Anyone able to copy the text?
https://twitter.com/theage/status/1665815666409234433?s=46&t=A5S-z5IJslFoC5SVN0Jodg
2 Likes
Australia is set to give Ukraine the missile-capable, four-wheel-drive armoured cars that it has been requesting for months â the Hawkei â as the centrepiece of a forthcoming support package.
Although a formal commitment has yet to be sealed, there has been serious progress informally and Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov told the Herald and The Agethe vehicles were number one on his list of âdemandsâ from Australia.
Ukraine wants Australian-made Hawkei four-wheel drives for its fight against Russia.
He described the Australian-made vehicles as âvery, very famous armed vehicles with air defence systemsâ in an interview in Singapore after meeting his Australian counterpart, Richard Marles, at the weekend.
The Hawkei is a seven-tonne armoured car designed to be fitted with the same Norwegian-American air defence system that protects the White House.
Marles declined to comment specifically on the Hawkei but said the Ukrainians âhave given us a list; we had a pretty detailed conversationâ. The new support package would be unveiled âsoonâ, he said.
The announcement is expected by the time Prime Minister Anthony Albanese travels to a NATO summit in Lithuania next month.
People with knowledge of the talks but not authorised to speak publicly said an understanding had been reached but the deal was yet to be processed through Canberraâs formal systems.
Australian-made Bushmasters have been on the front lines from early in the Ukraine war. Kate Geraghty
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said that he was ready to launch the countryâs much-anticipated counteroffensivebut worried that Russia had air superiority on the front lines.
A lack of protection from Russian air power meant âa large number of soldiers will dieâ in the counteroffensive, he told the Wall Street Journalin a weekend interview. Ukraine would have liked to have more Western-supplied weapons for the coming campaign, he said. âWe would like to have certain things, but we canât wait for months.â
Reznikov, Zelenskyâs defence minister, told the Herald and The Age in an interview in Singapore at the Shangri-La Dialogue: âFor us, air defence systems is priority number one. Different levels, short range, middle range, etc. Thatâs why we are wondering for the Hawkei. We will be happy to get it.â
Reznikov was full of praise for the performance of the Bushmaster armoured troop carriers supplied by Australia, which he said had been critical in Ukraineâs ability to recover the city of Kharkiv from Russian forces.
âIt was surprise for Russians. Honestly, it was surprise for me, also.â
Among Ukraineâs other requests, Reznikov said he had asked that Australia join the so-called âbirds coalitionâ to support its use of F-16 fighter jets that NATO nations are supplying. He said Ukraine needed training for its pilots as well as technicians and sustainment support. He had requested Australian personnel and cash.
Australiaâs army has 1100 Hawkeis, recently delivered or in the process of being delivered. Some already are deployed in South Australia and trialling the National Advanced Surface to Air Missile System (NASAM), said retired Australian Army major general Mick Ryan.
âThe NASAM comes with a whole suite of very sophisticated sensors and missiles,â Ryan said. âItâs not just a missile system â it has a pretty powerful radar that over 100 kilometres could be quite useful.â
The Australian Army has raised serial objections to supplying the Hawkei. It first said its brakes were faulty. Next it said that so many spare parts would need to be supplied to Ukraine that the whole fleet would be unusable.
Liberal senator David Van, the chair of the parliamentary Friends of Ukraine group, said it was âcomplete bollocksâ that the vehicles could not be sent to Ukraine.
âThere are 450 Hawkeis sitting in the Thales compound in Bendigo. Why wonât we send them?â
The Ukrainian Defence Ministry has said that it does not care about any braking problems.
Ryan said of the situation: âI think itâs more Canberra risk aversion â Defence doesnât want to be embarrassed if thereâs a problem with the brakes. The Hawkeiâs already in use in Adelaide. If itâs good enough for the Australians itâd be good enough for the Ukrainians.â
The Ukrainian Defence Ministry has said that the Hawkei was its troopsâ ânew crushâ.
The vehicle takes its name from a species of death adder which, in turn, was named in honour of former prime minister Bob Hawke.
11 Likes
Thatâs a bit different to what you described earlier, when you said:
More likely to go around.
