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Libluini posted:Support from North Korea is pretty much limited, they may have some stockpiles they can sell to Russia, but their production capability as a tiny rear end country crippled by even worse isolation than Russia is probably fairly small. I agree none of them are game changers for Russia. I still think Russia has enough weapon stocks, existing resources and manufacturing capability to keep a crippling stalemate going for a long time despite everything else. It does no-one any good to underestimate Russia, especially now that their mentality is increasingly looking like they are being backed into a corner. That sense of desperation is when it's most dangerous to leave things to chance. What I'm saying is that we need to end this as soon as possible, before it becomes a never ending war that only occasionally pops up in the media to remind us that it's still happening, and millions of lives have been lost to no real result. Slow grinding wars loving suck for everyone. Right now, all I see is the western powers giving Ukraine just enough to hold the Russians at bay, but no more than that. It's not good enough, and we will all suffer for it.
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Jan 21, 2023 20:00
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There really isn’t any great mystery as to Germany sending tanks or not. You can just check how many tanks Germany has, like officially, best case scenario, and its less than what Ukraine is asking for. After the 90s, the German army was reduced to a low intensity peace keeping force, as no war was ever considered realistic. Germany sold or gave away most of its tanks, and certainly all spares. Only the industry keeps some stocks. And the fact that not all or probably have of the tanks that are left are working is really also just policy. Being able to send three to five tanks to exercises was considered good enough. Remember at the time of these decisions, Germany was the poor man of Europe, in need of reforms, and very much not in need of an army, at least that was the thought. So one sold it all. This was intentional, like it was planned by strategy consultants literally. How little army can we get away with, assuming there are no wars. Scholz is everything the thread says he is, no doubt. But in addition to all that, don’t kid yourself: Germany has very little to give without giving up its defensive ability. Certainly not any large amount of working tanks lmao
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Jan 21, 2023 20:11
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Haramstufe Rot posted:There really isn’t any great mystery as to Germany sending tanks or not. That's not the point, though. The idea is that if all of Ukraine's supporters that use Leo 2 gave some percentage - 5-10% - then that would fill Ukraine's requests. No country is going to give their entire fleet, and in the case of Finland which neighbours Russia, only a few can be afforded to be given away. OTOH Spain, which fields ~100 2A4's and ~200 2A6's, can probably deliver more than average. Germany's role will be to give re-export permits and ramp up production to replace the  's plus provide loads and loads of spare parts more.
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Jan 21, 2023 20:20
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The problem is that "Germany won't give their tanks" and "Germany won't let other countries give their German tanks" are somehow being conflated in the media, and I'm not really seeing effective counters to that notion from German leadership. I really don't think there is as much a problem with the former considering all the aid Germany has already given and the apparent state of their military, it's the latter that is pissing people off. The poo poo about the Americans sending tanks first just muddles things further. (is that even true?) E: It's absolutely an unfair narrative that the media is pushing, but that does not absolve German leadership from addressing it beyond a bunch of vague noncommittal statements that fail to directly address the issue. I've been watching DW, and it's like pulling teeth every time the subject comes up. Svaha fucked around with this message at 20:36 on Jan 21, 2023 |
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Jan 21, 2023 20:26
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Nenonen posted:OTOH Spain, which fields ~100 2A4's and ~200 2A6's, can probably deliver more than average. I can't find it anymore but there was some interesting commentary on giving away Leo2's and the long and short of it is that no one is really interested in donating the A6's or A7's (they're too good and expensive) but A4's and earlier might be on the table.
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Jan 21, 2023 20:29
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Nenonen posted:That's not the point, though. The idea is that if all of Ukraine's supporters that use Leo 2 gave some percentage - 5-10% - then that would fill Ukraine's requests. No country is going to give their entire fleet, and in the case of Finland which neighbours Russia, only a few can be afforded to be given away. OTOH Spain, which fields ~100 2A4's and ~200 2A6's, can probably deliver more than average. No idea how Europe does this but how similar are the various Leo 2s each country has? Are there specialized export models for each country or are they roughly the same? I imagine they do all the important bits the same but are there a lot of restrictions or local political factors within the EU that would prevent them from being 100% the same? (Local political factors being stuff like we want our home grown manufacturer to build this optic etc.) It probably won't be hard to reconfigure the units into a common config before sending it to Ukraine, but is that something that would have to be done? Could there be some interoperability/maintenance issues that the people in the know could wring their hands about?
