[W:#23,579]Ukraine War Thread

[Felis Leo]

The HIMARS missiles are not radar guided. They are GPS guided.

The Russian mirror defenses of bridges are to foil satellites that use radars to get their GPS coordinates and then relay GPS coordinates using radar signals down to the missile launchers.

With the Russian radar mirrors the satellites can't do their job. HIMARS missiles as used in Ukraine are foiled because they can't get the GPS from the radar dependent satellites.


This is from an article dated August 7 to be published in the Sunday Eurasia Times....

Russia Exploiting ‘Technical Flaw’ In HIMARS MLRS; Deploys Radar Reflectors To Protect Key Infra — Expert​

As Ukraine continues to ramp up its offensive against Russia using long-range weapons like HIMARS, Russia has started deploying countermeasures like radar reflectors to confuse the enemy.

DECOY DEFENSE: #RUSSIA ROLLS OUT BARGES WHICH ARE COVERED IN RADAR REFLECTORS AT THE #CRIMEAN BRIDGE TO COUNTER POTENTIAL THREATS FROM #UKRAINIAN FORCES WHO HAVE SUGGESTED THE CROSSING IS THEIR NUMBER ONE TARGET.@INTELREPUBLIC#RUSSIANUKRAINIANWAR #UKRAINEWAR PIC.TWITTER.COM/HNCAMCU4NR

Russia Exploiting 'Technical Flaw' In HIMARS MLRS; Deploys Radar Reflectors To Protect Key Infra -- Expert

As Ukraine continues to ramp up its offensive against Russia using long-range weapons like HIMARS, Russia has started deploying countermeasures like radar reflectors to confuse the enemy. Stunning Image Of China’s ‘Apache Helicopter’ (Z-10ME) Breaks Internet; Netizens Speculate A Possible Sale...

eurasiantimes.com

The article states that Russia "is trying to evade enemy fire by deploying countermeasures. Russians have deployed an array of pyramidal radar reflectors in the water to the west of the Antonivsky bridge and near the rail bridge. The Antonivsky Bridge is just upstream of Kherson." Neither is it a news bulletin that the only way for Moscow to hold onto this oblast is by maintaining its supply lines over the Dnipro river."

I am curious, do these floating mirror pyramids and barges even work? Or is this some grand military placebo to boost morale? Like when the Soviet government gave its soldiers lead underwear to allay their fears of sterility when they were cleaning up around Chernobyl?

 

[maxparrish]

 

[maxparrish]

This is the "mainstream media" of Russia, the representatives of their Russian audiences and culture. What else do you need to know about the enemies of Ukraine's people?

MSN

www.msn.com

 

[maxparrish]

 

[Juks]

Turkey needs to be booted from NATO.

I believe Turkey has NATO by the throat so to say. Sweden and Finland is strategically important to NATO and especially important to the Baltic states and Poland. This is why NATO has been so keen on training with us even before we made any application and when Sweden and Finland was highly unlikely to apply. Besides that Sweden together with Denmark control the in and outflow to the Baltic sea. We also have a significant air force, for our size and even if Poland on the paper has more planes (or just under if you count both of our countries), they count in the planes from the 80th in their equipment list, Sweden (and I believe also Finland) have only modern and ready to go airplanes in their fleet, which makes us more able to hold back any aggression towards the Baltic states (and even Poland) until reinforcement can arrive from for example the UK or the Netherlands, than they are themselves. Finland borders to Russia gives NATO reach to any of the Russian military bases and the white sea in Murmansk with basic missile systems like the Himars. Even Severodvinsk is only about 680 km away from the Finnish border.

Turkey though is also very strategically important for NATO since Turkey control the inflow to the black sea and are the closest military main power to protect NATO members as Romania and Bulgaria, if they were to be attacked. (Question is would they though?)

So no criticism or consequences for playing both sides will come towards Turkey until they have ratified the Swedish and Finnish applications. Well, maybe from the US, I don’t know how important you think Poland and the Baltic states and the Baltic sea really is. You might though think it is important due to Finland’s border and the access it gives to the bases where Russia has placed the long distant nuclear weapons (set for the US) and nuclear submarines.

 

[Juks]

On July 1 this year, Biden promised that the country would send the Norwegian air defense system NASAMS to Ukraine, something that the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense hopes to receive in mid-September,

Ukraine Needs NASAMS to Defend Against Russian Cruise Missiles | Air & Space Forces Magazine

Ukraine needs surface-to-air missile systems that can track and destroy cruise missiles fired by long-range strategic bombers from Russia.

www.airforcemag.com

 

[maxparrish]

On July 1 this year, Biden promised that the country would send the Norwegian air defense system NASAMS to Ukraine, something that the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense hopes to receive in mid-September,

Ukraine Needs NASAMS to Defend Against Russian Cruise Missiles | Air & Space Forces Magazine

Ukraine needs surface-to-air missile systems that can track and destroy cruise missiles fired by long-range strategic bombers from Russia.

www.airforcemag.com

If find this very perplexing. How does it take so long to purchase systems? How is a desperate AA-anti cruise missile need that was identified by March 1st 2022, labor for 7 1/2 months only to gave give birth to only one or two systems? (Which is what the US said it would purchase).

