Great explanation. It's sad state of blogosphere that such basic facts need to be explained because bloggers don't actually understand nature of what they're talking about.
Afaik AFU, like the US Army (and most Western Armies I guess) don't use regiment anymore. Or only for specialists troops who dont form "Brigade".
Theoretically the US Army can still organize into Division which are to be formed with 3 Brigade (effectively replacing old school regiment). Although they never use division anyway with their concept of Brigade Combat Team.
RU organizational names look all over the place although I admit I dont really care about them.
Regiment is still used in Australia, or it was when I was in. But it's more of an administrative term than something that describes a particular unit on the ground (well sort of). Royal Australian Regiment means an infantry unit in the regular army, so 6th Battalion Royal Australian Regiment would be a regular army infantry battalion, while 16th Battalion Royal Western Australian Regiment would be a reservist Battalion based in the state of Western Australia.
If it's used for a non-infantry arms corps unit it means a roughly Battalion sized unit that isn't infantry. So the 3rd Combat Engineer Regiment is a roughly Battalion sized engineering unit in the regular army that will provide engineering support to the brigade it's a part of.
A long time ago I (NLD officer ret) was taught a regiment consisted of (3) subunits (battalions) of the same branche while a brigade was composed of 3 subunits of different branches. So an infantry regiment consists of (3) infantry battalions and an infantry brigade consists of 2 infantry battalions and one tank battalion, both units of course supported by combat support and combat service support units. Also, a regiment is commanded by a colonel and a brigade is commanded by a brigade general or brigadier.
I remember your "3" point article. It was great. After them, i understood more. Thanks for clarification once again. People must read it more than once to understand it.
It fits exactly to what our staff sergeant told us in my conscript time, when talking about the first US prisoners of war: It happens in war, that you forget to notify a platoon or the message is not arriving. That happened to us in our military training exercise as well and all off a sudden we were behind enemy lines. We just ducked and hoped that we won't be noticed as it was night anyway.
And by the way, I was serving in an air defence battery as a truck driver in the mobile radar unit (Flamingo). So there are not many of those and it is quite big....
Staromaiorske is not even an apt example, since even one of the most conservative mappers (war_mapper) with respect to geolocation posted on July 17: "Over the weekend, [UA] advanced into Staromaiors'ke, on the Southern front. The settlement is now contested." It's also worth noting that the built area of the town stretches south exactly 1.5km from the spot the MRAP video was filmed. So it's reasonable to treat the village as hosting troops of both sides at the time of filming.
Good mappers try to represent the fluid and uncertain nature of "control" by denoting contested space; visual evidence is given the highest premium because it offers a higher degree of confidence as to 'how much, where, when'. This is good for an operational overview in a war which rarely sees movement of more than one kilometer in a day, though it will be less applicable for maps with a fast update timescale or an aim of depicting tactical movement -which is much more difficult and less reliable, hence most avoid that approach.
(Nathan Ruser made a few movement-oriented maps in the initial stage of the invasion, when such a model was probably most precise.)
The one real drawback in terms of keeping track of the battlefield situation is that conclusive evidence on which side has final control or presence in a given location that changes hands many times (especially if it is in a less observed sector) may only emerge weeks later, leading to belated corrections. The famous Oleksandrivka in Kherson was one such case, as was part of the hill between Ivanivske and Klischiivka. But there would be many more corrections if attempting to map each one of dozens of reported or possible tactical actions.
None of this implies that mappers would believe that nothing happened if there wasn't an image of it, or that the state of their map corresponds exactly to the state of the battlefield.
Maybe we could also say that textual and graphical reporting/analysis complement one another... Only glancing at maps of any kind, by anyone, once a day, won't inform you as to 'what's going on'.
Thank you for your reminder. I think best maps are not costantly updated in details, they should serve just to explain in what parts of ukr. they are fighting.
Again: if a ukr. battallion advances 2 km taking heavy losses in a difficult-to-keep position without enough support is not a good situation, but in a map I could Say "well, fantastic!"
If the same battallion take a "window of opportunity", advance 2 km smashing an enemy inprepared battallion and then retreat before a counter-attack (taking little damage), I think they are doing a good job. But I can Say, in a static map, "hey, what are they doing, sleeping? Advance!"
Writing here is like parenting a teenager. You can fill the kitchen with good food (information), describe it factually, and show said teenager where all the food is. Teenager continues to say there is nothing to eat and then orders food delivered from McDonalds, then complains about delivery.
>Staromaiorske and Urozhaine (southern Zaporizhzhya)
Did you mean Donetsk region instead of Zaporizhzhya?
The Urozhaine in southern Zaporizhzhya is just to the east-south-east of Tokmak. It is quite deep and makes a bit less sense to be used together with Staromaiorske.
Great explanation. It's sad state of blogosphere that such basic facts need to be explained because bloggers don't actually understand nature of what they're talking about.
Thanks Tom, what you do is really appreciated.
"3 battalions are making a brigade."
...usually here would be the "regiments"
Afaik AFU, like the US Army (and most Western Armies I guess) don't use regiment anymore. Or only for specialists troops who dont form "Brigade".
Theoretically the US Army can still organize into Division which are to be formed with 3 Brigade (effectively replacing old school regiment). Although they never use division anyway with their concept of Brigade Combat Team.
