Russia-Ukraine War - News and Developments

[jamahir]

Americans can't afford healthcare but always have money for wars ?

700+ billion dollars just for 2020-21.

 

[WotTen]

True story is that european nations have been figting among eachother since time immeorable. Ww1 and WW2 is just continuiation of that pattern.

The question is what stops rest of the world from catching up and becoming dominant like the west did? Western europe historically wasnt that advanced or central to world as it slowly became during past 500 years .

Westerners evolved to look past their religious and ethnic differences and realized that cooperation was more fruitful.

Muslims are still obsessed with ethnic and religious differences. Many Muslim countries live in the past and want to recreate historical empires by conquering or dominating other Muslim neighbors.

And I say this as a Muslim.

 

[WotTen]

The reasons for the Crusades was of course because the Muslims invaded Eastern Rome. Then the Muslims continued and tried to invade Western/Central Europe.

The reason for the Crusades was that unemployed knights were busy terrorizing European neighborhoods, and local thugs with too much time on their hands were squabbling each other, so Pope Urban II decided to send them all to to a far off land so they could not cause mischief in Europe.

 

[A.P. Richelieu]

Says the man who keeps bringing up libya and Iraq in a thread about Russia and Ukraine. Seems you like to derail even when people aren't speaking to you. Hope they're paying you for this.


Religion was a massive factor, many christians did Pilgrimage and thought they were doing God's bidding when they massacred all those women and children. Yes, some were advantageous who did it for worldly wealth. Opportunistic behaviour is a well known western cultural trait, after all.

Basel bringing up Iraq and Libya.

Someone you might be familiar with bringing up the Crusades…

The reason for the Crusades was that unemployed knights were busy terrorizing European neighborhoods, and local thugs with too much time on their hands were squabbling each other, so Pope Urban II decided to send them all to to a far off land so they could not cause mischief in Europe.

The reason for the Crusades was that the rules for pilgrimage to Jerusalem changed.
That was the final straw.

Saddam's decision to sell oil in EUR instead of USD was the, uh, legality of Gulf War II.

 

[Paul2]

When is this DAMN war going to end? When it started, PDF members were given timeline 5-6 weeks.
Russia has no clear objective. What is the point of killing and destroying everyday. Putin should stop this war immediately. Give chance to Ukraine to act Russian demands. Russia can attack anytime if Ukraine don't follow/obey those demands.

My prediction: once Russians cross 1 more field army worth of losses, they will be ordered to wrap up the assault formation, and go into 100% defensive, and holding territory at any cost, and extra losses.

But once losses cross another field army worth of bodies, they will start routing.

 

[Hydration]

Is this verified?

i do not know but if it is true then imagine the ones who already escaped. we might find the CIA head in ukraine next lol

 

[gambit]

The mainstream media finally got around to acknowledging what air force types like meself have been saying for weeks -- that the VKS sucks and its suckness IS THE MAIN CAUSE of the shittiness of the war.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/05/russian-military-air-force-failure-ukraine/629803/

Now, I understand that 'theatlantic' is a paywall site with limited free article access, so am just going to quote relevant passages from the article written by Phillips O'Brien and Edward Stringer:

Phillips Payson O’Brien is a professor of strategic studies at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. He is the author of How the War Was Won: Air-Sea Power and Allied Victory in World War II. Edward Stringer is a retired Royal Air Force air marshal and a senior fellow at Policy Exchange.​

To start off...

Airpower should have been one of Russia’s greatest advantages over Ukraine. With almost 4,000 combat aircraft and extensive experience bombing targets in Syria, Georgia, and Chechnya, Russia’s air force was expected to play a vital role in the invasion, allowing the Russian army to plunge deep into Ukraine, seize Kyiv, and destroy the Ukrainian military. But more than two months into the war, Vladimir Putin’s air force is still fighting for control of the skies.​

​

The Russian air force’s failure is perhaps the most important, but least discussed, story of the military conflict so far.​

I said this several hundreds pages ago. There is no 'perhaps' about this failure. The VKS was THE point of failure.

In the history of war, there are always points of no return, meaning if a military does not possess this <something> the odds of losing a war trespass greater than 50/50. The horse, the bow and arrow, gunpowder, or the tank, just to name a few. But of all these points of no return, the greatest of them all is the ability to attack from the 3rd dimension. Make no mistake about this, it is not about throwing a spear or using the catapult to lob a rock. These things are sort of 'attacks' from the 3rd dimension, but they are of limited range and flexibility. The weapons of/from the 3rd dimension are the airplane and submarine.

Airpower is potentially decisive in any war, but difficult to wield effectively. Air forces are dependent on an array of technologies that require highly trained personnel who can quickly set up what amounts to an airborne military ecosystem: airborne radar stations to provide command and control, fighters to protect and police the skies, refueling aircraft to keep everyone full of gas, electronic-warfare planes to keep enemy defenses suppressed, and a range of intelligence-gatherers and attack aircraft to locate and destroy enemy forces. These sorts of combined operations involve hundreds of aircraft and thousands of people in a tightly choreographed dance that takes a lifetime to master. But when managed correctly, these overlapping operations allow a military to dominate the skies, making life much easier for the ground or naval forces below.​

​

Unfortunately for the Russians, the recent modernization of the Russian air force, although intended to enable it to conduct modern combined operations, was mostly for show. The Russians wasted money and effort on corruption and inefficiency. Though much was made of the flashy new equipment, such as the much-hyped SU-34 strike aircraft, the Russian air force continues to suffer from flawed logistics operations and the lack of regular, realistic training. Above all, the autocratic Russian kleptocracy does not trust low-ranking and middle-ranking officers, and so cannot allow the imaginative, flexible decision making that NATO air forces rely upon.​

Having the weapon is 1/2 of the equation. Knowing how to wield it is the other 1/2. Unfortunately, the VKS is the first 1/2 and not the second 1/2. It is now clear the VKS is mostly an airshow air force.

