Russian invasion of Ukraine | Fewer tweets, more discussion

Krakenzero said:
Well, has it? So far at least.
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It would be strange if corruption within the military doesn't have an effect on the military, so I assume so, yes. Also, in general, corruption is harmful. How many pages in this thread are about Russian corruption and the devastating effect it has had? Quite a few. Ukraine is by far the European country that comes closest to Russian levels of corrupton, how could it not have an impact?

There's also been talked about Ukraine joining the European Union, so corruption levels would of course also be relevant in that context.
 
NotThatSoph said:
It would be strange if corruption within the military doesn't have an effect on the military, so I assume so, yes. Also, in general, corruption is harmful. How many pages in this thread are about Russian corruption and the devastating effect it has had? Quite a few. Ukraine is by far the European country that comes closest to Russian levels of corrupton, how could it not have an impact?

There's also been talked about Ukraine joining the European Union, so corruption levels would of course also be relevant in that context.
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Its not really that relevant in the broader scheme of things, specifically who wins the war between Russia and Ukraine. At the end of the day Ukraine is a democracy with credible elections and Russia is a totalitarian dictatorship. Who wins the war will therefore inform the prospects of reforming corruption in Ukraine over the long term, far more than the act of momentarily exposing a few examples in the present.
 
Raoul said:
Its not really that relevant in the broader scheme of things, specifically who wins the war between Russia and Ukraine. At the end of the day Ukraine is a democracy with credible elections and Russia is a totalitarian dictatorship. Who wins the war will therefore inform the prospects of reforming corruption in Ukraine over the long term, far more than the act of momentarily exposing a few examples in the present.
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Weather forecasts and the specific number of tanks are also probably not going to be what decides the war, yet they're frequent topics of discussion. Will Russian corruption decide who wins the war? I don't know, but it certainly doesn't help and it's a relevant and sometimes interesting topic.

By all means, discuss or don't discuss whatever you want, but questioning whether or not Ukranian corruption is even relevant for this 1068 page long thread about the war is a bit weird (I'm not saying you did that). People are talking about how hard soil is, about protests outside of both Ukraine and Russia, and about pros and cons of rocket XT782 vs AB9000 or whatever. It's a pretty wide scope!
 
NotThatSoph said:
Weather forecasts and the specific number of tanks are also probably not going to be what decides the war, yet they're frequent topics of discussion. Will Russian corruption decide who wins the war? I don't know, but it certainly doesn't help and it's a relevant and sometimes interesting topic.

By all means, discuss or don't discuss whatever you want, but questioning whether or not Ukranian corruption is even relevant for this 1068 page long thread about the war is a bit weird (I'm not saying you did that). People are talking about how hard soil is, about protests outside of both Ukraine and Russia, and about pros and cons of rocket XT782 vs AB9000 or whatever. It's a pretty wide scope!
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Its not relevant any more than Russian corruption is relevant during the war. Its the daily execution of the war itself and the political and humanitarian impact that are the central issues of this thread. That's not to say corruption can't be discussed, but its not even remotely relevant to how the war is being discharged. At best, its an ancillary distraction from the monotony of daily war updates.
 
stefan92 said:
So sad that our resident Greek troll went silent in this thread... I would love to wind him up by reminding him that the AfD originally was founded as a reaction to the Greek financial disaster and that this is his fault...

*whistling innocently*
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Easy to counter. Germany created the greek crisis, greek crisis created AfD ergo Germany created AfD. In your face, back to you
 
4bars said:
Easy to counter. Germany created the greek crisis, greek crisis created AfD ergo Germany created AfD. In your face, back to you
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Good one :lol:

Back to topic, today it was officially confirmed that the complete industry stock of Leopard 1 tanks in Germany will be refurbished and then delivered to Ukraine. First 25 units should be delivered in the summer, in total it could be up to 178 Leopard 1 tanks (assuming that all units in storage at Rheinmetall and FFG are still usable, the last of these left active service in 2003), delivery of the last units in the summer.

Compared to the Leo 2 it obviously is older, weaker and less protected, but it's big advantage is a similar size and weight to the Soviet T-series tanks. Which means that it can easily use the same roads and bridges, while the more modern western tanks could create some logistical problems.

Generally on the topic of western tanks: I think the situation is quite sad. Two weeks ago I would never have expected that Germany is promising the biggest numbers in total, considering that a lot of people made it sound like everyone was just waiting for Germany to unleash a tsunami of Leopards for Ukraine. For me that actually redeems Scholz a bit who always insisted on not doing this alone, and I never wanted to write anything positive about him in this thread as I still think his stance towards Russia is a shameful disaster.
 
Sad on a number of levels, not the least of which as a reminder of how Putin is throwing bodies at a conflict he probably can't win.

