Five more Ukrainian service members have been killed in the past 24 hours, Ukraine's Defense Ministry said Tuesday -- another sign that the truce between the government and pro-Russian separatists is falling apart.Go here to read the rest of the story and see the video.
The news comes three days into a ceasefire between Ukrainian forces and the separatists in eastern Ukraine. But clearly, the fire has not ceased.
On Monday, Ukrainian defense spokesman Andriy Lysenko reported five deaths from the previous day and at least 129 violations of the ceasefire since it went into effect at midnight Saturday.
And there are more signs that the international efforts to stop the bloodshed are failing.
Civilians are suffering, the Red Cross is strained and the average person is getting throat punched/heel stomped
This is not working.
It also seems like they have ditched the idea of using any kind of VLTOR collapsable stock?
ReplyDeleteThe case fire only work where two sides want that... or they are forced to do this. In this case, Ukrainians would be very happy to have one, but Russia don't want it. So there was no "case fire" there... just a 25 min pause in fire.
ReplyDeleteAside from maybe match grade triggers all other upgrades give nothing away in robustness. And even in triggers on the last sniper rifle contest won by Remington only one trigger was proven safe when testing safety by droping rifle 5 feet on a steel plate and it this case it was a real match trigger that won.
ReplyDeleteyeah and that would seem a no brainer. compensators? match triggers? they are really losing their minds at the head shed. the rifle team side of the house along with many Marines having tricked out personal rifles is really clouding the issue for the powers that be. they're being sold a bill of goods. want better marksmanship? how about adjustable buttstock for smaller shooters? naw that would be too easy.
ReplyDeletecompensator instead of flash suppressors? look at the entire package. the most needed item is the one they don't talk about. adjustable buttstocks. you want a free floating barrel on an infantry rifle? really? have you seen how Marines treat weapons that they love?
ReplyDeleteFree floated barrel just means that handguards are not attached to the barrel but too an intermediate tube instead,In case of alu foreends that is already the case.
ReplyDeletei know what it means but i also know how Marine treat their rifles especially when the going gets tough and you're trying to keep up with your squad. check out pics of the Jungle Endurance Course. they stopped running Marines with their issue weapons and started using dummy weapons cause the going was so rough and shit was breaking.
ReplyDeletejust cause it works, sounds good and looks cool for civilians doesn't mean that it will work for the military. all the civilians that are runnning around thinking about Red Dawn scenarios or end of the world as we know it type scenarios have no idea what they're really talking about. 99 percent of the population couldn't "bug out" and most couldn't hump 25 miles if there lives depended on it. so what works for civilians will not work for the military.
It can work for Military service, no big deal.
ReplyDeleteM16 clones used in military service already use free float forends and compensators
The most fragile part is the adjustable buttstock
http://scgnews.com/leaked-documents-ukraines-new-president-works-for-the-us-state-department
ReplyDeletename the M16 clone that is used as a battle rifle that has a free floating barrel. not freaking forends and i don't care about other people using compensators in battle...its stupid no matter who's doing it.
ReplyDeleteCNN is promoting the Washington line. The US had no part in Minsk and doesn't want it to succeed. But the reality is on the ground, particularly in Debaltseve. Thousands of Kyev troops, about a quarter of their army, are still surrounded and about to either surrender or meet their maker. This is a big reason why Minsk 2.0 happened, with France and Germany, and it's not working out for the US. Then will the US order Poroshenko to take offensive action? is the question.
ReplyDeleteI read three times what you write and still it don't make any sense.
ReplyDeleteCorrect, I have the same theory. Merkel and Hollande just broke their diplomatic necks as Debaltseve has fallen.
ReplyDeleteNow is time for the cavalry to step in (Kerry) and save the day.
I have the bad feeling that US is playing a patience game to corner Putin and after that destroy him. At this point he is not all-in but if the fight escalates one more notch he will. And then...
I fully agree on that one . So its just o question when 'our men' in 'our ukraine' (read wilki leak ukraine cables) make certain Minsk 2 fails ,thereby securing their political future and at the same time drawing us into wider war.
