ABATTBQ11 said:

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AgBQ-00 said:

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If the technology is close enough in ability, this is absolutely correct. Listening to the podcast right now and he said something related to this in terms of if a new technology is truly making a winning impact. They were talking about WWII tanks and if you'd rather have x number of T-34s or y number of Tigers. Elon said well if your kill ratio is 3 to 1 and it only costs you 2 times as much time/money then you are making a difference. And it is probably good to keep doing that thing.
Again really simplified but illustrative. But what if the technology he is talking about is "we have it and the other side does not have anything with any similar capabilities"? That is the game changer.

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Afghanistan would like a word.

The Russians had plenty of capabilities the mujahadeen didn't, yet they still left. We had plenty of capabilities they didn't, and we also got tired of spending money and left.

And look at the Russians now. They have a lot of technology and capabilities the Ukrainians don't (or didn't until very recently), and yet their tactical use of it is so poor they're getting their asses kicked.

The Moskva is a good example. The Russians have naval capabilities and technologies the Ukrainians don't, yet the Ukrainians better tactical employment of their lower level technology sank a Russian guided missile cruiser and has forced the Russians to completely rethink their naval deployment. All because the Russians did not respect the Ukrainian threat and employed poor tactics with the technology they had.

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I am not sure the Russians really have the technological advantage over the Ukrainians to the degree that the pre-war assumptions would have suggested. Alot of the Russian "technology" seems to be smoke and mirrors without much substance behind it. The few truly advanced pieces of weaponry they have shown are more like rare one-off demonstration models rather than being representative of some armed forces-wide level of technological superiority. They simply don't have the numbers of their more advanced weapons to really make good tactical use of them in a way that gives them a decisive advantage.

Something to keep an eye out for

There are warnings from reliable sources of a potential #Russian attack out of #Belgorod, but if that attack does not come soon #UAF will reach the international border and begin digging defenses. The RU troops massing to the N were likely destined for the #Izyum axis originally. pic.twitter.com/xEI9EYC6yL

— OSINT Aggregator (@AggregateOsint) May 10, 2022

Russia did have a big technological advantage but now with the west getting invloved the battlefield is more even. Russia has satellites, drones, better navy, better air force, but still use WW2 tactics. The lack of NCOs compounds this even more.

Afghanistan and Vietnam showed what happens when you fight a country on home soil and use guerilla warefare. We started off both wars with the right tactics but then went with short term solutions for a long term war.

So here is a question. I know very little about Belgorod. So is it an important enough city to Russia that they would be upset if the Ukrainians cut it off from Russia? I know the Ukrainians don't have the troop numbers to street by street and try to capture it. But could they cut off the key roads and rail lines in or out and use it as a trade piece to get one of their cities back from Russia?

txags92 said:

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ABATTBQ11 said:

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AgBQ-00 said:

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If the technology is close enough in ability, this is absolutely correct. Listening to the podcast right now and he said something related to this in terms of if a new technology is truly making a winning impact. They were talking about WWII tanks and if you'd rather have x number of T-34s or y number of Tigers. Elon said well if your kill ratio is 3 to 1 and it only costs you 2 times as much time/money then you are making a difference. And it is probably good to keep doing that thing.
Again really simplified but illustrative. But what if the technology he is talking about is "we have it and the other side does not have anything with any similar capabilities"? That is the game changer.

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Afghanistan would like a word.

The Russians had plenty of capabilities the mujahadeen didn't, yet they still left. We had plenty of capabilities they didn't, and we also got tired of spending money and left.

And look at the Russians now. They have a lot of technology and capabilities the Ukrainians don't (or didn't until very recently), and yet their tactical use of it is so poor they're getting their asses kicked.

The Moskva is a good example. The Russians have naval capabilities and technologies the Ukrainians don't, yet the Ukrainians better tactical employment of their lower level technology sank a Russian guided missile cruiser and has forced the Russians to completely rethink their naval deployment. All because the Russians did not respect the Ukrainian threat and employed poor tactics with the technology they had.

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I am not sure the Russians really have the technological advantage over the Ukrainians to the degree that the pre-war assumptions would have suggested. Alot of the Russian "technology" seems to be smoke and mirrors without much substance behind it. The few truly advanced pieces of weaponry they have shown are more like rare one-off demonstration models rather than being representative of some armed forces-wide level of technological superiority. They simply don't have the numbers of their more advanced weapons to really make good tactical use of them in a way that gives them a decisive advantage.

