The drones sent into Poland were sent by the route an air attack against Poland would follow. They were mostly decoy drones, and the exercise was calculated to map Polish air defense radar systems, test their ranges, and test the reaction time of the Polish Air Force. Friday's expedition had the same objectives. The MiGs were equipped to be non-threatening so as not to escalate the interception into a dogfight.
Plus, the Russians sent in one of their most radar-visible aircraft. //
Again, they were mapping air defense radar coverage of the Gulf of Finland and the eastern Baltic and testing NATO reaction and reaction times.
This was also a political move to further isolate Europe, as President Trump sends repeated signals that the Europeans had better learn to fend for themselves.
Not only were the Russians out to rattle cages in Tallinn, they were sending a message to the Finns. //
A new round of sanctions seems sure to be imposed on Russia in the very near future; EU hammers Putin and charms Trump by targeting China, India in new Russia sanctions.
There is also the possibility that Russian aircraft in NATO airspace may be met with deadly force.
In 2015, Turkey reacted to a Russian violation of its airspace by shooting down a Russian strike fighter.
GBenton
3 hours ago
I really don't see a peace deal happening here. Two many confounding factors. Too many incentives on both sides to continue. Trump should step away from this until they show signs they're serious.
Putin is evil but Zelensky is a fool. No need to make a terrible situation worse by diminishing US prestige further.
These people have fought for centuries. So long as they don't expand the aggression, it's in God's hands.
wish it were otherwise but Putin is a monster and Zelensky is a selfish goon.
The targets were:
Olenya Air Base in the Murmansk Region
Belaya Air Base in the Irkutsk Region
Ivanovo Air Base in the Ivanovo Region
Dyagilevo Air Base in the Ryazan Region
Severomorsk (Main Administrative Base of the Russian Northern Fleet) in the Murmansk Region //
The airbases are the home to Russia's fleet of Tu-22, Tu-95M, and Tu-160 nuclear-capable strategic bombers as well as AS-50 battle management aircraft. They were located from the Siberian Far East to the Arctic Circle. The furthest target, Belaya Airbase in Irkutsk, is over 2700 miles from Ukraine.
Reports indicate that at least 41 aircraft were hit. The unofficial tally indicates 24 Tu-22, 8 Tu-95MS, and 5 Tu-16 were hit. MiG-31 fighters and Il-76 transports were also hit. To put this in context, open-source data says Russia's bomber inventory is about 58 Tu-22, 47 Tu-95MS, and 15 Tu-160. These planes are the ones used to launch most of the missiles fired at Ukrainian cities. //
When you consider the operational readiness rate, Russia probably has less than 50 aircraft capable of flying...on the bright side, they have plenty of aircraft to cannibalize for parts. The Tu-22 and Tu-95MS production lines are closed, and the Tu-160 production is one, yes, one per year. For all intents and purposes, this represents a permanent decrease in the size of the Russian strategic bomber fleet.
How did this come to be? The special forces operated by Ukraine's intelligence directorate, the SBU, used semi-trucks hauling trailers that were drone launch pods. //
This was a fire-and-forget attack. There was no need for Ukrainian drone operators to remain on the scene to manage the attacks. An autonomously targeted drone swarm hit each target. SBU operatives placed the trucks, and the rest of the operation, from first launch to the self-destruct of the transport, appears to have been carried out without a man in the loop. //
According to online reporting, the Russians were prepared for a night attack by large drones and got a daylight attack by quadcopters instead. China has access to some 43,000 container ships registered in either the People's Republic of China or Hong Kong (which is basically the same thing). Imagine a few hundred of them carrying containers modified for launching drones. I would submit that a similar attack by China on US Naval and Air Force bases throughout the world would render a crippling blow that would force us to either acknowledge a possible Chinese conquest of Taiwan as a fait accompli or go nuclear.
Rupert Brooke, "The Soldier."
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/13076/the-soldier
Laurence Binyon, "For the Fallen."
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57322/for-the-fallen
Wilfred Owen, "Dulce et Decorum Est."
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46560/dulce-et-decorum-est
John McCrae, "In Flanders Field."
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47380/in-flanders-fields //
War sometimes brings out the worst in us. But sometimes it brings out the best, as well. Sometimes it inspires. The four poems here were inspired by war, and more to the point, they were inspired by the misery of war and the sacrifices men make in war. That makes them, on this Memorial Day, worth consideration. And as we read, we should remember our own, the men and women who fell serving our great republic, and those who paid the price in other ways as well. And, we should remember those who serve the colors today, who face this daunting prospect with each new day.
