This sounds a lot like the Chinese during the Korean war and the Russians' during the Korean war, when suddenly Chinese and Russian "Volunteers" started showing up in theatre.
People were screaming about the involvement of the Russians and Chinese who would shrug and say that they "Couldn't control their people's freedom of choice to participate in the struggle against the West"
To me this doesn't sound like a prelude to an all out Russian offensive as much as they are augmenting Ukrainian irregulars with equipment and trained troops.
to me there is no doubt that the more sophisticated weapons that take years of training to operate like advanced anti aircraft systems and advanced battle tanks are being operated by Sovi-err Russian troops.
But unless American or other intelligence agencies start keeping count on troops and tanks on the Russian side and can track their activities in the Ukraine, the Russians who have removed numbering and unit tags can simply say "Prove it was us".
The natural response from NATO is one or two or three things
!) They can petition the UN to intercede and place a Peace keeping force in there, however the Russians, and their now close buddies the Chinese will use their veto. (Plus we all know what I think of the UN).
2) NATO can get involved directly, put troops and heavy armor and artillery formation on the ground and try to bluff the Russians to back down. Which I don't like because the Russian's and their allies there have had time to dig in, have a short logistical line and have a strong force on fore advantage.
3) NATO can start supplying more weapons, and logistical support, however this will lead to bloodier battles and a lot more deaths on both sides.
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Don't know if this has been brought up already, but the Superbowl Ring theft scandal is ridiculous.
Basically, the gist of what happened:
Putin asks Robert Kraft, of the Patriot's, if he can see his Superbowl ring. He then pockets it and walks out, while surrounded by body guards. Putin initially denies any knowledge of the ring, but then later claims it as a gift after it shows up in a museum.
Don't know if this has been brought up already, but the Superbowl Ring theft scandal is ridiculous.
Basically, the gist of what happened:
Putin asks Robert Kraft, of the Patriot's, if he can see his Superbowl ring. He then pockets it and walks out, while surrounded by body guards. Putin initially denies any knowledge of the ring, but then later claims it as a gift after it shows up in a museum.
People were screaming about the involvement of the Russians and Chinese who would shrug and say that they "Couldn't control their people's freedom of choice to participate in the struggle against the West"
To me this doesn't sound like a prelude to an all out Russian offensive as much as they are augmenting Ukrainian irregulars with equipment and trained troops.
So in an ideal international framework, at what point do we start labeling countries as aggressors? What point do we stop calling these pro-Russia rebels and just Russian 'irregular' troops fighting a proxy battle? There just seems to be no way to stop Russia from doing this without some kind of large bloody Western presence in the area.
Russia also just outlawed reporting of Russian troop casualties. All deaths tolls are consider state secrets and reporters will be prosecuted under state secret laws. http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...-state-secrets
The big question is how can you track the equipment and soldiers back to Russia?
On the equipment side of things the Russians seem to be very careful in removing identifying marks from the equipment they're sending in. No unit badges, no unit numbers, I'm betting the serial numbers have been removed. So the Russians can say
1) Hey we sold a lot of equipment to the Ukrainians, the stuff that the rebels are using probably came from their war stocks.
2) We have a black market problem here, we've had a lot of equipment stolen, its criminals and arms dealers supplying the rebels and not us.
With the soldiers, its just as easy
1) They're not wearing our unit badges, and not wearing our uniforms, so even if they're Russians and former members of our armed forces, they could be volunteers that traveled to join them, kind of like ISIS. I'm betting anything that anyone that goes into the Ukraine is either recently demobilized or officially AWOL. Which is a nice twist because if one of them is captured, they merely have to say, this guy is AWOL so he should be placed into our custody for punishment.
Frankly the only way to deal with this is to treat the entire Ukrainian rebel militia as insurgents and not under the protection of the Geneva Convention.
The International Courts can't do anything because they don't have strong evidence that the Russians as a country are doing this.
The UN can't do anything because China or Russia will veto anything that hits the UN Security Council.
Nato could do something, and are really obligated to do it under the deal that the Ukraine made years ago in giving up their Nuclear stock pile. But the Russians have more tanks, planes, artillery, soldiers, ships and a shorter logistics trail then Nato does. If Nato does go in and attack the rebel held areas where a lot of Russian declared civilians live, the Russians will claim justification in going in to protect them.
As much as Putin is crazy, he knows all the moves here.
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
The big question is how can you track the equipment and soldiers back to Russia?
On the equipment side of things the Russians seem to be very careful in removing identifying marks from the equipment they're sending in. No unit badges, no unit numbers, I'm betting the serial numbers have been removed. So the Russians can say
1) Hey we sold a lot of equipment to the Ukrainians, the stuff that the rebels are using probably came from their war stocks.
2) We have a black market problem here, we've had a lot of equipment stolen, its criminals and arms dealers supplying the rebels and not us.
As much as Putin is crazy, he knows all the moves here.
