What's going on in Ukraine?

[Frop.E]

Even the most beat down, low down Russian soldier has to start fragging at some point, right?

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[Frop.E]

One last spam of the thread.

[Frop.E]

Ok one more, like this Social media function on the forum

[fishfoodie]

Even the most beat down, low down Russian soldier has to start fragging at some point, right?

If its not already happening on an almost daily basis, I'd be very surprised.

[Hellraiser]

I can't imagine sending their marines to mobik style death marches is going to be a stable and long term strategy. Particularly when it results in embarrassments like Vuhledar.

It isn't. The whole point of using convicts and chmobiks in Zapp Brannigan-esque Zerg rushes in Bakhmut, Soledar, etc., was to preserve the contract professionals they had left.

[Hellraiser]

Even the most beat down, low down Russian soldier has to start fragging at some point, right?

If its not already happening on an almost daily basis, I'd be very surprised.

It is. Go on Russian milblogger Telegram channels and there is constant examples. Fuckloads of suicides too.

[Frop.E]

I can't imagine sending their marines to mobik style death marches is going to be a stable and long term strategy. Particularly when it results in embarrassments like Vuhledar.

It isn't. The whole point of using convicts and chmobiks in Zapp Brannigan-esque Zerg rushes in Bakhmut, Soledar, etc., was to preserve the contract professionals they had left.

I understand the urge to preserve, but also surely the marines would expect and insist on not being chewed up like that?
Maybe they're as "helpless" as the mobilised but that doesn't seem likely.

[Hellraiser]

[Hellraiser]

The Ukraine repair shop: where Russian tanks go to change sides

Engineers work on modifying and fixing tanks and armoured personnel carriers in a secret warehouse.

Western supplies of Leopards and Challengers have made the news, but the biggest donor is the enemy

Daniel Boffey
Daniel Boffey in Ukraine
Fri 3 Feb 2023 08.14 EST
Last modified on Fri 3 Feb 2023 14.40 EST

The first task is to wipe off or cover up the Z, says Anatoly, 44, of the call sign infamously daubed on Russian hardware involved in the war in Ukraine. “We don’t want friendly fire later on.” Then the mechanics get to work.

In a secret location in Ukraine, within a vast warehouse that could be mistaken for a tank graveyard, what was once Russian – Soviet, in many cases – is being turned Ukrainian.

All the headlines have recently been made by the decision of Germany and a host of others to supply Ukraine with western heavy armour: Leopard 2s, Challengers and Abrams.

The names have become familiar and they may have the technical cutting-edge and firepower to turn the course of the Ukraine’s war, when they arrive and if in sufficient numbers.

But for all the efforts of the Nato allies, it is Russia that is unwittingly, and yet by some margin, Ukraine’s biggest donor of tanks today.

Oryx, the open-source Dutch intelligence defence analysis website, has collected photographs of 546 captured Russian tanks. It will be just a fraction of the total haul that were either abandoned by the fleeing Russian forces or seized in bloody battle.

Admittedly the trophies do not always turn up in tip-top condition. Gesturing towards a T-72B3, covered in dry leaves, and bearing evidence of battle in the form of warped and battered armour, Anatoly proudly boasts that it is the most recent upgrade of the old Soviet T-72 tank.

It was brought into the facility, which lies just a few miles from the frontlines, by the 54th brigade from the eastern Donetsk region, four weeks ago. “It took a direct hit on its turret,” says Anatoly. “The firing system was damaged too.”

They plan to get it back on its tracks in swift time, with added armour. There is little time for sentiment. Did Russian soldiers die in it? “I don’t know, I suppose so. There were arms and legs in it. Lots of blood.”

In some cases the Ukrainian army has set about getting such vehicles back on the field of battle under their flag. “But the state is busy repairing Ukrainian tanks,” says Roman Sinicyn, 37, a coordinator at the Serhiy Prytula Foundation, a charity managing this operation in partnership with an engineering company whose name is being withheld to avoid identification of the plant site.

As a result, civil society has stepped in. A host of private companies have set aside their usual business to get in the game of refurbishing killing machines: the tanks, armoured vehicles, missile systems and other lethal hardware left behind.

These operations are often funded through donations. The Prytula Foundation, one of the largest organisations crowdfunding the purchase of military equipment, has invested £200,000 in this facility. “It is not a lot of money,” says Bohdan Ostapchuk, 30, who is leading on tank refurbishment for the Prytula Foundation.

It has, however, borne deadly fruit: seven tanks back into battle, a command vehicle, a Hurricane rocket system, a multiple rocket system, an infantry transport vehicle and a host of armoured vehicles, so far.

Their destinations are a roll-call of Ukraine’s deadliest hot spots: Bakhmut, Kramatorsk, Luhansk, Svatove, to name a few.

