OT: Putin's War in Ukraine

[kcdusk]

Given the risks from a more direct confrontation and the limited (if any) additional rewards, what would be gained I'm curious because I hear this frustration from others, but never have gotten a good reply.

I guess that's why i didn't offer a solution. Its more a feeling of these constant, daily war atrocities in this day and age, feels so wrong. This can't be the lessor of two evils, can it (perhaps it is)

I agree NATO has done well to impose economic sanctions, and Ukraine has done well to hold its own. Is this because of good management Was this the plan all along

Or dumb luck Russia hasn't lived up to expectations

[Raellus]

I think the sanctions need to be strengthened, or at least tightened up considerably. I've heard that there are multiple loopholes that the Russians are actively exploiting. After the first week of the war, news reports were all like, "The Russian economy is on the verge of collapse!" That was a month ago. In the meantime, it appears that they've figured out how to circumvent some of the sanctions and cope with the economic impact of those that are actually working. So that leverage is apparently not as strong as the media initially reported.

Apart from that, I think the US shouldn't have chickened out on the transfer of Polish MiG-29s. It's not too late, I imagine, to pass them along. They're not going to change the game, but in the absence of a no-fly zone, a few more fighters would help the Ukrainians defend their cities from bombing. Last I heard, the Slovak MiGs are still on the way.

And The Drive recently suggested that the Romanians should give Ukraine their recently grounded fleet of MiG-21s (which are slated to be replaced by second-hand F-16s soon anyway).

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/romania-should-give-the-mig-21-lancers-it-just-grounded-to-ukraine

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[Targan]

Given the risks from a more direct confrontation and the limited (if any) additional rewards, what would be gained I'm curious because I hear this frustration from others, but never have gotten a good reply.

I think there is almost zero chance the Russians would launch nukes in response to direct NATO military intervention in Ukraine. I'm not sure what you mean by "additional rewards", but time after time we've seen western nations go into conflicts essentially to enrich themselves while telling the world it was the "right thing to do". Well this time the right thing to do is to stop a totally unjustified invasion and the slaughter of tens of thousands of civilians, and that's the reward.

[pmulcahy11b]

What's a good way to rally the people around you Go to War!

Unless it goes on too long, gets too expensive, the people at home are tired of being downtrodden...

Regardless of what Putin wants, Putin is not Stalin, or even Khrushchev...

[Raellus]

Putin's done a pretty good job of muzzling dissent at home. Even exiles aren't safe from the long arm of the FSB.

I think we need to look at the lessons of history. Appeasement doesn't work. It only encourages aggression. The world basically turned a blind eye to the Russian seizure of Crimea in 2014. Look where we are now.

The EU/UN/NATO were slow to intervene during the Yugoslav Wars (1991-2001). As a result, tens of thousands of civilians were killed. More were displaced. Ethnic cleansing entered the English lexicon.

When NATO finally did intervene- first, by implementing a no-fly zone, later by conducting airstrikes and putting boots on the ground- the Yugoslav Wars were ended.

Unfortunately, the situation in Ukraine is drastically different.

The elephant in the room today is that none of the afore-mentioned bad actors of the not-so-distant past had a nuclear arsenal. This complicates things immensely. How does one stand up to a nuclear-armed bully without triggering Armageddon

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[Targan]

The elephant in the room today is that none of the afore-mentioned bad actors of the not-so-distant past had a nuclear arsenal. This complicates things immensely. How does one stand up to a nuclear-armed bully without triggering Armageddon

Taking just about any negative action against Russia could trigger a nuclear response. Sanctions could trigger a nuclear response. Sanctions were put in place anyway, because the judgement call was made that Putin/the Russian leadership wouldn't knowingly end their own existence and the existence of viable human civilisation on this planet in response to sanctions.

Well I say that the first genuinely risky breakpoint for the use of Russian nukes would be Russia facing an immediate existential military threat (foreign forces rolling onto Russian territory for instance). The next step down from that would be Putin thinking his own survival was at stake (although I really doubt those around him would be willing to kick off the end of the world just because he might lose his life or his position as Russian dictator-for-life).

