The end?

on the Guardian live feed they mention about suspicious activity in Kherson implying the Russians are setting a trap for the Ukrainian army in Kherson Locals from Kherson say the "Russians have changed into civilian clothes and are hiding all over the city." sounds a bit mad but who knows check out the live feed at 16:05 . Kherson
 
Fattyfoggon said:
on the Guardian live feed they mention about suspicious activity in Kherson implying the Russians are setting a trap for the Ukrainian army in Kherson Locals from Kherson say the "Russians have changed into civilian clothes and are hiding all over the city." sounds a bit mad but who knows check out the live feed at 16:05 . Kherson
Click to expand...

It's possible. Do they still execute spies in Ukraine?
 
exiledinboro said:
Is that in part because the war will grind to a halt over winter?
Click to expand...

Our tank girl on the front line is in the SW suburbs I believe, but they are waiting on forces coming in from the N & NE. I don't think they will just waltz into downtown Kherson just yet, but lay siege.
 
Kherson is 100% a trap , to lose the city with a fight would be a propaganda disaster for the orcs never mind no fighting.

Hopefully the satellites can give an insight into their plans . In my opinion they will either :

-Hide as civilians and attack the Ukrainian soldiers so the soldiers have no choice but to attack back . Soldiers hiding as civilians is a war crime but the Russians have never given a **** about that . Most likely in my opinion
Blow the dam and wipe out the Ukrainian soldiers . Less likely in my opinion as they **** up the water supply for crimea . But again , Russia doesn’t give a **** about its civilians so not impossible
Tactical nuke or dirty bomb . Least likely of all 3 in my opinion . This one will justifiably bring nato into the conflict, the last thing the Russians want. Russia then risks true international isolation then as it won’t be just the west and allies shunning them, it will be pretty much the whole world

I reckon Ukraine will have to lay siege to the city in my opinion
 
It's good that there is no talk about ANY of Ukraine not eventually being liberated now. Crimea, Ukraine and Donbass, Ukraine will both be rid of the dictator's army at some stage
Lay siege to Kherson and flush them out. If they are not in uniform are they classed as spies - with whatever consequences that brings when those not killed are captured ?
 
borolad259 said:
A small installment.

"So, now that the mobilisation has stopped, and the conscripting of 18-21 years olds can start (120 000 of them) so that they can be sent to die at the front, we are already seeing what is going to happen next.
And as I predicted they are going for the women next.
On Monday school children in Russia was sent home with a note to their "Dear Mothers", yes it really said Dear Mothers.
The mothers are then supposed to answer these questions and sign the paper:
-Do you have previous military training?
-How do you rate your physical abillity from 1 to 10?
-Do you consider yourself patriotic to Russia?
Note, this is even worse than I expected. I thought they would go for childless women, instead they are going for the mothers directly. Why?
Single women would just run away or become Campniks (those who have gone into the woods to hide), it is far harder for mothers to run away or camp in the woods, so it is easier to haul them to the front to die.

Attrition rate
This phrase is the average rate per day that an army is losing soldiers.
Prior to mobilisation this number was bobbing between 300-500 dead and between 900-1500 wounded per day.
Now that the quality of the soldiers have dropped the number has gone up to 600-1000 dead per day and 1800 to 3000 wounded per day.
The number that die under hospital care is unknown, but it is estimated to be at around 25%. This number is not in the death rate.
The death rate is calculated from Russian bodies counted by Ukraine. So, the number is conservative.
But, we know that the numbers are fairly accurate since up until first of October Russia was openly budgeting their death payments. And those tracked earily close to Ukrainian numbers.

As more and more untrained and unequiped Mobiks enter the frontline these numbers will increase correspondingly.
At the same time the Ukrainian mortality rate, and rate of wounded, has not gone up. Those numbers peaked during the massive Russian onslaught in the beginning of their Donbas offensive at 200 dead and 600 wounded per day, down to 100 and 300 from Juli onwards.

