08:47 – Johan No.1
There was quite a long time when they tried to paint with “soon Ukraine will go down towards Mariupol and cut off Crimea and then they will encompass from below in northern Luhansk, it is on”, while they really fought for a local counteroffensive in some block in Popasna – which was immediately praised to the skies. Repeat for many long months.
Now I get the feeling that bigger strategic movements are underway and at least the Russians also seem to take this seriously because they are building field fortifications all the way down in Crimea right now and considering how the winter offensive has gone there are probably not many points left on the command’s list here, or they have a blank paper and can’t come up with a single point.
I don’t even think the Russians know what they will do next week – the winter offensive has actually been that poorly coordinated.
The trolling from Belarus did not happen (which I was the only one who believed 😀), an offensive from the northern front did not happen, northern Luhansk became lukewarm if you want to interpret it positively (for the Russians).
At the same time they have gone all in in Vuhledar, Avdiivka, Bakhmut and Soledar – and have been completely crushed every time.
And have not attacked at all on the southern front after the first 8 brigades went to zero.
Ukraine has been able to move units around as they pleased throughout this entire winter offensive, focusing on one location at a time since the Russians never pressured all fronts simultaneously and forced Ukraine to prioritize what they wanted to hold.
What happened to the air force?
What happened to the army aviation?
Why haven’t they used the heavy rockets to strike geographically small areas like Vuhledar, for example?
After all, they have deployed the TOS-1 and lost hundreds of heavy vehicles at Vuhledar, so why didn’t they rain rockets over this geographically limited location?
Imagine what 80 heavy rockets could have done.
There is a terrible video on Slava showing Wagner going through a destroyed UA defense system, with bodies everywhere, and then in a larger covered bunker they had pulled in their dead, completely full up to the ceiling.
It looks like a mix of indirect fire and fighting, and it is a geographically small area, I think a platoon bunker.
It shows that Ukraine has suffered terrible losses in their positions and the units that have taken the brunt where the Russians prioritized sometimes get completely wiped out when overrun.
Russia has really tried this winter but they simply couldn’t do better – coordination between fronts and different branches of the military is too difficult.
This was after a year of tactical adjustment and they wasted the best units they had left on this.
This is the reality.
It is also the reality that they will not have this numerical strength left by April 15 (or earlier), which is a presumed start for Ukraine’s spring offensive.
And we haven’t seen much in the way of mobilization…
Ukraine, on the other hand, has managed the defense with fewer units while training and equipping an armored fist that would make Patton refuse to talk about it and just look sour.
I usually write that when it has been 10:1 in Bakhmut to Ukraine’s disadvantage, the other 9 Ukrainians have been standing around eating sausages and bored.
Of course, they have the ammunition, coordination, different weapons systems, training, and all the equipment in place for the start of the offensive. Why do it half-heartedly when they have had time to plan and practice this since September?
The thread figured out quite early what a wedge down towards Azov would do, and it certainly wasn’t before that arrow was on the wall map at the Ukrainian command, we can be quite sure of that. Then they have the task of carrying it out and not just sitting and guessing behind a computer.
Motivation is at an absolute peak in Ukraine and the whole country is like a drawn bow waiting to be released.
Because of that, we can be absolutely sure that the offensive will come, it will be more extensive and aggressive than we thought, and it will deliver results.
Operation Storm went a bit too fast with its four days to be used as an example, but bigger breakthroughs will likely happen quickly here.
Then we have inertia on the Russian side, and the army pulling back doesn’t necessarily mean a peace treaty will be signed, and Ukraine will probably have to defend its border with force, but that is more than enough for a win.
There is also a risk that the darkest Donbass will have to be worked back over time, but the Russian threat is completely eliminated and northern Luhansk, Crimea, behind the southern front, and all the terrain up to the ceasefire lines are retaken. Since it is then only a matter of time before the occupiers run out of food and ammunition and Ukraine can pool in the best they have, it is really no longer a war; it becomes a cleanup operation and 99% of the country can return to normal.
But my money is on Donbass going now as well because the 1st and 2nd Army Corps are laying down arms.
With a bit of luck, there will be an offensive near Zaporizhzhia in March, but we have already seen reports that they are going on the defensive instead, so maybe they no longer follow Putin’s general orders?
Avdiivka seems like they are still trying there, which is good because Ukraine has good fields of fire and elite units there.
Such a high death toll in March bodes well.
As someone quick-footed in the thread noticed, we have seen many videos of Russian army units subordinated to DPR or LPR units.
Previously, LPR and DPR were second-rate units that were wasted first before Russian army units were deployed.
If newly mobilized troops are now subordinated to DPR and LPR units, it probably means they are either worse than the rebel hordes or that the rebel hordes are even worse empty shells than the Russian ones and must be reinforced with newly mobilized troops.
There is no way the Russian army subordinated anything under DPR or LPR in spring 2022; something has clearly changed and it is not for the better, we can be quite sure of that.
Now it will probably be a time of guesses again, but when Ukraine announces that they have 18 brigades trained to NATO standard, and 14 newly formed brigades, that is a signal as good as any about their ambition, I think.
09:08 – MatsExtrude
+1
I’ve never seen Trump as a breath of fresh air. A dangerous, selfish clown who has contributed to increased internal division in the USA.
Sure, like a blind chicken, he has occasionally done the right thing. Trying to strengthen domestic industry and reduce dependence on China is probably the right idea.
Thanks for a good summary of the private armies. I had no real knowledge about that.
Then we really keep our fingers crossed for Georgia and everyone – everywhere!
09:22 – MatsExtrude
+1 Almost makes you want to fast forward a month!
10:45 – Johan No.1
They shouldn’t have started with Trump, the rest got lost behind this clown 😀
11:21 – MatsExtrude
🙂 Everyone has opinions about Trump so he outshines everything else!
