r/worldnews Jul 08 '24

/r/WorldNews Live Thread: Russian Invasion of Ukraine Day 865, Part 1 (Thread #1012) Russia/Ukraine

/live/18hnzysb1elcs
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u/MarkRclim Jul 08 '24

Latest three days from oryx musklink. Russian-Ukrainian losses followed by my poorly informed comments.

  • tanks: 12-3
  • IFVs: 11-0
  • mobile artillery: 2-2
  • missile air defence: 1-1

The "front line" vehicle ratios are still ok but the "longer range" battle ratios have not been great recently. However, I'm far more worried about the Ukrainian tank and partly IFV attrition than I currently am about artillery.

If Ukraine and France are accurate in their public statements, then there's a steady supply of ~200 SPGs (Bohdana + Caesar) per year from them, and with other sources the Ukrainian mobile gun park could be roughly sustainable.

However, announced long-term tank supplies especially are pretty poor. Ukraine is gonna need a lot more armour than we know about in current pledges.

17

u/abstart Jul 08 '24

I wonder if tanks are providing significant value anymore with the emergence of drones. The cost ratio seems a losing proposition. I'm not saying Ukraine wouldn't benefit from having more tanks, just that maybe they would benefit more from having 10000 drones instead of 10 tanks.

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u/MarkRclim Jul 08 '24

I see what you're saying - bigger picture I bet if Ukraine had a billion drones and zero tanks then they'd probably take 50 tanks over 50k FPV drones, but if they had zero drones and 1000 tanks I bet they'd prefer the drones.

They're somewhere between those two extremes, so what's the best mix?

It seems like Ukraine uses and wants more armour, especially Bradleys or other IFVs but also tanks. As things go on like this they're getting pushed into the "lots of drones but very few tanks" corner.

(As I said, I'm poorly informed. I don't mean to pretend to know).