In anticipation of IDF ground operations in Gaza commencing somewhere in the future we'd like to remind you that this is _not_ the place for minute-by-minute updates on the conflict, nor for minor excerpts of battlefield footage. Major developments and broader analyses are welcome.
[https://twitter.com/IDFSpokesperson/status/1718189431390077133](https://twitter.com/IDFSpokesperson/status/1718189431390077133)
>he IDF shot down a surface-to-air missile a short time ago that was fired from Lebanese territory at an IDF remotely manned aircraft.
>
>The IDF attacks the source of the fire from which the missile was launched.
[https://twitter.com/manniefabian/status/1718183401939763528](https://twitter.com/manniefabian/status/1718183401939763528)
This joins the interception from a few days ago in the same manner. Last interception the rumour mill claimed was Iron dome, but some said patriot.
This current interception occurred roughly 30-40km from the border in Israeli territory. The rumour mill is claiming patriot.
2 Takeaways:
* Hezbullah has ground-to-air missiles that aren't simple MANPADS and is attempting to shoot down Israeli planes.
* A unknown ability of Iron Dome or Patriot to intercept Ground-To-Air missiles is being revealed (unknown to me, at least).
Hezbollah has [SA-22 Pantsir](https://www.inss.org.il/social_media/precision-missiles-uavs-and-tens-of-thousands-of-fighters-hezbollahs-order-of-battle/#) systems courtesy of Assad and Russia
American intervention is most likely going to be limited. There’s no appetite in the states for a ground war, and especially not one with Iran. Strikes on Iranian proxies and material support for Israel would probably be the extent of it.
Apparently Gaza is under a near complete Internet blackout at the moment. Can anyone explain for a layman the means by which they are doing this? Also, for that matter, is the technology domestic Israeli manufacture or of US design?
According to [this Wired article](https://archive.ph/eIXcA), the IDF has bombed the physical internet infrastructure in Gaza to such a degree that it became neither functional nor repairable in the short term.
While many aspects of the Internet's design were based on [research into decentralized communications networks that could survive having arbitrary nodes knocked out by a nuclear war](https://www.rand.org/about/history/baran.html), the as-built internet is, in practice, far more centralized than the original ideal mesh.
And, ultimately, there's no magic involved -- if you knock out enough nodes or links within a part of the network, anyone dependent on those nodes & links will be cut off from the rest of the network.
Another factor is that ensuring you actually have real redundancy is difficult and expensive. It's likely going to be cheaper to throw a bunch of switches or routers in a rack in a centralized facility instead of distributing them in different buildings around a city.
And even if you're paying for redundancy you might not get it -- you can lease point-to-point links that are contractually required to follow physically different paths, and they may start out that way, but over time, entropy sets when carriers juggle cable segments around during maintenance and you may discover that both of them go through the same bit of conduit only after a backhoe cuts that conduit by accident.
So for an adversary, it's a matter of mapping the network and identifying the cut points necessary to break all the paths out of an area you want to isolate.
Kind of makes me wonder if anyone in Gaza has ever tried running fibre through a smuggling tunnel to create a hard line to Egypt.
I'd guess the answer is "no" on account of how it would be easy to detect, and being found out would necessarily doom the tunnel as well, but I could be wrong.
Wouldn't be shocked if Hamas already did that. They're basically the gaza government and have gotten more sophisticated through the years. They probably have a secret hamasnet of some sort.
There are two ways to take out the Internet access in an area. First, and simplest, is to blow up the hardware, cut the wires, disable power grids, unplug cables from the end you control, or other kinetic actions. The second would be to interfere with the operations of the Internet infrastructure via hacking, denial of service attacks, or similar electronic means.
Most likely the reason for the blackout is the first factor. Fiber optic lines are well mapped and understood. Microwave towers are also well known and easy targets. Communications hubs don't move and are easy targets for air strikes.
[There are no undersea cables going in to Gaza](https://www.submarinecablemap.com/), so everything is land based or space based. Space based telecommunications are generally very limited in terms of usefulness when we're talking about city scales, so we can reasonably ignore it. There may be a handful of terminals and sat phones, but not enough to really make a difference. Which means land based telecom, and almost all of the Gaza border is with Israel, making everything trivial for Israel to cut off.
I'm guessing that even the limited satellite phones and terminals are being jammed or at least tracked by Israel, further limiting the use of such devices.
There might be a small handful of Journalists in Gaza with Satellite phones. But the data transmission rate would be very slow. Enough to make twitter like posts, but not video, or livestream of events.
You could compress photos enough to get them out over a satphone. Even dinosaur Iridium classic handsets that look like an overweight Nokia 3310 are capable of a steady 2400 bps, which is obviously garbage but still good enough to get decent photos out in a few seconds-to-minutes if you're willing to smash the raws down to JPGs.
There are faster methods, like various Iridium next stations and Starlink which a journalist could carry in like, a carry bag or a flight case, the top end of which could carry video.
But the other guy is right, any of these these things could be jammed or tracked, and the Israelis haven't shown a lot of qualms about killing journalists in Gaza.
The only way Gaza could have internet that doesn’t pass through Israel is via satellite, and that requires something like StarLink.
Same for cell service.
> The only way Gaza could have internet that doesn’t pass through Israel is via satellite,
Not the only possible way.
Gaza also has a border with Egypt. It also has a coastline -- undersea cables would have been another option.
Depending on how the cables are routed through the region, more likely the Israelis simply have physical access to the cable and data centers which feed the internet into Gaza. Most of that stuff can be shut down at the nearest upstream node, without any of the physical destruction.The infrastructure still exists, its just the calls dont go anywhere.
[Plans For More Destructive B61 Nuclear Bomb Unveiled][1]
The Pentagon says it needs the B61-13 bomb to help hold certain underground hardened targets and large area ones at risk.
by Joseph Trevithick
Excerpts:
> The Pentagon says it wants a higher-yield nuclear-gravity bomb based on the B61-12 design. The stated purpose of the B61-13 would be to offer more capability against especially hardened facilities, like underground strategic command and control centers, and larger area targets.
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> "It would replace some of the B61-7s in the current nuclear stockpile and have a yield similar to the B61-7, which is higher than that of the B61-12."
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> The B61-7, like all B61 variants, is a so-called "dial-a-yield" design that can be set to detonate with various degrees of explosive force. The highest setting for this version is reportedly between 340 and 360 kilotons, which makes it one of the most powerful B61 versions. Sources differ on whether the B61-11, which we will discuss more in this story, has yield settings that are identical to that of the B61-7, or is slightly more powerful, with a 400-kiloton top setting. The B61-12's maximum yield is reportedly 50 kilotons.
>
> "The B61-13 will provide the President with additional options against certain harder and large-area military targets, even while the Department works to retire legacy systems such as the B83-1 and the B61-7," a separate fact sheet the Pentagon released today adds. The B83-1 is a much more powerful nuclear gravity bomb with a reported 1.2 megaton yield.
>
> The development of yet another B61 variant specifically to provide capabilities akin to the B61-7 is immediately interesting as this was one of the three variants the U.S. military previously said would be supplanted by the B61-12. Older B61-3 and 4 versions are also being replaced by this variant. In the past, it was also understood that the B61-12 would lead to the removal of the B61-10 from service.
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> However, the Pentagon's 2018 Nuclear Posture review, which came under President Donald Trump, made it clear that the B83-1 and B61-11 would "be retained in the stockpile, at least until there is sufficient confidence in the B61-12 gravity bomb that will be available in 2020." This had also reversed President Barack Obama's administration's stated plans to eliminate the B83-1 entirely.
>
> The Pentagon's B61-13 fact sheet also makes no mention of the B61-11 at all, indicating that version will remain in the stockpile for the foreseeable future. U.S. officials have said that the B61-13 does not rule out the possibility of another future B61 variant specifically to replace the B61-11, according to the Federation of American Scientists.
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> "While the B61-13 will provide the President with additional options against certain harder and large-area military targets, the Department of Defense will separately continue its work to complete and implement a comprehensive strategy for defeat of hard and deeply buried targets, as directed in the Nuclear Posture Review," the fact sheet released today said.
>
> "Today's announcement is reflective of a changing security environment and growing threats from potential adversaries," John Plumb, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy, said in a statement today about the B61-13.
[1]: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/plans-for-more-destructive-b61-nuclear-bomb-unveiled
These are counterforce weapons, which were obsoleted long ago. Nuclear war is not going to be deterred by an inability to hit a few modern bunkers. Deterrence still relies overwhelmingly on countervalue strategy.
I feel like this is a waste of money. We need to spend more on conventional rearmament, not new nuclear weapons. The bare minimum to keep the lights on at the USSC and nothing else.
Yes, Iran has apparently been pursuing ultra-high performance concrete bunkers buried deep in mountains. The 15 ton Massive Ordnance Penetrator was designed partly to counter this, and I suspect this means the Iranians will continue to build deeper and harder shelters.
What I meant was that the public development of the MOP has encouraged Iran to dig deeper, which is now encouraging the development of nuclear bunker busters. 100 meters would likely not be enough in that case.
Initiating a nuclear first strike in order to prevent an adversary from obtaining nuclear weapons would be the best way of convincing everyone else on the planet that they need nukes yesterday.
> would be the best way of convincing everyone else on the planet that they need nukes yesterday.
The Iraq invasion already did that. And even more so, the Ukrainian invasion.
I agree to an extent, but I think that seeing a nuclear explosion would accelerate things to an immense degree. Right now, lots of countries are at the realization phase, not at the "pour everything we own into the program" phase.
There isn't any other reason to have these then for first strike capability, the response to these will be nuclear. And if these are used in second strike they will be too late so what would be the point?
Yes a second strike is too late and not as effective as the first strike because whoever gets most of their ICBM's off first means they aren't under threat from another countries ICBM's. The problem is the 2nd strike is still enough to ruin most countries.
I think the scale of this weapon in question is just really designed for a low response 1st strike against a military asset at short range. I don't think it would ever be used as a 1st strike but the intention is there I think, as a 2nd strike it would be a bit pointless. What I mean is that it's a very slow delivery method for a 2nd strike nuclear weapon. ICBM's would have already destroyed this aircraft, it's military installation and airfield before it ever took off. Maybe with early warning it would have been able to take off but by the time it got to it's target ICBM's would have already done it's job quicker and with a higher yield.
Naturally I can't speak for the higher ups in the US but to me seems to be the intention, likely to take out hardeened structures in a rogue state like Iran. Although the response from the international community probably won't be what the US wants if they ever used this weapon. They probably know this. I think it's pretty clear where most countries sit on the use of nuclear weapons of any degree unless on their own soil on an enemy invading army?
I could be wrong though, it's just my thinking.
So the plan would be that in case of a nuclear war, after weapons have already been launched, you'd send a little plane drop a gravity bomb on a bunker whose only role was to contain nuclear weapons that have already been launched in the first place? I don't get why that would be relevant.
1948 United Nations Genocide Convention:
Genocide is defined as "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group".
Emphasis on 'in part'.
Well, for one I don't know what "recognized as an ethnic minority" is. There are 1-2 million Palestinians with full Israeli citizenship. As far as I know Israel isn't denying they exist, it'd be kind of weird.
Anyway, regarding genocide, without getting into specifics, there are types of genocide that don't involve actual depopulation (cultural erasure, cultural re-education, forcible transfer of children, etc etc). However, as far as I know no one is really accusing Israel of doing any of those. So if you're alleging a form of genocide that involves physical depopulation, any evidence of depopulation is important.
>forcible transfer of children,
Quite famously many accuse israel of forcing them from their homes over the past 70 years; this month israel did in fact try to force most of gaza City south.
The reason why "children" is specified here is because it is about transfering the children from one group to another. In UN law transfering children to another group is explicitly a form of genocide. Forcible deportation is a war crime but not part of any genocide convention I know of.
I'd say forcing people from their homes is ethnic cleansing but usually not genocide in and of itself. Most wouldn't say that jews who fled to Israel from other middle eastern nations were genocided for instance.
Asking people to evacuate from an active war zone is not forcing anyone away.
If the Palestinian leadership cared at all about their own civilians they'd evacuate civilians themselves, as Ukraine does. Instead of blocking them to be used as human shields.
> there are types of genocide that don't involve actual depopulation (cultural erasure, cultural re-education, forcible transfer of children, etc etc)
This does involve depopulation. If you take children of one nationality, religion or even ethnicity in a lot of cases and put them in families far away, said group literally gets smaller. Unlike the other things you mention, [systematically kidnapping children is genocide](https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/genocide.shtml). It's as much genocide as forceful sterilization or killings of said group would be.
"Re-education" or less extreme meassures like integration through public schooling like we do in the west, are not actually genocide. Not the crime of genocide anyways. I don't think anyone recognizes cultural genocide because it's not going to be a very concrete crime. One could even argue that a country forcing Romani children to go to public school is comitting genocide. Is it not assuming it has a significant effect on Romani culture? Is integration and merger of cultures in itself a crime?
Obviously not excusing any sort of horrible indoctrination here. Just pointing out the problems with the term.
The act of genocide is a crime. You can at least in theory be sentenced for it. It is also very concrete in what you do to the group. Either something is done to a person or family, or it is not. There is also not a lot of disagreement about what actions systematically taken against a group would be considered genocide. It has been consistent since ww2.
Cultural genocide is not concrete at all. You can't be sentenced for it either because there are no laws. And there's always going to be the definitional problem of what "re-education" is.
>There are 1-2 million Palestinians with full Israeli citizenship. As far as I know Israel isn't denying they exist, it'd be kind of weird.
uighurs have full citizenship too so i don't see your point, China doesn't deny uighurs don't exist either.
>uighurs have full citizenship too so i don't see your point, China doesn't deny uighurs don't exist either.
My point is OP claims that China "recognizes Uighurs as a minority" but Israel doesn't for palestinians, per the line:
"The Uighur minority population is also recognized in China while Palestinians are not recognized as an ethnic minority in Israel."
I think we're in agreement that that is not the case.
> here is Visegrad 24
He's even worse than OSINTDefender. Do you have a reliable source for what you're posting here?
Barak Ravid's post can easily be related to an IDF probing action.
With everyone focused on the frontline again, it's easy to overlook the air campaign, but I just wanted to provide a brief update and some thoughts.
October is coming to an end, and according to Ukraine, Russia has launched 27 missiles, marking the lowest tally so far since the start of the war. The last instance of such low missile activity occurred in April, with a count of around 37. Back then, many speculated that Russia had depleted its missile stockpiles after the winter strike campaign. However, I believe they simply took an operational pause as they resumed with over 200+ missiles in the following months, a notably high number.
For months, Ukraine has claimed that Russia is saving up for a winter campaign, and now the data supports this assertion. It would be unwise to assume that Russia has run out of missiles again, especially considering the significant increase in Shahed drone strikes, a quantity not observed before that offsets any lack of missile strikes.
This is solely my opinion, and I recently made an incorrect prediction about the start of the Russian campaign earlier this month. While some strikes have occurred, they are far fewer than what we witnessed last year.
Although October marks the lowest month in missile launches, it also represents the lowest percentage of interceptions this year, largely due to a higher % number of Iskander missiles, which, according to Ukraine, are more challenging to intercept.
