Germany launches first permanent foreign deployment since WWII; newly created 45th Armored Brigade to be stationed in Lithuania's East

essentialsaltes said:

the unit to become fully operational by 2027

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Infirmus said:

... by 2027... dear God. We have a full-scale imperial invasion at our doorstep at the moment...

The USA sent 500,000 (yes, half a million) men to Iraq during Desert Storm on only a month's notice, and it will take Germany (the largest and richest European country) two years to send a 5000-men brigade to Lithuania. Let that properly sink in...

Ladies and gentlemen we are well and truly [insert (in)appropriate word here].

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Infirmus said:

... by 2027... dear God. We have a full-scale imperial invasion at our doorstep at the moment...

The USA sent 500,000 (yes, half a million) men to Iraq during Desert Storm on only a month's notice, and it will take Germany (the largest and richest European country) two years to send a 5000-men brigade to Lithuania. Let that properly sink in...

Ladies and gentlemen we are well and truly [insert (in)appropriate word here].

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Maori Aussie said:

I sincerely appreciate your concern, but my assessment is:
The Russian tank fleet has been shredded, they are nearly out of T-72s and now using T-80s with their notorious gas turbine.
These flopped in the first battle of Grozny as the gas turbines emptied the fuel tanks just before the battle started. Russian attacks are now on foot.
The Russian air fleet has taken a mauling. The older jets are now worn out. Only top-tier jets remain.
The Russians have worn out most of their artillery barrels. This means rounds are landing in say a 200-yard radius, not 50 yard radius.
Russian air defence has taken a mauling.
NATO has a good number of F-35 stealth fighters, and the performance of Israeli F-35s against Iran over Syria was very impressive.
Poland and Finland have impressive armies, and more than 50% of the Russian army is impaled in Ukraine.
Once the Russians reduce their forces in Ukraine, and rebuild for a few years, then the risk to NATO increases again.
But this time, the Poles will be well armed, ready and waiting for them.
The ability of drones to decimate tank columns is not to be under-estimated.
As a Result, expect the Russians to try something hybrid, like a rigged election or similar.

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Maori Aussie said:

my assessment is

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Infirmus said:

Thank you for presenting your point of view. I appreciate it but it would seem that you underestimate Russian capabilities. Their entire economy is switched into war mode and there is no way that they will just stop the entire machinery because they took 20% of the former Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic's territory. That's not why they started this war and they're not going to stop there. Their military production dwarves European NATO (and we can't count on USA under Trump), and they don't care if they lose 10-15 million people out of their 140. My Russian friend claims that Russia will be able to still exist and function as a country with 40-50 million people. Yes, it's madness but that's their approach, they won't back down.

Russia will attack a NATO country, and not in a hybrid way but it will be a regular conventional invasion. My bet would be the Baltics but it will automatically mean Poland because we will surely honour our obligations. As for the rest of NATO--especially Americans, I wouldn't hold my breath. Germans would like to get back to business as usual with Russia, Britain's doesn't have adequate land army and Italians and French are... well... Italians and French. If, with Trump's help, Russia takes over Ukraine, which will also mean taking over Ukrainian military potential, and decides to continue rolling West, Poland won't be able to stop them. Not because we don't have enough brave soldiers but because we have serious shortages in stockpiles, especially artillery shells. We have artillery ammo for about two weeks of war. The only reason Ukraine held out for 3 years is because, among other things, they received trainloads after trainloads of 155mm artillery shells from the USA. With Trump on Russian side now, Europe really needs to switch into war mode because the war IS coming.

Unfortunately, I don't see this serious war effort in European NATO. OK, Poland will fight, Finns are tough warriors and Romania will try to hold the southern flank... but apart from that... it's hard to be an optimist.

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mindlight said:

The F-35 is a really good aircraft, but in the current climate there is a worry that it involves an overdependence on the USA and that many of its higher functions actually depend on the Command and Control the US provides. If the US is not in the fight what then? Maybe Typhoons or Rafael's would be better. Even without the US European NATO would have air dominance in a way that Ukraine never did and this would change the nature of the warfare on the ground also.

There is no doubt that Russia's military needs peace to rebuild. Whereas the NATO equipment is now upgraded or the newer versions that were never sent to Ukraine. Poland is a case in point with significant air defence and drone upgrades. Not sure why they bought so many new tanks (1000) when the conflict in Ukraine seems to have demonstrated the end of viable tank warfare.

A key consideration no one has mentioned is the Kalingrad oblast. Polish and German forces would need to take that out early on in any conflict. There are maybe 100 nukes in the oblast.

