War in Eastern Europe, what's it good for ....

[cordex]

Another possibility:

Putin DID escalate to using Nukes, and Russia thought that missile had live warheads on it till it landed.  Now they are simultaneously looking for the General that sold the warheads and trying to figure out how to spin this as a show of force.

Yeah, I thought about making that joke too.

If Putin launched nuke missiles expecting a nuclear blast, I think he'd have to ensure a nuclear blast occurred no matter what.

The US knew about the strike ahead of time and telegraphed that knowledge by closing the Embassy in Kiev because of a "significant airstrike" on November 20.  So Russia knew that we knew, and if they were legitimately going to fire nukes and those nukes quite publicly did not go off, they would absolutely have to fire another missile and pretend the first one was decoys just to maintain deterrence.  Putin has to have nukes to fall back on, and if he launches nukes and ends up with a lightshow, small craters, and a couple of injuries then there would be a perception that he has nothing at all backing his play.

The only reason why they wouldn't fire another ICBM or IRBM to make sure there was a nice mushroom cloud would be if they legitimately weren't confident they could make it go boom on round 2.

That said, the most obvious proof that this wasn't intended to be nuclear is that they wouldn't waste that many warheads on such a small area if they thought they were using nukes.

[Opportunity]

Just a weapon test - why not? Good training area, good time...

[WLJ]

Just a weapon test - why not? Good training area, good time...

More people dying in a pointless war, yay

[Opportunity]

More people dying in a pointless war, yay

Try to send even more weapons to Ukraine - maybe then fewer people will die? Idiotic logic that doesn't work in practice, but let's try again?

[cordex]

Try to send even more weapons to Ukraine - maybe then fewer people will die? Idiotic logic that doesn't work in practice, but let's try again?

Do you believe your initiation of the war was righteous?

[dogmush]

Do you believe your initiation of the war was righteous?

Do you think ours was?

[Opportunity]

Do you believe your initiation of the war was righteous?

Yes, I think that your initiation of this war was unrighteous ))) Sorry, but my dialogue with you looks quite funny because we have completely different beliefs about the reasons for the start of this war.

[cordex]

Yes, I think that your initiation of this war was unrighteous ))) Sorry, but my dialogue with you looks quite funny because we have completely different beliefs about the reasons for the start of this war.

I'd love to hear more of your beliefs on the matter.

[Ben]

S2 Underground has some updated info on the cable cutting. Apparently, the latest info is that the cables were cut ~100 miles apart and not next to each other as some previous reports indicated. Prime culprit might be a Chinese Cargo Carrier that "accidentally" dragged her anchor for 100 miles. It still might be something else as details are still lacking.

This is his longer weekly Intel update, but the cable stuff is in the first 5 minutes.

https://youtu.be/0z8Wt74dfik

[K Frame]

Fun overview on what North Korean soldiers are facing in Ukraine...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGPlwEV5jAU

[MechAg94]

Fun overview on what North Korean soldiers are facing in Ukraine...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGPlwEV5jAU

Makes me wonder if South Korea beams an open Wifi signal over the border to N. Korea.  Or maybe they should.

[BobR]

Makes me wonder if South Korea beams an open Wifi signal over the border to N. Korea.  Or maybe they should.

Even if they do I sure wouldn't want to be the Nork that caught using it. From what I understand South Korea (Souks?) will float USB sticks with music, movies, news across the border by balloon hoping to show the Norks what they are missing. When the Norks find people watching or sharing them it is either off to the gulag or the firing squad.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/north-korea-executed-30-teenagers-133020195.html

https://www.rfa.org/english/news/korea/by-hyemin-son-for-rfa-korean-12022022204452.html


bob

[WLJ]

Not Ukraine but didn't know where else to put it

Square profile picture
Breaking911
@Breaking911
The Russian Security Services has announced that they have taken down three scam call centers in Moscow, which had defrauded people in more than 20 countries out of tens of millions of dollars.

https://x.com/Breaking911/status/1866822247408865323

Probably forgot to give the Big Guy his cut

[WLJ]

Visegrád 24
@visegrad24
BREAKING:

Russia shot down the Azeri passenger plane, killing 38.

Euronews has received a confirmation from Azerbaijani government sources that a Russian surface-to-air missile caused yesterday’s Azerbaijan Airlines plane crash.