Now, ponder that the first 300 to 500 thousand Mobiks got bad weapons (at best) and a little ammo, imagine how bad it will be for the 120 000 youngsters that are being sent straight to the front without training. I doubt they will get anything, they will probably have to go directly into combat wielding a rock while wearing ripoff adidas clothes.

This is no longer a war, it is a self-inflicted massacre on Russians.
Russia no longer have an army, they have a travesty."
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Not just wanting Ukrainians kill them liberating their land - looks like they are killing them directly now....
Screenshot_2022-11-04-10-17-09-77_965bbf4d18d205f782c6b8409c5773a4.jpg
 
TeessideCleveland said:
Not just wanting Ukrainians kill them liberating their land - looks like they are killing them directly now....
View attachment 47060
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They have had them for a while. The Ukrainians send in flyers with a hotline number to call, which lots of them have been doing, as being a POW is much better than the alternative. The Kadyvorites were raping retreaters before shooting them.... as some sort of extra deterrent.
 
This does pretty much tie in with all borolad's source has said.

The Russians know Kherson is lost and so do the Ukrainians. Surovkin is fighting a rearguard war of retreat and has shown himself a wily tactician. Ukraine know this, so they will approach this carefully. Winter is coming.

If Surovkin is using his best troops, which I imagine he needs to in order to effectively spring the trap, then they are stuck there and can't be deployed elsewhere.. If they are lesser troops then they will likely give up as soon as they can as conditions worsen.

Ukraine's problems are that they (rightly) have a steel not flesh approach, but attacking is usually more costly until a rout sets in and they are trying to retake their own country rather than invade another so damage limitation is a consideration. In addition, the winter 'pause' may allow Russia to replace munitions and equipment, although it may allow Ukraine to do so even more, so it isn't clear who benefits most. Generally, the longer this war goes on, the worse it is for Putin and the Russian economy, but it is the winter when gas and oil shortages in Europe will be most felt.
 
Lefty said:
This does pretty much tie in with all borolad's source has said.

The Russians know Kherson is lost and so do the Ukrainians. Surovkin is fighting a rearguard war of retreat and has shown himself a wily tactician. Ukraine know this, so they will approach this carefully. Winter is coming.

If Surovkin is using his best troops, which I imagine he needs to in order to effectively spring the trap, then they are stuck there and can't be deployed elsewhere.. If they are lesser troops then they will likely give up as soon as they can as conditions worsen.

Ukraine's problems are that they (rightly) have a steel not flesh approach, but attacking is usually more costly until a rout sets in and they are trying to retake their own country rather than invade another so damage limitation is a consideration. In addition, the winter 'pause' may allow Russia to replace munitions and equipment, although it may allow Ukraine to do so even more, so it isn't clear who benefits most. Generally, the longer this war goes on, the worse it is for Putin and the Russian economy, but it is the winter when gas and oil shortages in Europe will be most felt.
Click to expand...
Did you see the stats saying only 1 in 20 Russians are surviving the Ukranians targetted attacks.
 
Jonny_Rondos_Disco_pants said:
Did you see the stats saying only 1 in 20 Russians are surviving the Ukranians targetted attacks.
Click to expand...

No, but this is going to be potentially very different.

This could be well led, experienced, professional soldiers executing a plan, not poorly trained, poorly equipped, badly motivated new recruits just told that the enemy is coming so do your best.

A lot of the targeted attacks have been on small settlements that could be easily surrounded, cut off and overrun. Morale and determination play a huge part. A lot of the targeted attacks were in countryside and the targeting is thanks to satellite and drone observations. That's not going to be possible in a city.

I wonder if Surovkin wants to try and turn this into a Stalingrad? That was a city that had it's back to a river. The Russians sucked the Germans in. It was costly, hand to hand fighting, taken building by building. The Nazi's were bled dry and worn down. Firepower advantage was negated. Winter helped. It became symbolic rather than a strategic necessity. This could become the same if Ukraine are not smart. Booby traps, prepared defensive positions, well trained troops who understand the tactics and that the aim is to inflict losses and give ground slowly to suggest to the world that the conflict is in bloody stalemate.

