(Ukraine Air Raid Alert Warning Map as of 10:50 PM EDT)
I just got the following in an email from a commenter whose nym I’m not sure of. It is a link to a post on Mastodon and he wanted to know if this was possible.
I’m sorry to tell you that it appears to be so. I immediately went to Olga Honcharenko’s Twitter feed. She is in Odesa and monitors Russian military aviation radio frequencies. Here’s what she has been posting beginning six hours ago:
https://twitter.com/olga_pp98/status/1703143217837789573
https://twitter.com/olga_pp98/status/1703178397717782769
https://twitter.com/olga_pp98/status/1703184766093103592
https://twitter.com/olga_pp98/status/1703194031797215678
The rest after the jump:
https://twitter.com/olga_pp98/status/1703194581288808830
https://twitter.com/olga_pp98/status/1703200561477091692
Is it possibly Russia is just moving its strategic bombers around? Yes. Is it also possible that Russia has launched them on an attack run for an aerial bombardment of Ukrainian civilian targets in the small hours of the night. Also possible. And based on past Russian performance, that’s what I expect is coming. We’ll know more later today in Ukraine and tomorrow for those of us in the US.
War for Ukraine Day 570: Kharkiv in the Crosshairs
Ksmiami
Hmm. Seems that Russia deserves return incoming fire. Not sorry. The entire country is goddamn menace to the world
Adam L Silverman
@Ksmiami: Let’s keep the comments about this level and you’ll be good to go. Reciprocity is covered under the Just War concept.
Carlo Graziani
If this happens, it seems to me that it speaks to a perception of crisis in Russia’s MOD and in the Kremlin. Such attacks would have nonexistent effects on the military situation in Ukraine. They could be construed as retaliation for recent Ukrainian attacks on naval targets, but this does nothing to forestall any future similar attacks.
When the Russians rained missiles on civilian infrastructure last winter, it was at least a choice driven by an actual theory of victory: the Ukrainians would be forced to come to terms when they froze in the dark. Their effort failed miserably, but there was some logic to it. There is no coherent strategic logic to this strike, no theory of victory, or even of averted defeat, that justifies the effort.
When a country mobilizes major strategic assets for punitive actions of negligible strategic value, we should read panic between the lines. I would conclude that the Kremlin is looking at situation maps that scare officials, and/or political knees are jerking in ways that are unhelpful to their strategic effort.
Adam L Silverman
@Carlo Graziani: If I was a betting person, and I’m not, I’d wager the targets are and/or include the granaries and storehouses in Odesa, it’s port, and the port at Izmail. While those are not legitimate military targets, hitting them does serve Putin’s strategic vision of both preventing Ukraine from generating any revenue from grain and food sales and creating a food crisis in the global south.
dmsilev
Flying strategic bombers a few thousand miles round trip, to launch missiles from several hundred miles away from the presumed target? Doesn’t really seem like a well-thought-out plan.
Adam L Silverman
@dmsilev: They’ve been doing it for over a year now. Given Ukraine’s naval drone capabilities, they’re not going to risk the Black Sea Fleet to launch the attacks. That means these types of air strikes.
Carlo Graziani
@Adam L Silverman: I see your point. This would then be a strike in support of their latest theory of victory: provoke a global food crisis that (in some poorly-specified, Underwear Gnomes-style manner) pressures the West and Ukraine to come to terms.
They must be on their 5th or 6th theory by now. Each one is more threadbare than the last. Which also speaks volumes about desperation, and panic.
AJ of the Mustard Search and Rescue Team
Christ almighty.
dmsilev
@Adam L Silverman: Ah, got it, thank you. Didn’t realize that launching their terror attacks from so far away was a regular thing for the Russians.
JaySinWA
Am I correct in assuming the bombers can launch missiles from far enough away to be largely out of range of current UK anti-aircraft? Are the missiles themselves less likely to be shot down than others launched from other platforms?
Chetan Murthy
@dmsilev: Earlier-on (heck, maybe even in the initial full invasion), I remember RU bombers would launch cruise missiles from firing positions over the Caspian Sea. They were flying from airbases not so far from there (Engels airbase, maybe others). I think the only thing that’s changed, is that after UA started attacking Engels and other airbases, they moved their bombers to where they’d be safe — that is to say, near NATO’s borders. [rueful chuckle]
Adam L Silverman
@JaySinWA: Yes, that’s why they use this tactic.
Adam L Silverman
@Carlo Graziani: From Putin’s perspective the refugee crisis he partially fomented during the Syrian civil war brought him partial gains via his proxies in many EU states. Same playbook.
wjca
That was my kneejerk reaction as well.