The missile was fired at Flight 8432 during a Ukrainian drone attack on Grozny, and the shrapnel hit the plane when the missile  exploded next to the aircraft mid-flight.

Russia didn’t allow the damaged aircraft to land at any Russian airports despite the pilots’ requests for an emergency landing, and it was ordered to fly across the Caspian Sea towards Aktau in Kazakhstan.

Russia also jammed the plane’s GPS navigation systems with electronic warfare systems throughout the flight over thr Caspian Sea.

https://x.com/visegrad24/status/1872276595009782011

[Ron]

Do you think ours was?

No

[WLJ]

https://x.com/visegrad24/status/1872276595009782011

Putin apologized but stopped short of saying a Russian missile brought down the airliner

https://nypost.com/2024/12/28/world-news/putin-apologizes-to-azerbaijani-leader-for-tragic-incident-involving-plane-crash/

[Angel Eyes]

Russian anti-drone measures: trap shooting on steroids

https://x.com/OwenGregorian/status/1873340384345989350

[dogmush]

I imagine that works pretty well. That's a LOT of buckshot.

I can tell you that a 12ga is absolutely a useful anti-drone weapon at the squad level.

[Angel Eyes]

I'm wondering what the reloading time is, and whether the barrels fire in sequence or all at once.

[K Frame]

The Russians for some reason love *expletive deleted*it like that...

During WW II the Soviets had a prototype ground attack aircraft called the hedgehog that mounted 88 PPSh-41 submachine guns in the bomb bay.




They also had similar (primarily naval, I believe) mounts using multiple Maxim machine guns for anti-aircraft use. I seem to recall the biggest being 8 Maxims.

[dogmush]

The Russians do luv them some volley guns.  To be fair, I think they are pretty cool as well, and are a cheap way to up rate of fire if you already have a bunch of rifles and/or SMGs laying around, as opposed to engineering some new high rate of fire weapon.

The US tends to do the same thing but we strap beltfeds to everything.  The UH-1 gunships and M35 Guntrucks of the Vietnam era are one example, 160th SOAR straps a minigun or two to everything they fly, etc.  If left alone, soldiers will strap more guns on something. 

Heh, real world example: The LCU-2000 class landing craft I used to run came from the factory with two .50 M2 machine guns in tripods for defense.  On the ones I ran in CENTCOM for GWOT, we had "uparmed" them by welding more tripods, armor plating, and acquired more guns, so we were running with 2 M2's, 2 Mk19s, a M240B, and 2 M249s, all mounted for vessel defense.  We stopped there because we ran out of crew to man the guns.

THen of course there's the Metal Storm the Aussies invented.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8hlj4EbdsE

[K Frame]

Oh hell, I know we do stuff like that...

B-25s in the South Pacific with as many as 18 .50 BMGs, the Maxon Quad Mount, but the Russians just seem to take it to another level...

Comrad! I have an idea! Let's mount submachine guns in the bomb bay and use it strafe the Nazis!

I'm listening, how many do you think would be a good number?

I think... 10?

You mean 40?

Uh... 25?

88 it is! Congratulations, Comrad! You are now a Hero of the Soviet Union. Comrad Stalin congratulates you on your impending execution as an enemy of the state!

[dogmush]

 

They do have a certain.....Je ne sais quoi on strapping guns to things.

[HankB]

. . . The US tends to do the same thing but we strap beltfeds to everything.  The UH-1 gunships and M35 Guntrucks of the Vietnam era are one example, 160th SOAR straps a minigun or two to everything they fly, etc.  If left alone, soldiers will strap more guns on something.  . . .

I remember reading that some Navy units did the same type of thing during WWII. Being tasked to interdict Japanese inter-island small boat traffic, some PT boats got rid of torpedoes and strapped on everything else they could, up to and including 37mm AT guns and apparently even a Bofors 40mm.

[dogmush]

I remember reading that some Navy units did the same type of thing during WWII. Being tasked to interdict Japanese inter-island small boat traffic, some PT boats got rid of torpedoes and strapped on everything else they could, up to and including 37mm AT guns and apparently even a Bofors 40mm.

I legit kept a Bradley on deck for 3 extra trips in the Persian Gulf in 2016.  Offered their crew a 2.5 week cruise while they were waiting on taskings and transport into Iraq.  We used their optics and did 25mm live fire from the boat.

If I can strap it or weld it to the boat, and get ammo, I'll give it a go.