Ukraine

On the drone/EW topic:  extract from ISW below – it does seem ukraine has some new bit of counter drone tech, and has the ability to re-route russian drones, into Belarus

” Independent Belarusian monitoring group Hajun Project reported on November 25 that 38 Russian Shahed drones entered Belarusian airspace on November 24 and 25 – a record number of Russian drones violating Belarusian airspace.[14] Belarus scrambled jets to respond to the airspace violation—suggesting that Belarus was unprepared to receive errant Russian drones and that Russia had not anticipated the impacts of Ukrainian interference or communicated them to Belarus in advance.”

she said to my mum that she/her husband and his fellow soldiers will not rest till every occupying Russian is swinging from the trees and they get their land and homes back.

That is what some of the takes suggesting that the USA can ‘solve this in a day’ by forcing both sides to the negotiating table seem to miss, if the lines freeze where they are that will leave millions of Ukranians behind ‘enemy lines’ and there is no way that this does not lead to decades of violence and brutal repression in the occupied areas, which at any time could provide the spark for a whole new conflict.

Yes, Iran. There’s a regime that has brought nothing but utter misery to everything it has touched.

Unlike the Shah of course. Maybe we could get Iraq to invade them again? That worked out great last time.

On the drone/EW topic: extract from ISW below – it does seem ukraine has some new bit of counter drone tech

Absolutely. This will continue as it has since 2022, counter-tech, counter-counter-tech…

Russia leveraged experience from EW operations in Syria and transferred that to Ukraine, the to and fro has continued since then (2022 article- https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-fall-and-rise-of-russian-electronic-warfare )

The US have learnt from this and one promising area 12 months ago was microwaves https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/3588869/ Other areas were being explored for when atmospheric conditions weren’t favourable to a specific technology

Counter-Unmanned Aerial Systems (c-UAS) munitions were the thing five years ago and are being supplied to Ukraine, but how times change 🙂

I see on TubeYou that Tucker Carlson has interviewed Lavrov – I look forward to the in-depth critique of the Russian regime.

The most useful of idiots.

Some Korean style DMZ could be the result but far less stable.

Who gives up a chunk of land? Who polices almost 2000km?

Ukraine has heard about border agreements and treaties before and would prefer simple NATO membership. Hungary, and probably a handful of others as well, certainly won’t go for membership though

Crimea is more suited to being a DMZ and can attract tourist money with its Black Sea coast. Ukraine-controlled, civilian policing only

Russia is 28 times the size of Ukraine (approximately 603,550 sq km, while Russia is approximately 17,098,242 sq km) and they want another 20% of Ukraine? No country should settle on those terms.

…if he can’t guarantee his port Tartus…

It looks like the die is cast. Russian ships have left Tartus, which suggests that Russia will focus on Ukraine; those ships can’t influence Ukraine because they won’t be allowed access to the Black Sea

Rebel forces in Syria are advancing south towards Homs, a staging post in Iran’s logistics chain supplying Hezbollah in Lebanon. That’s arguably good for stability in the middle-east, but could mean more availability of Iranian materiel for Russia to use in Ukraine. That’s in the future though and a successful middle-east ceasefire will see greater availability in any event

No country should settle on those terms.

The hard logic of the Lanchester laws will probably dictate otherwise.

Humiliating defeat for Russia.

The rebels are meant to be less “extreme” than before, time will tell I suppose.

Seeing reports a russian ship has fired warning shots at a german helicopter. doesn’t seem like an entirely sensible thing to do at this current time

Given Berlin’s often cosy attitude towards Russia does that count as friendly fire?

^ apparently German helicopter was / is monitoring sanctions being broken in the Baltic, the Russian Navy assisting civilian smuggler ships and more.

Seeing reports a russian ship has fired warning shots at a german helicopter.

It’s one of those “deniable” issues that Germany will probably ignore, “Russian ship fires internationally-recognised signal flare”

It’s good to see that someone is monitoring shipping in an area full of sub-sea cables; two have been cut there in the past few weeks

3 minute read from Ruth Deyermond (Senior Lecturer in Post-Soviet Security, King’s College, London) about calling President Putin’s nuclear bluff

https://theconversation.com/putins-nuclear-threats-aim-to-scare-the-west-but-ukraines-allies-are-now-calling-his-bluff-244776

Not a great deal of insight in there.

Russia going all in to try and liberate what they can in Donetsk, theyve made a bit of ground lately but at huge cost in men and equipment (even by their standards)  45,000 casualties a month!

ISW previously assessed that Russian forces suffered an estimated 80,000 casualties in September and October 2024 and cannot sustain such significant loss rates indefinitely in return for gradual, creeping battlefield gains. isw.pub/UkrWar120324

— Institute for the Study of War (@thestudyofwar.bsky.social) 2024-12-04T20:09:17.863Z

Having to move their ships out of Tartus implies they think theres a good chance they could lose the base, if Russia/Assad cant regain control of Syria itll be a big humiliation for Russia and cause them problems for their presence in Africa, the HTS are still advancing, and Assads troops pullling back from HAma which iis a stepping stone to Tartus and the coast

Im not sure HTS can use this stuff but T90 tanks & anti air systems arent cheap!

