chrisl

One of the problems with the clearance process is that the younger you are and less history you have, the easier it is to get a clearance.  And at that age it's easier to hide wacko properties because there are just fewer people who would have seen them.  
A lot of the investigation is about whether you have questionable connections, or things you're hiding from people that make you blackmailable, etc, and so if you're 22 and fresh out of school there's just a lot less there.  I'm also not convinced that the government has done any really scientific study of what works and what doesn't as evaluation criteria - quite a few of the criteria look like they came right out of the 50s and there are things that make you "questionable" that might have been an issue in 1956 but not only are common today, so common that you may not be able to find people without those characteristics. 
But to your point - they should be able to find people who aren't wackos who are competent, even for pretty obscure things.  You may not always be able to get all the skills/capabilities you want in a single cleared person, but should be able to do it by making a small group of complementary people.  And that's probably more secure in some ways, since they should start noticing if their teammates are wacko.
edit:
But all that said, I'm also not convinced that it's not a psyop.  It's a lot of stuff to get out in one place, and it's got some strange characteristics.  So even if it wasn't originally a US/NATO created psyop, it's possible that it's the product of some random OSINT person (or hobbyist making a game, or troll, or whatever) and the intel people decided they could fabricate a psyop around it. "Yeah, that report about aliens that you found on the internet that says USG all over it? IT'S ALL REAL!!!" and then start feeding stories to the WAPO and NYT "Oh, those aliens, yeah, we've been hiding them for decades and now the jig is up.  We're so effed that the alien technology is about to all get out.  The brits have been teleporting in and out all over the Russian lines and are going to be shut down".

Drive straight at Rostov; with it lost both Crimea and Donbas are doomed 😜 Seriously though, the only thing I’m really sure of is that I’ll be surprised.

still the documents were mingled with even before the obvious change of casualties and losses. 
USA maps would wouldnt show a scale 600miles when the distance is 600km, and the country names were added. I didnt go through all the documents. 
both could be true of course. official documents were leaked 'off the record', they were mingled with and then leaked deliberately on some forum and then mingled with again to make people think that the previous (already altered) numbers were right.
also there might still be the option that the Pentagon is playing the game along 'ow noes! they found fake info, lets investigate!'. 
enough possibilities, but i wouldnt take anything written in these documents for the truth (or right assessment)... (except ofc the nato-member countries, which are quite correctly drawn as to common knowledge).

Or could it be "the Pax. The G-23 Paxilon Hydrochlorate that we added to the air processors. It was supposed to calm the population and weed out aggression."

Could be a hobbyist or rpg player/game designer working on their SMO campaign game.  Some of you might be old enough to remember the Secret Service convincing themselves that Steve Jackson Games was writing a handbook for cybercrime.

The most plausible thing I’ve found is that it dates back to days when data transmission was expensive, so they abbreviated everything and terminated abbreviations with “x”.  To this day if you read the short data things on aircraft status, weather delays and cancellations are WX, mechanical are MX, and probably a few others.

The most plausible thing I’ve found is that it dates back to days when data transmission was expensive, so they abbreviated everything and terminated abbreviations with “x”.  To this day if you read the short data things on aircraft status, weather delays and cancellations are WX, mechanical are MX, and probably a few others.

I've discovered my own cache of top secret government documents. Its totally legit, I swear!
 

Who publishes maps using miles outside the US? 
It'd be like trying to submit a scientific paper using pounds and inches. Good luck with that. 
H

Well, sometimes promotions can be quite rapid, but that is pretty much never good news.
 

Once again: kit porn
The aircraft (or tanks) in themselves aren't especially important. The system they operate within is everything.^ The USAF could be flying Phantoms and it would be almost as effective as it is with F-35s and F/A-18s.
In some ways it's not surprising this pilot doesn't perceive the wider system, in the same way a fish doesn't perceive the water it swims in. But, you know. Pilots are supposed to be smart.
 
^ the canonical example here is the Germans using PzIIs to defeat French CharBs in 1940. The Germans didn't win that stoush because the PzII is an objectively better tank than the CharB.

Maybe it's because I'm too idealistic, but all this all this "the US should not involve itself" is just a fancy way of saying "oooh, there's a horrible going on, let's just watch and not do anything".
How can someone look at Bucha and the Mariopol and kidnapping children and whatever else and say that?
No matter how you spin it, it is such a heartless position and always will be. How can someone say this and live with themselves?
I will never understand.

