I've cited them as a source a few times on a variety of topics. They identify the source of their information and make their own assessments. When possible, I compare sources on a particular topic and I found this site to be aligned with other credible sources.
Some sites mix real news with Russian propaganda to look more serious and gain more popularity. And then it's harder to distinguish lies and truth by the readers. Better not to cite them even if some article is not a lie.
Great report. Thank you very much. All in all I am at my wits' end presently. How will Ukarine continue without munition ? With a new commander in chief. Because Zaluschni will be replaced. I am sure now. Some say the Americans want it. Who will replace this wonderful warrior and intelligent man ? You only have to read his articles if you are not convinced by him on the battlefields. And he probably was right with Zaporischja .... it is devastating.
"Some say the Americans want it." - and many more of my Ukrainian contacts say it has nothing to do with Americans, Austrians or Australians...
Unfortunately, there's no conspiracy - it's an initiative coming purely from Zelensky, whi is in horror of Zaluzhny's popularity and integrity.
Zelensky's administration, his party members and pocket MPs were all working to undermine Zaluzhny's public image for quite a while already - no success.
Now Zelensky says "Ya nie lokh / I'm not a sucker" (his actual quote as a President from a few years ago) and tries to force Zaluzhny out for his own political benefit, but to a catastrophe for the whole country.
I think, if nothing 'ex-machina' happens to prevent it, this will be one of the turning points leading to Ukraine's downfall.
P.S. It's not only about 'removing' Zaluzhny, but also the Chief of General Staff of ZSU - Shaptala. He's not a public person, but he's also highly respected in the Army.
P.P.S. "An army of sheep led by a lion is better than an army of lions led by a sheep."
The distributed (and not mass-produced) system for making drones in Ukraine might be a blessing in disguise. Having a central drone factory would be a very tempting target for Russian missiles.
Like troop training/generation and tank manufacturing, the huge size of Russia offers an advantage to them.
Also, the Russian drone use for getting more territory (by demolishing fortifications) mirrors the use of the other assets (personnel, tanks etc) - getting territory is the name of the game for Russia. And they're ready to spend a huge amount of military resources for this.
(with more and more howitzers arriving in Ukraine, from RCH 155 and CAESAR to Pzh2000 etc), the problem might not be the number of guns anymore, but the ammunition.
Volume of production depends on the method, not the building it's housed in. You can have different parts of munition production even in different regions, let alone buildings. Same with injection moulding. After 2 years, both Russian and Ukrainian war industries are more primitive than those of Western Europe pre-ww1. In 1916 Germany produced 34M artillery shells, starting from ~2M in 1914. Ukraine cannot even make 100k a month. We are talking about a nominally 40M people country. The level of government dysfunction and impotence is increbile. We are talking about a country that struggles to mobilise more than 2.5% of its 2022 population. Finland today can mobilise 10% of its population within a few months and in winter war had an army of 500k out of 3.7M, in 1939. No, the shitty 3d printing in somebody's basement isn't a replacement for mass scale production. If they were mass producing drones, they'd be making 500k or 5M a month, not 50k.
Also, drones are incredibly ineffective and inefficient in terms of delivering high explosive tonnage. They are also much more labour intensive to use on the battlefield and their operators are constantly in incredible danger. Suicide drones as a primary weapon is the definition of an army of paupers.
Is any NATO country currently in a state of war? Europe is producing more than 1M 155mm shells already (some reports suggest about 1.4M). Other calibres are produced on top of that. However, as none of the countries are at war, much of the production is exported based on existing international contracts. Do you understand the difference between a peace and war time economy?
2 years of a full scale war, what does Ukraine actually produce at scale? Munitions of any calibre? No. Small arms? No. Bombs? No. IFVs/APCs? No. Tanks? No. Mortars? No. Artillery? No. Barrels? No. Rockets? No. What are they producing except a medium scale (at best) drone production? They have published videos where they cut open cluster shells to scavenge bomblets for their drones. Now repeat after me. 40. million. people.
What a depressing prognosis; one I am not in a position to prove or disprove. Anyway, I wasn't referring to Western countries' ability to produce munitions; I was referring to their not providing them for Ukraine in adequate numbers - due to domestic politics (USA), slow processes & vetoes (EU), and general strategic stupor and fear of their populations' lack of appetite for ... discomfort. Or, perhaps they assess Ukraine's arms production like you do and simply can't bring themselves to fork out to help them...
