Ukraine 4

[sneakypete]

Looks to me like drones are the "attack aircraft of the future,and the future has already arrived".

I have no idea how many drones a nation and build and launch for the price of just ONE jet fighter-bomber,but HAS to be a bunch of them.

The USAF and their fighter jocks should be VERY worried.

Not to mention the brass,because if you no longer have fighter-bomber pilots,you no longer need so many senior officers,big runways,big air bases,etc,etc,etc.

The VERY serious downside to this newly advanced technology is that "We bees terrorists!" groups won't need a support group,either. Just some stolen drones and the control units,plus someone to teach  them how to  put it all together and make it  work.

Several dozen "sumbodies" a LOT smarter than me needs to be doing some  serious thinking,plotting,and scheming about this before it is too late.

BTW,I have no doubt that Air Forces all over the world are already aware of this,but I would almost bet money  their focus  is on how to get rid of drones and keep fighter jocks and fighter-bomber aircraft,along with the entire command structure necessary to support such units.

Not to mention congresscritters with USAF bases in their districts,manufacturers that manufacture and assemble jet fighter-bomber aircraft,stockholders,etc,etc,etc.

It ain't gonna be pretty from the POV of a LOT of humans who will  see their jobs and their security  slipping away.

[Kamaji]

Kyiv fighters look to skies for ‘air dominance’ as US aid key to counteroffensive

By Kelly Jane Torrance
July 16, 2023

KYIV — In Donbas, mere miles from the heart of Ukraine’s counteroffensive, you can actually find a laugh.

“There’s this joke that before the Russian invasion Feb. 24, 2022, Russia’s army was considered by some to be the second-best army in the world,” Oleg Shiryaev, commander of the 225th separate assault battalion, told me through a translator. “After the invasion, it became apparent that it’s the second-best army in Ukraine. After the Prigozhin coup, it’s the second-best army in Russia.”

Everyone in the room chuckles.

But of course Ukraine’s fight for survival is no joke.

And the world is watching to see how the country uses Western aid in its attempt to push a better-resourced, bigger-manned force out of its territory.

“We went into this counteroffensive with very heightened expectations from not just our Western partners but from even the Ukrainian people because we all still remember how successful was our counteroffensive in Kharkiv,” Yuriy Sak, an adviser to the defense minister, said Sunday over the sound of air-raid sirens.

But “the military and political command had no illusions,” knowing it’s “not going to be the same way it was in Kharkiv and Kherson,” he noted. “The Russians have built unprecedentedly fortified defense lines along the front lines everywhere in the east, in the south. So we knew that there were millions of mines, that there were hundreds of kilometers of trenches.”

In other words, the counterattack remains in the early stages.

“It’s been a month and a half of offensive operations by now, but it is still largely probing and shaping operations. Now, that means that we have not yet committed our major forces — we are still looking for vulnerabilities in the enemy’s defense lines.”

*  *  *

Source:  https://nypost.com/2023/07/16/kyiv-fighters-look-to-skies-for-air-dominance-as-us-aid-key-to-counteroffensive/

[Kamaji]

Russia halts wartime deal that allows Ukraine to ship grain in a hit to global food security

By Associated Press
July 17, 2023

Russia said Monday it has halted an unprecedented wartime deal that allows grain to flow from Ukraine to countries in Africa, the Middle East and Asia where hunger is a growing threat and high food prices have pushed more people into poverty.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov announced halting the deal in a conference call with reporters, adding that Russia will return to the deal after its demands are met.

“When the part of the Black Sea deal related to Russia is implemented, Russia will immediately return to the implementation of the deal,” Peskov said.

It’s the end of a breakthrough accord that the United Nations and Turkey brokered last summer to allow food to leave the Black Sea region after Russia invaded its neighbor nearly a year and a half ago. A separate agreement facilitated the movement of Russian food and fertilizer amid Western sanctions.

The warring nations are both major global suppliers of wheat, barley, sunflower oil and other affordable food products that developing nations rely on.

*  *  *

Source:  https://nypost.com/2023/07/17/russia-halts-wartime-deal-that-allows-ukraine-to-ship-grain-in-a-hit-to-global-food-security/

[Smokin Joe]

Looks to me like drones are the "attack aircraft of the future,and the future has already arrived".

I have no idea how many drones a nation and build and launch for the price of just ONE jet fighter-bomber,but HAS to be a bunch of them.

The USAF and their fighter jocks should be VERY worried.

