What's going on in Ukraine?

[Hellraiser]

This "fo real"?

Yes and no. The Poles absolutely have been playing silly buggers for internal political reasons, but the SPD have been foot dragging as much as possible.

[fishfoodie]

Is this the new Ukrainian tactic ?

Create Monte Cassino type situations, & let the Orcs throw their limited resources at them, & just chew them up !

If the Orcs get fixated on places like this, they'll end up being thinner in other places, & they expend whatever ammunition they have, & ultimately they force another draft, of ever lower quality troops, & they make it easier prosecute any offensive they plan in the Spring.

[Hellraiser]

[Hellraiser]

Is this the new Ukrainian tactic ?

Create Monte Cassino type situations, & let the Orcs throw their limited resources at them, & just chew them up !

If the Orcs get fixated on places like this, they'll end up being thinner in other places, & they expend whatever ammunition they have, & ultimately they force another draft, of ever lower quality troops, & they make it easier prosecute any offensive they plan in the Spring.

Not really. The Ukrainian approach has been attrition from the start, they just exploit Russian higher command (i.e. Putin) obsession with political, as opposed to tactical/operational/strategic objectives.

[Uncle fester]

Re the earlier conversation on combined arms or how not to use tanks.

[tabascoboy]

Russians still trying to completely level Bakhmut

[petej]

Superb thread


Post 2 in the thread is interesting considering brexit and many of the individuals involved. Looking at Cummings posting over the last year it is pretty much a given him he is putin lickspittle.

[tabascoboy]

Not in Ukraine, but a "strange coincidence". Arabic news suggest suggesting Israel behind a number of overnight attacks, not verified that any plants producing drones for supply to Russia were struck though.

[weegie01]

This "fo real"?

Yes and no. The Poles absolutely have been playing silly buggers for internal political reasons, but the SPD have been foot dragging as much as possible.

I saw an article suggesting that whilst younger voters wanted a hurry up, the German approach was popular amongst older voters. Them seemed to support a slow and careful approach, and to still carry the scars of WW2 even though none would have experienced it themselves. One quote was 'German tanks fighting Russian tanks, we all know how that went last time'.

[weegie01]

Re the earlier conversation on combined arms or how not to use tanks.

That is a more detailed version of a comment an ex tank relative of mine made. Used properly, even the small number of Challengers will do serious damage, but the Ukrainians may struggle to deploy them due to a lack of bridging, recovery, engineering etc support. He also thought 14 was a daft number as there will always be be tanks out of combat being repaired so they need a few more just to maintain fighting strength.

Picking up another point made in this, he thought the best way to use the Challengers was in defense against Russian armoured attacks. His point was that (assuming they had proper support) they would be knocking out anything the Russians have before the Russians get in range. Of course, that requires the co-operation of the Russians, but he thought they may actually do this on the basis that they seem to beleive that numbers are enough.

Edit.
I went onto the BBC website after I had posted this. There I discovered that the UK is also sending self propelled guns, bridging and mine breaching equipment. I had not seen that before.

[TB63]

[tabascoboy]

Division in the ranks, good

[Uncle fester]

Putin vs the West on BBC 2 now. Worth watching for the interviews with various leaders and diplomats.

[Uncle fester]

No F-16's for Ukraine.

BBC News - Ukraine war: Joe Biden rules out sending F-16 fighter jets
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-64461613

[robmatic]

No F-16's for Ukraine.

BBC News - Ukraine war: Joe Biden rules out sending F-16 fighter jets
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-64461613

Surely it's inevitable though? At some point Ukraine is going to run out of Soviet planes and the parts to operate them due to combat losses and heavy usage.

[Flockwitt]

No F-16's for Ukraine.

BBC News - Ukraine war: Joe Biden rules out sending F-16 fighter jets
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-64461613

But they've got nothing against Poland or anybody else supplying F-16s to Ukraine, and the US will supply any European ally that asks for them. There's something going on there, the Poles are perfectly happy to provide them.

[Hellraiser]

It's silly buggers.

[PornDog]

Whats the story with all the Migs that Poland, East Germany, Czechs etc had? They still haven't provided them yet have they?

