Europe to supply Ukraine with aircraft
Ed Nash reports that the EU will supply Ukraine with aircraft, probably MiG-29 fighters and Su-25 ground attack aircraft:
Many eastern European states fielded Russian aircraft during the cold war. Some still have them, and the EU it proposing to give some or all of these aircraft to Ukraine, as they are all types that Ukraine already uses.
According to The Military Balance 2021:
Bulgaria has 15 Mig-29, 3 Su-25
Poland has 28 MiG-29
Slovakia has 11 MiG-29
So that's a total of 54 MiG-29 and 3 Su-25. The Mig-29 is an OK but not spectacularly good fighter aircraft. Many of these have been upgraded with Western avionics, but are still able to use Soviet-era missiles. They are about as good as the Russian fighter aircraft (Russian fighter aircraft include 88 MiG-29 and a few hundred Flanker (Su-27/32/35) variants). So 50 or so MiG-29 will not on their own be enough to enable Ukraine to win the war, but they will certainly help.
Also a lot of former Warsaw Pact countries have soviet-era helicopters such as the Mi-24 Hind, and of course other soviet-era equipment, which may be useful to Ukraine. If Europe is delivering fighter aircraft, it makes sense for them to deliver other kit where they can.
Chris Cappy's analysis
Chris Cappy (former US infantryman) is doing a daily live analysis on the Russian-Ukraine war.
Main takeaways are:
The halt in the Russian advance is mainly due to logistic issues and not Ukrainian resistance. Yes the advance appears to have halted, but that doesn't mean Ukraine is winning yet.
Most Russian military vehicles don't have GPS. The Russian military is under-funded and under-equipped.
Russian infantry lack night vision goggles. "This is stuff you can buy on Amazon for $100".
Russia may be holding most of its forces back, including its best units. In this case the attack so far is an attempt to gauge Ukrainian resistance.
Russian logistic vulnerablilities
War On The Rocks takes a look at Russian Army logistics:
In an initial offensive — depending on the fighting involved — Russian forces might reach early objectives, but logistics would impose requirements for operational pauses. As a result, a large land grab is unrealistic as a fait accompli. The Russian army has the combat power to capture the objectives envisioned in a fait accompli scenario, but it does not have the logistic forces to do it in a single push without a logistical pause to reset its sustainment infrastructure.
Russian military formations have more artillery than the equivalent US formations (therefore requiring more logistic support, because artillery uses up lots of ammo) but fewer logistic forces to mean those greater requirements:
Russian army logistics forces are not designed for a large-scale ground offensive far from their railroads. Inside maneuver units, Russian sustainment units are a size lower than their Western counterparts. Only brigades have an equivalent logistics capability, but it’s not an exact comparison. Russian formations have only three-quarters the number of combat vehicles as their U.S. counterparts but almost three times as much artillery. On paper (not all brigades have a full number of battalions), Russian brigades have two artillery battalions, a rocket battalion, and two air defense battalions per brigade as opposed to one artillery battalion and an attached air defense company per U.S. brigade. As a result of extra artillery and air defense battalions, the Russian logistics requirements are much larger than their U.S. counterparts.
Russia still depends on railways:
The reason Russia is unique in having railroad brigades is that logistically, Russian forces are tied to railroad from factory to army depot and to combined arms army and, where possible, to the division/brigade level. No other European nation uses railroads to the extent that the Russian army does.
In the event of this war becoming a general one between Russia and NATO, these railways will very likely be attacked, greatly reducing Russian logistics capability.
Why is Russia not using its air force?
RUSI asks why isn't Russia using its air force:
The logical and widely anticipated next step, as seen in almost every military conflict since 1938, would have been for the Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS) to mount large-scale strike operations to destroy the UkrAF. With its early warning chain blinded and some runways cratered, the UkrAF was left vulnerable to raids by strike aircraft like the Su-34 with guided munitions, or even multirole Su-30 fighters with predominantly unguided munitions. If present in significant numbers, escorting Su-35 and Su-30 fighters would have overwhelmed the Ukrainian fighters, even if they did manage to take off for sorties conducted at very low altitudes with limited situational awareness. This did not happen.
And suggests some possible reasons:
(1) lack of precision-guided munitions (PGMs)
The first is the limited quantities of air-delivered precision-guided munitions (PGMs) available to most VKS fighter units. During combat operations over Syria, only the Su-34 fleet has regularly made use of PGMs, and even these specialist strike aircraft have regularly resorted to unguided bomb and rocket attacks. This not only indicates a very limited familiarity with PGMs among most Russian fighter crews, but also reinforces the widely accepted theory that the Russian air-delivered PGM stockpile is very limited. Years of combat operations in Syria will have further depleted that stockpile, and may mean that the bulk of the 300 VKS fixed wing combat aircraft massed around Ukraine have only unguided bombs and rockets to draw on for ground-attack sorties.
