BamaATL

If ever there was a country and a group of dumbfucks to pull a "Weekend at Bernie's", it's Russia.

I don't know the answer to that, perhaps someone with international law does. What I do know, is that while Russia has specifically targeted, in the case of the Zaporizhaia NPP take, and effected energy, I haven't heard anyone call that a war crime. Then again, Russia has committed so many war crimes, it's hard to keep track of all of it.

Counter point, there is no Ukrainian political will lost by ceding a few miles of bombed out area in the Donbas they are likely to have to cede in a diplomatic resolution. However, Russia losing half an Oblast could certainly effect the political will within Russia. In my opinion, the scales don't balance.

I'll never forget the time he ruined the Academy Awards.

Another interesting aspect to all this is that NATO estimates the Kursk invasion group consists of 6k of front line troops, and 4k of logistics people. Grabbing such a large swath of land with so little is incredibly well done. There were rumors floating around that the Ukrainians had managed to hold back almost 3k of some combination of heavy wheeled vehicles, tracked vehicles, etc. Assuming that NATO numbers to be correct, even if the dipped into that pool of 3k, I doubt it's much, maybe 1k. That would in theory leave the other 2k for any potential other moves. Beyond an incursion into Belogrod, I just don't see anything that immediately stands out. The Ukrainains may well save the reserves for later, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if we get another surprise in the next week or so. There is still about a month or so before the mud.

Oh good heavens, don't let @Brisketexan get in on this, we will wind up with a Lifetime after dark featuring Possum Man.

Great, now the Travel Channel will run a full season on Possum Man.

I'd prefer it if he were having a discussion about Ralph's involving this guy.

In the event it wasn't clear, the Ukrainians are taking Kursk south of the Seym

Bridge Strike

I remember from a while back after the Ukrainians initially got the HIMARs one of the operators in a video mentioned that they were hiding in old Soviet built hardened bunkers, and shortly thereafter there was article detailing this. Anyway, in the article, from what I remember from reading it, when the Soviet Union collapsed, a lot of the record keeping was done in each administrative district, and as a result a lot stuff never wound up going back to Russia. The Ukrainians, either with great foresight or just as a matter of policy, kept all this well organized, whereas the Russia's either didn't wind up with much in the way of records from the breakaway republics, or never really bothered with keeping them centrally in the first place (another possibility is that they have the records, it's just never been dealt with). This could explain why the Ukrainians know where all these bunkers are in Ukraine (and perhaps Kursk, given the proximity) and why the Russians don't. If you recall, when the Russians first invaded, many of the troops were found with road maps that dated back to the 60s, which doesn't exactly bode well for a lot of things, but record keeping of any type stands out. At any rate, this may well be a large part of their secret sauce when it comes to logistics. As I mentioned earlier, the Soviets were clearly very concerned with end world stuff and from what I understand, every town pretty much has these sort of hardened underground bunkers, many of the villages with more than one. The assumption that the Russians would know where all these sort of facilities are in Kursk may well be backwards. If that is in fact the case, it would potentially give the Ukrainians the ability to stage their logistics in forward areas easier than we are thinking.

That's a great question, I would presume a combination of preparation, i.e. fortifications and supply caches within them, and then as they can. It's not something covered a ton, probably because it doesn't involve explosions and what not, but it's what wins. I'm sure part of the reason we don't see much of this is for protective purposes, and I'm sure there is some level of secret sauce to it. The one interesting aspect to all this is that apparently, the Soviets were more scared of end times than we ever were. All thru Ukraine, there are fortified underground bunkers pretty much everywhere, so many, that there aren't even accurate records of where they all are (The Ukrainians have admitted they use those for Himars hosting, I would imagine logistics as well). I'm gonna presume that this is also true in much of Russia, including the Kursk region. I've already seen that the Ukrainians have seized some of these, including there weapons and tech, and those are probably just the ones they know about.

Long story short, they really don't in active combat areas, or if they do its really slow. If you notice in all the rural areas of Ukraine, all the paved roads and railroads are elevated for to prevent this from being a problem under ordinary circumstances. However, in the combat zone, or rather within in drone range, paved roads may as well be death sentences for anyone traveling on them as they are under constant surveillance. So basically everything slows to a crawl. I remember watching the Ukrainians doing training with the Bradleys in the mud, basically it's a total quagmire. So heavy vehicles, heavy equipment, etc, aren't going to fair well. Lighter off road vehicles can get thru this sort of stuff with major difficulty, but obviously that means they can't haul nearly as much.

There are so many problems with that article and this "negotiation". 1st - Since when are the Qatari's the authority on human rights negotiation? These guys killed thousands to have some soccer games. 2nd - Russia is a consistent bad faith actor (see the grain deal) 3rd - even if the power brokers realize that their biggest cash cow, oil and gas, is now in tremendous peril, any negotiating prompted by these guys could be overridden. Why should the Ukrainians even bother?

I saw footage yesterday of an F-16 intercepting a Shaheed with it's gun, but it was quickly pulled down, in fact so quickly it was deleted before I could even post it. I'm not surprised they are keeping a pretty good lid on their usage.

Once they sober him up, might be a good source of intel Oh who am I kidding.

The subtitle of every Russian history book reads, "and then it got worse." I wouldn't count on the next guy being any better, if history tells us anything with them, there is a greater chance he is more of a psycho.

Unfortunately, Putin isn't a glitch in Russian history, he's more of the same.

This just seems sort of fitting

It's starting to strongly look like Russia will retreat from everything south of the Seym in Kursk, this includes the Nuclear Plant. It occurred to me that if the Ukrainians take the plant, and turn it off, Belogorad will be largely without power. The would obviously affect a lot things, but the big one we may have missed was the ability to get fuel to the Russian units in Kharkiv. Basically, without the trains working effectively, no diesel gets to the front, or what little does isn't enough. If they can do this prior to winter, the Russian army in that area will be stuck, and not just starve from lack of food, but also lack of fuel.

Well, Putin did say he wanted "buffer zones", between Ukrainian bridge destruction and now Russian, looks like he will get it.

Another bridge down in Kursk

My guess is that just with FPV drones the Russians are fish in a barrel there. While not listed on that map, those fields of fire are by my estimation artillery ranges. So it comes down to ammo.

Gee wiz, that looks like a lot of fields of fire for the Russians to advance into, but hey, WSJ.