With the soldiers and equipment it's been easy to spot. Soldiers have been spotted with scopes and arms that are Spetznaz specific kit. As all the old Russian old war stock (that is cold war era and similar to what Ukraine has) is destroyed by Ukrainian forces, the new stuff Russian has been shipping in is new, as in brand new, tank and APC variants that no one but the Russians have. They have been numerous pictures of these as well as transport markings that are specific to the Russian rail system.
Unfortunately like you say, Russia could still claim black market so the ICC can't touch him. Putin is a sly one, though I wonder when the Russian oligarchs that back him will get fed up with how much he's screwed over the Russian economy.
With the soldiers and equipment it's been easy to spot. Soldiers have been spotted with scopes and arms that are Spetznaz specific kit. As all the old Russian old war stock (that is cold war era and similar to what Ukraine has) is destroyed by Ukrainian forces, the new stuff Russian has been shipping in is new, as in brand new, tank and APC variants that no one but the Russians have. They have been numerous pictures of these as well as transport markings that are specific to the Russian rail system.
Unfortunately like you say, Russia could still claim black market so the ICC can't touch him. Putin is a sly one, though I wonder when the Russian oligarchs that back him will get fed up with how much he's screwed over the Russian economy.
Can you please post some sources for this?
It isn't that I don't believe you, I am interested in reading it.
With the soldiers and equipment it's been easy to spot. Soldiers have been spotted with scopes and arms that are Spetznaz specific kit. As all the old Russian old war stock (that is cold war era and similar to what Ukraine has) is destroyed by Ukrainian forces, the new stuff Russian has been shipping in is new, as in brand new, tank and APC variants that no one but the Russians have. They have been numerous pictures of these as well as transport markings that are specific to the Russian rail system.
Unfortunately like you say, Russia could still claim black market so the ICC can't touch him. Putin is a sly one, though I wonder when the Russian oligarchs that back him will get fed up with how much he's screwed over the Russian economy.
I don't know dude, I'm not current anymore on European arms.
But I believe that the Ukrainians use the T-84 which is similar to the T-80 Russian main battle tank. Russia primarily uses the T-90 MBT, however when they retired their T-80s, about 4000 of them, they put them into storage, I'm betting if we saw satellite pictures of the Russian forces gathering on the border you'd see some T-80s
The Ukrainians use mainly the BTR-4 APC/AFV, which is pretty similar in appearance to the Russian BTR-90
The Ukraines also have a health number of BTR-94's which are a modification of the Russian BTR-80 which the Russians still have in service.
The standing personal weapons that the Spetznaz uses have been imported all over the world, they're not exclusive to Russia, so Russia's argument remains the same, we sell thousands of these weapons to other countries, how they end up in the hands of Ukrainian fighters is beyond our control.
Hell the Ukrainian military uses a lot of the same anti aircraft and artillery as the Russian military including the Buk systems.
Its going to be difficult to prove Russian intentions or involvement unless you capture someone that can prove that he's taking orders from Russia while wearing Russian unit identifiers and driving equiptment that they can prove comes from Russian active war stocks.
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
It isn't that I don't believe you, I am interested in reading it.
Cheers
Lots of these were previously mentioned in the thread. When things started hitting the fan all the "rebels" showed up, it was immediately clear that they were using Russian Spetznaz kit. Weapons analysis here of the supposed "rebels" at the time from my previous post: http://forum.calgarypuck.com/showpos...&postcount=283
Every piece of these rebel's equipment were direct issue from Russian special forces and far far better than what regular Russian or Ukrainian regular grunts would be using. Ukrainians don't use any of this equipment.
Tanks and equipment that rebels are using are all Russian variants and modernizations with French optics and they still even have the fresh Russian railway transport markers. http://forum.calgarypuck.com/showpos...postcount=1386
Artillery attack analysis from Bellingcat (respected British investigative journalists) analyzed the artillery attack patterns for the supposed "rebel" fire support from commercial satellite imagery/Russian social media and they all came from within Russia. https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-a...llery-attacks/
Conclusion: "rebels" are at best Ukrainians with very very extensive Russian training and almost all equipment provided by Russia (though that well trained in a month to start of hostilities is a really long stretch). Far more likely, (given the training, organization and coordination against Ukrainian troops + support), they are mostly VDV/Spetznaz special forces acting as "rebels" fighting the Ukrainian military. How else is it within a month you'd have entire regiments of "rebels" that know how to operate the tanks, artillery AND long range self-propelled anti-aircraft missile launchers used effectively against Ukrainian army. Putin admitted as much at least in Crimea, but hasn't yet for Eastern Ukraine.
Last edited by FlameOn; 05-29-2015 at 10:18 PM.
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I don't know dude, I'm not current anymore on European arms.
But I believe that the Ukrainians use the T-84 which is similar to the T-80 Russian main battle tank. Russia primarily uses the T-90 MBT, however when they retired their T-80s, about 4000 of them, they put them into storage, I'm betting if we saw satellite pictures of the Russian forces gathering on the border you'd see some T-80s
The Ukrainians use mainly the BTR-4 APC/AFV, which is pretty similar in appearance to the Russian BTR-90
The Ukraines also have a health number of BTR-94's which are a modification of the Russian BTR-80 which the Russians still have in service.