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Jan 21, 2023 20:35
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Nenonen posted:That's not the point, though. The idea is that if all of Ukraine's supporters that use Leo 2 gave some percentage - 5-10% - then that would fill Ukraine's requests. No country is going to give their entire fleet, and in the case of Finland which neighbours Russia, only a few can be afforded to be given away. OTOH Spain, which fields ~100 2A4's and ~200 2A6's, can probably deliver more than average. But there is a point that agreeing to give the permits, very quickly leads to the question: "well what can you provide?" - and the answer to that question is probably extremely embarrassing. Not just internationally, but also domestically. In other words, Russia isn't the only country which had far more MBTs on paper than in reality. The Danish army has had problems with keeping enough Leopards in acceptable conditions for deployment - and the ones sent for upgrade kits have been delayed. If Germany claims to have 150 operational Leopards on paper, it makes a difference if the truth is 15 or 100. Given that Germany isn't just dealing with peace dividend issues, but has had actual grift scandals as well, I wouldn't be surprised if wanting to keep the lid on regarding the true number of MBTs, is a contributing factor to Germany's weird stance. In other words - "taking inventory" could be a euphemism for "we need to think up an explanation real fast". The sad thing is that the US, Russia and everyone else with an interest probably knows the true count perfectly well. Which could be one reason that Kreml is (mostly) dismissive of the potential threat from Leopards.
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Jan 21, 2023 20:35
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I've got a sinking feeling you guys are right and no-one wants to admit how pathetic their stocks are. That certainly explains all the non-germany nations also being weirdly evasive on the subject. gently caress. 
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Jan 21, 2023 20:43
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:I'm a historian who works with government archives and I wouldn't be at all surprised if they have piss poor records. I know at least one major military branch that doesn't have a complete catalog of their own archival material. That's insane. Not that it's relevant, but I am a former academic (political scientist) who primarily did work on the social character of memory. Really I was doing social philosophy and history in a political science department... so it sounds like your work might be interesting as gently caress to me. I gave up on academia though for personal reasons and now I'm just a director level functionary in state government who, despite working for one of the worst states in the US for state employee compensation, now makes twice what I made as an academic (while still being incredibly underpaid).  PS. You had me at "catalog of their own archival material."
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Jan 21, 2023 20:58
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:I'm a historian who works with government archives and I wouldn't be at all surprised if they have piss poor records. I know at least one major military branch that doesn't have a complete catalog of their own archival material. As an archivist, I'm amazed to hear that anyone claims to have a complete catalog of their own archival material.
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Jan 21, 2023 21:53
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According to this DW segment, Germany is definitely blocking re-export of Leopard II battle tanks, but Olaf Scholz and Boris Pistorius are receiving huge international pressure not just from other NATO nations and the German opposition, but from within their own party. I Imagine we'll have to endure a bit more foot dragging, but I suspect they will crack eventually, because disallowing re-export is pretty hard to justify. Then I guess we'll see if anyone has any that are worth a drat, but the ball is in Scholz's court now.
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Jan 21, 2023 22:10
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No way that anyone is going to forget this whole shitshow when it's time to buy new military hardware. They're gonna think really hard before buying anything German I can see the hand-wringing in Korea from here, they're gonna be selling a lot of K2's in the next decade or so I imagine.
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Jan 21, 2023 22:58
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If you never want to give your tank purchases away or resell them, Germany is still a fine supplier.
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Jan 21, 2023 23:19
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Svaha posted:Everyone seems to have been overly optimistic about the prospect of peace and trade with Russia until fairly recently, yes. Even after the invasion Georgia and Crimea, which should have been huge flashing warning signs that history was not, in fact, over. It's hard to make people see things that they have a vested interest in not seeing. It's something Russia pursued aggressively, even. It doesn't even require corruption; if you benefit either directly or politically from a trade deal with Russia, you're going to be unwilling to believe there are problems.
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Jan 21, 2023 23:32
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National defence for the vast majority of countries seems to be largely just an opportunity for upper class grift rather than an actual existential consideration and Ukraine is seeing the consequences of that now from its Europe allies.. who, at least in Germany's case, will probably not learn a goddamn thing. Because as has always been the case and will remain the case, the leadership class has more in common with their enemies than the people they control
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Jan 22, 2023 00:13
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Since we're still on the topic, have a long read: https://www.spiegel.de/internationa...a3-ef0c27dcc797 As far as I know the amniotic fluid story is bollocks, but it is in the "spiritually true" category.
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Jan 22, 2023 00:18
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spankmeister posted:No way that anyone is going to forget this whole shitshow when it's time to buy new military hardware. They're gonna think really hard before buying anything German The next big war will be China vs. Taiwan, so...
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Jan 22, 2023 00:18
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EasilyConfused posted:As an archivist, I'm amazed to hear that anyone claims to have a complete catalog of their own archival material. Yeah but almost all archives I've gone to have at least a skeletal catalog you can consult. This archive said "lol no  ". There's a filing system of sorts but it's staff use only and I have no idea if there's an actual register.
