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Put me down in the "Absolutely blow up the Kerch bridge, it's a military target, and you don't have to wait for it to finish getting repaired to do it either" column.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:13
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Ynglaur posted:I'm actually not convinced US doctrinal changes will be glacial. It changed remarkably quickly in both the 1930s and 1970s, and was not necessarily driven solely off of its own experience. Parts have remained consistent (we still don't bother with any double-envelopment complexity), but the state of US doctrine has not been static. Nenonen posted:Why is it okay to bomb the Antonovsky bridge and the crews that repair it, but not the Kerch bridge? Both are or were used by civilians. One of them makes Putin very sad!
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Oct 12, 2022 21:16
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To me, it isn't purely a matter of whether the bridge (or the repair crew) is a legitimate target or not - discussing which bunch of people should be killed and in what fashion is tasteless bloodlusting. Just like I think it is beyond poor taste to discuss in detail the various possible targets and ways to obliterate soldiers (from one side or the other). Even in the context of a genocidal war of aggression. War sucks and people dying sucks. This bridge being made inoperable is a good thing in the context of ending this war sooner, but that doesn't make it useful to hypothesize about how to achieve that in vivid and gruesome detail. The wider discussion of whether Ukraine is able to disrupt the bridge repairs, whether they have expressed an intent to do so and whether they can/will strike the bridge after any repairs? I think that's pretty relevant, and as far as I am aware the official Ukrainian stance is still that this bridge should be destroyed, *and* that minimizing resulting civilian casualties is important. This latter fact matters when the recent Russian strikes seem to be made with completely opposite intent - to maximize civilian casualties. Ukraine has so far shown admirable restraint and refrained from responding in turn to terror tactics. To what degree this is based on a need to keep international support vs taking the moral high ground I could care less about. I am glad they're not launching terrorism of their own. And I hope they maintain this position - also when attacking the bridge. Because Ukraine is going to attack the bridge again - if have an opportunity to do so. We have no idea when and how they'll do it and if it happens, it will probably be like the strike that just happened, and come out of nowhere with a lot of confusion as to what actually happened and how.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:18
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I suppose I agree with all of that (from Orthanc6), I just don't agree with intentionally targeting a civilian repair ship and its crew and workers. I don't think that'd be necessary or justifiable and would not fit into a doctrine of minimizing civilian casualties. A follow-up strike can target the bridge itself, ideally when repair crews are not present. Similarly, you can blow up rail lines, but it'd be gross to intentionally attack a civilian rail repair crew. My apologies for misunderstanding what was meant by "suicide" in that reference, it's a really bad term for an unmanned drone attack, we don't call cruise missiles "suicide missiles" it's just a new form of smart bomb basically and I think that'd be a better term. A drone bomb or drone smart bomb or similar. e. yeah basically PederP is better describing my feelings about why it's gross to post about. Of course cinci can explain (or not, if he doesn't feel like it) the mod action, and I'm not a mod here I'm just a poster giving my dumbass opinion.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:21
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Just wait until the workers go on break and then blow the bridge up.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:23
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Leperflesh posted:I suppose I agree with all of that (from Orthanc6), I just don't agree with intentionally targeting a civilian repair ship and its crew and workers. I don't think that'd be necessary or justifiable and would not fit into a doctrine of minimizing civilian casualties. A follow-up strike can target the bridge itself, ideally when repair crews are not present. Similarly, you can blow up rail lines, but it'd be gross to intentionally attack a civilian rail repair crew. A civilian ship performing a military task under orders from the military leadership in an occupied area is not really a civilian ship.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:24
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:Just wait until the workers go on break and then blow the bridge up.  The bridge is clearly how they're funneling supplies to the south, so it totally a legit target. It also didn't exist until 2018 and the world didn't end. IIRC basically the requirement is that you do everything possible to minimize civilian casualties when they aren't completely avoidable. So yeah when the workers are on a break, or in the middle of the night if possible.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:26
