I agree with nearly all you wrote, only extra thing I'll add is that I listened to M Kofman on the War on The Rocks podcast where he outlined that only a fraction of RU mil combat power had been committed, no air force so far, so the UKR are only resisting initial probing attacks. Anecdotes of failures are being portrayed in media as widespread issues when untrue. RU mil not following doctrine of arty/fires etc
..Think of an anaconda enveloping its prey and slowly squeezing the life out of it...the idea is to have something left o the people and infrastructure...not a Mosul or Aleppo. The neo-nazi/nationalist elements are many...they control civilian exodus from the population centers in which they hide (human shields anyone... who are shot by their countrymen when they try to flee?) and since the ROE for the RAF stipulate civilian life is "sacred", and to try and spare "regular" UAF (as opposed to the crazy racist ones); they are avoiding going all in. (Except Mariupol where the Azov (ultras) HQ is located...there they will hunt them down to the last crazy). I think we'd see far more UAF surrendering if not for the embedded "ultranationalist blockers" embedded throughout the units. The country is literally held hostage by the crazies who swept the Maidan Revolution of Dignity into disaster and despair. Has anyone really wondered about how "all the horrible civilian deaths" are counted in hundreds after almost 3 weeks (extremely low if you believe the press) and many caused by Ukrainian factions themselves. The earliest apartment building that was hit in Kiev was hit by a Ukrainian Buk that missed it's intended target! Consider the 14,000 (conservatively counted) civilian deaths in the Donbas inflicted by the Ukie gov't over the past 8 years...do their lives mean nothing?
"...probing attacks..." Hard to grasp that 130K+ KIA and 150K+ of WIA as "probing"? Given Ru losses in WWII, perhaps that's part for the course. Expended Ru arty/fires also seem to suggest a volume that goes beyond "probing" as well.
In you opinion, do those nicely drawn red areas on the maps represent areas of Russian control or do they just represent the invasion routes and lines of communication currently used by the Russians?
Thanks, most refreshing to see a military man look at this situation and size it up. It seems to me there are two principal strategic objectives: cut off Ukrainian Army elements in Donbas (their crack troops) from retreat to Kiev, and, subject Kiev and other major cities to siege warfare.
Note, Ukrainian air is non-existent since D-1. Lights are on in Kiev and, apparently, all the major Ukrainian cities. Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant was secured on D-1 (most of Crimea gets water from the reservoir, which is not deep because the dam is run-of-river type). Mariupol, steel center, is secured. Ukraine forces there were the genuine Nazi types, horrible soldiers, covered in tats, basically MS-13, Einsatzgruppen types.
Russians don't want to destroy Ukraine. They want to use Ukraine as a buffer against the Franco-Germans, who have a long history of marching east. Note, Germany announces rearmament . . . snarky remark stifled.
Arming Ukrainian civilians was a horribly cynical move, to get them killed so they would make good propaganda pictures. Hamas does this, also ANTIFA, BLM, and drug dealers. The same Euro-American Fascist element controlling Ukraine through Zelensky . . . and getting a foretaste of their just desserts there.
FWIW, the electronics of this campaign intrigue me. I think we have entered a new era of war fighting, comparable in scale and consequence to the US Civil War Between The States doing the same. This one will be studied carefully for clues as to battle-space viability. I think it shows that viability continuing on the trajectory of small, fast, decentralized, and simple.
The IO is so massive as to nearly subdue one's patience. It's order of battle on the ground, of course, that is the real weapon. Soros used the Zelensky cohort to run IO storms against POTUS Trump.
Heavy armor is out (Javelines, which can also hit choppers). Choppers are out (MANPADS). Complex signaling is out. Capital ships are out. Air superiority fighters and possibly bombers are out. Light, very fast and no armor is in (battle-space Ferraris, but not bespoke). Cyber is in . . . until units and equipment get so simple cyber cannot reach them, or can reach them only marginally. Simplifying signally is in, will take some creative thinking. Expect paper and boots on clutches and accelerators to play a part. Massed small air transport and ground support are in, including drones. Massed under-, on-, and over-water drones, along with massed destroyers, frigates, and fast attack-and-run boats are in.
