Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

>>>OP stated that Russia don't have any warmwater ports outside Crimea which is obviously incorrect.

If Sevastopol is highlighted for its warm-water access, but Novorossiysk is not, then the issue is at best unclear.

>>>They could sign a peace agreement with Ukraine and quickly move their armies north no attack Finland, no?

Even leveraging interior lines and Russia's robust rail transportation network, pivoting 150,000+ men >1,100km (roughly the distance from Kursk to Petrozadovsk) is not something that happens quickly. Also, not all "NATO borders" are created equal. As I said, sharing a hostile border with Finland and sharing a hostile border with Ukraine do not present the same security implications for the heartland of the Russian state.

>>>Ukraine offered to commit to neutrality multiple times during peace negotiations in February and March, but Russia rejected the proposals

Did Russia reject the proposals, or did the West torpedo the negotiations? https://www.globalresearch.ca/diplomacy-watch-did-boris-john...

>>>Which failed spectacularly and kinda proves my point?

Yet the American "Thunder Run" into Baghdad was a spectacular success, and Russia's own armored drive on Tblisi in 2008 was also reasonably successful. The tactical concept isn't the failure point, the abysmal incompetence of the force trying to execute it is. Russia's armored blitz into Grozny in 1995 was also a brutal and costly failure. They had the same problem then of a poorly-led and poorly-supported underskilled army driving into urban terrain held by experienced and well-led veterans.

>>>Also, they assumed that after initial missile barrage on Ukraine military assets they will achieve complete air superiority which didn't happen. I don't think anyone expects NATO to quickly achieve air superiority in Russian airspace, including Russia's own military analysts.

The Ukrainians are turning off the search radars on their SAMs, and get fed extensive intelligence from practically every NATO ISR asset in Europe. They largely only activate their big long-range SAMs after NATO has already tipped them off to a threat. Combine that with generally threadbare Russian ISR of the Deep Battlespace, and Russian Air Force pilots not having the skill/experience to do very large US/Israeli-style strike packages. All of that has kept the airspace surprisingly contested.

By contrast, none of those limiting factors would apply to US airpower if we needed to peel back Russia's IADS. It's the one thing at which we are absolutely exceptional, and while Russian SAMs are still very respectable hardware, their personnel have demonstrated they are so incompetent/poorly trained....we'll probably walk all over them. Hopefully we don't have to find out.

>>>I have no knowledge of India's or Pakistan's nuclear doctrines. Do they permit first strike?

Same here, no clue.

>>>Where is ad hominem exactly? Your portrayal of the start of WW2

Rather than engage with the argument you attempted to attack my credentials and/or regional knowledge. I did not make a "portrayal of the start of WW2" [emphasis mine], as my comments contain no temporal specificity. I said that the Soviets were on the receiving end of an invasion from an alliance on their western border. That's an indisputable fact. I didn't clarify WHEN, merely that it happened, and that it colors their logic and thought processes.

Here's another statement about an adversary within my actual Area of Operations: "North Korea was on the receiving end of a bombing campaign that destroyed every structure larger than a footbridge in the country." That doesn't imply that the war was started by a US bombing campaign, nor does it assign any moral justification to North Korea's actions. It merely provides context for things that affect our military planning today, such as North Korea having thousands of underground facilities. The entire country is an underground bunker complex. I have to constantly bring this up to shake overconfident Marine Corps officers out of their complacency, by comparing a fight in North Korea to "like invading Iwo Jima, except the defenders have fortified a territory the size of Indiana". But back on subject...

The key take-away is that the physical borders of the Russian state are demonstrably insecure from the west. Attacking along the Warsaw-Minsk-Moscow axis has been used in 1812, 1915, and 1941 for a reason, all with catastrophic implications for Russia. Russia will continually act with extreme paranoia regarding its European frontier, probably until they have reliable buffer states as far as the Carpathian Mountains. Watch this Finnish Colonel for some background: https://youtu.be/CvonRMSuFpw

>>>keep repeating Russian propaganda talking points

Dates. Distances. Timelines. Treaties. US Congressional discussions. You have contested the accuracy of none of them. If you conclude that they are all "Russian propaganda", perhaps you are simply DEEP in an ideological bubble?

>>>and make it look like they were just peacefully minding their own business in thirties

Don't put words in my mouth, at no point have I implied that. Your inference of such is entirely a product of your own biases.

