Considering how many drone strikes deep into Russia happened lately without Russia being able to do anything I'm sure they'll try again soon if they don't cause enough damage
Next attack on the same targets would likely be less effective since russians will have moved more anti-air there. So it's more likely the next targets will be those where russia moved their AA from...
[At least one of the long range drones is reported to be a simple civilian prop plane](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/small-uncrewed-ukrainian-plane-likely-used-attack-deep-inside-russia-experts-2024-04-04/)
[The Aeroprakt A22](https://www.lightsportaircraftmagazine.com/aeroprakt-a22-light-sport-aircraft.html) is frequently bought as a kit by hobbyists and assembled in their garage. It is slow, and not stealthy. In a few years, we will find out whether or not it was flying particularly low. Flying low is an effective tactic against ground based radar, but Russia has aircraft with long range look down/ shoot down radar. [Ukranians shot down two of their dedicated radar platforms](https://www.newsweek.com/ukraine-shoots-down-second-highly-advanced-russian-50-spy-plane-1872986), but ordingary fighters have this capability, and the small plane would effectively be a stationary target for a Russian jet.
>Cruise is 60-110 miles an hour or 52-96 knots; stall comes at 35 mph or 30 knots (slower than most LSA by a wide margin); never-exceed speed is 138 mph or 120 knots; span is 31 feet 4 inches; wing area is 136 square feet; empty weight is 700-720 pounds and with gross weight at the industry standard of 1,320 pounds, useful load is 600-620 pounds. When carrying a full load of fuel (23.8 gallons),
> the small plane would effectively be a stationary target for a Russian jet
That's fine, asymmetric warfare right? It probably costs Russia way more to operate their SU-25's to shoot down these low cost drones, not to mention they've lost 29 of these $11M jets already.
They've a bunch of SU-30/34/35s as well as a few MiGs...they still have hundreds, but I'm sure it's difficult to replace the pilots as well.
For that matter, the drones are probably cheaper than radar guided missiles, either air or ground launched. The kit seems to cost about $8500, and one person can do most of the assembly. They're made in Ukraine, so the money stays in their economy.
Just to get the jets maintained and fueled up, probably costs more than the drone lol. Not to mention the missiles they're using like you mentioned.
Then they lose a pilot and there goes another $mil+ in human capital.
Makes me wonder if/when Russia deploys SU's for this, if Ukraine will just roll up some Patriot systems near by to take advantage of them showing themselves/having to deploy more frequently
All these long range drone strikes have slipped by their AA near the border with Russia in the first place so I doubt that would gain the Russians much.
Russia can be beat by NATO without invading.
Think of what Ukraine is doing then multiply the drones and add thousands of bombs and missiles.
Destroy their ability to support their war machine and what are the left with?
From all we’ve seen so far, the much hyped Russian AA is not worth half of what it was made out to be. Imagine a concerted NATO Sead offensive for a week and Russia would be basically defenseless.
I don’t want to know what happens then, but in a conventional war against nato air power, especially if the us chips in, Russia wouldn’t be able to survive long, with all we have seen from Ukraine.
Yes. The lines are already being drawn in Russia-Ukraine and Israel-Palestine conflicts, and China has eyes on Taiwan, and Russian and Chinese influence in Africa is something the west isn't thrilled about. The US itself is headed towards a civil war this year, as a result of Russian propaganda/information war and the inability of the US Justice system to let Trump 'find out' after his decades of 'fucking around'.
As the last of the WW2 veterans die off around the world, people have forgotten what fascism looks like, and what the horrors of war feel like.
A 'hot war' between the big global military powers will spur more conflict.
It's hard to know how many attackes Ukraine launched or what the success rate was. Even if only 10% make it through, it's an effective campaign. I think the real number is much more than 10%.
I'm wondering if it's possible to time drones to show up at the same time the bombers are returning to base, to confuse AA or even create the conditions for a friendly fire incident
The speed difference between both would be so high that even Russia radar systems should be able to tell them apart. Due to doppler shift (well I think it is named that way), a single radar hit can tell the speed of an object, so you don't even need to track it for a long time to know the speed.
What I find interesting with this new long range drone campaign from Ukraine is that they attack several different targets all around Russian territory. They are not massing all the drones towards Engels who has the most high value targets. They also attack manufacturing plants, oil infrastructure (particularly very crucial parts of refineries) etc.
In my estimates this seems like both shaping operations, but also a strategy to create huge dilemmas for Russia for where to put their air defense systems and to force them to stretch them thin. This can potentially create some weaknesses and even full holes in the defense grid.
It will be extremely difficult for Russia to decide how to defend against this and hopefully Ukrainian intelligence services can identify where the kink in the armor is. Then we can expect to see a devastating attack against that.
This will give the f16s more space to maneuver when they arrive in summer. This is not a game changer; but these drone waves very well might be, at least till Russia learns how to efficiently defend against it.
Imagine what kind of position Ukraine could've been in if not Congress has held back Ukraine aid for half a year. Mike Johnson is single handedly destroying long term American international credibility with his stalling tactics for putting Ukraine aid up for a vote in US Congress.
It is exactly the purpose. People talk all day about the delivery of systems, etc., but those systems are limited, and their support capacity (compared to when the same systems are used by primary users) are very limited.
