vikingTON Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 20 hours ago, The Other Foot said: Sorry, but since when has geopolitics been as black and white as 'those guys invited those guys to help with this thing, so they're all best buddies now'? Would Georgia's government legitimately invite Russian troops in to keep the peace in Tbilisi? Of course not. The Kazakh request wasn't some sort of Warsaw Pact 'friendly assistance' either - the government wanted heavies and asked Putin to provide them, just as Belarus did the previous year. You do not do this if the geopolitical relationship between the two countries (or at least leaders) doesn't include a significant degree of trust. Quote Georgia is a far more obvious target - we all remember the invasion of 2008 - but a psychopathic dictator such as Putin, determined to secure his place in the pantheon of psychopathic Russian dictators, will not have ruled the Central Asian nations out of the equation. Surely. I agree. But the original claim was that the Kazakhs were next, which does not at all follow from a Russian invasion of Ukraine. Tbilisi's government has every right to be afraid, given its fraught relationship with Putin and the wider readjustments within the Caucasus region. The Russians rolling tanks into Astana though - instead of trying to turn a friendly regime into an effective client state - is just as ridiculous as the idea that they would just continue rolling straight through Ukraine and into NATO's easternmost states. Putin's geopolitical aim is to rebuild Russia's sphere of influence to at least the pre-1991 Soviet frontier. That's not in itself the act of a psychopath, and when he leaves the next Russian leader who isn't looking into a bottle of vodka like Yeltsin will have similar objectives. Even the 'liberal' opposition leaders. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silvio Tattiescone Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 More about the Amnesty report that Field Marshall VT drooled over - https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/08/13/amnesty-ukraine-civilians-at-risk-why-i-quit/ 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HeWhoWalksBehindTheRows Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 On 13/08/2022 at 22:12, steve55 said: Another hero from Ukraine: Dr Snekotron would be a great name for a DJ from Inverness, or a teuchter Autobot. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vikingTON Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 (edited) 3 hours ago, Newbornbairn said: More about the Amnesty report that Field Marshall VT drooled over - https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/08/13/amnesty-ukraine-civilians-at-risk-why-i-quit/ I would be surprised if a Ukrainian wasn't quitting Amnesty in a tantrum, now that breaches in the pesky laws of war are being highlighted on both sides of the conflict. A large number of people in the UK can't even accept that 'our boys' should be prosecuted for murdering civilians fully 50 years ago - whereas this is a hot blooded situation. It doesn't make her 'analysis' for a right-wing rag like the WP correct though. Edited August 16, 2022 by vikingTON 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jacksgranda Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 6 hours ago, LongTimeLurker said: Think two targets in Crimea have probably had a visit from ballistic missiles this morning although this guy favours the partisan sabotage theory and may turn out to be right: My understanding is bridges have been taken out prior to this on the two railways out of Crimea into the rest of occupied southern Ukraine and there's no way to send trains west from Donetsk because the frontlines are too close in Donetsk oblast so the Ukrainians appear to be systematically taking out Russian logistics. That would be good - and smart. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ICTChris Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 One of the guys who runs a popular Wagner affiliated Telegram channel has been confirmed as having been killed in the HIMARs attack on Popansa. Translation: Allegedly (and I guess we'll never really know) the channel posted this photo, handily featuring the address of the base visible. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DiegoDiego Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 The army of Odin? I assumed they would be orthodox, are they playing up Varangian angle? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TxRover Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 7 hours ago, LongTimeLurker said: Think two targets in Crimea have probably had a visit from ballistic missiles this morning although this guy favours the partisan sabotage theory and may turn out to be right: The problem is there is little of a ballistic nature in any inventory that Ukraine could have acquired with suitable range AND accuracy to hit these Crimean targets. The relative risk of handing a 200+ mile, ballistic missile with GPS accuracy to a nation at war with Russia and with areas that would put significant areas of Russia under threat is sorta serious. Unless someone snuck a few ATACMS into a delivery, the primary option for long-range strike would be a Neptune cruise missile with a locally developed land-attack guidance system…and even that is capped at about 170 miles. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LongTimeLurker Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 There is some speculation that the Ukrainians have developed their own system with funding from the Saudis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hrim-2 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
