obaaderemi: South Africa has everything to be in the league of countries like Czech and Poland or at least Indonesia. But disenfranchising the blacks for so long robbed South Africa of the balance it could have achieved economically and socially.
The massive contributions the blacks could have made were blocked for decades by making sure they were poorly educated and marginalized in industries that could promote their progress. The scars may never heal.
true...that and heavy sanctions in the 80s put us back decades..... And Zuma did a great job putting us behind in the 21st century
kabe1: Has anyone noticed Russian airstrikes in Ukraine are pretty low, especially when compared to their campaign in Syria where in 4 days the VKS carried out over 522 combat sorties.
Why is this number low?
Are the Russians trying to limit civilian casualties in Ukraine?
I believe there are several factors to this imo...1. Ukraine have much better anti air capabilities than ISIS and 2. Indiscriminate bombing of civilians is a war crime 3. What @ Odunayaw said
SuperSixSeven: I am surprised how much scrap equipment RU Army is throwing into battle. Many front line units field MT-LBs and BMP-2s (not upgraded) - they wont last against NATO in a conventional war. They have not even archived air superiority. I am not really impressed what i see so far.
because they don't in fact have that many modern systems in total.... The vast majority of there defence force is still soviet era equipment
Tinfoil: Ghost of Kiev is fake, used footage from a game, DCS
yes I saw the Ukrainian defence force shared a video of a flight simulator on their twitter just now.....imo I think its just an urban legend, however I don't think it was intentionally created though
kabe1: Not true, just a morale boosting tale for the Ukrainians. Same as the bombardment of Snake island, with all the border guards giving their lives in battle.
Besides only the Ukrainians currently fly MIG-29s in this conflict.
impossible to say with 100% certainty since we are not there and certainly don't know the facts however logically I tend to agree that it is implausible But it's been making headlines all over so we'll have to wait and see for all the facts
GreenandGold: They have no standing chance... I don't even think they have a functional Airforce any longer, Russia obtained air superiority in the first few hours of the invasion.
Don't know how true this is but apparently a Ukrainian pilot in a mig29 shot down 2Su35,1Su27,2Su25 and a mig29.... Becoming the first fighter ace in decades...
Stormtrooper11: Extremely true. Can Nigeria attack Bakassi today? Yes. Can Nigeria hold it? No. Bleak. Before every operation, strategists and tacticians debate. You can easily attack any position in a war situation regardless of the losses and costs, but can you defend it? That should be your top priority before envisaging on any mission.
you are missing the point, Kabe1 said its easier to attack than defend however that is totally untrue, Lanchester laws state that a defending force usually has a 3:1 advantage against an attacking force
kabe1: I don't see any of your own specific military qualifications there.
Your dad, his older brother and his cousin are not in this thread, the alleged qualifications of your family members do not translate to yours.
Which boils down to the fact you lack the requisite knowledge, information and experience to talk with authority on this matter.
- maybe you didn't read properly but I said my information on military matters is purely a hobby....i did not claim I had any military experience.... However how does that disqualify me from participating since 99% of this thread including you have no experience and even less knowledge on military subjects than I.
- yes there qualifications will never translate to mine however I have someone with real world experience when it comes to waging war whom I consult wrt military matters on a regular basis especially now with the Ukraine-Russia conflict.... Not to mention they have actual experience fighting against Soviet tactics and Soviet equipment.
- and what knowledge, Information and experience do you possess old wise one
kabe1: It is to be expected, the EU is one of the world's largest trading bloc, should the Russians have traded more with Africa instead? Pick up a map please.
what relevance is this? My point is how reliant the Russian economy is on the EU
When talking about the conflict in Ukraine, and you say this "It's pretty common military knowledge that a defending force has a 3:1 advantaged vs a similarly equipped foe", what does it mean?
it means a defending force has a 3:1 advantage
Also my post was in response to you saying it is easier to attack than defend..... Nothing to do with Ukraine per say
kabe1: You know they didn't do all these sitting from your extensive military experience playing Call of Duty..... Quite impressive!!!
Ukrainian capitulation was to be expected, they are right on the border with a significantly more powerful neighbour.
They don't have the full support of all their citizens.
Russia conducted a very successful SEAD mission on day 1 of this conflict.
Russia has a very impressive military, it took their army less than 48 hours to reach Kyiv. The operation by the military of Russia has been largely successful, with targets met.
The Russians have only deployed a fraction of the forces they have positioned for this military operation.
it might come as a surprise but I don't play video games, being outside was always more of my forte.... Anyway my knowledge of military matters are solely out of hobby, hence Ive read several books from Mr Heitman, Col Stander, Mr Barlow, Sun Tzu(obviously!!) ect ect
Also my dad was a lieutenant in the SADF, My Dad's oldest brother a Captain, his other 2 brothers were NCOs and my cousin was a troopy.
kabe1: How do you prepare against the Russian or US army?
You keep saying prepare, how? Please list them.
Entrenchment, Fortifications, Mobilisation of troops, Build up of military stocks.............How much more do you want me to mention??
Seems like your alternative is to do fvckall because it's Russia..........Russia might look impressive on paper but they have a fragile economy and don't necessary have the projection capability to sustain a force of 100 000 for that long!
kabe1: Ukraine, Iraq during the gulf war, Iraq in 2003, the Taliban in Afghanistan, Armenia, Georgia in 2008 the list is endless.
And this list proves what exactly?? Go do some research, maybe read about the Lanchester's laws.....It's pretty common military knowledge that a defending force has a 3:1 advantaged vs a similarly equipped foe
Lurker4Long: This is the easy phase, which Ukraine was never going to win. Why expend all your munitions when there's an insurgency phase still to come?
They should've entrenched themselves in strategic positions especially in cities.........Russia has a very poor economy and with the massive sanctions they could of easily dragged on this war and made it exponentially more difficult for the Russians.
kabe1: I've seen hundreds of Ukrainian POWs, some simply abandoned their posts and fled.
I don't think Sweden can defeat Russia. We haven't seen Russian EW capabilities thus far in this conflict, to their credit they have also minimized attacking areas with high civilian populations. A conflict with Sweden would be a different game entirely. They would employ more stand off munitions in that scenario.
We haven't also seen a lot of Russian UAV's in this conflict either.
I also think it is easier to attack a position than to defend it. Look at the war in Armenia.
GreenandGold: Don't you think there's Green Barrets and SAS in the country already? There's a video of British accent people fighting in Ukrain on the frontline, they don't show their faces.
America is supplying more Javelins and Stingers, intelligence as we speak. They cant get directly involved because "WWIII". Russia knows this for sure.
GreenandGold: Ukrainians are making plenty of defensive blunders. Look at this picture; the IFV is exposing its flank, which is the weakest part of the armour. Secondly, their positions are not fortified. This current position will be over runoff in a few minutes.
it baffles me how shockingly ill prepared the Ukrainians are.... I mean this is 8 years in the making.... Quite a long time to re-equip and fortify stratigic positions.... But no...the Russians just drive in to Kiev like its a KFC drive through
GreenandGold: The objective is to resist and make it costly for that invading force.
Look at Ukraine, in less than 24hrs the Russians are at the gates of the capital, have imposed no flight zones and taken almost all regions of the country. Ukrainians couldn't even hold a line with their equipment.
It helps when you literally border a much inferior enemy....not the same as launching a cross ocean invasion... Only the US has the capability to actually pull of a successful invasion of a country like SA...