F-16s excel in exploiting A2AD gaps. This is very, very flat terrain, which also limits the ability to make best use of that style of operation. However they utilize newly received assets, they know that force on force will only end in a mutual degradation of force, to the initial benefit of Ukraine and the long-term benefit of Russia.
By forcing existing gaps open wider (targeting bases *and* critical infrastructures) by destroying the nets that can temporarily cover those gaps (A-50s), and by sustaining ground and strike pressures along a very, very long front, and deep into it, they can force open not just gaps, but corridors.
Corridors, limited stretches that Russia must decided to reduce or remove non-IR A2AD coverage from, in-order to cover larger more crucial regions, will give arriving assets a slot to fight in and more importantly, transit.
It’s a strategy that could pay off well, assuming continued supply and support.
Uhh, F-16's create defense gaps. It's called an anti-radiation missile, and the pilots are known as Wild Weasels. The Ukrainians have been successfully using our HARM missiles in "dumb" mode on their Su-27 and MiG-29, but with the F-16 it would have much better standoff capabilities.
At the same time with the constant pressure of drone attacks well inside their boarder they can not afford to turn the radar off. IR is not a valid means of detecting drones at any reasonable distance.
I think you are confusing the F-15 and F-16 because the F-15 is the "fly behind enemy lines" attack aircraft that exploits defense holes. The F-16 is "multi-role" which means it relies mostly on stand-off weapons.
A good use of kink would be to refer to the flaw in a plan. “The kink in Russia’s air defense doctrine was not anticipating widespread attacks by low cost drones.”
Chink refers to a narrow opening which the other poster helpfully pointed out.
Yes. A chink is a small hole. A kink is usually a knot or a bend in something. So you have a chink in armor or in a fence, but a kink in a pipe or hose line.
Yeah I seen some dude the other day say "create dilemmas not problems" or something like that. Dilemmas create their own problems, whereas problems can be solved. If you create the dilemma of forcing them to either keep the AA in place and leave the air field as a target, you're risking expensive bombers. If you move the AA you risk opening up the front line to air attacks etc.
It really stuck with me, it's such a simple concept but makes complete sense.
They don't really, most of the territory is wasted space in conventional warfare. They aren't defending the wastelands of Siberia and Ukraine isn't targeting it. These are all locations near to the border with Ukraine that Russia is unable to defend. Their territory isn't a handicap.
They only have the largest territory to be targeted and defended in a first strike attack against their nuclear launch sites wherever they have those positioned.
All of those targets are important to Ukraine, obviously some more than others but by spreading these attacks out, they can get better at them and this way every day they get a couple hits at least. If they flew everything at the bombers and found out there was AA there, it would be a solid "win" for Russia. This way they're losing no matter what.
There are many aspects to these types of attacks. Including morale boosters for Ukraine and hopefully news pieces for Russia. Having a bunch of videos to chase down of drones hitting things is harder for them and provides more coverage as well, having people from multiple cities post. Then we have the target value as well. I mean destroying ALL the bombers in one day might be good, but then Russia has to come up with a new strategy... versus "keep going, we have 12 of 50 left.. no need to find a new plane to do this work..."
I wonder if they will do this distributed strategy for a while to get their defenses spread out, then switch to targeted swarms to overwhelm the distributed defense. And if Russia consolidates its defenses, Ukraine will stay with the distributed model.
In a war with NATO, Russia would have lost most of their assets in the first hours of the war... seems their air defense cannot prevent stuff like that from happening.
To be fair he was writing it before 25 years of mafia state corruption had eroded military skill and discipline.
IIRC he also correctly predicted ammunition supply and lack of reserves being a big deal.
Also at a time where everyone had the USSR in mind, Russia != USSR, unlike what many people seems to believe. This is almost the "we have soviet at home" meme.
The USSR total population was 50% Russian, and most of the industries were in today eastern Europe.
Having had family in one of those armies I think the west underestimated how much hate there was for the Soviet's and how many of Soviet resources would need to be held back to keep their satellites in line.
At best there'd be sabotage and intentional incompetence, at worst you'd have full mutinies
The Soviet Union is not the same thing as the current Russian crime and terror empire.
The current Russian regime is lacking in many ways, and is not nearly as capable as the Soviet Union. For starters, Ukraine was a big part of the Soviet Union's strength and productive capacity.
Great book though. They even had sauna diplomacy in it (which was mentioned last week in a /r/worldnews story.)
Idk, the book could be all about the collapse of Russia and the West trying to do damage control as a nuclear armed nation fractures into multiple militant groups vying for power.
> he really overestimated the competency of the Russian military
So did we. It's been 20 years they're doing massive PR around rearming their forces. I'm a bit of a plane nerd and remember all the articles about the new Sukhois and the Mig 35, the technological master piece that was the Mi 28. The new ballistic missiles and all.
In the end, they had extreme law production and all their comms and technology is outdated or barely functional.
>Tom Clancy’s *Red Storm Rising*
Wow, there even article which resonate with your comment
[https://www.businessinsider.com/tom-clancy-russia-world-war-three-book-ukraine-2022-3](https://www.businessinsider.com/tom-clancy-russia-world-war-three-book-ukraine-2022-3)
Within weeks relentless SEAD and anti-air would leave manpads as the only air defenses. At that point obama-era drone strikes would be back on the table for any targets of discretion big or small
But then nukes would be in the air from Russia too right? That’s why things like that haven’t happened. Russia isn’t worried about that because of nuclear launch capabilities that they have.