And we must remember, again, George Santayana's caution: Only the dead have seen the end of war. On this day of all days, we should remember that, as well. //
7againstthebes
9 hours ago
This one is a bit more stark.
A gut catcher
Have you ever seen
A gut catcher?
Perhaps not
If you never had to use one.
There is no patent on them.
They're make shift
Depending upon time
And place.
I've seen ponchos used
And a pack
And a canteen cover
Or your hands.
You catch the guts of your buddy
As they spill out of his body
And try to stuff them back in
But they keep sliding out.
For a face blown in
For an eye blown out
For an arm blown off
For a body blown open
.........a gut catcher.
—Stan Platke
4th Infantry '68-69
Many Americans, bathed in the myth of Zelensky as Ukraine’s George Washington, would be surprised to know that unlike Washington, who rejected the monarch’s crown at the end of the American Revolution, and who on his own accord returned to his farm after two terms as president, is now entering his second year after his term was supposed to expire.
Zelensky was sworn in on May 20, 2019, for a five-year term that should have expired 12 months ago. He signed a 90-day martial order Feb. 24, 2022, after it was passed by the Rada, our parliament, with provisions for almost automatic renewals. After Zelensky’s term expired, the Rada is now voting to renew martial law every 90 days.
We have had war in Ukraine since 2014, but there was never martial law until Zelensky and his crew took a chance and got away with it. //
Americans are told Zelensky’s term was extended by the Ukrainian Constitution because the country was at war, but the record shows that martial law is a legislative action, renewed every quarter with Zelensky’s signature.
In addition to suspending elections, subsequent amendments to the martial order have put all media under the Kiev government’s control and the outlawing of nearly a dozen opposition parties, including the Opposition Platform-For Life Party, the second largest bloc in the Rada.
American presidents never suspended elections during war
The contrast with the American experience is instructive here. In the War of 1812, President James Madison saw the British burn the White House, among other humiliations, but he did not suspend elections, seize the printing presses or outlaw the Federalist Party.
Presidents Abraham Lincoln, fighting the Civil War; Woodrow Wilson, fighting World War I; and Franklin Roosevelt, fighting World War II, all curtailed civil rights and restricted the media.
Yet, the elections went forward, even with the government facilitating the ballots for millions of soldiers mobilized far away from home. //
The Ukrainian Civil War has brought death and destruction to my country, but for one man alone, it has brought glory and power.
Every day, Zelensky keeps the war going to preserve that glory and power, the suffering continues, and he mocks Washington as a fool for peacefully returning to Mount Vernon.
Sergii Nosenko was a 2019 candidate for Ukrainian president. He lives in the United States with his author wife Daria and their children to avoid the clampdown on President Volodymyr Zelensky's political critics. //
mdavt 3 minutes ago
And that election will be fraught with danger for Ukraine and Europe. Putin will be working hard to ensure that someone friendly to him gets elected. If that happens Ukraine will go right back to where it was headed before the Orange Revolution. Perhaps the near-inevitable removal of Donbass from the electorate will tilt things strongly to an independence-minded candidate, but I wouldn't count on it.
polyjunkie
3 days ago edited
Well. I lived through this era and was about to be drafted when the war ended. The media had little to do with how the war was lost, because the war was already lost by the time Walter Cronkite figured it out. It was lost because of Lyndon Johnson’s and Robert MacNamara’s insane policy of “proportional escalation”, which theorized we could cause the North Vietnamese to quit because we would meet everything they did with an equally large response. To say this policy was stupid is to claim AOC is a genius.
This led to bombing dikes and roads instead of power plants and factories. It led to allowing “humanitarian aid” from Russia and China instead of cutting off North Vietnam and starving them into submission. It led to “destroying the village in order to save it” and 58,000 dead soldiers. It handicapped the world’s strongest power and kept us from using that power to end the conflict quickly.
