Russia is a little country in economic terms with a GDP that is dwarfed by Italy. It is not a technologically advanced nation with most of its manufacturing expertise having been imported.
It is not unfair to say Russia is a little gas station owned by China and India.
Given the recent avalanche of Russian misinformation, one would think they are winning the war and their economy is booming!
That is simply not the case.
Ahhh, dear reader, you want an example? OK, let’s chat about the Russian supposed 5th generation stealth fighter, the Sukhoi Su-57.
It is supposed to be better than the best US fighter. Haha. Sorry.
Recently, the Russians announced with breathless excitement that they had DOUBLED PRODUCTION OF THE STUPENDOUS SU-57.
Even the American Military Watch magazine printed such disinformation tripe with no context or perspective. Here’s a link to the article.
This was clearly intended to weaken the knees of the West, Nato, the United States, and Ukraine.
Oh, my God, the Russians have DOUBLED PRODUCTION OF THE STUPENDOUS SU-57.
OK, dear reader, here are the facts:
1. In 2022, Russia reported delivering 6 Su-57 aircraft. Yes, that is 6 in a whole year of production from their famous Komsomolsk-on-Amur Aviation Plant.
The Russians say their Su-57 is a $100,000,000 aircraft.
2. In 2023, Russia reported delivering 12 Su-57 aircraft <<< haha, they did in fact DOUBLE PRODUCTION, but it’s a meaningless number
3. The total fleet of Russian Su-57 aircraft is 22
4. Since Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, no Su-57 aircraft have been flown in the battlespace or been involved in any form of aerial combat.
The production numbers are from Russia and are, like anything coming from Russia, impossible to check and verify.
BTW, the same thing is true of the vaunted Russian T-14 Armata — not in theater and insignificant amount of production.
What is true as to armor is the Russians have been jerking 1940s/50s/60s era tanks out of mothballs given they have lost more than 4,000 tanks thus far in combat.
The newest Russian gear is just not that good and Putin is trying to avoid the embarrassment of seeing it destroyed by the Ukrainians.
Satellite surveillance of Russian tank production facilities makes it easy to verify this intel.
Russia attacked Ukraine with a total inventory of 900 aircraft.
1. Since the beginning of the war they have lost to combat and crashes (including a half dozen of their own aircraft they shot down themselves in “friendly fire” incidents) a total of 180 +/- aircraft including fighters and, most importantly, trained pilots.
2. Since Russia is flying the snot out of its aircraft — more than 300 hours a month v a more normal 100 hours per month — functional destruction (meaning blowing through the number of anticipated hours of flight for an airframe) has cost them another 70 aircraft.
This will get worse as the airframes they are flying are their most seasoned aircraft.
3. The Russian air fleet continues to suffer from excessive magnitude of flying hours grinding down performance, struggle to get parts, and pressure on maintenance crews.
Perhaps the biggest indictment of Russian air is they have never achieved air superiority and come into the battle space every day with a high regard for Ukrainian anti-air assets.
OK, here’s the bottom line:
1. Russia is conducting a massive disinformation and misinformation campaign via the media and social media that can be identified and proven handily.
The Su-57 hoax is just one of many such lies intended to cow the West, Nato, US, and Ukraine.
2. Russia is struggling to make up battlefield losses in manpower, artillery, armor, drones, ammunition, and aircraft. Battlefield medical care is a joke.
3. Russia is buying artillery ammo from North Korea, drones from Iran, and is using Chinese firms to find chips. This speaks volumes.
4. Russian manpower is stretched to the limit. More than 1.5MM young Russian men of draft age have fled the country. Russian casualties have hit experienced leadership the hardest.
5. Russian airborne forces — typically good troops — were mauled by the Ukrainians at the beginning of the war losing one of four divisions and more than half of their 40,000 paratroopers.
Russia stood up a new airborne division — again typically elite troops — recently committed it to combat, and within a week it too had sustained a casualty rate in excess of 50%.
[In World War II, the US stood up almost 100 divisions and it took more than a year to train up a new division even when starting with half of the NCOs and officers being combat vets.]
6. Ukraine, a nation with no bluewater navy sunk the Russian Black Sea flagship and has driven the entire Black Sea fleet out of Crimea.
Do not fall under the spell of the Russian disinformation and misinformation. Hang in there.
But, hey, what the Hell do I really know anyway? I’m just a Big Red Car. Happy New Year!
