Saho
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Russia-Ukraine War - News and Developments
- Thread starter T-SaGe
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Enigma SIG
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Trust me when I say this: That senile pae** knows exactly what he's doing.Now, Biden is nothing more than a "Gawaachi Gaan" (Lost Cow).
8888888888888
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He is better than a keyboard warrior.
bobo6661
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you mean like those
German officer with the Russian Liberation Army (ROA) soldiers and Orthodox priests.
or like those ?
Theres much more of other nazi russians from military groups like wagner or the donetsk separatists
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Messerschmitt
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Clutch
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8888888888888
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Could be true, one video shot of an arty attack on the civilians was too conveniently at the right place and time
Not done by an ex military vet.
Messerschmitt
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^ Yes, you read it correctly.
Hack-Hook
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aircraft operation is expensive and they can't have 24/7hours surveillance of drones.
drones can stay up there and direct your forces to where its needed , tell you what happens there before entering there , and if needed can engage target .
they are cheep to operate and if you fly at 7km pretty much no stinger can engage them even be aware of their existence . and even by chance you lose one no big deal
Day 13, Russians still trying to regroup for assault on Kiyv. Some massive airborne last ditch staging happening in Minsk.
Stalemate across much of the country.
A last reserve of 7 BTGs bypassed Kharkiv, and Sumy by going through empty fields.
Russians have now switched to bigger formations in many places, and no longer rout after losing a single vehicle in a convoy.
These slightly bigger formations still get scattered when met with enough firepower like a coordinated ATGM ambush, artillery strikes, or tanks, but Ukraine lacks that everywhere except for their defence strongpoints.
In other words, Ukraine really needs to get 1 more functioning division free of defence duties some way to regain the initiative. Too much defence now, when they can really be pushing them back where they stretched thin, and regaining ground.
Stalemate across much of the country.
A last reserve of 7 BTGs bypassed Kharkiv, and Sumy by going through empty fields.
Russians have now switched to bigger formations in many places, and no longer rout after losing a single vehicle in a convoy.
These slightly bigger formations still get scattered when met with enough firepower like a coordinated ATGM ambush, artillery strikes, or tanks, but Ukraine lacks that everywhere except for their defence strongpoints.
In other words, Ukraine really needs to get 1 more functioning division free of defence duties some way to regain the initiative. Too much defence now, when they can really be pushing them back where they stretched thin, and regaining ground.
Last edited:
Madni Bappa
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If we end up getting cut off from Western and Turkish helicopters. Definitely get Russian Ka or Mi28. We need heavier helicopters. Z10 is pretty light man.
ALSO:
Hungarians saying they don't want mufft ka phadda with Roosya. They're not willing to end gas and oil purchase from Roosya
Clutch
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Russia’s Air Force Can’t Own the Skies Over Ukraine. We Know Why
By
Sandboxx News
Published
5 mins ago
Su-57 Fighter Russia
Su-57 Fighter. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
Why can’t Russia’s might Air Force dominate over Ukraine? The reason are complicated: As experts the world over continue to try to divine why Russia has failed to capture air dominance over Ukraine nearly two weeks into the fighting, stories, pictures and videos of Russian aircraft being downed by Ukraine’s military continue to surface. It would seem that popular perceptions of Russia’s military—which have been intentionally shaped by Moscow for years—are beginning to unravel as Russian forces pour further into its embattled neighbor.
On paper, Russia’s Air Force outnumber Ukraine’s by more than 20 to 1, and while no one expected Russia to send every combat aircraft they have into Ukraine, Russia’s inability to dominate the skies despite such a massive numbers advantage, and while further bolstered by advanced surface-to-air defense systems like the S-400 is hard to wrap your head around.
Regardless of the reasons behind Russia’s failure to secure air supremacy, the nation’s inability to do so has allowed for valuable tactical and political victories for Ukraine over the past two weeks, from the legends of a Ukrainian ACE MiG-29 pilot known as the Ghost of Kyiv inspiring Ukrainians and others around the world, to stories of small Ukrainian drones destroying Russian armor in a 40-kilometer long traffic jam of Russian hardware headed toward Kyiv.
