• --- how long NATO has feared the invincible Russian bear-----

    From a425couple@21:1/5 to All on Fri May 13 10:31:15 2022
    XPost: alt.war.vietnam, soc.history.war.misc

    Liberals United ·
    Answered by
    Alex Mann
    Mon

    Did Russia’s Putin teach a lesson to NATO countries and the West by
    attacking Ukraine?
    Oh ya- Putin taught NATO lessons like he was a professor.

    Lesson 1: Russia sucks

    I cannot overstate how long NATO has feared the invincible Russian bear-
    a military that could muster 15,000 tanks and swarm Europe. The US has
    spent 700 billion dollars PER YEAR building to face this exact threat.

    NATO developed special tactics to deal with Russia including specialized defense-in-depth (definition in comments) procedures, specialized
    weapons training, and tactical concepts meant to target Russia’s weak
    points.

    The big question was “would it work”. Would these untested tactics, strategies, and weapons work in the face of a large-scale Russian invasion?

    Ukraine didn’t really have much of an Army prior to 2014. Then Putin
    annexed Crimea and started fighting in the Donbas. Suddenly Ukraine had
    to build an army very quickly with the singular goal of defending
    against a Russian invasion. So naturally, they turned to NATO for
    training and NATO gave them everything- the weapons, the tactics, the strategies.

    Turns out it did work! The tactics used by the Ukrainians are NATO
    tactics (with some alternations) and the weapons proving to be the
    deadliest are NATO weapons.

    So now we know for sure that the US military would dominate the Russian military in short order. Ukraine is managing to really give the Russians
    a bloody nose with minimal training, minimal equipment, and minimal support.

    Russia has failed to control the air space in the face of about 500
    anti-air weapons, a handful of Helicopters, and 225 Aircraft. The US has
    6,000 Aircraft, 3000 Helicopters, and over 2000 highly advanced anti-air missile guidance weapons.
    Russia has struggled against a few thousand APCs- the US has over 10,000
    plus 250,000 Humvees
    Russia has struggled against the 1,500 outdated Ukrainian tanks- the US
    has 8,000 Abrams tanks and 6,000 Bradleys.

    Lesson 2: Russia has weak points

    The entire Russian military isn’t bad. Their Navy is pretty modern,
    though it lacks carriers. Their Airforce is also something to behold.
    How much of the airforce is functional and combat-ready? Not a ton. But
    even if Russia could sustain combat operations with 25% of their
    Airforce it would be deadly.

    But Russia has some serious flaws here too.

    Their logistical capability is…. subpar to say the least. They lack
    manpower, trucks, and even tires. Russia is down to using civilian
    trucks to haul supplies to the frontlines. It’s not like Ukraine is a superpower either. Ukraine was able to unravel the entire Russian
    logistical system with a few drones. In fact, it's unlikely that Russia
    could have supplied its forces without Ukrainian intervention. By week 2
    of this conflict, Russian troops were looting markets for food and
    abandoning tanks due to a lack of gas.

    Their tactical depth is bad. When a war starts and you send all your
    guys forward how far can they go before they run out of food, fuel, and
    ammo? The further the better obviously. Well, Russian troops can’t
    operate more than 90 km from a supply depot. This means they cannot
    strike deep into enemy territory or employ flexible creative advances.
    They have to hop-frog from city to city because cities can serve as
    ample supply depots.

    Ukraine knows this and it's why to defends its cities so strongly
    Russia has bad SEAD (definition in comments) capabilities. Step 1 of any
    war is to destroy your enemy's fixed-wing aircraft (or airports) and
    then target anti-air weapons by bombers, cruise missiles, artillery, you
    name it. Russia hasn’t even destroyed the very small Ukrainian Airforce
    yet and Ukraine still possesses loads of anti-air weapons.
    Russia relies on conscripted troops too heavily. Someone forced into the
    army, given little training, and paid virtually nothing is not going to
    fight hard or well.

    Russia has too much old equipment. There are lots of obsolete Russian
    tanks, planes, helicopters, trucks, guns, artillery- you name it. These
    old weapons systems are not doing well.
    Lesson 3: Putin is not to be trusted

    Putin's goals are clear- reform the USSR (in terms of size) and he is
    willing to go to war to do so.

    Putin cares little for peace or for his own people. He should be viewed
    like we viewed Hitler in 1938.

