeed decided to sac it.

[Loge]

49 minutes ago, 3CityApache said:

So they sacrified their own Su-25 to do that or what?

It wasn't functional. There are photos of it and apparently it's a fake.

Edited December 1, 2023 by Loge

[Toth]

4 hours ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

Yep, was wondering the same. Two options, Ukraine is bsing after the loss of the SU-25. Or it was non-operational for whatever reason, and since spares are hard to come by, they indeed decided to sac it.

There is a Russian POV video from the drone going around on Reddit and you can clearly see that the cockpit is painted on and the engines are cannibalized from... something else entirely. It looks like a plane, but certainly not a SU-25.

Edited December 1, 2023 by Toth

[Kalbear]

US Office of Management and Budget states that they will be out of money for Ukraine by the end of the year without congressional approval:

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/4340410-white-house-warns-it-will-run-out-of-money-for-ukraine-unless-congress-acts-by-end-of-year/

 

[Werthead]

Confirmation that Russian Major General Vladimir Zavadsky was killed in Ukraine. According to one report, he decided to take a captured Ukrainian vehicle but came under friendly fire from Russian troops. Panicking, he drove off-road and hit a Russian mine.

Russia has sold off more than 10% of its total currency reserves to keep the ruble stable into the new year. Speculation that this is to prop up the economy during Putin's re-election campaign.

[The Anti-Targ]

Simple, depreciate a bunch of surplus US military hardware that the Pentagon is happy for Ukraine to have to $1 per unit ($0.001 for 10 rounds of small calibre ammo) and give it to Ukraine. Monetary value for equipment the US govt already owns and exclusively uses that will never be put into private markets is a nonsense with the dollar value only being what the US govt decides it should be. This is not a normal market situation. The US govt paid private companies to build the stuff, but as soon as the US military took ownership the value was no longer the price paid. The value is effectively $0 since they are all non-tradeable. They can be assigned nominal value where the US military wants to calculate replacement and maintenance costs. But for surplus hardware that does not require replacement, and is a storage / maintenance drain on the federal budget, the US govt can assign any value it likes, the State dept can "purchase" the hardware off DoD and Ukraine can pay the shipping costs (or take out a USD loan it will be paying back for the rest of time).

[Kalbear]

12 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Simple, depreciate a bunch of surplus US military hardware that the Pentagon is happy for Ukraine to have to $1 per unit ($0.001 for 10 rounds of small calibre ammo) and give it to Ukraine.

This is shockingly incredibly illegal and has been tried multiple times throughout the years, notably by Reagan. It is heavily against regulations. 

12 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

 They can be assigned nominal value where the US military wants to calculate replacement and maintenance costs. But for surplus hardware that does not require replacement, and is a storage / maintenance drain on the federal budget, the US govt can assign any value it likes, the State dept can "purchase" the hardware off DoD and Ukraine can pay the shipping costs (or take out a USD loan it will be paying back for the rest of time).

This is factually untrue. the US government cannot assign whatever value it likes to these things and that would constitute massive fraud on the US government, break a great number of contract laws and military equipment laws and quite a few treaties that the US has with other nations. 

I'm almost sure that Trump will suggest something exactly like this in order to give Russia and Saudi Arabia some weapons but this is not something that can be done legally at all. 

[Zorral]

26 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

the Pentagon is happy for Ukraine to have to $1 per unit ($0.001 for 10 rounds of small calibre ammo) and give it to Ukraine.

It's weird how consistently this poster doesn't know/understand how things in the USA operate.

[The Anti-Targ]

Perhaps you are thinking of a different word. [The US] Govts can't defraud themselves, especially when what it is doing is open and transparent.

A regulation can be changed, more or less, at the whim of the executive, so it would be interesting to see what is covered in regulation and what is covered in acts of congress.

International arms treaties are important, but I would be surprised if such treaties the US signed up to didn't give it wriggle room to do whatever it wanted with non-nuclear armaments in emergency situations.

Edited December 5, 2023 by The Anti-Targ

[Kalbear]

9 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Perhaps you are thinking of a different word. [The US] Govts can't defraud themselves, especially when what it is doing is open and transparent.

They absolutely can, and there have been literally dozens of cases of fraud from one party to the other. In particular, they cannot choose to change the value of assets they have because this would literally defraud the US population. 

9 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

A regulation can be changed, more or less, at the whim of the executive, so it would be interesting to see what is covered in regulation and what is covered in acts of congress.

This is absurdly, wholly inaccurate. There is a massive amount of rules around changing regulations, and probably the place with the most regulation, most scrutiny and most requirement of long-term comment periods and oversight is the federal acquisition system.

From their page, their very first paragraph on conduct:

Quote

Government business shall be conducted in a manner above reproach and, except as authorized by statute or regulation, with complete impartiality and with preferential treatment for none. Transactions relating to the expenditure of public funds require the highest degree of public trust and an impeccable standard of conduct. The general rule is to avoid strictly any conflict of interest or even the appearance of a conflict of interest in Government-contractor relationships. While many Federal laws and regulations place restrictions on the actions of Government personnel, their official conduct must, in addition, be such that they would have no reluctance to make a full public disclosure of their actions.

Good luck getting a quick change there!

9 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

International arms treaties are important, but I would be surprised if such treaties the US signed up to didn't give it wriggle room to do whatever it wanted with non-nuclear armaments in emergency situations.

Possibly! But it doesn't really matter because spending oversight is huge, accounting tricks like this are not allowed or ethical, this isn't an emergency situation (for the US at least) and ultimately congress has the power of the budget, even for requisitioning things that are worth .01 cents. 

There are a WHOLE lot of very specific laws built around how the US sells or gives weapons to other countries. It is not just a regulation controlled by the executive branch.