The US will lose WW3

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > C-SPAM > The US will lose WW3

Mandel Brotset: Jan 1, 2024

cagliostr0 posted:

I doubt China would waste engineers on most of the car r+d. They are far too valuable on structures and dynamic systems to waste time in something a research chemist could handle fine.

and yet,

# ? May 2, 2024 01:53

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# ? May 23, 2024 18:22

BearsBearsBears: Aug 4, 2022

Hey Gradenko and/or DD, you were reading a book about artillery called something like "Fire Power". Was it "Field Artillery and Firepower by Maj. Gen. J.B.A. Bailey"?

I'm also taking a recommendation on US doctrine in WW2 compared to today. This is mentioned a lot but I'm not sure if there's a single book to read.

# ? May 2, 2024 02:08

DJJIB-DJDCT: Feb 1, 2024

No, though Bailey's book is the gold standard for a technical history of the arm. Fire-Power is by Bidwell and Graham and is a much more enjoyable, approachable, read.

# ? May 2, 2024 02:12

dead gay comedy forums: Oct 21, 2011

so, about that spending

first of all, there's the old problem of economic efficiency and efficacy - how much gets spent and how much does that spending addresses the material problem it is for. GDP by itself is meaningless with those considerations in mind. If the PLA represents a proportionally smaller budget slice than NATO's defense, but has all its concerns satisfied well enough, that means there is a positive economic relationship in terms of utilization of resources.

and to have efficiency and efficacy, an economy requires a certain level of aggregate development in order to provide those factors - concentration of productive forces can be directed unto themselves for them to be more efficient and efficacious. The result is that stuff gets not only cheaper to make, but also easier: a wider throughput is a good example of that. Less capacity is required to provide large amounts of supply. Expenditure becomes a much less reliable indicator in those circumstances without actual material numbers to be compared with.

as such, financial metrics that aim to provide a quality outlook have to be adjusted to actually account for that, which require a far more comprehensive analysis that considers supply, current production, capacity, etc. It's not merely about being cheaper, because those prices can be simply nominal for all intents and purposes (especially when there's central planning involved) and they can be way less. Then to gauge all of that into parity with some other economy? Depending on those structural differences, the numbers game can become ridiculous. What truly matters is the why of this type of analysis being done in the first place instead of a material comparison of productive forces.

# ? May 2, 2024 02:25

BearsBearsBears: Aug 4, 2022

DJJIB-DJDCT posted:

No, though Bailey's book is the gold standard for a technical history of the arm. Fire-Power is by Bidwell and Graham and is a much more enjoyable, approachable, read.

Thanks, I thought it seemed a bit technical.

# ? May 2, 2024 03:10

cagliostr0: Jun 8, 2020

Mandel Brotset posted:

and yet,

I would wager good money the vast majority of the r+d is being handled by the chemistry and physics PhDs they churn out by the cartload. Where I personally see their top tier engineering brains working is in ship hull dynamics. Australia, Japan, South Korea, China and Iran are the people pushing forwards the development of frictional drag reduction on hulls. I haven't seen a single American paper on the topic despite it being one of the primary drivers for speed, noise and efficiency of ships.

# ? May 2, 2024 03:17

dk2m: May 6, 2009

Danann posted:

https://twitter.com/AEI/status/1785017847011533148

GDP metric worship is going to end in the American empire spreadsheeting itself to death.

lol turns out a society that actively subsidizes basic needs like housing, education, healthcare, etc doesn�t need its salaries to be so high and leads to more material and output instead of just accruing financial overhead and grift

# ? May 2, 2024 06:49

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

Sanlav posted:

I remember being appalled when I took Electric Circuits junior year. I got a 45 on an exam at the start of term and was really worried I should drop, and then realized it was an A. Students were passing with 10-15% solutions. Just pages of nonsense diffeq submitted, and professors were like ... well you tried and attended. That's a C.

lol what the gently caress

i used to ta here in finland and the attrition rate among math students was actually p high at least among undergrads. admittedly many of those were people who did a year or two of maths or physics while trying to get into med school, but still

# ? May 2, 2024 07:24

genericnick: Dec 26, 2012

Cerebral Bore posted:

lol what the gently caress

i used to ta here in finland and the attrition rate among math students was actually p high at least among undergrads. admittedly many of those were people who did a year or two of maths or physics while trying to get into med school, but still

Yeah, I guess that's one of the results of really fleecing the students for money. In all the small euro nations I know where tuition is still a minor part of university funding, the first few semesters of Physics and Math looks like Enemy at the Gates.

