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[Eric Blank]

This is very true for the letters my great grandfather sent home to my great grandma. "Loose lips sink ships" was very much the motto of the day, his letters never revealed times or dates or locations, to protect his ship. If Japanese patrols did intercept a mail carrier, and someone included such information, it could compromise their position and movements and get them killed. So censorship in the field is very important, and it's understandable the Russians, as evil as they are, would want to keep their troops from using personal devices in the field that could compromise their positions. That's just good sense. The fact they're failing to do that is a huge strategic failure on their part.

Ukranian forces should also be exercising the highest caution when using their phones in the field, because they can compromise themselves the same way Russian troops are (Metadata from images and GPS locations/cell towers used in texts and calls) and get their whole unit killed.

It's not just about propaganda. Loose lips sink ships, and now you have to keep your personal spying on your every move devices from squaking too.

[Starver]

Entirely agreed with you both, though I was talking of the (counter-)morale aspect in particular. We've seen stuff like the Wagner Group's HQ identified by media metadata (and basic slogging through things like StreetView to confirm minor physical location clues and match up with otherwise anonymous building features. But the reason we have these things to work with is that they were released (outside of military circles) for their own morale/propoganda purposes, which has been an important "message to all those still at home", or even intended for the wider world, which got seized upon by the opposition ("us") and made use of against them.

OpSec has been very lax, probably was the ruin of some of those amazingly fragile Generals, and I'm sure they have done much (as have all sides) to remove the free flow of identifying info into the non-partisan cyberverse and thence the opposition, but I suspect that they're going further and trying to prevent 'antipropoganda' leaking back home as well. It would actually be a perfectly rational and wise thing to do, by any leadership, but (despite that) I actually still suspect that Russia is doing it to some extent.

[Eric Blank]

Ok, I see what you're saying now, and yeah you're right about that

[Loud Whispers]

So, Russia begs for a free day to resupply and reinforce... I mean they proposed a ceasefire for the orthodox Christmas...

I hope our leaders aren't idiots and won't fall for this primitive trap

Ceasefire didn't last very long before Russians started shelling bakhmut again

[EuchreJack]

So, Russia begs for a free day to resupply and reinforce... I mean they proposed a ceasefire for the orthodox Christmas...

I hope our leaders aren't idiots and won't fall for this primitive trap

Ceasefire didn't last very long before Russians started shelling bakhmut again

Er, that was a mistake by a rogue general whom will be forced to return to Moscow at ONCE_{for a medal}
Russia totally wants to keep the ceasefire_{where they can keep moving supplies, reinforcements, and fire missiles without retaliation}

[King Zultan]

Er, that was a mistake by a rogue general whom will be forced to return to Moscow at ONCE_{for a medal}
Russia totally wants to keep the ceasefire_{where they can keep moving supplies, reinforcements, and fire missiles without retaliation}

Na man it was a Ukrainian spy a Russian would never lie or do something they said they wouldn't.

[Strongpoint]

Proper winter started in Ukraine, after an absurdly warm December, it is now a rather windy -15-20 C. I don't envy anyone on the front.

It may also mean, that in a few days, when the ground will freeze, new offensive(s) may start somewhere.

[EuchreJack]

Semi-serious question: When the ground freezes, what happens to the vehicles stuck in the mud?
I was originally thinking about the treaded vehicles, but wheeled seems even worse.

[Starver]

Would depend upon how stuck in mud (i.e. whether they really bogged in, or just found it easier to throw some camouflage over and not move for the duration[1]) but similar to "dug in as hull-down" vehicles, I suspect... You spend time redigging them out.

Some advantages over them being in actual mud (it doesn't flow back again/fill up with groundwater), some disadvantages (harder to actually dig). Tactical (and strategic) needs will shape what state it was left in and what prompts any renewed effort to get it moving.


