Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-23 and Invasion

[Zoupa]

All I am saying is that I am getting Erdogan the liberal liberator of religious folks vibes from you guys on this, from many years ago.

Putin going hat in hand for 1950s level artillery ammunition to North Korea, alone, should confirm it to you that they are NOT doing well.

I remember a couple of months ago there was a thing when Putin himself commented on the lack of chicken in stores, blaming the miscalculation of imports or some such.

Sure they will probably manage a slow slide down, but you are foolish to draw conclusions based on data coming out of that place.

But the conclusion is that they are managing to ramp up their war time economy at the price have suffering a slide down from where they could have been if there had been no war.

What is it you are disagreeing with?

I disagree with the sentiment that Russia is doing alright.

And their war economy has been ramping up like hell since April and all I have seen evidence of that is terror bombing using Iranian drones, and ww1 level advance of the front using Chinese buggies and North Korean ammo.

Indeed. I don't think people appreciate the level of russian shittyness. They are being invaded by a country that probably has around 30 million people left, a country plagued by decades of corruption, with logistical nightmares operating old soviet crap and slightly more modern old NATO equipment.

It's simply mind-boggling that we're on day 900 of the full scale invasion and the russians have been losing ground for like 893 days.

[Norgy]

I don't know if you other Euros remember the amazing car Lada.
My dad bought one, because that other great car maker in Europe, the UK, had discontinued making the Vauxhall. The Vauxhall Viva we had probably had more time in the garage than on the road, because nothing really worked on it.

The Lada worked. Sort of. At times. It had an immense 44 horsepower engine that you could not break a single speed limit with unless you had the wind at your back and was going downhill. Rather steeply downhill. It weighed more than my mini-SUV does, had backwheel drive and the dashboard lit up like a Christmas tree because there was always some sort of electrical failure going on.

While other car makers in Europe used aluminium-steel compounds, the Lada, I think was just steel. It was, in short, shit. Utter and complete shit.

The only good thing about it, was that with a little bit of equipment you could repair a lot of what was always broken yourself.

That car seems symptomatic of what Russia's lacking outside of hacking and still making fur hats: Innovation and the ability to improve production when the first batch fails.
Well, except with vodka, that is.

[Josquius]

I know of ladas. Interesting they largely vanished whilst Skoda, a far bigger butt of crap car jokes, has become pretty respectable.

I also used to work with a Serbian named Lada.

I'm not sure about Russian inability to innovate. The glide bombs are causing havoc and they've innovated a lot in drones. And beyond the war the Soviets did a fair bit - though the story of the space pen vs pencil is fake, it wasn't born out of nothing.
The problems seems to be more this is very compartmentslised.
I have read the way the Russian army works is local commanders are given a box of goodies and an objective and they must then throw all their resources at this objective. No other objectives matter and how much they have left at the end is also irrelevant. If they fail to meet the objective... Sucks for them but that's that unless high command decides to have another go.

[Syt]

I know of ladas. Interesting they largely vanished whilst Skoda, a far bigger butt of crap car jokes, has become pretty respectable.

Dacia, too, I think?

[garbon]

Several years ago when I was in Berlin for pride, there was oddly a Lada sitting out that you could pay to rent to have a lively drive about the city.

[Duque de Bragança]

Several years ago when I was in Berlin for pride, there was oddly a Lada sitting out that you could pay to rent to have a lively drive about the city.

I guess they ran out of Trabants. 

[Tamas]

As I remember, Ladas were definitely not the low end of Eastern Bloc cars. We had two Ladas, then the third and last one was a Lada Samara bought about the time of the regime's end I think and in 3 years was rotting away heavily. The first Lada we had (my dad bought before I was born) we kept seeing around town with its new owner for many many years after selling it, it lived several decades.

Dacia was utter shit as I recall. I had a car mechanic relative and he had one, it seemed like it was his pet project to keep it going.

Skodas I have no experience with but those are Czech, not Russian, which should explain to you why they are still alive.

Plus, nowadays, Dacia is the poor man's Renault and Skoda is the poor man's Volkswagen - like, literally. They are cheaper versions of their grander owners' models.

I'd never buy a Dacia but I'd consider a Skoda, the problem with them int he UK at least is that for being the budget version of Volkswagen, they don't seem that much cheaper.

[DGuller]

My uncle once told us a story about how he went with a friend to pick up a Lada.  The friend inherited the car from a deceased relative, but since he was an orthopedic surgeon, he didn't want to use his hands to fix anything that needed fixing on the car, so he brought my uncle along.  They got the car and then drove to the tech inspection facility.  When they hoisted up the car, half of the car stayed on the ground.

