Russia and its “Special Operation” in Ukraine

[sidcow]

50 minutes ago, villa89 said:

Ukraine talking peace plans, hopefully the end game is in sight. Ukraine gives up territory for peace. 

Need to be accepted into NATO the day the agreement is signed. 

[magnkarl]

Two more SU-34's shot down by Ukraine today.

Whatever they're shooting at them with is blindingly effective.

This makes the 10th aircraft Ukraine have downed in 10 days, 1 A-50, 7 Su-34's and two Su-35's.

Edit, there's more.

17th 2 Su-34, 1 Su-35

18th 1 Su-34

19th 1 Su-34, 1 Su-35

21st 1 Su-34

23rd: 1 Su-34, 1 A-50, 1 IL-22

27th (so far) 2 Su-34.

For reference, a Su-34 costs something like £30 million to produce, the 35 costs double that, the A-50 is around £330 million and the IL-22 around £300 million depending on the spec.

That's a lot of dosh, and pilots. And some of those casualties are guaranteed to be friendly fire.

Edited February 27 by magnkarl

[sidcow]

12 minutes ago, magnkarl said:

And some of those casualties are guaranteed to be friendly fire.

 

[BleedClaretAndBlue]

On 12/02/2024 at 10:19, LondonLax said:

It’s been denied by both Starlink and by Russia. The Ukrainians never gave any evidence for their claims. . 

 

[LondonLax]

38 minutes ago, BleedClaretAndBlue said:

 

It sounds like they have bought some of the consoles through the black market, not being supplied to them like was claimed. It seems Starlink can’t switch off the satellites running those consoles without it also stopping service to the Ukrainian soldiers using them as well. 

[villa89]

On 27/02/2024 at 18:37, magnkarl said:

This makes the 10th aircraft Ukraine have downed in 10 days,

Seems they have moved the patriot missiles closer to russian territory. Worth the risk if they are able to take out ten planes in ten days. Also I assume the more planes they take out the less chance they have of losing a patriot system/missile.

[BleedClaretAndBlue]

 

[bickster]

Another day another SU-34. The loss of that AWACs aircraft certainly appears to have been wildly detrimental

[magnkarl]

20 hours ago, villa89 said:

Seems they have moved the patriot missiles closer to russian territory. Worth the risk if they are able to take out ten planes in ten days. Also I assume the more planes they take out the less chance they have of losing a patriot system/missile.

And the NASAMS, of which they've lost one launcher to an FPV drone closer to the front line in the South. Russia is celebrating like they've hit jackpot when Norway has already sent a new launcher.. Russia doesn't seem to understand that the launchers aren't really what's important about Western systems.

Edited February 29 by magnkarl

[ender4]

On 27/02/2024 at 18:37, magnkarl said:

Two more SU-34's shot down by Ukraine today.

Whatever they're shooting at them with is blindingly effective.

This makes the 10th aircraft Ukraine have downed in 10 days, 1 A-50, 7 Su-34's and two Su-35's.

Edit, there's more.

17th 2 Su-34, 1 Su-35

18th 1 Su-34

19th 1 Su-34, 1 Su-35

21st 1 Su-34

23rd: 1 Su-34, 1 A-50, 1 IL-22

27th (so far) 2 Su-34.

For reference, a Su-34 costs something like £30 million to produce, the 35 costs double that, the A-50 is around £330 million and the IL-22 around £300 million depending on the spec.

That's a lot of dosh, and pilots. And some of those casualties are guaranteed to be friendly fire.

So will Ukraine get to a point where they have control of the airspace and Russia has no more planes in the air?

[Mandy Lifeboats]

28 minutes ago, ender4 said:

So will Ukraine get to a point where they have control of the airspace and Russia has no more planes in the air?

Probably not.  

Getting air supremacy with ground based missiles would require a lot of missiles. 

Getting air supremacy with F16 requires a lot of trained pilots.  

Ukraine doesn't have an inexhaustible supply of either. 

But stopping Russia gaining air supremacy is massive achievement.  

Hopefully the incoming F16 will allow Ukraine to assert air superiority over more of their territory. 

 

[magnkarl]

Two more Su-34s today. 12 in 12 days. Keeping the streak going.