No nuclear-fired propulsion. Shoot, I can see the day when wind-propulsion of wooden ships have a role in US Navy and Marine operations. To escape or at least mitigate the ubiquitous fires by cyber. Cyber is long-range arty, very hot and very effective.
Carriers are huge nuclear and thermobaric bombs waiting for someone to ride in on a piggybacked radio wave, and blow the monster up. No ports will want that danger. US Army has not fielded a MANPAD for ten or twenty years. Javelines and MANADS CIA gave Ukraine are 30 years old. But they work if they have batteries and skilled hands to operate them. Russians and Chinese have made two or three new generations of anti-armor and anti-air weaponry over those 30 years. Main battle tanks, self-propelled fires, and APCs are battlefield waste waiting to happen. Ditto choppers. And ditto capital ships.
These are points of an AAR I at least would offer in the the wake of this action in Ukraine. I think the Russians have gone very easy on the Ukrainians, so far. They could have leveled the country the way Obama leveled the ancient, beautiful section of Mosul at the end of his rule. They do not want to rule the country -- what would be the point of that masochism? -- just have it neutral as between NATO (WEF, Franco-Germany) and Russia. It's all very simple. The Davoisie must be kicked out of the house.
There is a lot in this I am unsure I agree with but unmanned platforms I completely agree with. Cyber will be in for a while and will increasingly be used as a weapon against the will of other countries as well as in actual warfare. Weapons in space are undoubtedly the next frontier. For now though, every regional environment and opponent brings about a different mix of assets needed. Carriers are still useful but the utility against risk ratio is shrinking fast.
For Ukraine, I presume they will soon run out of enough javelins even if they still find brave warriors to use them. I don't see how we can get more weapons to the front. The Russians have already conducted war crimes with thermobarics and cluster weapons. The more frustrated they get the tougher they will become.
Though I am sure there has been some corruption, there is a lot to admire about the Ukrainian people and how they have fought. Zelensky looks like the real deal to me. Countries can be built on such leaders, if he somehow survives. Russia will be forced to withdraw but it may take a year or two and they will keep much of eastern Ukraine. In the meantime we need to bolster the NATO countries on the Belarus and Russian border.
Clearly age does not always confer wisdom, Reverend Wingnut. "They do not want to rule the country ... just have it neutral"
No, they want a weak rump state on their border, that they control, that they keep weak, like Belarus, without having to govern and deal with the obligations - financial and otherwise - pursuant thereto.
Separately, as for your mention of this ridiculous anti-Trump, Soros-Zelensky cabal conspiracy you've dreamed up. A self-gratifying illusion born in a rancid political mindset. And Black Lives Matter, btw. Deal with it.
Something like Finland, perhaps? I myself cannot read minds, but I am pretty sure that one thing the Russians will NOT tolerate is Ukraine as a member of NATO. I think they have proved that. And yet supposedly intelligent and competent folks seem hell-bent on getting Ukraine into NATO. The very idea of a neutral Ukraine seems to be anathema to a lot of folks. I am convinced there are some people, the Norwegian head of NATO for one, who won't be happy until NATO (i.e. US) tanks are rolling through Red Square..
Pretty dark Sal. I think we could, with all the players helping as they have been in the last week at least, break the Russian economy in a year or two and create the conditions for a change of government by the Russians themselves. Only China can keep the regime running, if they choose to do so, and that would be a drain. We need to do all we can do break our addiction to (still relatively) cheap Chinese goods and hold them accountable for the many illegal things they do.
Closest thing to level analysis I have seen. But people are still refusing to acknowledge that Zelensky had at least 2 weeks of notice and refused evacuate civilians and refused to mobilize the country. And now most of Ukraines best forces are stuck in a Russian cauldron in eastern ukraine.
Stalin had far more than 2 weeks notice that Hitler was coming for him in June 1941 and refused to believe. He even shot some of the intelligence people who brought him the information. Willful blindness is hard to get by. In Zelensky's case I'm betting intelligence he was getting from the West was telling him it wasn't going to happen until it did.