Syrian rebels (HTS) have overrun the Syrian army base of the 25th Division in the Hama province and captured dozens of fully intact T-90A, Tigr MRAPs, BM-21 MLRS, trucks and other armored vehicles. This Syrian Division was one of the better equipped one, as we can obviously see.

— (((Tendar))) (@tendar.bsky.social) 2024-12-04T11:25:28.229Z

Rebel forces in Syria are advancing south towards Homs, a staging post in Iran’s logistics chain supplying Hezbollah in Lebanon. That’s arguably good for stability in the middle-east, but could mean more availability of Iranian materiel for Russia to use in Ukraine. That’s in the future though and a successful middle-east ceasefire will see greater availability in any event

But will Iran react to that, what if Iran decides to intervene directly in Syria!?

This passage from the ISW article is important – India no longer has confidence in Russia as an arms supplier. That will deprive Russia of a major source of funds for their defense sector and hand it to Russia’s rivals.

India is reportedly attempting to decouple its defense industry from Russia as it increases cooperation with Western defense companies and builds up its own defense industrial base (DIB). Bloomberg reported on December 3 that senior Indian officials stated that India has sharply reduced its defense equipment orders from Russia and instead started purchasing defense equipment from Western suppliers.[14] The officials reportedly stated that India canceled plans to jointly develop and manufacture helicopters and advanced fighter jets with Russia “some time ago” and that India is unlikely to move forward with plans to lease a Russian nuclear-powered submarine to train Indian crews as India is building its own submarines. One unnamed senior Indian official reportedly stated that Russian-made weapons are often cheaper than Western weapons but need frequent repairs, which increases their long-term costs. ISW has previously reported on other sources of increased tensions within the Russia-India relationship, including Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s August 23 visit to Ukraine and the reported transfer of Indian artillery shells through European intermediaries to Ukraine.[15]

I wouldn’t be surprised if Russia is also pulling back from supplying arms given the amount of kit they have lost I would imagine they need all their capacity to keep their war effort going – exporting has got to be secondary

I see ISW stating (again) that Russia cannot sustain those types of loses.  Whilst I agree I can’t believe they can, somehow they seem to just keep going.

But will Iran react to that, what if Iran decides to intervene directly in Syria!?

Considering that this week the US has been merrily using A10 warthogs to strafe anything Iran-related that even looks at them funny in Syria I suspect that Iran are going to be very wary of putting troops on the ground.

But will Iran react to that, what if Iran decides to intervene directly in Syria!?

IMHO Iran won’t. They don’t have an air force in the conventional sense and Tom Cruise stole one of their remaining working F14 aircraft in TG Maverick

Iran does have missile stocks, but what is needed is a ground force and they won’t supply that because of the danger of a rebellion in Iran, which is what happened in Syria. In Syria rebels took the opportunity when Russia transferred troops and Israel decimated Iran’s proxy, Hezbollah, and its command structure.

Iran wouldn’t confront Israel with any more than a symbolic missile strike earlier this year because sending the IRGC into war would remove the regime’s protection. Religious zealots would have confronted Israel, but survival of the theocracy prevailed. It doesn’t help that IRGC senior command was suspected of leaking Hezbollah movements and arrests resulted

Iraqi Hezbollah supplied some 300 troops earlier this week, but that won’t go far in the grand scheme

I’ll leave it there and suggest that non-Ukraine posts go elsewhere (TBF, mine was pretty nebulous) 🙂

Will Russia abandoning Syria free up more assets to attack Ukraine?

Will Russia abandoning Syria free up more assets to attack Ukraine?

I think it’s more the case that Russia won’t be taking assets from Ukraine to send to Syria

India no longer has confidence in Russia as an arms supplier.

This has been brewing for a while. India has incomplete orders for both spares and weapons with Russia and it’s estimated that they have twenty years of life in some of the Russian kit and will need parts in the future. India really wanted to keep Russia onside as a balance to China with Pakistan and had licensing agreements for manufacture that isn’t happening ATM, so instead of Kamov helicopters they now make Hindustan Aeronautics designs

India is still waiting for two S400 AD systems that were part of a $5.4bn order for five made in 2018, Russia has been losing S400 systems since 2022

IMHO Iran won’t. They don’t have an air force in the conventional sense and Tom Cruise stole one of their remaining working F14 aircraft in TG Maverick

This^^^

Iran knows they are being baited so can only take the beating for now.