[Norgy]

Several years ago when I was in Berlin for pride, there was oddly a Lada sitting out that you could pay to rent to have a lively drive about the city.

I guess they ran out of Trabants. 

A lack of Trabants is a travesty!

[Zanza]

There was an interesting thread long ago when the second iteration of the war started. The guy is not really reliable, but he is a good story teller. This story on why the Russian economy cannot really innovate somehow sounds plausible:

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1501360272442896388.html

[grumbler]

I'm not sure about Russian inability to innovate. The glide bombs are causing havoc and they've innovated a lot in drones. And beyond the war the Soviets did a fair bit - though the story of the space pen vs pencil is fake, it wasn't born out of nothing.

Glide bombs have ben around since WW2.  Nothing innovative there.  I haven't seen anything about Russian innovations in drones, except for responses to Ukrainian innovations.

Russian research, especially theoretical, is world-class.  Mathematics are a real strength for them.  Engineering, however, is a real weakness.  The idea behind the T-34 tank, for instance, was brilliant but the execution of the design probably robbed it of 20% of its potential.  In space, they are still using variants of the Soyuz capsule introduced in 1967, and it is still a deathtrap should anything go wrong.

[Norgy]

Yeah, that sounds like my Lada.

[Tamas]

Do you know any OSINT / war news feed on Threads or anyrhing that isn't Twitter? I am never going back there, I almost threw up the last time I was browsing it.

[Norgy]

Do you know any OSINT / war news feed on Threads or anyrhing that isn't Twitter? I am never going back there, I almost threw up the last time I was browsing it.

Twitter or X is basically football agents spreading rumours, a few morons selling Doge coin or whatever, and a bunch of people my age having a crisis of faith and finding a support in "Hey, fascism and libertarian principles along with a bit of racism" wank circles.

I never post. I use it purely to follow the local police tweets (and Nottingham Forest).
But whatever I choose to follow, the same wankers always pop up. It's like "Holocaust never happened, good luck local football team, fuck off women and anyone not thinking the same has low T and is a soyboy".
And I can usually rather replace a dose of that daily with a coffee and a cig.

[Josquius]

Again unsourced telegram guy* etc etc...

WATER IS LIFE - UNLESS YOU'RE RUSSIAN

According to British Military Intelligence, water has become a serious issue for Russian forces in the south and east frontal areas.
The long, hot and very dry summer has reduced water supplies.
Notable areas of suffering are the occupied Kherson, Zaporhizia and Crimean areas. It seems that blowing up the dam last year has finally come home to roost. There are few if any rivers in much of the Occupied Kherson oblast. The dam was used to divert water from the Dnepr down a man made canal.
That water fed the dykes and water systems of the agriculture in the area, as well as most villages.
The canal was also the only full scale water supply for the whole of Crimea, which is notorious for its lack of fresh water sources.
The situation has spread further, with Russian water trucks in short supply along the entire front, often having to travel a considerable distance to pick up drinking water.
The situation at some airbases is said to be so bad, pilots are given just 1L per day - a quarter of what's needed in the kind of heat they're facing. They have even gotten to the point of asking locals to give them water.
Like so much else the situation has been allowed to fester and worsen until it becomes a major issue and only then is it made public.
But in Russia that means nothing. Complainers are quickly silenced, problems swept under the carpet. Even if solutions are found and promised so much of the money vanishes nothing reaches those who need water.
Another major disaster waits the Russians if the Kerch bridge finally meets its end. It's the main crossing point for water supplies. It wouldn't take long for chronic shortages to develop on that isolated peninsula.
Russia's road tanker water supply system is virtually crippled. Partly it's their own doing, nobody saw water as being such a big issue, but there aren't enough tankers to supply civilian and military needs in the occupied regions.
It's just one more aspect of the war taking its toll on operational capability, troop and civilian morale.
Corruption and inflexibility, failure to plan or innovate, a lack of understanding the consequences of their own actions. It's a classic case of modern Russia under Putin and his ineptitude.

Reading this some bells rung in my head.
I do remember between the initial seizure of crimea and the mass invasion that Ukraine cutting off water supplies to crimea was a big issue.
It makes a lot of sense with the dam destruction that Russia is seeing this problem again.


*I've found a name "Jon champs" but Google fails me trying to find someone who claims to be such a respected expert.