I'm glad Ukraine seems to be in no rush. They have clearly some master tacticians, I'm sure they have considered this possibility.
 
Lefty said:
No, but this is going to be potentially very different.

This could be well led, experienced, professional soldiers executing a plan, not poorly trained, poorly equipped, badly motivated new recruits just told that the enemy is coming so do your best.

A lot of the targeted attacks have been on small settlements that could be easily surrounded, cut off and overrun. Morale and determination play a huge part. A lot of the targeted attacks were in countryside and the targeting is thanks to satellite and drone observations. That's not going to be possible in a city.

I wonder if Surovkin wants to try and turn this into a Stalingrad? That was a city that had it's back to a river. The Russians sucked the Germans in. It was costly, hand to hand fighting, taken building by building. The Nazi's were bled dry and worn down. Firepower advantage was negated. Winter helped. It became symbolic rather than a strategic necessity. This could become the same if Ukraine are not smart. Booby traps, prepared defensive positions, well trained troops who understand the tactics and that the aim is to inflict losses and give ground slowly to suggest to the world that the conflict is in bloody stalemate.

I'm glad Ukraine seems to be in no rush. They have clearly some master tacticians, I'm sure they have considered this possibility.
Click to expand...
Have you heard anything about Russian evidence of sabotage and drone attacks conducted by the uk?
 
Jonny_Rondos_Disco_pants said:
Yes, would be interesting to actually know what their evidence is.
Click to expand...
Apparently moments after the Nord stream explosions Lizz Truss sent US Secretary Blinken a message saying "Its done" whether or not that's true is anyone's guess. But it's funny how it came out not long after Ben Wallace told the government about Lizz Truss's phone being hacked by Russia.
 
johnmfc said:
Apparently moments after the Nord stream explosions Lizz Truss sent US Secretary Blinken a message saying "Its done" whether or not that's true is anyone's guess. But it's funny how it came out not long after Ben Wallace told the government about Lizz Truss's phone being hacked by Russia.
Click to expand...
I read that, but that came from a twitter account and was completely unverified. Many people quoted it.
 
I don't like it when he comes out with stuff like this because it's usually coming from an "informed" perspective.
First part grim speculative opinion.

Some good factual stuff about the current conflict though. Especially the bit about our Tank Girl in the Kherson govt building.

"
Things are happening now at a rapid pace, and the world is getting near more danger, and what might end up as in the land of the utterly bizarre. In other words, we might be on the brink of WWIII.
Let me explain.

Iran
In Galaxy far far away from Ukraine religious bearded men in funny headgear is getting ready to declare war on other religious bearded men in other weird headgear.
Obviously both sides have large beards, are overly religious, and are afraid of women. This goes without saying.

Due to internal strife as the women are trying to liberate themselves in Iran, the Iranian religious yahoo's need a deflection to rally the country behind them. After all, a couple of hundred thousand dead men are preferable to womens hair.
And what better than to scream Yihaa and declare Jihad on those who wear beards and are somehow wrongly religiously, but that also hate women (The Saudis).
We have strong indications that the Iranians will attack Saudi Arabia within the next 72 hours.

This will obviously pull in the US and divert attention away from Ukraine (according to the Russians).
It will also wreak havoc on the world supply of oil and force The Collective West to sue for peace (according to the Russians).
They are obviously partially correct.
It will pull in the US, to the glee of both China and Russia.
It will not pull away the attention from Ukraine. This will be a fairly simple policing action from the US side. Attacking across the straight will be a very deadly surprise for the Iranians, and the internal rebellion in Iran will not abate from it, au contraire. Instead it is more likely to be the death of the Iranian regime.
Oil prices will obviously sky rocket. This will hurt China more than anyone else. Prices will though stabilise within a month or so.
It will though in the end be the death toll for Hydrocarbons.

China
This obviously opens the road for China, even the US navy would be a bit hard pressed to move enough assets to stop both Iran and China in case China goes for Taiwan, and at the same time keep the Russian fleet in the Mediterranean down.
The previous assesment was that it was more likely that China would go for parts of Russia, but this might swing the pendulum towards Taiwan instead.
If Taiwan is attacked we have WWIII, same goes for if they attack Russia.