    In summary, Russia is inferior to most modernized nations militarily due
    to their many flaws and Putin is something a rouge dictator- and a
    threat to world peace.

    84.7K viewsView 2,168 upvotesView 8 sharesSubmission accepted by
    Tamer Aydogdu

    Profile photo for Joe Hoff
    Joe Hoff
    · Mon
    Best quote heard in youtube video. “We thought Russia had the 2nd best
    army in the world. Turns out they have the 2nd best army in Ukraine”. <Zing>

    Profile photo for Vincent Bligh
    Vincent Bligh
    · Mon
    Prefer the line Third best in Ukraine after the Farmers Tractor Brigade

    Profile photo for Neil Bravo
    Neil Bravo
    · Tue
    I think Farmed Forces of Ukraine sounds better.

    C. Harrison
    Hey I’m an actual farmer and I think it should be the Farmers

    Robert Coker
    · Tue
    Excellent commentary but at least one huge factor has not been accounted
    for. Corruption. Putin’s large group of compatriots has milked his new
    regime for all they can get- at the cost of military efficiency. We’ve
    all read the stories of how fuel is somehow not available, neither is
    food. These and…
    (more)

    Andrzej Ława
    · Tue
    In relation to item 4: Russia (and earlier the Soviet Union) had failed
    at creating strong NCO core. They rely on unskilled conscripts
    micromanaged by enlisted officers, quite often quite high ranking (this
    is why so many of their generals got “terminated with extreme prejudice”).


    Barry Hudson
    · Wed
    Lack of non-coms is their biggest flaw. The U. S. Army and Marines
    rebuilt their millions of men with the few career non-coms from the
    peacetime forces. Without them it would have taken years and possibly
    another 500,000 dead to win WWII. You will be hard pressed to find any U
    S. Officer with anything but praise for his senior non-coms. They are
    the backbone of all effective infantry. But Russia doesn’t have them
    because they are expensive, they require as much development and
    training as an officer and they require respect which doesn’t exist in
    the Russian army unless you are a senior officer. Without effective non-commissioned officers, unit cohesion, discipline and morale
    generally is poor. The non-coms hold things together while those green
    2nd Louies are learning the ropes and they protect the infantry against
    their foolish mistakes.

    Ruben Firstater
    · Tue
    Excellent analyze, as you always do.
    One remark though: There are countries that do rely on conscripts like
    mine (Israel) or Finland - both countries even leaning heavily on the
    reserves in case of a war but they are very well trained and very
    motivated (of course there is a core of professional officers and NCOs)
    - therefore I think that Rusia problem is not so much the conscripts but
    maybe the attitude towards them.

    Anton Gudenus
    · Tue
    One important limitation of conscripts, is that they are vastly superior
    in defense than in offense, especially so in countries that offer their citizens a good way of life and a society that’s worth defending.

    Conscripts will generally fight tooth and nail for their home and fellow countrymen. But to make them attack into foreign territory is a vastly
    more difficult task. One generally only achieved by heavy indoctrination.

    Israel and Finland are perfect examples in this regard. Both of them
    have high standards of living compared to any possible invader, a very
    high social cohesion and deploy their conscripts defensively.

    Dolph Watts
    · Tue
    Big difference between countries with mandatory service and reserve
    components and the term conscripts.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From canope234@gmail.com@21:1/5 to All on Mon Jun 13 18:22:50 2022
    On Friday, May 13, 2022 at 1:31:18 PM UTC-4, a425couple wrote:
    Liberals United ·
    Answered by
    Alex Mann
    Mon

    Did Russia’s Putin teach a lesson to NATO countries and the West by attacking Ukraine?
    Oh ya- Putin taught NATO lessons like he was a professor.

    Lesson 1: Russia sucks

    I cannot overstate how long NATO has feared the invincible Russian bear-
    a military that could muster 15,000 tanks and swarm Europe. The US has
    spent 700 billion dollars PER YEAR building to face this exact threat.

    NATO developed special tactics to deal with Russia including specialized defense-in-depth (definition in comments) procedures, specialized
    weapons training, and tactical concepts meant to target Russia’s weak points.

    The big question was “would it work”. Would these untested tactics, strategies, and weapons work in the face of a large-scale Russian invasion?

