Live Conflict Ukraine-Russia War

[Relic]

We're getting a clearer picture of the tank battalions that will be sent to Ukraine in 2023. A Ukrainian tank battalion consists of 31 tanks. This is what the battalions will look like from what we know so far.

Battalion #1 (Jan-Feb)
28x T-55 (Slovenia)
3x T-72 (Czech Republic)

Battalion #2 (Feb-Mar)
31x PT-91 Twardy (Poland)

Battalion #3 (Feb-Mar)
31x T-72B (Poland)

Battalion #4 (Mar-Apr)
31x T-72B (USA / Netherlands)

Battalion #4 (Mar-Apr)
14× Leopard 2A6 (Germany)
3x Leopard 2A6 (Portugal)
14x Challenger 2 (Britain)

Battalion #5 (Apr-May)
14x Leopard 2A4 (Poland)
8x Leopard 2A4 (Norway)
6x Leopard 2A4 (Spain)
4x Leopard 2A4 (Canada)

Battalion #6 (Jun-Jul)
31x Leopard 1A5 (Germany)

Battalion #7 (Aug-Sept)
31x Leopard 1A5 (Germany)

Battalion #8 (2023 unknown)
31x M1A2 Abrams (USA)

I expect to see a couple more battalions announced throughout the year. The following have not yet been announced, but I'm expecting them...

Battalion #9
31x T-72B (Morocco)

Battalion #10
10x Leopard 2A4 (Finland)
10x Leopard 2A4 (Sweden)
7x Leopard 2A4 (Germany)
4x Leopard 2A4 (Canada)

Battalion #11
31x T-72B (Poland)

Battalion #12
31× M1A1 Abrams (USA)

Battalion #13
31× Leopard 1A5 (Belgium)

Battalion #14
31x Leopard 1A5 (Denmark)

Battalion #15
31x Leopard 1A5 (Netherlands)

 

[Soldier30]

A Russian professional sniper, howling near Ugledar, spoke about the intricacies of a sniper's work in battles in Ukraine. The sniper's interview is large and the most detailed at the moment.

Russian craftsmen conducted a test flight of a homemade FPV kamikaze drone with a simulated rocket-propelled grenade from an RPG grenade launcher.

The Su-24M aircraft of PMC Wagner, hit by a MANPADS missile of the Ukrainian armies, was able to return to the base. After the impact of the Ukrainian missile, a fire started in the engines, despite this and the fact that the aircraft's controls were damaged, the crew was able to land the aircraft.

A 152-mm divisional self-propelled howitzer 2S19 "Msta-S" of the Ukrainian army came under attack from a Russian kamikaze drone "Lancet". This is the first footage of Ukraine's Msta-S self-propelled guns being hit by Lancet drones.

Footage of the assault on the Ukrainian stronghold by three Russian combat vehicles, BMPT "Terminator", BMD-2K-AU and BTR-D with a ZU-23 anti-aircraft artillery mount. The crews of combat vehicles approached the enemy and opened heavy fire on him. The video has been edited, the dead Ukrainian servicemen have been cut from the video.

 

[Era_shield]

Look at how convincing these decoys are. Even some mines strewn around so that when hit it makes it look like ammo is cooking off:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1628534650057461761

 

[Kathirz]

Look at how convincing these decoys are. Even some mines strewn around so that when hit it makes it look like ammo is cooking off:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1628534650057461761

Good one. Some of them are being made in Czech republic:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1628522734052601856

 

[Azeri441]

So where is this massive Russian offensive we were promised?

 

[Gary]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1628694821345935360

 

[Gary]

The Russian Army Is Time-Traveling Back To 1966​

The Soviet BMP-1 was one of the first modern infantry fighting vehicles. It both reflected, and helped to drive, profound changes in Soviet ground-combat doctrine when it entered service in 1966.




Fifty-seven years later, the BMP-1 is obsolete. And that’s a big problem for the Russian army, which after a year of hard fighting in Ukraine is so desperately short of newer BMP-2 and BMP-3 fighting vehicles it has had no choice but to reactivate hundreds of stored BMP-1s.


A recent tally by an open-source-intelligence analyst underscores the BMP crisis. The Russian army widened its war in Ukraine in February 2022 with 400 active BMP-3s, 2,800 BMP-2s and 600 BMP-1s.


Over the next 12 months, the Ukrainians destroyed or captured at least 220 BMP-3s, 750 BMP-2s and 300 BMP-1s. The Kremlin is sitting on huge stocks of surplus BMP-1s and BMP-2s—7,200 and 1,400, respectively—but it has zero of the latest BMP-3s in reserve.

So as the Russian army scrambles to rebuild its battered forces, it’s replacing the third-generation BMPs it’s lost with second-generation and—even more so—first-generation BMPs it’s pulling out of long-term storage. The army is, in technological terms, traveling back in time.

The BMP-1 is armored—albeit thinly—and it carries personnel, but it’s not an armored personnel carrier. That’s because, in mechanized warfare, APCs haul troops into battle but don’t actually fight. They’re too lightly armed, too lightly protected.


