• Help Support The Rugby Forum :

The Ukraine War thread

Well despite my gloomy predictions a month or so ago it would appear that the Russian offensive in Bakhmut has ground to a halt with manpower attrition and lack of artillery ammo the most probable cause along with the obvious resistance of the Ukrainian army. There are other Russian offensives going on but these have also failed to achieve any significant breakthrough. There are also reports and films of T-55s coming out of storage and being sent to the front line which sounds desperate but makes some sense as they can get 100mm ammo from the Iranians and use these old tanks in the indirect fire role while the artillery pieces they have been using can be overhauled and ammunition stockpiles replenished.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-65072173
 
Looks like the Russians are running low on ground floor windows...

Never Mind Oh Dear GIF by Harborne Web Design Ltd
 

I know it's unlikely they are actively fighting the Russians and also unlikely that Russia would use this as an excuse to start a larger with NATO, but it does undermine Nato's position as purely an ally supplying resources to Ukraine. One thing to provide them with arms, another to have military personal in the country, especially special forces.
 

I know it's unlikely they are actively fighting the Russians and also unlikely that Russia would use this as an excuse to start a larger with NATO, but it does undermine Nato's position as purely an ally supplying resources to Ukraine. One thing to provide them with arms, another to have military personal in the country, especially special forces.
Disagree. There will absolutely be forces within Ukraine advising and training. Systems like HIMARs and Patriot require lots of technical advice as does special forces ops.

Normally the first advisers you have in country are special forces, it's part of their job description to provide training, it's not all jumping through embassy windows.
 
Disagree. There will absolutely be forces within Ukraine advising and training. Systems like HIMARs and Patriot require lots of technical advice as does special forces ops.

Normally the first advisers you have in country are special forces, it's part of their job description to provide training, it's not all jumping through embassy windows.
Fair enough. I'm guessing it won't be a huge surprise to the Russians anyway. Still the leak is not a good look at all.
 
Fair enough. I'm guessing it won't be a huge surprise to the Russians anyway. Still the leak is not a good look at all.
Yeh apparently the leak showed Ukraine will run out of STA missiles by May 23rd, which means Russia know they can then go all in from the air.
 
Yeh apparently the leak showed Ukraine will run out of STA missiles by May 23rd, which means Russia know they can then go all in from the air.
If Russia has any missiles left. The leaks also include Russia had approached Egypt about setting up a factory there to build missiles but the Egyptians wanted it on the QT incase the Americans found out (which they obviously did) the attacks on civil infrastructure have decreased greatly in the last few months pointing to a lack of assets. As early as last year the Russians were converting ship to ship missiles to be used by aircraft to attack Ukrainian targets
 
And also which of their (Russia) intelligence agencies have been compromised, which mean those leaks will be plugged pretty quickly.

Plus there's the matter of massive trust being lost amongst USA's allies finding out the the US have been spying on them and sharing it.

No wonder Biden's doing this whole Irish tour.
 
And also which of their (Russia) intelligence agencies have been compromised, which mean those leaks will be plugged pretty quickly.

Plus there's the matter of massive trust being lost amongst USA's allies finding out the the US have been spying on them and sharing it.

No wonder Biden's doing this whole Irish tour.
On the upside, the Ukrainians can say "look at this **** you have dropped us in! Give us more weapons to compensate!" And they end up with more artillery systems, ammo etc
 

Although tragic in the loss of civilian life this latest attack shows a couple of things:

Firstly the number of missiles/drones launched in these attacks has dropped significantly and in frequency. There used to be waves of a hundred plus every 3 weeks, now it's down to the 20s every 6 weeks

Second the targets are random civilian residential buildings not specific infrastructure targets which shows that the Russians for now seem to have run out of their more sophisticated munitions and are using fire and hope stuff similar to what the Germans were doing with their V weapons 80 years ago.

Question is can the Russians source new more sophisticated gear (they tried with Eygpt) and if so can the Ukrainians get enough anti air capabilities to stop them?
 
Top