Russian Ukraine Invasion

(Aug 16, 2022 09:47 PM)Yazata Wrote: The ammunition depot in Crimea that exploded this morning was right next to a rail line with all sorts of ordinance stored right out in the open. Grad multiple rocket launchers, big piles of ammunition crates. Here's video shot from a train, before it blew up.

Just from looking at it, an accident doesn't seem out of the question. It doesn't look like a very professional military operation. The Russians are apparently blaming sabotage.

https://twitter.com/Militarylandnet/stat...3160083457

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/ZSy6pjKvBs4

Russian tourist attractions (Photos from Russian social media of the mysterious attack on the Russian airbase in Crimea.)

Gotta admit, great fireworks.

The Russians are sure having trouble with their ammunition depots. Here's another one blowing up just a few minutes ago in Timonovo, Belgorod oblast, inside Russian territory north of the border.

https://twitter.com/Militarylandnet/stat...8713107457

Edit - And this just in during the last five minutes - loud explosion reported in Kerch in Russian held Crimea, air defense activated. (Edit 2: video appearing on the internet from Kerch showing surface to air missiles launching at... something.)

https://twitter.com/ukrainewar24/status/...4688453632

More reports of explosions in the Sevastopol area, home of the Russian Black Sea fleet and multiple military bases. Unclear if the explosions are incoming attacks or surface to air missile batteries panicking and launching at nothing. But whatever is happening, the Russians are all stirred up.

https://twitter.com/ukrainewar24/status/...9120402433

Edit - Russians in Sevastopol report that their air defense shot down a drone

https://twitter.com/ukrainewar24/status/...8881073152

(Aug 18, 2022 08:55 PM)Yazata Wrote: More reports of explosions in the Sevastopol area, home of the Russian Black Sea fleet and multiple military bases. Unclear if the explosions are incoming attacks or surface to air missile batteries panicking and launching at nothing. But whatever is happening, the Russians are all stirred up.

https://twitter.com/ukrainewar24/status/...9120402433

Just what has the Fellowship managed to get its hands on, that the orcs are so beleaguered? Vlad may start decrying that the West has provided something "unprincipled" to the underdog, and threatening nuclear responses if the "gifts" are not returned or eliminated.

Russia’s Republic of Grief: One of the country’s poorest regions, Dagestan, is also the region that has lost the most men to the war in Ukraine.
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/photo-...c-of-grief

EXCERPTS: . . . the army executing Putin’s “special operation” features a striking number of young men from the ethnic republics. [...] This apparent overrepresentation of minorities is partly a function of demographic trends -- but also of economic inequality and lack of opportunity in many of the areas outside the wealthy metropolises of Moscow and St. Petersburg.

Because a majority of the Russian force consists of kontraktniki, or soldiers on contract, and because the contracts are relatively lucrative (as much as forty-seven hundred dollars a month, according to some sources), the men who sign up are often those who were unable to find gainful employment elsewhere.

[...] The republic that has seen the most war dead, according to official figures -- and where poverty, a martial tradition, and relative loyalty to Moscow intersect -- is Dagestan. ... The republic is predominantly Muslim but incredibly multiethnic, with fourteen official languages. It’s also one of the poorest republics in the country.

[...] Khadizhat Saikumov is a schoolteacher, in her late forties, who lives in the beautiful hillside village of Verkhneye Kazanishche, about an hour’s drive from Dagestan’s capital, Makhachkala. She and her husband, Rasul [...] are mourning their eldest son, Makhach, who joined the military right out of high school.

[...] on March 17th, Makhach was hit by shrapnel in the back of the head near the Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv. It was impossible to evacuate him, and he died later that day. He was twenty-four.

The parents are bereft. [...] Khadizhat is more stoic. In her large, tidy home, she said that she supported the war simply because Makhach had fought in it.

“Makhach was a very religious boy,” she said. “If it wasn’t a just operation, he would not have gone to fight.” Her explanations aligned with Kremlin messaging -- the Ukrainians were Nazis, and they wanted to spread homosexuality to Russia.

