15 ms·

Why a Russian convoy remains stalled north of Kyiv

68 points by okareaman 5y ago

okareaman 5y ago
https://archive.ph/bcu0e https://archive.ph/bcu0e
- zikohh 5y ago
  https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome
h2odragon 5y ago
Perhaps the bear isn't as healthy as had been supposed. https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2022/03/the-universal-boosting-of-putin/ https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2022/03/the-universa...
- kidme5 5y ago
  Good to see a take that isn't binary. Hopefully this is the end of Putin's government and the ease of collapse helps us realize our conjured threats for "defense" funding are only making the world less safe.
- NicoJuicy 5y ago
  What they say and do are 2 different things. In 2010 or 2012 a large gas supply was found and Crimea was at the center of it. Putin doesn't like the alternative solution for Europe and moved in to occupy Crimea as fast as possible. Ukraine cut off water supply to the invaders. They were getting dry. And now he is looking for an excuse to invade a country. NATO is a defensive measure, not an offensive one. Putin is a bully that wants to keep his hold over Europe. Nothing more, nothing less.
- ncmncm 5y ago
  Wishful thinking has never worked very well, where Russia was involved. It might be that the slow-rolled advance on Kyiv is meant to draw units away from the southern front Putin actually cares about.
  - starwind 5y ago
    Unlikely. The Russian’s have struggled logistically almost from the start. Within a day-or-two of the invasion there were numerous reports of Russian tank units walking around on foot looking for diesel. This is consistent with the convoy looking like it’s struggling with mechanical and fuel problems. Those soldiers can’t have much food left. The Russian’s also wouldn’t park themselves like that. They don’t have air dominance and from the numerous Ukrainian air strikes, it doesn’t seem like they have much idea of what’s above them at any given time. (They’re parked close together to stay under the umbrella of anti-aircraft weaponry.) The longer the convoy waits, the more time the Ukrainians have to prep to shell the convoy or hit it from the air.
    - syntheweave 5y ago
      Most of these things fall within Russia's known doctrine. The daily advancement rate of the convoy is right at their by-the-book limit - it just takes time to advance an operation on the ground, and this is why airfields were targeted early on in a bid to accelerate deployment; media reports of a "slow" advance are just unrealistic analysis. This goes for other questions about the campaign. As a large conscript force still basically using the Soviet model, weak troops are often thrown into the fire early on to soften opposition. Likewise, reliance on artillery is a byproduct of the air force being stretched thin and not reinvesting in new equipment: air dominance and precision bombing missions are expensive, and Russia's military primarily focuses on maintaining its own sovereignty, thus most of the allocation is towards a defensive air war with support provided by ground-based rockets and shelling. However, there are severe challenges still to be reckoned with, which support the idea of Russia remaining on the back foot. The reports of abandoned vehicles, disorganized troops and stretched supplies hold some credence; again, as a conscript army it's harder to pursue delegation of responsibility like a professional force. You are getting relatively less out of more troops simply due to lack of coordination. As well, Ukraine has a smaller force but has been spurred to rearm with the assistance of foreign aid and equipment since the 2014 invasion, getting access to some of the best technologies and training of NATO forces. So Ukraine has some significant battlefield advantages, and with the cutoffs to supply chains on Russia's end, from my viewpoint, while a Russian victory could still occur if they rout the forces in major cities, a slow, protracted conflict will definitely end in Russian defeat at significant cost to civilians. The next weeks will be critical.
- xenadu02 5y ago