I straight-up don't believe that the Russians would knowingly commit mass suicide over their forces being kicked out of a country they're invading. I just don't see it happening. At the VERY least I think there should be a NATO-led no-fly zone enforced over western Ukraine. Yes it absolutely would probably elicit some sort of military response from Russia, but come on. Many of the old guard on this forum literally TRAINED to shoot at the the Russian military back in the day. In my barracks in the 90s we certainly had to know the enemy vehicle recognition posters off by heart. It was all but assumed by most of NATO that a big fight was inevitable, eventually.

All those decades we faced off against the whole of the Soviet Union, ready to roll at any time. Now we're in this bizarre erectile dysfunction-riddled world where we're taking a softly-softly approach against just a fraction of the old USSR, letting Russia dictate to countries we're allied with that they'd better not join NATO or else. Or else what Say it out loud, Russia. What kind of trippy fever dream reality are we living in where many western conservatives friggin' ADMIRE Vladimir Putin WTAF Did someone sneak in during the night and cut the balls off the lot of us without us noticing

[pmulcahy11b]

What do we do after a single tac nuke strike without it escalating into the Twilight War

[Raellus]

Artillery is the god of war

This article drives how how badly Ukraine needs long-range, mobile, counter-battery fire capability as the war enters its next phase in the Donbass.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/ukraines-ability-to-withstand-russian-artillery-critical-to-fight-for-donbas

Frankly, I think the confirmed 18 towed 155mm guns that the US is giving Ukraine are little moral than a symbolic gesture. NATO should send them MLRS systems and [more] counter-battery radars, STAT.

Once the Russians have seized territory in the east, it's going to be very difficult to drive them out of it. I have to wonder if the Ukrainian flag will ever fly over Mariupol again.

Slava Ukraini!

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[Vespers War]

I think I mentioned it before, but this article drives how how badly Ukraine Ukraine needs long-range, mobile, counter-battery fire capability.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/ukraines-ability-to-withstand-russian-artillery-critical-to-fight-for-donbas

Frankly, I think the confirmed 18 towed 155mm guns that the US is giving Ukraine are little moral than a symbolic gesture. NATO should send them MLRS systems and [more] counter-battery radars, STAT.

Once the Russians have seized territory, it's going to be very difficult to drive them out of it.

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The US, UK, and Canada all announced today they're sending additional "heavy artillery" to Ukraine, which I presume will be either 105mm or 155mm based on what each country has in use currently. There were also some AN/TPQ-36 in the last assistance package, and I imagine there'll be more as US troops finish doing train-the-trainer training with Ukrainian forces.

[Raellus]

Stick and Move

The US, UK, and Canada all announced today they're sending additional "heavy artillery" to Ukraine, which I presume will be either 105mm or 155mm based on what each country has in use currently. There were also some AN/TPQ-36 in the last assistance package, and I imagine there'll be more as US troops finish doing train-the-trainer training with Ukrainian forces.

That's something, but those are probably towed systems, which are more vulnerable to counter-battery fire than mobile systems. The Soviets have a huge numerical superiority in artillery. The Ukrainians have been so far been quite successful with hit-and-run attacks. SPAAGs or MLRS would lend themselves much better to said tactics than static tube artillery.

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[Spartan-117]

That's something, but those are probably towed systems, which are more vulnerable to counter-battery fire than mobile systems. The Soviets have a huge numerical superiority in artillery. The Ukrainians have been so far been quite successful with hit-and-run attacks. SPAAGs or MLRS would lend themselves much better to said tactics than static tube artillery.

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My guess is that there is some consideration being given to the logistics of getting field artillery into theater. M777 is technically an ultralight howitzer, which means more tubes delivered per C17 flight. Once you have the 18 on the ground, you still have 40K rounds to deliver after that, which I suspect, a significant amount of which will probably end up in Ukr SOF hands as IEDs.

