3022
3023

UA shot down something big over Kyiv - came down in a rain of debris over a residential area.

3024

LCol Vindman on CNN gave a surprisingly upbeat prognosis on the war. He felt that Russian troops were doing worse than expected and Ukrainans better than expected. While he stopped short of saying the Ukrainian could hold he did think that Russian casualties would be higher than Putin expected Both he and the form Amb. to Russia, who I saw on Maddow, thought that size of the protest in over 50 cites was a real surprise to Putin.

3025

I wonder if it’s laid out such that Russia can’t remotely cripple their AA capability? US doctrine would always be missile and air attack to cripple the SAM and radar capability before anything else would be sent in, it doesn’t sound like Russia has air superiority except at the edges. Somebody mentioned they have a bunch of man portable AA, maybe that’s keeping the first steps from succeeding.

3026

Doesn’t Russia have more cruise missiles? Praying for Ukraine but it doesn’t exactly seem like shock and awe. Maybe they’ll turn it up now that things haven’t gone to plan.

3027

I don’t know much about Ukraine’s AA capabilities but I’d think only static AA positions would be easy pickings for Russian missile attacks. Mobile systems are a lot trickier because you need to locate them. So they either need intelligence that can locate them or you’re basically looking at needing to fly missions that would like what the US calls Wild Weasel.

3028
3029

I’ve seen several reports that Russia just doesn’t have as many precision guided munitions as the US does.

3030

They’re also expensive - million bucks for a Kalibr Cruise Missile. Night ones bombardment was 100 mill for the missiles alone.

3031

Russia may have been hoping to “shock and awe” Ukraine into submission.

US could have told them that doesn’t work.

3032

In my view the next week is going to have alot of consequences for how conflict will play out the next couple of decades. If Putin overwhelms the Ukranian military, the civilian population cooperate with the puppet government that gets installed, and the west is incapable of inflicting severe and lasting economic damage on Russia… then I just don’t see how it stops here. Xi, and any dictator that is under the direct protection of Russia/China, will feel encouraged to start snuffing out nearby democracies through force of arms.

3033

Vindman on The Last Word telling some stories that, if true (big if), would suggest real bad stuff for the Russians.

Reports from captured Russian officers saying that they weren’t even told that they were deploying to Ukraine to kill Ukrainians, and Russian soldiers saying that they have not been given full water or food rations.

3034

Does anyone know why Sweden, Ireland, and Austria aren’t in NATO? Was it ideological reluctance or are they in other treaties that have the same effect or something?

3035

The thing is, this attack on Ukraine has been nowhere near as competently executed as the US attacks on Iraq.

If the recent news is accurate, it suggests that Russia’s ability to conduct networked warfare is even further behind the US than I would have expected.

3036

Sweden has historically been neutral for a long time. Weirdly enough, they have a sizeable defense industry for such a small nation, and they’ve generally been content to arm themselves to keep everyone at bay. But even they recognize that Russia is an entirely different beast, and they’ve been having issues over the past decade of Russia probing their defenses.

Ireland has had issues with the UK occupying them until after WW1, and obviously weren’t feeling any urge to help the Brits out during their wars. And aside from the Brits, who else is invading Ireland? They’re pretty isolated.

3037

So far it’s clear that the Ukrainians are willing to fight for their country. Iraqis weren’t particularly willing to fight for Saddam.

I think it was a post on ACOUP that went into how hard it is to actually build a professional “western style” army that will be willing to actually fight and die. There was a reason why for much of history troops were personally loyal to their commander.

Edit: I should say, the US military has a lot more going for it than the Russian military as well.

3038

Austria was also neutral - Declaration of Neutrality - Wikipedia ; it was the only way for the Soviets to give them their country back basically.

3039

When it comes to Ireland, they have a little problem with the UK.

3040

Some of the Russian troops are conscripts - cannon fodder - there to distract and pin down Ukrainian soldiers away from the professional army that is doing the heaviest fighting.

3041

This is definitely the case, but honestly the initial attack on Iraq was so one sided that it didn’t really come down to the Iraqis wanting to fight or not… Our ability to conduct networked warfare was a generation ahead of them. Their targets were getting blown up without even realizing they were being engaged.

I don’t think we’re seeing the same kind of technological superiority in this engagement between Ukraine and Russia.