2 NASAMs are used to protect Washington DC government offices. That is a very modest area, so why in the world would the administration purchase almost nothing when all of Ukraine is in need of deployable AA against tactical and strategic bombing?

Germany promised IRIS-T in DECEMBER. And one report is that it promised ONE. One? Are they kidding?

And those Gepards. Of the 50 suggested, 30 was promised, 15 of them by Mid July. Last I heard is that in Mid July a total of THREE were done. And no word if any have been shipped to Ukraine.

What has not be acknowledged in the press, but is very apparent, the West is a paper tiger. It is entirely unprepared for a major war, ability to build replacement weapons and produce munitions at the rate of likely expenditure is almost non existent.

It's almost criminal how brittle and vulnerable the western militaries have left their forces. Once an intense full scale war begins, NATO will be totally out of munitions within days or a few weeks. The Russians, on the other hand, seem to have a mountain of munitions...never ending.

 

[anatta]

Does it no seem peculiar to you that if the US has produced 1200 M270s and 550 HIMARS (this does not included licensed production the other NATO countries) then mathematically it means there are not less than 2950 loaded MRLS pods x 6 rockets each. That 17,700 rockets for just one load of all pods, which means 1 load and 2 reloads if one assumes there are only 50,000 guided rockets produced to date (the other 100 of thousands unguided ones being retired?).

In other words, has the US has been so negligent to produce massive numbers of launchers with perhaps only ONE DAY of ammunition for each? And no one is screaming that is is a military disaster why isn't someone should accountable for such near criminally negligent munitions planning?

I am saying that if you can't even supply 30 or 40 HIMARS out of 1700 systems, we might be advised to start some court martials and tell the American people the truth. In the meantime, by all means ration the supply of ammo. But don't ration delivery systems. Even 32 HIMARS distributed over several threatened weapons sectors, and a number of them for an offensive is invaluable in this kind of war.

The don't have to be all firing boatloads of rockets concurrently, they do need to be emplaced at the ready when of necessity needed.

As the administration itself leaked that another 12 to 16 himars was doable, then by GOD...DO IT.

save some production for the Chinese..the cupboard is bare - Ukraine sucked it dry and now we are supposed to send more?
What kind of open ended committment is this without accountability? Ukraine is riding the US gravy train.

 

[Juks]

If find this very perplexing. How does it take so long to purchase systems? How is a desperate AA-anti cruise missile need that was identified by March 1st 2022, labor for 7 1/2 months only to gave give birth to only one or two systems? (Which is what the US said it would purchase).

2 NASAMs are used to protect Washington DC government offices. That is a very modest area, so why in the world would the administration purchase almost nothing when all of Ukraine is in need of deployable AA against tactical and strategic bombing?

Germany promised IRIS-T in DECEMBER. And one report is that it promised ONE. One? Are they kidding?

And those Gepards. Of the 50 suggested, 30 was promised, 15 of them by Mid July. Last I heard is that in Mid July a total of THREE were done. And no word if any have been shipped to Ukraine.

What has not be acknowledged in the press, but is very apparent, the West is a paper tiger. It is entirely unprepared for a major war, ability to build replacement weapons and produce munitions almost non existent.

It's almost criminal how brittle and vulnerable the western militaries have left their forces. Once an intense full scale war begins, NATO will be totally out of munitions within days or a few weeks.

Pathetic.

I agree, and want to add: Whenever Sweden has promised weapons to the Ukraine (in total 5 times) we have delivered within a week or two from the decision was made in our parlament, with exception for one time when we coordinated deliveries with NATO.

GO SWEDEN!

If we are let in, maybe NATO should make us responsible for logistics....

 

[anatta]

Obama era military budget cuts. I am sure the pentegon spent what money was there on weapon systems at the expense of "ammo". My speculation.

the problem is how fast can we re-produce the warheads? It seems we produced a lot of platforms to be able to field them,
but not a lot of replacements. I doubt we thought we would need so many all at once against Russia since NATO could suppress Russian artillery and NATO would not need so much range

 

[maxparrish]

save some production for the Chinese..the cupboard is bare - Ukraine sucked it dry and now we are supposed to send more?
What kind of open ended committment is this without accountability? Ukraine is riding the US gravy train.

