poesel

Not to dispute the general direction of this post, but I have to set some things right: - no one is using solar panels instead of fences in Germany. But some people have installed solar panel as(!) fences. That did occur, but is very rare - Germany has willingly killed her own solar industry herself about 10 years ago. Mostly by ****ing up subventions which went to China instead of European manufacturers. Germany basically paid for the creation of the solar industry in China, and we lost 5-figure jobs here. Thanks to the ignorance on the side of the Merkel government which believed that solar (and wind) had no future Now China owns the market and the US is paying immense subventions for solar factories so that companies relocate there. Currently, it is pointless for Germany (and Europe in general) to push money in that direction because that would only end in an economic fight with the US & China. OTOH if China would embargo solar panels that would be annoying but would mostly hurt China itself. The biggest market is the West.

Russian milblogger Romanov confirms that the AFU expanded the bridgehead in Krynky 500 meter to the west. While this information is not that new, Romanov reveals Russians just left this position without a fight. He also claims Russians made a small advance in the center of Krynky. So Krynky still exists, and the Russians have voluntarily retreated (a bit). Did they finally understand the futility of their actions, or is there another reason?

Just to set the record straight: 'not long ago' is about 60 years (depending on which law you mean).

Real life is very different from what you read in social media. Those things you mentioned do exist, but they are few and far between. It is blown out of proportion by the media. Take it with a grain of salt and don't fall for the propaganda. Live in general changes very little and very slow.

I guess the economics for supplying and carrying an extra sensor package just for the last 20m are not there. Especially since radar works in that range, too. Ultrasonic is only good if you need to detect stuff that radar doesn't bounce off - like a fly. So unless drones become THAT stealthy, sound is off the table. Wrt to swarm communications: the swarm could communicate in ways that are designed to be low range. Like weak IR for example. No physical chance to pick that up from distance. With mesh networks, the swarm can also be quite large if its density is high enough to relay the communication. All doable - only question is when we will see it.

Not enough precision at range. Also, comparatively slow (speed of sound vs speed of light) against anything electromagnetic. I put my money on radar for counter drone. IIRC the Serbs managed to detect F-117s by analyzing bounced mobile signals in the 90s. Now, drone are slightly smaller than F-117s, but then this is 30 years ago and signal processing has made huge leaps. I wouldn't be surprised if we would see automatic counter drones this year. The pressure to have them is high as never, and the technology is there (in principle).

The French have a version of it ('Bonus') that uses wings instead of a parachute. But the motion is the same: the ammunition is doing a spiral motion to scan for targets. The area covered is a circle with around 150m radius (that's about 70.000 m^2 or 760.000 ft^2 so slightly more than 'a few tens of meters'). The spiraling motion points it towards many points in that area, and that covers scanning and aiming in one go. Trying to replace that with something that can fly, fit inside a 155mm tube and survive the delivery was hard in '89 and still is today. Even if it were feasible I doubt it would be economical.

I guess this is the AI part: an optical system that can track the tank with a camera. Probably the operator needs to point out the target once and then it is autonomous. No amount of EW can defeat that (unless you can fry the drone with microwaves).

Most of what is labeled AI today is pattern recognition of some sorts. So a cruise missile that can orient itself by looking down and compare that to a map is AI driven. As soon as you can chat with a missile, bad things happen.

Wow, this is really cheap - in a good way. They didn't even bother to sink the servos into the hull. I guess aerodynamics are not that important here. I'm a bit surprised they went for wooden ribs instead of going full foam. Since the ribs are all the same (usually they are not) they are easy to mass produce. But you still need to assemble all these parts. Well, they will know why. Do we know anything about how this thing is controlled?

Now that Putin has admitted that ISIS did it, and we axiomatically know that he lies when he speaks. That means, that we now know that it has been an inside job! No more proof needed! Just kidding. Of course, it was Ukraine. Obviously, neo-Nazis work together with Islamists. The world is explained so easily.

Is Ukraine actually shelling the civilian parts of Belgorod? Or the Free Russians? Or where do these impacts come from? Because if they do - why?

