Much of the worlds' population is fascinated by all things of entertainers. His music is genius, but that in no way extends to his understanding of politics which is just $h!t brained. He just needs to be tuned out on the latter.
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Russia/Ukraine conflict
- Thread starter amolina
- Start date
Doggydogworld
Active Member
ThreadReader version (with all the missing pics) for those who aren't on Twitter.
Correct, I'm just making the point that it's easy to do. And if a defense contractor does it on spec, you know it's easy.
You wouldn't need a whole fancy containerized system to fire off a few dozen HARMs, though. You can easily jury-rig a launch system if you don't have to deploy it widely. Test engineers do this all the time during development. Grab a few parts off a wrecked plane or from the spares room and build a test rig. They have to do a lot of ground testing in cells and on the range before ever hanging one off a $100m plane + pilot.
They retrofit tons of ex-Soviet planes when Poland and other eastern European countries joined NATO. Ukraine may have some of those or they maybe retrofit a few of their own by now (we're in month 6).
Deciding to give Ukraine these capabilities is the hard part, once decided there are lots of ways to make it work.
A month ago, Dmitry Medvedev (currently Deputy Chairman of their "Security Council") said that were Crimea attacked "Judgement Day will instantly await all those [involved]. It will be very fast and very hard."
Let's see if Medvedev's talk is bluster. Looks like Ukraine may have called their bluff, certainly there was no "very fast" response.
SwedishAdvocate
Active Member
Some news about a traffic jam at the Kerch Bridge...
Credit goes to (as usual) (in Swedish):
cornucopia.se
Credit goes to (as usual) (in Swedish):
458 mördade hittade i Butja - terrorbombningar av Nikopol och Charkiv - Ryssland börjar kannibalisera trafikflyg på reservdelar - HARM bekräftad i Ukraina - ryska anfall tillbakaslagna
Antalet mördade civila i den lilla förorten Butja är nu uppe på 458 personer, varav majoriteten bär spår av tortyr eller har avrättats genom att skjutas eller misshandlas till döds. Rysslands terrorbombningar av Nikopol och Charkiv fortsätter. Hemma i Ryssland har ryska flygbolag nu börjat kannibali
cornucopia.se
…As Russian and occupation officials scrambled to determine the cause, raising the terrorist threat level in the area, a senior Ukrainian military official with knowledge of the situation said that Ukrainian forces were behind the blast at the Saki Air Base on the western coast of Crimea…
…The air base, which is near the city of Novofederivka, is nearly 200 miles from the nearest Ukrainian military position.
The senior Ukrainian official said the attack involved partisan resistance forces loyal to the government in Kyiv, but he would not disclose whether those forces carried out the attack or assisted regular Ukrainian military units in targeting the base, as has sometimes occurred in other Russian-occupied territories…
Ukraine Live Updates: Explosion Rocks Russian Air Base in Crimea
petit_bateau
Active Member
ATACM, Neptune, SF, Tochka, AGM88, ........ not much safe space left in Crimea
That's like blaming Churchill for WW II.
Great explanation. The best I've seen yet.
Though it is also possible the Ukrainians have some NATO updated MiGs passed to them on the sly they are using. The Poles were going to transfer a bunch early in the war and it turned into a political circus then went quiet. The Poles may have transferred the planes quietly when the world media moved on to something else.
In any case, keeping Russian AA defenses paranoid about an AGM visit if they switch on their radar for even a second is a good thing.
When I was in high school there was a very unhappy kid who are teased a lot. He was an odd kid who had double vision and needed glasses with prisms and wore clothes more like a 50s dad than a 1980s teenager. He used to promise retribution on his enemies and kept a kill list of his tormentors.
These days school officials would likely be all over him like flies on, well you know. But everyone ignored his threats and he never did anything about them.
Russia's threats of retribution sound like this kid. They do still have nuclear weapons which may work, but if they use them, they will have the rest of the world down on them in an instant. Their conventional forces are fully engaged now and they aren't getting anywhere. Conventionally they are incapable of anything more than they are doing now.
We'll probably find out in the coming days. If it was missiles, there will be debris.
It is possible that the Ukrainians took a page from the early days of the SAS. The British SAS was created as an irregular force in North Africa during WW II. They operated behind German lines and were called the Special Air Service to misdirect the Germans.
The early SAS raids, they were dropped off by the British deep desert force who drove trucks deep behind German lines, mostly keeping contact with Libyan resistance fighters and supplying them. In their expanded role they transported the SAS to German bases, the SAS would plant explosives and cause other mayhem on the base, then get picked up by the deep desert force. Later the SAS started operating US made Jeeps which were modified for raids.
