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Mr. Apollo posted:There’s also BEAR. this does not look comfy to ride in at all.
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Aug 5, 2023 19:16
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A couple goons were asking about Ukraine's uncrewed medevac capabilities. This came across my Twitter feed and purports to show some of the things they've built. It's unclear whether they're being actively used or are still in development, though I suspect "both". https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1687553646685253632?s=20
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Aug 5, 2023 19:17
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Cantorsdust posted:I want to push on this claim a bit. Can you expand on what you mean by "everything" we touch turning to poo poo? Is there anything the US can do that doesn't turn to poo poo? Or is it a universal assumption that anything the US does is fundamentally flawed and not capable of success? When does a foreign policy success age out of the consideration? Like 95% of the pride in American interventionism is founded in our role in WWII, where everyone who had any active role in its engagement is long dead. And practically, US action is WWII is far less relevant to modern US foreign policy than our supporting a Saudi blockade on Yemen that led to a hundred thousand deaths. If you were like 'Boy I dont like the way the Tories are handling the current issues with healthcare wait times and backlogs' and someone responded that they trusted the UK government to make good, public oriented decisions when it comes to policy governing national healthcare because the government established the NHS(in 1948), would that be a valid counterargument? Would you be like oh yeah I guess they did do something good 75 years ago, when my grandma was 3, they're probably on the level. Why is foreign policy different?
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Aug 5, 2023 19:35
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Ynglaur posted:A couple goons were asking about Ukraine's uncrewed medevac capabilities. This came across my Twitter feed and purports to show some of the things they've built. It's unclear whether they're being actively used or are still in development, though I suspect "both". Yeah I dunno, I've seen those little robots armed with mines and it seems like something that is more likely a PR move than an actual platform. I guess time will tell if these are actually in the field somewhere.
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Aug 5, 2023 19:42
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celadon posted:When does a foreign policy success age out of the consideration? Like 95% of the pride in American interventionism is founded in our role in WWII, where everyone who had any active role in its engagement is long dead. And practically, US action is WWII is far less relevant to modern US foreign policy than our supporting a Saudi blockade on Yemen that led to a hundred thousand deaths. It's absolutely a fair point, which is why I included examples of the Balkans and the first Gulf War which I would argue are within recent memory. You could point towards ongoing efforts against ISIS as well, if you wanted, although I understand staying far away from the Syria mess in general. It's also why I gave caveats of choosing actions where there was a clear military goal achievable with military aims and where the goal is a prima facie acceptable one. I have no dispute that Iraq and Afghanistan were messes because of a failure to define strategic aims or how the military would go about achieving them. But ultimately, I'm countering a claim that "everything" the US touches turns to poo poo. That's a very general claim and it also didn't give a timeframe. You could try to make a more limited claim of "ever since the US finished establishing itself as global hegemon, everything it touches has turned to poo poo", but that wasn't the claim. Furthermore, how far back do you want to look for examples of things turning to poo poo? I can name a few, in reverse chronological order: 1) Afghanistan falling apart 2) ?Syrian Intervention (I would argue this is mixed) 3) Libyan intervention leading to its collapse 4) Iraq going to poo poo, Isis forming 5) Various Central and South American interventions/sponsored coups 6) Vietnam If you're willing to count back to 4), then I would ask why you're not willing to include the Balkans or 1st Gulf War as policy successes. I don't think there was anything fundamentally different about the nature of the US between Gulf Wars 1 and 2. And if you're willing to count back to 6), I would ask why the preservation of South Korea shouldn't be considered. And if you're not willing to even count back to 4), then I would question how limited of a historical perspective you're working with and ask to justify that framing. I would personally argue for either counting back to the fall of the Soviet Union or the end of WW2 as your two main points to start counting foreign policy successes and failures. Regardless, this is all overthinking the original claim. Which was that everything the US touches turns to poo poo, and that fundamentally it's not possible for a US intervention to be good or go well. That's an extremely broad claim requiring a strong argument behind it. There was no such argument. Asking me to take a claim like that at face value to me sounds like someone who's bought into tankie propaganda and is asserting it as a given fact. Edit: To try to make more explicit my criteria for evaluating a potential "good" US intervention, I would require: 1) The US is starting with a good goal (like stopping a genocide rather than "helping our Saudi allies massacre some Yemenis" or "making the world safe for capitalism") 2) There is a clear theory for victory / method of achieving that goal (like "We will defeat Saddam's forces in Kuwait and push them out of the country, liberating it" rather than "We will defeat Saddam's forces in Iraq and then turn the country into a thriving democracy at the point of a gun") I believe intervention in Ukraine meets both criteria, so I support it. I fully acknowledge that many (most?) US interventions do not! Cantorsdust fucked around with this message at 20:23 on Aug 5, 2023 |
