Hello, /k/
It has been brought to my attention that the inlet to the Vistula Lagoon and thus Kaliningrad is, at most, 15 feet deep, with a width of a quarter mile or just north of 400m. On this chart I found online (picrel) it is in fact listed as being 0 meters deep. Now the Russian Baltic fleet is situated mostly in Kaliningrad (The gulf of Finland aka. the inlet to St. Petersburg freezes over completely in winter) and has to inevitably pass through this "0 meter" deep channel to get literally anywhere.
How powerful is the Russian Baltic navy? Do you really have to run your subs on the surface to get them through there? And most importantly, is there a weapon or military strategy that could completely and permanently block off access to the Visula Lagoon? How difficult would it be?
> And most importantly, is there a weapon or military strategy that could completely and permanently block off access to the Visula Lagoon?
Maybe some batteries situated in Poland. It has to be Poland because Russia could roll over the baltic states before NATO RRFs could arrive
Batteries? So you mean missiles could do the trick? I was thinking you would have to block it by scuttling an old freighter or something
>Russia could roll over the baltic states before NATO RRFs could arrive
That would be reasonable to assume before Russia revealed their hand in Ukraine. But if you mean their fleet could leave port before NATO would arrive then yeah maybe, that's much more relevant
>Russia could roll over the baltic states
just like the mighty aids bear could easily roll over ukraine and finland
> Do you really have to run your subs on the surface to get them through there?
yes. Whole Konigsberg naval base is a rotten hulk merely for the bragging rights as ziggers are petty animals and took it as a trophy post ww2. Pidorsburg has always been and will always remain the real home of the baltic fleet. Whatever is left of it. When the war eventually erupts in the baltic states Konigsberg will be quickly captured as it has near zero defensive works or usable terrain and that miserable corpse will be put out of its misery once and for all
>miserable corpse will be put out of its misery once and for all
most likely it will become an independant state, sice neither the pole nor the lithuanians will want to deal with the "natives", colonizing it is also unlikely, and i personaly belive that its inhabitants in enough time will start larping as the previous owner for a better sense of identity
For a grand sense of irony the surrounding nations should honor property claims by descendants of those removed from the region and subsidize migration into an independant Kaliningrad by their citizens in order to create a Euro diaspora 5th column to sabotage any attempts to reconcile with Russia once things calm down.
Irony or not, Poland honors the property claim of Germans who didn't left during and in the immediate aftermath of WW2. I think there's even some treaty that confirmed that properties of these early departures were forfeited. People who stayed for a while (and it was ridiculously easy to do so, plenty of Germans remained but have since assimilated) and emigrated later, retained their property.
The most likely outcome is that the "natives" (all settled in after 1945) will frick off to their real homeland and the area will be turned into a giant nature preserve.
But it should be called "Prussia" for the memes
Shhh, don't give the Germans any ideas about Danzig.
Germans weren't natives of Gdańsk.
Ironically, the current PM of Poland comes from the ethnic group that's actually aboriginal to the area.
This. Kaliningrad will only be fit for human habitation after several centuries of bioremediation.
No they fricking wont. If the baltic states haven't been able/willing to rid themselves of the russomulatto menace, there is no way they will do so with Königsberg.
>and i personaly belive that its inhabitants in enough time will start larping as the previous owner for a better sense of identity
lol
lmao, even
some might say, xd
>Russians
>willingly moving to Russia
roflmao indeed
2 years of active war, hundreds of threads laughing at their telegram posts and Westerners STILL don't understand anything about Russians.
"willingly"? Is that a hard requirement?
First of all, Russians living in Baltics cry all the time about how they are being oppressed but cry even harder when they are threatened with being deported back to Russia, an act they consider genocide.
The further a Russian is from Russia, the bigger the patriot.
Secondly, do you seriously want me to believe that the West, who do not have their heart in this conflict, would permit the deportation of the Soviet garbage that is occupying northern Prussia, let alone do it themselves? In what kind of world do you live in where that could be a possibility even worth entertaining?
the French and Russians have some sort of spiritual doomer bond, Germany is a Russian colony, British are allergic to any geopolitics that benefit Europe, the southerners are too busy enjoying the sunshine to care, Americans like to pretend they have nothing to do with and carry no responsibility for what is happening in Eastern Europe.
So yes, it is a hard requirement because they sure as well won't get deported and in the case that they get completely isolated they would rather regress to living like it is 19th century without electricity, running water or sewage than return to Russia.
>because Russia could roll over the baltic states before NATO RRFs could arrive
Beware of veterans of 3 days Kiev conquest
Russia’s attack succeeded in taking land equivalent to the entire combined territory of the baltic states iirc, and this is with the AFU being much stronger than the baltic armies.
Pooplska could probably fend Russia off, however.
You’re ignoring the central premise here: the Baltics are not Ukraine. Russia won’t be able to hide or explain their initial troop buildup or count on fifth columnists to not blow bridges, mine roads, etc. How many minutes does the RuAF have after they enter Baltic airspace or land borders before the first F-35s that were scrambled show up to take out Russian airframes and lob PGMs at their GLOC?
