dan/california
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Posts posted by dan/california
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23 minutes ago, cesmonkey said:
I wonder if we could speculate now on what the U.S. could give to Ukraine that would make the most difference, both to stabilize the battlefield short term and maybe turn things around a bit by next January, assuming an aid package of some sort finally arrives at Biden's desk to sign in early May?
Patriot missiles and what else?
155, GMLRS, ATACMS. Bradleys. All of these have been proven to work, they just need a ton more of them. NASSAMS and missiles for it. Then put real money and technical effort behind Ukraines drone programs. Last but most certainly not least would be more training, preferably measured in months, not weeks.
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1 hour ago, kimbosbread said:
Correct. If there was a will, there would be a way… but that would require a will to be present.
Which is whatever is after crazy making.
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3 hours ago, squatter said:
Seems like the general feeling on here is that autonomous weapons are the way forward.
No-one here feel like we should be arguing for the abolition of autonomous weapons, or are you all already in the 'well the bad guys are gonna do it, so we should do it first' camp? (ie the 'race to the bottom' scenario)
I'm guessing you all caught this short film by the Future of Life Institute a few years back?
2 hours ago, squatter said:Yes of course that is true. But unmanned does not equal autonomous. And yes, of course autonomous weapons will offer huge advantages to those who employ them, but at what cost (see video I linked to above.)? Due to the cheapness and ease of manufacture of autonomous killer drones (once the tech has been developed), the implications of their use by bad actors are horrendous.
The world did manage to get some level of control over nuclear proliferation (somewhat latterly and post-hoc) - should we not at aspire to learn the lessons from the successes and failures of nuclear non-proliferation and at least attempt to limit autonomous weapon development?
If we don't then we are heading into an utterly terrifying world, and one most on here seem to have just shrugged and set off down the road towards at the first fork in the road.
2 hours ago, The_Capt said:The issue with fully autonomous is that it offers superiority for a deterministic system. That driver will pretty much ensure any attempts at regulation/proliferation are going to fall apart. Now if autonomous systems achieve the level of a WMD with a MAD component, perhaps. But the best counter to stop fully autonomous weapon systems...are other fully autonomous weapon systems. We already have this in maritime warfare with missiles and point defence systems. The CWIS is entirely autonomous once someone flips the switch. They can target and engage on their own. Why? Because a machine can react far faster than a manned gun.
I don't think it is a question of Warhawk shrugging, it is the recognition that the odds of regulation that 1) we can agree upon and 2) sticks, is simply very unlikely. Nuclear proliferation is a bad example because the morale imperative is not why the major powers did it. They did so they could exclusively remain the major powers. The other examples really are somewhat historical anomalies that we are also likely to walk back from as wars become more existential in nature. Probably the best example is bio or chemical weapons, but we also know that neither of these really stuck either.
Trying to outlaw weapons is like trying to outlaw warfare. We believe we can because we think that war is solely a political extremity and we can use political legality to control a political mechanism. The reality is that the nature of warfare we currently subscribe to is the 2nd generation. The 1st generation was "war is an extension of survival by violent means." That is the older darker nature of warfare that Clausewitz all tried to forget...right up to the point it throws itself in our faces. We live in a third generation nature of warfare - "viable violence to achieve political ends." The introduction of nuclear weapons put us all in a box whereby we can only really wage warfare in a constrained manner. Go too far and one faces mutual annihilation. The problem is when 3rd generation collides with the first one.
So I fully believe in and adhere to the Law of Armed Conflict. I think we should definitely aspire to be better than we really are. But I know an existential capability when I see it. And fully autonomous weapon systems are definitely on that list.
If I may attempt to summarize, you have to win the war to earn the privilege of making the rules. And if rejecting a new technology means you lose....
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27 minutes ago, JonS said:
Yes, but there is no feedback loop between one autonomous drone and the next, in the way that there is between subsequent rounds from a rifle.
