As much as this war looks like WWI, I worry that it will have elements of the Spain Civil War where the warring armies figure out how to use a new technology (drones) and, after a pause, we have a rerun of WWII.

The drone battle feels like it could go either way. I've got a lot of respect for Russia's engineering prowess but I don't think we've really seen what comes out of DARPA's far-flung robot dogs, etc. efforts. I keep thinking about what a motivated team could do with drone-as-spotters and long-range missiles for the kill against a rail system. It is not a big leap to be able to stop every train that moves. I don't know if you can fight a modern land war without rail.

So far, all the so called 'wonder-weapons' have been unimpressive but they are old, old systems. It is no surprise to me that the Lancet is the MVP of this conflict. I don't think we've see the US equivalent yet.

[and, for those who mistake this for concern-trolling, I expect Russia to pick up the pace next year but have to deal with increasingly deadly new toys from the West. Or, as likely, Trump becomes US President by campaigning to stop this proxy war and the UA collapses when the money spigot is turned off. The situation is not dire but dragging this out for another 2-5 years feels risky.]

Posted by: je | Sep 3 2023 14:01 utc | 1

The latest post from Mearsheimer on his substack "Bound to Lose"contains some fairly persuasive arguments as to why Ukraine had almost zero chance to succeed militarily using the Blitzkrieg techniques favored by their Western 'advisors'. And even if they had 'succeeded', that the following events would almost surely develop in a way not necessarily to Ukraine's (and the West's) advantage.

Of course Mearsheimer is no peacenik (more like the ugliest of ugly Americans), and he would prefer the Ukraine debacle be wrapped up as soon as possible (whatever the outcome for the unfortunate participants) in order to get to the serious business of attacking China solely in an attempt to preserve US primacy, so that should be kept in mind.

Posted by: BillB | Sep 3 2023 14:08 utc | 2

Posted by: je | Sep 3 2023 14:01 utc | 4

##############

Whatever the American equivalent of the Lancet is, it will be expensive, slow to produce, and difficult to maintain. That is the entire business model and hundreds of Congressmen depend on it.

The mythology of American technical military superiority is a lie that the Russians have been dispelling since the start of the SMO.

Like Prighozin, the Americans are masters of self-promotion, not necessarily personal achievement and excellence. Although, you can be sure that they will tell you all about it in an entertaining and well-produced manner.

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 14:17 utc | 3

A trope of the last week has been “there is no cost to the west as only Ukrainians are being killed” which demonstrates the cynical racist attitude of western governments and their cheerleaders.

Posted by: Lev Davidovich | Sep 3 2023 14:08 utc | 6

It is a lie, this is all very expensive for the West. That has been quite a shock. Ask yourself who it is that wants to get this over now? I am pretty sure "Biden" would do just about anything to bring it to a conclusion acceptable to his cabal, so he could focus on Trump. They are cutting "deals" with Venezuela and Iran now. Russia looks less in a hurry than when they started.

Posted by: Bemildred | Sep 3 2023 14:18 utc | 4

Re: Posted by: Wondrous | Sep 3 2023 14:14 utc | 8

All ok, but if ‘killing trains ‘ was easy why isn’t Russia doing it? If the reasons are not technological , then why would the USA kill railways when Russia doesn’t?

The USA MB>would do it because the US oligarchs are not using Russian railways to transport their goods to market.

The Russians won't do it because the Russian oligarchs are using Ukrainian railways to transport their goods to market.

Posted by: Julian | Sep 3 2023 14:24 utc | 5

The Russians won't do it because the Russian oligarchs are using Ukrainian railways to transport their goods to market

The Chinese are the ones they are considering more. The Russian oligarchs have been mostly defanged.

Posted by: Doctor Eleven | Sep 3 2023 14:26 utc | 6

Lately my views on this conflict have changed. I have and continue to be a supporter of Russia and it's people against NATO aggression and the radical Nazi ideology that has flourished in Ukraine. I have also followed this conflict and have from the start had many questions about the way Russia has conducted itself and often wondered why they have done the things they've done. I've heard all the arguments and have agreed at least in part with some but have never been satisfied completely with any of them.

What it comes down too is the question, why does Russia continue to fight and it's soldiers die when they could have at any time had they chosen, won this conflict outright. They have fought this war with one hand tied behind their back and continue to do so. In doing so they have allowed and it could almost be said invited, continuing escalation by Washington and NATO without displaying the least resistance too it. At any time Russia chooses it could, turn all the lights off in Ukraine and leave the country in the dark. They could go after the government and decision making centers...turn the entire mechanisms of government into rubble. They could blow the bridges and railways into more rubble making resupply virtually impossible yet they do not.

After a lot of pondering I have come to the sad conclusion that it all comes down to money. There are many Russian Oligarchs making boatloads of cash off this conflict and I fear that corruption is as deeply seeded within the Russian government as it is in NATO and Washington. Doesn't it make you scratch your head every time you read an article talking about how much gas and oil Europe continues to buy from Russia and all the money Russia is making off of it. Haven't you asked yourself why Russia would continue to supply critical resources to an entity bent on Russian destruction. I know I have. If Russia turned off the energy spigot those countries would quickly be brought to their knees and be forced to capitulate, yet they do not.

This is not a happy conclusion for me, just an inevitable one. I have not wanted to come to this conclusion...my desire to be supporting the "good guys" against the evil empire of lies has been as strong in me as it has for many who inhabit this blog. I think it is part of the human condition to look for the easy answer and think the best of whoever they decide to support while ignoring pesky and inconvenient evidence that the "good guys" are not as good as we may have hoped.

The reason this war has gone on as long as it has, and will continue into the foreseeable future with so much suffering, blood and death, is that there is simply too much money to be made on all sides by continuing. It always comes down to money and this war is no different.

Posted by: JustAMaverick | Sep 3 2023 14:27 utc | 7

Russia wouldn't do any large scale offensive till one month before the end of the war.

Russian strategy is to inflict attrition to Ukraine till it no longer has the manpower or the equipment to man the fronts, once Ukraine lacks the manpower in the SMO, Russia will invade from all side including Belarus to capture all of Ukraine.

Russia is playing a waiting game, western quantity of supplies has dropped significantly, for example ISA running out of 155mm shells to give and choosing to give cluster ammunition, Or Ukraine lack of Soviet Anti Air missles of systems such as s300, Ukraine lack of trained manpower and their morales after limited or non existent success is all playing in the Russian hands. Not to mention Russian military industrial complex is catching up so they wouldn't feel safe starting any operations without proper stockpiles.

Russia wouldn't accept any peace deal without copulation of the Ukrainian government, essentially they won't leave until they have Ukraine under their control, so this leave Ukraine to defend for multiple years, they cannot conduct offensive operations anymore due to lack of tanks, Air support, and Russian deep entrenchment.

This leaves Ukraine to just defend what they currently have and throwing peace deals hoping China or India pressure Russia to a seize fire. Replacing Anti Air defence in the whole of ukraine with patriot or other system would cost hundreds of billions, which Russia knows America is not that stupid to spend that much money into it, Russian air superiority will get bigger and bigger. Russian drone superiority is already so impactful the Ukrainians had to put a cage around a Leo tank just to somewhat defend them against lancets.

