Fucking BLAMMO.  Big and accurate, I wonder what those were.

Girkin is back, and in a long post describing his impressions slanders the Russian approach, saying the Russian forces are apathetic, the soldiers don't know what they're fighting for, and is not expecting any success in the near future.https://t.co/7ZCgBWIekC pic.twitter.com/rpcgBdGmgQ

Dmitri  (@wartranslated) December 6, 2022

I'm behind - is it news that Ukraine has hit a third airbase in Russia?  

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/ukraine-warns-emergency-blackouts-after-more-missile-hits-2022-12-05/

Ukraine appears to expose Russian air defence gaps with long-range strikes

Three killed at Russian base just hours from Moscow
One of bases hit was home to Russian bomber fleet
Ukraine minister jokes that careless Russian smokers to blame

KYIV/NOVOSOFIIVKA, Ukraine, Dec 6 (Reuters) - A third Russian airfield was ablaze on Tuesday from a drone strike, a day after Ukraine demonstrated an apparent new ability to penetrate hundreds of kilometers deep into Russian air space with attacks on two Russian air bases.

Officials in the Russian city of Kursk, located close to Ukraine, released pictures of black smoke above an airfield in the early morning hours of Tuesday after the latest strike. The governor said an oil storage tank there had been set ablaze but there were no casualties.

It came a day after Russia confirmed it had been hit hundreds of kilometers from Ukraine by what it said were Soviet-era drones - at Engels air base, home to Russia's strategic bomber fleet, and in Ryazan, a few hours' drive from Moscow.

Kyiv did not directly claim responsibility for the strikes but celebrated them.

"If Russia assesses the incidents were deliberate attacks, it will probably consider them as some of the most strategically significant failures of force protection since its invasion of Ukraine," Britain's ministry of defence said on Tuesday.

"The Russian chain of command will probably seek to identify and impose severe sanctions on Russian officers deemed responsible for allowing the incident."

Russia's defence ministry said three service members were killed in the attack at Ryazan. Although the attacks struck military targets it characterised them as terrorism and said the aim was to disable its long-range aircraft.

The New York Times, citing a senior Ukrainian official, said the drones involved in Monday's attacks were launched from Ukrainian territory, and at least one of the strikes was made with the help of special forces close to the base.

Ukraine never acknowledges responsibility for attacks inside Russia. Asked about the strikes, Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleskiy Reznikov repeated a longstanding joke blaming carelessness with cigarettes.

"Very often Russians smoke in places where it's forbidden to smoke," he said.

Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych went further, noting that Engels is Russia's only base fully equipped for the fleet of huge bombers Moscow has used to attack Ukraine.

"They will try to disperse (strategic aircraft) to airfields, but all this complicates the operation against Ukraine. Yesterday, thanks to their 'unsuccessful smoking', we achieved a very big result," he said.

Russian commentators on social media said that if Ukraine could strike that far inside Russia, it might also be able to hit Moscow.

NEW BARRAGE
The huge Tupolev long-range bombers that Russia stations at Engels are a major part of its strategic nuclear arsenal, similar to the B-52s deployed by the United States during the Cold War. Russia has used them in its campaign since October to destroy Ukraine's energy grid with near weekly waves of missile strikes.

The Engels base, near the city of Saratov, is at least 600 km (372 miles) from the nearest Ukrainian territory.

Russia responded to Monday's attacks with what it called a "massive strike on Ukraine's military control system", though it did not identify any specific military targets for what Ukraine called Moscow's latest strikes on civilian infrastructure.

Missiles across Ukraine destroyed homes and knocked out power, but the impact seemed to be less severe than barrages last month that plunged millions of Ukrainians into darkness and cold.

Ukraine's air force said it had shot down more than 60 of around 70 missiles. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said at least four people were killed.

A missile tore a huge crater out of the earth in the village of Novosofiivka, about 25 km (16 miles) east of Zaporizhzhia city in southern Ukraine, and completely shredded a nearby house. Ambulance workers collected two bodies lying by a destroyed car.