I agree with you but there are in fact russian cumsuckers in the Baltics
There are, but they're not in power. They can't give away a city to ziggeria, for example, as it happened with Kherson.
True, and an Estonian friend has described them at length to me, lol.
The big difference is that (unlike Ukraine 2022) those Russian cumsuckers generally aren’t in positions of authority, either civilian or military. Even if they support a Russian takeover, bribing them isn’t going to get Putin a shortcut to installing a puppet government and annexing territory. The local border guards will almost certainly carry out orders, mine roads and install obstacles.
The Russians wouldn’t have the luxury of setting up in occupied territory like they did with Crimea or the DPR, either. GLOC through their own border to Latvia and Estonia is close enough to Finland that I’d say they’re dangerously exposed.
>Russia’s attack succeeded in taking land equivalent to the entire combined territory of the baltic states
It's roughly half of the Baltics in terms of area.
Is it? Ukraine’s pretty big and Russia occupied a large chunk of it before “retreating”. You could be right, though.
Regardless, the baltics have a fairly small army compared to that of Ukraine.
If we don’t send a bunch of NATO troops to the batics whenever Russia puts troops nearby, the baltics will fold if it’s an actual attack and not a bluff. The F-35 is cool but I don’t trust them to hold the line unless a large fraction of the entire global stock is deployed there, which is unlikely.
If NATO does deploy a bunch of troops in the baltics whenever Russia has troops there, it probably works out in Russia’s favor from an economic standpoint.
>If NATO does deploy a bunch of troops in the baltics whenever Russia has troops there, it probably works out in Russia’s favor from an economic standpoint.
lol, lmao even
you are now aware the entire economy of Russia is 2.2x Poland's alone.
only nato is capable of using symmetric or close to symmetric economic cost due to the enormous wealth difference.
Ignoring the fact that they took Kherson by subterfuge and not force, Mauripol was a long grind against a small motivated defence and with all the planning in the world they would never have encircled Kyiv even if they hadn't run out of fuel.
Russias only saving grace in this entire war was Surovickin's preparations in Zapahrosita, and the mere fact of his competence has required the regime to imprison him.
yes, yes. puccia stronk and always learns from its last frick up. Here is a preview I will give how the war in baltic states goes:
>ziggers mass concentration four months before war signaling with a loud speaker what they are about to do
>they drive in unsecured Kyiv convoy style trying to go straight to all three capital cities at once (vilnius, riga, tallinn)
>this is all done on presumption that these puny nazy states wont dare to resist the mighty aids bear and west wont do shit because NOOK
>convoys end up being torn to shreds by local mobilized irregulars and regular armies+foreign military advisers ambushing them from all sides with prepped stocks of atgms+mortars+artillery+mines
>westerners after cleaning their pants finally give the go ahead for air strikes with nearby stationed air force detachements including cruise strikes
>mighty puccians go BLLLJJJAAAT, cyyyka nobody said fashists fight war!!!
>east ukraine repeats itself on the eastern most territories of the baltic states
>ukranians, if capable, see an opportunity and start fricking with ziggers on their occupied clay
>suddenly mighty aids bear has a two front war on its hands
Reminder that in the lead up to the winter war the force concentrations sent against the finns were exactly the same that previously were stationed against the baltic state borders before they cucked out and gave in to stalins ultimatums for surrender. If you think the balts are somehow less capable then finns then you clearly have never been in the region. In fact finns were considered the weakest of four baltic states at the time. Biggest threat to balts security is not the zigger plague behind the border, its their ingrained inferiority complex
Well yes, but Ukraine had no ability to use their airforce to strike ground targets, since their planes were busy trying to survive and keep the airspace contested.
If Russia crosses into the baltics their tank columns and artillery will be bombed to shit in a matter of hours.
The Baltic Fleet is essentially neutralized since Sweden and Finland joined NATO. It'd be more effective to move the vast majority of it's ships to the Northern Fleet. The strategic importance of Kaliningrad as a whole has been extremely deteriorated because of the expansion of the alliance to the point that it's more of a liability than a strongpoint. The Baltic Sea was already a terrible strategic region for Russia because of Denmark and Norway controlling passage through it.
In terms of power rankings, russia/the USSRs fleets have always been Northern > Pacific > Power Gap > Baltic > Black Sea >>>> meme fleets/squadrons like the Caspian
Yeah, nobody will ever notice the huge build up of forces needed for that and russia has proven itself to be extremely competent. You buffoon.
>missiles
A bunker with direct firing field guns would do it. Assigning a tank unit would be a legitimate option and harder to remove..
>In Pyongyang an artillery display comes to life and begins somehow moving with no crew towards Europe
>Russia could roll over the baltic states before NATO RRFs could arrive
I think that remains to be proven. Putin’s attempted blyatzkrieg on Ukraine leaned heavily on insisting that the invasion force was just “training exercises” near the border. There’s no way to conceal a force large enough to occupy another country from satellite, even when the country is smaller than Ukraine.