Depending on a great many things this may or may not be true. It is certainly possible it is true and the second drone, and the seventh can't learn anything from the previous attempts. There are great many ways that learning could occur though. The first, most obvious, and certainly happening right now is that the same guy is flying the next drone when it shows up in a few minutes, perhaps less if they have an orbit of them already in the air. The drone pilot knows what he did wrong, and doesn't make the same mistake the next time. The second possibility, the FPV drone is being observed by an ISR drone with vastly better sensors, the operators of the two systems are in communication, and the ISR guy can tell the FPV guy what he did wrong for round 2. Third way, the drones are using at least last kilometer autonomy, and start missing., The aforementioned ISR drone can tell the unit flying the FPV drones to change their targeting parameters. The fourth and most important way though, is that every time someone makes a improvement in an autonomous AI drone program, that program shows up in ALL the drones next month, and it will just iterate forever. So the autonomous piloting systems flying nine months after the first ones come out might be five, or twenty five, or 225 times better than the first models.
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7 minutes ago, Carolus said:
EU parliament pulled a "Republican" and refused to pass the budget by the EU council until funding for 7 Patriot batteries is found.
512 to 62 votes.
Outstanding!
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7 minutes ago, cesmonkey said:
This part was interesting:
Then the jammer will have to go to remote antennas, so the expensive bits, and the operator are in a hole a hundred yards away. And then the "wild weasel drones" (TM) will have to operate in small packs where where most of them autonomously attack everything around the antenna with a relevant infra red signature. Then the people doing the jamming.... and on the game goes. This war is in the process of creating an entire group of new military specialties, and I don't see it doing anything but multiplying.
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https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-april-10-2024
Key Takeaways:
- The Ukrainian military’s effective use of drones on the battlefield cannot fully mitigate Ukraine’s theater-wide shortage of critical munitions.
- Zelensky stated that there are no mitigations for insufficient air defense systems and indicated that Russian strikes are forcing Ukraine to reallocate already scarce air defense assets to defend Kharkiv City.
- Zelensky warned about the threat of a potential future Russian ground offensive operation targeting Kharkiv City, which would force Ukraine to reallocate some of its already-strained manpower and materiel capabilities away from other currently active and critical sectors of the front.
- The Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada considered and adopted provisions from Ukraine’s draft mobilization law on April 10 as part of an ongoing effort to increase the sustainability of Ukrainian mobilization over the long term.
- Russian officials continue to indicate that they are not interested in any meaningful negotiations on the war in Ukraine amid Switzerland’s announcement that it will host a global peace summit on the war on June 15 and 16.
- Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov attempted to downplay tension in Armenian-Russian relations amid Armenia’s continued efforts to distance itself from political and security relations with Russia.
- Russian Investigative Committee Head Alexander Bastrykin claimed that Russia has no economic reason to import foreign labor, a direct contradiction of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s recent efforts to justify Russia’s current migration laws to his xenophobic ultra-nationalist constituency.
- Russian forces recently captured Ivanivske, a settlement east of Chasiv Yar, and advanced near Avdiivka.
- Eight Russian senators and 16 State Duma deputies submitted a bill to the Russian State Duma that would likely allow Russian authorities to deploy Russian Federal Penitentiaries Service (FSIN) employees to Ukraine, amid reports that Russia is intensifying its crypto-mobilization efforts.
ISW has a lengthy discussion on the subject of the day, including quotes from Zelensky on the subject. He would REALLY like some some artillery ammunition and more SAMs soonest. At the same time drones are killing a LOT of Russian armored vehicles.
The other great item is the last bullet point. Russian prisons have been emptied out to such a degree that the prison guards are the next people on the list for being "volunteered", they are currently standing around with nothing to do and the powers that be have noticed. It couldn't happen to a nicer bunch.
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Read Dmitri every day.
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2 hours ago, poesel said:
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.
So some body has already done pop out wings. It already has a pretty good sensor package. All it needs is a tiny solid fuel motor and some way warp those wings for control purposes, and instead of a 150 meter circle, it is a 1500 meter circle. I think that might worth the some engineering effort. setting up a new line is almost free, as a marginal cost, because we need LOTS of new lines for every type of 155 round in the inventory. They might as well be better 155 rounds with current generation electronics.
