Russian invasion of Ukraine

[Corvus]

Everyone believed that russia was going to throw human waves at defenders - it is what they have always done. I have no idea where you get this idea nobody thought they would do it.

The only difference is that only you think it would actually work. Modern technology has rendered it obsolete. As the results at Vuhledar and Avdiikva have shown.

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How big are russian companies? I think Western companies range from 80-250 men...

Similar size, if at full strength. But none of these are going to be at full strength.

[Lynarii]

I did say before their plan was to just to overwhelm with sheer numbers and this is pretty much what was expected; what will continue. People couldn't believe the idea Russians would just throw themselves on-foot in human wave attacks.

This is a straight up lie. We all believed that they WOULD do it, we just also realize that it isn't a very effective tactic in modern warfare without the kind of logistical support that Russia has yet to display in this entire conflict. You seem to have zero comprehension of how difficult it is to get food and water to 500,000 troops if they're sitting in one place, much less if you want to move them somewhere. And you need to solve this problem every single day, because any soldier that goes even a single day with nothing to eat or drink is going to be a mess.

It's a big scary sounding number, but its made up of actual living people who have needs and morale, not a zombie horde that can be pointed a direction and will just shuffle that way until they're all shot.

And so far we've been right. For all that big scary number, it's started, and Kiev still stands. They have, so far, been unable to translate the numbers into real tangible gains of note.

[Slirith]

Yuppie gets to scream and shout bullshit constantly and mods do nothing but if you dare to call it out you get infracted?

gg MMO-C

Sounds about on par for MMO-C, calling out trolls is like DEFCON level for them.

[YUPPIE]

no, really, if you scroll back you'll see arguments about this 500k-man assault blitzkrieg with one side pretty much saying they cannot be that stupid - how they will probably be more coordinated and prepared the next time around.

When I tried to say they will just run at Kyiv on-foot on mass, I was rebuked by Edge among others, who questioned the idea of how they would get there, feed their own troops, have anything to show for it. I just said "they will just do it ok."

And now, they are pretty much just doing it: running enraged on-foot guns blazing.

[Edge-]

When I tried to say they will just run at Kyiv on-foot on mass, I was rebuked by Edge among others, who questioned the idea of how they would get there, feed their own troops, have anything to show for it. I just said "they will just do it ok."

How close to Kyiv are they right now, do you reckon?

[Corvus]

You seem to have zero comprehension of how difficult it is to get food and water to 500,000 troops if they're sitting in one place, much less if you want to move them somewhere. And you need to solve this problem every single day, because any soldier that goes even a single day with nothing to eat or drink is going to be a mess.

For 500K soldiers, you'd need at least a million litres of water. A day. Of course they could provide some of it themselves, but that is a lot of water.

And 3 meals a day is 1.5 million meals a day. Everyday. I'm not sure what a russian meal pack weighs, but a standard MRE weighs in at over half a kilo each. So you are looking at 750,000 kilos of meal packs a day just to feed them all. Or 750 tons of food each and everyday.

Thats just food and water.

[YUPPIE]

How close to Kyiv are they right now, do you reckon?

not much progress yet judging from the disastrous reports of the early stages of this all-out assault. But remember the idea of throwing thousands of lives away for incremental gains. That's what they're trying to do, evidently, but with much bigger numbers this time. Biggest yet.

[DarkTZeratul]

not much progress yet judging from the disastrous reports of the early stages of this all-out assault. But remember the idea of throwing thousands of lives away for incremental gains. That's what they're trying to do, evidently, but with much bigger numbers this time. Biggest yet.

And Corvus has already pointed out that, from a simple logistics standpoint, there are severe diminishing returns on bigger numbers.

[Corvus]

Incremental gains don't mean much if you destroy your army in the process of taking them. You still have to hold the ground you take. And if everyone is dead, who holds the ground?

[YUPPIE]

And Corvus has already pointed out that, from a simple logistics standpoint, there are severe diminishing returns on bigger numbers.

the reason I mostly stopped concerning myself with talks of logistics (food, equipment) is that I sincerely believe Russia has long stopped caring for that stuff.

So say you're a soldier out there complaining you're hungry or tired (etc). The Russian response would not be to address these concerns but intimidate you back into subordination by threat of violence. I would not be surprised if the lot of people rushing out on-foot don't have much of a choice in the matter to turn around with special divisions set up to kill them if they object.

That's just their military culture: "Spartans do not surrender. Die honorably or don't come back alive at all."

[Iphie]

the reason I mostly stopped concerning myself with talks of logistics (food, equipment) is that I sincerely believe Russia has long stopped caring for that stuff.

So say you're a soldier out there complaining you're hungry or tired (etc). The Russian response would not be to address these concerns but intimidate you back into subordination by threat of violence. I would not be surprised if the lot of people rushing out on-foot don't have much of a choice in the matter to turn around with special divisions set up to kill them if they object.

