Russian transport plane crashed in flames. “Engine failure” seems a bit of an understatement based on the video. Missile strike is an obvious possibility given the size of the fire.

A Russian Il-76 transport aircraft crashed in Ryazan. https://t.co/DMPB7bhlMH pic.twitter.com/3unVcmWKNd

— Rob Lee (@RALee85) June 24, 2022

Alleged footage of Russians debuting their new Nazi-seeking missile.

This is reportedly footage of a failed Russian air defense system missile launch from Alchevsk, Luhansk Oblast. https://t.co/6ekiNna454 pic.twitter.com/DvHf1heAR8

— Rob Lee (@RALee85) June 24, 2022

Do tell

Please don’t.

Loose lips sink ships!

Is it just me that likes to think there’s an unreported conversation between Boris and Pres Zelenskyy from the visit last week?
Zel: “Are you aware we’ve recently put in an application to be considered for membership of the EU?”
TheSofa “Best of luck with that, old chap; there are a lot of unreported advantages to being in the EU, you know”
Oh, the irony if that had actually happened

Is it too cynical to think that it quite suits the US and allies for the Russians to grind away in Ukraine getting their stock of weapons slowly whittled down at no cost (apart from lives of Ukrainians, who obviously don’t count), and it is serving as an excellent sales pitch for the manufacturers of western weapons systems ?

Is it too cynical to think that it quite suits the US and allies for the Russians to grind away in Ukraine getting their stock of weapons slowly whittled down at no cost

Yes, it’s too cynical. That’s not what’s happening here.

What happened was that Russia thought that it could intimidate Ukraine but Ukraine fought back. Everyone assumed Russia wouldn’t be stupid enough to actually follow through on their threats. Russia actually was stupid enough.

This is not a strategic masterplan by NATO to weaken Russia, it’s just Russia being stupid.

This is not a strategic masterplan by NATO to weaken Russia, it’s just Russia being stupid.

This is a bit of a straw man – the suggestion wasn’t of a “strategic masterplan”, but of responding to things that happened in a way that suits NATO and helps Ukraine, but not optimally.

Is it just me that likes to think there’s an unreported conversation between Boris and Pres Zelenskyy from the visit last week?
Zel: “Are you aware we’ve recently put in an application to be considered for membership of the EU?”
TheSofa “Best of luck with that, old chap; there are a lot of unreported advantages to being in the EU, you know”
Oh, the irony if that had actually happened

This is very funny!

Is it too cynical to think that it quite suits the US and allies for the Russians to grind away in Ukraine getting their stock of weapons slowly whittled down at no cost (apart from lives of Ukrainians, who obviously don’t count),

This is a little cynical.

In a perfect world, after Russia invaded a coalition inc the US could have steamed in and given Russia a spanking (as per the Budapest Memorandum) , and they would have gone running back to the Kremlin with their tail between their legs. Unfortunately, I suspect the US analysts concluded (prob quite correctly) that this would be a war that would be very difficult to end, and would end up being the 10+ year slog that this is looking like it will be, so therefore we have the situation we have- US et al supporting Ukraine, but not committing US soldiers’ lives to the cause.

How has this slipped to page 3?

The cynical targeting of a shopping centre today shows us what the Putin approach is. Talk to the west, get further punished.

The article on grain theft was interesting

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/61790625

Is it too cynical to think that it quite suits the US and allies for the Russians to grind away in Ukraine getting their stock of weapons slowly whittled down at no cost (apart from lives of Ukrainians, who obviously don’t count), and it is serving as an excellent sales pitch for the manufacturers of western weapons systems ?

Possibly cynical, but Russia are already losing plenty of orders from their usual suspects after their showing in Ukraine by all accounts. China are probably raising their eyebrows as well now that the US have got hold of some fairly modern Russian parts to examine especially since a lot of their engine technology are clones of Russian ones (and not to mention, somewhat unethical copies of the planes). Of course, all the embargoes also mean all those Western made chips, personal GPS and parts can’t be used to buld the things in the first place so Russia are struggling to fulfill internally let alone export.

IIRC Turkey got kicked off the F35 programme, took a look at the state of the Sugois and now are looking at the Typhoon/Eurofighter.

It’s all in for Putin now in 4 months time it will all be getting wet and cold for both sides. I’m not sure how many blatantly civilian targets he can hit without the west and NATO responding. Economically Russia must be close to being on its knees in real terms and the blatantly stealing grain and steel from Ukraine needs to stop somehow. Seeing city’s being turned into apocalyptic nightmares will not be forgotten by Europe it’s just to close to home.

I’m not sure how many blatantly civilian targets he can hit without the west and NATO responding.