  The agencies competent enough to know (or guess) certainly aren't going to tell anyone. It is absolutely possible to get high on your own supply (of authoritarianism, propaganda, and shooting messengers). So it is entirely possible upper echelons of the Russian Military tell Putin what he wants to hear because anyone who doesn't gets an unscheduled dose of Polonium. It is also possible they are deliberately slow-rolling for various reasons: legitimate supply line issues, testing the waters, being able to pull back if the west responds too strongly, they really just wanted to steal some territory, etc. Being an opportunist is hardly unique. Perhaps the plan was to invade. If you take the capital within a few days yay: you annexed Ukraine and you'll be done and it will be old news before the west can really respond. If the west sends aircraft carriers and troops you claim you were just protecting ethnic Russians in the border areas. If the invasion bogs down or the economic cost gets too high sign a peace treaty that contains as much as you can get away with and play nice neighbor for a bit while you send in the undercover agents to try another regime change in 5-10 years when everyone has stopped paying attention. Russia, much like the US, hasn't really faced off against a reasonably modern military with good training and decent weapons systems anytime in the recent past. Even though Ukraine has a smaller military they've been pouring a lot of effort into training, arming, and modernizing since the last time Russian decided to invade and take some territory in 2014. And it wasn't like they were rag-tag religious extremists or a guerrilla force prior to that - they weren't starting from zero. If Putin and his cronies really did overestimated Russian military capabilities it is still entirely possible for Russia to win the same way the Soviets survived the Wehrmacht: Massive mobilization, throw bodies into the fire, then slowly slog it out for as many years as it takes. That is an option Ukraine doesn't really have. They can't mobilize the same level of industrial production and they can't sustain as many dead sons. No one really knows if top of the line western weapons would level the playing field vs what Russia's defense industry can make. In the end it might come down to will: does Putin have the will to kill as many Russian soldiers as it takes? Would the rest of his cronies let him if he tried? Will the Russian military accept that? On the Ukrainian side how far are they willing to go? How many citizens will volunteer? How many modern western weapons can they get ahold of? Can they continue disrupting Russian communications and logistics? As far as I know this is the closest to a true military faceoff using modern weapons and tactics as we've seen. Most recent conflicts have been very asymmetric at every level which doesn't make for apt comparisons.
baybal2 5y ago
I am a Russian citizen, and I grew up in a military town in Far East. A place where the draft is the harshest, and which is the base of Pacific Fleet. A sad town called Vladivostok. I still retain connections with my high school mates. A lot of them have parent in military, seamen, and frontier men. The news of Putin's fiasco is spreading like wildfire among DOSes, ship crews, and in army barracks. The navy been traditionally the most disciplined service branch of the military because ships almost always have actual officers to command, vs. NCOs in the army. I can't preclude the possibility of a mutiny brewing there right now, as news of ships crews (yes, not even marine infantry, but actual ship crews, 3 star lieutenants) being forced into trains going to Ukraine came.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- ncmncm 5y ago
  Maybe needed in Crimea? I thought Russia took Ukraine's navy, back when.
- jollybean 5y ago
  So this is an incredible comment. It's very hard to figure out what is really going on in Ukraine (though we have a 1/2 decent idea) - let alone how to grasp what Russians all over are thinking. I would imagine the propaganda is effective at the same time Russians have to be cluing into the fact that this is 'not going well'. The degree to which they comprehend that up to 1000 armoured vehicles destroyed is definitely a 'giant disaster' is hard to fathom, as few people can put that into context. And at the same time, they have a lot of blood to spill, and, they know they have a lot of reserves in depth.
- mwattsun 5y ago
  As a former Navy man, I can't imagine being told to go fight in some muddy field with a weapon I don't know how to use for a crazy leader with delusions of grandeur. I would find a way not to go.
octoberfranklin 5y ago
Or maybe they just don't really want to occupy Kyiv. They want to annex a crapton of Ukranian territory, extract a demilitarization commitment, declare victory, and flip the bird at NATO. Occupying Kyiv means urban guerilla warfare and a lot of civilan deaths. They don't want to occupy Kyiv, they want to threaten to occupy Kyiv. Which is exactly what this preposterously-slow convoy accomplishes.
- RationPhantoms 5y ago
  Sure and in the interim, they can lose $13,000,000 missile systems, $20 million jets and divisions of tanks.
  - ncmncm 5y ago
    By all accounts, those are obsolete. Putin might have needed to "use them up" in order to get his people on board for replacing them. Franklin Roosevelt had the Navy's obsolete battleships all parked in Pearl Harbor when war was threatening in the Pacific. The all-important aircraft carriers were far away. Everyone in the US Navy understood how a successful attack would run, because it had been rehearsed twice already by the Navy itself.