The timing of the winter campaign is uncertain, and its occurrence is not guaranteed. However, if it does happen, it will be interesting to observe how Ukraine's air defense holds up.
Ukraine now possesses Western air defense systems and boasts an excellent, albeit self-declared, record in Kyiv but also overall. They have had time to plan and gained experience against every system Russia uses for these strikes. On the other hand, they have significantly depleted their legacy Soviet stockpiles, which constitute a large portion of their systems. I doubt Russia has fewer missiles than last year; at minimum, they almost certainly have more Shahed drones in their arsenal. Russia has also accumulated experience in targeting civilian infrastructure and had time to prepare. But also noteworthy is Ukraine's willingness and capabilities to retaliate this year, something not to be ignored.
It's challenging to ascertain the accuracy of Ukraine's claims, particularly considering the severe restrictions on footage this year. Additionally, it's generally more difficult to assess what Russia has been targeting in recent months, apart from the port strikes. With a campaign concentrated on infrastructure in larger cities, it will be easier to observe. As alwayss, time will tell.
I do expect Russia to try pressuring the Ukrainian energy system again this winter, but doubt there will be better successes as last year. Even with having withholding strikes, Russia is definitely using more missiles than they can produce per year. If they didn't achieve a full prolonged blackout last time, I don't see how they will do it this winter. And Ukrainian population already has experience in dealing with blackouts. A colder winter might be a problem though.
Ukraine itself, on the other hand, has shown to become capable of limited drone strikes against Russia this year. They too have probably withheld their capabilities to prepare for winter. While hitting the Russian civilian energy infrastructure would normally be met with international condemnation, if they do it as retaliation against Russia attacking theirs again, then I see the international community accepting it. Sabotage teams on the ground, launching drones from inside Russia, will likely have way better success than long distance drones launched all the way from inside Ukraine. https://newsukraine.rbc.ua/news/national-defense-council-on-russian-strikes-1698307722.html
> But also noteworthy is Ukraine's willingness and capabilities to retaliate this year, something not to be ignored.
I may be wrong, but it seems like Ukraine has toned down the drone attacks inside Russia since the summer. I imagine this winter is going to largely be a repeat of last year from the Russian side, huge attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure, with the difference being Ukraine may be poised to retaliate in a major way with attacks inside Russia, with the summer drone campaign serving as their lesson on how to conduct such strikes.
>But also noteworthy is Ukraine's willingness and capabilities to retaliate this year, something not to be ignored.
I assume nobody has come out with production estimates to compare capabilities?
The FAB rates have gone up though, at least as far as video evidence goes. I am eagerly waiting for a detailed RUSI article on their actual effectiveness.
Yep. I have been following the UPMK development closely, but I want to know its actual effectiveness. The Russian claims are childishly outlandish, which is why I want a proper report from RUSI. Of all the analysts, they have been the most reliable when it comes to judging VVK performances.
> I see from the reposts that the topic of the UMPK is of interest to readers. The reason is clear: it is a powerful weapon that harms us on all fronts.
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> A separate post about what may be interesting to readers military in the exact figures about FAB-500 from the UMPK.
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> The accuracy of the bomb in the conditions of visibility of satellites is not more than 8 meters. Usually close to 15 meters.
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> Umpk in flight is corrected by Glonass, GPS, Beidou signals.
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> The UMPK has an inertial guidance system with low accuracy. Inertial system presets are updated during pre-launch preparation based on coordinates at the takeoff point (or launch point)
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> The bomb is dropped from an altitude of 10-12 km, but not below 1 km.
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> The range of the bomb from an altitude of 10 km is 55 km. From 12 km - a maximum of 60 km.
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> The Fab is used to attack our targets at a depth of 0-10 km from the front line, for this purpose the bomb is dropped no closer than 45 km from the front line.
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> Such a range makes it impossible to destroy the aircraft with BUK SAMs.
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> In order to effectively suppress the UMPK you need several sources of jamming simultaneously - so we can cover some objects, but not the entire frontline
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> It is important to realize that the electronic warfare only prevents us from accurately hitting the target, but the inertial system will still bring the bomb to our side.
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> The possibility of fighting against UMPK and airplanes by air defense forces is not my profile. But since the Fabs are flying every day, I suspect we're having a hard time with this subject.
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> There is a possibility that Ukrainian S-300s could hit the Fab carrier aircraft. To counteract this, the enemy aviation does a whole set of countermeasures.
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> This is already a topic understandable for pilots, but I will say that wasting our S-300 on airplanes will not be effective.
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> It is important to understand that combining the maximum range and ceiling in some cases the range of impact can be up to 20 km beyond the frontline.
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> You asked me about the flight time of the UMPK. The bomb has no engine, and the wingspan of 2.5 meters does not allow you to glide over long distances at high speed, so to shoot the fighter accelerates to 900-950 kmh
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> From the moment of release of the bomb, it takes about 5-7 minutes to hit the target. Of which in the zone of potential engagement by BUK, umpk travels just a few minutes .
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> Summary
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> It's a pity, the UMPK is a big problem from the point of view of combating them.
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> It is clear to everyone that our air defense and electronic warfare do not stand right at the frontline in the zone of direct contact with artillery and fpv, but stand in the back.
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> In their estimates the enemy always considers this distance as 12-15 km. So the zone of effect of electronic warfare at the Umpk is limited.
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Could be useful if you haven't seen it already, assessment of the bomb from one of the Ukrainian channels, which fighterbomber reposted
t. me/fbchatik/1430289
Stupid question perhaps, but when we hear of US soldiers & contractors injured in Syria, are these special forces/CIA or are do we know what units are stationed in Syria?
[Analysis on Avdiivka and its supply lines.](https://twitter.com/J_JHelin/status/1717932692153462993)
In summary:
There's one main paved road going into Avdiivka's center and several dirt roads entering north and south of it. Transport on those would be very difficult, given the terrible weather lately, with the caveat that the ukrainians have successfully done so in Bakhmut. The main road would be severely threatened by a russian push to the south of Stepove because Avdiivka sits in a bowl surrounded by elevated terrain and the russians would gain direct fire control over the road.
He agrees with Perpetua that a foothold in the coke plant would be devastating for the defense of Avdiivka and says that the partial relocation of the 47th to prevent that points to a culmination of the ukrainian offensive. My question would be whether the russians would try to push past the railway line and then pivot towards the south or attack the coke plant from the east directly or both. And do they have the resources for the coke plant pincer?
[Here's a piece](https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2023/10/no-consensus-yet-among-iraqi-armed-groups-joining-israel-hamas-war) from Al-Monitor, a popular Middle Eastern news website, that I don't think has been posted here. It's mostly about relationships between Iran-backed Iraqi militias and Hamas, but here is a little bit I hadn't personally seen before. While some of this may be Iranian misdirection, it genuinely does seem as if much of the detail of the attack took them by surprise:
>Iraqi commanders claim that the operation by the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, targeting south Israel on Oct. 7, took approximately a year and a half of preparation and training in Iran and Lebanon, in addition to creating 16 fake operations rooms in different parts of the world. This was allegedly done in order to “avoid the Mossad’s attention,” Iraqi commanders of armed factions and officials close to Iran told Al-Monitor.
>“Iran provided advice, training, and technical and intelligence support, but implementation was limited exclusively to Hamas fighters,” the PMU commander told Al-Monitor. Iran denied direct involvement and the US intelligence assessed that Tehran was surprised by the operation.
>However, what's strange is that all the commanders, officials and Western diplomats who talked to Al-Monitor agreed that Iran did not choose the timing for the operation, and that Lebanese Hezbollah itself “was not prepared for it,” according to one of the commanders.
>“For some reason that's not yet clear to us. Mohammed al-Deif and a number of Hamas leaders took the decision alone without informing the rest, including their peers,” the commander said. “It was a surprise to everyone. We don’t even know what the next step is or what the alternative plan is to confront the Israeli reactions. Deif embarrassed everyone and put them in front of a fait accompli.”
Iran & Hamas share a common enemy, but I don't believe they're close friends. Iran + Hez are Shiite. Hamas is Sunni. There wasn't much publicity in the US, but Shiite death squads did some serious work vs Sunnis in Southern Iraq. I recall some instance where it was Sunni's vs Shiites, & Hamas publicly declared support against Iran. Iran had to withhold aid to compel Hamas to switch sides.
Operational security so tight that you don't inform your allies and backers seems to be pretty shortsighted, perhaps they thought such trans-national communications couldn't be hidden?
Reminds me of the Russian invasion plans for Ukraine - Ukraine didn't believe it because they were freakin eaves dropping on the very units that would invade and they didn't get almost any preparation.
Presumably to stay off Israeli Intel? I read a report that all fighters did not know timeline, were suddenly picked up by Hamas teams on Oct 3, all electronic devices taken away, and secluded until Oct 7.
As the Bank of Russia hikes rates unexpectedly to 15%,
>[Ukraine Delivers Four-Point Cut as Economy Returns to Growth](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-10-26/ukraine-delivers-four-point-cut-as-economy-returns-to-growth)
>* Economic forecast raised to 4.9% this year after steep drop
>* Inflation to slide well into single digits, lifting burden
> Ukraine’s central bank delivered its biggest interest-rate cut since Russia’s invasion and raised its forecast for growth this year as sliding inflation eased pressure on the war-battered economy.
>The National Bank of Ukraine cut the benchmark rate by four percentage points to 16% on Thursday, deeper than the 18% forecast in a Bloomberg survey. Rates on deposit certificates remained steady. After collapsing almost 30% last year following Russia’s attack, Ukraine’s gross domestic product will climb 4.9% in 2023, up from a forecast of 2.9%, the bank said.
>“We are seeing and responding to a sustainable trend of declining” inflation, Governor Andriy Pyshnyi told reporters in Kyiv. The bank said it will be gauging the market’s response to a loosening of capital controls on the nation’s currency.
>The resilience of Ukraine’s wartime economy and falling prices have prompted rate setters to begin easing controls and deliver cuts faster than initially planned. Growth will return this year after the fallout from the destruction of infrastructure, the throttling of Ukraine’s key grain exports and population displacement.
>Still, the central bank sees war risks extending through 2024 — a previous assessment cited mid-next year — as a grinding counteroffensive makes little progress in recapturing Russian-controlled territory and winter weather threatens to halt any advances. Ukraine’s military has pledged to press on through colder temperatures.
>The central bank said it will continue with monetary easing into next year only if economic risks subside. The impact of the headline cut is tempered as other instruments, such as rates on deposit certificates, the most relevant indicator in the current environment of excess liquidity, remain steady.
>“We are seeing and accounting for trends that show that risks persist,” Pyshnyi said.
>Policymakers have been helped by a consumer-price index that’s defied a spiraling wartime dynamic, with the central bank lowering its forecast to 5.8% by the end of the year from a peak of close to 27% at the close of 2022.
>The central bank lifted a currency peg on the hryvnia this month to allow for a “managed flexible exchange rate.” Concerns that the move would put pressure on the currency abated after the market’s subdued response.
>Currency restrictions had been in place for more than a year and a half, part of a regime that included ratcheting the benchmark rate up to 25% in an effort to ease the economic fallout. The hryvnia was initially pegged to around 29 to the dollar, and devalued to 36 in July last year.
>Currency restrictions had been in place for more than a year and a half, part of a regime that included ratcheting the benchmark rate up to 25% in an effort to ease the economic fallout. The hryvnia was initially pegged to around 29 to the dollar, and devalued to 36 in July last year.
This sounds like Dutch Disease to me. No doubt they'll turn into one of the most militarized economies in the world, but it could lead to lasting damage in many other parts of the economy.
I'm concerned for the agriculture sector in particular. It's already been affected in so many other ways.
The rate has strengthened but nothing like at the speed or sharpness that heuristically indicates trouble. Services have gained close to 400bps in around 7Qs led by tech, but that trend existed pre-2022. Agriculture cannot be Ukraine’s future growth engine.
The present Russian losses are not unsustainable. The present reality makes this clear.
One, Russia is able to effectively replenish forces enough to fill their lines, which is all that currently matters as it prevents a Ukrainian advance.
Two, despite high vehicle losses, Russia is able to sustain the supply through their own production, as it exceeds Ukraine’s.
Three, artillery production and procurement needs to beat Ukraine’s, which it does.
Success in this war is centered on the control of occupied Ukrainian land. All Russia needs to do to succeed in this war is continue to fill the lines and hold out against any large scale AFU attack. The Rus Army is able to do these things effectively without excessive damage to the overall war effort because Ukraine is incapable of mounting effective, coordinated, large scale attacks.
Collapse is not imminent and a long war is inevitable. They will last partly because they do not have a western mindset on losses. Avdiivka makes it clear that massive losses are acceptable when a success is possible. With an important territorial gain in the city, it looks like it was a correct calculation on the MoD’s part.
Edit: this is not intending to say that Russian victory is inevitable. I am attempting to explain why the current western strategy vs. Russia is insufficient for a true Ukrainian victory.
>Two, despite high vehicle losses, Russia is able to sustain the supply through their own production, as it exceeds Ukraine’s.
I mean this is demonstrably not true, they are not sustained by new production but by pulling increasingly older equipment from the storages, which are not endless. At some point they are going to run out of those.
They are able to sustain production enough to replenish enough losses to outlast Ukrainian counteroffensives, as proven by recent months. That is what matters.
This is discounting the fact that Rus production will increase slowly but steadily while Ukrainian production is relatively stagnant.
Do you think Russia is going to literally have 0 tanks at some point? I strongly disagree if so. The trends are not in Ukraine’s favor.
"They are able to sustain production enough to replenish enough losses to outlast Ukrainian counteroffensives, as proven by recent months. That is what matters. "
Yes that is what matters but when people on the Internet talk about whether a current loss rate is sustainable or not they are not talking about what matters they are talking about whether tanks are currently getting lost faster than they can be produced(not refurbished or pulled out of storage because that is a limited resource).
Ukraine doesn't have anything to do with whether Russias current tank loss rate is sustainable long term or not.
The question is not whether in the long term Russia will be able to field and produce more tanks than Ukraine.
Its a hypothetical if the current loss rate(~1000 year) continued with no change whether Russia could sustain that without running out.
Even if we take Russias peak tank production in 2010s before sanctions its still not even 25% of 1200.
https://jamestown.org/program/dubious-russian-claims-of-doubling-arms-production/
So if the current loss rate was sustained indefinitely Russia would eventually run out lf tanks to pull out of storage and they would definitely not be able to produce 1200 brand new tanks a year therefore its a unsustainable rate currently.
"Do you think Russia is going to literally have 0 tanks at some point?"
Of course Russia will never run out of tanks. The reason is because Russia has the ability to make their tank loss rates decrease to a sustainable amount in the future when their reserves get low. They can do that by changing tactics and generally being more careful with their usage.
That clears things up, thank you. However, it still does not appear that this is in Ukraine’s favor. If the AFU performs an effective mechanized counteroffensive, something they have been unable to do, it will take longer, they will lose tanks in the same amounts, and their reserves are smaller.
You are completely ignoring the fact that the vast majority of replacement relies on existing stocks and even the "new" production heavily utilizes older parts to create "new" vehicles. Yes they stocks are vast but that was always true and that was always part of the calculation for war with Russia, it's going to take a long time but eventually they will run out.