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Yep. Ukraine anti-ship capabilities were literally just developed. As in the last couple of years and after the refitting of the Moskva. Your assumption that the Ukraine technology is less advanced than Russia's is just that. An assumption that doesn't appear to be correct based on reality.

I mean Ukrainian farmers take better care of their tractors than Russians maintained their fighting equipment. To the point Ukrainians generally make fun of the Russian equipment after capturing it. There's reports from Russian troops of mechanized units only have 20% or 30% of their equipment even capable of firing during battle. Reports that some units started with almost a complete tank company, but only a fraction actually made it to the fighting without breaking down in route.

Nothing about what we are seeing from Russian appears to be advance, unmatched technology. Heck even the intelligence agencies are laughing at Russia's inability to accurately hit targets with "precision munitions". It took Starlink hours to overcome Russia's jamming of the equipement.

There's a huge difference in spending lots of money and actually getting value for that money. What you are proposing is the exact opposite of Russian tactics and theory. It's literally the reason tanks turrets are popping off and killing the crew.

It is one of the largest cities close to Ukraine, has the Siverski Donets river run through it, and is only 20 miles from Kharkiv. Russia has/had an ammunition department there and has used the town for staging from the beginning of the war. There is a train station there as well

Shocked

⚡️Ukraine's Intelligence: grain stolen by Russians is already in Mediterranean.

Defense Ministry’s Intelligence Directorate reported that grain stolen by Russian troops in occupied areas of Ukraine is already being sent abroad, adding that the likely destination is Syria.

— The Kyiv Independent (@KyivIndependent) May 10, 2022

My hometown Volnovakha has nearly 25,000 residents as of February 24, 2022.
Now, no more than 3,000 still survive among the ruins. 90% of the town’s buildings have been destroyed.
No electricity, no running water, no jobs.
Ukraine will have to build a new city from scratch.

— Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 (@IAPonomarenko) May 10, 2022

V8Aggie said:

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Over simplifying is his motto. That's how he runs his companies. Quite literally.

See raptor V1 with V2

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That's not what I mean.

He looks at very complex issues or problems as if they're very simple only to discover they're a lot more complicated than he originally gave them credit for.

Tesla is a good example. He thought building a car was easy and manufacturers were just doing a bad job if it, only to realize that manufacturing is actually much more complicated than it seems. That's why everything with Tesla is a day late and a dollar short. A decade in and they're STILL having QC and design issues that those other "idiot" manufacturers figured out a long time ago.

Now, this point of view helps him as a visionary because he ignores many of the roadblocks that intimidate others from innovating, but it is detrimental in the implementation of that innovation because he is often reinventing the wheel or reworking processes because those roadblocks are still real. Where others get lost in details, he ignores them completely, but I think there's an optimal happy medium somewhere in between. With Tesla and SpaceX he's been able to throw money and passionate people at problems to kind of just overcome this inattention to detail, but with something like war you can't afford to just iteratively throw people at it to figure out what works.

So the precept of, "With better technology, tactics don't matter," is another of those oversimplifications. It's a seemingly great general idea until you get into the details and test its extremes. Then it becomes apparent that there are immutable reasons why tactics are important and there's some backtracking and caveats made.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/05/10/world/ukraine-russia-war-news

Quote:

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. . .
Ukraine's economy will shrink 30 percent this year, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development forecast on Tuesday, as the war is expected to have an even more devastating toll on the country than previously predicted.

The bank, which invests in projects across 40 countries in Europe and Central Asia, lowered its forecast from just two months ago, when it predicted that Ukraine's economy would contract 20 percent.
. . .
Already, it is estimated that 30 percent to 50 percent of Ukrainian businesses have shut down their operations, 10 percent of the population has fled the country and another 15 percent have been displaced within the country, the bank said.
. . .
Russia's economy is forecast to contract 10 percent this year and be stagnant next year.
. . .
The long-term potential of Russia's economy will be significantly hampered, it added, as highly trained and educated workers leave and as the country cuts itself off from the rest of the world.
. . .

