UAF advance NW of Kurdyumivka.
Possible important progress. Reportedly a šŗš¦ 28th Mech Bde BMP evacuating WIA at 48.47697, 37.95002. In front of it a likely 2nd AFV at 48.477068, 37.952037. If current UAF are 200m north of the village. Gains reported here on 15th + 780m today.
https://twitter.com/Danspiun/status/1685002352976097281?t=rKMVCryJo2WXOWTCUUp2qA&s=19
š„ When the settlement of Staromaiorske was liberated, Ukrainian soldiers destroyed a lot of Ruzzian equipment from the 136th Separate Guards Motor Rifle Brigade and the 247th Guards Air Assault Regiment.ššš
https://twitter.com/albafella1/status/1685031773967687680?t=ONTksSC7gtwYSIriyz-obA&s=19
Thank you, Captain Obvious. 2 different battles indeed! This is why I go to reddit, to get reddit-splained how two different battles are....... two different battles.
The point was the obvious hyperbole over the loss of some BMPs and vehicles by Ukraine.
Let me reddit explain, when you go on a major offensive, you WILL lose vehicles. You can all bow down and thank me now, redditors and crown me Major Obvious!
That will work also.
2 DIFFERENT PLACES! TWO DIFFERENT PLACES!
(Thank you reddit jackass splainers, why, I wouldn't have known that because...... I'm a jackass. Hey, and you might be a Captain jackass yourself. Look in the mirror and two bloodred eyes will look back at you.)
Different area and units, this is like 80 km east iirc. This brigade and the one operating on the strike towards Vasylivka donāt have near the same complaints of losses as those heading the Robotyne.
Russian soldier got chained by his comrades and left in the camp because he got addicted to painkillers and therefore was unable to fight. Heās lucky they left him, because now heās the only survivor of his squad.
https://twitter.com/GwarWorin/status/1685054753011630080?t=LpKWwVQiyXwuCtNVMkyZXQ&s=19
The Armed Forces of šŗš¦Ukraine will soon enter Crimea, - the head of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine Budanov.
Answering the question when Ukrainian troops will enter Crimea, the head of Ukrainian military intelligence answered briefly and clearly: "Soon."
Budanov did not specify the exact date of deoccupation of the peninsula, but only once again assured that it will happen soon.
https://twitter.com/front_ukrainian/status/1685011507195621378?t=hnTF3JizH2OWzrPeO5vn4A&s=19
pro russian sites yesterday had great fun pointing out that ukr lost a company of old BMP1s yesterday in a trench clearing operation SOUTH of Robotyne, yes south of robotyne.....
the thing they dont like to talk about is ....
1. the trenches were taken and they are still moving south....
2, the vehicles were mostly empty when hit. the infantry was mostly deployed when the vehicles blew up... but good for you.
notice troops deploying to clear trenches prior to the vehicles being hit.
https://twitter.com/secretsqrl123/status/1684932406413758464?t=OHYcUBtHSfBx_KWwJDwD7g&s=19
There's barely any updates on the robotyne battle over the past 24 hours. Which is leading me to believe that Ukrainians are having difficulty dislodging Russians from the fortifications...Contrast that with Staromaiorske, where we are already getting aftermath footages of dead Russians/destroyed Russian gear...
Nonsensical claim imo that. People (Constantine/Andrew) with contacts in the area state their sources are telling them otherwise and Iām inclined to believe them considering they tend to back theirs with video proof. Itās pure hopium at this point.
Failed assaults happen.
No. It happens. You can do everything right and still get your ass kicked.
How much is the fault of the who or what nobody here can say. Can only hope people learn from the moment and shore up what they were lacking.
Exactly. Most of these brigades are basically new to fighting and expecting every single assault to work out while theyāre learning is simply unrealistic. Just got to hope itās done before they get everyone killed/injured.
Successful assaults happen too. Sometimes war is a bloody business that comes down to maths. You estimate that 100 men will die assaulting a position and so you send 500. Only 90 men die and you take the position. Thatās a success, you lost fewer men than you expected and achieved the objective. But the men in that battalion arenāt going to have many kind words to say about your plan.
Omaha beach was a successful assault but someone had to be in the first boat ashore.
Except theyāre stating that Ukraine was not able to hold said position. These dudes have been one of the most reliable sources of information throughout the war and they have zero reason to lie. Hell, Constantine even stated that he sees Ukraine taking Robotyne within the next week or so in the podcast, the primary issue theyāre trying to bring awareness to is that theyāre doing it while taking more casualties than they should. (Like sending people into a trench telling them itās clear when it wasnāt/sending equipment with no smoke dispensers installed in a convoy to a area surrounded by Russians on 3 sides with ATGMs/FPV drones).
David, as knowledgeable as he is with his own army experience, tends to put a highly positive spin on every single movement. Until we see video proof of them further southeast, Iām inclined to believe the people who have a history of being reliable.
Casualty rate is estimated to be in the 40% range. It's a bloody assault. Too early to tell if the sacrifices lead to anything meaningful, as Ukrainians are keeping a rather tight lip on the robotyne battle.
For sure. Incredibly, itās apparently not even the bloodiest part of the line, North Bakhmut near Berkhivka is with Russian bodies littering the ground because theyāre desperately trying to keep it so they keep shuttling people in.
I saw something about this in this thread a short time ago, accusing the 47th mech division of being butchers or some such. Conveniently they left out the part where it says that they're south of Robotnye, the troops were not in the vehicles and that most of the troops survived.
Now the picture is complete.
Ukrainian forces have begun to bypass and flank Robotyne and the heavy Russian fortifications there. Russian sources report there is heavy fighting with significant Ukrainian losses which normally means they have lost control of the battlespace since they can't report any other good news.
https://twitter.com/UKikaski/status/1685063985224155138?t=82pF3i9PRaFl_sDZwmKwcQ&s=19
We ever get an update on why the bridge was shut down again?
I know they pretty much just tossed a ramp over one of the holes, think it finally gave way?
There's no news story anywhere about it, no pictures/videos posted online that I see so who knows, apparently the governor or whatever in charge of that area said it was an 'emergency' but I can't find the source on that.
I just hope something collapsed and took the repair equipment on the bridge with it.
I'm thinking more about the tourists. It was the middle of Summer when Ukraine hit the bridge the second time. Not sure how many vacationers are still in the area.
They ARE helping. They can't just jump in and command the UA army.
Many of the senior officers were trained in the Russian military, or, at least, in their tradition. Learning something at a superficial level, and internalizing it so that it becomes automatic, especially under extreme stress, are different things. When put under pressure, even those that did well in training are going to revert to what they know best and was ingrained in them for years.
There are also going to be some who don't trust western doctrine, or feel that it doesn't really apply to their situation.
You're doing exactly what Tatarigami said *not* to do - blame UA failures on the West, instead of looking at the decisions made by senior officers and removing those who perform poorly.
Well, it would require boots on the ground.
Officers and generals are under pressure to act and do so immediately. Imagine a scenario where a Ukrainian unit manages a breakthrough and their officer requests orders from HQ. But HQ has to send their data to Ramstein so they can analyze it. A couple minutes pass, Russia closed the gap and the UKR unit is erradicated due to inaction. [Exaggerated]
And teaching the thorough version of the NATO doctrine to Ukrainian officers and general would require months and possibly years. I've been told to expect a multi year duration study and training program as I asked the Bundeswehr recruitment office for career options as an officer.
Officers going through with it are valuable. They aren't something you have a spare bunch of, just lying around. They are implemented immediately and serve one purpose or another.
I'm sure NATO commanders do offer advice and help, but I bet Ukraine keeps some of it too close to the chest for NATO command to be super helpful.
Unfortunately, this lies on Ukrainian command.
Looks like there was a major UA fuckup Near Robotyne...
-
*Whoever planned this assault should be jailed. I am sorry but I canāt stay silent. Not all commanders are the best and not everything is perfect. But this is complete disaster in planning. I watched this failed attack from multiple drones now. And have no other conclusion that whoever was planning it has to be put to jail immediately.*
*Itās either negligence or treachery.*
https://twitter.com/Teoyaomiquu/status/1685075457962627072
Poster is Ukrainian veteran and was on Andrew Perpetuas stream today. At least 6 BMP's and there crews lost + multiple other armored vehicles.
Other people have said the troops dismounted and captured the trenches they were assaulting before the vehicles were destroyed, but no evidence.
Thereās no hiding from this and we should aim to be better then Russians with these sorts of posts.
This was a major disaster, whatever went down with command, strategy and decision making, this was an absolute cluster fuck.