Because of Russia’s dominant numbers, the story tends to be focused on what Russia’s doing wrong, but that shouldn’t discount the incredible bravery and heroism shown by Ukrainian warfighters and civilians alike, often using man-portable anti-air weapons (MANPADs) to take on Russian aircraft directly. And not to be dismissed either are the incredible Ukrainian pilots, men and women like the Grey Wolf—who was shot down near Kyiv last week—who are taking to the sky despite overwhelming odds to square off with some of Russia’s best as they defend their nation.
Russia’s Air Force isn’t facing one problem, but a symphony of them
Numerous arguments have surfaced to explain Russia’s lack of air supremacy, from their lack of precision ordnance limiting the pace of sorties to Russian pilots’ and air defense system operators lacking combat competency—making the chances of friendly fire too high. In an excellent piece of analysis from the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), research fellow Justin Bronk offers a number of insights into Russia’s air superiority struggle. While the article warrants reading, here are some important conclusions from Bronk’s essay:
Russia’s small stockpile and long resupply timelines for precision-guided munitions have limited their air force’s ability to conduct viable strike missions. As Bronk points out, this isn’t just a problem today, but also means Russian pilots have very limited experience leveraging these types of weapons.
A lack of targeting pods makes precision strikes difficult, meaning most fixed-wing assets may be waiting for authorization to commence Russia’s more traditional approach of unguided bombardments.
Russia may be uncertain of its ability to deconflict in a target-saturated environment, as evidenced by Russia’s history of friendly fire incidents.
Lack of pilot training makes Russian aviators less capable and competent in such a volatile combat environment, meaning they may not be comfortable using some of the most advanced systems at their disposal.
In another story from The Aviationist, defense analyst Guy Plopsky offers some further explanation for Russia’s inability to dominate the skies over Ukraine, adding to Bronk’s list. Plopsky highlights how some Ukrainian air defense systems seem to still be in operation days after the war began, and points to Russia’s lack of a dedicated suppression of enemy air defenses (SEAD) platform akin to America’s Wild Weasel F-16s, which are modified specifically for their role in hunting down and destroying air defense systems.
“On this note, while Russia’s operational-tactical aviation includes many aircraft types capable of employing anti-radiation missiles, it lacks a dedicated SEAD platform. There are no Russian ‘Wild Weasels,’” Plopsky explains.
A lack of a dedicated SEAD platform and training alone isn’t the culprit, but it may be when added to Russia’s very slow processing of strike packages followed by even slower battle assessments of those strikes, Plopsky points out. In short, Russia’s approach to attacking air defenses is proving rather ineffective.
The most logical explanation, as laid out by experts around the world, seems to be an unwieldy combination of problems, some of which are related to the current fighting, and many of which can likely be attributed to Russia’s funding priorities in recent years.
Russia’s military prioritizes perception of capability over actual capability
As we’ve covered time and time again at Sandboxx News, Russia has devoted a huge amount of resources into converting its defense apparatus into a rolling advertising platform for foreign weapons and equipment sales. The nation’s stagnating economy, already struggling under international sanctions, has severely limited Russia’s ability to modernize its military force. But Russia has continued to fund the development of new weapons and systems aimed at garnering a great deal of attention, rather than focusing on maintaining or improving its existing equipment fleets. Why would Russia do such a thing?
Well, to put it simply, Russia just can’t afford to mass-produce advanced platforms like the Su-57 stealth fighter or T-14 Armata tank without foreign interests footing the bill.
Russia’s annual defense budget floats at right around $60 billion annually, but to be fair, that figure can be a bit misleading. Russia spends less on just about everything across the board, from salaries and benefits for personnel to manufacturing and material costs, but even when accounting for these discrepancies, their total spending power is still a mere fraction of America’s or China’s.
We’ve discussed before how China hides a great deal of its defense spending behind the guise of domestic programs, as well as how China pays its troops significantly less than other developed nations, but even if we didn’t include those factors, China’s claimed budget remains nearly three-times that of Russia’s.
But whenever the media covers advanced military capabilities like stealth fighters or hypersonic weapons, Russia is presented not just as a peer to big spenders in the East and West, but it’s often even suggested that Russia may be ahead of the United States in developing and fielding new technologies. This isn’t just the result of wanton sensationalism in Western media (though that certainly plays a role), it’s important to remember that this hype is a product of Russian design.
Reflexive Control and stealth fighters
The Kremlin’s approach to information operations (IO) has long been based on the Reflexive Control methodology that’s taught in Russian military academies and leveraged within Russian military doctrine.