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More Ukrainian gains northeast of Kharkiv.
The Russian border is close. I think Russians have decided to give up on this area west of the Siverskiy Donets River.
Not enough manpower, I suppose. pic.twitter.com/MLnQ8OZoWR

— Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 (@IAPonomarenko) May 10, 2022

I think the political advantage of fighting a purely defensive war likely outweighs any logistical or tactical value of moving into Russian territory. There might be an upside in terms of morale (taking the fight to the Russians), but maybe not bigger than continuing to push the Russians off of Ukrainian land.

Without great knowledge of the ground situation, it seems like retaking Mariupol would be the greatest thing they could do for morale. Next would be cutting off the southern supply line. Those may greatly reduce Russia's ability to get Ukrainian food out of the country as well.

Ulrich said:

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I think the political advantage of fighting a purely defensive war likely outweighs any logistical or tactical value of moving into Russian territory. There might be an upside in terms of morale (taking the fight to the Russians), but maybe not bigger than continuing to push the Russians off of Ukrainian land.

Without great knowledge of the ground situation, it seems like retaking Mariupol would be the greatest thing they could do for morale. Next would be cutting off the southern supply line. Those may greatly reduce Russia's ability to get Ukrainian food out of the country as well.

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Retaking Mariupol would be a much more difficult task than the Ukrainians are up to at the moment. They have some momentum in the north that could carry them across the border if they wanted to push it. But I honestly think their best move would be to cut off the flow of troops and supplies south from Belgorod towards Izyum and then start trying to make the same push across the south to retake Kherson and cutoff the land access to the Crimea.

Ulrich said:

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I think the political advantage of fighting a purely defensive war likely outweighs any logistical or tactical value of moving into Russian territory. There might be an upside in terms of morale (taking the fight to the Russians), but maybe not bigger than continuing to push the Russians off of Ukrainian land.

Without great knowledge of the ground situation, it seems like retaking Mariupol would be the greatest thing they could do for morale. Next would be cutting off the southern supply line. Those may greatly reduce Russia's ability to get Ukrainian food out of the country as well.

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The other problem is it gives a lot of people in say Germany who are on the Russian payroll a chance to ask why are we funding an offensive war on Russia?

Yep. Retake Kherson and continue to drive Russia out and secure the border to the north. Once you've managed that, then you can plan how to cut off the flow of manpower and supplies out of Crimea and work on retaking the southern coast.

Macron is working with China to pressure a freeze to the conflict (which amounts to supporting Russia consolidating territorial gains and digging in) so hopefully Ukraine can keep Russia on the run and avoid that. Macron has been pontificating on the importance of not humiliating Putin by defeating him.

AgBQ-00 said:

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The Afghan reference is addressed in the simple cost analysis he describes though. And the technology they were using was sufficiently close enough to eventually overcome the advantages because of time and numbers. And in the case of USSR in Afghan, the application of advanced weaponry (MANPADs) completely changed the battlefield.

The technology that is being applied on the side of Ukraine currently is pretty far past what Russia has. Look at the open/unsecured comms that Russia uses and the lack of seemingly actionable intelligence to act nimbly. Or their atrocious supply line issues. All of those technological and tactical shortcomings are being exposed by a country that is using cutting edge comms (starlink, encryption etc., etc., etc.). Cutting edge or near cutting edge drone tech, and highly accurate and actionable intelligence (Moskova, generals dropping like prom dresses, etc. etc.) and we are getting the results we see.

Now If Russia had the capabilities and tactics being applied on the Ukraine side what we see now would look totally different. Which I think is the point he is making.

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Stingers didn't really change the battlefield. The Soviets started their invasion in 1980. They internally decided to leave around 1985, and stingers were introduced in 1986. They were initially very successful, but the Russians quickly changed tactics and used countermeasures to mitigate their employment. They didn't completely change the battlefield.


In Russia's case now, they HAVE all of the technology Ukraine does. Do you think they don't have secured comms? Or trucks? That pallets don't exist in Russia? They certainly have the technology for secured communications, they're just bad at making sure it's available and deployed. They know how to make trucks, they just don't have enough to maintain adequate supply for their forces. Russia has pallets and other important logistical technology, they just don't employ it.