[dkm57]

I can see it being quite an attractive prospect For Poland etc. donate your migs to Ukraine and replace with F16s, (other modern fighters are available).

[tabascoboy]

[yermum]

Whats the story with all the Migs that Poland, East Germany, Czechs etc had? They still haven't provided them yet have they?

Poland shipped flankers as "spare parts"
https://bulgarianmilitary.com/2023/01/2 ... -in-parts/
some assembly required.

[TB63]

Fuck being a grunt these days..

[Gav]

Their demographic advantage i.e. the available pool of cannon fodder, isn't what it once was.

[Hellraiser]

So FFG has 99 ex-Danish army Leopard 1A5s in storage in Flensburg and it appears the go ahead has been given to start refurbing them. Reported that the first 20 can be ready to be transferred to Ukraine within three months.

[Hellraiser]

[tabascoboy]

[tabascoboy]

[yermum]

Interesting long ish read about the Russian fail at vuhledar

[tabascoboy]

Well they are determined to turn their country into another North Korea

[Hellraiser]

Germany has approved the export of Leopard 1A5s to Ukraine from Rheinmetall and FFG storage stocks. That is a total of 88 ex-Heer tanks at Rheinmetall and 99 ex-Danish army tanks at FFG in Flensburg.

Also looking to buy back the 15 Gepards they sold to Qatar.

[Hellraiser]

[fishfoodie]

It's almost as if the Orcs invading wasn't really a good idea, but instead was a fucking appalling bad idea & now NATO is going to gift their weapons to Ukraine, get newer stuff, & expand their military spend & NATO will get stronger & closer to the Orcs borders.

Oh; & the Orcs will kill a large percentage of their military, & destroy all the numeric advantage they'd built up over the decades.

Putin, master strategist !

[Hellraiser]

It's almost as if the Orcs invading wasn't really a good idea, but instead was a fucking appalling bad idea & now NATO is going to gift their weapons to Ukraine, get newer stuff, & expand their military spend & NATO will get stronger & closer to the Orcs borders.

Oh; & the Orcs will kill a large percentage of their military, & destroy all the numeric advantage they'd built up over the decades.

Putin, master strategist !

And kickstarting the German defence industry from a moribund state. We're probably going to end up seeing European armaments production ramping back up to Cold War levels in the next two to three years.

[Uncle fester]

[Hellraiser]

Another museum piece. Literally. The Ukrainians pulled any M-240s they are fielding out of war museums and military base exhibits.

[laurent]

Another museum piece. Literally. The Ukrainians pulled any M-240s they are fielding out of war museums and military base exhibits.

The largest common ones they got from NATO is the 120 mm

The anti aircraft + missile + radar they are getting is top notch though (SAMP-T and Thales radars).

Looks like they could get the recently decommissioned Mirage 2000C (sadly this is mostly an interceptor version)

The french Airforce is running on fumes at the moment with 24 Rafale taken out for Greece and Croatia orders will start coming in this year but that is not enough to prepare a better gift (2000-5F 2000D or rafales).

[tabascoboy]

[Blackmac]

Another museum piece. Literally. The Ukrainians pulled any M-240s they are fielding out of war museums and military base exhibits.

If it kills Russians, who cares.

[Hellraiser]

Another museum piece. Literally. The Ukrainians pulled any M-240s they are fielding out of war museums and military base exhibits.

If it kills Russians, who cares.

The unfortunate thing with these mortars is that they have a very low rate of fire, very low mobility, and are extremely vulnerable to counter-battery fire. The Soviets started mounting them on the Akatsiya chassis in the 1960s as the 2S4 Tyulpan because of these issues. Ukraine doesn't have any of those.

[weegie01]

Talking of obsolete.

When I was in the OTC at school in the early 1970s we had an armoury with 150 Lee Enfields and a lot of .303 ammunition. We also has two Brens and ammo for them. Every private school in the area had similar, the theory being that we and local veterans could put up some resistance.

What was bizarre then, and is even more in retrospect, is that we also had racks of Martini Henry breech loading rifles, plus ammo. Exactly what anyone was going to do with them is a mystery, but every single weapon was meticulously maintained.