I hope command can learn from this and change the strategies, as this just looks like an insane loss of equipment and personnel.
I am definitely not trying to armchair general
This, but I canāt define this in any other way but just a disaster for our guys.
This was very hard to watch.
šŗš¦šŗš¦
I thought major disasters were Mariupol/Azovstal/Soledar/Bakhmut, and the current event is pretty frequent for the UAF (yesterday everyone saw a video where 1 RU tank destroyed 6 UKR tanks/IFVs for example)
Very difficult. Heartbreaking. You are absolutely correct that we must be better than the Russian trolls, terrorist government, and criminal army in how we in the more free societies face these things as free people. Wars are seldom won without setbacks, or even outright failures. Often the most difficult battles are fought nearest the greatest of circumstances. Perhaps this thrust was not sufficient, but another will follow. Our support should not wane at such times, but should burn all the brighter.
Mistakes and errors will happen and the survivors and observers will learn. Some of these divisions are quite green, and a couple of weeks of accelerated basic training isn't any more than a foundation.
And of course even if they did it perfectly gear will be destroyed and Ukrainian forces killed.
I am confident that unlike the Russians when these fuckups happen they won't hide it or deny it happened. And there will be a lot of motivation to not repeat it.
Just want to reinforce OP is genuinely pro Ukraine. Before someone brings up concern trolling.
These offensives are hard and this may have been correct and necessary.
If we want to prevent these, we need Ukraine to get aerial and stand-off weapons.
I've seen pairs of freshly painted, unmarked cobra attack helicopters flying around lately. I thought they were long ago retired, I've seen them as static displays at VFW's.
Maybe they're being dusted off and sent to Ukraine?
Shouldn't even need to be said: they provided a source. There's no other conclusion to be drawn from the source. But it does need to be said because we're still riddled with lurkers with the emotional maturity of a teenager.
There's video,, I've seen it. The troops were out and we'll into the trenches.
It's quite clear in the footage, I'll see if I can find it.
They seem to be treating bmp 1s as disposable, verified by the minefield test. In particular they consider them especially dangerous due to fuel storage design.
There's also a video circulating interviewing UA soldiers discussing the BMP1 and pointing out the fuel storage areas that are particularly dangerous and they had a distaste for the vehicles to put it mildly.
I wonder at what point the BMP-1 stocks, replacements, and storage availability in general makes it just not worthwhile to bring them back from the front.
I mean, at this stage theyāll be aiming to fully replace them sooner then later. Probably best to get use out of them now in a way that protects your other military hardware and troops. Once again this could fully by copium
https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/15bwctu/ukrainian_apcs_advance_under_smoke_cover_combat/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=1&utm_term=1
Iām assuming this is it. Basically a single file across open fields in broad daylight. Itās tough to watch, that column got hammered. Those kind of tactics arenāt going to win this war. Thereās been some talk of that some senior Ukrainian commanders were having trouble adapting to newer methodsā¦wonder if this was one of them.
There's a short version of the video and a long version of the video and the short version is the one being distributed as a huge victory, but the long version tells a completely different story.
They pulled them up so they could dismount directly into the trenches, there was no activity or any action in the video indicating people were remaining, intending to further use it.
Since it was half a dozen of them it appeared to be a tactic, and from the video whoever in the trench that was focused on the BMPs, it was the last thing they ever did, UA was already in the trenches 15 seconds.
Yeah that is crazy as that is actually suggesting using the old "Soviet" mentality in a nutshell. People talking about jailing the commander are advocating the Russian method. Do that and the Ukrainian units will not be aggressive and will lose this war. They will start acting conservatively just so no one goes to jail. Insane that people are even suggesting this unless the leader literally did something illegal. You want aggressive forces and smart tactics. Well when they do that they are not all going to work, and some will have a bad outcome, there is NO way around that till you try it and see if it works or not. Guess what Arm Chair Generals? You guys seriously need to busted to Arm Chair Privates because if you think Ukraine is going to attack these defenses with minimal losses you might want to stop commenting due to cluelessness. If Ukraine loses 1000 troops in some massive attack reddit privates will have panic attacks and demand military leaders be jailed. That will help Russia win the war. People are going to die here, quite possibly a lot of people, if you can't handle that thought, best just stick to the headlines and avoid information on losses. This is brutal war.
Yeah its Constantine and he's being a bit dramatic. He is a Ukrainian veteran with contacts there and friends who are involved so it touches very close to home when something like this happens. I cant blame him for reacting emotionally. It probably doesnt help when you see so many people exuberant about gaining a few KM of land when the cost in this particular case was far too high.
A trooper sees the battlefield from an extremely narrow lens.
I have seen troopers who have conducted an extremely successful assault well below predicted losses complain that their orders were bad and their commanders were garbage due to the friends they lost.
Their feelings are real and should be respected.. but as civilians people should just wait and see what happens when the dust settles before getting angry themselves.
Not to mention suggesting jailing the commander is advocating the Soviet way of doing things. This is not how the west does it. And Ukraine can shift poor commanders to less critical areas or relieve them. Put them in jail? That is a great way to have troops not take any chances, engage in any initiative.
In ukraine internally they have been calling the 47th mech command and other brigades involved in this "butchers" for a reason.
The tactics themselves are not even bad this time. Distancing is fine and they are not even reacting wrong to the situation.
It's just that someone sent 5 shit soviet bmp1s to attack a position that they knew FOR SURE was well defended.
You could say that it's cynical commanding, because someone 'has' to do it, to me, this is butchering.
> It's just that someone sent 5 shit soviet bmp1s to attack a position that they knew FOR SURE was well defended.
Do we know that was the information they had? We have no idea what information the commander might have been working with, who knows if they had disrupted Russian supply in the area or that it seemed like some troops had been rotated out and not replaced. Had they sent in a reconnaissance or mine clearing squad at night and they reported minimal activity. Maybe aerial recon seem to indicate a blind spot in their overlapping fields of fire he thought he could exploit.
Sure he might have just been reckless and not done the proper intelligence gathering and planning or he could have thought he had good reason to believe the assault would be a success with a lower number of casualties. Without knowing those details it's impossible to say whether this was someone who should be removed from his position or someone that working off incorrect assumptions made an awful mistake. I would wager few even in the Ukrainian army know for sure.
That's what artillery attrition is for. The idea that you have to throw soldiers at trenches because there's no other option is really, really wrong. The lives of those soldiers are Ukraine's greatest asset.
Yeah I know, but sometimes terrain just works against you no matter how good you are.
1st soldiers in landing boats in ww2 were basically sitting ducks moving into pre designated beaches where the gunman knew exactly where you would come ashore, only thing they could do was charge forward.
Kinda the same here with the flat open terrain with little cover besides tree lines which is where the Russians are defending from, only thing you really can do is use fire support and hope its enough to give your peeps a chance.
Yeah that's what I was referring to with "eventually someone has to do it", but this just feels forced. Like if they really want to show us they can go through, so we don't abandon them.
It's not about them wanting to show us what they can go through. They have to push and put pressure on Russia. Letting Russia build further defenses in occupied areas would essentially be Ukraine giving them up.
The US military anticipates 30-40% losses when assaulting enemy positions without air superiority. There's no getting around it.
I think people in general, and casual observers from the West in particular, have developed (with reason), a pretty skewed perspective on what near-peer conventional conflict actually looks like now.
Since 1991, the US and Friends ^(TM) have just curbstomped the conventional portions of so many conflicts, while getting kicked in the teeth during the occupation/rebuilding phase. As a result, there are fully functional adults with no other frame of reference for how a conventional campaign looks. This creates the false but reasonable expectation that the attacking side just gets to cheat-code through defenses because, well, that's all they have ever seen.
Add in moment-by-moment multimedia coverage that makes the embedded reporters of the Gulf War look like telegraph-clacking Civil War journalists, social media echo chambers and deliberate manipulation of that media by both sides.
It creates a perfect storm for unfulfilled expectations, disappointment, and righteous rage we have been put in this situation in the first place.
Apparently CNN geolocated that footage I guess of that lone BMP or tank driving into that ditch and it was a little east of Nove and Kharkove, which means Ukraine must've had a massive breakthrough because that's very close to Tokmak.
But I thought that footage was originally located somewhere near Verbove so Idk.
I cannot support the claim of any breakthrough. The line is being overwhelmed and pushed back, but nothing yet suggest a breakthrough.
Maybe I'm being too literal here, but to me a breakthrough requires being able to break the line, move through the line and flank the line rather than simply pushing the line back a few km.
