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From wikipedia, "150 watts for an hour of vigorous exercise", or 75 watts sustained for eight hours. Not sure that's enough to do anything useful. So we'll need swappable batteries and better armour than this:

Nice. "no one specified dead or alive". Little gaps like that lead to - great movies

I've seen that many armoured vehicles stacked up in CM only when I'm playing the AI, have lots of drones, and on top of that know what route the AI will take because I've done the scenario before. We keep talking about the RA learning. It's certainly learning some tactically (Lancets, drone ISR, artillery and supply chain dispersal, etc. ), but it remains stone-cold stupid in other ways. At least from what we see and how we assign value and the definition of success. It may well be that funnelling all that juicy armour through one spot secured a senior officer's promotion for being aggressive, or prevented his humiliating dismissal for lack of aggression / obedience to plan. In which case it was very successful for said officer even while being obviously not for the RA - kind of like big corporations where staff optimize their personal outcomes at the expense of the bigger picture. In modern war, artillery arrives in near-real time, and you can't even drive out of it because it adjusts in real-time. The C4ISR or overall OODA loop is that tight, as described in more detail by Haiduk a few days back. And of course the CONOPS of all armour - essentially that significant threats will come from the front, so tactical and operational doctrine is designed to see that they do - is completely broken by real-time artillery and/or smart and/or area-effect artillery, copious and rapidly re-laid mines (wait until they have legs), long-range man-portable top-attack AT missiles, and drones. PS: the Charge of the Light Brigade was a problem of communications, not tactics. "The charge was the result of a misunderstood order from the commander in chief, Lord Raglan, who had intended the Light Brigade to attack a different objective for which light cavalry was better suited, to prevent the Russians from removing captured guns from overrun Turkish positions. " - Charge of the Light Brigade - Wikipedia

For general interest, "Timelapse of every battle in history". It should say every _recorded_ battle, but is still interesting. And the final frame showing all of them at the same time makes Europe look truly dangerous.

Weight appears to be more of an issue than power. Ground pressure goes up and soldiers sink into soft terrain; stairs built to code are designed for (in the US) 510 lbs, which assuming that the soldier weighs 225 leaves less than one would like for exoskeleton, power source, full-coverage armour, weapons, ammunition, and a 3-day pack. There could be breakthroughs in armour weight. How about an angry, murderous sumo wrestler? Nuclear EFPs could be built today, and will be when someone thinks it is necessary, although more likely in the space domain than ground, sea or air. "a 1 kiloton yield warhead could propel more than 21.7 tons of metal at the target at 9 km/s." https://toughsf.blogspot.com/2017/05/nuclear-efp-and-heat.html We talk a lot about near-real-time ISR from satellites. In the next peer-to-peer war, space will be a warfighting domain. Which will likely cause a Kessler syndrome, and we'll go back to communicating with tin cans and string.

Another indication that MBTs are finished. Up to nearly 30km away, if the C4ISR loop is tight, boom. Try APSing your way out of this. Then the surveillance drone will fly to the next target, and boom again.

Not sure it's really off-topic. It affects a combatant's Will. Look at Afghanistan - the armed forces folded during / after the US' etc. abrupt withdrawal, because of Will.

Fair enough, and I agree that birth rates etc. are a symptom. Having said that, if one of COVIDs symptoms is lungs failing, we can treat that while waiting for a course of Paxlovid to get rid of the underlying virus. Thanks for the youtube series, I'll look at it. Regards Collapse, unless it is a significant step up from "guns, germs and steel", which contained a fair number of fundamental mistakes (my study notes are long gone) and ignored the pivotal role of social technology, while I appreciate the reference I'll leave it on the shelf.

