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Small White Dragon posted:What is the state of Independent Russian media? To be honest, I thought there wasn't really any left. The state controls all broadcast television and just about all print media. Independent media exists, but it is not very relevant for reaching out to the masses, especially the older generations who prefer TV. And even the last of the Mohicans have largely fled the country for their safety. That said, many of them still do valuable journalistic work in very challenging conditions.
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Oct 12, 2022 05:56
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Mr. Fall Down Terror posted:digging fighting positions in concealment is normal, if you're short on time. breaking out the trencher and putting it behind a bunch of prepared vehicle obstacles in a field is something you do when you're pretty much out of time, or you're trying to create a position for a bunch of soldiers who can't really be trusted to prepare their own defensive positions due to inexperience. or if you think you're going to have to square off against a mechanized force and the only thing you have to prevent that is a bunch of leg infantry Also occasionally you may want to dig simple ditches, so that rainwater and groundwater doesn't flood the actual trenches so much. Not saying that this is the case here.
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Oct 12, 2022 19:04
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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. To be clear, it's not okay to unannouncedly start bombing any random parts of enemy infrastructure in dual military/civilian use. There should be a clear warning beforehand so that people can avoid danger. But on the other hand, I'm pretty sure that Ukraine has issued a warning before. And it's also obvious that a civilian crew repairing a military target like a bridge is not protected. Nenonen fucked around with this message at 21:15 on Oct 12, 2022 |
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Oct 12, 2022 21:09
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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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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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I thought that unboxing videos went out of fashion already.
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Oct 13, 2022 11:18
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Charlz Guybon posted:This is the equivalent of of WWI reconnaissance pilots shooting at each other with revolvers in 1914. Actually, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyotr_Nesterov
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Oct 13, 2022 15:28
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Deteriorata posted:The average high temperature in Kherson in January is 34°F, so I would expect it would. The flowing water will work against it, so it might be patchy or thin in places. Probably solid enough to walk on, but I doubt cars or trucks would make it. That's not nearly enough to freeze a major river. For a lake to freeze sufficiently that I would risk it, I would first want a period of at least one week of -20C (-4F) temperatures every night. But anywhere with even a slight current, nnnn-nope, especially a big river like Dnipro can be treacherous and vicinity to sea also evens out the extreme temperatures a bit. For reference, the small Aura river in southern Finland freezes just about every winter, but only seldom does it get so solid that people dare to go walking on it because you can't really tell where the ice is thick enough to carry you and where your foot will go through and whether there is another layer of ice under or just water all the way down.
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Oct 13, 2022 21:41
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Tuna-Fish posted:I don't think Ukraine has any need to do that. Anyone who lives in the Antonivka suburb should probably get out while the getting is good, but once Ukraine captures that there is no point in actually fighting for the city itself. Ah yes, just capture the victory flag and the garrison will automatically capitulate. Bing bang bong.
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Oct 14, 2022 08:46
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Regardless of what you feel about Crimean people's wishes for independence, military annexations are illegal, full stop. Russia has no right to annex Crimea or any other part of Ukraine and Ukraine has every right to take Crime back by force if she has to. Crimea's right to self-determination has nothing to do with it.
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Oct 14, 2022 21:26
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NeatHeteroDude posted:This may not be relevant here, but because someone mentioned russian influence in the Brexit referendum, I'm interested: Since the war started, the west has shut many of their easy channels, for example you can't watch RT in as many places now. The events have also been unifying, so there's no easy way for Russian trolls and shills to make their point. This doesn't mean though that Russian propaganda has been totally unsuccessful globally. In large parts of the world people are either understanding for Russian goals or indifferent. But then, I don't think most people I meet daily have strong opinions about Azeri-Armenian or Indo-Pakistani conflicts because they barely know that those countries exist. And then we have Hungary, a member of EU and NATO that is absolutely drooling for gas from Putin. Russia doesn't even need propaganda in Hungary because Orban does it for them.
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Oct 14, 2022 22:00
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Cicero posted:The problem with saying things like this Besides that, Sevastopol was a huge Russian naval base inside Ukraine, so any polls have to be viewed through the prism of "did people speculate in their responses if the city would just die economically if Russia eventually withdrew" as well as "did Russia spend hundreds of millions of rubles to influence the public opinion to be favourable to Russia". The answer is "yes" to both, probably.
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Oct 14, 2022 22:06
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spankmeister posted:Weird flex by Sweden imo. They don't want to tell what anti-submarine surveillance capabilities they have/don't have because it would eventually end in Russian hands.
