Interesting on the switchblade. The Russian MLRS are very time consuming to reload. They have been taking a few out over the last month but none yesterday.
Here in the USA weight restrictions have been put in place in Michigan logging roads so we can basically say mud season begins in a week or so.
Then a 2 month wait for dry enough weather to maneuver. Basically til the end of May/ beginning of June. Spent 6 hours pressure washing machines that had been working in mud just to be able to grease. Towing each other out (they work in pairs) several times a day. I have great appreciation for mud now that I am no longer a desk jockey.
From what I've read the Ukrainian mud season usually ends in late April and it gets earlier as you go south.
EU+Norway progress
Only EU and Norwegian firms will be able to take advantage of joint procurement agreement, says leaked paper
www.theguardian.com
That's a poke in the eye to the UK for Brexit. I suspect nobody in British politics is going to be very popular until the public gets used to the fact that the UK has show itself in the foot with Brexit and the economy is permanently damaged.
I learned a lot about the fighting in Ukraine from this concise 20 minute talk by David Willey of the Tank Museum.
Why does Ukraine want tanks?
A few examples:
Note: Deployment of HARM was only announced after Russia showed video footage of wreckage from one of the missiles.
I don't have the time to watch right now, but all the evidence we're seeing points to the likelihood that the Russian's have exhausted their reserves of artillery shells. There may still be some that are so corroded as to be unusable in storage, but they have probably exhausted their stockpile. Current rate of fire for artillery on the front is very close to estimates I've seen on their capacity for daily production. They are dissolving artillery units and turning them into infantry (many stories on this for different units) and the rate of daily fire has been consistent for most of the last two months.
It is likely the Ukrainians lost at least 50% of their pre-war equipment in the first six months of the war. Except for a handful of bling weapons like AT missiles and AA missiles, they were fighting with what they had. Western governments were planning from the start of the war to prepare Ukraine for a long insurgency. That involves a lot of infantry carried weapons. When Ukraine showed they were in the fight to the end western governments started to step up with larger weapons. First artillery and light vehicles and now heavier vehicles.
Russia is learning and adapting the best they can, but they also face a lot of major challenges that are difficult to control, they don't want to control, or are completely out of their control.
The apparent ammunition shortages is one thing out of their control. The lack of training and low morale are things that are very difficult to control. The Russians have devolved to fighting WW I style battles because it's the only thing they can do with what they have left. That is an adaptation, but it results in massive casualties and very slow progress.
There are lots of stories of Russian units with very minimal ammunition. There are also a lot of stories of Russian units equipped with antiquated equipment and not enough of any equipment. Most of the more modern weapons in the Russian order of battle have largely disappeared and have been replaced with much older weapons. The disappearance of most SP artillery to be replaced with towed guns and the increase in T-62 sightings with fewer more modern tanks being seen are two examples. BMPs which were everywhere in the early part of the war are also more scarce than they were. BMP-1s which were uncommon in the early war are sighted much more frequently now.
Russia was short of infantry in the early part of the war, which led to disasters when they tried combined arms warfare with their BTGs which were designed as small combined arms units. Now they have lots of infantry, but a lot of their equipment has been destroyed. Some of their early war weapons types are still in the field, mostly because they haven't been engaged heavily. Most prominent among those are AA weapons. Other than fairly low tech weapons for shooting down small drones, AA has been more of a force in being than a heavily used asset in this war.
Russia is also building a lot of fortifications throughout all their occupied Ukrainian territory. The problem is that fortifications are useless unless they are properly manned. Their strategy of trying to take ground by throwing away a lot of lives has weakened their manpower pool. They can still generate a lot of untrained conscripts if they need them, but a strong point with a bunch of untrained conscripts with no leadership (there are lots of stories of conscript units with no battlefield leadership at all) and only small arms with limited ammunition are not really going to be effective.