[Raellus]

More MiGs

Ukraine's operational MiG-29 fleet has grown, but NOT because its received replacement aircraft.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/no-additional-fighter-jets-havent-been-delivered-to-ukraine

Do you think NATO is covertly sending whole aircraft to Ukraine, but only publicly saying that they're sending spare parts

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[Vespers War]

That's something, but those are probably towed systems, which are more vulnerable to counter-battery fire than mobile systems. The Soviets have a huge numerical superiority in artillery. The Ukrainians have been so far been quite successful with hit-and-run attacks. SPAAGs or MLRS would lend themselves much better to said tactics than static tube artillery.

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Ukraine already has more self-propelled artillery than the United States (over 1000 combined units of Gvozdika, Akatsiya, Giatsint-S, Pion, and Msta-S compared to 850 Paladin), and a little less than half as many MLRS (450+ Grad, ~75 Uragan and 75 Smerch [around 600 launchers total] to 500 HIMARS and ~1000 M270A1 MLRS). It would probably be more helpful to offer replacements to allies that can send Soviet/Russian-caliber weaponry to Ukraine, like Czech Republic sending Dana artillery vehicles and RM-70 rocket launchers, to keep Ukraine's logistics from spiraling out of control with a bunch of incompatible ammunition types.

Other allies might send self-propelled anti-aircraft guns, but the US doesn't really have any. I suppose we could send Avenger, but Ukraine already has Gecko and Gopher in the short-range self-propelled anti-aircraft missile world, along with however many Stormer vehicles the UK ends up sending.

Supplying vehicles ends up raising a number of questions, some of which are likely relatively simple concerns, but some of which could be real problems in the middle of a shooting war:
1. How easy are they to operate by soldiers who aren't literate in English Can all the labels (and manuals) be easily produced in Ukrainian for use by soldiers literate in that language This is likely to need specialized translators who know Ukrainian military jargon to ensure ease of understanding.
2. What's the spare parts supply chain look like Can parts be easily shipped in to Ukraine to maintain these vehicles that likely have no parts commonality with Ukraine's ex-WP supply chain
3. How long does it take to train mechanics to keep these vehicles running What effect will the time for that training have on their ability to keep existing forces maintained
4. As touched on briefly above, what does adding yet another caliber do to supply chain logistics Their vehicular artillery already uses 120mm, 122mm, 152mm, and 203mm shells. Adding 155mm (and possibly 105mm) increases complexity. This wouldn't be as much of an issue if the 155mm Bohdana had replaced large numbers of the ex-Soviet self-propelled artillery, but only the prototype(s) have been built and still haven't been fully tested. On the MLRS side, they have 122mm, 220mm, and 280mm launchers, while the US uses 227mm and 610mm rockets. Would countries using vehicles with the same caliber of weapons as Ukraine (Poland, Romania, Algeria, India, Bosnia & Herzegovina, etc) be interested in "selling" them to Ukraine to "buy" systems from the United States as a way to both modernize their equipment and supply Ukraine with vehicles they can already arm and maintain

[kato13]

VW agree with everything you said. However, while I am torn about it, I would love to send them a few HIMARS with the traditional rockets and few ATACMS given what they Ukrainians did with their twice tested Neptun missiles.

Their ability to leverage limited resources for maximum effect makes me want to give them a few tools with better accuracy characteristics for really prime targets.

I am torn because of the political downsides, as the ATACMS could hit really deep into Russia, Would be clearly supplied by NATO (even 155mm shells have deniability due to local production), and could easily (on accident) hit something clearly civilian or culturally important well outside of the borders of the current conflict. EDIT ADD I am hearing that such concerns - Use deep inside Russia, was part of the reason for the delay in sending planes. Imagine if a transferred Polish Mig-29 crashed into the Kremlin

[Targan]

Imagine if a transferred Polish Mig-29 crashed into the Kremlin

Imagine indeed. Thank you for that image. It has greatly lifted my mood.