That's just their military culture.

It doesn't matter whether or not russia cares about the logistics, they CANNOT ignore those, there a very GOOD reason that the phrase: "an army marches on it's stomach" exists.

[Mekh]

the reason I mostly stopped concerning myself with talks of logistics (food, equipment) is that I sincerely believe Russia has long stopped caring for that stuff.

So say you're a soldier out there complaining you're hungry or tired (etc). The Russian response would not be to address these concerns but intimidate you back into subordination by threat of violence. I would not be surprised if the lot of people rushing out on-foot don't have much of a choice in the matter to turn around with special divisions set up to kill them if they object.

That's just their military culture: "Spartans do not surrender. Die honorably or don't come back alive at all."

Food and water in real life don't work as they do in WoW. It's not an optional buff you can do fine without. Death by dehydration happens in 3-5 days.

[Calfredd]

the reason I mostly stopped concerning myself with talks of logistics (food, equipment) is that I sincerely believe Russia has long stopped caring for that stuff.

So say you're a soldier out there complaining you're hungry or tired (etc). The Russian response would not be to address these concerns but intimidate you back into subordination by threat of violence. I would not be surprised if the lot of people rushing out on-foot don't have much of a choice in the matter to turn around with special divisions set up to kill them if they object.

That's just their military culture: "Spartans do not surrender. Die honorably or don't come back alive at all."

So you finally agree that this "blitzkrieg" is a failure because the Russian soldiers are going to be emaciated due to lack of provisions and even the threat of violence won't improve performance.

[Edge-]

not much progress yet judging from the disastrous reports of the early stages of this all-out assault. But remember the idea of throwing thousands of lives away for incremental gains. That's what they're trying to do, evidently, but with much bigger numbers this time. Biggest yet.

How many gains have they made so far? How much further are they now compared to where they started, and how many losses did it take?

[YUPPIE]

So you finally agree that this "blitzkrieg" is a failure because the Russian soldiers are going to be emaciated due to lack of provisions and even the threat of violence won't improve performance.

I've said before that what I'm most interested in, above all else, is what happens after this all-all blitzkrieg or whatever you want to refer to it fails...

I'm not vouching for Russia to pull some miraculous victory against overwhelming odds. I just want to see what happens - what they do - if/when they fail this offensive and retreat from Ukraine altogether to tell Putin straight-up it's over.

[Corvus]

Combat is an exhausting business. Soldiers need to eat or they can not function. Even the Spartans. Back in the Pelloponesian War, the Athenians forced a band if Spartans to surrender by starving them out.

[Calfredd]

I'm not vouching for Russia to pull some miraculous victory against overwhelming odds.

Again, you could have fooled me.

[Yunru]

By the looks of the report, it doesnt look good for russan invasion.
If fields are also mined as reported, i could see a lot of russan numbers lost due to minefields.
They are probaly reducing the non-russan citizen numbers so they dont have to suppy them and hope to cause some damage in process.

[Lynarii]

the reason I mostly stopped concerning myself with talks of logistics (food, equipment) is that I sincerely believe Russia has long stopped caring for that stuff.

So say you're a soldier out there complaining you're hungry or tired (etc). The Russian response would not be to address these concerns but intimidate you back into subordination by threat of violence. I would not be surprised if the lot of people rushing out on-foot don't have much of a choice in the matter to turn around with special divisions set up to kill them if they object.

That's just their military culture: "Spartans do not surrender. Die honorably or don't come back alive at all."

This is not how the real world works. If you tried to force march people from the border to Kiev without any food or water, be it 1 person or 1 billion people, they would die without a bullet needing to be fired. It's not a question of comfort, it's not a question of being nice to the troops, it's literally about what the body requires to do that level of exertion. Trying to intimidate or threaten a person who is incapable of standing is not going to work, it doesn't matter what you say. There is a minimum level of logistics that is required for an army to exist at all, and when you're talking 500,000 people in hostile territory with destroyed infrastructure, that minimum level is quite challenging to reach.

(Also, despite pop culture, actual historical Spartans did both retreat and surrender. So even your cultural comparison is junk.)

[YUPPIE]

This is not how the real world works. If you tried to force march people from the border to Kiev without any food or water, be it 1 person or 1 billion people, they would die without a bullet needing to be fired. It's not a question of comfort, it's not a question of being nice to the troops, it's literally about what the body requires to do that level of exertion. Trying to intimidate or threaten a person who is incapable of standing is not going to work, it doesn't matter what you say. There is a minimum level of logistics that is required for an army to exist at all, and when you're talking 500,000 people in hostile territory with destroyed infrastructure, that minimum level is quite challenging to reach.

Logic like that isn't really applied to Russians, as you can see with today's aforementioned tank disaster (i.e, their sense of reasoning).

Warning: Nothing graphic or particularly NSFW, but still live combat footage.