The War in the Ukraine

[tankphobia]

Idk feels like repeated oil infrastructure hits on Russia would be bad for the economy. Ukraine has demonstrated ability to hit up to 1000 km behind the line of contact, which puts much of Russian refining capacity within striking distance.

While less reliant on oil exports than GCC, like half of Russian export is still oil/gas. Russia can't exactly retaliate in kind because there's nothing equivalent in Ukraine to hit and they're not reliant on exports to fund the armed forces.

 

[tokenanalyst]

Its about the hearts and minds. Ukraine is mainly relying on the psychological aspects of the war and focusing in Russian people to give up due to escalating damages, economic hardship and overall sense of hopelessness.

But this is resulting in escalatory missile and drones attacks much bigger than Ukranians ones. That is doing serious damage, is perpetuating the already precarious Ukraine economy hardships and making Ukrainians more hopeless of this war. The Russians are going to hit everything that they suspect these weapons are, doesn't matter if they put the drone manufacturing facility in a school or a hospital.

The war will be decided not on who take more land, but who will give up first.

Then Zelensky is up for a LOOONG wait because I don't see how the Russians will return the Donbass after this lengthy war, the longer the less likely. I don't think is possible for the Ukrainians to close the Russia land border to cut the Donbass region as I don't see Russia cutting Ukraine Europeans land borders.

Ukraine likely will not give up due to extreme backing from the west. But Russia does not have unlimited patience, money or willpower due to being the aggressor.

i don't know man, Russian weapons production is still way cheaper and some the elites may have faith on Zelensky but a lot people are getting tired, specially in the US, of seeing Zelensky wasting munitions in 17 million square kilometers, escalating with nuclear power and ZERO gains in frontlines.

I understand the desperation of Zelensky, he trapped himself between a rock and hard place, nobody wants to lost territory but at the same time he knows that the Ukrainian army is grinding itself in the East, pretty much by Zelensky own tacticals and strategic mistakes, Western elites inability to recognize how serious Russia was about its security and the lack strategic thinking of stooges like Boris Johnson or Victoria Nuland.

 

[Atomicfrog]

i don't know man, Russian weapons production is still way cheaper and some the elites may have faith on Zelensky but a lot people are getting tired, specially in the US, of seeing Zelensky wasting munitions in 17 million square kilometers, escalating with nuclear power and ZERO gains in frontlines.

Yep, situation is clearly not the same.

It is a grind in manpower, money and infrastructures for sure. Its not good for any country but Ukraine is now lacking badly in manpower, money and infrastructures, scapping the barrels for manpower and for the rest, its a thin lifeline from the west .

Cheaper + available stockpiles is a big help on Russia side. Russia are still refurbishing Soviet era stockpiles for multiple combat systems. They have deep pockets for old sturdy stuff, even Soviet time industrial base was mostly not dismantled and have been restarted over after big dust-off.

Most equipments that Ukraine will rely upon are on a need to be made list and existing stockpiles are mostly empty in the west. Production are late even to refurbishes the countries that produce them...industries need to be created to cope with demand. They even cannibalize productions and also deployments on the other side of the globe for Ukraine and Israel.

 

[tokenanalyst]

Idk feels like repeated oil infrastructure hits on Russia would be bad for the economy. Ukraine has demonstrated ability to hit up to 1000 km behind the line of contact, which puts much of Russian refining capacity within striking distance.

While less reliant on oil exports than GCC, like half of Russian export is still oil/gas. Russia can't exactly retaliate in kind because there's nothing equivalent in Ukraine to hit and they're not reliant on exports to fund the armed forces.

Remain to be seen. But this is resulting in escalatory missile and drones attacks, I mean every time Ukraine have electricity they get hit again.

 

[sutton999]

Is it due to a lack of modern AWACS?

These drones are flying a couple of hundred meters high, RCS is small but not stealth at all.
Ground-based radar/SAM networks can be damaged or saturated at a single point, and incoming drones will exploit that weakness.

If Russia has a modern AWACS fleet, monitor 24/7 and dispatch intercepter jets. A few hundred slow drones can be handled.

 

[defenceman]

Hi,
another aspect of getting mankind for Russians are form Afghanistan, now if we go by virtue of their so called defence pact with Afghanistan & Russia what Russia will get from Afghans are foot soldiers and pure manpower mercenaries who fought in syria against or with Russians under different circumstance, mercenaries who are fighting with Pakistan army every day not for the sake of religion but for dollars and what taliban and other powers surrounding Pakistan is paying to them to cross border terrorism Russia can pay more to them to fight in Ukrainian territory & other benefits, so Russian can linger own this war probably little more than Ukraine and their supporter around them but if I’m not wrong Donald Trump might make Putin to finish this war before he leave office in two years time just like Iranian give & take deal
thank you

 

[Tam]

Is it due to a lack of modern AWACS?

