The War in the Ukraine

A friend who was over for dinner raised an interesting point about Germany's reluctance to send Leopard 2 that didn't occur to me.

So far people who say "it's a historical thing" focus on the fact that Germany is uncomfortable with the Nazi past. But on the other hand consider the Russians, I saw this on pro-Russian telegram this week:

They've been playing up the Great Patriotic War theme all week. Now we've heard repeatedly from western media that Kremlin seems to be interested in another wave of mobilization and is putting out their feelers at the moment.

When Ukrainian nationalist brigades get their hands on Leopard 2 do you suppose they can resist the urge to cosplay a bit and paint 3rd Reich iconography on them? And when such a tank gets captures on photo you can be sure people like Medvedev is going to be waving that photo around and give speeches like "Comrades! 80 years later German tanks are once again charging through the plains of Ukraine, as before we cannot retreat, Moscow is behind us!" And next thing you know nationalist feelings lead to another 500,000 mobilized thanks to this narrative.

Abram doesn't seem to get this treatment, just Leopard. If the above plays out then you could make a good argument that Leopard 2 (but not other NATO tanks) is overall a negative for Ukraine.

Temstar said:

A friend who was over for dinner raised an interesting point about Germany's reluctance to send Leopard 2 that didn't occur to me.

So far people who say "it's a historical thing" focus on the fact that Germany is uncomfortable with the Nazi past. But on the other hand consider the Russians, I saw this on pro-Russian telegram this week:
View attachment 105913
They've been playing up the Great Patriotic War theme all week. Now we've heard repeatedly from western media that Kremlin seems to be interested in another wave of mobilization and is putting out their feelers at the moment.

When Ukrainian nationalist brigades get their hands on Leopard 2 do you suppose they can resist the urge to cosplay a bit and paint 3rd Reich iconography on them? And when such a tank gets captures on photo you can be sure people like Medvedev is going to be waving that photo around and give speeches like "Comrades! 80 years later German tanks are once again charging through the plains of Ukraine, as before we cannot retreat, Moscow is behind us!" And next thing you know nationalist feelings lead to another 500,000 mobilized thanks to this narrative.

Abram doesn't seem to get this treatment, just Leopard. If the above plays out then you could make a good argument that Leopard 2 (but not other NATO tanks) is overall a negative for Ukraine.

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Good points that I generally agree with except the bold part.

If the deliberate shelling of cities filled with ethnic Russian civilians in Ukraine hasn’t fired up Russian youth to join up in droves, a bit of additional nazi paintwork (it’s not like there hasnt been plenty of that already) won’t either, no matter how on the nose the symbolism is.

While Russian society at large seem broadly supportive of the war, for the overwhelming majority, that support is also very limited in that is more like, I support ‘us’ going in, so long as it doesn’t negatively impact my normal daily life too much; rather than the I’m ready to go to the front myself kind of support.

This is made worse by the royal mess the Russian military have made of the war, where it’s a real war with plenty of losses on both sides. That makes the job of recruitment exponentially harder than say the US army trying to get troops for Iraq, since they cannot advertise it as a overseas human safari shoot where you get to shoot the locals with minimal risk being shot your self.

I think the only thing that might galvanise Russian young enough to join up in the numbers you suggest is if the war moves to Russian soil.

This, I think, is the main reason America has been so hesitant to supply Ukraine with missiles that have enough range to hit Russian soil. Because no matter how strict the instructions might be that those missiles should only be used on military targets, it’s a good bet the Ukrainians won’t be able to help themselves from bombing Russian population centres with them.

Another wave of loitering munitions and cruise missiles from Russia targeting Ukrainian infrastructure today.


Here is a substation near Petrodolinsky near Odessa on fire after a hit.

Russian side claiming:


Strikes
- Kiev
- Kiev region (Kiev HPSP);
- Odessa region (Substation near Usatovo)
- Odessa region (Substation in Mayakov area)
- Odessa region (Substation in Malinovsky district)
- Odessa region (Substation SS 110/35/6 kV "Chumka")
- Zaporozhye region
- Nikolaev region
- Dnepropetrovsk region
- Vinnitsa region

Emergency shutdowns in:
- Odessa
- Odessa region
- Vinnitsa region
- Nikolaev region
- Kiev region

Problems with water supply in:
- Odessa.

Ukrainian side says this:

"47 out of 55 Russian missiles launched over Ukraine today were destroyed - Zaluzhny.

SolarWarden said:

Those Russian troops in Kharkiv Oblast/Lyman-Izium front were strengthen by forces that pulled out of Kyiv Oblast, Sumy Oblast and Kharkiv city

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No matter how much Russia reshuffled forces from Kiev/Sumy/Kharkiv fronts, 200K against 800K defenders is still a 4:1 manpower deficit as an attacker no less.
That's not even account for expired contracts after 6-months which further reduced manpower. Isn't the cliche that you should attack with 3:1 advantage, but pre-mobolization, it was the opposite. So my point is, Ukraine was fighting with a manpower advantage, mainly due to Russian incompetence and overconfidence, which they have quickly rectified with partial mobolization.

SolarWarden said:

They used donated T-72's and BMP's and other outdated vehicles including outdated NATO vehicles to take all that territory including Kherson.

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Ukraine with 8 rounds of mobolization and 800K troops, retakes Kherson, Lyman, and Izium, against Russia with 0 rounds of mobolization and less than 200K troops.

And you are clapping like you made a huge achievement with outdated NATO hardware.... while ignoring the 4:1 manpower advantage and Russia's self-inflicted incompetence.