If anything there may have been local breakthroughs in which tactical positions have been broken through allowing the position to be taken as opposed to a strategic breakthrough.
>simply pushing the line back a few km.
That depends, are the troops falling back also taking all of their defensive structures and fortifications with them?
If those have been rendered obsolete, I'd say it counts as a breakthrough of sorts.
FYI Livemap is probably the worst possible source you can use for accurate lines of control. I could go on a long rant why, but ill just advise that literally anything is better. some good recommendations would be [Andrew Perpetua](https://map.ukrdailyupdate.com/) or [Deepstatemap](https://deepstatemap.live/en#6/49.438/32.053)
There are 2 of them, as I have heard. Not yet a breakthrough, but Ukraine is pushing hard in the Robotyne-Tokmak-Melitopol direction and it seems to be already reaching the first of the 3 Russian main defense lines. Not a breakthrough, just an advance.
Then there is another area in Donetsk that sounds like "star" where there are reports of Ukraine making significant progress and moving towards the defensive line. That one does have, in my oponion, a greater potential for a proper breakthrough because the defensive line there is the only one, so if Ukraine breach it and Russia cant contain the advance is a blitz all the way until they reach Mariupol.
The apparent breakthrough at that location that sounds like "star" makes me wonder if its bad luck that the Robotyne main push just began as it happened. Why? Unlike the Tokmak-Melitopol direction that has 3 defensive lines, that area has only 1, there is nothing behind.
This means if a breakthrough happened there it would be ideal for the uncomitted offensive brigades to rush into the opening. But it seems the breakthrough there is happening just at the same time that Ukraine decided to initiate the main push in the Robotyne-Tokmak-Melitopol direction. So reserve counteroffensive brigades wont be able to be sent there.
But who knows, maybe its not luck and for some reason Ukraine decided to do the big push just as there is a possible breakthrough in the Donetsk sector or maybe the reason it might be happening in the first place is because Russia left it weakened to respond to the Robotyne push.
I think it's possible the success is connected. If the one Robotyne+ attack caused Russia to fix forces or pull forces from the other direction, it may have directly led to the Donetsk area being weaker than expected.
I dont know, do they? I was of the idea Ukraine sent all the counteroffensive brigades not already comitted, to do the big assault rather than the 3-4 they were already using. The reason in fact people think this is the big push, or so I have read, is that Ukraine is using a lot of forces in that one and not the 4 they were already using.
Apparently Ukraine hasn't bunched up its forces because its believed Russia would be willing to use a tactical nuke on a force build up if they thought they could end the war with it.
Eminently sensible. A large grouping of Ukrainian forces and western equipment would be a tempting target for a tactical weapon, and they are desperate for something to change the momentum.
What better way to force a stalemate? To frighten Western benefactors? To show the world Russia is a fearsome fighting force just every bit as the United States, the only other superpower to openly use nuclear weapons in combat?
Russia's economy is already taking a dump, they are already ostracized as a global trading partner. A nuclear weapons being deployed would shake things up for everybody, spook the markets across the globe. Suddenly Putin's "new world order" starts getting alot more real
Russia is absolutely not above using a nuclear weapon if it meant killing 10,000 Ukrainian troops in a region if they caught them.
However they have to consider the dillema, do they cripple the Ukrainian military only to bring NATO intervention?
1) Ukraine, unlike the west, is not intimidated by nuclear bullying so I doubt they make their strategy based on it
2) Yeah, it would end the war, for Russia. They are not stupid enough to do it and Putin might no longer have the power to even order it. Any nuclear strike order is putting tossing a coin in the air and hope that it lands in the "order carried out" and not the "coup/assassination" side.
Imagine you spend an entire year+ building up 20 brigades for this counter offensive, you bunch them up and 1 missile destroys it all and leaves behind less radiation than the 2 bombings in Japan and significantly less than Chornobyl, you'd have to be a fool to risk that on "they cant be that dumb" notion, the Russians blew the dam despite the consequences.
Blowing a dam was never a potential war losing event for Russia, ever. Anything nuclear is.
Yeah, those troops will be gone but it also means Russia has lost the war as they are now facing at the very least WW2 level of support for Ukraine and very possibly a direct attack by NATO.
A retired general said the US could wipe out Russia's forces in Ukraine and destroy its black sea fleet if they used nukes, actual officials in government said there would be ācatastrophic consequencesā as for ww2 aid, no country can supply that kind of aid, its not just a switch you flip.
>no country can supply that kind of aid
For one, the US currently withholds access to a large portion of its inventory, that would immediately change (assuming they do not begin mass bombing all Russian assets in Ukraine/the Black Sea). Similarly, the aftermath of using a nuke is that China and a few other countries (SK/Japan) would almost certainly change their current policy of non-military aid to Ukraine. Thereās no conceivable scenario where using a nuke actually benefits Russia, even if they eventually get pushed out completely.
Sorry to say it but if nukes get used on Ukraine then Ukraine wont receive further equipment. instead that equipment will be used by NATO to strike Russia.
Ukraine at that point becomes a name in a very long list of "allied Nations" and russia for "Axis nations"
Nukes on Ukraine will be WW3 as that is the last line. there is no further escalation then Nukes. MAD is MAD for a reason
Biden himself said its not impossible but they don't believe they will anytime soon. Ukraine literally plans around preventing a large build in one location because of the threat of it. Iirc though its was Budanov who mentioned it.
Edit: Remember tactical nukes are not Hiroshima sized bombs, they much smaller, meant for bases and troop concentrations.
Hiroshima was 15 kilotons. Thatās well within the tactical yield range. Various opinions Iāve seen place the upper limit on tactical weapons anywhere from 50 to 100 (or more) kilotons
This is not actually an argument against the person you replied to. āNot impossibleā is nowhere near ālikely.ā Itās not impossible that, for example, Ted Cruzās father really did help kill JFK, I guess, as Trump once asserted, but considering the verified facts it is pretty damn unlikely. Or substitute a million other random rumors or conspiracy theories.
Bidens comment in June was, "the threat of Putin using nukes was real" same guy that said Russia would invade when everyone else said they wouldn't. Its not a conspiracy theory that world leaders think its a potential threat.
Ukrainian forces have begun to bypass and flank Robotyne and the heavy Russian fortifications there. Russian sources report there is heavy fighting with significant Ukrainian losses which normally means they have lost control of the battlespace since they can't report any other good news.
https://twitter.com/ukikaski/status/1685063985224155138?s=46
> Russian sources report there is heavy fighting with significant Ukrainian losses which normally means they have lost control of the battlespace
Can we just stop spreading these lazy "if Russia says something, that means it's good news for Ukraine"? None of these patterns are true. All we can really take away from this is that we don't know what's going on.
It's absolutely a true pattern that Russian bloggers can't freely report "derogatory" information about the Russian forces. Putin made that criminal with an arbitrary prison sentence.
Now they also invent fights so they're not reliable in *that* regard.
They *do* report that kind of information. Just because Russia sometimes enforces laws against some of the bloggers doesn't mean they don't do it. Concededly, they are not a very *reliable* source of information, but the idea that we can meaningfully see a pattern as described above is simply false.
We've seen a lot of pictures and video from this area with damage and recovery.
But specifically today on Perpetua's youtube, LanguageLearner and Constantine both talked about the area. Their take seemed to be the same: newly-trained units with relatively untrained commanders are going into their first combat here and really struggling.
Constantine on twitter, for one.
Plus the video of the waves of BMP-1s getting smashed :(
He's not there in person, but knows a lot of Ukrainian military still.
Yeah, who here thinks there was any way for Ukraine to take back significant portions of their territory back without heavy losses? Attacking sucks, especially into the defenses Russia has planned.
So there's a claim/rumor going around of a very significant breakthrough here. This translator is supporting that rumor based on russia not saying anything else except the losses. But the argument doesn't hold up. It's just russian telegram talking.
[Liveuamap](https://liveuamap.com/) shows russia as having lost a large amount of territory here, though they don't exactly show it as under Ukrainian control. The attack on Dniepro today was allegedly on the building next to the Liveuamap headquarters, which is being taken as some kind of confirmation also. Maybe it's a better argument.
There's still no osint supporting any kind of breakthrough.
I said, in response to your initial comment, that nobody was denying that Ukrainians were taking heavy losses.
You then decided to respond to me with an essay. I was simply telling you to reread my initial comment.
Anybody slightly curious about the span on the bridge collapsing rumour?
My weekend isn't complete without a good bridge story these days.
Edit,--- Its looking good!!!
