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On September 28 2023 20:10 zatic wrote:
They need to rely on their tiny number of SU-24 as a launch platform for Storm Shadow.
Which is exactly what I said - what they need are long range strike capabilities, not "bombers". Since the US doesn't want to send the most obvious choice - ATACMS - other systems are being used. Like Storm Shadow. Which needs an airborne platform.
The key capability here is not the launch platform - this can be and will likely be F16 in the future - , but the missile.
And since you are the one bringing up armchair generals: Your own admission that you can't confirm whether Su-24 is still flying or not alone is enough to tell everyone that you have no idea what you are talking about.
This is a general statement about everything, we're only working with what's known to the public. Can you confirm that they're definitely not being used? Exactly, you can't. So there's no reason for you to act like you know more than I do.
Additional bombers would be useful, and the more important fact is that the US has been witholding weapon systems out of an irrational fear of triggering a nuclear reponse.
People pushed for F-16s, what's the difference with bombers? Why not add them to the arsenal? Every bit helps, so what's up with this irrational response?
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Zurich15358 Posts
Again, you have no idea what you are talking about. It shows throughout your post history in this thread, and often enough is quite painful to read.
Of course Su-24 is still flying, if in tiny numbers. We don't know how many, might be only like 5 flyable airframes. But everyone with a clue knows that they are still flying, because Ukraine is still launching Storm Shadow.
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On September 28 2023 20:55 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On September 28 2023 20:10 zatic wrote:
They need to rely on their tiny number of SU-24 as a launch platform for Storm Shadow.
Which is exactly what I said - what they need are long range strike capabilities, not "bombers". Since the US doesn't want to send the most obvious choice - ATACMS - other systems are being used. Like Storm Shadow. Which needs an airborne platform.
The key capability here is not the launch platform - this can be and will likely be F16 in the future - , but the missile.
And since you are the one bringing up armchair generals: Your own admission that you can't confirm whether Su-24 is still flying or not alone is enough to tell everyone that you have no idea what you are talking about. This is a general statement about everything, we're only working with what's known to the public. Can you confirm that they're definitely not being used? Exactly, you can't. So there's no reason for you to act like you know more than I do. Additional bombers would be useful, and the more important fact is that the US has been witholding weapon systems out of an irrational fear of triggering a nuclear reponse. People pushed for F-16s, what's the difference with bombers? Why not add them to the arsenal? Every bit helps, so what's up with this irrational response? The difference is that the F-16's function as a long range weapon platform launching a wide variety of missiles that NATO has in large supply because its part of their primary combat doctrine.
No one is going to fly a B-52 Stratofortress across the Russian defensive line to drop a payload of 500 pound bombs on them, its going to get peppered with anti air missiles before it gets anywhere close.
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On September 28 2023 21:07 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On September 28 2023 20:55 Magic Powers wrote:On September 28 2023 20:10 zatic wrote:
They need to rely on their tiny number of SU-24 as a launch platform for Storm Shadow.
Which is exactly what I said - what they need are long range strike capabilities, not "bombers". Since the US doesn't want to send the most obvious choice - ATACMS - other systems are being used. Like Storm Shadow. Which needs an airborne platform.
The key capability here is not the launch platform - this can be and will likely be F16 in the future - , but the missile.
And since you are the one bringing up armchair generals: Your own admission that you can't confirm whether Su-24 is still flying or not alone is enough to tell everyone that you have no idea what you are talking about. This is a general statement about everything, we're only working with what's known to the public. Can you confirm that they're definitely not being used? Exactly, you can't. So there's no reason for you to act like you know more than I do. Additional bombers would be useful, and the more important fact is that the US has been witholding weapon systems out of an irrational fear of triggering a nuclear reponse. People pushed for F-16s, what's the difference with bombers? Why not add them to the arsenal? Every bit helps, so what's up with this irrational response? The difference is that the F-16's function as a long range weapon platform launching a wide variety of missiles that NATO has in large supply because its part of their primary combat doctrine. No one is going to fly a B-52 Stratofortress across the Russian defensive line to drop a payload of 500 pound bombs on them, its going to get peppered with anti air missiles before it gets anywhere close.
Bombers are not just the flying fortresses that cost tens or hundreds of billions of dollars. There are many versions of them ranging from small to very large, and I'm talking mainly about the smaller versions that have other specialized functions than MRCAs. THe SU-24 is an example of one of those much cheaper versions that has a use in this war.
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Russian Federation617 Posts
I guess you should define what "bomb" and "bomber" is first.
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On September 28 2023 18:20 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On September 28 2023 17:31 pmp10 wrote:On September 28 2023 05:28 KwarK wrote:
Ukraine is incentivized more than anyone to minimize the Ukrainian blood spent. There is no non attritional way of doing this. They’ve asked for the tool that can bypass trenches and the US has refused. That's a little harsh. There is only so much political will to aid Ukraine and US has been making reasonable choices given the allotted budget and dubious western unity. Is it reasonable that there have been no talks of sending a fleet of bombers to Ukraine? That's one of the most essential tools for Ukraine to win the war as they could reach far out targets at a high rate.