Olha Troshyna, 62, said the dead were her neighbours who were standing by the car seeing off their son and daughter-in-law when the missile struck. With houses now destroyed and winter setting in, she had no idea where she would go.

"We have no place to go back to," she said. "It would be fine if it were spring or summer. We could have done something if it were a warm season. But what am I going to do now?”

On Tuesday, Zelenskiy visited troops in the Donbas region in the east of the country that has seen the war's heaviest fighting.

He praised soldiers in a selfie video filmed in front of a sign on the road outside Sloviansk, near the city of Bakhmut that Russian forces have been trying to encircle for weeks in one of the war's bloodiest campaigns. In other videos, he presented medals and shook hands with troops in a hangar.

Kyrylo Budanov, head of Ukraine's Defence Intelligence agency, said Moscow had enough missiles left for just a few more giant barrages before they were depleted.

RESISTANCE
Russia claims a military justification for attacks on Ukraine's civil infrastructure. Kyiv says the strikes are intended to hurt civilians, a war crime.

"They do not understand one thing - such missile strikes only increase our resistance," Ukraine's defence minister Reznikov said.

No political talks are underway to end the war. Moscow insists it will not negotiate unless Kyiv and the West accept its sovereignty over Ukrainian lands it claims, while Kyiv says Russia must quit all its territory.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday talks would only be possible when Russia achieves the goals of its "special military operation", which he did not define.

"Russia must and will achieve the goals it has set," he said "As for the prospects for some kind of negotiations, we don't see them at the moment, we have repeatedly said so."

However, the sides have discussed issues such as prisoner swaps. A Russian-installed official said the latest such exchange would see each side free 60 prisoners later on Tuesday.

This falls in line with Capta's thinking on the drone attacks.

many are saying the TU141 that hit the 2 rus. air basses
doesn't sound right. drones like that are not set up to do attack missions like that.  normally not that direct.  
its metal, easy to see on radar, so easy to kill.
and something that big should have big parts at the site

david D.  (@secretsqrl123) December 6, 2022

no wreckage, no wings, nothing can be seen.  again this is a drone the size of a gull sized military truck with only a 150lm warhead.  what looks like hit it was smaller and or made from modern items like fiber of plastic.

david D.  (@secretsqrl123) December 6, 2022

saying it was a old 141 is something russia can deal with.. having something new that ru cant deal with scares them to death.

david D.  (@secretsqrl123) December 6, 2022

I read somewhere the UA had deeply inserted SOF to guide the drones in. Skeptical of that if they are GPS guided it doesn't seem needed, but what would SOF do to "guide" them in outside out laser designating them?

. . . and if they were laser designated I think they would have lazed a Blackjack rather than a Bear.  That's a much larger strategic loss especially since only 16 are known to exist.

I think the drone was GPS guided.

I am just blown away by the 86% success rate of shooting down the cruise missiles. 61 of 70 shot down is amazing.

"THAT'S ALL FOLKS! Ukrainians CROSS DNIPRO River. Russians RISK BEING STRANDED in the South"

View Quote

I also thought it was UA talking about RU which sounds plausible

Reversed, RU is making up stupid shit

Him getting the ol' KGB "Makarov to the back of the head in a dingy, windowless basement" treatment would be good enough for me.

Sort of like how the combination of the 1940 "Two Ocean Navy Act" and economic sanctions led the Japanese Government to approve the Pearl Harbor attack?  Interesting...

The thread moves fast. Go read some to catch up. Unfortunately Ukraine is the best real life advertisement there is at the moment.

One example:
https://mil.in.ua/en/news/poland-is-negotiating-the-purchase-of-200-himars/

"Poland is negotiating the purchase of 200 HIMARS"

https://www.google.com/amp/s/news.yahoo.com/amphtml/us-weapons-sales-in-europe-are-booming-as-russias-war-in-ukraine-continues-to-rage-215801466.html

"Since late February, when Russian forces invaded Ukraine, countries in the European Union have pledged to beef up their arsenals by some $230 billion, with Germany alone planning to modernize its military to the tune of $100 billion this year. And the United States arms industry, which produces and exports more weapons than any other country — selling over 39% of the estimated $210 billion annual global arms sales from 2017 to 2021 — has been the biggest beneficiary."