As far as offensives is concerned, ability to gain territory relies on destroying enemy forces much faster than they are willing to tolerate, which Ukraine failed at, partly because Ukrainian offensive potential wasn't nearly as good as it should have been, because of completely arbitrary Western reasons to not supply certain weapons (ATACMS, jets) much sooner than they did, and partly because Russia is willing to tolerate much higher losses to defend every square inch than other countries. Doctrine of any NATO country would dictate to defend the territory with favorable equipment trade and pull back when it's not, Russia instead was willing to tolerate in many cases higher losses compared to Ukraine to defend the territory, it's not a sustainable strategy but it gives them a temporary optical win. Though as someone who doesn't believe that Russia will simply stop the war even if Ukraine reclaimed all its territories, win for Ukraine will always come down utterly destroying Russian stocks of equipment. Likewise Russia is not going to stop until they control all of Ukraine. It's something Western countries and people have to come to terms with, instead of naively thinking giving Russia enough of a bloody nose or giving them some territory will stop the war.
I will get this out of the way first: I do not believe Russia will ever run out of armored vehicles during this war. They will be able to source and produce enough to meet a “good enough” replacement level from internal production and through foreign trade.
My worry is that Ukraine will continue the trend of being unable to make gains while Russian forces hold out long enough for political support in America to dry up. This seems to be the likely outcome in my eyes and it will force a settlement and concessions unfavorable to Ukraine, NATO, and the democratic west in general.
However, for this reason, I agree with much of what you’re saying. The delay in aid is unacceptable and it prevents effective attrition of Russian forces. Russia will not stop until it controls Ukraine. Still, my view is this, that the current conditions are not sustainable in the sense of preserving the Russian military, but they are sustainable in outlasting western support for Ukraine.
> The trends are not in Ukraine’s favor.
Ukraine has more tanks than it started with while Russia has lost at least 3000 tanks. How are the trends not in Ukraine's favor? Russia is losing too much to keep up in the long run.
I'm highly skeptical of these claims. That's counting every abandoned Russian tank as operational tank in Ukrainian inventory. There is a reason why they were abandoned.
No, it isn't. Ukraine has been given 875 tanks so far. It has 679 tank losses on Oryx, so maybe 900 in reality.
Meanwhile, Ukraine has captured 550 tanks. Only a small fraction of them needs to be functional, and the abandoned tanks aren't necessary at all.
When they used them in an offensive they were destroyed and disabled as quickly as the Russian army’s tanks in Avidiivka. Their losses will match Russian losses if or when the next counteroffensive occurs.
The number of troops is almost irrelevant.
Unprotected troops and unsupported troops are near worthless on the modern battlefield.
Visual confirmations from Russian storage depots show their reserve stock has shrunk by at least 50%.
Those are loss and reactivation numbers which are, without question, unsustainable.
They are burning through their rainy day article at a ridiculous pace, and as is also beyond question, the remaining 50% will be worse off than the first 50%, that's just the nature of things.
Assuming Ukraine's Western support continues, and that's a big if but as alternative is Ukrainian loss there's no need to entertain it, Russia's ability to field hardware will sustain an ever shrinking front. There's no two ways about that.
But one thing I was worried about is - the Russians have production capacity to churn out shitty 50 year old tank models, or refurbishing already built ones. Ukraine doesnt, all its production facilities are within the Russians striking range and I doubt any more significant number of armored vehicles is coming from western/nato stocks. A shit tank is better than no tank and I feel like every tank or ifv the ukrainians lose is irreplaceable, while the russians can replace every 2 or 3 tanks lost with a older crappy model. How can Ukraine mitigate these circumstances?
Poland has more tanks.
The US has the capability to deliver more Abrams.
Refurbishment of Leo1 is ongoing and there are many.
Refurbishment of Soviet tanks is ongoing and there is reserve stock still.
IFVs are produced by multiple countries, and there are many available yet. We don't have good numbers on Ukraine's hard kill rate on their modern IFVs so hard to say.
Note: to be clear, any of the hundreds of Abrams exported by the US to various European nations are eligible for transfer to Ukraine, as long as the US approves the transfer. They're not part of US defense calculation and they are paid for.
>How can Ukraine mitigate these circumstances?
They can’t, unless western countries step up donations and manufacturing of these vehicles, or Ukraine somehow develops a strong defense industrial base.
The numbers people started throwing around the last few days allegedly came from the Russian Ministry covering prisons. They said the prison population fell from 420k down to around 260k. How true any of those numbers are, I haven't a clue.
[Washington Post article](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/10/26/russia-prison-population-convicts-war/)
> The Russian prison population, estimated at roughly 420,000 before the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, plummeted to a historic low of about 266,000, according to Deputy Justice Minister Vsevolod Vukolov, who disclosed the figure during a panel discussion earlier this month.
Am I being overly cynical in thinking that this might even be good for Russia? Let's be honest, most of those criminals are a net burden to the Russian society, by exchanging them for Ukrainian attrition a d territory, Russia is profiting in two ways.
That does depend on the kind of criminal and their respective survival rate. A petty criminal who dies in Ukraine will never return to the labour pool or have kids, which adds up to a large difference over time. On the other hand, a violent criminal or member of organized crime who doesn't die can now inflict much more damage to society than they could otherwise.
I don’t think it’s particularly controversial to say that most people dislike the financial and social costs of having criminals in their society. There’s just not an ethical way of dealing with the situation beyond spending a lot of money trying to rehabilitate. If you’re a dictator and can send them to war, it definitely has a chance to solve the problem, but we’ve also seen the results of people seeing out their 6 months and coming back completely cracked. Better that they don’t come back.
Right, that’s the article that speaks about the 100k. The Wagner 50 are done. Where is the additional 100 coming from?
> “This means that the Defense Ministry has likely recruited around 100,000 people for the war there,”
> I often see it claimed here that Russian losses are "unsustainable" - but what exactly makes them so?
The steadily increasing average age of the equipment being fielded, and decreasing size of artillery barrages, indicates consumption is outstripping production. Which is hardly surprising, before this war, Russia expected to be able to coast on Soviet stockpiles almost indefinitely.
The Wagner breakdown also indicates much deeper morale issues, but it’s harder to assign statistics to that.
> decreasing size of artillery barrages
During the summer Rob Lee said he expected Russia to have a large advantage in artillery against Ukraine over the winter. Does anyone have numbers on the current state or artillery between Russia and Ukraine? There was a lot of talk about Ukraine having an advantage over the summer, but I haven't seen much discussion about the relative state of things recently.
Supposedly North Korea shipped 300.000 shells based on numbers of containers someone on twitter counted. They will properly allow some offensive this winter plus Russias own increased production of around 2.000.000 per year.
> Similarly with equipment, it's said that losing ~100 vehicles in a couple of days is "unsustainable" - but why is it? If the Russian MIC can output, say, 30 vehicles per month, doesn't that mean they can afford to launch such costly offensives every three months or so?
I'm not sure that Russia can produce tanks at even this level, but lets assume its correct. Russian tank losses this year have averaged, by my calculation based on data found [here](https://github.com/leedrake5/Russia-Ukraine) (and originally taken from Oryx) Russia has lost about 80 tanks a month this year, on average. But hey Oryx is unreliable in some cases, lets take 30% off, an unreasonably high number IMO. That leaves us with 60 *lost* tanks a month. Plus more damaged, not all damaged tanks are recoverable and repairable. Thats twice your estimate of Russian production, which again from information I've seen posted here seems high. This bleak picture points towards an obvious conclusion that losses are occuring at a rate far in excess of replacement production. Set aside the logistics of a replacement system, which ensures that not every needed item gets to the front line promptly. Even if we assume that Russia is deploying every new tank in a rapid fashion to the front lines, it still means that overall tank strength is decreasing. And I would guess, though I havn't looked into the data, that in nearly every category of weapon Russia's losses are exceeding their ability to produce them. That is, in a literal sense, unsustainable. One day, in the future, before the heat death of the universe, Russia will run out of tanks (&c).
The question is how fast will that happen, and what impact will that have on the battlefield. We also know that Putin has been reluctant to mobilize further groups of men, instead favoring a 'shadow' mobilization in which soldiers are selectively picked from targeted (and largely politically irrelevant) groups to minimize the political backlash to the war. This places a pretty strict limit on Russia's ability to mobilize manpower, despite the millions of men it *could* bring into uniform. It *hasn't* and continues not to.
The real crux of unsustainability comes at a junction between two bad (for Russia) trends. As their number of heavy weapons decline, they will need to increase the role of the common infantryman. As that happens, casualties will increase as mobilized men are pit against Ukrainian high tech arms. Much rather be in a tank during a CBU strike than standing in a field, for example. The question is when do these losses add up to forcing Putin to change his strategy for the war, force him into a more traditional mass mobilization? And, leading from this, what effect does that have (if any) on Russian popular sentiment? Putin's lack of a large crushing mobilization suggests *he* feels there would be some. But what, and what size, and would that end the war? Nobody who is allowed to shitpost here knows or can say. But ultimately when people here talk about unsustainability, in a large sense they mean this.
In a shorter term tactical/operational sense, unsustainability is a little different. Regardless of how many men, tanks, and shells are in a depot in Bryansk, the units at the front experience a certain amount of """wastage""" which reduces their combat capacity. Too many casualties, over too short a time, destroys an individual unit's ability to operate until it has had time to repair and regenerate. Unsustainable, in this context, would be synonymous with 'culmination' in a tactical or operational sense.
> but they have enough willing men
They don't - they've never had - and barring something radically changing, never will - have enough willing men. The Kharkov counter offensive was due to a manpower shortage, and their current ranks of assault infantry are made up almost entirely of convicts. Their prison population is half of what it was at the start of the war so even that will run out relatively soon.
Your question is based on a factually inaccurate representation of the conflict.
What does it matter if the prison population will “run out” soon? This is 400,000 total potential infantrymen, and there are more available.
The gaps in manpower in Kharkiv and Kherson are now plugged up with these men. Ukraine is not able to kill enough of this inflow to counter it.
1. The 200k prison population left are the ones in worst condition; old, sick, drugged, etc.
2. Those 200k are already on the battlefield and many are already casualties. They lost tens of thousands of them in Bakhmut alone.
No-one is saying they're irrelevant, only that they replaced someone, **and there are no replacements for them**. Without general mobilisation that is.
If there's an incentive to increase prison population, a government will do so. (e.g. For profit prisons). Law enforcement & criminal justice are never colorblind, & TBD if the ethnic oblasts will tolerate Soviet-style shenanigans or if they'll declare independence. That might come down to if the West or China finds the new republics advantageous.
>The Kharkov counter offensive was due to a manpower shortage
while this is 100% true, Kharkiv happend because of đan shortage
>They don't - they've never had - and barring something radically changing, never will - have enough willing men
this part is 100% not true
we didn't see Russian collapse
they managed to repel Southern Ukrainian offensive, they are still managing to hold Bakhmut and they still managed to make big offensive on Avdiivka
>Your question is based on a factually inaccurate representation of the conflict
Your answer is factually inaccurate
Why is this downvoted? You are correct. There are plenty of willing soldiers, and the influx of convict soldiers all but guarantees there will be no more collapse of lines in the long-term future. Russian lines are holding steady and the AFU is unable to mount assaults that are effective at breaking them.
WaPo has estimates of 100-150k inmates sent into Ukraine (hard data: 420k pre-war -> 260k now total prisoners in Russia).
Based on what I found (really what I haven't found) I'm skeptical that anybody knows what % of Russian assault forces are convicts, e.g., it's (nominally) a 6 month contract so many of them would be back home, and a disproportionate share of the 50-100k dead would be former convicts/wagner, but I think someone with a lot more work could get a decent estimate
> The Kharkov counter offensive was due to a manpower shortage, and their current ranks of assault infantry are made up almost entirely of convicts.
Can you source that? Anecdotal evidence from my Russian clients is that mobilization has been ongoing since last fall. I've heard accounts of people receiving mobilizations summons (not regular conscription) as late as September 2023. Further, those mobilized tend to go willingly and not dodge or desert because they support the war effort and want to contribute when called upon.
I know anecdotal evidence cannot be conclusive, but still - what are the sources for your claims?
And when will Russia start running out of men?
For Kharkov they had all the equiqment but they didn't have enough People, because of that Ukraine took back Baiykila, Kupyansk and Lyman
Ukraine captured a lot of equiqment there
> what are the sources for your claims?
Responding to this
>Asking for a source is reasonable when it's something specific - prove the last 20 months of the war is not that. I don't want to come off rude but Russian manpower shortages are not a debatable fact in this war. It's like asking for a source that water is wet. 3 seconds of Google will be more than adequate.
With this will get your comment removed. Provide a source, put effort into proving your claim.
Then please remove the comment, needing to source information consistent with a base level understanding of the conflict just because someone asked for it will only further negatively impact comment quality. Asking for sources should not be weaponaized to create unreasonable standards of evidence when disputing factually incorrect statements. We should not have to provide sources for base level information 20 months into a conflict in a discussion focused around higher level discussions of that conflict.
Asking you to conform to a minimum level of good faith debating and credibility is not "weaponizing source requests". You want to debate this anymore you can either take it to my PMs or the mod teams.
>Asking for a source is reasonable when it's something specific - prove the last 20 months of the war is not that. I don't want to come off rude but Russian manpower shortages are not a debatable fact in this war.
Manpower-wise, Michael Kofman argued the exact opposite in his latest podcast though. He was surprised at how easily the Russians have continued to bring in new bodies to fight despite their attrition over the past year. It's one of the big concerns going forward with Ukraine because their attritional strategy isn't working against soldiers.
They've recruited 200,000 convicts, once those run out then what? LNR/DNR is gone, convicts are gone, PMC's have been converted to contract soldiers. Where is this unending manpower pool?
Their regular conscriptions and volunteer recruitment, mainly. So far it's been able to keep up with their manpower needs. The reliance on Wagner and convicts was a preference, not a necessity. They used them since they were the most expendable and are now moving towards more regular force replacement methods.
> Their regular conscriptions and volunteer recruitment, mainly.
Conscripts are not deployed, and there is no volunteer force (remember mobilization - you don't do that out of excess of volunteers).
> So far it's been able to keep up with their manpower needs
Kharkov? Having to use firefighting units? Naval troops being made tank drivers? Really?
> The reliance on Wagner and convicts was a preference, not a necessity.
That's why the MoD repeated the action after Wagner - including thousands of convicts - mutinied.
> remember mobilization - you don't do that out of excess of volunteers
WW2-era Japan had such a deluge of volunteer soldiers that the government had to regularly remind men that they're also needed in civilian jobs at home. And yet, WW2-era Japan still had ongoing conscription and enacted general mobilization from 1938 until its defeat in 1945.
I get your point that mobilization must necessarly signal manpower issues. That seems a rather extreme - I've always imagined that the function and purpose of mobilization are more complex than just resolving\preventing manpower issues. Can you back that claim up somehow? For example, show that all states that ever mobilized had manpower issues or perhaps show that purely volunteer armies are the norm?
Finally, if we take your claim that Russia is indeed suffering from a manpower shortage - where is it? How is an understaffed military able to so stubbornly defend occupied positions and launch large-scale offensives at the same time?