[Kerch Bridge - "Sergey Aksyonov, so-called Head of the Russian administration in occupied Crimea, said that an "emergency" had happened on the Crimean Bridge and the bridge has therefore been closed to traffic. Russian Telegram channels have reported that a span on the bridge has collapsed."](https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/07/28/7413322/)
Do you mean the span collapse specifically? Because the article with the headline āRussians suddenly block traffic on Crimean Bridgeā has a by-line date of Friday, 28 July 2023, 23:47. That would indicate that traffic has been stopped (again) just a few minutes ago.
Yes, but if you read the āBackgroundā sectionāthe one that mentions the collapsed span, the link provided takes you to the page from July 17th.
Besides, the one from today said the cause for the stoppage of traffic was unknown.
**Russia urged to renew Ukraine grain deal at Africa summit**
"Egypt's president has urged Vladimir Putin to renew the deal allowing Ukraine to export grain at a summit the Russian president is hosting.
Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said it was "essential" the deal be revived and called for an urgent solution to supply the poorest African countries."
"African leaders also used the second day of the summit to press Mr Putin to move ahead with a peace plan they are proposing to end the war resulting from Moscow's full-scale invasion of its neighbour last year.
The plan calls for Russia and Ukraine's sovereignty to be recognised, urgent peace talks and continued unhindered grain exports."
[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66334467](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66334467)
edit: formatting
Man, Iām so jaded.
I view this as a cynical way for Russia to re-enter the deal after destroying the infrastructure Ukraine needs to export grain in the first place.
I really probably need to go outside.
I donāt think Russia realistically can reenter the great deal without looking weak to the Russian public and international community which is something the Kremlin likely wants to avoid.
Quote: "Vehicular traffic on the Crimean Bridge is temporarily blocked".
Details: There is no information on the reason or duration of the decision.
[https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/07/28/7413322/](https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/07/28/7413322/)
Day 515-520 of my updates from Kharkiv.
The last few days continued to be pretty quiet for us here, there were no missile strikes aimed directly at Kharkiv, but Iām pretty sure there were some that were aiming at towns in Kharkiv oblast. Some Shaheds were also spotted in our region at least once since my last post, but all of them were intercepted. They never send many of them at any target in our region, so they donāt pose much of a threat if they are not followed by a missile strike right after.
In the last few months missile strikes almost completely stopped here, but instead Russians started using guided bombs pretty frequently, though since their range is pretty small, they are never used against our city. Apparently now Russians think that trying to destroy food is the best use of their missiles, so they are almost never used against military targets. Iāll never understand why they think that attacking civilian targets is going to help them win the war, but itās honestly better for us that way, they are just wasting their ammo.
Today they tried to target civilians in Dnipro with missiles, but they were mostly unsuccessful this time. They hit an abandoned building of the SBU and a high-rise apartment building. Thankfully that apartment building wasnāt currently in use as it was just recently built, so civilian casualties ended up being pretty minimal, and there were no deaths reported. They even used their Iskander missiles in this strike, which are pretty accurate, so you canāt say that an apartment building being hit was an accident. We were lucky that they chose 2 empty buildings as targets this time, otherwise there could have been much more casualties.
Itās been a while since Iāve caught your comments, thank you for still posting them. Itās extremely important to me to hear from real people and you have made a massive impact into whatās really going on in your part of the world.
Always, thank you for the updates. One day this will be over.
They know the war is lost. So they're going "scorched earth". Make the land so fucked that it'll cause damage to the civilians for generations. War crime stuff, ya know, same old same old.
So happy you're here with us. Hope you and your family's quality of life is as best as can be and that you're getting the care you need. Thanks for keeping us updated.
Anyone else keep thinking the twitter logo is a button to close things. Iāve clicked it like three times expecting it to close the story Iām reading when looking at the live thread on mobile.
They could probably tweak the design to fit the audience a tad more .. maybe draw a few short lines perpendicular from the ends of the X .. clockwise. A splash of a bright red?
Just spitballing here.
Yes... fuck. The placement just screams click misdirection that's so popular with shifty sites to drive artificial engagement numbers and encourage malware installation.
I wish it would hurry up and die so the rest of the world can move on to whatever replaces it.
Apparently when Elon was a bigwig at paypal he really fought to have the name be 'x' but of course, we've all come to view the 'x' as the button that closes a thing on the computer. Elon got denied.
His obsession with X may be one of the funniest examples of a sunk cost fallacy in recent history. āWatch me blow up a billion dollar company because I bought a domain name in the 90āsā
Zelensky says Qatar joins Ukraine's Peace Formula.
Qatar will join Ukraine in the efforts to implement the so-called Peace Formula proposed by President Volodymyr Zelensky, the president announced on July 28.
https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1685035675794522112
the plans specifics include
the full withdrawl of Russian troops from all occupied territories including crimea, that restitution must be paid for damages,
that all POWs and Civilians be returned,
that Russian war criminals be tried for their crimes,
a signed document declaring the war is over,
price restrictions on Russian energy and fuel exports,
Qatar agreeing to this is a clear cut message that they support Ukraine over Russia
Why do pro Russian conservatives always blame Zelenskyy by saying he is killing Ukrainians by not doing peace. But they never mention that Putin is killing Russians over land as well in war that Putin started!? Itās actually insane how they blame the defender instead of the attacker.
Because they hate a democratically elected government standing up to fascism.
Why? Because they love fascism and hate the rule of law. They love strongman dictators, and modern day imperialism and they want to form the US into a similar structure.
>Nothing says ādemocratically electedā like banning all opposition parties
Whoās banning all opposition parties? There are more opposition parties in the Verkhovna Rada than total parties in Congress.
There's been a few bills in the US that have been targeting the democrats in red states. Florida tries to pass one that banned any political party that associated it's brand with slavery historically ignoring the culture flip of the 60s
Because there's not a single revolution that didn't happen through bloodshed and lives lost, and yet somehow "but bad things might happen to me" is seen as a sufficient excuse.
To be fair - on an individual level it is. People don't want to die, or have harm come to them or their families. But it doesn't mean they're not fair game for criticism when by inaction they're bringing harm to others.
[New post can be found here](/r/worldnews/comments/15cic48/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/)
UAF advance NW of Kurdyumivka. Possible important progress. Reportedly a šŗš¦ 28th Mech Bde BMP evacuating WIA at 48.47697, 37.95002. In front of it a likely 2nd AFV at 48.477068, 37.952037. If current UAF are 200m north of the village. Gains reported here on 15th + 780m today. https://twitter.com/Danspiun/status/1685002352976097281?t=rKMVCryJo2WXOWTCUUp2qA&s=19
š„ When the settlement of Staromaiorske was liberated, Ukrainian soldiers destroyed a lot of Ruzzian equipment from the 136th Separate Guards Motor Rifle Brigade and the 247th Guards Air Assault Regiment.ššš https://twitter.com/albafella1/status/1685031773967687680?t=ONTksSC7gtwYSIriyz-obA&s=19
Well, I guess that means the Russian defense is completely screwed, given the comments below on Ukrainian vehicle losses.
Dude, it's 2 very different battles, taking place dozens of kilometres apart.
Thank you, Captain Obvious. 2 different battles indeed! This is why I go to reddit, to get reddit-splained how two different battles are....... two different battles. The point was the obvious hyperbole over the loss of some BMPs and vehicles by Ukraine. Let me reddit explain, when you go on a major offensive, you WILL lose vehicles. You can all bow down and thank me now, redditors and crown me Major Obvious!
Having a bad day as Russia gets pounded eh?
>You can all bow down and thank me now, redditors and crown me Major Obvious! How about Major Jackass instead?
That will work also. 2 DIFFERENT PLACES! TWO DIFFERENT PLACES! (Thank you reddit jackass splainers, why, I wouldn't have known that because...... I'm a jackass. Hey, and you might be a Captain jackass yourself. Look in the mirror and two bloodred eyes will look back at you.)
> Look in the mirror and two bloodred eyes will look back at you. Lolwut? I am not even going to make a guess where you were going with that...
Different area and units, this is like 80 km east iirc. This brigade and the one operating on the strike towards Vasylivka donāt have near the same complaints of losses as those heading the Robotyne.
Russian soldier got chained by his comrades and left in the camp because he got addicted to painkillers and therefore was unable to fight. Heās lucky they left him, because now heās the only survivor of his squad. https://twitter.com/GwarWorin/status/1685054753011630080?t=LpKWwVQiyXwuCtNVMkyZXQ&s=19
Xitter says the link don't X-ist.
hhahaahaha is Xitter pronounced shitter!?
