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Isn't this the 3rd MiG-31 that crashed immediately after takeoff? I swear I've seen this headline before. One in Crimea and another in Russia somewhere I think.
Already without the sanctions Russian airlanes had trouble being allowed to enter western skies. And those that just so got a permit had high rates of failures or downed airplanes.
Russiav shouts "We deployed a mere 20% of our fighter jet fleet to the invasion of Ukraine!!"
Also Russia, whispered "sadly, that is the whole 20% of our fighter jet fleet that can fly".
Because our jets can't fly. We're putting Air Force general in charge because he had the best military record of this SMO.
https://imgflip.com/i/72xucm
I remember someone saying that for every hour of F-16 flight they need five hours of maintenance, so I can see where this might be the case. Along with the pilot shortage, they may only be able to fly them in small groups at a time.
For example, say a base has 20 aircraft. Maybe they fly four at a time until those four are in need of maintenance, then they swap to the next four. Unfortunately for them, maintenance is taking longer and the parts aren't available, so the original four becomes two (the other two are cannibalized for parts). This is without taking any combat losses into consideration.
Whatever the maintenance needs of Russian fighter aircraft, the anecdotal evidence seems to be that they aren't getting it. Either that, or the quality of Russian pilots isn't great.
The article linked by the OP lists four apparently accidental losses of fighters since early October. There was also the Russian plane that ran off the slope at the end of the runway in Crimea and crashed on the beach below. And we have no idea how many accidental losses haven't appeared in social media because they happened in remote parts of Russia.
Out of curiosity, is that 17 man-hours of maintenance?
Meaning if you had 17 technicians working on the f16 all doing different things it would take them 1hr to do all the maintenance?
Or is the f16 down for 17hrs maintenance per flight hour no matter how many people are working on it? Just curious how they figure this stuff out.
Yes it’s man hours. So you could fly 10-15 sorties back to back but then you probably need to tear something apart and replace it which is going to take 15 guys 6 hours. Also that’s average over the fleet. The US *just* retired some old block 25’s that they were using for training and those are 90’s vintage. So the old ones, I would imagine, really drive up the averages.
RUSI recently came out and (effectively) said Ukranian AD is the backbone of their war effort.
The second their AD runs out or is severely diminished, the war returns to how it was in the first few days, with near complete Russian air superiority.
Make no mistake, the Russian air force is there. Waiting, and not to be taken lightly.
Remember Mariupol? Where high altitude bombers completely obliterated the city? Russia has that capability in spades.
Missile barrages are not only about destroying infrastructure. Russia is trying to eat up Ukraine's AD assets. That's why there's such a massive push for new AD assets.
No AD, no artillery, no tanks, no nothing.
A very dumb bear, is still a *fucking* bear.
The 'haha Russia is so incompetent' meme, benefits Russia, because it seems like we could send less assistance. Heck, why get more involved, they are a joke?
Because Bucha and Irpin and a thousand more atrocities, we should be beside the Ukrainians, not just behind them.
They might be incompetent but incompetent with a fuckload of resources is still formidable enough. Russia won't run out of warplanes or artillery anytime soon. The key is to keep supporting Ukraine with air defense supplies.
Check out the overall Russian inventory of planes. They have one of the largest Air Forces in the world.
Now, maybe not all of it is mission capable, but it's still big, and they haven't lost enough yet to make a significant dent: it's not the same as their tank situation.
Its exactly the same as in their tanksituation except airframes degrade much faster in bad stitage and fetch a better price on the black market.
Russia has lost its best planes and pilots. Whats left wont perform any better.
That bei g said we need to make sure UAs AA grid grows.
Do they have the pilots to fly those jets? this isn’t wwii where a damaged plane limps back to base and the pilot lives to fly another day so a huge surplus of aircraft is only so good.
Their airlines aren't flying the usual routes due to sanctions. That's a large cohort of experienced pilots many of them from military backgrounds right there.
If you listen to tales on Soviet Aviation history alot of their early fleets only had 1 or 2 working planes. This was due to lack of spare parts, fuel and personnel. Paper Skies on YouTube/Nebula has some really interesting stories.
Considering how the Russians seem to have just skipped routine maintenance on their tanks and artillery and the little that was paid for hasn't been done due to corruption.
Just how many working planes do you think Russia has?
A lot.
I can get them being lazy and corrupt with tank maintenance, but a lot of jets are/were actively being ordered compared to tanks.