“Reflexive control is a ‘uniquely Russian’ concept based on maskirovka, an old Soviet notion in which one ‘conveys to an opponent specifically prepared information to incline him/her to voluntarily make the predetermined decision desired by the initiator of the action’. That is, reflexive control is a sustained campaign that feeds an opponent select information so that the opponent makes the decisions that one wants him/her to. “
“Disinformation and Reflexive Control: The New Cold War” by Annie Kowalewski; published by the Georgetown Security Studies Review
Reflexive Control is usually brought up in conversations about Russia’s efforts to meddle in foreign elections, sew discord in foreign populations, or discredit efforts to hold Russia accountable for its aggressive actions, but it has proven just as effective in managing perceptions of Russia’s military-industrial complex in recent years.
The Kremlin is well aware of how the world’s media reports on advanced military technologies, leaning hard on sensationalized headlines based on national or manufacturer claims and almost always without any broader context into the history or potential use of the new hardware. When Russia unveiled their new Su-75 Checkmate—said to be a budget-busting stealth fighter many compared to America’s F-35—we saw the media flood the world with coverage, highlighting what Russia says this new fighter will do and comparing it to what we know (or believe) other 5th generation platforms are capable of.
But was the fervor surrounding Checkmate actually justified? Russia unveiled what proved to be a largely wooden mock-up of what this notional fighter might look like if one is ever built, but as far as most of the world’s coverage was concerned, Russia might as well have already put this jet into production. The media wasn’t forced to report as such, nor were they colluding with Moscow. It’s just a matter of the modern media industry and Russia’s willingness and ability to manipulate it for their own ends.
The truth, however, is that Russia’s Checkmate is currently nothing more than a design on a sheet of paper. To date, Russia has struggled to kick-start production on their existing stealth fighter, the Su-57 Felon. In fact, while the U.S. and China both operate stealth fighter fleets with unit counts in the triple digits, Russia has only 12 hand-built prototypes and 2 serial production stealth fighters in all.
Without a foreign investor willing to pay to build the Checkmate, we’ll likely see it follow in the Felon’s footsteps… with a token number of hand-built jets flown in parades and called “highly capable” as Russia continues to court partners with deeper pockets.
Russia knows exactly how to stir the media into a frenzy over dramatic new advances in military technology, but it’s also well aware of how the media won’t be nearly as interested in corrections to come weeks or months later. Russia’s Uran-9 ground combat drone, for instance, was deployed to Syria with great fanfare for Russia. Months later, when reports of the drone’s repeated and egregious failures finally bubbled to the surface, media coverage of its failure was simply drowned out by the trending outrages and anxieties of the day.
Russia’s first hypersonic weapon, the Kh-47M2 Kinzhal, is another excellent example. It’s actually a 1988-era Iskander short-range ballistic missile married to a new targeting apparatus and mounted on a dated fighter (the MiG-31). Once again, Russia’s stockpile of Kinzhals is reportedly limited to just 10 weapons, but that hasn’t stopped outlet after outlet from reporting on them as though the Kinzhal represents a significant leap in Russian weapons technology.
Su-35 Russia
Su-35 fighter. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
With so little money to go around, Russia’s heavy investment in problem-ridden but headline-grabbing programs like nuclear-powered cruise missiles, stealth fighters, infantry drones, UCAVs, nuclear drone torpedoes, hypersonic weapons, and others has clearly come at the expense of modernizing or even maintaining large swaths of the force.
After nearly two weeks of fighting over Ukraine, that problem with priorities seems to extend into Russia’s air power apparatus, substantiating conclusions others have made about a lack of training, a lack of precision weapons, and a lack of capability to conduct complex operations in a hectic environment.
Russia still poses a threat, despite its failings
The problem with writing stories like this, especially while Russian forces continue to push into Kyiv, is that our modern upvote/downvote culture struggles to appreciate the nuance in saying Russia is not nearly as capable as they may seem but are also capable enough to warrant concern. As such, demonstrating Russia’s ineffectual approach to military priorities might read a lot like a dismissal of the threat Russia poses to the U.S., its allies, or its interests at large.
That isn’t the case. Instead, this sort of analysis is aimed at ensuring our efforts to mitigate Russia’s threats are based on the reality of their capabilities, rather than public perceptions of them.