Nixon proved as much with the 1972 Christmas bombing when in 12 days (Twelve Days!) the B52s destroyed so much of North Vietnam’s infrastructure and Haiphong harbor that the commies signed the peace deal in Paris. It cost the loss of 12 B52s to end the war. What might have happened if that power had been used in 1964 and saved millions of lives, a couple of whom were my friends and classmates? I hope that Johnson and MacNamara are roasting in the nether world as they most certainly deserve it. //
edhuff polyjunkie
3 days ago
By the time Lyndon Johnson's lying war fiasco was over, most young Americans and nearly the entire population of Vietnam disliked and distrusted everything about the American government for decades to come. The origins of today's "Hate and Blame America First" leftist Democrat cabal are the result of Johnson's miscalculations about Vietnam, and the welfare state. //
(N)o.(B)ody.(C)ares
3 days ago
Vietnam could have been won, much like Korea, if the gloves would have come off, and hit them with overwhelming force, instead of tit-for-tat warfare.
Never go into a “conflict” with the idea of “police action”, go to fight with a mindset of total control. //
kls&c 85
3 days ago
We had the war WON TWICE.
The first was after the 1968 Tet Offensive. The North has used everything they had for forces in the South and were soundly defeated. They had little left between the DMZ and Hanoi. Our Marines in Nothern South Vietnam could have marched to Hanoi facing little opposition. Instead President Johnson opted for "Peace Talks" that gave the North years to regroup and rearm.
The second was when President Nixon authorized the B-52s to bomb targets around Hanoi and Haiphong. At the end, the North Vietnamese ran out of SA-2 surface to air missiles. Some sources say that if we had continued these attacks another weeek or more, North Vietnam was ready to surrender. Instead President Nixon opted for more "Peace Talks".
This time we did get our PoWs back and we left South Vietnam. The North again regrouped and rearmed. South Vietnam fell about 2.5 years later.
After the 1968 Tet Offensive CBS news anchor Walter Cronkite called this complete routing of North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong forces in the South a a great defeat for America. If Walter Cronkite who was a journalist in WWII had used this same standard for the December 1944 German Offensive we call The Battle of the Bulge, he would have reported this was a great Victory for Hitler and a defeat for General Eisenhower and Allied Forces.
Still today the legacy is we are great at winning the battles, but terrible at winning the peace. //
Cafeblue32
3 days ago edited
We could have won if we didn't have everyone in congress trying to run it. When you have arbitrary rules that tie one hand behind your back while the enemy has no such rules, what do we think is going to happen? The VC went into Cambodia and Laos to move supplies because they knew we couldn't. Sorry, but if the enemy is using neutral countries to schlep supplies, then that country is fair game. We eventually carpet bombed them, but it was too little too late.
Ever since Hiroshima, politicians have suffered under the delusion that there is a cleaner, less violent way to fight a war. This is why they last 10 or 20 years now. They are trying to avoid collateral damage with an enemy that hide among them. If we hadn't leveled entire cities in WW2 and broke their ability to produce weapons by bombing civilian workers and their factories, that war could have lasted for decades. Our heavy handed involvement in it ended it in about 3 and a half years. Sorry, but you can't win a war playing by arbitrary self-limiting rules. What are we going to do when they are violated, go to war over it with them when we already are? //
anon-jzmf
3 days ago
You know what might have well won the war? Had the short-sighted and penny-pinching Pentagon not switched to powdered gun powder for the 5.56mm rounds fired in the M-16 assault rifle.
The M-16 was designed to fire pelletized gun powder. This type of powder fired cleaner, and only very rarely fouled the rifle. But in order to save about a half-cent per round of ammunition - the Pentagon switched to "powdered" gun powder - which fired more dirty, fouled the rifles, and then very often jammed them up. So many fatalities from that war were discovered with their cleaning kits out trying to get their M-16s back in the fight. They were basically unarmed when they were killed.
It haunts me to this day. Nobody asked the rifle's designer, a man named Eugene Stoner. They just did it. And since the procurement specialists in the Pentagon could scarcely have been further from the fight they had no idea what they'd done. But it might well have cost us that war, and the Vietnamese people two generations of unspeakable suffering and oppression. //
7againstthebes
3 days ago edited
Per Clausewitz: There are three objectives to obtain to wage victorious war.
The enemy's army
The enemy's territory
The will of the people.
During the Viet Nam war US forces defeated the enemy's army in every major battle.
During the Viet Nam war, the US did not commit enough troops to the theater of war to capture and hold enemy territory.
During the Viet Nam war the US did not destroy the will of the North Vietnamese people to wage war.
The North Vietnamese did not defeat the US military.
