10:46 – Johan No.1
Quite a few really bad decisions are probably made from time to time. That Zelensky did not mobilize the army at the start of special operations is probably the most serious.
That the entire southern front collapsed is probably bad decisions combined with successful Russian infiltration and subversive activities that had major consequences.
In this context, Bakhmut, even if it goes down the drain, is not one of the major wrong decisions of this war and I don’t think it should receive the criticism it has gotten.
That said, I really only see smart delaying tactics here.
Compare that with the French and Germans’ promise to UA that the Russians would never attack – that’s something they probably cringe about when they remember the rest of their lives if they are them.
Yes, it gets a bit far-fetched to talk about enormous pinchers snapping shut, but if you can hold Bakhmut until the offensive starts, you don’t have to retake it later, and the Wagner bag north of Bakhmut is a risk for them if Bakhmut does not fall when the spring offensive starts.
11:09 – Johan No.1
Before the meeting with China, it might be good to calibrate with what Russian experts themselves say.
I, in my fits of positivity, believe we can be positively surprised by Xi’s visit.
https://twitter.com/francis_scarr/status/1636436987748990998?s=20
11:21 – MatsExtrude
+100 Good analysis and many nice expressions today!
Regarding “acid rain” and also ozone holes, these are two environmental problems that we have actually managed to tackle with joint efforts, and that is why we don’t hear much about them anymore.
The problems were taken seriously by almost all countries, and strict environmental regulations prevented the harmful emissions that were the cause. The measures were obvious and there was not even any public discussion (other than realizing something had to be done).
I won’t write more about it because then we risk falling down a rabbit hole! 🙂
#SpringIsComing!
13:42 – Johan No.1
Very interesting PolloHermano 👍
I experience the Chinese as very pragmatic and quite unaffected by idealism, ideology, friendships, etc. They do what benefits them.
The question now is whether they see Russia as a winning horse or a sinking ship?
In January, they stated that Crimea belongs to Ukraine, and there are somewhat different interpretations of their peace proposal.
Let’s say worst case they give weapons to Russia – increasingly technically advanced than RPGs – the Russians manage to deploy units before they are overrun.
Airloads of RPGs would be unfortunate, of course, but not war-deciding.
Ammunition of all calibers, the Russian railway network is long and much can happen before the ammunition reaches Donbass…
Will they threaten?
I personally don’t think they will side with Russia and I personally think we can be positively surprised, but then I am also diagnosed with acute positivity 😀
15:46 – Johan No.1
If Finland is involved, that’s probably good enough 👍
Personally, I am very happy that our neighbors can come out of the Russian shadow and maybe in the future not only smile with their eyes but also have a little twitch at the corners of their mouths 😀
It must be like a bad day at work every day to live in the shadow of that gangster paradise.
16:18 – Johan No.1
Now this might sound a bit insensitive but if Ukraine is smart, they delimit some areas with Russian tank losses like Vuhledar and make them tourist destinations for “battlefield tours”.
Then they take some community, not too big, and let it remain.
After having bought out the landowners with hard cash and after their approval, of course.
Different provinces will be able to live on this going forward; it is lucrative to have First World War trips to Flanders even today, for example, and this is not a small provincial war for Europe but something history will be written about.
16:21 – MatsExtrude
Think that’s smart!
Have pointed out similar regarding their more cozy fortifications. Rent out sleeping places to tourists, serve field rations and show off some tanks, artillery pieces.
Can be combined with your idea, day trips to different places.
17:38 – MatsExtrude
I (and maybe Johan No.1) mostly thought about income for reconstruction but of course, and in the long run more important, is the historical reminder of the events.
Good on those of you who pointed that out.
06:46 – Johan No.1
Go team Putin ✊
This must sting even for Putin.
Enormous integrity from the ICC chief because Putin is known for murder for less 👍
https://twitter.com/AnonOpsSE/status/1636765214094901256?s=20
We should be closer to a terror classification of their subversive activities, Wagner is terror classified and Putin is wanted by the ICC.
