"All of Vlad's forces and all of Vlad's men, are out to put Humpty together again." (14 Viewers)

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It looks to me like the Ukrainians are not in panic-mode, but the Russians are.
 
Admiral Beez said:
From my couch I'm a very little worried about Bahkmut.

MSN

www.msn.com
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It's a battle of attrition there. ISW assesses that Russia is throwing bad money after good, seemingly not having learnt the lessons of Lysichansk etc from late-spring/early-summer of this year -- devoting inordinate forces to missions of dubious value, and losing a lot of men in the process. I agree with that.

That doesn't make anything a damned bit easier for the defenders, and they're fighting a knock-down-drag-out too. But I think that because the Russians have suffered defeat doing this before, the Ukrainians have 'em by the nose. There's a kick in the Russian ass coming, no different than Chuikov dragging 6th Army into Stalingrad while the counterstroke builds up, is my guess.

Odd that the Russians seem to have forgotten this lesson they taught others. They're not only repeating the mistake the Germans made in 1942, they're also repeating the mistake they made only this last summer. That's the institutional memory of a flea.
 

Again:

Russian efforts around Bakhmut indicate that Russian forces have fundamentally failed to learn from previous high-casualty campaigns concentrated on objectives of limited operational or strategic significance. Russian forces have continually expended combat strength on small settlements around Bakhmut since the end of May; in the following six months, they have only secured gains on the order of a few kilometers at a time.[1] As ISW has previously observed, Russian efforts to advance on Bakhmut have resulted in the continued attrition of Russian manpower and equipment, pinning troops on relatively insignificant settlements for weeks and months at a time.[2] This pattern of operations closely resembles the previous Russian effort to take Severodonetsk and Lysychansk earlier in the war. As ISW assessed throughout June and July of this year, Ukrainian forces essentially allowed Russian troops to concentrate efforts on Severodonetsk and Lysychansk, two cities near the Luhansk Oblast border of limited operational and strategic significance, in order to capitalize on the continued degradation of Russian manpower and equipment over the course of months of grinding combat.[3] Russian troops eventually captured Lysychansk and Severodonetsk and reached the Luhansk Oblast border, but that tactical success translated to negligible operational benefit as the Russian offensive in the east then culminated. Russian efforts in this area have remained largely stalled along the lines that they reached in early July. Even if Russian troops continue to advance toward and within Bakhmut, and even if they force a controlled Ukrainian withdrawal from the city (as was the case in Lysychansk), Bakhmut itself offers them little operational benefit. The costs associated with six months of brutal, grinding, and attrition-based combat around Bakhmut far outweigh any operational advantage that the Russians can obtain from taking Bakhmut. Russian offensives around Bakhmut, on the other hand, are consuming a significant proportion of Russia's available combat power, potentially facilitating continued Ukrainian counteroffensives elsewhere.

Institute for the Study of War

This page collects ISW and CTP's updates on the conflict in Ukraine. In late February 2022, ISW began publishing daily synthetic products covering key events related to renewed Russian aggression against Ukraine.
www.understandingwar.org

There's nothing there for them to gain that can redress the losses they're incurring trying to take it. And even if they do take it, the grinddown they're suffering in the process works to Ukrainian advantage. The Russians are expending a lot for a little, and thinning out other fronts in the process.

I have no doubt the Ukrainian high command understands this, and plans to exploit it as the weather allows. It's not very different from what we were reading in July and early-mid August, before the Kharkiv stroke.
 
Dimlee said:
And freedom to Iran.
As Poles said years ago: Za wolność naszą i waszą.
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Thank you a lot.
RogerdeLluria said:
I think that was already planned and is totally unrelated to the recent mail-bombs, but ....


I think that Spain could do more --the goverment coalition with the far left doesn't help much--, but everything counts.
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A mixture of Persian and US news style, it reads:

OR hosted MR in OD
 
RogerdeLluria said:
I think that Spain could do more --the goverment coalition with the far left doesn't help much--, but everything counts.
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Spain did offer to donate all its Leopard 2 MBTs, but these were deemed unrestorable. AIUI they were produced in Spain with majority locally made components rather than from German kits; so perhaps the tanks are somehow incapable of restoration.
 
What do we expect the Ukrainian Air Force to look like by early summer 2023? The fleet of MiG-29s must be wearing out, but we're years away from F-16s or Gripens.

Meanwhile, some news for the Russians. If only in penny packets.

Su-57 Felon To Enter Service With Elite Russian Air Force Unit

A historic unit in Russia's Far East will be first to receive Su-57 fighters, but until then, its Su-35s are fighting in the war in Ukraine.
www.thedrive.com
 
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