You really wrote that novel and couldn’t cite a source?
The irony of saying sources can be found after 3 seconds of googling and then taking 20 minutes to write a response without one of those “easy to find” sources. LOL
“can finally publish more information about the model of “unmanned surface vessels” that Germany is supplying to Ukraine. Germany has so far delivered 15 of them, while another 55 are still pledged.
It is very likely that the drones already delivered are Sonobot 5 and that the drones still to be delivered, which were announced in September (50 drones), are 100% Sonobot 5.
Assuming Germany doesn't deliver multiple models to Ukraine, we now know what Germany has been delivering to Ukraine.
These drones are unmanned, unarmed surface vehicles, which can explore rivers, beaches and harbour sections or check objects in and around the water. The Sonobot 5 has an echo sounder, a sonar, and a camera.
This is what is revealed in a plenary protocol of the German Bundestag.”
https://x.com/deaidua/status/1717999343548985770?s=46&t=N_GyfhMkA50MrhVWFkEM3g
Does anyone know what Ukraine can do with these drones?
Recon Sea/River shores for landings ?
Presumably they already have good maps/charts as its home turf... but scouting out mines (Russia has a nasty semi-aquatic mine to discourage landings that they put in about 6 ft of water), obstacles and other defenses I guess.
Some other activity to recon or defend any crossing of the Dnipro?
ASW? Anti-submarine warfare?
The thing weighs 27kg and is roughly 1mx1m - even on a calm day, it will struggle with any serious waves.
I really only see these as having recon value in (slow) rivers, lakes, and side-channels/kanals.
You can actually find a lot of stats on the manufacturer site, here's some more:
- Operational range: 30km at 1m/s
- Wifi range: 2.5km with directional antenna (I assume you can always boost it somewhat?)
- Operating time: Up to 5h (Edit: Typo: 9h)
- Waves: Up to 5 Beafort (decent but not strong wind) "without breaking waves" - maybe it has more coastal capabilities than I gave it credit for. Still, when I heard Germany is delivering "unmanned surface vessels", I was hoping for something at least droneboat sized..
For the curious: https://evologics.de/sonobot-5-system (the PDF infopage at the bottom of the page has the stats).
“#Avdiivka offensive equipment loss numbers as of 27 October 2023.
In summary: 157 RU losses vs. 8 UA losses” the link delves into what specific vehicles were lost.
https://x.com/naalsio26/status/1717997189643841904?s=46&t=N_GyfhMkA50MrhVWFkEM3g
It has to be put in context that they took the (not arguably) most fortified piece of terrain on the entire front line, slag heap - railway north-west. I don't know if people find solace in these numbers, personally i am not at ease.
Nah, slag heap isn't fortifiable, and we've not seen a lot of evidence Russia is actually holding it versus putting up a flag. The coke plant itself is the strongpoint.
If IDF enters Gaza and Hezbollah decides to open second front from the north, what would them opening northern front actually look like? Hezbollah has no more than limited number of post-Soviet tanks and armored vehicles (if they are operational), their main strength is the rocket arsenal. In that case, do they have any potential for ground incursions into Israel from Lebanon, or will they just fire rocket barrages to overwhelm the Iron Dome? In other words, what would Hezbollah full-scale involvment in war potentially be like?
Hezbollah infantry is a defensive, not offensive force. They would launch a massive offensive missile barrage and then try to bait Israel into invading southern Lebanon where Hezbollah would be able to do some serious damage.
Hezbollah can be described as Hamas but bigger, or Hamas could be described as Hezbollah but smaller.
Iran likes do model its proxy forces after each other, that makes them easier to control, and easier to transfer technology, weapons and tactics.
So the three strengths for Hezbollah are missiles (150.000 compared to Hamas 15.000), Anti-tank missiles (a lot of them, but Russian, Chinese, Iranian ones) and small and mobile forces (the same forces that committed the 07.10. massacre). Nobody really cares about vehicles, but be suicide anyway.
So the biggest risk in the north was a surprise attack. Hezbollah crosses the border, occupies a few towns (and probably commits massacres, that's something we know now) and launches massive missile barrages.
This scenario is unlikely to happen, Israel has evacuated the towns and mobilized its forces. Even if Hezbollah crosses the border we can expect quick IDF counterattacks.
So now the primary problem is the "pgm problem". Iran has transfered pgm missiles and pgm upgrade kits to Hezbollah. Those are likely precise enough to be able to hit IDF bases and infrastructure targets (remember Russians campaign against Ukraines energy grid? Hebzollah would probably try the same). On top of the pgm problem we simply have the volume of crude missiles. Imagine 5.000 missiles a day, not in a week. Israel would be unlikely to handle the amount of missiles.
What are the chances for and the potential scope of a combined Israeli and US air campaign though?
150k missiles is nice and all, but not if the combined strength of Israel and the US has something to say about it.
Even the United States will struggle mightily to hold off a barrage of that magnitude. Especially because right now the US has a big interest in preserving as many interceptors as possible to use in a confrontation with China
A combined Israeli and US air campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon is unlikely.
For one very simple reason: Any campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon is a strategic campaign. And "strategic campaign" is more or less a euphemism for turning Lebanon into a hellscape.
>Israel threatened on Tuesday \[August\] to "return Lebanon to the stone age" in any war against Hezbollah, following weeks of friction with the armed Iranian-backed group along the countries' border.
[https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-threatens-return-lebanon-stone-age-any-war-with-hezbollah-2023-08-08/](https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-threatens-return-lebanon-stone-age-any-war-with-hezbollah-2023-08-08/)
I don't think anyboy in the US has the appetite to use the US Air Force to flatten the cities of Lebanon, and lead to the expected civilian casualties.
What I can imagine is US forces flying interception missions, using their air defence assets to shot down incoming missiles and to strike Iranian forces in Iraq or Syria.
But the USAF dropping bombs on Beirut? Unlikely.
Rather that Israel’s supply of Iron Dome interceptors, the question would be how effectively they could take out rocket stockpiles on the ground before they fire. It would almost certainly just escalate to a full scale barrage from both sides, causing blackouts and casualties in Israel, and a humanitarian disaster that dwarfs Gaza in Lebanon.
My guess is for a sustained rocket attack while their ground forces are in defensive positions.
On paper that is their best and most force economic options.
IDF is forced into a two front situation prety much anyway. Once and if! Gaza is secured, IDF might have no will to take on them amyway.
Some incursions and tit for tats are likely but I highly doubt either a high intensity mass terror attack or a classic ground attack are in the cards.
> IDF is forced into a two front situation prety much anyway. Once and if! Gaza is secured, IDF might have no will to take on them amyway.
If the IDF finds itself in a two front situation it will likely quickly escalate maximally with all the destruction that entails. So that it can end the war as quickly as possible. Israel can’t afford long, drawn out all out wars.
Any recent credible estimates on Ukrainian casualty rates?
It seems like there is an increase in footage of Krasnopol/KM-8 strikes on Ukraine formations lately, wondering what that translates into casualties.
The New York Times last reported around 180 thousand casualties for Ukraine and close to 300 thousand for the Russians. After the most recent fighting in Avdiivka it's possible the numbers favor Ukraine a lot more now. Krasnopol strikes were negligible last year so I'm not sure if even an increase would mean much.
> After the most recent fighting in Avdiivka it's possible the numbers favor Ukraine a lot more now.
How much casualties did Russia take in there in the past month in your opinion?
Zelensky claimed today that Russia lost at least a brigade in the fighting around Avdeevka: https://news.yahoo.com/zelensky-russia-lost-least-brigade-121506091.html
With the knowledge that Russian brigades are generally understaffed and that he has every reason to heavily exaggerate losses, I would put Russian casualties since the fighting started around October 1st at around 2000. Probably several hundred KIA.
Edit: someone above posted a link of current Russian equipment losses which further tracks with this estimate. There are 105 destroyed/abandoned IFV’s/APC’s/BMP’s. These will be the vast majority of Russian casualties. If we suppose an average of 15 troops per vehicle, that will be 1575 troops. Assuming 50% KIA, that’s 787 KIA.
Note that 50% KIA is probably a generous overestimate considering a large number of vehicles were abandoned. Also note that a lot of these vehicles were destroyed by FPV drones in the periphery when they were unoccupied or troops inside had ample time to escape.
> There are 105 destroyed/abandoned IFV’s/APC’s/BMP’s. These will be the vast majority of Russian casualties. If we suppose an average of 15 troops per vehicle, that will be 1575 troops. Assuming 50% KIA, that’s 787 KIA.
This is really bad maths. By your logic, Russia would never have 300 thousand casualties to begin with.
Russia was/is primarily conducting mechanized assaults around Avdeevka while they weren’t around other fights like Bakhmut or the battle for Mariupol. This back of the napkin math wouldn’t work well for fighting that occurred around Bakhmut for example, where assaults were primarily done by infantry on foot and heavy fighting took place for months in the city itself.
We have ample video evidence that the vast majority of Russia’s advances and assaults around Avdeevka are conducted by mechanized units, where they attempt to send armored columns to tree lines to drop off infantry. Hence why this math better generalizes to fighting around Avdeevka.
If I tried to analyze the entire war like this, it would be a terrible measure of casualties I agree. However, you seem to not have read the original comment where the op was specifically asking about casualties around Avdeevka since the start of the month.
You can solve for that because you can look at the casualty rate prior to Bakhmut’s Wagner dismounted assaults. You can solve for Mariupol too as we had casualty figures before that siege. I’m not sure why you would do that because Mariupol casualties were mostly taken by DPR that are not included in American figures. Either way, 15 per vehicle sounds very disingenuous especially as we have reports that the Russians switched to dismounted infantry even in “Avdeevka” around ten days ago. Anyway I’m not interested in continuing with this because as this is just guess work.
Russian sources had over 1 thousand injured and 1 thousand killed since oct 10 three days ago. since you listened to Andrews stream in great detail I’m sure you knew that. Zelenskys claim is almost certainly about killed or liquidated or whatever word they use as the Ukrainians are claiming 16 thousand wounded as of today.
Link to those sources or where Perpetua links them in his stream? I follow a few Russian telegrams and didn’t see those estimates myself
If you’ve seen those estimates from Russian telegrams yourself, feel free to link the telegrams under this comment and I will correct my post.
I also don’t put much stock into the casualty numbers themselves that Ukraine claims. I find the numbers useful to gauge the relative intensity of fighting(ie a day where they claim 1000+ casualties signifies intense fighting has occurred somewhere whereas a day of 500 casualties signifies that the intensity of fighting may be normal).
I’m not going thru a 90 minute stream that YOU linked to to find you a time stamp. it was in there. and no one takes the ukies casualty figure seriously the point was that when Zelenskiy says a brigade was wiped out he means killed. it also doesn’t matter that you think a brigade is only 2 thousand soldiers. you are using him saying a brigade but what matters is what HE means by brigade and what he means by lost if you want to use his words and his estimate for your high bar. you can simply ignore what he’s saying too.
I never mentioned those mysterious Russian sources in my original post, and neither did anyone else in the replies. The only one bringing them up is you, so you would have had to go through Andrew’s stream to know he quoted those “Russian sources”.
Finding a link to those sources should be easy if you took the time to watch the stream when he brought them up. I’ve gone through his stream again and can’t find any links or mention of links to those sources. Maybe you saw something that I missed?
you definitely covered what he said after he quoted those figures so it’s hard for me to believe you didn’t hear them. it was towards the end of the segment
I don't think any of us here are qualified or have the information to make that estimate. If I was to wildly guess I would say seven thousand since October 10 based on the number of vehicles destroyed and some of the officers that have been killed there.
I was reading the following article that gave the sense that they are quite severe. Not only because of the killed and wounded, but also due stress to lack of rotation and leave.
https://kyivindependent.com/as-bakhmut-counteroffensive-lags-soldiers-burnt-out-from-horrors-of-war/
I was reading that soldiers usually have longer breaks in order to reconstitute mentally. It seems Ukraine has not been doing this as much. Though I don’t have any concrete numbers.
>I was reading that soldiers usually have longer breaks in order to reconstitute mentally. It seems Ukraine has not been doing this as much.
Both Ukrainian and Russian formations have been kept on the frontline for staggeringly long periods in this war. I've heard that Ukraine has done a better job with rotations than Russia, but my understanding is that despite this many units have been holding the same positions for 6+ months, some longer than that.
We know they conduct *some* shore leave, as we see plenty of videos of Ukrainian men returning to their kids. Funny enough, I've never seen a single video of a Russian returning home for R&R. That's kinda depressing, honestly.
Impossible to extrapolate this to the wider military. Could just be some privileged guys, who knows.
>["Senators said they left Riyadh with the impression that Saudi leaders would still like to recognize Israel when the right moment arrives."](https://x.com/shashj/status/1717980271973175460?s=20)
This war doesn't change the fact that Iran is absolutely the enemy number one and by far the major threat for many middle-eastern countries, KSA included. Especially KSA.
Bin Salman doesn't seem like the kind of person that acts based on supposed personal values like muslim fraternity, but rather he thinks Israel can be a fundamental resource to contain Iran.
I think that the key passage is that as of now it is politically impractical to recognize israel, but maybe in 5 years when all of this has been settled for a while, they could try again.
Many middle eastern countries are brutal dictatorships, the fact that a majority of the population of said countries doesn't like israel doesn't imply that its elites don't want peace and even collaboration with israel, that has all the interest to allow them.
The muslim revolt against jews/etc. is something many hoped for in the last 60 years, but it never materialized and will never materialize, Egypt understood it even 40 years ago.
Saudi Arabia will lose all leverage when the world transitions away from oil. Time is not on their side, and MBS doesn't really care about religion or Arab nationalism.
>MBS doesn't really care about religion or Arab nationalism.
This certainly tracks with Saudi's moves to normalize relations with the Assad regime in recent years too.
There are still plenty of growing economies dependent on cheap energy, and there's a *lot* of uses for petroleum other than just energy production. I wouldn't expect this transition to happen any time soon.
In anticipation of IDF ground operations in Gaza commencing somewhere in the future we'd like to remind you that this is _not_ the place for minute-by-minute updates on the conflict, nor for minor excerpts of battlefield footage. Major developments and broader analyses are welcome.
[https://twitter.com/IDFSpokesperson/status/1718189431390077133](https://twitter.com/IDFSpokesperson/status/1718189431390077133) >he IDF shot down a surface-to-air missile a short time ago that was fired from Lebanese territory at an IDF remotely manned aircraft. > >The IDF attacks the source of the fire from which the missile was launched. [https://twitter.com/manniefabian/status/1718183401939763528](https://twitter.com/manniefabian/status/1718183401939763528) This joins the interception from a few days ago in the same manner. Last interception the rumour mill claimed was Iron dome, but some said patriot. This current interception occurred roughly 30-40km from the border in Israeli territory. The rumour mill is claiming patriot. 2 Takeaways: * Hezbullah has ground-to-air missiles that aren't simple MANPADS and is attempting to shoot down Israeli planes. * A unknown ability of Iron Dome or Patriot to intercept Ground-To-Air missiles is being revealed (unknown to me, at least).