Essentially, Russia wouldn't attack (large military operation not localised attacks such as bakhmut or kupyansk) until it believes it has sufficient forces to completely capture Ukraine in a short amount of time, if they do it slowly they would only invite more calculaties to their side and more time for western powers to react. Russia would attack and fight positional battles to keep Ukrainian defences attached to the frontlines but it wouldn't attempt to grab huge some of territory until at least 2024. Maybe even timing it with elections.

Posted by: Sultanambam | Sep 3 2023 14:39 utc | 8

Russia wouldn't accept any peace deal without copulation of the Ukrainian government, essentially they won't leave until they have Ukraine under their control, so this leave Ukraine to defend for multiple years, they cannot conduct offensive operations anymore due to lack of tanks, Air support, and Russian deep entrenchment.

Posted by: Sultanambam | Sep 3 2023 14:39 utc | 21

##########

I do believe that the Russians intend to F*%k the Ukrainian government.

In a sea of concern trolling, thank you for getting me to smile.

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 14:45 utc | 9

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 14:17 utc | 10

Americans are masters of self-promotion

-----

You talk about the US like it is one monolithic beast. People in the West make the same mistake about Russia.

There is a tremendous amount of rot and profiteering in the MIC (especially the big boys) but there are hundreds of tiny drone 'startups' that you have never heard about. They are getting showered with money with the explicit promise of more to come if come up with something cheap and effective.

I grant you that the current crop of weapons are all gold-plated. You'd be a fool to assume that the army of US/Israel/Germany/French/Japan/South Korean researchers won't figure out something deadly given more time. (I left out UK because they feel irrelevant).

The primary advantage that Russia and China have is that the most of the best talent in the US goes into Finance/Advertising/Law because of the economic incentives. And the West is not taking this seriously.

Posted by: je | Sep 3 2023 14:45 utc | 10

What many commentators, including Paul Craig Roberts, have missed is that the Russians' slow approach to this conflict has reaped many political and military benefits..Those include low Russian casualties, time to modernize and expand the Russian military, a massive expansion of BRICS, proof to the world that the Biden administration has no interest in peace, and demonstration that American weapons and training aren't what they were cracked up to be....

Posted by: pyrrhus | Sep 3 2023 14:48 utc | 11

"If one wishes to look outside of the echo chamber I would suggest to go to telegram channels run by people from russian front lines. This is good example
https://t.me/wehearfromyanina/2579

Posted by: g wiltek | Sep 3 2023 14:52 utc | 12

Posted by: Wondrous | Sep 3 2023 14:14 utc | 8

All ok, but if ‘killing trains ‘ was easy why isn’t Russia doing it? If the reasons are not technological , then why would the USA kill railways when Russia doesn’t?

###################################

Beat me. Seems like neither side can do it. It appears that satellites can't provide real-time targeting to put a missile on moving target. Or maybe the Russian's AD is good enough to stop the HARMs and cruise missiles require stationary targets. Russia has the missiles but perhaps not the targeting capabilities.

My thoughts are about what is coming. Loitering drones are already used to target at the front-line. It is not a big step to make something that can passively watch for train and call in a missile.

Russia has a 5-10 year lead in missiles. I think it is playing catchup on drones. I am sure there is someone in a Skunkworks in the American Southwest with $50-100 million figuring out how to knock out trains.

Posted by: je | Sep 3 2023 14:56 utc | 13

The slosmo has maximized thr pain for the Maerican economy. Maerica's banks are insolvent, but her deluded population mostly doesn't know this thanks to the complaint fascist media.

Putin is the greatest strategist of this age. So sorry Maericans.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/05/02/half-of-americas-banks-are-already-insolvent-credit-crunch/

Truth is, sooner than later the collapse stops being concealable. The question is what then.

Posted by: Doctor Eleven | Sep 3 2023 14:57 utc | 14

Motherland Russia always had a plan. The West has no clue of it.

Posted by: AI | Sep 3 2023 15:03 utc | 15

@ 27

Huh, the B-team of the Wehrmacht on the Western Front. During & after D-Day had units composed of partially disabled or infirm occupation troops.

It's a bad sign when those guys go from, freeing up fitter men to being used in combat Which they almost certainly will...

Posted by: Urban Fox | Sep 3 2023 15:04 utc | 16

DU munitions being advertised as first time supplied coming soon per Reuters.
unprovoked again.

Posted by: Not Ewe | Sep 3 2023 15:05 utc | 17

I think the conflict is one of death by a thousand cuts. It is a longwinded slow kill where the subject bleeds to death.
Most people cannot see that this is the slow death of NATO, the EU and quite possibly the US.
But this will be the result. The de-industrialization of Germany is well started, and without this economic locomotive the EU loses cohesion. And the US influence in Europe.
It is high time and well overdue.
One hard winter could easily tip the scale irrevocably.

Posted by: g wiltek | Sep 3 2023 15:10 utc | 18

@pyrrhus | Sep 3 2023 14:48 utc | 25

They could do what you described much better from the border of the new regions, not from inside as it is now. And I highly doubt they do a "demonstration that American weapons and training aren't what they were cracked up to be" using their own people as guinea pigs. Only disturbed minds of yt (from natostan) say "let nato send anything... no problem! ha ha! now please buy me a coffee, donate".

Posted by: rk | Sep 3 2023 15:16 utc | 19

I see stupid people.

Posted by: gottlieb | Sep 3 2023 14:37 utc | 20

I see a bunch of paid agents of imperialism trying to convince the bar that Russia is actually on the ropes and that if you squint hard enough you'll see the Ukronazis and their RC backers in the west are actually bringing it in for the big win.

There have been some good articles from Greenwald and Taibi lately detailing another push to desperately censor any site that reveals the truth about the crisis-ridden and rapidly declining west. Surest sign they are losing.

US Imperialism is a desperate loser at this point with nothing left but censorship and narrative management. Again, a reality show with nukes. And poor, tragic Ukraine can only aspire to be like them which is infinitely more pathetic.

You trolls should really get out of the bar a little. Tell your masters you want to join the Ukie volunteer brigades and report for us from the front lines. Then you can regale us with more accurate info.

Posted by: Ahenobarbus | Sep 3 2023 15:24 utc | 20

As BillB | Sep 3 2023 14:08 utc |5 posted, John Mearsheimer offers a postmortem, Bound to Lose, on how Ukraine’s counter-offensive was doomed from the start.

Mearsheimer writes with the benefit of hindsight, but he acknowledges a few in the West wrote with foresight: “Finally, there are several individuals who operate on alternative media who argued that the counteroffensive would fail before it was launched. They include Brian Berletic, Alex Christoforou, Glenn Diesen, Douglas Macgregor, Alexander Mercouris, and Scott Ritter.”

Thanks b; you’ve kept us well-informed.

Posted by: DocHollywood | Sep 3 2023 15:32 utc | 21

@pyrrhus | Sep 3 2023 14:48 utc
The slow aproach doesn't lead to low casualties. It leads to a low death count per day but will in the end lead to alot more death then a fast aproach. It will also lead to alot more risk of unexpected events which might lead to a failure to reach the end goal. Also it will kill ALOT more russian people fighting for Ukraine, unwilling but forced to fight.

Posted by: rageman | Sep 3 2023 15:38 utc | 22

@ Posted by: je | Sep 3 2023 14:01 utc | 1

All things are possible. One cannot defeat the possible - best to face the reality. US seeks to ensure that this is a long war - burden Russia with another Afghanistan. Russia seems content to do likewise to US. However, Russia strives to use the motivation of the war to make itself stronger and strengthen the will of its people. Additionally, the war is straining western alliances and weakening western countries, many of which were already rather vulnerable. All while strengthening the relations of non-aligned nations. There are a lot of moving parts. It seems a step in the right direction.

