RE: Russia 'increasingly frustrated' by lack of momentum: US defense official
(02-28-2022 01:15 PM)bullet Wrote:
(02-28-2022 10:40 AM)Attackcoog Wrote:
(02-28-2022 09:43 AM)49RFootballNow Wrote: If they send fighters, then they are sending fighter pilots too.
Volunteers.
Again—where would they operate from? I don’t see the Ukrainians as being able to hold any airport long enough or keep it safe enough to effectively sortie out of it. You’d probably need a Patriot battery and enough troops to hold an area around the airbase—-preferably a ring of defense would be large enough to keep enemy artillery out of range. The F35B can take off vercally— so it theoretically could operate from anywhere (no air strip needed), but the West is not going to let its most sophisticated fighter get into a situation where it could be captured and reverse engineered by Russia and China. That means you’re back to needing a safe air strip to operate from. The best option then would be fighters from ex-Warsaw Pact nations as some still operate old Mig-29s like Ukraine uses. Ukraine could use its own pilots.
The western half of the nation is mostly untouched by the invasion. US embassy moved to Lviv.
That might change if air attacks were coming from that area. That said, Im pretty sure NATO AWAC's in Poland are providing Ukraine with complete radar coverage in that area---so planes based in that area would get some warning of incoming attacks.
(This post was last modified: 02-28-2022 03:09 PM by Attackcoog.)
RE: Russia 'increasingly frustrated' by lack of momentum: US defense official
(02-28-2022 09:43 AM)49RFootballNow Wrote: If they send fighters, then they are sending fighter pilots too.
Volunteers.
Again—where would they operate from? I don’t see the Ukrainians as being able to hold any airport long enough or keep it safe enough to effectively sortie out of.
Putin needs to realize this backfired bigtime and use these peace talks to get out of this mess.
But if the army comes home defeated, I could see how he would be afraid of being ousted, and not by losing an election.
He has really backed himself into a corner here and is in a very bad situation
Its been 5 days.
How long did it take for the germans to take poland?
How long did it take us to take bagdad?
Russia has taken territory and shelled their capital
I just dont see how this has backfired yet. You dont think they knew all this would happen?
I don't think he foresaw Switzerland breaking their neutrality principle over this. Too me this indicates a lost cause as Switzerland just doesn't do things like that.
I believe he thought it would be done or close to done by now. I believe he thought Zelensky would flee, morale would collapse, and those that stayed behind would accept their fate as Belarus 2.0. None of that has happened. Now the EU is practically funding the Ukrainian war effort, Ukrainian nationalism has never been higher, and Russia is viewed a pariah state invading another sovereign nation.
Had the Russian army taken care of business quickly with a population not fighting back, Russia could have put their puppet leader in and withdrawn. The west would have been unhappy, but what's done is done and there would be no momentum to undo what Putin did. I don't think Putin wanted to control and occupy Ukraine. He wanted them to be Belarus for protection of the Russian border.
In my opinion, the breakaway provinces idea didn't have the support of China because it was too close to Taiwanese situation. So he expanded the fight and argued Ukraine's right to exist as a country. That's something where they have common ground with China. Now, Putin is losing that argument badly both on the battlefield and in the diplomatic world.
(This post was last modified: 02-28-2022 05:33 PM by solohawks.)
Putin needs to realize this backfired bigtime and use these peace talks to get out of this mess.
But if the army comes home defeated, I could see how he would be afraid of being ousted, and not by losing an election.
He has really backed himself into a corner here and is in a very bad situation
Its been 5 days.
How long did it take for the germans to take poland?
How long did it take us to take bagdad?
Russia has taken territory and shelled their capital
I just dont see how this has backfired yet. You dont think they knew all this would happen?
Based on the casualties alone, it seems like Putin is either holding back or going out of his way to avoid casualties. By comparison in the 30 days of active combat of Iraq pt2 the US had killed around 12,000 combatants and 5000 civilians. They haven't really began to try to take major cities yet though.
Putin needs to realize this backfired bigtime and use these peace talks to get out of this mess.
But if the army comes home defeated, I could see how he would be afraid of being ousted, and not by losing an election.
He has really backed himself into a corner here and is in a very bad situation
Its been 5 days.
How long did it take for the germans to take poland?
How long did it take us to take bagdad?
Russia has taken territory and shelled their capital
I just dont see how this has backfired yet. You dont think they knew all this would happen?
Baghdad? About 3 weeks. Granted, we owned the air from day 1. And all we did was roll in and over them.
But this is Ukraine, not Baghdad. Iraq at the time had the #1 army in the world, and had all of the best soviet military equipment. Ukraine has a bunch of farmers and city folk running around with stinger missiles and homemade molotov cocktails.
Its not a good look for the russians, primarily because its not a good look. Noone can seriously believe that Putin thought it would go down like this.