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Infirmus said:

Thank you for presenting your point of view. I appreciate it but it would seem that you underestimate Russian capabilities. Their entire economy is switched into war mode and there is no way that they will just stop the entire machinery because they took 20% of the former Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic's territory. That's not why they started this war and they're not going to stop there. Their military production dwarves European NATO (and we can't count on USA under Trump), and they don't care if they lose 10-15 million people out of their 140. My Russian friend claims that Russia will be able to still exist and function as a country with 40-50 million people. Yes, it's madness but that's their approach, they won't back down.

Russia will attack a NATO country, and not in a hybrid way but it will be a regular conventional invasion. My bet would be the Baltics but it will automatically mean Poland because we will surely honour our obligations. As for the rest of NATO--especially Americans, I wouldn't hold my breath. Germans would like to get back to business as usual with Russia, Britain's doesn't have adequate land army and Italians and French are... well... Italians and French. If, with Trump's help, Russia takes over Ukraine, which will also mean taking over Ukrainian military potential, and decides to continue rolling West, Poland won't be able to stop them. Not because we don't have enough brave soldiers but because we have serious shortages in stockpiles, especially artillery shells. We have artillery ammo for about two weeks of war. The only reason Ukraine held out for 3 years is because, among other things, they received trainloads after trainloads of 155mm artillery shells from the USA. With Trump on Russian side now, Europe really needs to switch into war mode because the war IS coming.

Unfortunately, I don't see this serious war effort in European NATO. OK, Poland will fight, Finns are tough warriors and Romania will try to hold the southern flank... but apart from that... it's hard to be an optimist.

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Infirmus said:

Thank you for presenting your point of view. I appreciate it but it would seem that you underestimate Russian capabilities. Their entire economy is switched into war mode and there is no way that they will just stop the entire machinery because they took 20% of the former Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic's territory. That's not why they started this war and they're not going to stop there. Their military production dwarves European NATO (and we can't count on USA under Trump), and they don't care if they lose 10-15 million people out of their 140. My Russian friend claims that Russia will be able to still exist and function as a country with 40-50 million people. Yes, it's madness but that's their approach, they won't back down.

Russia will attack a NATO country, and not in a hybrid way but it will be a regular conventional invasion. My bet would be the Baltics but it will automatically mean Poland because we will surely honour our obligations. As for the rest of NATO--especially Americans, I wouldn't hold my breath. Germans would like to get back to business as usual with Russia, Britain's doesn't have adequate land army and Italians and French are... well... Italians and French. If, with Trump's help, Russia takes over Ukraine, which will also mean taking over Ukrainian military potential, and decides to continue rolling West, Poland won't be able to stop them. Not because we don't have enough brave soldiers but because we have serious shortages in stockpiles, especially artillery shells. We have artillery ammo for about two weeks of war. The only reason Ukraine held out for 3 years is because, among other things, they received trainloads after trainloads of 155mm artillery shells from the USA. With Trump on Russian side now, Europe really needs to switch into war mode because the war IS coming.

Unfortunately, I don't see this serious war effort in European NATO. OK, Poland will fight, Finns are tough warriors and Romania will try to hold the southern flank... but apart from that... it's hard to be an optimist.

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Maori Aussie said:

the Russians are still struggling to eject the Ukrainians from Russia (Kursk Oblast)...

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Infirmus said:

The reason Russia struggles with Ukraine is that Ukraine had huge post-Warsaw-Pact ammo and weapons stockpiles, managed to mobilise 1.3 million active personnel (and still has about 3 million reservists), got first quality intelligence and surveillance from the US, and many countries sent them huge quantities of ammo, military equipment, all kinds of supplies and money, whilst Russia didn't even conduct proper war-time mobilisation. If Russia mobilises for a large scale war, Europe alone will struggle to stop them (that is IF all European countries decide to honour Article 5). And there is, of course, the question of Russian advantage in nuclear forces.

I would really like to be wrong but this war is far from being over, and it will spread to other countries.

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Nithavela said:

I also think that germany should do more, and be able to do much more than it does. Sadly there was no political will for that in the last decades, and even assuming that things are picking up now, these things take time.

Luckily, german industry is picking up where german politics are sluggish.