>>>repeatedly calling Kyiv "Kiev"

I also refer to Volgograd as "Stalingrad", Myanmar as "Burma", and sometimes even Ho Chi Minh City as "Saigon". Again, anything you infer from that is a product of your own mind. Unless you spell Munich as "München" regularly, and do the same for every other native-language rendition of every city, in every conversation, then demanding usage of "Kyiv" is just a meaningless virtue-signal. As a side note, do some Google Searches with the date range feature. Reuters.com was using Kiev vice Kyiv in their English reporting as late as 2019. Why did they wait 5 years after Putin invaded the Donbas to switch? https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-rally-idUS... Reuters is still using "Munich", BTW. Those dastardly Anglophiles. /s

>>>but calling someone a paid shill will indeed be against HN rules

I'm not just a defense contractor, I'm also a NATO military officer. Just because I serve Russia's #1 geopolitical adversary doesn't mean I let my brain fall out of my head to be filled with whatever palatable nonsense is swallowed uncritically from major western sources. The number of field grade officers I knew who took the "Ghost of Kiev" at face value was equally shocking and disappointing. You must understand the context of why your opponent is making the moves that they make, or you will be surprised, caught off guard, or otherwise ill-positioned to send as many of them to Hell as possible. I find "Pressing 'X' to doubt" on most of the talking points coming from friendly sources more useful than the opposite approach.

Also spend some time lurking on the various intel fusion chatrooms on SIPR or JWICS if you have an appropriate security clearance, and read some of the historical orders for things like when we wanted to put anti-ballistic missiles in Eastern Europe in 2007 (IIRC there are EUCOM Campaign Orders for that, you can search on Intelink.sgov.gov on SIPR). It's important to grasp what we're REALLY doing and not just what we say we are doing. You'll find yourself with far more questions than answers.

That being said, the commenter you replied to is wrong. Yes, warehousing occasionally does lead to massive wastage. But warehousing in general is common even if it means things will be slightly more expensive. That's how the military is able to run equipment whose manufacturing ended decades ago. That's how manufacturing worked worldwide before JIT became widespread.

The reason it might appear warehousing doesn't work is because the news will report instances where it's gone wrong. They're not gonna report the significantly greater instances where things are working just fine, because that's not news.

https://phys.org/news/2022-10-telescope-mirrors-sharpen-view...

You seem to be hellbent on dying on that hill, but I don't see what is "unclear" about it since anyone can easily verify with 2 minutes of googling that Novorossiysk (as well as multiple other ports in the region) are warmwater. As someone who visited eastern Black See coast in January I can attest that water there is indeed in liquid aggregate state during the winter :)

> Even leveraging interior lines and Russia's robust rail transportation network, pivoting 150,000+ men >1,100km (roughly the distance from Kursk to Petrozadovsk) is not something that happens quickly.

But they would have managed by now if they wanted to, wouldn't they?

> Did Russia reject the proposals, or did the West torpedo the negotiations? https://www.globalresearch.ca/diplomacy-watch-did-boris-john...

Well, I think you could find some hot take on Twitter (which your linked article seems to be based on besides unnamed "multiple former senior U.S. officials") that supports any kind of wild theory on any subject. (maybe martians torpedoed the negotiations? go figure!)

However, Zelensky had always been reasonably pro-Russian until such political position became completely untenable. Remember that the guy was elected on program to "stop the war that is only going on because Poroshenko and his goons are making millions on it and we just need to stop shooting and make peace with Putin", etc. so I don't see any motivation for him to continue it instead of reaping significant political benefits from bringing the peace to his people. I guess next thing you are going to tell me is how revolution in 2014 was completely orchestrated by the West (my friends that participated are still waiting for their paychecks BTW!) and other such talking points that people with your views likes to repeat ad nauseam...

> Yet the American "Thunder Run" into Baghdad was a spectacular success, and Russia's own armored drive on Tblisi in 2008 was also reasonably successful. The tactical concept isn't the failure point, the abysmal incompetence of the force trying to execute it is.

Both of these were executed in conditions of air superiority, which is exactly what I talked about in very next sentence of my previous comment, no?

> By contrast, none of those limiting factors would apply to US airpower if we needed to peel back Russia's IADS. It's the one thing at which we are absolutely exceptional, and while Russian SAMs are still very respectable hardware, their personnel have demonstrated they are so incompetent/poorly trained....we'll probably walk all over them. Hopefully we don't have to find out.

You assume NATO will just "walk over" Russian layered defense of endless Thors, Pancirs, Buks, S-300s and S-400s in hours to allow tank blitz on Moscow? That is a quite a surprising take for me, but okay. I mean, Ukraine _slowly_ putting them out one-by-one with HARMs, but it takes quite some time...

> Rather than engage with the argument you attempted to attack my credentials and/or regional knowledge. I did not make a "portrayal of the start of WW2" [emphasis mine], as my comments contain no temporal specificity. I said that the Soviets were on the receiving end of an invasion from an alliance on their western border. That's an indisputable fact. I didn't clarify WHEN, merely that it happened, and that it colors their logic and thought processes.

