Gurgeh

13 hours ago, DCSaints_fan said:

 

Only two of their carriers are currently active.   Third one is supposed to come online sometime later this year.  At any given time, generally only one is active, though they could press the second into service (the USN uses the same)    

 

These are all diesel designs from the 1970s.

 

The oldest is the Liaoning.  It is an old Soviet conversion.  It is not even as good as the Kittyhawk, which earned an interesting nickname from sailors and was recently put into mothballs when the Gerald Ford class came online

 

It is true that their capabilities do extend to thousands of km, and they will patrol the South/Central Pacific.  But they haven't ventured out much further than that.

 

Part of that is bases,  it is mostly the same reason the US can patrol of the world.  Hence the trying to rectify that with the base in Djibouti and agreement with Thailand, and the Solomon Islands.

 

But, correct me if I'm wrong, you just don't see them venturing that far from the Chinese coast.

 

If they really wanted to send a message, they would send a carrier group international waters around Hawaii in a "freedom of navigation" exercise. 

Yes, they are still in the learning phase about carrier operations, but you can see progress they are making. They are due to announce their fourth carrier soon, and it'll be interesting to see if it's the same as the third, or another step past that, maybe a nuclear powered vessel.

China does want to reduce and remove US influence around the world, but their focus is Taiwan and they are constructing their forces to that purpose. They don't need to park a carrier group off the Pacific coast to isolate Taiwan, they don't want a Pearl Harbor. They just want to cut Taiwan off from the rest of the world and take it by force as fast as possible. It doesn't really matter to them if Taiwan is wrecked in the process, the Chinese will have it rebuilt inside a decade. And to dictatorships, politics always triumph over economics so whatever the economic cost, it will be worth it  because the leader has decreed the island will be taken and the leader can never be seen to be wrong.

Coincidentally, we just had this speech from the Chinese defense minister. Yes, this reads as the usual bluster, but what happened before Ukraine was invaded should teach us that what sounds like reckless crazy talk to us can be a deadly serious statement of intent:

China’s defence chief repeats threat of force against Taiwanese independence | Taiwan | The Guardian

"Speaking at the Shangri-La Dialogue conference in Singapore on Sunday, Dong said Taiwan was the “core of core issues” for China. He accused Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive party of incrementally pursuing separatism and working to erase Chinese identity.

“They [‘separatists’] will be nailed to the pillar of shame in history,” he said. “The Chinese People’s Liberation Army has always been an indestructible and powerful force in defence of the unification of the motherland, and it will act resolutely and forcefully at all times to curb the independence of Taiwan and to ensure that it never succeeds in its attempts. Whoever dares to split Taiwan from China will be crushed to pieces and suffer his own destruction.”

"..After his speech, Dong was asked several questions by delegates but remained preoccupied with Taiwan and had to be prompted by the moderator to address other issues. He accused foreign powers of interfering in “domestic issues” and “emboldening Taiwan separatists”. “We’re very confident in our capability to deter Taiwan independence.”

23 minutes ago, DCSaints_fan said:

Yes China's navy is mostly coastal.  95% of the navy doen't sail more than ~1000 km outside of China.

 

Recently there have been attempts to rectify that by securing bases in the Pacific and Indian Ocean, such as Djibouti and Thailand.   But you're still talking mostly talking about a brown water navy.  As opposed to the US which is the exact opposite - nearly all of our vessels are designed to sail anywhere in the world.

 

In the event of a conflict with the US, China's coasts are going to be flooded with active sonar.   US subs won't get within 100 km of China's coast.   But they do have pretty long range weapons now so it won't matter all that much.

 

And China is vulnerable on imports/exports, especially oil from the Middle East.  Somewhat paradoxically, the US Navy keeping the oceans free for global trade has been a massive boon for China.  They can't protect their merchants once they reach the Indian Ocean, if the USN would have to go that far.  Of course, they could use a "shadow fleet" like Russia is doing and ships can simply lie about where they are headed, so there would be some political risk at the USN enforcing a naval blockade beyond the immediate approaches to China.