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Oct 15, 2022 10:43
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FishBulbia posted:I guess so, that's how they accomplished the advances in the first place. That said, Ukraine can spare the manpower and Russia cannot. It's daring to say that they can spare it, after all Ukrainians too have lost many of their veterans and now that they are on the offensive, there is a pressing need for reserves so that same units don't have to be in front for weeks without rest. But having mostly fresh recruits undergoing training is probably enough backup on that front. Russia can't attack with freshly mobilised troops so if they want to move experienced mechanized units there instead of say Kherson, good. Ukraine controls the interior lines so it's easy for them to move reserves from one sector to another if necessary. For Russia the distance is far longer. I'm skeptical though about these rumours, they may well be intentionally generated by Russia.
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Oct 15, 2022 18:42
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Ynglaur posted:I hope this isn't veering into Clancychat and if it is I'll demur, but I'm genuinely curious: if Belarus becomes an active belligerent, does that change the political situation enough so that e.g. Poland or another country might use direct military action against Belarus? I just don't know enough about Eastern European political norms. What would Poland, Lithuania or Latvia actually gain from starting a war in which NATO wouldn't be helping them? Or from letting a third country from doing so through their territory?
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Oct 15, 2022 23:53
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OddObserver posted:Also they have yet another election coming up, don't they? Yes, in November. It seems unlikely that the caretaker government will make any big moves in this regard, but I have little doubt that Israel will look into ways of confronting Iran by proxy in Ukraine just like they do everywhere.
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Oct 16, 2022 14:57
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saratoga posted:When people talk about long range missiles (with the exception of maybe very specialized ones to target Crimea or large bridges) they're really saying that they want to take the fight into Russia. That doesn't seem like a sound plan compared to just winning the war they have. Taking the fight into Russia would be beneficial to Ukraine, in the sense that it's better to destroy Russian airfields, missile launchers and such before they fire long range missiles to kill Ukrainians. When Russia invaded Ukraine and went on bombing Ukrainian cities with weapon systems stationed in Russia, it gave Ukraine the permission to hit them back.
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Oct 16, 2022 19:59
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spankmeister posted:https://twitter.com/kyivindependent/status/1581671085061251073 He's a minister from a minor party (Labor) in the caretaker government until the election. Currently Labor has seven seats in Knesset (out of 120), and Shai did not even go through in the last election. A caretaker government is not going to make huge shifts in foreign policy. However a politician preparing for elections next month can make huge shifts in outcomes if he thinks it might get him elected. Israeli politics are really byzantine, I would be wary of drawing conclusions from a single tweet unless it was put into context by an Israel specialist.
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Oct 16, 2022 21:57
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spankmeister posted:You seem to be more knowledgeable about Israeli politics than I am, but don't you agree that it's significant for the minister of diaspora affairs to comment on this rather than say the minister of defense or foreign affairs? I'm neither knowledgeable about Israel, nor do I agree that it is significant. It would be significant if the government of Israel said that they will provide weapons to Ukraine. A minor minister from a minor party at the end of his term making a tweet is nothing noteworthy in itself. If they win big, then sure! But if Netanyahu wins and this guy stays out of Knesset??
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Oct 16, 2022 23:05
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mobby_6kl posted:Some indication that Hungary is gonna ratify Sweden and Finland. Dunno how reliable of a source someone from the Hungarian "Party of European Socialists" is, considering it's Orban's party that has all the power. Hopefully true though. This would leave only Turkey. PES is not a Hungarian party, it's European like it says in the name. It's part of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats which is the second largest block in the European Parliament. Heinäluoma is also a member. So it's not the most reliable source. Maybe, who knows, but it's entirely up to Fidesz.
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Oct 17, 2022 11:12
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Mr. Apollo posted:The Iranian drones seem more like the WW2 German V1 Buzzbombs where they're programmed with a preset course and then released and there's no way to change it or control them once they're released. Not really, V-1's were just given a direction and flight time after which they would crash down and explode. Germans never knew what they would hit, if anything, unless they did a recon flight over London. These loitering munitions require the operator to control them until they see a target they want to hit. After it's locked to a target the drone goes into automatic mode to make radio jamming ineffective.
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Oct 17, 2022 14:05
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Owling Howl posted:The main problem with the Iranian drones is that they are cheap and plentiful. Practcally just an MC engine strapped to a fiberglass fuselage and some electronics for control. They seem to exploit a gap in AA capabilities that haven't been developed to deal with that type of threat. AA has been focused on fast and expensive missiles or planes - not swarms of aerial mopeds. It's not sustainable to shoot down a $5.000 drone with a $100.000 missile especially if you can produce the drones faster than the AA missiles. You're kinda hosed whether you shoot it down or not. There's a possible solution, and it's nothing high end - just place anti-drone posts with heavy machine guns and listening posts around cities and other targets like it's 1940 again. The drones are not particularly fast and a hit from a 12.7mm DShK is going to break it up real good. The issue is that you need people to keep their eyes and ears open for them all day long, but you could quickly train auxiliary air defense troops without much trouble and no need to tie front soldiers down to do it. At least it would be more effective than policemen opening fire with AK's.