Russia’s military, despite floundering in Ukraine, remains among the largest in the world, and of course, Russia’s nuclear arsenal is nothing to be dismissed. But concerns about Russia expanding this conflict into a global war, invading Europe, or taking on the United States are based more on Russia’s hard-earned perception of might than on Russia’s mediocre military reality.
Russian Military
Image Credit: Russian Military.
Russia New Stealth Fighter
Image of Russia’s Su-57 fighter. Creative Commons.
Russia’s massive collection of air assets could feasibly lay waste to huge swaths of Ukraine if ordered to do so. The nation boasts the airframes and ordnance necessary, but blanketing the nation in unguided bombs has—thus far—not been a part of Putin’s plan to quickly replace Ukraine’s government with a friendly asset. Their inability to perform complex operations with high precision shouldn’t be seen as an inability to kill thousands if their objectives shift.
But to be clear, Russia should have already been able to secure air dominance over Ukraine without resorting to carpet-bombing anything that even resembles an air-defense system or soldier carrying a MANPAD. The fact that they haven’t is a solid argument in favor of the idea that… maybe they simply lack the ability to do so, lack faith in their troops to pull it off, or lack the training necessary to succeed.
In any regard, the perceptions of Russia’s military prowess are finally starting to align with Russia’s military reality, and nowhere is that more clear than in the skies over Ukraine.
By
Sandboxx News
Published
5 mins ago
Su-57 Fighter Russia
Su-57 Fighter. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
Why can’t Russia’s might Air Force dominate over Ukraine? The reason are complicated: As experts the world over continue to try to divine why Russia has failed to capture air dominance over Ukraine nearly two weeks into the fighting, stories, pictures and videos of Russian aircraft being downed by Ukraine’s military continue to surface. It would seem that popular perceptions of Russia’s military—which have been intentionally shaped by Moscow for years—are beginning to unravel as Russian forces pour further into its embattled neighbor.
On paper, Russia’s Air Force outnumber Ukraine’s by more than 20 to 1, and while no one expected Russia to send every combat aircraft they have into Ukraine, Russia’s inability to dominate the skies despite such a massive numbers advantage, and while further bolstered by advanced surface-to-air defense systems like the S-400 is hard to wrap your head around.
Regardless of the reasons behind Russia’s failure to secure air supremacy, the nation’s inability to do so has allowed for valuable tactical and political victories for Ukraine over the past two weeks, from the legends of a Ukrainian ACE MiG-29 pilot known as the Ghost of Kyiv inspiring Ukrainians and others around the world, to stories of small Ukrainian drones destroying Russian armor in a 40-kilometer long traffic jam of Russian hardware headed toward Kyiv.
Because of Russia’s dominant numbers, the story tends to be focused on what Russia’s doing wrong, but that shouldn’t discount the incredible bravery and heroism shown by Ukrainian warfighters and civilians alike, often using man-portable anti-air weapons (MANPADs) to take on Russian aircraft directly. And not to be dismissed either are the incredible Ukrainian pilots, men and women like the Grey Wolf—who was shot down near Kyiv last week—who are taking to the sky despite overwhelming odds to square off with some of Russia’s best as they defend their nation.
Russia’s Air Force isn’t facing one problem, but a symphony of them
Numerous arguments have surfaced to explain Russia’s lack of air supremacy, from their lack of precision ordnance limiting the pace of sorties to Russian pilots’ and air defense system operators lacking combat competency—making the chances of friendly fire too high. In an excellent piece of analysis from the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), research fellow Justin Bronk offers a number of insights into Russia’s air superiority struggle. While the article warrants reading, here are some important conclusions from Bronk’s essay:
Russia’s small stockpile and long resupply timelines for precision-guided munitions have limited their air force’s ability to conduct viable strike missions. As Bronk points out, this isn’t just a problem today, but also means Russian pilots have very limited experience leveraging these types of weapons.
A lack of targeting pods makes precision strikes difficult, meaning most fixed-wing assets may be waiting for authorization to commence Russia’s more traditional approach of unguided bombardments.
Russia may be uncertain of its ability to deconflict in a target-saturated environment, as evidenced by Russia’s history of friendly fire incidents.
Lack of pilot training makes Russian aviators less capable and competent in such a volatile combat environment, meaning they may not be comfortable using some of the most advanced systems at their disposal.
