Wadding can still wound / kill & quite a few rounds that are crimped closed like that at the tip have solder applied to the tip which is just as dangerous.

That visual reference to OGPU in #4167 is a chilling echo from the past.

Indeed, and amusing as well.
notasmodnoradmin:
The joke loses some of its impact, though, when the gratuitous editorializing is added to it.
It has been said that brevity is the soul of wit.
Don't quit your day job for a career in comedy. ;)

​​​​​​​70 Ukrainian military men (pilots and ground staff) will undergo F-16 training in Denmark. They are the first wave, followed by the second and third, Air Force spokesman Yuriy Ignat said.

"The other group are young pilots, actually yesterday's graduates, who will go to Great Britain, where they will undergo a longer program starting with basic English training and knowledge of Western light-engine equipment with the transition to fighter aircraft. This program will last longer, possibly up to 2 years, but this is the perspective that awaits us.”

Just compare the speed of delivery compared t9 that from the USA which is measured in years…

BREAKING:

The 1st of the 288 K239 Chunmoo rocket artillery systems Poland has bought from South Korea was offloaded in the Port of Gdańsk today.

Poland will receive another 17 before the end of 2023

Poland is paying USD 3.5 billion for the 288 systems and 23 000 missiles.


https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....06a2c70017.png
​​​​​​​

For an automatic weapon, it amounts to the same thing, ie the weapon stops firing.

Errrrm..... No, I would not call that a jam as the weapon is still capable of firing, the fault is the lack of the BFA and is the fault of the operator, you can still operate it by cocking the weapon, it will become a glorified standard rifle but it will fire single rounds.

61 donated, another 67 more required…

​​​​​​​In order to replace the old aircraft fleet, Ukraine needs 128 fighter jets,” Air Force spokesman Yuriy Ignat said.

"It is clear that war can make its adjustments, but more than 100 aircraft are really needed to disperse them at different airfields so that they respond to different challenges and strike different targets. By air, by land and in the enemy's rear, in particular," Ignat explained.

I wonder how it will work out, I remember a bunch of Arab engineers that went through Halton, the instructor started teaching them and and one of the students started talking over him, pulling him up, the student informed the instructor he was the only one to speak English so was translating, come exam time the student read out all the questions and the papers were duly filled in........... The all scored exactly the same, on each question.
There was a corfuffle when they were going to send one student home early, they were informed that if he went home early his family would be dishonoured and severe penalties would result against him and his family as the state had paid for them, he was kept in his class and went home with them having passed.

My own father (RAF 1936-1962) recalled similar experiences from his time with Middle East Command. Choosing my words carefully in these PC times, I would suggest that the Ukrainians may be rather more motivated than the Arabs on this occasion.

And far less worried about loss of face.

russia is fighting for its existence - Medvedev
 

In his Telegram channel, Medvedev has revealed what are Russia.s real war aims He sees this as a war that determines whether Russia will continue to exist or not, and for that reason there is simply no alternative and it will not end until Ukraine has been "swept from the earth ". He foresees the war lasting for decades, or until "the decadent West gets bored, tired of the cost and stops its support for Ukraine and Russia will be able to deliver the killing blow to the traitor."

https://www.focus.de/politik/wann-en...202444152.html

I flip-flopped whether this was for this thread or JB, hope this is seen as relevant here

From that link But hopefully not before Ukraine is strong and well-equipped enough to recover and maintain it's own territory.

Reports now suggest that the Tu22 Backfire bomber at the Soltsty-2 airbase, south of St Petersburg, was apparently hit by a UKR "quadcopter type" drone, which has a relatively short range and may indicate that the drone was launched inside Russia.

https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cp...0433bf3cc8.png

FUMR has begun that on JB, but if I may focus on the military, aviation and campaign planning ramifications of that as the true war aim.

1. I believe him. The initial strike toward Kiev was intended as something like a deep attack (or a flying column) with the intent of something similar to a decapitation strike that was attempted using air assets in the OIF in 2003. Both attempts failed, but their aim was the kind of thing you get taught as a strategic planner: disable the enemy command and control and you'll have a less difficult fight. Quite frankly, if the Russians were a bit more competent at implementing their plan and running the logistics to support it, we'd not be having this discussion as they'd have achieved their ends on the ground in a week or two.
There was an analysis posted here a couple of months ago (RUSI?) regarding their fifth column / psyops campaign, that was aimed at coming across to the Ukrainians as "liberators" rather than "invaders" - needless to say, that plan didn't do what they hoped for it.

2. If one has those aims, to more or less wipe the nation state of Ukraine from the pages of history, and fold it back into Mother Russia, then one must provide a set of means to achieve that end. In the modern era, that means you have to establish air superiority. Having it isn't a guarantee, but lacking it is a recipe for failure.
They never managed to do that.
He (well, Russia if they want to succeed) needs air superiority for two core reasons:
provide own forces with more freedom of action (in the air and on the ground)
and
to deny the enemy the same (in the air and on the ground).

Both Russia and Ukraine are doing a decent job of Air Denial, in that the air volume over the battlefield / FEBA remains contested.

I don't know how much Mr Medvedev knows about the waging of war, but if he wants to either redraw the borders of Ukraine at the Dniepr / Dnipro River, or at roughly the Romanian border, Russia will need to establish air superiority to achieve that end.
To do that, Russia has to establish electromagnetic spectrum superiority and / or dominance. (Those go hand in hand).

3. Or Ukraine will have to run out of men and material and not be able to fight. <==== That is what he seems to be pinning his hopes upon.
And that boils down to a poor strategy since he is relying on hope as a method.
As the Chief of Staff of our Army (General Sullivan) once pointed out: hope is not a method.

I'll ask those with some expertise in the matter: what change in plan and implementation can Mr Medvedev summon up to meet those war aims (presuming that he is one day in charge of things, as he once was).
Anyone have an idea?
How does Russia apply their means at hand to achieve those ends?

I am not sure that they are achievable at this point. Could someone provide Mr Medvedev with a memo?

I would ignorantly opine that RU expects/hopes to grind UKR forces to dust.

And unless The Evil West continues to support UKR massively with all it needs, that may sadly be the outcome. UKR has limited manpower in comparison with the Orc hordes.

Greece to assist in F-16 training

Twitter

“How did you go bankrupt?” Bill asked. “Two ways,” Mike said. “Gradually and then suddenly.” That's from Ernest Hemingway, in his 1926 breakthrough novel, The Sun Also Rises.

I think that this quote is what is going to happen to the Russian Army in Ukraine. The lightening advance last September in Kharkiv is a forecast of what will happen next. The only question is when and where the Ukrainian army will break through and the Russians collapse.

I'll take a page from my own post and ask:
Does Ukraine have local air superiority in the area you are eyeing for the breakthrough?
And if they don't have it, can they get it?

Reading the news for the past two months, I get the idea that Armed Forces of Ukraine have been trying to shape the battlefield, in particular the logistics piece, so that the "gradually but suddenly" happens in the second and third echelon to the point that first echelon "suddenly realizes" that
"there's nobody/nothing backing us up."
But that's a guess.

⚡️This morning, a Ukrainian drone with explosives attacked the Russian Shaykovka airbase in the Kaluga region, where Tu-22M3 bombers were based — Russian media

One source reports an "eruption" after the detonation of dropped explosives, another reports damage to an "unusable" aircraft

The case is similar to the attack that took place a few days ago on the Soltsi airfield in the Novgorod region


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