Current Affairs Ukraine

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PhilM said:
To add context to this, the general consensus coming out of the defence departments (MoD, inside NATO etc.) is that the moved units still face many problems.

The matter of a fortnight or so will not be enough to replenish supplies and the loss of men and materials, nor will it offer time to train and change tactics.

They now have the opportunity to attack on a broader line rather than focusing on narrows axis of attack, but they're still logistically in the mire.

The Ukrainians in front of them know their territory, are entrenched in deep, well-built defence lines and with their own troop deployments coming to support.

I'm far from an expert, however I think we'll see advances in the first few days and it'll then slow and perhaps stall again when the UKA engage them.

The flip side of that will be that the Russians will be reverting to tactics more akin to their doctrine: mass artillery; broader sweeps and try to encircle.
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I’ve not seen a number for the amount of Ukraine defenders, obviously there was the regular army, plus reserves, but of course thousands of ordinary people have taken up arms as well. I don’t know the numbers as I say, but while Russia will have the mechanised might, Ukraine may well have the greater numbers in the field…Russia may well just want to grind out a stalemate, but I cannot believe that Ukraine will accept that as an outcome. So we may well see Russia make some advances but over the months to come may well see quite a few Russian reverses. The west just needs to keep providing the arms…..
 
PhilM said:
To add context to this, the general consensus coming out of the defence departments (MoD, inside NATO etc.) is that the moved units still face many problems.

The matter of a fortnight or so will not be enough to replenish supplies and the loss of men and materials, nor will it offer time to train and change tactics.

They now have the opportunity to attack on a broader line rather than focusing on narrows axis of attack, but they're still logistically in the mire.

The Ukrainians in front of them know their territory, are entrenched in deep, well-built defence lines and with their own troop deployments coming to support.

I'm far from an expert, however I think we'll see advances in the first few days and it'll then slow and perhaps stall again when the UKA engage them.

The flip side of that will be that the Russians will be reverting to tactics more akin to their doctrine: mass artillery; broader sweeps and try to encircle.
Click to expand...
I agree with all of this. What we learned from the Kyiv offensive is that the Russians don't know how to execute a combined arms blitzkrieg. On paper, a side with their capabilities should get over the line. It turns out that the Russians are logistical morons, and it would seem that their pilots aren't worthy of their planes. This caused the Russians to get their noses bloodied, instead of rolling up Kyiv the way we could have rolled up/did roll up Baghdad in the two wars over there. Granted, the Russians had to travel across some nasty dirt as opposed to fighting in open desert the whole way, but they should have been able to establish and defend supply lines that would have enabled them to contest the more open environs around Kyiv.

Give the Russians a broader front that's more to their liking, and that should sort their logistical handicaps. Whether or not that's enough to dig out the Ukrainians in Donbas is another question entirely, given the loss of materiel and expenditure of supplies to date. The Russians may already have lost enough that they cannot win by attrition. They certainly can't hold much more than Donbas and what they have already taken (if that), if they win by attrition.

The most likely outcome would seem to be a Pyrrhic victory by the Russians, which the cynic in me says is precisely NATO's most preferred outcome. Ukraine coughs up some dirt at the conference table, NATO welcomes two new members that make defending NATO's eastern flank a lot easier, and the Russians are isolated politically and left licking their wounds militarily for a few years. This would have been played as a crushing foreign policy success during the Cold War years. Modern media is weird.
 
Martin Alvito said:
I agree with all of this. What we learned from the Kyiv offensive is that the Russians don't know how to execute a combined arms blitzkrieg. On paper, a side with their capabilities should get over the line. It turns out that the Russians are logistical morons, and it would seem that their pilots aren't worthy of their planes. This caused the Russians to get their noses bloodied, instead of rolling up Kyiv the way we could have rolled up/did roll up Baghdad in the two wars over there. Granted, the Russians had to travel across some nasty dirt as opposed to fighting in open desert the whole way, but they should have been able to establish and defend supply lines that would have enabled them to contest the more open environs around Kyiv.

