Russia threatening to invade Ukraine 2.0

[Easo]

Just this March, actually.

Russia also only moved around 20-25k troops for those exercises; the rest are troops that always were there.

You really should learn to read. First, you linked last years exercise (which had 20k Americans plus something from Europe). This year we have this:
https://www.army.mil/article/244260/..._dozen_nations
Second, this years 30k is actually not simultaneous - biggest concentration is 13k, as the exercise is 2 months long.

And field army (or just army in Russian terminology) is 100k+. Which is why I specifically mentioned it.

Then you linked 2nd April news, when this all just started. How very Shalcker of you.

How about this, then (WSJ, CNN, Reuters, blah blah)? 20th April:

U.S. officials estimate that there are currently as many as 80,000 Russians in Crimea and near Ukraine. That is nearly double the Russian force deployed there about four weeks ago, the officials said. The European Union’s foreign-policy chief, Josep Borrell, put the number at more than 100,000, which he said would make it larger than the force the Russians deployed when they seized Crimea in 2014 and sent troops into eastern Ukraine.

That's twice your numbers. Ah Shalcker...

[Shalcker]

You really should learn to read. First, you linked last years exercise (which had 20k Americans plus something from Europe). This year we have this:
https://www.army.mil/article/244260/..._dozen_nations
Second, this years 30k is actually not simultaneous - biggest concentration is 13k, as the exercise is 2 months long.

Doesn't refute my point one bit.

That's twice your numbers. Ah Shalcker...

30k vs 40k, seems still to match overall. It looks like simple posturing - responding to NATO exercises with Russian exercises.

Happened plenty of times before.

Again, it isn't entire 100k moved around. Which is my point.

[Kuntantee]

Yeah, about those Russian missiles....

Few years ago, their missiles also hit targets in Western Syria from Hazar (Caspian). Malfunction is bound to happen.

- - - Updated - - -

The Black Sea Fleet would be sunk within hours of war, it is too small of an area to survive. We are not talking about ships coming from other fleets, we are talking about the Black Sea Fleet.

How?

Oh, and the Battle of Tsushima is a more apt comparison for the Russian Navy these days.

The point is Dardanelles isn't the only option for Russia.

[Kellhound]

It only goes to 100 thousands if you include troops that were always there.

Actual movement of troops was a lot less impressive.

Given that the troops already stationed there are offensive, of course. Plus the troops that were involved had a large number of offensive forces (airborne/air mobile and amphibious).

- - - Updated - - -

Just this March, actually.

Russia also only moved around 20-25k troops for those exercises; the rest are troops that always were there.

The US moved 20K troops for Defender Europe 20, to augment the light forces that are stationed in Germany. The multinational exercise was still smaller than Russia's

- - - Updated - - -

Again, 100k estimate is entire army presence in all regions around Donbass and Crimea. Including ones that were always there.

It's like if i would count entire NATO forces in Europe for that 20k US troop movement exercise in March i linked.

Sure, if NATO would invade most of them will certainly mobilize! ...it isn't unprecedented troop buildup, however.

Russian exercise even goes after NATO exercise and basically matches number of troops moved around.

100,000 troops concentrated in a small area vs all of NATO's area...

- - - Updated - - -

Few years ago, their missiles also hit targets in Western Syria from Hazar (Caspian). Malfunction is bound to happen.

- - - Updated - - -



How?



The point is Dardanelles isn't the only option for Russia.

The best defense for a fleet is not being found in a vast area of water. Even if (as we know you would prefer) Turkey stayed out of a war against Russia, NATO has sufficient air power to sink every major Russian ship stuck in the sea in short order.

The Dardanelles IS the only option for the Black Sea Fleet to sortie into the Med. That is the POINT of the BSF.

[Kuntantee]

The best defense for a fleet is not being found in a vast area of water. Even if (as we know you would prefer) Turkey stayed out of a war against Russia, NATO has sufficient air power to sink every major Russian ship stuck in the sea in short order.

The Dardanelles IS the only option for the Black Sea Fleet to sortie into the Med. That is the POINT of the BSF.