Russia has leveled Mariupol, train stations, theatres sheltering civilians… I think if attacks on civilians were the catalyst for more western involvement then we would have seen it by now.

Is it too cynical to think that it quite suits the US and allies for the Russians to grind away in Ukraine getting their stock of weapons slowly whittled down at no cost (apart from lives of Ukrainians, who obviously don’t count), and it is serving as an excellent sales pitch for the manufacturers of western weapons systems ?

Sounds about right to me. I can’t remember who said it, tongue in cheek, but “we are willing to fight Russia to the last Ukrainian”. Probably not far from the truth strategically. Hobble Russia through a proxy land war and direct economic war and hope for regime change. And then profit from rebuilding Ukraine and Russia.

Not sure if they are quite on their knees yet with gas prices through the roof they’ve kinda covered themselves.

They are close to default on some payments (was it due this Sunday?) but I think they actually had the money, just they couldn’t actually do the transaction as there as an embargo.

When things do start to break, then thats going to be the issue – no replacement parts for your civilian planes, cars, computers etc.

Not cynical at all Dr J.

I think this was obvious within the first couple of weeks, when they did the hokey cokey with regards the Polish Mig’s etc.. and it took months for any effective artillery to turn up,

“we are willing to fight Russia to the last Ukrainian”

…and starving third world citizen.

I also think the notion that the approach from the West was some kind of pre-formed strategy a bit far fetched. Especially when you consider that 4 months in and the West still hasn’t been able to muster anything we could recognise as an actual strategy.

The ‘strategy’ of allowing Russia to gradually erode its resources is not so much a strategy as simply what happens when you have your head stuck up your arse and let your enemy dictate how events infold.

I also think the notion that the approach from the West was some kind of pre-formed strategy a bit far fetched.

It’s a total fantasy. Pre-war, the general view seemed to be that Russia would fairly beat the Ukrainian army but there would likely be a protracted insurgency. NATO was supplying some aid, but not heavy weapons – the thinking was that they would just be captured by the Russians. On top of that, things like night-vision gear, decent boots, medical kit, etc. are just as important as the headline stuff like tanks and aircraft.

The Ukrainian forces vastly exceeded expectations, they fought very cleverly and let the Russian over-extend their logistics. The Russians performed abysmally, it looks obvious in hindsight but it’s much safer to assume the enemy will be competent than to assume they will be inept.

NATO has made it clear that they will not supply weapons to strike deep into Russia, hence the limited range of the rocket artillery supplied. I think their point is that they support Ukraine kicking Russian forces out of Ukraine, but not invading Russia itself. The U.S. and NATO need to keep adequate stocks of their best weapons to deter Russia and China, so they can only supply those in limited numbers. There will also be older weapons that are probably going to be scrapped some time in the future so NATO can ship their entire stock to Ukraine.

On top of that, the most sophisticated weapons systems require huge amounts of training and technical support so it would take months or years for Ukraine to be able to use them. The idea of sending F16s, for example, is a non-starter because Ukraine won’t have the technical facilities to service them, plus they won’t be able to use the guided munitions without extensive training and technical support. Trying to use an F16 for close air support without guided munitions will just put it at risk from MANPADS, GPS guided rocket artillery is a much more useful system to send. An F16 armed only with a cannon and air-to-air missiles is probably no more effective than the Mig 29s that Ukraine already has.

Bit naive to think the support Ukraine is getting is detached from other nations own strategic thinking.

Russia apparently sourcing ammo from Belarus. Suggests that either: i) rocket attacks on ammo depots have interfered with logistics; or ii) Russia has blown through their ammo stocks and the intensity will drop off from now on.

…pause, the bigger the Russian artillery logistic problem.

A protracted Russian shell pause, say a week, will point to a shell shortage _CRISIS_.

Russian forces in Donbas without artillery ammo is going to have a Ukrainian infantry counter-offensive on its hands.
2/

— Trent Telenko (@TrentTelenko) June 27, 2022

Possibly cynical, but Russia are already losing plenty of orders from their usual suspects after their showing in Ukraine by all accounts.

UKR make and export T84 tanks (upgraded T80s). The latest is the Oplot-M variant but UKR could only afford 10 for its own military.
In the Strong Europe Tank Challenge 2018 competition UKR came last https://www.kyivpost.com/multimedia/photo/ukraines-tankmen-come-last-in-strong-europe-tank-challenge-2018-photos
Experts (not me!) suggest that these are at least equal to the Russian T90, which shows on the ground

When things do start to break, then thats going to be the issue – no replacement parts for your civilian planes, cars, computers etc.