    - powerslacker 5y ago
      Interesting, never heard this take before.
    - starwind 5y ago
      “Obsolete” is about all the Russian defense industry can produce. Russia’s defense industry has struggled to produce modern fighters and equipment. Russia touted the new Su-57 fighter and T-14 Armata tank but have hardly delivered any. Most of what their defense industry can build is upgraded versions of Soviet-designed fighters and armor
      - mediumsmart 5y ago
        so true - here is one of their obsolete drones throwing a firecracker: https://twitter.com/politblogme/status/1499868149776322563?s=20&t=vnDeToh4uVeh8u0F_pV7dw https://twitter.com/politblogme/status/1499868149776322563?s...
NicoJuicy 5y ago
It's Russian strategy to wait for the supply lines to move with the convoy. They need to bridge more distance with not enough resupply trucks. So they wait from a secure distance to resupply the convoy. It's also at important intersections to cut off main roads.
starwind 5y ago
"Improvements in command, control, joint action and coordination have also been made, as demonstrated in both Crimea and Syria, and during a number of large-scale exercises training for joint combined arms operations. A costly programme of rearmament has modernized available military equipment. Following a hiatus in the delivery and upgrading of military hardware lasting for more than a decade, the armed services' stocks of weaponry have been comprehensively replenished. The impact of technological renewal on the Russian military's ability to project power on a global level was demonstrated in Syria. At the same time, the country's capabilities for expeditionary operations remained limited. It is highly unlikely that it could supply sand sustain the scale of forces required for an operation comparable to the US coalition efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq." --Bettina Renz, Russia's Military Revival, 2018, page 196, emphasis mine
empressplay 5y ago
Putin doesn't want to occupy Kyiv, he just wants to draw attention away from the south, where he's almost completed a land bridge with Crimea.
mc32 5y ago
If it's stalled is or why cannot Ukraine perform a turkey shoot? Give the conscripts fair warning and then let loose?
- simonblack 5y ago
  No Ukrainian air force left. Gone in the first hour.
  - ceejayoz 5y ago
    That does not appear to be the case. https://www.reuters.com/world/ukraine-still-has-significant-majority-its-military-aircraft-us-official-2022-03-04/ https://www.reuters.com/world/ukraine-still-has-significant-...
    - toomuchtodo 5y ago
      NATO has also greenlit NATO forces providing their aircraft to Ukraine. https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/ukraine-russia-war-fighter-jets-antony-blinken-face-the-nation/ https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/ukraine-russia-war-fighter-...
  - nikolay 5y ago
    How about the Ghost of Kyiv?
    - ceejayoz 5y ago
      No indication it's really a thing. (Probably several separate engagements by several separate planes/pilots, or even downings via MANPADs. War breeds myths quickly. https://www.military.com/daily-news/2022/03/02/ukraines-fighter-ace-ghost-of-kyiv-may-be-myth-its-lethal-war-morale.html https://www.military.com/daily-news/2022/03/02/ukraines-figh...)
      - nikolay 5y ago
        I was making a joke. It's unfortunately, but most of the fakes come from the Ukrainian side - the like the heroic Snake Island solider, the girl showing how to drive an abandon Russian tank, or the model-turned-warrior, and other fakes.
rightbyte 5y ago
I would not trust these analysts too much. The bulk of the US force hadn't even entered Iraq yet. There was a huge traffic jam at the border — thousands of vehicles parked in parallel rows, nothing but columns of trucks, humvees, oil tankers, flatbed tucks, armored vehicles and vehicles of every stripe, from horizon to horizon. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/iraqis-surrendering-in-hordes/#app https://www.cbsnews.com/news/iraqis-surrendering-in-hordes/#...
puffoflogic 5y ago
I was hoping for some new info, but this article appears to be merely a rehash of every scrap of rumor and speculation that's come out over the past several days.
brailsafe 5y ago
Seems like it might have been a decent idea to plant bombs under that one road, if it wouldn't be normally quite risky
- joeman1000 5y ago
  Bombs under the road? Do you know how much excavation that would take just for one? And to do so without disturbing the road is near impossible.
  - brailsafe 5y ago
    I do not
adsmit14 5y ago