I doubt NATO would be caught completely unprepared. At the first sign of 10,000+ Russian troops mustering, the Baltics would close borders and NATO AFBs would be on high alert. I genuinely don’t believe Russia could “roll over” every population center in mere hours, but if you’ve got data or anything that shows wargaming results, I’ll try to keep an open mind.
pic related is the distance from the the barracks bed i slept in to VDV base
we dont have depth
These are both interesting points, and the announcement just a few weeks back that all three states are going to build a common defensive line along the Russian and Belarussian border territory is definitely a step in the right direction.
NATO wargaming in 2016 concluded that a full Russian offensive could conceivably have troops in Riga and Tallinn in 36-60 hours if they fully committed, but that was part of the reason to switch from tripwire troop placements to a more robust "every square inch, repel-don't-expel" plan. A common railway through the Baltics is also going to yield more options for quickly redeploying troops.
My opinion is that if the Baltics can hold out more than 72 hours, that's enough time for the NATO response to flank Russian deployments and start mogging their supply lines with PGMs, but I'm always curious to learn more.
>Maybe some batteries situated in Poland. It has to be Poland because Russia could roll over the baltic states before NATO RRFs could arrive
Just use Gotland
>The other half of the lagoon is in Poland
Implications? There might be a navigable channel here but it's not exactly easy to tell. It seems perilously shallow
You guys seriously do not know shit. Polan built a canal right through the spit to get access without going through Russia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vistula_Spit_canal
>There might be a navigable channel here
You mean like the one right there on your own picture?
homie it's 50ft wide
large enough for corvettes and anything smaller, not that it matters because realistically it's too easy to attack
>or just north of 400m
>block off access
heh..
That's the wrong type of map, there is about 10m deep approach channel between the Baltic and Kaliningrad. Might not be enough for the largest navy ships but they mostly use Baltiysk and Kronstadt anyway
>they mostly use Baltiysk and Kronstadt anyway
Baltiysk IS that channel. The docks are on the inside, Vistula Lagoon side. Literally no different than operating from Kaliningrad city itself. As for Kronstadt, as I mentioned it's frozen in winter which is a problem they can surely work around but is very far from ideal
NSM batteries around 3city mostly solve the problem of the russian baltic fleet. Also Kalingrad will be raped at all to ground even with only polish forces.
I think this illustrates the problem of operating a navy out of St. Petersburg in winter well (it's situated on the right side, the tip of the dick so to speak)
It can even get much worse than that during the coldest winters
one of the first purchases of Poland after joining NATO was anti ship missile system - so it can block Kaliningrad. now with long range artillery and himars systems kaliningrad is no longer useful as a war port
...so the Russian Baltic fleet is just 100% cucked in winter?
There should be a landbridge between Tallinn and Helsinki to cuck it in Summer too.
with finland and sweden joining there is no point of it existing in any larger capacity - some mining/demining, recon/submarines, patrol/sar and that's it - anything more is for propaganda reasons...
100%
There's multiple chokepoints after Finland joined.
And even more if Sweden joins.
Like to get through they would need to pass
- Helsinki/Tallin (nearly impossible, but might get done if those points are invaded)
- Hiiumaa (same as above)
- Saaremaa
- Gotland (mot important one, in practice russia has no chance of taking it and it would make all central baltic sea NATO only zone)
And even if it passes through all of these it would need to fight much more modern fleet of regional nato countries.
The entirety of sweden is basically chokepoints btw
The travel distance is like going from copenhagen-germany but there's several rivers in the way AND forests and that's without needing to clear Finland which is a clusterfrick on its own
Copenhagen-Rome* i mean
Sweden is the longest country in Europe save for Russia itself. The strategic depth it has against a land army is insane.
Stockholm archipelago be like playing real life tetris for any would-be naval attack.
Agreed, it's a NATO lake and Russia knows it.
I don't think Sweden is an "if" so much as a "when". Orban and Erdogan are going to roll over and accede on Sweden; they're just doing their usual stalling bullshit.
The baltic is literally a NATO lake, it'll be eternally fricked no matter what season it is.
It's completely useless. Poland has about 100 NSM hidden in forests around the coast and small ships armed with RBS-15.
Russian navy would get annihilated in few days.
The more I think about it the more a independent Kaliningrad seems to solve a lot of problems.
1. It would show that a west-aligned Russia is vastly more prosperous than a multipolar meme state. Like how Taiwan is much richer and infinitely nicer than the mainland. It unequivocally shows that China is worse off than they could be if they just stopped sperging, which makes them seethe. Kaliningrad could be like a Russian Taiwan, proving to the russian people that they're better off looking west
2. It would be good for the locals because the west would pour in funds to prove point 1. This is basically Poland. We built Poland into a functioning middle-income country to prove to the former Soviet states that they're better off looking west.
3. All the seething russkies in the other Baltic countries could move there. They would stay close to their birth places and families and still live in a russian-speaking society with western amenities. It would be better for them AND the Baltic peoples