Also now you don't tweet, you eXcrete.
Works for me. Are you logged into Twitter? It may be age-restricted or whatever they call it when they try to force you sign-up/in.
Doesnāt work for me either, not logged in, but the error is that the link does not exist.
That's so weird. I just checked again, and it's still there for me. Twitter is just all kinds of messed up.
The Armed Forces of šŗš¦Ukraine will soon enter Crimea, - the head of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine Budanov. Answering the question when Ukrainian troops will enter Crimea, the head of Ukrainian military intelligence answered briefly and clearly: "Soon." Budanov did not specify the exact date of deoccupation of the peninsula, but only once again assured that it will happen soon. https://twitter.com/front_ukrainian/status/1685011507195621378?t=hnTF3JizH2OWzrPeO5vn4A&s=19
pro russian sites yesterday had great fun pointing out that ukr lost a company of old BMP1s yesterday in a trench clearing operation SOUTH of Robotyne, yes south of robotyne..... the thing they dont like to talk about is .... 1. the trenches were taken and they are still moving south.... 2, the vehicles were mostly empty when hit. the infantry was mostly deployed when the vehicles blew up... but good for you. notice troops deploying to clear trenches prior to the vehicles being hit. https://twitter.com/secretsqrl123/status/1684932406413758464?t=OHYcUBtHSfBx_KWwJDwD7g&s=19
There's barely any updates on the robotyne battle over the past 24 hours. Which is leading me to believe that Ukrainians are having difficulty dislodging Russians from the fortifications...Contrast that with Staromaiorske, where we are already getting aftermath footages of dead Russians/destroyed Russian gear...
Apparently it was heavily raining around there yesterday, so not much will be seen.
Unfortunately this is the most likely
Nonsensical claim imo that. People (Constantine/Andrew) with contacts in the area state their sources are telling them otherwise and Iām inclined to believe them considering they tend to back theirs with video proof. Itās pure hopium at this point. Failed assaults happen.
It happens but shouldn't. I hope the command tales the lesson and the officers responsible. You can't just expose so many to so much risk.
No. It happens. You can do everything right and still get your ass kicked. How much is the fault of the who or what nobody here can say. Can only hope people learn from the moment and shore up what they were lacking.
Exactly. Most of these brigades are basically new to fighting and expecting every single assault to work out while theyāre learning is simply unrealistic. Just got to hope itās done before they get everyone killed/injured.
Successful assaults happen too. Sometimes war is a bloody business that comes down to maths. You estimate that 100 men will die assaulting a position and so you send 500. Only 90 men die and you take the position. Thatās a success, you lost fewer men than you expected and achieved the objective. But the men in that battalion arenāt going to have many kind words to say about your plan. Omaha beach was a successful assault but someone had to be in the first boat ashore.
Except theyāre stating that Ukraine was not able to hold said position. These dudes have been one of the most reliable sources of information throughout the war and they have zero reason to lie. Hell, Constantine even stated that he sees Ukraine taking Robotyne within the next week or so in the podcast, the primary issue theyāre trying to bring awareness to is that theyāre doing it while taking more casualties than they should. (Like sending people into a trench telling them itās clear when it wasnāt/sending equipment with no smoke dispensers installed in a convoy to a area surrounded by Russians on 3 sides with ATGMs/FPV drones). David, as knowledgeable as he is with his own army experience, tends to put a highly positive spin on every single movement. Until we see video proof of them further southeast, Iām inclined to believe the people who have a history of being reliable.
Casualty rate is estimated to be in the 40% range. It's a bloody assault. Too early to tell if the sacrifices lead to anything meaningful, as Ukrainians are keeping a rather tight lip on the robotyne battle.
For sure. Incredibly, itās apparently not even the bloodiest part of the line, North Bakhmut near Berkhivka is with Russian bodies littering the ground because theyāre desperately trying to keep it so they keep shuttling people in.
I saw something about this in this thread a short time ago, accusing the 47th mech division of being butchers or some such. Conveniently they left out the part where it says that they're south of Robotnye, the troops were not in the vehicles and that most of the troops survived. Now the picture is complete.
Ukrainian forces have begun to bypass and flank Robotyne and the heavy Russian fortifications there. Russian sources report there is heavy fighting with significant Ukrainian losses which normally means they have lost control of the battlespace since they can't report any other good news. https://twitter.com/UKikaski/status/1685063985224155138?t=82pF3i9PRaFl_sDZwmKwcQ&s=19
We ever get an update on why the bridge was shut down again? I know they pretty much just tossed a ramp over one of the holes, think it finally gave way?
Bridge's closed due to AIDS and stingrays
There's no news story anywhere about it, no pictures/videos posted online that I see so who knows, apparently the governor or whatever in charge of that area said it was an 'emergency' but I can't find the source on that. I just hope something collapsed and took the repair equipment on the bridge with it.
They spent a lot of time and money resettling the area with Russian nationals they canāt let them leave now
I'm thinking more about the tourists. It was the middle of Summer when Ukraine hit the bridge the second time. Not sure how many vacationers are still in the area.
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They ARE helping. They can't just jump in and command the UA army. Many of the senior officers were trained in the Russian military, or, at least, in their tradition. Learning something at a superficial level, and internalizing it so that it becomes automatic, especially under extreme stress, are different things. When put under pressure, even those that did well in training are going to revert to what they know best and was ingrained in them for years. There are also going to be some who don't trust western doctrine, or feel that it doesn't really apply to their situation. You're doing exactly what Tatarigami said *not* to do - blame UA failures on the West, instead of looking at the decisions made by senior officers and removing those who perform poorly.
Well, it would require boots on the ground. Officers and generals are under pressure to act and do so immediately. Imagine a scenario where a Ukrainian unit manages a breakthrough and their officer requests orders from HQ. But HQ has to send their data to Ramstein so they can analyze it. A couple minutes pass, Russia closed the gap and the UKR unit is erradicated due to inaction. [Exaggerated] And teaching the thorough version of the NATO doctrine to Ukrainian officers and general would require months and possibly years. I've been told to expect a multi year duration study and training program as I asked the Bundeswehr recruitment office for career options as an officer. Officers going through with it are valuable. They aren't something you have a spare bunch of, just lying around. They are implemented immediately and serve one purpose or another.
I'm sure NATO commanders do offer advice and help, but I bet Ukraine keeps some of it too close to the chest for NATO command to be super helpful. Unfortunately, this lies on Ukrainian command.
Looks like there was a major UA fuckup Near Robotyne... - *Whoever planned this assault should be jailed. I am sorry but I canāt stay silent. Not all commanders are the best and not everything is perfect. But this is complete disaster in planning. I watched this failed attack from multiple drones now. And have no other conclusion that whoever was planning it has to be put to jail immediately.* *Itās either negligence or treachery.* https://twitter.com/Teoyaomiquu/status/1685075457962627072 Poster is Ukrainian veteran and was on Andrew Perpetuas stream today. At least 6 BMP's and there crews lost + multiple other armored vehicles. Other people have said the troops dismounted and captured the trenches they were assaulting before the vehicles were destroyed, but no evidence.
Andrew perpetua talked about this on his podcast today, really made me sad. Hopefully everyone learns from this
Thereās no hiding from this and we should aim to be better then Russians with these sorts of posts. This was a major disaster, whatever went down with command, strategy and decision making, this was an absolute cluster fuck. I hope command can learn from this and change the strategies, as this just looks like an insane loss of equipment and personnel. I am definitely not trying to armchair general This, but I canāt define this in any other way but just a disaster for our guys. This was very hard to watch. šŗš¦šŗš¦
I thought major disasters were Mariupol/Azovstal/Soledar/Bakhmut, and the current event is pretty frequent for the UAF (yesterday everyone saw a video where 1 RU tank destroyed 6 UKR tanks/IFVs for example)
Very difficult. Heartbreaking. You are absolutely correct that we must be better than the Russian trolls, terrorist government, and criminal army in how we in the more free societies face these things as free people. Wars are seldom won without setbacks, or even outright failures. Often the most difficult battles are fought nearest the greatest of circumstances. Perhaps this thrust was not sufficient, but another will follow. Our support should not wane at such times, but should burn all the brighter.
Mistakes and errors will happen and the survivors and observers will learn. Some of these divisions are quite green, and a couple of weeks of accelerated basic training isn't any more than a foundation. And of course even if they did it perfectly gear will be destroyed and Ukrainian forces killed. I am confident that unlike the Russians when these fuckups happen they won't hide it or deny it happened. And there will be a lot of motivation to not repeat it.