# ? May 2, 2024 07:39

Sanlav: Feb 10, 2020; We'll Meet Again

genericnick posted:

Yeah, I guess that's one of the results of really fleecing the students for money. In all the small euro nations I know where tuition is still a minor part of university funding, the first few semesters of Physics and Math looks like Enemy at the Gates.

It was the tip of the 'grade inflation' iceberg, they were so harassed by parents they gave up. Not every course was like that, I had a Signals teacher who still failed half the class.

# ? May 2, 2024 09:59

Jon Pod Van Damm: Apr 6, 2009; THE POSSESSION OF WEALTH IS IN AND OF ITSELF A SIGN OF POOR VIRTUE. AS SUCH:
1 NEVER TRUST ANY RICH PERSON.
2 NEVER HIRE ANY RICH PERSON.
BY RULE 1, IT IS APPROPRIATE TO PRESUME THAT ALL DEGREES AND CREDENTIALS HELD BY A WEALTHY PERSON ARE FRAUDULENT. THIS JUSTIFIES RULE 2--RULE 1 NEEDS NO JUSTIFIC

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVMEQy0AFw0

I don't think America can keep up with the discipline and execution of other countries militaries.

# ? May 2, 2024 10:11

Isentropy: Dec 12, 2010

genericnick posted:

Yeah, I guess that's one of the results of really fleecing the students for money. In all the small euro nations I know where tuition is still a minor part of university funding, the first few semesters of Physics and Math looks like Enemy at the Gates.

The Canadian engineering experience was more like "everyone realizing a lot of high schools just did social passing/were grade inflating". Statics, physics, math, and circuits were the "our objective is to fail a third of the class minimum" classes

On the topic of boats FF I looked up the old naval engineering professors at my uni and her title is now something like:

Irving Shipbuilding Company Naval Engineering Professor specializing in autonomous vehicles

Thread readers might remember Irving Shipbuilding as the company that doesn't want to keep skilled labour on because that's too expensive, tries to sue its own VP Engs when they leave if they're mean, can't actually build ships... It's basically a gift to the oligarchy that runs the Maritimes and probably Maine too

Isentropy has issued a correction as of 10:42 on May 2, 2024

# ? May 2, 2024 10:28

Orange Devil: Oct 1, 2010; Wullie's reign cannae smother the flames o' equality!

Trabisnikof posted:

here's the research: https://www.aei.org/wp-content/uplo...ding.pdf?x85095

they multiplied China's spending until it was much as the US's lol

also added in the People's Armed Police, because they're totally the military, duh. and the pension costs because its unfair that China funds their pensions through the Ministry of Civil Affairs.

lol they literally went "this is how many dollars it would cost the US to do what China does, so that's their real budget", which is hilarious in two ways:

1. it shows how much cheaper China gets poo poo done because they have so much less grift
2. it means China is building a military capacity rivalling the US

# ? May 2, 2024 10:54

Remulak: Jun 8, 2001; I can't count to four.; Yams Fan

Zeppelin Insanity posted:

I think a very, very good argument could be made that Nazis could have been stopped in Poland if the Soviets were allowed to fight them instead of being repeatedly told to gently caress off.

WTF Poland was (is) run by assholes but the country was invaded by the Nazis and Soviets and partitioned between them under the terms of the Molotov�Ribbentrop Pact. Is this a bit?

# ? May 2, 2024 11:45

genericnick: Dec 26, 2012

Remulak posted:

WTF Poland was (is) run by assholes but the country was invaded by the Nazis and Soviets and partitioned between them under the terms of the Molotov�Ribbentrop Pact. Is this a bit?

it's not

# ? May 2, 2024 11:51

Lin-Manuel Turtle: Jul 12, 2023

The Soviets wanted to defend Czechoslovakia from the Nazis with the assistance of Britain and France, but the Polish government said no, we won�t let you travel through our country to do that, and then when the Nazis invaded Czechoslovakia the Polish tagged along and got in on the action to grab a piece. The greedy hyena of Europe.

# ? May 2, 2024 11:52

Doktor Avalanche: Dec 30, 2008

Remulak posted:

WTF Poland was (is) run by assholes but the country was invaded by the Nazis and Soviets and partitioned between them under the terms of the Molotov�Ribbentrop Pact. Is this a bit?

just read the wiki article on M-R, it's surprisingly even-handed if I remember correctly

# ? May 2, 2024 11:59

gradenko_2000: Oct 5, 2010; HELL SERPENT; Lipstick Apathy

Remulak posted:

WTF Poland was (is) run by assholes but the country was invaded by the Nazis and Soviets and partitioned between them under the terms of the Molotov�Ribbentrop Pact. Is this a bit?

the Soviets signed the M-R Pact because Stalin was rebuffed by the Western Allies at every turn, and then signed their own deal-with-the-devil at Munich. As Zeppelin Insanity said, in some hypothetical where the West showed any kind of interest in working with the USSR, it's not unreasonable to assume that they would do so in a way that ends with the Soviets fighting Nazi Germany in 1939.