I believe that the outcome of the war will be determined by economics, demographics and international relations. The political world is reforming under the stress of this war - maybe some of the west will even come around to the good side.

Posted by: jared | Sep 3 2023 15:40 utc | 23

je @1: " It is no surprise to me that the Lancet is the MVP of this conflict. I don't think we've see the US equivalent yet."

Yes, you have seen the US equivalent, but NAFO Nazi fairies would rather forget about it. It is called the "Switchblade".

Posted by: William Gruff | Sep 3 2023 15:42 utc | 24

Posted by: William Gruff | Sep 3 2023 15:42 utc | 24

je @1: " It is no surprise to me that the Lancet is the MVP of this conflict. I don't think we've see the US equivalent yet."

Yes, you have seen the US equivalent,

Indeed. The empire, with it's all powerful MIC, has been burning through multiple iterations of drones touted as a finished product for almost two years now.

Most recently we're being sold the latest iteration in cardboard.

Pathetic really.

LOL! Always one step behind!

Posted by: Arch Bungle | Sep 3 2023 15:56 utc | 25

Posted by: Arch Bungle | Sep 3 2023 15:56 utc | 25

##########

I thought the cardboard drones were quite clever. Now the test for the Military Industrial Complex (MIC) is to figure out how to make cardboard worth $250,000 per drone.

I am sure the patent process can assist with that. 😂

The obvious downsides are that I can't imagine they are any good in weather, and now we're getting into the time of year when paper drones will be a liability if they are used for more than short-distance terrorist attacks.

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 16:08 utc | 26

Russian Command

The general consensus is that after the Ukrainian offensive runs out of steam that the Russians will attack with a quick and successful offensive bringing a final and decisive defeat to the AFU.

I also held to this possibility giving it some credence. Perhaps, this is the way it will play out.

However, I am starting to doubt Russia's ability to conduct a successful offensive. This is due to the reports of some notable military leaders of obtaining adequate support for their troops from the Russian MOD command structure.

It could be that Sergei Shoigu has a difficult time relating to his more aggressive commanders and offensive leaders. This is often the case with a Minister of Defense that is more suspicious of aggressive commanders than being observant of their capabilities and being sensitive to the needs of the battlefield.

A great commander is able to balance their offensive and their defensive leaders to bring about victory.
I question that this is the case with Shoigu.

I think that Shoigu purposefully hinders the more aggressive commanders in their tasks on the front lines. In doing so he not only hinders the commanders and leaders he does not like, but he also jeapordises the troops under their command.

Perhaps, Prigozhin and Popov had legitiment concerns regarding the Russian MOD.

Posted by: young | Sep 3 2023 16:28 utc | 27

Perhaps, Prigozhin and Popov had legitiment concerns regarding the Russian MOD.

Posted by: young | Sep 3 2023 16:28 utc | 27

#############

We can discount anything Prighozin said because he was a traitor who killed Russians. The man should have zero credibility with any intelligent man. Men don't betray their country, or murder their countrymen, over any sort of ideological dispute.

Prighozin's issue was likely much more base. The Russian MOD wanted to bring Wagner under command structure control, and he didn't want to lose his golden egg, both for money (side jobs that reflected poorly on the Russian state) and prestige. Who would even know who Prighozin was if not for Wagner? It's not like he made the best peroghi in Moscow.

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 16:38 utc | 28

posted by: Ahenobarbus | Sep 3 2023 15:24 utc | 20

You mistook the stupid people I was talking about. I agree 100%

Posted by: gottlieb | Sep 3 2023 16:38 utc | 29

Zelensky is touring EU controlled part of Europe again. Apparently he is asking to extradite all military aged Ukrainians back to Ukraine.

Posted by: unimperator | Sep 3 2023 16:45 utc | 30

I have to wonder about Russia's intentions if they are putting great effort into building extensive defenses. I recently heard they were doing this near the nuclear power plant. So, I have to wonder about these lines becoming a future border.

Posted by: Eighthman | Sep 3 2023 16:52 utc | 31

Zelensky is touring EU controlled part of Europe again. Apparently he is asking to extradite all military aged Ukrainians back to Ukraine.

Posted by: unimperator | Sep 3 2023 16:45 utc | 30

########

I have been told by the international media that this is what winners do.

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 16:55 utc | 32

As much as this war looks like WWI, I worry that it will have elements of the Spain Civil War where the warring armies figure out how to use a new technology (drones) and, after a pause, we have a rerun of WWII.

The drone battle feels like it could go either way. I've got a lot of respect for Russia's engineering prowess but I don't think we've really seen what comes out of DARPA's far-flung robot dogs, etc. efforts.
Posted by: je | Sep 3 2023 14:01 utc | 1

That's because most of the "super weapons" like lasers/directed energy, stealth, "AI" etc. are cash cows for the defense contractors like Lokheed Martin to swindle tax payers for "weapons" that have little practical use in a real war.

If they are as advanced as the brochures say they are, the US could have covertly sent them to Ukraine and have Russia destroyed last year.

These defense contractors also spend a great deal of propaganda through think tanks, media, comments sections of military magazines and even Hollywood to convince the general public that they're a great "investment", even if they're reluctant to demonstrate their capabilities against near peer adversaries in opportunities such as Ukraine.

The major leap forward from world war 2 is ICBMs (ability to destroy entire bases and cities in 10 minutes), satellite imagining (no more surprise attacks), air defenses (the ability shoot down anything flies) and cruise missiles (the ability shoot down boats as well as planes parked in bases in case they are "stealth"). Everything else is smoke and mirrors.

The Soviet Union was good at most of these. Since both Ukraine & Russia inherited the technology from the USSR, the advantage is more or less negated and back to artillery they went. That also explains why the NATO military brass is reluctant despite a few politician's desires. NATO ain't former Soviet like Ukraine, Putin will stomp them into pancakes.

Posted by: FieryButMostPeaceful | Sep 3 2023 17:02 utc | 33

"You'd be a fool to assume that the army of US/Israel/Germany/French/Japan/South Korean researchers won't figure out something deadly given more time
Posted by: je | Sep 3 2023 14:45 utc | 24"

They've had 18 months. In thay time, Russia has trained hundreds of thousands of soldiers, field tested its own & allies' newest missiles, drones, etc., upped its production capabilities numerous times over, shut down 23 bioweapon labs, put poseidon & now sarmat on active duty & successfully destroyed everything the combined west has thrown at it.

Aside from advertising wunderweapon failures, distributing massive lethal weapons to Isis & other unknown black market parties, destroying infrastructure & farmland, lining the pockets of pols & the mic, & killing a half million or so Ukrainian soldiers & an unknown # of mercs, what has the west accomplished so far?

Posted by: Mary | Sep 3 2023 17:11 utc | 34

B, you cant counter propaganda by hiding people from it, it simply lends credence to the propaganda.simply put it makes you look afraid of bad news, like its real.

Frankly it makes it seem like you believe it. The censorship isn't a good weapon just because you have good intentions.

Posted by: Neofeudalfuture | Sep 3 2023 17:12 utc | 35

The obvious downsides are that I can't imagine they [cardboard drones] are any good in weather, and now we're getting into the time of year when paper drones will be a liability if they are used for more than short-distance terrorist attacks.