The cupboard has been bare for a long time, and a small portion of it given to Ukraine isn't going to matter much in an all out war of mobilization. And one reason it is bare is because the west has increasingly retired legacy mentions that it deems as to likely to cause collateral damage in favor of a lower volume of precision strike weapons.

This has been a horrible mistake as the less precise but high volume unguided cluster bombs, sub-munitions, etc. has always been necessary as a large base to stop large masses of tanks and vast numbers of artillery.

One is not going to micro manage from the US "accountability" from a foreign army in the midst of a war - the only logical way to aid any country has always been and will always be to tell the receiving country the limits of aid one is willing to commit on an annual basis and warn them to plan accordingly. This "accountability" crap is a canard, invented by those who are opposed to helping Ukraine to begin with.

LIke, for example, you!

 

[maxparrish]

I agree, and want to add: Whenever Sweden has promised weapons to the Ukraine (in total 5 times) we have delivered within a week or two from the decision was made in our parlament, with exception for one time when we coordinated deliveries with NATO.

GO SWEDEN!

If we are let in, maybe NATO should make us responsible for logistics....

Sweden will be a member. And while I understand why Germany is so extremely dysfunctional, I am at a loss to rationally justify the other nations poor planning and inability to grasp that this is a war that is only beginning Ukraine, but eventually will be relaunched against the Baltic states and Poland.

 

[Juks]

Sweden will be a member. And while I understand why Germany is so extremely dysfunctional, I am at a loss to rationally justify the other nations poor planning and inability to grasp that this is a war that is only beginning Ukraine, but eventually will be relaunched against the Baltic states and Poland.

You just can't help yourself, you have to put in some criticism towards Germany no matter what... It is as I can see your fingers twitching and trembleing at the keyboard

 

[Yakshi]

This is the "mainstream media" of Russia, the representatives of their Russian audiences and culture. What else do you need to know about the enemies of Ukraine's people?

MSN

www.msn.com

russia's "political commentators" so often try to out-macho each other. One guy will say, "We will kill you all," another guy will say, "Hey now, he's just a journalist," and the first guy will say, "I don't care, I'll kill him," and the second guy will basically shrug, as if to say, he's got a point.

It's like they took our blueprint for WWE interviews--"And Ric Flair with a neck brace on came charging into the arena with a baseball bat!"--and applied it to their political-commentary shows.

And they keep making the same two contradictory claims: russian victory is inevitable; and if russia loses, we will be forced to use nuclear weapons, because Russia never loses.

In my opinion, they seem scared shitless.

 

[Rogue Valley]

Zelensky Condemns Russian 'Terror' After Damage to Nuclear Plant - The Moscow Times

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky on Saturday accused Russia of using the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant "for terror" after the operator of the facility reported major damage at the site.

www.themoscowtimes.com

Energoatom, the operator of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in the south of the country, said Saturday that parts of the facility had been "seriously damaged" by military strikes and one of its reactors was forced to shut down.

Friday's strikes had damaged a station containing nitrogen and oxygen and an auxiliary building.

---

Institute for the Study of War

Russian and Ukrainian forces traded accusations of dangerous shelling at the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) on August 6 continuing the exchange of accusations ISW reported on August 5. ISW cannot independently determine which

www.understandingwar.org

August 6

---

Four more grain ships are leaving Ukrainian ports today. A Barbados-flagged general cargo ship has sailed into the Ukrainian port of Chornomorsk to take on a load of grain.

North Macedonia has transferred 8 T-72A tanks and 4 Su-25 attack aircraft to Ukraine. That's more than some G20 nations have contributed.

 

[Juin]

.

 

[anatta]

The cupboard has been bare for a long time, and a small portion of it given to Ukraine isn't going to matter much in an all out war of mobilization. And one reason it is bare is because the west has increasingly retired legacy mentions that it deems as to likely to cause collateral damage in favor of a lower volume of precision strike weapons.

This has been a horrible mistake as the less precise but high volume unguided cluster bombs, sub-munitions, etc. has always been necessary as a large base to stop large masses of tanks and vast numbers of artillery.

One is not going to micro manage from the US "accountability" from a foreign army in the midst of a war - the only logical way to aid any country has always been and will always be to tell the receiving country the limits of aid one is willing to commit on an annual basis and warn them to plan accordingly. This "accountability" crap is a canard, invented by those who are opposed to helping Ukraine to begin with.

LIke, for example, you!

lol.. flood the zone is what you want.. i thought conservatives didn't want to pay taxes for others wars?
I mean that was a big deal by Trump on NATO - pay your share. So why cant Europe pay for this?

LIke, for example, you!