War on the Rocks, bless their enthusiastic hard work, seems to have no idea what the real strength of RFA was before Ukraine - weak, and now its weaker still. Bulk of the fighting is being done by Donbass troops and Wagner; Donbass doesn't went to fight anymore. As for Wagner, there are always testosterone-hyped young men to volunteer. Ukraine has doubled the number of brigades from 20 to 50, and overall from 200,000 men to 500,000. You are right, RFA have made net gains on Eastern front, if you use a kilometer grid and think of a fotograph in time. But they also keep losing ground in the East, which they recover and lose again, and are losing ground in the South. Agreed it will be a long fight. But look, Ukraine is causing Russia incredible grief in Crimea, which I certainly did not expect. The area in a state of war has increased, not to Russia's advantage. NATO knew as far back as the early 1980s (if not earlier) that RFA (then the USSR) was in terrible shape. It couldn't say so because US was trying to keep NATO on task. Also, the endemic problems of USSR forces COULD, in theory, be remedied in 2-years. Russia has degenerated well below Soviet standards - which were never high to begin with.
But - in line with Cdr. Salamander warnings not to get complacent, NATO could at any time go so wobbly it cant get out of its chair, and with the US, you just never know when the ADD hits and we go on to something else. There is a strong element in US decision-making circles that (incredibly) Ukraine should give land for peace. It is a minority, but its there. Things within US can change overnight.
BTW, we often talk about RFA's inability to fill its ranks. But what about us? With a population of 330-million we cant get up even to a 500,000 person army.
That map was as of March, 2022. Didn't they have anything more current and accurate? Surely the situation has changed in the year+ since the map. I am pretty sure the Russians are no longer on the outskirts of Kiev.
I agree with nearly all you wrote, only extra thing I'll add is that I listened to M Kofman on the War on The Rocks podcast where he outlined that only a fraction of RU mil combat power had been committed, no air force so far, so the UKR are only resisting initial probing attacks. Anecdotes of failures are being portrayed in media as widespread issues when untrue. RU mil not following doctrine of arty/fires etc
..Think of an anaconda enveloping its prey and slowly squeezing the life out of it...the idea is to have something left o the people and infrastructure...not a Mosul or Aleppo. The neo-nazi/nationalist elements are many...they control civilian exodus from the population centers in which they hide (human shields anyone... who are shot by their countrymen when they try to flee?) and since the ROE for the RAF stipulate civilian life is "sacred", and to try and spare "regular" UAF (as opposed to the crazy racist ones); they are avoiding going all in. (Except Mariupol where the Azov (ultras) HQ is located...there they will hunt them down to the last crazy). I think we'd see far more UAF surrendering if not for the embedded "ultranationalist blockers" embedded throughout the units. The country is literally held hostage by the crazies who swept the Maidan Revolution of Dignity into disaster and despair. Has anyone really wondered about how "all the horrible civilian deaths" are counted in hundreds after almost 3 weeks (extremely low if you believe the press) and many caused by Ukrainian factions themselves. The earliest apartment building that was hit in Kiev was hit by a Ukrainian Buk that missed it's intended target! Consider the 14,000 (conservatively counted) civilian deaths in the Donbas inflicted by the Ukie gov't over the past 8 years...do their lives mean nothing?
"...probing attacks..." Hard to grasp that 130K+ KIA and 150K+ of WIA as "probing"? Given Ru losses in WWII, perhaps that's part for the course. Expended Ru arty/fires also seem to suggest a volume that goes beyond "probing" as well.
Test
In you opinion, do those nicely drawn red areas on the maps represent areas of Russian control or do they just represent the invasion routes and lines of communication currently used by the Russians?
Best objective analysis I've read to date
St. Michael, pray for Ukraine and us.
Great Analysis
Thanks, most refreshing to see a military man look at this situation and size it up. It seems to me there are two principal strategic objectives: cut off Ukrainian Army elements in Donbas (their crack troops) from retreat to Kiev, and, subject Kiev and other major cities to siege warfare.
