(Image by NEIVANMADE)
https://twitter.com/IAPonomarenko/status/1645899126138101761?cxt=HHwWgoCz2Z2itNctAAAA
The Kyiv Indenpendent‘s Illia Ponomarenko is correct, time is also Ukraine’s adversary.
Here’s one of the returned Ukrainian POWs calling his mother:
https://twitter.com/DefenceU/status/1645748611945209859?cxt=HHwWhoCxyZPp79YtAAAA
Here is President Zelesnkyy’s address from earlier this evening. Video below, English transcript after the jump:
We are now at such a stage of the war, when it is important not to lose a sense of the path we have to overcome – address by the President of Ukraine
11 April 2023 – 22:28
Good health to you, fellow Ukrainians!
I held a regular meeting of the Staff today. First of all, we considered the combat situation, what we manage to succeed in in the main directions, in difficult directions, such as Bakhmut and Avdiivka, the Donetsk region in general, such as Kreminna and the Luhansk region in general.
We also considered at the Staff meeting what we are yet to succeed in. What we are working on.
There were reports by General Syrskyi, General Tarnavskyi, the Commander-in-Chief, the Main Intelligence Directorate.
The General Staff and the Minister of Internal Affairs reported on the staffing of new units of our defense forces – new brigades.
Head of the Security Service, General Malyuk made a report on his part – on what concerns our internal resilience, protection from the internal enemy and counteraction to collaborators.
We are now at such a stage of the war, when it is important for our society and partners not to lose a sense of the path we have to overcome. Precisely the path. The path that’s ahead.
Compared to last year, it’s quieter in many places now. But this does not mean that somewhere you can ignore the war or be less focused on helping the state.
We managed to do a lot together with our partners to protect people, Ukraine, and the whole of Europe. But this doesn’t mean it’s time to rest on our laurels. The path is ahead. The movement is ahead. Something that requires no less unity from us than before. No less focus than before.
Just as before, our positions at the front, all our warriors in their positions must be supported by Ukrainian positions politically and informationally, by the power of weapons and the power of our social unity, by our internal resilience and the strength of Ukraine’s ties with the world. And this is the task of both the state and everyone in the state, of both Ukraine and everyone in the world who values a free life and an international order based on rules.
It is unwise to just passively hope that someone else will bring victory, the one who is now in the trenches, who is now in the assaults. This is a common task. Victory is gained by everyone. By those who fight for it and those who give weapons. By those who reduce the capabilities of the terrorist state and those who increase the capabilities of Ukraine.
Just as everyone in the Staff is responsible for their part of the defense of the state, on the path to victory everyone should understand what their steps to victory are. And whether these steps are enough to complete the entire path.
Today I had a very interesting, meaningful meeting with American businessman and philanthropist Howard Buffett. He has been generously helping Ukraine and our people for a long time. Many projects are implemented with his support. For example, construction of a kitchen factory has begun in Bucha, which will become part of the school meals reform in Ukraine and will provide for children in three communities of the Kyiv region. This project will also be scaled to other regions, in particular to the Kharkiv region.
And when a person helps so much, when he personally cares about support – and these are projects worth hundreds of millions of dollars – such a person sees very well how important it is for everyone to be on the path to victory, how important it is for everyone to be active, how important it is for everyone to become a hero at least in a certain way so that we all win.
I thank Mr. Buffett for his support. I am thankful to all our partners in the world who remain active in helping.
Thank you to all Ukrainian men and women who understand that we have to walk this path together – to victory, and in true unity, supporting each other and the state.
Glory to all our warriors!
Glory to our strong people!
Glory to Ukraine!
Here is a machine translation of the Ukrainian MOD’s most recent operational update:
Ministry of Defense of Ukraine
Operational information as of 18.00 11.04.2023 regarding the Russian invasionGlory to Ukraine! The four hundred and twelfth days of large-scale armed aggression of the Russian federation against our state continue.
During the day, the enemy struck 1 missile and 10 air strikes, fired more than 18 from volley jet systems.
The probability of the task of missile and aviation strikes remains high throughout Ukraine.
Despite numerous losses in technology and live power, the enemy continues to focus on the offensive in the Lyman, Bakhmut, Avdiyevsky, and Marjin directions – more than 50 enemy attacks were repulsed during the day.