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 16:08 utc | 26

Actually, the waxed cardboard boxes used for certain kinds of produce seem to stand up pretty well against rain, at least for a few days. Probably heavier, though.

In any case, nothing says alternative light/cheap/waterproof materials can't be used instead. One could imagine certain kinds of plastic would work well. Might even be easier to manufacture.

Posted by: Boris Badenov | Sep 3 2023 17:14 utc | 36

Posted by: Neofeudalfuture | Sep 3 2023 17:12 utc | 35

brings to mind:
"Everyone believes in the atrocities of the enemy and disbelieves in those of his own side, without ever bothering to examine the evidence."
Eric Blair/ George Orwell

Posted by: czechlist | Sep 3 2023 17:18 utc | 37

Posted by: Mary | Sep 3 2023 17:11 utc | 34

Not the west, obviously, but Ukrainian sinking of Moskva immediately comes to mind

Posted by: Membrum Virile | Sep 3 2023 17:19 utc | 38

To je, 1st poster, in no way to be mean, I find the adage "people prepare to fight the last war, not the current" enlightening. We humans crave understanding of events, hence we seek literal, symbolic, metaphoric, or allegorical points of reference to talk about new events. It's a completely natural process.

That said, like we have often seen in other Ukraine topics (and previous wars in an age of instant internet commentary), we can often get lost in trying to categorize in detail the event. But comparisons can never be so precise. And so much energy can be lost in the struggle to split such hairs of detail.

So the comparisons to other wars and battles often become red herrings (usually) without any fault of our own (malicious actors always exist, so there will always be that exception). We are trying to make sense the best way we can, and past learning must be projected upon current events. Useful enough exercise as long as people "stay upon the green," as it were, without getting "lost in the rough."

So I find your questioning prompts on "the current value of rail in a time of war" and "what can the USA-West MIC create in current manufacturing time to catch up meaningfully" to be of greater topical interest. I'd be more interested in hearing what barflies think of those discussions -- as it has been revealed to us by the current events & their results -- than a retread of history through an artful collage of battles. Personally, I feel rail shows to be priceless and The West's financialization has crippled any meaningful industrial build up in time to match with these current developments.

:) But I'd like to hear other views!

Posted by: titmouse | Sep 3 2023 17:20 utc | 39

I thought the cardboard drones were quite clever.
Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 16:08 utc | 26

We are supplying arms, intelligence, training, all the while claiming we are not involved.
These are dangerous precedents we are setting. If Russia supplies an app to protesters next time a suburb of Paris or London goes up in flames, we will not have a leg to stand on.

Posted by: Passerby | Sep 3 2023 17:33 utc | 40

@39 titmouse

Re:other views

You won't find them here. In fact I'm so annoyed I'm taking my ball and going home.

No need to delete my posts. I won't make any more, message received.

But delete this one lest anyone get tempted from this blogs garden path.

Posted by: Neofeudalfuture | Sep 3 2023 17:33 utc | 41

Both sides in this conflict (Russia/Ukraine + western sponsors) have been using it as a laboratory for military tech and strategy. Neither side uses aircraft over the contact line, limiting air support to standoff weapons/attacks and support behind the front. This despite Russian superiority in AD and air capability because of the threat from MANPADs and surveillance resources that can track aircraft movements in real time. I don't believe either side expected this situation at the start.

Artillery range and accuracy have proved to be critical factors with both sides working as fast as possible to improve both. New passive means to target firing positions are being tested and fielded by the Russians, and likely by the west as well.

The inability to mass forces without detection and targeting by the opponent has limited both sides ability to make offensive moves of sufficient scale to take territory. The solution seems to have been to build up forces at many points simultaneously in an attempt to mask objectives and confuse the opponent. This strategy requires deploying more forces than would otherwise be required and attacking on multiple fronts at once.

Drones and EW countermeasures have become critical resources with both sides constantly innovating and improving both hardware and tactics.

Both sides have had some success in this competition and UAF forces would not have been able to survive this long without the ability to compensate for their shortcomings in logistics and hardware availability.

It seems to me that, while Ukraine remains unable to recover territory, that Russia cannot prevail militarily until it is able to mass sufficient forces to completely overwhelm the opposing forces on all strategic fronts simultaneously. Continued attrition and degradation of Ukrainian forces improves the Russian calculus, but does not change the fundamental basis for military victory in this conflict.

Propaganda, information warfare, and lack of clear understanding of the real effectiveness of things like the Russian bombing/missile campaign make accurate and realistic assesment of the state of play problematic for outside observers.

Political changes, such as a collapse of the Ukrainian government or coup could, of course, alter the situation radically.

I think the west intends to maximize the benifits from this 'experiment' by prolonging the conflict as long as possible. At some point I expect Russia to attempt to finish it definitively in their favor. Timing completely unclear.

Posted by: the pessimist | Sep 3 2023 17:35 utc | 42

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 14:17 utc | 3

first rule never ever underestimate your enemy, if you really think VSA spending their ridiculous high military budget for useless nonsense then your wrong. they are using already their fancy super duper AI intel stuff, that we haven't seen Lancet equivalents on the ground idk, maybe VSA just don't want to reveal their fancy high-tech stuff , we will see..

Posted by: publicdisorder | Sep 3 2023 17:36 utc | 43

LoveDonbass 9

The original comment 21 seems to have got caught in the sperm trap. Childish of me I know. You are all too polite , , or grown up , or maybe drunk, to comment
Sorry. Sorry

Posted by: Giyane | Sep 3 2023 17:38 utc | 44

The primary advantage that Russia and China have is that the most of the best talent in the US goes into Finance/Advertising/Law because of the economic incentives. And the West is not taking this seriously.

Posted by: je | Sep 3 2023 14:45 utc | 10

A Key and Fatal Flaw of Western strategy. Favoring Finance, Advertising, Law, and other Parasitical endeavors over Manufacturing is Hubris gone Mad. It is the West that wanted the "in vogue" shiny skin of Arsenic Poison glorified by story after story of the money-printing, debt addiction, versus the difficult and "unclean" industries critical to value-added, not inflation, overhead added Cotton Candy jobs propped up from cooking the books.
Western Banking? Like the vast majority of Western Business, dependent entirely on Central Banks putting the thumb down on interest rates for more than a decade, and conjuring into the money system, unearned dollars/euros that give the illusion of an economy. Russia, whether by strategic design or not, is precisely the powerhouse that the USA was pre and during WWII - self-sufficient in energy, key resources, and educated/determined people motivated by survival.
Ukraine, led by hubris and greed, egged on by anachronistic, ossified old men in DC and Europe, decided to be the fly who put one leg onto the flypaper. The more they wriggle, the stucker they get.
In some ways, ascribing clarity to the Russian timeline, in the fog of an actual war, is just an exercise of Magpies chatting to each other across the telephone lines. Many of the initial unknowns are now clear for Russia. The West, especially the U.S. Government, wants to jawbone Russia into submission, while expecting Russia to do nothing about the actual American, British, and European, DIRECT action against Russia and her troops. The current Leaders of Collective West
are saying, "I dare you" to Russia, as dirtier and dirtier weapons are introduced. That very broad Russian Red Line has an edge to it somewhere and we shall see.

Posted by: kupkee | Sep 3 2023 17:39 utc | 45

Neofeudalfuture, do not flounce away in a huff. Sometimes it is the manner not the material that provokes pushback. There is a reason style and substance goes together; "the sugar makes the medicine go down." Rest, rephrase, and retry.

