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To be fair, the CIA/NSA have missed most major events (Fall of berlin wall, invasion of kuwait, 9/11, etc) so its not surprising that they also missed this poo poo too.
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Mar 24, 2014 20:33
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Mortabis posted:Whether we saw it coming or not, it doesn't seem like anyone's actually willing to do anything meaningful about it anyway. There are what, 12 people under sanctions now? Whatever will Putin do. He's not even one of them. As far as I can tell "sanctions" amounts to the same thing as sticking a "Free Tibet" bumper sticker on your car. It's actually more like ~20 and a bank. The bank is the critical one, since overnight all the client's VISAs stopped working and its the real threat that we could economically destroy them without using a single weapon.
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Mar 25, 2014 02:13
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friend of the family DEATH TURBO posted:nope, but apparently ukraine thought it did and demolished their military cause they thought the us/uk would totally bail them out if they got invaded You really think a few more helicopters or tanks would have done anything to stop Putin?
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Mar 26, 2014 21:38
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friend of the family DEATH TURBO posted:what? ukraine let their military decay into basically nothing from a pretty sizeable one because they interpreted the budapest memorandum to mean that the us/uk would step in and help them fight off an invasion if it happened Or maybe instead of it being because Ukraine is foolish and naive it is because they are poor as poo poo with weak civil institutions? Thus, they don't have enough money for a large military and all the kickbacks. Besides, even if they somehow kept their Soviet Union era force sizes, do you think they would have been able to stop what the Russians did (which remember, occurred right after revolution in Ukraine)? Or is your argument that Yanukovych would have been able to maintain power with a larger military more reliant on Russia (since building your own stuff costs a lot more than buying Russian made goods)? Booblord Zagats posted:So wait, you're tellin me we need Cossacks in Austin and San Francisco? Obviously. Trabisnikof fucked around with this message at 17:01 on Mar 27, 2014 |
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Mar 27, 2014 16:56
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Snowdens Secret posted:I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you, but Russia's military is also a pale shadow of its Cold War prime. And Ukraine got a disproportionate share of Soviet armor and shipbuilding industry, and a good chunk of aerospace. I agree completely that this is a wake up call across Europe, I just think Ukraine probably has a few more legitimate excuses than EU nations that can afford a military. Which is a larger part of the problem as the EU tries to act jointly as a superpower but individually nations don't want the costs associated with the title.
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Mar 27, 2014 17:33
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Mortabis posted:Can EU nations actually afford more military spending? Many of them are even more broke than we are for a lot of the same reasons. They already have insanely high taxes (40%+ of GDP, compared to our ~25%) and are still running deficits because of generous entitlements. Compared to Ukraine? Definitely. Realize that combined France, UK, Germany and Italy together spend 2x as much on military spending as Russia does. But as we know well in the US, there's a difference between spending a bunch of money on a military and spending it well. People in the old thread discussed the EU is no where near a unified military command and thus countries replicate functions and spend money redundantly. But they want the ability to act collectively as a superpower, yet they can't back up their diplomacy collectively. So I tend to give Ukraine some slack for being a poor country with weak institutions but the EU doesn't get that excuse.
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Mar 27, 2014 19:13
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Mad Dragon posted:Are they trying to one-up the Navy? http://www.military.com/daily-news/2014/02/05/navy-discovers-cheating-on-nuclear-reactor-tests.html posted:Richardson said those who compromised tests numbered fewer than 20, but he declined to state how many were suspected of being involved as an investigation continues. http://bigstory.ap.org/article/commanders-fired-nuke-missile-cheating-scandal posted:A total of 100 missile launch crew members at Malmstrom were identified as potentially involved in the cheating, but nine were cleared by investigators So far 91 - 20 with the Air Force taking a soaring lead! Who will score next is anyone's guess!
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Mar 27, 2014 22:16
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Frosted Flake posted:I wouldn't want to be a Ukrainian conscript right now. What would it feel like to hear an armoured division turning over their engines in the middle of the night? Especially since Ukraine just got rid of conscription....
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Mar 28, 2014 19:07
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Snowdens Secret posted:Actually I'm linking those survey results directly because they have other gems: Well, it is an online poll so take it with a grain of salt, but those are getting more and more accurate. Re: Turkey, I think this chart is also interesting as it reminds me of a lot of issues in America where Americans don't actually understand what they are agreeing to.
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Apr 2, 2014 16:57
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gfanikf posted:Well they agree with the principle, it's just that for certain countries, Americans, feel that they can also get hosed. The wording of the question actually asked makes it a little less ambiguous that is asking about any NATO member (which is why you should never trust polls that don't release questions and numbers of answers). quote:As a member of the NATO alliance, an attack on one of the NATO members is considered to be an attack on the U.S. and the U.S. is obligated to come to the defense of the NATO member that has been attacked. Do you think the U.S. should maintain it’s commitment to defend NATO allies when attacked or is this no longer necessary?
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Apr 2, 2014 17:15
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Snowdens Secret posted:There were apparently other subquestions like "Would you support defending Great Britain against attack" getting quite a bit more support than "Would you support defending Great Britain against attack by Russia." How is the majority of Americans approving of maintaining our treaty obligations a failure of public opinion? This country has always had an isolationist streak. Also the way the survey was conducted, the respondents were asked about NATO last and none of the other questions mention NATO in them. Likely people didn't realize that the countries they wouldn't want to defend are actually in NATO (I mean, Turkey is hardly Northern nor Atlantic). Remember, we have poor geographic literacy here.
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Apr 2, 2014 17:26
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Snowdens Secret posted:Look at the numbers again, majority support is only among ages 45 and up. Or roughly the people who reached draft age before the Wall fell. I think that's a pretty telling line. Uh...no? Majority support is amongst 18-29 year olds @ 58%, only drops to 48% amongst 30-44 year olds. 
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Apr 2, 2014 17:56
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Snowdens Secret posted:You're right, I was looking at the Britain numbers on my phone thinking they were the NATO ones. My mistake. Which honestly I kinda find hilarious that people wouldn't be in favor of defending Britain from Russia.
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Apr 2, 2014 18:01
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Booblord Zagats posted:Eh, we might let Mexico fall if it were to someone we could negotiate it with Where else would we get our cheap labor and sell our extra guns?
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Apr 2, 2014 19:36
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anne frank fanfic posted:If anything itd be the opposite and youd be forced to draw your weapons only from the training centers and kuwait. There is 0% chance of any sort of "gun restriction" occurring. People are already arguing for arming everyone on base at all times.
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Apr 3, 2014 14:47
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friend of the family DEATH TURBO posted:wait are you even a vet? there's a 0% chance of anyone extra getting armed despite what anyone's clamoring for I agree completely nothing is going to happen.
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Apr 3, 2014 15:43
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