68 points by okareaman 5y ago

okareaman 5y ago

https://archive.ph/bcu0e https://archive.ph/bcu0e

zikohh 5y ago
https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome

h2odragon 5y ago

Perhaps the bear isn't as healthy as had been supposed. https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2022/03/the-universal-boosting-of-putin/ https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2022/03/the-universa...

kidme5 5y ago
Good to see a take that isn't binary. Hopefully this is the end of Putin's government and the ease of collapse helps us realize our conjured threats for "defense" funding are only making the world less safe.
NicoJuicy 5y ago
What they say and do are 2 different things. In 2010 or 2012 a large gas supply was found and Crimea was at the center of it. Putin doesn't like the alternative solution for Europe and moved in to occupy Crimea as fast as possible. Ukraine cut off water supply to the invaders. They were getting dry. And now he is looking for an excuse to invade a country. NATO is a defensive measure, not an offensive one. Putin is a bully that wants to keep his hold over Europe. Nothing more, nothing less.
ncmncm 5y ago
Wishful thinking has never worked very well, where Russia was involved. It might be that the slow-rolled advance on Kyiv is meant to draw units away from the southern front Putin actually cares about.
- starwind 5y ago
  Unlikely. The Russian’s have struggled logistically almost from the start. Within a day-or-two of the invasion there were numerous reports of Russian tank units walking around on foot looking for diesel. This is consistent with the convoy looking like it’s struggling with mechanical and fuel problems. Those soldiers can’t have much food left. The Russian’s also wouldn’t park themselves like that. They don’t have air dominance and from the numerous Ukrainian air strikes, it doesn’t seem like they have much idea of what’s above them at any given time. (They’re parked close together to stay under the umbrella of anti-aircraft weaponry.) The longer the convoy waits, the more time the Ukrainians have to prep to shell the convoy or hit it from the air.
  - syntheweave 5y ago
    Most of these things fall within Russia's known doctrine. The daily advancement rate of the convoy is right at their by-the-book limit - it just takes time to advance an operation on the ground, and this is why airfields were targeted early on in a bid to accelerate deployment; media reports of a "slow" advance are just unrealistic analysis. This goes for other questions about the campaign. As a large conscript force still basically using the Soviet model, weak troops are often thrown into the fire early on to soften opposition. Likewise, reliance on artillery is a byproduct of the air force being stretched thin and not reinvesting in new equipment: air dominance and precision bombing missions are expensive, and Russia's military primarily focuses on maintaining its own sovereignty, thus most of the allocation is towards a defensive air war with support provided by ground-based rockets and shelling. However, there are severe challenges still to be reckoned with, which support the idea of Russia remaining on the back foot. The reports of abandoned vehicles, disorganized troops and stretched supplies hold some credence; again, as a conscript army it's harder to pursue delegation of responsibility like a professional force. You are getting relatively less out of more troops simply due to lack of coordination. As well, Ukraine has a smaller force but has been spurred to rearm with the assistance of foreign aid and equipment since the 2014 invasion, getting access to some of the best technologies and training of NATO forces. So Ukraine has some significant battlefield advantages, and with the cutoffs to supply chains on Russia's end, from my viewpoint, while a Russian victory could still occur if they rout the forces in major cities, a slow, protracted conflict will definitely end in Russian defeat at significant cost to civilians. The next weeks will be critical.
xenadu02 5y ago
The agencies competent enough to know (or guess) certainly aren't going to tell anyone. It is absolutely possible to get high on your own supply (of authoritarianism, propaganda, and shooting messengers). So it is entirely possible upper echelons of the Russian Military tell Putin what he wants to hear because anyone who doesn't gets an unscheduled dose of Polonium. It is also possible they are deliberately slow-rolling for various reasons: legitimate supply line issues, testing the waters, being able to pull back if the west responds too strongly, they really just wanted to steal some territory, etc. Being an opportunist is hardly unique. Perhaps the plan was to invade. If you take the capital within a few days yay: you annexed Ukraine and you'll be done and it will be old news before the west can really respond. If the west sends aircraft carriers and troops you claim you were just protecting ethnic Russians in the border areas. If the invasion bogs down or the economic cost gets too high sign a peace treaty that contains as much as you can get away with and play nice neighbor for a bit while you send in the undercover agents to try another regime change in 5-10 years when everyone has stopped paying attention. Russia, much like the US, hasn't really faced off against a reasonably modern military with good training and decent weapons systems anytime in the recent past. Even though Ukraine has a smaller military they've been pouring a lot of effort into training, arming, and modernizing since the last time Russian decided to invade and take some territory in 2014. And it wasn't like they were rag-tag religious extremists or a guerrilla force prior to that - they weren't starting from zero. If Putin and his cronies really did overestimated Russian military capabilities it is still entirely possible for Russia to win the same way the Soviets survived the Wehrmacht: Massive mobilization, throw bodies into the fire, then slowly slog it out for as many years as it takes. That is an option Ukraine doesn't really have. They can't mobilize the same level of industrial production and they can't sustain as many dead sons. No one really knows if top of the line western weapons would level the playing field vs what Russia's defense industry can make. In the end it might come down to will: does Putin have the will to kill as many Russian soldiers as it takes? Would the rest of his cronies let him if he tried? Will the Russian military accept that? On the Ukrainian side how far are they willing to go? How many citizens will volunteer? How many modern western weapons can they get ahold of? Can they continue disrupting Russian communications and logistics? As far as I know this is the closest to a true military faceoff using modern weapons and tactics as we've seen. Most recent conflicts have been very asymmetric at every level which doesn't make for apt comparisons.