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Oct 17, 2022 18:05
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This just in: the special operation will be over by  also at least Leningrad oblast and Saint Petersburg have cancelled the New Year's celebrations, citing that the funds will be used to buy gear for troops.  apparently Kremlin has not decided if this is wise...https://t.me/lenobladminka/3754 https://www.fontanka.ru/2022/10/07/71717540/ https://yle.fi/uutiset/3-12662472
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Oct 19, 2022 12:35
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Randarkman posted:One would assume that Hezbollah, Iran's proxy Shi'ite militias, the IRGC officers, what still passed for the SAA and so on also had something to do with that. Not saying that this dude, Russian aircraft and diplomatic support weren't significant but there's a tendency among many overinflate the singular importance of Russia in the Syrian Civil War. Nevertheless it can be said that the Russian mission in Syria was rather successful. But for Russia it was a small affair that was easy to supply, against an enemy with no AA. It's like if I had a reputation of breaking into a kindergarten where I suckerpunched a nanny and then gave wedgies to a bunch of 5-year olds, after which the local Hell's Angels chapter approached me and asked if I would like to lead their attack on a MS-13 club house.
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Oct 19, 2022 15:10
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VSOKUL girl posted:no no. previously the DNR and LNR were under a de facto, homegrown state of martial law under a nascent and largely unrecognized police state. now they're in an official state of martial law under a well-established police state.it's premium brand martial law VSOPS - Vladimir's Superior Oligarch Police State
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Oct 20, 2022 08:13
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A big flaming stink posted:Their presence has been all but assured by the US's repeated hostility and attacks on their country. It's funny that you bring up the nuclear deal when it was Russia standing in the way of renewing the deal in March because it would have allowed Iranian oil back to global market, tanking the high prices and thus Russian war economy! Such a great ally, that Russia 
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Oct 21, 2022 10:20
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Payndz posted:I'm no expert, but it seems to me that unless each one of those little Toblerone chunks has a big-rear end mine underneath it, one shot from an advancing tank's main gun should clear a wide enough path for armour to get through, then the following infantry can just drag the rest out of the way. Lol,no it wouldn't but a tank could just drive over them anyway, carefully. But the tank can't be sure that there aren't anti-tank mines around it. And anyone going to check can't be sure that there aren't anti-personnel mines as well. And even if there are no such things, it will slow down the advance enough for artillery to start pounding the area. And even if that doesn't stop them, it will channel the supply trucks, and so on ad infinitum... So it's some kind of obstacle. Depends on other things if it actually matters.
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Oct 22, 2022 00:42
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Chalks posted:Some blurry footage clearly showing the crash as it happened There's no way to tell, as Russian military air accidents are far from rare even in more peaceful times. Looking at the list, 2015 seems to have been a particularly bad year. But it is very interesting that there's two incidents of a fighter colliding in a populated area in such short time. It might tell something about the cause - something so unexpected and so catastrophic that the pilot couldn't do anything to alter course. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Russian_military_accidents
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Oct 23, 2022 12:35
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silhouetted aircraft hitting the ground
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Yeah, it seems like the guy whose job is to say entertainingly outrageous in a  way things got too outrageous and not entertaining for the corporation. Fortunately there's no shortage of Z clowns who are ready to shoot their mouths on television for a good compensation. Discendo Vox posted:New thread title. It would be a wonderful title too, as the forum software does not support special characters in thread titles! Nenonen fucked around with this message at 07:36 on Oct 24, 2022 |
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Oct 24, 2022 07:31
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Feliday Melody posted:Honestly, I'm not even sure if the PM has the power to negotiate handing over those journalists to Turkey. He certainly wants to. Either Turkey has the legal right or they don't. Ministers can't decide that on their own without putting legislation through parliament. Even the riksdag can't really do that without casting Sweden in the same pariah category as Hungary and Poland in EU. And while Ulf is determined to end feminist foreign policy I'm not sure if that's what he really wants.
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Oct 24, 2022 08:55
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alex314 posted:I don't think I saw this in the thread: It reads more like exporting to shady shell companies set up to import them to Russia, which doesn't sound too unusual for the market of defence goods. Why, I didn't know that Dimitri's Honest Previously Owned Helicopter Emporium in Crete was really owned by a Russian oligarch who does trade with North Korea and Eritrea!