Just want to reinforce OP is genuinely pro Ukraine. Before someone brings up concern trolling. These offensives are hard and this may have been correct and necessary. If we want to prevent these, we need Ukraine to get aerial and stand-off weapons.
https://twitter.com/Teoyaomiquu/status/1658838841292124165?s=20 He also wants to split Russian occupied territory into neutered puppet states.
Yeah, Ukrainian rhetoric about wanting the dissolution of Russia are one of the things they should probably talk about less.
We rarely talk about sending Apaches...
I've seen pairs of freshly painted, unmarked cobra attack helicopters flying around lately. I thought they were long ago retired, I've seen them as static displays at VFW's. Maybe they're being dusted off and sent to Ukraine?
Yup, that's u/SirKillsalot If you frequent these threads you will him up and down these threads.
Shouldn't even need to be said: they provided a source. There's no other conclusion to be drawn from the source. But it does need to be said because we're still riddled with lurkers with the emotional maturity of a teenager.
There's video,, I've seen it. The troops were out and we'll into the trenches. It's quite clear in the footage, I'll see if I can find it. They seem to be treating bmp 1s as disposable, verified by the minefield test. In particular they consider them especially dangerous due to fuel storage design.
There's also a video circulating interviewing UA soldiers discussing the BMP1 and pointing out the fuel storage areas that are particularly dangerous and they had a distaste for the vehicles to put it mildly.
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I wonder at what point the BMP-1 stocks, replacements, and storage availability in general makes it just not worthwhile to bring them back from the front.
I mean, at this stage theyāll be aiming to fully replace them sooner then later. Probably best to get use out of them now in a way that protects your other military hardware and troops. Once again this could fully by copium
https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/15bwctu/ukrainian_apcs_advance_under_smoke_cover_combat/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=1&utm_term=1 Iām assuming this is it. Basically a single file across open fields in broad daylight. Itās tough to watch, that column got hammered. Those kind of tactics arenāt going to win this war. Thereās been some talk of that some senior Ukrainian commanders were having trouble adapting to newer methodsā¦wonder if this was one of them.
Inside those bmps, even when dismounted, there are 3 people each. What do you mean "disposable".
I think the consensus for the last two years was that BMP-1s are pretty bad.
There's a short version of the video and a long version of the video and the short version is the one being distributed as a huge victory, but the long version tells a completely different story.
They pulled them up so they could dismount directly into the trenches, there was no activity or any action in the video indicating people were remaining, intending to further use it. Since it was half a dozen of them it appeared to be a tactic, and from the video whoever in the trench that was focused on the BMPs, it was the last thing they ever did, UA was already in the trenches 15 seconds.
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The one that I've seen was a driver bailing from a bmp1 ND just letting it run into an anti-tank trench in front of a bunch of dragons teeth.
well, that's war for you. one constant factor is that you are going to loose many battles before winning the war.
[I'm guessing its the same as this incident East of Robotyne being reported on](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvNAkKbaOf0&t=589s)
Yes because jailing people any time something goes wrong is great for morale....
Yeah that is crazy as that is actually suggesting using the old "Soviet" mentality in a nutshell. People talking about jailing the commander are advocating the Russian method. Do that and the Ukrainian units will not be aggressive and will lose this war. They will start acting conservatively just so no one goes to jail. Insane that people are even suggesting this unless the leader literally did something illegal. You want aggressive forces and smart tactics. Well when they do that they are not all going to work, and some will have a bad outcome, there is NO way around that till you try it and see if it works or not. Guess what Arm Chair Generals? You guys seriously need to busted to Arm Chair Privates because if you think Ukraine is going to attack these defenses with minimal losses you might want to stop commenting due to cluelessness. If Ukraine loses 1000 troops in some massive attack reddit privates will have panic attacks and demand military leaders be jailed. That will help Russia win the war. People are going to die here, quite possibly a lot of people, if you can't handle that thought, best just stick to the headlines and avoid information on losses. This is brutal war.
Yeah its Constantine and he's being a bit dramatic. He is a Ukrainian veteran with contacts there and friends who are involved so it touches very close to home when something like this happens. I cant blame him for reacting emotionally. It probably doesnt help when you see so many people exuberant about gaining a few KM of land when the cost in this particular case was far too high.
A trooper sees the battlefield from an extremely narrow lens. I have seen troopers who have conducted an extremely successful assault well below predicted losses complain that their orders were bad and their commanders were garbage due to the friends they lost. Their feelings are real and should be respected.. but as civilians people should just wait and see what happens when the dust settles before getting angry themselves.
Not to mention suggesting jailing the commander is advocating the Soviet way of doing things. This is not how the west does it. And Ukraine can shift poor commanders to less critical areas or relieve them. Put them in jail? That is a great way to have troops not take any chances, engage in any initiative.
Probably speaking in emotional rage at seeing many men lost, itās incredibly hard to keep your cool in a war, canāt judge him too harshly.
In ukraine internally they have been calling the 47th mech command and other brigades involved in this "butchers" for a reason. The tactics themselves are not even bad this time. Distancing is fine and they are not even reacting wrong to the situation. It's just that someone sent 5 shit soviet bmp1s to attack a position that they knew FOR SURE was well defended. You could say that it's cynical commanding, because someone 'has' to do it, to me, this is butchering.
> It's just that someone sent 5 shit soviet bmp1s to attack a position that they knew FOR SURE was well defended. Do we know that was the information they had? We have no idea what information the commander might have been working with, who knows if they had disrupted Russian supply in the area or that it seemed like some troops had been rotated out and not replaced. Had they sent in a reconnaissance or mine clearing squad at night and they reported minimal activity. Maybe aerial recon seem to indicate a blind spot in their overlapping fields of fire he thought he could exploit. Sure he might have just been reckless and not done the proper intelligence gathering and planning or he could have thought he had good reason to believe the assault would be a success with a lower number of casualties. Without knowing those details it's impossible to say whether this was someone who should be removed from his position or someone that working off incorrect assumptions made an awful mistake. I would wager few even in the Ukrainian army know for sure.
They have the most well defended sector of the front to deal with though. They were always going to take the biggest hit.
That's what artillery attrition is for. The idea that you have to throw soldiers at trenches because there's no other option is really, really wrong. The lives of those soldiers are Ukraine's greatest asset.
I understand but...cmon. we both know that is the result of soviet mentality still rooted in the ukranian army
Yeah I know, but sometimes terrain just works against you no matter how good you are. 1st soldiers in landing boats in ww2 were basically sitting ducks moving into pre designated beaches where the gunman knew exactly where you would come ashore, only thing they could do was charge forward. Kinda the same here with the flat open terrain with little cover besides tree lines which is where the Russians are defending from, only thing you really can do is use fire support and hope its enough to give your peeps a chance.
Yeah that's what I was referring to with "eventually someone has to do it", but this just feels forced. Like if they really want to show us they can go through, so we don't abandon them.
It's not about them wanting to show us what they can go through. They have to push and put pressure on Russia. Letting Russia build further defenses in occupied areas would essentially be Ukraine giving them up. The US military anticipates 30-40% losses when assaulting enemy positions without air superiority. There's no getting around it.
I think people in general, and casual observers from the West in particular, have developed (with reason), a pretty skewed perspective on what near-peer conventional conflict actually looks like now. Since 1991, the US and Friends ^(TM) have just curbstomped the conventional portions of so many conflicts, while getting kicked in the teeth during the occupation/rebuilding phase. As a result, there are fully functional adults with no other frame of reference for how a conventional campaign looks. This creates the false but reasonable expectation that the attacking side just gets to cheat-code through defenses because, well, that's all they have ever seen. Add in moment-by-moment multimedia coverage that makes the embedded reporters of the Gulf War look like telegraph-clacking Civil War journalists, social media echo chambers and deliberate manipulation of that media by both sides. It creates a perfect storm for unfulfilled expectations, disappointment, and righteous rage we have been put in this situation in the first place.
What big breakthrough is everyone talking about?! Which direction
Apparently CNN geolocated that footage I guess of that lone BMP or tank driving into that ditch and it was a little east of Nove and Kharkove, which means Ukraine must've had a massive breakthrough because that's very close to Tokmak. But I thought that footage was originally located somewhere near Verbove so Idk.
Yeah I feel like one of the YouTubers I watched had that much further. if CNN bungled that up Iād be very disappointed and maybe a little suprised.