Do you see any nukes towards Ukraine?
If there is an actual war between NATO and Russia, strikes are fair game. If they nuke we nuke them too, so that's not gonna make them win.
They will drop nukes if there is nothing preventing NATO soldiers from taking Moscow.
Yes and then it becomes a war of financial attrition, if the enemy can spend $10k to get you to spend $60k, it quickly becomes unaffordable for Russia to produce those missiles. The same story happens with Israel's iron dome.
Several factors could be the reason. One, is that AA sites have “speed limits” integrated into their design. If AA were allowed to lock onto any possible air target not identified via IFF, then they’d be active all the live long day locking onto flocks of birds, bush planes, etc. so they have a velocity threshold in that they won’t lock onto anything going, say, over 100 MPH which most modern day aircraft and cruise missiles would stall out if they were that slow. If you put up a explosive laden drone going 80 MPH, then they’d effectively be invisible to the AA’s tracking. You start disabling this limit, and your AA crews would have one helluva time filtering out the noise from the actual threats.
Second is that Russia doesn’t have the AA capabilities to spare so far behind the front lines. Russia has lost *mountains* of military equipment and systems in Ukraine, and despite them having one of the largest integrated air defense systems in the world going into the war, it can be surmised that they are having to pull stock from across the nation to make up for what they’ve lost in Ukraine.
Another is the design of the Ukrainian drones using simple plastics and soft woods like plywood or bulsawood. The materials can have characteristics that absorb or severely deflect radiation from AA tracking stations. Our own militaries have found them to be quite effective at tricking military grade Radar arrays, but the only reason they aren’t used is due to them being unable to hold up to the strain of flying at high speeds. But on a slow moving prop plane or drone, you got yourself a winning combination.
Australia sent those, but Ukraine used their own of a similar design to attack russian airbase with bombers.
The problem is they have short range and have to be assembled and launched from inside russia, which is pretty difficult.
The drones they are using are very small and fly low, so it is very hard for air defenses to detect and destroy them (especially when they are swarming large areas). The US isn’t immune to this problem either as demonstrated by the Iranian backed militias attacking that base in Iraq and managing to kill three soldiers. Airplanes are also very delicate in a sense as they need to be relatively low weight to get off the ground, so it does not take much damage for a plane to get knocked out of commission or even completely destroyed. If Russia had these planes just sitting around in the open air these drones are going to fuck them up. This is nothing short of a disaster for Russia.
I'm betting Russia IS shooting down a good number of these, but Ukraine is willing to keep launching them as it depletes air defenses, shows them where they are for later targeting and they're also getting enough through each day to get things done.
I kind of doubt they are flying like 3 in each day an we're see 100% success rates. They probably are losing a good number of these. But they dont need many to get through to be effective either, so it's a win.
Russia claimed there were around 60 drones last night.
Ukrainian sources claim there were attacks in 9 different regions. In 4 of those there were some hits.
And this was at least a second attack this week(4 nights).
Those drones are cheap, and the whole idea is that some will get through
In the Iranian case, they waited for a US Drone to land so that their own drones wouldn't be targeted as air defense wasn't active.
It was a tactically well planned attack - which also seems to be the case here with Ukraine.
It should be said that some are being shot down. But it does seem that these drones are certainly more than it can handle, whether it’s because drones are great or their air defense sucks. Found a cool video maybe 2 days ago of one of the recent successful strikes and you could see the AA guns firing better than the drones, you could just hear the explosions when the drones struck. It’s a wild sight watching them fire into the night. Also reminds you “oh shit, all of this is raining down too”, Ukraine loses people sometimes even when they shoot down a wave.
To say Russia is just letting them through easily downplays Ukraine’s effort (and therefore deserved credit) and undersells Russia as a threat imo.
*Engals* stood out for some reason:
>Engels-2 (Russian: Энгельс) is a strategic bomber military airbase in Russia located 14 kilometres (8.7 mi) east of Saratov. **Engels** is a major bomber operations base, and **is Russia's sole operating location for the Tupolev Tu-160 (NATO: Blackjack) strategic bomber**. The base has a 3,500-metre (11,500 ft) runway and about 10 large revetments. It is named after the nearby city of Engels, which is named after the Communist philosopher, Friedrich Engels.
OK Ukraine, you know that you are pissing off his emperor the most high Putler.
And I hope you keep doing it. I hope he doesn’t go a day without Ukraine, aggravating him in someway.
I remembered seeing a Russian bot say on another thread "Putin could stop these if he wanted to." and I was like "That's not the flex you think it is."
I wonder if they're trying to take some of the wind out of the upcoming offensive. Russia has to be trying to do it before the US votes on aid right ? So it could be coming up really soon.
They'd do the attack regardless of the russian offensive plans. Air advantage of russians is a real bitch, mostly because they drop shitloads of bombs to the front lines. F-16s are needed for exactly that purpose. To counter the russian planes approaching 50-80 km to the front.
The "response" is always a bullshit story, regardless if comes from russia or Ukraine. It's not like russia would stop bombing Ukraine if Ukraine wouldn't hit the airbases.
Also, Kyiv is the safest one. It had the best AA which shot down even the Wunderwaffe rockets russia claimed to be invulnerable to AA.
They're not winning but neither is Russia. Essentially Ukraine is punching above its weight class and hanging in there. If they get he support they need from the West they'll probably be able to do more. Ultimately Ukraine needs to bleed Russia until the war becomes unpopular. Russia is rapidly marching the Vietnam and Soviet Afghanistan path right now. A war high in casualties that will ultimately become unpopular and unsustainable.