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Nenonen posted:A civilian ship performing a military task under orders from the military leadership in an occupied area is not really a civilian ship. Fixing a bridge used by civilians isn't a military task. They're primarily repairing the road not the railroad tracks anyways. Would you say construction workers in the U.S. are performing a military task anytime they fix a pot hole or perform maintenance on an intersection? PederP posted:To me, it isn't purely a matter of whether the bridge (or the repair crew) is a legitimate target or not - discussing which bunch of people should be killed and in what fashion is tasteless bloodlusting. Just like I think it is beyond poor taste to discuss in detail the various possible targets and ways to obliterate soldiers (from one side or the other). Even in the context of a genocidal war of aggression. War sucks and people dying sucks. This bridge being made inoperable is a good thing in the context of ending this war sooner, but that doesn't make it useful to hypothesize about how to achieve that in vivid and gruesome detail. Agreed, people flippantly talking about killing a bunch of civilian construction workers is gross.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:26
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slurm posted:Curious what the mod policy is here. This is a Russian-flagged crane vessel the "Aleksander Zinovyev" flying visible Russian flags and working on a piece of infrastructure that we all regard as a legitimate target. It seems like an ideal and very interesting target for sneaky long range boat-drones if they exist, what am I missing? They are civilians this is really not terribly difficult at all.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:28
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Dirt5o8 posted:There is going to be a lot of soul searching in armies across the world when this done, I figure. In the U.S. Army's case, change will be typically glacial when it comes to doctrine change. I think another thing this war has shown is how limited NATO is in the area of anti aircraft defenses. Especially the US. I mean since the end of the cold war what has the US really had in their arsenal? Manpads like the stinger, which are limited in range and mainly useful against helicopters and low flying planes, and Patriot missiles which are big, complex and take a lot of time to train a crew to use. I guess this hasn't been much of an issue for the US since they just use their own aircraft and cruise missiles to take out the enemies airforce while they are on the ground. And 20 years of fighting enemies that don't even have an airforce has probably done little to prioritize development of new systems. And the NASAMS system seems to be pretty good but it doesn't look like the US has many in storage so it's been taking forever to get them sent to Ukraine.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:28
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Nenonen posted:Why is it okay to bomb the Antonovsky bridge and the crews that repair it, but not the Kerch bridge? Both are or were used by civilians. it's a piece of infrastructure supporting a war effort so yeah it's 100% a legitimate target. it's just weird to look at specifically the civilian repair crew and think about blowing them up.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:32
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Popete posted:Fixing a bridge used by civilians isn't a military task. They're primarily repairing the road not the railroad tracks anyways. Isn't the US freeway system basically a military asset? Like in a WW3 scenario it would play a huge part in getting military equipment to various places. So in wartime if civilians are repairing sections of it then yeah I believe they would be performing a military task. Which would make them a legit military target.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:32
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Kevin Smith addressed this in Clerks and the right answer hasn't changed since that was released.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:32
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PederP posted:To me, it isn't purely a matter of whether the bridge (or the repair crew) is a legitimate target or not - discussing which bunch of people should be killed and in what fashion is tasteless bloodlusting. Just like I think it is beyond poor taste to discuss in detail the various possible targets and ways to obliterate soldiers (from one side or the other). Even in the context of a genocidal war of aggression. War sucks and people dying sucks. This bridge being made inoperable is a good thing in the context of ending this war sooner, but that doesn't make it useful to hypothesize about how to achieve that in vivid and gruesome detail. I appreciate not devolving into outright blood-lusting, but discussing ways and means of achieving tactical and operational and strategic aims seems to be appropriate for this thread. Obviously the usual conversational rules about chaining speculations and being boring apply. I wish all sorts of calamities upon the Russian military, but only for the aim of ending this senseless war more quickly. A civilian ship repairing infrastructure used by the military in an active war zone is a legitimate military target. They are effectively combatants, though a reasonable interpretation would be only in the conduct of such repairs. That said, sinking such a ship to prevent further such repairs would also be legitimate. Doing such in a manner that minimized loss of life would, of course, be ideal.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:32
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UN Voted on condemning the annexation referenda https://twitter.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1580295103088066560 against: Belarus, Russia, North Korea, Nicaragua, & Syria voted against
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Oct 12, 2022 21:35
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If India and China want to be seen as global leaders, they need to start having opinions on questions such as "should one country genocide another country".
