The War in the Ukraine

Which will spur western assistance more, sour Western Russo relations farther. Cause more resistance. I mean remember WW2 it was primarily battled in Ukraine with the Ukrainians still fighting the Russians for another decade after the fall of Berlin.

Shouldn’t this thread be called “Russian Cheerleaders Thread” I have suspicions that this is what it’s intended to be! It’s nothing but the worst of the previous Ukraine war thread! Even the posts of the multiple account holding drone salesman was better than this wishful-thinkers forum! No wonder it’s nowhere near as active as that one was; like Deino, I’m out of this mutual ass-kissers’ thread!

gelgoog said:

Oh really? Back in WW2 the Soviets were basically fighting the rest of continental Europe put together. They could not hit the rearward production areas of the Nazis even if they wanted to. They did do a couple raids on Berlin with Il-4 bombers in 1941. But as they lost territory they couldn't even do that as it got out of range. Today Russia can easily hit any rearward transportation and production areas. Just think about it. Is there any area in Ukraine they can't hit with cruise missiles or hypersonics if they really want to? Try looking at the range of either the Kh-101, the Kalibr, or the Kh-47 Kinzhal. They can hit any target up to northern Spain or beyond from Russian territory if they wanted to. And consider how NATO cannot even intercept an errant Ukrainian drone. Do you think they will be able to intercept a stealthy or hypersonic Russian cruise missile?

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We can disagree here. I don't think the WWII scenarios apply here. My whole post was around 21st century modern warfare with information characteristics. At the beginning of this war, many well-known China military commentators and geopolitical experts were almost unanimously optimistic that Russia would have smothered battlefields but would have struggled in other aspects of the total war. Now, most of them were disappointed by the Russian military performance on the ground. I have been saying from the beginning that Russia is winning this war. I am still thinking that way. It is the overall performance and direction that has exposed the deficiencies of the Russian armed forces. Winning truly has an undertone, which is exactly that "at what cost". I was not saying Russia is going to lose this war. Rather, I am saying the war is approaching a stalemate much earlier than I thought. The primary reason is that, as Russia advances out of Donbas toward west, the offset will become more acute, to a point where it would not be profitable for Putin to advance further, under the assumptions that:

(1) US keeps feeding Ukraine.
(2) China does not provide.

gelgoog said:

Let us say the US decides to do a sea lift and bring loads of modern heavy equipment into Europe. Then Russia starts blowing up harbors to prevent the heavy equipment being brought in. Or NATO decides to do a no fly zone, like some US pundits wanted, and Russia starts blowing up NATO airbases, maintenance facilities, aviation fuel storage, etc. And get this. They get to tell the US that if they hit similar targets inside Russia proper they will retaliate with nukes on US territory.

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There is one scenario that would change my current view. That is, if Russia took out Odessa before November while holding steady in what they have occupied.

gelgoog said:

Well the West is being retarded. They don't understand modern warfare, neither how the Cold War happened, nor what modern weapons can do. The US is making a massive gamble here where they will ruin Europe in an attempt to ruin Russia and maybe China. And the Europeans were dumb enough to get into the ride. There is also little evidence that if Russia goes into Western Ukraine or beyond that they will keep using the same rules of engagement where they try to minimize civilian losses. If the Russians are made to fight NATO directly, you can pretty much bet they won't use these rules of engagement.

And Russia has lots of techniques to counter "networked warfare" of peer level adversaries like ASAT. If it came to that. Let us say that US observation satellites become a real issue. Then by some coincidence some ground based laser temporarily blinds that said observation satellite or satellites. Right when it is passing over the area of operations. Then they keep insisting, and oops, the satellite malfunctioned for whatever reason. This isn't theory as Russia has Peresvet in service.


They are in a sequence of urban combat scenarios against the bulk of the Ukrainian army. Once the Donbass is cleaned up if they want to continue they will move a lot faster, well until they start taking the main cities. If it comes to that.

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Let's not kid our selves. Other than nukes or maybe subs, the Russian armed forces are at least once notch below US or PLA, in the air, from the space, at the sea or on the ground. I am not talking about European losers. If you take out US, NATO is nothing. If you put the Russian armed forces in front of the US armed forces or PLA, they are no longer the second most powerful military as we used to know.

This is a protracted war of attrition and Putin knows it from the get-go. I don't think he was fooled by his generals. But he may be surprised how far behind his conventional forces have become.

SinoSoldier said:

Just like how China lost its incursion into Vietnam, Russia will lose this war. It may take months or even a few years for that to happen, given the propensity of Russia to throw its men into the fray, but it will happen.

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Russia is not throwing man into it. they are doing bare minimum to engage.
This more complex than most people can comprehend. Russia response is calibrated in such away that Ukraine will always think they are about to win they just need more manpower, weapons and money. the better Ukraine shift all those new resources to East. so the question does not even arise at this point going further than measured pace.