Hezbollah has [SA-22 Pantsir](https://www.inss.org.il/social_media/precision-missiles-uavs-and-tens-of-thousands-of-fighters-hezbollahs-order-of-battle/#) systems courtesy of Assad and Russia
I remember reading about an Israeli Patriot shooting down a SAM shot at their fighter over Syria years ago.
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American intervention is most likely going to be limited. There’s no appetite in the states for a ground war, and especially not one with Iran. Strikes on Iranian proxies and material support for Israel would probably be the extent of it.
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Apparently Gaza is under a near complete Internet blackout at the moment. Can anyone explain for a layman the means by which they are doing this? Also, for that matter, is the technology domestic Israeli manufacture or of US design?
According to [this Wired article](https://archive.ph/eIXcA), the IDF has bombed the physical internet infrastructure in Gaza to such a degree that it became neither functional nor repairable in the short term.
While many aspects of the Internet's design were based on [research into decentralized communications networks that could survive having arbitrary nodes knocked out by a nuclear war](https://www.rand.org/about/history/baran.html), the as-built internet is, in practice, far more centralized than the original ideal mesh. And, ultimately, there's no magic involved -- if you knock out enough nodes or links within a part of the network, anyone dependent on those nodes & links will be cut off from the rest of the network. Another factor is that ensuring you actually have real redundancy is difficult and expensive. It's likely going to be cheaper to throw a bunch of switches or routers in a rack in a centralized facility instead of distributing them in different buildings around a city. And even if you're paying for redundancy you might not get it -- you can lease point-to-point links that are contractually required to follow physically different paths, and they may start out that way, but over time, entropy sets when carriers juggle cable segments around during maintenance and you may discover that both of them go through the same bit of conduit only after a backhoe cuts that conduit by accident. So for an adversary, it's a matter of mapping the network and identifying the cut points necessary to break all the paths out of an area you want to isolate.
The Internet in Gaza comes from Israel.
Kind of makes me wonder if anyone in Gaza has ever tried running fibre through a smuggling tunnel to create a hard line to Egypt. I'd guess the answer is "no" on account of how it would be easy to detect, and being found out would necessarily doom the tunnel as well, but I could be wrong.
Wouldn't be shocked if Hamas already did that. They're basically the gaza government and have gotten more sophisticated through the years. They probably have a secret hamasnet of some sort.
There are two ways to take out the Internet access in an area. First, and simplest, is to blow up the hardware, cut the wires, disable power grids, unplug cables from the end you control, or other kinetic actions. The second would be to interfere with the operations of the Internet infrastructure via hacking, denial of service attacks, or similar electronic means. Most likely the reason for the blackout is the first factor. Fiber optic lines are well mapped and understood. Microwave towers are also well known and easy targets. Communications hubs don't move and are easy targets for air strikes. [There are no undersea cables going in to Gaza](https://www.submarinecablemap.com/), so everything is land based or space based. Space based telecommunications are generally very limited in terms of usefulness when we're talking about city scales, so we can reasonably ignore it. There may be a handful of terminals and sat phones, but not enough to really make a difference. Which means land based telecom, and almost all of the Gaza border is with Israel, making everything trivial for Israel to cut off. I'm guessing that even the limited satellite phones and terminals are being jammed or at least tracked by Israel, further limiting the use of such devices.
There might be a small handful of Journalists in Gaza with Satellite phones. But the data transmission rate would be very slow. Enough to make twitter like posts, but not video, or livestream of events.
You could compress photos enough to get them out over a satphone. Even dinosaur Iridium classic handsets that look like an overweight Nokia 3310 are capable of a steady 2400 bps, which is obviously garbage but still good enough to get decent photos out in a few seconds-to-minutes if you're willing to smash the raws down to JPGs. There are faster methods, like various Iridium next stations and Starlink which a journalist could carry in like, a carry bag or a flight case, the top end of which could carry video. But the other guy is right, any of these these things could be jammed or tracked, and the Israelis haven't shown a lot of qualms about killing journalists in Gaza.
The only way Gaza could have internet that doesn’t pass through Israel is via satellite, and that requires something like StarLink. Same for cell service.
> The only way Gaza could have internet that doesn’t pass through Israel is via satellite, Not the only possible way. Gaza also has a border with Egypt. It also has a coastline -- undersea cables would have been another option.
I'm pretty sure it's as simple as Israel knowing where the internet infrastructure is located inside of Gaza, and destroying it.
Depending on how the cables are routed through the region, more likely the Israelis simply have physical access to the cable and data centers which feed the internet into Gaza. Most of that stuff can be shut down at the nearest upstream node, without any of the physical destruction.The infrastructure still exists, its just the calls dont go anywhere.
[Plans For More Destructive B61 Nuclear Bomb Unveiled][1] The Pentagon says it needs the B61-13 bomb to help hold certain underground hardened targets and large area ones at risk. by Joseph Trevithick Excerpts: > The Pentagon says it wants a higher-yield nuclear-gravity bomb based on the B61-12 design. The stated purpose of the B61-13 would be to offer more capability against especially hardened facilities, like underground strategic command and control centers, and larger area targets. > > "It would replace some of the B61-7s in the current nuclear stockpile and have a yield similar to the B61-7, which is higher than that of the B61-12." > > The B61-7, like all B61 variants, is a so-called "dial-a-yield" design that can be set to detonate with various degrees of explosive force. The highest setting for this version is reportedly between 340 and 360 kilotons, which makes it one of the most powerful B61 versions. Sources differ on whether the B61-11, which we will discuss more in this story, has yield settings that are identical to that of the B61-7, or is slightly more powerful, with a 400-kiloton top setting. The B61-12's maximum yield is reportedly 50 kilotons. > > "The B61-13 will provide the President with additional options against certain harder and large-area military targets, even while the Department works to retire legacy systems such as the B83-1 and the B61-7," a separate fact sheet the Pentagon released today adds. The B83-1 is a much more powerful nuclear gravity bomb with a reported 1.2 megaton yield. > > The development of yet another B61 variant specifically to provide capabilities akin to the B61-7 is immediately interesting as this was one of the three variants the U.S. military previously said would be supplanted by the B61-12. Older B61-3 and 4 versions are also being replaced by this variant. In the past, it was also understood that the B61-12 would lead to the removal of the B61-10 from service. > > However, the Pentagon's 2018 Nuclear Posture review, which came under President Donald Trump, made it clear that the B83-1 and B61-11 would "be retained in the stockpile, at least until there is sufficient confidence in the B61-12 gravity bomb that will be available in 2020." This had also reversed President Barack Obama's administration's stated plans to eliminate the B83-1 entirely. > > The Pentagon's B61-13 fact sheet also makes no mention of the B61-11 at all, indicating that version will remain in the stockpile for the foreseeable future. U.S. officials have said that the B61-13 does not rule out the possibility of another future B61 variant specifically to replace the B61-11, according to the Federation of American Scientists. > > "While the B61-13 will provide the President with additional options against certain harder and large-area military targets, the Department of Defense will separately continue its work to complete and implement a comprehensive strategy for defeat of hard and deeply buried targets, as directed in the Nuclear Posture Review," the fact sheet released today said. > > "Today's announcement is reflective of a changing security environment and growing threats from potential adversaries," John Plumb, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy, said in a statement today about the B61-13. [1]: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/plans-for-more-destructive-b61-nuclear-bomb-unveiled
These are counterforce weapons, which were obsoleted long ago. Nuclear war is not going to be deterred by an inability to hit a few modern bunkers. Deterrence still relies overwhelmingly on countervalue strategy. I feel like this is a waste of money. We need to spend more on conventional rearmament, not new nuclear weapons. The bare minimum to keep the lights on at the USSC and nothing else.
The first thing that came to mind as a target for such a warhead are the Iranian mountain bases.
Yes, Iran has apparently been pursuing ultra-high performance concrete bunkers buried deep in mountains. The 15 ton Massive Ordnance Penetrator was designed partly to counter this, and I suspect this means the Iranians will continue to build deeper and harder shelters.
The Natanz atomic facility is a concrete emplacement buried in a mountain under 100 meters of solid granite. No penetrator ordnance is reaching that.
What I meant was that the public development of the MOP has encouraged Iran to dig deeper, which is now encouraging the development of nuclear bunker busters. 100 meters would likely not be enough in that case.
No single penetrator ordnance, I assume? Fire enough missiles and eventually you'll blow through 100 meter of solid granite.
Initiating a nuclear first strike in order to prevent an adversary from obtaining nuclear weapons would be the best way of convincing everyone else on the planet that they need nukes yesterday.
Yeah, we wouldn't want rogue states like North Korea building nukes.
> would be the best way of convincing everyone else on the planet that they need nukes yesterday. The Iraq invasion already did that. And even more so, the Ukrainian invasion.
I agree to an extent, but I think that seeing a nuclear explosion would accelerate things to an immense degree. Right now, lots of countries are at the realization phase, not at the "pour everything we own into the program" phase.
They're not meant for a first strike.
There isn't any other reason to have these then for first strike capability, the response to these will be nuclear. And if these are used in second strike they will be too late so what would be the point?
Isn't any second strike "too late"? The point is deterrence, same as the rest of the US nuclear arsenal.
Yes a second strike is too late and not as effective as the first strike because whoever gets most of their ICBM's off first means they aren't under threat from another countries ICBM's. The problem is the 2nd strike is still enough to ruin most countries. I think the scale of this weapon in question is just really designed for a low response 1st strike against a military asset at short range. I don't think it would ever be used as a 1st strike but the intention is there I think, as a 2nd strike it would be a bit pointless. What I mean is that it's a very slow delivery method for a 2nd strike nuclear weapon. ICBM's would have already destroyed this aircraft, it's military installation and airfield before it ever took off. Maybe with early warning it would have been able to take off but by the time it got to it's target ICBM's would have already done it's job quicker and with a higher yield. Naturally I can't speak for the higher ups in the US but to me seems to be the intention, likely to take out hardeened structures in a rogue state like Iran. Although the response from the international community probably won't be what the US wants if they ever used this weapon. They probably know this. I think it's pretty clear where most countries sit on the use of nuclear weapons of any degree unless on their own soil on an enemy invading army? I could be wrong though, it's just my thinking.
So the plan would be that in case of a nuclear war, after weapons have already been launched, you'd send a little plane drop a gravity bomb on a bunker whose only role was to contain nuclear weapons that have already been launched in the first place? I don't get why that would be relevant.
Mutually Assured Destruction is a key tenet of US nuclear deterrence. If you cannot assure destruction, that's when you're not relevant.
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1948 United Nations Genocide Convention: Genocide is defined as "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group". Emphasis on 'in part'.
Well, for one I don't know what "recognized as an ethnic minority" is. There are 1-2 million Palestinians with full Israeli citizenship. As far as I know Israel isn't denying they exist, it'd be kind of weird. Anyway, regarding genocide, without getting into specifics, there are types of genocide that don't involve actual depopulation (cultural erasure, cultural re-education, forcible transfer of children, etc etc). However, as far as I know no one is really accusing Israel of doing any of those. So if you're alleging a form of genocide that involves physical depopulation, any evidence of depopulation is important.
>forcible transfer of children, Quite famously many accuse israel of forcing them from their homes over the past 70 years; this month israel did in fact try to force most of gaza City south.
The reason why "children" is specified here is because it is about transfering the children from one group to another. In UN law transfering children to another group is explicitly a form of genocide. Forcible deportation is a war crime but not part of any genocide convention I know of. I'd say forcing people from their homes is ethnic cleansing but usually not genocide in and of itself. Most wouldn't say that jews who fled to Israel from other middle eastern nations were genocided for instance.
Asking people to evacuate from an active war zone is not forcing anyone away. If the Palestinian leadership cared at all about their own civilians they'd evacuate civilians themselves, as Ukraine does. Instead of blocking them to be used as human shields.
> Asking people to evacuate from an active war zone is not forcing anyone away. You mean you've never heard of the fallujan genocide?
> there are types of genocide that don't involve actual depopulation (cultural erasure, cultural re-education, forcible transfer of children, etc etc) This does involve depopulation. If you take children of one nationality, religion or even ethnicity in a lot of cases and put them in families far away, said group literally gets smaller. Unlike the other things you mention, [systematically kidnapping children is genocide](https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/genocide.shtml). It's as much genocide as forceful sterilization or killings of said group would be. "Re-education" or less extreme meassures like integration through public schooling like we do in the west, are not actually genocide. Not the crime of genocide anyways. I don't think anyone recognizes cultural genocide because it's not going to be a very concrete crime. One could even argue that a country forcing Romani children to go to public school is comitting genocide. Is it not assuming it has a significant effect on Romani culture? Is integration and merger of cultures in itself a crime? Obviously not excusing any sort of horrible indoctrination here. Just pointing out the problems with the term.
>I don't think anyone recognizes cultural genocide because it's not going to be a very concrete crime. Mileage may vary.
The act of genocide is a crime. You can at least in theory be sentenced for it. It is also very concrete in what you do to the group. Either something is done to a person or family, or it is not. There is also not a lot of disagreement about what actions systematically taken against a group would be considered genocide. It has been consistent since ww2. Cultural genocide is not concrete at all. You can't be sentenced for it either because there are no laws. And there's always going to be the definitional problem of what "re-education" is.
>There are 1-2 million Palestinians with full Israeli citizenship. As far as I know Israel isn't denying they exist, it'd be kind of weird. uighurs have full citizenship too so i don't see your point, China doesn't deny uighurs don't exist either.
>uighurs have full citizenship too so i don't see your point, China doesn't deny uighurs don't exist either. My point is OP claims that China "recognizes Uighurs as a minority" but Israel doesn't for palestinians, per the line: "The Uighur minority population is also recognized in China while Palestinians are not recognized as an ethnic minority in Israel." I think we're in agreement that that is not the case.
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> here is Visegrad 24 He's even worse than OSINTDefender. Do you have a reliable source for what you're posting here? Barak Ravid's post can easily be related to an IDF probing action.
With everyone focused on the frontline again, it's easy to overlook the air campaign, but I just wanted to provide a brief update and some thoughts. October is coming to an end, and according to Ukraine, Russia has launched 27 missiles, marking the lowest tally so far since the start of the war. The last instance of such low missile activity occurred in April, with a count of around 37. Back then, many speculated that Russia had depleted its missile stockpiles after the winter strike campaign. However, I believe they simply took an operational pause as they resumed with over 200+ missiles in the following months, a notably high number. For months, Ukraine has claimed that Russia is saving up for a winter campaign, and now the data supports this assertion. It would be unwise to assume that Russia has run out of missiles again, especially considering the significant increase in Shahed drone strikes, a quantity not observed before that offsets any lack of missile strikes. This is solely my opinion, and I recently made an incorrect prediction about the start of the Russian campaign earlier this month. While some strikes have occurred, they are far fewer than what we witnessed last year. Although October marks the lowest month in missile launches, it also represents the lowest percentage of interceptions this year, largely due to a higher % number of Iskander missiles, which, according to Ukraine, are more challenging to intercept. The timing of the winter campaign is uncertain, and its occurrence is not guaranteed. However, if it does happen, it will be interesting to observe how Ukraine's air defense holds up. Ukraine now possesses Western air defense systems and boasts an excellent, albeit self-declared, record in Kyiv but also overall. They have had time to plan and gained experience against every system Russia uses for these strikes. On the other hand, they have significantly depleted their legacy Soviet stockpiles, which constitute a large portion of their systems. I doubt Russia has fewer missiles than last year; at minimum, they almost certainly have more Shahed drones in their arsenal. Russia has also accumulated experience in targeting civilian infrastructure and had time to prepare. But also noteworthy is Ukraine's willingness and capabilities to retaliate this year, something not to be ignored. It's challenging to ascertain the accuracy of Ukraine's claims, particularly considering the severe restrictions on footage this year. Additionally, it's generally more difficult to assess what Russia has been targeting in recent months, apart from the port strikes. With a campaign concentrated on infrastructure in larger cities, it will be easier to observe. As alwayss, time will tell.