11:24 – Johan No.1
Sure feels like that, weather and ground bearing capacity are probably the first points on all reviews, one would guess.
12:20 – Johan No.1
Just saw that there is that browser-adapted advertising in the thread, booked a flight and suddenly there were flight ads all over the page.
Almost waiting for the old classic “LW why do you have ads for Russian single women on your site,” it has been a while since someone tried to back out of that 😀
12:34 – Johan No.1
Maybe should have written “singles,” now you probably get caught twice over…
12:39 – MatsExtrude
Double laugh! 🙂
21:06 – Johan No.1
Good 👍
https://twitter.com/chriso_wiki/status/1633920129560920067?s=46&t=hcT3vcW_UnaWIp2jqWJ0Mg
08:37 – Johan No.1
It has been discussed for a few days but Trump has said that his solution to the war would be to negotiate away some land to Russia. Then DeSantis said that one should not go too hard against Putin and the Republicans (not all) are completely against supporting Ukraine now.
No normally functioning person can anymore see Trump as a breath of fresh air. Without blinking, he is ready to bypass international law and above all, he does not see the Ukraine war for what it is.
Now he will probably lose in the primaries because there is no Clinton to vote out in protest, but it shows the strength of the Russian subversive activity and maybe during the Cold War the McCarthy era existed for a reason (I don’t know)?
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/fox-news-accused-of-editing-out-trump-saying-he-wanted-ukraine-to-cede-land-to-putin/ar-AA18nDns
The bubble list is in full change.
We discussed this spring something like – “The USA is definitely planning to divert the Russians’ attention by creating some protests in all the -stans.”
That was a simplification and the real situation is that the -stans are messy and not homogeneous, some countries are ready for a popular revolution, others have dictators who will feel that China serves their purposes better, some will approach the USA and then there are surely those who understand nothing and stay put.
Then they probably manage it quite well themselves but the West has probably just cracked open the door to prosperity, one can guess?
Besides the -stans there are provinces, many of which are other ethnicities than Russian/Slavic and which certainly have currents of liberation.
What has held it all together has been Russia’s monopoly on violence (not a monopoly but it sounds good).
We know that Russia has 97% of the army units in Ukraine (not exactly scared of NATO…).
The tweet below shows the bases they had and which now lie empty, there are all opportunities for the Caucasus to rise.
https://twitter.com/secretsqrl123/status/1633625836069814272?s=46&t=Did8KducJmdnABy-uQ-F0g
This one shows how it looked in Georgia.
https://twitter.com/thedeaddistrict/status/1633536810490945551?s=46&t=Did8KducJmdnABy-uQ-F0g
Blinken recently traveled around all the -stans and I have for a while now wondered how Georgia after Saakashvili and the war could become pro-Russian again, a whole chain that has completely passed me by.
It is clear that the citizens of Georgia are dissatisfied and the whole Russian sphere sees exactly what is happening in Ukraine, the bear is old, clawless and flea-bitten.
A Soviet spring is probably weighing right now.
Russia together with China are probably the two remaining colonial powers that got a free pass because they had a communist revolution, at least I haven’t heard much colonial-shaming of those two. Maybe there is another explanatory model I don’t know?
Or maybe it’s just because they didn’t care so there is nothing to gain by devoting one’s life to criticizing them?
The fact that the military bases are empty is good but we must not forget all the agencies and private armies that exist to keep the citizens in line –
Wild mix below – everything from total numbers to military units, so it is not a number ready to be deployed with weapons.
We can assume that Rosgvardia and GRU are not as fully staffed as Google suggests but that agencies overall have probably prioritized themselves. These are different spheres of power that different elites belong to so they have probably not gone through the same Afghanistan as the army.
I have previously thrown around the figure 500,000 and was a bit worried that I completely made it up but I had probably done the same exercise as below at some point.
-FSB – 66,000 military + 18,000 civilians
-Rosgvardia (national guard but there is a whole range from “elite” to useless) – 350,000
-Omon – 20,000
-SVR – 13,000
-FSO – 50,000 “soldiers”
-GRU – no number given but in 1997 they had “25,000 Spetsnaz” and there are several different military branches – big guess.
-SBP (Putin’s security guards? He is said to have 40,000 somewhere but I can’t find anything) – 2,500
-Patriot (Shoigu’s army) – 15,000 I read somewhere, they are now in Ukraine.
-MVD – they saw the internal troops moved to Rosgvardia but still have “troops” in various forms, unclear how many but say 100,000?
Somewhere here you understand what kind of oppressive regime Russia is, right?
A bunch of different agencies with military units all tasked with oppressing the citizens and then private armies on top of that.
The reason they haven’t sent all these to Ukraine is of course that unlike not being the least bit afraid of NATO, they are absolutely terrified of a revolution in Russia.
Wagner, Patriot and someone else are in Ukraine for an old-fashioned looting raid, nothing else.
So… there are 500,000 more to try to suppress the joy of life in the -stans and provinces now when they want to live, but they must also suffice for Russia.
It sounds like a lot if it is Tuva that wants to rise but if it becomes an explosive Soviet spring altogether, the Russian oppressive regime is completely done for is my conclusion.
There were big protests in Dagestan earlier and Georgia could very well become the last piece on the fuse here.
One must not forget that many -stans have their own armies today and if you choose soldiers’ lives and prosperity you don’t get far with the above numbers.
The provinces probably have it a bit harder maybe?
But if it starts moving in Georgia it can start moving in other -stans, if it starts moving in provinces, it can start moving in core Russia…
Then we have Belarus and Kaliningrad on top of that.
It was today one should have written – my god what a mess Putin has gotten himself into 😀