The North Vietnamese did not capture and hold US controlled territory in South Viet Nam.
The North Vietnamese did defeat the will of the American people to wage war.
The American people got tired of the war and as protests grew the will of the people to wage war declined.
Did the media have a part in this. Yes. Was their part decisive. Likely not. But it did contribute.
anon-pkys 7againstthebes
3 days ago
I disagree with the affect the MSM had on the war. When Walter Cronkite said the war was lost, folks believed him. Of course he lied, but the American citizens did not know that. But what did I know? I had only been in the military since January, 1964, followed the news, and served in VN, 1969-70. I have also read most of the history of the war, especially by those that were there and fought it. //
Laocoön of Troy
3 days ago
“In this age, in this country, public sentiment is everything. With it, nothing can fail; against it, nothing can succeed. Whoever molds public sentiment goes deeper than he who enacts statutes, or pronounces judicial decisions.”
― Abraham Lincoln
I find most war movies a bit trite and overly sentimental. Sometimes, war has a higher purpose than mere coercion, but I'd consider those occasions rare. Whenever you come away from a war movie feeling uplifted, I'd submit that you have been sold a product. To me, the story is the bonding of men facing death, the shared suffering and sacrifice endured when we ask men barely (and maybe not) out of their teens to take incredible risks and responsibility. I've always held "Black Hawk Down" to be the gold standard because it hit the sociology of an infantry unit pitch-perfect and hammers home the fact that young men take these risks and pay this price, now and in the future, for each other, not to make the world safe for democracy or any other slogan the political class uses to sanitize what is at once both the most brutal and transcendent of human activities. Former Navy SEAL and one of the main characters in this film, Ray Mendoza, and English screenwriter and director Alex Garland team up to turn Mendoza's autobiographical script into a masterpiece of what wars do to the young men we send to fight them. //
This is not a war movie; it is a movie about men at war. If you think anything militarily significant happened here, the ending will disabuse you of that notion. The short documentary segment after the fade-to-black for the movie really ties everything together.
"Warfare" is minimalist, but the emotions it conjures up are raw, and you feel them as much as you watch them. Go see it. It is a great film, and we need to support smaller indie studios, such as Angel Studios, if we want to change what movies look like.
People often look at countries like Liberia and focus on the trauma of war, the chaos, the displacement. But here’s what I see: our government does the same thing in America when it tears families apart. The trauma may not be caused by civil war, but the suffering is eerily similar.
The child welfare system uses its power to forcibly remove children from their parents, just like I was separated from my siblings. These children are often placed with strangers, stripped from their community, their culture, and everything they know. Siblings are split up. Families are erased. And all of it is done in the name of safety.
Let’s be honest. This isn’t safety. It’s state-sanctioned separation. And it’s causing a level of trauma that mirrors the effects of war.
Crawford | March 26, 2025 at 11:46 am
“No matter where you are and what you’re accused of, you deserve due process if you are a citizen of America.”
Simply not true. US citizens who had gone to Germany and volunteered for the Wehrmacht were not given due process during WWII, and no one expected them to receive it. They were enemy combatants, no more.
TargaGTS in reply to Crawford. | March 26, 2025 at 12:47 pm
That’s true. They were not afforded due process on the battlefield…in Europe. However, some were captured in the US. For instance, the US citizens involved in Operation Pastorious (three total), were granted due process (as were the other German nationals captured with them) and that would eventually produce the case SCOTUS decided, Ex parte Quirin, 317 U.S. 1 (1942). Those men were eventually sentenced to death. Their convictions upheld by the Court but two of the three US citizens were granted clemency by FDR and I think later deported to Germany after the war. One was executed weeks after the sentences were upheld.
Russia does not provide medical assistance at the front to its own soldiers. So, if you get seriously wounded, too bad for you and your family.
I've seen drone videos of such Russian men writhing on the ground in filthy trenches littered with dead bodies. And they end up killing themselves with a rifle or grenade rather than die slowly alone in agony.
The thinking in news media is often that graphically detailed news coverage of such conflicts is too gruesome for viewers or readers back home. Often, they don't even show or describe dead bodies.
