Erwin

Some of you may know that way back when I used to piggy back on foreign cultural exchange programs. Had some similar travel over the past 8 months (hence my absence from the forums) and was able to gauge how people abroad feel about the current Ukraine situation - plus my own (very) personal conclusions. Visited places like Scandinavia, Baltics, N. Africa, Central Asia, with an unscheduled quick drive through the Russian Fed. (Yes, one can easily/accidentally do that in places.) Talked with regular people, not govt. spokesmen, and any comments/conclusions are mine alone and not that of any official or govt. entity. Got back home just as the Israeli crisis erupted. The situation in Israel makes my report somewhat obsolete, but the ME situation can be regarded as a “Ukraine added” phase of the increasingly hot global struggle for dominance between China and the US-led west. Foreign travel makes one realize that we in the west are fed a very one-sided view of events from our media, so I hope the following very brief summary is interesting. 1) Outside of the US-led west, Russia (and China) have substantial support. 2) Whatever Russia's initial hopes for an easy conquest of Ukraine, the current stalemate situation serves China's (and Russia's) aims. 3) For Ukraine to "win", Russia has to be removed from all Ukraine's territory. If Russia controls any of Ukraine's territory, Russia "wins". 4) The west has no plans (or way) to remove Russia from Ukraine (barring unforeseen massive change in circumstances). 5) The west’s plan seems to be simply to drain Russian resources and work out novel ways of waging war with new technologies. However, that now appears also to be China and Russia's plan… to distract and drain resources from the west, and to train. 6) The proxy war could go on indefinitely with Ukraine supported by the west and Russia supported by China until one side runs out of manpower. 7) In Europe, there is rapidly decreasing support for sending funds and resources to Ukraine (or anywhere) because of the fast-worsening economic situation for ordinary people in all European countries. Was even lectured in detail by an Albanian about how the Ukraine war was the fault of the US. 8 ) In N. Africa and Asia, there is significant support for Russia and Putin. Swedish folks are not particularly supportive of US goals. 9) The nations bordering the Russian Federation were most concerned about Russian expansionism as one might expect. From additional reading it appears that Muslim nations are responding favorably to Chinese entreaties despite its treatment of the Uyghurs. Looking at the big grand strategic picture China is doing everything it can to create an alternative world reserve currency to rival and diminish the dollar and US influence re its goal of world domination. The situation in Ukraine and the new crisis in the Middle East serves its purposes as nations hostile to the US enter the Chinese sphere of influence.

Best approach is to download the latest "all in one bundle" of each game you own from BF site and make a new install with that. That gives one the latest version of everything plus any new scenarios and campaigns.

Good pic to demonstrate tank positioning for greatest armor slope.

Works xnt with the jungle sounds mod - parrots etc.

An obvious thing to check is do you have all the required modules and are they activated?

It's good to know what are the alternative missions as it's often fun to either lose a mission or choose a different path in order to play the other missions.

Hope you haven't burned out. Your contributions have been much appreciated.

Totally agree. My favorite Red vs Red campaign.. Very playable, can't recall any frustrations and great fun. Would love to see it updated.

Have noticed that with the rare squads that can be split into 3 teams, the order in which one splits the squad can make a difference as to how the teams are called.

Need to have same version.

It would still be useful to be able to split off a 2-man scout and not end up with an unsplittable 7-man team which is "unwieldy".

Check with Bootie. A couple years ago, I sent him an ext HD with almost 300GB of content - pretty much everything that had been produced since 2007.

It's 640KB, so may be able to e-mail it to you. Send me PM address. Has to be today tho' as I go on travels tomorrow.

Yes, this also the challenge I recall facing. Be interesting to see how you do it.

IIRC only squads with 10-11+ members can be split into 3 teams. Nearly all the NATO squads one sees in CM cannot be split into 3 teams. Which is what makes the Ukrainian 7-man squads squads so interesting and versatile. I only wish someone would explain the rationale behind not allowing NATO and other 7-9 man squads to split into 3 teams.

Excellent. My family comes from there so hope I can investigate the real places.

Totally agree. However, the most "inconvenient" thing for folks like me is having to wait months for a STEAM update when it's already available on the BF site.

Most people don't know what they want until you sell em... Marketing is key.

Yes, me 2. Most, (but not all) CMSF1 mods work in CMSF2. I am about to travel abroad so busy packing. If you have a dropbox, I can try and upload some folders b4 I leave. But most should be on Booties CMMODS/FGM site.

You are doing Aris proud. Quietly giving us an entire snowy set of vehicles. Much appreciated.

I use a hodgepodge of "Mord's Mixed combatants", "Syrian Realism mod", "unconventional", "ISIS fighters", "Talibans" etc. From what I see on the news, the uncon forces feature a complete hodgepodge of what they wear as well.

Yeah... That's what I do every year or two as sometimes updates do strange things. So easy. In all other issues, gamers want things yesterday. With Steam users, they seem happy to wait for weeks/months to get what BF purchasers get immediately. Weird. Plus I like that BF gets 100% of my money.

Many years since I played it. But, re the briefing etc. list what units are depicted in the game. Then one can find the relevant mod. Hopefully all works with CMSF2 engine.

Just curious... With all the problems people are having with Steam, why not just buy the games direct from BF and get updates as soon as they come out instead of waiting for weeks? Normally, folks here are very impatient. But, Steam seems to get a "get out of jail free" card.

Yes, a problem with all titles. In CMBS the Ukrainian 7 man squad can be split into 3 elements: 2 x 2 man teams and 1 x 3 man team. This gives much more flexibility. Cannot understand if BF is saying that it is unrealistic for NATO forces to split into three teams or...?