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Aug 5, 2023 20:13
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US is not going to put boots on the ground or send in the bombers in this conflict so bringing up Iraq and Afghanistan seems like making an argument out of nothing
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Aug 5, 2023 20:54
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I can't remember if these exact numbers were posted but some nuance to the polls of American support: https://twitter.com/timkmak/status/1687913321003925505 quote:CNN poll: As usual when things get broken down into specifics people are way more on board than they are with vague, open ended concepts.
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Aug 5, 2023 21:00
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Moon Slayer posted:As usual when things get broken down into specifics people are way more on board than they are with vague, open ended concepts. This is kind of interesting breakdown. Relatively "cheap" support like Intel and training are more popular than "expensive" options like weapons and soldiers.
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Aug 5, 2023 21:15
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Meanwhile in the real world, Russians just bombed a blood transfusion clinic in Kupyansk.
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Aug 5, 2023 21:15
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Purported video of the submersible drone attack near theKerch Bridge which struck the Russian commercial tanker, SIG. MyMomSaysImKeen fucked around with this message at 22:00 on Aug 5, 2023 |
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Aug 5, 2023 21:54
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Introducing Battlefield Duck, the adorable autonomous wartime wounded person retrieval medical robot! Battlefield Duck's capabilities are continually being improved for purely humanitarian, non-offensive capacity, it is not a "war robot" designed to kill humans, and we will continue to improve its battlefield performance in saving the wounded only!
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Aug 6, 2023 00:53
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Staluigi posted:Introducing Battlefield Duck, the adorable autonomous wartime wounded person retrieval medical robot! Battlefield Duck's capabilities are continually being improved for purely humanitarian, non-offensive capacity, it is not a "war robot" designed to kill humans, and we will continue to improve its battlefield performance in saving the wounded only! Saving them... FROM LIFE *wack wack* From Johnson and Johnson.
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Aug 6, 2023 05:24
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daslog posted:Exactly, our system of government is beyond dysfunctional. Everything we touch goes to poo poo. Why should the public believe that this time it's going to be different? Congratulations, you’ve succumbed to the Republican strategy of the last 50 years. Perhaps you feel now is the time to drown government in the bathtub? Since the 1970s they’ve been trying to convince everyone that government is not the answer to anything, and in this post at least you seem to be buying that argument. Government of the instrument of the people, and if it doesn’t look that way then the people need to get even harder into politics, not turn away. The Artificial Kid fucked around with this message at 06:20 on Aug 6, 2023 |
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Aug 6, 2023 06:12
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daslog posted:
“My house is a little chilly so I’m turning my heater off.” The dysfunctional role of the Republican Party is a reason why US politics need to be renewed and reinvigorated, not dropped. You’re talking about giving them what they want in return for their administrative terrorism. The Artificial Kid fucked around with this message at 06:19 on Aug 6, 2023 |
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Aug 6, 2023 06:16
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celadon posted:When does a foreign policy success age out of the consideration? Like 95% of the pride in American interventionism is founded in our role in WWII, where everyone who had any active role in its engagement is long dead. And practically, US action is WWII is far less relevant to modern US foreign policy than our supporting a Saudi blockade on Yemen that led to a hundred thousand deaths. The thesis being discussed is “whatever the US touches will turn to poo poo”. The counterargument is “Ukraine has a democratically elected government that is requesting military aid to prevent an invasion and genocide, the US can and should provide it and while they may gently caress it up there’s no particular reason they shouldn’t be successful in giving that aid. If they do gently caress it up the loss in aid will be trivial compared to the negatives of Russia succeeding in its invasion of a sovereign neighbour”. Nobody in arguing the latter needs to prove that the US can be trusted to run other countries, intervene unilaterally in other countries or invade other countries. A more apt analogy would be “I think we would be justified in providing medical assistance to country x but don’t you think we should stop the new labour government from sending them surplus medical supplies because the Tories always gently caress things up and recently tried to block supply?”