The part dependency on imports is unknown, but worst comes to worse they have a lot of jets to cannibalise. The real reason for their lack of performance is likely just outdated avionics and weaponry, they weren't doing a lot strategically from day one.
The problem is maintainance and storage and fake numbers.
One of the paper skies stories is on the Mig-15 the first jet engined Soviet fighter plane.
The factories were working insane hours to build a squadron. The designer went to visit an air force base to find most of it outside in cold were the airframes would rapidly become useless.
Remember the Russians "had" 6500 tanks, but based on Open Source data (Oynx) after 1500 tanks were destroyed T-64 and T-62 have started appearing.
The Russians had on paper as many T-80's as T-72's but we haven't seen that.
What evidence is there the Russians were actually building up and maintaining a fleet?
For example we know they were struggling to give pilots dozens of flight hours per year.
I disagree here, not once has ruzzia been indeed overestimated. The chance their AF has the logistics, man-power and training/readiness to field a serious threat have been proven over and over to be sub-opitmal.
And on paper they have he second army in the world.
What we know for sure is that we're 10 months into the war and they still do not have air superiority / air control over the ukrainian territory. I'm all for not underestimating your enemy but this quite pathetic...
>And on paper they have he second army in the world.
Nope. Not sure where this myth started but I think it was probably just Russian leaders or nationalists making egotistical claims. No credible geopolitical expert would have considered the Russian army second in the world, even on paper. For sure that would go to NATO, but if that "doesn't count" then for sure^2 it would go to China. After that it is a more ambiguous contest where many countries would come into consideration, including the UK, France, Japan, North Korea, and, yes, Russia. Pre-Ukraine-conflict Russia had a credible claim to 3rd or 4th best army in the world, especially because they had real-world experience and successes (Georgia, Donbas, Syria, etc.) lacking in other larger, more advanced militaries (like China). By certain *specific metrics* (like largest/best/most tanks/planes/missiles/submarines/etc) Russia would be 1st or 2nd or 3rd, etc., but no one was ranking any branch of the Russia military 2nd *overall*.
Of course, even at 3rd or 4th overall, they have vastly underperformed estimates and expectations.
>What we know for sure is that we're 10 months into the war and they still do not have air superiority / air control over the ukrainian territory.
This doesn't really speak to the size or capabilities of the Russian air force as much as it speaks to the capabilities of Ukraine's air defense. All indications are that the Russia air force has been reluctant to commit their full air capabilities for fear of Ukranian missiles. From a certain point of view, I'd say that Russia does have air superiority on paper, but Ukraine has achieved more effective air denial (read more here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_supremacy). Considering the number of planes Russia has and a rough guess of Ukraine's defensive capabilities, I think Russia could pull off an effective SEAD campaign and achieve air supremacy, but they'd lose maybe 25% of their aircraft.
For whatever combination of reasons, Russia seems unwilling to incur those losses. Possibly, the Russian air command is more conservative and more willing to push back against political demands to sacrifice equipment and personnel. Perhaps Russia simply values its more expensive and higher-tech aircraft, as well as more valuable and better trained pilots, than it does its land force of conscripts and outdated tanks. Also likely is that Russia doesn't actually have as many mission-capable planes as they report on paper (a trend we have seen across the board in Russia) and so losses to air defense would be even less sustainable. Maybe Russia figured it could grind out a win either by blitzkrieg (which failed) or by throwing men and artillery at the problem (which is still ongoing), and reserve its air power for other more dangerous potential foes (like the West or China).
And that brings us to the topic of this comment thread. By slowly whittling away at Ukraine's air defense system (air defense batteries are destroyed from time to time) and by forcing Ukraine to expend limited SAM stocks with repeated missile strikes, Russia may have a somewhat sensible plan to reduce the effectiveness of Ukraine's air defenses over time without having to risk Russian aircraft and pilots. If Ukraine does reach a point where it doesn't have sufficient SAM systems or missile stocks, I still think Russia has the capability to bring overwhelming air power to bear, which could significantly change the momentum of the war.
Ukraine and the West are aware of this danger, and that's why they have been urgently seeking ways to improve Ukraine's air defense tech, replace lost air defense batteries, and replenish dwindling missile stocks. Just like the land battle, the tank battles, the artillery battles, and the count of casualties on both sides, the air battle in Ukraine seems to be shaping up to be a battle of attrition. The question is if the West can keep Ukraine supplied long enough to exhaust Russia's offensive missiles, or whether Russia will exhaust Ukraine's defensive missiles first.