Well, first of all, Russian aggression needs to be kept in check that's for sure. I prefer Turkey stays out of a direct conflict, I am perfectly happy with Turkey equipping Ukraine and other proxies. And that's precisely what we do; same in Syria and same especially in Libya. We will make sure Ukraine gets proper drone and EW training but that should be the extent of dealing with Russia. A direct NATO conflict is neither desired by Europeans no Turks. So It's not just me, it's most Turks and most Europeans.

As for your argument, Russians have jets too right? And they have more of them in the region. Not to mention they have Air Shields (S-400) deployed. The only hope of NATO destroying Russian Black Sea Fleet is if they are caught off-guard and chance of it happening is close to zero.

[CostinR]

The best defense for a fleet is not being found in a vast area of water. Even if (as we know you would prefer) Turkey stayed out of a war against Russia, NATO has sufficient air power to sink every major Russian ship stuck in the sea in short order.

In short order? With what planes and what munitions? Outside a few airfields in Romania, Bulgaria and Greece, which absolutely cannot service the number of planes that would be required for such an operation, NATO would be forced to rely on long range strike missions. Assuming Turkey stays neutral, which frankly given the situation with Erdogan is very likely, you wouldn't be able to transit ships or fly planes through their air space.

Sure if given enough time and resources NATO could mass a sufficiently strong enough force to attack the Black Sea Fleet, but then we'd run into the problem that while the Black Sea Fleet only has a few combatants with sufficiently strong enough air defenses, that could be as you said sunk in a matter of hours with enough fighter craft, they absolutely have a very large, well equipped and well trained air defense force in Crimea.

Over the last half decade Russia has turned into Crimea into the same kind of military fortress that Kaliningrad is with layers upon layers of air defenses and anti-ship missile launchers. We're talking divisions of troops here armed with S-400s, S-300s, TORs and BUKs and long range cruise missiles, let alone fighter craft and drones.

https://euro-sd.com/2020/03/allgemei...ed-the-crimea/

That was in 2019, not what they have now or what they mobilized recently.

So yeah good luck with sinking their fleet when it's got all of that to help protect it and they would absolutely retaliate with their own long range weapons. Any war between Russia and NATO is going to come down to long range missiles, radar, jamming and so on and it will be quite a long and bloody affair and there are quite a few areas of their military where Russia not only has parity with the US in many key areas, it has parity with all of NATO combined, especially in munitions: Seriously take the US out of NATO and it's a paper tiger despite the hundreds of billions spent. Europe has done a shit job on defense spending, not only in overall numbers but how they've spent their cash except for France ( oh the irony ).

[Easo]

Doesn't refute my point one bit.

30k vs 40k, seems still to match overall. It looks like simple posturing - responding to NATO exercises with Russian exercises.

Happened plenty of times before.

Again, it isn't entire 100k moved around. Which is my point.

30k vs 40k? Do you take me for a moron? You said 20-25k troops moved. Observer reported numbers are literally double that. That is up to 50k+ soldiers moved. Your disingenuousness is incredible. Then again, not surprising.

[Logwyn]

...There are quite a few areas of their military where Russia not only has parity with the US in many key areas, it has parity with all of NATO combined, especially in munitions:

What and where does Russia have parity with the US in a conventional war?

[Easo]

What and where does Russia have parity with the US in a conventional war?

Well, unless USA ships all the tanks it has to Europe then mechanized forces would be the thing. Simply due to numbers.

[CostinR]

What and where does Russia have parity with the US in a conventional war?

Artillery systems, tanks and armored vehicles in general, munitions, jamming, radar, helicopters, bombers, submarines.

I can go on really. In some areas it's quantity in other areas it's quality and in a few it's both quantity and quality: Munitions and artillery especially and I emphasize I am not merely talking just the US here but all of NATO.

Well, unless USA ships all the tanks it has to Europe then mechanized forces would be the thing. Simply due to numbers.

Also this. It's all well and good to compare America vs Russia on paper. Practically speaking the US has only 60.000 troops in Europe, over half in Germany and there's only a few thousand in Poland. Yes it can deploy more to reinforce, but getting armored units would take time. It makes sense however from America's point of view: No one sees an immediate land war breaking out and the US is focused on it's Asia pivot still, but if tensions were to rise it would take time to get a large number of troops in Europe...and Europe itself is in no position to stop Russia: The Baltics and Poland know they'd be conquered and so are readying for a guerilla war.