In Volynsky, Polissya, Sieversky and Slobozhansky directions, the operational situation is without significant changes. Certain units of the territorial troops of the Russian Federation continue to be in the territory of the Belarusian Republic. Also, the enemy continues to hold certain units in the border areas with Ukraine in the Kursk and Belgorod regions, continuing the engineering equipment of the area. During the day, the occupiers fired on the settlements of Bleszna, Kamyanska Sloboda and the Gremiach of the Chernihiv region; Wolfine and Katerynivka of the Sumy region, as well as Veterinarian, Deep, Gatishche, Vovchansk, Zibine, Volohivka, Ohrimivka, Chernyakivka, Commissarove, Beets and Dovzhanka in Kharkiv region.
In the Kupyan direction, enemy shelling was carried out by the settlements Kolodyany, Kamyanka, Topoli, Krasne First, Ridkodub, Novomlinsk, Dvorichna, Kindrashivka, Pishchane and Berestov, Kharkiv Oblast, and Novoselivsky in Luhanshchyn.
In the Lyman direction during the day, the enemy led unsuccessful offensive actions in the area south of the White and Spirny. Makiyivka, Nevske, Belorivka of the Luhansk region and Yampolivka, Torske and Spirne – Donetsk were attacked by artillery.
In the Bakhmut direction, the enemy continues to lead offensive actions, tries to take full control of the city of Bakhmut, fierce fighting continues. During the day, the enemy led unsuccessful offensive actions in the area of the village of Bogdanivka. Defense forces repulsed about 20 enemy attacks on the front. Nikiforivka, Vasyukivka, Minkivka, Orykhovo-Vasylivka, Novomarkov, Markov, Bakhmut, Khromove, Chasiv Yar, Ivanivsky, Stupochki, Predtechine, Alexandro-Shultine, Kurdyumivka, Ozaryanovka, Druzhba, suffered from enemy shelling, Toretsk and New York of the Donetsk region.
In the Avdiyevsky and Mariinsky directions, the enemy led offensive actions
in the districts of Avdiyivka, Pervomaisky, Nevelsky and Marinka, he was unsuccessful. The fiercest fighting on this part of the front continues behind Marinka, where more than 15 enemy attacks have been repulsed. At the same time, the enemy was shelled by the settlements of Novokalinove, Orlivka, Avdiyivka, Tonenke, Severny, Pervomaiske, Netailove, Karlyivka, Krasnyvka, Georgyivka, Marjinka, and Pobed Donetsk region.In the Shakhtar direction during the day, the enemy did not carry out offensive actions. He fired on the settlements of Novomikhailovka, Shakhtar, Novoukrainka, Velyka Novosilka, Vugledar and Prechistivka in the Donetsk region.
In the Zaporizhia and Kherson directions, the enemy continues to conduct defensive actions. He fired on settlements near the battle line. Among them – Vremivka, Novopil of the Donetsk region; Novosilka, Olgivsky, Malinovka, Red, Gulyaipole, Charming, Little Tokmachka, Orihiv of the Zaporizhia region; Golden Balkans, Kachkarivka, Berislav, Kozatske, Burgunka, Ivanivka, Mykilske, Dniprovsk Region of Kherson and the city of Kherson.
The enemy continues to use medical facilities of temporarily occupied territories for its own purposes. Thus, the building of the primary health care center in Novopskov and the paramedic-midwife point of Kryakivka, in Luhanshchyn, is used by the occupiers as a military hospital. At the same time, in Kryakivka, in order to increase the number of beds, the invaders additionally deployed a tent camp.
Only representatives of the Russian occupation forces can receive medical care in these civilian medical institutions.
During the day, the Defense Forces aircraft struck 13 times in the areas of concentration of personnel and military equipment of the occupiers. Also shot down 2 enemy UAVs type “Orlan – 10”.
During the day, missile and artillery units affected 4 areas of concentration of live force, weapons and military equipment, as well as 2 stations of enemy radio control.Support the Armed Forces! Let’s win!
Glory to Ukraine!General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine
Bakhmut:
https://twitter.com/wartranslated/status/1645894670172688384?cxt=HHwWgMDQle6estctAAAA
Here’s the full translation from Dmitri of Bakhmut Demon’s Telegram post:
https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1645892499179724808?cxt=HHwWkICzgb-gsdctAAAA
I can’t be sure this is Bakhmut, but given it involves Wagner, I think it is likely. Apparently, the Wagner mercs beheaded a Ukrainian Soldier with a knife. Maria Avdeeva has posted a blurred still image grabbed from the video that is circulating on pro-Russian social media at that link in the previous sentence. You can’t really see anything as she’s done a good job, but don’t click across unless you feel you must.
