Earlier quoted context omitted.
Over the last thirty years or so, it's been increasingly popular to see WW1 and WW2 as the same conflict, but with a pause for populations to stabilize and stocks to be rebuilt. It's sometimes called "The Second Thirty Years' War", although I feel that labelling is misleading, as is, potentially, the core thesis. Careful reading of the diplomatic history illustrates that WW2, despite our popular notions, was not enti…
I prefer to think of the history of the 20th Century as The Great War plus repercussions.
As much as you ever wanted to know about 155M artillery shell production
291–300 of 367 posts
Re: As much as you ever wanted to know about 155M artillery shell production
#292Earlier quoted context omitted.
gentleman's agreement... what a weird way to say there was no agreement.
Don't you know. Russians never mastered the art of written treaties. The Soviets were confused and thought that pinky swear (after all of the deception of cold war) is guarantee of future power sharing :D
Re: As much as you ever wanted to know about 155M artillery shell production
#293[flagged]
> these shells have been redirected to Israel and are being used in Gaza The front in Gaza is not Israel's only wartime front, not in the current conflict and not during past conflicts: Currently, Israel needs this ammunition to defend itself from Hezbollah forces in Southern Lebanon that have engaged in heavy indiscriminate rocket launching against Israeli civilian populations in the Northern Israel. At least 65,000…
> are performed to limit casualties of non-engaged civilians in the conflict.
Over 20k Gazans have died, few of them resistance members because they are in tunnels. The majority of dead are women and children. Israel is attacking the families of the resistance because they cannot reach them. This is collective punishment. Almost every hospital has been evacuated or destroyed. Universities destroyed. They are wiping out all humanitarian services and cultural artifacts.
> FYI the ICJ's court of justice has NOT determined that a genocide is likely to be occurring,
Provisional measures are granted when it is determined there is a likelihood that genocide is occurring. The case will drag on for years to determine on the merits whether genocide has in fact occurred. Many scholars have opined that this case is unique because of the sheer number of open statements of intent by every level of Israeli society.
Re: As much as you ever wanted to know about 155M artillery shell production
#294Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, these pacifist-style comments are really tone deaf and out of touch. Yes, we'd all prefer peace and leaving each other alone, but if some other nation comes to kill your countrymen and replace your democracy with a puppet, suddenly just relying on pacifist ideals doesn't work well anymore. Most of the time, these commenters don't want to engage with reality as it currently exists. If you ask them what exactly y…
I agree that we should engage with reality as it currently exists. Davyd Arakhamia [1] is a Ukrainian member of parliament, in Zelensky's party. He was one of the negotiators early on with Russia. He stated that Russia's main demand was simply that Ukraine agree to not join NATO. Meduza has an article about it (which also links to the interview itself) here, as well as spin from various sides. [2] If you're unaware o…
All that feigned "paranoia about NATO" talk is trivially invalidated by the fact that Finland joined NATO, it was obvious that Finland would join NATO no matter the outcome of the Ukraine invasion, and it's obvious that Putin understood this. The only threat NATO poses is to Russia's ability to re-colonize its neighbours.
Re: As much as you ever wanted to know about 155M artillery shell production
#295Earlier quoted context omitted.
Mearsheimer is literally on Russian payroll. His works have received financial support from Russian government through the so-called Valdai club. Andrei Kozyrev, the minister of foreign affairs of the Russian Federation (1990-1996), had this to say about the purpose of the club and people like Mearsheimer: I ask Kozyrev about a debate that has roiled the American foreign policy establishment in the leadup to this war…
Kozyrev statements are interesting, it is a tragedy that he failed and that the revanchists won. But Ukraine's und USA's way to deal with the revanchists (full confrontation) was reckless and stupid.
Re: As much as you ever wanted to know about 155M artillery shell production
#296Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, these pacifist-style comments are really tone deaf and out of touch. Yes, we'd all prefer peace and leaving each other alone, but if some other nation comes to kill your countrymen and replace your democracy with a puppet, suddenly just relying on pacifist ideals doesn't work well anymore. Most of the time, these commenters don't want to engage with reality as it currently exists. If you ask them what exactly y…
This comment is peak 2004 neo-conservatives logic. Ukraine is fighting a bloody attrition land war in Russia. They are currently losing and will likely fair worse as time goes on. Mind you Ukraine could have prevented all of this if they had decided not to break the Minsk agreement which would have ended the conflict in Donbas. Instead the US and EU used it to buy for time so they could further arm Ukraine for war wi…
Whatever comes after the if, unless it's "surrender sovereignty unconditionally", it's wrong. Putin's goal was, and is now, to incorporate Ukraine into his empire as a client state, similar to Belarus. And eventually to take even that decorative residual bit of sovereignty. Of course at this point, taking over Ukraine will mean mass murder of hundreds of thousands of people and an erasure of Ukrainian identity and language.
Just want you to be clear about what outcome you're defending.
Re: As much as you ever wanted to know about 155M artillery shell production
#297Earlier quoted context omitted.
Russia's Black Sea Fleet has been largely confined to port in Novorossiysk by Ukrainian "naval drones", having previously been used to bombard Ukrainian cities with cruise missiles. So what are these naval drones? I assumed they were fancy, expensive sea-skimming cruise missiles; nope. Apparently they're modified jet-skis with cheap FPV navigation equipment. So I don't think you're wrong, and I think we've already fo…
Apparently they're modified jet-skis with cheap FPV navigation equipment. Yeah. I read about that recent sinking, momentarily cheered for Ukraine, and then thought about the larger implications and was like... man the USN is screwed, huh?
Re: As much as you ever wanted to know about 155M artillery shell production
#298Earlier quoted context omitted.
> because they can't UNREP top off their VLSs Wait, for real? That seems crazy to me. Lot of those ships minus the vls are pretty useless. I guess they rely on bases all over
One of the less intuitive results found in RAND wargaming is that no ship needs more than 4 anti-ship missiles when fighting against a foe that's roughly matched in quality. Either you have sufficient advantage that by the time you've spent 4 everything on the other side is sunk, or the enemy has sufficient advantage that you don't get to spend 4 before being sunk. The Navy took a look at these results, and doubled i…
Re: As much as you ever wanted to know about 155M artillery shell production
#299Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ukraine only housed Soviet nuclear missiles. They (Ukraine) would never ever had access to launch codes. That it is stated in Budapest memorandum along with the rest of the Soviet army leaving does not in any way make Ukraine a former nuclear power. We had Soviet nukes stationed in Czechia too. Does that make us a former nuclear power? I thought not... Slava Ukraini
> would never ever had access to launch codes What do you think, how many hours does it take to remove and jury-rig launch signal electronics for a motivated nation state at the cutting edge of weapons technology? If the Soviet troops had agreed to leave the bombs in situ, Ukraine would have had some sort of nuclear capability within the week. (And even if the Russians had sabotaged it, Iran and NorK prove that obtai…
Re: As much as you ever wanted to know about 155M artillery shell production
#300Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Are you claiming that shelling ethnic Russians in Donbas The OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine diligently documented the use of lethal force and resulting casualties in the low-intensity conflict before the full-scale invasion in 2022 and did not witness anything like what you describe. The number of civilian casualties was in low tens per year, mostly due to landmines and unexploded ordnance.
It's well documented that Ukraine was firing unguided MLRS into Donetsk years ago. https://www.hrw.org/news/2014/07/24/ukraine-unguided-rockets...
So in terms of it "violating the Minsk agreements" - no.