We should have provocative discussions about such unofficial censorship that sanitizes the horrors of war. Because that reduces the awful ongoing events basically to an imaginary game far away. Who's going to oppose war — or support it, for that matter — if they never see how bad it really is? I ran into some of this editorial opposition at the end of the Vietnam War. //
While Russian forces are killing Ukrainian men in combat at the front lines (and thousands of civilians in indiscriminate artillery, bombing, and missile attacks on cities), other Russians are kidnapping children from Ukrainian homes behind the front lines. They are simply seizing them from their families — I call that kidnapping — and shipping them off to Russia, never to be seen again.
There, they are punished if they don't speak Russian. The goal is to erase from the minds of these Ukrainian youngsters the national identity that Putin maintains does not exist. Hundreds of thousands of children stolen from their families.
In observing the trajectory of Western civilization over the past 70 years, one is hard-pressed to honestly assess that the modern global order has truly been good for mankind. Rather than ending warfare, it has spread fighting far beyond the realms of land and sea combat to mass informational war and lawfare waged both internationally and domestically among our fellow citizens.
Decades of American involvement in wars overseas have desensitized Westerners and their militaries. In the U.S., we hear choruses about willingness to die for freedom. Yet when tyrants violate the freedoms of U.S. citizens on American soil, the allegedly brave roll over. “To the guns for Ukraine,” we hear… though we never see those who sport "I stand with Ukraine" iconography deploy to the fight. //
In a just world, Vladimir Putin would be driven from office and sent to the gallows. But his evil nature does not by default bequeath the character of George Washington on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. //
Unlike much of the current "Give war a chance"/Ukraine flag as social media banner mob, I went to war. It's not pleasant. Union General William Tecumseh Sherman rightly described combat as a cruelty that cannot be refined. Thus, it is right that we should seek the option of armed conflict as a last resort—that if war must be waged, we should fully commit to overwhelming force to bring it to an end and work to expeditiously restore peace and ordered liberty. Those who insist on the necessity of a prolonged conflict to "defeat Russia" often fail to recognize the moral costs of such an approach. War should always be a last resort, and when it is waged, it should aim for an expedient resolution. Yet, in the case of Ukraine, many are advocating for a war of attrition that sacrifices human lives—on both sides—in the hope of a political outcome that seems increasingly distant.
Russia was unjustified in starting this war. The U.S. has been unjustified in merely prolonging it. If lawmakers want to argue that American interests are at stake and that destiny demands that the U.S. fight in Ukraine, let them make the case to the public and follow the constitutional rules for committing America to the fight. Otherwise, the choices are to sit this one out, or use the other instruments of national power to help negotiate a lasting peace. But waging proxy war of attrition against fellow human beings who have not lifted a finger against Americans—without a clear victory strategy—does not place us on the moral high ground.
Christmas Day, Azerbaijan Airlines Flight JS-8243 crashed while attempting an emergency landing at Aqtau Airport in Aktau, Kazakhstan. There were 67 passengers and crew aboard; at least 38 died in the crash, and the body count may climb as hospitalized passengers succumb to their injuries. Russian aviation authorities blamed the loss on a massive bird strike, but the intact tail section bore the tell-tale marks of a hit by a missile fired from an SA-22 Greyhound (Russian name: Pantsir) surface-to-air missile system. Read the background in my post: Azerbaijan Airline Crash Was Most Likely Caused by a Russian Missile.
Despite warnings from the Kremlin not to speculate on the cause of the crash, Azerbaijani officials have told the media Flight JS-8243 was brought down by a Russian missile. //
It was the drone attack, not fog, that prevented JS-8243 from landing.
Near Grozny, the plane was hit by a Russian missile. The plane asked to divert to airports at Makhachkala or Mineralnye Vody, but permission was denied, and it was told to land at Aqtau Airport. Essentially, it was forbidden to land in Russian territory. As the plane left the Grozny area, it was subjected to GPS jamming and other electronic warfare effects. "According to data, the plane’s GPS navigation systems were jammed throughout the flight path above the sea."
By now, the plane had lost steering, and the pilot and co-pilot were managing direction and altitude by using engine power. This is what the flight looked like with altitude changes. //
By any standard, the flight crew on JS-8243 were heroic. By keeping the fatally damaged aircraft in the air and accomplishing a controlled crash near the Aqtau Airport, they saved nearly half the people on board. //
flyovercountry
11 hours ago
It needs to be said over and over, the reason why the Russians denied landing anywhere except Kazakhstan is the hope the airplane, and evidence, would be at the bottom of the Caspian Sea.
