Where Do Things End With Vlad? (h/t romad1)

[romad1]

This is an interesting thread about the modeling of this by various smart observers. 

My general comment is that we don't know how this ends but the force-on-force conflict is really starting to slide in Ukraine's favor.  That might not matter because Russia may just keep sending its kids into certain death until Putin dies.

[gehringer_2]

  On 5/15/2022 at 1:15 PM, romad1 said:

This is an interesting thread about the modeling of this by various smart observers. 

My general comment is that we don't know how this ends but the force-on-force conflict is really starting to slide in Ukraine's favor.  That might not matter because Russia may just keep sending its kids into certain death until Putin dies.

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If this were china vs Taiwan, I could see it, but the population ratio between Russia and Ukraine just isn’t great enough for Russia to overwhelm through numbers alone. 

[romad1]

  On 5/15/2022 at 1:20 PM, gehringer_2 said:

If this were china vs Taiwan, I could see it, but the population ratio between Russia and Ukraine just isn’t great enough for Russia to overwhelm through numbers alone. 

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China certainly has all the ear marks of a country willing to sacrifice a generation to capturing Taiwan.   And we don't want to underweight how hard China can hit Taiwan.  

Taiwan's poses a great logistics challenge of amphibious invasion for a non-expert country.   D-Day in Normandy was a marvel that came at the end of a steep learning curve for the Allies that benefited from strong US and British naval traditions as well as institutional experience in the Pacific, North Africa, Sicily, Italy, Dieppe, various commando raids around the periphery of Europe and even the experiences of Dunkirk and Gallipoli.  If China can overwhelm the Taiwanese, US, Australian, Japanese and maybe British air forces they will have done quite a bit of work. 

China's missile though probably won't have such terrible accuracy as the Russians have though.  There are technical reasons for that.  

Another thing that will impact combat if the US and China are fighting over Taiwan's airspace is that both will be fighting globally over Space.  You won't have as many channels on your cable when all the sats are blown up.

Edited May 15, 2022 by romad1

[gehringer_2]

  On 5/15/2022 at 1:32 PM, romad1 said:

China certainly has all the ear marks of a country willing to sacrifice a generation to capturing Taiwan.   And we don't want to underweight how hard China can hit Taiwan.  

Taiwan's poses a great logistics challenge of amphibious invasion for a non-expert country.   D-Day in Normandy was a marvel that came at the end of a steep learning curve for the Allies that benefited from strong US and British naval traditions as well as institutional experience in the Pacific, North Africa, Sicily, Italy, Dieppe, various commando raids around the periphery of Europe and even the experiences of Dunkirk and Gallipoli.  If China can overwhelm the Taiwanese, US, Australian, Japanese and maybe British air forces they will have done quite a bit of work. 

China's missile though probably won't have such terrible accuracy as the Russians have though.  There are technical reasons for that.  

Another thing that will impact combat if the US and China are fighting over Taiwan's airspace is that both will be fighting globally over Space.  You won't have as many channels on your cable when all the sats are blown up.

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I could well be wrong, but I still have more confidence in Chinese society as a whole to believe they will let Xi lead them over a cliff. To me, philosophically, we see China's draconian internal policies in terms of just being evil, but internally the Chinese leadership justifies them as being utilitarian. Xi wants to demonstrate he can *save* more lives with his Covid policies than we have in the West. Political Chaos must be suppressed in China because it is historically too deadly and bad for economic development - etc. But that's a harder logic to apply to starting a war. I think/hope there is still a difference there between that and Russia, where Europe's ancient and deep 'Glory of the Motherland' mindset can still be tapped into by a Putin to justify a war of ambition.

Edited May 15, 2022 by gehringer_2

[romad1]

Hmm

 

[romad1]

  On 5/15/2022 at 5:55 AM, Jim Cowan said:

I have just been watching some UAV videos, one UAV which on an excursion seemed to have taken out 10 Russian tanks, and, in a particularly chilling moment, put a missile down into the center of a group of people who had escaped from a disabled tank, and the blast wave got all of them.