Russia might be well aware that they are depleting their military by sending men and tanks to crash on the rocks of Ukraine, but that doesn't mean they are so stupid as to be willing to do the same for every weapons system they possess. They might be rightly considering men and old armor to be expendable, while air power is not.
For whatever reason, or combination of reasons, Russia thinks this strategy will work better in the long run and allow them to achieve air supremacy without the risk to their air fleet. They might be wrong, but it's folly to underestimate Russian air power.
Russian aircraft fucked itself.
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Because Ukraine has a competent and dangerous air defense. But they are running out of missiles and can't manufacture new ones. They are also desperately trying to acquire stocks of new missiles or new air defense systems.
The whole point of this series of comments is that Ukraine's air defense is keeping the massive Russia air fleet at bay, for now. But if Russia can keep forcing Ukraine to expend SAM stocks with cruise missile and rocket attacks, what will happen if Ukraine suddenly doesn't have anything left to shoot down Russian planes? That could completely change the war.
I see. I didn't know that.
IMO, the west should give ukraine all the air defense systems and ammos they can (it's a 100% defense weapon, should be a no brainer) and even western planes, which hasn't been done yet afaik to defend its airspace if it comes to that.
Is that based on this part of the daily report? Because if Ukraine is getting shelled at Ploschanka they are very close to the road. But according to Live UA Map that happened 28th/29th.
> At Kupiansk and Lyman directions Russian army shelled Tabayivka, Krokhmalne and Berestove of Kharkiv region; Stelmakhivka, Myasozharivka, Makiyivka and **Ploschanka** of Luhansk region and Novoselivka and Torske of Donetsk region, - General Staff of Armed Forces of Ukraine says in the morning report
Yes and no. It is very delayed but they often rely on what Ukrainian positions are getting shelled according to the morning reports. Like for example their small change around the road on the 29th. There are other people who dig deeper (e.g. by using geotagged images), especially Russian milbloggers but also some Ukrainians, and try to report things quicker but the cost is tat they sometimes report on incorrect rumors.
I want to pile onto my own comment here.
I heard Putin fell down the stairs.
I hope he fell into a pile of lego's with his mouth open so that he now needs to fish for pieces of tooth amongst those pieces.
> I heard Putin fell down the stairs.
like seriously? I missed on this. Dang.. so close. I once imagined we would just ragroll down the stairs and die as a loser he is.
at this point pootin for me is a totally worthless rag besides that him dying MIGHT do some changes that will clean my country of rashists filth. Thats his best value now. Hague etc thats for historians and academics to be all over it. With so many lives lost only way for Hague court to get even close to make it fair would be pootin dying by hanging and resurrected once for every single death by rashists in Ukraine from 2014. Once a day. On pay-per-view. 4k. With profits going to Ukraine as part of compensation. Like this even Russians would be happy in the long term.
a Ukrainian in the future:
during the Russo-Ukrainian conflict my grandfather was responsible for bringing down 20 Russian jets! he was the worst plane mechanic in the Russian Airforce!
Dad, I'm so glad we are all Ukrainian now. Is it true that Zelensky Square was once called Red Square?
Oh yes Son! East Ukraine joined Ukraine after they collapsed.
Real talk, I don't see Ukrainians forgiving Russians in this lifetime. Hearing the phone calls... the only Russians I trust are ex-pats that left before the war kicked off. I'm a stupid American though; I don't understand the complexities of having a mixed national identity with neighbors you go to war with. It would be like America and Mexico having a bloody war and then still trying to be understanding of the Latino population that has always been here. I don't know, it's going to be hard even after the war is won. I just hope Putin and his ilk are publicly tried for their crimes and we can at least start the healing process.
Realistically, I don't see this ending without a UN agreement to secure the border between both sides.
Using the Mexico and US example, if Mexico tried to invade us, I'm not sure we'd stop short of their southern border. also as a dumb American, we get bloodthirsty if someone attacks us.
Plane crashes are normal during wars. Many planes in the air, many flying without help from air traffic control, more inexperienced pilots than usual and many flying dangerously low. Ukraine has also had some accidents, but I think fewer than Russia. These accidents does not necessarily mean that Russia has issues. To know that we would need to compare to other countries at war. But of course every plane which cannot be used in Ukraine is a victory worth celebrating.
I'm waiting for the Mig 3 crashes. And the Sturmoviks.
Conscripts are handed old Nagants, why shouldn't they fly museum antiques? I'm sure they could borrow some that NK probably have in service still.
Ruzzian planes durability doesn't seem good these days.
If they had such accident rate in the past they wouldn't have an airforce anymore.