Russia
Russia has informally given terms for a peace negotiation.
They want The Collective West to guarantee the borders of Russia, and the sovereignty of Russia.
This is all of what they communicated.
It is uncommonly straightforward and minimalist for being Russia.
First of all, what borders? The recently annexed parts? The 2014 borders? The 2013 Crimea borders? The original Russian border?
Here is my interpretation.
Russia is in deep ****. Regardless of how many men, women and children they pull in, they do not any longer have a viable army in the modern era.
Yes, they can still defend against third rate countries like Georgia, Moldova, Armenia and Azerbaijan. Perhaps even attack them.
Attacking a second rung country like Kazakhstan is out of the question, and they would by now be hard pressed defending.
Another first rate regional power like Ukraine or Turkey? Forget it, either would win a war and one is already winning a war...
A world power like China? Not a chance.

Problem is that Russia has ***ed off a lot of countries, and you can bet those are sharpening their knives waiting for Ukraine to finish serving the Russians whopass so they can play tag team.
And then there is the Chinese army waiting quietly at the border to nibble of huge chunks, and they want back a huge chunk of Russian real estate.
Chinese have extremely long memories, for them Manchuria and Mongolia are yesterday.

So, the sailient point is most likely: Any border the west wants, just as long as Russia get security guarantees for it's borders and territorial sovereignty.
They are fishing for protection, specifically NATO protection. Someone woke up in Russia and smelled the Wantoon Soup.

Luhansk
Ukraine is still pushing forward at a sedate pace in Luhansk against the sporadic Russian counter-attacks.
As soon as Ukraine have taken better control of the roads things will probably pick up the pace here.

Bakhmut
It is ironical, but somehow the Ukrainians got a bit of reinforcements in (not even a lot), and that tipped the scales and Ukraine broke through.
This surprised both the Ukrainians and the Russians to equal proportions.
Ukraine is now rapidly sending in more forces to take advantage, and Wagner and their Kadyrovite frenemies are struggling to find any army support.
The regular army is sitting mostly laughing their arses off and letting the Ukrainians whack the pricks at a goodly pace.
Surovikin is obviously not in any hurry whatsoever to help his political enemies, so it is a very bad day for Prigozhin and Dondon Ramzan.

Northwestern Kherson
Ukraine is now slowly starting to name liberated villages. The names are from about two weeks ago.
Compared to the usual map around half of the Northwestern Kherson is liberated, but the Russians are holding on to the bank towards Dnipro.

Southwestern Kherson
It is mostly abandoned, the only area under Russian control reaches from the Northern end of Kherson City towards the Antonivka Bridge.

Weirdly though, it seems like some stubborn Russian has declared himself King of Znihorivka, and flat out refuses to follow orders to move out, instead he is stubbornly continuing to fight.
He is pretty much surrounded by now, but he is not caring one bit about that, nor is he caring one bit about Surovikins orders. For the time being he and his 1500 men are left alone in their sort of independent Kingdom.

Ukraine is doing reconnaissance missions in force inside Kherson City, and there is a rather stupendous photo of Slavinska sitting in the abandoned Governors office (the building with the missing Russian flag). It is supposedly meant for the Ukrainian news when they declare the City liberated. I hope she get's a bit of time as a hero, she deserves it.

There are reports of Russian soldiers hiding in the city in civilian clothes. Not even the locals know if they are trying out some weird Guerrila warfare campaign, or if these are Russians trying to defect.
Currently it is very calm in Kherson City with the exception of the Northern part where fighting is ongoing.
The Ukrainian army is not happy, the thought of having to go from house to house to clear out Russians is a recipee for disaster, regardless of the reason for them being there.
And there may be up towards 5000 of them hiding.
The local population are obviously more used to having 5000 Russians doing weird ****, so they are starting to go out and do chores and shop...