Interesting 35 minute meeting between Presidents Macron, Trump and Zelensky in Paris https://www.france24.com/en/france/20241207-macron-trump-zelensky-hold-trilateral-on-sidelines-of-notre-dame-ceremony

Don’t get too excited by Trump’s blue and yellow ensemble (see France 24 pics), they’re also religiously significant colours used in the Notre Dame opening 🙂

What are the implications for Ukraine of this weekend’s events?

I know Russia can’t get it’s ships from Tartus into the Black Sea, but other than that, does this free up a load of battle-hardened forces and equipment that can now be transferred to the Ukraine conflict? Or will they all go to Africa, as a pre-emptive shoring up of their forces there, given that it’s going to be much harder to keep them supplied and supported from here on?

does this free up a load of battle-hardened forces and equipment that can now be transferred to the Ukraine conflict?

I think most of Russia’s support to Assad was in the form of stand-off attacks on rebel positions with airstrikes, missiles and artillery, not so much in the way of Russian combat troops engaging directly on the ground. So there will be advisors, training staff, technical support personnel etc. but not a whole load of “battle hardened troops”.  I’m not 100% sure of my facts there, so I stand to be corrected, but that’s my understanding.  On the equipment side, things moved so quickly, the logistics of getting kit to the departure points and loaded might be difficult and also a whole load of kit has been captured by HTS et al.

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/in-moscows-shadows-178-assad-la-vista-baby-what-does/id1510124746?i=1000679637193

Galeotti goes through the implications for Ukraine. He thinks not a lot. While a Bad Thing for Putin, it’s not going to cost him domestically. Assad falling quickly made it easy to just yoink everything out straight away. Had Assad held on that would have caused more of a dilema. Unlikely to be able to keep the africa schenanigans going. Overal, bad for Russia, but unlikely to be transformative for the ukraine conflict

Russia will now negotiate with the new regime to keep it’s bases. And if Assad is in Russia then they will offer to return him as part of the deal and for everyone’s convenience they’ll use one of their planes that only need runways to take off.

Russia will now negotiate with the new regime to keep it’s bases.

They will, although they will be negotiating with people they’ve been bombing the shit out of for years, who consequently aren’t going to be brimming with good will towards them!

does this free up a load of battle-hardened forces and equipment that can now be transferred to the Ukraine conflict?

Russia has been transferring troops and equipment out of Syria to Ukraine since May 2022. This is one reason for the speed of the HTS rebellion; there isn’t much left https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2022/05/7/7344760/

Or will they all go to Africa, as a pre-emptive shoring up of their forces there, given that it’s going to be much harder to keep them supplied and supported from here on?

What is left won’t go far wherever it’s deployed. One cargo ship and some aircraft movement doesn’t amount to much in the grand scheme; modern cargo aircraft will move between one and two artic lorries worth as a comparison

Also posted on the Syria thread…

Israel has attacked Syrian military depots on the outskirts of Damascus and elsewhere to put abandoned missile stocks out of reach of groups that might target them

Ukraine reports that the remaining Russian fleet has left Tartus

On 8 December 2024, the Admiral Grigorovich frigate of the Russian Black Sea Fleet and the Inzhener Trubin cargo ship of the Russian Northern Fleet departed from Tartus and headed to the Mediterranean Sea.

In addition, the Russians are transferring remnants of their weapons and military equipment from Syria’s Khmeimim airfield.”

https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2024/12/8/7488240/

Pro Ukrainian accounts are making a few claims about Tartus and Khmeimim presently

Following the Paris meeting, this appeared

“Zelensky and Ukraine would like to make a deal and stop the madness,” Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social, adding that Kyiv had lost some 400,000* soldiers. “There should be an immediate ceasefire and negotiations should begin.”
“I know Vladimir well. This is his time to act. China can help. The World is waiting!” Trump added, referring to Russian President Putin.

…and President Zelensky added…

“It (the war) cannot simply end with a piece of paper and a few signatures. A ceasefire without guarantees can be reignited at any moment, as Putin has already done before. To ensure that Ukrainians no longer suffer losses, we must guarantee the reliability of peace and not turn a blind eye to occupation.” https://www.reuters.com/world/trump-calls-immediate-ukraine-ceasefire-zelenskiy-says-guarantees-needed-2024-12-08/

*400,000 soldiers was clarified, “Zelenskiy said 43,000 soldiers had been killed in the war and that there had been 370,000 wounded soldiers.”

Pro Ukrainian accounts are making a few claims about Tartus and Khmeimim presently

Yes, there is some confusion. Russia seems to be trying hard for a diplomatic solution, but as someone commented^^, the rebels aren’t likely to favour Russia following the last decade of attacks

Yeah, the Syrians haven’t forgotten, only a few months back there was a fair bit of rejoicing after a Russian Air Force major was downed and killed over Eastern Ukraine.

Turns out he was directly involved in much of Russia’s terror bombing of civilians in Aleppo and other rebel held areas.

The first Russian tank storage base to be emptied. The dominoes are falling.