The Ukrainian officer who tweets as Tatarigami has posted a great analytical explainer on the defenses the Russians have been building in expectation of a Ukrainian offensive. First tweet is below the rest is copied and pasted from something called @rattibha because it appears that the Starlink Snowflake has had Twitter’s code changed to make requests to the Thread Reader App no longer work.
https://twitter.com/Tatarigami_UA/status/1645651237415575553?cxt=HHwWgoCz5ZrFw9YtAAAA
2/ To help paint a clearer picture, we’ll be using satellite imagery from Feb 2023 to analyze a section of the enemy’s fortifications located south of Vasylivka, Zaporizhia oblast. Although some changes have occurred since then, the general idea of the defenses remains the same3/ One key feature of russia’s defense lines are famous dragon’s teeth, pyramidal anti-tank obstacles that can effectively impede or slow down mechanized or motorized units during an attack. These obstacles can be particularly effective in combination with other defense measures4/ It is common for the areas immediately preceding and following dragon’s teeth to be heavily mined, and this specific section of the defense line is no exception.5/ The subsequent defensive line, positioned approximately 300-500 meters away from the dragon’s teeth, is composed of conventional trenches, dugouts, and vehicle revetments, providing protective cover for armored vehicles positioned in “hull down” mode.6/ It is common to utilize tree lines as camouflage for ammunition, observation posts, or anti-tank guided missile (ATGM) teams. It is possible that we may observe the presence of older anti-tank weapons such as the MT-12 “Rapira” in that area.7/ About 500 meters further, another line of defense begins which includes anti-tank ditch. This excavated ditch is designed to prevent the advance of attacking vehicles by forcing them to fall into the ditch, thus becoming immobilized.8/ Although overcoming these obstacles is certainly feasible and well within Ukraine’s capabilities, it is important to acknowledge that the fortified defenses are substantial and have the potential to significantly impede maneuverable attacking forces.9/ If we view these defense lines on the imagery as a single echelon, it’s important to note that russia has multiple echelons in some areas, with as many as three in certain directions, each separated by dozens of kilometers.10/ Air power can neutralize these defenses, but limited availability of modern jets in sufficient numbers makes it challenging. A successful breach of such defenses could serve as a valuable case study for researchers and historians, showcasing effective military art.11/ Kindly ensure to like and follow, as Twitter algorithms tend to demote content related to war and Ukraine, so you do not miss the second part. For location confirmation: @GeoConfirmed
Here’s some additional Q&A he did after the final tweet (#11) in the thread:
https://twitter.com/Tatarigami_UA/status/1645679748444553217
https://twitter.com/Tatarigami_UA/status/1645859080282558488
https://twitter.com/Tatarigami_UA/status/1645831991705600024
https://twitter.com/Tatarigami_UA/status/1645874977491636225
https://twitter.com/Tatarigami_UA/status/1645859718190059523
That’s all of them, for now…
https://twitter.com/DefenceU/status/1645780236762488836?cxt=HHwWiICx6fqZ_tYtAAAA
Tallyho!
https://twitter.com/KpsZSU/status/1645695241108742144?cxt=HHwWgICz7cfG19YtAAAA
That’s enough for tonight.
Your daily Patron!
https://twitter.com/PatronDsns/status/1645897976882028546?cxt=HHwWhICziavfs9ctAAAA
And a new video from Patron’s official TikTok!
@patron__dsns Про мій звичайний день :) #песпатрон
Here’s the machine translation of the caption:
About my usual day :) #песпатрон
Open thread!
Old School
Because I didn’t know who he was, I’ll mention that Howard Buffett is Warren Buffett’s son.
Gin & Tonic
tobie
Washington Post is saying one of the leaked reports alleges that Egypt was planning to supply Russia secretly with 40,000 rockets. Maybe Egypt’s playing both sides in the war. That’s certainly possible but it’s been stunning to see the number of developing nations lining up behind Russia on the grounds that it’s a European conflict and doesn’t affect them. I find the moral relativism in that claim unsettling, and I’m also surprised that formally colonized nations have declared common cause with the colonizer in this conflict. I get Russia’s hold over oil producing nations. Together they can flex their muscles against the West. But Egypt? What can Russia offer it?
Jay
@tobie:
Keep in mind that “the leak”, has been “washed”. Some of the info is real, some is disinformation.