RU organizational names look all over the place although I admit I dont really care about them.
Regiment is still used in Australia, or it was when I was in. But it's more of an administrative term than something that describes a particular unit on the ground (well sort of). Royal Australian Regiment means an infantry unit in the regular army, so 6th Battalion Royal Australian Regiment would be a regular army infantry battalion, while 16th Battalion Royal Western Australian Regiment would be a reservist Battalion based in the state of Western Australia.
If it's used for a non-infantry arms corps unit it means a roughly Battalion sized unit that isn't infantry. So the 3rd Combat Engineer Regiment is a roughly Battalion sized engineering unit in the regular army that will provide engineering support to the brigade it's a part of.
A long time ago I (NLD officer ret) was taught a regiment consisted of (3) subunits (battalions) of the same branche while a brigade was composed of 3 subunits of different branches. So an infantry regiment consists of (3) infantry battalions and an infantry brigade consists of 2 infantry battalions and one tank battalion, both units of course supported by combat support and combat service support units. Also, a regiment is commanded by a colonel and a brigade is commanded by a brigade general or brigadier.
I remember your "3" point article. It was great. After them, i understood more. Thanks for clarification once again. People must read it more than once to understand it.
Sometimes (more times that you like, I see) is necessary going back to basics.
But, hey! They’re “experten” anyway! 🤣
From what my friends in AFU told me - there are 3+1 (four) battalions in Mech Brigade - 3 mech infantry and one tank. Tank Brigade - 3 tank + 1 Mech
3 artillery batteries (normally 122, 152, Grad). And several additional specialised companies.
Thank you for your explanation.
It fits exactly to what our staff sergeant told us in my conscript time, when talking about the first US prisoners of war: It happens in war, that you forget to notify a platoon or the message is not arriving. That happened to us in our military training exercise as well and all off a sudden we were behind enemy lines. We just ducked and hoped that we won't be noticed as it was night anyway.
And by the way, I was serving in an air defence battery as a truck driver in the mobile radar unit (Flamingo). So there are not many of those and it is quite big....
Staromaiorske is not even an apt example, since even one of the most conservative mappers (war_mapper) with respect to geolocation posted on July 17: "Over the weekend, [UA] advanced into Staromaiors'ke, on the Southern front. The settlement is now contested." It's also worth noting that the built area of the town stretches south exactly 1.5km from the spot the MRAP video was filmed. So it's reasonable to treat the village as hosting troops of both sides at the time of filming.
Good mappers try to represent the fluid and uncertain nature of "control" by denoting contested space; visual evidence is given the highest premium because it offers a higher degree of confidence as to 'how much, where, when'. This is good for an operational overview in a war which rarely sees movement of more than one kilometer in a day, though it will be less applicable for maps with a fast update timescale or an aim of depicting tactical movement -which is much more difficult and less reliable, hence most avoid that approach.
(Nathan Ruser made a few movement-oriented maps in the initial stage of the invasion, when such a model was probably most precise.)
https://twitter.com/Nrg8000/status/1509526813688889348
The one real drawback in terms of keeping track of the battlefield situation is that conclusive evidence on which side has final control or presence in a given location that changes hands many times (especially if it is in a less observed sector) may only emerge weeks later, leading to belated corrections. The famous Oleksandrivka in Kherson was one such case, as was part of the hill between Ivanivske and Klischiivka. But there would be many more corrections if attempting to map each one of dozens of reported or possible tactical actions.
None of this implies that mappers would believe that nothing happened if there wasn't an image of it, or that the state of their map corresponds exactly to the state of the battlefield.
Maybe we could also say that textual and graphical reporting/analysis complement one another... Only glancing at maps of any kind, by anyone, once a day, won't inform you as to 'what's going on'.
Thank you for the detailed analysis here. It seems self evident when you spell it out, but since you have to spell it out it probably isnt.
Tom, thank you very much! Very informative and interesting, I'm sure that many did not know about
Thank you for your reminder. I think best maps are not costantly updated in details, they should serve just to explain in what parts of ukr. they are fighting.
Again: if a ukr. battallion advances 2 km taking heavy losses in a difficult-to-keep position without enough support is not a good situation, but in a map I could Say "well, fantastic!"
If the same battallion take a "window of opportunity", advance 2 km smashing an enemy inprepared battallion and then retreat before a counter-attack (taking little damage), I think they are doing a good job. But I can Say, in a static map, "hey, what are they doing, sleeping? Advance!"
Writing here is like parenting a teenager. You can fill the kitchen with good food (information), describe it factually, and show said teenager where all the food is. Teenager continues to say there is nothing to eat and then orders food delivered from McDonalds, then complains about delivery.
>Staromaiorske and Urozhaine (southern Zaporizhzhya)
Did you mean Donetsk region instead of Zaporizhzhya?
The Urozhaine in southern Zaporizhzhya is just to the east-south-east of Tokmak. It is quite deep and makes a bit less sense to be used together with Staromaiorske.
The reminder about how war is done with nice example is great, of course.
Thanks Tom this is why I'm not an arm chair commander
Never too old to learn (Army 30+ years, retired). This ain't your Uncle's "Thunder Run" nor his FOB-based stabilization op. Thanks, Tom!