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Jan 22, 2023 00:20
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mlmp08 posted:If you never want to give your tank purchases away or resell them, Germany is still a fine supplier. So, if you have no allies?
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Jan 22, 2023 00:21
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Ynglaur posted:So, if you have no allies? Ukraine isn’t an ally of any Leo operators. But more that Germany is considered a reliable supplier, but a supplier who requires permission before you proliferate their weapons to countries or organizations they never agreed to arm. So if you are buying for your defense, fine. If you are buying and want to sell or transfer the weapons later, there are easier suppliers than buying from Germany.
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Jan 22, 2023 00:27
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:Yeah but almost all archives I've gone to have at least a skeletal catalog you can consult. This archive said "lol no Gross, sounds like combining the worst aspect of local historical societies (no resources for description) with the worst aspect of corporate archives (no interest in openness).
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Jan 22, 2023 01:37
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Antigravitas posted:Since we're still on the topic, have a long read: https://www.spiegel.de/internationa...a3-ef0c27dcc797 Has anyone said Badwehr? I read it all, and Jesus loving Christ. Pretty sure the tiered accounting percentage steroids is going to add another tier between “available” and the real thing, like “war-ready”. The ministry itself could’ve unironically improved from Elon Musk taking charge.
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Jan 22, 2023 01:43
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mlmp08 posted:But more that Germany is considered a reliable supplier, but a supplier who requires permission before you proliferate their weapons to countries or organizations they never agreed to arm. So if you are buying for your defense, fine. If you are buying and want to sell or transfer the weapons later, there are easier suppliers than buying from Germany.
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Jan 22, 2023 01:53
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mlmp08 posted:But more that Germany is considered a reliable supplier, but a supplier who requires permission before you proliferate their weapons to countries or organizations they never agreed to arm. So if you are buying for your defense, fine. If you are buying and want to sell or transfer the weapons later, there are easier suppliers than buying from Germany. How exactly are these restrictive arms export contracts supposed to work in a region like Europe, which has about 50 different tiny states, several of which might apparently be invaded by fascists all of a sudden? All it takes is one of the major countries in the centre deciding to throw you to the night wolves and then you're boned? I guess, as always with European security, the only workable answer is NATO. If you're not in NATO, then you're not getting the good weapons (let alone Article 5)
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Jan 22, 2023 01:55
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Nenonen posted:The next big war will be China vs. Taiwan, so... One of the likely reasons Poland went with the K2 is the potential of manufacturing them domestically. Poland wants a tank they can build in Poland, not one they need to import everything for. But yeah, Korea's not gonna clean out their own stocks right now.
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Jan 22, 2023 03:27
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All it takes is someone to foot the bill and Korea can churn out a K2 fleet for export pretty quickly, they're not lacking for industrial might or advanced components needed for fire control and comms
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Jan 22, 2023 04:24
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NTRabbit posted:All it takes is someone to foot the bill and Korea can churn out a K2 fleet for export pretty quickly, they're not lacking for industrial might or advanced components needed for fire control and comms Possibly, but that would be a big bill, indeed. If we're looking at military materiel efficacy per $ spent though, I imagine a larger fleet of older, but cheaper to fix up/source Leopard 2's are going to be more bang for buck than a smaller set of tanks built new from scratch. Not to mention, much faster to get to the front.
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Jan 22, 2023 04:36
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It's all about cost/benefit. The losses they've taken to gain what they have are too great. https://twitter.com/TheStudyofWar/status/1617010012244824068 https://twitter.com/TheStudyofWar/status/1617012723262394368 https://twitter.com/TheStudyofWar/status/1617012726500409345 https://twitter.com/TheStudyofWar/status/1617012728966615040
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Jan 22, 2023 05:20
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jaete posted:How exactly are these restrictive arms export contracts supposed to work in a region like Europe, which has about 50 different tiny states, several of which might apparently be invaded by fascists all of a sudden? All it takes is one of the major countries in the centre deciding to throw you to the night wolves and then you're boned? The vast majority are in mutual defence agreements. People happily buy weapons from the USA, Denmark, Sweden – and they have It's Switzerland which killed off its defence industry. Germany's order books are filled for decades. cinci zoo sniper posted:Has anyone said Badwehr? I read it all, and Jesus loving Christ. Pretty sure the tiered accounting percentage steroids is going to add another tier between “available” and the real thing, like “war-ready”. The ministry itself could’ve unironically improved from Elon Musk taking charge. Now, you may be thinking that this is just the Bundeswehr, but I'd like you to consider that no, this is what every CDU/CSU led ministry looks like. Antigravitas fucked around with this message at 09:53 on Jan 22, 2023 |
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Jan 22, 2023 09:43
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it puts into some perspective why the Russian military was considered the #2 military in spite of all of its countless problems
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Jan 22, 2023 10:41
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Actually, thinking more about it, there is a way the American refusal to send Abrams makes sense. If it's their demand that everyone else sends Leopards and the USA backfills with Abrams and long-term contracts, it would kill the MGCS and severely weaken European defence industries, especially Nexter and KMW.
