Russians will have a hard time moving anything outside roads as soon as the soil thaw. The rasputitsa (mud season) is 3 feet deep of mud in everything that is not paved.
The era of the tank may be over. Tanks seem to be far more burden than blessing, being a hog of resources and maintenance.
OP here.
It just occurred to me here that the flip side of OP is at some levels equally important:
What new weapons/weapons tactics have the Russions not so far introduced in Ukraine?
… obviously excluding strategic nukes (although OP has “… so far,” God forbid some sort of nuke/radiation will be posted here).
What comes to my mind first, at its low level of knowledge/security clearance of equipment and technique, is the S-400 SAM specifically.
I’m aware that the Air Force measures employed at all do not require the equipment.
But the US and defense contractors soak up any opportunity to upgrade their systems. On this, sadly, their longest and most productive area for battlefield intelligence is (now) Syria, Lebanon, and no doubt Iran (overflight).
As to the S-400, the latest and greatest, it has been stationed in Syria and Lebanon, and the Russians didn’t even turn it on, during Israeli bomb-raids or their sonic-booming runs, not so much for “embarrassment” if/when it failed, I believe, but because of the intelligence windfall to the IDF which will be passed on to the USA (although sometimes Israel holds back a smidgen which makes all the difference)…
And even on that score, Israel has curtailed its overflights, and changed Its tactics by using, ironically, its SAM missiles as cruise missiles, essentially, by agreement with Russia (Israel has to play its cards with Russia a lot more than we do), not using them as often, to allow that active battlefield intelligence any more exposure than what no doubt is quite good by the USA and IDF.
( don’t even know if the S-400 has ever been used since its introduction and sales.
I should add here the (projective) point for the discussion: as the invasion (and later some form of occupation)–continues, what Russian military. stuff might/probably would step on stage.
I believe a whole slew of stuff will start coming as the matériel is increased and upgraded flying into Ukraine. (Speaking of SAMS…)
This is just a side note on this military and Jewish history, and typically, unique: in WII in similar field conditions the Hungarian Army, in their defensive maneuvers alongside the Germans against the Soviet Union, men from the Jewish slave labor contingent assigned to most (all?) of the commands were made to lie face down in the mud so that artillery and horses would cross over them.
Source: My father
Short of nukes, what sort of advanced weaponry does Russia have that will help them defend 1,600 miles of new border with NATO?
For starters, see, inter alia, Russian Armed Forces - Wikipedia
Well, the last time they had a border that long…
Soviet Armed Forces - Wikipedia
Wait. Randolph Braham was your father?
Wow! I learned so much from his book on the Holocaust in Hungary. Exhaustively researched, beautifully written – it was really awe-inspiring.
I realize this post is several days old but, I’m wondering where the heck the Russian Air Force is at all. They should have overwhelmed the skies by now. However, I haven’t read anything about Ukrainian planes being destroyed on the ground, or SAM sites and radar or comms being hit. Those are usually first wave targets. I don’t think I’ve even read about artillery being destroyed. Manned fixed wing aircraft seem to be sparingly used, which is strange considering the numerical advantage Russia has.
I think it was Blinken at his news conference today who mentioned that they had been supplying Stingers to the Ukrainians. Seems like a reason for caution. It was mentioned early in the invasion that a few Russian aircraft and helicopters had been shot down.
Stingers are very ineffective against fighters, though. They only work against slow transports and low helos.
Ukraine has SU-25s, which are designed for essentially the same thing as the A-10. Doesn’t matter a whole hell of a lot if you can’t control the sky over what you want to hit and Russia will always have (or should have) massive air superiority.
But they don’t. They are struggling.
https://news.yahoo.com/russian-troops-surrendering-sabotaging-vehicles-130211053.html
Russia’s vaunted air force has yet to gain air superiority over Ukraine, with Russian warplanes thwarted by Ukrainian fighter jets and a surprisingly resilient and potent array of air defenses, from shoulder-fired Stinger anti-aircraft missiles to much larger surface-to-air weapons, the Pentagon official said.
I read a couple of early stories about Ukrainian SU-25s being used for ground support, but haven’t really heard much lately. The reporting on this war is really showing the fog of war thing. Much of the info that comes out has no verifying sources at all.
This is true. There’s some belief that Stingers are somewhat overrated even against low and slow targets. It’s difficult to get real numbers because they are often farmed out to inexperienced operators like the mujahideen in Afghanistan.
According to reports, Ukraine has more capable SAM batteries and radar but for some reason the Russians aren’t trying to destroy them, which is strange if you want air superiority. No one seems to have anything other than guesses why.
It may just be that intelligence has overestimated Russia’s capabilities. Maybe they don’t have control of the skies because they can’t control them.
The reason is obvious. SAMS are going be deployed next or near to valuable targets. Valuable targets invariably have lots of civilians living in them and they have been staying their hand with respect to airpower.
I was thinking more along the lines of C&C, military bases, fuel depots etc. All are legit military targets and hitting military targets is much easier when they are bunched up in one spot rather than deployed. That goes double for aircraft. Much better to destroy them on the ground than hope you can shoot them out of the air while they are dropping bombs on you. All that should have been done at the beginning of the ground invasion. The fact that they apparently didn’t even try is strange.
Heck, it could be that they succeeded in controlling the parts of the country they wanted to and don’t see a need to go any further with it. It’s not like the Ukrainians are bombing everything in sight with their air force.
I don’t think civilian casualties matter at all. It’s never held anyone back before at the beginning of a war, why would the Russians be any different? They aren’t particularly known for even pretending that they care about civilians.
Its never a good thing to believe you own press releases.
This is Ukraine. The birthplace of Russia culture. A place which was Russia until a few decades ago. Which has a lot of family links with Russia.
You can absolutely be sure that they will care about civilian casualties.
If the US ever had to remove “undesirable” Governments in Canada or the UK, they absolutely would be very careful about civilian casualties.
Now if Russia goes after Sweden and Finland, well they can’t expect anymore such courtesy than the Syrians or Afghans got.
care to explain your concept of courtesy in more depth?
They aren’t going to care as much about civilian casualties as they would in Ukraine.
There are two reasons to make extra efforts to avoid civilian casualties. Global outrage and domestic opinion. The latter plays a big role in Ukraine not so much in a hypothetical Swedish or Finnish war.