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Aug 6, 2023 06:31
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I'd like to add the implicit security guarantee to Taiwan as US policy success, if Ukraine had enjoyed that sort of commitment after 2014 the invasion could've been less likely.
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Aug 6, 2023 06:57
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Name Change posted:Saving them... FROM LIFE It DOES retrieve dead bodies from the battlefield. How those dead bodies were generated should be none of your concern.
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Aug 6, 2023 09:17
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The Artificial Kid posted:Congratulations, you’ve succumbed to the Republican strategy of the last 50 years. Perhaps you feel now is the time to drown government in the bathtub? Since the 1970s they’ve been trying to convince everyone that government is not the answer to anything, and in this post at least you seem to be buying that argument. The US framed every war it engaged in over the course of the last century (century and a decade, now) as totally justified in terms of defending itself and \ or poor oppressed and attacked people on the other side of the world. Vietnam (for example) also started out with defending the sovereign nation of South Vietnam from a "foreign invasion" by supplying them with munitions and training, rather than direct intervention. Edit - As you may note, I'm all for Ukraine defending itself and \ or for killing as many of my former countrymen on its territory as possible. I'm just noting that "oh, this particular conflict we're sticking our nose into is totally justified" is understandable skepticism. Xander77 fucked around with this message at 10:38 on Aug 6, 2023 |
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Aug 6, 2023 09:36
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American involvement in Vietnam started unambiguously as an effort to protect French colonial interests in Vietnam and the government of the Republic of Vietnam hardly factored into that whatsoever. Later it was about filling the power gap left behind after the French withdrew from the region. Insofar as the Vietnamese did factor in they were largely viewed as an inconvenience and a hindrance to American efforts. hell, when America got involved originally the Vietnamese government wasn't even the sovereign of its own territory. there's really no parallel. really the American involvement in Vietnam better parallels what Russia is doing in Ukraine if anything. The US had been sending trainers and advisors for 5 years already when the RVN was formed. Herstory Begins Now fucked around with this message at 10:20 on Aug 6, 2023 |
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Aug 6, 2023 10:16
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Xander77 posted:
It’s fine to draw conclusions about America’s tendencies from observing its past actions, but that doesn’t excuse us from deciding things on their merits, especially when sovereignty and genocide are at stake. I opposed the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, and look back in horror at the war in Vietnam. I see this as the first legitimate use of US weapons in decades (probably since the Balkans, unless I’m unfairly forgetting some other good that America did between then and now). It doesn’t matter to me that America once said South Vietnam was a democratic bastion against communist totalitarianism. I didn’t buy that. But today my own reading of the situation, taking into account as much evidence as I can find, tells me that Ukraine really is at least trying to be a self determining democracy in the face of unjustified invasion. It doesn’t matter to me that America once said Ho Chi Minh was nothing but a communist dictator. The same process that decades ago taught me of his drive for national liberation and attempts to work with America after world war 2 now tells me that Putin really is an authoritarian who opposes pretty much everything I want for the world. I’d love it if Ukraine had a better key partner than the United States, or if the United States had a better history. But right action today is balanced, not invalidated, by wrong action in the past. And I have no love for military industries, but I also have no guns to give Ukraine.
