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Ukraine's military chief warns of 'significantly' worsening battlefield situation in the east | AP News (apnews.com)

submitted 6 months ago by dugmeup to c/world

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[–] [email protected] 45 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Meanwhile the US is sending arms to Israel to bomb the lethally dangerous Palestinian children. And the EU is still debating whether Russia means it or not.

[–] FlyingSquid 16 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I think the EU knows full well that Putin means it.

I also think Putin has a huge amount of kompromat on EU leaders due to his vast intelligence machine and they are aware that he could leak any of one their dirty secrets any time he wants via proxies.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 6 months ago

Secrets and political careers over filthy Ukrainian lives. Sounds about right for politicians👌

[–] [email protected] 39 points 6 months ago

Last year around this time Russia was advancing every day by the 10s of meters. Now some advances are 1-2 km.

The Ukrainians announcing this means things are a lot more dire than what we've been led to believe.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 6 months ago

Meanwhile, the Russian bought GOP continues to block and slow military aid to Ukraine.

[–] gmtom 20 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Sorry ukraine. The republicans want you dead and the war has been going on too long to stay inside the attention span of the average person, so they don't care anymore.

[–] SendMePhotos 3 points 6 months ago

Ukraine. We still support you. I'm sorry.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:

In an update on the Telegram messaging app, Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyy said that Moscow had “significantly” ramped up its assaults since President Vladimir Putin extended his nearly quarter-century rule in a preordained election last month that saw anti-war candidates barred from the ballot and independent voices silenced in a Kremlin-backed media blockade.

According to Syrskyy, Russian forces have been “actively attacking” Ukrainian positions in three areas of the eastern Donetsk region, near the cities of Lyman, Bakhmut and Pokrovsk, and beginning to launch tank assaults as drier, warmer spring weather has made it easier for heavy vehicles to move across previously muddy terrain.

Analysts from Ukraine’s non-governmental Deep State group, which tracks frontline developments, had reported on Russia’s takeover of Pervomaiske, some 45 kilometers (28 miles) southeast of Pokrovsk, in the early hours of Thursday.

With the war in Ukraine entering its third year and a vital U.S. aid package for Kyiv stuck in Congress, Russian troops are ramping up pressure on exhausted Ukrainian forces on the front line to prepare to grab more land this spring and summer.

In an update on X, formerly known as Twitter, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he had discussed the “massive” Russian air attacks on civilian energy infrastructure with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Saturday, and declared that Berlin will “stand unbreakably by Ukraine’s side.”

The volume and accuracy of recent attacks have alarmed the country’s defenders, who say Kremlin forces now have better intelligence and fresh tactics in their campaign to annihilate Ukraine’s electrical grid and bring its economy to a halt.

The original article contains 827 words, the summary contains 260 words. Saved 69%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

[+] Linkerbaan -9 points 6 months ago (3 children)

Is the narrative finally shifting? If you said this two months ago everyone called you a tankie.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 6 months ago

If you said what? "What if we don't support Ukraine?"

Why not just supporting them.instead, so this does not happen?

[+] [email protected] -8 points 6 months ago (3 children)

It will be very dire. Russia has a lot of people to throw at the problem. That’s how the they won Ww2. They didn’t win based on tactics. They threw more people at the slaughter. I’m just shocked the average Russian has had enough of this yet.

[–] Linkerbaan 8 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

Russia is just producing more weapons this is not a manpower problem. And after using Ukraine as meat puppets to tank the Russian economy we are now abandoning them as we did with past allies such as the Kurds.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 months ago (2 children)

I’ve been shocked at how little ammo we can produce. I always assumed America had more capacity to produce ammo. I get stingers and javelins are limited runs but 155mm ammo seems like something we should be able to produce in large quantities but we can’t.

[–] Linkerbaan 4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

We can definitely produce large quantities. The problem is that we are giving Ukraine our old garbage to fight with. They are two years into the war and still haven't received F16's

If we were serious we would have given Ukraine some good stuff at the start and they would have won before Russia was able to ramp up their weapons production.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I wouldn’t call the 155 ammo garbage. It’s just from our stockpile It isn’t as easy as hand them something. It’s takes training to use the weapon correctly. Most everything we’ve given is current issue for the United States military. You just can’t had them an f16. They need the equipment to use the f16. They need the training to fly the f16

[–] Linkerbaan 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Sure but it certainly doesn't take two years.

The point remains. Especially at the start of the invasion we just gave Ukraine old scraps. We did not give them what they needed to win, only to stall.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I would say what we gave was scarps. It’s all current issue hardware. Nothing was obsolete.