The real leak, origional leak, has been wiped from the web, so only second hand copies remain.
CaseyL
@tobie: A lot of those countries have lousy human rights records; some of them have horrific human rights records.
While it is true that the US insistence on human rights is often trivial and hypocritical (and, when TFG was in power, nonexistent), it is also true that Russia makes no human rights demands whatsoever.
Nelle
Howard Buffet has a history of working on programs that feed people around the world. He’s also a fine photographer.
tobie
@Jay: The Post implies they have screen copies of what appeared on Discord. Whether some of these documents are fake is another question. It’s certainly possible. Whoever ‘leaked’ or ‘fabricated’ or ‘altered’ the documents wants to mess with the American govt and the American public, not to speak of the US’s strategic allies.
tobie
@CaseyL: Interesting take. Maybe autocratic regimes in the developing world believe Russia will be a truer ally to them if they suppress the opposition in their country in violent ways.
jackmac
Great Middle Eastern “friend” stabbing the U.S. in the back according to reports it will supply 40,000 rockets to Russia?
Here’s what the U.S. has provided to Egypt (according to a U.S. State Department summary):
Jay
@tobie:
the origional leak, wasn’t on Discord.
bellingcat.com/news/2023/04/09/from-discord-to-4chan-the-improbable-journey-of-a-us-defence-leak/
We already know that between the first and second appearance on Discord, several of the documents were crudely manipulated.
I would take any “hot takes” with a dose of salt or perhaps a risotto recipie.
Geminidq3
@tobie: Both Egypt and the Wagner group backed General Hiftar in Libya’s civil war, so they must have cooperated some already. But this proposed transfer- if there really was such a plan- might not have been a government project but instead a black market affair. The rockets in question might have been sitting in warehouses since the 1970s.
counterfactual
@tobie: What Russia can offer Egypt is wheat and fertilizer, among other things.
Jay
@counterfactual
scav
I think Africa was a sort of cold war battlefield between the USSR and western powers, and African nations could play off the one against the others to get economic and other aid, as well as for backing in internal power struggles. There’s a complex history there, plus all the complications and immediate benefits to be gained under the current tensions.
tobie
@Jay: I’ve got lots of salt in my cupboard and am happy to strew it liberally over my news diet.
Geminid
People can blame Jimmy Carter for all that military aid to Egypt. The U.S. did not formally guarantee the peace treaty Anwar Sadat and Menachim Begin signed on behalf of their nations in q978, but we informally guaranteed it by pledging $2 billion a year in military aid to each country.
It seems a little strange now to be paying Egypt and Israel not to go to war with each other, but at the time that prospect was a big headache. There were real fears during the 1967 and 1973 wars that the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. might end up fighting each other too. And the Egyptians and the Israeli are certainly better off at peace with each other even if relations are sometimes cool.
All that money we give to Egypt ends up here anyway. It buys weapons from U.S military-industrial companies, that are then shipped to Egypt. We give Israel a special deal: they can spend 20% of the subsidy on domestically produced weapons. Most of the rest goes to Lockheed and Boeing for fighter jets.
billcoop4
Pity if an Egyptian warehouse had an … ammunition explosion.
BC
Jay
@billcoop4:
smoking incident,…….
Prescott Cactus
Howard B bought up land in AZ and likes to play “border warrior”
Phoenix New Times, Jan 19th 2019
Betty
@Gin & Tonic: Barbaric.
lowtechcyclist
@Geminid:
When you put it like that, maybe we shouldn’t bother giving that $1.3B/year to Egypt anymore if they’re going to be aiding Russia against Ukraine, but rather give it out in bonus payments directly to the workers at those defense contractors. Cut out all the middlemen!
Bill Arnold
@Betty:
118 thumb-downs, though. Almost 10 percent of the thumb-ups!
/s
lowtechcyclist
@Prescott Cactus:
That’s appalling. But that’s what the extremely wealthy can do: they can buy up not just politicians, but entire governmental units.
We need 90% income tax brackets and a wealth tax. The power in this country has gotten way too out of balance.
Madness takes its toll.
Gin & Tonic
@Betty: That’s russia for you.
Geminid
@lowtechcyclist: Has Egypt actually supplied weapons to Russia? So far all we know is that maybe someone in Egypt talked about sending rockets. And any of these documents could have been doctored so as to cause trouble between the U.S. and other countries. If that was the process, it certainly worked.
Jay
@Geminid:
None of the OSINT groups that I read daily, have mentioned Egyptian weapons in Ukraine, on either side.