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Aug 6, 2023 10:25
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In some ways this dilemma reminds me of the pandemic. The pharmaceutical industry is fully profit-driven and morally corrupt, but I sure am glad they were there to make the vaccines. I have similar feelings about the MIC wrt. Ukraine now.
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Aug 6, 2023 10:31
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All of this discussion on the merits of the USA supporting the territorial integrity of a sovereign nation fighting a defensive war curiously omits the opinions of nations and people in the region that are being affected by military and civilian aid to Ukraine. And I can't help but notice that this seems to be a very common theme when Americans argue about the virtue of such aid.
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Aug 6, 2023 10:43
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Antigravitas posted:All of this discussion on the merits of the USA supporting the territorial integrity of a sovereign nation fighting a defensive war curiously omits the opinions of nations and people in the region that are being affected by military and civilian aid to Ukraine. I've been saying this as well and it's infuriating, really.
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Aug 6, 2023 10:51
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Antigravitas posted:All of this discussion on the merits of the USA supporting the territorial integrity of a sovereign nation fighting a defensive war curiously omits the opinions of nations and people in the region that are being affected by military and civilian aid to Ukraine. I think it's partly because there's two inter-twined conversations, one which relates to this thread more and the other a bit less. Ukraine wants (and needs) materiel and other sorts of military assistance like training, which NATO and some other European nations are offering in addition to the United States. Since Ukraine is a sovereign nation defending themselves from a violent aggressor, this is both a moral good and supported by international law and the UN charter. Then there is the conversation about the United States' internal politics and how voters there view all this, which apparently led to re-litigating Vietnam among other things. There have been a few Finnish politicians and commentators who have observed, in various phrasings, that superpowers have the luxury of dismissing foreign policy into just another talking point, especially for internal "debates" and arguments about things ultimately divorced from the affairs of whichever state is affected by said foreign policy. Smaller nations generally do not have such a luxury, as Ukraine's horrible situation demonstrates quite aptly.
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Aug 6, 2023 10:52
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Antigravitas posted:All of this discussion on the merits of the USA supporting the territorial integrity of a sovereign nation fighting a defensive war curiously omits the opinions of nations and people in the region that are being affected by military and civilian aid to Ukraine. Which opinions are you worried are being discounted?
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Aug 6, 2023 11:13
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The Artificial Kid posted:Which opinions are you worried are being discounted? Won't you think of the poor Russians affected by American aid to the rebellious Russian province of Ukraine?
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Aug 6, 2023 13:06
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A couple interesting things I've stumbled across this morning: Zelenskyy's account tweeted/xeeted/yeeted out a couple pictures of him visiting an airbase of some kind in a generic tweet/xeet/yeet about the heroes of the Ukrainian Air Force, but it included a couple pictures of him using a VR training rig and getting an F-16 jacket.   The branding and (at the very least) the headset appears to be from a portable flight simulator advertised on the company's website as developed with the US Marine Corps and only lists US-made air frames as what they can train pilots on, although there's an "etc." at the end of the list that's doing a lot of heavy lifting. Unrelated, an interesting Washington Post article about the SBU's drone squads. quote:Last year, there were opportunities to creep into Russian-occupied territory at night to take out enemy targets. Now, with vast minefields and other fortified Russian defenses stalling Ukraine’s sweeping counteroffensive, a UAV armed with explosives does that during daylight instead.
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Aug 6, 2023 13:17
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The Artificial Kid posted:Which opinions are you worried are being discounted? EE (sans Hungary and Belarus), for a start. Try explaining to someone in Vilnius how US military aid is categorically bad and should be stopped.
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Aug 6, 2023 13:23
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Moon Slayer posted:A couple interesting things I've stumbled across this morning: vrgineers is simultaneously the worst and most appropriate name for a VR company
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Aug 6, 2023 13:24
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As a passport holding yank, I’m really sorry we made Vladimir Vladimirovich invade Ukraine. Real bad move on our part.