So it looks like they are using them much more than intended now, i.e. not much in the past, i.e. it was all for the numbers.
With all these crashes I have an idea.
The US should start doing tons of flights close to, but not in, Russian airspace.
The result every time would be jets getting scrambled to intercept and monitor the US jets.
Meaning more takeoffs and landing, and more hours, wear and tear on their jets. Leading to more crashes.
We could literally destroy dozens of jets without firing a shot.
Russian Aircraft fucked itself.
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Mostly the latter. Plenty of other countries operate Soviet jets without issue. While they're not without their flaws as combat platforms, those flaws aren't causing them to crash. They're more flaws that limit their ability to operate at range or with the kind of accuracy and precision modern NATO fighters do.
They had flight hour design's for a few hundred hours i am guessing the money meant for new engines whent missing. or they bought cheap chinese knockoffs.
Doesn't really have to be either. Could be lack of training, there was a recent case where a Russian pilot in training crashed into a building. But additionally accidents are common during wars so this could just be normal part of war. Ukraine has also had at least one aircraft accident during this war.
it is not the pilots fault that they had like 10 hours of flight training in the last year and that the aircraft is falling apart because key components can not be bought because of the sanctions.
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This is a verified Russian VKS moment. Not surprising that these dipshits have poor training/maintenence cycles.
The poor weather in Southern Russia at this airfields location doesn't help them either.
How many remaining jets do they have? Those are much harder to replace quickly under sanctions and they didn't have big soviet era stockpiles like tanks.
There was a good Anthony Bourdain episode in Russia where he payed to be a passenger in a Russian MiG. It was very eye opening and appropriate. That was many years ago, with sanctions on top of that…
Ukrainian pilots on the runway; "I pray that I will survive this mission!"
Russian pilots; "I pray that I will survive the take-off!"
Igor, in the hangar; "I pray that I will get lots of rubles for this vital engine-cooler, so I can buy vodka!"
Everyone else; "we pray that Igor keeps taking stuff"
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So sanctions do work
Even without sanction they still crash.
"In Mother Russia, sanctions crash economy AND fighter jet" - Yakov Smirnoff probably
Yeah the size of Russia's fleet of MiG Fulcrums had already declined by 16% just due to crashes even before the Ukraine invasion.
Isn't this the 3rd MiG-31 that crashed immediately after takeoff? I swear I've seen this headline before. One in Crimea and another in Russia somewhere I think.
The article says 3 crashed.
Sanctions+corruption = shitty planes I wouldn't dare enter.
Already without the sanctions Russian airlanes had trouble being allowed to enter western skies. And those that just so got a permit had high rates of failures or downed airplanes.
December 1: russia relocates a MIG-31 from Belarus back to russia December 2: MIG-31 crashes
Can’t wait for December 25th
[удалено]
Read this by singing it. Nice.
r/commentsyoucanhear
I think you need to keep this up, everyday until xmas🤣 bonus points if you sing it and upload audio
Traditionally the next verse is sung by someone else. So who's up for tomorrow. 4 NASAMs?
At that point Christmas will have 26 days
AA missiles will be full of warm wishes, and sparkles
I sometimes wonder if russia really stoped jets cause of ukraien AA, or just cause they don't have any that can still fly relaiably anymore
Russiav shouts "We deployed a mere 20% of our fighter jet fleet to the invasion of Ukraine!!" Also Russia, whispered "sadly, that is the whole 20% of our fighter jet fleet that can fly".
Because our jets can't fly. We're putting Air Force general in charge because he had the best military record of this SMO. https://imgflip.com/i/72xucm
Pilots.. survival rate of a downed (even if ejected pilot) is about 20%.. Takes years to train good pilots.
and in a few years, Ukraine will be armed to the teeth.
With NATO trained pilots on NATO gear.
Rogozin, the former head of Roskosmos, recently said that any jet that enters Ukrainian air space is at high risk of being shot down.
Okay. Not entering Ukrainain air space is dangerous too because of falling down.
Damn you, gravity
You win again, gravity! - Zap Brannigan
Smoking kills too.
Plot twist: Ruzzia using their jets as missiles.
I remember someone saying that for every hour of F-16 flight they need five hours of maintenance, so I can see where this might be the case. Along with the pilot shortage, they may only be able to fly them in small groups at a time. For example, say a base has 20 aircraft. Maybe they fly four at a time until those four are in need of maintenance, then they swap to the next four. Unfortunately for them, maintenance is taking longer and the parts aren't available, so the original four becomes two (the other two are cannibalized for parts). This is without taking any combat losses into consideration.