Geminid
@Geminidq3: Turkiye threw its military weight behind the Libyan government that was fighting the Wagner Group and General Hiftar. This provides some important background to its role in the Ukraine war, according to Oryx’s Stijn Mitzer in his article “The Staunch Ally: Turkiye’s Arms Deliveries to Ukraine,” November 24, 2022:
Mr. Mitzer contrasted Turkiye’s attitude with that of Israel, which fears the consequences of its weapons killing Russians. Mitzer said that’s no big deal to the Turks; they’ve been killing Russians in Libya for years now.
Stijn Mitzer’s Oryx article on Turkiye’s military aid to Ukraine is some very interesting reading. I’ll try to excerpt some more of it on a future thread.
Jinchi
It’s worth remembering that one of the reasons this info was leaked was to set allies against one another. Don’t be so quick to trust intelligence leaks posted by the Russians, especially since we know they’ve manipulated much of it.
This is one of the reasons people like Adam are supposed to avoid reading it.
Geminid
@Jay: The U.S. watches these matters closely. The biggest problem is stopping small, critical electronic components from being re-exported to Russia. I don’t think Egypt could pull off shipping weapons without our knowing about it. My guess is that this story is either entirely bogus, or based on big talk by some black market operator.
Andrya
Of course, G&T is totally right about the vileness of the russian atrocities. I’d like to comment on how completely counterproductive they are in terms of russian aims.
I commented a couple days ago that medvedev, in his Tweet, called Poles “insolent Polacks” and that this was counterproductive to russian aims. russia wants Poland to stop sending Ukraine weapons- part of Poland’s motivation for doing so is fear that russia will be coming for Poland next. medvedev’s use of an ethnic slur implying Polish inferiority, plus the use of “insolent” implying a russian right to dominate Poland, could only exacerbate Polish fears.
In any war, you WANT the other side’s soldiers to surrender. Every enemy soldier who surrenders is one you deprived the enemy of without incurring the costs of combat. In WW2, the US dropped leaflets over Germany and the German army, emphasizing that YOU COULD SAVE YOUR LIFE BY SURRENDERING. The kind of atrocities russia routinely perpetrates can only make Ukrainian soldiers more resolute. I do not claim to be especially courageous, but if I were a Ukrainian soldier, I would choose death in combat over any surrender- I hope I could face death in combat, but I know I could not face what the russians do to POWs. And, as Winston Churchill said during WW2, “you can always take one with you”.
Chetan Murthy
@Andrya: I’d been thinking about your previous comment, when I saw this one, and …. was also thinking about Bret Deveraux’s (acoup.blog) writings on siege warfare in premodern times. He writes that one of the things that attackers did, was to make clear to the to-be-besieged city that if they didn’t surrender, then when they (inevitably, naturally) fell, there would be no quarter whatsoever. That is, to frighten them into surrendering. It’s a premodern way of thinking and acting. It seems like this is a consistent explanation for Russia’s “public messaging” around the war: “surrender, or we’ll make you regret it.”
And this seems to mesh with your previous comment: the Russian elites are still thinking as feudal lords: the lives and happiness of their serfs don’t matter to them, for they are so much meat to be used, abused, or dispensed with as the lord wills.
There’s something truly medieval in the way that the Russian elites behave, and it shows up in so many ways, like the ones you’ve noted.
Ruckus
@Chetan Murthy:
The russian economy is very, very lopsided towards the effluent. Yes I purposely used that word. The very wealthy in russia are not all that wealthy in a world wide concept of wealthy. They are just far wealthier than the average russian. Sure we have a wealth imbalance in this country, a rather sizable one. But we also have at least some level of reasonable comfort that is obtainable by many
Andrya
@Chetan Murthy: Thanks, your reply is so interesting!
I’ve recommended before Timothy Snyder’s course on the history of Ukraine, which he posted on YouTube. (Here is a link to the full playlist.) One of Dr. Snyder’s points was that between the Medieval period and the early modern period, most European countries went through a change where, originally, the king was a dictator who could execute anyone he thought had offended him. (Example: Henry VIII executing his wives.) Then the nobles acquired rights against the king. (Think Magna Carta.) Then the rights of the nobles were extended down the social hierarchy until everyone had rights against the king- at which point you have the rule of law.