(2) Concerns about friendly fire
The Russian air force might be worried about being shot down by its own army:
the VKS are not confident in their capacity to safely deconflict large-scale sorties with the activity of Russian ground-based SAMs operated by the Ground Forces.
(3) Untrained Russian pilots
A final factor to consider is the relatively low number of flying hours that VKS pilots receive each year relative to most of their Western counterparts. [Russian] Fighter unit flying hours are [...] probably a little under 100. RAF and US Air Force fighter pilots often complain that they struggle to maintain multirole combat readiness with around 180–240 flying hours a year, access to modern high-fidelity simulators for additional training, and better cockpit ergonomics and weapon interfaces than their Russian counterparts.
Whichever of these three explanations is correct, it does not speak well of the Russian air force's capabilities.
Zelenskyy asks to join EU
Zelenskyy asks for immediate accession into EU:
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on Monday for Ukraine’s immediate accession into the EU under a new simplified procedure, though it was unclear how that could work in practice.
“We ask the European Union for Ukraine’s immediate accession via a new special procedure,” he said, speaking on his Telegram channel as fighting with Russian troops continued across the country. “Our goal is to be together with all Europeans and, most importantly, to be on an equal footing. I’m sure it’s fair. I’m sure it’s possible.”
The plea builds on Zelenskyy’s earlier call on Saturday to allow Ukraine’s accession into the bloc and comes on the back of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen saying Sunday that the bloc wants Ukraine to join. “They are one of us and we want them in,” she said. Ukraine is still not an official candidate for EU accession talks.
It seems that unless this war ends in Putin installing a puppet Ukrainian regime, Ukraine will join the EU. Putin wanted to prevent Ukraine aligning itself with the West, but he may acheive the opposite.
Russian rocket artillery attacks Kharkiv
@taras_kornel has a video of indiscriminate Russian shelling of civilians in Kharkiv (Ukraine's second largest city):
The weapons used appear to be Grad rockets fired from BM-21 launchers. Here's a Grad rocket that didn't explode:
There is very little to be gained militarily from shelling random civilian areas, so I suspect Russia is conducting terror bombings to reduce civilian morale, out of frustration that they haven't captured Kharkiv.
Financial sanctions hit Moscovites
Jason Corcoran reports that Apple and Google cashless systems no longer work for Moscovites:
Up until now, Putin has ruled in what Russia calls "managed democracy", where he does in fact have some popular support. But as Russians start to directly feel the consequences of his aggression and recklessness, support for him will drop. If he does stay in power, it will be as a dictator ruling by naked force.
Latvia gives refuge to Russian soldiers
Latvia encourages Russian soldiers to defect if they don't want to fight Ukraine:
Latvia is ready to give refuge in the West to Russian soldiers who refuse to use weapons against Ukraine. This was announced by Advisor to the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Anton Gerashchenko in the Telegram channel .
"Latvians are ready to give asylum in the West to Russian soldiers who refused to use weapons against Ukraine. They will be hosted by countries that are not involved in the supply of weapons to the Ukrainian army," Gerashchenko wrote.
"The Russian troops are demoralized. They do not want to fight. The opportunity to leave to live in Europe is a matter of survival for them," the adviser to the minister emphasized.
(Via Google translate. Original here.)
Most Russian soldiers would rather live in the EU than get killed in Ukraine fighting Putin's pointless war.
How to drive abandoned Russian vehicles
The Russian army has abandoned many of its vehicles, often from running out of fuel. So much so that Ukrainians are making Tiktok videos showing how to start them up and drive them away.
Finns now want to join NATO
According to a poll most Finns want to join NATO:
An Yle poll suggests that 53 percent of people in Finland would support an application to join the Nato military alliance. Twenty-eight percent opposed an application, while 19 percent said they were unsure.
Taloustutkimus conducted the poll last week, as Ukraine came under attack by Russian forces. Interviews took place between February 23 and 25, spanning the opening days of the invasion.
In previous polls, Finns were against joining NATO. Putin’s aggression is getting him the exact opposite of what he wanted.
Japan supports Ukraine
Japan is giving Ukraine $200 million in aid:
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky announced that Japan had increased financial support for Ukraine to $ 200 million
And is imposing sanctions on Russia:
Japan declared that it would join anti-Russian sanctions against Russia because of its actions against Ukraine.
/end/