Russia Invades Ukraine

[Sam the Centipede]

Hit their logistics (a major Russian weak point in any case, even worse given the few ways to move material into Crimea) and they'll collapse quickly even if the defensive capabilities they're building now are world class. And it's pretty hard to imagine that they can suddenly transform from an utterly inept bunch of clowns into a world-class fighting force.

That certainly seems to be the case with logistics. Russia's military logistics are very heavily railroad-oriented. If the rails and the bridges are kaboomed then they're seriously disadvantaged. They don't have decent truck fleets, and they don't have handling equipment. Pallets are not used by the Russian military, so ammunition etc. is unloaded manually, box by box, which is labor-intensive and slooooow. Even if they were to consider adopting pallets, they don't have the appropriate forklifts to operate in messy terrain - most civilian forklifts are designed for nice flat concrete warehouse floors and docks, not for negotiating bomb-damaged ground.

The Ukrainian strategy is described by one military guru (Mick Ryan possibly, I can't remember) as "corrosion" - they attack supply lines, they destroy equipment, the blow up ammunition dumps, they set fire to fuel tanks, they wreck morale, but they try to avoid being sucked into a "we can accept more deaths than you can" conflict that seems to be the miserable basis of much Russian doctrine.

It's difficult to see how this is going to be resolved, other than by a revolution (either a palace revolution - a coup - or a popular revolution) in Russia that removes the top fascists, preferably including the death of Putin and his main henchmen. It needs the Russians to understand that Ukraine won't concede, and its neighboring allies will continue support (even if the US gets bored with this distant conflict) because they remember and fear the Soviet heel in their backs.

Of course, I am could be, and probably am, wrong.

[johnpcapitalist]

It's difficult to see how this is going to be resolved, other than by a revolution (either a palace revolution - a coup - or a popular revolution) in Russia that removes the top fascists, preferably including the death of Putin and his main henchmen. It needs the Russians to understand that Ukraine won't concede, and its neighboring allies will continue support (even if the US gets bored with this distant conflict) because they remember and fear the Soviet heel in their backs.

Putin will probably be removed from power at some point over the next year or two, but it's likely to be via some unexpected event with little warning. That's not likely to end the war, or to return Russia to participation, however unwilling, in the rules-based international order.

Unfortunately, Putin is a product of his political system, so it's likely that his replacement will be even worse in terms of incompetence, repression of the domestic population, larcenous tendencies, etc. After all, the new guy will seize power by offing the king, and there will be others who were plotting to get rid of Putin, so they'll try to topple the new guy immediately. There will have to be purges of potential rivals immediately. Because Russian power structures are so centralized (there are about 100 "siloviki" who utterly control the country), a purge of a couple dozen or more of these people will cause massive chaos in the companies that make up the backbone of the economy and the ministries needed to run the government. So things will go from bad to worse when the tsar is gone.

The longer that western sanctions remain in place, the less incentive the West has to remove them. The GDP of the US and aligned nations (EU, Japan, Australia, etc.) is about 40-50 times the GDP of Russia. We can route around the oil issue in a year or two, maybe less. So we don't need Russia all that much. And we can have very long memories for countries that have destabilized the world order -- we're still punishing Cuba for the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Sanctions will likely remain in place as an experimental laboratory in economic warfare, an art that we'll want to perfect to keep the pressure on China.

So the destiny of Russia could easily be that of North Korea: a nuclear-armed pariah that will exist in isolation. As it proceeds along that trajectory, it will have to turn military strength inwards to keep its population in line and to keep control of the East, where all the resources are located. If they want to protect Russia in its current form, they'll have to guard more against a Chinese attempt to peel off the land east of the Urals and turn that into a vassal state as it did with Mongolia for many years. There could easily be other internal conflicts that make the Chechen wars look like bar fights, as other populations try to become independent, especially after they've been turned into cannon fodder in Ukraine far more often than ethnic Russians.

[Gregg]

Putin will be overthrown by a sect who gets fed up with him going so easy on Ukraine. The viable resistance is to his authoritarian right, not left.

Then after that faction in fact lets a large army in Ukraine get destroyed rather than let it tactically retreat, a group of Generals who know better, who are now Majors and Lt Colonels in fact and become Generals by attrition, will finally get fed up, topple the Fascists in charge and save what is left of the Russian military. The triggering event my very likely be someone telling them to start tossing nukes.

I dunno if it will happen that way, but that's how Thomas Clancy would write it.

[Dave from down under]

Putin will be overthrown by a sect who gets fed up with him going so easy on Ukraine. The viable resistance is to his authoritarian right, not left.