An infantry fighting vehicle does as its name implies. It hauls infantry into battle and, unlike an APC, also stays and fights. That requires thicker armor and bigger weapons than you’d find on an APC, which tends to weigh on an IFV’s passenger capacity. A Russian MT-LB APC can pack in 10 or 11 infantry; a BMP-1 IFV squeezes in just eight.

But even that modest troop-capacity meant major design compromises as BMP-inventor Pavel Isakov struggled to balance firepower, protection and payload. For one, the BMP-1 stows ammunition in the passenger compartment. A direct hit can set off the ammo, with obvious negative implications for the infantry sitting right next to the exploding shells.

The 13-ton, three-crew BMP-1 has other problems. Its low-velocity 73-millimeter gun is unimpressive. Its turret has blind spots: it can’t rotate through 10 o’clock without the gun running into the hull-mounted searchlight.

The vehicle’s biggest flaw is its steel armor, which is just a quarter-inch thick in some places and can’t even stop heavy machine guns firing armor-piercing rounds. It’s not for no reason that the major driver of the BMP-2 and BMP-3’s developments, respectively in the late 1970s and early ’80s, was protection.

There’s no shortage of videos on social media depicting Russian BMP-1s and their crews and passengers coming to bad ends in Ukraine. Peppered by artillery, popped by mines, pulverized by anti-tank missiles, the BMPs explode like firecrackers and burn like kindling.

The Russian army in a year has written off around 1,300 BMPs of all models. But a thousand were BMP-2s and BMP-3s with their thicker armor. The Russians could lose even more IFVs in the next year as the older, and much more vulnerable, BMP-1 once again becomes their standard fighting vehicle. Just like in 1966.

The Russian Army Is Time-Traveling Back To 1966 As It Reequips With Hundreds Of Old BMP-1 Fighting Vehicles

The vehicle’s biggest flaw is its steel armor, which is just a quarter-inch thick in some places and can’t even stop heavy machine guns firing armor-piercing rounds.

www.forbes.com

 

[Era_shield]

Check mate Ukraine. 1954 armour has arrived:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1628695296552144896

 

[Gary]

 

[UkroTurk]

How Putin blundered into Ukraine — then doubled down

The decision to invade was taken after consulting only a tiny circle. The Russian leader has since become even more isolated Planning for the Ukraine invasion was carried out by a tiny group of people handpicked by Vladimir Putin ©
FT montage: Getty Images/AP


How Putin blundered into Ukraine — then doubled down on twitter (opens in a new window) How Putin blundered into Ukraine —


At about 1am on February 24 last year, Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, received a troubling phone call.
After spending months building up a more than 100,000-strong invasion force on the border with Ukraine, Vladimir Putin had given the go-ahead to invade. The decision caught Lavrov completely by surprise. Just days earlier, the Russian president had polled his security council for their opinions on recognising two separatist statelets in the Donbas, an industrial border region in Ukraine, at an excruciatingly awkward televised session — but had left them none the wiser about his true intentions.


Keeping Lavrov in the dark was not unusual for Putin, who tended to concentrate his foreign policy decision-making among a handful of close confidants, even when it undermined Russia’s diplomatic efforts.
On this occasion, the phone call made Lavrov one of the very few people who had any knowledge of the plan ahead of time.

The Kremlin’s senior leadership all found out about the invasion only when they saw Putin declare a “special military operation” on television that morning.

Shibboleth Authentication Request

https://www-ft-com.ezp.lib.cam.ac.uk/content/80002564-33e8-48fb-b734-44810afb7a49



Later that day, several dozen oligarchs gathered at the Kremlin for a meeting arranged only the day before, aware that the invasion would trigger western sanctions that could destroy their empires. “Everyone was completely losing it,” says a person who attended the event. While they waited, one of the oligarchs spied Lavrov exiting another meeting and pressed him for an explanation about why Putin had decided to invade. Lavrov had no answer: the officials he was there to see in the Kremlin had known less about it than he did. Stunned, the oligarch asked Lavrov how Putin could have planned such an enormous invasion in such a tiny circle — so much so that most of the senior officials at the Kremlin, Russia’s economic cabinet and its business elite had not believed it was even possible. “He has three advisers,” Lavrov replied, according to the oligarch. “Ivan the Terrible. Peter the Great. And Catherine the Great.” Under Putin’s invasion plan, Russia’s troops were to seize Kyiv within a matter of days in a brilliant, comparatively bloodless blitzkrieg. Instead, the war has proved to be a quagmire of historic proportions for Russia. A year on, Putin’s invasion has claimed well over 200,000 dead and injured among Russia’s armed forces, according to US and European officials; depleted its stock of tanks, artillery and cruise missiles; and cut the country off from global financial markets and western supply chains. Nor has the fighting in Ukraine brought Putin any closer to his vaguely defined goals of “demilitarising” and “de-Nazifying” Kyiv. Though Russia now controls 17 per cent of Ukraine’s internationally recognised territory, it has abandoned half of the land it seized in the war’s early weeks — including a humiliating retreat from Kherson, the only provincial capital under its control, just weeks after Putin attempted to annex it. But as the war rumbles on with no end in sight, Putin has given no indication he intends to back down on his war efforts. At his state-of-the-union address on Tuesday, Putin insisted the war was “about the very existence of our country” and said the west had forced him to invade Ukraine. “They’re the ones who started the war. We are using force to stop it,” he said. Even as the huge cost of the invasion to Russia becomes apparent to him, Putin is more determined than ever to see it through, people who know him say.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1628650097348059138

 

[Ecderha]

So where is this massive Russian offensive we were promised?

in putin's wet dream mind

 

[UkroTurk]

US consider sending fifth-generation fighter jets to Ukraine - Nuland

It is about providing aircraft in the long term.

