Russian blogger “Atomic Cherry” argues that much greater Ukrainian organizational flexibility has defeated Russian systems run by Soviet-style thinking. “Within the framework of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, one can clearly see an interesting trend: … 1/
“…the mismatch of competencies of military structures regarding the technologies used on the battlefield. Sounds unclear, right? 2/
“Well, in reality, it is very simple– for example, the Air Force turned out to be extremely incompetent in the war of unmanned systems, although formally the vast majority of the weapons used are aircraft, ie, they correspond to the environment in which the Air Force operates. 3/
“Or, say, take the naval structures, which turned out to be surprisingly helpless in the naval war, despite the apparent abundance of technical means and resources. 4/
“This leads to very curious results – the war in complex operational environments begins to be waged by structures that seem to be extremely far from such by their competencies. 5/
“It is especially interesting to observe this in the example of Ukraine – despite the fact that the Armed Forces of Ukraine are de facto the same fragment of the Soviet system as the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, the Ukrainian military bureaucracy has a much… 6/
“…lower level of systemic influence – it is structurally ‘loose,’ and it has been possible to extract resources, functions, means, and technologies from it in favor of alternative forms and types of organization. 7/
“(similar processes are happening in Russia, but on a less massive and obvious scale, because the military bureaucracy is much more monolithic and knows how to defend its historical monopoly). 8/
“This made it possible to form parallel General Staff and Ministry of Defense military-civilian structures–such as the Forces of Unmanned Systems, for example–or to transfer part of the military functions to other power agencies as happened with the Security Service of Ukraine. 9
“And interestingly, these rather modest in scale and number parallel structures have become some of the key pillars of Ukrainian defense capability. 10/
“Why did this happen? The difference in the thinking of the leaders. The difference in the system of organizing combat work, approaches, and goal-setting. 11/
“For example, look at the units responsible for "deep strike" on Russian territory – the 14th Regiment of the Forces of Unmanned Systems. It is easy to assume that the topic of long-range air attack means is handled by a former Air Force officer, right? 12/
“But no, the 14th Regiment was organized by an officer...of the Special Operations Forces. A person who has nothing to do with air warfare–but nevertheless ensured very serious results (not only the destruction of oil refineries but also work on Russian military warehouses; .. 13
“…regular strikes on fuel echelons – also the work of this unit). A professional saboteur and infiltration specialist turned out to be more competent, flexible, and understanding of the situation than the ‘classic’ specialists formally trained to operate in this environment. 14
And this is a widespread situation on both sides of the front. "Classical military education" turned out to be mostly ineffective, not corresponding to the moment and needs. Trends are set by specialists from more flexible, adaptive structures… 15/
“…(by the way, about trends: the use of FPV drones in combat originated in the Ukrainian Special Operations Forces and the Security Service of Ukraine), by default related to intelligence activities, working with complex data, and non-standard tasks.” 16/16
@GrandpaRoy2 Thanks for the analysis. Re Classical Military Education-the established western military needs to wake up and change fast
@Moamoafish My pleasure.
@GrandpaRoy2 Excellent report / post! Thank you!
@TrevorDoyl19375 You’re welcome.
@GrandpaRoy2 Yeah read it all. Russia is dismantling NATO and the best U.S. and UK strategic thinkers so all this guff is bollocks…most of what you quoted is just utter jibberish and proven by facts on the ground. It’s desperate times
@ap_gardner Utter jibberish by a well-known Russian blogger, living in Russia, instead of England.
@GrandpaRoy2 TLDR: russians confessing "even though Ukraine has severe disadvantages, Ukrainians are able to adapt and still kick our ass because we are led be incompetent criminals and idjits"
@GrandpaRoy2 Nukes wont win wars when one thinks I can sit at home in UK and using my Tablet direct a Drone onto any Russia target I want. That's the new warfare now. Armchair warriors like me can! be real warriors.
@GrandpaRoy2 The curious think-tank version of having defeating a system, whereby it kicks the shit out of you and takes your stuff while you desperately scramble to regenerate something to hold it off with.
@GrandpaRoy2 Excellent thread. War is chaos. Those that can adapt during the chaos are the ones with the best chance of both surviving and winning. During WWII Americans were famous for adapting and innovating, especially the non officer troops that were at the tip of the spear and
@GrandpaRoy2 ...not to mention russian kleptocracy
@GrandpaRoy2 You mention it indirectly but an organisation is only a part of the system. Other strong elements of the systems are personnel, information systems/communication means and armament technology.
@GrandpaRoy2 Almost every military is structure to fight a Blitzkrieg/Shock-N-Awe war. A long drawn out guerrilla war like Ukraine, which is dictated by the defender, who grabs what they can use... just can't be planned.
@GrandpaRoy2 Probably younger folks with more modern ways of thinking also helped in Ukraine
@GrandpaRoy2 So how come Ukraine is losing?
@GrandpaRoy2 Thank you for this post, Roy. @threadreaderapp unroll please. The eternal flaws of the old, rigid and corrupted Soviet System have worked against the 🇷🇺 Mafia boss himself, Putler. The whole free world must thank all the 🇺🇦 people who exploited with brio these 🇷🇺 weaknesses. 👍
@GrandpaRoy2 Sun Tzu would say something about Yin becoming Yang and Yang becoming Yin