Where is this claim from? Wasn’t from the article. I guess he is just regurgitating government press releases? Without any real analysis, as useless as regurgitating something from RT. Who is this guy anyway, what are his credentials? Former Navy Seal and co-writer of acclaimed movie Barb Wire starring Pamela Anderson…
The War in the Ukraine
- Thread starter SampanViking
- Start date
Where is this claim from? Wasn’t from the article. I guess he is just regurgitating government press releases? Without any real analysis, as useless as regurgitating something from RT. Who is this guy anyway, what are his credentials? Former Navy Seal and co-writer of acclaimed movie Barb Wire starring Pamela Anderson…
plawolf
Lieutenant General
A number issues to consider here.
Firstly, NATO ISR are not some magical all-seeing eye, and are subject to the same limitations of range, endurance, availability, geography and weather as everyone else’s. Not even bring in decoys, deception, jamming and good old fashioned camouflage etc.
Range and time are probably most relevant here because thus far, NATO ISR has always operated from neighbouring NATO countries’ airspace or international airspace. Never Ukrainian airspace. As the battlefront moves further east, that degrades the capabilities of the bulk of NATO ISR operating over NATO member states.
As with all live battlefield intel gathering operations, you will never get a complete picture from one or even several passes of recon satellites or recon planes. The successful Ukrainian offensives were made possible by relatively static frontlines that allowed NATO to gradually build a comprehensive picture over weeks or months. The current far more fluid situation massively degrades the completeness and accuracy of NATO’s battlespace awareness and understanding, especially under constant time pressure due to the need to continue pushing ahead and not loose momentum
ISR are most effective at spotting big things. Big columns of troops and armour are next to impossible to hide, but troops dug into defensive positions, especially in or around population centres, are far harder to accurately and comprehensively assess. This is one of the reasons a lot of NATO and Ukraine fanboys are getting their undies in a twist about Russia evacuating civilians - it makes it much much harder for NATO space based ISR to get a good understanding of what’s going on. Are those buses and troop trucks leaving town full of civilians or soldiers? Are the same trucks and buses coming back empty or full of troops and supplies? Not impossible to tell of course, but hard and eats up finite and precious analytical and recon assets’ time and bandwidth.
In the past, it was Russia that was struggling with this when they were on the offensive, and their big troop concentrations were very obvious and easy to find and track by NATO ISR. But now it’s the Ukrainians who are on the move, so the burdens have been flipped and even Russia’s bare bones ISR should have little trouble finding and tracking the bulk of the Ukrainian forces while NATO ISR now not only need to track the retreating Russian forces, but also assess and map out defences of new frontline settlements as well as keep tabs on Russian reinforcement.
Also worth considering is that even with perfect tactical battlefield awareness, it is still possible to be lured into untenable strategic level positions or even traps if your supply lines become overstretched and bad weather hamstrings the mobility that was key to your current successful strategy.
All of this is also assuming that NATO has Ukraine’s best interests at heart, and are not at all swayed by domestic considerations and demands and are above using Ukrainian blood to buy domestic political capital. I mean that’s totally unprecedented and it’s not like the US President has been conducting foreign policy, economics policy and managing the US strategic oil reserves with the upcoming midterm elections as the main and only consideration.
He takes some sources and publications but uses statements from the Ukrainian government or AFU to make claims.
More non-substantial losses around Berislav. Several AFV's cross an open field and get peppered by artillery as they reach a tree line, knocking out several of the vehicles and forcing the crews to make a run back
Photos from the scene:
There are more photos but I will not post them due to dead bodies.
There was a vídeo also from Berislav of a T-80U in Ukranian hands but the offensive seems to be carried out with T-72M and T-64, so I guess whatever functional equipment they capture from the Russians just becomes the personal joyrides of the commanders.
plawolf
Lieutenant General
Volume of fire and inaccuracy of said fire strongly suggests it’s Russian artillery and Ukrainians on the receiving end.
''Likely kill'' radius of 155mm class can go to 150m depending of ammunition...''kill radius'' is 50m. So with infantry going haywire in all direction, inaccuracy help sweep the fields more or less. M113 probably are pierced through at 30m or so. The most surprising is seing the tank cookoff on the video ! Maybe some ATGM involved ?
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Most of these drones Russia uses for spotting do not have a laser rangefinder to paint targets. Only some Orlan-10 drone variants (not all) can do that. The alternative would be for a forward deployed infantry unit to lase the targets but that is much more dangerous. Krasnopol rounds are also a lot more expensive than standard ones.
Supposedly a regular artillery shell costs around 1000 USD, a Krasnopol round 35000 USD, and an Excalibur round 70000 USD.
So all that volume of regular artillery shells might look like a waste but it is actually way cheaper than firing guided rounds.
Supposedly a regular artillery shell costs around 1000 USD, a Krasnopol round 35000 USD, and an Excalibur round 70000 USD.
So all that volume of regular artillery shells might look like a waste but it is actually way cheaper than firing guided rounds.
plawolf
Lieutenant General
Sorry but that’s sugar coating things. Against a tree line where the enemy is dug in and you can’t see obvious targets, sure, area fire and blanket that entire grid reference, multiple times. But against columns of advancing enemy tanks and armour, a few guided rounds would have deleted the entire advance while all the troops were embarked or closely clustered around the vehicles without the need to hit tree lines.
The Russians obvious have laser guided artillery rounds, but they are so infrequently used they might as well not exist in Ukraine.
So massed artillery area bombardment is basically the only option the Russians have most of the time, so it’s a little pointless listing the benefits of dumb artillery like the Russians had a host of actual options and chose that based on its merits for the situation at hand.