Current Affairs Ukraine

[Yarrgh]

From today's Frankfurter Allgemeine;

View attachment 169731

Reads:

How is the war of the future going to look like?

Russia is fighting in Donbass like in the 20th century. NATO is no longer prepared for this.

Germans seeing what's up...soon leaving the block imho

Germany are certainly a weak link in the west due to their reliance on Russian fuel and they know well what happens in European land wars against Russia from bitter experience.

I'm interested in how EU candidacy is sold this week - could be very telling.

 

[PhilM]

From today's Frankfurter Allgemeine;

View attachment 169731

Reads:

How is the war of the future going to look like?

Russia is fighting in Donbass like in the 20th century. NATO is no longer prepared for this.

Germans seeing what's up...soon leaving the block imho

Do people read that as 'NATO's tactics and training isn't ready for OBUA/FIBUA fighting' or 'NATO isn't prepared to allow Russia to fight such a conflict.'

My little caveat would be to take a German military perspective with a handful of salt - their lack of experience and will to fight (rightly or wrongly) is telling.

 

[tsubaki]

Germany are certainly a weak link in the west due to their reliance on Russian fuel and they know well what happens in European land wars against Russia from bitter experience.

I'm interested in how EU candidacy is sold this week - could be very telling.

Ukraine should really be told an honest no, that it isn't in their or the EU's interests to do this now.

In terms of the 20th century war comment I think the Germans are more right than we are - you can have a few high-tech weapons systems but you also need numbers, firepower and the ability to hit the other guy before he can hit you plus in the EUs case it needs to work as part of a team (including a non-NATO team in case Trump gets back in). I hope therefore that they go down the route of interoperability, more men, more and better artillery / armour and bigger reserves of ammo. An effective defence force of 500k - a million (and bear in mind they have circa two million now, albeit they aren't so effective as a cohesive whole) is going to deter Putin far more than any sanctions will.

I also think they should seriously think about what a pan-European communal mass civil defence force would look like and how it would work; maybe not going down the road of "every man gets a rifle" but giving the citizenry a role to play in the event of disaster or war is much better than abandoning them to whatever, and I think that is one of the lessons from this war (and the pandemic fwiw) so far.

We should also be doing all the above too of course, but Johnson isn't. We are nearly four months into this and they've still not reversed the cuts of the 2021 review.

 

[Leylo]

Watching Russia opening replacement burger establishments, people there made up ffs they really don't know what's happening or maybe don't care sad really.

 

[Deleted member 48881]

Do people read that as 'NATO's tactics and training isn't ready for OBUA/FIBUA fighting' or 'NATO isn't prepared to allow Russia to fight such a conflict.'

Let's hope for the latter

 

[Deleted member 48881]

 

[Lobster Johnson]

View attachment 169798

That's not from where I think it is, is it?

 

[Deleted member 48881]

That's not from where I think it is, is it?

metro

 

[Spadge Vernacular]

 

[tsubaki]

I must say this request for a huge increase in supply - 1000 howitzers, 300 MLRS, 500 tanks + ammo - from the Ukrainians almost seems designed to get turned down.

 

[Spadge Vernacular]

100 Days of Tragedy and Triumph

In the first instalment of two reports on Russia’s invasion, Tom Mutch describes the barbarity of Putin’s aggression, and the resilience of Ukraine and its people

bylinetimes.com

 

[Deleted member 48881]

Madness. Europe, 2022

 

[peteblue]

Ukraine should really be told an honest no, that it isn't in their or the EU's interests to do this now.

In terms of the 20th century war comment I think the Germans are more right than we are - you can have a few high-tech weapons systems but you also need numbers, firepower and the ability to hit the other guy before he can hit you plus in the EUs case it needs to work as part of a team (including a non-NATO team in case Trump gets back in). I hope therefore that they go down the route of interoperability, more men, more and better artillery / armour and bigger reserves of ammo. An effective defence force of 500k - a million (and bear in mind they have circa two million now, albeit they aren't so effective as a cohesive whole) is going to deter Putin far more than any sanctions will.