In one of their early raids, they infiltrated a German air base on foot, planted a bunch of bombs in the German planes, then hoofed it out of there. Later they attacked another German base with Jeeps driving down the taxiways shooting up the planes.
If Russian security was lax at a deep rear base, then the Ukrainian partisans could have snuck onto the base, planted bombs in the planes and gotten out of there.
Quite the day in Ukraine. Jay in Kyiv is mostly right, but this isn't the biggest day of losses in Russian air force history. They lost 1200 aircraft in one day on June 21, 1941. Over the next couple of months they lost 70% of the entire Red Air Force.
It's definitely the biggest day of losses for the Russian Air Force in this war.
If the planes were fully armed and ready to go and parked wing tip to wing tip, a missile that set off one plane could have started a chain reaction that burned up the entire flight line. That's why smart air forces do dispersal unless they are in territory they know is very, very safe.
There have been stories that the Ukrainians were getting the longer range MRLS/HIMARS rockets and then they were walked back. They may have gotten the missiles. They could also be Tochka or AGM-88 uses in a new role. The Ukrainians were holding back their Tochkas until they got the HIMARS, then we saw them used in the campaign to knock out supply depots.
"Ukraine’s defense ministry said in a statement that it could not “determine the cause of the explosion,” and suggested that personnel at the base adhere to no-smoking regulations."
Artful Dodger
"Neko no me"
Pentagon acknowledges sending Ukraine previously undisclosed anti-radar missiles - CNNPolitics
edition.cnn.com
Pentagon acknowledges sending previously undisclosed anti-radar missiles to Ukraine
The Pentagon announced Monday that the US has sent anti-radar missiles for Ukrainian aircraft to target Russian radar systems, marking the first time the Defense Department has acknowledged sending the previously undisclosed missile to Ukraine.
petit_bateau
Active Member
Tends to suggest the IADS unpeeling is working. And general evidence tends towards Tochka strikes being the airbase ones. But Ukraine aviation now much more active.
https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1557171028492750849?
https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1557171028492750849?
https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1557171028492750849?
https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1557171028492750849?
petit_bateau
Active Member
Interesting, a successor to the Tochka
www.thedrive.com
Does Ukraine Have A Stash Of Domestically Developed Ballistic Missiles?
A possible high-profile long-range attack on a Russian airbase has led many to wonder if Ukraine has a pocket arsenal of ballistic missiles.
www.thedrive.com
petit_bateau
Active Member
Satellite imagery, before & after. Very much looks like some aiming points were aircraft, others key personnel.
and
threadreaderapp.com
and
Thread by @EliotHiggins on Thread Reader App
@EliotHiggins: First unrectified images of Saki Air Base in Crimea via @planet following yesterday's multiple explosions. There's clearly been a massive fire across the base following whatever happened there: Compar...…
threadreaderapp.com
Confirms bountiful hunting day for Ukraine, another Moskva level kill.Satellite imagery, before & after. Very much looks like some aiming points were aircraft, others key personnel.
and
Thread by @EliotHiggins on Thread Reader App
@EliotHiggins: First unrectified images of Saki Air Base in Crimea via @planet following yesterday's multiple explosions. There's clearly been a massive fire across the base following whatever happened there: Compar...…
News websites are saying there were only 9 plains destroyed now, not 40.
Comparison of before and after satellite images shows a minimum of eight completely destroyed aircraft. These were identified to be Su-24 and Su-30 warplanes, each tens of millions of dollars a piece.
I counted 17 smudges on the ramp from where planes were in the pre-pictures. Some planes were clearly charred wrecks. The places where the smudges are may be damages planes that were moved, but if they left smudges visible from space the planes may have been movable after the fire, but they are probably going to be out of action for a long time if they ever become flyable again.
It may be 12 clearly destroyed, but others are almost certainly severely damaged and some will probably be written off.
In other news, inflatable missiles?
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Some further analysis of the base damage. There was significant debris 850 m from the biggest crater. That base got a serious plastering.
Mick Ryan's analysis
Thread by @WarintheFuture on Thread Reader App
A captured T-80 with the reactive armor replaced with rubber blocks. Russian thievery in action.
Mick Ryan's analysis
Thread by @WarintheFuture on Thread Reader App
A captured T-80 with the reactive armor replaced with rubber blocks. Russian thievery in action.
TheTalkingMule
Distributed Energy Enthusiast
Russian oil production is basically back to pre-war levels. Maybe even higher by now.
From S&P:
From S&P:
I wonder what the robust domestic demand was. /s
Doggydogworld
Active Member
More trolling from Ukraine's Ministry of Defense.