And it's OK if people get you yet still disagree completely. Such is life.

(Which brings up a broader current events commentary: The West is all sugar of late, and The RoW is all medicine. It's obvious which is better for the ailing from a remove, but it is so distressing for the ailing.)

Posted by: titmouse | Sep 3 2023 17:44 utc | 46

@ the pessimist | Sep 3 2023 17:35 utc | 42

thanks for stating all that.. i agree with you.. timing is completely unclear as you say..

Posted by: james | Sep 3 2023 18:06 utc | 47

Posted by: Membrum Virile | Sep 3 2023 17:19 utc | 38

What multicolor flag do you subscribe to?

Posted by: sal | Sep 3 2023 18:08 utc | 48

Posted by: Passerby | Sep 3 2023 17:33 utc | 40

I guess you missed Korea and Vietnam...

Posted by: truth unedited | Sep 3 2023 18:13 utc | 49

If there are ever negotiations, the minimum Russian position will be:
ALL of the Ukraine to be annexed to Russia except:
1. Six oblasts: Kiev, Zhitomir, Ploskurov (aka Khmelnitsky), Vinnitsa, Cherkassy & Yelizavetgrad (aka Kirovograd) may elect to become a state analogous to Belarus and allied to Russia.
2. Provided Poland & Rumania leave NATO, surrender their Aegis Ashore systems and demilitarize (no foreign troops), then:
(a) Galicia [= oblasts Lvov, Volyn, Rovno, Tarnopol & Stanislavov (aka Ivano-Frankovsk)] may elect to be administered by Poland;
(b) Bessarabia [= Chernovtsy & Bujak] may elect to be administered by Rumania;
(c) Transcarpathia may elect to be independent or an exclave of Russia (cf. Kaliningrad).
3. All sanctions to end and normal trade relations restored.
4. All seized Russian assets to be returned with interest.

Posted by: John Marks | Sep 3 2023 18:17 utc | 50

Armchair Warlord's Twitter page posts the following analysis.....
The Sword of Damocles - the Russian Army's force buildup through 2023 and what it means for the Ukrainian War going forward.

It should also be noted that the Russians do not seem to be leaving anything at all to chance. In Zaporozhe, for example, they constructed several defensive lines in a deep, complex scheme in preparation for an offensive they ended up stopping close to the line of contact. I would expect similar thoroughness out of their offensive preparations.

Could it be.....???

INDY

Posted by: Dr. George W Oprisko | Sep 3 2023 18:29 utc | 51

8..and subsequent posters re trains...pretty sure about 3-4 ammo trains military supplies have suffered in about last 5 months....usually parked in sidings marshalling yards. Maybe others we do not know about?

Posted by: Jo | Sep 3 2023 18:31 utc | 52

publicdisorder | Sep 3 2023 17:36 utc | 43

"they are using already their fancy super duper AI intel stuff"

If it was 1945, and you wanted to plot an aerial attack on Pskov, you'd need contour maps of large areas, locations of all radar stations, times and routes of surveillance flights, missile and AA batteries, then several hundred boffins with slide rules working out best route/time combo.

Now AI can do this in minutes, and I imagine the US military have tons of it. AI is perhaps the one area where the US have a big lead. Unlike the Raytheons etc, the actual chips are produced in Taiwan using state-of-art raw materials and machines, so the mark-ups are (while large) not at US levels.

Russia and China need IMHO to put serious effort into catching up. While China may not be able to produce TSMC quality, quantity is also important in AI. Slower chips? More and more of them in parallel!

Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | Sep 3 2023 18:32 utc | 53

Posted by: William Gruff | Sep 3 2023 15:42 utc | 24

Yes, you have seen the US equivalent, but NAFO Nazi fairies would rather forget about it. It is called the "Switchblade".

#######################

I had forgotten about them because they didn't seem effective but did some poking around.

Switchblade 300 is a toy. The Lancet-1 wasn't really much different. That's the device that 'failed'.

Switchblade 600 is an equivalent.

It kind of validates my concerns in the medium term but shows Russia still currently has the lead, especially in production.

Best I can tell UA got around 10 Switchblade 600 and 2,000 Switchblade 300. Pricing on the 600 appears to be around $200K vs maybe $35K on the Lancet-3. Hard to tell because nobody is giving clear pricing tied to specific models and, more importantly, we'd need cost-to-replicate info.

If you assume that Russia has fielded around 1,500 (one for every tank) Lancet-3s and you count the videos of kills (around 10-20), it probably means that 100 shots and 1-in-10 captured on video. So, we don't know if the 600 works because there haven't been enough tests.

But the US can clearly field thousands of these in a year. The maker claims they can make 6K/month. I am sure the Chinese are walking all this and taking notes.

I'm still expecting the UA to collapse but I don't believe time is on Russia's side forever.

Posted by: je | Sep 3 2023 18:42 utc | 54

Some drone reportedly hit a government building in Kurchatov.

The kievite forces also tried to hit a nuclear power plant.

Posted by: Izuna Uchiha | Sep 3 2023 18:49 utc | 55

1 & 39

Rail lines are trivially easy targets. Not necessary to hit moving trains. The location of the trackage is well known and it does not move around. Send an FAB-9000 to the railyard, make a nice big crater. Weeks or months to repair and the repair crews are also a target. The Geran drones are plenty big enough to take out a switch or a section of track, small enough to be perfectly stealthy, also cheap and very long range (originally deigned to strike Israel from Iran). Send a hundred of those in a volley, the repair crews will scramble over the landscape and never complete.

Trackage is not being bombed because Russia has chosen not to. If the decision is made there is no technical problem

Posted by: oldhippie | Sep 3 2023 18:57 utc | 56

Russia is daily attacked, while Russian media and russomaniacs in social networks got excited when some oil depot in Reni got destroyed, like that's a big deal... I guess everything is going according to plan.

Posted by: La Fleur Verte | Sep 3 2023 18:58 utc | 57

In regards to the cardboard drones and how to stop them. The Australian company that makes them has their factory at 60 Bertie St Port Melbourne. If it is OK for the Australian government to provide Bushmasters, artillery shells and drones that target Russian civilian targets then perhaps that factory is a legitimate target? Not hard to buy a generic drone and fly it from nearby to crash into that factory. Might wake the stupid public up to the foolish actions of the government provoking the bear.
As for how durable cardboard is to wet weather I would point out that UHT milk does just fine in cartons made of thin cardboard. Ditto waxed fruit boxes. Though perhaps the thin plastic film on the milk cartons or the wax on the fruit boxes might reduce how invisible cardboard is to normal detection methods.

Posted by: Neal | Sep 3 2023 18:58 utc | 58

The gurniad.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/02/everything-is-ahead-of-us-ukraine-breaks-russias-first-line-of-defence-in-stronghold

Posted by: jpc | Sep 3 2023 19:07 utc | 59

From my post at #59.
It looks like we are totally missing out on the situation on the ground.

Posted by: jpc | Sep 3 2023 19:09 utc | 60

Posted by: jpc | Sep 3 2023 19:09 utc | 60

I mean, Moon of Alabama is basically an echo chamber.

Posted by: Alina | Sep 3 2023 19:16 utc | 61

If Russia supplies an app to protesters next time a suburb of Paris or London goes up in flames, we will not have a leg to stand on.

