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Maersk ship hit by missile in the Red Sea

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Re: Maersk ship hit by missile in the Red Sea

#201

Post by throwaway290 »

drewcoo wrote: post #175
pclmulqdq wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's time to read some Clausewitz. That book outlines the philosophy of how most western states think about war. The short version I would say is that war is a tool of politics, so if there is no political goal, there will be no war, regardless of how bad the supposed Causus Belli is. Shooting down a drone usually doesn't do it partly because of the political implications: it would be deeply unpopular to put "boots o…

The exact thing I was thinking in response to the GP. Worth noting is that Clausewitz lived in a world where wars were events that were declared between states. Today a major difference is insurgency/counterinsurgency. And our state likes to wage wars without formal declaration. Not to mention its wars against abstract concepts instead of foreign states.

> And our state likes to wage wars without formal declaration. Not to mention its wars against abstract concepts instead of foreign states.

This really well fits what Russian gov does (as someone from there).

I actually think every offensive war is explained by concepts because people don't want to just kill people, they need a higher explanation to risk death and sleep at night after some murdering. It is in the name of religion or unification or against Nazism or against rotting capitalism. Only true defence doesn't need explanation.

Re: Maersk ship hit by missile in the Red Sea

#202

Post by keefle »

exabrial wrote: post #153
huytersd wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shoot, with free energy you could build your own land.

precisely my point and what the downvoters are missing. ultimately all wars are energy wars... just maybe 2-3 times removed.

Wouldn't justice be a cause for wars too? Even if energy was limitless or extremely cheap, this wouldn't mean people will stop being mean right? Something else will become too valuable and greed and other human traits will cause injustices and people will still fight to enforce/overthrow the injustice no?

Re: Maersk ship hit by missile in the Red Sea

#203

Post by mrtksn »

keefle wrote: post #196

I'm really confused as to why no where in the article do they mention the intent of attacking the ships. As if the houthis in yemen are attacking ships because they like it or just because they "hate developed societies". Their declared reason is to put pressure on Israel to allow humanitarian aid to Gaza at once. They target ships that have Israeli links or heading to Israeli ports. It can be seen as a form of treat…

The same reason why when civilians in Gaza die it’s because a rocket explodes in a refugee camp or something. Damn rockets why do they do that?

Unfortunately, propaganda is part of the war and I can’t really blame them for trying. You can be sure that the other side of the conflict is also not impartial.

If the reasons about killing each other were openly discussed in a logical way without the emotional overload, People wouldn’t bother to kill each other. That’s something undesirable in the context of war.

I also think this is not necessarily bad, because when you start thinking in cold blooded strategic way you may find out that exterminating certain people is beneficial for you. Therefore, you should do it.

That level of thinking can be beneficial when you’re in the higher ranks, but a society shouldn’t be willing to destroy another society for material or political gains. You can see that among Russians, and how they think about conquering Ukraine and Europe. Scary stuff, it might lead to a war where one of the nations gets decimated.

Re: Maersk ship hit by missile in the Red Sea

#204

Post by ffgjgf1 »

screye wrote: post #31
nomilk wrote: post #4

Something I'm unsure about is what does and doesn't trigger wars. Russian jets downed a US drone over the black sea in March 2023, I thought for sure there'd be a commensurate US military response. But there didn't appear to be one. Was it because no human was aboard the drone (so no response was justified), from fear or escalation, or something else? In any case, if a large cargo ship were sunk, would the US or othe…

Because events never cause wars. Countries want war and then they wait for an inciting event to go in. The US wants a war with Russia without putting boots on the ground. Ukraine was a convieinient excuse. 9/11 triggered a war with random middle eastern countries that the US wanted to invade anyway. If Cuba downed a large cargo ship, then the US will have annexed it before midnight. If China downs one in South China…

> The US wants a war with Russia without putting boots on the ground. Ukraine was a convieinient excuse.

That claim seems delusional. US was doing it’s best over the last 20 years to appease Putin so that they could ignore Europe and focus on the Pacific.

Hardly anyone in the west wanted to be dragged into this pointless war..

Re: Maersk ship hit by missile in the Red Sea

#205

Post by ffgjgf1 »

Aeolun wrote: post #189
golergka wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ukraine had some parts of the nuclear weapon system, but it didn’t have the system as a whole. There’s all kinds of very specialised plants and tech the country has to develop and maintain, and USSR made a point to distribute all industries (not only nuclear or even military) and supply chains among the republics. To be able to demolish a city in 2023, Ukraine would have not only not given the weapons away, but also…

I think the point is that Russia would have been worried Ukraine had done exactly that. Publicly giving up all your nuclear stockpile is the complete opposite.