Apparently, there are more on the way and if one can also terror classify, say, the FSB and GRU, or whoever it is that is responsible for all subversive activities, then one is well on the way to burning out this cancer that is doing its best to destroy the West.
10:13 – Johan No.1
I guess I have to give up trying to interpret Bakhmut with Deepstatemap, the contested area has increased further inside Bakhmut and RU is straight up towards Ivanivske – if you interpret “contested” strictly, it looks bad.
But if you stick to “captured” on the map, the situation is actually completely under UA control in the delaying battle and there isn’t an alarming amount of movement.
You would think that in contested areas there would be hordes of barbarians* with shovels and sharp knives, but maybe that’s not the case?
As MRF so brilliantly wrote yesterday under (my) yesterday’s post “things are usually what they appear to be”
-UA rotated units a couple of days ago.
-UA has launched counterattacks on Khromove.
-Dmitri posts a firsthand account from a soldier in Bakhmut who is not worried.
-UA has deployed offensive reserves on the flanks.
-Zelensky and the entire defense-something agree that Bakhmut must hold.
-the industrial area in NE Bakhmut has tunnels and bunkers like Azovstal.
-if they can hold for another 3.5 weeks, or as long as the ground holds, they have a good starting position for an attack and there are offensive units on the flanks – the crayfish trap operation closes.
Looking at what is happening, all signals are that UA continues to fight in Bakhmut, right?
Then we have a layer of war on top of that – situations always arise and indeed the line in Bakhmut is thin right now.
Girkin has been more depressed than usual lately and he is usually reliable with that, but all pro-Ukrainian bloggers and their doom crying combined with Deepstate’s contested area might make one overinterpret this too negatively?
Between doom crying and “the great win” I think Accentmannen is spot-on in how I also see Bakhmut and try to write about it, he is the twin I never had. I will ask him after the war how he got his information!
I always read their posts the day after and he interprets information the same way. Then he can draw nice arrows on maps too, a big dose of envy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjfiaK4_jBw
I find it infinitely difficult to understand why there suddenly is general depression, newspapers, pro-Ukrainian bloggers, everyone starts screaming and crying over Bakhmut’s imminent fall and that the war is lost.
It suddenly dominates and everyone gets worried.
All I see is that they have forced the Russians into urban combat and that the delaying battle is ongoing. How far the Russians have advanced is the tricky part but there are two outcomes – either they finish the delaying battle and leave the buildings in Bakhmut according to plan or they launch counterattacks or otherwise reduce the Russian team’s gas meter so they can’t advance.
What I learned was that urban combat is extremely costly for the attacking party and that RU takes proportionally MUCH higher losses in these battles. They are also supposed to be terrible at urban combat and then it goes even worse?
Now they took astronomical losses earlier too because they ran with infantry over open fields (how much they lost on that was never taught because the world ended after WW1) and in comparison maybe they do better in the buildings but it costs astronomically to try to capture the buildings in Bakhmut, that’s just how it was taught to me in the military in the 90s!
The choice between leaving Bakhmut when everyone started screaming about it or forcing them into a costly urban battle I think was a pretty obvious decision?
And it is the Russians’ best units that are going down.
Flytrap absolutely and possibly also a crayfish trap but that is still speculative.
If Russia needs to mobilize another 400,000 soldiers, is it because the special operation is going well or badly?
If Ukraine is now low on everything and morale is faltering and the war is soon lost – why then do they need 400,000 newly mobilized?
Then a friend of mine in a bunker wonders a bit worried what happened to those 20 new divisions that were supposed to be formed – when do they start recruiting for them?
Could this mobilization have something to do with astronomical losses Jan-Mar?
Then this mobilization has been directly denied by Pesky and the emphasis is on calling it “voluntary” – they make quite an effort not to portray it as a general mobilization, I must say.
And when the Leo2 was supposed to arrive in January, it was exactly a general mobilization they threatened would come like a German acid rain over the Ukrainian forests in the 80s (by the way, why did the acid rains suddenly stop, was it no longer possible to sustain that narrative?)