Gabriel Noronha
@GLNoronha
·
Follow
The missiles hitting Israel right now are the same ones Biden and Harris worked to lift UN sanctions on the first month he took office.
They said it would help promote diplomacy with Iran.
12:54 PM · Oct 1, 2024 //
Brytek
36 minutes ago
Wars end when you annihilate the opposition or force an unconditional surrender, wars on end begin with proportional responses. Perhaps Israel has learned anyone pushing a proportional response is not their friend and is in fact the worst kind of enemy to have, as all it does is bleed both sides whilst the “allies” military industrial complex sell weapons to both sides, while draining their own populations of wealth to fund it.
But Iran? If Iran were to obtain a nuke, either by building their own or just buying one from North Korea or Pakistan, that might very well be the flashpoint. This is a line that has not been crossed since 1945, and was Iran to torch off a nuke in Haifa - or New York - that would almost certainly plunge the world into conflict.
Watch Iran. Watch the least stable players. Hopefully, reason will prevail, but as von Clausewitz famously said, "Only the dead have seen the end of war."
How Did It Happen?
You don't give the Tsar unpleasant information. The invasion of Ukraine unfolded the way it did because the FSB directorate responsible for intelligence in Ukraine gave optimistic reports about the desire of Ukraine for an Anschluss and said the Ukrainian Army would not fight. According to Bloomberg, something similar happened this time.
Gerasimov and top officials "seemingly dismissed intelligence warnings that Ukrainian soldiers were gathering near the border with Russia’s western Kursk region as much as two weeks before they began the assault," Bloomberg said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin was also not briefed on the troop buildup, the unnamed source reportedly told Bloomberg.
True or not true? It's hard to tell. //
Ukraine's challenge is to convert a tactical and operational victory into something that has strategic impact.
Russia has been knocked back on its heels, and Putin has been made to look rather ridiculous. He's not going to take that lying down because if the Tsar is not omnipotent, well, he's not the Tsar. It is hard to see how Gerasimov and most of the Russian General Staff survive this fiasco.
The episode has also demonstrated a degree of operational brilliance that no one expected. So far, the Ukrainians have seemed as mired in Soviet-era tactics as the Russians.
The CEO of Germany's leading defense industry corporation escaped assassination by Russian operatives earlier this year thanks to the timely cooperation and information sharing between the United States and Germany. Armin Papperger, the head of the massive Rheinmetall conglomerate, was targeted for death by Russia because of his company's central role in arming and supplying Ukraine.
According to reports, US intelligence uncovered the plot and enabled German counterintelligence and security forces to put Papperger under close protection. The missing part of this story is the German GSG9 hauling the Russian assets off to prison. The assassination operatives and planners are still at large.
This episode is not a one-off. It is part of a campaign of hybrid warfare that is being actively waged against the West by Russia as part of its campaign to eradicate Ukraine.
Hybrid warfare involves blending kinetic and non-kinetic actions to exploit an enemy's weaknesses without crossing the line between peace and war. //
In the current case, Russia wants to keep NATO off balance and damage critical assets, but it doesn't want to tickle that fine line between painful annoyance and an Article 5 consultation.
There are two main characteristics of hybrid warfare. First, the level of violence must fall below the threshold the adversary would consider an attack requiring military response. Second, the source of the attack must remain ambiguous and difficult to definitively attribute to a foreign actor. These two factors make it difficult for a state to develop a coherent response to various lines of attack.
For the past months, the Russian OPTEMPO of hybrid operations in Germany has accelerated: //
Natasha Bertrand @NatashaBertrand
·
A senior NATO official said today that Russia's sabotage campaign across Europe is a "more concerted, more aggressive effort, than what we’ve seen certainly since the Cold War...we’re seeing sabotage, assassination plots, arson — real things that have cost human lives.”
1:46 PM · Jul 9, 2024. //
Per-Erik Schulze @PerErikSchulze
·
Nothing to see here. Just perfectly normal russian bottom trawling back and forth repeatedly just on top of the main fiber optic internet cable between Svalbard and the Norwegian mainland. From NRK.
4:29 PM · May 26, 2024. //
All of these are examples of hostile action from Russia becoming gradually normalised because nobody is willing or able to deal with it. In this way, Russia pushes the boundaries of what is acceptable, or at least accepted, by doing something that should be outrageous, and then doing it more when there is no response from the West. //
Russia is engaged in a very aggressive hybrid war against Europe that includes propaganda, economic attacks, cyberwarfare, and kinetic operations on the ground. That war's objectives are to increase internal divisions in European countries, damage their economies, and weaken their resolve to resist Russian demands.