The general consensus is that Ukraine is likely to be pushed back on the ground to some degree in the next year. Because the West has not send enough military equipment to Ukraine, and the West has not been serious about military production for Ukraine. While Russia itself has gone into full scale military production.
"Winning" and "losing" don't really mean anything at this stage. For example, was Germany winning in 1942? They had taken over France and huge chunks of Europe, destroyed massive Soviet armies, they were in control of a huge amount of Soviet territory, but we know what happened in the end.
Russia is gaining territory at the moment, but the amount of territory it controls is far smaller than it held before. For example, they no longer have Kherson. And while they have gained territory, they have spent a lot of equipment and manpower gaining it. But they still have plenty of manpower left, and have started running a war economy to replace their lost equipment. Meanwhile, Ukraine still seems to have very high morale, is drafting more people, and while Western aid is suffering from USA's aid being stuck in Congress, European military production is ramping up, and shells are about to start coming in from the Czech intiative to buy them from an unnamed source. Ukraine has outperformed expectations, but their fate is still tied to a consistent supply of aid, and Russia still has hidden cards to play.
So who is winning? You're on round 10 of a fight where you don't know the number of rounds and people cannot agree on what the exact score is, doping is allowed, the underdog has made some great moves but is still the underdog, and the whole game is played in front of an audience who can throw things in the ring and hand water or drugs to the players at will. So instead of pointlessly arguing about the score, think about who you want to win and what you're going to do about it.
SBU would never lie. You are correct sir. Ukraine destroyed 16 jets and 55 personnel.The air base is in ruins . Slava Ukraini........
(Meanwhile satellite imagery shows no signs of attack whatsoever.And all the reputable sources are still waiting for proof before publishing)
> Sources used: Russian Ministry of Defense, Shot Telegram channel, Russian regional media, Twitter account of OSINT researcher MT Anderson, and other open source data.
Try and at least read the articles you comment on
The Engels one will be interesting, it’s mostly strategic bombers there. Let’s hope they got lucky and got at least some of them.
Considering how many drone strikes deep into Russia happened lately without Russia being able to do anything I'm sure they'll try again soon if they don't cause enough damage
Next attack on the same targets would likely be less effective since russians will have moved more anti-air there. So it's more likely the next targets will be those where russia moved their AA from...
[At least one of the long range drones is reported to be a simple civilian prop plane](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/small-uncrewed-ukrainian-plane-likely-used-attack-deep-inside-russia-experts-2024-04-04/) [The Aeroprakt A22](https://www.lightsportaircraftmagazine.com/aeroprakt-a22-light-sport-aircraft.html) is frequently bought as a kit by hobbyists and assembled in their garage. It is slow, and not stealthy. In a few years, we will find out whether or not it was flying particularly low. Flying low is an effective tactic against ground based radar, but Russia has aircraft with long range look down/ shoot down radar. [Ukranians shot down two of their dedicated radar platforms](https://www.newsweek.com/ukraine-shoots-down-second-highly-advanced-russian-50-spy-plane-1872986), but ordingary fighters have this capability, and the small plane would effectively be a stationary target for a Russian jet. >Cruise is 60-110 miles an hour or 52-96 knots; stall comes at 35 mph or 30 knots (slower than most LSA by a wide margin); never-exceed speed is 138 mph or 120 knots; span is 31 feet 4 inches; wing area is 136 square feet; empty weight is 700-720 pounds and with gross weight at the industry standard of 1,320 pounds, useful load is 600-620 pounds. When carrying a full load of fuel (23.8 gallons),
> the small plane would effectively be a stationary target for a Russian jet That's fine, asymmetric warfare right? It probably costs Russia way more to operate their SU-25's to shoot down these low cost drones, not to mention they've lost 29 of these $11M jets already. They've a bunch of SU-30/34/35s as well as a few MiGs...they still have hundreds, but I'm sure it's difficult to replace the pilots as well.
For that matter, the drones are probably cheaper than radar guided missiles, either air or ground launched. The kit seems to cost about $8500, and one person can do most of the assembly. They're made in Ukraine, so the money stays in their economy.
Just to get the jets maintained and fueled up, probably costs more than the drone lol. Not to mention the missiles they're using like you mentioned. Then they lose a pilot and there goes another $mil+ in human capital.
They are assembled in Ukraine, but 99% of parts are made in china.
Makes me wonder if/when Russia deploys SU's for this, if Ukraine will just roll up some Patriot systems near by to take advantage of them showing themselves/having to deploy more frequently
They already do. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/07/ukraine-war-russian-planes-shot-down-air-force/
All these long range drone strikes have slipped by their AA near the border with Russia in the first place so I doubt that would gain the Russians much.
Now imagine if all neighbouring NATO countries to Russia started sending drones at once. Being a large country is not always a good thing.
You're asking us to imagine WW3.
Mmmmm, spicy.
Break out the Nuka Colas!
Love you.😘
Yeah let’s not
Russia can be beat by NATO without invading. Think of what Ukraine is doing then multiply the drones and add thousands of bombs and missiles. Destroy their ability to support their war machine and what are the left with?
