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Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

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271–280 of 1001 posts

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Give nukes to Ukraine, even pretend ones and war will end in minutes This is the wrong answer. But it's clear non-proliferation has failed. If Ukraine had kept its nukes from the 90s, this wouldn't have happened. It would have had the ability to credibly threaten that it had reverse engineered the arming mechanisms.

My understanding is that they were always in Russian control, kind of like how the US keeps nuclear assets at overseas bases. Not only did the Russians have the codes, but they had soldiers in physical control with the ability to scuttle the devices.

> My understanding is that they were always in Russian control, kind of like how the US keeps nuclear assets at overseas bases

No. The 43rd Rocket Army "became part of the Armed Forces of Ukraine" on 6 December 1991 [1]. Unlike American warheads, which are on U.S. bases, those were Russian warheads on Ukrainian bases.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/43rd_Rocket_Army

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To the extent there's a meat grinder, it's of Russians. That seems unfair. It's more of a meat grinder for the aggressor, but it's also one for the Ukrainians, by all indications.

[flagged]

It has already been acknowledged that the rates are "lopsided", i.e. that Russian loss rates are higher than Ukrainian loss rates.

But none of what you're saying means that Ukraine isn't also suffering from a very high loss rate.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#273
post #76

It's just practice. Locate the cables, establish a means of damaging them, deploy the means as a test and a show of force. The western economy is almost completely built using off-prem in Cloud PaaS environments. It should be pretty fun when WW3 starts and not a single hospital, school, laboratory, or factory can operate.

> It should be pretty fun when WW3 starts ...

Which may happen as some people just got Biden to authorize (honestly I don't think he can do that by himself), without congress approval, the use of long range missiles by Ukraine.

Some people are really hard at work trying to start WWIII.

I don't think it's the russian who severed those cables.

Russia knows that if WWIII doesn't start until a few more weeks, Trump is probably going to stop the US aiding Ukraine and stop the US giving its approval for total nonsense (like allowing these long range missiles weeks before handing over the presidency).

So why would Russia severe those cable?

I think there's a very high probability the bad actors here are the same that used Biden as a puppet to give Ukraine the greenlight to fire long range missile on to Russia.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding is that they were always in Russian control, kind of like how the US keeps nuclear assets at overseas bases. Not only did the Russians have the codes, but they had soldiers in physical control with the ability to scuttle the devices.

> My understanding is that they were always in Russian control, kind of like how the US keeps nuclear assets at overseas bases No. The 43rd Rocket Army "became part of the Armed Forces of Ukraine" on 6 December 1991 [1]. Unlike American warheads, which are on U.S. bases, those were Russian warheads on Ukrainian bases. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/43rd_Rocket_Army

Not posting this as a definitive gotcha, but this article includes some detail on how the situation was "complex" at best

> In early 1994, after the Trilateral Agreement, "General Vitaly Radetskyi, Ukraine’s new Minister of Defence, summoned Mikhtyuk and two of his senior generals to Kyiv.[10] Without warning, General Radetskyi told them they had 15 minutes to decide whether to take Ukraine’s oath of allegiance. General Mikhtyuk and one general took the oath, while the other refused. Then, the minister ordered [Mikhtyuk] to return to his headquarters in Vinnytsia immediately, and convene all of his subordinate commanders. ..He did so explaining his personal decision to remain in Ukraine, and asking each officer to take or reject the oath. “All of my deputies,” Mikhtyuk recalled, “except one, said they would not take the oath and asked me to transfer them to the Russian Federation."

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#275
post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their shadow oil fleet is operated by third parties and shell companies. We are dealing with a mafia state here. https://windward.ai/knowledge-base/illuminating-russias-shad...

> Their shadow oil fleet is operated by third parties and shell companies Would be a shame if they started having engine troubles in the middle of the ocean.

The "problem" of Western countries is that the political sphere operates under different moral compasses: like taking down a shadow fleet tanker would be a natural disaster... taking down many would mean many disasters.

The real question is, should security and defense concerns be placed on hold? If our basic freedoms and rights are being attacked, how big of a deal would be a shadow fleet tanker catastrophe?

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My understanding is that they were always in Russian control, kind of like how the US keeps nuclear assets at overseas bases No. The 43rd Rocket Army "became part of the Armed Forces of Ukraine" on 6 December 1991 [1]. Unlike American warheads, which are on U.S. bases, those were Russian warheads on Ukrainian bases. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/43rd_Rocket_Army

Not posting this as a definitive gotcha, but this article includes some detail on how the situation was "complex" at best > In early 1994, after the Trilateral Agreement, "General Vitaly Radetskyi, Ukraine’s new Minister of Defence, summoned Mikhtyuk and two of his senior generals to Kyiv.[10] Without warning, General Radetskyi told them they had 15 minutes to decide whether to take Ukraine’s oath of allegiance. Gene…

Of course it was complex. The point is if Kyiv refused to co-operate it would take Russian military strength it didn’t have at the time to seize them. That isn’t analogous to American nukes on overseas bases.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#277
post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> yet NATO/EU just looks weak and pathetic in the process Really? Russia, with the 6th largest army in the world, had to pull in Iran and Pyongyang to not get invaded by the 13th largest [1][2]. Moscow is being a nuisance. That doesn't make NATO or Europe look weak, it makes Russia look pathetic. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of... [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/13/world/europe/uk…

13th largest backed by the whole NATO and other US-aligned countries. They send almost everything they can outside of nuclear weapons, the most cutting edge military tech, and people (well, outside of a limited contingent of "advisors"). Let's be honest, without this backing the war would've ended in the first month as was drafted in Istanbul.

> They send almost everything they can outside of nuclear weapons

Equipment from the 1980s, 1990s, and early 2000s isn't "almost everything they can outside of nuclear weapons."

But you're 100% right, Ukraine should have received more, especially because we asked them to surrender their nuclear deterrence.

There is still a lot of equipment Ukraine could use, like long-range cruise missiles would help them a lot to stop from being attacked by Russia long-range cruise missiles.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What exactly would "properly" arming Ukraine look like? More long-range offensive weapons and clearance to hit sites in Russia. Let Israel know that we wouldn't mind them taking out the Iranian drone factories supplying Russia.

Even the pentagons own assessments say this won’t make much difference.

> Even the pentagons own assessments say this won’t make much difference

I mean yes, it’s also what the press secretary has been saying. They’ve been wrong at every step to date because Biden has been wrong about this.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Trump now controls all of them No, he doesn't. The GOP narrowly controls the House and Senate, and Trump has strong influence over them. That doesn't mean he controls them. And that's before we get to the states and lower courts.

The courts are effectively captured at every level, because Trump can scribble a writ of cert on a McDonald's napkin and SCOTUS will grant cert and provide the desired outcome. The playbook across the country will be the same, mark my words. The fascists will file motions for changes of venue out of state courts with integrity and into captured federal courts.

> courts are effectively captured at every level, because Trump can scribble a writ of cert on a McDonald's napkin and SCOTUS will grant cert and provide the desired outcome

Sure. This takes time. You also can’t remove state cases to any federal court, it has to be in the circuit.

Re: Two undersea cables in Baltic Sea disrupted

#280

I'm surprised there's such a cable in the first place, it seems it would be easier to go on land through Denmark and Sweden. Is it for some reason easier to have an undersea cable than a land one?

It's much easier to lay a cable on the bottom of the sea. There's nothing interfering there, you don't have to dig, you don't have to put up poles. If you give it some thought, you'll realize how much easier it is to have an undersea cable.
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