4 ms·

> I'm not convinced. Me either. Seems like this article characterized about the last month of the conflict. Things are about to change. Precision weapons ar

> I'm not convinced. Me either. Seems like this article characterized about the last month of the conflict. Things are about to change. Precision weapons are arriving, with trained crews and Western ammo supply. By the end of June being a Russian artillery crew anywhere near the front in Ukraine will be a bad idea with HIMARS crews hunting you. Then UK M270s come online. German MARS GMLRS are apparently on the horizon as well. German PzH 2000 will be firing on Russians by about end of this week. Added up this should blunt the one meaningful advantage the Russian's still have; massed cold war artillery. Take that away and what's left besides nukes? A horde of undersupplied Russian contract soldiers and whatever remains of their stock of PGMs. That's not sufficient to defeat Ukraine.

ncmncm 4y ago
Very small amounts of precision weapons are arriving. More specifically, not enough. The article is correct. Numbers matter.
- topspin 4y ago
  These are advanced weapons. They can't be integrated over night and everyone involved knows that. Meanwhile, the US Secretary Of Defense has already stated that these HIMARS are an "initial tranche." More will come with time.
  - topspin 4y ago
    The Biden admin made this official today. More HIMARS coming in July. And Ukraine is about a week early; combat footage of a HIMARS battery firing on Russians emerged from Ukraine today.
- spywaregorilla 4y ago
  Numbers do matter, but don't read too much into Ukraine's pleas for hundreds of them. It's just hyperbole to justify getting dozens.
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    Let me guess, you are not being shot at with thousands of artillery pieces, and with ballistic precision-guided rockets.
    - spywaregorilla 4y ago
      I've donated 8k to Ukraine personally and am deeply supportive. I'm all for sending them pretty much whatever they want. I'm supportive of deploying US troops, back in time, to the beginning of the conflict. And yet, I still think the current HIMAR supplies are a significant contribution. I think Russia will have a very difficult time doing much more. I'm vaguely confident that Lysychansk will be the last significant area where they see any offensive progress, and am not certain they will succeed there either. Not entirely due to the HIMARs of course, but I remain optimistic. Especially if Russia continues to refuse a general mobilization.
      - ncmncm 4y ago
        They need large numbers specifically because Russia is using large numbers. Each round typically destroys only one piece of enemy materiel. Used, it is gone. Even ideally, it usually takes several shells to destroy a tank or artillery piece, or missiles to sink a ship. If they have more of those than you have rounds, they win even if rounds are, in principle, much cheaper. That is their logic of sending in T72 tanks. Yes, they are easy to take out with the cheapest shoulder-launched missile, if shot from in-range, but until that happens each is a grave threat to life and limb. They are sending in whole trainloads.
themgt 4y ago
My guess is this comment is not going to age well. Fundamentally the point this article is making is: how many of those weapons / missiles do we have in the entire NATO stockpile? What's the annual production rate? How fast can that be scaled up? The numbers are not all public, but from what I can tell the answers are really surprisingly bad. e.g. it looks like Ukraine conducted a first HIMARS strike: https://twitter.com/ralee85/status/1540859211814502405 https://twitter.com/ralee85/status/1540859211814502405 "one of their salvos killed two and wounded several" and destroyed some vehicles - now multiply that times how many missiles the US and NATO has in their total stockpile and total annual production, and see if it that will win a war against a fully mobilized Russian army, much less China.
- topspin 4y ago
  The flaw in this thinking is the "fully mobilized Russian army" part. The full mobilization of Russia remains a hypothetical and until it actually happens Ukraine doesn't have to contend with it; all they have to do is keep bloodying the forces at hand and bleed Russia white. Can Russia undertake a full mobilization without destabilizing the Putin regime? That's not a given and time is against Russia in this regard. Regarding stockpiles: First, Russia has its own stockpile problems. They've depleted their PGMs and they can't get the components they need to make more. They've had to resurrect laughably obsolescent armor to backfill their losses. Second, the "low rate production" scheme the West has employed to replenish stockpiles between conflicts has worked well for us and so a working supply chain exists to be scaled up. Time is against Russia here as well. Aside from political will there is no reason we ultimately couldn't supply Ukraine with thousands of M31Ax rockets every month.

ncmncm 4y ago

Very small amounts of precision weapons are arriving. More specifically, not enough. The article is correct. Numbers matter.

topspin 4y ago
These are advanced weapons. They can't be integrated over night and everyone involved knows that. Meanwhile, the US Secretary Of Defense has already stated that these HIMARS are an "initial tranche." More will come with time.
- topspin 4y ago
  The Biden admin made this official today. More HIMARS coming in July. And Ukraine is about a week early; combat footage of a HIMARS battery firing on Russians emerged from Ukraine today.
spywaregorilla 4y ago
Numbers do matter, but don't read too much into Ukraine's pleas for hundreds of them. It's just hyperbole to justify getting dozens.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  Let me guess, you are not being shot at with thousands of artillery pieces, and with ballistic precision-guided rockets.
  - spywaregorilla 4y ago
    I've donated 8k to Ukraine personally and am deeply supportive. I'm all for sending them pretty much whatever they want. I'm supportive of deploying US troops, back in time, to the beginning of the conflict. And yet, I still think the current HIMAR supplies are a significant contribution. I think Russia will have a very difficult time doing much more. I'm vaguely confident that Lysychansk will be the last significant area where they see any offensive progress, and am not certain they will succeed there either. Not entirely due to the HIMARs of course, but I remain optimistic. Especially if Russia continues to refuse a general mobilization.
    - ncmncm 4y ago
      They need large numbers specifically because Russia is using large numbers. Each round typically destroys only one piece of enemy materiel. Used, it is gone. Even ideally, it usually takes several shells to destroy a tank or artillery piece, or missiles to sink a ship. If they have more of those than you have rounds, they win even if rounds are, in principle, much cheaper. That is their logic of sending in T72 tanks. Yes, they are easy to take out with the cheapest shoulder-launched missile, if shot from in-range, but until that happens each is a grave threat to life and limb. They are sending in whole trainloads.

themgt 4y ago

My guess is this comment is not going to age well. Fundamentally the point this article is making is: how many of those weapons / missiles do we have in the entire NATO stockpile? What's the annual production rate? How fast can that be scaled up? The numbers are not all public, but from what I can tell the answers are really surprisingly bad. e.g. it looks like Ukraine conducted a first HIMARS strike: https://twitter.com/ralee85/status/1540859211814502405 https://twitter.com/ralee85/status/1540859211814502405 "one of their salvos killed two and wounded several" and destroyed some vehicles - now multiply that times how many missiles the US and NATO has in their total stockpile and total annual production, and see if it that will win a war against a fully mobilized Russian army, much less China.

topspin 4y ago
The flaw in this thinking is the "fully mobilized Russian army" part. The full mobilization of Russia remains a hypothetical and until it actually happens Ukraine doesn't have to contend with it; all they have to do is keep bloodying the forces at hand and bleed Russia white. Can Russia undertake a full mobilization without destabilizing the Putin regime? That's not a given and time is against Russia in this regard. Regarding stockpiles: First, Russia has its own stockpile problems. They've depleted their PGMs and they can't get the components they need to make more. They've had to resurrect laughably obsolescent armor to backfill their losses. Second, the "low rate production" scheme the West has employed to replenish stockpiles between conflicts has worked well for us and so a working supply chain exists to be scaled up. Time is against Russia here as well. Aside from political will there is no reason we ultimately couldn't supply Ukraine with thousands of M31Ax rockets every month.