The liberation of the Kharkiv region, in north-east Ukraine, last May was the high point in the hunt for battlefield treasure, as the Russian forces panicked in retreat. “It was like walking into a big, big shop where you can walk through and say, ‘I will have this one, and this one,’” says Ostapchuk.

The mistake was not repeated when the Kremlin ordered the retreat in the southern Kherson region before Christmas, but there remains a healthy supply of vehicles coming through the doors. They are, however, often of an older model, the mechanics note.

Pointing to a former personnel carrier brought in by Ukraine’s 46th airborne brigade from Soledar, the eastern Ukrainian city recently captured by Russia, Anatoly says it was probably built somewhere between 1982 and 1987.

The same goes for a Soviet-era Shturm S model anti-tank missile carrier that bears the O sign of the Russian marines on it side. It went over a mine near Vuhledar in the Donetsk region and was abandoned.

Then there is the T62 Soviet tank, likely dating from 1970 or so, brought back by the 128th mountain brigade from Kherson, three months ago, at the time of the Ukrainian counteroffensive there.

“This old tank is no good for war,” says Anatoly, “so we have cut off the top of it, the turret and we are going to turn it into an evacuation vehicle that can pull heavy armoured tanks when they get stuck.”

The Prytula Foundation has contacts across the Ukrainian armed forces as a result of also being a supplier of smaller equipment, such as thermal imaging goggles, drones and medical packs, and so spare parts can be summoned up relatively easily. “There is a database in his head,” says Sinicyn pointing to Ostapchuk.

The noise of the metal presses, soldering and hammering, along with the heavy smell of tank exhaust fumes makes this a difficult place to work. It is cold, dirty. There is the constant threat of Russia identifying and destroying it. They have between 30 and 50 staff working here at any point, seven days a week among the cylinders, cannibalised engines and piles of tyres and tracks.

But if there is something Steptoe and Son about the operation, with the rag and bone appearance of the BBC sitcom of the 1960s and 70s, there is more than a element of the US television series, The A-Team, to their work, with ever more ingenious modifications being made, as they acquire knowhow.

There is a sense of mission. Sometimes they find papers and personal effects belonging to the former Russian owners inside the vehicles. They are thrown away, not given a second thought. How does Anatoly feel about working around the tanks and armoured vehicles sent out to kill Ukrainian soldiers? “I am just glad to be getting them for free.”

[Frop.E]

I can't imagine sending their marines to mobik style death marches is going to be a stable and long term strategy. Particularly when it results in embarrassments like Vuhledar.

It isn't. The whole point of using convicts and chmobiks in Zapp Brannigan-esque Zerg rushes in Bakhmut, Soledar, etc., was to preserve the contract professionals they had left.

Would said contract pros not be getting sick of deployment?
Or have they been rotated out at any point?

[Niegs]

The slope on that superstructure had me thinking ...

[Hellraiser]

[Frop.E]

A lot of people in the QTs saying it's small fish in reality etc.
Seems a big deal in terms of economic future demo wise though.

[MungoMan]

A lot of people in the QTs saying it's small fish in reality etc.
Seems a big deal in terms of economic future demo wise though.

Most-requested foreign language song in Russia, 2022: Georgia on my mind.

[Uncle fester]

That's Russia's casus belli sorted for the next few centuries.

[robmatic]

I have a mate who lives in Tbilisi, says it is swarming with Russians.

The number for Turkey is probably quite a big underestimate, they are here in large numbers in Istanbul and Antalya.

[Hellraiser]

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[Hellraiser]

https://wartranslated.com/pravda-com-ua ... h-faydyuk/

[tc27]

I had written off Bakmut but the latest news is more optimistic.

[tabascoboy]

[laurent]

I had written off Bakmut but the latest news is more optimistic.

It's very Fluid though
This guy has reliable sources usually.

[Frop.E]

More on Bakhmut, seems it's not all one way traffic though it's probably too soon to draw too much.

[Hellraiser]

[Hellraiser]

[tabascoboy]

wrt TOS-1A

Presumably this was posted as a result of

[Grandpa]

Brave girl... dobbed in by her classmates...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-64625127

Ukraine war: The Russian student under arrest for an Instagram story



University student Olesya Krivtsova has been missing a lot of classes.

That's because 20-year-old Olesya is under house arrest. She has an electronic tag on her leg. Police can monitor her every move.

Her alleged crime? Olesya was arrested for anti-war posts on social media. One of them concerned last October's explosion on the bridge linking Russia to annexed Crimea.

"I posted an Instagram story about the bridge," Olesya tells the BBC, "reflecting on how Ukrainians were happy with what had happened."

She had also shared a friend's post about the war.

Then the drama began.

"I was talking on the phone to my mother," Olesya recalls, "when I heard the front door opening. Lots of police came in. They took away my phone and shouted at me to lie on the floor."

