I was also thinking about this and I think it has to go a step further: Assets don't just need to be underground, they need to be on mobile rails underground. They need to constantly be moveable and pop out of one of thousands of holes to attack or if it comes to defensive e.g SAM sites they need to be moveable so that when an incoming missile is not interceptable that it can simply move away to a different underground location, pop out somewhere else and be able to keep defending. All you should be losing when a missile hits is a one of the underground exit holes. And of course to defeat such underground networks you need vast armies of small intelligent drones that can go in there and explore every tunnel where no human wants to risk setting foot in.
Nowhere is safe
181–190 of 329 posts
Re: Nowhere is safe
#182Earlier quoted context omitted.
To add, the primary reason the US supported Iraq was because it didn't want Iran to send oil to the USSR. This was because the US didn't want a communist nation to have a good economy. That's the story of a bunch of the CIAs operations.
Iran itself in its current form is a continuous line of failures of CIA and MI6 that led to their revolution against highly unpopular shah that was undemocratically installed only by those powers. Why do you think back then the us embassy situation evolved as it did. 'Embassy' my ass, full of cia folks regardless what shallow hollywood flicks try to propagate, meddling with internal affairs for profit and power of br…
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Re: Nowhere is safe
#183Earlier quoted context omitted.
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Tell me about the problems outside of N. Korea that have resulted from N. Korea's ownership of nuclear weapons?
North Korea started out with a "nuclear weapon": Seoul is within artillery range of the border. Consequently the Kim regime has been able to starve and torture its own population, and yes - develop nuclear weapons - without anyone willing to stop them.
You think the problems inside North Korea are ok? Koreans are human too.
Re: Nowhere is safe
#184The ridiculous AI slop image of troops posing around a TBM that's apparently just dug a tunnel several multiples its own diameter is a good illustration of how clueless the author is about tunneling. TBMs are hugely complicated and expensive machines, need vast amounts of materials and the associated logistics network to operate, and drill 200 to 700 meters per week depending on the terrain. Deploying and operating o…
I don't think that the prospect of getting hit under battlefield conditions is the problem here because that's always the problem and the tunnel is supposed to be the thing that helps you avoid getting hit. Tunneling under battlefield conditions has also been a thing in military conquest of castles for a very long time. These days you don't really have to tunnel towards an enemy, you just have to create underground spaces for your missiles, aircraft, etc. and as safer bases so the situation is vastly easier.
Re: Nowhere is safe
#185Hmm... Interestingly one does not look at the solutions to de-escalate conflict. Despite the proxy wars we've had a relatively peaceful world since WW1/WW2. Please humor me here, I'm not saying the world is horror free. The emphasis I would hope would also be for improved negotiation tactics, better resource sharing and goal alignment between groups of people. Why is it that we can dream up more conflict but not peac…
That could work if the actors were rational. Unfortunately, they are largely ideological.
you don't have to be ideological. You can be perfectly rational and continue a seemingly useless pointless war, when the alternative is "armed men return home and start to question your power". Your goal is to stay in power and every move which helps you with it is rational
Re: Nowhere is safe
#186Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Why is it that we can dream up more conflict but not peaceful scenarios? Because nature is filled with examples. Look at the plants around you. They are nice and peaceful, right? No wars with other plants, no battles for life and death and resources... Well if you don't know anything about plants that's exactly what you'd think. And I'm not really talking about animals and insects that are trying to consume them, pl…
Human cooperation is another survival strategy, and a very effective one when achievable. Peace in no way disagrees with what you said, anymore than plant cooperation with bacteria is a counterexample.
I think you're thinking of it the wrong way. Cooperation is effective if the party you're cooperating with has something to give in return that's within a couple of orders of magnitude of value. Just as much as war has a cost, peace/cooperation has a cost.
Re: Nowhere is safe
#187Earlier quoted context omitted.
As I understand it, the idea was that there would be winners and losers from globalization but overall the benefit would be more global and outweigh localized drawbacks. This means that you can tax the global benefit and compensate the losers while still having everyone come out ahead! Sounds fantastic right, but in reality there were winners and losers and no one gave a shit about the losers. Detroit and Toledo did…
One of the reasons for this is that the financial system - which is supposed to serve as a mechanism for representing value in a fungible way - does not assign value to many forms of structured, engineered creation. For instance, a high-performing team within an organization has value, held in the agreements and trusts between the people; organizations will destroy this in a second if it suits them because there is n…
Capitalism offers a means of dealing with the problem. Workers are free to start their own companies. People can just do things and don't need permission. Henry Ford himself started from nothing.
Re: Nowhere is safe
#188Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a property shared by any large scale government spending. The difference between pouring 80B into a war and pouring the same into infrastructure is that one gives you a more developed MIC and a lot of munitions and a lot of explosions (exported), and the other gives you... infrastructure, and construction industry.
A big part of this is that apparently, any president can unilaterally decide to go to war and spend $1B per day destroying things, but building infrastructure for Americans requires the agreement of 60 US Senators. Pre-emptive strikes are “national security”, but ensuring nutritional food for children in schools, safe bridges and potable water, and healthcare are not “national security”. Look what Biden had to do to…
US states are free to build infrastructure without any federal involvement or permission. California just spent $114M to build a wildlife crossing bridge over Highway 101.
Re: Nowhere is safe
#189Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If you have the precast tunnel segments to do that why wouldn’t you just plop them down on the ground? What benefit does cutting and covering provide? I have no opinion on this, but TFA makes it pretty clear: visibility and susceptibility to attack. TFA also makes it clear that cutting and covering is weak sauce compared with actual tunnels "30-40 feet below the surface".
> I have no opinion on this Use your mind and develop an opinion. I read the article too, i’m just disagreeing with it. > visibility There are two kinds of visibility to be had. Not knowing where the tunnel is, and not knowing who and when passes in it. Cut and cover doesn’t help with the first kind of visibility. Disturbed vegetation and soil will reveal your tunnel’s path to even a senile adversary. One who somehow…
> Use your mind and develop an opinion. I read the article too, i’m just disagreeing with it.
I have no particular interest or knowledge of military tactics, and no desire to expand it. I do, however, recall what is written in an article that I've just read, particularly when it already answers, all by itself, questions that people are asking about it.
Re: Nowhere is safe
#190Hmm... Interestingly one does not look at the solutions to de-escalate conflict. Despite the proxy wars we've had a relatively peaceful world since WW1/WW2. Please humor me here, I'm not saying the world is horror free. The emphasis I would hope would also be for improved negotiation tactics, better resource sharing and goal alignment between groups of people. Why is it that we can dream up more conflict but not peac…
The US spends more on its military than the next 10 countries combined. When all you have is a hammer…
Bullshit. Those numbers are not to be trused. China simply lies about their military spending, but independent estimates put their spending alone close to the USA.