12:51
Yes, that was probably the case, Zelensky downplayed the threat and the army was not fully mobilized, more could have been done.
That it broke on the southern front was not Zelensky’s fault but down there the FSB had probably paid the bribes.
That it held anyway was the Ukrainian infantry’s merit.
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It tells me how INCREDIBLY effective Russian psyops have been. There were hundreds of articles, chatter and forum threads about Russia not attacking and that it was all a conspiracy from the USA to blacken Russia.
On February 24th everyone went silent and new threads came up justifying the invasion instead.
15:52
If anyone thought Johan No.1 had a positive undertone, I present… Andri Yusov, probably the war’s most tired but at the same time most exuberantly positive intelligence operative 🙂
https://www.ukrinform.net/rubric-ato/3552376-tense-situation-expected-at-entire-front-in-near-future-intelligence.html
16:08
Yes, I had the same feeling and there were a bunch of positive voices in the thread, including Moralist, from the start when the media ran their – Kiev will fall in a few days – reports. What is quite striking is that then and for a while afterwards there were two clear camps – positive and happy life-affirmers and those who saw everything in pitch black 🙂 but lately there has started to be a fairly strong consensus that Ukraine will win the war, the only question is when.
That alone is a sign of strength from Ukraine I think, pessimists are usually the hardest to convert.
16:22
You have an unbeatable ability to kill the mood Ben Dover 🙂
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On-topic, combat value and motivation still seem to be at the top in Ukraine and you have almost a warrior culture where the hardest fights give the most cred. However I describe this there will be sour comments but what I see is roughly like that. They seek out fights, not away from them. They seek out front-line units, not rear ones etc. It is 150 years of oppression channeled into throwing the Russians out of Ukraine.
16:26
There was a fun string of comments under your post LELLEPRINTER and thanks for the kind words 🙂
Then I have probably written more times than I intended that in this war you should cheer Ukraine all the way, if they shoot in the direction of Russia there will be standing ovations.
Sitting and whining and judging the suffering Ukrainians we can do after the war, now support in all its forms is needed, some go there, others donate, others sit here…
19:10
I also reacted to that report.
When it was hottest it was 50,000 shells per day and now it’s much milder Russian indirect fire.
That it is then 60,000 shells per day felt a bit off?
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You have brought up tube artillery before I believe and that is probably a very important factor in Russian artillery effectiveness here because tube artillery I find it hard to believe they can produce, maybe they can produce replacement artillery you might think but it will be increasingly older models.
19:20
There are rumors that the USA has been in charge of the entire combat command – true or not who knows.
That getting target data to the fire units has also been rumored that the USA had a staff of 50 in Lviv handling it.
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I can imagine it would have been quite Ukrainian to die standing upright in attack until the end and that restraint and tactical retreats have been forced on the Ukrainians by the USA at least in the beginning.
Then Ukraine has the world’s best infantry and now everyone has probably learned how to fight Western-style?
19:23
Interesting take on what is to come. I thought it was defense of Kherson and the Southern front primarily when they now moved Russian-Russian BTGs there. Izyum has more or less been left to its fate.
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If they now concentrate on the fields while HIMARS, 777, air and army aviation step on the gas and Ukraine concentrates its refitted brigades in roughly the same area it could get quite exciting. It goes fast to get a brigade on the move knocked out and with Ukraine’s arsenal it should be able to go even faster.
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One can only hope that the stuck-out chin was the right thought I think 🙂
12:46
I dabbled a bit with this yesterday but it’s a constant – nothing happens, when we talk about Ukraine reclaiming its land from the criminal skat-clan with a little dwarf who has had his normal human functions filed away over 50 years in the service of the KGB.
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February 24th, or maybe the day after, was the only offensive operation that seemed professional – the air landing in Hostomel. Within a week I wrote a comment in the thread under that day’s blog post that everything seemed unorganized and that it was not at all according to Russian doctrine, or anything like that. Even then you got the feeling that this was a rolling circus rather than “the second largest army in the world” conducting offensive operations with its best units.
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That particular air landing struck a chord with what one learned about Russian warfare, I think that day I aired that if Ukraine only lost all terrain up to east of the Dnieper it would be a win. At that time, that was my best scenario – that half of Ukraine would be lost.
Of course, one sat mocking the Russians and cheering Ukraine but the worry was there that something would break somewhere, when they crossed the Dnieper already by lunchtime on the first day it didn’t feel so good and you saw rows of destroyed Ukrainian convoys, armor, and artillery. The fall of Mariupol was also sad but it came so late that it didn’t feel like a decisive loss.
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Examine yourselves thoroughly – did you think we would be sitting in July and August watching the Russian logistics being pulverized?
-Did you think we would see T62s, old condemned tube artillery and old GRADs that were taken out of service 10 years ago being mobilized?
-That elite units had taken staggering losses and that they had started topping up with old convicts and forced conscripts from occupied areas.
-Did you think 10-15 generals (or however many there are).
Or that the Ukrainian air force would gain air superiority together with air defense over half of Ukraine.
And a few more…
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Kherson is already carved in stone, it can only end one way. The southern front as well and we can guess how the rest will go, they isolate a front section like an island and knock out all logistics around it and then pulverize the defense and retake the terrain. As they reach the borders a defense brigade rolls in and occupies the border, rinse and repeat.
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It’s a qualified guess but if you are a bit more cautious – Ukraine has so far surprised quite a lot and Russia has been among the worst bunglers one has seen trying to conduct a war. Now the Russians will improve but Ukraine has an almost exponential curve on equipment, personnel, ammunition and now war experience, they are stepping on the gas. We can probably be very, very sure that Ukraine will continue to surprise.
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It’s no secret that there are T72s in large numbers with night fighting equipment and rumors of Leo2 and Abrams as well as the Polish P91. IFVs are a bit of a mixed bag but this equipment has not yet been thrown in fully in the fighting. A low-odds bet (or high odds as someone will soon point out) is that they are gathering for a big hit. Reasonably, the next phase should be air superiority with or without F16s and then mechanized combat beyond what we have seen today. Six months of training is quite a lot and the soldiers either have conscription or combat experience in their baggage.