Instead of working to control the skies, Russia’s air force has mostly provided air support to ground troops or bombed Ukrainian cities. In this it has followed the traditional tactics of a continental power that privileges land forces.​

​

“Russia has never fully appreciated the use of airpower beyond support to ground forces,” David A. Deptula, a retired U.S. Air Force lieutenant general, told us. “As a result, Russia, in all its wars, has never conceived of or run a strategic air campaign.”​

It means the VKS is what other Western air forces said in the past, and that I repeated here, that the Russian military view airpower, or at least Russian airpower, as little more than 'airborne artillery'. It means the VKS is independent only in name but not in doctrines. It also means against NATO airpower, the VKS would have been dead on day one, like how the Iraqi Air Force was back in Desert Storm.

Russian aircraft are instead left flying their straightforward missions, many of which use single aircraft without the mutual support from combined air operations that would be expected in an advanced NATO air force. The pilots are given a target; fly in quickly to attack it, in many cases relying on unguided munitions to try to hit their target; and then fly out and try to not get shot down. They are not allowed to act flexibly within their commanders’ intent to achieve a mission. They have task orders and they execute them, come what may.​

How many air forces in the world took training from the Soviet Union and later Russia?

The West has much to learn from Ukraine’s successes, Deptula told us. “We have become so dominant in the air that we have never had to think through how we would use airpower if we were the inferior force,” he said. “Ukraine is posing us some very interesting questions that we should seriously consider, if only to understand how a clever opponent would take us on.”​

Absolutely Ukraine will teach US and we will learn much from them. But think back to the previous question of how many air forces in the world trained under Soviet/Russia/China airpower doctrines? The Soviet/Russia model is now a proven failure. So what does the China model have to offer when China learned from the Soviet Union?

The bottom line now is that the Western concept of wielding airpower is preeminent with no credible alternatives, and if you want to learn our ways, it will cost you.

 

[CAPRICORN-88]

Just read the news. Biden is considering another USD 40 billion worth of arms to Ukraine.

I don't know what many average Americans would be thinking. Nothing allocated to save them the needy.

Statistics shown only 33 nations are supporting the US and NATO in their campaign against Russia. Meaning 1 in 6 of all the nations in the world. So the world Biden, Antony Blinkens, Lizz Truss, Jake Sullivan are talking is very small.

This included small states like Luxembourg, North Macedonia, Slovenia, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.

Many cities in Asia has more people that those states.

The rest of the world which is 5/6 of thr 195 nations choose neutrality.

 

[Ali_Baba]

Ukraine – The new face of air warfare?

Above Ukraine rages a battle unlike any in Western experience. We should pay attention to how it is being done.

ukdefencejournal.org.uk

Interesting article on airwar in Ukraine and the use of UCAV's.

 

[F-22Raptor]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1523992255769501697

 

[Vergennes]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1523993448956805121

 

[F-22Raptor]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1523976305456390145

https://twitter.com/x/status/1523919178851360769

https://twitter.com/x/status/1523972174234767360

 

[Apollon]

True, but now it exists China to substitute Western commerce with Russia.

China in the USSR collapsed was nothing.

So far china does nothing. A weak russia is in best chinese interest

@Apollon

Meanwhile Putin looks bloated from pain killers and shaking from Parkinson

 

[F-22Raptor]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1523970279361421312

 

[Meengla]

Meaning: Don't come round and expects the rest of us to clean up all the mess you have created in Ukraine due to lack of leadership.

The leadership and the destiny of EU should be determined by Europeans and not outside esp. the US.

Many EU nations are beginning to speak out.

Bulgaria has just joined Hungary and Slovakia and have openly criticized the EU commission.
It has decide to VETO any sanction against Russian Oil.

EU under rhe present set up in Brussel is facing a deep division and crisis. It may eventually split up.

It is happening.

From the twitter comments it does seem many continental Europeans are very angry with their govts over the Ukraine-Russia war. German and French govts initially tried to resist and prevent yet another war on the European continent but they failed; the biggest proponents of this war were the UK and the Americans if you read the news from just a few months ago. Even Zelenskyy didn't believe a war of this scale was likely.

My prediction: once Russians cross 1 more field army worth of losses, they will be ordered to wrap up the assault formation, and go into 100% defensive, and holding territory at any cost, and extra losses.

But once losses cross another field army worth of bodies, they will start routing.

It would be cruel and even stupid for Russia to try to take the entire southern Ukraine. Consolidation in the east and around Mariupol will itself be a huge task but I think do-able for Russia. They are major gains--even strategic gains--and more than some 'consolation prize' if achieved.