These drones are flying a couple of hundred meters high, RCS is small but not stealth at all.
Ground-based radar/SAM networks can be damaged or saturated at a single point, and incoming drones will exploit that weakness.

If Russia has a modern AWACS fleet, monitor 24/7 and dispatch intercepter jets. A few hundred slow drones can be handled.

Not at all. Modern jets can also act as AEW, link to defense stations. Su-35 is mainly used this way. Drones simply overwhelm the defenses by sheer number. Granted though, the amount of damage is more psychological than infrastructure, 50kg of explosive isn't going to do much compared to 250kg of explosive traveling at hypersonic speed. A missile is needed in order to break through concrete infrastructure, and sometimes that will fail too.

Unrelated.

Rai-Oleksandrivka has fallen to Group South of forces, which handle the sector from Konstantinovka to Slavyansk. This leaves Nikolaivka as the last remaining settlement before Russian forces can drive through to Kramatorsk.

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Konstantinovka also appears to be mostly gone at this point. The city is either red zone or grey zone and Russian units are already displaying flags.

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[sutton999]

Not at all. Modern jets can also act as AEW, link to defense stations. Su-35 is mainly used this way. Drones simply overwhelm the defenses by sheer number. Granted though, the amount of damage is more psychological than infrastructure, 50kg of explosive isn't going to do much compared to 250kg of explosive traveling at hypersonic speed. A missile is needed in order to break through concrete infrastructure, and sometimes that will fail too.

Unrelated.

Rai-Oleksandrivka has fallen to Group South of forces, which handle the sector from Konstantinovka to Slavyansk. This leaves Nikolaivka as the last remaining settlement before Russian forces can drive through to Kramatorsk.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Konstantinovka also appears to be mostly gone at this point. The city is either red zone or grey zone and Russian units are already displaying flags.

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Su-35/Mig-31 whatever are not comparable to modern AWACS at all, pure fantasy.

Not sure A-50a is capable of this, these drones are low flying, small RCS. Anyway, only a few A-50a are available.

 

[Tam]

Su-35/Mig-31 whatever are not comparable to modern AWACS at all, pure fantasy.

Not sure A-50a is capable of this, these drones are low flying, small RCS. Anyway, only a few A-50a are available.

They are AESA using an X-band frequency with look down mode.

AEW or at least the A50 kind, uses long frequency which does not diffentiate well against ground clutter. If a drone is flying low it would be indistinguishable from the ground due to the lack of resolution. Which is why they fly low in the first place.

Look down pulse doppler mode compares and contrasts the radar reflections of moving objects versus stationary objects. Because drones are small, high resolution high frequency is needed to differentiate that otherwise you can't tell it from a bird because to low frequency radar they are all like one pixel blob.

Furthermore the radar paths of the drones are tracked back to their original sources. That's where the counterstrike begins. As the drone launchers are using trucks, therefore they are mobile, the next thing to strike are garages and parking lots that can hold trucks, and gas stations that can fill them up. EW also determines where the source signals are, and in due course these are targeted. Also targeted are electrical substations in that area.

Noting the history of the tracked paths, you will know where to deploy your mobile ground fire units the next time. The drones fly low enough they can be taken down by 12.7mm machine guns and even by clustered AKs.

The kind of AEW you actually need is something like the Chinese did with their Y-8s which has large fixed chin AESA radars facing sideways instead of the revolving type.

In any case, the Russians don't have such Y-8s, the main issue with Su-35 is they have limited loiter capability but it's better than an A-50 for this purpose. Also someone also recently posted an Su-30SM firing R-73 missiles at the drones which means that the drones are observable and trackable by radar. The Russians do have large stocks of expirable missiles that you might as well use them. It also means the R-73 can still track the heat from the drone's engines, yes for this purpose you are using a two stroke moped size twin engine. For more note, even if the radar can pass through the styrofoam, it will still pick up the engine.

 

[Tam]

None of that is going to help them right now though, which was the point that Mar ling was making. Moreover, holding Donbass most likely won't help them even after the war - it will take years, if not decades, and huge investments to rebuild the region back to the industrial and mining powerhouse it once was. Donbass has been an active war zone for almost 12 years now - most of the industrial base was destroyed, same for the infrastructure.

Does not matter. Russia...and China...are thinking in the long term. In historical long terms. Like in historical era length terms. Which is probably why Russia went to war in the first place, having NATO place missiles in Ukraine is unacceptable. Funny how this reminds me of the Cuban Missile Crisis, JFK is ready to go to war if the SU puts missiles in Cuba, even if they are SAMs.