Originally Posted by
Fitter2
Tartiflette fan
£10,000,000 plus to Ukraine now may well save multi billions on the defence etc. budget if it prevents a larger and wider scale conflict a little later.
Quite so. The simple maths is that the cost of the bullet will remain the same, the cost to a nation in lives lost comes back to the donor country instead of having a currently motivated and evidently capable fighting force that is pleading for the support. The damage to Ukraine was today estimated in infrastructure losses due to Russia of around USD B800, which is considerable and is an amount that the Russian Federation may well be forced to foot, subject to how weaselly our lords and masters are in dealing with an aggressor
criminal enterprise nation. Right now, there is around USD T 1.0 in frozen assets all up of the same kleptocrats and state. Now that is the damage that Russia has inflicted in 4 months, on a relatively small section of turf, that had a decent amount of infrastructure, roads, utilities, services, public and private buildings, businesses and production facilities. All of which are a discounted cost relative to any EU nation that would become the next target of Vlad's team. just Lithuania alone would come close to that order of magnitude in losses with any invasion of their sovereign territory, and in a much shorter time frame. Rest of the Baltics are similar, and it would be irrational to take action simply against one when that triggers the mutual defence articles to come into play, so the whole of the Baltics as an economic loss is an outcome, and the whole deal doesn't look great for Poland or even Germany to avoid conventional attacks to minimize defensive responses. Whatever is in Vlad's mind is his alone to know, but the simple thing is that the downside of not stopping Russia under Vlad in Ukraine is a vastly more expensive proposition, so pennies spent in giving generously to Ukraine to defeat Russia in the field today is a bargain. Rough order.... 15:1 return on investment in a conventional outcome, and 1000:1 if some billy goat starts flicking gifts of sunshine around to make a fashion statement.
[Aviation content] There are gallons of UH-1s sitting in the desert; there are scores of A-10's sitting there as well. These are not long-lead training aircraft to provide motivated defenders. There are complete squadrons of OH-6s and OH58s that can be returned to service, and have TOW/mini guns added to their sides. The helos don't have great survivability in direct attack against any competent AAA/SAM threats, but we are in a new world of tactics at present. Ukraine has been provided some extended range capable munitions (even where they then have had the fire control systems crippled.... they can fight for us but they can't be trusted to protect weapon secrets from the Russians...). To provide targeting data for these, the troops are in range of the Russian forces around the front lines, where the greatest targets are in the rear areas, extended range data linking of survivable drones would seem to be worthwhile; interdicting the Red's supply lines is the least cost way to take pressure off the guy in the trench.
Every bullet, bomb, tank, helicopter and plane that we hold back will be regretted later if the Russians find the ability to organize themselves into a coordinated, disciplined fighting force and attack in concentration against the defenders. While it appears that Russia is also being machiavellian in their "support" for DNR/DPR, "volunteers" with their provisioning of antiques for weapons, scraps for rations and no body protection, and no casualty care worthy of the term, they may realise that the bulk of their "manpower" is being so compromised, that along with the abuse of their own conscripts as the bulk of their army, that they need to resolve their internal manpower paradoxes if they really want to defeat the defenders. That is also a pact with the devil, Russia has managed to alienate a substantial portion of the people that they supposedly are acting to "protect", the type of friends that means you don't need enemies.
"Macron, if you are listening... " ...there is no such thing as appeasement of dictators, and by now no one should have any illusion that Russia is anything other than a kleptocratic dictatorship.
Give generously, but give now, not after this crosses the next border.
- Targeting capability
- Munitions
- Delivery systems
IMHO, E&OE