Updates in light of Ukraine war

[DRG]

Thinking that if they were falling short of expectations we would have heard about it by now

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/u...-say-rcna20878

“The Javelins are the most sophisticated and most effective weapon the Ukrainians have, but not the most numerous,” Cancian said.

The Ukrainians have more Israeli-made NLOS “Spike” antitank missiles in their arsenal as well as German Panzerfaust 3 antitank weapons, Cancian said.

THAT is significant from my POV for three reasons

• This is the first news I have read they have any Spikes
• This is the first news I have read that the Ukrainians have NLOS Spikes.
• I have been testing various NLOS weapons with my drone experiments and the two coupled together is highly effective

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidax...h=5649222743ca

The powerful Javelin anti-tank missiles that Ukraine has been getting from the United States tend to dominate the headlines.

That makes sense. The Javelins aren’t just highly effective weapons—they’re also symbols of U.S. support for Ukraine as a huge Russian army masses on the Russia-Ukraine border.

But the Ukrainian army has only a handful of Javelin launchers—47 from the United States plus an unspecified number that Estonia has pledged—and a few hundred of the 35-pound, 2.5-mile-range, infrared-guided missiles.

The huge majority of Ukraine’s anti-tank missile arsenal is locally made. And the local Stugna-P is proving to be just about as dangerous as the world-class Javelin. And cheaper.

We do have the Skif in the OOB and I just changed it to make it more selectable to the AI but ( I just discovered ) the Stugna-P was developed from the Skif so that's on the list to investigate ( that may be the Skif 2M-K ATGM W237 ),but I need to investigate further if the Ukrainians do indeed have NLOS Spikes

THIS says they do not

https://www.shephardmedia.com/news/l...s-no-to-spike/

Israel has decided not to authorise European users of Rafael Spike to donate the advanced ATGMs to Ukraine, so as avoid disrupting its fragile relationship with Russia that allows attacks on Iran-related targets in Syria.

[FASTBOAT TOUGH]

If you can do the search in the MBT Thread, you and I covered this ground when discussing getting these on the Ukrainian tanks about 3 years ago. What they had and what was coming most from Ukrainian Industry sources with "outside" ones as well.

Just throwing it out there to save you some work (maybe), we did several posts on the matter.

You might further look at as a reminder, there's a reason the JAVALINs the Ukrainians are using are so effective. Remember also they were to be "under lock and key" with U.S. approved storage and security measures before even one got into country. A couple of the refs included touched on this and the fact they couldn't use them without our authorization. Training missiles were the exception to facilitate training and qualification all addressed in those refs.
Infantry Served Weapons and Organization Page 5/Posts 43 & 44.

It was set up for submission also for the USA.

Regards,
Pat

[DRG]

https://www.19fortyfive.com/2022/03/...-so-effective/

Points out again how fluid and flexible "information" is The Forbes article was published Jan 11 and claimed " the Ukrainian army has only a handful of Javelin launchers"

The ABC report that mentioned Spike NLOS was made March 22 but I question it and now we have info thats there are Milans in Ukraine as well

This article claims.....

"A month into its struggle against the Russian invasion, Ukraine’s military has received well over 5,000 Javelin ATGMs from multiple countries and Milan missiles from France."

Obviously a lot can ( and apparently had ) happened between Jan 11 and now but that first link claims......

...... the Stugna-P is in many ways comparable to established ATGMs like the Russian Kornet and U.S. TOW. It has a sight/guidance system which can lock onto a distant target, or the operator can semi-automatically steer the missile in flight by aiming a targeting reticle. Either way, the fire control system calculates course corrections and uses a laser on the launcher to transmit them to the missile via an optical receiver on its tail.

The missile can be programmed to dive down from 10 meters high towards the thinner top armor of a tank, though at a shallower angle than would a U.S. Javelin missile. This capability can be seen in some combat footage.

The standard 130-millimetre RK-2S missile has a 22-pound tandem-charge warhead designed to preemptively trip the bricks of explosive reactive armor (ERA) liberally applied to protect Russian tanks, and can penetrate 800 millimetres RHA behind reactive armor. That’s just enough to penetrate the frontal armor of Russia’s best-protected tanks (T-90A, T-72B3, T-80U, T-80BVM)…if the warhead’s tandem warhead can bypass Russian Kontkat-5 or Relikt ERA as claimed.