Posted by: Passerby | Sep 3 2023 17:33 utc | 40

##########

Woe be unto the West if Russia decides to engage in open asymmetric warfare CIA style.

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 19:19 utc | 62

A poster suggested that Russia should take out the large transformers in Ukraine. I’d suggest a better target is the large transformers in the USA, especially the ones near the factories making supplies for the military. Perhaps some might recall that several transformers in America were damaged by bullets fired into them. The shooter/ were never caught. They don’t have much in the way of spare transformers and replacements would likely take a year and be manufactured in China as the US now has not much in the way of transformer manufacturers.
Not hard to pay by intermediaries some gang bangers from south of the border to cross into the US and destroy dozens of those transformers. No proof of who financed it and they could only hazard to guess maybe Russia or then again maybe China. Payback for Nordstream or payback for tech sanctions on China.

Posted by: Neal | Sep 3 2023 19:21 utc | 63

Re the cardboard drones, is there anyone here who wouldn't love to see a balsa wood drone? Maybe even powered by a big rubber band...

Posted by: Boris Badenov | Sep 3 2023 19:22 utc | 64

Just skimmed this whole latest "open thread" to find typical 1000s of words devoid of information. Just uninformed opinions, mindless nattering, bickering, and general cluelessness, guided by the emissions of a few cottage industry bloviators, for example Duran and Ritter, who think they are the reincarnation of Hunter Thompson, but lack any panache. Re wonks like Mearsheimer, who survey the MSM and recalculate found talking points into question-begging under a word-of-the-day theme such as "ABCs OF BLITZKRIEG", this shit just adds up to noise.

The topical posts here are somewhat more informative in that these at least survey some domain of war news and offer opinions in context.

Regarding picking a side (Russia) and having effectively no understanding of the dynamics, you've got a 50/50 chance of being right. Great odds! Just no idea why anyone thinks this level cheerleading is meaningful except maybe in some championship of arm-chair prognostication.

Why are there no ideas here?

Dear editor(s), it might be interesting to go back to threads from early days of invasion and see what the track record of opinion has been against history. Does what gets blathered here end up having any connection to manifest reality?

Or is this just a pumping station for propaganda? Note that you don't have to agree with propaganda to pump it.

But study the propaganda as you may, the great projects will keep rolling, irreducible to matters of life and limb because the people who run these projects make no sacrifices and only get involved because they stand to gain. The degree of administrative detachment of policy making (especially in the west) to the human cost more than notes in the margins: the people sponsoring the war truly are elites, cynically pursuing their vague notions of an ideal ("freedumb") at the cost of ordinary lives. Their detachment and M.O. is everyday standard operating procedure for their class; it's how they think and relate about everything. This is why Zelensky is always garbed in olive drab: to remind himself that what he decides has some contact with actual lives otherwise unknown to the political theaters through which scurries. Whether people live or die, the administrators ensure the concept of Ukraine lives on. It's impossible for this to change as long as the dissent are merely bloggy mcblogsters in their rec rooms mediating forgone conclusions for Patreon.

Posted by: Arrnon | Sep 3 2023 19:33 utc | 65

first rule never ever underestimate your enemy, if you really think VSA spending their ridiculous high military budget for useless nonsense then your wrong. they are using already their fancy super duper AI intel stuff, that we haven't seen Lancet equivalents on the ground idk, maybe VSA just don't want to reveal their fancy high-tech stuff , we will see..

Posted by: publicdisorder | Sep 3 2023 17:36 utc | 43

###########

Yes, it's like Trump's 20th-dimensional election chess. TRUST THE PLAN! LOL

The US may have stuff in reserve but they haven't fought a peer conflict since WW2, and even then the Russians are the ones who won that war. Right now, Russia is blooding its junior officers, revising its tactics, and having its nation on a war footing, while they are building its economic coalition at the expense of the West.

The thing about WunderWaffe is that it is like making threats. At one point, someone calls your bluff. And if your schtick is all red-faced bluster and insults, then it's going to end badly. Americans believe a lot of the crap they are fed about their government, the world, technology, and war, but most people in the Global South and in Russia/China do not. That BS is strictly for domestic consumption to an audience of naive people suffering from historic levels of mental illness, IMO.

I doubt the MIC has been developing the next generation of amazing warfare tech for a simple reason. Incentives always tell us the true story, and the MIC has captured Congress, and its incentives are to continue to fail for profit until the host is dead. There is so little accountability in the West in particular and America has the least accountability.

Much like democracy in the West, many of these "institutions" are in terminal decline and the only chance of saving the system is for those institutions and beliefs to die, and be wholly replaced by fresh ones. No miracle politician is going to reform the bureaucracy or the MIC. Those leeches will kill the host before they allow the host to shake them off like the fleas and ticks that they are.

Btw, I am not underestimating anyone. I just don't fear predators that have had their claws and fangs removed. What are they going to do? Gum and lick me to death? Ewww...

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 19:34 utc | 66

Dima says that Ukraine is still fiercely attacking.
Russians do the best they can, but Russians are forced to step back near Bahmut.

Posted by: simplex | Sep 3 2023 19:39 utc | 67

As someone who has been using AI in work for most of this year, I can say one thing about it. AI is not magic. It is only as good as the input data, and the assumptions programmed into the algorithm.

Does anyone trust the West to program their AI not to have a heavy ideological bias? The same bias that produces these fairy Generals and copium-filled articles and news segments.

That is why you can go to any language or image AI and give it the exact instructions and get radically different outputs, even if you repeat the experiment dozens of iterations.

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 19:40 utc | 68

It looks like we are totally missing out on the situation on the ground.

Posted by: jpc | Sep 3 2023 19:09 utc | 60

###########

As reported in the Guardian, in an article that is long on conjecture and short on details.

Maybe they are right. Will anyone hold the Guardian accountable in two weeks if they are wrong?

I have read so much propaganda from both sides that I take everything with a ton of salt.

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 19:47 utc | 69

The recent Duran video had some interesting insights to the counter-offensive narrative and drone strikes in Russia.

Apparently the estimate closest to the truth is that Russia has coolly absorbed the AFU counter-offensive. Mark Milley and others in the west have jumped the gun proclaiming that Ukraine has now breached the "Surovikin line" and on their way to Melitopol.

In reality, the west is extremely irritated by the fact that the counter-offensive is a goner. Scholz, Macron and the White House have even begun to make phone calls to the Kremlin but no one is picking up the phone. There are even some ex Obama-officials in Moscow trying to have "negotiations". Apparently they are not going anywhere, and Kremlin denies that any of these negotiations even occur.

Consequentially, Nato is irritated and has begun launching drones to Russia. The critical military targets are being hardened and it is very hard for Nato/Kiev to hit the important targets. However, they can hit secondary targets, but even as that becomes too hard, they might decide to start hitting civilian targets. Kremlin can absorb the hits on military targets, but if there are casualty events with AFU drones on civilians, the political pressure may start increasing on the RU administration. This is definitely something they don't want to do.

And the post of "Dr. George W Oprisko | Sep 3 2023 18:29 utc | 51" is very revealing of the overall strategy. Contrary to western media, RU army started this conflict ill-prepared, and AFU army started the conflict in best shape they had ever been.

Posted by: unimperator | Sep 3 2023 19:48 utc | 70

Posted by: Mary | Sep 3 2023 17:11 utc | 34

Not the west, obviously, but Ukrainian sinking of Moskva immediately comes to mind

Posted by: Membrum Virile | Sep 3 2023 17:19 utc | 38

Strategically & tactically irrelevant.

