Russia Ukraine Update Thread - part 2

* - Results of battles near Velyka Doroha village on 30-31 March: 31 pieces of military equipment seized or destroyed

* - Head of regional administration of Dnipropetrovsk region: air defense shot down 4 missiles and a drone overnight

* - Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister: The people of Mariupol will be allowed to go out in their own cars today

* - Poltava. There was a missile attack on one of the infrastructure facilities. Also many strikes in the city of Kremenchuk in Poltava region happened in the morning. Infrastructure facilities and residential buildings are damaged

* - Russian Ministry of Defense claims attacks on refinery in Kremenchuk, airfields in Dnipro and Poltava cities

* - As result of missile strike in Dnipro city overnight 3 buildings and 8 pieces of equipment were destroyed - Civil Defense

* - Russian troops kidnapped the head of Tavriysk city council Mykola Rizak

* - Kramatorsk(10:35). Red Alert: aerial threat. Sirens sounding. Take cover now!

* - Zaporizhia(10:35). Red Alert: aerial threat. Sirens sounding. Take cover now!

* - Russian troops left the town of Horodnya on 1st April, situation in the town is controlled - head of Horodnya territorial community Andriy Bohdan

* - Pokrovsk(10:45). Red Alert: aerial threat. Sirens sounding. Take cover now!

* - Russian army shelling Lysychansk with MLRS

As a reminder -

Just so people know and understand. Information from war zones can become confusing as there will no doubt be info released from the players (on both sides) involved that might not necessarily be true.

As such take everything as a possibility and NOT as absolute truth.

The very first casualty in a war is the truth and all warfare is based on deception

a reply to: paraphi


Random's last video had short drone footage of exactly that.

There is no doubt anymore, russia indiscriminately destroyed some entire cities for no apparent reason, and treated civilians horribly in some occupied areas, the only thing I don't know yet is the number of places where this occured.

Flightradar24

* - KL12 - Lockheed EP-3E Aries II Orion / US Navy - Over Romania near the Moldova border
* - PICO68 - Boeing KC-46A Pegasus / USAF - Over south east Poland
* - HOMER61 - Boeing RC-135W Rivet Joint / USAF - Patrolling Romania - Ukraine/Moldova border
* - SVF645 - Gulfstream IV / Finnish air force - Patrolling Poland - Kaliningrad/Belarus/Ukraine border
* - MMF18 - Airbus A330-243MRTT / NATO (Netherlands) - Currently over Poland
* - PC9 - Pilatus PC-9B / unknown (lith?) - over lithuania

YouTube video presentation


There is a lot to unpack in the excellent analysis, but ironically, Ukraine is copying the Soviet playbook from the Great Patriotic War. The Ukrainian people are mobilising to support the war effort, from people learning to use missile systems on the go to providing meals for soldiers.

In contrast, the Russians aren't "officially at war", and they are attempting to use a tiny element of their military and national resources to conquer Ukraine.

To what extent Putin moves Russia to a wartime footing is one of the determining factors in the outcome of the war. The other matter is if Ukraine receives enough international support to destroy the invaders.

a reply to: xpert11

There is an error with the youtube link

a reply to: xpert11

"Ukraine is copying the Soviet playbook from the Great Patriotic War"


I was thinking the same thing last night in a few ways, look forward to watching the video.

originally posted by: Xcathdra
a reply to: xpert11

There is an error with the youtube link

Thank you for letting me know and for your regular updates concerning Ukraine. I have edited my post to address the issue.

a reply to: xpert11

I somehow got the youtube link feature to work

a reply to: nugget1

At the expense of Ukraine? That's ridiculous, US is helping them and Ukraine can choose to surrender whenever they want. Do you agree about that at least? The US had zero control over starting this war and zero control when it comes to ending it. Biden isn't some kind of supervillain lol, just an old man.

a reply to: Erno86
I thought that anyone spreading their ideology or political agenda using corporate and state power with violence meets the definition of fascist ?

by replacing individual rights with social justice and equality among individuals , replacing capitalism with corporatism
and thus becoming totalitarian in nature

so technically the west meet the criteria right , most governments that engage in conflicts do
in fact didn't Mussolini predict that most governments would end up fascist ? by becoming a corporatocracy
are we not now seeing the west slowly being taken over by corporate interests directing our democratic governments
we see the rise of social justice and individual rights slipping away and we see a big push towards equality
isn't all war fascist in nature ?

it reminds me of the futurist manifesto a little and how they aligned themselves with fascism, Although I think they only did this so that they could continue producing art of any form unimpeded by the regime at the time as the regime were banning all forms of art that didnt align with their ideology in Italy.
Either way it was pretty shocking that their manifesto read like that , artists who were happy to destroy as they were to create

We want to glorify war - the only cure for the world - militarism, patriotism, the destructive gesture of the anarchists, the beautiful ideas which kill, and contempt for woman.