I think he was referring to the relative involvement of the Chicken and the Pig in a bacon and eggs breakfast.  The Chicken is involved, but the Pig is committed. It's not all that common of an analogy, but I've heard it come up a few times. Except many of the NATO Chickens are committed to support because they're worried that dinner will be Chicken & Waffles.

Both sound and it suffers from the same strategic problems Japan had. First, it cannot control the security of its energy supplies and it cannot solve that problem in any conceivable way. Second, it can't really gain the assets it might seize (the semiconductor factories) without effectively destroying them.  Perforce, while China would prefer an anaconda strategy it will instead be driven towards a quick strike strategy that is unlikely to succeed. 
Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

OT: Dont tell me germans have no sense of humor...No belated April fools joke...
 

I think he was referring to the relative involvement of the Chicken and the Pig in a bacon and eggs breakfast.  The Chicken is involved, but the Pig is committed. It's not all that common of an analogy, but I've heard it come up a few times. Except many of the NATO Chickens are committed to support because they're worried that dinner will be Chicken & Waffles.

I think he was referring to the relative involvement of the Chicken and the Pig in a bacon and eggs breakfast.  The Chicken is involved, but the Pig is committed. It's not all that common of an analogy, but I've heard it come up a few times. Except many of the NATO Chickens are committed to support because they're worried that dinner will be Chicken & Waffles.

I think he was referring to the relative involvement of the Chicken and the Pig in a bacon and eggs breakfast.  The Chicken is involved, but the Pig is committed. It's not all that common of an analogy, but I've heard it come up a few times. Except many of the NATO Chickens are committed to support because they're worried that dinner will be Chicken & Waffles.

I think he was referring to the relative involvement of the Chicken and the Pig in a bacon and eggs breakfast.  The Chicken is involved, but the Pig is committed. It's not all that common of an analogy, but I've heard it come up a few times. Except many of the NATO Chickens are committed to support because they're worried that dinner will be Chicken & Waffles.

My brother in law just died a needlessly horrible drawn out death, today. He fought for decades in a variety of ways to defend the USA. One person was directly responsible for how it went down. My sister is heartbroken, and enraged at what happened. I am in more than a foul mood. So my thoughts right now are colored in a certain way by this tragedy. Not particularly with distance, nuance and diplomacy. What happens when you are inside the box, not outside. My apologies if you don’t like them. I don’t either.
Lot of talk lately about Ukraine has GOT to produce big battlefield wins, now. Trying to put myself within Ukraine’s box:
1. Your country was suddenly invaded by one of the largest monsters in the world, ravaging your cities, raping and killing civilians. That is awful. We condemn it. You will collapse in three days.
2. We are NATO. We are a hugely powerful military alliance designed  to defend ourselves against that very same horrible monster.  Because we all fear trying to do so alone. Like you. Too bad you aren’t in NATO.
3. There won’t be any cavalry coming to your rescue, on land, sea, or air. But good luck, we support you brave people. Here are a lot of supplies and defensive short range weapons. You go fight the monster. We’ll cheer you on. 
4. OK, you have been doing a great job! Well done. Even with most of your cities and power grid regularly under missile and drone attack in the winter,  thousands of casualties, and smashed into rubble cities, you are still standing! Great job! Here are some more weapons, and one with a little longer range. It works really well so you can continue to not only survive but make some progress. Not too much progress though. Might be dangerous. So, no to your other requests for planes and long range weapons. We can’t risk getting attacked by the monster.. But we will open war crimes investigations into the massacres, rapes and civilian killings and targetings.
5. Hey, you haven’t won yet! We don’t think you can win although the monster has obviously already lost. You have really fracked up his army good. By the way, our patience is growing thin and you haven’t defeated one of the world’s largest military powers yet. After a whole year.  We are the richest group of countries ever on Earth.  We have awesome military capabilities beyond belief. And lots of nuclear weapons. If we lose interest and get tired, you probably will have to negotiate away big chunks of your country you fought and died for. If you only achieve a stalemate against the monster. Unless you defeat that monster, real soon now. Here’s a few older tanks we made a long time ago. And a handful of rusty old Soviet/Russian jets, some don’t work though. Please don’t complain. It’s ungrateful.
6. Oh, hey. Go out there as soon as the ground is firmed up and really tear apart the monster, the monster we are definitely not wanting to get any madder at us. No pressure, but if you don’t defeat the monster right now, you are pretty much up a creek because we’re tired and have real problems here in our nice undamaged, heated homes. By the way, we are worried about you defeating the monster. What will happen to the him? He might hurt us. But don’t forget, the monster has already lost.
7. I mean, yeah, the monster just threw a few hundred thousand troops at you and you survived and all. Well, most of you. But hey, they weren’t well-trained. And we all know the monster has already lost (as far as threatening us over here in NATO - yay).  So you better defeat this monster by yourself, Right now. We gave you a LOT of equipment so you should be able to do this on your own. We can’t get involved. But here are a few more old jets. Don’t work so good right now, but…
8. We just got Finland into NATO!  Mostly thanks to you!). Now we are even stronger, and NATO makes sure none of us have to try to defeat the monster on our own. Like you. Because we don’t think we could. We can’t give you more powerful offensive weapons because it would have taken you all last year to learn how to use them. And then you might have defeated the monster. And we are really really worried because that might be bad. For us. You understand. So go out there NOW and defeat the monster. Or we will probably have to reduce our support for you. Like, if things get really bad for you. Not winning. We might not be there. As much. Or something. Hard to tell. But go win. Now. OK? 