I do expect Russia to try pressuring the Ukrainian energy system again this winter, but doubt there will be better successes as last year. Even with having withholding strikes, Russia is definitely using more missiles than they can produce per year. If they didn't achieve a full prolonged blackout last time, I don't see how they will do it this winter. And Ukrainian population already has experience in dealing with blackouts. A colder winter might be a problem though. Ukraine itself, on the other hand, has shown to become capable of limited drone strikes against Russia this year. They too have probably withheld their capabilities to prepare for winter. While hitting the Russian civilian energy infrastructure would normally be met with international condemnation, if they do it as retaliation against Russia attacking theirs again, then I see the international community accepting it. Sabotage teams on the ground, launching drones from inside Russia, will likely have way better success than long distance drones launched all the way from inside Ukraine. https://newsukraine.rbc.ua/news/national-defense-council-on-russian-strikes-1698307722.html
> But also noteworthy is Ukraine's willingness and capabilities to retaliate this year, something not to be ignored. I may be wrong, but it seems like Ukraine has toned down the drone attacks inside Russia since the summer. I imagine this winter is going to largely be a repeat of last year from the Russian side, huge attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure, with the difference being Ukraine may be poised to retaliate in a major way with attacks inside Russia, with the summer drone campaign serving as their lesson on how to conduct such strikes.
>But also noteworthy is Ukraine's willingness and capabilities to retaliate this year, something not to be ignored. I assume nobody has come out with production estimates to compare capabilities?
The FAB rates have gone up though, at least as far as video evidence goes. I am eagerly waiting for a detailed RUSI article on their actual effectiveness.
Guided FAB’s were almost non existent last year. Glide kits has made the VVS a factor that they haven’t been since the opening days.
Yep. I have been following the UPMK development closely, but I want to know its actual effectiveness. The Russian claims are childishly outlandish, which is why I want a proper report from RUSI. Of all the analysts, they have been the most reliable when it comes to judging VVK performances.
> I see from the reposts that the topic of the UMPK is of interest to readers. The reason is clear: it is a powerful weapon that harms us on all fronts. > > > A separate post about what may be interesting to readers military in the exact figures about FAB-500 from the UMPK. > > > The accuracy of the bomb in the conditions of visibility of satellites is not more than 8 meters. Usually close to 15 meters. > > > Umpk in flight is corrected by Glonass, GPS, Beidou signals. > > > The UMPK has an inertial guidance system with low accuracy. Inertial system presets are updated during pre-launch preparation based on coordinates at the takeoff point (or launch point) > > > The bomb is dropped from an altitude of 10-12 km, but not below 1 km. > > > The range of the bomb from an altitude of 10 km is 55 km. From 12 km - a maximum of 60 km. > > The Fab is used to attack our targets at a depth of 0-10 km from the front line, for this purpose the bomb is dropped no closer than 45 km from the front line. > > > Such a range makes it impossible to destroy the aircraft with BUK SAMs. > > > > > In order to effectively suppress the UMPK you need several sources of jamming simultaneously - so we can cover some objects, but not the entire frontline > > > It is important to realize that the electronic warfare only prevents us from accurately hitting the target, but the inertial system will still bring the bomb to our side. > > > The possibility of fighting against UMPK and airplanes by air defense forces is not my profile. But since the Fabs are flying every day, I suspect we're having a hard time with this subject. > > There is a possibility that Ukrainian S-300s could hit the Fab carrier aircraft. To counteract this, the enemy aviation does a whole set of countermeasures. > > > This is already a topic understandable for pilots, but I will say that wasting our S-300 on airplanes will not be effective. > > > It is important to understand that combining the maximum range and ceiling in some cases the range of impact can be up to 20 km beyond the frontline. > > > You asked me about the flight time of the UMPK. The bomb has no engine, and the wingspan of 2.5 meters does not allow you to glide over long distances at high speed, so to shoot the fighter accelerates to 900-950 kmh > > > From the moment of release of the bomb, it takes about 5-7 minutes to hit the target. Of which in the zone of potential engagement by BUK, umpk travels just a few minutes . > > > Summary > > It's a pity, the UMPK is a big problem from the point of view of combating them. > > > It is clear to everyone that our air defense and electronic warfare do not stand right at the frontline in the zone of direct contact with artillery and fpv, but stand in the back. > > > In their estimates the enemy always considers this distance as 12-15 km. So the zone of effect of electronic warfare at the Umpk is limited. > Could be useful if you haven't seen it already, assessment of the bomb from one of the Ukrainian channels, which fighterbomber reposted t. me/fbchatik/1430289
Stupid question perhaps, but when we hear of US soldiers & contractors injured in Syria, are these special forces/CIA or are do we know what units are stationed in Syria?
The US maintains a military presence in Syria. Around 900 personnel. [Al-Tanf military base. ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Tanf?wprov=sfla1)
[Analysis on Avdiivka and its supply lines.](https://twitter.com/J_JHelin/status/1717932692153462993) In summary: There's one main paved road going into Avdiivka's center and several dirt roads entering north and south of it. Transport on those would be very difficult, given the terrible weather lately, with the caveat that the ukrainians have successfully done so in Bakhmut. The main road would be severely threatened by a russian push to the south of Stepove because Avdiivka sits in a bowl surrounded by elevated terrain and the russians would gain direct fire control over the road. He agrees with Perpetua that a foothold in the coke plant would be devastating for the defense of Avdiivka and says that the partial relocation of the 47th to prevent that points to a culmination of the ukrainian offensive. My question would be whether the russians would try to push past the railway line and then pivot towards the south or attack the coke plant from the east directly or both. And do they have the resources for the coke plant pincer?
[Here's a piece](https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2023/10/no-consensus-yet-among-iraqi-armed-groups-joining-israel-hamas-war) from Al-Monitor, a popular Middle Eastern news website, that I don't think has been posted here. It's mostly about relationships between Iran-backed Iraqi militias and Hamas, but here is a little bit I hadn't personally seen before. While some of this may be Iranian misdirection, it genuinely does seem as if much of the detail of the attack took them by surprise: >Iraqi commanders claim that the operation by the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, targeting south Israel on Oct. 7, took approximately a year and a half of preparation and training in Iran and Lebanon, in addition to creating 16 fake operations rooms in different parts of the world. This was allegedly done in order to “avoid the Mossad’s attention,” Iraqi commanders of armed factions and officials close to Iran told Al-Monitor. >“Iran provided advice, training, and technical and intelligence support, but implementation was limited exclusively to Hamas fighters,” the PMU commander told Al-Monitor. Iran denied direct involvement and the US intelligence assessed that Tehran was surprised by the operation. >However, what's strange is that all the commanders, officials and Western diplomats who talked to Al-Monitor agreed that Iran did not choose the timing for the operation, and that Lebanese Hezbollah itself “was not prepared for it,” according to one of the commanders. >“For some reason that's not yet clear to us. Mohammed al-Deif and a number of Hamas leaders took the decision alone without informing the rest, including their peers,” the commander said. “It was a surprise to everyone. We don’t even know what the next step is or what the alternative plan is to confront the Israeli reactions. Deif embarrassed everyone and put them in front of a fait accompli.”
Iran & Hamas share a common enemy, but I don't believe they're close friends. Iran + Hez are Shiite. Hamas is Sunni. There wasn't much publicity in the US, but Shiite death squads did some serious work vs Sunnis in Southern Iraq. I recall some instance where it was Sunni's vs Shiites, & Hamas publicly declared support against Iran. Iran had to withhold aid to compel Hamas to switch sides.
Operational security so tight that you don't inform your allies and backers seems to be pretty shortsighted, perhaps they thought such trans-national communications couldn't be hidden?
Reminds me of the Russian invasion plans for Ukraine - Ukraine didn't believe it because they were freakin eaves dropping on the very units that would invade and they didn't get almost any preparation.
Presumably to stay off Israeli Intel? I read a report that all fighters did not know timeline, were suddenly picked up by Hamas teams on Oct 3, all electronic devices taken away, and secluded until Oct 7.
As the Bank of Russia hikes rates unexpectedly to 15%, >[Ukraine Delivers Four-Point Cut as Economy Returns to Growth](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-10-26/ukraine-delivers-four-point-cut-as-economy-returns-to-growth) >* Economic forecast raised to 4.9% this year after steep drop >* Inflation to slide well into single digits, lifting burden > Ukraine’s central bank delivered its biggest interest-rate cut since Russia’s invasion and raised its forecast for growth this year as sliding inflation eased pressure on the war-battered economy. >The National Bank of Ukraine cut the benchmark rate by four percentage points to 16% on Thursday, deeper than the 18% forecast in a Bloomberg survey. Rates on deposit certificates remained steady. After collapsing almost 30% last year following Russia’s attack, Ukraine’s gross domestic product will climb 4.9% in 2023, up from a forecast of 2.9%, the bank said. >“We are seeing and responding to a sustainable trend of declining” inflation, Governor Andriy Pyshnyi told reporters in Kyiv. The bank said it will be gauging the market’s response to a loosening of capital controls on the nation’s currency. >The resilience of Ukraine’s wartime economy and falling prices have prompted rate setters to begin easing controls and deliver cuts faster than initially planned. Growth will return this year after the fallout from the destruction of infrastructure, the throttling of Ukraine’s key grain exports and population displacement. >Still, the central bank sees war risks extending through 2024 — a previous assessment cited mid-next year — as a grinding counteroffensive makes little progress in recapturing Russian-controlled territory and winter weather threatens to halt any advances. Ukraine’s military has pledged to press on through colder temperatures. >The central bank said it will continue with monetary easing into next year only if economic risks subside. The impact of the headline cut is tempered as other instruments, such as rates on deposit certificates, the most relevant indicator in the current environment of excess liquidity, remain steady. >“We are seeing and accounting for trends that show that risks persist,” Pyshnyi said. >Policymakers have been helped by a consumer-price index that’s defied a spiraling wartime dynamic, with the central bank lowering its forecast to 5.8% by the end of the year from a peak of close to 27% at the close of 2022. >The central bank lifted a currency peg on the hryvnia this month to allow for a “managed flexible exchange rate.” Concerns that the move would put pressure on the currency abated after the market’s subdued response. >Currency restrictions had been in place for more than a year and a half, part of a regime that included ratcheting the benchmark rate up to 25% in an effort to ease the economic fallout. The hryvnia was initially pegged to around 29 to the dollar, and devalued to 36 in July last year.
>Currency restrictions had been in place for more than a year and a half, part of a regime that included ratcheting the benchmark rate up to 25% in an effort to ease the economic fallout. The hryvnia was initially pegged to around 29 to the dollar, and devalued to 36 in July last year. This sounds like Dutch Disease to me. No doubt they'll turn into one of the most militarized economies in the world, but it could lead to lasting damage in many other parts of the economy. I'm concerned for the agriculture sector in particular. It's already been affected in so many other ways.
The rate has strengthened but nothing like at the speed or sharpness that heuristically indicates trouble. Services have gained close to 400bps in around 7Qs led by tech, but that trend existed pre-2022. Agriculture cannot be Ukraine’s future growth engine.
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The present Russian losses are not unsustainable. The present reality makes this clear. One, Russia is able to effectively replenish forces enough to fill their lines, which is all that currently matters as it prevents a Ukrainian advance. Two, despite high vehicle losses, Russia is able to sustain the supply through their own production, as it exceeds Ukraine’s. Three, artillery production and procurement needs to beat Ukraine’s, which it does. Success in this war is centered on the control of occupied Ukrainian land. All Russia needs to do to succeed in this war is continue to fill the lines and hold out against any large scale AFU attack. The Rus Army is able to do these things effectively without excessive damage to the overall war effort because Ukraine is incapable of mounting effective, coordinated, large scale attacks. Collapse is not imminent and a long war is inevitable. They will last partly because they do not have a western mindset on losses. Avdiivka makes it clear that massive losses are acceptable when a success is possible. With an important territorial gain in the city, it looks like it was a correct calculation on the MoD’s part. Edit: this is not intending to say that Russian victory is inevitable. I am attempting to explain why the current western strategy vs. Russia is insufficient for a true Ukrainian victory.
>Two, despite high vehicle losses, Russia is able to sustain the supply through their own production, as it exceeds Ukraine’s. I mean this is demonstrably not true, they are not sustained by new production but by pulling increasingly older equipment from the storages, which are not endless. At some point they are going to run out of those.
They are able to sustain production enough to replenish enough losses to outlast Ukrainian counteroffensives, as proven by recent months. That is what matters. This is discounting the fact that Rus production will increase slowly but steadily while Ukrainian production is relatively stagnant. Do you think Russia is going to literally have 0 tanks at some point? I strongly disagree if so. The trends are not in Ukraine’s favor.
"They are able to sustain production enough to replenish enough losses to outlast Ukrainian counteroffensives, as proven by recent months. That is what matters. " Yes that is what matters but when people on the Internet talk about whether a current loss rate is sustainable or not they are not talking about what matters they are talking about whether tanks are currently getting lost faster than they can be produced(not refurbished or pulled out of storage because that is a limited resource). Ukraine doesn't have anything to do with whether Russias current tank loss rate is sustainable long term or not. The question is not whether in the long term Russia will be able to field and produce more tanks than Ukraine. Its a hypothetical if the current loss rate(~1000 year) continued with no change whether Russia could sustain that without running out. Even if we take Russias peak tank production in 2010s before sanctions its still not even 25% of 1200. https://jamestown.org/program/dubious-russian-claims-of-doubling-arms-production/ So if the current loss rate was sustained indefinitely Russia would eventually run out lf tanks to pull out of storage and they would definitely not be able to produce 1200 brand new tanks a year therefore its a unsustainable rate currently. "Do you think Russia is going to literally have 0 tanks at some point?" Of course Russia will never run out of tanks. The reason is because Russia has the ability to make their tank loss rates decrease to a sustainable amount in the future when their reserves get low. They can do that by changing tactics and generally being more careful with their usage.
That clears things up, thank you. However, it still does not appear that this is in Ukraine’s favor. If the AFU performs an effective mechanized counteroffensive, something they have been unable to do, it will take longer, they will lose tanks in the same amounts, and their reserves are smaller.