I also think they should seriously think about what a pan-European communal mass civil defence force would look like and how it would work; maybe not going down the road of "every man gets a rifle" but giving the citizenry a role to play in the event of disaster or war is much better than abandoning them to whatever, and I think that is one of the lessons from this war (and the pandemic fwiw) so far.

We should also be doing all the above too of course, but Johnson isn't. We are nearly four months into this and they've still not reversed the cuts of the 2021 review.

What of the 2021 review would you change….

 

[tsubaki]

What of the 2021 review would you change….

All of it, pete. We need to seriously think about at least doubling the size of the Army, if not getting it back to its 1989 size (300,000 service personnel). We need more artillery and for it to have longer range; tank numbers need to be maintained, not cut; they need to actually get a working IFV rather than one which injures its occupants. Stockpiles of ammunition for all systems need to be built up again, and UK capacity to keep producing more of it in an emergency needs to be built up too. Bases need to be reoccupied / acquired to house it all. The RAF needs the hundred-plus F35s it originally ordered, not the 50 it has been reduced to. The Navy needs no more cuts to surface ship numbers, in fact to properly protect two carrier groups will probably mean more ships.

This will all cost, and the government is going to have to actually get a hold of procurement and prevent the waste (theft, really) of billions of pounds.

Or if you want you could just watch this clip to see how utterly wrong Johnson and his cuts are:



It is from November 2021. I especially like how completely dismissive he is of Ellwood, as if Ellwood is talking about what shade of brown to paint a park bench rather than the defence of the bloody realm.

 

[Deleted member 48881]

Kremlin-sponsored outlet Izvestia published and quickly removed an appeal by the First Deputy Head of the Russian Presidential Administration Sergey Kirelenko for Russia to rebuild the Donbas on June 12 and blamed hackers for what they (likely falsely) claimed was a “fake publication.” Izvestia likely intended to save the article for a later date to set informational conditions for Russian annexation of Donbas. Kirelenko’s appeal stated that Russia will restore the Donbas regardless of high costs or if doing so lowers the standard of living in Russia. Izvestia blamed unknown hackers for publishing a “fake article,” but it is possible that hackers instead released an article Izvestia had prepared to publish at a later date. The Kremlin previously published and removed an article prematurely celebrating a Russian victory over Ukraine in late February and discussing the capture of Ukraine in past tense in anticipation of Ukraine’s capitulation during the first Russian-Ukrainian negotiations in Belarus. Unnamed Kremlin officials previously identified Kirelenko as the future head of a new Russian federal district, which would encompass Donbas, and occupied settlements in Kherson and Zaporizhia Oblasts.

Russia continues to deploy insufficiently prepared volunteer and reserve forces to reinforce its ongoing operations. Kremlin-sponsored outlet Izvestia released footage showing Russian artillery reservists undergoing training with old D-20 howitzers reportedly within 10 days of their deployment to Ukraine. The reservists focused on learning how to operate hand-held weapons, despite being reportedly only days away from deploying. Social media footage also showed Russian forces transporting Russian volunteer and reserve units with T-80BV tanks (a variant produced in 1985, as opposed to the modernized T-80 BVM operated by the 1st Guards Tank Army) and BMP-1 armored personnel carriers (which have largely been phased out in favor of the BMP-2) to Belgorod Oblast on June 9. Additional social media footage showed Russian forces transporting T-80BV tanks removed from storage in Moscow Oblast on June 9.

Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, June 13, 2022

Kremlin-sponsored outlet Izvestia published and quickly removed an appeal by the First Deputy Head of the Russian Presidential Administration Sergey Kirelenko for Russia to rebuild the Donbas on June 12 and blamed hackers for what they (likely falsely) claimed was a “fake publication.” Izvestia...

www.understandingwar.org