There’s a more powerful 152-millimetre caliber RK-2M missile that can penetrate 1100 meters ( EDIt... that is their error it should read millimetres NOT " meters) RHA and has 10% greater range and speed, but it’s unclear whether Ukraine uses it operationally. For anti-personnel targets there’s also high-explosive and thermobaric variants.

The Stugna differs, however from many ATGMs in its control system, which allows the three-person crew to set up the launcher on its tripod from an ideal firing position, and remotely control it from cover, or even from an underground bunker, using a laptop-like control system connected to the launcher by a 50-meter-long cable.

So duel charge AND top attack capable.

We do already have the Stugna in the OOB but it's set up as a vehicle mounted system but there may be more than one "Stugna" and that is what I am investigating now but it would appear that w237 in the OOB now as "Skif 2M-K ATGM" is the larger 152mm missile and w236 is the 130mm verison

https://root-nation.com/en/articles-...ugna-p-review/

[DRG]

https://www.lemonde.fr/international...6758_3210.html

France delivers Milan anti-tank missiles to Ukraine
In addition to protective equipment, Paris has provided kyiv with "a few dozen" of these weapons, used by infantry troops against tanks and armored vehicles.

Taken from the stocks of the French army, the quantity seems, for the time being, to have remained modest – “a few dozen”, between February 28 and March 3, according to a diplomatic source.

[carp]

Neither the Javelins nor the Stingers from the US are being shipped as the weapons the US military uses. They have had the most recent classified guidance bits removed and are export versions. This means any updating of the UA kit would have to have different versions developed for use in one game. That may be a bit of a chore. I don't know about the NLAWS. I haven't seen any reports from the UK on what they are sending.

[DRG]

It may make a slight difference in RL. It won't in the game

[Wdll]

Any idea what this recoilless rifle is?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKLnX-TcBn8

[Aeraaa]

Originally Posted by Wdll

Any idea what this recoilless rifle is?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKLnX-TcBn8

SPG-9 if I'm not mistaken.

[DRG]

A lot of new things in the Ukrainian OOB for next release.

Recent additions were 40mm Mk 19's. A photo exists of boxes with 40-mm Mk 19 ammo unloaded from an American aircraft at Boryspil Airport on October 10, 2021 and the Supply Classification code for "Machine Gun, 40mm, MK19 Mod III" was seen being unloaded Jan 28. 2022

https://mil.in.ua/uk/news/ssha-pered...atomety-mk-19/

It was recently announced that Australia is sending Bushmaster PMV's that may possibly be in Ukraine in May -June 2022

[DRG]

Originally Posted by Wdll

Any idea what this recoilless rifle is?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKLnX-TcBn8

We need to investigate just who uses what armbands like the info on the Russian vehicle markings

Those troops had white bands. Normally Ukraine uses yellow

The text for that video mentions" Russia-backed forces in Mariupol" but earlier footage shows troops in yellow armbands. The ones with the RR are wearing white

One quote found

Ukrainian forces are using yellow and blue.

Russian forces are using a bizarre collection of white/red/silver/and the ribbon of Saint George.

Soldiers wearing white armbands seen patrolling Ukraine's Kherson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YJo2vlGAOQ

That video has this comment.........."hite armband were to indentified this russian brigade as the 17th motorized rifle brigade that were deployed in donbas as early as 2014."

Still digging but it looks like the RR team is not Ukrainian

FURTHER

https://fresno24.com/what-do-the-col...is-the-answer/

The purpose of this marking is to be able to distinguish between the warring parties: the Russians mostly use white or red, and the Ukrainians use yellow armbands for this purpose. In addition to the armbands, the Russian soldiers can also see the pattern of the “St. George Ribbon”, which is one of the national symbols of Russia.

In the “normal” case, such markings would not be necessary, as one of the purposes of the uniform would be precisely to make it easy to distinguish the fighting sides. However, there is a significant overlap between the equipment of the Russian and Ukrainian forces: the vast majority of both sides use Soviet remnant technology or modernized versions of it, so the silhouette of their vehicles and soldiers is very similar.

But there are also covert patterns that are specifically used by both sides: for example, the Russian and Ukrainian special operations units have standardized the multicam pattern, making it almost impossible to distinguish between these formations, and even their helmets are almost the same. . The Russians would also use a surprisingly large number of samples based on the A-TACS, which could be remotely confused with the Ukrainian MM-14 sample because of its shades.

It is also hampered by the fact that, since the beginning of the conflict, both sides have apparently been looser in applying uniform rules on the wearing of uniforms and a large number of irregular militias without uniforms are fighting on the Ukrainian side. only their identification is the yellow armband.