Russia and Ukraine

[The Grand Nudger]

Russia has returned to threatening the world with nuclear weapons, so it must be going very well.

Classic Russian maskirovka.

There's a non-zero chance that some enterprising colonels sold all their nukes for scrap.  Jokes aside, I wonder how many of them are viable.

Enough to destroy what's left of russia. In other news, sea babies got an upgrade. 800kg of explosives 800km, and now they come with optional 122mm grad mlrs. Pewpewpew

[ShinyCrystals]

Classic Russian maskirovka.

There's a non-zero chance that some enterprising colonels sold all their nukes for scrap.  Jokes aside, I wonder how many of them are viable.

Enough to destroy what's left of russia. In other news, sea babies got an upgrade. 800kg of explosives 800km, and now they come with optional 122mm grad mlrs. Pewpewpew

Enough to destroy what’s left of Russia? If I may ask, what has been happing over there?

[The Grand Nudger]

Weapons malfunctions various and sundry. Operators blowing themselves up. Friendly fire. Just the usual. There are undoubtedly ways to fuck up a nuclear strike that only russia, as innovative as it is in this regard, is likely to discover.

They're purging the brass today, have been for a bit.

[pocaracas]

I've been hearing of how poorly maintained Russian gear is and how bad their soldiers are... however, I just saw this from over a year ago

And it looks very similar to today, except for the bit around Kharkiv which happened in September 2022.




When will the Russians run out of equipment and be forced to cede control of all that territory?... and beyond (since they have no gear, it's time to carve it up with some expansion by Ukraine, Georgia, North Korea, Kazakhstan, Mongolia... China!)

[The Grand Nudger]

Try a map of the maximum extent of russian held territory directly after the full scale invasion and you might see that they ran out of enough troops and material right from the start, with the situation only getting worse since.

Meanwhile, thousands of kms into russia, their refineries are burning. It's all fine, I'm sure air defense will get on that with their mounds and mounds of guns and troops. Don't get me wrong. I give russia credit where it's due. That they elected to invade the poorest country in europe with no army to speak of was a masterstroke. Can you imagine the world of shit they'd be in right now if they'd gotten that wrong, what with this being the best they can do in that situation?

[The Grand Nudger]

For a more sober analysis of why it's going as demonstrably poor for russia as it is, as hard as it is to take anything russia-related seriously anymore.....russian intelligence had to get three crucial things wrong, and all at the same time, for ukraine to have so much as a chance. It probably seemed unlikely, on the russian end, that they would get all three wrong in that way. The resistance of ukrainian defenders. They believed there would be parades. Their influence in us politics, they believed that they could prevent us aid. That there was a disagreement between The West as to whether or not they would support ukraine. Turns out there was a disagreement between western partners as to whether or not russia would be so foolish - thus a lack of preparedness.

Notice that "believed their troops were better equipped or trained or would perform better on the field or would be less corrupt" was not included. This is not an unintentional omission. I think russia knew exactly what kind of army it was going to take to war - see their target selection. They knew...long before anyone else...that they didn't have much, and that what they had was shit. I apologize if I get easily irritated by seeing the question "when will the russians run out of gear" when they've been sending museum pieces to the front as fast as they can for some time now just to get blown up impotently while thousands of men are cut down around them. If the us army was raiding the infantry museum in georgia for spare parts and whole kit as it lost half the landmass....no one would ask when we would run out of stuff. Imagine, if you will.... an armed convoy of rebels advancing directly on washington with no resistance to speak of. The moment, in that case, had clearly already arrived.

There are questions that, honestly, make the whole thing moot, too. For example..is russian life so worthless to the russian administration that it doesn't and never would matter when or if they ran out of gear?

[Pat Mustard]

I've been hearing of how poorly maintained Russian gear is and how bad their soldiers are... however, I just saw this from over a year ago

And it looks very similar to today, except for the bit around Kharkiv which happened in September 2022.




When will the Russians run out of equipment and be forced to cede control of all that territory?... and beyond (since they have no gear, it's time to carve it up with some expansion by Ukraine, Georgia, North Korea, Kazakhstan, Mongolia... China!)

A large part of why the map looks so static is that the UAF stalled out their summer offensive too long waiting for western tanks and artillery systems to be delivered. This allowed the Russian general in charge at the time to build deep defensive lines which stymied the Ukrainian offense when it happened.

Russia has made some small gains, mostly tactically insignificant, but they've had to do so in return for accepting absolutely horrendous losses in both personnel and equipments. Their current offensive near Kharkiv, for example is delivering roughly 1,700 deaths a day (which equates to about three times that in permanent incapacitations) for what amounts to a few border villages of no strategic or tactical value.

Russia is incapable of fighting this war to a victory, either in manpower/equipment or in tactical/strategic planning.

[ShinyCrystals]

Weapons malfunctions various and sundry. Operators blowing themselves up. Friendly fire. Just the usual. There are undoubtedly ways to fuck up a nuclear strike that only russia, as innovative as it is in this regard, is likely to discover.

They're purging the brass today, have been for a bit.

I see. It looks like Russia is becoming more of a joke, or should I say they are a joke already?

[The Grand Nudger]

The jokes practically write themselves. The russian admin handing out charges for exceptional corruption. Not the normal kind of corruption...the good shit. Who are they replaced by? Why...the normaly corrupt ones. This is not an action taken to change the military situation. It's the ground work for a "the generals failed glorious leader" monologue right before putin shoots himself and his aides toss him into a ditch then set it on fire.

[Thumpalumpacus]

He wants them all to be corrupt. 1) He gets to skim their take, and 2) he's got dirt on everyone, so the axe can drop at any tme.