> Here's another statement about an adversary within my actual Area of Operations: "North Korea was on the receiving end of a bombing campaign that destroyed every structure larger than a footbridge in the country." That doesn't imply that the war was started by a US bombing campaign, nor does it assign any moral justification to North Korea's actions. It merely provides context for things that affect our military planning today, such as North Korea having thousands of underground facilities. The entire country is an underground bunker complex. I have to constantly bring this up to shake overconfident Marine Corps officers out of their complacency, by comparing a fight in North Korea to "like invading Iwo Jima, except the defenders have fortified a territory the size of Indiana". But back on subject...

Something that is factually correct but presented in certain way is one of the best and most effective kinds of propaganda. A quote from the master of the subject:

"Good propaganda does not need to lie, indeed it may not lie. It has no reason to fear the truth. It is a mistake to believe that people cannot take the truth. They can. It is only a matter of presenting the truth to people in a way that they will be able to understand. A propaganda that lies proves that it has a bad cause. It cannot be successful in the long run."

I believe is is important to frame the start of WW2 in the correct way. There is a reason why USSR/Russia propaganda always insist on framing that their Great Patriotic War started in 1941, and the reason is not because USSR had nothing to do with it in 39-40, quite the opposite in fact.

>The key take-away is that the physical borders of the Russian state are demonstrably insecure from the west. Attacking along the Warsaw-Minsk-Moscow axis has been used in 1812, 1915, and 1941 for a reason, all with catastrophic implications for Russia. Russia will continually act with extreme paranoia regarding its European frontier, probably until they have reliable buffer states as far as the Carpathian Mountains. Watch this Finnish Colonel for some background: https://youtu.be/CvonRMSuFpw

As a highly experienced military officer with access to all kinds of closed chatrooms with scary-looking abbreviated names what is your assessment on the likelihood of western invasion into Russia in 21st century? What would be the motivation of invaders and their plan to prevent the war from quickly escalating into nuclear? Do you believe that Russian analyst has different assessment than you on the matter? If so, why?

> Don't put words in my mouth, at no point have I implied that. Your inference of such is entirely a product of your own biases.

And I suggest that framing and wording of facts presented by you is an indication of your biases. Apparently we will have to disagree on this one.

> I also refer to Volgograd as "Stalingrad", Myanmar as "Burma", and sometimes even Ho Chi Minh City as "Saigon". Again, anything you infer from that is a product of your own mind. Unless you spell Munich as "München" regularly, and do the same for every other native-language rendition of every city, in every conversation, then demanding usage of "Kyiv" is just a meaningless virtue-signal. As a side note, do some Google Searches with the date range feature. Reuters.com was using Kiev vice Kyiv in their English reporting as late as 2019. Why did they wait 5 years after Putin invaded the Donbas to switch? https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-rally-idUS... Reuters is still using "Munich", BTW. Those dastardly Anglophiles. /s

I don't see anything funny or "virtue signaling" on having courtesy to use geographical names preferred by people that live there. I didn't know that Germany prefers "Munchen", but I happen to mostly call it like that my whole life because that is how it is called in my native tongue (Russian).

> I'm not just a defense contractor, I'm also a NATO military officer. Just because I serve Russia's #1 geopolitical adversary doesn't mean I let my brain fall out of my head to be filled with whatever palatable nonsense is swallowed uncritically from major western sources. The number of field grade officers I knew who took the "Ghost of Kiev" at face value was equally shocking and disappointing. You must understand the context of why your opponent is making the moves that they make, or you will be surprised, caught off guard, or otherwise ill-positioned to send as many of them to Hell as possible. I find "Pressing 'X' to doubt" on most of the talking points coming from friendly sources more useful than the opposite approach.

So let's assume for a second you are actually who you say you are, as opposed to some FSB-dude (or even better-trained Olgino worker) and present you with very simple question: do you believe that security concerns are indeed _the main motivation_ for the invasion? no empire-rebuilding for ideological reasons and political gains involved?

Dude, I'm Ukrainian and Pravda isn't exactly considered a paragon of journalistic integrity here. In fact, they are exactly the ones who would publish articles based on twitter hot takes and "unnamed sources close to X".

> Fully orchestrated? No. Subsidized and facilitated by the US State Department and NGOs? Yes.

> https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-ukraine-tape-idUSBREA...

Sigh People with your political inclinations (usually Russia-sympathizers) always bring "Nuland tapes" like some kind of slam dunk. They were discussing who would they have preferred to work with in future Ukrainian government. What exactly is so scandalous here in your opinion? You don't believe Russian diplomats had been discussing their preference at the time? Or that there weren't any strong words exchanged in private conversations of Ukrainian government officials regarding US president elections in general and Donald Trump in particular in 2020, for example? Were US president elections "subsidized and facilitated" by Ukraine?