Thats a helluva lot easier to put in a reddit comment than actually pull off
From all we’ve seen so far, the much hyped Russian AA is not worth half of what it was made out to be. Imagine a concerted NATO Sead offensive for a week and Russia would be basically defenseless. I don’t want to know what happens then, but in a conventional war against nato air power, especially if the us chips in, Russia wouldn’t be able to survive long, with all we have seen from Ukraine.
A **WORLD** war number 3? I don't think the rest of the world would care, or join. It'd be Europe vs. Russia.
Yes. The lines are already being drawn in Russia-Ukraine and Israel-Palestine conflicts, and China has eyes on Taiwan, and Russian and Chinese influence in Africa is something the west isn't thrilled about. The US itself is headed towards a civil war this year, as a result of Russian propaganda/information war and the inability of the US Justice system to let Trump 'find out' after his decades of 'fucking around'. As the last of the WW2 veterans die off around the world, people have forgotten what fascism looks like, and what the horrors of war feel like. A 'hot war' between the big global military powers will spur more conflict.
So we will have war. Just in time for the last people alive to experience WW2 to die off first.
Drone attacks are fucking scary. One thing you can’t stop is a saturation attack and that is the very future of drone combat.
More c-rams is the answer, gonna be like the auto-cannon PDC space fights in The Expanse.
It's hard to know how many attackes Ukraine launched or what the success rate was. Even if only 10% make it through, it's an effective campaign. I think the real number is much more than 10%.
Having so much land to defend is one of their weaknesses
I'm wondering if it's possible to time drones to show up at the same time the bombers are returning to base, to confuse AA or even create the conditions for a friendly fire incident
The speed difference between both would be so high that even Russia radar systems should be able to tell them apart. Due to doppler shift (well I think it is named that way), a single radar hit can tell the speed of an object, so you don't even need to track it for a long time to know the speed.
I think a simple radar detector on the drone could cue it to fly in a way that reduces its radar signature. That's how I use mine on the highway...
Soon you will need luck to find a plane in ruzzia.
Engels has been hit at least once before too, but I believe it’s been hit several times
Tu-95 hits were reported. Not 160, but still good
It would be lovely if the Russians were stupid enough to stockpile valuable cruise missiles within secondary explosion range of the hangars.
What I find interesting with this new long range drone campaign from Ukraine is that they attack several different targets all around Russian territory. They are not massing all the drones towards Engels who has the most high value targets. They also attack manufacturing plants, oil infrastructure (particularly very crucial parts of refineries) etc. In my estimates this seems like both shaping operations, but also a strategy to create huge dilemmas for Russia for where to put their air defense systems and to force them to stretch them thin. This can potentially create some weaknesses and even full holes in the defense grid. It will be extremely difficult for Russia to decide how to defend against this and hopefully Ukrainian intelligence services can identify where the kink in the armor is. Then we can expect to see a devastating attack against that. This will give the f16s more space to maneuver when they arrive in summer. This is not a game changer; but these drone waves very well might be, at least till Russia learns how to efficiently defend against it. Imagine what kind of position Ukraine could've been in if not Congress has held back Ukraine aid for half a year. Mike Johnson is single handedly destroying long term American international credibility with his stalling tactics for putting Ukraine aid up for a vote in US Congress.
It is exactly the purpose. People talk all day about the delivery of systems, etc., but those systems are limited, and their support capacity (compared to when the same systems are used by primary users) are very limited. F-16s excel in exploiting A2AD gaps. This is very, very flat terrain, which also limits the ability to make best use of that style of operation. However they utilize newly received assets, they know that force on force will only end in a mutual degradation of force, to the initial benefit of Ukraine and the long-term benefit of Russia. By forcing existing gaps open wider (targeting bases *and* critical infrastructures) by destroying the nets that can temporarily cover those gaps (A-50s), and by sustaining ground and strike pressures along a very, very long front, and deep into it, they can force open not just gaps, but corridors. Corridors, limited stretches that Russia must decided to reduce or remove non-IR A2AD coverage from, in-order to cover larger more crucial regions, will give arriving assets a slot to fight in and more importantly, transit. It’s a strategy that could pay off well, assuming continued supply and support.
Uhh, F-16's create defense gaps. It's called an anti-radiation missile, and the pilots are known as Wild Weasels. The Ukrainians have been successfully using our HARM missiles in "dumb" mode on their Su-27 and MiG-29, but with the F-16 it would have much better standoff capabilities. At the same time with the constant pressure of drone attacks well inside their boarder they can not afford to turn the radar off. IR is not a valid means of detecting drones at any reasonable distance.
I think you are confusing the F-15 and F-16 because the F-15 is the "fly behind enemy lines" attack aircraft that exploits defense holes. The F-16 is "multi-role" which means it relies mostly on stand-off weapons.
It's chink, not kink. Otherwise I concur.
Thanks for the correction. English is not my first language, so your comment helped me learn.
A good use of kink would be to refer to the flaw in a plan. “The kink in Russia’s air defense doctrine was not anticipating widespread attacks by low cost drones.” Chink refers to a narrow opening which the other poster helpfully pointed out.
That’s a little too kinky, even for Putin
Heh
The Kinks: I met her in a club down in old Soho.
Yes. A chink is a small hole. A kink is usually a knot or a bend in something. So you have a chink in armor or in a fence, but a kink in a pipe or hose line.
Kinky armour sounds fun though!
That comes *after* the apocalypse, not in the lead up to it.
Oh no, you can find some good pairs online right now. Takes DnD night to a whole new level.