I aint no neocon/ the hell with the USA being the sugar daddy for Europe - we got the bill to deal with China
I dont see NATO taking a leading role in the western Pacific. Your (Europe) backyard, your war, you pay for it
~~
as to "accountability" of course you dont want that- just give Ukraine anything Zelensky desires and dont worry about
where it goes from there

 

[anatta]

Sweden will be a member. And while I understand why Germany is so extremely dysfunctional, I am at a loss to rationally justify the other nations poor planning and inability to grasp that this is a war that is only beginning Ukraine, but eventually will be relaunched against the Baltic states and Poland.

SMH..Putin cant even take Donetsk..

 

[justoneman]

Sweden will be a member. And while I understand why Germany is so extremely dysfunctional, I am at a loss to rationally justify the other nations poor planning and inability to grasp that this is a war that is only beginning Ukraine, but eventually will be relaunched against the Baltic states and Poland.

This not a war only beginning with Ukraine.

 

[Juin]

SMH..Putin cant even take Donetsk..

Is @maxparrish already accusing Russians of attacking Poland and the Baltics? The avarice of the demonic Russian Federation knows no bounds. Maybe Samoa and Papua New Guinea better up their defense budgets. Definitely the actual Russia and the fantastic Russia borne from Russophobic intellects are worlds apart

 

[EnigmaO01]

You may both have a reasonable disagreement about Assange and Wikileaks, but Juks is not a Putin fanboy. He has been a great poster in this thread.

Absolutely!

 

[EnigmaO01]

They know whats coming

Looks really old school doesn't it? And as has been pointed out it won't help against gps guided missiles.

 

[EnigmaO01]

All you have to do, take a satellite pic of them, you have the GPS info and then use GPS ammo.
Its a desperate move of the Russians, Mars ammo uses GPS. It shows the different stages of Russia and Nato, Russia thinks radar, NATO thinks GPS.
The difference is 2 decades of technology. Lets not forget Russia does not have a GPS system, they are working on it, but well, oil well , gas well, water well.

Actually Russia does have their own form of GPS known as Glosnos. Not quite as accurate as the west but fairly close.

GLONASS (Russia)​

GLObal NAvigation Satellite System or GLONASS is global navigation system of Russia. GLONASS became operational in year 1993 with 12 satellites in 2 orbits at the height of 19,130 km. At present, there are total 27 satellites in orbit and all are operational. GLONASS is operated by Russian Aerospace Defence Forces and is the Second alternative navigational system in operation.

What are various GNSS systems?

GPS, or Global Positioning System, is one of the four Global Navigation Satellite Systems? The four global GNSS systems are – GPS (US), GLONASS (Russia), Galileo (EU), BeiDou (China). Additionally, there are two regional systems – QZSS (Japan) and IRNSS or NavIC (India).

www.geospatialworld.net

 

[Juin]

Deported Civilians: How civilians are illegally deported to Russia

By Sofia Santos & Benjamin PitetUkrainian refugees are presented with the illusion of choice from the moment of their capture until their involuntary settlement in Russian territory. They are trapped in a Kafka-esque system working against them. Kept under the watchful eyes of the invading...

www.info-res.org

I read the article from top to bottom. Do the authors know what the word "deport" means? The headline infers people rounded up, kickin and screamin, by armed guards into buses headed for Russia. When in fact all the article is about is at best less than satisfactory handling of people displaced by war. Where "illegality" comes in I cannot tell. Or maybe the authors believe allowing the refugees to remain in the ruins is the "legal" thing to do.

 

[EnigmaO01]

I believe Turkey has NATO by the throat so to say. Sweden and Finland is strategically important to NATO and especially important to the Baltic states and Poland. This is why NATO has been so keen on training with us even before we made any application and when Sweden and Finland was highly unlikely to apply. Besides that Sweden together with Denmark control the in and outflow to the Baltic sea. We also have a significant air force, for our size and even if Poland on the paper has more planes (or just under if you count both of our countries), they count in the planes from the 80th in their equipment list, Sweden (and I believe also Finland) have only modern and ready to go airplanes in their fleet, which makes us more able to hold back any aggression towards the Baltic states (and even Poland) until reinforcement can arrive from for example the UK or the Netherlands, than they are themselves. Finland borders to Russia gives NATO reach to any of the Russian military bases and the white sea in Murmansk with basic missile systems like the Himars. Even Severodvinsk is only about 680 km away from the Finnish border.

Turkey though is also very strategically important for NATO since Turkey control the inflow to the black sea and are the closest military main power to protect NATO members as Romania and Bulgaria, if they were to be attacked. (Question is would they though?)

So no criticism or consequences for playing both sides will come towards Turkey until they have ratified the Swedish and Finnish applications. Well, maybe from the US, I don’t know how important you think Poland and the Baltic states and the Baltic sea really is. You might though think it is important due to Finland’s border and the access it gives to the bases where Russia has placed the long distant nuclear weapons (set for the US) and nuclear submarines.

I can assure you all the Baltic countries including Poland are important to the U.S.