On the whole, experienced forces will avoid 'losing' (temporarily) as many vehicles as they possibly can by treating certain bits of landscape as a "natural minefield", and the freezing of the ground will then just let them use that ground again without the same level of disabling risk. Also a marked difference in the leaving of telltail trackmarks/etc, in inconvenient numbers.


[1] Would depend upon how active the site is in the ongoing theatre of war. And if this piece of equipment could be deemed "in reserve, for furure eventualities" rather than actually desperately needed now regardless of the practicalities of getting it moving.

[anewaname]

Many military vehicles have towing winches exactly for this sort of problem. Besides, if you were parking a vehicle, you'd know both your CO and the enemy would be vicious if you couldn't move out at a moment's notice.

[Starver]

...I imagined "involuntarily parked", with no handy supporting vehicles or (perhaps) the respite to use them.

And the rookie error of not examining/preparing the ground upon which to rest up/operate in-situ is probably something well trained out of the current forces. (The danger may now become one of apparently frozen but imminently thawing ground, but the morning Sun isn't likely to penetrate so deeply into semipermafrost.)

Possibly, more likely, is setting up in a dip/ditch in the ground which the immediate slight thawing of the area causes to reveive disproportionately more runoff than expected. Having myself set up a tent half way up a mountain in a hollow (with the latest in a series of a scenic views of another mountain) and then by morning discovered that a significant trickle rain/meltwater tended to flow through the very spot I was pitched... Didn't make that mistake twice, albeit that I'd doubt this experience alone would make me any better at successfully laying up an AFV in good order in a (near-)combat situation.

Also, I meant to add (and the real intent of this new post) that tracked vehicles actually stuck in mud might yet dig themselves out once the mud is frozen. So long as the drivechain and tracks themselves aren't gripped too hard in the ice itself. It's when wheels (and typical chassis protusions) of a vehicle are axle-deep in now-frozen depressions that you might need more than enginepower, and perhaps some handy bundles of vegetation, to (eventually) extract yourself. But this is going to be something that experienced commanderss/drivers will know much more about and pass the subtleties on to their more green compatriots.

(Not sure what the mix is between 'veterans' (of at least a year) and greenhorns, in the respective armies. I get the impression that Russia is more likely to build up units with a greater concentration of the latter, as time goes on, while Ukraine is heading in the opposite direction.)

[Strongpoint]

There is something hilarious when a so-called 2nd army in the world celebrates capturing a 10k town (Soledar, near Bakhmut) in a months-long battle.

[Strongpoint]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

It was a residential building in a city far from the frontlines with no military or even industrial targets nearby. With no warning, a ballistic missile hit on a weekend when people are at home

[Horizon]

For the love of god, to think Russia fought the Nazi's way back in the WW is unthinkable when their marching against a country not for a noble purpose but to claim territory and kill innocent people?  I don't care if you are not a soldier, you should feel shame for your countries actions. It may not be your fault and the rest of the world has fucked you over cause of this war so I feel bad the Russian citizens are being punished for something they aren't a part of. But the people of Ukraine, the country my great-grandmother came from are suffering more, this war must end.

Let it end peacefully, I pray to god it does.

[Madman198237]

For the love of god, to think Russia fought the Nazi's way back in the WW is unthinkable when their marching against a country not for a noble purpose but to claim territory and kill innocent people?

The Russians have not intentionally fought evil at ANY point in the last century or so. They fought WITH the Nazis at the start of the war to seize territory in Poland and attacked Finland on their own. THAT was the choice that Russia made at the beginning of WWII; it most certainly wasn't anywhere near the side of good. They joined the Allies only because the Nazis tried to take them out. Not a single good choice was made by the Soviet scum back then, they were actively forced to leave the Axis.

That is the history of modern Russia I guess, more than a century of spineless cowardice and evil. Evil for obvious reasons from the murders of the revolutions to WWII to Ukraine today, spineless cowardice that they STILL have a government capable of doing such things today.