I think footage of the train being ran at night yesterday was the other train line that had no train on it at the time of the attack (there are two), whilst the main damaged one will take a while to get back into running condition.
The War in the Ukraine
- Thread starter SampanViking
- Start date
That's exactly what I meant - last night the Russians ran a test train on the free rail.
Maybe the wording about single weapon changing the conflict was too strong, but I think the rest of description about HIMARS still stands. Beyond the propaganda value of destroying a HIMARS there's also a strong military reason why the Russians focus a lot on trying to counter or destroy it. Other forum users have said before these HIMARS are driven by the Americans themselves and I do think there's a strong possibility that is the case. Emphasis on the combination with US/NATO ISR that makes it effective. I don't like giving credit to the Western supplied weaponry either but if I were to rank effectiveness this would be near the top.
I think you're very right about the mobilization. Ukrainians have been fighting well with what they have. Here's how I understand Ukraine's mobilization plans: there's no doubt the earlier waves of mobilization resulted in gargantuan casualties among the Ukrainians. However, they also serve a purpose as the "meat shield" to slow the Russian advance while it gives time for the later waves of mobilization to be crash course trained closer to "non-conscript" levels. I'm aware that we had seen reports of Ukrainian conscripts perform poorly in training in NATO camps, but some of the issues would definitely be ironed out over time. The newer batch of better trained troops are now being used in the latest offensives. Definitely not at the same level as the original Air Assault brigade troops early in the war, but better than the Territorial battalion troops that get thrown into the Donbass fire. And the numbers are of course the main advantage as you say. So now it's Russia's turn to put their conscripts to the test.
Other users like Temstar said they've been quasi-networked and that's also provided a strong tactical advantage. The Russians complained recently in Kherson when the Ukrainians painted the vehicles with "Z" and "V". Are the Russians using visual IDs exclusively? If you're Russian troops you better hope not.
Back to the battlefield, Russian MOD reports they've launched ground incursions in Kherson, Zaporozhye and Siversk area in Donbass. Sounds like some people are waking up a bit after the Crimean bridge attack. Ukrainians also say Russia has deployed Shahed-136s in Luninets AB in Belarus. Finally, are they going to try to hit the logistics points in Western Ukraine?
Yeah, this looks like solid evidence that the other train track is largely undamaged/easily repairable and is able to run trains.
They don't need to satisfy anyone here, they need to achieve the goals they set when they started the war. Ukraine doesn't seem anywhere close to being denazified. If anything the Nazi problem in the Ukraine is much worse, and they're rubbing it in the Russians faces.
De-Nazification is a very vague term and it can be achieved the moment Putin thinks it's achieved. Who will argue against it? Will Zelensky say 'we still got Nazis?'.
Not my idea, it's Putin. He is not satisfied with slow tempo - ergo partial mobilization of conscripts.
Who said it was not successful? We are saying Putin desires more than a land bridge to Crimea, he wants all of Donbass (original objective to begin with)
For clarity, we are not saying Russia is losing the war. It's winning, Ukraine will never win the war.
From what I am seeing the past days it seems that Russians have stabilised the front lines, making further advances by the Ukrainian army a lot more difficult.
However I am not sure if this due to Russia forces change of tactics or due to Ukrainian forces consolidating. I suppose we will find out in the next week
However I am not sure if this due to Russia forces change of tactics or due to Ukrainian forces consolidating. I suppose we will find out in the next week
Picture from underneath the bridge. The damage is minimal to the under side of the other span, which would suggest there was no explosion below, even the walkway is fairly intact.
Which should rule out the idea of any missiles, if the distance from any Ukranian positions wasn't clue enough.
Which should rule out the idea of any missiles, if the distance from any Ukranian positions wasn't clue enough.
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Oh the irony. The cited comment missed everything of any significance. All of the conclusions were backwards. But that's to be expected considering that it was written by a layman with no knowledge in the field. In this instance this is not a criticism, but a statement of fact. The difference between the professional and a layman in almost any field is that the professional has undergone the several years of education and training to rid himself of "intuition" and "common sense" which are awfully wrong. This is the core of professional education - apply the method and stick to it, all your other senses are wrong. And that's the main lesson here, to paraphrase: if you think you understand quantum physics, you don't understand quantum physics.
First of all the bridge was back in operation within hours. By the time I wrote my comments there were recordings from the bridge already in use. I assumed everyone was aware of that so I didn't address it. The traffic was restricted but for security reasons, not because the bridge was unsafe for operation.