Meanwhile the vast majority of Russia's military is deployed in European Russia.

[jonnysensible]

looks like more troops being built up on the Russian side despite them saying they were chilling out.

how bad is the water crisis in Crimea lads?

[Kellhound]

Well, first of all, Russian aggression needs to be kept in check that's for sure. I prefer Turkey stays out of a direct conflict, I am perfectly happy with Turkey equipping Ukraine and other proxies. And that's precisely what we do; same in Syria and same especially in Libya. We will make sure Ukraine gets proper drone and EW training but that should be the extent of dealing with Russia. A direct NATO conflict is neither desired by Europeans no Turks. So It's not just me, it's most Turks and most Europeans.

As for your argument, Russians have jets too right? And they have more of them in the region. Not to mention they have Air Shields (S-400) deployed. The only hope of NATO destroying Russian Black Sea Fleet is if they are caught off-guard and chance of it happening is close to zero.

Russia has fewer air dominance and SEAD forces than NATO. Russian SAMs have NEVER closed airspace. Also, the Black Sea Fleet has very few significant ships, for the very reason that Russia knows how useless it is during a war.

[Shalcker]

looks like more troops being built up on the Russian side despite them saying they were chilling out.

how bad is the water crisis in Crimea lads?

About as bad as in Taiwan?

[Kellhound]

In short order? With what planes and what munitions? Outside a few airfields in Romania, Bulgaria and Greece, which absolutely cannot service the number of planes that would be required for such an operation, NATO would be forced to rely on long range strike missions. Assuming Turkey stays neutral, which frankly given the situation with Erdogan is very likely, you wouldn't be able to transit ships or fly planes through their air space.

Sure if given enough time and resources NATO could mass a sufficiently strong enough force to attack the Black Sea Fleet, but then we'd run into the problem that while the Black Sea Fleet only has a few combatants with sufficiently strong enough air defenses, that could be as you said sunk in a matter of hours with enough fighter craft, they absolutely have a very large, well equipped and well trained air defense force in Crimea.

Over the last half decade Russia has turned into Crimea into the same kind of military fortress that Kaliningrad is with layers upon layers of air defenses and anti-ship missile launchers. We're talking divisions of troops here armed with S-400s, S-300s, TORs and BUKs and long range cruise missiles, let alone fighter craft and drones.

https://euro-sd.com/2020/03/allgemei...ed-the-crimea/

That was in 2019, not what they have now or what they mobilized recently.

So yeah good luck with sinking their fleet when it's got all of that to help protect it and they would absolutely retaliate with their own long range weapons. Any war between Russia and NATO is going to come down to long range missiles, radar, jamming and so on and it will be quite a long and bloody affair and there are quite a few areas of their military where Russia not only has parity with the US in many key areas, it has parity with all of NATO combined, especially in munitions: Seriously take the US out of NATO and it's a paper tiger despite the hundreds of billions spent. Europe has done a shit job on defense spending, not only in overall numbers but how they've spent their cash except for France ( oh the irony ).

Russia has not had good luck with its SAMs ever being the decisive figure in a war. NATO has the advantage in Air Dominance, AEW, SEAD, EW, guided munitions, and long range strike.

- - - Updated - - -

Artillery systems, tanks and armored vehicles in general, munitions, jamming, radar, helicopters, bombers, submarines.

I can go on really. In some areas it's quantity in other areas it's quality and in a few it's both quantity and quality: Munitions and artillery especially and I emphasize I am not merely talking just the US here but all of NATO.



Also this. It's all well and good to compare America vs Russia on paper. Practically speaking the US has only 60.000 troops in Europe, over half in Germany and there's only a few thousand in Poland. Yes it can deploy more to reinforce, but getting armored units would take time. It makes sense however from America's point of view: No one sees an immediate land war breaking out and the US is focused on it's Asia pivot still, but if tensions were to rise it would take time to get a large number of troops in Europe...and Europe itself is in no position to stop Russia: The Baltics and Poland know they'd be conquered and so are readying for a guerilla war.