# ? May 2, 2024 12:37

Orange Devil: Oct 1, 2010; Wullie's reign cannae smother the flames o' equality!

Remulak posted:

WTF Poland was (is) run by assholes but the country was invaded by the Nazis and Soviets and partitioned between them under the terms of the Molotov�Ribbentrop Pact. Is this a bit?

It's historic fact, OP.

# ? May 2, 2024 12:42

Orange Devil: Oct 1, 2010; Wullie's reign cannae smother the flames o' equality!

Lin-Manuel Turtle posted:

The Soviets wanted to defend Czechoslovakia from the Nazis with the assistance of Britain and France, but the Polish government said no, we won�t let you travel through our country to do that, and then when the Nazis invaded Czechoslovakia the Polish tagged along and got in on the action to grab a piece. The greedy hyena of Europe.

Czechoslovakia was partioned between Germany, Poland, Hungary and a newly formed Slovak Republic German vassal state.

gradenko_2000 posted:

the Soviets signed the M-R Pact because Stalin was rebuffed by the Western Allies at every turn, and then signed their own deal-with-the-devil at Munich. As Zeppelin Insanity said, in some hypothetical where the West showed any kind of interest in working with the USSR, it's not unreasonable to assume that they would do so in a way that ends with the Soviets fighting Nazi Germany in 1939.

At which point there is zero chance the war goes on as long as it did because the strategic depth of Poland + the SU means Germany is never going to be able to rotate its armies away from the East and mass enough troops in the West to launch Fall Gelb. Even Fall Weserebung becomes iffy. So either they go off half-cocked in the West and don't manage the strategic breakthrough near Sedan outmaneuvring the British and French, or they stay in a defensive posture with the token forces they had and concentrate on the East. Either way France doesn't get knocked out of the war and Britain remains on the continent, meaning Germany is just insanely outnumbered from the word go.

A significantly shorter war also means a lot of the Holocaust could have been prevented, as the industrial murder in the camps didn't get going until 1942, and the Holocaust by bullets required Germany occupying vast parts of Eastern Europe and the SU, which is also iffy without the minor Axis countries (Romania, Hungary, Italy) involved and with the pressure of a constant two front war. Even if they move up the timeline on the camps, they occupy significantly less territory and thus Jewish and Roma population.

Long story short, anyone blaming the Soviets for how WW2 went should cast at least three times as much blame on the Western Allies and also Poland.

Orange Devil has issued a correction as of 12:52 on May 2, 2024

# ? May 2, 2024 12:44

Fell Mood: Jul 2, 2022; A terrible Fell look!

Also, and correct me please if I'm wrong, didn't the Soviets do less of taking Polish land in that treaty, and more of making Poland give back what they took from Ukraine in the Polish-Ukraine war of 1918? Maybe I'm misremembering something I'd read.

# ? May 2, 2024 13:39

gradenko_2000: Oct 5, 2010; HELL SERPENT; Lipstick Apathy

Fell Mood posted:

Also, and correct me please if I'm wrong, didn't the Soviets do less of taking Polish land in that treaty, and more of making Poland give back what they took from Ukraine in the Polish-Ukraine war of 1918? Maybe I'm misremembering something I'd read.

I had asked some version of this question two years ago and the answer is a bit complicated

# ? May 2, 2024 14:09

Officer Sandvich: Feb 14, 2010

https://www.npr.org/2024/05/02/1246636334/pentagon-military-healthcare

After downsizing health care for years, Pentagon says medical readiness was a casualty

quote:

...Now Rasmussen and other veteran medical officers warn that
U.S. military health care again needs a course correction. After a decade of downsizing, Defense Department officials also admit they need to rebuild the medical force and the general health of active duty troops. But restoring medical readiness to where it was during the last war, much less where is needs to be for the next one, is a by all accounts a herculean task.

[....]

Rasmussen deployed six times between 2005 and 2012. On his first tour to Iraq, he worked in tents and saw medics improvising � using cargo straps as tourniquets. On his last tour, in Afghanistan, he operated in a fully equipped hospital with new concrete floors and access to MRI and CT scans. Then the wars wound down. And Rasmussen felt some of the progress slide back.