Also, the conversation about the subject always goes in following way in my experience:

- The revolution was fully orchestrated by the evil collective West!

- How?

- Okay, maybe not orchestrated but payed for!

- People who participated still waiting for they paycheck, where do they apply?

...

- Okay, okay, but US gave some humanitarian aid aNd hEr tApeZ!!1

I personally know a lot of people who participated directly (for free, no Nuland or "drugged oranges" involved, if you get the reference), donated money, food or medical supplies, so please spare me your lectures about western spies paying opposition and hiring nazis to overthrow the legitimate government...

> Not in hours. I'd assume at least 30 days for a thorough air campaign, with 1000+ sorties per day for at least the first week.

I don't get it. You state they are afraid of sudden decapitating tank blitz on Moscow... that will be preceded by 30 days of bombardment? How does that make sense? Won't Russia just retaliate with nukes? (again, which is explicitly allowed by their nuclear doctrine and fits well with their "escalate to de-escalate" playbook)

> With that mindset almost anything can be misconstrued as propaganda.

With your background you should understand better than most how modern propaganda works. It is not a leaflet or poster with "Tovarisch, motherland calls you to kill evil nazi Ukrainians! Apply Now!" (though that still do exist and has its place in the toolkit) but bunch of dudes on payroll performing organized campaigns in social media to distort facts, set the framing and control the narrative. Your message history on HN fits that description perfectly BTW ;)

> Except the point was never about the start of WW2. It was about identifying the terrain-related strategic vulnerabilities of central Russia which spans centuries.

Except that they didn't have nukes during that invasions!

>1) Undermine a Eurasian-spanning power bloc (reference Brzezinski's "The Great Game" for why)

Russia creating "Eurasian-spanning power bloc"? With what? Dude, they have been getting their asses kicked by bunch of poorly-trained Ukrainians with some outdated stuff (Stingers, Javelins, M777s), some nineties tech (HARM, etc.) and very few relatively modern but limited pieces of equipment (~30 launchers with GLMRS, no ATACMS). You assume US are threatened by _that_ and are plotting to prevent Russian glorious domination of Eurasia?!

> 2) Prevent the creation of an alternate reserve currency backed by Russian natural resources (oil + gold, Gaddafi wanted to do this before he was killed)

Russians seem to be doing very well in sabotaging their natural resources business empire themselves at the moment, no need to tank-rush Moscow for that.

> 3) Finally eliminate the most credible nuclear existential threat to the US (China's nuclear triad, in contrast, is small and inadequate)

Fully eliminate nuclear threat... by provoking nuclear war with biggest adversary?

> I don't think escalation can be prevented with sufficient reliability to approve a conventional regime change operation. The problem is, Russia's paranoid leadership likely sees things differently.

Or they just pretending that they are "being threatened by big-scary NATO at their border" to legitimize their conquests?

> Yes, because their lived experience and cultural environment is completely different. Their historical trauma + cultural ego/chauvinism combine to cause them to weigh the variables in the equation differently than I would.

Aren't analyst supposed to analyze military capabilities and scenarios objectively? I mean, how stupid can they be? It is not like their analysis is performed by Kadyrov and Prigozhin, right?

> Our historical trauma = the Navy "abandoning" us at Guadalcanal, so we have an irrational attachment to maintaining our own air support, with stupidly-expensive/complex VTOL performance requirements. Our organizational chauvinism reinforces our refusal to source assistance from our sister services because we think we can do anything and everything by ourselves.

Irrational attachment or people who produce and sell the necessary equipment lobbying for that? There are clear financial incentives for military-industrial complex to keep things "with stupidly-expensive/complex VTOL performance requirements" which I consider more relevant explanation than some "historical traumas".

> But aren't the four (security, empire-building, ideology, politics) always inextricably linked? National leaders express "security concerns" usually because The Other Guy is interfering with their empire-building, both foreign and domestic. I loathe every time I hear a general talk about our vague "national security interests". A friend of mine used to provide communications support for Tier 1 spec ops units. He said "I didn't kick in doors with them, but I traveled with them and made sure they had working radios. What I learned was..... everything is about money, family, and power."

When US invaded Iraq or Afghanistan they didn't try to annex the lands. And even if you suggest it would be unfeasible to annex lands thousands kilometers away, they still could have easily annexed nearby Panama in 1990, for example. Here we see very clear divergence of stated goals ("We just want Ukraine to commit to not let spooky-scary NATO in", as if NATO is actually anxious to get in in the first place...) and actions (ethnic cleansings, forced deportations, annexations).

Do you think there was any realistic scenario where NATO could have accepted Ukraine with significant chunks of the country occupied by Russians since 2015 even without the invasion? And you think Russia didn't understand that Ukraine was not going to be accepted any time soon?