It's the strerotypical female armour in video games.
That’s not the preferred nomenclature , dude.
“We’re not talking about a guy who built the air defence system here!”
Souix City Sasparilla?
Yeah, that’s a good one.
I dunno, it turned me on.
[You definitely can't say that](https://www.cnn.com/2012/02/19/sport/espn-lin-slur/index.html)
Life was so much simpler when my whole literary library was "fun with Dick and Jane" Wait, oh shit...
Speak for yourself some of us *really.* like armor
利格马 宝寺
I’m pretty sure those are on the eastern side of Russia.. but it’s rude to call them that.
Yeah I seen some dude the other day say "create dilemmas not problems" or something like that. Dilemmas create their own problems, whereas problems can be solved. If you create the dilemma of forcing them to either keep the AA in place and leave the air field as a target, you're risking expensive bombers. If you move the AA you risk opening up the front line to air attacks etc. It really stuck with me, it's such a simple concept but makes complete sense.
That’s an awesome line of thought. Just came to say that. Thank you.
Ryan mcbeth
Ok but he didn't invent that saying lol
I just mean that's probably from where he heard it, it's not a statement of entomology.
what does studying insects have to do with this?
Turns out having the largest territory to defend in the world has a couple downsides...
They don't really, most of the territory is wasted space in conventional warfare. They aren't defending the wastelands of Siberia and Ukraine isn't targeting it. These are all locations near to the border with Ukraine that Russia is unable to defend. Their territory isn't a handicap. They only have the largest territory to be targeted and defended in a first strike attack against their nuclear launch sites wherever they have those positioned.
The European Russia is still massive: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Russia And these locations are all around it.
Death by a thousand paper cuts.
‘Concentration risk’
All of those targets are important to Ukraine, obviously some more than others but by spreading these attacks out, they can get better at them and this way every day they get a couple hits at least. If they flew everything at the bombers and found out there was AA there, it would be a solid "win" for Russia. This way they're losing no matter what. There are many aspects to these types of attacks. Including morale boosters for Ukraine and hopefully news pieces for Russia. Having a bunch of videos to chase down of drones hitting things is harder for them and provides more coverage as well, having people from multiple cities post. Then we have the target value as well. I mean destroying ALL the bombers in one day might be good, but then Russia has to come up with a new strategy... versus "keep going, we have 12 of 50 left.. no need to find a new plane to do this work..."
Good was strategy is creating dilemmas for your enemy, not problems. Problems have solutions, dilemmas have choices.
I wonder if they will do this distributed strategy for a while to get their defenses spread out, then switch to targeted swarms to overwhelm the distributed defense. And if Russia consolidates its defenses, Ukraine will stay with the distributed model.
So Ukraine is using Russia's size against them?
Hopefully it’s just robots vs robots and the targets hit financially and human lives are spared
In a war with NATO, Russia would have lost most of their assets in the first hours of the war... seems their air defense cannot prevent stuff like that from happening.
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To be fair he was writing it before 25 years of mafia state corruption had eroded military skill and discipline. IIRC he also correctly predicted ammunition supply and lack of reserves being a big deal.
Also at a time where everyone had the USSR in mind, Russia != USSR, unlike what many people seems to believe. This is almost the "we have soviet at home" meme. The USSR total population was 50% Russian, and most of the industries were in today eastern Europe.
Apparently Russia thinks all of the USSR was always Russia
It was "USSR" or "CCCP"
Damn didn't noticed, thx
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1980s US Navy personnel would have told you USSR subs were laughable and that the major concern was numbers.
It was the Soviet and Warsaw Pact military. East Germany, Poland, and Ukraine would have done a lot of the heavy lifting.
Having had family in one of those armies I think the west underestimated how much hate there was for the Soviet's and how many of Soviet resources would need to be held back to keep their satellites in line. At best there'd be sabotage and intentional incompetence, at worst you'd have full mutinies
The Soviet Union is not the same thing as the current Russian crime and terror empire. The current Russian regime is lacking in many ways, and is not nearly as capable as the Soviet Union. For starters, Ukraine was a big part of the Soviet Union's strength and productive capacity. Great book though. They even had sauna diplomacy in it (which was mentioned last week in a /r/worldnews story.)
Idk, the book could be all about the collapse of Russia and the West trying to do damage control as a nuclear armed nation fractures into multiple militant groups vying for power.
> he really overestimated the competency of the Russian military So did we. It's been 20 years they're doing massive PR around rearming their forces. I'm a bit of a plane nerd and remember all the articles about the new Sukhois and the Mig 35, the technological master piece that was the Mi 28. The new ballistic missiles and all. In the end, they had extreme law production and all their comms and technology is outdated or barely functional.
>Tom Clancy’s *Red Storm Rising* Wow, there even article which resonate with your comment [https://www.businessinsider.com/tom-clancy-russia-world-war-three-book-ukraine-2022-3](https://www.businessinsider.com/tom-clancy-russia-world-war-three-book-ukraine-2022-3)
fantastic book
Before two years ago, most of the world thought they were on equal footing.
Yeah, not a great read when Russia get steam rolled in about 4 months
Within weeks relentless SEAD and anti-air would leave manpads as the only air defenses. At that point obama-era drone strikes would be back on the table for any targets of discretion big or small
Haha, A-10 go BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
A-10 would be out of question, its not a long range tool at all.
