Outside Topic Way OT: Ukraine - Printable Version

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - BostonCard - 06-05-2022

About those threats from Russia if we supply Ukraine MLrS….

[tweet]https://twitter.com/michaelh992/status/1533369049920458752?s=21&t=hHdeXb9pK7LPSr4UfnZBbw[/tweet]

BC

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - BostonCard - 06-05-2022

Sadly, Ukraines chances of qualifying for the World Cup were dashed by a 1-0 loss to Wales today.  It would have been quite something if they had been able to pull it off.

BC

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - BostonCard - 06-05-2022

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russian-general-killed-eastern-ukraine-russian-state-media-reporter-says-2022-06-05/



BC

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - Goose - 06-05-2022

https://www.yahoo.com/news/cit-expert-explains-himars-system-162900875.html discusses the overall situation in Donbas. I think it is an excellent article. If puts HIMARS/MLRS into context with Russian SRBM and cruise missiles in an understandable way. It also correctly points out that the four large drones the US is providing will probably never be used for anything but reconnaissance. These drones have high resolution optics that allow them to survey large areas continuously and target several artillery/missile strikes at once. Many people seem to believe that the US has high-resolution PHOTINT of the entire earth surface available 24/7. That isn't anywhere near true. Satellites in synchronous orbit can see a lot of the earth's surface but generally with limited resolution. LEO satellites are much better resolution wise, but only provide data when passing over the area of interest. That is why the US flies so many high altitude drones. They can provide persistent coverage with high resolution, which is what one needs to target and evaluate missile/artillery strikes. The Turkish Bayraktar drones are good but provide a limited field of view and limited resolution. To fully use HIMARS, you need good targeting. Thus the Gray Eagle drones.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - M T - 06-05-2022

(06-05-2022, 01:46 PM)BostonCard Wrote:  https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russian-general-killed-eastern-ukraine-russian-state-media-reporter-says-2022-06-05/

BC

Up to and going into the American Civil War, the US Army and Navy had many of their top officers that were rather old, which complicated giving promotion to more active, younger officers.

Maybe this is a strategic war to weed out senior staff and to provide room for advancement within the Russian military?  (;-)

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - dabigv13 - 06-05-2022

[Tweet]https://twitter.com/olliecarroll/status/1533619320093388800?s=20&t=7_ddKrMDKj8MalfOp8HvoQ[/tweet]

Zelensky is truly an incredible wartime leader. Big brass balls.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - Goose - 06-05-2022

(06-05-2022, 06:58 PM)dabigv13 Wrote:  https://twitter.com/olliecarroll/status/1533619320093388800?s=20&t=7_ddKrMDKj8MalfOp8HvoQ

Zelensky is truly an incredible wartime leader. Big brass balls.

Indeed! His leadership has made Ukraine possible. Hard to imagine what would have happened without him. Also, who knew? I don't think even his greatest admirers expected this level of leadership.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - BostonCard - 06-05-2022

Given that he was an actor playing an accidental president, “fake it till you make it” takes on a whole new meaning.

I will say that times like these reveal the best and worst of people. Zelensky’s reform efforts were half-hearted and his leadership pre-war was undistinguished.  As a wartime leader, he has indeed been superb.

BC

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - Mick - 06-06-2022

(06-05-2022, 07:23 PM)BostonCard Wrote:  Given that he was an actor playing an accidental president, “fake it till you make it” takes on a whole new meaning.

I will say that times like these reveal the best and worst of people. Zelensky’s reform efforts were half-hearted and his leadership pre-war was undistinguished.  As a wartime leader, he has indeed been superb.

BC

Given their votes, the Brits may have thought the same of Churchill...

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(06-05-2022, 06:57 PM)M T Wrote:  Maybe this is a strategic war to weed out senior staff and to provide room for advancement within the Russian military?  (;-)

I think that's my firm's strategy. I've lost 20 of my team of 34 and 5 of my 9 Directors during The Great Resignation.  Annual bonuses are in July, will probably lose another 3-4.

Rich country problems, I know.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - TrumpCard - 06-06-2022

(05-27-2022, 02:11 PM)dabigv13 Wrote:  It looks like Severodonetsk and the remaining sliver of Luhansk not under Russian/separatist control is slowly being taken by the Russians. Ukraine has blown some bridges and retreated from some of the front areas there. Whether Russia can then quickly reduce Severodonetsk and push further west seems to be the question.