And yet, civilizations do fall. Just because they didn't with the last moral panic doesn't mean that the structure isn't under attack and/or failing. Just like with financial statements, past performance does not guarantee future results. Complacency is fatal. Values like patriotism, religion falling out of favor among Americans: poll (nypost.com) The best weapon systems / war fighting structures in the world don't matter if there aren't enough 'patriots' willing to man them. Or if there simply isn't anyone to man them, as the interest in starting a family drops precipitously. Also, culture is largely transmitted through family structures. No children, no cohesive belief in 'good' culture (broadly defined as the values of the Enlightenment), no West. So get out there and make some babies Find yourself a thirty-year-old with wide, child-bearing hips and start over (if you haven't already created a significant brood)

Another demonstration of the fragility of MBTs. Down the hatch:

Instead of talking about tasty rodents (best boiled with goldenrod leaves for a bit of flavour): Russia may have lost another ship, this time a support vessel. Russia apparently has 43 'mine countermeasure' ships, but only eight in the Black Sea fleet. If correct, they now have 13% fewer in the Black Sea.

We saw in the video of the RA soldier being chased around some trees that you can't run from small UAVs. I posited that you can't hide either. This relatively well-hidden RA soldier gets knee-capped: Of course there are counter-measures like chicken wire on all the gaps in your cover. But that adds friction to the whole thing, cost, and is vulnerable to counter-counter measures. Like a small UGV with good loiter time, waiting for someone to emerge from cover.

Agreed, which is why I put a "winking face" - - after that line. Having said that, reading your response was interesting, so thanks!

Watching that video tells me several things, both IRL and in-game: IRL: 1) tanks are done in their current role, which means' they're overall done, unless 40-plus-ton pieces of armour that can only be significantly hardened from the frontal aspect can somehow be rendered invisible in an active/passive multi-spectrum detection environment. We are in the "what can be seen can be killed, and everything can be seen" era. No combination of APS or point-defence is going to stop DPICM or its replacement AWP, or suicide drone swarms, etc. Of course there are counters to everything (suppressing artillery, counter-drone swarms, advanced camoflage, etc.), it's just that a meshed defensive system seems to beat big offensives consistently, and the much-noted lack of air superiority isn't really relevant. Air superiority would not have changed the outcome from the video, although it might have made it less likely (the artillery might have been suppressed / destroyed before the armoured push through the minefield) - and with cheap manpads etc., I'm not so sure that air superiority in the sense of full overmatch is even achievable in a peer-to-peer conflict. So I'm not seeing the point of MBTs in future warfare. For extra fun, the future of UGVs - not mini-excavator-sized tracks, but goats (not the men who stare at them): Marines are preparing to send 'robotic goats' with rocket launchers into battle (msn.com) 2) Mines are back, baby! One assumes every major armed forces is reviewing their mine-laying technology and inventory. In-Game: 1) in CM:BS it takes minutes to adjust indirect fire. In the video, it looking like it was being adjusted in real-time - so when do I get my real-time indirect patch? 2) in CM:BS and other titles, heavy armour (MBTs) are almost immune to indirect fire, even large calibres, and pretty close to the same for IFVs and other light armour, which has been mentioned before in this thread. Please fix or do sumfink.

It does not (assuming the video is accurate - others will investigate) - as I've been saying, there's some time yet until the fog of war thins enough. Until then, I'm in the 'cautiously optimistic it wasn't IAF' camp.

And here's another video, perhaps this time an accurate one. Hell, let's make it two:

I expect they would and are, just like the UNRWA is quite disappointed that Hamas 'requisitioned' food and fuel from UNRWA's facilities, just recently - UNRWA indicates Hamas stole supplies from its Gaza premises, then walks back claim (msn.com) I'd walk back the claim too, if it meant keeping my staff alive. Owned and operated does not mean 'controlled by' - not in Gaza.

Maybe that's because Israeli targets aren't routinely filled with munitions? Also, Hamas announced (apparently, I don't read Arabic) the use of their biggest rockets moments before the explosion, which the Syrian-made M-302, Khaibar-1, a 302mm device with a 331 lb warhead. So, big boom. Or maybe the IAF did it - I don't know, and right now the only people who do are the respective combatants. It's possible that it was a Hamas rocket but Hamas actually thinks it was IAF. As I said, let's wait and see what the American's say.