Putin needs to realize this backfired bigtime and use these peace talks to get out of this mess.
But if the army comes home defeated, I could see how he would be afraid of being ousted, and not by losing an election.
He has really backed himself into a corner here and is in a very bad situation
Its been 5 days.
How long did it take for the germans to take poland?
How long did it take us to take bagdad?
Russia has taken territory and shelled their capital
I just dont see how this has backfired yet. You dont think they knew all this would happen?
Based on the casualties alone, it seems like Putin is either holding back or going out of his way to avoid casualties. By comparison in the 30 days of active combat of Iraq pt2 the US had killed around 12,000 combatants and 5000 civilians. They haven't really began to try to take major cities yet though.
RE: Russia 'increasingly frustrated' by lack of momentum: US defense official
(02-28-2022 03:16 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:
(02-28-2022 09:43 AM)49RFootballNow Wrote: If they send fighters, then they are sending fighter pilots too.
Volunteers.
Again—where would they operate from? I don’t see the Ukrainians as being able to hold any airport long enough or keep it safe enough to effectively sortie out of.
The MiG29 is designed to operate from any straight piece of highway or even a dirt road. It has dual-mode air-intakes, so it can close the main intake during takeoff and avoid sucking in gravel, cows and dead Russians and get its air from the auxiliary intake on the top of the aircraft. The Ukrainians would still have to meet the planes with fuel bowsers and munitions. But they appear to have prepared for that (this was also Soviet doctrine).
Here's a very good open-source-based analysis of the fighting. It updates every afternoon:
RE: Russia 'increasingly frustrated' by lack of momentum: US defense official
(02-28-2022 03:57 PM)rath v2.0 Wrote: It’s why I love the AK platform. Soviet functionality isn’t often pretty but it’s genius is in the simplicity of use.
There is a video of s guy firing one until failure. It gets so hot the barrel droops. He bangs it on a table, straightens it and keeps firing
02-28-2022 04:06 PM
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RE: Russia 'increasingly frustrated' by lack of momentum: US defense official
(02-28-2022 03:57 PM)rath v2.0 Wrote: It’s why I love the AK platform. Soviet functionality isn’t often pretty but it’s genius is in the simplicity of use.
It normally says something when, in the face of modern advances over a nearly a century, the most utilized weapon is still one made before any of us were born (same with the 1911 model).
(02-28-2022 04:06 PM)shere khan Wrote: There is a video of s guy firing one until failure. It gets so hot the barrel droops. He bangs it on a table, straightens it and keeps firing
I've found a video where the barrel block basically melts out to the point that the receiver can't retract back...of course, the barrel grip has been on fire for 5 minutes at that point
(This post was last modified: 02-28-2022 04:23 PM by BearcatMan.)
RE: Russia 'increasingly frustrated' by lack of momentum: US defense official
Ain’t it the truth on both.
Years back I watched an archived Russian TV interview with Kalishnakov from perhaps the 70’s had to try to use my 3 years of college Russian to try to parse through at times because only some of it was translated.
Said when he was in the hospital after his tank went kaboom in 41’ he decided that the problem with infantry rifles were they were too prone to jamming, too complicated for someone with little intensive training to maintain, too hard to work on, and too expensive and time consuming to produce in large numbers quickly. Had the original sketches that looked like he did them on shopping bags. The 7.62x39 was already a thing.
(This post was last modified: 02-28-2022 05:25 PM by rath v2.0.)
Putin needs to realize this backfired bigtime and use these peace talks to get out of this mess.
But if the army comes home defeated, I could see how he would be afraid of being ousted, and not by losing an election.
He has really backed himself into a corner here and is in a very bad situation
Its been 5 days.
How long did it take for the germans to take poland?
How long did it take us to take bagdad?
Russia has taken territory and shelled their capital
I just dont see how this has backfired yet. You dont think they knew all this would happen?
Baghdad? About 3 weeks. Granted, we owned the air from day 1. And all we did was roll in and over them.
But this is Ukraine, not Baghdad. Iraq at the time had the #1 army in the world, and had all of the best soviet military equipment. Ukraine has a bunch of farmers and city folk running around with stinger missiles and homemade molotov cocktails.
Its not a good look for the russians, primarily because its not a good look. Noone can seriously believe that Putin thought it would go down like this.
Baghdad is 350 miles from Kuwait. Kiev is about 60 miles from Belarus. US casualties were pretty small in that first 30 days, although over 18 years it was about 4,000 dead and 30,000 wounded.
RE: Russia 'increasingly frustrated' by lack of momentum: US defense official
(02-28-2022 03:48 PM)58-56 Wrote:
(02-28-2022 03:16 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:
(02-28-2022 09:43 AM)49RFootballNow Wrote: If they send fighters, then they are sending fighter pilots too.