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Oct 12, 2022 21:38
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Ynglaur posted:I appreciate not devolving into outright blood-lusting, but discussing ways and means of achieving tactical and operational and strategic aims seems to be appropriate for this thread. Obviously the usual conversational rules about chaining speculations and being boring apply. This thread doesn't get to decide what does or does not get blown up so it's kind of a pointless discussion that just reeks of war gawking and fantasizing about Russians dying. At best it's a very grey area if civilians repairing a bridge are valid military target, posting about it like you're making an order at McDonalds and it's just so obviously the right thing isn't cool. Note: I'm not talking about this post I'm quoting in particular as it's a bit more nuance but other posts about how it's 100% a valid military target and should be blown up.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:41
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Bel Shazar posted:Kevin Smith addressed this in Clerks and the right answer hasn't changed since that was released. Any contractor working on the Death Star or the Kerch Strait Bridge knew the risk involved and bear the responsibility for their decision to take that giant wad of cash.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:41
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Tomn posted:Oh, I hadn’t realized it was a Ukrainian government request- that does put a different spin on thing. Though I do note the only source is apparently “Ian Bremmer said Musk told him”? Not that I’m putting it past Musk to try and act like he’s the protagonist of a RPG forging the only path towards the True Ending, but it is a little he said she said right now. I agree with you here. The “Musk spoke to Putin” thing is also from here, and I’m inclined to sit the story out until it’s further corroborated by a distant enough third party. Rigel posted:You really should. Perun is fantastic, he puts in a lot of effort to be as objective as possible (while admitting up front his bias in favor of Ukraine), everything is researched and well-reasoned, and he sprinkles in just enough of a light dusting of humor to keep it all interesting. I simply don’t have time reserved for watching videos in my day. For instance, I haven’t watched a single YouTube video in the last 30 days. slurm posted:Curious what the mod policy is here. This is a Russian-flagged crane vessel the "Aleksander Zinovyev" flying visible Russian flags and working on a piece of infrastructure that we all regard as a legitimate target. It seems like an ideal and very interesting target for sneaky long range boat-drones if they exist, what am I missing? Libluini posted:a soul Herstory Begins Now posted:cuz it's gross to look at some civilian dudes repairing a bridge and go 'i hope someone blows them up with a mk19 submersible antibridgepersonnel bomb'' It’s this. I’m fine with people saying stuff like “I hope they blow the bridge up again”, but I’m not going to tolerate “I hope they murder Artyom the ministry of transportation subcontractor”. sniper4625 posted:The thing alleged to have hit the strat bombers in Russia was a suicide bomber drone, not a suicide bomber person, that's what I assume they meant. Not that I think there's any chance of a redux, if the Russians aren't on highest alert, land sea and air, now, then uh, it'd be a new low even for them. Where can I read more about Russian strategic bombers taking fire? cinci zoo sniper fucked around with this message at 21:47 on Oct 12, 2022 |
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Oct 12, 2022 21:42
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Ynglaur posted:If India and China want to be seen as global leaders, they need to start having opinions on questions such as "should one country genocide another country". The problem is that sharing their real opinion might prove a huge impediment in getting others on board with their leadership role.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:43
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Ynglaur posted:If India and China want to be seen as global leaders, they need to start having opinions on questions such as "should one country genocide another country". I'm not 100% sure why that would be a necessary thing for them except if you mean India and China should also embrace the Western perspective on the world.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:44
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Herstory Begins Now posted:it's a piece of infrastructure supporting a war effort so yeah it's 100% a legitimate target. it's just weird to look at specifically the civilian repair crew and think about blowing them up. Yeah, I agree that violence fantasies are not okay. But I just wanted to point out that the bridge is a legit military target, all of it, not just the rail part like some seem to think. It was built to annex Crimea illegally to Russia. Ukraine has warned that it will be taken down. Anyone participating in building the bridge or repairing it is a participant, they can't possibly claim neutrality. It is outright absurd to claim that they are civilians.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:45