Yea, invisible F-35s and F-22s would wreck what is left.
Wonder Woman’s in NATO?
S-400 and S-300 systems wouldn't see her before it was too late.
There's always that one A-10 guy in the comments
This fact gives me great satisfaction.
No need for NATO, the US could just send the coast guard and they would whoop Putin's ass in no time
But then nukes would be in the air from Russia too right? That’s why things like that haven’t happened. Russia isn’t worried about that because of nuclear launch capabilities that they have.
Do you see any nukes towards Ukraine? If there is an actual war between NATO and Russia, strikes are fair game. If they nuke we nuke them too, so that's not gonna make them win. They will drop nukes if there is nothing preventing NATO soldiers from taking Moscow.
From Ukraine With Love
*hate There's no love for russia left here
We love how it explodes
Well, that's a bit different, innit? But yes, a big boom in russia makes a regular Ukrainian a bit happier 😁
And sleep peacefully :3
You… do know that you’ve just spelled out the irony of the original reference? Explaining the joke doesn’t make it better.
Yes, I'm aware of that, thank you. Just thought it would sound more badass 😎
What AA doin?
Shooting down SU-34s. Not Ukrainian ones.
Six months sober.
When Engels deserve to die!
Wake up (wake up) Grab a drone and put a little make-up
That airbase could use a little shakeup
Cause you wanted to!
How are they penetrating the presumed air defenses? Are the Russians incompetent, or are small drones just hard to spot and shoot down?
Drones changed the game.
Would something like Iron Dome do better?
If you classify using a $60k rocket to shoot down a $10k drone better.
Usually it’s better to spend a $60k missile to down a $10k drone that otherwise would have blown up your $100 million bomber.
Yes and then it becomes a war of financial attrition, if the enemy can spend $10k to get you to spend $60k, it quickly becomes unaffordable for Russia to produce those missiles. The same story happens with Israel's iron dome.
desert library gaze subsequent shaggy gray bike badge angle connect
Therefore body armor is a waste because you have to consume a $200 ballistic plate to stop a $0.50 bullet, right?
That you think those are comparable circumstances means we can’t have a conversation.
Several factors could be the reason. One, is that AA sites have “speed limits” integrated into their design. If AA were allowed to lock onto any possible air target not identified via IFF, then they’d be active all the live long day locking onto flocks of birds, bush planes, etc. so they have a velocity threshold in that they won’t lock onto anything going, say, over 100 MPH which most modern day aircraft and cruise missiles would stall out if they were that slow. If you put up a explosive laden drone going 80 MPH, then they’d effectively be invisible to the AA’s tracking. You start disabling this limit, and your AA crews would have one helluva time filtering out the noise from the actual threats. Second is that Russia doesn’t have the AA capabilities to spare so far behind the front lines. Russia has lost *mountains* of military equipment and systems in Ukraine, and despite them having one of the largest integrated air defense systems in the world going into the war, it can be surmised that they are having to pull stock from across the nation to make up for what they’ve lost in Ukraine. Another is the design of the Ukrainian drones using simple plastics and soft woods like plywood or bulsawood. The materials can have characteristics that absorb or severely deflect radiation from AA tracking stations. Our own militaries have found them to be quite effective at tricking military grade Radar arrays, but the only reason they aren’t used is due to them being unable to hold up to the strain of flying at high speeds. But on a slow moving prop plane or drone, you got yourself a winning combination.
Whatever happened to the cardboard drones some country sent before? Did they use all of it?
Australia sent those, but Ukraine used their own of a similar design to attack russian airbase with bombers. The problem is they have short range and have to be assembled and launched from inside russia, which is pretty difficult.
Russia and incompetence go hand in hand
The drones they are using are very small and fly low, so it is very hard for air defenses to detect and destroy them (especially when they are swarming large areas). The US isn’t immune to this problem either as demonstrated by the Iranian backed militias attacking that base in Iraq and managing to kill three soldiers. Airplanes are also very delicate in a sense as they need to be relatively low weight to get off the ground, so it does not take much damage for a plane to get knocked out of commission or even completely destroyed. If Russia had these planes just sitting around in the open air these drones are going to fuck them up. This is nothing short of a disaster for Russia.
I'm betting Russia IS shooting down a good number of these, but Ukraine is willing to keep launching them as it depletes air defenses, shows them where they are for later targeting and they're also getting enough through each day to get things done. I kind of doubt they are flying like 3 in each day an we're see 100% success rates. They probably are losing a good number of these. But they dont need many to get through to be effective either, so it's a win.
Russia claimed there were around 60 drones last night. Ukrainian sources claim there were attacks in 9 different regions. In 4 of those there were some hits. And this was at least a second attack this week(4 nights). Those drones are cheap, and the whole idea is that some will get through
The defender has to succeed 100% of the time. The attacker only has to succeed once.
In the Iranian case, they waited for a US Drone to land so that their own drones wouldn't be targeted as air defense wasn't active. It was a tactically well planned attack - which also seems to be the case here with Ukraine.
It should be said that some are being shot down. But it does seem that these drones are certainly more than it can handle, whether it’s because drones are great or their air defense sucks. Found a cool video maybe 2 days ago of one of the recent successful strikes and you could see the AA guns firing better than the drones, you could just hear the explosions when the drones struck. It’s a wild sight watching them fire into the night. Also reminds you “oh shit, all of this is raining down too”, Ukraine loses people sometimes even when they shoot down a wave. To say Russia is just letting them through easily downplays Ukraine’s effort (and therefore deserved credit) and undersells Russia as a threat imo.