"There were efforts to outsource ... beneficiary care from the military treatment facilities to civilian institutions, which emptied out and hollowed out storied military medical centers like Walter Reed," he says.

Even before the wars ended the Pentagon activated a plan to tame massive health care costs by pushing military medical care into the private sector, especially for family members.

The result was a sort of spiral. Military hospitals lost the minimum numbers of patients they needed to keep doctors in practice. The quality of military care suffered, and many clinicians left. Even more resigned during the pandemic, and Pentagon planners realized that the private health care sector they had hoped to lean on actually needed help itself, from the military. But the cuts kept going, says Rasmussen.

Pentagon officials even floated an idea to close the Uniform Services University, the military's medical school, which trains up military doctors and preserves medical advances, like those made during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. "I mean, why do we need a military medical academy?" Rasmussen jokes.

"They achieved the highest rate of survival from battlefield wounds in the history of warfare. They were able to save people that would have died in any prior conflict," says Dr. Art Kellerman, who served as dean of the Uniform Services University of the Health Sciences during the threats to shut it down.

Kellerman frames it as a national security priority. He says as much as a helmet or flak jacket, the success of U.S. military medicine gave troops confidence to rush into a firefight, knowing they would probably survive. U.S. allies joined the fight knowing a U.S. medevac would fly to the rescue within 30 minutes if they got blown up. What's more, Kellerman says, those in the fight believed they'd not just survive, but live well.

"They dramatically improved their ability to rehabilitate wounded warriors after being injured. And many of them were able to return to duty and others were able to return home to be with their families and to function for the rest of their careers. Some of them today are members of Congress," he says.

Kellerman says America needs that same ready medical force for any future conflict.

And the Pentagon now seems to agree.

A Defense Department internal memo obtained by NPR concluded that outsourcing didn't actually save money but did hurt readiness. The so-called "stabilization memo" directs the Pentagon to reverse course, to bring more medical care back to its hospitals on base and increase medical staff, both to keep America's standing army fit for duty and to make sure enough military doctors and nurses are trained up for a possible future war.

Military strategists caution that generals often try to refight their last war, but America's next war may be different. In Iraq and Afghanistan, the golden hour was possible because the U.S. had air superiority; the enemy had no planes or helicopters.

"Sooner or later, somewhere, we're not going to have air superiority. And I don't care if we think we are, we should plan for not having it," says Dr. Sean Murphy, who served 44 years and retired in 2021 as Air Force deputy surgeon general.

Murphy points to Ukraine, where two conventional armies suffer massive casualties being evacuated by ground.

Or even more extreme: a possible conflict with China around Taiwan.

"What we've realized when we start looking at a theater like the Pacific, and the distances and a peer-to-peer fight, there is no way we're going to get to the golden hour. So if we're not going to be able to get a surgeon or somebody to the golden hour, then what we have to do is ... to make everybody a medic," he says.

To do that he says, the Pentagon needs, urgently, to build back its ready medical force.

"The most important fighting system we have is the human system. It's not a plane or a ship or a tank," says Rasmussen. He says he saw that again and again when he served.

"And that human system is only optimized and cared for if there is a robust and expert military health system," he says. "I think degrading that risks our national security."

# ? May 2, 2024 16:52

Nix Panicus: Feb 25, 2007

My wife TA'd a course in statistics as a grad student and said that about half of college students could not understand the concept of conditional probability no matter how much time was spent on it

# ? May 2, 2024 17:27

Morbus: May 18, 2004

dead gay comedy forums posted:

What truly matters is the why of this type of analysis being done in the first place instead of a material comparison of productive forces.

oh that part's easy, *taps thread title*

# ? May 2, 2024 20:00

Kitfox88: Aug 21, 2007; Anybody lose their glasses?

Nix Panicus posted:

My wife TA'd a course in statistics as a grad student and said that about half of college students could not understand the concept of conditional probability no matter how much time was spent on it

is this that fucker with the door goats? math is confusing to me.

# ? May 2, 2024 20:14

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

just remember that you should always switch the door and you'll be fine

# ? May 2, 2024 20:19

The Oldest Man: Jul 28, 2003

I found it easier to understand if you scale it up. Imagine there's a hundred doors and you pick one at random, then they eliminate 98 wrong doors. They just handed you a lot of information about the likelihood that the other unpicked door does not have a goat behind it.