PS. I really am pleased at how the West has helped out. I just don’t think it’s been soon enough with enough of the right stuff to end it before the political rot sets in. So I’m ventilating how it might feel. While I am grieving.

That first one is the rub for Russia.  The troop density they need to sustain for a defence in depth is far too low for the frontage they have bitten off.  The UA has done it through ISR coverage backed up by fires and likely rapidly mobile counter move forces.  The RA has not demonstrated any of this capability, in fact the capability they had has demonstrated erosion, not growth, so they can only offset with manpower…which is also a shrinking pool thanks to baffling wastages in the Winter offensives.
So Russia has a really big frontage to try and freeze the conflict while the UA only has to find the weak spots to exploit - and keep exploiting.  As to mobilization, I am not sold that the west is at the bottom of the barrel yet.  In fact I know we are not even close.  Now political will is the one thing that may start to run low but materially we have a long way to go before we are totally Winchester.  Now dipping into stocks will make us uncomfortable but those stocks are there.  For example Canada still has about 70 Leo 2 (and we all love those guys - The Capt said sarcastically) we could ship another dozen or more with parts etc.  
Would we be happy, nope.  Would we be in trouble if China invades Taiwan?…trust me 12-24 Canadian Leo2s are not going to make a difference in Taiwan.  But could we do it if we had too, yes.  And there are a lot of nations in NATO with war stocks etc with a lot of depth.  So again, Russia is not on the winning end of that calculus either.  What we do not need is a Ukrainian military disaster which would result in a lot of western political testicular retreats into abdomens. 

It's been called as a defeat for UKR I'm afraid.  If they're this good at clearing trenches I'm hopeful UKR can start training their own Beaver units.
Edit - anyone else seeing a NAFO pic on the twitter home button and loading screen?

In my experience I have not seen another place on the internet with as much knowledge on military matters as this forum that is discussing this war. Steve also does a fantastic job of keeping obvious pro-Kremlin trolls out of this discussion making the environment much healthier than discussions on Reddit or Twitter. 
When the discussion becomes off topic, I just ignore it until it gets back to the war in Ukraine.

https://interestingengineering.com/innovation/australia-ukraine-cardboard-drones
Cardboard supply Drones,  Ikea flatpack style. 

You actually need multiple (at least two, more to be more effective) jammers per system being attacked, or more like multiple antennas in a phased array, but the array can be a bunch of drones scattered around if you can sync them up.  You would have multiple drones, each with multiple transmitters on it, and phase them so they mess up the signals at your target locations.  But we have $$$ to impose an asymmetric environment.
Not easy (and harder to do with everything moving), but doesn't violate any laws of physics.  You can do it with a speaker system where you have a bunch of speakers in a space and put a microphone at some point where you want to cancel the sound (where someone's head is in their workspace), then send phased signals from the speakers to cancel all the sound in that small space.  Outside that cone of silence there will be all sorts of crazy noise where the speakers' sounds add up in weird ways.  And with a bunch of speakers you can do it in multiple locations at once if you're careful.  Same thing, but with RF.