This may well end up being 100% correct, but some events from the last 10 days reinforce that the fog of war is real.  Why was Zelenskyy apparently safer than the Russian major general on this battlefront?  How much did Ukraine really withdraw from Severodonetsk, and how much was a ploy to set up the apparent counterattack this last weekend (that seems to have succeeded to some extent and took out that Russian major general)?  How much success has Ukraine really achieved it halting Russia's breakout from Popasna versus how much is Russia just pausing to solidify its logistics before advancing on more terrain?

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - Goose - 06-07-2022

https://www.yahoo.com/news/potent-weapons-reach-ukraine-faster-114318516.html discusses some of the training problems Ukraine is facing. The lack of imperial units wrenches is also a classic NATO screw-up. NATO tries to use MKS as much as possible, but the weapons systems often are built with IPS components.

I would imagine the Ukraine can put together a phone app that can convert NATO coordinates to the maps they are using and visa versa. No reason to do it by hand. However, the "right people" need to know about this problem and get some volunteers to do the work. Still, you can enter a number incorrectly. These are just the "normal" fit-for-purpose problems that new equipment in any military creates. However, Ukraine doesn't have a year to work them out and they are absorbing vast quantities of new "stuff", not just one item. Amazing how well they have done with so little training, but it is a problem. It will get worse as the equipment is deployed longer and needs maintenance.

As probably most of you already know, the M777 howitzers the US provided did not have the computer based gun laying capability included. The Ukrainians have to do it "by hand". Nobody in the West is saying why that is the case. It could be that we are worried about "compromising" that technology to Russia, but I can't imagine there is anything real high tech in the system. IMHO it is more probable that the military decided the Ukrainians are already trained in manual gun laying and understand it. It is also pretty simple. Learning to use the computer based system is a training problem and in the short time available it was decided it was too much to learn and too many things could break that the Ukrainians could not fix. It is also true that you need to know how to lay the gun manually anyway in case the computer breaks, so emphasis may have been given to that skill set. These types of issues are a big deal, and affect what happens in ways we don't always know about.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - TrumpCard - 06-08-2022

Seems like Turkey's objections to Sweden and Finland's application to join NATO may be more difficult to overcome than previously acknowledged.  And I wonder whether Sweden and Finland joining is really so likely anyway.  Seems plausible that any negotiated resolution could include a NATO bar on FIN and SWE as well as a NATO bar on UKR.  If the idea is to let Putin save face and give him something, I would rather see that than ceding territory.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - Treefence - 06-08-2022

(06-08-2022, 05:25 PM)TrumpCard Wrote:  Seems like Turkey's objections to Sweden and Finland's application to join NATO may be more difficult to overcome than previously acknowledged.  And I wonder whether Sweden and Finland joining is really so likely anyway.  Seems plausible that any negotiated resolution could include a NATO bar on FIN and SWE as well as a NATO bar on UKR.  If the idea is to let Putin save face and give him something, I would rather see that than ceding territory.

I think Turkey is still just negotiation and seeing everything they can get, I think Sweden and Finland is still essentially a foregone conclusion.  If I were Ukraine I'd agree to neutrality to avoid losing territory, but then join NATO anyway, or at the very least have security assurances from several western nations, because Russia will likely just attempt another invasion if and when they can recover their losses.  That being said, there is no going back to the way things were with Russia, as long as the current regime is in power.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - dabigv13 - 06-08-2022

Turkey wants F16s, and because they bought S400 from Russia they are on the shitlist and only congress can get them off. Biden may have to muscle Menendez on it. I think Sweden and Finland will make it eventually but there will be some protracted horse trading.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - Treefence - 06-08-2022

(06-08-2022, 08:57 PM)dabigv13 Wrote:  Turkey wants F16s, and because they bought S400 from Russia they are on the shitlist and only congress can get them off. Biden may have to muscle Menendez on it. I think Sweden and Finland will make it eventually but there will be some protracted horse trading.

I believe they also want F35's which likely is a nonstarter for the US, but since Turkey already has F16s, I'm guessing the US will eventually allow it, but likely try to only give in on that request.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - Goose - 06-08-2022

I think many here are misreading the situation  with regard to Turkey. While I am sure Erdogan will gladly take any "loot" he can extract from the US, he is deadly serious about the PKK issue and about the sanctions applied by Sweden and Finland to Turkey because of this invasion into Syria. Failing to realize that he means business will just piss him off more, so I hope our diplomats aren't patronizing him. It won't work. There is going to have to be movement on both these issues or NATO membership for Sweden and Finland will not happen, period.

