The Ukraine

[husaberg]

Drones as used in Ukraine are interesting. Ukraine wanted cluster bombs, the US has them in storage but they are illegal now. Consequently the Americans were not keen to supply them.

Ukraine doesn't want to use them as cluster bombs though, they want to disassemble them and remove the bomblets. They want to drop the bomblets from their drones. Clever stuff.

The Russians were using cluster bombs in Syria they showed a video on RT then had to delete it later.
http://www.stopclustermunitions.org/.../in-syria.aspx

Convention on Cluster Munitions - Wikipedia
According to Cluster Munition Monitor 2022, the list of 16 countries that refuse to sign the convention and produce cluster munitions included Brazil, China, Egypt, Greece, Iran, Israel, India, North Korea, Pakistan, Poland, Romania, Russia, Singapore, South Korea, the United States and Turkey.

The difference is USA and other's unlike Russia dont tend to use them or thermobaric bombs on civilians .

[R650R]

Drones as used in Ukraine are interesting. Ukraine wanted cluster bombs, the US has them in storage but they are illegal now. Consequently the Americans were not keen to supply them.

Ukraine doesn't want to use them as cluster bombs though, they want to disassemble them and remove the bomblets. They want to drop the bomblets from their drones. Clever stuff.

In his book about Iraq, tank commander colonel MacGregor describes cluster bombs as a nightmare to use in combat. This is due to a high failure rate among the multiple bombleys within a cluster. So you suppress the enemy but as you advance through area you lose tracks off vehicles and take out your own infantry on foot. It was so bad he eventually started going around those areas.
Whether or not the failure rate is same with drone Mount individual remains to be seen.
Post war civilians mostly children are injured playing with them.

[R650R]

I think Tradition more suggests that engaging in all-out warefare against a Nuclear power is a massive risk.

I also don't think that Ukraine is fighting with one hand behind their back - I'm not sure they have the manpower and resources for a counter-offensive into a Russia. Yet.

What gets me is the continual announcement on mainstream media in advance of coming counter strikes and battle plans. It’s almost as if they’d like the Russians to know anything they might not have realised themselves.
Man power wise they have lost nearly half their population according to experts whether through conflict or escape to other countries. Russians have population base to keep grinding a war of attrition which is what is going on. This is Afghanistan mkIII

In the background we have chatter about war with China. Truth is west has about enough conventional weapons to wage full warfare for a week then out of resources. The Chinese would win based on population base and mindset, a couple million dead is no big deal to them.

In the west we are delusional about our strength. Post Vietnam the USA has consistently only battled with less than peer adversary’s and still stuffed it up often. Even the Wagner chief compliments Ukraine’s fighting spirit but war is a numbers game.

[R650R]

Nah. Traditionally surrender has been an option. No negotiations much at all.

History hasn't seen much of this kind of warfare. We are inventing new types. The Irish "troubles" for instance. The first time in history one side had to give the other side a free shot.

Ukraine is fighting with one hand behind their back. Tradition suggests they should be doing to Russian cities what the Russians have been doing to theirs but that would be too scary. Personally I think that's a mistake. The Russian population had no idea what was going on. Young Russians in Ukraine could not convince their parents what was actually happening. The parents believed Putin's propaganda and thought their kids were mistaken. Now that large numbers of their sons have been shipped home in body bags the penny might be starting to drop. Hopefully somebody will decide Russia needs a new president.

We should be careful of what we wish for, we could end up with someone even more hardline in power. I’m sure Russian families feel sadness of war losses as much as any western families would. But they also know what an American puppet state/NATO base on their border would mean.
We got all upset here just about the prospect of China having bigger influence in Fiji and other pacific islands. It’s the same exact thing but without the big expanse of water.
Russians are quite a conservative society, after everything they went through under peristroika reforms I don’t think they are keen for change. There’s prob a limited appeal to the idea of standing in breadlines again….

[husaberg]

. Russians have population base to keep grinding a war of attrition which is what is going on. This is Afghanistan mkIII

.

The Russians lost against Afghanistan as there own people were sick of there kids needlessly dying in another country fighting a war and the sanctions against the USSR were crippling them

[pete376403]

The Russians lost against Afghanistan as there own people were sick of there kids needlessly dying in another country fighting a war and the sanctions against the USSR were crippling them

Similar in a way to USA /Vietnam. Not a popular war with the public and the financial costs were, if not crippling, then extreme. And Russia will (probably) loose in Ukraine for the same reasons. What major wars in recent (last hundred years or so) have been won by the country that started them? Being attacked is a compelling way of getting the populace onside with the government as well as allied countries.

[husaberg]

Similar in a way to USA /Vietnam. Not a popular war with the public and the financial costs were, if not crippling, then extreme. And Russia will (probably) loose in Ukraine for the same reasons. What major wars in recent (last hundred years or so) have been won by the country that started them? Being attacked is a compelling way of getting the populace onside with the government as well as allied countries.