In another story from The Aviationist, defense analyst Guy Plopsky offers some further explanation for Russia’s inability to dominate the skies over Ukraine, adding to Bronk’s list. Plopsky highlights how some Ukrainian air defense systems seem to still be in operation days after the war began, and points to Russia’s lack of a dedicated suppression of enemy air defenses (SEAD) platform akin to America’s Wild Weasel F-16s, which are modified specifically for their role in hunting down and destroying air defense systems.
“On this note, while Russia’s operational-tactical aviation includes many aircraft types capable of employing anti-radiation missiles, it lacks a dedicated SEAD platform. There are no Russian ‘Wild Weasels,’” Plopsky explains.
A lack of a dedicated SEAD platform and training alone isn’t the culprit, but it may be when added to Russia’s very slow processing of strike packages followed by even slower battle assessments of those strikes, Plopsky points out. In short, Russia’s approach to attacking air defenses is proving rather ineffective.
The most logical explanation, as laid out by experts around the world, seems to be an unwieldy combination of problems, some of which are related to the current fighting, and many of which can likely be attributed to Russia’s funding priorities in recent years.
Russia’s military prioritizes perception of capability over actual capability
As we’ve covered time and time again at Sandboxx News, Russia has devoted a huge amount of resources into converting its defense apparatus into a rolling advertising platform for foreign weapons and equipment sales. The nation’s stagnating economy, already struggling under international sanctions, has severely limited Russia’s ability to modernize its military force. But Russia has continued to fund the development of new weapons and systems aimed at garnering a great deal of attention, rather than focusing on maintaining or improving its existing equipment fleets. Why would Russia do such a thing?
Well, to put it simply, Russia just can’t afford to mass-produce advanced platforms like the Su-57 stealth fighter or T-14 Armata tank without foreign interests footing the bill.
Russia’s annual defense budget floats at right around $60 billion annually, but to be fair, that figure can be a bit misleading. Russia spends less on just about everything across the board, from salaries and benefits for personnel to manufacturing and material costs, but even when accounting for these discrepancies, their total spending power is still a mere fraction of America’s or China’s.
We’ve discussed before how China hides a great deal of its defense spending behind the guise of domestic programs, as well as how China pays its troops significantly less than other developed nations, but even if we didn’t include those factors, China’s claimed budget remains nearly three-times that of Russia’s.
But whenever the media covers advanced military capabilities like stealth fighters or hypersonic weapons, Russia is presented not just as a peer to big spenders in the East and West, but it’s often even suggested that Russia may be ahead of the United States in developing and fielding new technologies. This isn’t just the result of wanton sensationalism in Western media (though that certainly plays a role), it’s important to remember that this hype is a product of Russian design.
Reflexive Control and stealth fighters
The Kremlin’s approach to information operations (IO) has long been based on the Reflexive Control methodology that’s taught in Russian military academies and leveraged within Russian military doctrine.
“Reflexive control is a ‘uniquely Russian’ concept based on maskirovka, an old Soviet notion in which one ‘conveys to an opponent specifically prepared information to incline him/her to voluntarily make the predetermined decision desired by the initiator of the action’. That is, reflexive control is a sustained campaign that feeds an opponent select information so that the opponent makes the decisions that one wants him/her to. “
“Disinformation and Reflexive Control: The New Cold War” by Annie Kowalewski; published by the Georgetown Security Studies Review
Reflexive Control is usually brought up in conversations about Russia’s efforts to meddle in foreign elections, sew discord in foreign populations, or discredit efforts to hold Russia accountable for its aggressive actions, but it has proven just as effective in managing perceptions of Russia’s military-industrial complex in recent years.
The Kremlin is well aware of how the world’s media reports on advanced military technologies, leaning hard on sensationalized headlines based on national or manufacturer claims and almost always without any broader context into the history or potential use of the new hardware. When Russia unveiled their new Su-75 Checkmate—said to be a budget-busting stealth fighter many compared to America’s F-35—we saw the media flood the world with coverage, highlighting what Russia says this new fighter will do and comparing it to what we know (or believe) other 5th generation platforms are capable of.
But was the fervor surrounding Checkmate actually justified? Russia unveiled what proved to be a largely wooden mock-up of what this notional fighter might look like if one is ever built, but as far as most of the world’s coverage was concerned, Russia might as well have already put this jet into production. The media wasn’t forced to report as such, nor were they colluding with Moscow. It’s just a matter of the modern media industry and Russia’s willingness and ability to manipulate it for their own ends.