Volunteers.
Again—where would they operate from? I don’t see the Ukrainians as being able to hold any airport long enough or keep it safe enough to effectively sortie out of.
The MiG29 is designed to operate from any straight piece of highway or even a dirt road. It has dual-mode air-intakes, so it can close the main intake during takeoff and avoid sucking in gravel, cows and dead Russians and get its air from the auxiliary intake on the top of the aircraft. The Ukrainians would still have to meet the planes with fuel bowsers and munitions. But they appear to have prepared for that (this was also Soviet doctrine).
Here's a very good open-source-based analysis of the fighting. It updates every afternoon:
I still find the air war so far hard to fathom. Honestly, Ukraine should barely be able to get a plane up before its in danger of being shot down. The US had about as complete control over the skies as you can have in the Gulf Wars---I would have assumed that the Russians could do the same on their front doorstep given the limited resources of the Ukrainian Air Force.
(This post was last modified: 02-28-2022 06:35 PM by Attackcoog.)
Putin needs to realize this backfired bigtime and use these peace talks to get out of this mess.
But if the army comes home defeated, I could see how he would be afraid of being ousted, and not by losing an election.
He has really backed himself into a corner here and is in a very bad situation
Its been 5 days.
How long did it take for the germans to take poland?
How long did it take us to take bagdad?
Russia has taken territory and shelled their capital
I just dont see how this has backfired yet. You dont think they knew all this would happen?
Baghdad? About 3 weeks. Granted, we owned the air from day 1. And all we did was roll in and over them.
But this is Ukraine, not Baghdad. Iraq at the time had the #1 army in the world, and had all of the best soviet military equipment. Ukraine has a bunch of farmers and city folk running around with stinger missiles and homemade molotov cocktails.
Its not a good look for the russians, primarily because its not a good look. Noone can seriously believe that Putin thought it would go down like this.
Thank goodness the rhetoric is staying grounded and no one is making g any ludicrous statements.
RE: Russia 'increasingly frustrated' by lack of momentum: US defense official
(02-28-2022 06:30 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:
(02-28-2022 03:48 PM)58-56 Wrote:
(02-28-2022 03:16 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:
(02-28-2022 09:43 AM)49RFootballNow Wrote: If they send fighters, then they are sending fighter pilots too.
Volunteers.
Again—where would they operate from? I don’t see the Ukrainians as being able to hold any airport long enough or keep it safe enough to effectively sortie out of.
The MiG29 is designed to operate from any straight piece of highway or even a dirt road. It has dual-mode air-intakes, so it can close the main intake during takeoff and avoid sucking in gravel, cows and dead Russians and get its air from the auxiliary intake on the top of the aircraft. The Ukrainians would still have to meet the planes with fuel bowsers and munitions. But they appear to have prepared for that (this was also Soviet doctrine).
Here's a very good open-source-based analysis of the fighting. It updates every afternoon:
I still find the air war so far hard to fathom. Honestly, Ukraine should barely be able to get a plane up before its in danger of being shot down. The US had about as complete control over the skies as you can have in the Gulf Wars---I would have assumed that the Russians could do the same on their front doorstep given the limited resources of the Ukrainian Air Force.
You ask, I deliver. A pretty good analysis of the VKS and its lack of performance:
RE: Russia 'increasingly frustrated' by lack of momentum: US defense official
(02-28-2022 07:14 PM)58-56 Wrote:
(02-28-2022 06:30 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:
(02-28-2022 03:48 PM)58-56 Wrote:
(02-28-2022 03:16 PM)Attackcoog Wrote:
(02-28-2022 09:43 AM)49RFootballNow Wrote: If they send fighters, then they are sending fighter pilots too.
Volunteers.
Again—where would they operate from? I don’t see the Ukrainians as being able to hold any airport long enough or keep it safe enough to effectively sortie out of.
The MiG29 is designed to operate from any straight piece of highway or even a dirt road. It has dual-mode air-intakes, so it can close the main intake during takeoff and avoid sucking in gravel, cows and dead Russians and get its air from the auxiliary intake on the top of the aircraft. The Ukrainians would still have to meet the planes with fuel bowsers and munitions. But they appear to have prepared for that (this was also Soviet doctrine).
Here's a very good open-source-based analysis of the fighting. It updates every afternoon:
I still find the air war so far hard to fathom. Honestly, Ukraine should barely be able to get a plane up before its in danger of being shot down. The US had about as complete control over the skies as you can have in the Gulf Wars---I would have assumed that the Russians could do the same on their front doorstep given the limited resources of the Ukrainian Air Force.
You ask, I deliver. A pretty good analysis of the VKS and its lack of performance:
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[NEWS] Russia 'increasingly frustrated' by lack of momentum: US defense official