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Ynglaur posted:I appreciate not devolving into outright blood-lusting, but discussing ways and means of achieving tactical and operational and strategic aims seems to be appropriate for this thread. Obviously the usual conversational rules about chaining speculations and being boring apply. There's no bright line you can draw between definitely military and definitely non-military when a country is at war, it's just chains of connections. So I don't want you to feel like I'm attacking your ethics in particular, you're making a familiar argument that many people would agree with. There are degrees of separation between people acting within a nation that is at war and the people prosecuting that war that if you follow completely, ultimately drags everyone into the status of "legitimate target", including people growing the food that feeds the army, people who voted for the guy who is doing the war, whatever. I'm sure we'd both agree that voters and farmers are too far removed to be legitimate targets... so we're just not landing on the same fuzzy gray area in the same place. For me, I draw a line that would protect civilians repairing infrastructure used by civilians, even if it's dual-use. That argument aside, a post that amounts to "they should kill those civilians" is gross, while "I hope they find a way to keep that bridge out of commission" is not, even if they both imply that civilians could be killed - there's a difference in expressed intent, bloodthirstiness, etc.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:45
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Herstory Begins Now posted:UN Voted on condemning the annexation referenda Serbia and Hungary voting for. A bunch of shameful abstentions, though.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:46
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Popete posted:Would you say construction workers in the U.S. are performing a military task anytime they fix a pot hole or perform maintenance on an intersection? If they’re fixing critical, road-closing potholes on the only road connecting a US military base to another US military base, in an active war zone, then… yes, 100% absolutely? An army engineer is still part of the military even if they’re not shooting a gun. But yeah weird to be so eager for anyone’s deaths, especially non-combattants. E: also wtf South Africa abstaining? Otherwise looks like the typical abstainers plus some countries that I wonder if it was an "idealogical abstain" or "don’t care" like South Sudan. I guess blank means "not present" although what’s up with Azerbaijan not showing up to either vote? Saladman fucked around with this message at 21:57 on Oct 12, 2022 |
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Oct 12, 2022 21:51
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Herstory Begins Now posted:UN Voted on condemning the annexation referenda So essentially the same as the vote in March, with minor movements, e.g. Eritrea moving from against to abstention and Nicaragua moving from abstention to against. March vote:  https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/3/3/unga-resolution-against-ukraine-invasion-full-text
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Oct 12, 2022 21:53
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Herstory Begins Now posted:UN Voted on condemning the annexation referenda The others I get, but what bug has Nicaragua got up its rear end lately to think siding with the crazy people is a good idea?
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Oct 12, 2022 21:58
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Plastic_Gargoyle posted:The others I get, but what bug has Nicaragua got up its rear end lately to think siding with the crazy people is a good idea? Amerikkka bad, I imagine. They have a good reason I imagine but it's still pretty stupid to vote for in favor of wars of conquest. Also India playing the "neutrality" card again in the worst way possible.
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Oct 12, 2022 22:00
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Ynglaur posted:If India and China want to be seen as global leaders, they need to start having opinions on questions such as "should one country genocide another country". "Both parties should resolve their differences through dialogue and consultation".
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Oct 12, 2022 22:06
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Ynglaur posted:If India and China want to be seen as global leaders, they need to start having opinions on questions such as "should one country genocide another country". It's difficult when you want the answer to be "Yes" but without saying it out loud yourself
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Oct 12, 2022 22:07
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cinci zoo sniper posted:Where can I read more about Russian strategic bombers taking fire? There were rumors on twitter a few days ago that two Russian bombers got blown up on an airfield, nothing further came out so I am filing this one under "unfortunate fog of war want-to-believe" until shown otherwise. https://eurasiantimes.com/black-day-for-russia-ukraine-claims-two-tu-22-bombers-destroyed/
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Oct 12, 2022 22:12
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Saladman posted:If they’re fixing critical, road-closing potholes on the only road connecting a US military base to another US military base, in an active war zone, then… yes, 100% absolutely? An army engineer is still part of the military even if they’re not shooting a gun. I presume Azerbaijan is trying to keep good relations with both Ukraine and Russia, and abstaining won't really work?