That’s been part of the problem. We can degrade our ability to fight by giving it to Ukraine.

The large gap is the 155mm ammo. We can’t keep up with that.

[–] Linkerbaan 0 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

We were sending cold war era Garbonzo at the start

Biden is reportedly sending Ukraine old Soviet air defense weapons from America's own secret stockpile

After the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the U.S. went on a secret buying spree to collect "a small number of Soviet missile defense systems so that they could be examined by U.S. intelligence experts and help with training American forces," The Wall Street Journal reports. Now, the U.S. is sending some of those air defense systems to Ukraine to help Ukrainian forces shoot down Russian fighter jets and missiles. Ukrainian soldiers already know how to operate old Soviet weapons systems.

An Obsolete German Tank Seeks a Second Life on Ukraine’s Front Lines

The Cold War-era Leopard 1A5 may be old, but it is still effective, Germany says. The country is now training Ukrainian troops to operate the weapons.

The Leopard 1A5 is so old, in fact, that the German trainers had to rely on soldiers from the Dutch and Danish armies — where the model was used for longer — and former German tank drivers who trained back in the 1980s and 1990s. The last time the German army actually taught recruits on the system was in 2000.

Some of the trainers were civilians in their 50s or 60s who took a break from their day jobs to help. “They were really important in getting us going from a cold start,” said Colonel Maulbecker, who normally commands a battalion of modern tanks.

Ukraine is getting Soviet-era fighter jets from Poland after Germany approves transfer

The German government on Thursday authorized Poland to transfer five Soviet-era fighter jets to Ukraine, boosting Kyiv's ability to challenge Russia by air.

Poland obtained the MiG-29 jets from Germany in the early 2000s, according to media reports. They were originally used by the armed forces in Communist-era East Germany.

And I can go on and on with that list. Even now Ukraine is still waiting for their F16s and it's probably too late by now.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 6 months ago (1 children)

We Soviet equipment because Ukraine knew how to use it and has the expertise to support it. Most of our current equipment is Cold War. The m16 is from the Cold War. The m1 is from the Cold War. The f16 is from the Cold War. The m4 is from the Cold War.

The javelin and stinger are all Cold War.

I’m not sure why you are focused on the f16. It won’t change the war. I always see non/military people acting like the f-16 is a super weapon.

[–] Linkerbaan 0 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Ukraine knew how to use it and has the expertise to support it

Not necessarily. There's a reason they needed training for those old tanks. Germany having to grab some random 60 year old civvies to give the training because it was all rotting away in warehouses exemplifies that nobody wanted to use that stuff anymore and we were glad to ditch it. There's also plenty of old British and French tanks being used in Ukraine right now.

You are right there is stuff that the Ukrainians had before. But that's also the problem. We didn't want that cold war stuff ourselves, we already upgraded from it.

But when it comes to giving Ukraine our modern new equipment we got all stingy about it. It's not just F16's. No Reaper Drones, No modern tanks, even the anti air missiles are often old stuff. But we have new stuff! We just don't want to give it to Ukraine because then "we have nothing to defend ourselves".

Only recently have we really committed to giving Ukraine some newer weapons. But it's likely already too late now.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

The m1a1 is still a modern thank. It’s better than anything the Russians have. We gave them the patriot. Our current air defense system. What’s newer than the patriot? What’s newer than the stinger or javelin ?

You keep saying things that aren’t true. We are not giving them garbage. We are giving them things they can use and are still better than the Russian crap they have.

We did give them a lot of Russian gear because they didn’t need training to use it. We won’t give them certain weapons because they are restricted and only for countries we’ve vetted.

[–] Linkerbaan 0 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

The patriot stuff is fine. But it took more than one year for Ukraine to get the first ones. Same with the M1A1 tanks

Ukraine got some good weapons. I'm just saying that especially at the start of the war we were very much just dumping old garbage into Ukraine. If we didn't do a bureaucratic stall for 1-2 years and didn't allow Putin to get a war economy going but decisively sent modern weapons to Ukaine, Ukraine would have won by now. Russia did not have a good weapons arsenal at the start of the war.

But we did not do that and turned the war into a stall fest. Just barely giving Ukraine enough equipment to hold out while bleeding manpower. Zelensky had to regularly go on trips around the world asking for some modern weaponry.

And now we are finally getting them some new stuff but it's getting real obvious that it's just too little too late.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I’m not sure you understand how military equipment works. You. Can’t just hand someone an f16 and say happy hunting. Also Ukraine isn’t vetted for the technology. You act like they some trusted ally.

Ukraine at the time didn’t have a runaway that the F-16 could even use reliably. They didn’t have trained pilots. They didn’t have trained staff to maintain it. They didn’t have the equipment to maintain an f-16.

