The first thing I think when I see a Su-25 is ''rugged''. These are real workhorses.
The War in the Ukraine
- Thread starter SampanViking
- Start date
No, they just started using bigger drones that have a larger lift capacity instead of those tiny DJI Mavics that can at best carry 1 grenade
They have used them for a while, problem is that anything bigger than a classic quadcopter is slower, easier to see by optic/radar means, and easier to shoot down.
Modifying Chinese ones such as DJI Matrice 300. This is old story. Showing said videos are also banned in this forum. These types of drones are classified under agricultural and industrial use, where they are used to carry and drop stuff like fertilizers and insecticides for farms. But they can carry up to 22 lbs and travel up to 8km. So this is like cheap arty.
There are tons of videos from the Russian side, you can find everyday. The biggest culprit is DPR's Obtf Sparta. Everytime I see a video with the Sparta Battalion overlay it's guaranteed they are dropping grenades from quadcopters. Other DPR units do it too, including Somali and Kaskad. Prime targets is to drop grenades into trenches.
To save on posts, just adding. FAB-500 glide bombs being used in Avdiivka. Evacuation is currently underway for Avdiivka.
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In terms of losses Kiyv offensive in February-March 2022 was much worse. Russia lost three brigades worth of equipment and we know of an equivalent of a VDV regiment beig entirely wiped out on the west bank. Casualties reached several thousand.
Comparing Debaltseve and Kiyv may be confusing because of how the situation was presented in the media. Debaltseve was a clear situation of separatist-controlled territory forming a cauldron around AFU positions leading. Russian offensive toward Kiyv was presented incorrectly as large contiguous areas of Russian control approaching toward Kiyv. In reality Russians only controlled the roads, and intermittently, and the area near the front.
If you invert territorial control and start looking at Ukrainian control rather than Russia as the "active" part you will have a series of deep Russian penetrations which turned into a de facto cauldrons logistically cut off by mobile light units or in places like Chernihiv by the 1st Armored Bde operating from the city.
Didn't you mean to say 2014? There was no fighting in 2015 outside of ATO zone in Donbas and only until Minsk II which was in February and Debaltseve however disastrous was not definitive of AFU performance by that time. Error of judgment, individual decisions - all of that played a role. There are several units in the south that performed as poorly in 2022. The tactical situation was just different.
The problems in 2014 weren't only caused by lack of training or working equipment. A military is a social structure and the institutional knowledge that defines the military capabilities is contained within the social network. Military is all about how people work together, not what they can do on their own. So when that network breaks down the institutional knowledge disappears and you have to re-create it, often from scratch.
Ukrainian military was also based on the Soviet model, which meant that it lacked professional NCOs. NCO's are responsible for small tactics and managing discipline. If an army doesn't have professional NCOs it has two very serious consequences. First is almost complete lack of institutional knowledge retention below junior officer level. Second is emergence of "dedovshchina" because that natural leadership role is not taken by a separate and established hierarchy. No army with professional NCOs has that problem and every army without professional NCOs has it. "Dedovshchina" has a crippling effect on soldier morale and also typically causes officers to withdraw from interaction with their underlings because they have to do the NCOs job as well as the officer's. This is why those armies perform so poorly in combat. Their cohesion and morale is minimal on top of having no institutional knowledge bellow officer level.
To make things worse the events of 2014 were not as clear as those in 2022. When Russia began the annexation of Crimea - even though it was impossible for such operation to take place without preparations in advance, and there were preparations done during Zapad 2013 for example - in the public eye it came as consequence to the overthrow of Yanukovych which was illegal. That illegality was recognized by people in Ukraine as was the role of the nationalists in the crisis. So when Ukrainians saw things spiralling out of control their natural instinct was not to perceive it as deliberate Russian invasion of Ukraine like in 2022 but rather as an uncontrolled escalation stemming from an internal crisis. Naturally the instinctive reaction was to stop adding fuel to the fire hoping that if there's less escalation then the crisis can be resolve. That turned out to be an erroneous assessment as Russia was determined to capture Crimea by force and to destabilize eastern Ukraine as protection for annexation of Crimea. One of the plans even assumed outright breakup of the country which would create a western Ukrainian state that would be run by nationalists which would make it an automatic problem for Poland, Slovakia and Hungary.
Annexation of Crimea took place end of February and early March. The separatist republics in Donbas were established in April. The presidential election took place end of May with the parliamentary election planned for late October. Until then the government in Kiyv was of dubious legitimacy and people in Ukraine reasonably saw the overthrow of Yanukovych and the chaos in central administration as main cause of instability. After Proshenko took over several reforms were instituted to address the complaints of people from various regions demanding greater autonomy or self-governance on a local level. Before that happened the government was disproportionately influenced by nationalists who not only rejected such postulates but further aggravated the situation.
