Thanks for pointing that out. The ruble is still worth more than the yen. It’s all relative.
That’s a good reason to make the story up from whole cloth.
Yes, thanks. So thats 1 ruble is worth 1.3 cents to 1 ruble is worth 0.9 cents. Checks with my numbers. But it is a little more informative (to me) the way you wrote it, as rubles to the dollar.
Fear, Uncertainly and Doubt also affects tyrants. Maybe even more than regular people.
If Putin thinks there are rats in his organization, there’s a good chance he’ll go on a purge rampage to try to eliminate them - which just makes it more likely that someone will off him to save themselves.
This thing isn’t going to be won or lost on the battlefield. Ultimately, it’s a war in the mind of one person.
Well there are certainly a lot of people who want to help Putin expand his mind.
True or not, it will likely distract a few of Putin’s brain cells from Ukraine to internal dissention problems.
It was nice to see the Ukrainian ambassador being saluted in the State of the Union address, and Biden just announced that Russian aircraft are not going to be allowed in the US.
Sure. However, this only works for simple jobs… and simple weapons.
That second vehicle is actually a 2S3 self-propelled howitzer. That’s a hell of a thing to just leave behind.
What could be more simple than an AK-47 (or variant)? That’s the whole point.
Then the answer to the question “is the West doing everything it can?” is yes. We ARE sending simple weapons that could be used by an insurgency.
From my reading, it sounds like the principal defense that Ukraine has against Russian air offense is about 600 S300 missile system rockets.
Any thoughts on how effective that’s liable to prove if Russia decides to send everything in to level Kyiv, Kharkov, etc.? Do we know if they’re still there, or if they’ve all been used?
From The Guardian:
Russia president Vladimir Putin has signed a decree to prohibit Russians from leaving the country with more than $10,000 in foreign currency , Russia state media outlet TASS reports.
Where exactly are they going to go, and how are they going to get there? The middle east? China? When a Russian plane leaves Russian airspace, where exactly can they fly and land?
Well, Ukraine is equipped with largely Russian aircraft. They abandoned using them in the Donbas war, because it seemed that Russian aircraft didn’t really have a useful defense against Russian SAM systems, so air power was negated. I’ve seen it speculated (and it’s the only believable reason I’ve seen) that would explain why Russia still does not have air superiority in this war after 6 days - they seem to know that their aircraft are vulnerable to the systems in Ukraine’s possession and have used them carefully as a result.
Now, if they decided that Ukraine was an existential war for them, I could see them risking their entire air force to take out the SAM systems in Ukraine. But, there’s no way this is an existential war for them, and they don’t even seem willing to pit their few stealth F/A against Ukraine’s SAM systems. I suspect that 600 S300s * 4 missiles = 2400 potential losses (yes, it would never be that perfect). That is potentially enough to make Russia’s air force pretty much useless, even if they only knock down 600 aircraft.
It’s 600 missiles, not 600 launchers. (Sorry, I’ll find my cite once I’m home again.)
Ok, so 150 aircraft lost as a proposition. I still can’t see them happily eating that amount of losses short of an existential war at this point.
Probably I should have found my cite before asking the question. I’m horrible at correctly recalling specifics (and horrible at remembering that).
Funny how all that hand-wringing about supplying Ukraine with weapons didn’t make a lick of difference in Russia’s decision to invade.
A question: I’ve seen “organic” used specifically in reference to radar and defense systems three times in the last few days now. From the article:
A properly integrated air defense network shouldn’t rely solely on the organic radars of its missile units.
It seems to mean something like “built-in” or perhaps “moving as part of the same battle group”, but I can’t tell for sure. Anyone know?
Yeah, I wouldn’t want to fly (heh, not a pilot, anyway) in an environment the size of Texas with 250 S-300 systems looking for me unless I was in a very stealthy craft. Running “Wild Weasel” on one seems like it would be impossible without a stealth craft. Those systems can see far, and depending on the missiles they’re armed with they can shoot far. I can’t find any info on how many reloads they have, but that seems to explain the lack of a concerted air war from Russia at the moment.
“I am making out the report now. We haven’t quite decided yet whether he committed suicide or died trying to escape.”
I think airlines are still flying from Russia to Dubai, for example, from which one can fly practically anywhere in the world.