This is already happening https://travelradar.aero/russia-could-lose-two-thirds-of-its-fleet-by-2025/ and https://travelradar.aero/russia-to-produce-replacement-boeing-and-airbus-parts/

Would be interesting if the US or UK gave Ukraine a couple of cruise missile systems so they could hit back at military bases in Russia (or the Kremlin…), maybe park them in Poland during the day and just do a Putin and deny all knowledge. I guess Putin might then start some false flag operations as justification for escalating further

Hopefully the crews getting trained on some of the more advanced AA and short-range missile systems make a difference soon to. The reality is though it will turn into a grinding quasi-stalemate as  Ukraine don’t have the capability to push Russia out of the Donbas without significantly more support and the sad thing is the support is likely to dwindle once a stalemate ensues and it drops out of the news cycle (like Crimea did).

Would be interesting if the US or UK gave Ukraine a couple of cruise missile systems so they could hit back at military bases in Russia (or the Kremlin…), maybe park them in Poland during the day and just do a Putin and deny all knowledge.

Becoming Putin to beat Putin probably isn’t the greatest idea.

Sadly, stuff with significant range is likely to stay off the table, given we’re dealing with a (likely) dying, vengeful man with his finger on the nuclear button.

snip…support is likely to dwindle once a stalemate ensues and it drops out of the news cycle (like Crimea did).

Crimea dropped off the news radar because there were “only” six dead; three protestors and three military.
The bigger worry is that the further 2014 incursion into Eastern Ukraine’s Donbas dropped off the radar. This has to be seen against the pro-Russia/pro-Europe split in Ukraine and European interests in Russian energy
When Russia invaded the pro-Europe west things changed

With Russia commandeering train loads of ammo from Belarus, they will be less likely to enter the war?

@futonrivercrossing I was wondering if that was related to fewer deaths yesterday. Wonder if the Russians are running out of ammo?

The russians are stealing the grain but where is it going and who is buying it? if the russians are selling it surly pressure could be put on those buying it to pay the Ukrainians

Would be interesting if the US or UK gave Ukraine a couple of cruise missile systems so they could hit back at military bases in Russia (or the Kremlin…)

The U.S. has made it clear that they aren’t going to supply weapons to hit targets deep inside Russia. The rocket artillery they are supplying can fire guided rockets with different ranges. It looks like Ukraine now have the version with 80 km range, which means that Russian supply depots need to be kept well back from the front lines, which means their truck fleet is going to struggle to supply enough ammo for large scale artillery bombardment. Apparently, the longest range rockets those systems can fire have a range of about 500 km so the U.S. has the option of supplying longer range rockets in the future.

The russians are stealing the grain but where is it going and who is buying it?

They’ll have no problem selling it to India or China or Egypt. Meanwhile half the developing world is starving so ethics go out of the window when cheap staples are available.

Syria would probably be an outlet for grain as well.
In fact any starving African country with a sea port who can either buy it for home use or sell it on to a third party and make a few bucks is a potential buyer.

So are the Turks letting the russians sail the stolen grain out of the black sea and in to the Med

Tracking where Russia is taking Ukraine’s stolen grain

I think only warships are affected by the “embargo” in the Bosphorus.

BREAKING: The leaders of Turkey, Sweden & Finland have just signed a memorandum for the two Nordic states to join NATO, removing a Turkish block to the accession process, a source said.
“It’s a three-way agreement on accession,” the source said. @jensstoltenberg to make statement

— Deborah Haynes (@haynesdeborah) June 28, 2022

Turkey got what it wanted then? And Putin has NATO on his border

I wonder what it took to win Turkey over!

👍

I wonder what it took to win Turkey over!

probably some deal regarding Kurdish separatists who escaped to the Nordic countries.

probably some deal regarding Kurdish separatists who escaped to the Nordic countries.

Given their economic situation probably a few quid as well/favourable trade deals which will just happen to be agreed soon.

I believe there is no longer a block imposed on selling arms to to Turkey from Sweden/Finland in the new accord. Given turkeys reliance on Russian military tech (and seeing it’s apparent limitations fully exposed) that’s a big win I suppose.

I’m sure there is much more to the agreement though.

Anyway, it was inevitable that Turkey would relent. Once Sweden/Finland said they wanted to join NATO any hurdles would be overcome come what may.

Well done Putin you genius.

The EU is about to compromise on sanctions in respect of Kaliningrad, “(Putin) has much more leverage than we have. It’s in our interests to find a compromise,” he said, conceding that the eventual outcome may appear unfair https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/exclusive-kaliningrad-row-eu-nears-compromise-deal-defuse-standoff-with-russia-2022-06-29/
It seems reasonable to allow Russia to move goods to an enclave “within” Russia, but they have to be careful that the Baltic port isn’t then used to bust sanctions further

I don’t really see how Putin has more leverage in the Kaliningrad situation?