In 2012 out of 450 seats in Rada 185 were Party of Regions, 101 were Batkivshchina, 40 were Klitchko's UDAR, 37 were Svoboda, 30 were Communists and 43 were independents, typically pro-Russian. The numbers however are misleading because after the ousting of Yanukovych the Party of Regions went into a passive mode leaving all initiative to the other side. Svoboda was necessary to form a government. Svoboda are far-right nationalists. Batkivshchina are moderate nationalists. In situations of internal crisis the radical voice sets the tone and that meant that Batkivshchina had to pander to nationalist sentiment so as not to lose influence in the upcoming election because nobody knew how the situation would turn out. If Russia's plan to destabilize and break-off the east worked then they would be left with a completely different country and electoral demographics.
That meant that the situation before October was incredibly bad for stability because people in Ukraine had radical nationalists and moderate nationalists in power and disgraced pro-Russian opposition turning increasigly to protesting the government as illegitimate. The country became extremely polarised politically despite the fact that Ukraine as a whole is politically moderate. This is where the "Nazis taking over Kiyv" narrative takes its legitimacy - from those three chaotic months when far-right had disproportionate influence. Then Poroshenko won the electon and formed his own party based on alliance with Klitshko's UDAR which brought the centre back into play and stabilized the situation.
Russian intervention which is where the idea of "AFU of 2014" was in August. Ukraine had two months to organize and build an army to perform the Anti-Terrorist Operation which was controversial and not very popular. It wasn't until the notion of Russia being directly engaged in the war that the view on the conflict began to change and more people began to come around to support it. Even then it took time. The first thing that happened in 2014 was a mass wave of emigrants to Poland seeking a way out of conscription. And largely because they knew the state of the Ukrainian army. Defections of officers, collapse of morale, general chaos, infighting etc.
What fought back in 2014-15 was not the regular military but popular militia wearing the uniforms of the regular military backed by few select airborne units. There was absolutely no reason to expect that would happen in 2022 unless government collapsed early on. Anyone who said that simply doesn't understand military operations.
Shortly before the war - you can look up those posts - I even suspect American foul play because from my calculations Russia had no way to succeed in a full-scale invasion save some unbelievably lucky break. And that was assuming full complement. Early on I was less surprised with Russia's failure as with the decision to proceed in the first place. It was illogical.
Why the Pentagon thought that Ukraine would fold is a separate story.
Unlikely.
Mariupol's defense was to prevent flanking of ATO defensive line early in the invasion when Russian plan of invasion wasn't clear. Even if they were forced to retreat the defenders couldn't leave the city because that would mean dispersal and destruction. They stayed and what followed which was a protracted bloody siege absorbing several Russian units and DPR forces both sustaining heavy casualties. Tactically that was the correct decision. The failure occurred to the east where the Crimean front collapsed without fighting. If AFU prepared defenses from Zaporozhia to Melitopol - as was logical - Mariupol wouldn't have fallen.
Mariupol was also a city of half a million. Bakhmut and Avdiivka are small towns along a front where AFU in theory should have the capacity to counter-attack to break the encirclement. I can't tell whether it will happen or not but whatever Russia will make of it if they capture the towns will likely be staged propaganda. I don't think those two are some huge battles deciding the fate of the front. It's the two places where increased pressure is either necessary (Bakhmut - to capture roads and rail) or convenient (Avdiivka). But the fighting in tactical sense really occurs along the entire front.
From what I've seen and read they're also better design than A-10.
There is no specific rule against videos of modified DJI drones used in the Ukraine conflict as long as they are relevant and does not lead to off topic discussions/flamebait.
We have deleted videos when it showed drones dropping munitions directly on infantry or other visible acts of violence on people. This applies for all videos of weapon usage, not just drones.
New ammunition plant can't be made because TikTok data center hogs much of the energy of the existing electrical grid. Should look elsewhere then than blaming a legit customer.
Battles being geolocated to the center of Bakhmut.
I heard something about the Avangard Stadium has already been taken but awaiting confirmation and collaboration on that one.
MRAP taken out by ATGM by Wagner forces.
Destroyed Ukrainian T-64BV and BMP-2.
Hearing reports that Wagner and the Chechens have both set up headquarters in the Zaporozhye region along with various DPR forces.
Battles being geolocated to the center of Bakhmut.
I heard something about the Avangard Stadium has already been taken but awaiting confirmation and collaboration on that one.
MRAP taken out by ATGM by Wagner forces.
Destroyed Ukrainian T-64BV and BMP-2.
Hearing reports that Wagner and the Chechens have both set up headquarters in the Zaporozhye region along with various DPR forces.
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See, e.g., US War of Independence (from Britain) and later US-British War of 1812 (which did indeed involve Canada).
Fascinating.
Have your Donbas folks always been overwhelmingly anti-Russian? In your view, does it seem like Russia lost a huge amount of support in Ukraine between 2014 and 2022? For example in 2014, there was a pretty big openly pro-Russian grouping in Kharkov. You had lots of photos of people occupying government buildings while waving Russian flags back in the day. However, in 2022, when the Russians entered Kharkov in the first days of the war, almost no one turned up to support them. We know the Russians do still have substantial support in Donbas, but it doesn't seem like as much as it was back in 2014. And the resistance, of course, is much greater. What, in your view, is the reason for this?
A lot left Ukraine to live in Russia for not being killed by their own Ukrainian government ultranationalist fascist bunch from 2014 onward...