IMHO the US and the rest of the NATO members really screwed the pooch on this one. Before encouraging Finland and Sweden to apply for membership, or even hinting it was on offer, they should have ensured that nothing like this fiasco was possible. This situation makes NATO look very, very foolish. Not good.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - dabigv13 - 06-08-2022

Hard for any of us to judge Erdogan's true intentions, but he apparently encouraged the Finns to apply and told the Finnish PM that Turkey would support them joining NATO, back in April.

So I'm not sure he's that serious about the PKK stuff. I don't think US or anyone else in NATO screwed the pooch. Erdogan just doing his thing.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - Goose - 06-09-2022

(06-08-2022, 10:47 PM)dabigv13 Wrote:  Hard for any of us to judge Erdogan's true intentions, but he apparently encouraged the Finns to apply and told the Finnish PM that Turkey would support them joining NATO, back in April.

So I'm not sure he's that serious about the PKK stuff. I don't think US or anyone else in NATO screwed the pooch. Erdogan just doing his thing.

Take a look at https://www.dailysabah.com/politics/diplomacy/erdogan-finlands-niinisto-discuss-defense-export-obstacles date April 4. Also https://nationworldnews.com/nato-chief-tries-to-stop-erdogans-resistance-to-finland-sweden-joining-alliance/ originally published 4/6/2022. Clearly, there was some significant concern back in April about Erdogan's position. If you have a reference for him "encouraging" Finland to apply, I would like to read it. In any case, was it a public statement saying Turkey would not stand in the way of Finland and Sweden joining NATO? If not, IMHO NATO did indeed commit a grievous error.
You are correct that nobody really knows Erdogan's reasoning. His intentions are actually another matter. He is indeed a loose cannon. Given that, I think NATO should have realized they needed to back him into a corner from which it would be hard to extricate himself. If he resisted that effort, look out, because he isn't on board and will stand in the way. Actually, where the US and NATO have been burned most frequently is by not taking Erdogan at his word. He said Turkey would buy the S-400 because they didn't like the local manufacturing content/technology transfer (and the cost) of the Patriot. Nobody took him seriously, because it didn't appear to "make sense" (to us) that he would do that. He did exactly what he said he was going to do. Based on the April 4th article I cited above, clearly NATO was aware there was at a minimum the arms embargo "problem" that had to be "fixed". The other issues, such as the PKK were also already "out there". NATO apparently thought that these issues could be made to "go away". Real bad assumption.
Allowing Finland and Sweden to apply for membership without Erdogan publicly embracing that action was asking for trouble, given that he had already raised issues. It gives him even more leverage. If backroom negotiations were going to be "the answer", those negotiations needed to happen BEFORE the application, because if Erdogan was going to demand the impossible from them, there was no reason for NATO to endure the embarrassment and concern raised by a public split among it's members.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - dabigv13 - 06-09-2022

I'm not certain but I think the second article you linked was perhaps from June 4th, with date written in Euro style. Finland and Sweden had not applied for NATO membership by April 6th.

This was apparently a discussion Erdogan had with Finnish president Niinisto in April. The first article you linked I think touches on this same discussion, but Niinisto now is revealing what Erdogan told him regarding Finnish accession to NATO.

Quote:IN AN INTERVIEW WITH IS, THE PRESIDENT OF THE Republic Sauli Niinistö said that there was no reason to doubt Turkey's position before Erdogan's sharp exits.

According to Niinistö, in a telephone conversation on 4 April, Erdogan clearly expressed his support for Finland's efforts.

- At the end of a rather long discussion, he said that you are applying for NATO membership, we will look at it favorably, we will assess it favorably , Niinistö says.

https://www.is.fi/politiikka/art-2000008869077.html

Erdogan is moving the goalposts. Maybe that should have been anticipated more by NATO, Finland, and Sweden, but my estimation is that Erdogan was always going to try to and get maximal leverage for his vote and publicly stating support for Finnish/Swedish accession before it's even declared throws away that leverage. I am skeptical NATO could have done much more on this, but I am pretty optimistic this will get sorted eventually, because if it doesn't then Erdogan gets nothing.

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RE: Way OT: Ukraine - Goose - 06-09-2022

(06-09-2022, 07:52 AM)dabigv13 Wrote:  I'm not certain but I think the second article you linked was perhaps from June 4th, with date written in Euro style. Finland and Sweden had not applied for NATO membership by April 6th.

