It appears the T-62s were saw with cages are T-62Ms, allegedly meant for rebel reservists. Prior to this we saw rebel reservists with no armored vehicles of any kind, just mobilized light infantry, typically without even body armor, and old metal helmets. The situation has improved somewhat, partly due to efforts from LDNR authorities, partly due to volunteers continuing to donate equipment, but they are still significantly underequipped compared to even Ukrainian territorial defense formations. Sending them T-62Ms makes sense and follows the pattern of the type being donated to local friendlies in various war zones (Syria, Libya).
Т-62 на службе резервистов ВСН. @Ugolok_Sitha
t.me
The T-62 saga continues. We have two more interesting photos of the T-62s.
First is a T-62MV, with no cage on top. The sign says "good night, we are from Sochi" which is a town in Russia. This could mean anything of course, from DNR fighters being Russian volunteers, to Russian mercenaries or irregulars. The tank and a piece of the sideskirts are covered in K-1 tiles. But the main sideskirt apparently is missing and has been replaced with scrap metal. Improvised sideskirts are normal in LDNR hands, especially for light armor. BMPs frequently get rubber sideskirts.
vk.com
Then we have this one. It's a T-62M, not MV, no ERA tiles here... or are there? Look at the side-skirt. It's a modern Russian sideskirt off of a T-80BVM or T-72B3mod'16. Russia could of course install them at depots or field repair units. However they obviously didn't. None of the T-62 photos we saw until now had them. But we did see improvised side-skirts above. I think this is more of the same, expect in this case sides kirts from a more modern tank were available. These probably came from a destroyed vehicle.
vk.com
It's still not completely clear who the operators are. The graffiti on the second tank says Tuapse, a town in southern Russia, suspiciously near Sochi. I wonder if that area has some sort of staging area or training ground, where these vehicles are coming from.
I would love to know the turnover rate for the 30 day contractors. Can the RU government issue stop-loss orders ?
"Can" they? I'm sure they
can. Would they want to? I suspect not. The Russian military is far looser on enforcing service contracts, and on letting people leave before their contract time is up. Also I'm not aware of 30 day contracts, I'm aware of 90 day contracts.
As a civillian with zero iota of military experience I have been sceptical of the effectiveness of the S-8 rocket volleys launched by Russian helicopters at enemy directions. I knew that the Russian choppers had a ballistic computer on board that helped make the unguided rocket launches somewhat accurate. But reading about it is onething and seeing is another. Just saw the thermal video of the rockets being luanched and I was surprised how closely they actually cluster together.
https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/vc2m1e
This is a picture of a feild that was apparently a target ofa much larger salvo, the area coverage is quite intense
This is real military hardware. Why wouldn't it cluster? Rifles group when fired at the same target. Artillery groups when fired at the same location. Why wouldn't unguided rockets? The real issue with these barrages is that they're ill-suited to dislodging entrenched infantry. If an open artillery position gets hit by a barrage like that, especially towed guns or Grads, they will have a bad day. But if dug in infantry gets hit, and they hear the rockets coming and take cover, there could be very few to no casualties. You posted that "lunar" landscape with the craters. How many military targets got hit? Do we see any trenches, dug in positions, vehicles, bodies, anything at all?