The War in the Ukraine

FairAndUnbiased said:

Negatives for Russia: their ISR is so bad as to render their excellent shooter platforms mediocre in end effect.

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Russia has 7 A-50U and 2 A-100. IL-20M/ Su-34M along classified number of PAKFA. that is sufficient how Ukraine operates. Tu-214R is more in minute level.
ISR is not just finding targets but also protecting troops from incoming fire. UAE made mistake in Yemen when single missile strike it lost 45 soldiers (other claims much higher). satellites cannot see missile preparation in real time that give sufficient warning and that is flat desert without trees. Russia is more mobile. it is using alot more attack and transport choppers. Air defense moves with soldiers. Most of air strikes are from low g platforms like Su-25 at closer range that is taking human toll but also sustainable in sortie rate over prolong period. Russia has the capability to push every Ukrainian outside Ukraine but that is not in its interest nor outside players that it cares about at this point. so infrastructure is not targeted unless its necessary for tactical reason. wars are about larger interests that some time cannot be spelled out in public. just need to observe.
A general from Dagestan is made commander Far East. They know what they are doing.

tankphobia said:

You're looking at this from a purely territorial perspective, after this conflict Russia has:
- isolated itself from the West/EU, now it has no choice but to partner with China forever
- Have NATO pretty much against its entire western border
- No end in sight for western sanctions for anything other than resources
- Spending an absurd amount of resources on what was a cheap frozen conflict that they could've continued indefinitely
- Loss of military prestige/power that will take decades to rebuild.

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What would you rather have Russia do? Wait until Poland and Ukraine finished their rearmament programs, so they would be fighting the war on their own soil? The Russians are not THAT dumb.
Whatever economic benefit the Russians might have by doing business with the West is irrelevant in the face of the security issue.

xypher said:

It's not just "less than 15", according to Russian sources, their forces had whopping 3 Su-57 back in March and all of them with old engines.

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They have seven Su-57 in service. As for the engine even the dual Al-41F1s give the Su-57 better kinematic performance than the F-35 and it is close enough in performance to the F-22 to have similar thrust/weight when you consider the overall package of the aircraft with the engine. The engine gives worse performance than the F-22 engine in non-afterburning mode but the performance in afterburning mode is not that different. And the Su-57 has much more modern electronics and weapon systems than the F-22.

Well for what its worth, I suspect that the Bridge will be repaired a lot quicker than many here anticipate.
This is a wartime bridge, built at a time of war in order to secure a vital strategic asset.
I cannot believe that it has not been built with redundancy and survivability in mind.

The fact that the Road Causeway and the Railway line have there own structural support rather reinforces this view.
Unless I have missed anything significant, It looks to me as though the bridge was designed for the Causeway Trestles to take the blast and to insulate the supporting structure from the damage. This is exactly how it looks to me.
A few new prefab causeway sections, some large floating cranes and some very large barges should be sufficient to replace the damaged section after suitable checked and fittings replaced/refreshed.

To be honest, I think the weather will prove the bigger obstacle rather than any engineering challenge.

solarz said:

This is exactly what I'm talking about.

The fact that Russia did not end up doing a Desert Storm on Ukraine does not mean their military gains are invalidated.

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Let me clarify:

Russia is not losing the war, but Russia's progress against Donbass is significantly underperforming at it's current rate of territorial acquisition. Russia overperformed in Kherson-Melitopol-Zapo, but the region was captured as early as Day 6 within the initial invasion, most likely due to southeast as most lightly defended region among Ukrainian oblasts. So victory achieved over 8 months ago is great, but we expected more progress since then.

Russia is not losing the war, we all expected large territory gains (great in Kherson/Zapo), but we expect far more gains in the key regions (Donbass) than what has been acquired.

solarz said:

Objectively speaking, Russia's military achievements so far are extremely significant. Four oblasts have been annexed, creating a wide buffer zone, securing land access to Crimea, and cutting Ukraine's access to the sea of Azov.

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solarz said:

Russia has annexed four strategically vital Ukrainian oblasts, and Ukraine is throwing everything they have at Russia trying to dislodge them.