Timothy Snyder made the point that western Ukraine had been part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which had gone through this process that led to the rule of law. russia never did. The tsars could execute anyone they wanted to execute. The communists could execute anyone they wanted to execute. (Although Stalin did that a lot more than Khrushchev.) russia had a chance at the rule of law for only one decade- the 1990s- but Yeltsin blew that between being drunk all the time and implementing Thatcher/Bush Sr. economics, which damn near destroyed the country.
The ancient Greeks had a saying “whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad”. I think this applies to the russian government- they are so out of touch with how normal, free people think that they think saying “WE WILL KILL EVERYONE” is an effective strategy.
Bill Arnold
@Andrya:
The original is often said to be the Sophocles (Antigone) version, “evil at one time or another seems good, to him whose mind a god leads to ruin.”
It applies just as well to the Russian government and to its leadership. Arguably better.
(There are also earlier variants as well.)
Andrya
@Bill Arnold: Thanks! I admit I operated from memory and did not check the quotation. And the situation in “Antigone” is actually deeply similar- a tyrant violating basic rules of decency to show how scary he is.
Carlo Graziani
Fortification-busting is one of the principal applications of thermobaric bombs. I haven’t seen those in the supplied-weapons goody lists, so it may be a stretch. But coupled to some of the bomb guidance strap-on kits that have been supplied, such bombs might be a plausible way for the present UAF aircraft operating in stand-off mode to deliver a path clearing mission.
Jay
@Carlo Graziani:
Ukraine has 13 TOS-1’s, captured from the Moskovites,
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TOS-1
AlaskaReader
@Geminid: What we can thank Jimmy Carter for is the fact that ever since Jimmy Carter stepped up Egypt has maintained lasting peace with Israel, supported U.S. military operations in the Middle East, and cooperated with U.S. intelligence on countering extremist groups in the region. Egypt has enabled the U.S. military to maintain operations in the region.
Egypt has granted expedited treatment and enhanced security to hundreds of U.S. naval ships as they passed through the Suez Canal and overflight permissions to several thousand U.S. military flights annually.
During Operation Desert Storm, Egypt expedited transit of 762 U.S. naval vessels and permitted 34,952 over- flights. Following the 9/11 attacks and through operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, Egypt permitted more than 36,000 overflights.
I’ve long been under the impression funding for foreign aid is controlled by Congress, …so if there’s ‘blame’ to be placed, It’s always interesting to me what drives folks to be misdirecting the focus of that supposed blame, eh?
RAM
The question about Russia’s defensive line is, is it real or a largely Potemkin line? Given Russia’s innate corruption and military ineptitude, how effective will the parts of the line prove to be? For instance, are those dragon’s teeth actual dragon’s teeth or are they merely unanchored concrete pyramids sitting on the ground that LOOK like dragon’s teeth? A static defense in depth requires close coordination of the parts of the line and effective communication with the ready reaction forces assigned to deal with breakthroughs. So far in this war, Russia has shown no observable skills in either coordination or communication among their military units, not to mention the basic military skills or abilities among the units themselves. Russia’s defenses certainly appear formidable, and planners should not dismiss their potential. But we shouldn’t be too surprised if the whole edifice comes crashing down whenever Ukraine mounts a serious, well-coordinated combined arms attack on it, either.
Bill Arnold
Electronic warfare pace of change is much higher than in the past in
the (current) Russia vs Ukraine war, and a lot of the innovation is being done
on a tight budget. (No comment about the specific assertions here,
and the usual reminder that information ops are a big part of this
war.)
Bill Arnold
@Jay:
That pages lists the mass of the rockets at about 200kg, so the warhead must be much less massive. (this site says 45kg)
Aircraft-delivered fuel-air explosive devices can be much much larger.
Geminid
From Mr. Tendar’s timeline:
Finland is buying 64 Lockheed F-35 fighter jets. A Reuters report on Dec. 10, 2021 said that the price was $9.4 billion including weapons systems. The plan is for the planes to be phased in starting in 2027.
Geminid
@Bill Arnold: The Oryx article I referenced at #27 said that the jamming resistance of the “Mini” Bayraktar drones Turkiye has supplied Ukraine is “a highly welcome feature in the jamming-rich battlefield environment of Ukraine.”
The Mini Bayraktar is a surveillance and target marking drone. Reports are that Turkiye has integrated it with the TLRG-30 missiles of the type it provided Ukraine last Spring. Those are aimed by GPS or laser, and are fired from a multiple launcher similar to the HIMARS. They have a range from 20 to 70km, with a 42kg warhead.