1 April update.

* ISW assesses that the Kremlin has revised its campaign plan in Ukraine after the failure of its initial campaign to capture Kyiv and other major Ukrainian cities and its subsequent failure to adjust its operations in late March.

* Russia’s main effort is now focused on eastern Ukraine, with two subordinate main efforts: capturing the port city of Mariupol and capturing the entirety of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts.

* The Kremlin may intend to capture Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts before seeking to negotiate a Kremlin-favorable ceasefire and claim that Russia has achieved its war aims.

More at URL above.

Cheers

One thing I read is that Russia's reserves aren't pre-organized into units? So they can't raise units that have already trained together, they'd have to start forming new units from scratch if they need more. Of course so far they've just been reinforcing the BTG's in Ukraine.

a reply to: xpert11

Excellent video with lots of good information.

originally posted by: Cutepants
One thing I read is that Russia's reserves aren't pre-organized into units? So they can't raise units that have already trained together, they'd have to start forming new units from scratch if they need more. Of course so far they've just been reinforcing the BTG's in Ukraine.

May be a mix of units and individual reservists.

The Military Balance 2021 mentions their reserves have cadre formations for 13 motor rifle brigades.

Cheers

a reply to: F2d5thCavv2

Yeah, it may have been false too I don't know, thanks. What do you think about the battalion tactical groups? I also read somewhere that they have a relatively small number of infantry compared to US regimental combat teams, and that makes them less suited for urban combat?

originally posted by: Cutepants
One thing I read is that Russia's reserves aren't pre-organized into units?

Russia's regular troops are poorly disciplined, poorly led and ill-equipped. Cannot imagine what the reserves will look like. If it gets to that, then Russia have surely lost. I mean, they have lost the war in Ukraine already, and lost it before they fired the first shot.

Russia will now be bled if they try to keep this going. Only Germany and France seem to think Ukraine should throw in the towel, and reward Russia with a peace that gives them vast swathes of land in the East.

Russia - causing misery and grief for a hundred years.

a reply to: paraphi

"Cannot imagine what the reserves will look like."

Probably be armed with a pitch fork and metal bin lid.

a reply to: Cutepants

A US Army publication in 2016 noted,

The BTGs commonly consist of a tank company, three mechanized-infantry companies, two anti-tank companies, two artillery batteries and two air-defense batteries.

Link

My thoughts--

Ugly from a command and control perspective, something like 10 formations that have to be controlled by the commander? Span of control is at best functional up to 5 or 6 subordinate formations.

They appear to have a logistical requirement that is both large in quantity (fuel, food, etc.) and complex in terms of the variety of parts and munitions that have to support a unit with many different kinds of weapons and vehicles. Not a good match for the reported fragility of the Russian logistics system.

Urban combat will reduce the strength of the mech companies. If the mech companies have BMP-2s (as an example), there are only seven squad members that dismount from those vehicles, which makes for a small squad in a casualty-intensive environment.

The apparent poor state of training of the Russian soldiers is not a good match for combined arms formations like these. Combined arms is superb when operated properly, but if the soldiers are not well trained, the various arms get separated from each other and cut up (tanks with no supporting infantry).

The impression I get is the Russian military set these up to look like battalion task forces in Western militaries, but have not trained the troops adequately to maximize the potential of these formations.

Cheers

a reply to: Xcathdra


I'm technically working from home right now and it's been a little busy so I'm still pausing my way through the video.

Very well delivered with well organized information, I already have some new brain food, and that's always top of the list for me.

The only real critiques I have right now is that he missed a couple easy opportunities to really drive home a point with the examples he was already using, and that he seems to be using very low quantities for older russian equipment, but he may be intentionally ignoring the stuff in long term storage.

Did a great job describing the organization of the current russian 'military' force options and limitations.

a reply to: paraphi

Yeah, EU countries have been too soft I'm sad to say. Germany even let a Russian company run some of their gas reserve facilities.