baybal2 5y ago

I am a Russian citizen, and I grew up in a military town in Far East. A place where the draft is the harshest, and which is the base of Pacific Fleet. A sad town called Vladivostok. I still retain connections with my high school mates. A lot of them have parent in military, seamen, and frontier men. The news of Putin's fiasco is spreading like wildfire among DOSes, ship crews, and in army barracks. The navy been traditionally the most disciplined service branch of the military because ships almost always have actual officers to command, vs. NCOs in the army. I can't preclude the possibility of a mutiny brewing there right now, as news of ships crews (yes, not even marine infantry, but actual ship crews, 3 star lieutenants) being forced into trains going to Ukraine came.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
ncmncm 5y ago
Maybe needed in Crimea? I thought Russia took Ukraine's navy, back when.
jollybean 5y ago
So this is an incredible comment. It's very hard to figure out what is really going on in Ukraine (though we have a 1/2 decent idea) - let alone how to grasp what Russians all over are thinking. I would imagine the propaganda is effective at the same time Russians have to be cluing into the fact that this is 'not going well'. The degree to which they comprehend that up to 1000 armoured vehicles destroyed is definitely a 'giant disaster' is hard to fathom, as few people can put that into context. And at the same time, they have a lot of blood to spill, and, they know they have a lot of reserves in depth.
mwattsun 5y ago
As a former Navy man, I can't imagine being told to go fight in some muddy field with a weapon I don't know how to use for a crazy leader with delusions of grandeur. I would find a way not to go.

octoberfranklin 5y ago

Or maybe they just don't really want to occupy Kyiv. They want to annex a crapton of Ukranian territory, extract a demilitarization commitment, declare victory, and flip the bird at NATO. Occupying Kyiv means urban guerilla warfare and a lot of civilan deaths. They don't want to occupy Kyiv, they want to threaten to occupy Kyiv. Which is exactly what this preposterously-slow convoy accomplishes.