This is true, but for the immediate future China is focused on Taiwan and the South China Sea. Taiwan is about 100 miles off the Chinese coast; the "conflict area" for the South China Sea is further out but obviously not that far from the coast. China doesn't need a global navy to achieve it's immediate goals. Their version of the dear leader has decreed the navy should be prepared to invade Taiwan by 2027, so they have 3 more years of shipbuilding to go, and lots of training.

2 minutes ago, PokerPacker said:

What, is China's navy all LCS?

Three aircraft carriers, 58 destroyers, 54 frigates, 75 corvettes, 79 submarines, of various ages and capabilities (e.g. the type 055 destroyers look formidable and are definitely not limited to the coast, while the type 052Bs look obsolete). Plus a lot of smaller ships (missile boats, landing craft, etc.). 

19 hours ago, tshile said:

It would seem to me that if anything were significantly more advanced technology wise since then. 
 

Unless we’ve made a dramatic shift in tactics (possible, not like they’d tell us) or our technology doesn’t work or we’ve since introduced rampant corruption… I don’t know why anyone would assume we’re not significantly improved, much less worse off. 
 

We’ve accomplished some pretty impressive **** over recent history, and that’s just what’s public knowledge. I’m just not sure where this idea that our military is “untested” comes from, much less the idea that we aren’t as good as we think we are. 
 

Where we’ve failed is in our goals - things like spreading democracy and winning hearts & minds and thinking we’ll install a democracy therefore we don’t want to destroy infrastructure. 
 

But matches up 1 on 1 with another country? Chinas made some interesting tech advances for over the horizon defense capabilities but otherwise the only thing people could have on us is sheer numbers of people and given how surgical and systematic we are with destroying defense, communications, and supply infrastructure… and that we have two large oceans surrounding us… I don’t think sheer numbers helps anyone unless we’re invading them. 

Something to remember is that in general Ukraine isn't getting the latest in Western technology, it's getting the previous generation, the stuff that was going to be sold off, stored or scrapped. For NATO armies it's been a significant boost, all the old stuff handed over to Ukraine is now being replaced with better gear.

From what I've read, the Russians have ramped up their production of equipment to what you might call "break even". They can just about replace each tank or IFV that the Ukrainians destroy. However, the replacements are a mix of refurbished old tanks (of which they have an effectively unlimited supply) and pretty modern tanks (limited by what Western tech the Russians can get their hands on, or replace with Chinese gear). Every vehicle Ukraine gets on the other hand is an upgrade to what they had; even their best tanks were a generation behind the ones Russia started the war with.

It's important to view the equipment we've given Ukraine objectively; we tend to assume our stuff is the best and the Russian gear is outdated and inferior, and that just isn't always true. The Russians have known for decades that they cannot match NATO airpower in the skies, they simply don't have the money to develop such high tech aircraft. So instead they took the cheaper route of developing highly effective AA systems and missiles - and they are effective, to the point where they can now jam HIMARS systems. The Russians are good at jamming and shooting down aircraft. The F-16s we're giving Ukraine will help even things out, but let's not think they aren't going to get shot down.

China is a different problem. Russia is a land power with a navy that was supposed to be sufficient to defend itself, not to project power overseas like the US navy. China has the largest navy in the world, and can out-produce the US in shipbuilding by about 4:1, and do it for less money. The wargaming of a Chinese invasion and blockade of Taiwan shows both the US and Chinese navies taking huge losses, and whichever side wins that fight, the Chinese are going to be the ones who replace those losses first, and then we have a real problem.

Russia won't stop with Ukraine. If Putin gets what he wants there, next will be Georgia (what he hasn't already grabbed) and Moldova (where he's already laying the groundwork). And after that, he's up against the NATO states, but he's betting by that time the US will have left NATO, so the small Baltic states will be vulnerable. Politically he's funding the far right parties in Europe to weaken Western democracies.