The cutting edge technology Ukraine is using exists within Russia and Russia has all of those capabilities, but what kills them is poor tactical employment. Their failure isn't in being ill-equipped, it's in not knowing how to use of being incapable of effectively using the technology they have. You talk about not having the intelligence to act nimbly, but it's not a matter of intelligence: it's a matter of structure and tactics. Russian soldiers aren't authorized to take advantage of such intelligence and take the initiative. If an officer doesn't say to do it or authorize it, it isn't happening. Yes, the Ukrainians had intelligence on where the Moskva was, but the Moskva should have had all of the necessary defenses to mitigate an ASM. Tactically, they did not employ what they had and the Ukrainians employed what they had on the most radically advantageous ways. It wasn't an intelligence or technology delta, it was a tactical delta that sank the Moskva. The systems can have all of the technology and intelligence in the world, but their military culture and tactical employment would make it useless.


Russia could be winning this war because they have all of the means. What they lack are the methods. Tactically, they're horrible at combined arms and utilizing all of their available tools in conjunction with each other. They can't develop synergy between units and adapt to changing conditions, despite all of the tech they have. It's not that western technology is so much better, it's that the Russians are Neanderthals fighting with tanks and machine guns.

I wonder how many fighters have died in the Ukraine Army? They have enough equipment and intelligence to win this thing, but is Russia going to outlast them in the end? Didn't it start at something like 80k vs 200k?

txags92 said:

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ABATTBQ11 said:

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AgBQ-00 said:

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If the technology is close enough in ability, this is absolutely correct. Listening to the podcast right now and he said something related to this in terms of if a new technology is truly making a winning impact. They were talking about WWII tanks and if you'd rather have x number of T-34s or y number of Tigers. Elon said well if your kill ratio is 3 to 1 and it only costs you 2 times as much time/money then you are making a difference. And it is probably good to keep doing that thing.
Again really simplified but illustrative. But what if the technology he is talking about is "we have it and the other side does not have anything with any similar capabilities"? That is the game changer.

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Afghanistan would like a word.

The Russians had plenty of capabilities the mujahadeen didn't, yet they still left. We had plenty of capabilities they didn't, and we also got tired of spending money and left.

And look at the Russians now. They have a lot of technology and capabilities the Ukrainians don't (or didn't until very recently), and yet their tactical use of it is so poor they're getting their asses kicked.

The Moskva is a good example. The Russians have naval capabilities and technologies the Ukrainians don't, yet the Ukrainians better tactical employment of their lower level technology sank a Russian guided missile cruiser and has forced the Russians to completely rethink their naval deployment. All because the Russians did not respect the Ukrainian threat and employed poor tactics with the technology they had.

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I am not sure the Russians really have the technological advantage over the Ukrainians to the degree that the pre-war assumptions would have suggested. Alot of the Russian "technology" seems to be smoke and mirrors without much substance behind it. The few truly advanced pieces of weaponry they have shown are more like rare one-off demonstration models rather than being representative of some armed forces-wide level of technological superiority. They simply don't have the numbers of their more advanced weapons to really make good tactical use of them in a way that gives them a decisive advantage.

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Now, they don't. In February, I think they did. In terms of jamming, capable aircraft, long range and precision fires, etc, they certainly had a huge advantage.

Then they blew it all because they're stupid.

FriscoKid said:

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I wonder how many fighters have died in the Ukraine Army? They have enough equipment and intelligence to win this thing, but is Russia going to outlast them in the end? Didn't it start at something like 80k vs 200k?

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80k was roughly the active military numbers at the time the war began but they have a lot of highly experienced veterans who have rotated through the east over the past 8 years. Their actual numbers of trained fighters are functionally quite a bit higher. The longer this goes the more men will have been trained and served as part of the TDF and can serve in securing border areas as well as rear positions to free others up for front line duty.

🇺🇸7 x Boeing C-17A Globemaster III pic.twitter.com/CRtObdXncE

— 360°Radar (@wipljw) May 10, 2022

AgLA06 said:

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They literally don't have secure coms. They supposedly had a fancy new system that didn't work once the war started.

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Because it's a phone system that relies on 3G and 4G connections and they destroyed all the cell towers as they advanced. Their tactics precluded it's employment.

ETA It's not that they don't have the technology or that the doesn't work, it's that they're idiots who cut themselves off at the knees because their frontline soldiers don't know how to effectively employ the technology they're given.

Rossticus said:

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Yep. Retake Kherson and continue to drive Russia out and secure the border to the north. Once you've managed that, then you can plan how to cut off the flow of manpower and supplies out of Crimea and work on retaking the southern coast.