In the case of Estonia, Russia is amplifying a border dispute so that it can become a plausible potential casus belli. As I've pointed out before, Estonia is a particularly tempting target for Putin because it is about 24 percent ethnic Russian. If Putin can successfully encroach on Estonia without consequences, NATO will become very unstable. See How Putin Dismembers NATO Without Firing A Shot: A Scenario From the Cold War for more details.
Europe is treating these attacks as individual data points and not as a coherent Russian destabilization campaign. As long as that goes on, Russia is winning this hybrid war, and it has no reason to stop.
How do we know that Biden's forces would shrug off his orders and refuse to act out his will? Because it already did happen in Texas. Texas was ordered by the Supreme Court to do as Biden says and take down the measures they set up to stop illegal immigration into the country, to which the Texas National Guard indicated they were in a "Come and take it" kind of mood and Biden's Border Patrol union refused to take things further knowing that it would escalate things to a very dangerous point.
As I said then, if Biden can't even count on his own border patrol to act against open defiance from a state's national guard, what chance does he have of having a military that would obey his command to assault their fellow Americans? Sure, there'd probably be a couple of thousand willing to get bloody, but even they would lose their taste for it once they found out how overwhelmingly outnumbered and unpopular they were.
Biden wouldn't have any F-15s because he'd likely have no one to fly them. //
Mongo FKA ya think?
4 hours ago
I never imagined an American president would actually talk about killing American citizens with the American military. Joe Biden is a demonic scumbag. //
kamief
4 hours ago
Can you just imagine if Trump said something like that?
Headline news on every alphabet network, 24/7 none stop.
Problem is nobody besides the most die in the wool of us has an idea in hell that the puppet said this.
What gets me more nervous is the closer the election gets the more desperate the rats seem to get.
I would put nothing past the rat bastards, even starting a civil war. The right would be blamed. Every killing they would show on the news would be the fault of the right. No matter what.
At that point I think these wise words come into play. Then all hell breaks loose.
“The most terrifying force of death comes from the hands of Men who wanted to be left Alone. They try, so very hard, to mind their own business and provide for themselves and those they love. They resist every impulse to fight back, knowing the forced and permanent change of life that will come from it. They know that the moment they fight back, their lives as they have lived them, are over. The moment the Men who wanted to be left alone are forced to fight back, it is a form of suicide. They are literally killing off who they used to be. Which is why, when forced to take up violence, these Men who wanted to be left alone, fight with unholy vengeance against those who murdered their former lives. They fight with raw hate, and a drive that cannot be fathomed by those who are merely play-acting at politics and terror. TRUE TERROR will arrive at these people’s door, and they will cry, scream, and beg for mercy… but it will fall upon the deaf ears of the Men who just wanted to be left alone.”
– Author Unknown //
Robert A Hahn
3 hours ago
The Viet Cong had no F-14s. The Taliban didn't even have biplanes. It is just very difficult to beat committed, sneaky people in their own country.
Alternative historical fiction is a popular genre in America, where readers explore possibilities such as Napoleon deciding not to invade Russia or a Confederate victory in the Civil War, pondering the hypothetical impact on world history. In honor of Maritime Day 2024, let's consider what would have happened if the United States had fought the Second World War without a strong Merchant Marine and the tens of thousands of courageous mariners who delivered crucial supplies, troops, and weapons across dangerous waters.
It's clear: we would have lost the war or failed to achieve a decisive victory.
During WWII, an estimated 250,000 mariners served, and nearly 10,000 gave their lives, resulting in a higher per capita casualty rate than any of the armed services. Over 700 Merchant Marine ships were sunk by enemy attacks, and hundreds of mariners were held as prisoners of war.
FDR recognized the indispensable role of the Merchant Marine, which he considered the "fourth arm of defense" on par with the navy, army, and air force.
As we observe current global instability and brutal Eurasian conflicts, who will be the visionary leader and advocate who ensures the readiness of our Merchant Marine for the challenges ahead? Its current state is far from adequate. //
The distinction between admirals, generals, and media commentators who freely opine on strategy and theory neglects or casually assumes away the hard reality of logistics. Lately, the strategists have not fared well in deterring conflicts, and the logistic shortcomings in Ukraine and the Middle East are glaring. While those deficiencies are apparent, they pale in comparison to a potential war in the Pacific.
