One person was killed and at least nine others injured in Kharkiv; a 14-storey apartment building in Kyiv was set on fire after Russia strikes. What we know on day 859
I don’t think that there’s any realistic chance that Ukraine can make use of ships in the Black Sea. Russia built their military to contest the US in the Pacific – they’ve got a lot of long-range anti-ship weapons. That surplus capacity is why they’ve been blowing anti-ship missiles on land attack. I’d be pretty confident that Russia can keep a Ukrainian warship from surviving in the Black Sea. Where Ukraine’s pulling off naval attacks, it’s using either small, very-low-profile boats or even-lower-profile, mostly-submerged USVs. Russia apparently doesn’t have the sensor capability to reliably pick those up (and I imagine that Ukrainian strikes on radars probably also complicate that).
I have wondered about maybe Ukraine using larger UUVs that surface to launch a weapon. Such a UUV would have to be something that could be transported on a trailer, so there are some size limitations. But it might permit for a more-capable platform than the small USVs that are currently being used.
I don’t know what kind of anti-submarine-warfare tools Russia has available in the Black Sea, but if they aren’t able to detect the existing USVs, I would assume that they aren’t going to be doing better with UUVs.
EDIT: There’s a reference to a Ukrainian UUV project in progress here; it says that Russia is improving their ability to detect the existing Ukrainian USVs, so UUVs are becoming more important.
I was more referring to using a containership in the northern ice sea to launch a single wave of UAVs to destroy the Russian strategic bombers parked north of st petersburg. You know a one time strike option.
Or use clandestine means to build Magura type drone boat in the Caspian sea and launch against a vessel. You know, even more asymmetric. Like what they do in Syria and Africa.
I’d guess that Russia is able to prevent a surface ship from approaching Russia in any ocean unless someone can fight an offensive air and naval war to get control of that ocean.
I’m guessing (you said “container ship”) that the idea might be to use a concealed civilian vessel that then unloads some kind of surprise attack. While disguised military ships have been used to conduct armed warfare before, the last time I can think of an example was British Q-ships in World War I; I’m not sure that this is still legal.
Turkey has closed the Turkish Straits to warships due to the conflict, so technically no warships are supposed to pass, from either side. I’m I believe that it violates the convention governing this to either tell Turkey that the warship isn’t actually a warship or if Turkey knows but preferentially lets warships through. That being said, I guess theoretically Ukraine could assemble such an attack using a ship somewhere far away from Ukraine.
My guess is that if Ukraine had a lot of long-range cruise missiles, they’d probably be using them in their own theater of operations, as they’re pretty short on them.
I don’t think that Russia is using strategic bombers for the glide bombing attacks, so whatever the benefits of hitting them, I’m not sure that it would be a counter to the glide bomb attacks. kagisYeah, this has the (much more numerous) Su-34 being used:
On or just before Thursday, an air force Sukhoi Su-34 fighter-bomber lobbed a single FAB-3000 bomb with pop-out wings and satellite guidance at a multi-story building Russian intelligence had identified as a staging base for Ukrainian troops in Lyptsi, 10 miles north of Kharkiv in northern Ukraine.
Looks like two confirmed, another possible, another eventually (though I can’t imagine using the rare, intended-for-another-purposes Su-57 if they could use the others).
I don’t think that there’s any realistic chance that Ukraine can make use of ships in the Black Sea. Russia built their military to contest the US in the Pacific – they’ve got a lot of long-range anti-ship weapons. That surplus capacity is why they’ve been blowing anti-ship missiles on land attack. I’d be pretty confident that Russia can keep a Ukrainian warship from surviving in the Black Sea. Where Ukraine’s pulling off naval attacks, it’s using either small, very-low-profile boats or even-lower-profile, mostly-submerged USVs. Russia apparently doesn’t have the sensor capability to reliably pick those up (and I imagine that Ukrainian strikes on radars probably also complicate that).
I have wondered about maybe Ukraine using larger UUVs that surface to launch a weapon. Such a UUV would have to be something that could be transported on a trailer, so there are some size limitations. But it might permit for a more-capable platform than the small USVs that are currently being used.
I don’t know what kind of anti-submarine-warfare tools Russia has available in the Black Sea, but if they aren’t able to detect the existing USVs, I would assume that they aren’t going to be doing better with UUVs.
EDIT: There’s a reference to a Ukrainian UUV project in progress here; it says that Russia is improving their ability to detect the existing Ukrainian USVs, so UUVs are becoming more important.
I was more referring to using a containership in the northern ice sea to launch a single wave of UAVs to destroy the Russian strategic bombers parked north of st petersburg. You know a one time strike option.
Or use clandestine means to build Magura type drone boat in the Caspian sea and launch against a vessel. You know, even more asymmetric. Like what they do in Syria and Africa.
The Baltic Sea?
Arctic ocean. I did a literal translation from Dutch… which made sense but was wrong. Sry
Ah, okay, gotcha.
So, there are a couple issues:
I’d guess that Russia is able to prevent a surface ship from approaching Russia in any ocean unless someone can fight an offensive air and naval war to get control of that ocean.
I’m guessing (you said “container ship”) that the idea might be to use a concealed civilian vessel that then unloads some kind of surprise attack. While disguised military ships have been used to conduct armed warfare before, the last time I can think of an example was British Q-ships in World War I; I’m not sure that this is still legal.
Turkey has closed the Turkish Straits to warships due to the conflict, so technically no warships are supposed to pass, from either side. I’m I believe that it violates the convention governing this to either tell Turkey that the warship isn’t actually a warship or if Turkey knows but preferentially lets warships through. That being said, I guess theoretically Ukraine could assemble such an attack using a ship somewhere far away from Ukraine.
My guess is that if Ukraine had a lot of long-range cruise missiles, they’d probably be using them in their own theater of operations, as they’re pretty short on them.
I don’t think that Russia is using strategic bombers for the glide bombing attacks, so whatever the benefits of hitting them, I’m not sure that it would be a counter to the glide bomb attacks. kagis Yeah, this has the (much more numerous) Su-34 being used:
Strategic bombers are used to launch the hypersonics at Ukraine. They are rarer so a high value target. If they can cut of kinzal at its roots.
That’s true, though IIRC there are two planes, and I think that one of them – and the more-numerous one – is a variant of some multirole fighter.
kagis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kh-47M2_Kinzhal
Looks like two confirmed, another possible, another eventually (though I can’t imagine using the rare, intended-for-another-purposes Su-57 if they could use the others).