Give the Russians a broader front that's more to their liking, and that should sort their logistical handicaps. Whether or not that's enough to dig out the Ukrainians in Donbas is another question entirely, given the loss of materiel and expenditure of supplies to date. The Russians may already have lost enough that they cannot win by attrition. They certainly can't hold much more than Donbas and what they have already taken (if that), if they win by attrition.

The most likely outcome would seem to be a Pyrrhic victory by the Russians, which the cynic in me says is precisely NATO's most preferred outcome. Ukraine coughs up some dirt at the conference table, NATO welcomes two new members that make defending NATO's eastern flank a lot easier, and the Russians are isolated politically and left licking their wounds militarily for a few years. This would have been played as a crushing foreign policy success during the Cold War years. Modern media is weird.
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If you mean Sweden and Finland for NATO I agree. Ukraine never.

If NATO doesn't accept states in conflict then Russia will keep a military operational indefinitely. Hell If such a reason keeps Ukraine out, maybe Putin could engage Finland...
 
Yarrgh said:
If you mean Sweden and Finland for NATO I agree. Ukraine never.

If NATO doesn't accept states in conflict then Russia will keep a military operational indefinitely. Hell If such a reason keeps Ukraine out, maybe Putin could engage Finland...
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It is increasingly looking like Sweden and Finland will sign on the dotted line. Ukraine is not on the table and was not prior to the invasion. The situation in Crimea precluded Ukraine's membership.
 
Martin Alvito said:
I agree with all of this. What we learned from the Kyiv offensive is that the Russians don't know how to execute a combined arms blitzkrieg. On paper, a side with their capabilities should get over the line. It turns out that the Russians are logistical morons, and it would seem that their pilots aren't worthy of their planes. This caused the Russians to get their noses bloodied, instead of rolling up Kyiv the way we could have rolled up/did roll up Baghdad in the two wars over there. Granted, the Russians had to travel across some nasty dirt as opposed to fighting in open desert the whole way, but they should have been able to establish and defend supply lines that would have enabled them to contest the more open environs around Kyiv.

Give the Russians a broader front that's more to their liking, and that should sort their logistical handicaps. Whether or not that's enough to dig out the Ukrainians in Donbas is another question entirely, given the loss of materiel and expenditure of supplies to date. The Russians may already have lost enough that they cannot win by attrition. They certainly can't hold much more than Donbas and what they have already taken (if that), if they win by attrition.

The most likely outcome would seem to be a Pyrrhic victory by the Russians, which the cynic in me says is precisely NATO's most preferred outcome. Ukraine coughs up some dirt at the conference table, NATO welcomes two new members that make defending NATO's eastern flank a lot easier, and the Russians are isolated politically and left licking their wounds militarily for a few years. This would have been played as a crushing foreign policy success during the Cold War years. Modern media is weird.
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I am not so sure: it may alleviate some of the issue, but I think they'll still struggle to adequately resupply their front line units that are already short on supplies.

Without personally knowing too much details, I chatted to an ex-colleague and he mentioned BTGs have been redeployed without time to re-equip.

We're talking about quite a few units re-engaging at around 50-70% of their initial strength in terms of men and armour, with heavily depleted ammunition.

Those not redeployed are because they're so heavily depleted that they're being split at a company level or below to fill the gaps.
 
PhilM said:
I am not so sure: it may alleviate some of the issue, but I think they'll still struggle to adequately resupply their front line units that are already short on supplies.

Without personally knowing too much details, I chatted to an ex-colleague and he mentioned BTGs have been redeployed without time to re-equip.

We're talking about quite a few units re-engaging at around 50-70% of their initial strength in terms of men and armour, with heavily depleted ammunition.

Those not redeployed are because they're so heavily depleted that they're being split at a company level or below to fill the gaps.
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I agree that in the short run the Russians will have problems. One would think that the Russians could sort that over time, given secure supply lines along a long front. My suspicion is that if the Ukrainians are going to win, they'll have to do it fast with a counteroffensive after stalling the Russians again, which is probably why Zelenskyy is so gung ho about getting some more supplies in (and why the Russians now seem to be prioritizing denying resupply).
 