# ? May 2, 2024 20:48

Cerebral Bore: Apr 21, 2010; Fun Shoe

how it really works is that when you first pick a door you have a 1/3 chance of being right and a 2/3 chance of being wrong, and then monty hall has to open a door with a goat behind it

this means that if you picked a door with a goat behind it then monty has no choice but to open the other door with a goat behind it, which means that in the 2/3 of cases where you picked wrong switching doors will guarantee that you get the car

# ? May 2, 2024 20:56

fits my needs: Jan 1, 2011; Grimey Drawer

https://x.com/MilitaryTimes/status/1786112432147980304

# ? May 2, 2024 21:02

busalover: Sep 12, 2020

fits my needs posted:

https://x.com/MilitaryTimes/status/1786112432147980304

The ad starts with a John Steinbeck quote

lol

# ? May 2, 2024 21:11

jetz0r: May 10, 2003; Tomorrow, our nation will sit on the throne of the world. This is not a figment of the imagination, but a fact. Tomorrow we will lead the world, Allah willing.

Cerebral Bore posted:

how it really works is that when you first pick a door you have a 1/3 chance of being right and a 2/3 chance of being wrong, and then monty hall has to open a door with a goat behind it

this means that if you picked a door with a goat behind it then monty has no choice but to open the other door with a goat behind it, which means that in the 2/3 of cases where you picked wrong switching doors will guarantee that you get the car

the goats problem is also small enough that you can brute force it on one page of paper, using little drawings of goats.

# ? May 2, 2024 21:11

BearsBearsBears: Aug 4, 2022

You know they didn't actually let you keep the goat if you picked the wrong door? That's pretty hosed up.

# ? May 2, 2024 23:11

StashAugustine: Mar 24, 2013; Do not trust in hope- it will betray you! Only faith and hatred sustain.

BearsBearsBears posted:

You know they didn't actually let you keep the goat if you picked the wrong door? That's pretty hosed up.

There goes all my math about your odds of rescuing your kidnapped goat

# ? May 2, 2024 23:19

palindrome: Feb 3, 2020

I watched a video about this price is right superfan guy from the audience that caused trouble by memorizing the exact prices of things. I believe he said they'd hand you $100 bills on the show, but then at the commercial they'd take the money back and you'd get a voucher or promise that they'd send you a check for the equivalent amount several weeks later assuming you sign the terms and conditions form. That's some bullshit right there, imagine winning a few hundred bucks and not being able to spend it later that night.

# ? May 2, 2024 23:20

JAY ZERO SUM GAME: Oct 18, 2005; Walter.
I know you know how to do this.
Get up.

yeah, gotta make sure you get a W-2G

# ? May 3, 2024 01:01

Kitfox88: Aug 21, 2007; Anybody lose their glasses?

Cerebral Bore posted:

how it really works is that when you first pick a door you have a 1/3 chance of being right and a 2/3 chance of being wrong, and then monty hall has to open a door with a goat behind it

this means that if you picked a door with a goat behind it then monty has no choice but to open the other door with a goat behind it, which means that in the 2/3 of cases where you picked wrong switching doors will guarantee that you get the car

after literal years of people trying to explain this poo poo to me this is what made it click, thank you

# ? May 3, 2024 01:44

stephenthinkpad: Jan 2, 2020

fits my needs posted:

https://x.com/MilitaryTimes/status/1786112432147980304

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6hu83yVMlU

What the gently caress is this poo poo. Is this for hacker nerds or more sinister poo poo? Using AI to kill brown people for IDF?

# ? May 3, 2024 02:01

OhFunny: Jun 26, 2013; EXTREMELY PISSED AT THE DNC

Exclusive: Russian troops enter base housing US military in Niger, US official says

quote:

WASHINGTON, May 2 (Reuters) - Russian military personnel have entered an air base in Niger that is hosting U.S. troops, a senior U.S. defense official told Reuters, a move that follows a decision by Niger's junta to expel U.S. forces from the country.

The military officers ruling the West African nation have told the U.S. to withdraw its nearly 1,000 military personnel from the country, which until a coup last year had been a key partner for Washington's fight against insurgents who have killed thousands of people and displaced millions more.

A senior U.S. defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Russian forces were not mingling with U.S. troops but were using a separate hanger at Airbase 101, which is next to Diori Hamani International Airport in Niamey, Niger's capital.

US forces now (unwilling) sharing the base with Russians.

# ? May 3, 2024 02:22

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# ? May 23, 2024 18:22

jetz0r: May 10, 2003; Tomorrow, our nation will sit on the throne of the world. This is not a figment of the imagination, but a fact. Tomorrow we will lead the world, Allah willing.

OhFunny posted:

Exclusive: Russian troops enter base housing US military in Niger, US official says

US forces now (unwilling) sharing the base with Russians.

Wasn't this a 80s sitcom?

# ? May 3, 2024 02:37

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > C-SPAM > The US will lose WW3

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