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Russian Assets Reportedly Seized at Baikonur Cosmodrome by Kazakh Authorities

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Re: Russian Assets Reportedly Seized at Baikonur Cosmodrome by Kazakh Authorities

#131

Post by duxup »

qikInNdOutReply wrote: post #19

Thats what happens, when all you got to hold the band together is terror instead of soft power. Everyone just quits at the first sign of weakness.

Russia doesn’t seem very interested in soft power either. Under Putin they seem more interested in violence, helping some local insurgents, installing strong men.

Even in Ukraine previously sympathetic Ukrainian officials in Ukraine reported getting cold calls from Russians telling them they better fall in line and threatened them. You would think it would be easier to throw them a bone / bribe… but nope.

They don’t seem to understand much outside the bullying sphere.

Re: Russian Assets Reportedly Seized at Baikonur Cosmodrome by Kazakh Authorities

#132

Post by dotnet00 »

dotnet00 wrote: post #102
sorenjan wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know anything about space launches, how come the first orbital launch site in mainland Europe is in Esrange in northern Sweden, latitude 67° N? Are different latitudes good for different trajectories?

Yes, Esrange is best suited to launches into Sun Synchronous Orbit, which is high-inclination (nearly a polar orbit). It's very popular for things like Earth observation satellites.

To clarify, SSO is very popular.

Re: Russian Assets Reportedly Seized at Baikonur Cosmodrome by Kazakh Authorities

#133

Post by 0xDEF »

duxup wrote: post #131
qikInNdOutReply wrote: post #19

Thats what happens, when all you got to hold the band together is terror instead of soft power. Everyone just quits at the first sign of weakness.

Russia doesn’t seem very interested in soft power either. Under Putin they seem more interested in violence, helping some local insurgents, installing strong men. Even in Ukraine previously sympathetic Ukrainian officials in Ukraine reported getting cold calls from Russians telling them they better fall in line and threatened them. You would think it would be easier to throw them a bone / bribe… but nope. They don’t…

It is not a coincidence that 2 out of 4 of Russia's "separatist commanders" in eastern Ukraine were killed because of "infighting" between 2014 and 2022.

Re: Russian Assets Reportedly Seized at Baikonur Cosmodrome by Kazakh Authorities

#134

Post by 0xDEF »

hammock wrote: post #125
callalex wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have little interest in the mindless ramblings of a billionaire playboy.

That's not what twitter files are

The "twitter files" is just a happening Elon Musk and some "journalists" cooked up to get a following among the QAnon/MAGA crowd.

Sure, maybe some of the tweets are real which would make Elon Musk an asshole for leaking his ex-employees' communication to the public.

Re: Russian Assets Reportedly Seized at Baikonur Cosmodrome by Kazakh Authorities

#135

Post by SXX »

inglor_cz wrote: post #127
5e92cb50239222b wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the time being, the West has been supplying Putin's troops with plenty of money (taxes from selling natural resources go into the federal budget, which is used to fund the military, and therefore the war). They made record profits last year. https://svtv.org/gas-for-putin-war/

IDK about gas , but the price cap on Russian oil is lower than what Russians need to break even. They are now losing money on each exported barrel, but IIRC they can't just stop the production; the wells would become unusable. Of course, the price cap is only in force since December 2022, so the effects haven't fully shown themselves yet.

Where do you get that information about profitability? According to BBC [0] back in 2019 expenses per barrel was $25 before taxes. Obviously sanctions make everything more expensive (hardware, extraction, transport, insurance), but not that expensive.

If selling oil was unprofitable Putun would just burn it instead of selling it at loss just like they burned natural gas for $10,000,000 / day for months.

[0] https://www-bbc-com.translate.goog/russian/news-50392407?_x_...

Re: Russian Assets Reportedly Seized at Baikonur Cosmodrome by Kazakh Authorities

#136

Post by SXX »

johnwalkr wrote: post #82
pk-protect-ai wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not believe russians will want or need to get into space until 2050, because the economy of this country is screwed and electronics tech-stack is dependent on global market to deliver required chips... Needless to say the window of opportunity to receive the electronic components is closing. They can't run a space program on gray market deliveries.

Many aerospace engineers have left Russia in the last year, too.

Yes, but it's unlikely they will continue their work outside of Russia and many people can very well be bought back. Western countries don't really help talent with Russian passports to leave the country and since space industry is very close to military it's only make it harder to get EU / US visas.

Source: I have a friend who worked at Sea Launch more than decade ago and now he wasn't able to get green card he won because of security clearance.

Re: Russian Assets Reportedly Seized at Baikonur Cosmodrome by Kazakh Authorities

#137

Post by SXX »

Paradigma11 wrote: post #80
throwaway4good wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it is a misunderstanding to think Russia holds no soft power in Kazakhstan.

True, but it seems that the Kazakh leadership is fed up with that power.

Kazakhstan is as authoritarian as Russia was before 2022. They'll pretend there is some conflict with Putin while still supplying sanctioned goods to Russia and serving as banking gateway to bypass financial sanctions.

Re: Russian Assets Reportedly Seized at Baikonur Cosmodrome by Kazakh Authorities

#138

Post by SXX »

oaiey wrote: post #65
nradov wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, hopefully some of the federated republics will start civil wars to break away from the Russian empire. Continue the disintegration process that started in 1991.

Hoping that a nuclear power breaks apart is a nightmare. This is true for states like Pakistan but when you have a stockpile in the thousands and a nuclear logistical distribution like Russia it is nearly guarantee that we have several (terroristic) nuclear explosions over the next decades and probably half a dozen rogue states more. And do not assume that this is a peaceful transition. Putin is very much concerned a…

Putin is only concerned about integrity of his own political power and physical body. There is bunch of regions and cities in government databases that was never ever under any kind of military control. Russia is literally have imaginary state border.

Re: Russian Assets Reportedly Seized at Baikonur Cosmodrome by Kazakh Authorities

#139

Post by chii »

tablespoon wrote: post #96
vincnetas wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last i heard, china is also being limited in acquiring advanced electronics : On October 7, the Biden administration unveiled a sweeping set of export controls that ban Chinese companies from buying advanced chips and chip-making equipment without a license. The rule also restricts the ability of “US persons” — including American citizens or green card holders — to provide support for the “development or production”…

> Last i heard, china is also being limited in acquiring advanced electronics : In the short term, I'm sure China will be able to get whatever chips it needs (for military applications, at least) that are available on the civilian market, they'll just have to setup front companies, etc. In the medium to long term, this will motivate China to build the capacity it needs. It might ever exactly be cutting edge, but I'm…

> In the medium to long term, this will motivate China to build the capacity it needs. It might ever exactly be cutting edge, but I'm sure they'll get close enough that it won't matter too much.

which says to me, that the export bans is a failure in policy then.

The cost of the export ban is a drop in business value for all the companies being banned (and without compensation by the US gov't afaict). The ban isn't really going to prevent china from getting close-to-cutting-edge chips for military applications either. So the ban, and the associated costs, is for what exactly?!

Re: Russian Assets Reportedly Seized at Baikonur Cosmodrome by Kazakh Authorities

#140

Post by marcosdumay »

nradov wrote: post #53
pk-protect-ai wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not believe russians will want or need to get into space until 2050, because the economy of this country is screwed and electronics tech-stack is dependent on global market to deliver required chips... Needless to say the window of opportunity to receive the electronic components is closing. They can't run a space program on gray market deliveries.

Many years ago they ran a successful space program with no chips at all.

Besides it not being them, the Soviet Union stayed almost always close to the state of the art in chips manufacturing.
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