The United States is discussing providing Ukraine with fifth-generation fighters (these include the F-22 Raptor and F-35 Lightning II, which are no longer in production).

This can happen as part of meeting her long-term needs, US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland said in an interview with The Washington Post.

"We continue the discussion. We are considering long-term air defense. Some countries in Europe are interested in providing them. This is a choice that they will have to make. But again, this is a picture that is changing, we see that Ukraine needs it," she said , commenting on the possibility of providing 4th or 5th generation fighters.

Top State Department official on U.S. support for Ukraine (Full Stream 2/23)

During a historic trip to Ukraine this week, President Biden pledged new military assistance and U.S. support for "as long as it takes.” On Thursday, Feb. 23...

www.youtube.com

 

[Ecderha]

another one....
choose. Window or tea?

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1628792654719754242

 

[Bogeyman]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1628864721586728968

 

[Relic]

USA will announce another $2 Billion weapons package for Ukraine tomorrow. The package will come in the form of USAI funds, rather than drawdown authority.

I'll provide the full details of the package tomorrow, upon its release.

 

[Heartbang]

US consider sending fifth-generation fighter jets to Ukraine - Nuland


View attachment 54342


It is about providing aircraft in the long term.

The United States is discussing providing Ukraine with fifth-generation fighters (these include the F-22 Raptor and F-35 Lightning II, which are no longer in production).

This can happen as part of meeting her long-term needs, US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland said in an interview with The Washington Post.

"We continue the discussion. We are considering long-term air defense. Some countries in Europe are interested in providing them. This is a choice that they will have to make. But again, this is a picture that is changing, we see that Ukraine needs it," she said , commenting on the possibility of providing 4th or 5th generation fighters.

Top State Department official on U.S. support for Ukraine (Full Stream 2/23)

During a historic trip to Ukraine this week, President Biden pledged new military assistance and U.S. support for "as long as it takes.” On Thursday, Feb. 23...

www.youtube.com

Nuclear annhilation speedrun any%

 

[Relic]

Spain will send an initial batch of 6 Leopard 2A4 MBTs to Ukraine and will prepare an additional 4 to be sent at a later (unspecified) date.

Spain to send six 2A4 Leopard tanks to Ukraine -defence minister

Spain plans to send six German-made 2A4 Leopard battle tanks to Ukraine after they undergo repairs, Defence Minister Margarita Robles told lawmakers on Wednesday, adding that the number could increase over time.

www.reuters.com

 

[Ryder]

So where is this massive Russian offensive we were

Hello. I'm Leonard Nimoy. The following tale of a Russian Offensive is true. And by true, I mean false. It's all lies. But they're entertaining lies. And in the end, isn't that the real truth?

 

[UkroTurk]

During the day, the Armed Forces of Ukraine repelled about 100 attacks by troops

AFU successfully repel enemy attacks

The main efforts of the enemy are now concentrated on conducting offensive operations in the Kupyansky, Limansky, Bakhmutsky, Avdeevsky and Miners directions.

The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine published a summary of the Russian military invasion of Ukraine as of Friday morning, February 24, on the anniversary of the full-scale war.







"The Russian Federation has been continuing a full-scale armed aggression against Ukraine for a year already. The main efforts are now focused on conducting offensive operations in the Kupyansky, Limansky, Bakhmutsky, Avdeevsky and Shakhtyorsky directions. Over the past day, our defenders repulsed about 100 enemy attacks in these directions," the statement says. summary.

Russian troops delivered 10 missile and 31 air strikes. We made more than 40 attacks from multiple launch rocket systems. As a result of these criminal acts, civilian facilities in Kharkiv and Kherson regions were damaged. There are dead and wounded among the civilian population.





Aviation of the Defense Forces in a day delivered 17 strikes on the areas of concentration of the occupiers, as well as 4 strikes on the positions of anti-aircraft missile systems. The rocket and artillery units hit 3 enemy manpower concentration areas, an ammunition depot, a fuel and lubricants depot, and another important enemy target.

 

[UkroTurk]

China Reportedly Negotiating with Russia To Supply Kamikaze Drones​

The War in Ukraine: China Is Reportedly Negotiating with Russia To Supply Kamikaze Drones

The U.S. and Germany have warned China not to deliver weapons to Russia. According to information obtained by DER SPIEGEL, however, Beijing and Moscow are said to be negotiating the purchase of 100 strike drones, which could be delivered as soon as April.

www.spiegel.de