14:04 – Johan No.1
Yes exactly, we were supposed to do an airborne landing at the Uppsala plains or a landing at Oxelösund, I don’t remember how the priority went there. I1 had probably already gotten tangled up in the barracks during mobilization and then after many accidental shots became combat ineffective, so that’s why we would need to band up from Strängnäs if I remember correctly to save the country.
It would be enormously ambitious and one always wondered how the BMD crew would manage sitting in the vehicle when it was dropped by parachute, or at least that was the story during the film screenings in training.
Swarms of attack helicopters and ground attacks and as soon as ports were secured, motorized and armor would spread like a fan inland – the key was to run them over as early as possible and if you didn’t succeed, tank S had a reverse driver so we would have managed anyway.
We haven’t seen anything close to that expected capability in Ukraine so reasonably the fence series yes 😃
15:54 – MatsExtrude
+100
17:32 – Johan No.1
Can’t make sense of the weather and how the mud has developed but as soon as the ground holds they should start offensive operations and the NS line Kreminna-Svatove is probably first in line.
Kreminna seems to be half surrounded already but they are probably attacking along the whole line so the Russian team can’t redistribute units.
Where the breakthrough then comes, they will fan out?
50,000 Russian soldiers feels like 50,000 frozen stiff prisoners of war or tungsten-rained.
17:47 – Johan No.1
You can’t cheer for this because it is a mother who has lost her son. The purpose is to show that not even when they are supposed to give the family the news that their son has fallen for the fatherland and Putin can they do it in a balanced way that does not cause offense and is directly aggressive.
https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1604151764328005632?s=20&t=bQlwYzblmi0ZCcwi9MV1mQ
17:50 – Johan No.1
Moldova is doing the best they can here, the EU should naturally take the country under its wings.
https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1604140434825027585?s=20&t=bQlwYzblmi0ZCcwi9MV1mQ
17:51 – Johan No.1
Look at that, if that’s true…
https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1604116003561971712?s=20&t=bQlwYzblmi0ZCcwi9MV1mQ
Crossing the Dnipro with a maneuver brigade just became realistic and then you get behind the entire southern front.
17:54 – Johan No.1
It’s enormous if that’s true. Probably depends on all the tenacious SOF and accurate artillery.
17:58 – Johan No.1
This one has probably been up before but a sunshine story like few others, his arm and his condition were terrible when he was released from captivity and then he wasn’t an Azov soldier but marine.
Now he looks somewhat recovered after surgery in the USA.
https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1604068469968080896?s=20&t=bQlwYzblmi0ZCcwi9MV1mQ
18:01 – Johan No.1
The unit maps have collapsed but I think Ukraine is holding a couple of maneuver brigades behind the Dnipro.
Then over with SOF like a tenacious swarm and indirect fire on everything still moving.
Previously the Russians only had smaller units left, forward units, along the Dnipro. The rest they have pulled back because they don’t like tungsten rain.
If they completely abandon Khakovka then Ukrainian SOF will naturally take up positions there and then over with infantry for extended screening and then over with armor.
And suddenly we have a threat to the Southern front that the Russians either have to eliminate or retreat from. If they choose to eliminate, they go against CAS, artillery umbrella and dug-in Ukrainians – usually ends badly for them.
18:11 – Johan No.1
Can’t be bothered to check so guaranteed a ten on this but if you haven’t bookmarked this on Twitter then do it.
A mine explosion of a Russian tank filmed from the tank 😃
https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1604037628415852544?s=20&t=bQlwYzblmi0ZCcwi9MV1mQ
18:42 – Johan No.1
Yes, it’s hard to even come close to the legend on the 14th
13:08 – Johan No.1
If I may continue in a significantly more positive tone but on the same subject. The 200th brigade from Pechenga being wiped out is surely something the Finns are very happy about. Argus summarizes some units above.
Finland has always wanted peace but prepared for war, and has a loss in its baggage, so the Russians probably never got very far through northern Finland on their way to Sweden. I don’t think that is part of the battle plan anymore.
A realistic threat to Sweden today (before the Ukraine war) is probably an operation against Gotland from the air and sea.
For southern Sweden, the naval infantry from Baltiysk is already deployed in Ukraine and quite worn out, VDV from Pskov has taken a magnificent beating.
There are probably also the 79th Guards Rifle and 561(?) Spetsnaz brigades with a possible destination Gotland – unclear how they are doing.
Spetsnaz are rumored on Twitter to refuse to fight in Ukraine as they have taken so many hits.
