I guess they're nearly out of tanks and stockpiling the last for a spring assault, because right now the wet soil is shit for tanks. Or they really have changed tactics as the article suggests.
No, their tactics suck, but this is stockpiling for an offensive, whenever that may be.
Ukraines is still reporting between 70-130 tanks killed every month for the past 8 months. That amount corresponds to the estimated numbers of ancient stock being revived, and limited new production. Russia is likely still throwing everything it has at Ukraine.
However the amount of photographed and shared destruction is less. Since most of the tanks destroyed today are miles behind the front lines due to drones. The photos mostly came from Russian sources.
What changed last month?
Restrictions to Telegram..
https://kyivindependent.com/russia-reportedly-restricts-telegram/
Reduction of internet access to the front line.
The condition of "not having tanks" pretty much automatically changes your tactic of "send lots of tanks".
I read it as "they are running low, might try to send a large battalion to get large gains rather than keep losing them for nothing"
It's hard to lose tanks they don't have. The old Soviet stockpiles are empty, and the only tanks they have to lose are new builds.
The Russians don't need tanks because they seemingly have an endless supply of bodies riding motorbikes, golf carts, bread vans, Ladas, scooters, donkeys and horses to the line to advance by a couple of yards per 100 bodies.
I think i read about a month ago that they are pulling T-72s out of storage.
Nope, they are nearly out of the usable stock, now they are onto T-62s and T-64s.
They've been using T-72s and pulling them out of storage throughout the invasion, close to half of all of the visually confirmed Russian tank losses are T-72s.
The article links to a graph showing that they've recently started using the older T-62s and even a few T-54s https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HDYneCIWkAE3kYb?format=jpg&name=large
T-54s would be over 50 years old at this point, wouldn’t they?
To be completely fair, the graph does say T-54/55, and T-55s could be as "recent" as 45 years old. Maybe even 43 if you include Czechoslovak-built ones. Soviet-built T-54s are damn near 70 at minimum by now though
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