Russia and Ukraine

[Thumpalumpacus]

Probably an effect of officer attrition.  By random chance, some grifter died and left a competent underling at links in the coc.

more likely there is a systematic process improvement program and performance based assignment and promotion that is weeding out incompetent officers and trialing new doctrines. 

Dynamic, competent officers willing to take responsibility are the ones who tend to go up to the front line to personally take charge of serious and critical situations where they can get killed.   Grifters would find a way to be far away from where things might get gnarly, and head for  some place safe, and preferably where they can play act in public eye,  instead.

So officer attrition through casualty might be expected to do the opposite by killing more competent officers abs leaving a higher percentage of grifters.

[bolding added -- Thump]

Retraining officers to perform better during a war is pretty iffy. Eleven weeks to change a mindset is also pretty sketchy.

[Anomalocaris]

more likely there is a systematic process improvement program and performance based assignment and promotion that is weeding out incompetent officers and trialing new doctrines. 

Dynamic, competent officers willing to take responsibility are the ones who tend to go up to the front line to personally take charge of serious and critical situations where they can get killed.   Grifters would find a way to be far away from where things might get gnarly, and head for  some place safe, and preferably where they can play act in public eye,  instead.

So officer attrition through casualty might be expected to do the opposite by killing more competent officers abs leaving a higher percentage of grifters.

[bolding added -- Thump]

Retraining officers to perform better during a war is pretty iffy. Eleven weeks to change a mindset is also pretty sketchy.

High casualty rate amongst officers might have a salutary, mind focusing, lessons embracing effects on those who might wish their turn to not come too soon.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

[bolding added -- Thump]

Retraining officers to perform better during a war is pretty iffy. Eleven weeks to change a mindset is also pretty sketchy.

High casualty rate amongst officers might have a salutary, mind focusing effects on those who might wish their turn to not come too soon.

It very well might, in Western military organizations. But - as you’ve implied - Russian military thinking is fairly calcified. Their go-to move is to go bigger, not better.

Boru

[onlinebiker]

High casualty rate amongst officers might have a salutary, mind focusing effects on those who might wish their turn to not come too soon.

It very well might, in Western military organizations. But - as you’ve implied - Russian military thinking is fairly calcified. Their go-to move is to go bigger, not better.

Boru

It goes right to weapons design.

Consider the AK47 vs the M16 (and variants).

The AK was not designed for accuracy. It was designed for ruggedness.. I had one Russian brag to me - it can be run over by a tank and still function.... Great going Ivan....
 Only problem? You just got run over by a tank.

The M16 was designed for accuracy. Early rifles got a bad rep not because of fault of the rifle - but ammo problems. Yes - they are more finicky than an AK.

The Soviet ideal was to put up a wall of lead. Something would eventually connect. US doctrine was more about controlled fire. (Yes there are many examples to the contrary). But far more skill at arms was/is emphasized by US/NATO troops than former Soviet Bloc countries...

[Thumpalumpacus]

High casualty rate amongst officers might have a salutary, mind focusing, lessons embracing effects on those who might wish their turn to not come too soon.

Right, but you're going to have to change the centralized decision-making in the Russian military for that to happen. The willingness to accept responsibility subsumes the willingness to accepts consequences. Is that change in mindset going to happen very quickly? I doubt it. Cultures, especially military cultures, do not change in a couple of months.

[The Grand Nudger]

Distilled, the suggestion is that the urgency of combat makes people get right - and it's interesting to see that held out as a possibility in russias case alongside the firm belief that it's never happened for any western force. Breaking the soviet myth will take at least another generation.

[Anomalocaris]

When the consequence is untimely death,  mindset can change quickly to accept the responsibility of finding a practical way to avoid it.

Historically, even when changing mindset from approved norm provides a disconcertingly high chance of getting one shot out of spite, as had been the case in the soviet army during and after Stalin’s purges in the 1930s, mindset were nonetheless changed in about a year under the impetus of defeats during the german invasion.

Modern russian army is by no means as unforgiving of doctrinal and technical dissent as stalin’s army on the eve of WWII, so there seem to be no real reason to think the russians could not learn from mistakes and adapt, especially if the perspective adaptors can see the consequences of not adapting.

[The Grand Nudger]

No real reason except their performance on the battlefield, you mean?

[Anomalocaris]

No real reason except their performance on the battlefield, you mean?

their performance is reason to adapt, not reason to not adapt.

[The Grand Nudger]

It also appears to be a comprehensive demonstration of their failure or refusal to do so. We're all waiting for them to become presidential, lol.