My five eurocents
I am worried, this is shaping up to become a much larger conflict.
Just the Iranian stupidity is bad enough, but if China become frisky, then it will take years to get back to normal.
I still though stick to the Ukrainian part of it being over at the 24th of December. Especially if the US doesn't pull the punches on Iran and it becomes a short affair. A more protracted one and it may delay the end of the Ukraine war.

If China become involved against Taiwan the Russians will probably try to hang on for as long as possible.
If China goes against Russia the Ukrainian war is done and Russia walks home to try to delay the Chinese somewhat while beging like crazy for help, and that is a help that weirdly enough must be given if we ever want to see democracy prevail, because a China sitting on the Russian resources will just be a tad much to beat.
At best then the world will be completely divided into two parts, constantly fighting over Southern Asia and Africa.
In other words, the Cold War would be back in a far worse way.
This is obviously not counting in that Russia would go nuclear on day one, which they blooming will. After all, that is all they have left. At least a few nukes should work...

Me no like. Me no wanna see. Me wanna peace."
 
borolad259 said:
I don't like it when he comes out with stuff like this because it's usually coming from an "informed" perspective.
First part grim speculative opinion.

Some good factual stuff about the current conflict though. Especially the bit about our Tank Girl in the Kherson govt building.

"
Things are happening now at a rapid pace, and the world is getting near more danger, and what might end up as in the land of the utterly bizarre. In other words, we might be on the brink of WWIII.
Let me explain.

Iran
In Galaxy far far away from Ukraine religious bearded men in funny headgear is getting ready to declare war on other religious bearded men in other weird headgear.
Obviously both sides have large beards, are overly religious, and are afraid of women. This goes without saying.

Due to internal strife as the women are trying to liberate themselves in Iran, the Iranian religious yahoo's need a deflection to rally the country behind them. After all, a couple of hundred thousand dead men are preferable to womens hair.
And what better than to scream Yihaa and declare Jihad on those who wear beards and are somehow wrongly religiously, but that also hate women (The Saudis).
We have strong indications that the Iranians will attack Saudi Arabia within the next 72 hours.

This will obviously pull in the US and divert attention away from Ukraine (according to the Russians).
It will also wreak havoc on the world supply of oil and force The Collective West to sue for peace (according to the Russians).
They are obviously partially correct.
It will pull in the US, to the glee of both China and Russia.
It will not pull away the attention from Ukraine. This will be a fairly simple policing action from the US side. Attacking across the straight will be a very deadly surprise for the Iranians, and the internal rebellion in Iran will not abate from it, au contraire. Instead it is more likely to be the death of the Iranian regime.
Oil prices will obviously sky rocket. This will hurt China more than anyone else. Prices will though stabilise within a month or so.
It will though in the end be the death toll for Hydrocarbons.

China
This obviously opens the road for China, even the US navy would be a bit hard pressed to move enough assets to stop both Iran and China in case China goes for Taiwan, and at the same time keep the Russian fleet in the Mediterranean down.
The previous assesment was that it was more likely that China would go for parts of Russia, but this might swing the pendulum towards Taiwan instead.
If Taiwan is attacked we have WWIII, same goes for if they attack Russia.

Russia
Russia has informally given terms for a peace negotiation.
They want The Collective West to guarantee the borders of Russia, and the sovereignty of Russia.
This is all of what they communicated.
It is uncommonly straightforward and minimalist for being Russia.
First of all, what borders? The recently annexed parts? The 2014 borders? The 2013 Crimea borders? The original Russian border?
Here is my interpretation.
Russia is in deep ****. Regardless of how many men, women and children they pull in, they do not any longer have a viable army in the modern era.
Yes, they can still defend against third rate countries like Georgia, Moldova, Armenia and Azerbaijan. Perhaps even attack them.
Attacking a second rung country like Kazakhstan is out of the question, and they would by now be hard pressed defending.
Another first rate regional power like Ukraine or Turkey? Forget it, either would win a war and one is already winning a war...
A world power like China? Not a chance.