Among many possibilities they might for example head for Taganarog bypassing Donetsk on both sides (from Bakhmut and from whatever just did a feint in the Yuzhno-Donetsk direction turning around to head East of Mariupol)âŚ
I took it that you were suggesting they should go around all of the RU fortifications. But there is no way to do that. Here is a map showing the pre-2022 fortifications in Donetsk and the new additions in red. Iâve overlaid what I think is what you are suggesting:
Seems to me to be aiming for both a significant amount of new fortifications and then a line of seriously hardened pre-2022 fortifications. But even if that were successful, any breakthrough would only have a limited area to take control of before hitting all the fortifications east of Mariupol. The AFU would need to either invade RU territory toward Taganrog or a thin wedge between the border and Mariupol - hard to see how that could happen. So I donât see how any offensive from Bakhmut could have a realistic chance of long term success.
The least fortified areas are between Mariupol and Melitopol - I expect that there would be a few pushes at different locations, aiming for 2-3 major breakthroughs. They can then push toward Bardyansk and then east to Mariupol and look to partially encircle Melitopol and Tokmak.
If they cand push east to Mariupol then they could perhaps re-take the old fortifications to Donetsk and develop a strong defensive front against RU from there.
If I have misinterpreted your suggestion, then I suggest you draw a few lines on the map to show what you are meaning, easier to follow that way.
1 Like
Excellent news if true but FMD itâs been like pulling teeth.
2 Likes
Hereâs the text sans paywall
Retired RAAF fighter jets could be sent to Ukraine
Phillip Coorey and Andrew Tillett
Jun 6, 2023 â 5.00am
Australia, the US and Ukraine are discussing sending 41 Royal Australian Air Force F/A-18 Hornets to Kyiv helping fulfil part of President Volodymyr Zelenskyâs request for fighter jets, rather than sending them to the scrapheap as planned.
Sources have told The Australian Financial Review that the US, which recently gave permission to other Western allies to supply Ukraine with advanced fighter jets, including US-made F-16s, is favourably disposed to the idea of gifting Ukraine the F/A-18s.
The retired F/A-18s are sitting in a hangar at the Williamtown RAAF base outside Newcastle.
Washingtonâs approval is needed because it owns the intellectual property on the jets that have been retired by the RAAF and which are being replaced by F-35s, of which Australia has ordered 72.
The retired F/A-18s are sitting in a hangar at the Williamtown RAAF base outside Newcastle and unless sent to Ukraine, will either be scrapped or sold to a private sector aviation company, RAVN Aerospace, to use in the US as âenemiesâ for military aviators to train against
Robert Potter, an Australian security expert advising the Ukrainian government, confirmed negotiations were underway, but a specific deal is yet to be finalised.
âHowever, the United States and Ukraine have an active and specific interest in the acquisition of fourth generation fighters for the Ukrainian Air Force,â he said.
âAustralia operates a large stockpile of retired planes which are otherwise scheduled for destruction.
âThere are multiple formal approvals required to conclude a procurement of these planes, but it is likely an idea whose time has come.â
A separate source close to the discussions agreed it made no sense to destroy perfectly good aircraft that he said could be operational within four months and used to help repel the Russian invasion.
While a handful of planes would only be good for cannibalising parts, the vast bulk would take little work to be brought up to flying condition and have a couple of years left on their airframes. The Australian Hornets are in good shape because they didnât operate at sea.
Ukrainian pilots and ground crew could be quickly brought up to speed to operate the Hornets with Ukrainian language training manuals to be produced.
And with an influx of western fighters to help Ukraine, that would include ex-Hornet pilots.
Defence Minister Richard Marles, who met his Ukrainian counterpart on the sidelines of the weekendâs Shangri-La defence summit in Singapore, declined to comment, but his office pointed instead to comments he made at the weekend about Australiaâs next contribution to the war effort.
âThere are specific requests that Ukraine has made of us, I am not going to go into the details of those, but we are working through them with the government of Ukraine,â he said.
âBeing there for as long as it takes means that we will have another iteration of support for Ukraine, that wonât be long before we announce that, obviously, weâre in conversation with Ukraine about how we can best contribute, as we are in a conversation with both the UK, the US and other allies about the best kind of contribution we could make.
âThe starting point here is that we see whatâs at issue in the war in Ukraine is really the sanctity of the global rules-based order itself.â
After initial resistance to President Zelenskyâs request for used American fighters, US President Joe Biden at the G7 summit in Japan two weeks ago gave the green light to western allies to supply Kyiv with fourth generation fighters such as the Hornets and F-16s (which the RAAF does not operate).
Experts said there are several reasons why the Australian Hornets would help make a difference.
First, the Hornets would play an important role in defending Ukrainian civilians. Western air defence systems such as Patriot missiles are doing an effective job stopping the worst of Russiaâs nightly bombardments of major cities, but there are still gaps, with less built-up areas lacking those systems.