Then after that faction in fact lets a large army in Ukraine get destroyed rather than let it tactically retreat, a group of Generals who know better, who are now Majors and Lt Colonels in fact and become Generals by attrition, will finally get fed up, topple the Fascists in charge and save what is left of the Russian military. The triggering event my very likely be someone telling them to start tossing nukes.

I dunno if it will happen that way, but that's how Thomas Clancy would write it.

Before he died.. he would have written it with Putin as the hero..

[Gregg]

Off Topic

Yeah, I knew he was dead. I used to think he was pretty damned smart to have figured out so many things that were actually true but no one could confirm or deny. There were things he wrote about the military that were pretty insightful for someone who had never served.

Turns out he was the insurance agent of half the people who worked at the Pentagon, CIA and Ft Meade. He was basically retelling stories his clients had told him ''off the record''. As his books sold more, he went a lot more fictional situations but the insight was spot on.

Red Storm Rising, his not Jack Ryan book, could have been written by the faculty of the Army War College (or maybe not, now that I know Mastriano taught there I am a lot less impressed). I think the truth is it might have been.

[neeneko]

Putin will be overthrown by a sect who gets fed up with him going so easy on Ukraine. The viable resistance is to his authoritarian right, not left.

Even if Putin is overthrown by a group who want to end the war, I suspect it will boomerang back in a decade or two. Putin has built such a cult of personality, and invested so much social capital in this invasion, that it sets up some kind of 'follow me, I can do what Putin could not and remove this embarrassment on our honor!' hawk down the line. Crushing failure tends to lead to resentment and romanization, which are tools of power. Ukraine is gonna be looking over its shoulder for a generation or two.

[Foggy]

I think that's prescient, neeneko.

[Dr. Ken]

https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/16 ... orld-war-3

I was sent this. Not sure about the source but this might be a provocation of nato since Poland is a member

[Dr. Ken]

Abcnews now has a report
https://abcnews.go.com/International/li ... d=88905005

[Dr. Ken]

[Dr. Ken]

[Dave from down under]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-16/ ... /101658346

Ukraine-Russia war live: Poland convenes urgent meeting after reports Russian missiles hit its territory

Poland's foreign ministry has summoned the Russian ambassador
In a statement, the Polish foreign ministry said a Russian-produced rocket fell on the Polish village of Przewodow, near the Ukrainian border, at 3:40 pm local time.

Russia's defence ministry has denied reports it was a stray missile, and speaking earlier, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he had no information on the explosion.

Poland's ministry said Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau summoned the Russian ambassador and “demanded immediate detailed explanations.”

Separately, the White House says Polish President Andrzej Duda spoke to US President Joe Biden about Poland's ongoing assessment of the explosion.

[MN-Skeptic]

Russia's defence ministry has denied reports it was a stray missile, and speaking earlier, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he had no information on the explosion.

So the Polish village was its intended target?

[Dave from down under]

Russia's defence ministry has denied reports it was a stray missile, and speaking earlier, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he had no information on the explosion.

So the Polish village was its intended target?

well.. when you put it that way....

IIRC the Russians are claiming it wasn't one of there missiles,, because... ummm... it musta been someone elses... or sumthang.

[W. Kevin Vicklund]

Putin to throw Lukashenko under the tank in 3..2..1..

[Gregg]

Russia's defence ministry has denied reports it was a stray missile, and speaking earlier, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he had no information on the explosion.

So the Polish village was its intended target?

well.. when you put it that way....

IIRC the Russians are claiming it wasn't one of there missiles,, because... ummm... it musta been someone elses... or sumthang.

It might have been an accidently on purpose kind of thing. Russia saying "you don't know what might happen if you don't get your friends to surrender".

Militarily, after what we have seen so far, it should take NATO round about a week to entrap Russia's army. If they want war, they have to know that their Army in Ukraine and that bridge that he's so proud of both exist at the pleasure of the NATO Commander. And all this without setting foot on Russian soil but making it very plain that Russia is standing there in a towel in front of an angry NATO with a gun in their face.

The Russians are afraid, rightly so, to put too many fighters over Ukraine now, what do they think a whole generation of US Air Force Pilots eager to show they can do better than the ones in 1991 did in Iraq? Russia will be flying MIGs to North Korea to keep them safe if they make NATO mad.

Or so one would think. Hubris though has defeated more armies than spears and guns have.

[Gupwalla]

Biden just made a statement to the press pool condemning the series of bombings Russia launched during the G20 meetings.