On the battlefield, the latest Russian offensive against Kharkiv has been halted, and in some areas pushed back almost to the border. The army wanted 75,000 troops for the push, but launched the assault with just 30,000 to take what ground they could before US ammunition arrived. Now the ammo has reached the front, Russian casualties have been some of the highest of the war (some reports say its an 8:1 rate), but to Putin it's blood well spent as he's gained a few more miles. The rest of the 75,000 troops are now assembled and massing in safety on the other side of the Russian border, where the Ukrainians aren't allowed to strike with US weapons. It must be unbelievably frustrating to have to just sit and wait for the enemy reinforcements to roll back the lines again.

4 hours ago, BringMetheHeadofBruceAllen said:

 

Is he? I know there were rumors he was moving to the UK, but there's been no confirmation. The UK press will be all over this creep if he tries to buy into a soccer club...if he thought the US press was unfair to him he ain't seen nuthin' yet!

They've seen him coming

English football’s regulator: what will it do and why is independence needed? | Football politics | The Guardian

"What about dodgy owners?
That’s the second responsibility of the regulator: to assess the suitability of owners and directors at football clubs.... It can also force an owner to give up their stake if they are found to be (very) short unsuitable."

This is as close to being on a front line as you want to be ("I'm shot... fingers gone" "why are you so careless?")

Ukraine: BBC documentary’s rare access as soldiers film dangerous mission - BBC News

(videos on the link. To watch the full thing you'll need to figure out some VPN voodoo)

I like all the players we've picked so far. They aren't necessarily the set of players I would have picked, but I can see the sense behind all of them.

I'd have liked to draft OL earlier, but it seems so did they, the trade up just didn't work out. I wish we had found someone other than the Eagles to trade down with, but we got two good players out of it.

11 hours ago, Larry said:

Recall an ES poster once commenting that there are few environments more Darwinian than combat.  

 

The things that we're doing?  Other people are going to learn from.  (Anybody think China isn't studying what's going on?)  

We are also learning from what's happening. The effectiveness of sea drones. The weakness of our artillery ammunition supply. How drone surveillance makes it very difficult to mass troops and armor for an attack without the other side knowing. The ability to restock minefields faster than they can be cleared. What actually works in battlefield conditions and what doesn't (the Ukrainians have given up on some of the equipment and systems they've been supplied with because experience has shown they are simply ineffective against a near-equivalent foe).

IMO the biggest and most dangerous thing China will take from all this is that the US isn't really interested in defending democracies anymore. However expensive it is fighting in Ukraine, it'll be economic peanuts compared to what will happen if war breaks out in Taiwan.

15 hours ago, Larry said:

 

Not really seeing a motive, for them. Well, other than "just like crazy". 

They have a long history of attacking Russia

Islamic State’s deadly Moscow attack highlights its fixation with Russia | Moscow concert hall attack | The Guardian

A claim has surfaced that the attack was carried out by Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP) a regional affiliate of the IS terrorist organisation. IS has been implicated in some of Russia’s largest recent terror attacks, including the 2017 bombing in the St Petersburg metro that killed 15 and injured 45.

The group, which is a branch of IS mainly based in Afghanistan, has increasingly focused its attention on Russia since the United States left Afghanistan in 2021. The group was formed in 2015 by members of militant groups, including those from Pakistan and Uzbekistan, and is active in central Asia and Russia. It carried out twin bombings in January in Iran that killed nearly 100 people.

...

Putin changed the course of the Syrian civil war by intervening in 2015, supporting President Bashar al-Assad against the opposition and Islamic State. “Isis-K has been fixated on Russia for the past two years, frequently criticising Putin in its propaganda,” said Colin Clarke of the Soufan Center, according to Reuters.