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Jan 22, 2023 12:44
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This is a misunderstanding of the state of the arms industry. Abrams, Leopard, Challenger - they're all on final-upgrade end of life modernisation programmes. If you are getting offered Abrams on the cheap to replace a gap in the inventory then you absolutely take it now, but that just gives you 20-25 years of cover. Which sounds like a long time, but in terms of armoured vehicle development means you have to start the procurement process on your next generation tank right now and there's no reason why you would pick a US company as your contract winner just because you have Abrams now. All of Europe needs to do this, and they'll pick the Leopard successor for the same reason they picked Leopard 2 - US tanks are too expensive to operate and are made in the US rather than Europe. EU common funding for defence and a renewed emphasis on standardisation at NATO means that if you can spot the winners now then there's going to be an awful lot of money made in the European MIC over the next few decades.
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Jan 22, 2023 13:02
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Antigravitas posted:Actually, thinking more about it, there is a way the American refusal to send Abrams makes sense. If it's their demand that everyone else sends Leopards and the USA backfills with Abrams and long-term contracts, it would kill the MGCS and severely weaken European defence industries, especially Nexter and KMW. Your name is Marco Seliger? https://www.nzz.ch/international/kampfpanzer-leopard-2-us-ruestungsinteressen-lassen-scholz-zoegern-ld.1722377
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Jan 22, 2023 13:03
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Kallikaa posted:Your name is Marco Seliger? No, but, uh, huh. I swear the thought came to me while making my second cup of coffee today. 
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Jan 22, 2023 13:12
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Libluini posted:China, maybe. But on the other hand, India and China have Russia over an oil barrel and are squeezing so hard, their help also comes with a hefty price. A price that may cause an economical collapse if they force Russia to accept even lower oil prices in the future. It's important to keep in mind that China likes having Russia around as an anti west ally. They will squeeze them when it's in their interest, but squeezing to the point of collapsing them is *not* in their interest.
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Jan 22, 2023 13:59
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Antigravitas posted:Actually, thinking more about it, there is a way the American refusal to send Abrams makes sense. If it's their demand that everyone else sends Leopards and the USA backfills with Abrams and long-term contracts, it would kill the MGCS and severely weaken European defence industries, especially Nexter and KMW. There is a really interesting Perun vid that sort've goes into this subject offhandedly but its through talking about Poland's current and future weapons procurement instead: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrbaAKZfjwg As near as I can tell Poland got piiiiiissed off at being booted out of the MGCS program back in early 2020. They decided to go their own way with help from S. Korea which might lead to S. Korean MIC getting a foothold in the EU and this causing the companies and nations in on that program to worry about future MGCS sales. Which I guess they thought would be to a essentially captive EU market...but not anymore.
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Jan 22, 2023 14:07
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PC LOAD LETTER posted:There is a really interesting Perun vid that sort've goes into this subject offhandedly but its through talking about Poland's current and future weapons procurement instead: The projected in service date of the MGCS is 2035 according to the Wikipedia page, which also features repeated use of the term "glacial pace" regarding development.
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Jan 22, 2023 15:09
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Nenonen posted:That's a wrong take of the situation. They weren't prepared for a scenario where they would be requested to provide hundreds of main battle tanks to an outsider in the middle of a war in which they are not directly involved. If Russia attacked actual NATO members then they would be facing the full might of western air forces. Between 2011 and today, I'm fairly convinced at this point that "the full might of western air forces" is about one sortie each from the entire EU, then western air forces are the US air force, occasionally giving munitions to its little buddies so they can say they helped. mlmp08 posted:Ukraine isn’t an ally of any Leo operators. I can think of a lot of people in Africa very interested in how german weapons can't be proliferated.
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Jan 22, 2023 15:29
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:
It's only proliferation (or neutrality violation) if it's in Europe, otherwise it's just sparkling exports. Edit: that is to say, the very thing that makes European countries care enough to help also can make them care enough not to. OddObserver fucked around with this message at 15:45 on Jan 22, 2023 |
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Jan 22, 2023 15:42
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:The projected in service date of the MGCS is 2035 according to the Wikipedia page, which also features repeated use of the term "glacial pace" regarding development. And it'll be years before Poland gets K2's and around the mid 2030's when maybe the K3 shows up which is the time frame for the MGCS. These big development programs tend to take years and years to come to fruition. Especially if there is some sort've tech or manufacturing transfer. Which there is supposed to be with the K2 and K3 deals.
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Jan 22, 2023 15:59
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