That’s why we gave them Soviet hardware.

Ukraine doesn’t have the skills to maintain an m1. They didn’t know how to operate one and we didn’t want our best technology falling into Russian hands. When an m1 breaks and we can’t keep control of it. We blow them.

Trump was the first to arm them and sent javelins. What do you think is better than the javelin in our arsenal?

What is better than the patriot?

It’s Zelenskyy job to ask for things but it’s our military job to give them what they can use. It’s also our job to make sure our country and countries with treaties are protected. We don’t have a treaty with Ukraine. Thei corruption in Ukraine is epic.

I support Ukraine but I don’t support just handing over anything they want but can’t use. You need the logistics to support the equipment. You need the know how to use the equipment.

We taught them how to use it and then they did the exact opposite in the counter offensive and made no progress. They didn’t want to use nato tactics which is how you fight with nato equipment

[–] Linkerbaan 0 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

Can’t just hand someone an f16 and say happy hunting. Also Ukraine isn’t vetted for the technology. You act like they some trusted ally.

Yeah that was the excuse we used to not give it to them in the past. So what has changed?

Sure it takes training to use this equipment. But we did not start that training as soon as possible. We waited 1-2years and now then go "yeah actually you're getting slammed maybe we can get you some F16s and Patriot missiles".

In any case it's clearly too late now. Unless we start sending massive amounts of modern weaponry to Ukraine it's basically GG and all that we're doing now is throwing away more forcefully conscripted Ukrainian men as cannon fodder against Russia.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Yeah that was the excuse we used to not give it to them in the past. So what has changed?

We’ve been training them.

To be honest most people expected them to fall quickly. They didn’t.

[–] Linkerbaan -1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

That's just the generic excuse politicians use. If we truly wanted it those weapons would be there in a heartbeat.

Just look how fast the paperwork for israel got done. Genocide Joe tapping his tiger team for that one.. Not for Ukraine as that article clearly states

We promised to "not let Ukraine fall". Half assing it because "we thought they would have already lost" is the opposite of those words.

There are no excuses. We clearly did not do everything in our power for Ukraine which is why they are now losing.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Israel is trained on the weapons and we have treaties with Israel. We do not have treaties with Ukraine

It isn’t our job to to save Ukraine. They are not an ally. They are someone with empathize with but they are not someone we have treaties with.

[–] Linkerbaan 0 points 6 months ago (1 children)

OK so we went from "we did everything we could" to "yeah we didn't but we don't have treaties with them who cares".

I'm just saying that maybe we shouldn't have pretended we were going to support Ukraine till the end if we weren't serious about it. There's just a lot of dead Ukrainians that have been thrown into the meat grinder for nothing now.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

We have supported Ukraine. You seem to take the stance we should degrade our defenses to help Ukraine. That’s what you are asking and demanding.

Our military has an obligation to protect us and our allies first.

If anything you should ge asking why Biden ramp up ammo production quicker. Ukraine has asked for a rightly needs more artillery ammo. That’s more important than the f16. Yet, we still can’t product what they need with no real timeline to ever hit it.

We also should send more himars and rockets. They are effective, they’ve been trained on them and they have had good results with them.

There isn’t a magic weapon that is going to win the war for Ukraine. They need a lot of basic weapons which we can’t produce enough of to supply them.

[–] Linkerbaan 0 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I am saying either we give Ukraine what it needs to actually win or don't prolong pointless Ukrainian deaths.

As we promised to help Ukraine the first move would be the correct one. But this flip flopping only hurts them in the end.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 6 months ago

We are giving them what they need. The problem is we ran out.

[–] Siegfried 1 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I remember from Churchill's memories that he mentions as a rule of thumb (based on his experiences in both world wars) that a country needs something like 4 years to put the ammo industry up the conflict requirements.... anyway, this isn't (yet) ww2 by 2 orders of magnitude.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 6 months ago

I incorrectly assumed we had many factories running at smaller capacities. Turns out we shuttered those to save money.

I get things like cruise missiles are done in large batches but just assumed 155mm had several lines.

[–] Siegfried 4 points 6 months ago

Nah, they tuned their tactics a lot, that's why they went from losing every battle with a 10r:1g ratio to win them with a 3r:1g ratio.

[–] dragontamer 1 points 6 months ago

You might want to see who they threw into WW2.

Hint: It was the Ukrainians. The ability for Ukrainians to survive is epic. Still, we need to support them to minimize their pain, we don't want them to suffer WW2-like losses again or be forced to bear such burdens for Russia in the future.