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1 hour ago, The_Capt said:
I guess I have heard from the military conservative school for most of my career...hell at one point I think I was inside it. They have declared "fad" since 1991 for everything from EBO, RMA and Multi-Domain. They have also mounted evidence to prove their "rightness". This war is unique, not only for its time in history, but also what it is demonstrating - just how far war is evolving beyond our former doctrinal status quos.
What we are seeing in Ukraine is not a "fad". It is fundamental on many levels.
The current doctrine is hitting two fundamental physics problems. Tanks simply can't get any heavier, they are already so heavy that they can't go more places than they can in any environment except hardpan desert, never mind crossing anything but the largest bridges. Second a well designed five or ten kg tandem shaped charge can kill any land vehicle in existence, and the actual warhead cost at most a few thousand dollars. With tanks running five million and up the math doesn't add. All the points of friction that used to make introducing the expensive tank to cheap warhead are melting before our eyes. We need a whole new plan.
1 hour ago, The_Capt said:Solid "meh" from me. I mean, sure if we see scope and scale that overtakes artillery and begins to hunt it to extinction, like we have seen with tanks...but the evidence is not there yet.
Guns teaming with Unmanned and Light infantry has happened in this war to pretty solid effects, I suspect it will be a trend that continues.
I will put 50$ on the bar that the eggheads in the western MIDs are scrambling to figure out how to build and employ a cheap hunter-killer c-drone, drone. So an equilibrium wave is coming, but the needle will be moved and cannot be unmoved.
Whether it moves far enough to drop a second pillar of the combat arms teams (ie artillery) though? I am betting "no," at least for another decade. My guess is that they will share the battlefield and advantage will go to whichever side can combine them the best.
The biggest reason, at least in western warfare will be "control". Unmanned AI could be let off the leash to swarm and eliminate grid squares, but we will likely get bogged down in legality. Artillery still has high levels of direct human control, and legal frameworks that govern its employment. That alone almost guarantees a generational shift.
In the end we are talking about "killing at distance". Artillery and UAS share the qualities to push that out over the horizon when linked into modern C4ISR. Anything that can stop a drone, won't be able to stop PGM artillery and vice versa. Tanks simply do not have the range and are too big and heavy for what we get out of them. Infantry can hold ground. Now UGVs are a revolution for holding ground that we have not seen yet. But there I also expect human-unmanned pairing forward. At least at the start.
Everyone is being way to rigid about categories, drones and artillery are going to merge into a single multiply cross threaded complex of explosive delivery on demand. There will be unmanned indirect fire systems from 40mm all the way up to 155mm or even larger. There will be artillery and rocket delivered drones all the way up to the payload of an ATACMs.
QuoteThe artillery deployed sub munitions in the very effective German smart round were developed in 1989. They deploy a parachute and float over an unlucky target, or not. Electronics and and and everything else have improved in the last thirty years, just a bit. There is ZERO reason except some development time and money that a new version of this couldn't deploy the exact same submunition with pop out glider wings instead of a parachute. So now instead of sweeping a a strip a few tens of meters wide at the mercy of the wind, it systematically searches a square kilometer for the highest value target. And communicates with the rest of the salvo to avoid double kills. and if they can get it working with new some of the rocket assisted shells it might have a range of 80 or a hundred kilometers. Something approximating GLSDB could probably deliver 10 or twenty of the little monsters, and they wouldn't have to stand as much acceleration either. The possibilities just spin on from there.
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14 minutes ago, chrisl said:
And for modern naval vessels packing a single 5" gun, I imagine if things got hot they'd get used much like the guns on WWII era submarines. For an isolated, unarmed ship (or small hostile scout vessel) they wouldn't want to use their equivalent of a missile (a torpedo), especially for small targets that might not even trigger it. They'd sneak up and cut loose with the deck gun (or guns, sometimes they had a 20 mm and/or .50 cal too). Sometimes you need to be able to deliver an explosion from moderate range and don't need a whole missile for it.
In particular the gun can respond to close targets far faster than anything else. Say you are in the process of stopping and boarding a freighter of unknown provenance/registration/intentions, having a fast firing five inch gun pointed directly at the bridge of said freighter is a extremely good guarantee of the ships behavior unless the people on the bridge are suicidal. Furthermore the boom the five inch makes is unlikely to damage your own ship if it detonates a kilometer or two away.