If the US pulls out of NATO then any route is on the table, eventually. However, Putin won't invade anywhere until he's swallowed up Ukraine and rebuilt his army. Moldova would be the easiest target (and no tangling with whatever remained of NATO), then a Baltic state.

Finland has a very large army, if lacking in equipment. Poland is already arming itself to the teeth and might have the most capable army in Western Europe in a few years. Given how badly things went against Ukraine which was hardly a modern fighting force, taking on either Poland or Finland on it's own would be a considerable challenge for Russia. And that doesn't allow for the intervention of the rest of Western Europe, which is very unlikely to sit by and watch another large country go the way of Ukraine.

The obvious and easy thing for Putin to do would be to not repeat the mistake of Ukraine, and just stick to destabilising democracies. It's not like there's a shortage of politicians who'd rather take his money than defend democracy.

8 hours ago, DCSaints_fan said:

Scratch another Russian AWACS ... 

 

 

 

 

 

https://kyivindependent.com/russian-a50-plane-shot-down-over-azov-sea-military-says/

Each one of those planes costs over $300 million, and before the war the Russians had a total of six that were operational. The Ukrainians have now shot down two in the last month. Clearly they've found a way to target them, so you'd have to think the Russians won't be flying them anywhere near Ukraine until they figure out how the Ukrainians are doing it.

Russia arrests US dual national over alleged $51 Ukrainian charity donation | Russia | The Guardian

The White House has said it is seeking information after Russia announced it had arrested a dual US-Russian citizen on treason charges, accusing her of collecting funds for Ukrainian organisations and openly opposing the Russian war in Ukraine.

A Russian legal NGO said the woman, named by Russian media as Ksenia Khavana, may stand accused of transferring $51 (£40) to a Ukrainian charity in February 2022, on the day Vladimir Putin launched his invasion of the country. She faces up to 20 years in prison.

3 minutes ago, DCSaints_fan said:

I think technically its only nuclear attack, but I see the point

 

Unfortunately we are entering the era of realpolitik and "treaties are only pieces of paper"

Technically we agreed to protect their 1994 borders (amongst other things), which would of course include Crimea, in exchange for them handing over all the nukes they had. The lesson everyone will take from this is never hand over your nukes, and that's going to make the world a much more dangerous place for all of us.

Budapest Memorandum - Wikipedia

"According to the three memoranda, Russia, the US and the UK confirmed their recognition of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine becoming parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and effectively removing all Soviet nuclear weapons from their soil, and that they agreed to the following:

1. Respect the signatory's independence and sovereignty in the existing borders (in accordance with the principles of the CSCE Final Act).
2. Refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of the signatories to the memorandum, and undertake that none of their weapons will ever be used against these countries, except in cases of self-defense or otherwise in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations.

(etc.)"

The consequences of all these months of blocking support for Ukraine. Never thought I'd see the day when a major US political party effectively backed an avowed foe of the United States in his invasion of a democracy we'd pledged to protect. 

Ukrainian forces withdraw from Avdiivka to avoid encirclement, army chief says | Ukraine | The Guardian

Ukraine’s First Tank Brigade said during a visit on Thursday that their ability to strike the Russians had been cut dramatically since November.

“Back then, we could fire every half hour, to stop them from relaxing and disrupt their movements, now we have to be very selective, and only fire for defence,” said their commander, who gave his call-sign, Titushko, in accordance with Ukrainian army regulations.

“We cannot target only one vehicle, we only aim when we see a concentration of hardware,” he added.

With the frontlines largely static in recent months, the capture of Avdiivka would mark Russia’s first major gain since taking Bakhmut last May.

I wonder how many of these drones you could make for the cost of one aircraft carrier?

Equipment losses in Russia’s war on Ukraine mount (iiss.org)

The IISS will publish its assessment of Russian equipment losses on 13 February with the release of The Military Balance 2024. The losses are estimated to include more than 3,000 armoured fighting vehicles in the past year alone and close to 8,800 since February 2022.