The standing personal weapons that the Spetznaz uses have been imported all over the world, they're not exclusive to Russia, so Russia's argument remains the same, we sell thousands of these weapons to other countries, how they end up in the hands of Ukrainian fighters is beyond our control.
Hell the Ukrainian military uses a lot of the same anti aircraft and artillery as the Russian military including the Buk systems.
Its going to be difficult to prove Russian intentions or involvement unless you capture someone that can prove that he's taking orders from Russia while wearing Russian unit identifiers and driving equipment that they can prove comes from Russian active war stocks.
There is a lot of overlap, but what are the chances that so many coincidences happen with all the equipment being used lining up directly with Russian military/special forces, with such regularity in exactly the same combinations. Also the modernized T-72B3s (circa 2013) and the SA-22 systems I mentioned in my last post were a dead giveaway as Russian supplied. How do entire regiments of weapons disappear from inventory without someone hiring up not investigating this.
Unless someone subscribes to the Soviet/NK propaganda departments, it is pretty clear where this stuff is coming from just with inferred evidence. Just I don't think there is strong enough of a case for prosecution, like you said, without some leaked Russian order papers and non-retroactively discharged soldiers being captured and ratting out the whole system to the ICC/press.
Don't know if this has been brought up already, but the Superbowl Ring theft scandal is ridiculous.
Basically, the gist of what happened:
Putin asks Robert Kraft, of the Patriot's, if he can see his Superbowl ring. He then pockets it and walks out, while surrounded by body guards. Putin initially denies any knowledge of the ring, but then later claims it as a gift after it shows up in a museum.
I never thought the following situation in The Simpsons could ACTUALLY happen.
* Mr Burns flashes a trillion dollar bill in front of Fidel Castro *
"May I see"
"Look with your eyes, not with your hands"
"Please, we are all amigos here"
"Mr Burns, I think we can trust the President of Cuba"
"Now give it back"
"Give what back?"
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Two Russian men captured by Ukrainian forces fighting pro-Russian rebels have told a newspaper they were in Ukraine on a mission for the Russian military, contradicting Moscow's official line.
Speaking from a hospital bed in Kiev, one of the men, Alexander Alexandrov, became tearful when his interviewer told him his relatives had told Russian state media that he had quit the Russian military before heading to Ukraine.
"Why are they turning their backs on me?" he was quoted as saying by the Russian weekly Novaya Gazeta. "There was an order. I gave my oath to the motherland ... There was an order and, as a military man, I carried it out."
Ukraine's military said the two men had been wounded in a firefight in eastern Ukraine, and were being treated for their injuries. Authorities in Kiev have said they will be charged with "terrorist acts".
Quote:
But by insisting that any Russian fighters in the area are merely volunteers, Moscow finds itself unable to follow its own code of honour by standing up for servicemen who are captured.
Missed this during the summer, but Canada has pulled our remaining TOWs out of storage to be reintroduced to regular infantry battalions as part of an effort to beef up our presence in Eastern Europe.
Not sure how many of the launchers or missiles we still have, but as far as I know, TOW remains among the best anti-tank systems in the world.
Missed this during the summer, but Canada has pulled our remaining TOWs out of storage to be reintroduced to regular infantry battalions as part of an effort to beef up our presence in Eastern Europe.
Not sure how many of the launchers or missiles we still have, but as far as I know, TOW remains among the best anti-tank systems in the world.
TOW is an absolute thing of beauty.
As good TOW can be absolutely deadly.
I wonder if the ordnance has kept up with the technology in armour.
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Captain James P. DeCOSTE, CD, 18 Sep 1993
I wonder if the ordnance has kept up with the technology in armour.
I'm confused, because I thought that Canada had sold most of its Tow 2 stock to the US marines 2 years ago,
I guess it depends on how many we have left, the 2A is designed as a pure armor penetrater, and is supposed to be effective against modern main battle tanks with reactive armor. the 2B is probably the better weapon as it attacks tanks from above where the armor is thinner.
I don't know how the Tow would do against the newer main battle tanks. the T-90''s are suppossed to have three levels of protection. A very heavy armor a second armor skin that's reactive and their Shtora counter measures suite that can alert the crew of the tank being panted to they can turn the turret and fire on the enemy position before they get a shot off.
If the Russians have T-14 Armata's in the field and suppossedly they've built over 100 of them, I really don't know how well the Tow would do. the T-14 has duel reactive armor and the Aghanit missile interception system, this system has a duel passive/active defense. The passive is designed to jam the missile guidance system. The active fires a penetrator at the missile destroying it far away. This system is designed to defeat the latest generation of anti-tank missiles, so I would assume that missiles like the Hellfire, the Tow and Brimstone for example wouldn't be as effective.
As well the T-14 has an unmanned turret so its cross section is lower, and its coated with radar defeating material and thermal defeating technology.
Its considered a next generation up from the M1 tank, and countries like Germany are working on developing bigger main guns to combat the T14's armor and defensive capabilities.
Right now, just looking it up the Russians have over 100 of the T-14's in active units and about 600 of the T90's upgraded.
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My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
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