The railway portion was cleared as soon as the fire was put under control which took time because of the fire hazard and not any threat to structure. It is safer to let it burn because the structure of the bridge is not going to be affected. It's reinforced concrete over a body of water. It's probably the worst target for arson. Most firefighter interventions that people are aware of happen when there's human life and health risk. Firefighting is aimed at controlling the fire, not eliminating it. When there's no health and life risk the correct course of action is to let it burn and let the insurers handle the fallout. What is done is only what takes no risk to anyone involved - and that includes the firefighters.
The road portion was operational because it consists of parallel sections - each with two lanes. Those lanes have dimensions which enable for a portion of the bridge to be closed off so that the traffic throughput remains within designed parameters. There was little traffic across it because of safety and the risk of attack, not because it was incapable of sustaining traffic. Heavy loads (20t and over) could be restricted but not regular passenger traffic or trucks with mass of 4 to 8t.
The supports of a bridge are one of the strongest structural elements known to man, if not the strongest. All of them have deep pile foundations and are cast with heavily reinforced concrete of highest compression strength. You could detonate a large nuke nearby and they'd remain in place while the surface of the bridge would fly off. Anyone who suggests that something could happen to the supports has never seen one designed and made. The joint could be damaged but not the support itself so bridging over it is trivial.
The attack was deliberate and not intended to permanently disable the bridge let alone destroy it entirely. Both alternatives would not be significantly more difficult actions than what was performed. It was a warning shot.
There are a lot of the misconceptions around what is and isn't possible with regards to attacking the bridge and most of it comes from ignorant, uneducated and often hysterical media personnel and its audience. The real reason why the bridge wasn't struck is very different: only a complete idiot destroys valuable peacetime infrastructure when it can be simply neutralized by other means. The bridge is essential to any peacetime activity regardless of who has physical control over Crimea.
And here is your main error - the Crimean Bridge is not a "wartime bridge".
The proposal has a very long history dating back to Soviet times and was adopted several years before the annexation of Crimea. The formal agreement was signed in 2010 and majority of preliminary design and survey work was already done when the crisis started. Otherwise it would be impossible to start construction in 2016. The construction process is the shortest and in many ways the simplest of stages.
The reason why the work was started only in 2010 was cost. Ukraine is a poor country with tremendous need for infrastructural development but almost none of it is located in Crimea. So the cost of the bridge would disproportionately burden the budget of the country. Russia also couldn't afford it until the economic situation improved and arguably it was misplacing the resources if purely economic considerations were involved. Russia is also in serious need of infrastructural development, probably more so than Ukraine considering the role of geography in its economy. Crimean bridge was a purely political project that was developed partly as extending Russian influence to Ukraine. This is why things were stopped when Yushchenko was president of Ukraine and resumed under Yanukovych.
The bridge was built with economy in mind. Nobody builds bridges with "survivability" and "redundancy" in mind. Not even the Soviet Union did that. That's too complicated and too expensive. You do the opposite - you re-design your military assets to fit the infrastructure - and that's precisely why Soviet tanks were capable of crossing certain categories of bridges in double column. As for survivability and redundancy - that's what engineering and bridging units are for. You don't use static valuable and vulnerable civilian infrastructure as a rule in modern warfare.
The reason why the bridges in Kherson were used is because Dnepr is a large river with a strong current. It's Europe's third largest river after Volga and Danube and it's easier to fix those bridges than establish a proper pontoon crossing. The problem wasn't HIMARS strikes because HIMARS didn't destroy the bridge. It made it only uneconomical to continue repairs and risk engineering crews and transiting logistics. Disabling a bridge is not a problem in itself. The problem is that the enemy knows when you have to commit valuable engineering teams (target) and when to conduct offensive operations because your logistics is disrupted (time gap).
It wasn't about the bridges. It was about the horrible position that Russian soldiers were put in due to horrible planning, preparation and execution of military operation which was structured to serve an unsustainable political objective. Ukraine is Russia's Iraq and the invasion is the equivalent of US' decision to disband the iraqi military. Both did the very one thing they were not supposed to do because they were not prepared for the consequences. The people making the decision ignored it because they were complete idiots.
The mainstream media was talking about bridges and HIMARS because they don't know any better. They're laymen who happen to get paid for expressing the "correct opinion". In Russia the "correct opinion" was that nothing was happening in Kherson and everything was under control. In the area of American influence the "correct opinion" was that HIMARS strikes against bridges turned the tide of the war. Both are intended to create as specific reaction in the audience and both "correct opinions" were completely wrong.
Both war and engineering are fields where rules of physics are applied in specific timescales. What that means is that what people think will or should happen is of no consequence. Physics decides what happens and the side that applies the rules of physics more rigorously will have more success. The reason why Russia struggles in Ukraine is because while the US went woke with biology, Russia decided to go woke with physics. Biology is forgiving. Physics is not. You go woke with biology you end up broke. You go woke with physics you end up dead.
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