Not to mention the brass,because if you no longer have fighter-bomber pilots,you no longer need so many senior officers,big runways,big air bases,etc,etc,etc.

The VERY serious downside to this newly advanced technology is that "We bees terrorists!" groups won't need a support group,either. Just some stolen drones and the control units,plus someone to teach  them how to  put it all together and make it  work.

Several dozen "sumbodies" a LOT smarter than me needs to be doing some  serious thinking,plotting,and scheming about this before it is too late.

BTW,I have no doubt that Air Forces all over the world are already aware of this,but I would almost bet money  their focus  is on how to get rid of drones and keep fighter jocks and fighter-bomber aircraft,along with the entire command structure necessary to support such units.

Not to mention congresscritters with USAF bases in their districts,manufacturers that manufacture and assemble jet fighter-bomber aircraft,stockholders,etc,etc,etc.

It ain't gonna be pretty from the POV of a LOT of humans who will  see their jobs and their security  slipping away.

Some roles will not slip away, and there will always be a place for manned CAS (which is why getting rid of the A-10 makes little sense to me) and ultimately bombers and fighters, too. However, I expect the role of manned bombers and fighter bombers to diminish, replaced by drones, especially for saturation attacks against well-defended targets. This would relegate the command and control to 'motherships' in theater or satellite communications with remote control, both of which control functions could be subject to jamming and or electronic hijacking. (Why it was so essential that the Chinese NOT get a setup so near the GFAB in North Dakota,where drone development is being conducted.)

I can see where drone wingmen with AI response, either acting in concert, to defend, or as decoys for AAA and SAMs will be a definite possibility in the near future, such swarms with a manned aircraft for now, and likely entirely replacing them in the future. The advantages of unmanned fighter escorts is that they would be able technically to outmaneuver any live pilot (more Gs, no blackout) and provided their drivers or AI functions were up to the task, would have a distinct maneuver/targeting  advantage over any manned platform.

Still, the disadvantage is that corruption/disabling/hijacking those systems could cost the fight.

[Maj. Bill Martin]

Looks to me like drones are the "attack aircraft of the future,and the future has already arrived".

I have no idea how many drones a nation and build and launch for the price of just ONE jet fighter-bomber,but HAS to be a bunch of them.

The USAF and their fighter jocks should be VERY worried.

Not to mention the brass,because if you no longer have fighter-bomber pilots,you no longer need so many senior officers,big runways,big air bases,etc,etc,etc.

The VERY serious downside to this newly advanced technology is that "We bees terrorists!" groups won't need a support group,either. Just some stolen drones and the control units,plus someone to teach  them how to  put it all together and make it  work.

Several dozen "sumbodies" a LOT smarter than me needs to be doing some  serious thinking,plotting,and scheming about this before it is too late.

BTW,I have no doubt that Air Forces all over the world are already aware of this,but I would almost bet money  their focus  is on how to get rid of drones and keep fighter jocks and fighter-bomber aircraft,along with the entire command structure necessary to support such units.

Not to mention congresscritters with USAF bases in their districts,manufacturers that manufacture and assemble jet fighter-bomber aircraft,stockholders,etc,etc,etc.

It ain't gonna be pretty from the POV of a LOT of humans who will  see their jobs and their security  slipping away.

You raise a really interesting point.

Drones would seem to have some huge advantages over human pilots - you don't need to worry about a cockpit to keep a human alive, so the aircraft can be more compact. You also don't have to train the pilot for as long.

The problem I see is with range, and the electronic connection between the drone pilot and the drone itself.  Drones are always going to be vulnerable to electronic countermeasures, and if you have an air fleet that is based on drones you could find the entire thing disabled by an enemy who is managed to crack your electronic codes.

I think it's less of a problem when you're talking about having a larger number of smaller drones, with shorter range, and limited functions. In that case, it may not be worth it to the enemy to try to have sufficient electronic countermeasures everywhere to disable them one at a time.

But if you're talking about longer range actions, or ones that are more complex, I think human pilots are always going to be more flexible and reliable.

[Timber Rattler]

The biggest obstacle to Ukraine’s counteroffensive? Minefields.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/07/15/ukraine-war-russia-mines-counteroffensive/?fbclid=IwAR3xjmImQpaig8BRT5EFj8vjEbKpFTyP41GaHKNRInoiEwM8STJzdbuPsh0

In a painstakingly slow process that has come to define the speed of the Ukrainian counteroffensive, small groups of sappers on the front lines are crawling across minefields — sometimes literally on their stomachs — to detonate Russia’s defenses and clear a path for troops to advance.