It’s not so much that they are launching missiles from strategic bombers. As Adam mentions, that’s been happening. But flying bombers all the way from Murmansk to the Black Sea? That suggests that they are running short, near the front, of these munitions as well.
Adam L Silverman
The good news is that the air raid alerts are now only up for Russian occupied Crimea and Russian occupied Luhansk Oblast.
Adam L Silverman
I’m going to go watch some rugby and rack out. Catch everyone on the flip.
Anoniminous
@Adam L Silverman:
And why Ukraine should get High Altitude Long Endurance drones armed with air-to-air missiles.
wjca
Could that mean that the risk of a breakthrough is so great (at least in the minds of the Russian General Staff) that they are moved to use strategic assets for tactical purposes?
Carlo Graziani
@Adam L Silverman: ‘Night.
Chetan Murthy
@wjca:
I think those bombers were previously based at Engels & Saratov, much closer to the theater of operations. But UA made that too risky, so they were moved up to Murmansk. Or at least, that’s what I remember; I could be mistaken.
Adam L Silverman
@wjca: They’ve been doing it since the start of the war. So I’m not really sure that question would make sense to them.
Carlo Graziani
@Adam L Silverman:
Certainly. Nonetheless, the fact of the matter is that this playbook is of essentially negligible relevance to Russia’s military situation in Ukraine.
So, implementing such an attack (if it is in progress, or in planning) implies a political decisionmaking process that is divorced from the military realities of the war. Basically, “Hitler in the bunker”-level denial, or perhaps simply panic.
Frankensteinbeck
@Carlo Graziani:
I am going to suggest, based on a well-established behavior pattern, that the reasoning is simply that Putin is a world-class mean asshole, and brutality and murder are his preferred actions. He doesn’t need a reason, he’s looking for an excuse, because he wants to bomb civilians.
wjca
@Adam L Silverman: Thanks. I hadn’t realized the Russian air force was going thru contortions to that extent.
Chetan Murthy
We all see the videos of funeral processions in Ukraine for fallen soldiers, and the way that so many Ukrainians line up and kneel as the corteges pass by. And I wondered to myself: when was the last time that that happened in America? B/c I sure don’t remember it during the GWOT, and from what I’ve read, it didn’t happen during the Vietnam War either. During the Korean War? During WWII (I’d hope so) ? On another axis: I wonder whether this happens for all funeral corteges of fallen soldiers in Ukraine? That is to say, how universal is this behaviour? I’m guessing pretty universal, but just curious.
Geminid
Ukrainian news site Euromaidan Press reported that Ukrainian forces shot down 6 of 10 cruise missiles attacking Odesa; also, that one missile struck a civilian grain handling facility. Six Shahed drones launched from Crimea towards Odesa were downed also.
Geminid
@Geminid: Also, euromaidanpress.com reports that:
Chornomorsk port is about 20 km southwest of Odesa.
I think this story has been reported here:
I believe several ships have made it out from Odesa to the Bosphorus Strait using this inshore route along the Romanian , Bulgarian and Turkish coasts. These may be the first two ships attempting to make the round trip since Russia left the Black Sea Grain Intiative in July. The shipments have been facilitated by an indemnity fund that Ukraine’s Duma established earlier this year.
Doug R
Ukraine needs to send a crew to Finland and launch a drone attack.
Is there something with just over 200 km range they could smuggle to somewhere like Saija, Finland?
Glidwrith
@Chetan Murthy: My recollection of the GWOT is that Bushie hid the bodies. Basically, no press or publicity when fallen soldiers came home so that it would not weaken support.
The bastard.
Geminid
@Doug R: Not sure Finland would allow a drone attack to be staged from their territory. I don’t think any Nato country would.
wjca
Probably not. But drones are small enough that several could probably be “smuggled” to a boat on the Baltic, and fired from there.
Chetan Murthy
@Glidwrith: That he did. The bastard (indeed). But I meant something more: I get a sense of national unity in gratitude for the fallen soldiers of Ukraine, that I never got for any war we fought in my lifetime, with the exception of the first campaign in Afghanistan. Everything else: Vietnam, Desert Storm, Iraq, the rest of the Afghan war, those all didn’t produce any sense of unity or gratitude. Sure, we mouth the words, but we don’t mean them as a nation. And honestly, I can see why: none of those wars were actually about saving our nation or even our allies: they were just wars of conquest. But I do wonder whether we’ve simply lost the ability as a nation to come together around a common purpose, even for the salvation of our nation. I mean, we see that in our inability even at this late date to get our shit together about climate change, for instance.
Sigh.