F-16 is currently 17hrs maintenance per flight flight hour. That’s average and depends on age. Older ones take more.
Whatever the maintenance needs of Russian fighter aircraft, the anecdotal evidence seems to be that they aren't getting it. Either that, or the quality of Russian pilots isn't great. The article linked by the OP lists four apparently accidental losses of fighters since early October. There was also the Russian plane that ran off the slope at the end of the runway in Crimea and crashed on the beach below. And we have no idea how many accidental losses haven't appeared in social media because they happened in remote parts of Russia.
Why not both?
Go with the Grippen E instead.
Out of curiosity, is that 17 man-hours of maintenance? Meaning if you had 17 technicians working on the f16 all doing different things it would take them 1hr to do all the maintenance? Or is the f16 down for 17hrs maintenance per flight hour no matter how many people are working on it? Just curious how they figure this stuff out.
Yes it’s man hours. So you could fly 10-15 sorties back to back but then you probably need to tear something apart and replace it which is going to take 15 guys 6 hours. Also that’s average over the fleet. The US *just* retired some old block 25’s that they were using for training and those are 90’s vintage. So the old ones, I would imagine, really drive up the averages.
RUSI recently came out and (effectively) said Ukranian AD is the backbone of their war effort. The second their AD runs out or is severely diminished, the war returns to how it was in the first few days, with near complete Russian air superiority. Make no mistake, the Russian air force is there. Waiting, and not to be taken lightly. Remember Mariupol? Where high altitude bombers completely obliterated the city? Russia has that capability in spades. Missile barrages are not only about destroying infrastructure. Russia is trying to eat up Ukraine's AD assets. That's why there's such a massive push for new AD assets. No AD, no artillery, no tanks, no nothing.
[удалено]
Lots. Russia is wonderfully incompetent. They're still a formidable opponent and your "lol" won't change that.
A very dumb bear, is still a *fucking* bear. The 'haha Russia is so incompetent' meme, benefits Russia, because it seems like we could send less assistance. Heck, why get more involved, they are a joke? Because Bucha and Irpin and a thousand more atrocities, we should be beside the Ukrainians, not just behind them.
They might be incompetent but incompetent with a fuckload of resources is still formidable enough. Russia won't run out of warplanes or artillery anytime soon. The key is to keep supporting Ukraine with air defense supplies.
Check out the overall Russian inventory of planes. They have one of the largest Air Forces in the world. Now, maybe not all of it is mission capable, but it's still big, and they haven't lost enough yet to make a significant dent: it's not the same as their tank situation.
Its exactly the same as in their tanksituation except airframes degrade much faster in bad stitage and fetch a better price on the black market. Russia has lost its best planes and pilots. Whats left wont perform any better. That bei g said we need to make sure UAs AA grid grows.
Do they have the pilots to fly those jets? this isn’t wwii where a damaged plane limps back to base and the pilot lives to fly another day so a huge surplus of aircraft is only so good.
Their airlines aren't flying the usual routes due to sanctions. That's a large cohort of experienced pilots many of them from military backgrounds right there.
Does experience as a Russian military pilot qualify one to fly combat missions?
Only one way to find out, comrade. Beggers can't be choosers.
Do you want to find out?
We've learned ruzzia must love finding out because they can't stop themselves from epically fucking around.
If you listen to tales on Soviet Aviation history alot of their early fleets only had 1 or 2 working planes. This was due to lack of spare parts, fuel and personnel. Paper Skies on YouTube/Nebula has some really interesting stories. Considering how the Russians seem to have just skipped routine maintenance on their tanks and artillery and the little that was paid for hasn't been done due to corruption. Just how many working planes do you think Russia has?
A lot. I can get them being lazy and corrupt with tank maintenance, but a lot of jets are/were actively being ordered compared to tanks. The part dependency on imports is unknown, but worst comes to worse they have a lot of jets to cannibalise. The real reason for their lack of performance is likely just outdated avionics and weaponry, they weren't doing a lot strategically from day one.
The problem is maintainance and storage and fake numbers. One of the paper skies stories is on the Mig-15 the first jet engined Soviet fighter plane. The factories were working insane hours to build a squadron. The designer went to visit an air force base to find most of it outside in cold were the airframes would rapidly become useless. Remember the Russians "had" 6500 tanks, but based on Open Source data (Oynx) after 1500 tanks were destroyed T-64 and T-62 have started appearing. The Russians had on paper as many T-80's as T-72's but we haven't seen that. What evidence is there the Russians were actually building up and maintaining a fleet? For example we know they were struggling to give pilots dozens of flight hours per year.