The long buildup to the counteroffensive, which began about a month ago across multiple segments of the battlefield in the country’s east and south, gave the Russians time to prepare, soldiers said. Areas between 3 and 10 miles deep in front of the Russians’ main strongholds have been densely mined with antitank and antipersonnel mines and trip wires. These defenses have been successful in stalling the Ukrainian advance, they said.

As a result, Kyiv’s forces have changed strategy, Ukrainian military personnel said. Rather than try to break through with the infantry fighting vehicles and battle tanks that Western allies provided to aid Ukraine in this counteroffensive, units are moving forward, slowly, on foot.

“You can no longer do anything with just a tank with some armor, because the minefield is too deep, and sooner or later, it will stop and then it will be destroyed by concentrated fire,” Gen. Valery Zaluzhny, Ukraine’s military chief, said recently in an interview with The Washington Post.

(snip)

A senior Ukrainian official, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military matters, said Kyiv received less than 15 percent of the quantity of demining and engineering materiel, including MICLICs, that it asked for from Western partners ahead of the counteroffensive. Some of that equipment arrived just last week, the official said.

Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov and Zaluzhny told The Post that they have informed their Western counterparts that they urgently need more mine-clearing systems, such as Bangalore torpedo explosive charges. Ukraine has held back some of the brigades and Western weapons prepared for the counteroffensive as it attempts to penetrate the minefields.

Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, “opens up maps to me and says, ‘Look, there’s nothing here, there’s nothing here, there’s nothing here anymore,’” Zaluzhny said. “Minefields are one of the problems that certainly affects the pace of the offensive. This is a problem we see. Could it have been resolved more quickly? It could have been. How could it be solved? At least General Milley knows. The other question is, can he help with that? I don’t know.”

EXCERPT

The Russians essentially turned southern Ukraine into one vast minefield.

[PeteS in CA]

New: Ukraine attacks Kerch bridge -- again -- and claims credit

https://hotair.com/ed-morrissey/2023/07/17/new-ukraine-attacks-kerch-bridge-again-and-claims-credit-n565073

Is Ukraine ready to shift its offensive to Crimea? Overnight, two blasts further destabilized the Kerch Bridge, one of Vladimir Putin’s pet projects and a symbol of Russian claims for the strategic peninsula. More importantly, Ukraine’s successes in Kherson have made the Kerch Bridge the only reliable ground line of communication (GLOC) to their forces in Crimea.

Ukraine tried to take it out in October, and said at the time that it was “just the beginning.” Nine months later, is this the second step — or just an attack of opportunity? As CNN notes, this time Ukraine has claimed credit for the attack, unlike the attack in October, which makes it appear more significant than a one-off:

Depending on how much damage was done, this could be a pretty big setback for the Russians. It could make supplying and reinforcing the Crimean Peninsula and nearby Russian-occupied territory much more difficult.

WRT the attack on Sevastopol, that's a major port and naval base on the Crimean Peninsula. That attack also could make compound the difficulty of supplying and reinforcing the Crimean Peninsula, etc.. IOW, damage to the Kerch Strait Bridge and to the Port of Sevastopol are (forgive the trite term) synergistic.

[kevindavis007]

I don't feel sorry for them. They choose to vacation in a fricking WAR ZONE! What the hell were they thinking?

https://twitter.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/1680936587406761985

[kevindavis007]

Two words: Human Shields:

https://twitter.com/JasonHelford/status/1680978785632485379

[sneakypete]

I don't feel sorry for them. They choose to vacation in a fricking WAR ZONE! What the hell were they thinking?

@kevindavis007

Chances are excellent that the only news of the war they were getting back home was about how wonderfully the Soviet Forces were doing,and everything was just puppy-dog kisses.

Don't forget,the Soviets have absolute control over all the media in Russia,and no editor that wants to continue living as a free man is going to cross them.

It's not about truth or even victory. It's about the Soviet leadership  protecting their own asses.

[PeteS in CA]

How any Russian civilian could not know that the shore of the Sea of Azov and the Crimean Peninsula are an active war zone eludes me. And the northeast coast of the Black Sea isn't a lot safer.

[kevindavis007]

How any Russian civilian could not know that the shore of the Sea of Azov and the Crimean Peninsula are an active war zone eludes me. And the northeast coast of the Black Sea isn't a lot safer.