Yip same with Iraq and the yanks, i believe they lost the same amount of people in the open war as they did in the first month of occupation.
you can easily win a war when the combatant is weaker when you are fighting each other on equal terms but if the other side is not wearing a uniform and then blends back into the civilian population uses hit and un guerilla tactics or terrorist bombs etc has the support of the native population the invader can never really win unless they remove the population completely like the Germans tried to do with Poland.
In the Ukraine the people defending their country are far more motivated as its their own country the Russians on the other hand are conscripted against their will, fighting a war that means nothing to them but everything to those they are fighting against.

The yanks with Afghanistan and USSR like the Russians did with Vietnam supplied the resistance extensively with expensive weapons to even out the odds.
stinger missiles in 1986 Sams and rpgs in 1962....
Three of the first four Stingers fired each took down a Mil-24D helicopter gunships deployed by the Soviets to enforce their control over Afghanistan.
The stingers cost (at cost price for the US govt) $36000 each in 1986.
the av income in USD then for an Afghani was about 800usd. That's 45 peoples full earnings for a entire year.

[R650R]

Well so much for the coup everyone’s being waiting for….

https://i.stuff.co.nz/world/europe/3...military-sites

My moneys on the Wagner chief being served up a big Mac with a side of polonium at a future lunch date….
I hope Jacinda was watching all this, smart people turned around a private battle hardened army of 25,000 people with nothing to lose by merely accepting a form of dialogue was needed.

Of course it could all be a well managed psy-op by Putin tricking Ukraine fresh reinforcements to charge into another bahut style trap…

[husaberg]

Well so much for the coup everyone’s being waiting for….

https://i.stuff.co.nz/world/europe/3...military-sites

My moneys on the Wagner chief being served up a big Mac with a side of polonium at a future lunch date….
I hope Jacinda was watching all this, smart people turned around a private battle hardened army of 25,000 people with nothing to lose by merely accepting a form of dialogue was needed.

Of course it could all be a well managed psy-op by Putin tricking Ukraine fresh reinforcements to charge into another bahut style trap…

So its now 500 days of the 3 day war you claimed would never happen....

[R650R]

Game changer or WW3 and mushroom clouds time???

In a massive Pearl Harbour type surprise attack drones have damaged or destroyed about 40 long range strategic bombers deep inside Russia.

The analyst says this was a long term operation taking 18 months with drones secretly built inside Russia territory then launched from cargo trucks near airbase with fibre optic guidance so they couldn’t be jammed.

In the past all superpowers have regarded an attack on nuclear capable assets as start of WW3, let’s hope the Aurora is the only bright lights we see in sky tonight.

[TheDemonLord]

I've always liked Mover's analysis.

[Pursang]

It's Not a Game!

[pritch]

the invader can never really win unless they remove the population completely like the Germans tried to do with Poland.

Or like the Israelis are currently doing in Palestine.

[husaberg]

Or like the Israelis are currently doing in Palestine.

Well that's what happens with that tit for tat, eye for an eye biblical stuff. Its a zero win scenario.
I am sure if that was the aim it would have been finished with long ago. The cards are well stacked in Israels favour.
Russia like Germany was in Poland/Ukraine is actively and purposely engaging in targeting civilians.
but you could also suggest the poms and the Brits did this too in WW2 even if they were targeting the factory areas and transport hubs they still knew that they would destru hundreds and thousand s civilians
where as, with Israel, the Palestinians happen to purposely build "military facilities in built up areas" and fire rockets from schools yards or hospital grounds etc etc. I don't see any other country doing this.
Its a zero win scenario. The Israelis leadership do themselves zero favours as they cant ever seem to be restrained enough. Instead they engage in massive retaliation to any provocations. Thus tend to play into the Palestinians terrorists aims.

People also have pretty short memories of what Hamas did when they took over in Gaza. That was genocide. Just like the Balkans was.

The Palestine population has grown far faster then NZ to now out populate us from starting from one million or some people 60 years ago to over 5 million now.
Its a zero win senario.

[TheDemonLord]

So - on the recent Drone strike - I have seen some discussion as to whether or not this was a War crime - and I found the discussion interesting.

The argument is along the lines that this was a War Crime because it was using a weapon disguised as a Civilian Truck/Shipping Container.

I personally don't think it is a War Crime - but because I am me I did a bit of reading on it.

Specifically, this article

where it talks about the legality of disguising objects as civilian items as a legitimate Ruse - but then talks about the specific instance - how it was not near a Military base.

However, I also read about Sailing under False Colours - which is a valid ruse so long as the correct colours are shown before the attack commenced.

If one is so inclined to consider a shipping container/truck to be a civilian item, then I would say this is the same as the Royal navy Q-Ships pretending to be merchant vessels - perhaps one could argue that the Trucks ought to have flown the Ukrainian flag before the attack commenced for it to be all above board - but I think this is a minor quibble - especially because of the above article:

According to Rogers, “in the first case the tank crew do not feign protected status at all; in the second, the soldier lures the adversary into danger by pretending to have the protected status of someone hors de combat.”

Solis takes a similar position, claiming that:

the wearing of the ubiquitous camouflage field uniform is not perfidy. Although the camouflaged soldier hopes to kill, wound, or capture the enemy, his wearing of camouflage does not involve any assurance of protection under LOAC

Anyways - I found it interesting.