Thanks, that is interesting. So no powerful shells, just bomblets that likely cannot even penetrate an IFV. The lack of air defense shows just how caught-short everyone was with the arrival of drones.
The inability for the West to significantly scale-up production of just about anything (even the scale up of 155’s is relatively minor, considering the attrition-level starting point) is one of the main reasons I opposed this war (I’m not too hot on risking nukes flying either).
I knew the US mindset when it came to paying for extra capacity (something from the Yamaguchi School of Economics, or whatever they hell it’s called): “Shut up, when we need it, we’ll build it, you’re just wasting money now asking for those things.”. Unfortunately, surge-capacity doesn’t work that way in the modern world, where you need existing SECURE supply lines (i.e., not from China) and SKILLED workers for production lines, rather than lesbian vaginal studies majors. This ‘transition’ became OBVIOUS one Leftists took effective control of our institutions.
I also know that Russia never left the Soviet mindset (which was ours, by the way, going into WW2, and to a lesser extent after WW2) which was to have large inventories, and then be ready for large-scale surge production.
So, given the above, it probably wasn’t the brightest move to start a war on Russia’s borders, but ARROGANCE won out, and we would even got a taste of that arrogance here every once in a while, even before this war, such as: “No way that hypersonics can work for Russia and China (based on the fact that we decided not to develop them)”.
“So, given the above, it probably wasn’t the brightest move to start a war on Russia’s borders, but ARROGANCE won out, ...”
It sure did.
And they still think that all they have to do is borrow and print, and Ukraine magically keeps fighting.