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It's not. They tried to take Hostomel and airports SE and SW of Kyiva and failed. They were going for fast strikes. The failed to get the other airports (trie

It's not. They tried to take Hostomel and airports SE and SW of Kyiva and failed. They were going for fast strikes. The failed to get the other airports (tried to land a cargo plane and it was destroyed) - thought they go to Hostomel it was only by landing literally 100 assault helicopters with 1000 soldiers. That is literally 1/2 of their entire rotary fleet for a single, risky operation. Since then, they've been mauled over and over around the airport and have actually made negative or neutral progress for 5 days. So it remains to be seen if the balance of force can move in one direction or the other, I really wish the West would do more to make it more decisive. In the meantime, the USA can pay $100-200K (i.e. per javelin/stinger/mlaw etc.) to have a large chunk of Russian Amour sent to the dustbin with not much risk, that's not such a bad deal at all.

ncmncm 5y ago
That is a hell of a lot to pay to blow up just one obsolete tank.
- jollybean 5y ago
  It's cheap. It's costs nearly a million dollars to train, prepare and support a lowly US soldier. Then multiply that by the fact every fighter has 5 admins somewhere in the chain backing him up i.e. commanders, support, communications, intelligence etc.. Especially given that it is basically 'riskless' i.e. no US soldiers will die. $4B to wipe out the Russian Army? Deal of the Century.
  - ncmncm 5y ago
    They can always make more.
    - jollybean 5y ago
      The Russians can't make more gear in a short period of time, and it comes at great cost. Remember one armoured unit has support, training, soldiers as well. In the 'long game' of attrition warfare, the West would actually win, that is actually the State Dept. Assessment - that Russia 'wins' in Ukraine but is ground down over 15-20 years and eventually loses. Meanwhile, the US and West have more advanced, much more wealthy economies, and can send relatively cheap weapons to help grind Russia down. Frankly, if we could have a 'super weapon' it would be something that allows something resembling 'real' information into Russia so at very least regular Russians can see a bit of reality.
    - rasz 5y ago
      Can they manufacture faster than army abandons the armor? There have been at least three documented abandoned TOR SAM systems being just merely towed away by farmers, $25mil a pop.
yobbo 5y ago
Price per unit is closer to $10k, and they are being supplied from stocks which have a shelf-life anyway. So in terms of cash flow, it's not much of a cost.

ncmncm 5y ago

That is a hell of a lot to pay to blow up just one obsolete tank.

jollybean 5y ago
It's cheap. It's costs nearly a million dollars to train, prepare and support a lowly US soldier. Then multiply that by the fact every fighter has 5 admins somewhere in the chain backing him up i.e. commanders, support, communications, intelligence etc.. Especially given that it is basically 'riskless' i.e. no US soldiers will die. $4B to wipe out the Russian Army? Deal of the Century.
- ncmncm 5y ago
  They can always make more.
  - jollybean 5y ago
    The Russians can't make more gear in a short period of time, and it comes at great cost. Remember one armoured unit has support, training, soldiers as well. In the 'long game' of attrition warfare, the West would actually win, that is actually the State Dept. Assessment - that Russia 'wins' in Ukraine but is ground down over 15-20 years and eventually loses. Meanwhile, the US and West have more advanced, much more wealthy economies, and can send relatively cheap weapons to help grind Russia down. Frankly, if we could have a 'super weapon' it would be something that allows something resembling 'real' information into Russia so at very least regular Russians can see a bit of reality.
  - rasz 5y ago
    Can they manufacture faster than army abandons the armor? There have been at least three documented abandoned TOR SAM systems being just merely towed away by farmers, $25mil a pop.

yobbo 5y ago

Price per unit is closer to $10k, and they are being supplied from stocks which have a shelf-life anyway. So in terms of cash flow, it's not much of a cost.