The analogy is close and it is in my mind. There are however critical differences. The Vietcong is more like the LPR and DPR. There isn't as much jungle to hide in. Ukraine is a highly industrialized country heading back to the stone age. Ukrainians are not the Vietnamese who are toughened living in an agrarian society without conveniences. Huge difference between smartphone social media addicted millennials who whine when their wifi is cut off vs. those toughened farmers and peasants who can dig and live in deep tunnels that can survive bombing from B-52s.
The War in the Ukraine
- Thread starter SampanViking
- Start date
The analogy is close and it is in my mind. There are however critical differences. The Vietcong is more like the LPR and DPR. There isn't as much jungle to hide in. Ukraine is a highly industrialized country heading back to the stone age. Ukrainians are not the Vietnamese who are toughened living in an agrarian society without conveniences. Huge difference between smartphone social media addicted millennials who whine when their wifi is cut off vs. those toughened farmers and peasants who can dig and live in deep tunnels that can survive bombing from B-52s.
A std round in the viccinity would have a good chance to get them. Just need to land it at 50 or 100m and you have a good chance to do the job. Against personnel in the open, you don't need precision, against a well armored vehicule you have. So shooting a std round at the target after 10 sec could be a good move.
Actually the Ukrainians get repulsed the moment the Russians dig in. How long did Lyman last under less than 2000 paramilitaries --- not regular forces --- against so called NATO trained forces (NATO trained Iraqis got their ass handed by ISIS and NATO trained Afghan army by the Taliban.). The problem from the very beginning is that the Russians spared far too few people --- only 80,000 --- over a vast stretch of area that's like the half of Texas. Poor military and strategic decisions were made including by Putin.
Since Lyman, Ukrainian assaults are being repulsed with increasing regularity and casualties with what the Russians are calling 'fire bags'. The size of the Ukrainian forces seem less dense, less tanks and using an increasing number of civilian vehicles. Another trend is the increasing number of foreign mercenaries over native Ukrainians. Combine with things like they are now drafting women, there is a manpower shortage there. Add to that, a large portion of the population has fled to other countries as refugees, and a good portion of that to Russia, and fighting as the LPR and DPR. Cheap drones are making a mockery of infiltration techniques, probing assaults are picked up by dispensable drones, then saturated with artillery, MLRS and loitering drones.
Dont be an ideologue. I am no Russian fan but people tend to forget its Ukraine getting destroyed and not Russia. Dniper is a natural barrier, blow up the bridges then concentrate and take the whole east.
40% of Ukrainian power was destroyed okn a single attack, the Russians should have done that months ago. They were not regarding this as a real war initialky, they wanted to reduce civillian deaths and avoid destroying infrastructure then Zelensky escalated and refused to negotiate. We are only now seeing them taking things seriously, first is to solidify their positions in the East, instead of caving in to populism, it was a startegic move to go back east. Just common sense, then blow up the bridges which was what they did.
Mao said, take land lose men, in the end lose men and land. Keep men lose land, in the end take land and keep men.
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Just to make sure everyone is on the same page, unsubstantiated claims and inflammatory statements are forbidden. Claims like “Who knows? Ukraine can make nukes”, “Zelensky uses propaganda to make the populace think they are winning”, or “the Russians need to use Chinese arms to win” all fall under unsubstantiated claims and can be borderline inflammatory. I advise everyone to cool down prior to writing their posts, think in a mature manner, and provide EVIDENCE for your claims.
I do recall that when Russia withdrew from Kyiv earlier in the war, they redeployed to the East and launched a grinding offensive for months. Now that they're pulling out of Kherson, it's probable they're gonna do it again, which would make things go full circle. Deja vu?
If they're pursuing this goal, nothing short of everything east of Dnieper, including Kharkiv (which will be a beast to take), needs to be annexed for this war to be worthwhile.
However, I expect Zelensky to be hard at work undermining their recent gains. Be sure to look for suicidal D-day operations very soon.
If they're pursuing this goal, nothing short of everything east of Dnieper, including Kharkiv (which will be a beast to take), needs to be annexed for this war to be worthwhile.
However, I expect Zelensky to be hard at work undermining their recent gains. Be sure to look for suicidal D-day operations very soon.
Svatove and Staroblisk. Then swing southeast, towards Lugansk. That's my bet.
At this point unless they can make Ukrainian government capitulate, nothing they can do is "worthwhile" to the cost incurred. With the West still so invested in supporting Ukraine, that possibility looks less and less likely every day.
I've yet to see Russia actually being able to push entrenched Ukranians in any meaningful capacity after mobilization began, after all they've tried numerous pushes in the Bakhmut direction for 3 months now with little to show for it.
Ukraine has hardly been touched. Their cities still have functioning infrastructure, even their railway network is functioning. If it wasn't for their attack on the Crimea bridge, they'd even have regular electricity services. The only Ukrainian city that had meaningful destruction was Mariupol, which Russia is now rebuilding.
The big issue people are having is how much of a roadblock the Ukrainians have been for the Russian army. Russians are now trying to claim Ukrainians are tough people, ignoring the fact we know how poor they are from their deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan. It's a failed state with African level HDI and GDP per capita. If it wasn't for the billions the EU have pumped into it, it would be a European Somalia except with Nazi warlords instead of Jihadist warlords.
I don't think Russians fully comprehend how much their credibility is being damaged by this war, I bet NATO are even questioning their nuclear deterrence at this point. If they aren't prepared to kill a few million Ukrainians, are they really prepared to kill hundreds of millions in a nuclear war?
I doubt Russian Krasnopol uses Soviet era chips anymore. The optical guidance section of Krasnopol used to be made in Ukraine. After 2014 and the annexation of Crimea, the Russians had to develop their own optical guidance mechanism. It was probably redesigned with the technology available back then.
Well, knowing more about the missile and its control system might allow them to better determine the flight profile, or limitations. And who knows they might use some insights to redesign the Tornado-S 9M542 GLONASS missiles.