The big problem i see is, how will Putin react when his army indeed collapses as experts predict? He already lost more face than Cher and i guess in the end his generals need to pull the plug
The scuttlebutt is that Poutine fired 8 generals. We have no second confirmation at this time so we should not place too much value on this. But what if it is true? We are looking at senior army commanders, if not
THE army commander, and senior air commanders, if not
THE air commander. The FSB head is 'arrested', for what?
Also arrested is Anatoly Bolyukh, Beseda's deputy, according to respected author Andrey Soldatov, who said Putin is 'truly unhappy' with the agency - which he ran before becoming president.
www.dailymail.co.uk
Three weeks into the war and still the army and the air force cannot coordinate their ops. Another rumor is that the VKS is afraid of fratricide, meaning the VKS is afraid of being shot down by the army, so the VKS do not fly unless the pilots feel safe. Coordination between friendly army and air force is called 'airspace deconfliction'.
www.globalsecurity.org
Airspace decon is a
BASIC capability and skillset. One major factor is that Russian pilots do not fly as often as US/NATO pilots do. Reportedly about 10 hrs/mth. US/NATO pilots doubled or even tripled that. The average training sortie is about 1.5 hr. If you go to the range, it will be 2 to 2.5 hr. At the range is where you learn how to ingress to a ground target, make your delivery, then egress. Along the way, you learn how to coordinate with ground controllers simulating friendly ground forces. So flying 1-2 hrs/week as how the Russian train is not enough. That is just time to takeoff, gain altitude, maybe rendezvous with an air refueler, maybe do a few touch-and-go, then land. This seems to be the bulk of the VKS fighter pilot experience.
Observers are giving the Russian military much leeway, probably too much and that is because of the perception of the Russian military as a competent and capable force, but we are looking at 3 weeks and still the Russians are struggling.
If it is true that Poutine replaced his army and air commanders, that three weeks passed mean the new commanders will have doubled the difficulties since the Ukrainians gained valuable experience fighting against the Russian military. Regardless of how this war turn out, whether Russia withdraw from Ukraine or completely take over, the Russian military will
NOT be seen as a peer military to the US/NATO alliance.