I think it is crystal clear that the West must ensure that Ukraine gets all the equipment they need for a decisive victory before autumn (that is, this summer). UA’s burn-rate of equipment and ammunition will increase exponentially as soon as they go on the offensive.
The Russian 400,000 volunteers will naturally become conscripts when there are no volunteers but they will only be able to lie rolled up in a hole in Ukraine and freeze themselves to sleep two months from today – end of May sometime.
Then the weather is quite comfortable again and as a newly mobilized soldier you no longer have to fight your second war against the weather but can maintain your (relative) combat value.
Everyone remembers the summer field exercises compared to Dec – Mar and how miserable you were then compared to lying under a tree and roasting and eating cold canned food instead of trying to carve out a “finger bone” (wasn’t that the common name for them?) with a knife from a deep-frozen mass when you weren’t allowed to make a fire and the water in the water bottle had also frozen.
400,000 newly mobilized with a whole lot of Chinese RPGs (or whatever they have) and lots of mines on top can absolutely create a sluggishness that UA will find hard to quickly cut through.
It is important that there is no northern Luhansk or southern front then and that they cannot reinforce Crimea so the only area they can push them into is the darkest Donbass, and that there is a very long border with Russia that UA can project threats against so they are forced to spread them out.
If the war hasn’t ended by then (which it will this summer by the way!) long-range everything, SOF and the best brigades will grind down that number over time in the darkest Donbass while 99% of Ukraine has returned to normal.
The Russians have run out of missiles and UA has the world’s best air defense so they can start rebuilding the country again and if only the darkest Donbass remains, you can probably convince investors and companies to come back and the EU application will take several more years.
https://twitter.com/FriaUkraina/status/1636494131357708288?s=20
Krauss Maffei seems to be risk-taking at least and wants to build factories in UA.
But Ukraine needs to achieve results with the spring offensive (which they will!), and for that they need weapon systems and ammunition; the world’s best shooters and sky-high morale they bring themselves to the party.
This one from Erik14 was interesting because it means that even before the southern front retreats to Crimea, there are already large numbers there that will be trapped.
It will be fun to see Crimea emptied completely on its own.
https://mobile.twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1636386450911694849
This one from night owl ErikG was also highly interesting; the southern front’s defensive lines have been built by civilians with zero military knowledge and are located in valleys with hills in front, in marshland, etc.
The defense systems are therefore not optimally built at all and presumably full of weaknesses that the all-seeing eye has been constantly scouting since last autumn?
Like a rusty samovar to get through, and the best thing is probably that the Russians themselves do not know where the weaknesses are, but Ukraine has everything mapped out on their maps since February.
https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1636450410067099648?t=Wnb9BytAOFldE2TTWhGjQA&s=19
Budanov, whom Grankovich posted yesterday, is always right 😀
Russian low point against Ukrainian extra everything can only end one way and all analysts who do not succumb to crying and depression seem to agree.
https://www.thecipherbrief.com/ukraines-military-intelligence-chief-predicts-how-war-will-end
Then a friend of mine wonders about the weather how UA could conduct reconnaissance combat with heavy vehicles at the southern front south of Orihiv if the ground does not hold?
Does it already hold, the friend wonders anxiously from his bunker, sipping another spoon of black caviar.
The bubble list is boiling as said, and the spring offensive is probably the most anticipated offensive in world history after Patton’s attempt to attack the Soviet Union after the end of the war. Mid-April or earlier is probably the favorite guess?
It feels reassuring that the Russians’ defense systems are built by the local talent reserve who have held the maps upside down and that the condition of the Russian circus after this winter can only be poor – Telegram is full of wandering beggar camps crying over not having ammunition.
That they are low on near-PV I consider confirmed.
I see a prolonged war as unlikely; as Paasiikivi said, if it’s summer this summer, then summer applies, and luckily it is long in Ukraine.
*I no longer think they deserve to be called Russians or soldiers, so I write barbarians when I remember. If it is Barbaro-phobia to call the Russians barbarians, I guess I have to come up with something new.