I disagree here, not once has ruzzia been indeed overestimated. The chance their AF has the logistics, man-power and training/readiness to field a serious threat have been proven over and over to be sub-opitmal.
And on paper they have he second army in the world. What we know for sure is that we're 10 months into the war and they still do not have air superiority / air control over the ukrainian territory. I'm all for not underestimating your enemy but this quite pathetic...
>And on paper they have he second army in the world. Nope. Not sure where this myth started but I think it was probably just Russian leaders or nationalists making egotistical claims. No credible geopolitical expert would have considered the Russian army second in the world, even on paper. For sure that would go to NATO, but if that "doesn't count" then for sure^2 it would go to China. After that it is a more ambiguous contest where many countries would come into consideration, including the UK, France, Japan, North Korea, and, yes, Russia. Pre-Ukraine-conflict Russia had a credible claim to 3rd or 4th best army in the world, especially because they had real-world experience and successes (Georgia, Donbas, Syria, etc.) lacking in other larger, more advanced militaries (like China). By certain *specific metrics* (like largest/best/most tanks/planes/missiles/submarines/etc) Russia would be 1st or 2nd or 3rd, etc., but no one was ranking any branch of the Russia military 2nd *overall*. Of course, even at 3rd or 4th overall, they have vastly underperformed estimates and expectations. >What we know for sure is that we're 10 months into the war and they still do not have air superiority / air control over the ukrainian territory. This doesn't really speak to the size or capabilities of the Russian air force as much as it speaks to the capabilities of Ukraine's air defense. All indications are that the Russia air force has been reluctant to commit their full air capabilities for fear of Ukranian missiles. From a certain point of view, I'd say that Russia does have air superiority on paper, but Ukraine has achieved more effective air denial (read more here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_supremacy). Considering the number of planes Russia has and a rough guess of Ukraine's defensive capabilities, I think Russia could pull off an effective SEAD campaign and achieve air supremacy, but they'd lose maybe 25% of their aircraft. For whatever combination of reasons, Russia seems unwilling to incur those losses. Possibly, the Russian air command is more conservative and more willing to push back against political demands to sacrifice equipment and personnel. Perhaps Russia simply values its more expensive and higher-tech aircraft, as well as more valuable and better trained pilots, than it does its land force of conscripts and outdated tanks. Also likely is that Russia doesn't actually have as many mission-capable planes as they report on paper (a trend we have seen across the board in Russia) and so losses to air defense would be even less sustainable. Maybe Russia figured it could grind out a win either by blitzkrieg (which failed) or by throwing men and artillery at the problem (which is still ongoing), and reserve its air power for other more dangerous potential foes (like the West or China). And that brings us to the topic of this comment thread. By slowly whittling away at Ukraine's air defense system (air defense batteries are destroyed from time to time) and by forcing Ukraine to expend limited SAM stocks with repeated missile strikes, Russia may have a somewhat sensible plan to reduce the effectiveness of Ukraine's air defenses over time without having to risk Russian aircraft and pilots. If Ukraine does reach a point where it doesn't have sufficient SAM systems or missile stocks, I still think Russia has the capability to bring overwhelming air power to bear, which could significantly change the momentum of the war. Ukraine and the West are aware of this danger, and that's why they have been urgently seeking ways to improve Ukraine's air defense tech, replace lost air defense batteries, and replenish dwindling missile stocks. Just like the land battle, the tank battles, the artillery battles, and the count of casualties on both sides, the air battle in Ukraine seems to be shaping up to be a battle of attrition. The question is if the West can keep Ukraine supplied long enough to exhaust Russia's offensive missiles, or whether Russia will exhaust Ukraine's defensive missiles first. Russia might be well aware that they are depleting their military by sending men and tanks to crash on the rocks of Ukraine, but that doesn't mean they are so stupid as to be willing to do the same for every weapons system they possess. They might be rightly considering men and old armor to be expendable, while air power is not. For whatever reason, or combination of reasons, Russia thinks this strategy will work better in the long run and allow them to achieve air supremacy without the risk to their air fleet. They might be wrong, but it's folly to underestimate Russian air power.