“I love Ukraine and Ukrainian culture,” Khadizhat said. “They’re a very good people. But the ones who have taken over there . . . I don’t know. I think, as a teacher, they must not have been given tenderness when they were little. I don’t know how else to explain it.”

[...] There are so many funerals that one runs into them by accident. At one crossroads, a column of cars blocked the way: relatives of a soldier who had recently died in Ukraine. ... Abraham Arabchanov, a local teacher and imam, estimates that thousands of men from Tabasaranskiy Rayon are serving in Ukraine...

[...] Khadizhat told me that the family had received significant financial compensation for Makhach’s death: thirteen million rubles, equivalent to about two hundred and forty thousand dollars... (MORE - missing details, photos)

Multiple explosions reported this evening near the Dnipro river bridge at Nova Kahkovka. The video just shows a few flashes visible, but the audio has the sound of many detonations plus some Ukrainian expletives from those filming it. The Russians have apparently confirmed more damage to the bridge and say that it's impassible for civilian vehicles. These bridge strikes look to me to be the work of HIMARS.

https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/stat...5264301058

And this from yesterday too. Big explosion and fire at the airport in Stary Oskol in Belgorod oblast, Russia, about 150 km north of the front line. 'Special Kherson Cat' exclaims, "Holy HIMARS, what is going on??"

All these new explosions suggest to me that Ukraine has gotten their hands on the longer range surface-to-surface artillery missiles that they've been seeking for months. Since some of them appear to be firing into Russia itself, the country that provided them (the US?) might not want to say so publicly.

https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/stat...2054219779

(Aug 19, 2022 06:21 PM)Yazata Wrote: And this from yesterday too. Big explosion and fire at the airport in Stary Oskol in Belgorod oblast, Russia, about 150 km north of the front line. 'Special Kherson Cat' exclaims, "Holy HIMARS, what is going on??"

All these new explosions suggest to me that Ukraine has gotten their hands on the longer range surface-to-surface artillery missiles that they've been seeking for months. Since some of them appear to be firing into Russia itself, the country that provided them (the US?) might not want to say so publicly.

https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/stat...2054219779

Something like the Samad-3 air drone has the range to reach Moscow and beyond. Though most get shot down in the Middle East where they're used, a few do elude somewhat advanced defenses. 

Ukraine has its own artisan drone industry. If the Ukrainians really were Nazis with the original German ilk's engineering capabilities and speedy resources, their drone facilities would have gone underground and by now be outputting increased long-distance drones toting heavier explosive payloads.

Vlad may curiously have to rely on his swastika characterizations of Ukraine being chiefly just that: Empty, manufactured propaganda -- an absurdly exaggerated threat.

I agree with CC that it might be Ukrainian made drones and not US supplied ATACMS's causing much of the recent Russian excitement. Ukraine is known for having very capable engineers after all. Their government has historically been totally corrupt, but the recent Russian attack might very well have focused their minds.

The US probably wouldn't be pleased with Ukraine using US supplied weapons to attack into Russia, but Ukrainian made weapons wouldn't face that restriction. The Russians themselves are saying that yesterday's air defense firing in Kerch and in Sevastapol (both in Crimea) was in response to drones.

But these locations are far from the frontlines (200-300 km) and would require long range drones. And if the Ukrainians are using drones to launch attacks like the ones we've seen photos of at the air base and the weapons depots, the drones would need to fly a long way carrying a useful weapons payload.

Which made me think of the US Predator drones. They have supposedly been retired from US Air Force service where they have been replaced by the more capable Reapers. So there may be warehouses full of surplus ones that the US might have provided Ukraine. It wouldn't count against US drone capabilities if they have already been removed from service. It's still unknown what the weapons payload of a Predator is, since it's still classified, but these drones were famous for their use in "drone strikes" against all sorts of targets over the years.

But yeah, CC is right. Ukrainian drones of some sort, maybe a capable new model that they just rolled out in the last couple of weeks, is most likely.