Yes. The damage was severe, but Hamas does store munitions in hospitals and similar locations (schools, mosques). But I don't know - we'll see what the Americans say once they've analyzed intel. Not that anyone will be swayed (if the determination is Hamas or at least not Israel), the narrative has already taken hold.

That's unconfirmed as of yet.

Israel says it was a Hamas rocket that fell short, as 30-40% do, so I'm told. As they are somewhat home made, it's a credible number. So maybe best to reserve judgement for a bit. Hi did. He also noted the "... myth of six million dead jews in WW2 ...." So, not a serious person. Blocked him some time ago.

I don't disagree that Israel, particularly in the past, has engaged in actions that we, today and then, look at askance. Much of it through their proxies in Lebanon, as you noted. So it's possible to say that the Palestinians have a legitimate, provoked cause - I don't, but it is not an entirely unreasonable position. Having said that: Hamas put its headquarters under the Al-Shifa hospital; inculcates hatred of Jews in the Gazan population from a very early age, including in formal grade schooling and children's television shows; and literally worships death both in its charter ( e.g., death for the sake of Allah "is the loftiest of its wishes", Article 8 ) and its leadership's ongoing statements. Now Hamas has deliberately committed large-scale atrocities: torture, rape and murder of now about 1400 people; kidnapping and hostage-holding of even (or especially!) babies and toddlers; murder and bodily desecration of babies. And all deliberate, not an unfortunate side-effect of achieving military objectives. Some say that Israel also does atrocities. To conflate Israel's current behaviours with the above is to devalue the meaning of the above, which is abhorrent. For example, Israel announces attacks in advance to encourage civilians to leave the area; Hamas encourages/forces said civilians to stay, using them as ammunition in the info war. If the US lost as many people, proportionally, to torture, rape and murder, it would be about 52000. If Mexican government forces crossed the border and tortured, raped and murdered the entire population of, say, Calexico, what would the United States do? We know what they did when 2,977 were killed. Let's sum it up with a Lord of the Rings analogy. It's factual to say "Mordor is savage and evil, but Gondor has its problems." Yes, Gondor is imperfect, sometimes significantly so. But the worst of it can be fixed by the best of it, unlike Mordor. While I would not stretch that analogy too far, this is a good time for moral clarity, to pick a side. Then, when the dust has settled, make Gondor better. With some luck, Hamas will be extirpated, Palestinians will have a chance at better government and culture, and in a few generations this will be in the past. Absolutely.

Unlikely. I shoot competitively (locally), hang around good shooters, and I don't know anyone who could reliably get a smallish moving target with a rifle, let alone a handgun. One could put shotshells in the handgun, but these have low range due to dispersion and ballistics (think maybe ten yards or so). Volley fire from a platoon, maybe. So we've see a lot of EW guns taking down, or trying to, drones. Next step is one or more soldiers in a platoon to also have physical means, like a net.

Thinking for a few seconds more, going from what is possible to what it means, tactically: concealment is, as we've seen consistently, degraded dramatically. More so with autonomy and increased range (better batteries, drone carriers fueled by gasoline or RTGs, etc.). cover is a completely changed concept. It used to require as little as maybe 45 degrees ( e.g., a concrete pillar to crouch behind ). Now it needs to be 720 degrees - 360 horizontally and 360 vertically. But if your cover is 720, while you can't be attacked (short term, cover can be degraded), neither can you attack or move. So you pop open a door / hatch / pile of logs to attack or maneuver, and the waiting drone(s) swoop in.

You could do this autonomously now, or very, very soon. The Skydio 2+ can follow an individual, like a mountain biker or skier, while autonomously avoiding obstacles - this is used for filming, but has other obvious applications. A bit more smarts in the chassis, and you have a hunter-killer. https://www.skydio.com/skydio-2-plus-enterprise