    Ukraine didn’t really have much of an Army prior to 2014. Then Putin annexed Crimea and started fighting in the Donbas. Suddenly Ukraine had
    to build an army very quickly with the singular goal of defending
    against a Russian invasion. So naturally, they turned to NATO for
    training and NATO gave them everything- the weapons, the tactics, the strategies.

    Turns out it did work! The tactics used by the Ukrainians are NATO
    tactics (with some alternations) and the weapons proving to be the
    deadliest are NATO weapons.

    So now we know for sure that the US military would dominate the Russian military in short order. Ukraine is managing to really give the Russians
    a bloody nose with minimal training, minimal equipment, and minimal support.

    Russia has failed to control the air space in the face of about 500
    anti-air weapons, a handful of Helicopters, and 225 Aircraft. The US has 6,000 Aircraft, 3000 Helicopters, and over 2000 highly advanced anti-air missile guidance weapons.
    Russia has struggled against a few thousand APCs- the US has over 10,000 plus 250,000 Humvees
    Russia has struggled against the 1,500 outdated Ukrainian tanks- the US
    has 8,000 Abrams tanks and 6,000 Bradleys.

    Lesson 2: Russia has weak points

    The entire Russian military isn’t bad. Their Navy is pretty modern,
    though it lacks carriers. Their Airforce is also something to behold.
    How much of the airforce is functional and combat-ready? Not a ton. But
    even if Russia could sustain combat operations with 25% of their
    Airforce it would be deadly.

    But Russia has some serious flaws here too.

    Their logistical capability is…. subpar to say the least. They lack manpower, trucks, and even tires. Russia is down to using civilian
    trucks to haul supplies to the frontlines. It’s not like Ukraine is a superpower either. Ukraine was able to unravel the entire Russian
    logistical system with a few drones. In fact, it's unlikely that Russia could have supplied its forces without Ukrainian intervention. By week 2
    of this conflict, Russian troops were looting markets for food and abandoning tanks due to a lack of gas.

    Their tactical depth is bad. When a war starts and you send all your
    guys forward how far can they go before they run out of food, fuel, and ammo? The further the better obviously. Well, Russian troops can’t
    operate more than 90 km from a supply depot. This means they cannot
    strike deep into enemy territory or employ flexible creative advances.
    They have to hop-frog from city to city because cities can serve as
    ample supply depots.

    Ukraine knows this and it's why to defends its cities so strongly
    Russia has bad SEAD (definition in comments) capabilities. Step 1 of any
    war is to destroy your enemy's fixed-wing aircraft (or airports) and
    then target anti-air weapons by bombers, cruise missiles, artillery, you name it. Russia hasn’t even destroyed the very small Ukrainian Airforce yet and Ukraine still possesses loads of anti-air weapons.
    Russia relies on conscripted troops too heavily. Someone forced into the army, given little training, and paid virtually nothing is not going to fight hard or well.

    Russia has too much old equipment. There are lots of obsolete Russian
    tanks, planes, helicopters, trucks, guns, artillery- you name it. These
    old weapons systems are not doing well.
    Lesson 3: Putin is not to be trusted

    Putin's goals are clear- reform the USSR (in terms of size) and he is willing to go to war to do so.

    Putin cares little for peace or for his own people. He should be viewed
    like we viewed Hitler in 1938.

    In summary, Russia is inferior to most modernized nations militarily due
    to their many flaws and Putin is something a rouge dictator- and a
    threat to world peace.

    84.7K viewsView 2,168 upvotesView 8 sharesSubmission accepted by
    Tamer Aydogdu

    Profile photo for Joe Hoff
    Joe Hoff
    · Mon
    Best quote heard in youtube video. “We thought Russia had the 2nd best army in the world. Turns out they have the 2nd best army in Ukraine”. <Zing>

    Profile photo for Vincent Bligh
    Vincent Bligh
    · Mon
    Prefer the line Third best in Ukraine after the Farmers Tractor Brigade

    Profile photo for Neil Bravo
    Neil Bravo
    · Tue
    I think Farmed Forces of Ukraine sounds better.