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Aug 6, 2023 13:36
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The Artificial Kid posted:Which opinions are you worried are being discounted? the sanctions have been devastating to right wing anti-democracy groups across the region, I've heard that Greek superyacht maintenance crews are also suffering
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Aug 6, 2023 13:54
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Antigravitas posted:EE (sans Hungary and Belarus), for a start. Try explaining to someone in Vilnius how US military aid is categorically bad and should be stopped. Fragrag posted:vrgineers is simultaneously the worst and most appropriate name for a VR company
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Aug 6, 2023 13:56
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Antigravitas posted:EE (sans Hungary and Belarus), for a start. Try explaining to someone in Vilnius how US military aid is categorically bad and should be stopped. What if I explain it very smugly and with copious references to the internal politics of the Democratic Party?
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Aug 6, 2023 14:18
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Xander77 posted:Granted, for the sake of argument. But there's "the US government" and then there's the parasitical military-industrial complex. The US military and the private companies surrounding it aren't there to help people, they're there to kill foreigners and leech money. Or maybe a person could try using their brain by judging the situation on its own merits instead of making lazy generalities and/or regurgitating whatever their political safe space group and/or favorite grifting politician/talking head/podcaster/blogger/social media personality is saying about it?
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Aug 6, 2023 14:50
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Quixzlizx posted:Or maybe a person could try using their brain by judging the situation on its own merits instead of making lazy generalities and/or regurgitating whatever their political safe space group and/or favorite grifting politician/talking head/podcaster/blogger/social media personality is saying about it? Tired of people claiming that, just because the US has made mistakes in the past, that it puts them on the same moral scale as the most barbaric murderous regimes to ever exist in humanity. It's 13 year old edgelordism in the extreme.
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Aug 6, 2023 14:54
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Bridges hit about an hour ago. https://twitter.com/clashreport/status/1688184372002725889 Birdsite only place with the photos at the moment
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Aug 6, 2023 15:01
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TASS is covering it, in an "emergencies" feed. To give some sense of the credibility of this outlet, there's an item two entries down titled "Zelensky accepts Putin’s proposal, ready for peace talks". From February. 2022.
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Aug 6, 2023 19:04
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I encountered a potentially interesting episode of This American Life about conflict within a Russo-Ukrainian family about the war. Eight Fights quote:Nadia's family is split between Russia and Ukraine, which is pretty common. And when Russia invaded Ukraine, it didn’t just start fighting on the battlefield. It sparked family conflict, too. An intimate story of the war from writer Masha Gessen.
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Aug 6, 2023 19:33
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RandomPauI posted:Bridges hit about an hour ago. Nah, German Die Zeit Liveblog also has a photo, it's not even the newest news anymore, the liveblog-ticker has already moved the attack news fairly down the list of important news-items, like the peaceconference Russia is mad about because they weren't invited. Süddeutsche has the same picture and some more details: The original pictures from the attacks were released by Wladimir Saldo, "Occupation Chief" of the Kherson-region. He released the shots on Telegram. This is for the Tschonhar-bridge only, pictures from the strike on the Henitschesk-bridge came from Ukrainian sources. According to Süddeutsche, Russian civil protection has stopped the ferry connection between Crimea and the main land over the Kertch Strait until Monday morning, just in case. Likewise, the route between Dschankoj (North of Crimea) and Nowooleksijiwka (South of Kherson) is blocked for now. Feels like Crimea is more and more isolated by the attacks.
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Aug 6, 2023 23:12
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Libluini posted:Nah, German Die Zeit Liveblog also has a photo, it's not even the newest news anymore, the liveblog-ticker has already moved the attack news fairly down the list of important news-items, like the peaceconference Russia is mad about because they weren't invited. Lol. I'm sorry. I get it, it just reminds me of the German and German-Czech side of my family using German place-names for everything. Iglau, Karlsbad, Courland, etc. Could you pick me up some bananas from the colonial goods store while you're out, please?
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Aug 7, 2023 04:31
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