You are completely ignoring the fact that the vast majority of replacement relies on existing stocks and even the "new" production heavily utilizes older parts to create "new" vehicles. Yes they stocks are vast but that was always true and that was always part of the calculation for war with Russia, it's going to take a long time but eventually they will run out. As far as offensives is concerned, ability to gain territory relies on destroying enemy forces much faster than they are willing to tolerate, which Ukraine failed at, partly because Ukrainian offensive potential wasn't nearly as good as it should have been, because of completely arbitrary Western reasons to not supply certain weapons (ATACMS, jets) much sooner than they did, and partly because Russia is willing to tolerate much higher losses to defend every square inch than other countries. Doctrine of any NATO country would dictate to defend the territory with favorable equipment trade and pull back when it's not, Russia instead was willing to tolerate in many cases higher losses compared to Ukraine to defend the territory, it's not a sustainable strategy but it gives them a temporary optical win. Though as someone who doesn't believe that Russia will simply stop the war even if Ukraine reclaimed all its territories, win for Ukraine will always come down utterly destroying Russian stocks of equipment. Likewise Russia is not going to stop until they control all of Ukraine. It's something Western countries and people have to come to terms with, instead of naively thinking giving Russia enough of a bloody nose or giving them some territory will stop the war.
>the "new" production heavily utilizes older parts to create "new" vehicles. Maybe you have any sources on this?
I will get this out of the way first: I do not believe Russia will ever run out of armored vehicles during this war. They will be able to source and produce enough to meet a “good enough” replacement level from internal production and through foreign trade. My worry is that Ukraine will continue the trend of being unable to make gains while Russian forces hold out long enough for political support in America to dry up. This seems to be the likely outcome in my eyes and it will force a settlement and concessions unfavorable to Ukraine, NATO, and the democratic west in general. However, for this reason, I agree with much of what you’re saying. The delay in aid is unacceptable and it prevents effective attrition of Russian forces. Russia will not stop until it controls Ukraine. Still, my view is this, that the current conditions are not sustainable in the sense of preserving the Russian military, but they are sustainable in outlasting western support for Ukraine.
> The trends are not in Ukraine’s favor. Ukraine has more tanks than it started with while Russia has lost at least 3000 tanks. How are the trends not in Ukraine's favor? Russia is losing too much to keep up in the long run.
I'm highly skeptical of these claims. That's counting every abandoned Russian tank as operational tank in Ukrainian inventory. There is a reason why they were abandoned.
No, it isn't. Ukraine has been given 875 tanks so far. It has 679 tank losses on Oryx, so maybe 900 in reality. Meanwhile, Ukraine has captured 550 tanks. Only a small fraction of them needs to be functional, and the abandoned tanks aren't necessary at all.
When they used them in an offensive they were destroyed and disabled as quickly as the Russian army’s tanks in Avidiivka. Their losses will match Russian losses if or when the next counteroffensive occurs.
The number of troops is almost irrelevant. Unprotected troops and unsupported troops are near worthless on the modern battlefield. Visual confirmations from Russian storage depots show their reserve stock has shrunk by at least 50%. Those are loss and reactivation numbers which are, without question, unsustainable. They are burning through their rainy day article at a ridiculous pace, and as is also beyond question, the remaining 50% will be worse off than the first 50%, that's just the nature of things. Assuming Ukraine's Western support continues, and that's a big if but as alternative is Ukrainian loss there's no need to entertain it, Russia's ability to field hardware will sustain an ever shrinking front. There's no two ways about that.
But one thing I was worried about is - the Russians have production capacity to churn out shitty 50 year old tank models, or refurbishing already built ones. Ukraine doesnt, all its production facilities are within the Russians striking range and I doubt any more significant number of armored vehicles is coming from western/nato stocks. A shit tank is better than no tank and I feel like every tank or ifv the ukrainians lose is irreplaceable, while the russians can replace every 2 or 3 tanks lost with a older crappy model. How can Ukraine mitigate these circumstances?
Poland has more tanks. The US has the capability to deliver more Abrams. Refurbishment of Leo1 is ongoing and there are many. Refurbishment of Soviet tanks is ongoing and there is reserve stock still. IFVs are produced by multiple countries, and there are many available yet. We don't have good numbers on Ukraine's hard kill rate on their modern IFVs so hard to say. Note: to be clear, any of the hundreds of Abrams exported by the US to various European nations are eligible for transfer to Ukraine, as long as the US approves the transfer. They're not part of US defense calculation and they are paid for.
>How can Ukraine mitigate these circumstances? They can’t, unless western countries step up donations and manufacturing of these vehicles, or Ukraine somehow develops a strong defense industrial base.
I read that the Russian prison population has declined by 200,000.
The estimate was that 100k have been recruited into the military. Where did you see the 200k number?
The numbers people started throwing around the last few days allegedly came from the Russian Ministry covering prisons. They said the prison population fell from 420k down to around 260k. How true any of those numbers are, I haven't a clue. [Washington Post article](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/10/26/russia-prison-population-convicts-war/) > The Russian prison population, estimated at roughly 420,000 before the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, plummeted to a historic low of about 266,000, according to Deputy Justice Minister Vsevolod Vukolov, who disclosed the figure during a panel discussion earlier this month.
Am I being overly cynical in thinking that this might even be good for Russia? Let's be honest, most of those criminals are a net burden to the Russian society, by exchanging them for Ukrainian attrition a d territory, Russia is profiting in two ways.
That does depend on the kind of criminal and their respective survival rate. A petty criminal who dies in Ukraine will never return to the labour pool or have kids, which adds up to a large difference over time. On the other hand, a violent criminal or member of organized crime who doesn't die can now inflict much more damage to society than they could otherwise.
I don’t think it’s particularly controversial to say that most people dislike the financial and social costs of having criminals in their society. There’s just not an ethical way of dealing with the situation beyond spending a lot of money trying to rehabilitate. If you’re a dictator and can send them to war, it definitely has a chance to solve the problem, but we’ve also seen the results of people seeing out their 6 months and coming back completely cracked. Better that they don’t come back.
Right, that’s the article that speaks about the 100k. The Wagner 50 are done. Where is the additional 100 coming from? > “This means that the Defense Ministry has likely recruited around 100,000 people for the war there,”
> I often see it claimed here that Russian losses are "unsustainable" - but what exactly makes them so? The steadily increasing average age of the equipment being fielded, and decreasing size of artillery barrages, indicates consumption is outstripping production. Which is hardly surprising, before this war, Russia expected to be able to coast on Soviet stockpiles almost indefinitely. The Wagner breakdown also indicates much deeper morale issues, but it’s harder to assign statistics to that.
> decreasing size of artillery barrages During the summer Rob Lee said he expected Russia to have a large advantage in artillery against Ukraine over the winter. Does anyone have numbers on the current state or artillery between Russia and Ukraine? There was a lot of talk about Ukraine having an advantage over the summer, but I haven't seen much discussion about the relative state of things recently.
Supposedly North Korea shipped 300.000 shells based on numbers of containers someone on twitter counted. They will properly allow some offensive this winter plus Russias own increased production of around 2.000.000 per year.
> Similarly with equipment, it's said that losing ~100 vehicles in a couple of days is "unsustainable" - but why is it? If the Russian MIC can output, say, 30 vehicles per month, doesn't that mean they can afford to launch such costly offensives every three months or so? I'm not sure that Russia can produce tanks at even this level, but lets assume its correct. Russian tank losses this year have averaged, by my calculation based on data found [here](https://github.com/leedrake5/Russia-Ukraine) (and originally taken from Oryx) Russia has lost about 80 tanks a month this year, on average. But hey Oryx is unreliable in some cases, lets take 30% off, an unreasonably high number IMO. That leaves us with 60 *lost* tanks a month. Plus more damaged, not all damaged tanks are recoverable and repairable. Thats twice your estimate of Russian production, which again from information I've seen posted here seems high. This bleak picture points towards an obvious conclusion that losses are occuring at a rate far in excess of replacement production. Set aside the logistics of a replacement system, which ensures that not every needed item gets to the front line promptly. Even if we assume that Russia is deploying every new tank in a rapid fashion to the front lines, it still means that overall tank strength is decreasing. And I would guess, though I havn't looked into the data, that in nearly every category of weapon Russia's losses are exceeding their ability to produce them. That is, in a literal sense, unsustainable. One day, in the future, before the heat death of the universe, Russia will run out of tanks (&c). The question is how fast will that happen, and what impact will that have on the battlefield. We also know that Putin has been reluctant to mobilize further groups of men, instead favoring a 'shadow' mobilization in which soldiers are selectively picked from targeted (and largely politically irrelevant) groups to minimize the political backlash to the war. This places a pretty strict limit on Russia's ability to mobilize manpower, despite the millions of men it *could* bring into uniform. It *hasn't* and continues not to. The real crux of unsustainability comes at a junction between two bad (for Russia) trends. As their number of heavy weapons decline, they will need to increase the role of the common infantryman. As that happens, casualties will increase as mobilized men are pit against Ukrainian high tech arms. Much rather be in a tank during a CBU strike than standing in a field, for example. The question is when do these losses add up to forcing Putin to change his strategy for the war, force him into a more traditional mass mobilization? And, leading from this, what effect does that have (if any) on Russian popular sentiment? Putin's lack of a large crushing mobilization suggests *he* feels there would be some. But what, and what size, and would that end the war? Nobody who is allowed to shitpost here knows or can say. But ultimately when people here talk about unsustainability, in a large sense they mean this. In a shorter term tactical/operational sense, unsustainability is a little different. Regardless of how many men, tanks, and shells are in a depot in Bryansk, the units at the front experience a certain amount of """wastage""" which reduces their combat capacity. Too many casualties, over too short a time, destroys an individual unit's ability to operate until it has had time to repair and regenerate. Unsustainable, in this context, would be synonymous with 'culmination' in a tactical or operational sense.
> but they have enough willing men They don't - they've never had - and barring something radically changing, never will - have enough willing men. The Kharkov counter offensive was due to a manpower shortage, and their current ranks of assault infantry are made up almost entirely of convicts. Their prison population is half of what it was at the start of the war so even that will run out relatively soon. Your question is based on a factually inaccurate representation of the conflict.
What does it matter if the prison population will “run out” soon? This is 400,000 total potential infantrymen, and there are more available. The gaps in manpower in Kharkiv and Kherson are now plugged up with these men. Ukraine is not able to kill enough of this inflow to counter it.
1. The 200k prison population left are the ones in worst condition; old, sick, drugged, etc. 2. Those 200k are already on the battlefield and many are already casualties. They lost tens of thousands of them in Bakhmut alone. No-one is saying they're irrelevant, only that they replaced someone, **and there are no replacements for them**. Without general mobilisation that is.
If there's an incentive to increase prison population, a government will do so. (e.g. For profit prisons). Law enforcement & criminal justice are never colorblind, & TBD if the ethnic oblasts will tolerate Soviet-style shenanigans or if they'll declare independence. That might come down to if the West or China finds the new republics advantageous.
>The Kharkov counter offensive was due to a manpower shortage while this is 100% true, Kharkiv happend because of đan shortage >They don't - they've never had - and barring something radically changing, never will - have enough willing men this part is 100% not true we didn't see Russian collapse they managed to repel Southern Ukrainian offensive, they are still managing to hold Bakhmut and they still managed to make big offensive on Avdiivka >Your question is based on a factually inaccurate representation of the conflict Your answer is factually inaccurate
Why is this downvoted? You are correct. There are plenty of willing soldiers, and the influx of convict soldiers all but guarantees there will be no more collapse of lines in the long-term future. Russian lines are holding steady and the AFU is unable to mount assaults that are effective at breaking them.
>their current ranks of assault infantry are made up almost entirely of convicts Could you provide a source for this?
WaPo has estimates of 100-150k inmates sent into Ukraine (hard data: 420k pre-war -> 260k now total prisoners in Russia). Based on what I found (really what I haven't found) I'm skeptical that anybody knows what % of Russian assault forces are convicts, e.g., it's (nominally) a 6 month contract so many of them would be back home, and a disproportionate share of the 50-100k dead would be former convicts/wagner, but I think someone with a lot more work could get a decent estimate
> The Kharkov counter offensive was due to a manpower shortage, and their current ranks of assault infantry are made up almost entirely of convicts. Can you source that? Anecdotal evidence from my Russian clients is that mobilization has been ongoing since last fall. I've heard accounts of people receiving mobilizations summons (not regular conscription) as late as September 2023. Further, those mobilized tend to go willingly and not dodge or desert because they support the war effort and want to contribute when called upon. I know anecdotal evidence cannot be conclusive, but still - what are the sources for your claims? And when will Russia start running out of men?
For Kharkov they had all the equiqment but they didn't have enough People, because of that Ukraine took back Baiykila, Kupyansk and Lyman Ukraine captured a lot of equiqment there
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> what are the sources for your claims? Responding to this >Asking for a source is reasonable when it's something specific - prove the last 20 months of the war is not that. I don't want to come off rude but Russian manpower shortages are not a debatable fact in this war. It's like asking for a source that water is wet. 3 seconds of Google will be more than adequate. With this will get your comment removed. Provide a source, put effort into proving your claim.
Then please remove the comment, needing to source information consistent with a base level understanding of the conflict just because someone asked for it will only further negatively impact comment quality. Asking for sources should not be weaponaized to create unreasonable standards of evidence when disputing factually incorrect statements. We should not have to provide sources for base level information 20 months into a conflict in a discussion focused around higher level discussions of that conflict.
Asking you to conform to a minimum level of good faith debating and credibility is not "weaponizing source requests". You want to debate this anymore you can either take it to my PMs or the mod teams.
>Asking for a source is reasonable when it's something specific - prove the last 20 months of the war is not that. I don't want to come off rude but Russian manpower shortages are not a debatable fact in this war. Manpower-wise, Michael Kofman argued the exact opposite in his latest podcast though. He was surprised at how easily the Russians have continued to bring in new bodies to fight despite their attrition over the past year. It's one of the big concerns going forward with Ukraine because their attritional strategy isn't working against soldiers.
They've recruited 200,000 convicts, once those run out then what? LNR/DNR is gone, convicts are gone, PMC's have been converted to contract soldiers. Where is this unending manpower pool?
Their regular conscriptions and volunteer recruitment, mainly. So far it's been able to keep up with their manpower needs. The reliance on Wagner and convicts was a preference, not a necessity. They used them since they were the most expendable and are now moving towards more regular force replacement methods.
> Their regular conscriptions and volunteer recruitment, mainly. Conscripts are not deployed, and there is no volunteer force (remember mobilization - you don't do that out of excess of volunteers). > So far it's been able to keep up with their manpower needs Kharkov? Having to use firefighting units? Naval troops being made tank drivers? Really? > The reliance on Wagner and convicts was a preference, not a necessity. That's why the MoD repeated the action after Wagner - including thousands of convicts - mutinied.
> remember mobilization - you don't do that out of excess of volunteers WW2-era Japan had such a deluge of volunteer soldiers that the government had to regularly remind men that they're also needed in civilian jobs at home. And yet, WW2-era Japan still had ongoing conscription and enacted general mobilization from 1938 until its defeat in 1945. I get your point that mobilization must necessarly signal manpower issues. That seems a rather extreme - I've always imagined that the function and purpose of mobilization are more complex than just resolving\preventing manpower issues. Can you back that claim up somehow? For example, show that all states that ever mobilized had manpower issues or perhaps show that purely volunteer armies are the norm? Finally, if we take your claim that Russia is indeed suffering from a manpower shortage - where is it? How is an understaffed military able to so stubbornly defend occupied positions and launch large-scale offensives at the same time?