Policymakers properly acknowledge China as the pacing threat, but so few seriously consider the critical importance of logistics and the availability of highly trained and militarily obligated maritime personnel. Decades of war in the Middle East have conditioned us to the luxury of uncontested sea and airspace. We enjoyed large support bases close to combat operations. Our fleet had uninterrupted access to intact and secure port facilities. //
The People's Liberation Army knows that sealift is key to our success. While many debate the vulnerability of our aircraft carriers, they gloss over that our combat power will be short-lived without robust sealift and persistent combat logistics in a war at sea.
Regrettably, we are no longer a true maritime nation; we are now a naval nation.
China, now a bona fide maritime nation, has made significant investments in its merchant fleet and can call on over 5,000 merchant vessels during war. The US has around 80. We must expand our commercial fleet to align with our strategic interests. That means acquiring more ships and enhancing our ability to build, maintain, and quickly repair them. Above all, we cannot prevail without a significant number of merchant marine officers who are ready and obligated to serve the nation when called upon.
Negotiations don't start from a position of maximalist demands unless you are able to enforce them. Even the alleged Putin confidants who talked to Reuters for the report admit that Putin is tired of the war and wants to move on.
Let me stop here for a moment and say that anyone who thinks five members of Putin's entourage talked to Reuters about Putin's personal position on peace talks without acting under orders from Putin to do so. Those people are a danger to themselves and to others. The fact that no one in the Kremlin has acknowledged this alleged cease-fire offer on the record tells you all you need to know about its seriousness.
This means that Russia is not only demanding to keep the territory it has overrun, but it is actually requiring Ukraine to relinquish more territory as a condition of negotiations. //
If we look at this offer as anything other than a propaganda ploy aimed at bolstering the spirits and imaginations of Putin's fan club in the West, we are probably idiots who deserve whatever comes next. //
The Russians are simply advancing a narrative ahead of the international peace conference Switzerland is hosting on June 15-16.
Peace is not the absence of conflict but the presence of justice. All the Russian proposal does, to the extent it is even a serious proposal, is reward Russia for criminal behavior, return control of Russian overseas assets to Moscow, remove war-related economic sanctions, and set the stage for another Russian invasion. Nothing in the Russian scheme is even vaguely just, and no sane government would consider it. Russia knows that and they don't want it considered, they want big social media accounts and some Republican Members of Congress and Senators to have talking points to advace Putin's agenda.
The bigger problem is the Biden Crime Family's close ties to the Chinese government, and because of those ties, Joe Biden is afraid of pushing the Chinese too hard. Calling them out for providing lethal aid to Russia could very well be a red line in Beijing's relationship with Joe, Jim, and Hunter. //
anon-aqgv Ed in North Texas
6 hours ago
Russia population: 144 million
Ukraine: 38 million
Which side do you think will run out of manpower first?
DaveM anon-aqgv
5 hours ago
1960:
US Population 173 Million
Vietnam Population 30 Million.
Which side do you think will run out of manpower first?
JSobieski anon-aqgv
5 hours ago edited
Population of American colonies in 1776: 2.5M
Population of Great Britain in 1776: 8M
Which side did YOU think ran out of manpower first?
JSobieski anon-aqgv
5 hours ago edited
Population of USSR in 1989: 286.72M
Poulation of Afganistan in 1989: 10.67M
Which side did YOU think ran out of manpower first?
JSobieski anon-aqgv
7 hours ago
Non-symmetrical demands for manpower, which shouldn't be too hard to understand.
Russia cannot apply 100% of its manpower to Ukraine, while Ukraine can and does apply 100% of its manpower to fighting Russia.
Russia has extended supply lines, while Ukraine does not.
Ukraine is fighting in its home territory, Russia is the invader.
These concepts are difficult to understand, but I get that some people just refuse to understand.
A great example of non-symmetrical warfare was 9/11. Fewer than 20 people with boxcutters shut down US airspace.
Dieter Schultz JSobieski
7 hours ago edited
These concepts are difficult to understand, but I get that some people just refuse to understand.
I keep recalling one of the most insightful comments I ever encountered on the web, namely: "And now we get to the crux of the matter, I can explain it to you but I can't understand it for you."