How many of you have watched “hromadske” videos? They are an Ukrainian “independent media” outfit that makes war videos. They are obviously supporting the Ukie military but they are well produced videos and if a person analyzes “between the lines”, I think things can be learned.
These two came out supposedly about 11 and 9 days ago and are not Bakhmut but closer over to Donetsk. What is pretty striking in both videos is that there are almost no young guys in them. In the first one, a crew of a 1972 Czechoslovak GRAD system, maybe 1 or 2 young guys out of about a dozen shown. Everybody else is 40 and above. In the second vid, a mortar group, there is one young guy who speaks a lot but the rest of much older, the long beard guy on the 82mm mortar said he has been fighting for 8 years.
The second thing that is noticeable is that most of these older guys are not “lean” warriors by any means, well fed to portly can be said of them. I don’t think these guys could “beat cheeks” out of a position very fast. Compared to my kid’s unit– he’s a young sergeant in the U.S. Army– who are mostly in the their 20s and maybe mid-30s at the most, its sort of telling of a different military culture. Or a serious man power shortage.
A couple other quick observations. The oldest, most portly guy in the first video says almost every male in his family is now in the AFU. Perhaps some of that is family tradition but some of it is again that the Ukies have a substantial man power issue, as we all know. In the second video– and I’ve seen this in a lot of hromadske videos during the late fall to winter months– there is a emphasis on speed to get a few rounds off before counter fire starts coming in. The counter fire doesn’t seem to be very effective in this video but it certainly keeps the two mortar crews from continuously firing their weapons.
I wonder how many of these guys are alive or unwounded today…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCGEUC1MdHA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5idtz803pNA

Posted by: DakotaRog | Apr 2 2023 13:30 utc | 204

Posted by: DakotaRog | Apr 2 2023 13:30 utc | 206
This might explain the young manpower issue you refer to
https://twitter.com/Spriter99880/status/1641698920236568578
For 1989
https://twitter.com/racerx11080/status/1641518515415916544

Posted by: Tom_12 | Apr 2 2023 13:44 utc | 206

Weeb reports of recent advances by Wagner in Bakhmut, taking advantage of the change in weather with surprise night attacks, gaining some territory. Apparently a very large snowfall in the area recently, and now it’s going to melt, with rain predicted in the next days. Likely that no large scale advances will be attempted by either side for at least a week, maybe two in that area. The mud has less effect in urban settings, and according to Weeb, Wagner pulled personnel from the two flanks around Bakhmut into the city proper, while regular Russian army replaced the withdrawn Wagnerians. So fighting intensifies in the city, while any Ukie attempt to mass forces and attempt to ‘unblock’ Bakhmut is stalled by mud.
While the front line south of Bakhmut, around Ivonivke has been mostly static for some time, with Ukraine likely sending in forces from Chasiv Yar to shore up their lines there, the large fist north of Bakhmut is a different story. It expanded rapidly in the last few weeks to the southwest, after taking Yahidne, then widened significantly, but the line has stalled recently. This may be to shore up lines before advancing further, as any Ukie counter-offensive would likely focus on this area. Weeb has pointed out that the best situation for the Russians would have been to advance this fist all the way to the canal, taking Bodhanivka and some other towns in the process, giving them a more defensible position, but it looks like that won’t happen soon. At any rate, if Russia can solidify its position in the area it should be able to withstand any Ukie attempts to retake it, and the weather actually works in Russia’s favor, giving them time while Wagner clears out more of Bakhmut.
That’s my assessment anyway, and apologies for the spellings of these towns, I just take my best guess.

Posted by: Mike R | Apr 2 2023 14:09 utc | 208

Either Ukraine will be fully taken over, or Russia will lose the war. And Ukraine being fully taken over is a necessary, but not a sufficient condition. Those December 2021 demands were for a lot more than that — for the US to move back its bases to behind the Cold War line of separation. Ukraine being annexed was not originally required for that to be achieved, but right now it is an absolute prerequisite. A lot more than that is needed though, but the situation worsened in the other direction — US planes are now flying reconnaissance missions along the Russian border within Finland, B-52 bombers are simulating nuclear attacks on St. Petersburg, etc. unthinkable prior to the SMO things.
Posted by: shadowbanned | Apr 2 2023 7:26 utc | 158
Each of your posts make me sit up and pay attention.
Thanks.
I don’t see how even taking all of Ukraine, though, will solve any problem. There are submarines in the Baltic far closer than Lvov to Moscow, no? Nothing short of a huge political reset in the West dismantling most of the military-industrial complex will do the trick. That means a world-wide depression, probably also a wider war, no?
And if that happens, then what’s to stop Russia-China from developing the same hegemonic control freak lust that the neocons et alia have been acting out since the 90’s? Nothing. Which means it will happen. For the multipolar vision to work, the West needs to stay strong but reduce their psychopath quotient in the leadership classes so they can become peers with the rest rather than overlords or wild cards.

Posted by: Scorpion | Apr 2 2023 14:14 utc | 210

Posted by: Biswapriya Purkayast | Apr 2 2023 13:32 utc | 207
One of the reasons the IDF set up unit 9900, and GCHQ Cheltenham followed suit, was to free analysis from the egocentrism that too often taints the ‘product’.

Posted by: Milites | Apr 2 2023 15:10 utc | 212

MG @149
Thanks for the kind & thoughtful reply to my post.
As is the case, I suspect, with many barflies here who wish Russia well, it is hard but I think valuable to read the doomer accounts with an open mind (and a little twist in the gut). Sorry to see someone like Tex Bentley, whose heart is clearly in the right place, become disenchanted. The 8-year grind in the Donbass must be nearly unbearable.
And for a modern world conditioned by US-style ‘shock & awe’ / win-every-battle-and-lose-every-war an actual Clausewitzean strategic approach must be mystifying at times.
We’ve spoken of bridges, and why RF might prefer to destroy them, if at all, when UKR is using them to retreat, not when they’re serving up resources on a conveyor belt to a 7:1 kill ratio.
On a micro level, Prigozhin has already hinted that Wagner is not entirely opposed to keeping a corridor open that allows UKR troop rotation (but not heavy weapons replenishment) for as long as UKR is willing to send troops into a city surrounded through 320 degrees of the compass.
The key is to maintain UKR/NATO attrition at a rate that exceeds NATO’s rates of replenishment while remaining inferior to Russia’s.
Similarly, many have raged that the RuAF infrastructure destruction campaign has not completely shut off Ukraine’s heat and lights. But given Russia’s clearly effective outreach to the Global South, it’s entirely plausible that Russia does not want the chaos and spectacle of millions of starving/freezing women & children. They want things uncomfortable, but not to trigger a massive humanitarian catastrophe that would animate the NATO hot heads into a ‘humanitarian escalation’. They have the system on the brink of collapse–and can force the remaining UKR AD systems to run on generators (with a heat signature)–but would only trigger an actual collapse if / when it serves broader strategic objectives.
Russia & China seems to have established a pact to manage the transition from unipolarity while making every effort to keep this transition from devolving into all-out war. This takes immense patience, discipline and strategic acumen (and could still fail).

Posted by: Paul Damascene | Apr 2 2023 15:40 utc | 214

It’s intentional, tongue in cheek.
Posted by: Skiffer | Apr 2 2023 14:51 utc | 212

Completely missed that.

Posted by: Lengai | Apr 3 2023 8:55 utc | 216