Graphic

 
Weekly update on German delivered supplies contains mostly logistics stuff, different kinds of military trucks.

But it does also contain two more Gepard SPAAG and (this is important) additional Gepard ammo supplied by the industry.

Getting Gepard 35mm ammo for Ukraine was a big problem. Germany depended on a Swiss factory and isn't allowed to send that ammo to Ukraine. Rheinmetall is currently investing billions into new ammo production facilities to ensure that all necessary ammo for German systems can and will be produced in Germany again (but they also bought a factory in Spain, it's not unlikely that the current batch was produced there as the German 35mm production hasn't started yet).

Ukraine will get three more Gepard and Germany is in talks with partners who use Gepards to buy them back and send them to Ukraine (most likely this means Qatar)
 
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-64566762

Ukrainian President visiting the UK.
The most interesting thing I read was that the UK will train Ukrainian pilots to be able to fly and operate NATO standard fighter jets.
So either this is in preparation for NATO providing Ukraine with fighter jets to operate against Russia.
Or it is in preparation for when Ukraine actually joins NATO.
 
Raoul said:
Sad on a number of levels, not the least of which as a reminder of how Putin is throwing bodies at a conflict he probably can't win.

Graphic

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I’ve seen a couple of those videos. Do those frags do a lot of lateral damage? From above it looks like such a localised and contained explosion that it would only kill the person it lands on.
 
Pexbo said:
I’ve seen a couple of those videos. Do those frags do a lot of lateral damage? From above it looks like such a localised and contained explosion that it would only kill the person it lands on.
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Yep, they spray tiny fragments in an area doing high lateral damage. But it's not a mine, it will not blow people up, they just cause severe bleeding .

This is what happens when a grenade goes off near you (see the fragments in the x-ray).

Alte_Granatsplitter_-_alte_Fibulafraktur_Roe_ap_und_seitlich.jpg

EDIT: Normally 5m around it is the "kill zone", where there's so much bleeding from different areas that it's impossible to stem and recover from. "Casualty area" is 15m, where you take injuries that will need treatment. That said, the kinetic energy on those fragments is not very high, so they will usually stick on the first obstacle they meet. So another person or object can blanket it and absorb the impact.

In the video above it's quite possible a couple of the people on the right side of the pit avoided injury due to the bodies of the soldiers on the left absorbing all the fragments.
 
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MadMike said:
Yep, they spray tiny fragments in an area doing high lateral damage. But it's not a mine, it will not blow people up, they just cause severe bleeding .

This is what happens when a grenade goes off near you (see the fragments in the x-ray).

Alte_Granatsplitter_-_alte_Fibulafraktur_Roe_ap_und_seitlich.jpg
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Cheers for the info. Grim.
 
Buster15 said:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-64566762

Ukrainian President visiting the UK.
The most interesting thing I read was that the UK will train Ukrainian pilots to be able to fly and operate NATO standard fighter jets.
So either this is in preparation for NATO providing Ukraine with fighter jets to operate against Russia.
Or it is in preparation for when Ukraine actually joins NATO.
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I guess at this point it's definitely clear that Ukraine will get NATO jets in the relatively near future, otherwise they wouldn't commit their pilots for this now, it would be useless.

It's not in preparation for joining NATO, everyone knows that's far in the future.
 
Buster15 said:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-64566762

Ukrainian President visiting the UK.
The most interesting thing I read was that the UK will train Ukrainian pilots to be able to fly and operate NATO standard fighter jets.
So either this is in preparation for NATO providing Ukraine with fighter jets to operate against Russia.
Or it is in preparation for when Ukraine actually joins NATO.
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Hopefully the latter is pretence for the former.
 
At this stage, a slowrolled escalation bringing more and more powerful systems to Ukraine is the only apt strategy, yet going beyond 2023 seems just unsustainable for the US and Europe, especially if China raises their ante in Taiwan? It just seems a scarily concerted move, with Russia testing the West before China strikes, all the autocrats out there watching with a wry smile… hopefully, this attrition war will freeze into sort of the good, the bad, the ugly tree-way gun pointing without actually opening more fronts, yet de-escalation is needed sooner than later.
 
Bepi said:
At this stage, a slowrolled escalation bringing more and more powerful systems to Ukraine is the only apt strategy, yet going beyond 2023 seems just unsustainable for the US and Europe, especially if China raises their ante in Taiwan? It just seems a scarily concerted move, with Russia testing the West before China strikes, all the autocrats out there watching with a wry smile… hopefully, this attrition war will freeze into sort of the good, the bad, the ugly tree-way gun pointing without actually opening more fronts, yet de-escalation is needed sooner than later.
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Its around 5% of their military budget that the US is using to support Ukraine and as far as military spending goes, its just about the best money they have ever spent. Helping to dismantle the forces of an adversary while not risking a single US sole. Its more than sustainable, no matter what China does. It's also a deterrent to China in itself, showing no aggression of this nature can prevail.
 
