Round 2 in the battle for the Ukraine: The russians will do everything they can to save the "Special Military Operation" by taking territory in the east and south. The goal is the complete capture of the Donbas and other surrounding areas. Most of the troops previously engaged at Kiev are now resting and refitting in Belarus. Moscow shortly will also call up some 60,000 reservists for this new phase of the war. It remains to be seen whether the Ukrainian army, with the weapons they have, will be able to stop the russians in the Donbas. The big question is should the West provide them with heavier weapons on a large scale to stop or even help defeat the rA? The situation in the Izium area (russian bridgehead across the Severski Donets) is intensifying. Is a russian break-out towards Barvinkove imminent? Will the UA be capable to counter such a move one way or the other?
Video of Ka-52 shot down using Stugna-P ATGM https://twitter.com/UAWeapons/status/1511292509619568640
The moment of impact is just out of frame, but the chopper is clearly seen crashing down right after:
Stugna-P is laser-guided: The operator deliberately aimed close to the target to avoid possible detection by on-board warning systems. Only 2 seconds before impact does he bring the target into the crosshairs. With a skilled operator, this is quite possible with this ATGM. By the way, there are stills from the recovery of the wreckage:
At the moment, the UA is following the Dutch example and flooding the region quite diligently. Where the RA offensive will develop is still quite open.
That wreckage on stills is not the one shot down with Stugna, but the one that was shot earlier during the March with MANPAD over Kherson/Mykolaiv area. But video is not fake a falling helicopter is clearly visible in the video.
A long read - but worth the while: ‘Barbarians’: Russian troops leave grisly mark on town of Trostianets
It also shows up Mondelez, maker of Oreo cookies, quite badly, as it indicates they abandoned their staff there and are now gagging them from speaking about it. A lot of multinationals clearly have lost any ethical compass over this, despite decades of talking about the triple bottom-line. All the best Andreas
Russian material losses as of today 06/04/2022 compared with those of 2 days ago - 04/04/22 (according to Oryx - these are just verified losses, real numbers are probably higher): Total: 2501 Tanks 433 (+8) Armoured Fighting Vehicles 279 Infantry Fighting Vehicles 447 (+36) Armoured Personnel Carriers 87 Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) Vehicles 19 Infantry Mobility Vehicles 79 Communications Stations 16 Engineering Vehicles 85 (+4) Heavy Mortars 11 Towed Artillery 50 (+1) Self-Propelled Artillery 80 Multiple Rocket Launchers 46 Anti-Aircraft Guns 3 Self-Propelled Anti-Aircraft Guns 11 Surface-To-Air Missile Systems 47 (+4) Radars 8 (+1) Jammers And Deception Systems 6 Aircraft 20 Helicopters 32 (-6) Unmanned Aerial Vehicles 22 (+1) Naval Ships 3 Logistics Trains 2 Trucks, Vehicles and Jeeps 714 (-2) Unknown vehicles 35 (+1) NB. Oryx stopped the count of Anti-Tank Guided Missiles (76) and Man-Portable Air Defence Systems (24 ); they are no longer listed but the last registrated numbers still count for the total score. Situation April 5th: ... as a bonus a much longer live stream from War in Ukraine: What I find quite disturbing is the potential of the russian forces concentrated in the Izium bridgehead. They are slowly pushing south- and southeastward. The two Tank (4th and 47th) and one Mechanized Divisions (3rd) have an authorized strength of 180 tanks resp. 90 tanks each, making 450 tanks in all. UA forces are far more weaker in this area. Will the 450 or so tanks be a real danger ... or will the rA, with their flawed military leadership, screw up again and only create another huge, unorganized traffic jam south of Izium, which simply represents more shooting ducks for the UA? Unique images of an ambush of a retreating rA column near Sumy: An UA tank, well hidden and dug-in behind a house, is visible to the bottom left near the Ukrainian flag. Apparently not every round fired by the tank is a hit. According to another observer: "Note the tank fires blind though light structures. The drone is guiding the shot. The two misses are not misses. They hit right where the infantry are clustered up. HE really ruins your plans. The Russians can't see the tank and assume the shots are coming from the opposite direction, or the open gap to the right of the Tank and far further away. Tanks with drone overwatch are lethal. Particularly if there is a live feed into the tank." Bad news from the south. The defense of Mariupol crumbles. Part of the Ukrainian forces, 267 men of the 501st battalion who were defending the industrial complex to th enorth of th ecity centre (numbered 2 on the map) have surrendered: They are friendly treated by the rA, at least as long as the cameras are around.
The 'remote controlled' russian tank turrets explained: the reason these are easily detached lies in the way the ammunition is stored for the auto-loading mechanism in a carousel at the bottom of the turret. Once the stored ammo explodes - which is often the case - the turret is ejected. In fact a quite suicidal tank for the crews. Positions of crewmembers in a soviet T-72 tank. The driver (1) is seated in the vehicles front, commander (2) and gunner (3) are positioned in the turret, directly above the carousel (4), which contains the ammunition for the autoloading mechanism.
Mondelez represent the very worst form of capitalism and they have no interest whatsoever in their staff or many other aspects - this goes back decades - so I'm not at all surprised about their antics in Russia. When they bought Cadbury in the UK they promised to continue to focus on the UK and keep UK factories open - after the purchase they immediately closed the Somerdale factory near Bristol (even though they had made specific promises about thatmsite) and moved production to Poland. They have also 'rationalised' production on other sites and changed (cheapened) their long term heritage recipes by gradual 'new recipe' marketing and 'shrinkflation' etc - their products now taste completely different. To add insult to injury, when they were requested to attend a committee hearing at the UK Parliament, their CEO refused the basis that 'she hadn't got the time' - she did, however, have the time to collect a multi million dollar bonus during that and subsequent years. Truly the lowest of the low...
Authorized strength yes, actual strength likely much less. As you Itdan and sol noted earlier, 4th Tank Division has already lost at least 55 of its T-80 tanks, and getting replacement tanks in good working order seems to generate such a headache for Russian commanders that one of them (13th Tank Regiment's) allegedly chose to relieve it with a Makarov painkiller. Same must apply to the other two divisions too.
I seem to remember that the Germans were also quite adapt at using the water reservoirs of dams ... Schwammenauel dam in the Rur River near Heimbach, Germany 1945.
This assessment is ignoring the fact that Russian divisions involved in invasion are not exactly on their authorized strength on paper. Instead of being organized into standard regiments, they are organized into number of battalion tactical groups and peacetime regiments/brigades could provide just one or two BTG at best. Russian divisions consist of both contracted and conscripted soldiers but only former could be sent to Ukraine, at least in theory. This also mean than not all of the authorized equipment of the division was sent, but only the part of it which is distributed among several of division's BTG. So total number of tanks available to those formation is much lower than 450, but it is still significant. But this also mean that those BTG could somewhat replace their equipment losses by drawing from their parent unit arsenal ... to some margin of course. With retreat from Kyiv, Sumy and Chernihiv area, Russian will be able to significantly reinforce their forces in the Eastern part of Ukraine, so we can expect some really heavy fighting there. They will also have much more secure lines of supplies, unlike Sumy or Chernihiv for example are there are far less available reports of Ukrainians territorial units in that area. Also, seems like Russian are again attacking in the direction on Mykolaiv. Have feeling that intensity of the fighting will increase dramatically over next weeks.
Link Geschichte als Hobby: Sehen - Lesen - Spielen: Battalion Tactical Group (BTG) - Russian Army in 2022