Posted by: Mary | Sep 3 2023 19:48 utc | 71

Posted by: jpc | Sep 3 2023 19:07 utc | 59

First, at what cost?

Second, Iirc, simplicius recently posted a lovely, topographic map of Robotyne with tweeted message of how he loves invading valleys, or words to that effect.

Ukrs are now on low ground, surrounded by Russians on 3 sides on top of hills/mountainsides.

Can you spell "firebag?"

How about "cauldron?"

Posted by: Mary | Sep 3 2023 19:54 utc | 72

Posted by: Dr. George W Oprisko | Sep 3 2023 18:29 utc | 51

More than possible, probable for the following reasons

a) Few expect it, talking about the war dragging through 2024, so element an of surprise maintained.

b) Ukraine have committed their two strategic reserve corps to reinforce the faltering offensive and restore momentum. Both units have suffered severe attrition in personnel and equipment. Also, an attack whilst Ukraine is still threshing around in her own offensive means:

i) A significant portion of units needed to counter such a move (mechanised)are already committed, therefore hard to redeploy

ii) Units in those offensive axes are only able to conduct hasty field defences and have not had time to construct more substantial fortifications and obstacle belts.

c) The shock effect of massive armoured formations on green units, or ones used to small engagements cannot be over-estimated. This is the multiplied if rear area units are attacked and artillery support disrupted.

d) Multiple axes to choose, each offering different opportunities, also a perfect opportunity for strategic relocation (perhaps a reason for the Pskov attack)

e) Largest disparity between average tactical proficiency between both sides, numbers of combatants favour Russia now.

f) Perfect opportunity to reveal new platforms with new capabilities, genuine ‘game changers’ whose short window of advantage is maximised, as Ukrainian forces will not have time to develop large scale counters.

g) Maximum political impact for Putin, blindsiding any critics who might try to accuse him of dithering, especially effective if the drone mini-blitz escalates. Decisive action might also shield the Kremlin for the sharp increase in friendly casualties an offensive might cause

This does not mean this will happen, given the strategic restrictors invisible to any open-source analyst, but the odds of a decisive ‘big arrow’ solution I think have narrowed.

Posted by: Milites | Sep 3 2023 19:55 utc | 73

Sinking a cruiser wouldn't be 'strategically and tactically irrelevant'.

Y'all delusional.

Posted by: Sun of York | Sep 3 2023 19:56 utc | 74

Military summary update:

AFU controls large portion of Kleschevka. RU still holds a bridgehead in the SE portion of that village. Apparently RU has started reducing the Kleschevka village.

AFU also tries to attack at Andryivka but it is held by RU.

AFU has made some landing preparation opposite to Nova Kakhovka and RU has bombarded those heavily with all weapons.

AFU activity has significantly reduced around Robotyne. AFU 46th brigade (the one of two "elite brigades" committed to this breakthrough) released a video of bad condititons, apparently they are stationed on the bridgehead between Novopokryvka and Vodiane. Dima made a remark that every time AFU soldiers release a video about bad situation, so far it has led to the losing of positions within a few weeks time.

RU is still continuing their offensive operation around Kupyansk.

Posted by: unimperator | Sep 3 2023 20:13 utc | 75

I mean, Moon of Alabama is basically an echo chamber.

Posted by: Alina | Sep 3 2023 19:16 utc | 61

There's actually quite a diverse collection of opinions at MOA. Why'd you show up today?

Posted by: Ahenobarbus | Sep 3 2023 20:19 utc | 76

What it comes down too is the question, why does Russia continue to fight and it's soldiers die when they could have at any time had they chosen, won this conflict outright.
Posted by: JustAMaverick | Sep 3 2023 14:27 utc | 7
------------------------------------------------------------
That conversation has been held in these pages at great length. You are forgetful or have paid insufficient attention to the rather serious and ongoing dialog, b's attempts to keep you informed notwithstanding.

What were the stated Russian objectives in December 2021? Does the word security guarantees ring a bell?

Posted by: Acco Hengst | Sep 3 2023 20:31 utc | 77

MoA an echo chamber?

Pretty sure this echo chamber troll has quit, been reassigned or fired. Hasn't been around for awhile now.

To be fair, his/her/it efforts at the bar was below average to poor.

I wonder if 9 out of 10 people concludes 2+2=4 if they are just echoing each other?

Russia will comprehensively defeat NATO. US hegemony is finished.

Posted by: Suresh | Sep 3 2023 20:57 utc | 78

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 16:38 utc | 28

exactly, treating prigozhin as some kind of patriot is ridiculous. there's just been a concern troll flood lately.

Posted by: pretzelattack | Sep 3 2023 21:00 utc | 79

Both sides in this conflict (Russia/Ukraine + western sponsors) have been using it as a laboratory for military tech and strategy. Neither side uses aircraft over the contact line, limiting air support to standoff weapons/attacks and support behind the front. This despite Russian superiority in AD and air capability because of the threat from MANPADs and surveillance resources that can track aircraft movements in real time. I don't believe either side expected this situation at the start...

Posted by: the pessimist | Sep 3 2023 17:35 utc | 42

If Ukrainian AD has been attritted to the extent that has been claimed, I wonder why Russia has not been using high altitude bombers to carpet bomb Ukrainian positions at the front. These bombers fly above the range of manpads. My assumption is that Ukraine still has enough S300's around to pose a threat, which is why the Russian AF is still launching FAB's from behind the lines. Russia has a bunch of gravity bombs, and these would be the most effective at reducing Ukrainian formations.

Posted by: Mike R | Sep 3 2023 21:16 utc | 80

Who benefits from a frozen conflict? Well, sure, US oligarchs. They profit whatever happens. But further to that, it's telling to see the same commentators who realise that the US wants to move on to China, seemingly unable to process why it is that Russia is slow-walking the process (aside from a need to minimise casualties), indeed, while they practically beg for Russia to step things up. It becomes obvious that a slow progression from Russia also serves the needs of their most important partner in their efforts to prepare themselves for a possible coming conflict (although any rational person could see that the time when the US could prevail in that conflict has long ago passed).

So the speed at which Russia progresses the conflict serves multiple different needs simultaneously, and they'll likely move when they're (all) ready. It may take some time yet.

Posted by: tspoon | Sep 3 2023 21:21 utc | 81

@JustAMaverick - @7

"(..;) The reason this war has gone on as long as it has, and will continue into the foreseeable future with so much suffering, blood and death, is that there is simply too much money to be made on all sides by continuing. It always comes down to money and this war is no different. "

Indeed, same feeling here even if I would add -or not forget- the real and political war USA/NATO* against Russia (*which includes the "hidden" war of the USA against Europe)

The “novelty” is that we now have two opposing capitalist camps, it blurs the ideological charts.
This does not prevent from noting that if it was indeed Russia which invaded Ukraine, it was NATO which provoked this conflict.

note to certain: real definition of troll is not "one who does not share your opinions" but "one who calls those who do not agree with him a troll".

Posted by: Tak-Tik | Sep 3 2023 21:38 utc | 82

What did Reznikov do wrong? Suggestion negotiations?

"Ukraine's Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov has been dismissed from his post, the country's leader Volodymyr Zelensky has announced."