Martin Alvito said:
I agree with all of this. What we learned from the Kyiv offensive is that the Russians don't know how to execute a combined arms blitzkrieg. On paper, a side with their capabilities should get over the line. It turns out that the Russians are logistical morons, and it would seem that their pilots aren't worthy of their planes. This caused the Russians to get their noses bloodied, instead of rolling up Kyiv the way we could have rolled up/did roll up Baghdad in the two wars over there. Granted, the Russians had to travel across some nasty dirt as opposed to fighting in open desert the whole way, but they should have been able to establish and defend supply lines that would have enabled them to contest the more open environs around Kyiv.

Give the Russians a broader front that's more to their liking, and that should sort their logistical handicaps. Whether or not that's enough to dig out the Ukrainians in Donbas is another question entirely, given the loss of materiel and expenditure of supplies to date. The Russians may already have lost enough that they cannot win by attrition. They certainly can't hold much more than Donbas and what they have already taken (if that), if they win by attrition.

The most likely outcome would seem to be a Pyrrhic victory by the Russians, which the cynic in me says is precisely NATO's most preferred outcome. Ukraine coughs up some dirt at the conference table, NATO welcomes two new members that make defending NATO's eastern flank a lot easier, and the Russians are isolated politically and left licking their wounds militarily for a few years. This would have been played as a crushing foreign policy success during the Cold War years. Modern media is weird.
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Historically Russian army always fought and won their wars by by slow, grinding attrition rather than quick, organized military actions.
Even prelude to WW2, Winter War against Finland, was bloody stalemate, also what deceived Hitler in believing that Russians were weak.

Pretty much any war that Russians ever fought, usually starts with their disaster and bad planning, and then they start making a comeback and learning from starting mistakes. Will that gonna happen now, i don't know, but ensuing offensive gonna be bloody affair for both sides.

Also worth pointing out that great Russian victories were usually in wars that were fought in Coalitions, against Ottomans they fought in alliance with Habsburg Austria, against Napoleon it was Grand Coalition of Britain, Prussia and Austria and vs Hitler in tandem with Western Allies.
 
Going to be a tough few weeks for those in the Donbass and Eastern Ukraine. Sadly without assistance from the West it's unlikely that the Ukrainians will be able to hold off the occupiers.
 
stipe said:
Historically Russian army always fought and won their wars by by slow, grinding attrition rather than quick, organized military actions.
Even prelude to WW2, Winter War against Finland, was bloody stalemate, also what deceived Hitler in believing that Russians were weak.

Pretty much any war that Russians ever fought, usually starts with their disaster and bad planning, and then they start making a comeback and learning from starting mistakes. Will that gonna happen now, i don't know, but ensuing offensive gonna be bloody affair for both sides.

Also worth pointing out that great Russian victories were usually in wars that were fought in Coalitions, against Ottomans they fought in alliance with Habsburg Austria, against Napoleon it was Grand Coalition of Britain, Prussia and Austria and vs Hitler in tandem with Western Allies.
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Historically they are prepared to sacrifice millions, and because of their population they have done exactly this. Ukraine has a population of c 20+ m men - they are still overwhelmingly outnumbered. I don't know how many of those are of potential fighting age
 
Bluerover said:
Historically they are prepared to sacrifice millions, and because of their population they have done exactly this. Ukraine has a population of c 20+ m men - they are still overwhelmingly outnumbered. I don't know how many of those are of potential fighting age
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IIRC Russia’s demographics situation is one of the worst in the world with extremely low birth rates, high mortality rates, etc.
 
wm02 said:
IIRC Russia’s demographics situation is one of the worst in the world with extremely low birth rates, high mortality rates, etc.
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www.worldometers.info

Russia Demographics 2026 (Population, Age, Sex, Trends) - Worldometer

Population Pyramid, Age Structure, Sex Ratio (Males to Females), Life Expectancy, Dependency Ratio of Russia
www.worldometers.info www.worldometers.info

146m population in 2020 - so roughly three times that of Ukraine. They have a history of sending their soldiers to the slaughter
 
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