ReplyDeleteYou would think the Marine Corps has more pressing issues to concern themselves with. While I think they should have exchanged their rifles for M4s, staying with the good ol musket seems like a sensible thing to me.
ReplyDeleteI don't get why they would select those upgrades instead of just replacing the gas tube with a piston. Did they already do that when I wasn't looking? The rifle already works pretty good but if there was room for an improvement I would think that that is the spot.
ReplyDeletei've read up on the DI vs Piston debate and i think that going piston would be a mistake. i don't get the civilian market at all. they make these rifles smaller and smaller and they get more unreliable. they talk about weight but everything they do does nothing but add weight...the thing is that some people are just chasing trends or cool and forgetting that the entire market place is designed to sell the next hot thing...especially since the market is saturated with AR's. additionally have you seen some of the high end rifles? they're so far from Stoners vision that they should be classified differently. i mean they require tools for performing simple maintenance! they have proprietary parts! they're anything but durable weapons of war...they might be great range guns. they might be good varmint rifles but they're not for going to live in the dirt, mud or dust and kill bad guys...but that's what has the USMC's ear.
ReplyDeleteWell I was under the impression that the piston improved reliability but I haven't read about it much for a long time. I agree that they seem to going after flashy crap that they seem to have seen in their modern warfare game rather than getting the sort of things a grunt would want to keep his rifle operating.
ReplyDeleteSOPMOD Block II M4s and MK18s use Daniel Defense RIS II rail systems that free-float the barrel, MK12 SPRs use KAC free-floating rails, and the HK416/M27 series uses a free-floating rail system. There are enough very robust rails on the market that free-float the barrel, including designs that already in US military use, I see very little reason to keep buying older designs that lack the feature.
ReplyDeleteMuzzle brakes/compensators...I'm not going to disagree with you there. Unless it's only there as a mounting point for a sound suppressor...
The separatists said all along that Debaltsevo was surrounded and therefore did not count as part of the "front line" where fire would cease. Instead they called it their "internal matter" so no deals apply.
ReplyDeleteAnd Ukrainian government, with its friends in western media, pretend to be surprised because that is to their advantage.
NTS,
ReplyDelete. I disagree on the m4 comment, or a complete swap to the m4 across the board anyway. My reasoning is fairly simple as to why. When the fur really starts to fly the Marines get the leftovers. Simple right?
In a practical sense that means two things.
1. They can strip barrels off of stored guns to keep the grunts going.
2. They can burn the existing m855 out of barrels of a length that it's meant for. This should also help the logistics demand for spares which EVERYONE will be screaming for because 855a1 basically doubles breakage rates.
Now the collapsible stock situation... Personally I absolutely love my ti-6 collapsible stock with flat top or carry handle upper... I feel like it's an extremely workable combination.
What I've always dreamed though is that either MARSOC or someone would eventually design a rifleman 2020 package that includes the buffer tower tube and 6 position stock from hell! We're talking flip your rifle backwards and use it to batter doors down tough! Now i have a few ideas how it could be done without adding a ton of weight or cost, even a possible way to make it a unit armorer level retrofit to existing guns. But instead we're getting cheesedick fobbit with delusions of 3 gun grandeur!
I mean if they are really serious about upgrading the gun... Most of the parts they'd need to really take it to the next level already have NSN for the love of god! And as an added benefit this set of upgrades would give you a base to build your IAR off of that's just superb! Meaning no paying HK prices for a gun that's really not a huge upgrade.
SPOT ON! and did someone forget or doesn't realize that we're part of the Dept of Navy and the SEALs that I love to bang on would be more than happy to share all the work they're doing at CRANE to develop more advanced weapons? we have resources but they're looking for solutions in the wrong places.
ReplyDeleteAl HK M16 clones are free floated
ReplyDeleteNew vid from the Debali pocket
ReplyDeleteHard graphic!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TyQBZ3sC9rk#t=234
The rebels captured Ukrainian Spartan AV
ReplyDeletehttp://ic.pics.livejournal.com/militarizm/53794793/317120/317120_original.jpg
The only reason I agree with M4s is because of the M4A1 and existing manufacturing base for that weapon. There is no reason to reinvent the wheel when it comes to 5.56 shooting firearms and, with the marines hypothetically standardizing the SOST, the existing concerns about loss of lethality due to barrel length should be addressed.