Yes, not enough materiel is sent to Ukraine. Some processes are unbearably slow but some simply take exactly as much time as they must, e.g. new production lines/factories. Nexter, in France, has tripled the annual production of CAESARs. That means, they have at least tripled the production of barrels. Apparently, the production of a barrel blank can take up to a year. That means, that they have basically began ramping up around the start of the invasion, in order to reach the howitzer production increase 1-2 years later.
I don't know the logic and the reasoning behind all these decisions. There are a huge multitude of factors that come to this. However, if hobbyists can figure out the real state of the Russian economy, just by reading the official Russian documents, then I am 100% sure that all NATO leaders have access to such information and more.
It all dates back to a dinner in 1993, when Les Aspin and William Perry invited the executives of the defence industry to start reducing the size of their industries.
This led to a frenzy of consolidation, to the point that there are at most 2-3 companies competing on each project (an oligopoly), and artisanal production of everything, from artillery shells to aircraft.
There was a recent poll that included questions on how Ukrainians perceive the direction of changes in the society. They compared the results from Jan 2024 with those from Dec 2022. The dynamics on next topics is now perceived much more pessimistically (% of optimists halved since 2022):
Fantastic report!
This BulgarianMiliyary site looks/sounds like a mouthpiece of the Belarusian military.
I've cited them as a source a few times on a variety of topics. They identify the source of their information and make their own assessments. When possible, I compare sources on a particular topic and I found this site to be aligned with other credible sources.
BulgarianMilitary publishes fakes fabricated by Russian propaganda, e.g. https://bulgarianmilitary.com/2023/06/02/su-30-has-used-khibiny-ew-system-while-intercepting-the-f-35/ (Italians had no F-35 in Baltic states on 9th April 2022, they had F-35 on the Iceland only.)
Some sites mix real news with Russian propaganda to look more serious and gain more popularity. And then it's harder to distinguish lies and truth by the readers. Better not to cite them even if some article is not a lie.
Thanks Don . . . accurate!
Tom had a lot of input on this piece, as well.
Thank for both, we greatly appreciate your work. . . .
Great report. Thank you very much. All in all I am at my wits' end presently. How will Ukarine continue without munition ? With a new commander in chief. Because Zaluschni will be replaced. I am sure now. Some say the Americans want it. Who will replace this wonderful warrior and intelligent man ? You only have to read his articles if you are not convinced by him on the battlefields. And he probably was right with Zaporischja .... it is devastating.
"Some say the Americans want it." - and many more of my Ukrainian contacts say it has nothing to do with Americans, Austrians or Australians...
Unfortunately, there's no conspiracy - it's an initiative coming purely from Zelensky, whi is in horror of Zaluzhny's popularity and integrity.
Zelensky's administration, his party members and pocket MPs were all working to undermine Zaluzhny's public image for quite a while already - no success.
Now Zelensky says "Ya nie lokh / I'm not a sucker" (his actual quote as a President from a few years ago) and tries to force Zaluzhny out for his own political benefit, but to a catastrophe for the whole country.
I think, if nothing 'ex-machina' happens to prevent it, this will be one of the turning points leading to Ukraine's downfall.
P.S. It's not only about 'removing' Zaluzhny, but also the Chief of General Staff of ZSU - Shaptala. He's not a public person, but he's also highly respected in the Army.
P.P.S. "An army of sheep led by a lion is better than an army of lions led by a sheep."
Thanks for the drone discussion.
The distributed (and not mass-produced) system for making drones in Ukraine might be a blessing in disguise. Having a central drone factory would be a very tempting target for Russian missiles.
Like troop training/generation and tank manufacturing, the huge size of Russia offers an advantage to them.
Also, the Russian drone use for getting more territory (by demolishing fortifications) mirrors the use of the other assets (personnel, tanks etc) - getting territory is the name of the game for Russia. And they're ready to spend a huge amount of military resources for this.
(with more and more howitzers arriving in Ukraine, from RCH 155 and CAESAR to Pzh2000 etc), the problem might not be the number of guns anymore, but the ammunition.