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The two bolded is a disingenuous statement....

Russia can only annex what it militarily controls, and only controls 60% of Zaporizhzhia and 50% of Donestk. Technically, there is no full military control over any of these 4 provinces now with Lyman retreat in Luhansk, and Kherson northern retreat as well, but we can reasonable say those last two count.

Phead128 said:

Russia claims to annex four provinces which it does not fully militarily control (except (most) Luhansk/Kherson), but what is the point? Just look at map of provincial borders.

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The point is that, as I have already pointed out:

1. Secured land access to Crimea.
2. Created a buffer zone.
3. Cut off Ukrainian access to the sea of Azov

SolarWarden said:

So if Ukraine would have used Flankers and somehow got through Russian air defenses and bombed the bridge with same result that would not be terror but because they "allegedly" used a truck it's terror in your eyes? Seriously?

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I do find it amusing you two seem more wound up by the use of the term "terror" than anything else. Even if we skip the "terror" part of this attack, the Ukranians are still closer to ISIS in many aspects at this point than you'd care to admit.

And terror bombings can still be done to hit military targets. Dresden, Hiroshima, London blitz are all terror bombings with a military purpose.

SolarWarden said:

Since I don't believe (not yet at least) that it was a truck bomb and believe the explosion came from under the bridge, what if the rail bridge pillars were the target and not the road bridge?

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It would have affected the other span of the road bridge and there is a photo of the maintenace walkway underneath the other road span being quite intact.

Also this picture shows the span was pushed into under the other side, which makes sense in explosion from the above on the lane the truck was traveling on, which would have pushed the other end of the span outwards towards in a lever motion





There is a video going around allegedly from an Azov commander showing bodies in civilian clothings with their hands tied and bags over their heads being dropped into a pit. The claim says they are "collaborators" from Kupyansk.

pmc said:

Russia has the capability to push every Ukrainian outside Ukraine but that is not in its interest nor outside players that it cares about at this point. so infrastructure is not targeted unless its necessary for tactical reason. wars are about larger interests that some time cannot be spelled out in public. just need to observe.

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I am of the same opinion.

Yesterday, I posted a CNN article that quoted Erdogan's spokesman Ibrahim Kalin as saying that Putin wants to strike “a new grand bargain” with the West.

“Our understanding is that Mr. Putin wants to have a new grand bargain, a new deal, with the West,” Kalin said.

The Turkish official referenced agreements signed by Moscow and NATO in the early 1990s and the 1994 Budapest Memorandum – as decisions Putin would like to re-do.

“The Russian perception is that the Russia of that day, that signed that agreements – that is, the Russia of the Gorbachevs and the Yeltsins – is over,” Kalin claimed. “There is a new Russia, there is a new world, there is a new reality, and they want to have a new bargain.”

Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday said "lasting peace in Europe can be reached only with Russia’s involvement."

gelgoog said:

What would you rather have Russia do? Wait until Poland and Ukraine finished their rearmament programs, so they would be fighting the war on their own soil? The Russians are not THAT dumb.
Whatever economic benefit the Russians might have by doing business with the West is irrelevant in the face of the security issue.

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If Putin thinks that the greatest tragedy of his time is the fall of the Soviet union, no amount of "safe space" and "buffer zone" is going to satisfy him until he has the entire Warsaw pact under Russia's heel. Economics is how people live and prosper, I don't see how it's any less important than security concerns.

NATO cannot negotiate with Russia over Ukraine. Ukraine must negotiate with Russia itself.

NATO can give guarantees to Ukraine, but I don't think NATO is the right organization for that. A confederation of states would have to do this independently of NATO.

Intrepid said:

NATO cannot negotiate with Russia over Ukraine. Ukraine must negotiate with Russia itself.

NATO can give guarantees to Ukraine, but I don't think NATO is the right organization for that. A confederation of states would have to do this independently of NATO.

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Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban recently said there was no chance for peace talks between Russia and Ukraine.

"As Russia wants security guarantees, this war can be ended only with peace talks between Russia and America," Orban said.

This article of 17 January explains very well what Russia wants, namely a new European security architecture: