Hello everybody! Many thanks for your patience with me. Actually, I’m still trying to enjoy a few days off: thus, here just a short review of most important news of the last few days. AIR/MISSILE WAR 17 August…the Russians released a stream of Shahed-136 LPGMs at the ports of Reni and Izmail in southern Ukraine, on the border to Romania. The PSU claimed 16 of these as shot down, but a number came through and destroyed between 2,000 and 25,000 (reports vary) of metric tons of wheat in one of terminals. According to reports like this one,
Hi Tom, great insights, as usual. Just one thing which confuses me: in the text, you mention Hill 116, whilst the map has 166 - is it a typo? Thanks, Tamas
Interesting that the TU-22s were damaged/destroyed because their defensive radars, etc had been moved to Moscow.
Any thoughts on other viable targets, and would they be worth going after, vice a now heavily defended Moscow? IOW, a WW2 raid on dams might be better than a raid on Berlin.
Tom, can you tell me if the General "Giennadij Zydko" who recently died is the one who early at war made biggest progress at southern front for russians?
I like reading combo Donald Hill's updates with Toms, weiter so bitte 😁
That was Zusko (ex-CO 58th CAA; since autumn the last year, the CO or XO of the West OSK). Zydko was in overall command of the Russian forces in Ukraine, from around the late spring the last year, until replaced by Surovikin.
- losing about 50 Bradleys in two months seems to be a pretty big dent on their capabilities. It's about a third of all the pledged Bradleys, and about all of the unit's AFVs. I must admit, I don't count the ex-soviet hardware losses with this keen eye, so it can be that it's "nothing special", other units have similar losses, but anyhow, it's high.
- The strike on the Tu-22s - what's your take, could those be quadcopters all the way from Ukraine? Are there any type with this long range? Or drones from local partizans/SBU saboteur units, like the attack on the AEW planes a few months ago?
- the hot topic from yesterday, the F-16s. I must admit I was surprised by the numbers, I expected somewhere around two dozens max. 42 planes about the same as their whole remaining Mig-29 fleet. I know you hate crystal balls, but how would YOU use this stock, for what missions? To me the SEAD looks the most imperative, finally using the HARMs active capabilities. Also (maybe) anti-shipping, as they already had got the Penguin missiles and the Norwegian AF used them from the F-16.
Big question is if they will adapt to the NATO multi plane combined missions or will stick to the usual "one pair on their own" methods.
- all the Bradleys written off or heavily damaged were meanwhile replaced, on 1-for-1 basis. Thus, whatever the 47th lost in terms of Bradleys, didn't matter as much as how many of its troops lost legs in the Russian minefields.
- if it was a quadcopter (or several of them), me thinks, no way this was launched from within Ukraine.
- F-16s... they're not going to be delivered 'all at once'. Rather something like '6 in December, another 6 few months later, total of 18 by June...' etc. The PSU simply has not enough pilots and ground crews for them, and those it has cannot be re-qualified at once.
Re. how are they going to be deployed: for air defence. Armed with AIM-120s and AIM-9s.
I expect much more from an eventual delivery of Gripens: they are compatible with Meteors, which are going to enable them to counter MiG-31s and Su-35s, for example.
Finally, unless the PSU build-up in numbers of 'new' (actually: 40+ years-old) jets, it has little option but to operate in pairs only.
Do you think Gripens will deliver in any significant numbers? There aren't many at all, mainly not in reserve. AFAIK the Swedes used the older airframes for the new E/F versions (there was an article that two A airframes are used for one new, though it seems strange). So first somebody should pay real money for the planes, not just change a line in the accounting. Sadly I don't see anybody willing. The USA won't, it's better and easier to dust off a few dozens F-16s from the desert. The EU is struggling even to make a 500 million fund working and that desperately needs for all the ammo supply. Being successful in Ukraine would be a big boost of export - but the new E version isn't cheap (Finland bought the F-35 because according to them even the operational costs wouldn't be much lower) and the buyers with big enough wallet has mostly tied themselves to the F-35s in the past years.
I wish the Gripen would boost. Excellent plane and if anytime Europe would want to losen the ties with the USA weapon industry, knowledge and experience to produce capable planes should be preserved. But I don't see too much chance them in this war.