...Overall, we estimate that two years after the full-scale invasion, the number of MBTs in service in the Ukrainian armed forces remains near pre-war levels, while the number of APCs and IFVs has increased thanks to Western support. However, Ukrainian efforts to field additional combat elements have outpaced equipment supply, leaving some units lacking equipment to be even close to full strength.

...Despite losing hundreds of armoured vehicles and artillery pieces per month on average, Russia has been able to keep its active inventory numbers stable. For 2023, we estimate that Russia was able to reactivate at least 1,180 to 1,280 MBTs and around 2,470 IFVs and APCs from storage. On top of that, Moscow was able to manufacture new tanks and other armoured vehicles, though precise numbers are difficult to glean even from satellite images.

It is our assessment, therefore, that Russia will be able to sustain its assault on Ukraine at current attrition rates for another 2–3 years, and maybe even longer.

(in terms of quality, the Ukrainians have much improved their equipment, while the Russians are often fielding refurbished vehicles from decades ago. But as the document notes, they have no shortage of old tanks and vehicles, and an old tank is better than no tank)

Maybe Zelenskiy's first real misstep since the invasion

Volodymyr Zelenskiy fires top Ukraine army commander | Ukraine | The Guardian

Volodymyr Zelenskiy has fired his top army commander, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, in Ukraine’s biggest military shake-up since Russia’s full-scale invasion nearly two years ago...

In an eight-minute video explaining the decision, Zelenskiy denied any political motivation, and said the difficult situation that Ukrainian troops are facing at the front required a new approach... Tension between Zelenskiy and his top commander has been increasing for months, according to insiders. Zaluzhnyi rarely made public statements or gave interviews, but when he did it often irritated the president’s office. 

Zaluzhnyi was highly regarded among troops on the frontline, with a reputation for bravery, modesty and good humour, and also became a cult figure in Ukrainian society more broadly.

Lets look to thee future and hire ChatGPT

After going off at 4:30 and 5:30, the batteries on our alarm finally wore out

4 hours ago, Fergasun said:

...

 

Under the law he has been found to have "forcibly digitally penetrated her".  This is what a jury determined as fact.  The more he continues to act like this isn't fact, the more it is defamation.

 

 

Donald Trump understands two things:

1. For a sizeable part of the population, facts are whatever he says they are

2. Always take it to court, because it doesn't matter if you lose, you just claim you won (see 1 above)

These are lessons he learned long ago from Roy Cohn

 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/apr/20/roy-cohn-donald-trump-joseph-mccarthy-rosenberg-trial

"His [Roy Cohn] careful manipulation of negative attention is something that Trump noticed immediately when the two met in 1973. Trump and his father had just been sued for allegedly discriminating against black people in Trump’s built-and-managed houses in Brooklyn, and sought out Cohn’s counsel. Among other things, Cohn advised that Trump should “tell them to go to hell”. Cohn was hired, and one of his first acts as Trump’s new lawyer was to file a $100m countersuit that was quickly dismissed by the court. But it made the papers.

... Today, Cohn might be most remembered as a character in a TV series: Al Pacino played him in HBO’s version of Tony Kushner’s Angels In America... As played by Pacino, his bombast is already pathetic, self-deluding. “You want to be nice or you want to be effective?!” he shouts at an idealistic acolyte. “You want to make the law, or be subject to it? Choose!”

That last line of dialog is particularly apt for Trump. He wants to make the law, not be subject to it.

8 hours ago, CousinsCowgirl84 said:

This is a real test for the west in part because such a big deal about it. If the Ukrainians can’t push Russia back to 2020 boundaries it will be pretty clear the wests rule of law age is over. We are already seeing big cracks. I was all for Bidens strategic patience in Ukraine but at some point we have to smack back the swarms of mosquitoes.