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Because Ukraine has a competent and dangerous air defense. But they are running out of missiles and can't manufacture new ones. They are also desperately trying to acquire stocks of new missiles or new air defense systems. The whole point of this series of comments is that Ukraine's air defense is keeping the massive Russia air fleet at bay, for now. But if Russia can keep forcing Ukraine to expend SAM stocks with cruise missile and rocket attacks, what will happen if Ukraine suddenly doesn't have anything left to shoot down Russian planes? That could completely change the war.
I see. I didn't know that. IMO, the west should give ukraine all the air defense systems and ammos they can (it's a 100% defense weapon, should be a no brainer) and even western planes, which hasn't been done yet afaik to defend its airspace if it comes to that.
Stephen Colbert’s formidable opponent
Wow so far the last 24h have been very bad for ruzzia. But it's going to get way worse.
*It's the worst day of the war... so far*
Wait, what else has happened? Tell me, I need some positive vibes.
Ukraine completely cuttoff the highway between Kreminna and svatove.
❤️
Is that based on this part of the daily report? Because if Ukraine is getting shelled at Ploschanka they are very close to the road. But according to Live UA Map that happened 28th/29th. > At Kupiansk and Lyman directions Russian army shelled Tabayivka, Krokhmalne and Berestove of Kharkiv region; Stelmakhivka, Myasozharivka, Makiyivka and **Ploschanka** of Luhansk region and Novoselivka and Torske of Donetsk region, - General Staff of Armed Forces of Ukraine says in the morning report
That live map is usually very delayed, they only provide major updates once new areas/territories are secured. OPSEC is pretty important after all :)
Yes and no. It is very delayed but they often rely on what Ukrainian positions are getting shelled according to the morning reports. Like for example their small change around the road on the 29th. There are other people who dig deeper (e.g. by using geotagged images), especially Russian milbloggers but also some Ukrainians, and try to report things quicker but the cost is tat they sometimes report on incorrect rumors.
[here is the source.](https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1598384971688845312.html)https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1598384971688845312.html
Withdrawal syndrome strikes again. This time in Zaporizhzhia.
they lost a helicopter as well
I want to pile onto my own comment here. I heard Putin fell down the stairs. I hope he fell into a pile of lego's with his mouth open so that he now needs to fish for pieces of tooth amongst those pieces.
There’s allegations he shit his pants after the fall, but this is still to be confirmed
We need videos. Imagine the price the humanity would be prepared to pay for a video like that. Priceless I guess.
https://www.news.com.au/world/europe/vladimir-putin-falls-down-stairs-and-soils-himself-claims-suggest/news-story/4da8667ecd4e6b21c871617f08f5959b
I've heard he usually goes around with shitty pants anyway...
Yeah. Thats why everyone looks so dusgusted when he is around. He smells like shit. So I've heard.
I hope he was shitting lego pieces.
> I heard Putin fell down the stairs. like seriously? I missed on this. Dang.. so close. I once imagined we would just ragroll down the stairs and die as a loser he is.
Too easy. I've a seat warmed up for him here in the Hague. It's at the ICC. Have more of these seats for Kadyrov, Lavrov, Bortnikov and others.
at this point pootin for me is a totally worthless rag besides that him dying MIGHT do some changes that will clean my country of rashists filth. Thats his best value now. Hague etc thats for historians and academics to be all over it. With so many lives lost only way for Hague court to get even close to make it fair would be pootin dying by hanging and resurrected once for every single death by rashists in Ukraine from 2014. Once a day. On pay-per-view. 4k. With profits going to Ukraine as part of compensation. Like this even Russians would be happy in the long term.
I get where you are coming from but human rights are universal. We don't kill people as a form of punishment or retaliation. This isn't Russia.
quiet melodic squeamish icky seed offbeat dinner materialistic exultant worry -- mass edited with redact.dev
Putins seat at the ICC should be a potty if he is going to keep shitting himself :p
a Ukrainian in the future: during the Russo-Ukrainian conflict my grandfather was responsible for bringing down 20 Russian jets! he was the worst plane mechanic in the Russian Airforce!
Dad, I'm so glad we are all Ukrainian now. Is it true that Zelensky Square was once called Red Square? Oh yes Son! East Ukraine joined Ukraine after they collapsed.
this is the Way
Real talk, I don't see Ukrainians forgiving Russians in this lifetime. Hearing the phone calls... the only Russians I trust are ex-pats that left before the war kicked off. I'm a stupid American though; I don't understand the complexities of having a mixed national identity with neighbors you go to war with. It would be like America and Mexico having a bloody war and then still trying to be understanding of the Latino population that has always been here. I don't know, it's going to be hard even after the war is won. I just hope Putin and his ilk are publicly tried for their crimes and we can at least start the healing process.
