Ukraine Watch...

[UndercoverElephant]

https://tvpworld.com/69007819/china-doe ... ambassador

Chinese Ambassador to the EU, Fu Cong has emphasized that China does not acknowledge Russia's annexation of Ukrainian territories and does not provide military aid to Moscow. Fu Cong also stated that China does not recognize Crimea, as well as four other annexed regions of Ukraine, as Russian territory.

The ambassador pointed out however, that China did not condemn Russia's move because the root causes of the conflict are more complicated than the West says.

This is interesting. The Chinese must realise that Russia is probably going to lose most or all of the territory it currently occupies in Ukraine, and I think it is now clear that China has no intention of intervening to assist Russia and risk causing WW3. The Chinese have plenty to gain by just sitting tight, continue to accumulate gold, and wait for the US to decay or implode. Maybe even take back some land from Russia in Siberia.

[Potemkin Villager]

Maybe even take back some land from Russia in Siberia.

Considering the relative population densities on the two sides of the current border, not to mention the rich resources,
this is highly likely when they get the opportunity.

[BritDownUnder]

Apparently they are wanting to change the names of Russian cities in the Far East to original Chinese names on their maps.

The Ministry of Natural Resources on February 14 published a new version of its world map – directing a return to using the Chinese names of eight cities and areas occupied by the Russian Empire in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Under Beijing’s new directive, Vladivostok once again is called Haishenwai (meaning Sea Cucumber Bay) while Sakhalin Island is called Kuyedao. The Stanovoy Range is back to being called the Outer Xing’an Range in Chinese.

The Treaty of Nerchinsk, signed in 1689 after a series of conflicts, defined the Sino–Russian border as the Stanovoy Mountains and the Argun River, affirming Qing China’s sovereignty over the region now known as Outer Manchuria. However, after losing the Opium Wars, Qing China was forced to sign a series of treaties that gave away territories and ports to various Western powers as well as to Russia and Japan; these were collectively known as the Unequal Treaties. Starting with the Treaty of Aigun in 1858 and the Treaty of Peking in 1860, the Sino–Russian border was realigned in Russia’s favour along the Amur and Ussuri rivers. As a result, China lost the region now known as Outer Manchuria (an area of more than 1 million km2) and access to the Sea of Japan.

One can only wonder if the Chinese strategy is to weaken Russia (and the West if possible) so much that it has a free hand in a lot of the world. Maybe they will want Outer Mongolia back as well since they only 'lost' it in 1924.

[PS_RalphW]

The MOD his reporting that Wagner has control of the centre of Bakhmut, but heavy fighting remains in the west of the city. Elsewhere, the lines are almost static, as heavy rain and mud make movement very difficult.

[adam2]

I have heard a reliable report regarding the ease of use, and the effectiveness of Western anti-tank rockets. A Ukrainian army reservist without any training in anti tank weapons obtained two of these munitions from fallen comrades, they used both and destroyed two russian armoured vehicles and damaged a third. No one survived from the two destroyed vehicles, Survivors from the damaged vehicle were killed by school children with revolvers, cricket bats and kitchen knives.Three russians surrendered and were taken prisoner.
Poor ruskis, defeated by a reservist who had only a few days training, and the survivors taken prisoner by school children.

I dont really approve of child soldiers, but fighting for ones country feels different to fighting in a foreign war.

The anti-tank rockets were fired from INSIDE a flat, the damage to the room was described as surprisingly light.

[BritDownUnder]

I would think this happened before the front lines in the war stabilised and the Russians are adopting the strategy of pummelling limited areas on static front lines with intense artillery fire. However it does indicate that the best defence in asymmetric warfare is to have a well armed population, even children, who may have well founded fears of being kidnapped and taken to Russia.

This is a good argument for having US style rights to bear arms enshrined in law.

[adam2]

I would think this happened before the front lines in the war stabilised and the Russians are adopting the strategy of pummelling limited areas on static front lines with intense artillery fire. However it does indicate that the best defence in asymmetric warfare is to have a well armed population, even children, who may have well founded fears of being kidnapped and taken to Russia.

This is a good argument for having US style rights to bear arms enshrined in law.

The incident to which I refer was in the last few weeks. I have seen video of it, which is firstly private and not for publication, and secondly is also too graphic for general viewing.

Whilst I can see the merit of an armed population in time of war, I can not support any significant relaxing of UK gun controls. Too much risk of ending up like America.
HMG should in my view hold large stocks of firearms, for issuing to civilians and to newly called up troops in any future emergency. Nothing expensive or elaborate is needed. Something simple to use, easy to maintain, inexpensive, and with a generous magazine capacity.
A SLIGHTLY updated version of the "Welgun" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSA_Welgun

This was described at the time as being "an ideal child's first machine gun" It was intended to be operable by an intelligent child after only a few minutes instruction. Many Welguns were supplied to the French resistance, and used to good effect.

[UndercoverElephant]

Large leak of secret US documents about Ukraine:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-65225985

I bet this is disinformation designed to mislead the Russians about the coming offensive.

[PS_RalphW]

It might be disinformation, but among the papers is a report that Ukraine is about to run out of air defence missiles.

