re: Latest Updates: Russia-Ukraine Conflict

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Could have all been prevented back in 2014 and several times since

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How?

The Russians have heavily beefed up their EW capabilities along the front and HIMARS aren’t nearly as effective as they when they were first introduced into the theater.

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Yes they have increased their EW capability but they have no means taken the HIMARS out of the game. There’s still a shitload of rockets that hit their intended target.

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Electronic warfare will only work until the HIMARS are given well established terrain mapping/image recognition capability. Then only smoke and anti-missile missiles can defend against them.

I suspect that really broad spectrum EW would affect Russian drones and communications also.

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No they will not bring the HIMARS up to the very front which is why I said they still needed to make a little push further.

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But not too much. And you can add a little bit to HIMARS range in this situation, because the altitude at Staromlynivka is 348', and Mariupol is at sea level, so HIMARS will be able to hit from a greater range than on level ground.

I'm really curious to see how the pace of the Ukrainian offensive might change on the Velyka Novosilka axis (what Russia calls the Vremivsky Ridge axis).

The fight for Urozhaine was tough, and both sides suffered significant losses. Russia is suffering in that area from a significant lack of artillery, which might accelerate the Ukrainian advance. On the other hand, Russian accounts are consistently claiming that Ukraine lost a number of assets in that fight and will soon run out of offensive potential.

We'll see.

Personally, I look for Ukraine to push towards Staromlynivka over the next couple of weeks, perhaps taking Pryyutne and/or Novodonetske (marked with purple circles) in the process of pushing up the front and widening the salient.

As I said earlier, I expect Ukraine to bypass the village of Zavitne Bazhannya and simply cut it off -- it's not really defensible or even in Ukraine's way.

But I do expect Russia to fight very, very hard to keep Staromlynivka. It's the logistical hub for Russia in that area. If Ukraine takes it, there's an easy road to the east to broaden the salient, and there are roads to both Mariupol and Berdyansk, giving Ukraine options.




The defense that I expect Russia to present to Ukraine at Staromlynivka means that I'd be surprised if Ukraine can take it in less than a month. But I think that they will, because Russia has lost too much artillery in this sector and (I believe) has lost more combat power than Ukraine has (and Ukraine still has reserves that Russia lacks).

If Ukraine were to take Staromlynivka by mid-September, they'd likely need another couple of weeks to then push the front to the main Russian defensive line, and then they would have a month to break that before the mud gets to be too big of a problem.

The timetable is challenging, but it's definitely still doable for Ukraine.

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THREAD: Russia's Starshe Eddy Telegram channel discussed a recent battle near Antonovsky bridge involving drones and FPVs that was considered "a prototype of the war that we will see in the near future." Main points translated below

A group of our (Rusian) special forces... was clearing the territory them from the enemy. From the opposite high bank, that is, from Kherson, the enemy discovered this group and opened fire from a tank. Two guys were wounded, a group with the wounded took cover, but..."

.the Ukrainian forces were flying quadcopters over their location, which rotated constantly as the drone batteries ran out and responded with mortars for every attempt (by Rus soldiers) to leave the shelter. In fact, our guys were trapped and

it was almost impossible to get out. (Ukr military) was anticipating that they would destroy our guys, and dropped grenades on them from a quadcopter, and our soldiers had to either run several hundred meters with the wounded in their arms under continuous fire, or

stay in place until dark, without providing normal medical care. Enemy mortars could not be located, and the Ukr military continued to operate. At that moment, a group of our kamikaze drone operators, having approached as close as possible to the water's edge

launched an attack with the goal of, if not destroying, then at least suppressing the enemy's mortar fire and giving our guys the opportunity to escape the death trap. Kamikaze drones flew over us, a voice was heard over the radio: the drones are above and are heading

north. These are ours (drones), now they will cover you and you will escape, hold on. The first three drones flew over the possible location of enemy observers on our bank of the Dnieper, then the rest of the FPVs flew to Kherson, one flew

under the northern part of the Antonovsky bridge and a powerful explosion sounded, apparently one of the Ukrainian mortar crews was located there. At the same time, our (Rus) mortars began firing and the guys, along with the wounded, were able to escape the trap

and they were picked up by the evacuation group. Interestingly, in the skies over this extremely small patch of land were more than a dozen drones that observed, dropped grenades and hit people with a kamikaze strikes

After getting hit by drones, the Ukr forces stopped firing their mortars and did not climb out until they were finally convinced that the «?????» (Ghouls - Rus volunteer-provided FPV drone variant) were no longer flying above and were not looking for Ukr locations.

The massive use of drones, among other things, has a powerful psychological effect, and no one in their right mind can be and operate in the open spaces when death is buzzing over you with electric motors"

The "Ghoul" FPV drone mentioned earlier is a Russian volunteer project, one of many FPV variants donated to the Russian forces.

Such extensive FPV drone use goes both ways - just recently, Russian forces complained about Ukrainian FPV drones and their improving tactics that target Russian forces

The Russians are now also concerned that Ukrainians are operating FPV drones at night: "If in daytime, having heard these drones, you can still have time to react and understand where it flies visually, and decide (if the personnel are on vehicles) where to jump off to reduce casualties, then at night the FPVs will only be heard and not seen. On the other hand, you can make a bunch of decoys to confuse the enemy drones during nighttime ops."

The combat scenario described by Starshe Eddy is a perfect set up for the impending mass-scale use of drones in swarms enabled by AI for recon, comms, guidance, target recognition and other functions - something both sides are working on and pledged to field soon.

One aspect of this battle not covered by Starshe Eddy was EW and CUAS - how different would this outcome be if the Russian soldiers initially had such defenses? Or if the Ukrainian forces were able to neutralize FPVs with with this tech? Both sides are now fielding such defenses on a massive scale.

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LINK

Honestly all of this just makes me think that battlefields will be entirely robotic in the future.

Wars will be won by turning off the manufacture of drones. Mass drone manufacturing will occur inside mountains or in a distance space-based facility that can see everything coming and adjust.

This might be the great filter from Fermi’s paradox. Not nukes, but robotic battles that never cease.

One aspect that I had not considered regarding the attacks on the Kerch bridge is that even unsuccessful ones impact Russian maritime logistics.

There is still a massive back up of vessels following the recent attack and they are still unable to pass through the strait.

https://www.marinevesseltraffic.com/KERCH-STRAIT/ship-traffic-tracker

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There is still a massive back up of vessels following the recent attack and they are still unable to pass through the strait.

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Is this because of debris in the water or just fear of being hit?

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Is this because of debris in the water or just fear of being hit?

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My understanding is that Russia stops all transit during and after an attempted strike.

This is likely a combination of security, safety, and investigative reasons.

Edit: Added context