Russia has barely begun their mobolization campaign (1 round completed), while Ukraine is over 10 rounds mobolization now. The potential is on Russia's side.

plawolf said:

Good points that I generally agree with except the bold part.

If the deliberate shelling of cities filled with ethnic Russian civilians in Ukraine hasn’t fired up Russian youth to join up in droves, a bit of additional nazi paintwork (it’s not like there hasnt been plenty of that already) won’t either, no matter how on the nose the symbolism is.

While Russian society at large seem broadly supportive of the war, for the overwhelming majority, that support is also very limited in that is more like, I support ‘us’ going in, so long as it doesn’t negatively impact my normal daily life too much; rather than the I’m ready to go to the front myself kind of support.

This is made worse by the royal mess the Russian military have made of the war, where it’s a real war with plenty of losses on both sides. That makes the job of recruitment exponentially harder than say the US army trying to get troops for Iraq, since they cannot advertise it as a overseas human safari shoot where you get to shoot the locals with minimal risk being shot your self.

I think the only thing that might galvanise Russian young enough to join up in the numbers you suggest is if the war moves to Russian soil.

This, I think, is the main reason America has been so hesitant to supply Ukraine with missiles that have enough range to hit Russian soil. Because no matter how strict the instructions might be that those missiles should only be used on military targets, it’s a good bet the Ukrainians won’t be able to help themselves from bombing Russian population centres with them.

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The biggest limitation isn't whatever cultural ties Russians have with East ukrainians, its on how far the Kremlin will drag Russians to the war.

During the Vietnam war, US conscripted in total 2.6 million and took casualties of upwards 400k. This was a massively unpopular war with essentially no ethnic or cultural ties to the territory being attacked.

If the Russian state orders for a general mobilisation using their laws, they'll get tons of troops, by hook or by crook. Some will be unwilling, but that isn't going to affect their overall cohesion too much, as we see among the Ukrainians.

They still have lots, clearly. And the strike seems sustainable meaning that the limit would be production rate rather than financial capacity or stocks and to the fact the plant making them are still running.

In regards of missile "price" or "cost" tho it can be estimated in a simple manner via the method found in E.Fleeman's tactical missile design. It roughly starts with SDD cost (System Development and Demonstration).



One feature of Russian or Soviet RND was to minimize risk, use of older parts still deemed suitable for new design, common parts with other missile system. For example the Kh-101 which appears to be based of Kh-55 family and still use common parts particularly propulsion and maybe even some airframe parts. Electronics appears to be similar as the surface/submarine based Kalibr. They may have different software and structural elements. However these missiles eventually shares common ancestry to 1969 studies by OKB Ekho.

Kh-101 wise tho was started in 1992's for developmental work and apparently 6 years of development culminated in test flight in 1998. From here we could start estimate the cost of SDD's Which equates to US $ $ 601,890,337.50 FY99 or about 1 B USD FY-2022

This SDD cost will then spread into some early test batch for test launches, debugging, establishing QC (Quality Control) etc and to spread the developmental cost into several prototypes for lowering the cost of the mass production model. Now if one assume 50 of these early batches.. then each missile in this batch expended during firing trials or being an iron bird on the ground would be $21,118,959.21 FY-22

This then, if accepted by VKS or the RuMOD will go in serial production where agreed numbers, production runs and prices are set. This estimates also includes learning curve due to mass production process (this can be assumed to be 80% similar as aircraft). Which -Lowers- the cost even further. Let's say plant and Smolensk and Kirov can produce about 200 missiles/year as what they did with Kh-55 and production begin at 2002. The missile will then be in production for over 20 years. Totaling 4000 missiles.

If this 4000th missile produced in 2022, then its cost would be :

$(N4000th)=$.21,118,959.21*4000^(-0.322)
$(N4000th)=$1,462,406.81 FY-22

Which kinda comparable with Tomahawk and kinda far than those who said "multibillion dollar strike".

There are of course some problem with my estimates like :
1.It is based on American "way of making stuff" How do Soviet/Russians count production cost and price can be different
2.Initial batch. I picked 50 as it's kind of convenient number for doing cost spreading and at the same time, establishing Quality control for mass production.

However this kind of estimates are much better than "open ended" statement commonly used in social media realm on how Russians running out of missiles or each strikes cost an arm and a leg.

SolarWarden said:

They used donated T-72's and BMP's and other outdated vehicles including outdated NATO vehicles to take all that territory including Kherson.

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Not really, they didn't. No need to make bullshit up as the Ukranians recorded themselves and we all saw them rushing undermaned lines with technicals.

Whenever they tried to rush with MBT's and IFV like they tried in Kherson before they switched to technicals, they would get hammered.

Tam said:

Russian BMPs also engaged at Kremennaya.

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That's quite funny that the ammo ejection fall directly in the driver compartment, lol ! Better to close that hatch rapidly !

Phead128 said:

No matter how much Russia reshuffled forces from Kiev/Sumy/Kharkiv fronts, 200K against 800K defenders is still a 4:1 manpower deficit as an attacker no less.
That's not even account for expired contracts after 6-months which further reduced manpower. Isn't the cliche that you should attack with 3:1 advantage, but pre-mobolization, it was the opposite. So my point is, Ukraine was fighting with a manpower advantage, mainly due to Russian incompetence and overconfidence, which they have quickly rectified with partial mobolization.

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Quickly? They needed just 8 months to figure that.

Also- it's mobILIsation.

SolarWarden said:

At least take out the roads in western Ukraine close to Polish border where these weapons travel

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Probably Russian missiles aren't precise enough to do that, and they don't have enough of them to fire 20-30 of them to get one hit.