Sitting here in North America, having watched the videos of those forlorn homesick kids that the Ukrainians captured early on, I feel very badly about the horrifying deaths of those tank crews that I am witnessing.  But if I am that UAV pilot whose home was destroyed and whose family members were killed, I want to roast as many of them as I can, I want to watch them stagger out and burn to death.

Which leads me to my question...is this the end of the era of the tank as an effective tactical weapon?  They seem to be defenseless against UAV attack.  You would have to be crazy to sign up for tank crew now, wouldn't you?

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well stated

[romad1]

  On 5/15/2022 at 1:32 PM, romad1 said:

China certainly has all the ear marks of a country willing to sacrifice a generation to capturing Taiwan.   And we don't want to underweight how hard China can hit Taiwan.  

Taiwan's poses a great logistics challenge of amphibious invasion for a non-expert country.   D-Day in Normandy was a marvel that came at the end of a steep learning curve for the Allies that benefited from strong US and British naval traditions as well as institutional experience in the Pacific, North Africa, Sicily, Italy, Dieppe, various commando raids around the periphery of Europe and even the experiences of Dunkirk and Gallipoli.  If China can overwhelm the Taiwanese, US, Australian, Japanese and maybe British air forces they will have done quite a bit of work. 

China's missile though probably won't have such terrible accuracy as the Russians have though.  There are technical reasons for that.  

Another thing that will impact combat if the US and China are fighting over Taiwan's airspace is that both will be fighting globally over Space.  You won't have as many channels on your cable when all the sats are blown up.

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Just to be a compleatist:  Macarthur's and his air force commander General Kenney in particular New Guinea to Philippines campaign was a brilliant exposition of the technical plus operational challenges overcome.   Some huge errors but overall, so much effect with less stuff than other theaters. 

[gehringer_2]

it's a good measure of the fact that the Russian regime really does not actually fear external attack from Europe that Putin seems unconcerned about sacrificing so much of his war fighting capability that he may actually leave his nation close to defenseless if NATO was really planning one. A worried leader would have disengaged by now to protect his forces if he actually thought he needed them.

And of course, at what point does he deplete them to the point where the Chechens or even the Belarusians see an exit from Russian vassalage?  Does Putin think he can trust a scumbag like Lukashenko not to turn the tables on him for his own gain if he sees enough weakness in Moscow?

Edited May 16, 2022 by gehringer_2

[1984Echoes]

  On 5/16/2022 at 12:24 AM, gehringer_2 said:

.... Does Putin think he can trust a scumbag like Lukashenko not to turn the tables on him for his own gain if he sees enough weakness in Moscow?

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If Lukashenko made any noises about NATO...

Putin would stop this insanity immediately.

Full stop.

[romad1]

  On 5/16/2022 at 12:24 AM, gehringer_2 said:

it's a good measure of the fact that the Russian regime really does not actually fear external attack from Europe that Putin seems unconcerned about sacrificing so much of his war fighting capability that he may actually leave his nation close to defenseless if NATO was really planning one. A worried leader would have disengaged by now to protect his forces if he actually thought he needed them.

And of course, at what point does he deplete them to the point where the Chechens or even the Belarusians see an exit from Russian vassalage?  Does Putin think he can trust a scumbag like Lukashenko not to turn the tables on him for his own gain if he sees enough weakness in Moscow?

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I'm tickled by the idea of the Ukrainians capturing Belgorad

[Jim Cowan]

I know Sweet FA about military strategy and tactics, never having served.  But I think I have learned a couple of things, the second of which was intuitively obvious:

(a) the Russians apparently do not have senior non-coms.  I did not know that.  I know that senior non-coms are the heart and soul of a fighting force, even though I have never been in one.