welshbairn Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 30 minutes ago, TxRover said: The problem is there is little of a ballistic nature in any inventory that Ukraine could have acquired with suitable range AND accuracy to hit these Crimean targets. The relative risk of handing a 200+ mile, ballistic missile with GPS accuracy to a nation at war with Russia and with areas that would put significant areas of Russia under threat is sorta serious. Unless someone snuck a few ATACMS into a delivery, the primary option for long-range strike would be a Neptune cruise missile with a locally developed land-attack guidance system…and even that is capped at about 170 miles. My knowledge of this is zero, but is it possible a less accurate but long range rocket system could be combined with special forces guiding the attack with laser or radio targeting? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sergeant Wilson Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 1 hour ago, welshbairn said: My knowledge of this is zero, It's not stopping anyone else. 11 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LongTimeLurker Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 (edited) 2 hours ago, welshbairn said: My knowledge of this is zero, but is it possible a less accurate but long range rocket system could be combined with special forces guiding the attack with laser or radio targeting? Similarly clueless but inquiring minds like to know. I think if this info is accurate they would need GPS to be the guidance rather than some guy in a hedge with a laser pointer: Edited August 16, 2022 by LongTimeLurker 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ICTChris Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 38,000 cars cross the Kerch Bridge to Russia today, a single day record. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Todd_is_God Posted August 16, 2022 Share Posted August 16, 2022 14 minutes ago, ICTChris said: 38,000 cars cross the Kerch Bridge to Russia today, a single day record. Russian home? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TxRover Posted August 17, 2022 Share Posted August 17, 2022 (edited) 10 hours ago, welshbairn said: My knowledge of this is zero, but is it possible a less accurate but long range rocket system could be combined with special forces guiding the attack with laser or radio targeting? Laser guidance is generally bombs or air-launched (and occasionally land-launched) missiles, and not generally effective for ballistic (fast) weapons returning to earth. Radio targeting would require homing on a target signal…why plant a transmitter (that can be detected) instead of a small explosive? In either case, terminal fine-scale corrections are nearly impossible for ballistic trajectory warheads due to speeds and atmospheric resistance. The rapid progress of the warhead renders even small control surface deflections as hugely magnified, the computing power required to anticipate those impacts is huge, and the temperatures that any control surfaces would reach require extremely advanced metallurgical processes well beyond most countries. Russia has stated it has some warheads with limited maneuverability in the terminal phase, but even that hasn’t been confirmed and was reported as a fixed “juke” program to make the interception of the warheads more difficult. Edit: Saw the suggestion of the Hrim-2 SRBM, and with its lower trajectory and slower descent speed, GPS guidance would be plausible, but jamming might be an issue. The Russians have been playing with GPS spoofing for a decade plus now. Edited August 17, 2022 by TxRover 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ICTChris Posted August 17, 2022 Share Posted August 17, 2022 I saw someone suggest that the explosions the other day were due to a small quadrocopter drone flying over the facility and dropping an explosive in. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Other Foot Posted August 17, 2022 Share Posted August 17, 2022 (edited) Sky News reporting it was Ukrainian sabotage groups within Crimea: I think what is clear is there is at least one - if not two - Ukrainian special forces groups operating with Ukraine sympathisers in Crimea to disrupt Russian operations No mention of specific weapons though. Edited August 17, 2022 by The Other Foot 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LongTimeLurker Posted August 17, 2022 Share Posted August 17, 2022 (edited) Think the Ukrainians and by extension the West and its media outlets are happy to keep Vlad guessing on this. Problems with the sabotage angle are that Crimea's Slavic population is largely pro-Russian by all accounts and the northern portion of the peninsula is flat as a pancake with lots of large open fields so not easy to do something like this. Crimean Tatars are the prime suspects for being the portion of the population motivated enough to do something very risky even after eight years. Deported by Stalin during WWII and only able to finally get back in the Gorbachev era with the Ukrainian state having favourable policies towards them while local ethnic Russians would have preferred that they stayed in Central Asia. Edited August 17, 2022 by LongTimeLurker 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TxRover Posted August 17, 2022 Share Posted August 17, 2022 9 hours ago, The Other Foot said: Sky News reporting it was Ukrainian sabotage groups within Crimea: I think what is clear is there is at least one - if not two - Ukrainian special forces groups operating with Ukraine sympathisers in Crimea to disrupt Russian operations No mention of specific weapons though. New discussion of quad-copters with small explosive packages…plausible with the earlier use against troops and vehicles. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lurkst Posted August 18, 2022 Share Posted August 18, 2022 Sounds like the Ruskies were well prepped for this invasion 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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