Posted on 03/25/2022 7:18:47 AM PDT by tomd2
Thursday, US intelligence officials leaked a classified assessment about the performance of Russian precision-guided munitions in the Ukraine invasion.
The United States assesses that Russia is suffering failure rates as high as 60% for some of the precision-guided missiles it is using to attack Ukraine, three U.S. officials with knowledge of the intelligence told Reuters.
The disclosure could help explain why Russia has failed to achieve what most could consider basic objectives since its invasion a month ago, such as neutralizing Ukraine’s air force, despite the apparent strength of its military against Ukraine’s much smaller armed forces.
The U.S. officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the information, did not provide evidence to support the assessment and did not disclose what precisely was driving high Russian missile failure rates.
One of the staples on social media accounts reporting from Ukraine has been the very high rate of cruise missiles that have failed to detonate.
from Twitter
#russian dud missle stuck in kitchen in one of #ukrainian homes #Ukraine #Russia #war pic.twitter.com/jHQFnaAwMd https://twitter.com/DEFENSEEXPRESS/status/1504719056716324871 — Crimes Of War (@CrimesOfWarDoc) March 20, 2022
OSINTtechnical @Osinttechnical · Mar 24, 2022 The United States assesses that Russia is suffering failure rates as high as 60% for some of the precision-guided missiles it is using to attack Ukraine, three U.S. officials with knowledge of the intelligence told Reuters.
https://www.reuters.com/resizer/qwwdr8DbAE6Q-0vNoGPehbmt5E4=/1200x0/filters:quality(80)/cloudfront-us-east-2.images.arcpublishing.com/reuters/Y5YDJGQTLROU3MKBTIUW4Q46U4.jpg
A missile is seen after a shelling, amid Russia's invasion of Ukraine, in Kharkiv, Ukraine March 24, 2022.
https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/exclusive-us-assesses-up-60-failure-rate-some-russian-missiles-officials-say-2022-03-24/
Exclusive: Up to 60% failure rate for some Russian missiles in Ukraine, U.S. officials say The United States assesses that Russia is suffering failure rates as high as 60% for some of the precision-guided missiles it is using to attack Ukraine, three U.S. officials with knowledge of the...
NoMoreMrNiceBlyler @e_blyler maybe they’re just drunk? https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FOp6eO4VgBYutnY?format=jpg&name=900x900
Problems with fuzing are not unknown. The most famous example of this is the Mark 6 exploder used in the Mark 14 and Mark 15 torpedoes of the US Navy until September 1943. The flaws of the exploder and the torpedo produced a dud rate of over 50% in the standard submarine torpedo. The problem was caused by the Navy weapons designers wanting to avoid the cost of a field trial.
Precision-guided munitions are essential in modern warfare. However, in Ukraine, the proliferation of air defense systems, particularly MANPADS, has made flight below 10,000 feet very unhealthy. By the same token, dropping gravity bombs from above 10,000 feet, given the skill level of the Russian Air Force, which flew eight hours per month before the war, is not much better than using a trebuchet.
If this report is accurate, it speaks to massive manufacturing and possibly engineering design problems in the Russian arms industry.
Vodka.........................
Like our torpedo problems at the start of WWII against the Japanese.
Russia isn’t using their top equipment in Ukraine. They are saving it in case NATO gets involved. Also this is information warfare. The actual assessment means nothing.
Reuters article does not include the twitter links
https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/exclusive-us-assesses-up-60-failure-rate-some-russian-missiles-officials-say-2022-03-24/
We tell all this but we can’t count votes, hmmmm???
Yes we all know they sent the JV team to Ukraine and the varsity is back training in Moscow. /s
Anonymous sources: a MSM tactic to peddle junk.
Their “not-top” equipment has a 60% failure rate?!?
We can trust the same U.S. intelligence agencies who said the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation.
So, three “officials” leaked classified info to Reuters. Isn’t that, like, a crime or something?
More likely that satellite imagery is their source. The performance of Russian military tech against a first world adversary would be a strong reason to direct our NRO resources to observing 24/7. Also different satellites can track Tussian comms . Now maybe the sources of this story are BSing the reporters but our tech is such that a report such as this is more than possible.
Looks like a lotta duds are doing a lot of damage.
“as high as”
“for some of”
“what most could consider”
“up to”
“could help explain”
“who spoke on condition of anonymity”
“did not provide evidence”
“possibly”
I remember a story I read in National Review about thirty-five years ago.
The author of the story had succeeded in being sneaked into a Soviet air base in Afghanistan. He told some interesting stories about what he'd seen.
One of them was about the strong smell of jet fuel he experienced as he was being driven into the base; the road cut through what appeared to be a swamp.
He asked one of the crew members about this, and they explained it as follows: the aircraft at that base used pure ethanol as a coolant for their radars. They consumed coolant at the rate of one-half ton of ethanol for each twelve tons of fuel burned. Therefore, Soviet accountants checked the fuel and alcohol shipments very closely to ensure that this ratio was maintained, in order to detect any "unauthorized use" of the alcohol coolant.
This meant that for each gallon of alcohol consumed for recreational purposes, about 24 gallons of fuel must disappear. Simply burning it would create a lot of smoke that would be easily spotted, draw too much attention. So the crew members had taken to dumping the fuel out in the woods.
There were several thousand crew members at the base, which by then had been in operation for almost ten years.
Being able to track cruise missiles in real time from satellites might contribute to their failure rate...
Russia would be a much stronger and probably free-er nation if they would learn not to drink themselves into oblivion at every opportunity.
A close friend was working in Russia a couple of decades ago.
A Russian accomplice and he were able to get on base. He used a fake KGB card to bluff his way in.
It does not mean much, but it is a data point.
Do tell, I’m dying to hear about the great Russian equipment being held back.
Sometime or somewhere, US intelligence officials leaked a classified assessment about the current thing.
The United States assesses that the thing is bad, three U.S. officials with knowledge of the intelligence told Reuters.
The disclosure could help explain past things, current things, or future things.
The U.S. officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the information, did not provide evidence to support the assessment of the thing and did not disclose details of the thing.
One of the staples on social media accounts has been the thing.
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