Simbo said:
Its around 5% of their military budget that the US is using to support Ukraine and as far as military spending goes, its just about the best money they have ever spent. Helping to dismantle the forces of an adversary while not risking a single US sole. Its more than sustainable, no matter what China does. It's also a deterrent to China in itself, showing no aggression of this nature can prevail.
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True. You just hope most Republicans will think the same for a couple of more years at least.
 
Simbo said:
Its around 5% of their military budget that the US is using to support Ukraine and as far as military spending goes, its just about the best money they have ever spent. Helping to dismantle the forces of an adversary while not risking a single US sole. Its more than sustainable, no matter what China does. It's also a deterrent to China in itself, showing no aggression of this nature can prevail.
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And while the US is always ready for war, the situation in other countries is different.

Looking at Germany suddenly the combat readiness of the Bundeswehr is a topic people care about (which is unusual and it is as bad as you expect under that neglect) and the military industry is also investing in production facilities. The Ukraine war is causing a paradigm shift and causing new weapon factories to be built, new production lines created and getting rid of old stuff (by sending it to Ukraine).

If China doesn't strike right now before this paradigm shift is implemented they will have to face a much stronger Western World then before and I don't think they like that.

Russia struggling in Ukraine while the West does just deliver a few weapons this long is about the worst result possible for China.
 
Ramshock said:
If Putin dies, will this end? Any Russians in here who have an opinion on this?
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It’s really hard to predict. On one hand, it’s a personalist dictatorship and he is the sole constant in his entire ideology for the lack of a better word. But too many people are involved in this with their hands being covered in blood and they still hold all the power (police, army, fsb, government etc.).

More often then not those things end with a bloody internal struggle and the only chance is that someone relatively clean comes on top to make a deal with the West to save the crumbling economy and end the war (as it’s killing Russia). The bad thing is that Putin made sure that everyone pledged their support for the war so it’s going to be extremely hard to find an influential figure that is going to be able to start those negotiations.

That is if Putin dies before the war is completely lost and we’re not talking about an immediate revolution with someone like Navalny (the only notable opposition figure) coming to power.

P.S. the optimistic prognosis is that during the internal struggle between, say, the army, fsb, government and other forces no one is likely to be able to have enough resources to keep the fight going both back at home & in Ukraine
 
Fitting to this discussion, the German minister of defense is convinced that a world without Putin would be better.

Yes I know Bild is like the Sun, but still some surprisingly clear and strong statements made in Kyiv:
https://m.bild.de/politik/internati...ear-of-a-nuclear-str-82829324.bildMobile.html

Probably was Scholz' best decision to select Pistorius who surged to be Germany's most popular politician just days after he got this job.
 
harms said:
It’s really hard to predict. On one hand, it’s a personalist dictatorship and he is the sole constant in his entire ideology for the lack of a better word. But too many people are involved in this with their hands being covered in blood and they still hold all the power (police, army, fsb, government etc.).

More often then not those things end with a bloody internal struggle and the only chance is that someone relatively clean comes on top to make a deal with the West to save the crumbling economy and end the war (as it’s killing Russia). The bad thing is that Putin made sure that everyone pledged their support for the war so it’s going to be extremely hard to find an influential figure that is going to be able to start those negotiations.

That is if Putin dies before the war is completely lost and we’re not talking about an immediate revolution with someone like Navalny (the only notable opposition figure) coming to power.

P.S. the optimistic prognosis is that during the internal struggle between, say, the army, fsb, government and other forces no one is likely to be able to have enough resources to keep the fight going both back at home & in Ukraine
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Very informative post and good to hear from a Russian person on the topic.
 
Nine years later, and after a major war in Europe, we are still far from justice...


https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/08/world/europe/putin-flight-mh17-missile.html

Investigators say Putin likely approved the supply of the missile system that brought down Flight MH17.

A Dutch-led team said it had suspended its investigation because of insufficient evidence and rules that prevent new prosecutions.

There are “strong indications” that President Vladimir V. Putin decided to supply the antiaircraft missile system that Russia-backed separatists used to shoot down a Malaysia Airlines jet above eastern Ukraine in 2014, a Dutch-led international team found.