Hornets flying around could be used to intercept and shoot down enemy missiles.
With their twin engines, the Hornets have a much greater chance of survivability if they were damaged. A pilot can land on one engine, and Ukraine cannot afford to lose pilots. And the Hornets are better suited than other fourth-gen jets to the rougher airfields of Ukraine.
Australia going first with an initial delivery of fighter jets would give the Americans (and other nations) cover to provide hundreds from its own fleet of F/A-18s.
It could also be a bad look for Australia if it were not prepared to give up ageing planes at the same time the Americans are preparing to share the crown jewels of their military, nuclear-powered submarines with Australia when the US doesnât really have them to spare.
To prevent the risk of escalation, Australians (and the Americans) could make clear that the Hornets could only fly within Ukrainian airspace, warning if they were used to bomb Russia, the allies would stop maintaining the aircraft, effectively grounding them.
3 Likes
That is hilarious! 109 AFVs!
2 Likes
5 Likes
Nothing. As the Katz videos explain Putin is stuck and has no way out.
Putin does not have a âtheory of victoryâ. The imaginary Putin that US foreign policy establishment imagines that they can reach a rational settlement with.
There is no âbalance of powerâ. It is an existential struggle in which the regime either survives or does not survive.
There is a kleptocratic autocracy, with Putin as its only politician that has a mass base, that faced a real existential threat from democratic revolution in Ukraine and went to war to preserve itself from it in 2014. It will keep fighting until it is removed from power, with or without Putin.
It does of course have hopes for Donald Trump and Western attention spans. But it knows that Ukraine would maintain a guerilla war even if Western aid was cut off.
In desperation it is willing to become a Chinese vassal state. That may be clutching at straws. If they donât get precision tools etc from China they will run out of ammunition. If China does want to drag out the war to keep the West tied down they can.
That might suit Chinese as well as Russian fascism and it might suit the arms industry but rapidly ending the war by delivering what is needed as fast as it can be used is in the interests of everybody else.
Especially Australia for the reason explained by Ben Hodges. Not being able to support Ukraine to win NOW makes it utterly obvious that US commitments to Taiwan need not be taken seriously.
3 Likes
Is it true this bloke ended up with a cushy job in Integrity & PR dept at AFL HQ?
5 Likes
This is big.
The Nova Kakhovka Dam has been destroyed in Southern Ukraine.
https://twitter.com/Global_Mil_Info/status/1665906233335742464?s=20
Breaking: There are reports from Russian TG channels that a damn in the area of Nova Kakhovka was blown up. If this is true and it is the Nova Kakhovka hydro-electric dam on the #Dnipro River, this is huge news. There is also a damn on the canal that provides drinking water to Crimea there as well. Warning: Keep an eye out for any news related to the ZNPP which is relies on the pool elevation upstream of the NK damn for intake water. Source: âNgP raZVedkaâ Link: #Telegram: Contact @negumanitarnaya_pomosch_Z <<Breaking news. Kherson direction. It is reported that a dam was blown up in the area of the settlement of Novaya Kakhovka, there is a rapid flooding of the surroundings. We are monitoring the situation, checking the information, details will be announced later.
3 Likes
âRussian sources claim that a strike of the Armed Forces of Ukraine on the dam in Nova Kakhovka took place tonight.â
Intriguing
Perhaps strategy to get Russians out of southern Kherson and have panic in Crimea with no drinking water. You couldnât really see the Russians having reason to do it themselves
This based on the above article
Then again their logic hasnât been too sound on many things
1 Like
2 Likes
OMG that is huge. That video of the amount of water flowing downstream is crazy. Must have only been just after it was blown, as things are still breaking away from the dam structure.
1 Like
No I disagree, this has all the hallmarks of a short term destructive mindset from the russians. I think that they are simply trying to disrupt a possible amphibious crossing as part of the coming counteroffensive - perhaps their recon spotted something and they had pre-planned explosives set.
5 Likes
https://twitter.com/Teoyaomiquu/status/1665911542657818624?s=20
The distance of the concrete structure destroyed is around 200 meters. Ukraine has nothing that can do such damage unless explosives are planted.
Also, two sections of the dam lock were destroyed.
1 Like
Yeah there was talk initially when Ukr pushed Rus back out of Northern Kherson that they had rigged the dam. But I would have expected that would have been checked out and disarmed by now
Perhaps not.