Also, reports that Russia is beginning to develop counter measures to the Ukrainian drone models that have been so successful as spotters and grenade droppers and kamikazis.

Reports that the Wagner have been replaced in Bakhmut by better trained Russian regular forces, hence the continued progress.

Ukraine really needs good weather so that it’s counter offensive can start. Hopefully they have spent the winter effectively training their conscripts, because they are still light on heavy armour and artillery, so they will need mobile, highly trained troops to out manoeuver the Russians after using their few heavy tanks to punch holes in the front lines.

[clv101]

My expectations are for the war to be more intense in 2023 than last year. The stakes are getting higher and Russia is very far from a spent force. Public accounts are that they are fielding a significantly larger force this spring, than last spring and from a stronger territorial position. Ukrainian infrastructure is already on its knees (see grid article above). I think the ramping up of pledged NATO assistance is due to assessments that the Ukrainian Armed Forces risk being overrun in the coming months. The war is anything but over. I fear, in hindsight, 2022 will turn out only to be the beginning.

Have a read of this regarding the US leak:

https://open.substack.com/pub/bigserge/ ... medium=web

Ukraine is in big trouble, NATO support insufficient. Current strategy will not see a Ukrainian victory, more likely the opposite.

This is a major escerlation risk, as the US won't permit Russia to 'win', but how?

[UndercoverElephant]

If Ukraine is in big trouble, why have the Russians had so much difficulty making any progress? Why isn't the front line moving? Russia doesn't have so many men that it can afford to lose 20,000 of them every time it takes a town like Bakhmut. Or do you think the Russian spring offensive hasn't really started yet?

[adam2]

If Ukraine is seen to be in serious danger of loosing the war then I expect that NATO will increase supplies of munitions and other consumables. Claims that they have no more supplies to spare may turn out to be unfounded.
And of course munitions are still being manufactured, and the rate of production has probably been increased, or soon will be.

Reports from the USA suggest that some small arms ammo is in short supply. Manufacturers may be giving priority to military needs rather than civilian or retail sales.

[clv101]

I don't know. It's looking to me like this is a war of attrition, and Russia can simply stay standing the longest. NATO can't fight that kind of war as we aren't willing to accept casualties and don't have the manufacturing capacity to maintain a long fight. Folk have been saying for a year that Russia is on the brink of running out of ammunition - perhaps it's Ukraine that's out of shells and missiles?

The leaked documents suggest to me the much promoted Ukrainian Spring offensive won't amount to much at all, Western hardware much too little, too late. If Ukraine does run out of air defence we can then expect to see more of the Russian air force.

The question I'm left with is how much further is NATO willing to go? Air strikes again Russian positions? NATO boots on the ground?

[UndercoverElephant]

I don't know. It's looking to me like this is a war of attrition, and Russia can simply stay standing the longest. NATO can't fight that kind of war as we aren't willing to accept casualties

We aren't taking any casualties though. Ukraine is taking those.

don't have the manufacturing capacity to maintain a long fight.

You think Russia has more manufacturing capacity than the whole of the Western world put together?

The leaked documents suggest to me the much promoted Ukrainian Spring offensive won't amount to much at all, Western hardware much too little, too late.

And if you wanted to wrong foot the Russians - if you wanted to tempt them into making bad strategic decisions - what would you like to lead them to think? The Russian failures last year were largely the result of under-estimating Ukraine. Russia was over-confident. It will suit Ukraine very much if they are over-confident again, and the way to make that happen is to leak a load of documents which suggest Ukraine isn't ready to launch a major offensive. If I was in charge of the operation, I'd include quite a lot of genuine information -- real leaks, except intentional ones -- but I may also include some key bits of misdirection -- a few documents that aren't real, or maybe some that have been altered to present a distorted picture...

I might be completely wrong, of course.

The question I'm left with is how much further is NATO willing to go? Air strikes again Russian positions? NATO boots on the ground?

NATO will not let Russia win. They will go however far it takes to make sure of that, including NATO boots on the ground if it gets to that. I don't believe it will though.

[BritDownUnder]

The Ukrainians are outnumbered in population by a factor of three. Of course it would be difficult for Russia to fully mobilise and still do other things like oil production, industry, agriculture etc while Ukraine could be like North Vietnam and have a complete mobilisation of males and females and a war economy.

I think there probably is some mileage in claims that Ukrainians are close to running out of ammo and I think all this talk of Ukrainian offensives is premature. What they need to do is basically wipe out all the mobilised cohort of the 300,000 Russians last September to make the Russian public stop and think about what they are doing. Appealing to Putin's, or even Xi's, better judgement is a non starter. To do this they need specific targeted weaponry and good intelligence. Go for the Russian barracks, artillery firing positions and encourage them to make massed infantry attacks that result in high casualties of the attackers.

The Russians love wars of attrition and NATO should not be shy about giving them one. Russia no longer has the manpower that it had in the past.

NATO forces should have taken the chance when Xi was in Moscow to deploy into Ukraine on Ukraine's non-Russian borders with Belarus and Moldova to discourage Russian aggression from those places and free up Ukrainians for the front lines.