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Oct 24, 2022 10:26
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Family Values posted:Why? At least for the US, Russia's war doesn't seem to be causing any difficulty. The loss of Russian gas is perhaps difficult in the short term for Europe, but I hope they aren't stupid enough to get hooked on it a second time, ceasefire or no. Cracks in the Atlantic coalition aren't really in the US' best interests...
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Oct 25, 2022 07:17
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Scaramouche posted:Isn't having nearly 500k conscripts kind of a bad idea for Russia right now? They're going to have to feed and pay those guys (yes, poorly, but it still adds up), and have them not contributing to the economy, and winter is here which I assume slows down operations. An operational lull would be the best time to train new troops and rotate worn out units. Russian economy is not exactly in shortage of labour right now, lots of factories are closed because of lack of components.
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Oct 25, 2022 08:17
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So y'all saying that Trump would be the perfect speaker?
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Oct 25, 2022 14:15
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Reportedly Wagner is trying to recruit former Afghan special forces to fight for Russia. I have long wondered if real mercenary companies will make a return. NATO doesn't want to get directly involved in the war, but a hypothetical Afghan merc company wouldn't represent NATO even if they were paid by the west... https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/10/25/afghanistan-russia-ukraine-military-recruitment-putin-taliban/?tpcc=recirc_latest062921 quote:Members of Afghanistan’s elite National Army Commando Corps, who were abandoned by the United States and Western allies when the country fell to the Taliban last year, say they are being contacted with offers to join the Russian military to fight in Ukraine. Multiple Afghan military and security sources say the U.S.-trained light infantry force, which fought alongside U.S. and other allied special forces for almost 20 years, could make the difference Russia needs on the Ukrainian battlefield.
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Oct 26, 2022 13:15
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https://mobile.twitter.com/AricToler/status/1584901381374328838 At this point if I was someone born in South America living in a NATO country and had regular contact with army or security organisations, I would start feeling a need to emphasize that I'm not a Russian mole. Wearing a 'not a Russian undercover agent' shirt with fresh guacamole stains should solve that.
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Oct 26, 2022 13:48
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SirFozzie posted:I'd add that it gives insight to Russia propaganda: They can't be telling folks "Oh, the war is going swimmingly" if the TV news is full of pictures of human interest stories of brave russian soldiers suffering in the hospital. Kinda like that thing from the Naked Gun series where Leslie Nielsen told folks to stay calm, there's nothing to worry about (in front of a exploded burning building) I think the much simpler explanation is that they used Belarus as staging area for the attack on Kyiv, so they brought their casualties there because it was the nearest thing with hospital care and along the road. There was plenty of reporting about Russian casualties being taken to Russian hospitals in the regions bordering Ukraine, too.
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Oct 26, 2022 15:49
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Athas posted:I understand why mercenary companies can be convenient and how Wagner has been a useful tool for Russian foreign policy. But when fighting full-fledged wars, as the invasion of Ukraine has turned into, are they really useful anymore? Prolonged warfare between modern nations seem to require large citizen armies, and I don't see how mercenary companies are a useful part of that calculus, unless they also function as foreign legions and thus increase the available manpower pool. I understand that Wagner is also a political player, but at this point in the war, is it really contributing anything useful in a military sense that the regular Russian forces couldn't do? Wagner seems to be the mechanism by which prisoners are recruited for the war, but it's not clear to me whether they show up in useful numbers, or whether the regular army couldn't just raise penal battalions as well. Wagner's penal battalions are not specialists of any form of warfare (even to the standards of average Wagner mercs). Historically mercs were highly trained and experienced. The highest wages were paid for unique specialists who could for example cast a cannon that would bring down the strongest of walls. For example, one of the hitches in providing western air equipment for Ukraine has been that it takes a while to certify pilots just to fly a new thing, then some more to make sure that they know the expensive equipment well enough to come back alive from a combat mission. But what if a PMC could provide a list of airmen that know the ins and outs of e.g. F-16 and are willing to either provide additional training and technical support or even fly missions themselves? It's not something that is going to happen in an instant, but if more governments get the feeling that they need more 'flexibility' in fighting proxy wars... Nenonen fucked around with this message at 21:59 on Oct 26, 2022 |
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Oct 26, 2022 21:57
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Groda posted:So? Go back there with a dosimeter and a shovel and dig a hole in ground.
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Oct 27, 2022 11:08
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jeffreyw posted:So its just your typical rechanvist ramblings from a fascist. Basically loading grievances into a shotgun and seeing if anything hits. I just want to know if he mentioned "tofu-eating wokerati", that's all.
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Oct 27, 2022 15:57
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