Don's Weekly, 2 December 2024: Part 5 (Russian Logistics System, Air Combat & Equipment)

by Donald Hill

(…continued from Part 4…)

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Russian Logistics

Armies need ‘bullets, beans and gas’ - read: ammo, food, water, medical supplies and so many other items to the front lines to enable a unit to fight. Russia relies on railroads to move large volumes of cargo for both their civilian economy and the army. Trucks are needed to move the supplies from the rail line to the front line and the further the Russian army is from a rail line, the harder it is to supply it. There is a limited number of vehicles and longer distances mean they can make fewer round trips to connect the rail lines to the front lines.

The UAZ-452 has been produced in one form or another since 1965. Because it looks similar to a loaf of bread they are called ‘loafs’ (not loaves). This one has a screen for drone protection. The tire treads nailed to the car prevents the paint from being scratched.

Vehicles wear out and are destroyed by artillery and particularly by drones. Spare parts for military vehicles aren’t provided. Russia’s production of trucks, for both civilian and military use, reached a high of 143,000 in 2023 but as the economy falls apart, production is projected to be reduced to around 120,000 for 2024 and 2025. The 2023 figures for unarmored transport production dedicated to the military was only 10,600.

Russia transport losses are exceeding their production and its evident on the front line. When Russian troops in Crimea weren’t provided with water, a heavy and bulky cargo, they used the local groundwater and a resulting cholera outbreak spread to some cities. Ukrainian attacks on Russian supply depots and vehicles created shortages of food, water and ammo in Kharkiv last summer.

Like Ukraine, Russian troops have turned to civilian vehicles to fill the void. 96% of them were personally owned or donated. Trucks are more efficient, as one truck can carry as much cargo as ten civilian cars.

The notoriously corrupt Russian military police were ordered to confiscate any unregistered vehicles used by military units. The original orders came from local district commanders concerned about the number of accidents, sometimes because of drunk drivers. For the MPs, that is an opportunity for bribes, or to secure gasoline for their own vehicles, or to resell the vehicles to someone else. Instead of transporting wounded and supplies, a lot of time is spent hiding vehicles from the MPs, especially since the penalty is for the driver and his commander to be sent on an assault.

It takes 3-4 months to register a donated or personally owned car to a military unit. Since they are short on transport, they cannot wait that long. Plus, some commanders sell unit-owned vehicles and pocket the cash. Some don’t even bother to remove an EW jamming device that was installed. This, after many Russian soldiers pay for the car, the maintenance and fuel with their own money.

In short, the transport shortage near the front is real and it has an impact. The shortage doesn’t stop offensive operations but it can slow them down, which is useful.

The further away from the front lines, the larger the supply centers become since that increases efficiency. It also creates a more efficient way to destroy large amounts of logistical capability. When HIMARS was deployed, a lot of Russian depots were hit, forcing Russia to move them out of the 80 km range of the weapon or dispersing them into smaller depots to avoid detection or minimize the damage if it was detected. HIMARS and MLRS still attack logistical targets as the opportunities present themselves.

Offensive operations consume more supplies than defensive operations. The column in red on the left indicates the type of operation followed by the number of logistical vehicles needed to support the operation and where they’d have to draw the supplies from: The more supply needed, the further back it originates. Then there is an indication of which weapons have the range to attack various logistical components.

Logistics start at the industrial sites. Ukrainian drones have hit ammo depots, oil refineries and depots, factories as far as 1100 km from Ukraine - and airbases, destroying both supplies and, occasionally, aircraft. There are more targets than drones, but Ukrainian drone production is increasing.

While drones are effective against buildings, refineries and storage tanks they are ineffective against hard targets, such as bunkers. Their success against ammo depots didn’t come by penetrating bunkers, it came by hitting ammo stored outside bunkers or hitting trains that arrived to load or unload ammo. Ukrainian missiles can and have penetrated bunkers, though.

