Posted on 07/05/2022 6:44:38 AM PDT by JonPreston
The war in Ukraine risks turning into a protracted conflict that Russia will eventually win, a leading think-tank has said.
The report by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) warned that current Russian advantages and Ukrainian weaknesses are leading to a style of conflict that favours Moscow.
The capture of the city means that Russia has essentially gained control of the entire Luhansk region, marking Russia's biggest victory since it captured the southern port of Mariupol in late May.
Ukraine's military intelligence chief Kyrlo Budnov said his defence forces had withdrawn "to advantageous positions in order to gain tactical superiority" after the Russians razed the city to the ground.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
I might be wrong. It says that in 2012 Ukraine was the 4th largest arms exporter. In 2019, it was the 12th.
On the other hand, their arms industry is controlled by the government which, IMHO, bodes poorly for it.
They make no fighter, strike aircraft, or SAMs. It doesn’t seem to make ATGMs or light anti-tank weapons. It doesn’t seem to make artillery or ammo.
Russians love artillery wars.
Russians love artillery wars.
Nice selfie.
Russia has no power to support a war of attrition.
The Russian army today is now the most battle-tested modern army in the world.
Western armies haven't fought a modern military force since the Korean War. Every fight we've been in since then has been against brave men wearing sandals.
Actually Ukraine does have their own Stugna ATGM which has been extremely effective, and has been an export product for them for some time. You can find hundreds of videos of Stugna strikes on Russian armor with devastating results. It is a state of the art system.
They do make top tier mobile howitzers too. They just used them to drive the Russians off of Snake Island.
They make excellent sniper rifles, various semi-automatic rifles, and plenty of ammunition.
They built the anti-ship missiles that sunk the Moskva, and they built the Moskva itself a number of years ago.
Making your own ASMs and sinking a Slava class cruiser with them must be a source of pride.
But if they make all that stuff, why are they having to get weaponry from us?
*** Nah. They’re engaging in keyword abuse right now. ***
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The Turkish military says otherwise. In the end THEY dictate policy, not Erdogan. And they want NATO.
...and China much larger!
Nice to have the experts produce this report. I see they worked really hard to avoid having Russia in their name, but forgot to notice that the initials are RUSI. Could it possibly be with a name like that, this report is RUSSIAN propaganda?
“And so they can’t retreat. Generals might want them to retreat, but the politics say no. A time will come when Generals can’t bear to order their personal friends to their deaths. This has the makings of military coup written all over it.”
And I suspect this would be even more true of the military/political situation on Russia, especially since Putin seems to be on the way out. Lot of lost Russian generals.
Hush lady.
“Conventional wisdom says that in a protracted war of attrition between Russia and Ukraine, Russia would win. Still doesn’t make it right.”
Correct.
Russia will also never be able to hold the Ukraine. It will be a meat grinder that makes their adventure into Afghanistan look like a cake walk.
I, for one, look forward to lots of dead Russians.
Payback for losing my father in Vietnam.
You ignored item #2, perhaps the most important item.
In all my years here, I’ve posted maybe a dozen keywords, mainly for book-keeping/filing purposes.
Most likely because of the high volume of weapons and ammunition needed. Also because the USA does not want to send cash, but wants to send military hardware either sitting in inventory here or purchased from US military equipment suppliers. A lot of people seem to think that the budget allocated to support Ukraine gets spent there, but in reality it gets spent here in various factories around the USA.
Military aid for Ukraine helps defend their nation, reduces the strength of the Russian military, and generates jobs and spending here in the USA where the stuff gets built.
On a longer timeline the USA and NATO would rather have Ukraine depending on NATO weapons than increasing their arms industry as a competitor to the NATO weapons providers.
From a strategic point of view which situation is better - some country buys weapons from NATO, and therefore can be influenced and controlled by NATO, or the country develops and sells all kinds of armaments to anyone who wants to buy them. And then the NATO militaries end up facing those weapons in various places around the world.
Those Ukrainian Stugna ATGMs that rip apart Russian main battle tanks would do the same things to tanks and IFVs from other countries as well. Better to have them relying on NATO supplies.
That’s great!
I would rather see Ukraine competing with NATO, Russian and Chinese - competition drives innovation. Also, I’m not interested in NATO manipulating anyone - that’s what got us into this mess.
I don’t want to see the Russians too reduced in strength. IMHO, we missed a bet not making nice with them after they stopped being communists.
The Chicoms, however, can’t possibly suffer enough.
That is not an opinion widely held in Western governments. One reason the USA negotiated with Ukraine for Ukraine to give up their nuclear arsenal was to have one less nuclear armed nation, and to avoid the possibility that the Ukrainians would decide to innovate and commercialize their nuclear weapons technology.
If unfettered competition and a lack of ability to manipulate anyone is so good wouldn't it be a good idea to support the weapons innovation programs in places like Iran and North Korea? Who knows, maybe they will come up with some really good weapons and be willing to sell them to the USA for less than we pay our own companies to build them.
Ukraine never had the codes for the weapons. They couldn’t use them without essentially building new bombs using the material from the old.
The Norks are innovating within the limits of their budgets and expertise. For instance, they could not threaten to nuke Seoul, so instead they built a ginormicus artillery park right on the border in range of Seoul. They have also come up with some interesting mini-subs. And they’re some of the best folks in the world for building bunkers and underground shelters.
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