Recall this news:

Well, Juche necromancy strikes again:

To me the main issue Russia has had thus far in terms of equipment is the lack of spotter and attack drones and integrated kill chain.
The artillery also needs to be beefed up. Once Western artillery becomes more relevant in theater only the latest Russian artillery can compete with it in range. And there are not that many units of it. A lot of existing artillery is ongoing upgrades to increase its digitization but that by itself is probably not going to be enough.

james smith esq said:

Shouldn’t this thread be called “Russian Cheerleaders Thread” I have suspicions that this is what it’s intended to be! It’s nothing but the worst of the previous Ukraine war thread! Even the posts of the multiple account holding drone salesman was better than this wishful-thinkers forum! No wonder it’s nowhere near as active as that one was; like Deino, I’m out of this mutual ass-kissers’ thread!

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@james smith esq bro with all due respect, it's better than reading Western MSM, their propaganda and fake news. This thread is a good way to have a balance view, we're all adults here and we can discern. So bro chill, I respect your view so please respect mine.

Fighting definitely doesn't sound like what happened in 2014, that's for sure. The video is interesting and ... odd:


Guessimates on Russian losses in Ukraine. Russia is now up to 102 BTG in Ukraine. Two weeks ago it was 98. One week ago it was 99. The 'low' of BTG in Ukraine was ~ 84 after the Kiev withdrawal. The high of the war was 130. Those numbers are all via the Pentagon, so grains of salt and all that. We know Russia reinforced with troops from the far east, Ossetia, Chechnya and probably elsewhere. So how many BTG have been destroyed?

Using the Oryx site (stop groaning and provide an equivalent from the Russian side), I get a total of almost 33 BTG lost. There is almost another 12 tank battalions lost. The total tanks lost reported there are over 51% of the tanks in 130 BTG the Russians supposedly had at the start of the war and 25% of the APCs+IFVs.

By taking the reported destroyed front line equipment (tanks, APCs, IFVs, etc) I get a guessimate of 6,500 dead and over 26,000 total casualties. This number would not count in dead infantry, REMFs, aircraft crew, artillery, etc.

Even if those numbers are overly inflated, this war has been bad for the Russian army.

I have no insight into the Ukrainian losses. I imagine, but cannot prove, they are bad.

Few general comments.

1. The Russians are grinding forward in the Donbass. I half expect by the end of next week to hear of the fall of Severodonetsk.

2. My question about the Ukrainians aiming for the railways has been echoed online by others. If this is true - I stress the if - then Ukraine is and has been fighting a rather different war than the Russians. The Ukrainians have been fighting a logistics war rather than a territorial one. If the Ukrainians take the rail heads, then Russian logistics get that much harder. If.

3. The ground appears to be drying. It will be "interesting" to see how combat changes as a result.

4. Sumy, Kiev, Chernihiv, and... now Kharkov? Those were and are just feints, right?

This war will not be over quickly. I don't think there are any clear ways for either side to win at this point. Two of the most proud and stubborn cultures in the world that I know of are at war.

People here keep saying The West is willing to fight the Russians to the last Ukrainian. Again, I wildly dispute that: the Ukrainians are defending their homes. If they didn't want to fight, there would be little to no war despite being supplied by the West: see Afghanistan.

On a personal note, the family has been brought out of Europe and is now here. They are...adapting, but alive. This is the second time they have lost everything in a decade, but they are alive and so long as they are, they can rebuild their lives.

PS: I was asked if anyone had heard of Ukrainians being mobilized from abroad. So far, none of my friends have heard of that or received any messages to that affect.

kokole said:

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The disinformation, misinformation war against Russia and Putin is just wild. I remember not too long ago where the same media morons where pumping news after news reports about the supposed death or mortal illness of Kim Jung-un and when the man reanimated back into the living the media and the public couldn't believe what their lying eyes were seeing.

An attempt by Ukrainian soldiers to shoot down a Russian plane with MANPADS


The Russian army stopped the APU's attempt to cross the river. The battle unfolded on the Seversky Donets River, presumably near the village of Petrovskoye, where the Ukrainian army created a pontoon crossing and tried to cross the river. Russian motorized skirmishers engaged in battle and adjusted artillery fire on the guided crossing and the AFU equipment sheltering in the forest. As a result of the battle, the ferry was destroyed and drowned. The Ukrainian troops who managed to cross were destroyed by artillery fire.


Combat operations of Russian airborne units in Ukraine. The personnel conducts offensive battles in Ukraine and destroys enemy firing points. The assault on enemy strongholds of the Armed Forces of Ukraine is carried out with the fire support of mortar crews and crews of combat vehicles of the landing force.