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OT: World Politics

Wayward DP

Wayward DP

Well-known member
MindzEye said:
They've got some time. Mud season doesn't really clear up until May in eastern Ukraine.

It's too late to alter the course of the winter campaign, so all that really matters is June-September for an armor push..
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I just hope they don't lose too much ground or troops between now and then. Russia really seems to be throwing the kitchen sink at their defensive lines. Saw nearly 1,000 casualties today alone. Craziness. Up to over 120,000 total (Ukrainian estimate, I imagine it is actually much higher). Gotta think they run out of troops again at some point, but wonder where they get to in the meantime...
 
MindzEye

MindzEye

Wayward Ditch Pig
Wayward DP said:
I just hope they don't lose too much ground or troops between now and then.
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I'd be surprised if they lost anything at all anywhere but a bit more of Bakhmut. There's chatter about another big Russian "offensive" about to start, but we're on our what how? 5th of those with little change in the macro.

The biggest macro change likely coming in the next 8 weeks is the Svatove-Kreminna front imo, where Ukraine has been making small incremental gains over the last 3-4 weeks (took another strategic point necessary to squeeze the Russians out of Svatove last week and most war maps I've seen lately have 1-2km outside of Kreminna as "contested" now).

Bakhmut really serves no strategic purpose at all, if the Ukies fall back from that...meh. There's a bunch of forest, small rivers and rolling hills to the north. Lots of places to set up a defensive line and losing Bakhmut kind of does...nothing. It's a political target, not a military target. Wagner/Prigozhin giving the middle finger to the military establishment. Losing Svatove and Kreminna though makes the Russian defensive line in Luhansk untenable, puts the most important logistics hub north of Luhansk in direct jeopardy and causes a massive reset of about 150km of Russian defensive line unless they want to get flanked. Puts retaking SEV on the menu more or less immediately and probably triggers another one of those Russian major backwards advances up there that we grew so fond of.
 
Wayward DP

Wayward DP

Well-known member
MindzEye said:
I'd be surprised if they lost anything at all anywhere but a bit more of Bakhmut. There's chatter about another big Russian "offensive" about to start, but we're on our what how? 5th of those with little change in the macro.

The biggest macro change likely coming in the next 8 weeks is the Svatove-Kreminna front imo, where Ukraine has been making small incremental gains over the last 3-4 weeks (took another strategic point necessary to squeeze the Russians out of Svatove last week and most war maps I've seen lately have 1-2km outside of Kreminna as "contested" now).

Bakhmut really serves no strategic purpose at all, if the Ukies fall back from that...meh. There's a bunch of forest, small rivers and rolling hills to the north. Lots of places to set up a defensive line and losing Bakhmut kind of does...nothing. It's a political target, not a military target. Wagner/Prigozhin giving the middle finger to the military establishment. Losing Svatove and Kreminna though makes the Russian defensive line in Luhansk untenable, puts the most important logistics hub north of Luhansk in direct jeopardy and causes a massive reset of about 150km of Russian defensive line unless they want to get flanked. Puts retaking SEV on the menu more or less immediately and probably triggers another one of those Russian major backwards advances up there that we grew so fond of.
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yeah I'm hoping for a breakthrough on the Svatove-Kreminna line. does very much seem like the Ukies are inching forward and all the Russkie counter attempts have been foiled.

I also expect that once said breakthrough occurs, that defensive line rapidly deteriorates and wouldn't surprise me to see the Ukrainians rapidly advance to Starobilsk.

Just seems like we're getting back to the grinding war of attrition that was playing out in the Donbas prior to the Kharkiv/Kherson counteroffensives, that saw incremental Russian gains (granted, at humongous loss of life and resources) and wore on Ukrainian morale.

perhaps I am actually more concerned with optics than military success/progress. you know if Russia takes Bakhmut they're going to make it out like they won both world wars simultaneously.
 
MindzEye

MindzEye

Wayward Ditch Pig
I think we've arrived at the point where Russia has suffered enough real defeats and PR black eyes that western nations are beyond backing down on their support. 3 months ago there was a lot of mumbling about European winter coming, dependency on Russian O&G breaking Europes back, Ukraine can't win a war of attrition against the much larger Russia, etc.

Fast forward and European energy security is fine, India keeps bending Russia over on progressively worse and worse export deals (most recent deal is 33 dollar a barrel discounted to Brent (which is 86 bucks a barrel today...so with discount Russia is selling to India at 53 dollars a barrel...their cost of production as of september was 44 a barrel fwiw according to internal Russian documents...but that's probably with some grift and theft built in to the cost) and Ukraine is winning the battle of attrition (slow gains in the strategically important luhansk region, already won in Kherson, gathering forces in ZAP for an eventual push) and all they've lost is a few miles of strategically useless Bakhmut.

The attrition aspect of the war has changed pretty fundamentally since the Donbas offensive you reference. HIMARS and other long range systems given to the Ukies have changed the way Russia has to operate their arty. They used to be able to just line up, smash a zone, roll forward, smash the next zone, onward and upward. The Ukies didn't have arty with enough range to do much more than delay Russian advances and make them bleed heavy once infantry came in to sweep up after arty barrages. But the Ukies have the ability smesh supply depots if they're anywhere remotely convenient to the Russians, which has stretched already terrible logistics to near uselessness. Doesn't matter how many more arty pieces you have if you can't get shells to them that allow for a high firing rate. Also the traditional arty the Ukies were given (M777's etc) now match or exceed Russian range with better accuracy, so even with less pieces, the Ukies can maintain parity. Rolling fire just isn't an advantage for Russia anymore like it was during the Donbas offensive.
 
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MindzEye

MindzEye

Wayward Ditch Pig
Its almost like it was all a concerted push by major corporations to try to push back against workers wage and rights gains made during covid or something and as a repudiation of covid stimulus spending.

You know, or something.
 
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