Macron is working with China to pressure a freeze to the conflict (which amounts to supporting Russia consolidating territorial gains and digging in) so hopefully Ukraine can keep Russia on the run and avoid that. Macron has been pontificating on the importance of not humiliating Putin by defeating him.

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That freeze would ultimately favor Ukraine because with their new smart weapons and artillery, they are capable of scouring pro-Russian and Russian army forces out of the Donbas and eventually Mariupol. I think the Russians know this and are stumbling their way to some solution. Putin's ego will be the ultimate determinant as long as he is above room temperature.

Ukrainian soldiers have found a washing machine in one of the abandoned Russian trenches. How did it get there? 🤔#StopRussia #StandWithUkraine pic.twitter.com/9k1GcFpW4n

— UkraineWorld (@ukraine_world) May 10, 2022

ABATTBQ11 said:

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AgLA06 said:

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They literally don't have secure coms. They supposedly had a fancy new system that didn't work once the war started.

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Because it's a phone system that relies on 3G and 4G connections and they destroyed all the cell towers as they advanced. Their tactics precluded it's employment.

ETA It's not that they don't have the technology or that the doesn't work, it's that they're idiots who cut themselves off at the knees because their frontline soldiers don't know how to effectively employ the technology they're given.

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You don't have technology if it doesn't work. For whatever reason (in this case because they didn't create the platform to use it (starlink or satellite equivalent).

This is the equivalent of having a microwave in 1654. It's amazing technology you can't use. Idiotic.

It's like me saying I have the cure for cancer, but not the way to administer it. A cancer patience doesn't care. Just like their soldiers can't use their "technology".

Something to keep in mind amongst all this discussion of whether they have technology and how the use it or not is that they are dealing mostly with an army made up of people with less than 1 year of experience and training. These are the people who would not be trusted with much more than not accidentally shooting themselves or their squad mates in most western armies. At about the point where most of our troops are just getting trained up to the point that we might trust them with a weapon in a real battle, the Russians are finishing their conscription period and leaving service in Russia. So all of the complex tactical leadership training, specialized tool and weapons training that our troops get never happens for conscripted/enlisted troops in Russia.

They have "officer schools" where the advanced training happens, so there is at most one or two guys out of about 50 in a Russian formation that will have had that training, and they are responsible for trying to make sure all of the troops are doing what they are supposed to be doing. Their armored vehicle has one or more big antennas on it, making it an easy target for anti-tank gunners. When they get killed, the rest of troop has no idea what they are supposed to do. Doesn't matter how much technology they do or don't have if they are not trained to use it, and aren't cognizant of what the overall plan is.

Rossticus said:

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Best part is watching Russians trying to scoot and getting lit up on the run. The dub track, as always, is a +.

Russian armoured column targeted and destroyed by the Ukrainian 54th Mechanized Brigade in Donetsk Oblast.#Russia #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/duZS2ChiuC

— BlueSauron👁️ (@Blue_Sauron) May 10, 2022

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41s into that video. Look at how high that piece of vehicle flew!

goatchze said:

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Rossticus said:

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Best part is watching Russians trying to scoot and getting lit up on the run. The dub track, as always, is a +.

Russian armoured column targeted and destroyed by the Ukrainian 54th Mechanized Brigade in Donetsk Oblast.#Russia #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/duZS2ChiuC

— BlueSauron👁️ (@Blue_Sauron) May 10, 2022

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41s into that video. Look at how high that piece of vehicle flew!

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Scrap metal dealers in Ukraine must be making a fortune.

txags92 said:

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So here is a question. I know very little about Belgorod. So is it an important enough city to Russia that they would be upset if the Ukrainians cut it off from Russia? I know the Ukrainians don't have the troop numbers to street by street and try to capture it. But could they cut off the key roads and rail lines in or out and use it as a trade piece to get one of their cities back from Russia?

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It's a major logistics hub supporting Russian forces fighting in the east. Cutting the LOCs from it to eastern Ukraine would seriously damage Russian resupply and communications.

Similarly, just getting close enough to Belgorod to threaten it would require the Russians to divert forces from Ukraine to defend it.

Ukraine is extremely unlikely to actually try to capture it as that would copy the mistake the Russians have made getting bogged down in urban warfare.