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Oct 12, 2022 22:13
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sniper4625 posted:There were rumors on twitter a few days ago that two Russian bombers got blown up on an airfield, nothing further came out so I am filing this one under "unfortunate fog of war want-to-believe" until shown otherwise. I appreciate the link, cheers.
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Oct 12, 2022 22:17
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Plastic_Gargoyle posted:The others I get, but what bug has Nicaragua got up its rear end lately to think siding with the crazy people is a good idea? what do you mean lately? Other than the Chamorro years, Nicaragua has been on a pretty consistent trajectory both for internally-directed reasons and as a response to outward factors (like the US sponsored civil war that was basically just an atrocity showcase). Also China invests a poo poo ton of money in Nicaragua and they're still close to Russia, too. Ortega is just being Ortega, albeit with considerably more dictator for life vibes this time around.
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Oct 12, 2022 22:18
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Debating whether or not the Kerch bridge is a military target seems pretty pointless after it's already been categorized as a military target via truck bomb. Ukraine's behavior in the war has demonstrated a conscious aversion to attacking non-military targets and has tried to minimize collateral damage. This also sounds a lot like the argument about whether or not civilian contractors working on the Death Star counted as legitimate military targets from Clerks.
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Oct 12, 2022 22:19
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Herstory Begins Now posted:UN Voted on condemning the annexation referenda Worth noting I think that something around half or so of the abstentions come from Africa. There are of course also plenty of African countries voting for, but it's probably worth remembering that Russia is focusing a lot of messaging on former colonized countries and finding fertile ground for an anti-Western message. Heck, I recently found out that my landlord, a highly educated upper-middle-class Indian who was raised in the UK and has been working and living here since early childhood and is generally extremely British, apparently reads Russia Today uncritically and took a lot of Russian talking points for granted. And my landlord before that, back when the whole thing kicked off, was Kenyan and also highly educated upper-middle class and had been living in the UK for a while, and he was notably pretty "both sides" about the war. They were both pretty reasonable guys and receptive to arguments, mind you, it's just that their personal media spheres, even in a privileged position in a Western country, tended towards a certain healthy (and understandable) skepticism towards the West and sympathy for Russian messaging.
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Oct 12, 2022 22:22
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Tomn posted:Worth noting I think that something around half or so of the abstentions come from Africa. There are of course also plenty of African countries voting for, but it's probably worth remembering that Russia is focusing a lot of messaging on former colonized countries and finding fertile ground for an anti-Western message. Many Indians are sympathetic to Russia because the Soviet Union backed India significantly back in the 50s and especially 60s, during the sino-india war, and in general the USSR gave India a lot of aid and did quite a bit to support Indian territorial claims and development. They've been close really ever since. Herstory Begins Now fucked around with this message at 22:33 on Oct 12, 2022 |
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Oct 12, 2022 22:27
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Plastic_Gargoyle posted:The others I get, but what bug has Nicaragua got up its rear end lately to think siding with the crazy people is a good idea?
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Oct 12, 2022 22:27
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Ynglaur posted:If India and China want to be seen as global leaders, they need to start having opinions on questions such as "should one country genocide another country". China is currently genociding the Uyghurs and the Prime Minister of India looked the other way when he was a provincial governor and 3000 Muslims were slaughtered in his province.
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Oct 12, 2022 22:31
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HonorableTB posted:Debating whether or not the Kerch bridge is a military target seems pretty pointless after it's already been categorized as a military target via truck bomb. Ukraine's behavior in the war has demonstrated a conscious aversion to attacking non-military targets and has tried to minimize collateral damage. This also sounds a lot like the argument about whether or not civilian contractors working on the Death Star counted as legitimate military targets from Clerks. There’s no reason to debate that. I’m simply asking that people refrain from explicitly call for this or that group of civilians to be killed. If you want the bridge to be blasted again when empty or in unspecified circumstances, fine by me - I’m not after prosecuting thought crimes here. Same goes for the repair boat itself, it doesn’t have smaller repair boats waiting for it to come back to the wharf.
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Oct 12, 2022 22:33
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