Olesya was charged with justifying terrorism and discrediting the Russian armed forces. She faces up to 10 years in prison.


Her anti-Putin tattoo reads: "Big Brother is watching you."

[Niegs]

wrt TOS-1A

Presumably this was posted as a result of

Appropriate choice of music, and a marked change from the typical heavy metal and techno that tend to accompany them.

[_Os_]

I had written off Bakmut but the latest news is more optimistic.

It's very Fluid though
This guy has reliable sources usually.

Ukraine rotated their troops in the Bakhmut area recently.

I've seen video of Georgian Legion deploying there on foot (ruined urban terrain), weighed down by rucksacks and what they were carrying in their hands, they did not look like they were going for a short stay. I've also seen what looked like TDF (guessing based on how they were using RPGs, the lining up a stack against a wall method, then the best shot/bravest fires them all quickly in a volley from the same spot giving away his position but firing it all into one target, a 2014 volunteer technique) in heavy fighting there. I think I've seen Azov there in recent video too. Fairly sure those groups are confirmed to be in the Bakhmut area on some maps too.

The thing about Georgian Legion/veteran TDF (it's not going to be raw TDF sent into Bakhmut)/Azov. They may not strictly be regulars (although Azov has been fully regularised), but they are volunteers who've been doing this awhile. Not special forces with all the new gear but they may as well be elite, they're probably some of the most experienced light infantry on the planet in this type of full blown combat. They would keep going even if they were surrounded like the Mariupol defenders. Which could well be why veteran volunteer units were sent in.

[Flockwitt]

Mixed messages about Bahkmut but Ukraine has just banned journalists and humanitarian aid from going in which is not positive.

[laurent]

Mixed messages about Bahkmut but Ukraine has just banned journalists and humanitarian aid from going in which is not positive.

That's a few days old (before the recent push). There was most likely too much chatter (and the Russian target civilian volunteers) .

[Flockwitt]

Mixed messages about Bahkmut but Ukraine has just banned journalists and humanitarian aid from going in which is not positive.

That's a few days old (before the recent push). There was most likely too much chatter (and the Russian target civilian volunteers) .

Just is relative, I should have left it out of the sentence. The point is it's the same action and done for the same reason like there was in Lysychans'k just before it fell. The Ukrainians prepared for the worst case event, and fair enough given the situation. Bakhmut's most definitely in the balance.

[fishfoodie]

I wonder how long it'll be before someone decides to take advantage of >95% of the Orcs army committing suicide in Ukraine ?

Another Long read

Land forces at Kola reduced to one-fifth, Norwegian Intelligence says


"The land forces on Kola are reduced to a fifth of their original numbers before the invasion of Ukraine," says Chief of the Norwegian Intelligence Service, Vice Admiral Nils Andreas Stensønes to the Barents Observer. He warns that the consequence is a Russia which may lower the threshold for nuclear escalation, also near Norway.

...

Tears are flowing to the Pechenga River from young widows and children as names of fallen soldiers are telegrammed north from Vladimir Putin’s battlefields in Ukraine. The bloody fate of the men that just over a year ago were based near Russia’s peaceful border with Norway and Finland is much worse than previously known, according to a report issued on Monday by the Norwegian Intelligence Service.

1,500 troops are killed. Maybe more.

The men with the 200th Separate Motor Rifle Brigade had their training camps along the Pechenga River; at 19 km, in Loustari and in the village of Pechenga. All are less than an hour’s drive from the border with Norway.

In late 2021, the first orders were given to load up tanks, armored vehicles, guns, artillery, and other gear onto railway wagons at the train station in Loustari. Soldiers were ordered into passenger railroad cars.

Exercise in southern Russia, they were told.

On the night of February 24, Putin ordered his military commanders to invade Ukraine. A few hours later were vehicles from the 200th Motorized brigade rolling towards Kharkiv, the second largest city in Ukraine, just 30 kilometers south of the Russian border.

Putin’s soldiers were met not with flowers, but fierce resistance.

In the early stage of the war, the 200th Separate Brigade from the Kola Peninsula lost two battalion tactical groups. The Barents Observer reported about 645 killed during the first month, while other reports hinted the numbers of casualties were higher.

Before schools started in the Murmansk region last autumn, regional authorities launched free meals for pupils whose parents were killed or wounded in Ukraine. At the time, 1,274 children qualified, a strong indication of the wave of deaths among fathers who would never again see their children become students.

The Norwegian Intelligence, which since the second world war has kept close eyes on the military ups and downs in the Pechenga region, says in its FOKUS 2023 report that about three battalion groups, with 3,000 soldiers, were sent to the battlefields.

“About half is lost,” the report concludes. That is 1,500 dead soldiers.

The Northern Fleet has in addition lost up to 100 tanks and armored vehicles.

...

https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/secur ... -wiped-out