Arming the world: Rheinmetall’s secretive ammunition factory program

Germany’s leading defence company is a major supplier to Ukraine and ‘friendly’ Nato countries. But Rheinmetall also has a parallel business, free from German export rules, selling machinery and factories to places rarely named in public. Investigate Europe went on the trail of the arms giant’s...

www.investigate-europe.eu

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Maori Aussie said:

Short answer yes. Long answer, all the major Western arms manufacturers have entered into joint ventures in politically stable countries, and or have purchased large shareholdings in 'partner' arms manufacturers in politically stable countries. My sense of it is that some Governments have applied highly questionable policies regarding weapon exports (see below), and the corporations have responded by "spreading their bets". The best example I can think of is Oerlikon (of Switzerland) and their 35mm anti aircraft ammunition. The German Government paid Rheinmetall to refurbish retired "Gepard" anti-aircraft vehicles (2*35mm autocannon) and send these to Ukraine, to help stop Russian bombardment drones. I think Netherlands and Norway donated retired vehicles to the project and the EU purchased some from Jordan. But the 35mm ammunition was made in Switzerland, and Switzerland has a policy of no export of weapons or ammunition for countries at war. The back up ammunition manufacturer was Brazil, and the Russians somehow stopped that export. An international search by the EU resulted, scouring the entire planet for 35mm ammunition in storage. So Norway stepped up to the plate and committed to building its own 35mm anti-drone ammunition production line and developing and testing its own 35mm anti-drone ammunition. This ammunition is now being used in Ukraine against bombardment drones. IIRC progressives in Switzerland are now doing some soul searching asking themselves why they would not allow supply of their anti-drone ammunition to a country whose civilians are being bombarded by drones....

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Maori Aussie said:

Yes, but the idea of Russia sending its WW1 style infantry-based army "over the top" against NATO is a long shot. Russia is now reduced to using a WW1 style army against the Ukrainians, sometimes using unarmoured all-terrain vehicles in assaults, but mostly, infantry on foot....

In Ukraine, tanks are normally 3-8kms behind the front line, in a pit with a hurricane fencing cage over the top.
And they are still being lost in large numbers to cheap one-way drones.
Analysts have been watching the steady decline of Russian tanks and artillery both in storage and being sent to Ukraine. The storage units are now mostly spare parts only. All the vehicles that can still run have been deployed, except for the (bottom of the barrel) T-80s. The Russians have been fielding tanks and artillery from the 1950s and 1960s to Ukraine for the last year to maintain numbers. The Russians might be losing 150 tanks a month in Ukraine. The Russians claim to be building 120 tanks a month. This is not true. The are building about 10 T-90s a month, and those are the retrograde obr.2023 model without the cutting-edge French night vision. They are refurbishing about 100 T-80s a month. These tanks were placed in storage in the 2000s because of their problematic gas turbine, and the Russian Army went back to using T-72s. The performance of T-80s in the first battle of Grozny was woeful. They did not even get into battle... It is crystal clear to the analysts that the Russian Army's weak point is logistics, and that it is massively reliant on rail transport. Hence the Russians are pushing rail into Ukraine, to the point where Ukraine has been able to attack Russian logistics trains with small one-way drones (40-60kms from the front). NATO can IMHO cripple the Russian Army simply by dropping road and railway bridges 200-1000kms from the front. The Russian Army simply does not have the trucks and tank haulers to move its army. This is why NATO has bought so many F-35s. Israel's use of these above Russian air-defence in Syria is telling. The F-35 is very hard to track on radar, so at night they can operate over Russian air defences with little risk and can attack targets like bridges with precision. Long-term, the possibility of Russia repairing the tanks it has lost in Ukraine is low. All Russian tanks from the T-64 onwards have 28 large 125mm rounds stored below the turret. "Top attack" weapons like Javelin, NLAW and drones often put a jet of molten copper thru the propellant of the ammunition in this carousel, which often results in a catastrophic detonation ("turret toss") which basically wrecks the vehicle. The 12 ton turret often flies 20 metres into the air. There are so very many recordings of these online now. After the spectacular results of the $30k NLAW missile against $500k tanks in Ukraine were seen, a crash production program for these missiles started. Recently Donald Tusk of Poland summed up like this "Why do 500M people have to beg 300M people to protect them from 140M people who have been fighting 40M people for three years and not been able to defeat them". Poland is now asking France to base some of its nuclear weapons in Poland.
I pray that rational minds and Deterrence prevail.

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mindlight said:

Who is going to buy arms from Switzerland if that supply is cut off when actually needed. The EU needs to be self sufficient in military supplies or in trade agreements with reliable countries only.

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1. Left the other Europeans in the lurch.
2. Missed out on a lot of revenue
3. Forced the creation of a nearby reliable competitor