Until quite recently (and there is still a massive and extremely hard road ahead) Ukraine was basically a failed state and/or a Russian puppet. So I doubt Russia would’ve had to worry about something like that at all.

Re: Maersk ship hit by missile in the Red Sea

#206

Post by fancl20 »

maeil wrote: post #144
wolverine876 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read a lot of professional international relations material (but I'm not an expert in any way). IME what may differ the most between 'popular' takes on IR and professional ones is the response to incidents. Arguably the #1 priority of professional IR is to prevent wars (with occasional exceptions, such as Russia or Hamas recently, but even they want to control when, where, and how). Wars can and do happen whether y…

> Another mechanism that causes warfare is a lack of flexibility, a lack of options. Popular takes on IR love to urge that a 'line in the sand' or 'redline' should be drawn - another tough, angry way to feel powerful and safe. You don't see professionals say it however. One of the two biggest global superpowers, the PRC, bombastically announces a dozen or so redlines per year.

It’s a little funny but redlines / final warnings have a “different meaning” in PRC’s diplomatic language e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China%27s_final_warning

The actual diplomatic language for war is “勿谓言之不预” (from official diplomatic channels) and they use “core interests” for a vaguely defined redlines: https://www.strategictranslation.org/glossary/core-interests

So yes, cross “redlines” won’t trigger a war with PRC. And ignoring final warning is also fine.

Re: Maersk ship hit by missile in the Red Sea

#207

Post by ffgjgf1 »

mhog_hn wrote: post #191
golergka wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ukraine had some parts of the nuclear weapon system, but it didn’t have the system as a whole. There’s all kinds of very specialised plants and tech the country has to develop and maintain, and USSR made a point to distribute all industries (not only nuclear or even military) and supply chains among the republics. To be able to demolish a city in 2023, Ukraine would have not only not given the weapons away, but also…

North Korea managed.

So what? That’s not particularly relevant

Re: Maersk ship hit by missile in the Red Sea

#208

Post by ffgjgf1 »

echelon wrote: post #105
jmyeet wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ukraine is a cautionary tale in that as much as military technology can change, that conflict is being decided by trenches, minefields, artillery, fixed fortifications, the inability of either side to cross a river and manpower attrition. At this point, it's basically a World War One conflict, mainly because neither side has air superiority. Russia's strategy now seems to be to wait out the Western will to provide ma…

The tactics are an artifact of the players attempting to avoid a broader-scale conflict. Moreover, direct conflict between two nuclear-armed states isn't something we've ever done before. Nobody wants to go down that road. If the US and/or NATO were directly involved, it wouldn't look anything like trench warfare, and we wouldn't be using 30+ year old military tech. We really want to avoid this, though.

In theory, considering the state Russia’s military is in at this stage of the war, NATO could just steamroll the entire country just like US/UK did in Iraq. If they wanted to AND there were no nukes.

Of course the current balance of power and military doctrines etc. wouldn’t really exist without nukes

Re: Maersk ship hit by missile in the Red Sea

#209

Post by throwaway290 »

pydry wrote: post #186
empath75 wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the saudi military is kind of a joke. They have a bunch of expensive gear, but their soldiers aren't particularly well trained or motivated.

[flagged]

This is like WWII. Hitler also seemed winning at first. He even took the capital. Eventually thanks to allies though Hitler was defeated. In the end USSR lost twice as many millions of its people so in terms of human cost the win was dubious.

The difference is that right now Putler already lost 2x+ as many people as Zelensky, and could not manage to capture the capital. Which was promised how many times? I vaguely remember at first it was "take Kyiv in 3 days", but it's been so long I am forgetting ;)

Re: Maersk ship hit by missile in the Red Sea

#210

Post by pydry »

Aeolun wrote: post #188
pydry wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

You mean, them fighting a country 3 times the size, with about 10 times the manpower to a standstill is to be considered a loss?

We were promised a victory many times thanks to the overwhelming power and sophistication western weapons repeatedly. Not "hold off Russia for 2-3 years, not fight to a standstill". Victory and a return to 1991 borders after first severing the land bridge to Crimea. It was a very specific prediction.

To say that they havent lived up to their promise is an understatement given how abysmally they performed in the summer offensive. Vehicles failed especially badly, but the whole ensemble failed categorically for all the world to see.

I dont see how this can be spun as a stalemate or a win and I dont see the demo winning western arms manufacturers any new customers. It also looks like previously intimidated US opponents like the Houthis and Venezuela are also suddenly a lot less intimidated.

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