1w ago

How Ukraine carried out daring 'Spider Web' attack on Russian bombers

www.bbc.com

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Step one:
Don't tell the Americans.
- Amazing how silent the media is on this. The most I've heard on mainstream media was on NPR this morning, and even they far under-sold how important this is. They crippled the bear's air force. They can not recover this damage. This is a turning point in the war.
  
  It’s not exactly that.
  I mean, they greatly diminished the strategic bombing fleet, probably did billions in damage (assessments still coming in), and have caused logistical snarls in the country as security tightens.
  But this won’t end the war, it will only reduce the number of missile trucks they fly, which were already limited by the rate of missile production. It’s a long term hobbling of russia, but it doesn’t take them out. China and the US were the big winners here on the nuclear playing field.
  A big, quiet thing not being discussed was 2 trains going down in bridge collapses in russia recently. Logistical bites like that add up.
  The war can continue a long time, slowly grinding down both countries. Hopefully strikes like this will remind russia they cannot win, only not lose as badly.
  
  While this is an amazing operation, and has definitely permanently crippled the russian strategic air force, it's probably not a turning point.
  Russia needs 1-2 of these planes operational to deliver its strike packages (at least the ones we've seen until now). That likely means 4-6 planes total to account for down-time.
  This war will end when russia runs out of heavy equipment (we're getting closer every day), burns through its forces even faster than now (has been accelerating the past years due to shortages of armour), sees further drops in recruitment (it is dropping due to massive casualty rates), and unarmored russians on the frontline without heavy weapons begin to break and flee under Ukrainian assaults.
  Ukraine is working very hard to preserve its forces and materiel, while russia is burning through both at an amazingly unsustainable rate. European military production is increasing by the day, so sooner or later the scales will tip in Ukraines favour, and when they do, the russians won't have much to fight back with.
- I mean, they didn't even tell their European allies. This was clearly something they were able to to alone, and for strategic and political reasons, needed to do fully on their own. Kudos to them! 👍
Wow. What an awesome victory! Congratulations to everyone involved!
"One lorry driver interviewed by Russian state outlet Ria Novosti said he and other drivers tried to knock down drones flying out of a lorry with rocks."
They really use civilians and rocks for military purposes in this war. It's fascinating to think about.

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