ReplyDeleteM855 is a dead horse, at least in the US Army and Marine Corps level. There are THREE different cartridges that are far superior and already in inventory, to include the M855A1, despite its flaws. With SOST, there is no reason for 20" barrels among riflemen/assaultmen. Wearing out barrels faster? no problem. Replace barrels. Wearing out BCG components? replace them. We have the ability to produce M4 carbines at a rate of Soviet WW2 PPS43 levels, about one every three hours.
But, what is concerning to me is the need to reinvent the wheel when it comes to the triggers. Want a cheaper solution the army is doing? reintroduce automatic fire trigger groups again. That solves the "three cogs" trigger pull inherent to burst fire groups. It beats introducing PITA match triggers that will only be a bigger PITA because of budget woes.
Free float rails and tubes (especially tubes) should already be standard and there is no reason why they aren't.
ReplyDeleteFrom my experience, RIS IIs are awesome and built like a steel wrecking ball.
Piston is a lot more reliable. The gas pipe for DI is extremely small, chokes often under sustained firing as the carbon builds up.
ReplyDeleteThis is... insane level of work those lad done, worth reading.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2015/02/17/origin-of-artillery-attacks/
Common wisdom is that piston systems are more reliable. The problem is that scientific testing doesn't really back that up. In recent testing the M-4 outperformed all but one rifle in number of stoppages and the rifle that fewer stoppages had more stoppages that would require an armorers repair. The M-4 stoppage rate could be improved by the military going through their magazine inventory and discarding all of their non current standard magazines. I have heard reliable reports of some Servicemen being issued magazines that date back to the Vietnam war. The Standard GI mag that is produced under todays contract are far superior to the magazines issued as recently as 15 years ago. Probably the best route they could go would be to just get rid of the aluminum mag altogether and go with one of the premium civilian mags like the Magpul Pmag, Troy Battle mag, or the Lancer AWM.
ReplyDeleteUkrainians-PoWs in Debal'tsevo's pocket
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yL34z0J8GZw
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B-EzlqBIYAEeJlO.jpg
ReplyDeleteA lot of photo from the Debali's pocket
http://el-murid.livejournal.com/2257666.html
Ukrainians are retreating from the city, more or less what it left in organised way with some equipment... still under fire. Cut off units will probably surrender.
ReplyDeleteThanks for this situation go to Chancellor Merkel and President Hollande, thanks to their efforts in Mińsk Russian were able to concentrate forces around Debalcevo and defeat Ukrainians... God's save me from "friends" like that, with enemy I can fight by my own.
More impressive, good number of units were able to breakthrough from city without help from outside, many on foot under fire. Need some time to check if that info are legit.
ReplyDeleteCity is lost, some Ukrainians units still fight on the outskirts in rearguard action but most of ones that can are retreating, that was done not by the order of HQ but commanders in the area. They should done this couple of day ago, now they lost most of heavy equipment. The Russians lines are not "solid", Ukrainians units punch thru them without too much problem retreating from the town, they are under artillery fire all the time. Losses are high on both sides...
ReplyDeleteHappy news - Zacharczenko is wounded
Less happy news - only in ankle...
The initiative of Ukrainians inside the semipocket show in larger scale one thing, they were able to action in proper way if the field commanders are giving orders. there would be no pocket or anything if not the action or rather lack of it of HQ. The biggest enemy of Ukrainians is not the band of terrorists but own incompetent commanders.
And the ground work for WW3 has been laid. Question is, what next? If Poland perceives a threat, they will go all in, to the last man. That will draw in Germany, and that is when the situation goes out of control.
ReplyDeleteRussia's military is at least a generation behind and far too dependent on the massed armor formation. When those get chopped to pieces, that will leave only the nuclear option.
Russia has infiltrated and weakened Germany allmost to the highest level.
ReplyDelete