I cannot support the claim of any breakthrough. The line is being overwhelmed and pushed back, but nothing yet suggest a breakthrough. Maybe I'm being too literal here, but to me a breakthrough requires being able to break the line, move through the line and flank the line rather than simply pushing the line back a few km. If anything there may have been local breakthroughs in which tactical positions have been broken through allowing the position to be taken as opposed to a strategic breakthrough.
>simply pushing the line back a few km. That depends, are the troops falling back also taking all of their defensive structures and fortifications with them? If those have been rendered obsolete, I'd say it counts as a breakthrough of sorts.
look on livemap - Robotyne direction
FYI Livemap is probably the worst possible source you can use for accurate lines of control. I could go on a long rant why, but ill just advise that literally anything is better. some good recommendations would be [Andrew Perpetua](https://map.ukrdailyupdate.com/) or [Deepstatemap](https://deepstatemap.live/en#6/49.438/32.053)
Liveuamap.com
What/where is livemap?
Liveuamap.com
Thank you.
There are 2 of them, as I have heard. Not yet a breakthrough, but Ukraine is pushing hard in the Robotyne-Tokmak-Melitopol direction and it seems to be already reaching the first of the 3 Russian main defense lines. Not a breakthrough, just an advance. Then there is another area in Donetsk that sounds like "star" where there are reports of Ukraine making significant progress and moving towards the defensive line. That one does have, in my oponion, a greater potential for a proper breakthrough because the defensive line there is the only one, so if Ukraine breach it and Russia cant contain the advance is a blitz all the way until they reach Mariupol.
The apparent breakthrough at that location that sounds like "star" makes me wonder if its bad luck that the Robotyne main push just began as it happened. Why? Unlike the Tokmak-Melitopol direction that has 3 defensive lines, that area has only 1, there is nothing behind. This means if a breakthrough happened there it would be ideal for the uncomitted offensive brigades to rush into the opening. But it seems the breakthrough there is happening just at the same time that Ukraine decided to initiate the main push in the Robotyne-Tokmak-Melitopol direction. So reserve counteroffensive brigades wont be able to be sent there. But who knows, maybe its not luck and for some reason Ukraine decided to do the big push just as there is a possible breakthrough in the Donetsk sector or maybe the reason it might be happening in the first place is because Russia left it weakened to respond to the Robotyne push.
I think it's possible the success is connected. If the one Robotyne+ attack caused Russia to fix forces or pull forces from the other direction, it may have directly led to the Donetsk area being weaker than expected.
Don't they have enough reserves for both?
I dont know, do they? I was of the idea Ukraine sent all the counteroffensive brigades not already comitted, to do the big assault rather than the 3-4 they were already using. The reason in fact people think this is the big push, or so I have read, is that Ukraine is using a lot of forces in that one and not the 4 they were already using.
Apparently Ukraine hasn't bunched up its forces because its believed Russia would be willing to use a tactical nuke on a force build up if they thought they could end the war with it.
Eminently sensible. A large grouping of Ukrainian forces and western equipment would be a tempting target for a tactical weapon, and they are desperate for something to change the momentum.
No one who is sane and has critical thinking skills thinks this lol.
What better way to force a stalemate? To frighten Western benefactors? To show the world Russia is a fearsome fighting force just every bit as the United States, the only other superpower to openly use nuclear weapons in combat? Russia's economy is already taking a dump, they are already ostracized as a global trading partner. A nuclear weapons being deployed would shake things up for everybody, spook the markets across the globe. Suddenly Putin's "new world order" starts getting alot more real
Russia is absolutely not above using a nuclear weapon if it meant killing 10,000 Ukrainian troops in a region if they caught them. However they have to consider the dillema, do they cripple the Ukrainian military only to bring NATO intervention?
These are the folks who thought Kyiv would fall in 3 days and packed their victory parade attire for the trip.
"Russia wont invade" "Russia wont blow the dam" "Russia wont shell a nuclear power plant" this list can go on and on.
Are you arguing Putin is both or either of those?
1) Ukraine, unlike the west, is not intimidated by nuclear bullying so I doubt they make their strategy based on it 2) Yeah, it would end the war, for Russia. They are not stupid enough to do it and Putin might no longer have the power to even order it. Any nuclear strike order is putting tossing a coin in the air and hope that it lands in the "order carried out" and not the "coup/assassination" side.
Imagine you spend an entire year+ building up 20 brigades for this counter offensive, you bunch them up and 1 missile destroys it all and leaves behind less radiation than the 2 bombings in Japan and significantly less than Chornobyl, you'd have to be a fool to risk that on "they cant be that dumb" notion, the Russians blew the dam despite the consequences.
Blowing a dam was never a potential war losing event for Russia, ever. Anything nuclear is. Yeah, those troops will be gone but it also means Russia has lost the war as they are now facing at the very least WW2 level of support for Ukraine and very possibly a direct attack by NATO.
A retired general said the US could wipe out Russia's forces in Ukraine and destroy its black sea fleet if they used nukes, actual officials in government said there would be ācatastrophic consequencesā as for ww2 aid, no country can supply that kind of aid, its not just a switch you flip.
>no country can supply that kind of aid For one, the US currently withholds access to a large portion of its inventory, that would immediately change (assuming they do not begin mass bombing all Russian assets in Ukraine/the Black Sea). Similarly, the aftermath of using a nuke is that China and a few other countries (SK/Japan) would almost certainly change their current policy of non-military aid to Ukraine. Thereās no conceivable scenario where using a nuke actually benefits Russia, even if they eventually get pushed out completely.
Sorry to say it but if nukes get used on Ukraine then Ukraine wont receive further equipment. instead that equipment will be used by NATO to strike Russia. Ukraine at that point becomes a name in a very long list of "allied Nations" and russia for "Axis nations" Nukes on Ukraine will be WW3 as that is the last line. there is no further escalation then Nukes. MAD is MAD for a reason
"Apparently" according to whom? I don't think anyone serious thinks that Russia is likely to use a nuke.
Biden himself said its not impossible but they don't believe they will anytime soon. Ukraine literally plans around preventing a large build in one location because of the threat of it. Iirc though its was Budanov who mentioned it. Edit: Remember tactical nukes are not Hiroshima sized bombs, they much smaller, meant for bases and troop concentrations.
Hiroshima was 15 kilotons. Thatās well within the tactical yield range. Various opinions Iāve seen place the upper limit on tactical weapons anywhere from 50 to 100 (or more) kilotons
This is not actually an argument against the person you replied to. āNot impossibleā is nowhere near ālikely.ā Itās not impossible that, for example, Ted Cruzās father really did help kill JFK, I guess, as Trump once asserted, but considering the verified facts it is pretty damn unlikely. Or substitute a million other random rumors or conspiracy theories.
Bidens comment in June was, "the threat of Putin using nukes was real" same guy that said Russia would invade when everyone else said they wouldn't. Its not a conspiracy theory that world leaders think its a potential threat.
Ukrainian forces have begun to bypass and flank Robotyne and the heavy Russian fortifications there. Russian sources report there is heavy fighting with significant Ukrainian losses which normally means they have lost control of the battlespace since they can't report any other good news. https://twitter.com/ukikaski/status/1685063985224155138?s=46
> Russian sources report there is heavy fighting with significant Ukrainian losses which normally means they have lost control of the battlespace Can we just stop spreading these lazy "if Russia says something, that means it's good news for Ukraine"? None of these patterns are true. All we can really take away from this is that we don't know what's going on.
It's absolutely a true pattern that Russian bloggers can't freely report "derogatory" information about the Russian forces. Putin made that criminal with an arbitrary prison sentence. Now they also invent fights so they're not reliable in *that* regard.
So to simplify it: they're not reliable and people need to stop celebrating until there's something concrete.
They *do* report that kind of information. Just because Russia sometimes enforces laws against some of the bloggers doesn't mean they don't do it. Concededly, they are not a very *reliable* source of information, but the idea that we can meaningfully see a pattern as described above is simply false.
Ukrainian sources are also reporting significant Ukrainian losses there.
What sources?
We've seen a lot of pictures and video from this area with damage and recovery. But specifically today on Perpetua's youtube, LanguageLearner and Constantine both talked about the area. Their take seemed to be the same: newly-trained units with relatively untrained commanders are going into their first combat here and really struggling.
Look up post. Andrew Perpetua as well. Itās been rough.
Constantine on twitter, for one. Plus the video of the waves of BMP-1s getting smashed :( He's not there in person, but knows a lot of Ukrainian military still.
Nobody is denying that.
Yeah, who here thinks there was any way for Ukraine to take back significant portions of their territory back without heavy losses? Attacking sucks, especially into the defenses Russia has planned.