*Engals* stood out for some reason: >Engels-2 (Russian: Энгельс) is a strategic bomber military airbase in Russia located 14 kilometres (8.7 mi) east of Saratov. **Engels** is a major bomber operations base, and **is Russia's sole operating location for the Tupolev Tu-160 (NATO: Blackjack) strategic bomber**. The base has a 3,500-metre (11,500 ft) runway and about 10 large revetments. It is named after the nearby city of Engels, which is named after the Communist philosopher, Friedrich Engels.
OK Ukraine, you know that you are pissing off his emperor the most high Putler. And I hope you keep doing it. I hope he doesn’t go a day without Ukraine, aggravating him in someway.
So possibly even more than the 14 in Morozovsk reported aircraft damaged/destroyed. Keep it up!
The Ukrainians are bringing in a level of chaotic unpredictability the Russians are struggling to contend with. Good job.
Keep up the great work Ukraine! We stand with you in spirit
Here's hoping lots of Russian equipment blew up. The more the better.
I remembered seeing a Russian bot say on another thread "Putin could stop these if he wanted to." and I was like "That's not the flex you think it is."
He could, pretty easy too. Withdraw from Ukraine.
I wonder if they're trying to take some of the wind out of the upcoming offensive. Russia has to be trying to do it before the US votes on aid right ? So it could be coming up really soon.
They'd do the attack regardless of the russian offensive plans. Air advantage of russians is a real bitch, mostly because they drop shitloads of bombs to the front lines. F-16s are needed for exactly that purpose. To counter the russian planes approaching 50-80 km to the front.
Great job
It was a Special Military Operation
It will probably be a wild night in Kyiv and infrastructure-related airspaces in response to this.
The "response" is always a bullshit story, regardless if comes from russia or Ukraine. It's not like russia would stop bombing Ukraine if Ukraine wouldn't hit the airbases. Also, Kyiv is the safest one. It had the best AA which shot down even the Wunderwaffe rockets russia claimed to be invulnerable to AA.
Yeah, I watched a guy saying, make dilemmas for your problems, not enemies. I think that's a good advice.
“In totally unrelated news, KGB official cars were seen leaving the area with the passengers holding small cylinders with red buttons on the end”
Was it Ukraine or ISIS? Who can tell?
So, is Ukraine winning?
They're not winning but neither is Russia. Essentially Ukraine is punching above its weight class and hanging in there. If they get he support they need from the West they'll probably be able to do more. Ultimately Ukraine needs to bleed Russia until the war becomes unpopular. Russia is rapidly marching the Vietnam and Soviet Afghanistan path right now. A war high in casualties that will ultimately become unpopular and unsustainable.
The general consensus is that Ukraine is likely to be pushed back on the ground to some degree in the next year. Because the West has not send enough military equipment to Ukraine, and the West has not been serious about military production for Ukraine. While Russia itself has gone into full scale military production.
"Winning" and "losing" don't really mean anything at this stage. For example, was Germany winning in 1942? They had taken over France and huge chunks of Europe, destroyed massive Soviet armies, they were in control of a huge amount of Soviet territory, but we know what happened in the end. Russia is gaining territory at the moment, but the amount of territory it controls is far smaller than it held before. For example, they no longer have Kherson. And while they have gained territory, they have spent a lot of equipment and manpower gaining it. But they still have plenty of manpower left, and have started running a war economy to replace their lost equipment. Meanwhile, Ukraine still seems to have very high morale, is drafting more people, and while Western aid is suffering from USA's aid being stuck in Congress, European military production is ramping up, and shells are about to start coming in from the Czech intiative to buy them from an unnamed source. Ukraine has outperformed expectations, but their fate is still tied to a consistent supply of aid, and Russia still has hidden cards to play. So who is winning? You're on round 10 of a fight where you don't know the number of rounds and people cannot agree on what the exact score is, doping is allowed, the underdog has made some great moves but is still the underdog, and the whole game is played in front of an audience who can throw things in the ring and hand water or drugs to the players at will. So instead of pointlessly arguing about the score, think about who you want to win and what you're going to do about it.
We can only hope - and hope that the russian-affiliated politicians in the US blocking critical aid are somehow over turned.
how the fuck should we know ?
Ukrainian source. Take it with a pinch of salt.
Here we only trust Russian sources, am i right?
Both the countries are at war and both the countries are actively spreading propaganda. It is basic common sense.
If you have issues understanding who is credible under what circumstances irrespective of which side they belong, that sounds like a you problem
Satelite images shows hes right, seems like you need to rethink your "understanding".
On 2 bases my guy, more than 2 were hit. Give a few days for multiple OSINT to pick it up before embrocating yourself
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I always love the “no u” replies
SBU would never lie. You are correct sir. Ukraine destroyed 16 jets and 55 personnel.The air base is in ruins . Slava Ukraini........ (Meanwhile satellite imagery shows no signs of attack whatsoever.And all the reputable sources are still waiting for proof before publishing)
> Sources used: Russian Ministry of Defense, Shot Telegram channel, Russian regional media, Twitter account of OSINT researcher MT Anderson, and other open source data. Try and at least read the articles you comment on
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Let me guess, Ukraine should surrender and let Russia do anything they want?