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Since it seems that the situation has settled into another quite period while the sides sort their shit out, any other other DISGUSTING GEAR FUCKERS want to make predictions about the Special Operation?
Last time, I did better than most but still got blown the fuck out 'cause of shocking aggression from Ukraine and surprising incompetence from Russia, but Russia is running out of easy room to be incompetent and Ukraine is reaching the limits of easy aggression.
That said: Newest aid packages to Ukraine add capabilities that they did not have before, eg, a tank with a computer in it that was designed after the end of the cold war that doesn't explode if you sneeze on it, and Russia just dismissed the dude that organized the super clean double retreat across the dnipro (which was shocking; I wasn't sure it would happen but if it happened I thought it would be some combination of snafu and bloodbath).
None of this might matter given the fact that Russians are settles/behind a river.
Even with all this, it seems like the war will not end for the foreseeable future baring Putin dying of cancer and maybe not even then.
95% the war continues into 2024 in some regard
GIVEN PUTIN DIES in the next 5 months: 80% the war continues into 2024 in some regard
85% the war is HOT into 2024
90% no major territorial changes in the next 1 months
70% no major territorial changes in the next 3 months
40% no major territorial changes in the next 11 months
99% no nuclear action taken by Russia over the next 11 months.
60% Ukraine gets ATACMS in the next 3 months.
From an American point of view, while I'm totally sucked into supporting Ukraine and hating Russia's invasion, it's pretty nice that Russia is bleeding itself on the other side of the world with all kinds of internal tension and dissent. I have Ukrainian friends, and while I'd love to see Russia expelled immediately and peace restored, that is only a temporary reprieve from Russia's imperial ambitions. So while a grinding stalemate is terrible for Ukraine, I don't mind seeing the greatest geopolitical blunder in my lifetime be extended indefinitely to Russia's detriment.
I had honestly hoped for greater ties and reconciliation with Russia in 2005ish era. I wonder if that was truly a possibility or just foolish.
Where do you get your information to form a guess of what is happening in the Russia-Ukraine war or inside Russia itself?
/r/credibledefense daily megathreads mostly. Also /r/combatfootage has a megathread
Then you suffer from a very potent information exposure black hole, thankfully you can see the other side of the coin on https://old.reddit.com/r/UkraineRussiaReport
example of great footage probably downvoted to hell and therefore hidden on combatfootage
https://old.reddit.com/r/UkraineRussiaReport/comments/10muegb/ru_pov_a_single_russian_t72b3_with_artillery/
IMO that's a very great footage to contemplate how inept war performance is in the real world.
(not saying that Ukraine soldiers are more inept than russian ones, but that all are, confused, maximizing their survival and fake firing in the general direction) This observation has major implications.
but this subreddit most potent usefulness is not showing ukrainian losses but that it allows to be much more informed about issues in Ukraine, including human rights abuses, accounts of government corruption, etc.
If staying up to date on both sides actually mattered for me, I would. While /r/credibledefense certainly has a majority western perspective and bias, there are plenty of pro russian viewpoints which, if expressed soberly and analytically, get upvoted. Mostly, I am interested in where the front lines are, what do the Ukrainian defensive strategies look like, what is the OSINT consensus on Russian buildup and activity. I have zero interest in consuming Russian propaganda, even though it would balance my information diet. I do like hearing analytical Russian perspectives when they don’t set off propaganda red flags.
Only ukrainerussiareport will show the true Ukrainian military hardware losses which is necessary to have predictive power and when/if its defense capabilities will break down.
Ukrainerussiareport is mostly not propaganda btw, much less so than are the other subs, especially since many commenters are pro-ukrainian which give a certain rare balance.
Individual videos are generally utterly useless for that. Or multiple individual videos without broader analysis. Except cases of extremely rare kills. For example Russia unable to show single attack on HIMARS is a good indicator of 100% survival rate. Or video of Moscov being towed to the port after sustaining damage in storm sinking after Ukrainian rocket attack. War is large and looking at biased sample of 100 videos showing attacks on something is not giving significant predictive power about overall defense capabilities of either side.
Only systematic collection of data on larger scale is useful for predictive power as far as tanks/IFV go. Ukrainian official data is propaganda a bit based on facts. Russian official data is useful only as jokes. Oryx is not ideal but at least reality adjacent. Other sources are not available for randos discussing on the internet.
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Can you give specific numbers for what you think Ukrainian losses are? Numbers from the Kremlin are ridiculous to the point where they fall apart from you start to compare them to what we know Ukraine has. All other estimates I've seen favour Ukraine to some degree when comparing losses
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