Does anyone know if that convoy is STILL there? Have the Russians just basically abandoned that equipment now, and are relying on long distance artillery or rockets to blow things up in Kyiv?
Found the article, in the Washington Post; may be paywalled.
I meant “lasted” in the sense of didn’t get attacked and dispersed, not that it took that long to traverse that distance.
Yeah, I saw a Twitter post about where the Russians had issued their troops their equivalent of MREs with expiration dates in 2015.
Not only is that a pretty massive logistical fail to issue stuff that’s seven years out of date, but it’s not like the troops are illiterate. It’s got to be demoralizing to get expired food issued at the START of an operation.
I’ve read plenty of accounts of some nasty MRE entree choices, or of units being served the same thing for weeks on end in the US military, but I can’t say I’ve read about anyone being issued expired rations.
So it appears there’s a little bit more depth to that story. I can’t dig up the Twitter thread right now, but some OSINT folks are posting some pretty convincing images suggesting that many of these trucks show obvious signs of neglect.
Vehicles that aren’t in use need to be exercised every few weeks. They need to be cranked, turned a different way toward the sun, lubed, systems powered on. They need to bechecked for dry-rot, rust, loss of electrical charge, condensation, insect nesting, etc. These are easy, inexpensive ways to maintain a high state of readiness, and there are signs that they weren’t done at all in many cases.
This goes back to a common-knowledge observation that the Russian army, being mainly short-term conscripts, never developed a strong corps of non-commissioned officers. The NCO corps is the real backbone of an army. Keep troops trained, fed, ready, motivated, and paying attention to detail. An army without a good NCO corps doesn’t do boring maintenance chores. They don’t train thoroughly on their equipment, they don’t master their craft, they’re not even good at feeding themselves.
A bogged down convoy full of broken-down trucks with flat tires is exactly what you would expect to see from an army of junior conscripts without a good backbone of career NCOs. One wonders how many such readiness-related time bombs are lurking in the Russian army.
Missed the edit window, but I found that Twitter thread. Trent Telenko is a good follow. tl;dr vehicular assets of Russian forces are evidently in a bad state of neglect. Tire supply will become a critical bottleneck to their advance soon, if not yesterday.
For this reason, Russian forces that normally could operate off-road, will be road-bound for the next 4-6 weeks and possibly beyond due to mud season in northern UKR. This is why southern forces are making more progress.
People who are civilians and/or leg infantry may be surprised at such a “little” detail being so important. But anyone who has spent much time in mechanized/highly mobile units understand that >50% of time is spent on vehicle care and maintenance. It’s simply the lifeblood of such a unit. Whether you pull triggers or patch wounds, half of your job is being a mechanic (if you have good NCOs who are doing their jobs). To see this level of neglect is shocking, and honestly a little bit sad. These boys have been utterly failed by their leadership.
A completely different age, but much of this discussion reminded me of this road trip!
I also read (sorry no quote, so take it as “I read it on the internet”) … that the full attack force is already in ukraine (as opposed to the 80% number hovering around) … with the remaining 20% being malfunctionin equipment that did not even make it into Ukr.
They’ll join the fight once AAA shows up.
Actually, Russia has really failed on the AAA and SAM front, but that seems to be changing. I’m not sure what the real issue was, but it seems a lot of their forward-deployed air defense stuff was just sitting around with the equipment shut down for some odd reason…and a lot of it got hammered. They seem to be learning tactics and operational procedures as they go along, again, for some odd reason (they should know all of this already). They do seem to be starting to get their act together now though…unfortunately for the Ukrainians. Though there are real systemic issues here, so, getting their act together might not actually be all that feasible.
I meant AAA, not AA.
As in the American Automobile Association, to change some tires and jump start some tanks. Maybe open up an APC or two that have the keys locked inside.
And, yes, I meant it facetiously.
AAA == Anti Aircraft Artillery
Sorry, I totally missed the joke. AAA is also Anti-Aircraft Artillery, as gnoitall points out in the next post, and that’s what I thought you were talking about. 
So, the AAA blows an enemy jet fighter to smithereens, then the AAA comes in and gives them a jump-start.
Ukraine says it has attacked the column; official Pentagon official says can’t comment on intel matters; unofficial Pentagon official says there are some indications Ukraine forces have attacked the column.
Instructions unclear; attempting to jump-start my truck with a missile.
An interesting read.