I contend that they are being used as Human Shields. That is my guess. Cause they damn well know that Ukraine will never target civilians.  So much for the wonderful Russian Government using their own civilians as human shields.

[Ghost Bear]

I contend that they are being used as Human Shields. That is my guess. Cause they damn well know that Ukraine will never target civilians.  So much for the wonderful Russian Government using their own civilians as human shields.

OK, so I was watching a Russian ex-pat streamer on YouTube last night who was live-streaming about the news about the bridge as it broke (it was early morning where he was located). Someone in the chat asked about the people killed during the bridge strike, and "Why would they go there knowing it's a war zone?". The streamer said that the Russians have a certain kind of fatalism and disregard for personal danger in this regard. He said that the previous time the bridge was struck (last year) the big conversation on Russian social media was whether there would be any good deals available on Crimean vacation packages because of the war situation.

So no, most likely they knew of the war, the danger, and all of it. They just chose to accept the danger, and paid the price.

By the way, the streamer I'm talking about has the YouTube name Inside Russia, and you can find his channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@INSIDERUSSIA. He has some interesting takes on the Russian political and economic situation, and how things there are likely to play out.

[Kamaji]

Ukraine takes responsibility for deadly attack on key Crimean bridge

By Isabel Keane
July 17, 2023

Ukraine’s military has claimed responsibility for an early morning attack Monday on the bridge connecting the annexed Crimean peninsula to Russia’s mainland that killed two people and left their daughter injured.

A member of Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) told CNN the attack on Russia’s key supply route was a joint operation with Ukraine’s naval forces.

This is the second time since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine that the 12-mile crossing, also known as the Kerch Bridge, was the target of an attack. The first time was in October when a fuel tanker exploded while crossing to Crimea, which Russia illegally annexed in 2014.

Traffic sat at a standstill for about six hours following the strike, which was carried out by two Ukrainian maritime drones at about 3 a.m., Russia’s National Anti-Terrorist Committee said.

The attack killed two people, identified by Russian media as Alexei and Natalia Kulik, who were traveling to Crimea for summer vacation. The 40-year-old man was a truck driver while his 36-year-old wife was a municipal education worker.

*  *  *

Source:  https://nypost.com/2023/07/17/ukraine-responsible-for-deadly-attack-on-crimean-bridge/

[bilo]

How any Russian civilian could not know that the shore of the Sea of Azov and the Crimean Peninsula are an active war zone eludes me. And the northeast coast of the Black Sea isn't a lot safer.

How many people think Biden is doing a good job?

The point is there are an awful lot of dumb people in the world.

[sneakypete]

How many people think Biden is doing a good job?

The point is there are an awful lot of dumb people in the world.

@bilo

And even more greedy,selfish people.

[Kamaji]

Russia strikes Ukraine grain port after exiting export deal

By Reuters
July 18, 2023

Russia struck Ukrainian ports on Tuesday, a day after pulling out of a United Nations.-backed deal to let Kyiv export grain, and Moscow claimed gains on the ground in an area where Ukrainian officials said Russian forces were going back on the offensive.

Russia described a wave of missile and drone attacks on Ukraine’s ports as “mass revenge strikes” in retaliation for attacks by Ukrainian seaborne drones that knocked out its road bridge to the occupied Crimean Peninsula.

Shortly after the bridge was hit on Monday, Moscow withdrew from a year-old U.N. brokered grain export deal, a move the United Nations said risked creating hunger around the world.

Falling debris and blast waves damaged several homes and unspecified port infrastructure in Russia’s main port, Odesa, according to Ukraine’s southern operational military command.

Local authorities in Mykolaiv, another port, described a serious fire there.

*  *  *

Source:  https://nypost.com/2023/07/18/russia-strikes-ukraine-grain-port-after-exiting-export-deal/

[sneakypete]

Shortly after the bridge was hit on Monday, Moscow withdrew from a year-old U.N. brokered grain export deal, a move the United Nations said risked creating hunger around the world.

@Kamaji

Am I the only one thinking that is going to hurt Russia as much,and maybe even more,than Ukraine?

After all,Russia has no other real income coming into the country,and this has to be showing up in places like Moscow  and St.Petersburg by  now.

[Hoodat]

Shortly after the bridge was hit on Monday, Moscow withdrew from a year-old U.N. brokered grain export deal, a move the United Nations said risked creating hunger around the world.