ETA:

https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2022/12/05/estonia-buys-himars-as-eastern-allies-boost-artillery-arsenals/

"Estonia has signed a contract with the United States to purchase six M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, or HIMARS launchers, joining a rapidly expanding group of Eastern European allies who eye the weapons in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine."

Think of Geissele giving triggers away over the 10+ years of Cola Warrior. Sure many of us got a free trigger, but we also bought much more than the value of that initial gift. Real world experiences with products drives sales.

"Window of opportunity", they've determined the timing of many wars.  Taiwan is gunning up as quickly as the US can deliver.  And don't forget Japan is also arming up and flirting with a defense treaty with Taiwan.  The Japanese plan to have a thousand 900-1,500km range anti-ship cruise missiles (truck, ship, and air launched versions) deployed in 2024 that will lock down 80% of the Chinese coast, including the Taiwan Strait, and will have a secondary land attack feature: LINK   That alone will slam the window shut IMHO.  Remains to be seen if the Chinese think the window is open at any time before then.  The humiliation of the Russian Air Force and the growing interception rate of missile attacks can't be encouraging.

Actually, I think we encouraged Ukraine to give up their nukes just to have one less thing to worry about. Not knowing the future, we erred on the side of caution, but erred we did.

Wooooowzzaaa

Worth giving them away to demonstrate real world battlefield effectiveness to potential buyers.  To say nothing of the lessons being gained for our own use.

Tactical Tuna in theater.

Attached File

I’ve never wanted to visit a foreign country in my life as much as I’d like to see a post victory Ukraine.

OOF.  The wage of sin paid.
Those PGM hits make me wonder if Bayraktar is working the area.

My buddy is a University Professor that had 30 years of industry experience. One of the smartest guys I know.

There is something to be said for the value of psyops with a very low-cost vehicle that *everybody* knows is there but nobody can do anything about.

Being hunted by PGMs looks like it sucks ass. And then you just die tired.

To understand the significance of the attack in the Bryansk region: the Slava plant is a storage facility for the strategic state reserve of fuel of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation

On its territory there are 48 reservoirs with a capacity of 5 and 2 thousand /1 pic.twitter.com/EOMceXQXdl

Lew Anno Yieretz Israel  (@anno1540) December 6, 2022

cubic meters.

Earlier on Wednesday, it was already attacked by unknown UAVs, as a result of which 3 storage facilities for 15,000 tons of aviation kerosene were destroyed.

Judging by reports in Russian public pages, another 10-15 thousand tons of expensive fuel destined /2

Lew Anno Yieretz Israel  (@anno1540) December 6, 2022

The UAV attacks of today and yesterday are taken very seriously by Russian channels. For example, Zhivov shows that missile attacks against Ukraine cannot be considered an asymmetrical response and that soon Ukraine will be attacking targets even deeper in Russia. pic.twitter.com/DxUjzI5ty8

Dmitri  (@wartranslated) December 6, 2022

Dying tired. AMF!

Korea agreed to send some units intended for their own armed forces, and delay their own domestic acquisitions to meet Poland's timeline and secure the sale. According to Perun, the deal also involves tech transfer to have Poland build more K2-PL domestically, and service and maintain their fleets themselves.

Fucked around, finding out

Agree, also note the lack of furnishings in the collapsed area.

After the washing machines we now have a new Russian gadget which is very appealing to them.

Baths! pic.twitter.com/uW1MoEACSj

— NOËL \uD83C\uDDEA\uD83C\uDDFA \uD83C\uDDFA\uD83C\uDDE6 (@NOELreports) December 6, 2022

No kidding. Pretty rich trying to play victim.