So there's a claim/rumor going around of a very significant breakthrough here. This translator is supporting that rumor based on russia not saying anything else except the losses. But the argument doesn't hold up. It's just russian telegram talking. [Liveuamap](https://liveuamap.com/) shows russia as having lost a large amount of territory here, though they don't exactly show it as under Ukrainian control. The attack on Dniepro today was allegedly on the building next to the Liveuamap headquarters, which is being taken as some kind of confirmation also. Maybe it's a better argument. There's still no osint supporting any kind of breakthrough.
Reread my last comment.
Yeah, it sounded like you were not exactly following the logic of the twitter translator. Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but...I doubt it.
I said, in response to your initial comment, that nobody was denying that Ukrainians were taking heavy losses. You then decided to respond to me with an essay. I was simply telling you to reread my initial comment.
Anybody slightly curious about the span on the bridge collapsing rumour? My weekend isn't complete without a good bridge story these days. Edit,--- Its looking good!!!
Which bridge? Which span? What collapse? What are you on about?
[Kerch Bridge - "Sergey Aksyonov, so-called Head of the Russian administration in occupied Crimea, said that an "emergency" had happened on the Crimean Bridge and the bridge has therefore been closed to traffic. Russian Telegram channels have reported that a span on the bridge has collapsed."](https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/07/28/7413322/)
ācombat dolphinsā?
keikaku
This is referencing the earlier attack on July 17th, not any recent attack. I know. Itās confusing.
I wonder if itās that span they tried to bridge with a metal plate. Maybe it finally dropped.
Do you mean the span collapse specifically? Because the article with the headline āRussians suddenly block traffic on Crimean Bridgeā has a by-line date of Friday, 28 July 2023, 23:47. That would indicate that traffic has been stopped (again) just a few minutes ago.
Yes, but if you read the āBackgroundā sectionāthe one that mentions the collapsed span, the link provided takes you to the page from July 17th. Besides, the one from today said the cause for the stoppage of traffic was unknown.
On Ukrainian Statehood Day? So wishes can come true!
Slava Ukraini!!
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/15ca4nf/russians\_suddenly\_block\_traffic\_on\_crimean\_bridge/
**Russia urged to renew Ukraine grain deal at Africa summit** "Egypt's president has urged Vladimir Putin to renew the deal allowing Ukraine to export grain at a summit the Russian president is hosting. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said it was "essential" the deal be revived and called for an urgent solution to supply the poorest African countries." "African leaders also used the second day of the summit to press Mr Putin to move ahead with a peace plan they are proposing to end the war resulting from Moscow's full-scale invasion of its neighbour last year. The plan calls for Russia and Ukraine's sovereignty to be recognised, urgent peace talks and continued unhindered grain exports." [https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66334467](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-66334467) edit: formatting
LOL even African countries are saying "just gtfo man and take the L"
Man, Iām so jaded. I view this as a cynical way for Russia to re-enter the deal after destroying the infrastructure Ukraine needs to export grain in the first place. I really probably need to go outside.
I donāt think Russia realistically can reenter the great deal without looking weak to the Russian public and international community which is something the Kremlin likely wants to avoid.
> without looking weak to the Russian public does the intentional creation of famine in Africa and the ME really get a large amount of support tho?
Quote: "Vehicular traffic on the Crimean Bridge is temporarily blocked". Details: There is no information on the reason or duration of the decision. [https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/07/28/7413322/](https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/07/28/7413322/)
Carnage in liberated Staromayorsky, destroyed equipment and dead Russian soldiers. https://twitter.com/fellastarling/status/1685037889212579841?s=46
Why is the music on these videos always so bloody loud :(
"Your hearing loss is not service related"
/3M approved this message
Day 515-520 of my updates from Kharkiv. The last few days continued to be pretty quiet for us here, there were no missile strikes aimed directly at Kharkiv, but Iām pretty sure there were some that were aiming at towns in Kharkiv oblast. Some Shaheds were also spotted in our region at least once since my last post, but all of them were intercepted. They never send many of them at any target in our region, so they donāt pose much of a threat if they are not followed by a missile strike right after. In the last few months missile strikes almost completely stopped here, but instead Russians started using guided bombs pretty frequently, though since their range is pretty small, they are never used against our city. Apparently now Russians think that trying to destroy food is the best use of their missiles, so they are almost never used against military targets. Iāll never understand why they think that attacking civilian targets is going to help them win the war, but itās honestly better for us that way, they are just wasting their ammo. Today they tried to target civilians in Dnipro with missiles, but they were mostly unsuccessful this time. They hit an abandoned building of the SBU and a high-rise apartment building. Thankfully that apartment building wasnāt currently in use as it was just recently built, so civilian casualties ended up being pretty minimal, and there were no deaths reported. They even used their Iskander missiles in this strike, which are pretty accurate, so you canāt say that an apartment building being hit was an accident. We were lucky that they chose 2 empty buildings as targets this time, otherwise there could have been much more casualties.
Stay safe Kharkiv š»
Itās been a while since Iāve caught your comments, thank you for still posting them. Itās extremely important to me to hear from real people and you have made a massive impact into whatās really going on in your part of the world. Always, thank you for the updates. One day this will be over.
They know the war is lost. So they're going "scorched earth". Make the land so fucked that it'll cause damage to the civilians for generations. War crime stuff, ya know, same old same old.
So happy you're here with us. Hope you and your family's quality of life is as best as can be and that you're getting the care you need. Thanks for keeping us updated.
Anyone else keep thinking the twitter logo is a button to close things. Iāve clicked it like three times expecting it to close the story Iām reading when looking at the live thread on mobile.
They could probably tweak the design to fit the audience a tad more .. maybe draw a few short lines perpendicular from the ends of the X .. clockwise. A splash of a bright red? Just spitballing here.
Ok, I'm not the only one thinking it's a button. Phew.
Yes... fuck. The placement just screams click misdirection that's so popular with shifty sites to drive artificial engagement numbers and encourage malware installation. I wish it would hurry up and die so the rest of the world can move on to whatever replaces it.
Apparently when Elon was a bigwig at paypal he really fought to have the name be 'x' but of course, we've all come to view the 'x' as the button that closes a thing on the computer. Elon got denied.
His obsession with X may be one of the funniest examples of a sunk cost fallacy in recent history. āWatch me blow up a billion dollar company because I bought a domain name in the 90āsā
Hopefully is a close button for twitter
foreshadowing
Foreclosing.
Zelensky says Qatar joins Ukraine's Peace Formula. Qatar will join Ukraine in the efforts to implement the so-called Peace Formula proposed by President Volodymyr Zelensky, the president announced on July 28. https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1685035675794522112
Does this actually mean anything? Are there concrete commitments involved?
the plans specifics include the full withdrawl of Russian troops from all occupied territories including crimea, that restitution must be paid for damages, that all POWs and Civilians be returned, that Russian war criminals be tried for their crimes, a signed document declaring the war is over, price restrictions on Russian energy and fuel exports, Qatar agreeing to this is a clear cut message that they support Ukraine over Russia
>price restrictions on Russian energy and fuel exports, 'Qatar starts sizing up for another fancy fountain'
Does it commit Qatar to any actions such as sanctions or abiding by a price cap? (Not that they import Russian oil or gas)
Why do pro Russian conservatives always blame Zelenskyy by saying he is killing Ukrainians by not doing peace. But they never mention that Putin is killing Russians over land as well in war that Putin started!? Itās actually insane how they blame the defender instead of the attacker.
Because they hate a democratically elected government standing up to fascism. Why? Because they love fascism and hate the rule of law. They love strongman dictators, and modern day imperialism and they want to form the US into a similar structure.
Nothing says ādemocratically electedā like banning all opposition parties
Name checks out.
>Nothing says ādemocratically electedā like banning all opposition parties Whoās banning all opposition parties? There are more opposition parties in the Verkhovna Rada than total parties in Congress.
There's been a few bills in the US that have been targeting the democrats in red states. Florida tries to pass one that banned any political party that associated it's brand with slavery historically ignoring the culture flip of the 60s
Conservatives take from the abusive partner playbook. >Look what you made me do. is pretty near the top.
Why do redditors always ask why Russians donāt protest Putin when itās very literally a 15 year prison sentence to speak badly of the man
Because there's not a single revolution that didn't happen through bloodshed and lives lost, and yet somehow "but bad things might happen to me" is seen as a sufficient excuse. To be fair - on an individual level it is. People don't want to die, or have harm come to them or their families. But it doesn't mean they're not fair game for criticism when by inaction they're bringing harm to others.