There are 12 "brand new" C/D Gripens that Saab has stored disassembled for some years now. They were offered on 2 separate occasions to Croatia, but nothing came of it. I guess those are headed to Ukraine now, would make most sense. Any Es would need to come from the assembly line.
The airframe for the Gripen E/F are new, there are no parts taken from the C/D versions that are reused to build the new planes. If you don't count really small bracket.....
Thankyou Tom for the update, and you don't need to say sorry! I am wondering, with the general state of things, why on earth Russia is attacking at the north-east. It seems to me that if they want to hold on to the land bridge, they must focus as much force as they can there.
The joke I heard going around was that the Russians thought they detected a children's hospital, or an orphan home, on the moon and spontaneously tried to take it out.
Aug 21, 2023·edited Aug 21, 2023Liked by Sarcastosaurus
Tom, you're right.
"Our troops were successful in the direction of south-eastern Robotyne and south of Mala Tokmachka, Zaporizhzhia region. The enemy tried to regain lost positions east of Robotyne without success." Hanna Maliar https://t.me/s/annamaliar
It means very soon the first village in the Melitopol deriction will liberate and it can helps to move further.
Many thanks
Enjoy your holidays
Hi Tom, great insights, as usual. Just one thing which confuses me: in the text, you mention Hill 116, whilst the map has 166 - is it a typo? Thanks, Tamas
Yes, a typo - in my usual rush.... I'll correct that.
The link to Dailycos with height/heat maps puts 166 on different hills on the two maps.
Also, in the comments there they write that the southern part of the hill is a shallow slope which does not provide any extended viewpoint.
According to the map there is plenty of high ground to move around on to get good views.
https://images.dailykos.com/images/1219594/original/RobotyneTopography2.png?1692438082
Russians are only able to kill civilians! Their "technology" is very poor as shown during the Moon .. landing ..
A full disaster and "shit image" of the russian power!
To be fair, lots of rockets and probes fail, such as SpaceX Starship.
Great news about the destruction of Russian planes! Ukrainian officials and media did not report the fact. Many thanks for your support and good luck.
Interesting that the TU-22s were damaged/destroyed because their defensive radars, etc had been moved to Moscow.
Any thoughts on other viable targets, and would they be worth going after, vice a now heavily defended Moscow? IOW, a WW2 raid on dams might be better than a raid on Berlin.
Ukrainians are no mass-murderers, and even less so would Kyiv order an obvious war crime - like striking one of dams in Russia.
Striking Moscow to force the VKS to re-deploy its air defences there, and then striking air bases like Soltsy-2 - is far more effective.
Meanwhile, all the Tu-22M-3s were evacuated from there to an air base in the Murmansk area.
Isn't that getting too crowded up their? Aren't there the planes from the Engels base too?
Russians have enough air bases on the Kola Peninsula to deploy entire divisions of their bombers - which they do not have any more.
Thank you for the info, but aren't those airfields more like the other stuff from soviet heritage?
Not maintained, not used for decades, with old crumbling parts and no staff around?
Or got this more attention during Putins revival of the nuclear arsenal?
Some are, but many others not. At least minimal maintenance, and thus operational.
Rather my point.
No one's going to blow up Russian dams. 😉
But better to strike targets outside Moscow. They've got the message already, and in a big nation, there are plenty of other targets.
But if it is a better strategy, I suspect the Ukrainians are already hard at work at it.
It starts smelling very good . Let’s go to Tokmak.
Tom, can you tell me if the General "Giennadij Zydko" who recently died is the one who early at war made biggest progress at southern front for russians?
I like reading combo Donald Hill's updates with Toms, weiter so bitte 😁
;-)
That was Zusko (ex-CO 58th CAA; since autumn the last year, the CO or XO of the West OSK). Zydko was in overall command of the Russian forces in Ukraine, from around the late spring the last year, until replaced by Surovikin.
Thank you for the update!
Few notes:
- losing about 50 Bradleys in two months seems to be a pretty big dent on their capabilities. It's about a third of all the pledged Bradleys, and about all of the unit's AFVs. I must admit, I don't count the ex-soviet hardware losses with this keen eye, so it can be that it's "nothing special", other units have similar losses, but anyhow, it's high.