I don’t know if there are more units that would cross the Baltic Sea in an invasion, but the landing fleet has partly been moved to the Black Sea and decimated, and the Russian Black Sea Fleet with its partly newly built ships was in terrible condition. The Baltic Fleet has the same priority as the Black Sea Fleet, so it is probably not much better, but if a country without a navy can sink the flagship, we can probably guess what our submarines, corvettes, and heavy coastal missiles would do to the Russian Baltic Fleet. If the Finnish rowing boat armada puts paddles in the water and arms harpoons, it will probably do its part too?
The Russian Air Force is worn out and the JAS Gripen is one of the world’s best fighter jets.
We have problems with the Air Force but the feared “Iskander rain” turned out to be good only for terror bombings and to knock out civilian infrastructure, and the supplies are also running low. Our defense would hardly have been harmed if we had mobilized all branches and gone to the assembly areas?
(I have, however, wondered how easy it is to hide on Gotland, I guess people are creative and use all the environment and not just forest?).
For Russia, rebuilding an offensive capability of said units that is stronger and better than the rolling circus in Ukraine must reasonably be impossible within, say, 10 years. Attacking across the Baltic Sea is a completely different beast than rolling over a land border on several fronts with a compass course straight south. If you get stuck in the Baltic Sea, then you sink a battalion and not just the armored vehicles that are knocked out.
We know that full delivery of 150 CV90s can happen by 2029, so +6 years. Is our CV90 production the only production of MBTs and IFVs in all of Europe/USA?
Probably not, so per year the USA + EU should be able to shake out a couple of hundred new MBTs and IFVs, with a slightly slower start in the beginning?
Poland has already received Korean MBTs delivered and a couple of hundred Abrams, they apparently have ok workshops and maintenance chains and knew what they needed?
Then one should probably see Europe as a landmass that needs perimeter defense. Will Belgium, UK, Holland or Portugal ever get use for their tanks (unless one expects war with each other, of course..)?
That the EU would pool together 500 MBTs and double the number of IFVs today I see as completely uncontroversial and was really my point with the long posts yesterday. Ukraine is not getting the help they need and the EU must plan for a worst-case scenario – which I tried to describe as best I could. Even if a worst-case scenario has a lower probability.
UA equips a couple of brigades with Western armor and tops up the other brigades with leftover Eastern armor and suddenly they have an armored fist that would make Patton green with envy.
We have been through this a couple of rounds and none of our CV90s or Archers are fully assigned today and of course we would succeed in replacing the 30% we send to Ukraine within 6-7 years. We have de facto managed to build them once and now we can suddenly deliver 150 CV90s to Slovakia, or was it the Czech Republic, by 2029 and are going to build a new factory.
Build three new factories!
For me, Europe’s/USA’s decision not to send offensive weapons to Ukraine is very strange and I have been looking for explanatory models that would fit for quite a while. That the USA now tries to convince Germany to donate Leo2s makes it look like a deal with China had no credibility, which was actually my first choice.
That was for the simple reason that all other alternatives are directly embarrassing for the EU and one hoped there was something outside their responsibility, care for Putin or fearful with runaway incompetence is not becoming.
That they could not repair them is of course nonsense when UA has received more advanced weapon systems than that, new logistics chains as well. That Ukraine does not know what they need and that they do not need them is even more far-fetched.
-Destroying Russian offensive capability in Ukraine without risking the lives of one’s own citizens is very smart business, perhaps the best.
If there was no deal with China, then there is no diplomatic risk in sending them, no realpolitik to take a stand on.
The winter offensive is already resourced with what Ukraine has and there are now videos flying by of mechanized units moving in winter conditions so it should not be too far off with its three possible outcomes.
They need to take dominant terrain this round to give King Julien’s spring offensive the worst possible start so probably out with the stinginess and in with combined warfare. They will do what they can this winter and invest quite ambitiously. Many soldiers will die in old worn-out Western materiel or Soviet equivalents.
After that, Western armor must arrive; if it does not, a Ukrainian low point (not as low as a Russian low point) meets a Russian buildup. To be able to assign it to units by spring, it must be delivered fairly soon and that is probably why the USA goes out in the media and shames Germany?
The worst possible outcome is if Ukraine feels they do not get enough support and holds back this winter to have resources to meet the Russian attack in spring but we have not received those signals yet. There is really no natural law that says Ukraine must beat Putin in a way that is best for the EU. They can very well at some point do what is best for Ukraine at that time if they feel the support falters or is not sufficient. The Dnieper will never be crossed by the Russians (again) and the border with Belarus is probably becoming our time’s Maginot Line so whether Ukraine retakes all its land or stops a bit inside its border is more a political than military strategic question.
If they stop a bit inside their border, we will have to deal with Russian aggression for many more years and that is the risk the satiated leaders in the free West are playing with when they do not think they can afford to send offensive weapons that they will not need in the next 10 years.