But the team said on Wednesday that it had suspended its criminal investigation because of insufficient evidence and immunity privileges that prevent new prosecutions in the crash of Flight MH17, which killed all 298 people aboard.
 
goalscholes said:
Hopefully the latter is pretence for the former.
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Indeed.
PM Sunak has instructed the Defence Secretary Ben Wallace to come up with a plan as to which fighter jets the UK could supply to Ukraine.
The RAF currently operates 2 fast jet types.
Eurofighter Typhoon and F35. It has unfortunately retired its Tornado fleet. And has very limited BAE Hawks.
Eurofighter Typhoon would be highly capable in both air to air and air to ground and would not require foreign approval.
The RAF does operate a number of Tranche 1 Typhoon which are only air to air capable and are soon to be retired.
So if the UK does agree to supply fast jets to Ukraine, these could be the candidates.
F35 would be hugely capable but the RAF only has a limited number and would probably require US approval.
 
Ramshock said:
If Putin dies, will this end? Any Russians in here who have an opinion on this?
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Yes, it will end. Evidence from the Soviet Union (which is not very different from Russia today) suggests that the new Head of State will blame Putin for everything, and that will be the end of this story. Everyone else involved was "just following orders". There is absolutely no advantage for a new President to continue the war.
 
Buster15 said:
Indeed.
PM Sunak has instructed the Defence Secretary Ben Wallace to come up with a plan as to which fighter jets the UK could supply to Ukraine.
The RAF currently operates 2 fast jet types.
Eurofighter Typhoon and F35. It has unfortunately retired its Tornado fleet. And has very limited BAE Hawks.
Eurofighter Typhoon would be highly capable in both air to air and air to ground and would not require foreign approval.
The RAF does operate a number of Tranche 1 Typhoon which are only air to air capable and are soon to be retired.
So if the UK does agree to supply fast jets to Ukraine, these could be the candidates.
F35 would be hugely capable but the RAF only has a limited number and would probably require US approval.
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I hope that UK is brave enough to approve a fighter jet for Ukraine, any modern fighter jet in any quantities.

This will open the path for the rest of NATO to do the same. The Netherlands have already said that they do not exclude it. Someone must be the first. It is embarrassing that Biden was not the first to offer F-16s to Ukraine. I like Biden, I voted for him and I'll vote for him again if he is a candidate, but unfortunately, the truth is that he is an old man, quite conservative in his decisions. He messed up with Afghanistan, he messed up with the Chinese balloon, and he is too slow in his help to Ukraine (but it could be worse, much worse).
 
Buster15 said:
Eurofighter Typhoon would be highly capable in both air to air and air to ground and would not require foreign approval.
The RAF does operate a number of Tranche 1 Typhoon which are only air to air capable and are soon to be retired.
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The Tranche 1 Eurofighter seems to be the best option. It is going to be phased out soon so it's not going to create a too big capability gap, it is still a currently produced product line which allows easily upgrading the Ukrainian Air Force later and it makes it possible that other countries (looking at Germany which also is replacing its Tranche 1 by Tranche 4) could join the UK here.

Problem are spare parts which aren't produced any longer so it's not possible to keep the full numbers operational, especially not if used in real battle situations. But still Ukraine could realistically get 20-30 planes of that model I think.
 
frostbite said:
I hope that UK is brave enough to approve a fighter jet for Ukraine, any modern fighter jet in any quantities.

This will open the path for the rest of NATO to do the same. The Netherlands have already said that they do not exclude it. Someone must be the first. It is embarrassing that Biden was not the first to offer F-16s to Ukraine. I like Biden, I voted for him and I'll vote for him again if he is a candidate, but unfortunately, the truth is that he is an old man, quite conservative in his decisions. He messed up with Afghanistan, he messed up with the Chinese balloon, and he is too slow in his help to Ukraine (but it could be worse, much worse).
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Will Sunak be brave enough. He has said that nothing is off the table.
And what is the difference between supplying Tanks and supplying Typhoon fighter jets. I guess the answer is that a Tank can be destroyed and nobody would take that much notice.
But a fighter jet being shot down potentially over enemy held territory is another thing.
 
stefan92 said:
The Tranche 1 Eurofighter seems to be the best option. It is going to be phased out soon so it's not going to create a too big capability gap, it is still a currently produced product line which allows easily upgrading the Ukrainian Air Force later and it makes it possible that other countries (looking at Germany which also is replacing its Tranche 1 by Tranche 4) could join the UK here.

Problem are spare parts which aren't produced any longer so it's not possible to keep the full numbers operational, especially not if used in real battle situations. But still Ukraine could realistically get 20-30 planes of that model I think.
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Good post
 
the hea said:
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Tranche 1 Typhoon were essentially an Austere version. In particular radar and weapons fit. And it would take time to train Ukrainian pilots to be able to operate Typhoon.
But they would be a very useful addition and a pretty decent air defence jet.
 
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