The two are unrelated.  The grain export deal was already scheduled to expire on Monday.  The decision not to renew had already been made prior to the Kerch bridge hit.

The agreement, brokered by Turkey and the United Nations in July 2022, was officially set to expire at 5 p.m. ET on Monday (midnight local time in Istanbul, Kyiv, and Moscow).

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Monday that Russia would not renew the pact right now, saying it “has been terminated."

Russia has for some time complained that it is being prevented from adequately exporting its own foodstuffs, and Peskov cited that objection as the reason for pulling out of the deal. “As soon as the Russian part is completed, the Russian side will return to the implementation of this deal immediately,” he told reporters.

Over the weekend, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the main objective of the deal – supplying grain to countries in need – “has not been realized,” again complaining that Russia faced obstacles exporting its own food.

FILE - An excavator loads grain into a cargo ship at a grain port in Izmail, Ukraine, on April 26, 2023. Russia has suspended on Monday July 17, 2023 a wartime deal brokered by the U.N. and Turkey that was designed to move food from Ukraine to parts of the world where millions are going hungry.
Higher food prices and more hunger: Collapse of Black Sea grain deal poses a massive threat
Peskov left the door open to reviving the deal in the future, saying that Russia will comply “as soon as the Russian part (of the deal) is completed.”  .  .  .

.  .  .  When asked, Peskov denied that Russia’s decision to allow the deal to lapse was related to Ukraine’s claimed strike on the bridge connecting mainland Russia to occupied Crimea on Monday. “These are absolutely unrelated events,” he said.

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/07/17/europe/russia-ukraine-grain-deal-intl/index.html

[sneakypete]

The two are unrelated.  The grain export deal was already scheduled to expire on Monday.  The decision not to renew had already been made prior to the Kerch bridge hit.

@Hoodat

Thanks!

[Kamaji]

Wagner fighter reportedly executed comrades for refusing parts in mutiny

By Snejana Farberov
July 18, 2023

Two Wagner Group mercenaries were executed by their colleague for refusing to participate in Yevgeny Prigozhin’s short-lived armed mutiny last month, according to Russian officials and news reports.

The corpses of the fighters were found on July 6 resting by the side a highway that runs between the Russian city of Voronezh and the occupied city of Luhansk in eastern Ukraine, reported the influential Telegram news channel Mash.

The Wagner Group men were discovered next to a bullet-riddled van with military license plates, which was filled with an arsenal of weapons, including a pair of AK-74 assault rifle, a machine gun, ammunition and seven grenades.

Mash shared photos online showing a blurred image of a slain mercenary and the dark-colored van resting in a patch of grass.

Both victims were dressed in military uniforms but did not have any identification papers on them, according to the Telegram channel Baza.

*  *  *

Source:  https://nypost.com/2023/07/18/two-wagner-fighters-killed-for-refusing-to-partake-in-mutiny/

[Cyber Liberty]

The Blockers had Blockers?

[Kamaji]

Ukraine admits ‘complicated’ situation in east as Russia claims advances

By Snejana Farberov
July 18, 2023

Ukraine admitted that the fighting situation is the east was “complicated” Tuesday — as Russia claimed its forces had advanced more than a mile in the Kupiansk area where the enemy had amassed a force of 100,000 troops.

Comments from both sides have suggested that the fighting on the front lines was ferocious.

Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of Ukrainian ground forces, said in an update that Moscow had concentrated forces in the direction of Kupiansk — a strategically important railway junction in the Kharkiv region — but that Ukrainian troops were holding them back.

“The situation is complicated but under control (in the east),” Syrskyi said on his Telegram channel.

Meanwhile, the Russian state-controlled TASS news agency quoted the Defense Ministry as saying its forces had moved forward by up to 1.2 miles in the direction of Kupiansk.

*  *  *

Source:  https://nypost.com/2023/07/18/ukraine-admits-complicated-fighting-situation-as-russia-claims-advances/

[bilo]

@Kamaji

Am I the only one thinking that is going to hurt Russia as much,and maybe even more,than Ukraine?

After all,Russia has no other real income coming into the country,and this has to be showing up in places like Moscow  and St.Petersburg by  now.

They are still selling a lot of oil. Also, if Ukraine can't export their grain countries that need the food will look to Russia.

[DB]

They are still selling a lot of oil. Also, if Ukraine can't export their grain countries that need the food will look to Russia.

Ukraine can move it through Romania and through the Black Sea under Romanian flagged ships.