A draw isn’t good enough…

I think 2023 will bee looked at as a huge missed opportunity to end this war.

If the Ukrainians had been given the tanks and planes they asked for, when they asked for them, at the start of the year, then the Russians wouldn't have had the time to construct thousands of miles of minefields and trenches and would have faced Western armor and airpower in a largely open battlefield.

But instead the US and the Germans fretted about who should give tanks, and whether the Ukrainians should get F-16s, and by the time they gave about a third of what the Ukrainians said they needed it had all became moot, because no matter how many tanks we give them now, they can't drive through double-stacked mines laid 6 feet apart for 20 miles while being bombarded by artillery and drones.

The only way I see Ukraine winning now is airpower, if they can knock out the Russian artillery. It's a real stretch to see that happening, but if there's one thing NATO has in abundance it's armaments for air warfare.

Updates from the ISW assessments

Institute for the Study of War (understandingwar.org)

Some US officials are reported to be pressing Ukraine to limit itself to defensive operations in 2024, and prepare for another offensive in 2025. The Ukrainians are understandably sceptical about this advice, believing that it simply hands the initiative to the Russians (and obviously given the electoral situation it seems unlikely the Ukrainians will get what they need to succeed in 2025 when they didn't get it in 2023). The US believe the war will continue until at least until 2026 and probably go on until 2029, depending upon the level of aid Ukraine receive from the US. The ISW on the other hand believe that if US aid is cut, a collapse in the ability of Ukraine to resist becomes likely and the Russians will complete their stated goal of eliminating the country of Ukraine altogether.

The Ukrainians for their part are anticipating a major Russian offensive this summer, with the city of Kharkiv a prime target as the Russians seek to push the Ukrainians out from all the annexed territories. So far this winter the Russians have achieved some limited advances across the board, except where the Ukrainians have a toe hold on the far bank of the Dneipr river, a region where the Russians rebuild their units that have taken heavy losses on the main front line.

With US supplies on hold, the Russian artillery advantage has risen from 2:1 back to the 5:1 it was earlier in the war.

On the technology front, both sides are making advances. The Russians are making their cruise missiles harder to shoot down; it's notable that many more are getting through these days although that's partly due to Ukraine having to conserve their remaining Patriot stocks now they are no longer being replenished. For their part the Ukrainians are investing in more advanced drones, which local Russian commanders view as being more effective than the more mass produced Russian drones. The Ukrainians have also managed to strike targets deep into Russia.

Finally, given all the internet squabbling about who makes the better tanks, this clip of a fight between a Bradley and a T-90M hopefully shows that it's not always who has the bigger gun and better armor. The Bradley gunner apparently went for the T-90 optics, effectively blinding the tank which was later finished off by a drone strike.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/15/ukraine-shoots-down-two-russian-aircraft-in-disastrous-day-for-kremlin

Ukraine’s military has shot down two of Russia’s command planes, in one of the most disastrous days for the Kremlin’s air power since the start of Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion.

Valerii Zaluzhnyi, Ukraine’s commander in chief, said his air force had destroyed an A-50 long-range radar detection aircraft and an Il-22 control centre plane. Both were flying above the Sea of Azov on Sunday when they were hit at 9.10pm local time.

The A-50, which detects air defences and coordinates targets for Russian jets, crashed instantly, killing its crew. The badly damaged Il-22 appears to have made an emergency landing at an airfield in Anapa, Russia.

It is unclear how Ukraine managed to target and shoot down the planes. One theory is that a Patriot anti-aircraft missile battery – supplied by the US – was used. This, however, would involve moving the system close to the frontline where it could be detected. Russian officials said they have “no information” about what exactly happened. Pro-Kremlin bloggers suggested the planes were hit by friendly fire or even shot down by a team of British SAS operatives using surface-to-air missiles.

... According to the UK’s Ministry of Defence, the Kremlin has only six working A-50s in service. Each plane costs $330m to build.