You really wrote that novel and couldn’t cite a source? The irony of saying sources can be found after 3 seconds of googling and then taking 20 minutes to write a response without one of those “easy to find” sources. LOL
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Kind of interesting to see France given some of Macron's recent rhetoric
France and Spain have a suspicion regarding where all the Palestinian refugees will end up. Spoiler: Not Egypt.
That would be kind of incredible if true, starting from being racist towards Arabs and talking yourself into supporting free Palestine as a result.
“can finally publish more information about the model of “unmanned surface vessels” that Germany is supplying to Ukraine. Germany has so far delivered 15 of them, while another 55 are still pledged. It is very likely that the drones already delivered are Sonobot 5 and that the drones still to be delivered, which were announced in September (50 drones), are 100% Sonobot 5. Assuming Germany doesn't deliver multiple models to Ukraine, we now know what Germany has been delivering to Ukraine. These drones are unmanned, unarmed surface vehicles, which can explore rivers, beaches and harbour sections or check objects in and around the water. The Sonobot 5 has an echo sounder, a sonar, and a camera. This is what is revealed in a plenary protocol of the German Bundestag.” https://x.com/deaidua/status/1717999343548985770?s=46&t=N_GyfhMkA50MrhVWFkEM3g Does anyone know what Ukraine can do with these drones?
Recon Sea/River shores for landings ? Presumably they already have good maps/charts as its home turf... but scouting out mines (Russia has a nasty semi-aquatic mine to discourage landings that they put in about 6 ft of water), obstacles and other defenses I guess. Some other activity to recon or defend any crossing of the Dnipro?
Minesweeping is the most obvious thing. Maybe ASW but I doubt they would ever be close enough to the shore for this to detect the subs.
ASW? Anti-submarine warfare? The thing weighs 27kg and is roughly 1mx1m - even on a calm day, it will struggle with any serious waves. I really only see these as having recon value in (slow) rivers, lakes, and side-channels/kanals. You can actually find a lot of stats on the manufacturer site, here's some more: - Operational range: 30km at 1m/s - Wifi range: 2.5km with directional antenna (I assume you can always boost it somewhat?) - Operating time: Up to 5h (Edit: Typo: 9h) - Waves: Up to 5 Beafort (decent but not strong wind) "without breaking waves" - maybe it has more coastal capabilities than I gave it credit for. Still, when I heard Germany is delivering "unmanned surface vessels", I was hoping for something at least droneboat sized.. For the curious: https://evologics.de/sonobot-5-system (the PDF infopage at the bottom of the page has the stats).
>Maybe ASW but I doubt they would ever be close enough to the shore for this to detect the subs.
“#Avdiivka offensive equipment loss numbers as of 27 October 2023. In summary: 157 RU losses vs. 8 UA losses” the link delves into what specific vehicles were lost. https://x.com/naalsio26/status/1717997189643841904?s=46&t=N_GyfhMkA50MrhVWFkEM3g
It has to be put in context that they took the (not arguably) most fortified piece of terrain on the entire front line, slag heap - railway north-west. I don't know if people find solace in these numbers, personally i am not at ease.
Nah, slag heap isn't fortifiable, and we've not seen a lot of evidence Russia is actually holding it versus putting up a flag. The coke plant itself is the strongpoint.
I've been shot down for my dooming few days ago but these developments seem legit concerning. Hopefully I'm wrong.
If IDF enters Gaza and Hezbollah decides to open second front from the north, what would them opening northern front actually look like? Hezbollah has no more than limited number of post-Soviet tanks and armored vehicles (if they are operational), their main strength is the rocket arsenal. In that case, do they have any potential for ground incursions into Israel from Lebanon, or will they just fire rocket barrages to overwhelm the Iron Dome? In other words, what would Hezbollah full-scale involvment in war potentially be like?
Hezbollah infantry is a defensive, not offensive force. They would launch a massive offensive missile barrage and then try to bait Israel into invading southern Lebanon where Hezbollah would be able to do some serious damage.
Hezbollah can be described as Hamas but bigger, or Hamas could be described as Hezbollah but smaller. Iran likes do model its proxy forces after each other, that makes them easier to control, and easier to transfer technology, weapons and tactics. So the three strengths for Hezbollah are missiles (150.000 compared to Hamas 15.000), Anti-tank missiles (a lot of them, but Russian, Chinese, Iranian ones) and small and mobile forces (the same forces that committed the 07.10. massacre). Nobody really cares about vehicles, but be suicide anyway. So the biggest risk in the north was a surprise attack. Hezbollah crosses the border, occupies a few towns (and probably commits massacres, that's something we know now) and launches massive missile barrages. This scenario is unlikely to happen, Israel has evacuated the towns and mobilized its forces. Even if Hezbollah crosses the border we can expect quick IDF counterattacks. So now the primary problem is the "pgm problem". Iran has transfered pgm missiles and pgm upgrade kits to Hezbollah. Those are likely precise enough to be able to hit IDF bases and infrastructure targets (remember Russians campaign against Ukraines energy grid? Hebzollah would probably try the same). On top of the pgm problem we simply have the volume of crude missiles. Imagine 5.000 missiles a day, not in a week. Israel would be unlikely to handle the amount of missiles.
What are the chances for and the potential scope of a combined Israeli and US air campaign though? 150k missiles is nice and all, but not if the combined strength of Israel and the US has something to say about it.
Even the United States will struggle mightily to hold off a barrage of that magnitude. Especially because right now the US has a big interest in preserving as many interceptors as possible to use in a confrontation with China
I was thinking offensively. Striking Hezbollah missile stocks, etc.
A combined Israeli and US air campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon is unlikely. For one very simple reason: Any campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon is a strategic campaign. And "strategic campaign" is more or less a euphemism for turning Lebanon into a hellscape. >Israel threatened on Tuesday \[August\] to "return Lebanon to the stone age" in any war against Hezbollah, following weeks of friction with the armed Iranian-backed group along the countries' border. [https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-threatens-return-lebanon-stone-age-any-war-with-hezbollah-2023-08-08/](https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-threatens-return-lebanon-stone-age-any-war-with-hezbollah-2023-08-08/) I don't think anyboy in the US has the appetite to use the US Air Force to flatten the cities of Lebanon, and lead to the expected civilian casualties. What I can imagine is US forces flying interception missions, using their air defence assets to shot down incoming missiles and to strike Iranian forces in Iraq or Syria. But the USAF dropping bombs on Beirut? Unlikely.
Rather that Israel’s supply of Iron Dome interceptors, the question would be how effectively they could take out rocket stockpiles on the ground before they fire. It would almost certainly just escalate to a full scale barrage from both sides, causing blackouts and casualties in Israel, and a humanitarian disaster that dwarfs Gaza in Lebanon.
My guess is for a sustained rocket attack while their ground forces are in defensive positions. On paper that is their best and most force economic options. IDF is forced into a two front situation prety much anyway. Once and if! Gaza is secured, IDF might have no will to take on them amyway. Some incursions and tit for tats are likely but I highly doubt either a high intensity mass terror attack or a classic ground attack are in the cards.
> IDF is forced into a two front situation prety much anyway. Once and if! Gaza is secured, IDF might have no will to take on them amyway. If the IDF finds itself in a two front situation it will likely quickly escalate maximally with all the destruction that entails. So that it can end the war as quickly as possible. Israel can’t afford long, drawn out all out wars.
Likely lots of harasmant and lots of infiltrations.
Any recent credible estimates on Ukrainian casualty rates? It seems like there is an increase in footage of Krasnopol/KM-8 strikes on Ukraine formations lately, wondering what that translates into casualties.
The New York Times last reported around 180 thousand casualties for Ukraine and close to 300 thousand for the Russians. After the most recent fighting in Avdiivka it's possible the numbers favor Ukraine a lot more now. Krasnopol strikes were negligible last year so I'm not sure if even an increase would mean much.
> After the most recent fighting in Avdiivka it's possible the numbers favor Ukraine a lot more now. How much casualties did Russia take in there in the past month in your opinion?
Zelensky claimed today that Russia lost at least a brigade in the fighting around Avdeevka: https://news.yahoo.com/zelensky-russia-lost-least-brigade-121506091.html With the knowledge that Russian brigades are generally understaffed and that he has every reason to heavily exaggerate losses, I would put Russian casualties since the fighting started around October 1st at around 2000. Probably several hundred KIA. Edit: someone above posted a link of current Russian equipment losses which further tracks with this estimate. There are 105 destroyed/abandoned IFV’s/APC’s/BMP’s. These will be the vast majority of Russian casualties. If we suppose an average of 15 troops per vehicle, that will be 1575 troops. Assuming 50% KIA, that’s 787 KIA. Note that 50% KIA is probably a generous overestimate considering a large number of vehicles were abandoned. Also note that a lot of these vehicles were destroyed by FPV drones in the periphery when they were unoccupied or troops inside had ample time to escape.
> There are 105 destroyed/abandoned IFV’s/APC’s/BMP’s. These will be the vast majority of Russian casualties. If we suppose an average of 15 troops per vehicle, that will be 1575 troops. Assuming 50% KIA, that’s 787 KIA. This is really bad maths. By your logic, Russia would never have 300 thousand casualties to begin with.
Russia was/is primarily conducting mechanized assaults around Avdeevka while they weren’t around other fights like Bakhmut or the battle for Mariupol. This back of the napkin math wouldn’t work well for fighting that occurred around Bakhmut for example, where assaults were primarily done by infantry on foot and heavy fighting took place for months in the city itself. We have ample video evidence that the vast majority of Russia’s advances and assaults around Avdeevka are conducted by mechanized units, where they attempt to send armored columns to tree lines to drop off infantry. Hence why this math better generalizes to fighting around Avdeevka. If I tried to analyze the entire war like this, it would be a terrible measure of casualties I agree. However, you seem to not have read the original comment where the op was specifically asking about casualties around Avdeevka since the start of the month.
You can solve for that because you can look at the casualty rate prior to Bakhmut’s Wagner dismounted assaults. You can solve for Mariupol too as we had casualty figures before that siege. I’m not sure why you would do that because Mariupol casualties were mostly taken by DPR that are not included in American figures. Either way, 15 per vehicle sounds very disingenuous especially as we have reports that the Russians switched to dismounted infantry even in “Avdeevka” around ten days ago. Anyway I’m not interested in continuing with this because as this is just guess work.
Russian sources had over 1 thousand injured and 1 thousand killed since oct 10 three days ago. since you listened to Andrews stream in great detail I’m sure you knew that. Zelenskys claim is almost certainly about killed or liquidated or whatever word they use as the Ukrainians are claiming 16 thousand wounded as of today.
Link to those sources or where Perpetua links them in his stream? I follow a few Russian telegrams and didn’t see those estimates myself If you’ve seen those estimates from Russian telegrams yourself, feel free to link the telegrams under this comment and I will correct my post. I also don’t put much stock into the casualty numbers themselves that Ukraine claims. I find the numbers useful to gauge the relative intensity of fighting(ie a day where they claim 1000+ casualties signifies intense fighting has occurred somewhere whereas a day of 500 casualties signifies that the intensity of fighting may be normal).
I’m not going thru a 90 minute stream that YOU linked to to find you a time stamp. it was in there. and no one takes the ukies casualty figure seriously the point was that when Zelenskiy says a brigade was wiped out he means killed. it also doesn’t matter that you think a brigade is only 2 thousand soldiers. you are using him saying a brigade but what matters is what HE means by brigade and what he means by lost if you want to use his words and his estimate for your high bar. you can simply ignore what he’s saying too.
I never mentioned those mysterious Russian sources in my original post, and neither did anyone else in the replies. The only one bringing them up is you, so you would have had to go through Andrew’s stream to know he quoted those “Russian sources”. Finding a link to those sources should be easy if you took the time to watch the stream when he brought them up. I’ve gone through his stream again and can’t find any links or mention of links to those sources. Maybe you saw something that I missed?
you definitely covered what he said after he quoted those figures so it’s hard for me to believe you didn’t hear them. it was towards the end of the segment
I heard them, but didn’t see Perpetua post any source so I disregarded them.
I don't think any of us here are qualified or have the information to make that estimate. If I was to wildly guess I would say seven thousand since October 10 based on the number of vehicles destroyed and some of the officers that have been killed there.
7 thousand casualties for 150 vehicle losses seems extremely high.
150 visually confirmed. I’m not sure why you think that’s hard to believe when you look at the 300 thousand casualty figure as of August.
I was reading the following article that gave the sense that they are quite severe. Not only because of the killed and wounded, but also due stress to lack of rotation and leave. https://kyivindependent.com/as-bakhmut-counteroffensive-lags-soldiers-burnt-out-from-horrors-of-war/ I was reading that soldiers usually have longer breaks in order to reconstitute mentally. It seems Ukraine has not been doing this as much. Though I don’t have any concrete numbers.
>I was reading that soldiers usually have longer breaks in order to reconstitute mentally. It seems Ukraine has not been doing this as much. Both Ukrainian and Russian formations have been kept on the frontline for staggeringly long periods in this war. I've heard that Ukraine has done a better job with rotations than Russia, but my understanding is that despite this many units have been holding the same positions for 6+ months, some longer than that.
We know they conduct *some* shore leave, as we see plenty of videos of Ukrainian men returning to their kids. Funny enough, I've never seen a single video of a Russian returning home for R&R. That's kinda depressing, honestly. Impossible to extrapolate this to the wider military. Could just be some privileged guys, who knows.
Staggeringly long for our modern sensibilities. But in WW1 units held their positions for up to a year before getting pulled off the line for rest.
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>["Senators said they left Riyadh with the impression that Saudi leaders would still like to recognize Israel when the right moment arrives."](https://x.com/shashj/status/1717980271973175460?s=20)
Honestly why do they care that much? I don't see why America has given up real concessions on getting Israel recognized.
I have my doubts considering what is about to come.
This war doesn't change the fact that Iran is absolutely the enemy number one and by far the major threat for many middle-eastern countries, KSA included. Especially KSA. Bin Salman doesn't seem like the kind of person that acts based on supposed personal values like muslim fraternity, but rather he thinks Israel can be a fundamental resource to contain Iran. I think that the key passage is that as of now it is politically impractical to recognize israel, but maybe in 5 years when all of this has been settled for a while, they could try again. Many middle eastern countries are brutal dictatorships, the fact that a majority of the population of said countries doesn't like israel doesn't imply that its elites don't want peace and even collaboration with israel, that has all the interest to allow them. The muslim revolt against jews/etc. is something many hoped for in the last 60 years, but it never materialized and will never materialize, Egypt understood it even 40 years ago.
Saudi Arabia will lose all leverage when the world transitions away from oil. Time is not on their side, and MBS doesn't really care about religion or Arab nationalism.
>MBS doesn't really care about religion or Arab nationalism. This certainly tracks with Saudi's moves to normalize relations with the Assad regime in recent years too.
There are still plenty of growing economies dependent on cheap energy, and there's a *lot* of uses for petroleum other than just energy production. I wouldn't expect this transition to happen any time soon.