Volume of production depends on the method, not the building it's housed in. You can have different parts of munition production even in different regions, let alone buildings. Same with injection moulding. After 2 years, both Russian and Ukrainian war industries are more primitive than those of Western Europe pre-ww1. In 1916 Germany produced 34M artillery shells, starting from ~2M in 1914. Ukraine cannot even make 100k a month. We are talking about a nominally 40M people country. The level of government dysfunction and impotence is increbile. We are talking about a country that struggles to mobilise more than 2.5% of its 2022 population. Finland today can mobilise 10% of its population within a few months and in winter war had an army of 500k out of 3.7M, in 1939. No, the shitty 3d printing in somebody's basement isn't a replacement for mass scale production. If they were mass producing drones, they'd be making 500k or 5M a month, not 50k.
Also, drones are incredibly ineffective and inefficient in terms of delivering high explosive tonnage. They are also much more labour intensive to use on the battlefield and their operators are constantly in incredible danger. Suicide drones as a primary weapon is the definition of an army of paupers.
Re arms production, incompetence with Ukraine's Western backers too? A different kind of incompetence i guess.
Is any NATO country currently in a state of war? Europe is producing more than 1M 155mm shells already (some reports suggest about 1.4M). Other calibres are produced on top of that. However, as none of the countries are at war, much of the production is exported based on existing international contracts. Do you understand the difference between a peace and war time economy?
2 years of a full scale war, what does Ukraine actually produce at scale? Munitions of any calibre? No. Small arms? No. Bombs? No. IFVs/APCs? No. Tanks? No. Mortars? No. Artillery? No. Barrels? No. Rockets? No. What are they producing except a medium scale (at best) drone production? They have published videos where they cut open cluster shells to scavenge bomblets for their drones. Now repeat after me. 40. million. people.
What a depressing prognosis; one I am not in a position to prove or disprove. Anyway, I wasn't referring to Western countries' ability to produce munitions; I was referring to their not providing them for Ukraine in adequate numbers - due to domestic politics (USA), slow processes & vetoes (EU), and general strategic stupor and fear of their populations' lack of appetite for ... discomfort. Or, perhaps they assess Ukraine's arms production like you do and simply can't bring themselves to fork out to help them...
Yes, not enough materiel is sent to Ukraine. Some processes are unbearably slow but some simply take exactly as much time as they must, e.g. new production lines/factories. Nexter, in France, has tripled the annual production of CAESARs. That means, they have at least tripled the production of barrels. Apparently, the production of a barrel blank can take up to a year. That means, that they have basically began ramping up around the start of the invasion, in order to reach the howitzer production increase 1-2 years later.
I don't know the logic and the reasoning behind all these decisions. There are a huge multitude of factors that come to this. However, if hobbyists can figure out the real state of the Russian economy, just by reading the official Russian documents, then I am 100% sure that all NATO leaders have access to such information and more.
It all dates back to a dinner in 1993, when Les Aspin and William Perry invited the executives of the defence industry to start reducing the size of their industries.
This led to a frenzy of consolidation, to the point that there are at most 2-3 companies competing on each project (an oligopoly), and artisanal production of everything, from artillery shells to aircraft.
https://www.wbur.org/onpoint/2023/05/29/the-last-supper-rebroadcast-1993-pentagon-dinner-reshaped-defense-industry
Another superb report (both), thank you
There was a recent poll that included questions on how Ukrainians perceive the direction of changes in the society. They compared the results from Jan 2024 with those from Dec 2022. The dynamics on next topics is now perceived much more pessimistically (% of optimists halved since 2022):
* Democracy
* Freedom of speech
* Rights and freedoms of citizens
* The legality of actions of state officers
* The attitude of the government towards citizens
* The attitude of citizens towards the government
https://razumkov.org.ua/napriamky/sotsiologichni-doslidzhennia/otsinka-gromadianamy-sytuatsii-v-kraini-ta-dii-vlady-dovira-do-sotsialnykh-instytutiv-politykiv-posadovtsiv-ta-gromadskykh-diiachiv-sichen-2024r
The poll has much more topics, including the trust to politicians, but the points above seem to represent the feelings of Ukrainians.