RationPhantoms 5y ago
Sure and in the interim, they can lose $13,000,000 missile systems, $20 million jets and divisions of tanks.
- ncmncm 5y ago
  By all accounts, those are obsolete. Putin might have needed to "use them up" in order to get his people on board for replacing them. Franklin Roosevelt had the Navy's obsolete battleships all parked in Pearl Harbor when war was threatening in the Pacific. The all-important aircraft carriers were far away. Everyone in the US Navy understood how a successful attack would run, because it had been rehearsed twice already by the Navy itself.
  - powerslacker 5y ago
    Interesting, never heard this take before.
  - starwind 5y ago
    “Obsolete” is about all the Russian defense industry can produce. Russia’s defense industry has struggled to produce modern fighters and equipment. Russia touted the new Su-57 fighter and T-14 Armata tank but have hardly delivered any. Most of what their defense industry can build is upgraded versions of Soviet-designed fighters and armor
    - mediumsmart 5y ago
      so true - here is one of their obsolete drones throwing a firecracker: https://twitter.com/politblogme/status/1499868149776322563?s=20&t=vnDeToh4uVeh8u0F_pV7dw https://twitter.com/politblogme/status/1499868149776322563?s...

NicoJuicy 5y ago

It's Russian strategy to wait for the supply lines to move with the convoy. They need to bridge more distance with not enough resupply trucks. So they wait from a secure distance to resupply the convoy. It's also at important intersections to cut off main roads.

starwind 5y ago

"Improvements in command, control, joint action and coordination have also been made, as demonstrated in both Crimea and Syria, and during a number of large-scale exercises training for joint combined arms operations. A costly programme of rearmament has modernized available military equipment. Following a hiatus in the delivery and upgrading of military hardware lasting for more than a decade, the armed services' stocks of weaponry have been comprehensively replenished. The impact of technological renewal on the Russian military's ability to project power on a global level was demonstrated in Syria. At the same time, the country's capabilities for expeditionary operations remained limited. It is highly unlikely that it could supply sand sustain the scale of forces required for an operation comparable to the US coalition efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq." --Bettina Renz, Russia's Military Revival, 2018, page 196, emphasis mine

empressplay 5y ago

Putin doesn't want to occupy Kyiv, he just wants to draw attention away from the south, where he's almost completed a land bridge with Crimea.

mc32 5y ago

If it's stalled is or why cannot Ukraine perform a turkey shoot? Give the conscripts fair warning and then let loose?

simonblack 5y ago
No Ukrainian air force left. Gone in the first hour.
- ceejayoz 5y ago
  That does not appear to be the case. https://www.reuters.com/world/ukraine-still-has-significant-majority-its-military-aircraft-us-official-2022-03-04/ https://www.reuters.com/world/ukraine-still-has-significant-...
  - toomuchtodo 5y ago
    NATO has also greenlit NATO forces providing their aircraft to Ukraine. https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/ukraine-russia-war-fighter-jets-antony-blinken-face-the-nation/ https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/ukraine-russia-war-fighter-...
- nikolay 5y ago
  How about the Ghost of Kyiv?
  - ceejayoz 5y ago
    No indication it's really a thing. (Probably several separate engagements by several separate planes/pilots, or even downings via MANPADs. War breeds myths quickly. https://www.military.com/daily-news/2022/03/02/ukraines-fighter-ace-ghost-of-kyiv-may-be-myth-its-lethal-war-morale.html https://www.military.com/daily-news/2022/03/02/ukraines-figh...)
    - nikolay 5y ago
      I was making a joke. It's unfortunately, but most of the fakes come from the Ukrainian side - the like the heroic Snake Island solider, the girl showing how to drive an abandon Russian tank, or the model-turned-warrior, and other fakes.

rightbyte 5y ago

I would not trust these analysts too much. The bulk of the US force hadn't even entered Iraq yet. There was a huge traffic jam at the border — thousands of vehicles parked in parallel rows, nothing but columns of trucks, humvees, oil tankers, flatbed tucks, armored vehicles and vehicles of every stripe, from horizon to horizon. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/iraqis-surrendering-in-hordes/#app https://www.cbsnews.com/news/iraqis-surrendering-in-hordes/#...

puffoflogic 5y ago

I was hoping for some new info, but this article appears to be merely a rehash of every scrap of rumor and speculation that's come out over the past several days.

brailsafe 5y ago

Seems like it might have been a decent idea to plant bombs under that one road, if it wouldn't be normally quite risky

joeman1000 5y ago
Bombs under the road? Do you know how much excavation that would take just for one? And to do so without disturbing the road is near impossible.
- brailsafe 5y ago
  I do not

adsmit14 5y ago