Meanwhile the vast majority of Russia's military is deployed in European Russia.

Artillery, tanks, and armored vehicles: Yes in numbers, no in capability.
Guided munitions, EW, helicopters, bombers (seriously, they still have a prop bomber), submarines: No in both numbers and capability.

The US has prepositioned armor in Europe for this reason. And while Russia has the ability to invade NATO, it lacks the logistics to drive very far into it.

[Kuntantee]

Russia has fewer air dominance and SEAD forces than NATO. Russian SAMs have NEVER closed airspace. Also, the Black Sea Fleet has very few significant ships, for the very reason that Russia knows how useless it is during a war.

I checked some numbers on wiki. They have 100 Su-35 (upgraded ones) in RuAF alone. They also have some in Navy. Do you even have total of 100 aircrafts, let alone Air Dominance assets, in the region?

[Easo]

Kellhound, please top being Skroe. This is offtopic, but please stop. Let's talk tanks? Capability? Oh, I am pretty sure the 2k of T-72B3's are match for the average ubiquitos old Leo 2A4, or some barely upgraded versions of T-72 1/3 of NATO uses. We all can thank dear Russia that after 2014 pin was put under NATO's butt when it sat down and received a wake up call, but common. They have more upgraded and relatively modern tanks than most of NATO taken together. They also have spent a lot of resources getting APC's and IFV's up to date, the general rearmament program has been over a decade in the making and very systematic. They actually do know what they are doing.

As I said before, Russia is being both overrated and underrated at the same time.
P.S.
You may laugh at the prop bomber, but it is actually newer than B-52's. Both are nothing more than missile launch platforms and pretty much with same capability, there is zero point in laughing.

[CostinR]

Russia has not had good luck with its SAMs ever being the decisive figure in a war. NATO has the advantage in Air Dominance, AEW, SEAD, EW, guided munitions, and long range strike.

You mean third world countries with 2nd rate export versions of Russia's air defense systems, from 20-40 years ago, failed to defend themselves when faced with NATO's air power. What is this Libya 2011?

A more recent example is what happened in 2018 when the US, France and the UK bombed Syria using long range missiles. Now the US claims none of it's missiles were intercepted. Russia and Syria claim over 70% interception rate by Syrian air defense, a massive lie if I've heard one.

The SOHR however, which is cited as a reliable source by many Western Media outlets, claimed over 65 missiles were intercepted. https://www.syriahr.com/en/89324/

Whether or not that's true is debatable. The SOHR has a vested interest in reporting against Assad as they have for years, so if the claim is true then NATO has a massive problem on their hands since Syria doesn't exactly have top of the line air defense either ( the only started receiving S-300s after this event and even then Russia isn't sharing their top of the line equipment), nor are their personnel very well trained. There have been reports since then of Syrian air defenses intercepting Israeli Strikes, with mixed results.

The point is that Russia has poured in vast sums of money in dealing with America's and NATO's air dominance, and they have superior systems then what NATO has been dealing with so far in any other country. What the US and NATO should expect is a heavily contested air space where they won't be able to bomb their enemy into submission, and that is a major problem since we are far outnumbered and outgunned in terms of ground forces.

Artillery, tanks, and armored vehicles: Yes in numbers, no in capability.
Guided munitions, EW, helicopters, bombers (seriously, they still have a prop bomber), submarines: No in both numbers and capability.

The US has prepositioned armor in Europe for this reason. And while Russia has the ability to invade NATO, it lacks the logistics to drive very far into it.

Russia's armored and artillery forces have consistently received upgraded T90s, T80s, and T72s, on their APCs and artillery systems. This isn't the Gulf War where you can have a turkey shoot with a few dozen NATO tanks blowing up hundreds with no casualties.

As for calling the TU-95 a "prop bomber" yeah ok.

The US has prepositioned what? A few armored brigades on rotation when Russia has regiments of armored units in Kaliningrad alone? The main armored formations that would face a Russia invasion would be Poland's Leopard 2s, the problem is that Poland has older versions of the Leopard 2, specifically 2A4 and 2A5s with a only a few modern ones while Russia has a good number of upgraded tanks, especially in the West.