Very reasonable.
US contribution are limited by a fixed budget and even a small fleet of older aircraft could consume it in its entirety.
Besides this and all the other reasons already listed, this couldn't even have any effect before 2024 due to implementation lag.
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Wow, isn't Kazakhstan a part of the CSTO alliance? Also Russia's major space assets are located in his country... Perhaps this was just EU postering because he was in Europe at the time.
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What's up with Poland's support for Ukraine these days? Is it due to election or did Polish officials get burned out after almost 2 years of support?
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On September 29 2023 01:22 SC-Shield wrote:
What's up with Poland's support for Ukraine these days? Is it due to election or did Polish officials get burned out after almost 2 years of support?
What do you mean?
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An option could theoretically be to lease Ukraine one B52 if there are large stocks of old airforce cruise missiles left (some of them were made to launch from that platform). Take of from west ukraine, go high, launch, land.
I also think people vastly overestimate what both sides are capable of. The war is atritonal right now. I feel that Ukraine is mostly trying to make tactical gains and attack so their artillery has meaningful things to shoot at.
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On September 29 2023 01:22 SC-Shield wrote:
What's up with Poland's support for Ukraine these days? Is it due to election or did Polish officials get burned out after almost 2 years of support?
Probably due to the election, The Russian attacks on the grain ports have forced a lot of agriculture to go over land and crash local prices as a result. If their farmers tank the conservatives lose a lot of support before the election. PIS has never been a brave party and them supporting Russia has always been a nationalist thing more than a moral thing.
Once the routes to ship the food further into the EU have been sorted out you'll see them flip back to anti russian nationalism.
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On September 29 2023 01:22 SC-Shield wrote:
What's up with Poland's support for Ukraine these days? Is it due to election or did Polish officials get burned out after almost 2 years of support?
Nothing has really changed policy wise in regards to our support for Ukraine. There were some harsh words exchanged because of the grain debacle, but nothing important has changed yet.
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On September 29 2023 01:22 SC-Shield wrote:
What's up with Poland's support for Ukraine these days? Is it due to election or did Polish officials get burned out after almost 2 years of support?
My outsider perspective: Poland's PM relies on a tough guy persona as a component of his "brand" as a politician. And Poland's culture naturally rewards this kind of personality/character/brand. Poland is a generally tough/defensive country culturally because it has a long history of being involved in wars and whatnot. This culture and persona require him to dish out very harsh, strong words any time there is any kind of international disagreement involving Poland. Especially when Poland is being directly criticized.
So even though when you read the PM's words, its easy to think "oh shit", my understanding is that it is 100% politically motivated and essentially just an act he needs to put on to please his voters. But in terms of "data", nothing has changed at all in Poland's support for Ukraine.
The fact remains, Poland supports anyone who wants to shit on Russia. Ukraine is the best way to do that right now, so they're gonna keep supporting them in any way they can. Bless Poland.
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On September 29 2023 02:37 Silvanel wrote:Show nested quote +On September 29 2023 01:22 SC-Shield wrote:
What's up with Poland's support for Ukraine these days? Is it due to election or did Polish officials get burned out after almost 2 years of support? Nothing has really changed policy wise in regards to our support for Ukraine. There were some harsh words exchanged because of the grain debacle, but nothing important has changed yet.
Keyword being 'yet', no telling what will happen after elections.
The PM wouldn't be using harsh words during campaign if his nationalistic electorate didn't approve of the message.
The reality is that Polish right is slowly souring on Ukraine for a number of slights (real and imagined) and the general direction their foreign policy is taking.
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On September 28 2023 22:42 pmp10 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 28 2023 18:20 Magic Powers wrote:On September 28 2023 17:31 pmp10 wrote:On September 28 2023 05:28 KwarK wrote:
Ukraine is incentivized more than anyone to minimize the Ukrainian blood spent. There is no non attritional way of doing this. They’ve asked for the tool that can bypass trenches and the US has refused. That's a little harsh. There is only so much political will to aid Ukraine and US has been making reasonable choices given the allotted budget and dubious western unity. Is it reasonable that there have been no talks of sending a fleet of bombers to Ukraine? That's one of the most essential tools for Ukraine to win the war as they could reach far out targets at a high rate. Very reasonable. US contribution are limited by a fixed budget and even a small fleet of older aircraft could consume it in its entirety. Besides this and all the other reasons already listed, this couldn't even have any effect before 2024 due to implementation lag.
Rather than just going back and forth, you could go with this list:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_active_United_States_military_aircraft
There's only three active, pure bombers (ignoring UAVs), the B-1, B-2 and B-52 of which Ukraine will get zero.
The only other ground attack aircraft besides helicopters is the A-10.
Everything else is a fighter/multirole fighter.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_Air_Force#Current_inventory
Ukraine currently operates the Mig-29, Su-24, Su-25 and Su-27.