He said that some preliminary evidence on the Poland missiles, including an analysis of the trajectory, suggested the missiles might not have come from Russia. He did not go into anything further, except to say the US was committed to supplying Ukraine with the means to defend itself.

Just my speculation here, but it’s possible the missiles originated in Belarus. It would be on brand of Putin to test the limits of NATO and MAD escalation doctrine from someone else’s back yard. But again, that’s my speculation.

Edit to add: in Trump’s speech tonight, he blamed the Poland missiles on “Russia probably.” I don’t know if he has actual sources for that or if he’s just engaging mouth before brain.

[W. Kevin Vicklund]

Depending on where in Belarus you launch from, the flight path to Lviv could pass right over the town that was hit. It would take just a few degrees off target from Minsk (central Belarus) to hit it.

[Mr brolin]

It APPEARS based on the limited amount of information around, that the missile, whilst of Russian make and possible manufacture is of a build sold to a pretty wide selection of players in the region, including the Ukraine, from back in the day.

When the TYPE is identified, Surface to Surface, Air to Surface, Surface to Air (anti-missile missile), Air to Air (anti-aircraft or anti missile) then we may get a better understanding of what actually happened.

The thing is, it's in a weird location for a missile to be deliberately aimed at, either on the Polish or Ukraine side.

There really isn't anything there of military or civilian significance in the area (either side of the border), no power plant, no sewage, no major conurbations, no military bases (that are apparent), airfields etc etc. The closest city is Lviv which is about 100 clicks south.

Its about 900 clicks from Kharkiv which is roughly the closest Russian held area where a surface to surface missile could be launched and to reach that far it would really have to be either an air launched or surface launched cruise missile. Anything missile based with that range would have to be a ballistic missile and a launch like that would probably set of a LOT of bells and alarms as it would be something captured by the nuclear launch monitoring systems in place.

The flight time and distance would also TEND to posit that the weapon, if fired from outside of the Ukraine would have had to come from Belarus.

My WAG (Wild Assed Guess) is that this was either a missile aimed at Lviv or close, that was launched from Belarus and went off course or same that was intercepted by Ukrainian Surface to Air missiles and one of their SAM's missed and overshot.

WAG worth every penny you paid for it........

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Przew ... 23.9341284

[keith]

Shoulda been the introductory post to this thread...

[/media]

[Gupwalla]

Biden just made a statement to the press pool condemning the series of bombings Russia launched during the G20 meetings.

He said that some preliminary evidence on the Poland missiles, including an analysis of the trajectory, suggested the missiles might not have come from Russia.

News out of Brussels/NATO this morning is that the preliminary assessment is that these were air defense missiles, or fragments thereof, from Ukrainian missile defense systems (of Soviet/Russian make) and they are possibly the unfortunate and unintended result of Ukraine trying to defend from Russia’s missile barrage.

Stoltenberg lays ultimate blame on Russia even in that scenario - if Russia hadn’t been firing missiles, Ukraine wouldn’t have activated its missile defenses - but does not, for now, think this incident represents a security threat to NATO.

Ukraine is cooperating with the ongoing investigation and has requested access to the site for its own investigation.

These are preliminary findings. The investigation is ongoing. NATO urges caution and patience until the issue can be resolved to a greater certainty.

[John Thomas8]

Indirect fallout:

[RTH10260]

As for Europe, I don't believe there will be pressure upon the governments to collapse their support for the Ukraine. Depending the sources gas reserves may just last thru winter, regional restrictions may apply. I understand that technically the supply would be guaranteed by liquified gas transport by sea. The restriction is that there are only a limited number of ports prepared to offload liquified gas in general, and specially the number of regazification plants is a problem, they would need to be at locations to feed into the European gas network.

[Volkonski]

Ukraine’s Drone Boats Are Winning The Black Sea Naval War

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2 ... 3f99004fc5

An apparent Ukrainian drone-boat strike on Novorossiysk, a hundred miles from Russian-occupied Crimea in southern Russia, should sound the alarm in Sevastopol, the Crimean headquarters of the Russian navy’s beleaguered Black Sea Fleet.



The first sign the Ukrainians were acquiring drone boats came in September, when one of the robotic craft washed ashore near Sevastopol.

A month later, identical drone boats struck the Russian Black Sea Fleet’s home port of Sevastopol, in occupied Crimea. Fragmentary videos painted a confusing picture. Near-misses. Explosions.

It’s possible the drone boats struck the new Black Sea Fleet flagship Makarov. It also is possible the Russians prevented a catastrophic strike. In either case, it was clear that the Black Sea Fleet no longer was safe in the western Black Sea, even while in port.

[Chilidog]