As I said before, Russia is being both overrated and underrated at the same time.

I swear every time Russia comes up there's a bunch of Russian boys singing the Soviet Anthem about Russia STRONK while a bunch of Western military guys comes up to mock Russia just as they did in 2008 with Georgie or 2014 with Crimea and Ukraine or 2015 in Syria. Especially frustrating these kind of views are prevalent even among the top military brass.

Russia isn't the same military power as the Soviet Union, they lost their Blue Water navy capability, their carrier is a joke, many of their major surface combatants are gone or degrading.

But it also isn't the same joke that had it's tank units shredded by RPGs in Grozny in the 90s. They've spent well over a decade now going through a major modernization program which includes rearmament and retraining their entire military, it's not complete but the Russian military is far more capable then it was 7 years ago when they took over Crimea.

[Kuntantee]

Assuming Turkey stays neutral, which frankly given the situation with Erdogan is very likely, you wouldn't be able to transit ships or fly planes through their air space.

It isn't only Turkey that wants to stay neutral. It's pretty much everyone. And Turkey would remain neutral even if Erdogan was not the president of Turkey. Turkish Black Sea policies are a product of Cold War era. We made sure that Black Sea remains a sea of peace and it works. Turkey never followed an overly-aggressive policy against Russia. There simply isn't a need, even in 1950s where USSR actually threatened to invade Eastern Turkey. No one is interested in picking up a direct fight with Russia.

Romanians and their mighty army (assuming you have an army) can lead the charge against Russia. We will limit our response to arming/training Ukraine.

[Kellhound]

I checked some numbers on wiki. They have 100 Su-35 (upgraded ones) in RuAF alone. They also have some in Navy. Do you even have total of 100 aircrafts, let alone Air Dominance assets, in the region?

If you look at the Russian AF in total, you have to look at NATO in total. You also have to understand that air dominance is more than just fighters, its tankers, AEW, and ECM as well.

- - - Updated - - -

Kellhound, please top being Skroe. This is offtopic, but please stop. Let's talk tanks? Capability? Oh, I am pretty sure the 2k of T-72B3's are match for the average ubiquitos old Leo 2A4, or some barely upgraded versions of T-72 1/3 of NATO uses. We all can thank dear Russia that after 2014 pin was put under NATO's butt when it sat down and received a wake up call, but common. They have more upgraded and relatively modern tanks than most of NATO taken together. They also have spent a lot of resources getting APC's and IFV's up to date, the general rearmament program has been over a decade in the making and very systematic. They actually do know what they are doing.

As I said before, Russia is being both overrated and underrated at the same time.
P.S.
You may laugh at the prop bomber, but it is actually newer than B-52's. Both are nothing more than missile launch platforms and pretty much with same capability, there is zero point in laughing.

Russia has about 300 more tanks in service than the US does. The Brits have 200, the French have 200. These are all as good or better than what Russia has. So with just three countries NATO has at worst parity. Germany has at least 100 operational. Poland's 700ish tanks are about on par with Russia's T-72s. The rest of NATO has several hundred tanks equal or superior to the Russian T-72s. Russia has neither a quality nor a quantity advantage in operational tanks. In IFVs, Russia again has about 300 more than the US, the UK has 700, and Germany has 500 that are all equal to or superior to their Russian counterparts. Russia has neither a quality nor a quantity advantage in operational IFVs.

The Tu-95s are 15% slower, have half the payload, and less range than the B-52s. And they entered production at the same time (1952).

And I am not Skroe, I don't write as much.

[Logwyn]

Artillery systems, tanks and armored vehicles in general, munitions, jamming, radar, helicopters, bombers, submarines.

Russia has 550 T-90 the rest are old models from the 1980s. The US is all modern up to date tanks. The US has a wide advantage in Aircraft. Russia has 59 Subs to the US 71. The US has twice the available Military service population that Russia has. Much of Russia's equipment is old and outdated and they can't afford to replace it. Nor could they afford a war.

The best they really could hope for is to launch a Nuclear strike but that would pretty much kill off everyone in the Northern Hemisphere so would be a "Best not to play situation".

https://armedforces.eu/