The MIG-29 was designed for up to 4000 flight hours, the SU-25 seems to have a 2500 flight hour limit and the SU-24 is in that ballpark. I can't find information on the Su-27 but I'd guess it would be around the 4000-6000 mark. With the intensity of the conflict, and the age of the aircraft, Ukraine is likely running past the service life limit of the airframes.
What Ukraine needs right now is something with flight hours remaining on the airframe that can safely haul JDAMs/Cruise missiles a few hundred KM at medium-low level, pop-up/launch them, return, rearm, repeat. The F-16 ticks those boxes very well.
The initial tranche of F-16s is likely going to do the exact same thing as their current planes do. Intercept cruise missiles or lob bombs. Neither of these are - relatively speaking - high risk tasks. If Ukraine can get to the point where they have dozens of F-16s, they can work on expanding the sortie types that can be executed, but that is going to be a long ways out from here.
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Interesting article in the NYT as we come up to 4 month mark of the counter-offencive, giving a perspective on how things have changed in Ukraine during 2023. Since January 1st, Russia had occupied 331 square miles, and the Ukraine 143, for a total of less than 500 all together.
Less territory has changed hands in August of this year than at any time since the conflict began in Feb 2022
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United States43443 Posts
“They’re not winning fast enough”
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On September 29 2023 21:47 JimmiC wrote:Russia is starting new conscriptions starting Oct 1st and including the parts of Ukraine that they control. I guess they are not getting enough vaccines volunteers. It will be even more disturbingly Ukrainians vs Ukrainians. Show nested quote +
Fall conscription will begin from October 1 in all parts of the Russian Federation, including in the illegally annexed regions of Ukraine, Russia's defense ministry announced Friday.
In some regions of the Far North, the conscription will begin on November 1 due to the climate differences, Rear Admiral Vladimir Tsimlyansky, deputy chief of the Main Organizational and Mobilization Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, said during a briefing.
“The autumn conscription will take place from October 1 in all constituent entities of the Russian Federation," Tsimlyansky said.
"The exception is certain regions of the Far North and certain areas equated to regions of the Far North, where citizens living in these territories are conscripted for military service from November 1 to December 31. This is primarily due to the climatic characteristics of these territories."
The departure of conscripts from collection points is scheduled to begin on October 16, he said. “The term of conscription military service, as before, will be 12 months,” Tsimlyansky said.
The conscription for military service in what Moscow claims are Russia's the new regions is regulated by a so-called constitutional law on admission to the Russian Federation, according to state news agency TASS.
According to the law, the autumn 2023 conscription will include the annexed territories – Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia – for the first time. There was no conscription for military service last year and in the spring of 2023 in these regions, according to TASS.
While regular conscriptions will be carried out, Russia has no plans for further mobilizations, Tsimlyansky, said.
Some context: Conscriptions in Russia happen twice per year. Last fall’s conscription began a month later than usual due to bottlenecks at conscription offices amid a partial mobilization, according to TASS.
The quote even mentions this is just the usual mandatory military service draft. Hardly a case of "Russia is running out of bodies".
Nor would I expect any of the Ukrainians that are drafted to actually be deployed anywhere remotely near the fighting. That would seem like a recipe for 'accidents' and 'friendly fire incidents'.
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Russian Federation617 Posts
On September 29 2023 21:47 JimmiC wrote:Russia is starting new conscriptions starting Oct 1st and including the parts of Ukraine that they control. I guess they are not getting enough vaccines volunteers. It will be even more disturbingly Ukrainians vs Ukrainians. Show nested quote +
Fall conscription will begin from October 1 in all parts of the Russian Federation, including in the illegally annexed regions of Ukraine, Russia's defense ministry announced Friday.
In some regions of the Far North, the conscription will begin on November 1 due to the climate differences, Rear Admiral Vladimir Tsimlyansky, deputy chief of the Main Organizational and Mobilization Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, said during a briefing.
“The autumn conscription will take place from October 1 in all constituent entities of the Russian Federation," Tsimlyansky said.
"The exception is certain regions of the Far North and certain areas equated to regions of the Far North, where citizens living in these territories are conscripted for military service from November 1 to December 31. This is primarily due to the climatic characteristics of these territories."
The departure of conscripts from collection points is scheduled to begin on October 16, he said. “The term of conscription military service, as before, will be 12 months,” Tsimlyansky said.
The conscription for military service in what Moscow claims are Russia's the new regions is regulated by a so-called constitutional law on admission to the Russian Federation, according to state news agency TASS.
According to the law, the autumn 2023 conscription will include the annexed territories – Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia – for the first time. There was no conscription for military service last year and in the spring of 2023 in these regions, according to TASS.
While regular conscriptions will be carried out, Russia has no plans for further mobilizations, Tsimlyansky, said.
Some context: Conscriptions in Russia happen twice per year. Last fall’s conscription began a month later than usual due to bottlenecks at conscription offices amid a partial mobilization, according to TASS.
Conscripts do not partake in the war on the new territories. Some do in Belgorod/Kursk area though. Conscrips and mobilized do have different status, obligations, payment etc. and shouldn't be mixed.
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EPT