Problem is that Russia has ***ed off a lot of countries, and you can bet those are sharpening their knives waiting for Ukraine to finish serving the Russians whopass so they can play tag team.
And then there is the Chinese army waiting quietly at the border to nibble of huge chunks, and they want back a huge chunk of Russian real estate.
Chinese have extremely long memories, for them Manchuria and Mongolia are yesterday.

So, the sailient point is most likely: Any border the west wants, just as long as Russia get security guarantees for it's borders and territorial sovereignty.
They are fishing for protection, specifically NATO protection. Someone woke up in Russia and smelled the Wantoon Soup.

Luhansk
Ukraine is still pushing forward at a sedate pace in Luhansk against the sporadic Russian counter-attacks.
As soon as Ukraine have taken better control of the roads things will probably pick up the pace here.

Bakhmut
It is ironical, but somehow the Ukrainians got a bit of reinforcements in (not even a lot), and that tipped the scales and Ukraine broke through.
This surprised both the Ukrainians and the Russians to equal proportions.
Ukraine is now rapidly sending in more forces to take advantage, and Wagner and their Kadyrovite frenemies are struggling to find any army support.
The regular army is sitting mostly laughing their arses off and letting the Ukrainians whack the pricks at a goodly pace.
Surovikin is obviously not in any hurry whatsoever to help his political enemies, so it is a very bad day for Prigozhin and Dondon Ramzan.

Northwestern Kherson
Ukraine is now slowly starting to name liberated villages. The names are from about two weeks ago.
Compared to the usual map around half of the Northwestern Kherson is liberated, but the Russians are holding on to the bank towards Dnipro.

Southwestern Kherson
It is mostly abandoned, the only area under Russian control reaches from the Northern end of Kherson City towards the Antonivka Bridge.

Weirdly though, it seems like some stubborn Russian has declared himself King of Znihorivka, and flat out refuses to follow orders to move out, instead he is stubbornly continuing to fight.
He is pretty much surrounded by now, but he is not caring one bit about that, nor is he caring one bit about Surovikins orders. For the time being he and his 1500 men are left alone in their sort of independent Kingdom.

Ukraine is doing reconnaissance missions in force inside Kherson City, and there is a rather stupendous photo of Slavinska sitting in the abandoned Governors office (the building with the missing Russian flag). It is supposedly meant for the Ukrainian news when they declare the City liberated. I hope she get's a bit of time as a hero, she deserves it.

There are reports of Russian soldiers hiding in the city in civilian clothes. Not even the locals know if they are trying out some weird Guerrila warfare campaign, or if these are Russians trying to defect.
Currently it is very calm in Kherson City with the exception of the Northern part where fighting is ongoing.
The Ukrainian army is not happy, the thought of having to go from house to house to clear out Russians is a recipee for disaster, regardless of the reason for them being there.
And there may be up towards 5000 of them hiding.
The local population are obviously more used to having 5000 Russians doing weird ****, so they are starting to go out and do chores and shop...

My five eurocents
I am worried, this is shaping up to become a much larger conflict.
Just the Iranian stupidity is bad enough, but if China become frisky, then it will take years to get back to normal.
I still though stick to the Ukrainian part of it being over at the 24th of December. Especially if the US doesn't pull the punches on Iran and it becomes a short affair. A more protracted one and it may delay the end of the Ukraine war.

If China become involved against Taiwan the Russians will probably try to hang on for as long as possible.
If China goes against Russia the Ukrainian war is done and Russia walks home to try to delay the Chinese somewhat while beging like crazy for help, and that is a help that weirdly enough must be given if we ever want to see democracy prevail, because a China sitting on the Russian resources will just be a tad much to beat.
At best then the world will be completely divided into two parts, constantly fighting over Southern Asia and Africa.
In other words, the Cold War would be back in a far worse way.
This is obviously not counting in that Russia would go nuclear on day one, which they blooming will. After all, that is all they have left. At least a few nukes should work...

Me no like. Me no wanna see. Me wanna peace."
Click to expand...
The Ukraine stuff seems credible but the rest continues to be wild speculation for me.
 
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