131–140 of 339 posts
I thought I recognized the site. This the same author who wrote very detailed analysis of the Siege of Gondor and the Battle of Helms Deep from LOTR as well as articles about military and political topics from Game of Thrones, and many real-world historical topics. They're a military historian IRL and have a lot of content worth reading: https://acoup.blog/resources-for-world-builders/
This article is based on the flawed premise that the Russia-Ukraine war was overwhelmingly one-sided in Russia's favor, eliding the fact that Ukraine had, over nearly a decade, amassed the next largest land army in Europe, trained by NATO, armed by NATO, guided by NATO intelligence, and side-by-side with Western PMCs. In many aspects, they were peer competitors on the battlefield. The "paper tiger" argument would hav…
Amassed the next largest land army in Europe, trained by NATO, armed by NATO, .. Utter BS, both in terms of raw numbers and contextually -- in "eliding" the fact that they were invaded by a certain neighboring country in 2014. As you are perfectly aware. Please stop posting nonsense like this.
Were you not aware of this? It was kept quiet, but not exactly secret.
> Since Crimea was annexed in 2014, the U.S. and partner militaries have helped grow Ukraine’s forces from just over 100,000 troops to nearly 250,000 [in 2017]. Just since January, Capt. Christopher’s unit of 250 soldiers has added another 3,000 or so Ukrainian soldiers to Kiev’s ranks.
https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2017/10/ukraine-us-trains...
> What is – quietly, because they haven’t tried to launch a major invasion recently – most militaries are probably similarly incapable of the basic tasks of industrial warfare? I once read an article that argued in the absence of war, it's impossible to tell if a doctrine or commander is good or not . Maybe you've got five officers up for promotion. One officer wants to give soldiers high-tech equipment, a heads-up d…
None of those things. The one who is most flexible and has the best ooda loop when under pressure.
> What is – quietly, because they haven’t tried to launch a major invasion recently – most militaries are probably similarly incapable of the basic tasks of industrial warfare? I once read an article that argued in the absence of war, it's impossible to tell if a doctrine or commander is good or not . Maybe you've got five officers up for promotion. One officer wants to give soldiers high-tech equipment, a heads-up d…
None of those things. The one who is most flexible and has the best ooda loop when under pressure.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think that China has any interest in conquering the rest of World. They just want to be rich. They are stealing IP and spying. The fact that the US needs to use military force is a failure of policy. Violence is the last resort of the incompetent. I think that China is pulling on the US what the US did to the Soviet Union. The US bankrupted the Soviet Union with an arms race. China is doing it much more econo…
There are so many wrongs with your statements that I don't know where to start. I'll just tackle one of them. "build a high speed rail network", implying that US is failing there. China is suffering from a $1 TRILLION debt for its rails https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Markets/China-debt-crunch/C... , while ridership collapses https://japan-forward.com/weak-demand-for-chinas-high-speed-... . Cities in China are suffe…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not a cop-out: there are fundamental qualitative differences between a near-pear conflict, which demands restructuring of a nation's economic activity around supporting the fight, versus the kinds of conflicts the US was involved in post-WWII, where the costs aren't that much different than the steady-state maintenance of our armed forces.
It’s certainly a cop-out if you use such a segmentation to argue that things are peaceful.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Peaceful just has to be a continuum in order for us to make any sense of a theory of peace. Certainly wars between great powers and much smaller countries are more peaceful than near-peer wars.
> Peaceful just has to be a continuum in order for us to make any sense of a theory of peace. Nope. Any reasonable person will accept an argument about how things are peaceful in relative terms. Factoring in everything and not cherry-picking. Demanding perfect peace would be way too idealistic.
Those that knew war, kept peace. But now, especially with gen-z, there is less alarm and awareness of war. All the tech and military advancement mean war would be even more horrific and cruel but also as you can see in ukraine the usage of drones and remore controlled artillery is reshaping war.
Keep in mind, the rules of war only apply to the loser. The wars most western people alive today are familiar with are fought in remote countries and between soldiers. If your homeland was threatened most of your people will support breaking every rule of war.
> What is – quietly, because they haven’t tried to launch a major invasion recently – most militaries are probably similarly incapable of the basic tasks of industrial warfare? I once read an article that argued in the absence of war, it's impossible to tell if a doctrine or commander is good or not . Maybe you've got five officers up for promotion. One officer wants to give soldiers high-tech equipment, a heads-up d…
Remember how the US went into Afghanistan with HMMWVs (aluminum bodied cars with canvas doors) and M16a2s (full length battle rifles with iron sights) and left with MRAPs and A4s. You learn stuff when you switch from training to combat.
> What is – quietly, because they haven’t tried to launch a major invasion recently – most militaries are probably similarly incapable of the basic tasks of industrial warfare? I once read an article that argued in the absence of war, it's impossible to tell if a doctrine or commander is good or not . Maybe you've got five officers up for promotion. One officer wants to give soldiers high-tech equipment, a heads-up d…
Or, in software engineering terms, it's impossible to optimize code that you can't profile.