Note, Ukrainian air is non-existent since D-1. Lights are on in Kiev and, apparently, all the major Ukrainian cities. Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant was secured on D-1 (most of Crimea gets water from the reservoir, which is not deep because the dam is run-of-river type). Mariupol, steel center, is secured. Ukraine forces there were the genuine Nazi types, horrible soldiers, covered in tats, basically MS-13, Einsatzgruppen types.
Russians don't want to destroy Ukraine. They want to use Ukraine as a buffer against the Franco-Germans, who have a long history of marching east. Note, Germany announces rearmament . . . snarky remark stifled.
Arming Ukrainian civilians was a horribly cynical move, to get them killed so they would make good propaganda pictures. Hamas does this, also ANTIFA, BLM, and drug dealers. The same Euro-American Fascist element controlling Ukraine through Zelensky . . . and getting a foretaste of their just desserts there.
FWIW, the electronics of this campaign intrigue me. I think we have entered a new era of war fighting, comparable in scale and consequence to the US Civil War Between The States doing the same. This one will be studied carefully for clues as to battle-space viability. I think it shows that viability continuing on the trajectory of small, fast, decentralized, and simple.
The IO is so massive as to nearly subdue one's patience. It's order of battle on the ground, of course, that is the real weapon. Soros used the Zelensky cohort to run IO storms against POTUS Trump.
Heavy armor is out (Javelines, which can also hit choppers). Choppers are out (MANPADS). Complex signaling is out. Capital ships are out. Air superiority fighters and possibly bombers are out. Light, very fast and no armor is in (battle-space Ferraris, but not bespoke). Cyber is in . . . until units and equipment get so simple cyber cannot reach them, or can reach them only marginally. Simplifying signally is in, will take some creative thinking. Expect paper and boots on clutches and accelerators to play a part. Massed small air transport and ground support are in, including drones. Massed under-, on-, and over-water drones, along with massed destroyers, frigates, and fast attack-and-run boats are in.
No nuclear-fired propulsion. Shoot, I can see the day when wind-propulsion of wooden ships have a role in US Navy and Marine operations. To escape or at least mitigate the ubiquitous fires by cyber. Cyber is long-range arty, very hot and very effective.
Carriers are huge nuclear and thermobaric bombs waiting for someone to ride in on a piggybacked radio wave, and blow the monster up. No ports will want that danger. US Army has not fielded a MANPAD for ten or twenty years. Javelines and MANADS CIA gave Ukraine are 30 years old. But they work if they have batteries and skilled hands to operate them. Russians and Chinese have made two or three new generations of anti-armor and anti-air weaponry over those 30 years. Main battle tanks, self-propelled fires, and APCs are battlefield waste waiting to happen. Ditto choppers. And ditto capital ships.
These are points of an AAR I at least would offer in the the wake of this action in Ukraine. I think the Russians have gone very easy on the Ukrainians, so far. They could have leveled the country the way Obama leveled the ancient, beautiful section of Mosul at the end of his rule. They do not want to rule the country -- what would be the point of that masochism? -- just have it neutral as between NATO (WEF, Franco-Germany) and Russia. It's all very simple. The Davoisie must be kicked out of the house.
There is a lot in this I am unsure I agree with but unmanned platforms I completely agree with. Cyber will be in for a while and will increasingly be used as a weapon against the will of other countries as well as in actual warfare. Weapons in space are undoubtedly the next frontier. For now though, every regional environment and opponent brings about a different mix of assets needed. Carriers are still useful but the utility against risk ratio is shrinking fast.
For Ukraine, I presume they will soon run out of enough javelins even if they still find brave warriors to use them. I don't see how we can get more weapons to the front. The Russians have already conducted war crimes with thermobarics and cluster weapons. The more frustrated they get the tougher they will become.
Though I am sure there has been some corruption, there is a lot to admire about the Ukrainian people and how they have fought. Zelensky looks like the real deal to me. Countries can be built on such leaders, if he somehow survives. Russia will be forced to withdraw but it may take a year or two and they will keep much of eastern Ukraine. In the meantime we need to bolster the NATO countries on the Belarus and Russian border.
