By officially regarding the latest cross-border incursion as an act of terrorism instead of a military invasion, Putin signaled that he’s holding off on diverting forces from the Donbass front, which thus prevents Kiev from achieving its “primary military objective”.
Would love to hear what kind of black swan event you think is possible and what the fallout from the various scenarios might be. I know that would be speculative at best but as someone very interested but not super familiar with the dynamics in the region beyond what you share with us I’d be curious to hear your thoughts. If not no worries. Thanks.
A major incident at the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, a hugely successful push into Russia's western border regions, and/or the same but into Belarus' southern border regions.
A large-scale conventional NATO intervention is another black swan, but that's likely conditional on the above scenarios or other black swans, I don't think it'll happen out of nowhere. A Russian breakthrough in Donbass could also lead to that too.
Interesting thanks for responding. I saw that a “nuclear watchdog” was warning very seriously about a potential nuclear catastrophe if Ukraine keeps playing games around the various nuclear power plants in the region. The reckless nature of all of this has gotten so commonplace that even warnings of a situation like that, while shocking, aren’t entirely surprising.
Does NATO even have the capacity to mount anything of scale, and if so, how would they go about assembling that without being detected? Then once moving, how would they protect their columns, given Russian air superiority? Such a move could only end in disaster, unless that was the plan, but then what? Escalate? With what? Every credible report I've read suggests NATO is just about out of resources, not to mention how unpopular that move would be with large sections of their population. I wouldn't rule it out, but it does seem like a fool's errand to me.
I have to wonder if this wasn't a well laid trap. How did the UAF assemble a force of this size without being detected, given the amount of satellite, aerial, electronic and human intelligence which has caused both sides to limit large scale concentrations of personnel and armour?
There's a wooded area east of Sumy along the R200 (which I assume was the invasion route) that could provide cover for assembly, but once you start moving east it's almost all open ground. I find it hard to believe the RAF doesn't have ground intelligence in the Sumy area, given how easy it is to blend in with the local population, especially if you're already part of that population. That's been a thorn in the UK side from day one - people sympathetic to Russia in the population who provide targeting information.
Then there's the evacuation, which required some quick thinking if it wasn't planned in advance. I don't know how much of the population owns a vehicle, but assuming 3/4ths made it out that way, that still leaves about 15-20K people to move, which is hard to do at a moment's notice. Where did all the buses come from? You'd need about 100 making three trips apiece to move that amount of people.
This is just speculation of course, but I'm basing it on the above plus the often used strategy of drawing the enemy into a cauldron then flanking and closing the gap. Given this is Russian territory, it would be fairly easy to set that up in advance. The lack of cover presents a problem with this theory, but that doesn't negate an aerial or artillery response, which I believe we seen in abundance.
Anyone have thoughts along these lines? From the Russian standpoint this attack has the effect of solidifying pubic opinion for an increase in offensive action, plus the need to create a buffer zone along the border areas, which has already been talked about. I also notice that it's less than 400 km from the border to Kiev, which is actually the shortest route if that is your ultimate goal. In that scenario, rather than assemble the necessary forces, which would be noticed and countered, let the enemy attack, exhaust themselves, then counter attack with forces rapidly assembled for the defence, which can then switch to the offence with appropriate air cover. Speaking of which, the UAF advanced without significant air cover from what I've read. If so, what the hell were they thinking? The lack of air cover has been their undoing from day one.
Then there's the issue of labelling this a terrorist operation, which presumably suspends the rules of engagement as far as prisoners are concerned. I can't really picture Russian troops taking that approach, but I can picture them fighting like tigers, given this is Russian territory, which would have the same effect. I've read that the UAF used what remains of their best trained units, presumably dedicated to the ideology, so no quarter given in that case. This is important since I can imagine how demoralizing it must be to fight people who have no real skin in the game, and who in civilian life may have even voted for Yanukovych.