The truth, however, is that Russia’s Checkmate is currently nothing more than a design on a sheet of paper. To date, Russia has struggled to kick-start production on their existing stealth fighter, the Su-57 Felon. In fact, while the U.S. and China both operate stealth fighter fleets with unit counts in the triple digits, Russia has only 12 hand-built prototypes and 2 serial production stealth fighters in all.
Without a foreign investor willing to pay to build the Checkmate, we’ll likely see it follow in the Felon’s footsteps… with a token number of hand-built jets flown in parades and called “highly capable” as Russia continues to court partners with deeper pockets.
Russia knows exactly how to stir the media into a frenzy over dramatic new advances in military technology, but it’s also well aware of how the media won’t be nearly as interested in corrections to come weeks or months later. Russia’s Uran-9 ground combat drone, for instance, was deployed to Syria with great fanfare for Russia. Months later, when reports of the drone’s repeated and egregious failures finally bubbled to the surface, media coverage of its failure was simply drowned out by the trending outrages and anxieties of the day.
Russia’s first hypersonic weapon, the Kh-47M2 Kinzhal, is another excellent example. It’s actually a 1988-era Iskander short-range ballistic missile married to a new targeting apparatus and mounted on a dated fighter (the MiG-31). Once again, Russia’s stockpile of Kinzhals is reportedly limited to just 10 weapons, but that hasn’t stopped outlet after outlet from reporting on them as though the Kinzhal represents a significant leap in Russian weapons technology.
Su-35 Russia
Su-35 fighter. Image Credit: Creative Commons.
With so little money to go around, Russia’s heavy investment in problem-ridden but headline-grabbing programs like nuclear-powered cruise missiles, stealth fighters, infantry drones, UCAVs, nuclear drone torpedoes, hypersonic weapons, and others has clearly come at the expense of modernizing or even maintaining large swaths of the force.
After nearly two weeks of fighting over Ukraine, that problem with priorities seems to extend into Russia’s air power apparatus, substantiating conclusions others have made about a lack of training, a lack of precision weapons, and a lack of capability to conduct complex operations in a hectic environment.
Russia still poses a threat, despite its failings
The problem with writing stories like this, especially while Russian forces continue to push into Kyiv, is that our modern upvote/downvote culture struggles to appreciate the nuance in saying Russia is not nearly as capable as they may seem but are also capable enough to warrant concern. As such, demonstrating Russia’s ineffectual approach to military priorities might read a lot like a dismissal of the threat Russia poses to the U.S., its allies, or its interests at large.
That isn’t the case. Instead, this sort of analysis is aimed at ensuring our efforts to mitigate Russia’s threats are based on the reality of their capabilities, rather than public perceptions of them.
Russia’s military, despite floundering in Ukraine, remains among the largest in the world, and of course, Russia’s nuclear arsenal is nothing to be dismissed. But concerns about Russia expanding this conflict into a global war, invading Europe, or taking on the United States are based more on Russia’s hard-earned perception of might than on Russia’s mediocre military reality.
Russian Military
Image Credit: Russian Military.
Russia New Stealth Fighter
Image of Russia’s Su-57 fighter. Creative Commons.
Russia’s massive collection of air assets could feasibly lay waste to huge swaths of Ukraine if ordered to do so. The nation boasts the airframes and ordnance necessary, but blanketing the nation in unguided bombs has—thus far—not been a part of Putin’s plan to quickly replace Ukraine’s government with a friendly asset. Their inability to perform complex operations with high precision shouldn’t be seen as an inability to kill thousands if their objectives shift.
But to be clear, Russia should have already been able to secure air dominance over Ukraine without resorting to carpet-bombing anything that even resembles an air-defense system or soldier carrying a MANPAD. The fact that they haven’t is a solid argument in favor of the idea that… maybe they simply lack the ability to do so, lack faith in their troops to pull it off, or lack the training necessary to succeed.
In any regard, the perceptions of Russia’s military prowess are finally starting to align with Russia’s military reality, and nowhere is that more clear than in the skies over Ukraine.
Last edited:
Madni Bappa
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Any Central Asian troops called in as reinforcement??
RescueRanger
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Clutch
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Putin’s biggest mistake of the Ukraine war? Trusting the Western financial system
Published: March 7, 2022 11.32pm EST
Peter Martin, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University
The West is arraying financial weapons never deployed before against a country of Russia’s size, forsaking some of the principles that have defined it.