The article was listed as "revised" five days ago, but it shows up in a Google search for dates between April 1 to April 30. I imagine the "original" was in April and the later revisions applied the NATO membership updates. I think Google uses the original post date, not a date from the article text, but that may not be the case.

Quote:This was apparently a discussion Erdogan had with Finnish president Niinisto in April. The first article you linked I think touches on this same discussion, but Niinisto now is revealing what Erdogan told him regarding Finnish accession to NATO.

Quote:IN AN INTERVIEW WITH IS, THE PRESIDENT OF THE Republic Sauli Niinistö said that there was no reason to doubt Turkey's position before Erdogan's sharp exits.

According to Niinistö, in a telephone conversation on 4 April, Erdogan clearly expressed his support for Finland's efforts.

- At the end of a rather long discussion, he said that you are applying for NATO membership, we will look at it favorably, we will assess it favorably , Niinistö says.

https://www.is.fi/politiikka/art-2000008869077.html

This is a good article IMHO. However, one has to consider the entirety of its content.

Quote:It is noteworthy that the Turkish Chancellery tweeted, following a discussion between Niinistö and Erdogan on 4 April, that Erdogan had expressed in a call his expectations for the lifting of the arms embargo on Turkey.
Niinistö told STT that the arms export issue did not appear to be a condition for Finland's NATO membership, but “there was a separate discussion about this”.

Why did you think this was a separate discussion when for Erdogan it seems to have been one of the main themes? How could it be assessed that lifting the arms embargo would not be a condition for Finland's NATO membership?
- The absence of such a condition. These things had nothing to do with it, it was one thing he raised, among other things. Besides, we apparently still have things open, no negative solution has been announced for arms export requests, which do not seem to be even deadly weapons requests. They are resolved on a case-by-case basis.

Riiiight. The Turks were diplomatic enough to not explicitly link removing the embargo as the cost of their support, but they did raise the issue in the same phone call and "Erdogan had expressed in a call his expectations for the lifting of the arms embargo on Turkey." Of course they were linked. Only somebody who is exercising very wishful thinking could believe they were not. The Turks are sensitive to blackmail and they assumed the Finns probably would be too. No need for anybody to "lose face".

Quote:Erdogan is moving the goalposts. Maybe that should have been anticipated more by NATO, Finland, and Sweden, but my estimation is that Erdogan was always going to try to and get maximal leverage for his vote and publicly stating support for Finnish/Swedish accession before it's even declared throws away that leverage. I am skeptical NATO could have done much more on this,

A very reasonable assumption. IMHO you are exactly correct. That is why it was essential to get any quid pro quo out of the way before things became public. The only way to be relatively sure that is accomplished is for Erdogan to throw away that leverage. Until he does that, there is no agreement you can count on. NATO most certainly could have and should have done this. It may be that no agreement could be reached, in which case an alternative arrangement with Finland and Sweden may have been necessary. Allowing this dispute to "go public" was absolutely avoidable and should have been.

Quote:but I am pretty optimistic this will get sorted eventually, because if it doesn't then Erdogan gets nothing.

I am not so optimistic as you are, especially since this thing will now be publicly negotiated. I think the idea Erdogan gets nothing is dangerously wrong. What he gets at this point, no matter how things play out, is the ability to show the Turkish people (and the rest of the Muslim world, which is important to him) that he protects them from exploration and disrespect by "the West" and that he protects his countries interests no matter what. He is not a "lackey" of the EU or the US who think they are "better" than us Turks. This is very important to him.

From Erdogan's point of view the best outcome is that Sweden and Finland cave and he can crow about it. That way he can have his victory and still extract some loot. Unfortunately, since this is now all public, the ability of Sweden and Finland to compromise is circumscribed because they too can't seem to be pushed around by Turkey. The level of compromise Erdogan can accept is also circumscribed because he can't appear to "back down" or be bribed. Not a good place to be. Compromises made in private are easier to politically motivate than ones extracted in public. Consider the US removing IRBMs from Turkey after the Cuban Missile crisis. Kennedy could never have allowed that to be public at the time.

It is entirely possible that the minimum Erdogan requires and what Finland/Sweden can agree to are mutually exclusive. If so, letting this go public is a disaster for NATO. It calls into question the fabric that holds the alliance together. While this may indeed be a question NATO needs to ask itself, it should do so behind closed doors. If, OTOH, something can be worked out, it could have and should have been worked out without the drama and the hard feelings that will inevitably remain going forward.

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