ATACMS and Storm Shadows can now be used on Russian soil which are additional tools with additional capabilities. For instance, Storm Shadow can penetrate a bunker in a way that drones cannot. That said, the cost is much higher and the availability is much lower for these munitions when compared to drones. These valuable munitions have to be used on targets that a drone cannot effectively destroy, such as air defense systems and hardened targets.

One example of that was when 10-12 Storm Shadows were used against a bunker complex in Kursk. The target was already in range of the HIMARS/MLRS rockets but those rockets could not penetrate the bunkers. With so many precious Storm Shadows expended, the target can be presumed to be valuable and a communications center with dozens of command personnel was reportedly destroyed.

Another example is when ATACMS destroyed a Russian air defense system in Kursk, making it easier for other missiles and drones to penetrate Russian air space.

Ukraine will continue to attack the point of delivery with tactical drones and artillery destroying trucks. They will continue to attack the point of production, with strategic drones destroying factories and refineries. And in the middle, they will use strategic drones for soft targets, such as oil depots and ammo trains arriving at depots. The missiles will be used to attack air defenses to open the way for strategic bombing, as well as for hard targets, such as high value bunkers.

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Air Combat

Tochnyi examined published videos of reconnaissance drones (mostly) being intercepted by FPV drones. From what he’s seen, 870 Russian drones have been intercepted and 8 Ukrainian drones have been intercepted. 766 of the Russian drones were intercepted during the day and 104 were intercepted at night. It’s possible that some small number of interception videos were not posted or viewed by Tochnyi. 20 of the 870 drones were actually strike drones, not reconnaissance drones.

Many of the Ukrainian interceptions involved one drone tracking the Russian reconnaissance drone and another drone ramming the Russian drone, usually with an explosive. The second observation drone is useful in countering Russian drones interceptors as well as evasive maneuvers by the Russian target drone.

Russian drone teams had taken passive measures with camouflage paint schemes and even using Ukrainian insignia, but starting in October their drones started using evasive maneuvers as the Ukrainian FPV drones approached. Since drones only have cameras facing forward, Russian operators can only see an approaching FPV if it moves into its field of view. What Russian drones do have is sensors that detect radio waves as Ukrainian drones approach. Some of the Russian drones activate short-ranged jammers to disrupt Ukrainian drone communications. Others also use an algorithm to conduct automatic evasive maneuvers when the sensors detect FPV radio waves.

A Russian drone with Ukrainian rondelles.

Sometimes Russian drone teams are detected by radio waves or Ukrainian reconnaissance drones and eliminated with a $180,000 HIMARS missile.

The location, source videos and types of intercepted drones are shown on this interactive map.

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Equipment

Germany will send two more IRIS-T SAM systems in a month.

Ukraine has been chronically short of mortar shells of various calibers even though it was reported Ukraine produced 1 million rounds in 2024 (and 2.5 million shells of all calibers, including mortars). A video was released showing defective mortar shells built by Ukroboronprom that would be stuck in the tubes or fly just a few meters before landing without exploding. 90% of the batch of defective 120 mm mortar rounds would fail. 100,000 rounds have been recalled. A journalist said that 100,000 mortar rounds were about six months of ammo, which does not correspond with one million rounds being produced in a year.

The Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system is designed to intercept ballistic missiles up to 200 km away and at altitudes up to 150 km high. A battery has six launcher vehicles, each with eight $12.6 million missiles. Since ballistic missiles are heavy and fast, explosive warheads with shrapnel would have little effect on them, so the THAAD missile is kinetic, or hit-to-kill, as seen here. Its radar can track targets up to 3,000 km away. The US only has 7 with another on order. Ukraine wanted a battery a year ago. They didn’t get one, but Israel did. After Russia used it in IRBM, Ukraine is asking for it again. There are indications that Russia launched a second IRBM but that the missile failed shortly after launch. Faulty Russian missiles are not rare. Back in 2017, 9 of 27 test launches by Russia failed. An ICBM test in September exploded in the silo.

It takes almost 100 personnel to man a THAAD battery. In the US, the top 10% of Patriot operators train on the THAAD and they receive large bonuses. It takes hours or days to set up a site and it does not go unnoticed.

A Russian drone that moves on the ground and air.