[ardaoweo]

Well, it should be noted that the helicopter in question was designed to be used by an organization that couldn't care less about loss of life, as we have again seen in recent years. So I guess this aspect of human life wasn't a big concern to the designers, the military can always get new human resources from Siberia or whatever poor part of the country.

[ClumsyPilot]

I object.

I think our Media is a great disappointment.

We’ve spent 20 years in the Middle East, but the general public didn’t learn anything,

The idea of local culture is as uninformed as it was at the start of the war. As a result we will make the same mistake again.

The reporting about war in Ukraine is the same - basically a caricature of reality.

Sidenote: population of Texas and population of Siberia is about the same. Russia has a cruel culture, but their population is only 1/4 of EU’s.

Articles that ask probing questions are only now starting to appear, but are extremely rare. For example:

“Russia is producing artillery shells around three times faster than Ukraine's Western allies and for about a quarter of the cost” https://news.sky.com/story/russia-is-producing-artillery-she...

[nradov]

Yes, NATO countries have hollowed out their military-industrial complexes. Everyone is aware now that was a mistake but it will take time to rebuild the industrial capacity necessary to fight wars of attrition. And of course it's cheaper to manufacture artillery shells in Russia since the country has lower wages and is now running a partially mobilized command economy. But once you normalize for quality of the shells, the difference isn't quite as bad as it first looks.

[Sakos]

> The research on artillery rounds by Bain & Company, which drew on publicly available information, found that Russian factories were forecast to manufacture or refurbish about 4.5 million artillery shells this year compared with a combined production of about 1.3 million rounds across European nations and the US.

Rheinmetall intends to increase their annual production to 750k by 2025 and the US is aiming for 1 million annually by 2025. That's still much less than Russia and that's before considering they have access to the significant reserves and the factories in North Korea.

> Since August, Pyongyang has shipped about 6,700 containers to Russia, which could accommodate more than 3 million rounds of artillery shells or more than 500,000 rounds for multiple rocket launchers, according to the South Korean Defense Ministry.

https://news.sky.com/story/russia-is-producing-artillery-she...

https://edition.cnn.com/2024/03/07/asia/north-korea-artiller...

https://www.rheinmetall.com/en/media/news-watch/news/2024/02...

https://www.army.mil/article/274905/munitions_for_ukraine_ob...

[bluGill]

NATO war doctrine doesn't use nearly as much artillery as Soviet (Russian)- preferring air superiority and bombs/missiles instead. While it isn't clear this is really better (and I hope we never find out), it does mean that having less production ability may not be an issue. Which is why the US Air force is the largest air force in the world, followed by US army, then US navy at 4, and US Marines at 7.

Where the problem is, is Ukraine is trained on the Soviet war doctrine but are getting backing from NATO - but without all the airplanes NATO would use (and it isn't clear if they could train pilots/crew fast enough if given, but they haven't been given much) they need something to fight with.

[Sakos]

That's the point, no? Ukraine isn't NATO. Ukraine can't do NATO doctrine. So Ukraine also can't win against Russia if they're this behind on artillery supply. This is an issue for Ukraine. It's not for NATO. But we aren't talking about NATO, we're talking about Ukraine's ability to fight back.

[FeloniousHam]

[I get most of my information from Ukraine: The Latest] It seems to be that when Ukraine has even the below-necessary arms (be that artillery or air support or smarter, longer range weapons), Russia is unable to make significant gains.

Whether this is due to the impotence/utter incompetence of the Russian military or the inherent advantages of defensive fighting, I'm not sure Ukraine _can lose_ this war as long as NATO continues to the supply them with the tools.

[ClumsyPilot]

How much does that change or Is it just copium?

Are we able to produce millions of air to ground missiles if we cannot produce enough simple artillery shells?

Can we replace losses of aircraft in a timely manner?

[frostburg]

You cannot seriously think that you need 1:1 parity missile-to-shell in that paradigm. The overall result from the conflict is that the soviet doctrine underperfomed, with especially abysmal results for the IADS part of it.

[bell-cot]

> isn't quite as bad

That phrase sounds about right.

Though my impression is that shell production is still a "meh, I guess we probably should do something..." priority in the great majority of NATO countries.

[foldr]

Russia actually has a pretty strong tradition of pilot safety in the military. For example, the Ka-50 attack helicopter is one of very few such helicopters to be fitted with an ejection seat.