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66702893

Posted by: dh | Sep 3 2023 21:38 utc | 83

dh: I imagine _elensky is feeling the heat and eliminating potential challengers. Myself, I’m waiting to see what happens with _aluzhny.

Tak-Tik: No, there really are characteristically trollish behaviors. Never responding to objections to one’s assertions, then repeating the assertions, for instance.

Posted by: malenkov | Sep 3 2023 21:46 utc | 84

Someone once said that waging war on another country means going to war against your own people.
I fear that anti-Russian propaganda will be used to curtail our already endangered freedoms here in the US.
Maybe that's one major reason why our woke totalitarian rulers provoked the Ukrainian conflict in the first place
"Have you heard about the war? It comes back home."

Posted by: John Kirsch | Sep 3 2023 21:48 utc | 85

There is oprimism and delusion. i guess the only part i believe is the admission they havent won so far. " The current counteroffensive of Ukraine will not throw Russia away, and no one expected it. It is unlikely to be possible to halve the occupation before the onset of winter, which was one of the most optimistic goals. However, it showed that the Russian army can be defeated. Not in 2023, but in 2024 or 2025,” retired uk army general richard barrons in the Financial Times.

Posted by: hankster | Sep 3 2023 21:51 utc | 86

@je | Sep 3 2023 14:01 utc | 1
I do not see so much of concern trolling in your post, rather obsessive and desperate belief in western superiority.

Get me right: I do not doubt that the US and NATO still have some smart engineers who are able to design nifty weapons. We have not forgotten that all the Reaper, Global Hawk etc initially came from the US - 2 dacades ago. Since then, others have picked up the idea of unmanned weaponry. All the innovations of the last 2 decades came from everywhere, Turkey, Ukraine, Russia, China, not the US.

Certainly, there may be new developments even in the US. But mind that the US educate half the engineers of Russia, and one fifteens of China. In STEM graduations, they are at par with Russia (due to an excess in "life sciences"), with a twelfth of China.

Until recently, the shortcomings of US educational systems did matter less as long as they could buy intellectual capacity from elsewhere. Crumbling Dollar, crumbling cities, and rising crime make that harder.

Posted by: aquadraht | Sep 3 2023 21:57 utc | 87

Posted by: pretzelattack | Sep 3 2023 21:00 utc | 79

###########

The poster who takes up for Prighozin over Shoigu has been here for some time.

Disloyalty is disgusting. A man who betrays his people is unworthy of respect. Any man in a position of authority who cannot be trusted is a liability, and his fatal end, regardless of who did it, is unsurprising.

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 21:58 utc | 88

As to UAV innovations, apologies. Omitted Iran, and DPRK.

Posted by: aquadraht | Sep 3 2023 21:59 utc | 89

@ Alina | Sep 3 2023 19:16 utc | 61

lol.. and the western msm and guardian aren't?? if you are trying to be funny - you've succeeded!

Posted by: james | Sep 3 2023 22:03 utc | 90

"Sinking a cruiser wouldn't be 'strategically and tactically irrelevant'.

Y'all delusional."

Posted by: Sun of York | Sep 3 2023 19:56 utc | 74

So please describe the tactical &/or strategic advantage Ukr gained from the sinking? Other than a few days news headlines?

Posted by: Mary | Sep 3 2023 22:03 utc | 91

LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 19:40 utc | 68

"Does anyone trust the West to program their AI not to have a heavy ideological bias?"

When people like Hillary Clinton or Obama want something (like the Presidency) badly enough, all thoughts of political correctness or diversity fly out of the window. Both candidates election strategy teams looked straight out of Mad Men, set in a 1950s advertising agency - white males everywhere, no matter the rhetoric of the leader.

You are right that if you ask ChatGPT why Burkina Faso is poorer than Japan, you'll be fed boilerplate about imperialism and slavery. But when it's important, like hitting IL76s at Pskov, it'll be straight stuff about humidity, wind speeds, shear forces.

Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | Sep 3 2023 22:04 utc | 92

Posted by: John Kirsch | Sep 3 2023 21:48 utc | 86

########

Friend, don't kid yourself. The people in charge are not rational and don't care about ethics or laws. They have little integrity or they wouldn't have risen as high as they did.

They don't need a particular enemy to justify their oppression. If there isn't one, they will invent one.

China, Russia, white supremacy, Trumpism, Q-Anon, Islamists, Conservative Catholics, Proud Boys, etc. They always keep a roster of boogeymen to tie people and ideas to in order to mobilize mass opinion against individuals and challenges to their authority.

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Sep 3 2023 22:04 utc | 93

Posted by: dh | Sep 3 2023 21:38 utc | 83

Making Reznikov the UK Ambassador is an escape shuttle to London before the shit hits the fan for the junta.

Reznikov gets even further from the frontline, just as Zelensky attempts to recall Ukrainians in the EU for conscription.

Posted by: Lev Davidovich | Sep 3 2023 22:46 utc | 94

Posted by: Neal | Sep 3 2023 18:58 utc | 58

Jezzus mate! A post like that will bring ASIO to your door. SERIOUSLY.

Posted by: SCCC | Sep 3 2023 22:52 utc | 95

SouthFront has an article up claiming that the Ukrainians have started putting poison on drones that will affect soldiers if they handle a captured drone. Another twist in the drone wars.

james@47

Thanks - just thinking out loud and trying to summarize what has gone down so far as I see it. I believe I said last spring that I expected to have a better sense by September of how long the conflict will last... Now I am thinking maybe by the end of December as I still lack a clear sense of the real state of play.

Posted by: the pessimist | Sep 3 2023 22:58 utc | 96

Posted by: Neal | Sep 3 2023 19:21 utc | 63

Neal, ffs. A second one! You'll find yourself on the watchlist of urban terrorists. SERIOUSLY. Are you an idiot? I'd assume ASIO are monitoring all alt-Ukraine sites for Australian dissidents like you.

Posted by: SCCC | Sep 3 2023 23:00 utc | 97

Whether people live or die, the administrators ensure the concept of Ukraine lives on. It's impossible for this to change as long as the dissent are merely bloggy mcblogsters in their rec rooms mediating forgone conclusions for Patreon.
Posted by: Arrnon | Sep 3 2023 19:33 utc | 65

So you hate the bar and other refugees from the imperialist propaganda machine. Why are you here again, dippy mcdipshit?

Posted by: Ahenobarbus | Sep 3 2023 23:02 utc | 98

Now, the Narcofuhrer has replaced Mr Clean as defense minister. I'm sure that means all is well. Just like the story about Mr Clean misappropriating monies meant to feed soldiers dying on the front line, no doubt Russian propaganda.

Mr Cleans problem was he got caught, not that he was a traitor and a thief. Maericans don't care about that, but they sure as shit care about headlines.

Posted by: Doctor Eleven | Sep 3 2023 23:05 utc | 99

Zelensky “entertained” with his piano playing.
The new Ukrainian Minister of Defence entertains with a social media post of him masturbating.
(Pics, or it’s unsourced rumours, right?)
https://t.me/CyberspecNews/41133

Telegram |~ More details re Umerov
As the Turks write, one of the reasons for appointing Umerov to the post of Minister of Defense of Ukraine is the propaganda of his nationality, the acceleration of the recruitment of volunteers and mercenaries from the countries of the former USSR and Turkey, as well as the implementation of total mobilization in Ukraine, but "with a dream of Turan"

Posted by: Melaleuca | Sep 3 2023 23:33 utc | 100