- The strike on the Tu-22s - what's your take, could those be quadcopters all the way from Ukraine? Are there any type with this long range? Or drones from local partizans/SBU saboteur units, like the attack on the AEW planes a few months ago?
- the hot topic from yesterday, the F-16s. I must admit I was surprised by the numbers, I expected somewhere around two dozens max. 42 planes about the same as their whole remaining Mig-29 fleet. I know you hate crystal balls, but how would YOU use this stock, for what missions? To me the SEAD looks the most imperative, finally using the HARMs active capabilities. Also (maybe) anti-shipping, as they already had got the Penguin missiles and the Norwegian AF used them from the F-16.
Big question is if they will adapt to the NATO multi plane combined missions or will stick to the usual "one pair on their own" methods.
Few notes:
- all the Bradleys written off or heavily damaged were meanwhile replaced, on 1-for-1 basis. Thus, whatever the 47th lost in terms of Bradleys, didn't matter as much as how many of its troops lost legs in the Russian minefields.
- if it was a quadcopter (or several of them), me thinks, no way this was launched from within Ukraine.
- F-16s... they're not going to be delivered 'all at once'. Rather something like '6 in December, another 6 few months later, total of 18 by June...' etc. The PSU simply has not enough pilots and ground crews for them, and those it has cannot be re-qualified at once.
Re. how are they going to be deployed: for air defence. Armed with AIM-120s and AIM-9s.
I expect much more from an eventual delivery of Gripens: they are compatible with Meteors, which are going to enable them to counter MiG-31s and Su-35s, for example.
Finally, unless the PSU build-up in numbers of 'new' (actually: 40+ years-old) jets, it has little option but to operate in pairs only.
Do you think Gripens will deliver in any significant numbers? There aren't many at all, mainly not in reserve. AFAIK the Swedes used the older airframes for the new E/F versions (there was an article that two A airframes are used for one new, though it seems strange). So first somebody should pay real money for the planes, not just change a line in the accounting. Sadly I don't see anybody willing. The USA won't, it's better and easier to dust off a few dozens F-16s from the desert. The EU is struggling even to make a 500 million fund working and that desperately needs for all the ammo supply. Being successful in Ukraine would be a big boost of export - but the new E version isn't cheap (Finland bought the F-35 because according to them even the operational costs wouldn't be much lower) and the buyers with big enough wallet has mostly tied themselves to the F-35s in the past years.
I wish the Gripen would boost. Excellent plane and if anytime Europe would want to losen the ties with the USA weapon industry, knowledge and experience to produce capable planes should be preserved. But I don't see too much chance them in this war.
There are 12 "brand new" C/D Gripens that Saab has stored disassembled for some years now. They were offered on 2 separate occasions to Croatia, but nothing came of it. I guess those are headed to Ukraine now, would make most sense. Any Es would need to come from the assembly line.
Thanks!
The airframe for the Gripen E/F are new, there are no parts taken from the C/D versions that are reused to build the new planes. If you don't count really small bracket.....
ACME satellite image, LOL! You made my day, thanks! And, needless to say, thank you for all your work, as well.
Thankyou Tom for the update, and you don't need to say sorry! I am wondering, with the general state of things, why on earth Russia is attacking at the north-east. It seems to me that if they want to hold on to the land bridge, they must focus as much force as they can there.
Thanks
Thank you for update, Tom. God bless Ukrainian servicemen which are bringing these good news in that burning hell paying with their lives.
Thank you Tom.
The joke I heard going around was that the Russians thought they detected a children's hospital, or an orphan home, on the moon and spontaneously tried to take it out.
Hopefully when drones arrive in Moscow they turn on the air raid sirens so the worthy citizens lose their sleep, I assume not.
New Ukraine joke, Drones are listed on the arrivals board in Moscow airports.
Tom, you're right.
"Our troops were successful in the direction of south-eastern Robotyne and south of Mala Tokmachka, Zaporizhzhia region. The enemy tried to regain lost positions east of Robotyne without success." Hanna Maliar https://t.me/s/annamaliar
It means very soon the first village in the Melitopol deriction will liberate and it can helps to move further.