Saw two interesting videos recently. I’ll post them in links below:

Interesting video guide to Russian vehicles:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1PnFYQSUjCI

I don’t see Pantsirs or BUKs, but this is useful enough to ID the difference between a BMP-2 and a BMP-3. Probably not important for most people in the least, but it’s pretty informative when matched up with the video linked here-

This one is a reporter’s stroll through a 5 vehicle section that apparently looted some stores in the local village and then was baited into a Ukr mined choke point on a road. Pretty impressive- the UDFs took out a Type-72, 2 BMPs, and a Russian truck carrying AT mines.

Vehicles were either stopped through blown tracks, or destroyed completely. If you look even more closely, you can see the post-attack state of affairs- the blue container of fresh fruit they left behind the BMP-3 bc they likely were in a hurry. The discarded CW jackets, and the bloody bandages, which means they probably had someone who needed more beyond what was removed / replaced. And lots of shell casings, so it was an active firefight.

I do feel bad about whoever was in the BMP-2. That one had a significant internal fire, and there’s no crap dragged out onto the ground outside the back door- it’s quite likely no one survived. Likely killed by the cabin-penetrating explosion, though, before the fire that engulfed it.

Looking into the back door of the surviving BMP-3, we see lots and lots of RPGs (wth?!). Yeah, I’m glad I’m not a Russian motor rifleman sitting inside a can with a bunch of exposed rockets. Who sits next to 20 RPGs? Well, I guess it doesn’t matter if a round actually penetrates that vehicle, either. But, what if the riflemen have to exfil under fire, and rounds get shot into the open doors of the vehicle? It takes time to turn around and shut those heavy armored doors. Private Rasputitza forgets to shut the door because he’s scared and wants to get the hell away from his vehicle? *** That’s lots of fireworks going off inside an APC that still has its unit commander, gunner and driver inside. ***

Two more random observations- next to the clothing, fruit, bandages and looted Ukrainian store’s cash box, there’s some kind of printed box that reads Voyentorg, which is like an Army/Navy surplus store chain around Moscow. I don’t know if it’s a food box, like an MRE? At the bottom of it, it says “not for individual sale” - I actually think that’s what all the MREs say in US surplus stores too. Meaning (and this could be a stretch), this guy went out to an Army/Navy surplus store and bought his own MREs before the hike over into the Ukr.

One more thing I found interesting- if you look at the seals on the doors, they’re all cracked and weathered, like a 1980’s pinto. That’s not good. You don’t see that in the US military. Why? Try attaching the snorkel and driving that thing through a river. The seals won’t hold water. How about a chemical attack? Or even an IED or AT-mine? I’m not a vehicle guy at all, and maybe it’s not that bad? But I know that stuff like that would never fly in the US military.

AND, we didn’t come across the only piece of junk BMP-3 in the Soviet army. My guess is that more of the Russian vehicles deployed to the Ukr were not the best maintained vehicles of the overall Russian fleet. Again, just looking at a video and seeing things that don’t make sense to me.

Why the MSM doesn’t take time to understand this stuff is beyond me. If you want to understand what’s actually happening on the ground, and what the individual Russian personnel are doing, thinking and feeling, just look at what’s coming up on YouTube.

Bonus guesses:
руководитель стрельбы на участке

On the discarded, white arm band loosely means “Group shooting leader” and then there are dumped name tapes and ranks.

Why would soldiers and leaders dump their name tags, ranks, even jackets? Sterilizing their uniforms, or dumping them all together. So, if these Russians are now traveling on foot, they may be trying to get back to their HQ element, under the risk of being captured by more Ukrainians.

I have no idea what they would do with their injured comrades though. If they were able to medevac the wounded, then why would they dump their name and rank patches?


@airbornehokie96

[Post edited by reconhokie at 03/20/2022 6:27PM]