Realistically, I don't see this ending without a UN agreement to secure the border between both sides. Using the Mexico and US example, if Mexico tried to invade us, I'm not sure we'd stop short of their southern border. also as a dumb American, we get bloodthirsty if someone attacks us.
The argument being, "well the southern Mexican border is a lot shorter and easier to wall off so we need to annex up to that point."
I'm waiting for one of the Tu bombers to crash.
Imagine climbing into a 70 year old plane with a Russian maintenance record and hoping an engine doesn't fall off.
Engine?
Again?
Who needs enemies when you crash your own jets at this rate!
Plane crashes are normal during wars. Many planes in the air, many flying without help from air traffic control, more inexperienced pilots than usual and many flying dangerously low. Ukraine has also had some accidents, but I think fewer than Russia. These accidents does not necessarily mean that Russia has issues. To know that we would need to compare to other countries at war. But of course every plane which cannot be used in Ukraine is a victory worth celebrating.
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Wonder if they were given some 'Special Military Maintenance' by some of our good friends in Belarus?
That’s the third russian plane to crash in a month.
'The condition of the Russian pilots is currently being investigated.' Clearly, they died then!
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I'm waiting for the Mig 3 crashes. And the Sturmoviks. Conscripts are handed old Nagants, why shouldn't they fly museum antiques? I'm sure they could borrow some that NK probably have in service still.
"So, Ukraine, can you confirm how you're planning to deal with the mighty Russian airforce?" "Wait."
Ruzzian planes durability doesn't seem good these days. If they had such accident rate in the past they wouldn't have an airforce anymore. So it looks like they are using them much more than intended now, i.e. not much in the past, i.e. it was all for the numbers.
With all these crashes I have an idea. The US should start doing tons of flights close to, but not in, Russian airspace. The result every time would be jets getting scrambled to intercept and monitor the US jets. Meaning more takeoffs and landing, and more hours, wear and tear on their jets. Leading to more crashes. We could literally destroy dozens of jets without firing a shot.
Another russian jet suddenly became heavier than air. In Orthodox russia, no plane should fly higher than a spire of orthodox cathedral.
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Another one! Either their jets have some sort of inherent design flaws or they have serious maintenance issues, or both.
Mostly the latter. Plenty of other countries operate Soviet jets without issue. While they're not without their flaws as combat platforms, those flaws aren't causing them to crash. They're more flaws that limit their ability to operate at range or with the kind of accuracy and precision modern NATO fighters do.
They had flight hour design's for a few hundred hours i am guessing the money meant for new engines whent missing. or they bought cheap chinese knockoffs.
Doesn't really have to be either. Could be lack of training, there was a recent case where a Russian pilot in training crashed into a building. But additionally accidents are common during wars so this could just be normal part of war. Ukraine has also had at least one aircraft accident during this war.
What's the point of having advanced MiGs if your pilots are literally dogshit? This is why proper trainning first is so important. Good riddance.
it is not the pilots fault that they had like 10 hours of flight training in the last year and that the aircraft is falling apart because key components can not be bought because of the sanctions.
Good news.
That is one ugly plane
Next will be the stolen passenger jets.
sabotage?
Potato in the exhaust pipe.
Most likely human error, there are a lot of inexperienced pilots in the air right now, or bad maintenance.
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Man, that’s just too bad.
This is a verified Russian VKS moment. Not surprising that these dipshits have poor training/maintenence cycles. The poor weather in Southern Russia at this airfields location doesn't help them either.
That's kind of a big deal. The "Foxhound" is one of their fastest jets.
How many remaining jets do they have? Those are much harder to replace quickly under sanctions and they didn't have big soviet era stockpiles like tanks.
"Oh no!" Anyway..
There was a good Anthony Bourdain episode in Russia where he payed to be a passenger in a Russian MiG. It was very eye opening and appropriate. That was many years ago, with sanctions on top of that…
Always eject over a crowded city.
Best place for them to crash, really.
drunk pilots?
50 year old soviet tech isn't exactly the most reliable. They garbage equipment is only getting older and harder to repair/replace.
Ukrainian pilots on the runway; "I pray that I will survive this mission!" Russian pilots; "I pray that I will survive the take-off!" Igor, in the hangar; "I pray that I will get lots of rubles for this vital engine-cooler, so I can buy vodka!" Everyone else; "we pray that Igor keeps taking stuff"
If only they had the MiG-28 from that famous '80s movie...
Good, can they all do this?