[simion314]

Pilots costs many years to train, the OC is commenting about the mobiks, the soldiers used for their meat not brains. There is evidence to support that Russia or better said the Putin regime still gives less almost zero value to human live.

[masijo]

What government that has an active military cares about the lives of their soldiers beyond their utility value? I don't see how the US is different in that regard.

[ardaoweo]

Generally the US does a pretty good job training and keeping their grunt soldiers alive, and evacuating them if wounded. Russia really hasn't done well in these aspects if we look at the Ukraine war, or any earlier wars for that matter. Their tactics tend to prefer quantity over quality.

But yes, as pointed out I'm sure Russia places some more value on lives of skilled, well trained personnel than the average poorly trained grunt soldier, simply due to higher utility value.

[medo-bear]

It just amazes me that Russian soldiers are able to fight against one of the most Western-armed countries in Europe [0] using ... shovels [1] ... and zombie-like meat waves [2] ?

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_military_aid_to_Ukrain...

[1] https://www.businessinsider.com/russian-troops-are-ordered-f...

[2] https://nypost.com/2024/01/23/news/moscows-meat-wave-tactic-...

[simion314]

Does it amazes you that they gain less then 1 square kilometers even with their Chinese bikes and turtle tanks?

not sure why everyone shits on Russian shovels, the RuZZian special forces recorded themselves how they train to fight close combat with shovels, a shovel is a weapon. Anyway the real quote was something like "weapons and shovels" but the Ruscists could only read the last part. The Zeds also claim they fight NATO, I say to all the Zeds please attack a NATO country then you can claim you fight NATO - because now you fight just your little brother that gas some old Western weapons and better intel, the difference is that Ukraine is not Chechnya so is harder to invade them, the drunk bear found a big enough adversary to break it's mouth.

[arghnoname]

Their reign of villainy would surely be stopped by now if it weren't for their ability to power their war machines with washing machine parts

[greenavocado]

> Their tactics tend to prefer quantity over quality.

Nonsense.

[simion314]

>Nonsense

Reality disagrees , unless what we see is actually the best and brightest Ruzzia can find.

[rascul]

> What government that has an active military cares about the lives of their soldiers beyond their utility value?

I would speculate the governments that rely on volunteers instead of conscripts for the military.

[tpm]

Public opinion is a big deal in democratic countries, which makes them very much averse to loss of soldiers lives. Much less so in a dictatorship like Russia. They are losing more in a month than the US lost in years or decades in active campaigns.

[simion314]

That is the point, if you sacrifice the soldiers lives you should do it for something valuable, even using pro-Rus maps Russia is gaining at best something less then 1 square kilometer a day and has 1000+ dead or wooded, I am sorry for you disillusions with USA but in civilized countries nobody would think that 1 soldiers live is worth 5000 square netters of field. Sure probably they are sacrificed not for that land but for buying time for Putin, maybe Trump or other miracle move will save him. So from Putin's POV 1000 soldiers for 1 more day on the throne is a price he can pay, in a democracy this would have ended a long time ago.

[thriftwy]

> maybe Trump or other miracle move will save him

Save Putin from what?

By default, from now on Russia just retains the (formerly) Ukrainian lands it controls and integrates them in Russia. There's no deadline to that process, even if Russia stops gaining any land at all while still having to lose some number of people on the front line, basically indefinitely.

I can see that assertion in the Western media that Ukraine has an option to "not agree" to unfavorable terms, such as the ones voiced by Putin. The underlying assumption is that Putin has to disengage eventually, so the Ukraine can just wait it out. But unless some miracle saves the day for Ukraine, Russia is not getting out of these lands at all. After all, Russia is busy paving roads and issuing Russian citizenship in these areas.

[ardaoweo]

I tend to agree with you. If what Putin has done so far doesn't cause a massive internal revolt, then selling what they've gained by now as a victory shouldn't be too hard either.

Attitudes (and apathy) of the Russian population is the most astonishing thing about this whole conflict, and something that should be remembered when dealing with the country in the future, even after Putin.

[simion314]

It is not free for Putin to keep this land, drones will fly and kill his men , destroy his refineries, infrastructure etc. Gazprom has giant loses for the first time, Putin also needs to protect himself from the oligarchs that he screwed over with his imperialistic dreams. Ruzzia's economy is not doing well, if you notice in all the demands for peace Putin includes "please, please remove the sanctions". From what I see onlyne Zeds fray to God that Trump will save their SMO from failure, hopefully there are still soem repuplicans with brains around to prevent any truly zetarded decision.