Don's Weekly, 15 January 2024: Part 3
(….continued from Part 2…)
Diplomacy
The ISW makes the obvious case that aiding Ukraine is in the interest of the US…
https://twitter.com/TheStudyofWar/status/1735366664764702978
Back in 2020, at the World Economic forum in Davos, Trump told European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, "You need to understand that if Europe is under attack we will never come to help you and to support you.” He told French European Commissioner Thierry Breton, "By the way, NATO is dead, and we will leave, we will quit NATO. And by the way, you owe me $400 billion, because you didn’t pay, you Germans, what you had to pay for defense."…https://www.politico.eu/article/donald-trump-vow-never-help-europe-attack-thierry-breton/
The US funds to produce new weapons and ammo for Ukraine ran out months ago. The US funds to draw equipment from stockpiles and send them to Ukraine ran out with the last shipment at the end of December. The US will not be able to send any more aid to Ukraine until congress approves such aid…https://www.cnbc.com/2024/01/12/russia-ukraine-war-updates-for-jan-12-2024.html
The UK signed a ten year security agreement with Ukraine and pledged an additional $250 million in aid, most of which would be spent on drones built in the UK…https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/01/12/sunak-kyiv-ukraine-aid-britain/
33 years ago, Russia tried to prevent Lithuanian independence…
https://twitter.com/GlasnostGone/status/1745380642378956892
Republicans and Democrats in the US Senate have been working on a compromise on border policy. Majorie Taylor Greene, a MAGA politician that plays to the camera, threatened to out Speaker Johnson if aid to Ukraine is part of that deal. If she does force a vote to remove him, several Democrats in the House say they will support Johnson , which would prevent him from being removed…https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/moderate-democrats-say-help-mike-johnson-keep-job-speaker-rcna133711
Back in September, Switzerland agreed to sell back 25 of its 96 Leopard 2 tanks in storage to Germany. Germany promised that those tanks would stay in Germany but it allows them to send 25 other tanks to Ukraine…https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/swiss-sell-back-leopard-ii-tanks-help-restock-after-ukraine-donations-2023-09-27/
Equipment
The first of 116 M1 tanks Poland bought have arrived…
https://twitter.com/front_ukrainian/status/1744747844622279139
Andrew Perpetua says that the videos he’s been watching show that Russian night vision optics on drones is much better than Ukrainian versions of the same. I would like more data on the cost and effectiveness of both systems before assigning a value to them…
https://twitter.com/AndrewPerpetua/status/1744835281864257817
Germany will send two air surveillance radars, 30 drone detection systems, missiles for the IRIS-T air defense system and two Skynex air defense systems. The systems were contracted to be built in 2023, costing $100 million each, and will be delivered in early 2024. The system components are modular and can be operated on the ground or in the containers while on the vehicles. The radar has a 50 km range and the command post controls four 35mm canon. The remote controlled cannon have a range of 5 km…https://www.kyivpost.com/analysis/26463
This report says that the 47th Brigade’s Leopard tanks have been removed and replaced with T-64 BVs. The report is supported by the fact that in recent weeks the only damaged or destroyed Ukrainian tanks near Stepove are T-64s: at earlier times, they used to be Leopards. In any case, most of vehicles used by the 47th to repel Russian attacks have been Bradleys, so this will not significantly change their capabilities. The Leopards have been sent to the 21st Brigade, deployed in the Kreminna area. The 21st is nicknamed the “Swedish Brigade” because it is equipped with the Swedish the CV90 infantry fighting vehicles and the Strv 122 tank, a Swedish version of the Leopard. Both the 21st and 47th brigades lost Leopards to catastrophic destruction and long term repairs. Consolidating the Leopard variants at the 21st Bridgade will bring that unit up to full strength and simplify logistics…https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/1/8/2215883/-Ukraine-Update-The-Ukrainian-tank-shuffle-and-the-case-of-the-missing-Abrams
Leopard tanks sent to Poland are not being repaired quickly because of a lack of spare parts, and German companies won’t let Poland manufacture the spare parts…https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/ukraine-leopard-tanks-spare-parts-1.6953968
Although not as big of a problem as the lack of spare parts, Ukrainian repair crews trying to fix the Leopard 2 tanks near the front lines sometimes makes the problem worse…https://bulgarianmilitary.com/2024/01/03/ukraine-shouldnt-repair-leopard-tanks-as-it-damages-them-germany/
80 Leopard 2 and 88 Leopard 1 tanks were sent to Ukraine. Many of the Leopard 1 tanks had to be repaired upon delivery and Ukraine rejected delivery of 10 because they were in such a state of disrepair Ukrainian technicians didn’t know how to fix them…https://www.businessinsider.com/ukraines-leopard-tanks-russia-war-not-repaired-sebastian-schafer-germany-2024-1
Data from Andrew Perpetua is dependent on an attack being recorded on video, the video being released, and Andrew finding and viewing the video. That said, he watches videos released by both Russia and Ukraine and his data is organized and detailed, making it very useful to determine trends. While this graph doesn’t account for losses not recorded by video, including many artillery attacks, it does show that most of the losses recorded are caused by drones, and Russian losses due to drones are significantly higher. Again, drone operators rely on video to pilot their craft and it is much more likely their attacks will be recorded and released. But in a straight comparison focused on drones, we know that Russian drones hamper Ukrainian operations and are a severe threat to them. This chart indicates how much worse it is for Russia….
https://twitter.com/Cyrusontherun/status/1745784202279162039/photo/1
Ukrainian sea drones are now firing rockets…https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/ukraines-drone-boats-are-now-firing-rockets-at-russian-ships
Both sides have been working on incorporating Artificial Intelligence (AI) into their drones. The operator uses radio signals to fly the drone. If those signals are jammed then he can no longer fly the drone and it either crashes or hovers until it runs out of power. AI could be used to fly the drone autonomously, in which case jamming cannot interfere with navigation. AI can also be used to attack, matching target signatures in optics against images in its onboard library. While that works for kamikaze drones, reconnaissance drones need to send images back to spot for artillery and make observations. If they are jammed, though, AI could fly the drone back despite the jamming. There’s almost always a counter- to a counter-electronic action. For instance, a directed electromagnetic pulse could fry the drones circuits. But AI on kamikaze drones will defeat almost all the EW defenses currently used…
https://twitter.com/Sam_Cranny/status/1744244599860654154
AI in drones is still being developed…
https://twitter.com/moklasen/status/1742603980222443833
Russian drones are heavy (and therefore have a smaller payload) and of poor quality but they are being mass produced…
https://twitter.com/wilendhornets/status/1742252145561211016
Andrew Perpetua is annoyed that some people can’t accept that Russians use their drones to destroy Ukrainian defensive positions…
https://twitter.com/AndrewPerpetua/status/1742907402788250097
Thanks Don!
Could it be that such a sea drone shot a missile either directly at A-50/Il-22 or at some other target or just at a high altitude which in turn turned the Russian anti-aircraft systems on and they shot down their own planes?