Part of what has defined the West – and most of what has been the world’s engine of prosperity for the past century and a half – has been the free flow of goods across borders, a working banking system, and property rights.
There’s been an implicit understanding that no sizeable nation (Russia’s economy is about the size of Australia’s) would be denied access to these things. Otherwise the financial system wouldn’t be the financial system.
That seems to have been the understanding of Russian President Vladimir Putin. But ten days ago, the West did the unthinkable, and the global financial system may never be the same again.
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Russia’s vast war chest
Over the seven years since Putin last invaded Ukraine (and annexed Crimea) in 2014, Russia’s central bank has almost doubled its holdings of foreign currency and foreign bonds and gold, building up a reserve of US$630 billion at a considerable cost to the living standards of ordinary Russians.
It was a war chest that would enable Russia to continue to buy things that could only be bought in foreign currency, even if customers overseas refused to trade with it and supply it with that currency. It was Russia’s insurance policy.
Read more: 'Just short of nuclear': these sanctions will cripple Russia's economy
And although it could have been stored in Russia, much of it was kept in banks in the UK, Western Europe and the US, for easy access when it was needed to buy things on those markets.
Whatever his other suspicions of the West, Putin seemed to think its financial system wouldn’t be turned off – not to a nation of Russia’s size.
China will learn from Russia’s mistake
On February 27 the West froze the assets and travel of named oligarchs and Russian officials, as was expected.
Also, and less expected, it stopped named Russian banks from accessing the messaging system used to transfer money across borders, ensuring they were “disconnected from the international financial system”.
And, much less expected, it froze the reserves of Russia’s central bank stored in France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the US – the hundreds of billions of savings legitimately placed in foreign banks for safekeeping.
Read more: US-EU sanctions will pummel the Russian economy – two experts explain why they are likely to stick and sting
That action broke the bond of trust that makes a bank a bank. And while effective – Russia can’t get access to hundreds of billions of foreign dollars it has painstakingly built up to buy supplies and support the ruble on currency markets – it can only be done at this scale once.
China will have taken note and won’t be entrusting any more foreign assets to banks in France, Germany, Italy, the UK and the US than it can afford to lose.
Freezing foreign reserves has been done before – but only to the less powerful nations like Iran, Afghanistan and Venezuela. This is the first time it’s ever been done to a member of the G20 or the UN Security Council.
The battle of the fridge vs the TV
The ruble has collapsed 40%. Denied access to the foreign currency it would need to support the ruble in the market, Russia’s central bank has attempted to stem the tide by more than doubling its key interest rate, lifting it from 9.5% to 20%.
The ruble falls off a cliff
Fraction of a ruble per US cent. Trading Economics
Russia has blocked Russians from sending money abroad, stopped paying foreigners interest payments on government debt and required every Russian firm earning dollars to hand over 80% of them in exchange for rubles.
For ordinary Russians, there’s a “battle of the fridge versus the television”: the stark contrast between the reality of daily life against the claims of state media.
Until recently, Russian TV wasn’t even using the word “war” (although it has started). The television has been telling Russians things are normal.
But Russians’ fridges, ATMs, and their blocked Visa, Mastercard and ApplePay accounts are all telling them something else.
From buying a washing machine to getting a mortgage, an awful lot is suddenly expensive or unavailable. But official polls (for what they are worth) show public support for the “special military operation”. Television has been using the realities of shortages and price increases to attack the West for becoming anti-Russian.
Hitting Russia’s elite and military where it hurts
Whatever ordinary Russians actually think about the war, the impact of the West’s unprecedented sanctions on the Russian elite is likely to matter more. No longer able to travel aboard, access their offshore savings or pay the school fees of their children abroad, the oligarchs have at least the potential to exert influence.
The final way in which the financial embargo might succeed is by starving Russia of foreign exchange to the point where it can’t buy spare parts for its military or the computer chips and other materials needed to make those parts.
Read more: Russian sanctions are biting harder than imagined, and it'll get worse
There’s every chance none of these will work quickly, every chance they will further impoverish Russians, and every chance that, if Russia subjugates Ukraine, the West will find the sanctions impossible withdraw without losing face.
The global financial system changed when the West did the barely thinkable on February 27. It’s hard to see a way back.
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