Clearly age does not always confer wisdom, Reverend Wingnut. "They do not want to rule the country ... just have it neutral"
No, they want a weak rump state on their border, that they control, that they keep weak, like Belarus, without having to govern and deal with the obligations - financial and otherwise - pursuant thereto.
Separately, as for your mention of this ridiculous anti-Trump, Soros-Zelensky cabal conspiracy you've dreamed up. A self-gratifying illusion born in a rancid political mindset. And Black Lives Matter, btw. Deal with it.
Are you a spook?
"Are you married? Are you rich? Answer the second question first." - Groucho Marx
I am not rich.
"No, they want..."
Something like Finland, perhaps? I myself cannot read minds, but I am pretty sure that one thing the Russians will NOT tolerate is Ukraine as a member of NATO. I think they have proved that. And yet supposedly intelligent and competent folks seem hell-bent on getting Ukraine into NATO. The very idea of a neutral Ukraine seems to be anathema to a lot of folks. I am convinced there are some people, the Norwegian head of NATO for one, who won't be happy until NATO (i.e. US) tanks are rolling through Red Square..
Pretty dark Sal. I think we could, with all the players helping as they have been in the last week at least, break the Russian economy in a year or two and create the conditions for a change of government by the Russians themselves. Only China can keep the regime running, if they choose to do so, and that would be a drain. We need to do all we can do break our addiction to (still relatively) cheap Chinese goods and hold them accountable for the many illegal things they do.
"create the conditions for a change of government"
And you think that is a definite good thing because.....?
As I recall, the Germans tried for the same thing in 1917.
Closest thing to level analysis I have seen. But people are still refusing to acknowledge that Zelensky had at least 2 weeks of notice and refused evacuate civilians and refused to mobilize the country. And now most of Ukraines best forces are stuck in a Russian cauldron in eastern ukraine.
Stalin had far more than 2 weeks notice that Hitler was coming for him in June 1941 and refused to believe. He even shot some of the intelligence people who brought him the information. Willful blindness is hard to get by. In Zelensky's case I'm betting intelligence he was getting from the West was telling him it wasn't going to happen until it did.
War on the Rocks, bless their enthusiastic hard work, seems to have no idea what the real strength of RFA was before Ukraine - weak, and now its weaker still. Bulk of the fighting is being done by Donbass troops and Wagner; Donbass doesn't went to fight anymore. As for Wagner, there are always testosterone-hyped young men to volunteer. Ukraine has doubled the number of brigades from 20 to 50, and overall from 200,000 men to 500,000. You are right, RFA have made net gains on Eastern front, if you use a kilometer grid and think of a fotograph in time. But they also keep losing ground in the East, which they recover and lose again, and are losing ground in the South. Agreed it will be a long fight. But look, Ukraine is causing Russia incredible grief in Crimea, which I certainly did not expect. The area in a state of war has increased, not to Russia's advantage. NATO knew as far back as the early 1980s (if not earlier) that RFA (then the USSR) was in terrible shape. It couldn't say so because US was trying to keep NATO on task. Also, the endemic problems of USSR forces COULD, in theory, be remedied in 2-years. Russia has degenerated well below Soviet standards - which were never high to begin with.
But - in line with Cdr. Salamander warnings not to get complacent, NATO could at any time go so wobbly it cant get out of its chair, and with the US, you just never know when the ADD hits and we go on to something else. There is a strong element in US decision-making circles that (incredibly) Ukraine should give land for peace. It is a minority, but its there. Things within US can change overnight.
BTW, we often talk about RFA's inability to fill its ranks. But what about us? With a population of 330-million we cant get up even to a 500,000 person army.
My apologies - its 40 UA brigades, not 50 - slip of the finger.
As for the Russian anaconda, its so constipated it cant do the anaconda thing.
So there are no answers to the Ru model of mass formations and highly inefficient logistical support located beyond the reach of PGMs?
That map was as of March, 2022. Didn't they have anything more current and accurate? Surely the situation has changed in the year+ since the map. I am pretty sure the Russians are no longer on the outskirts of Kiev.
My apologies. I am now in May, 2023. I just noticed that this article is from Mar 2022.
Hindsight is certainly 20/20.
In the immortal words of Emily Litella; "Never mind".