(b) the Russians think that if 1,000 tanks are good, 2,000 tanks are twice as good, and they don't need to be defended because they are invincible.   Well even I know better than that.  Tigers were invincible until Typhoons showed up with rockets.  It seemed so odd for that huge column to be sitting there last month, without an infantry company sweeping up 500 meters on each side of the road to defend against those shoulder-mounted nuisance types  And now farther east, drones are just picking them off without any defensive measures at all.  That seems to be the fatal flaw, that tanks will overwhelm and aren't vulnerable.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[romad1]

  On 5/16/2022 at 5:48 AM, Jim Cowan said:

I know Sweet FA about military strategy and tactics, never having served.  But I think I have learned a couple of things, the second of which was intuitively obvious:

(a) the Russians apparently do not have senior non-coms.  I did not know that.  I know that senior non-coms are the heart and soul of a fighting force, even though I have never been in one.

(b) the Russians think that if 1,000 tanks are good, 2,000 tanks are twice as good, and they don't need to be defended because they are invincible.   Well even I know better than that.  Tigers were invincible until Typhoons showed up with rockets.  It seemed so odd for that huge column to be sitting there last month, without an infantry company sweeping up 500 meters on each side of the road to defend against those shoulder-mounted nuisance types  And now farther east, drones are just picking them off without any defensive measures at all.  That seems to be the fatal flaw, that tanks will overwhelm and aren't vulnerable.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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In my minds eye I read this in the voice of an East London gangster from a Guy Ritchie movie.  

[Hongbit]

  On 5/16/2022 at 5:48 AM, Jim Cowan said:

I know Sweet FA about military strategy and tactics, never having served.  But I think I have learned a couple of things, the second of which was intuitively obvious:

(a) the Russians apparently do not have senior non-coms.  I did not know that.  I know that senior non-coms are the heart and soul of a fighting force, even though I have never been in one.

(b) the Russians think that if 1,000 tanks are good, 2,000 tanks are twice as good, and they don't need to be defended because they are invincible.   Well even I know better than that.  Tigers were invincible until Typhoons showed up with rockets.  It seemed so odd for that huge column to be sitting there last month, without an infantry company sweeping up 500 meters on each side of the road to defend against those shoulder-mounted nuisance types  And now farther east, drones are just picking them off without any defensive measures at all.  That seems to be the fatal flaw, that tanks will overwhelm and aren't vulnerable.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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2000 tanks need a lot of maintenance to stay operational and that’s a hard thing to do with a line of crooked military leaders each siphoning off a piece of that money into their own pockets on the way.   

[mtutiger]

 

[gehringer_2]

  On 5/16/2022 at 3:12 PM, mtutiger said:

 

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The Ukrainians seem to be banking on exactly that, planning to keep grinding up Russian units until the Russian army reaches a point of rapid collapse.

[Hongbit]

 

[romad1]

  On 5/16/2022 at 3:57 PM, Hongbit said:

 

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That is Boris from Chernobyl isn't it? 

[gehringer_2]

  On 5/16/2022 at 4:14 PM, romad1 said:

That is Boris from Chernobyl isn't it? 

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Stellan Skarsgard. Under-rated.

[romad1]

  On 5/16/2022 at 4:24 PM, gehringer_2 said:

Stellan Skarsgard. Under-rated.

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He's fantastic.   He and Emily Watson were in one of those weird Lars Trier movies together apparently.  

My son does an almost pitch perfect Boris when you ask him where he's going he replies: 

"To get you 2000 tons of sand and boron!" 

[romad1]

Magic

 

[CMRivdogs]

if true...

 

[gehringer_2]

  On 5/16/2022 at 5:40 PM, CMRivdogs said:

if true...

 

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a lot more on Russian manpower situation in this podcast

https://warontherocks.com/2022/05/counter-attacks-and-can-kicking-in-the-russo-ukrainian-war/

an interesting point Kofman details is that unlike the US Military, that trains inductees at dedicated training bases, the Russian army is structured to largely do their training inside their active divisional forces, but that means when their forces are under pressure, suffering losses, having to be reconstituted etc., the training function is pretty much 1st to be thrown overboard.

Edited May 16, 2022 by gehringer_2

[romad1]

Vote these bums out!  Putin caucus!

 

[mtutiger]

  On 5/16/2022 at 4:24 PM, gehringer_2 said:

Stellan Skarsgard. Under-rated.

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Maybe the most underrated. He's been in so much good stuff but it seems like it took Chernobyl for him to get any notice

[ewsieg]