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Where is the Russian air force?
It almost seems as if the Russian air force's primary capability is putting on a good acrobatic display at the Paris air show.
One thing that looms large in every report about the Russian army is that they are weapon platform focused and seemingly have forgotten (or never knew to begin with) how to employ combined arms and the importance of command, control, and communication systems. They attitude of Russian planners seems to be based on Stalin's dictum that "quantity has a quality all it's own". While true, they didn't really allocate enough mass to succeed by brute force and they have suffered heavy losses.
I don't know whether Russian infantry units have an organic tactical air control party (TACP) that coordinates CAS but it doesn't seem like it. I also recall from talking with a Ukrainian (Soviet trained) classmate at Ft Sill 25 years ago that the Soviet doctrine for employing artillery doesn't provide direct support artillery that answers to specific battalion sized units. Their concept is to mass fires at what the US Army would call DIVARTY level and obliterate a grid square at a time for targets generated at the Division level. That mindeterrent isn't serving them well.