To have an effective strong point the defender needs to install an array of weapons there between heavy machine guns, AT weapons, and howitzers to repel all sorts of attacks. Infantry only armed with light weapons will be useless against even lightly armored vehicles. The American Strykers can take out those positions without scratching the paint much.
I came across an interesting graph about who has been buying Russian oil/gas since the war. India seems to have increased their purchases a lot, and China is, of course the #1 importer; Europe has decreased, but still buys a lot... It seems to me that battery storage is really the key to overcoming reliance - I know the UK spends $$$ to shut down wind to prevent overproduction at times.
Tesla's Investor Day plans sure seem to be a key piece in making sanctions more effective in the future.
That is a bit misleading because it covers the entire length of the war. A lot of western European countries were buying a lot of oil and gas and storing it early in the war, but quit by late last year. What would be more telling would be a graph showing who is buying oil and gas now.
To be fair, IIRC, Willey also said they may be low on the high tech stuff.
Perun's video on Artillery stresses how important this is. Worn tubes worsen the problems with low tech shells. Also, the reliability of the old shells is uncertain. Overall, Russia's stuff that has been in storage for a while can be pretty dodgy.
I found it compelling. Russia's spectacular failures early in the war, partly due to the profusion of cheap anti-tank weapons like the Javelin, made me wonder if tanks had become obsolete similar to how battleships became mostly obsolete (due to the disparity of cost in building them versus destroying them).
Willy's point was that tanks are still an essential part of
offensive combined-arms ground operations. I believe Ben Hodges and others have made this same point. Ukraine will need a lot of tanks in order to take back enough land to cut the land bridge to Crimea. Will 300 tanks be enough? No. But it's a good start.
Do you think Ukraine will be able to take back significant amounts of land in the Donbas without a lot of Western tanks?
An east-west battle in the Donbas does not require a lot of tanks. Breakthrough warfare is very difficult along that terrain. If the Ukrainians can break through to the north, then tanks will probably be useful running down the ridge lines and valleys of the region.
To go on the offensive the Ukrainians do need a highly mobile force. Once the front line fortifications are breached, moving fast allows the force to take ground before the defenses can coalesce again. Supply and good supply movement are also critical. The Kharkhiv offensive stopped because the Ukrainians ran out of supply to keep it going.
The Kharkhiv offensive did demonstrate what a highly mobile offensive force can do, but it also demonstrated that the force doesn't need to be tank heavy if the enemy is not very well equipped. The Ukrainians offensive moved with large numbers of light vehicles like HUMMWVs because the Russians didn't have enough heavy weapons to oppose them.
If Russia is running low on heavy weapons and heavy weapon ammunition, they will concentrate those where they can be most effective, probably near the isthmus of Crimea. There a combined Ukrainian force with lots of firepower will be needed.
The Ukrainians are getting a lot of vehicles that aren't tanks, but could be very effective in the coming offensive. Left over vehicles in the American arsenal they don't want like Strykers will be effective against a heavily infantry focused force. Bradleys are also the best APV/IFV available in large numbers. There are better vehicles, but they can only be provided in small numbers.
The Russian tank fleet is increasingly T-62s and some T-55s have been seen. Those are very old tanks. If encountered, they don't need the latest tank to take them out. Bradleys also carry two AT missiles. The Ukrainian offensive force will probably be pretty well equipped with AT weapons that are good enough. For non-armored targets, just a good sized gun firing HE rounds is what you want. In WWII the Russians fielded a lot of heavily armored SP guns with 152mm howitzers as the main gun. They were very effective at taking out fortified positions.
Those sorts of weapons don't exist anymore, but Ukraine is getting vehicles with 105mm and larger guns. The AMX will fit this role, especially if the Russians have minimal AT weapons. The Leopard I is perfectly adequate for this role too. The US recycled all the old M-60s, but if they were available, they would be a good choice. There are probably some armies out there still using them. Promising those armies something newer in exchange for donating their tanks to Ukraine would help the cause.
www.thedrive.com
