Putin's Invasion of Ukraine

[Hydra009]

Nosił wilk razy kilka ponieśli i wilka: Russia threatens to destroy Warsaw in 3 days

I have a few notes:

1) Russia couldn't take Kyiv in 3 days
2) There are ongoing battles over villages in Ukraine that have taken years. Russia's military is so degraded that it's now basically impossible for them to assault anything larger than small villages. The pace of advance - assuming they advance at all - is literally slower than a snail's pace.
3) Poland will soon be the largest and most powerful land army in Europe. And unlike Russia, it is very well-equipped. And unlike Ukraine, I don't think they'd show any restraint or have allies demanding that they show restraint.
4) You can forget being welcomed as liberators. Suffice it to say that Poland knows its history well and these people are known for holding grudges. Russia has lots of problems with partisans in Ukraine, but I think the Polish have a good shot a topping the Ukrainians there. Pretty much the entirety of Poland would resist in any way they can.
5) Zelenskyy made a mistake by being in denial during the imminent invasion. The Polish government won't make that mistake.
6) I'm pretty sure that if Poland and Russia were to formally be at war, Polish forces would be able to enter Ukrainian land (at Zelenskyy's request) and repel Russians there, too.

If Russia were to attack Poland, here's how it'd go:

[Hydra009]

Putin refuses energy ceasefire

Russia would benefit from this more than Ukraine, so it's odd, but not very odd. Russia has so far resisted all ceasefire attempts by Ukraine, brought in a third party into the war (North Korea), sent drones and planes and a helicopter over NATO territory, and threatened to expand the war into NATO territory. But Trump says Putin wants peace and - presumably under orders - pressures Zelenskyy, not Putin, to make peace (capitulate and give up territory to an aggressor).

The only times so far that Russia has agreed to a ceasefire are ones that Putin proposed and were extremely limited in time and place. Like the Easter ceasefire that was almost immediately violated by Russia. And also the Moscow Parade that Zelenskyy allowed to take place. But almost immediately after Putin was no longer personally in danger, Russia once again resumed hostilities.

Time and time again, Putin has doubled down on war. Sometimes, one of his mouthpieces says something about peace, but saying things and doing things are two different things. Actions speak louder than words. So the people who say he wants peace are either delusional or useful idiots.

[Hydra009]

By the way, the strikes on Russian logistics vehicles haven't stopped, even though they get much less press coverage now. Iirc, they've actually increased somewhat.

Like I said earlier, if Russia loses vehicles with every supply convoy, it's only a matter of time until they either start running out of vehicles or stop venturing there. Either way, it's bad for logistics.

[Hydra009]

Russia just conducted a drone strike very, very close to the Polish border

It went down several hundred meters from Poland.

[Hydra009]

Operation Vivaldi: Ukraine liberates captures 51 square kilometers, captures more than 250 Russians

The Ukrainian success is due to a number of factors:
1) Deceiving the Russians into thinking the main attack would come at a different location (can't beat the classics)
2) Using "mothership" drones to drop drones behind enemy lines, increasing their range and making their paths more unpredictable
3) Loading up old soviet-era armored vehicles with explosives, piloting them remotely, and using them to ram Russian fortifications (anyone else have Red Alert 2 demo trucks on their bingo card?)

The Russians were reportedly hampered by poor morale and poor communications as well as their own culture of lying, since apparently, they thought the front line was about 35km further than it actually was, leading support units to be much closer to Ukrainian forces than they should have been. Ukraine captured a bunch of drone operators and artillerymen, as well as some officers. A very good haul. With these forces taken out of the fighting, Russian forces in this sector are much weaker. And it's wonderful to have Russian prisoners to make further prisoner exchanges.

[Hydra009]

[Hydra009]

Russian bomber crashes in Russia, 6 of 7 crew members dead

The preliminary cause of the nighttime crash is believed to be a fuel explosion on board

*the footage shows fires galore*
"We think that maybe the fuel exploded"
Ya think?!

It added that the aircraft belongs to Ukrainka, a Russian strategic aviation grouping based at Amur Oblast's Ukrainka Air Base

Ukrainka, huh? Quite a familiar-sounding name...

The crash signals the likely growing strain on Russia's aviation industry, which has been cut off from Western-made parts due to sanctions imposed after Moscow's invasion of Ukraine.

Good. They just bombed the Ukrainian National Academy of Sciences, a hospital, and various other civilian targets. Let them all fall from the sky.

[Cassia]

Russian forces recorded their highest reported daily casualty total since the start of the full-scale invasion, with 2,090 troops killed or wounded over a 24-hour period, according to UK Defence Intelligence on September 29.

[Hydra009]

Russian forces recorded their highest reported daily casualty total since the start of the full-scale invasion, with 2,090 troops killed or wounded over a 24-hour period, according to UK Defence Intelligence on September 29.

Yeah, that's nuts. I thought maybe they had combined two days or something. I'm talking about 250 captured troops making life easier for the Ukrainians, meanwhile 2k Russians are cleared from the board (light casualties sometimes do come back later, but that's happening less and less in this conflict)

Putin will definitely have to mobilize several hundred thousand just to keep the war going. That's not even for ambitious goals like taking the fortress belt, that's just to keep the current Russian units from falling apart.

[Hydra009]

3) Loading up old soviet-era armored vehicles with explosives, piloting them remotely, and using them to ram Russian fortifications (anyone else have Red Alert 2 demo trucks on their bingo card?)

Apparently, the demo trucks (or whatever they're called, unmanned explodie vehicles) worked so well because the Russians mistook it for one of their own, so they just ignored it until it was too late. And it didn't hit any minefields, which was very good for the Ukrainians. They're definitely taking advantage of any tactical mistakes that the Russians make and bizarrely, I'm not seeing a lot of learning from mistakes and doing things differently in the future - it's just different people doing the same bad, amateurish stuff.