    C. Harrison
    Hey I’m an actual farmer and I think it should be the Farmers

    Robert Coker
    · Tue
    Excellent commentary but at least one huge factor has not been accounted for. Corruption. Putin’s large group of compatriots has milked his new regime for all they can get- at the cost of military efficiency. We’ve
    all read the stories of how fuel is somehow not available, neither is
    food. These and…
    (more)

    Andrzej Ława
    · Tue
    In relation to item 4: Russia (and earlier the Soviet Union) had failed
    at creating strong NCO core. They rely on unskilled conscripts
    micromanaged by enlisted officers, quite often quite high ranking (this
    is why so many of their generals got “terminated with extreme prejudice”).


    Barry Hudson
    · Wed
    Lack of non-coms is their biggest flaw. The U. S. Army and Marines
    rebuilt their millions of men with the few career non-coms from the peacetime forces. Without them it would have taken years and possibly another 500,000 dead to win WWII. You will be hard pressed to find any U
    S. Officer with anything but praise for his senior non-coms. They are
    the backbone of all effective infantry. But Russia doesn’t have them because they are expensive, they require as much development and
    training as an officer and they require respect which doesn’t exist in
    the Russian army unless you are a senior officer. Without effective non-commissioned officers, unit cohesion, discipline and morale
    generally is poor. The non-coms hold things together while those green
    2nd Louies are learning the ropes and they protect the infantry against their foolish mistakes.

    Ruben Firstater
    · Tue
    Excellent analyze, as you always do.
    One remark though: There are countries that do rely on conscripts like
    mine (Israel) or Finland - both countries even leaning heavily on the reserves in case of a war but they are very well trained and very
    motivated (of course there is a core of professional officers and NCOs)
    - therefore I think that Rusia problem is not so much the conscripts but maybe the attitude towards them.

    Anton Gudenus
    · Tue
    One important limitation of conscripts, is that they are vastly superior
    in defense than in offense, especially so in countries that offer their citizens a good way of life and a society that’s worth defending.

    Conscripts will generally fight tooth and nail for their home and fellow countrymen. But to make them attack into foreign territory is a vastly
    more difficult task. One generally only achieved by heavy indoctrination.

    Israel and Finland are perfect examples in this regard. Both of them
    have high standards of living compared to any possible invader, a very
    high social cohesion and deploy their conscripts defensively.

    Dolph Watts
    · Tue
    Big difference between countries with mandatory service and reserve components and the term conscripts.

    e US has
    spent 700 billion dollars PER YEAR building to face this exact threat.
    The us spent 50 million dollars to rebuild a 300 thousand dollar bridge in iraq.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From a425couple@21:1/5 to cano...@gmail.com on Mon Jun 13 19:48:55 2022
    On 6/13/2022 6:22 PM, cano...@gmail.com wrote:
    On Friday, May 13, 2022 at 1:31:18 PM UTC-4, a425couple wrote:

    Did Russia’s Putin teach a lesson to NATO countries and the West by
    attacking Ukraine?
    Oh ya- Putin taught NATO lessons like he was a professor.

    Lesson 1: Russia sucks

    I cannot overstate how long NATO has feared the invincible Russian bear-
    a military that could muster 15,000 tanks and swarm Europe. The US has
    spent 700 billion dollars PER YEAR building to face this exact threat.

    NATO developed special tactics to deal with Russia including specialized
    defense-in-depth (definition in comments) procedures, specialized
    weapons training, and tactical concepts meant to target Russia’s weak
    points.

    The big question was “would it work”. Would these untested tactics,
    strategies, and weapons work in the face of a large-scale Russian invasion? >>
    Ukraine didn’t really have much of an Army prior to 2014. Then Putin
    annexed Crimea and started fighting in the Donbas. Suddenly Ukraine had
    to build an army very quickly with the singular goal of defending
    against a Russian invasion. So naturally, they turned to NATO for
    training and NATO gave them everything- the weapons, the tactics, the
    strategies.-------------------------

    Big difference between countries with mandatory service and reserve
    components and the term conscripts.

    e US has
    spent 700 billion dollars PER YEAR building to face this exact threat.
    The us spent 50 million dollars to rebuild a 300 thousand dollar bridge in iraq.

    Yes. Rather amazing how much the USA wastes.
    Or, perhaps more amazing, how much the USA has to waste.
    Or how you can waste incredible amounts when you
    GDP is $22.94 TRILLION a year.

    While Russia can waste so much, but only have $1.65 trillion.

    Worth viewing: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/visualizing-the-94-trillion-world-economy-in-one-chart/

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)