Actually, he got 105%. But, as the modest person he is, Putin reduced it to 85% to show some respect for the other puppets candidates.

Btw, Putin won the election. With twice the candidates and the age of the candidates 20 years younger (on average) than the US election, it must have been more democratic and better.

I guess most people here (me included) don't read Russian and thus don't read the relevant TG groups. Since most stuff here is Pro-Ukrainian, we get a very biased view of what is really happening. For a better opinion I would have to watch more of the Russian stuff and, even if that is a bit stupid, I don't really want to do that.

That's 500 mil just for ammo production, out of a total of 2 bil for defense spending. But more important than the actual numbers is the fact, that the EU as an entity is spending money on defense. AFAIK, that is unprecedented.

I love the simple design. If this trend to unmanned continues, no one will be able to cross the front line anymore and the fighting will take place remotely in the hinterland. Tests of Ukrainian mine laying drone equipped with 15 TM-62 anti tank mines

FYI - the foreign minister would export Taurus to Ukraine ASAP. But it is the prerogative of the chancellor to decide that stuff. So she cannot say what she thinks. And what Scholz thinks - nobody knows. Wrong man at the wrong time.

Ok, I need to add something. The public interpretation of what the pope said is that he suggests that Ukraine should surrender. That is in itself a fact. So the public reaction is in response to that interpretation. That again is a reality. So the pope better explain himself. He did not speak clearly enough.

Yes. Read the transcript. I don't know what he thought, but I know what he said. Technically, he is the absolute monarch and head of the government of the Vatican State. So he IS the leader of a government. Since his faith is rather widespread, I guess that would qualify him as a 'world leader'.

The way this is phrased could mean either Ukraine or Russia. Most people do just assume he meant Ukraine. Very well phrased in the sense of "a great empire will fall".

Germany never showed "every intention". We have discussed that at length, and we are in line with most of the rest of the West, unfortunately. The economy is declining as it sometimes does. "no end in sight" is a bit over the top IMHO. The interest in Ukraine has declined. Of course, modern society is easily bored. The amount of newsworthy items has gone down. But look at us: downing an A-50 has even us only occupied for a few days until we derailed again. But: the amount of support given by Germany is pretty stable, and I don't see that changing (see below). That may not be necessary. The political constellation is currently, that the biggest supporters of Ukraine are both in the government (greens & liberals(*)) and the opposition (conservatives). The next government will most likely include one or two of those parties. Thus, it is most unlikely that support for Ukraine will falter. (*) not 'liberal' in the US sense of the word

This answers some of your questions: https://publications.bof.fi/handle/10024/53281 I included one graphic from the report, but there is more data. TL;DR: a mobik dying in his 30s might earn more by his death than he would during the remainder of his lifetime, including pension. Where do Russia’s mobilized soldiers come from? Evidence from bank deposits Solanko, Laura (21.02.2024) Forgot: I got this through this paywalled article: https://www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/russland-geld-fuer-tote-soldaten-wie-der-krieg-einen-makabren-vermoegensboom-ausloest-a-a35d1548-1e7c-4481-b798-0a5fae6dc3e4

I'm afraid we are way past the argument stage wrt Scholz and Taurus... There are also quite a few people in his party who still very much agree with him on that issue. Add to this that in East-Germany, the population is split on sending arms to Ukraine at all. I mentioned the three upcoming votes there? There is zero chance that anything will happen before these are through, and it won't get much better afterward. The last of these votes is September 22nd. And the next national vote is a year after that. So nope, I ain't seeing that happening as much as I wish it.

AFAIK it was published in the TG channel of some Russian propagandist first. So it is definitely pushed from Russia. There is also no doubt that it is beneficial for Russia. It makes look Scholz stupid no matter what he does. If he does not deliver Taurus, it's stupid because his arguments are wrong. If he does, he will look weak. And no way, this comes from his own party. We have a few votes coming up in the east. The only party which does profit from this are the fascists. Maybe Russia did it for them?