Would love to hear what kind of black swan event you think is possible and what the fallout from the various scenarios might be. I know that would be speculative at best but as someone very interested but not super familiar with the dynamics in the region beyond what you share with us I’d be curious to hear your thoughts. If not no worries. Thanks.
A major incident at the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant, a hugely successful push into Russia's western border regions, and/or the same but into Belarus' southern border regions.
A large-scale conventional NATO intervention is another black swan, but that's likely conditional on the above scenarios or other black swans, I don't think it'll happen out of nowhere. A Russian breakthrough in Donbass could also lead to that too.
Interesting thanks for responding. I saw that a “nuclear watchdog” was warning very seriously about a potential nuclear catastrophe if Ukraine keeps playing games around the various nuclear power plants in the region. The reckless nature of all of this has gotten so commonplace that even warnings of a situation like that, while shocking, aren’t entirely surprising.
Does NATO even have the capacity to mount anything of scale, and if so, how would they go about assembling that without being detected? Then once moving, how would they protect their columns, given Russian air superiority? Such a move could only end in disaster, unless that was the plan, but then what? Escalate? With what? Every credible report I've read suggests NATO is just about out of resources, not to mention how unpopular that move would be with large sections of their population. I wouldn't rule it out, but it does seem like a fool's errand to me.
So is the "northern group" activated one or two months ago playing the roles of Patton's First United States Army Group (Operation Quicksilver) ?
It's unclear as far as I'm aware, but I'd reckon that they're likely playing some sort of role even if it might not (yet?) be formally acknowledged.
another blackswan could be a biological warfare driven by Nato, since they’re part of Fort Detrick biolab research and run many bls4 around the globe…
I have to wonder if this wasn't a well laid trap. How did the UAF assemble a force of this size without being detected, given the amount of satellite, aerial, electronic and human intelligence which has caused both sides to limit large scale concentrations of personnel and armour?
There's a wooded area east of Sumy along the R200 (which I assume was the invasion route) that could provide cover for assembly, but once you start moving east it's almost all open ground. I find it hard to believe the RAF doesn't have ground intelligence in the Sumy area, given how easy it is to blend in with the local population, especially if you're already part of that population. That's been a thorn in the UK side from day one - people sympathetic to Russia in the population who provide targeting information.
Then there's the evacuation, which required some quick thinking if it wasn't planned in advance. I don't know how much of the population owns a vehicle, but assuming 3/4ths made it out that way, that still leaves about 15-20K people to move, which is hard to do at a moment's notice. Where did all the buses come from? You'd need about 100 making three trips apiece to move that amount of people.
This is just speculation of course, but I'm basing it on the above plus the often used strategy of drawing the enemy into a cauldron then flanking and closing the gap. Given this is Russian territory, it would be fairly easy to set that up in advance. The lack of cover presents a problem with this theory, but that doesn't negate an aerial or artillery response, which I believe we seen in abundance.
Anyone have thoughts along these lines? From the Russian standpoint this attack has the effect of solidifying pubic opinion for an increase in offensive action, plus the need to create a buffer zone along the border areas, which has already been talked about. I also notice that it's less than 400 km from the border to Kiev, which is actually the shortest route if that is your ultimate goal. In that scenario, rather than assemble the necessary forces, which would be noticed and countered, let the enemy attack, exhaust themselves, then counter attack with forces rapidly assembled for the defence, which can then switch to the offence with appropriate air cover. Speaking of which, the UAF advanced without significant air cover from what I've read. If so, what the hell were they thinking? The lack of air cover has been their undoing from day one.
Then there's the issue of labelling this a terrorist operation, which presumably suspends the rules of engagement as far as prisoners are concerned. I can't really picture Russian troops taking that approach, but I can picture them fighting like tigers, given this is Russian territory, which would have the same effect. I've read that the UAF used what remains of their best trained units, presumably dedicated to the ideology, so no quarter given in that case. This is important since I can imagine how demoralizing it must be to fight people who have no real skin in the game, and who in civilian life may have even voted for Yanukovych.