[magnkarl]

2 minutes ago, Mandy Lifeboats said:

Probably not.  

Getting air supremacy with ground based missiles would require a lot of missiles. 

Getting air supremacy with F16 requires a lot of trained pilots.  

Ukraine doesn't have an inexhaustible supply of either. 

But stopping Russia gaining air supremacy is massive achievement.  

Hopefully the incoming F16 will allow Ukraine to assert air superiority over more of their territory. 

 

This.

Though shooting down all these Russian jets will severely deplete Russia's bombing capabilities, along with the takedown of the a50 it'll likely be felt by front line troops as Russia's Su34s need to drop their payload much further away.. 

F16s will make it even harder for Russia to do whatever they want and likely add to the daily tally of downed Russian assets, and with some luck add local air superiority for offensives and smaller operations.

[chrisp65]

If these aircraft loss numbers are anywhere near accurate, I’m loving it.

[magnkarl]

@blandy could this be meteor missiles fired from i.e. the ground or jerry-rigged onto Ukraine's SU planes that is taking out all these jets?

Two more Su-34s taken out yesterday. It just seems like Ukraine is reaching further and further without anyone saying what is taking them down.

And, here's the result of the previous launches..

 

Edited March 2 by magnkarl

[Mandy Lifeboats]

There has been a reoccurring pattern in this war. If Russia make gains NATO provides more help to Ukraine.  The recent Russian gains leave me in no doubt that NATO has provided something new. 

It could be as simple as providing targeting information for planes that are in mainland Russia rather than over disputed Crimea.   

I hope NATO has integrated its command and control with weapons based in Ukraine.   

Earlier this week Putin threatened war with NATO if troops went into Ukraine.  A senior German politician said that UK troops were already in Ukraine. He suggested they were helping fire Storm Shadow. 

 

Edited March 2 by Mandy Lifeboats
Added details

[bickster]

29 minutes ago, Mandy Lifeboats said:

There has been a reoccurring pattern in this war. If Russia make gains NATO provides more help to Ukraine.  The recent Russian gains leave me in no doubt that NATO has provided something new. 

Maybe, maybe not.

Ive seen reports saying that Russia has been flying without AWACS since Ukraine downed the A-50 right at the start of this series planes falling out of the sky.

It could just be that simple, there’s no-one running cover for the Russian Airforce and their aircraft are just easier to see.

[blandy]

48 minutes ago, magnkarl said:

@blandy could this be meteor missiles fired from i.e. the ground or jerry-rigged onto Ukraine's SU planes that is taking out all these jets?

Has the west given Ukraine meteors? Not seen anything to say so.

We also don’t know how far away from Ukraine’s defenders the Russian aircraft were. 
A guess and only a guess is that it’s unlikely they’ve put meteors on soviet era jets, based on an assumption that the radar on those aged jets wouldn’t be up to scratch for detecting and targeting at long range - a long range missile is less useful if you can’t see and identify what’s a long way away to start with.

But in theory, given the missiles, launchers, plus ICD requirement data and so on, and if Ukraine can detect and identify Russian jets at long range, then mentors would be very effective.

[magnkarl]

It would be mightily cool by Sweden if they did provide meteors literally the day they got accepted into nato.

Not sure if they have, could just be missing awacs as Bicks writes. Planes are being shot down at astonishing rates and that’s without western planes.

What happens in June when the Dutch, Norwegian and Danish jets arrive? It’ll be dangerous to lob glide bombs at Ukraine.

[blandy]

3 hours ago, magnkarl said:

It would be mightily cool by Sweden if they did provide meteors literally the day they got accepted into nato.

Not sure if they have, could just be missing awacs as Bicks writes. Planes are being shot down at astonishing rates and that’s without western planes.

What happens in June when the Dutch, Norwegian and Danish jets arrive? It’ll be dangerous to lob glide bombs at Ukraine.

The absence of AWACS theory assumes they are being shot down by other aircraft. My suspicion is that it’s more likely Ukraine has moved some/many of the ground based air defence systems from protecting towns/cities to the front lines, because of desperation that their troops are being pounded from the air and losing ground, lives and territory, and that Russia is throwing aircraft at it like they throw troops at it, leading to heavy losses.