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14 hours ago, The_Capt said:
Hmm, not sure this tracks. They can be made less efficient through defensive manoeuver but naval warfare simply added volume. Up until modern missiles they were the primary weapon system for ships of the line. We still put them on ships for a reason. A/C took primacy due to range, even thought they lost volume. Missile offset with range and accuracy.
So naval gunnery expanded its options spaces through volume of fires effectively. Firing many salvos to reduce defensive options. This is how Jutland happened.
Just pulling these metrics together - range, energy-time, composition, accuracy, volume, agility. These are looking at lot like modern military High Level Military Requirements (HLMRs). To my mind these are the framework for an options space.
Precision as "small energy at the right time" of "smart energy" really resonates.
The problem with battleships guns is that they can only be fired from a battleship. They are sort the poster child for somethig that is going to be few, expensive, and too valuable to lose. Where you can dump cruisse missiles out submarines, and other PGMs out submarines that are much harder to kill, or cheap surface vessels that could be praticlly disposable. The unbelievably expensive radar, defensive lasers, and who knows what else a surface ship will need to actually be survivable can go on a platform dedicated to staying alive, and providing C4SIR to the miisslie barges..
57 minutes ago, The_Capt said:Steve forgot a fifth one: logistical weight. Guns are still big steel tubes with complex firing mechanics, towed or self propelled and heavy. That is fuel, spare parts and a lot of heavy ammunition. Not to mention human crew costs - but FPVs also come with crew costs as well, still not sure how these stack up against per-firepower compared to unmanned. Drones are not zero weight but do not need all that dense weight. Makes them far more distributable and much lower support bill. They are highly precise, more so than even artillery PGM - have not seen many 155 round make a U turn on a road to hit a tank from behind. Ranges are comparable now, but may get longer for tac UAS over time. FPVs can be massed produces cheaply, artillery ammo can as well but not the guns themselves.
Ranges for artillery and drones are just going to go up, and then up more.
https://www.nammo.com/story/the-range-revolution/
100 km 155 is in late stage testing.
Perun covers current and near future drones here with his usual brilliance, was posted a few pages ago, but definitely worth your time if you haven't watched it yet.
What all of this adds up to is an ever expanding grey zone/no mans land in a more or less equal fight between first tier militaries, and probably vastly higher costs for a first tier power to take on a second, or third tier one. We are already at the point where both sides in Ukraine can barely bring a vehicles within 10km of the front, and they certainly can't stop moving in that zone for more than a minute or two. Next year in Ukraine that could easily be twenty km instead of ten. In the next war, five or ten years from now it could easily be fifty.
QuoteU.S. is at the point of trying to get rid of towed guns completely. They can't shoot far enough, or scoot fast enough.
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1 minute ago, The_Capt said:
That is just insane. Forget situational awareness and they cannot swing the gun. Sure it may stop FPVs but now gets lit up by ATGMs and artillery.
It has to be really bad for vehicles if the Russians are trying out stuff like this.
The worst part is that it is open in back, so it isn't even particuraly protective against a competent FPV pilot. I assume they tried closing it up, and found that either the crew was in danger of suffocation, or the engine experienced severe overheating. I could be the ever popular both.
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Apologies for the double post.
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1 hour ago, Tenses said:
Taking a few steps back and looking at overall situation, what exactly do you think can really change the tide of this war? Beacuse even with these recent massive mechanized losses the pressure is pretty much the same and we know that when BMPs, BMDs and tanks will not be available, Ruzzians will just go on foot. We currently wait for(and Ukrainians die in the meantime):
- ammunition to artillery/more artillery: This will provide support, which is badly needed, especially in defence, might actually stop most of the attacks but not for long due to penetration of Russian ISR up to and beyond artillery positions.
- F16s : Just as above and might also have some impact on air defence. I don't see much usage in offence deep behind the frontline, definitly can provide good very close to the frontline air support. If will be properly used, with superior Ukraine ISR, can be hard to deal by Russian anti-air. The minus is that every mistake will be extremely costly and irreplacable(mainly the pilots, planes to the lesser degree).
- air defence, anti tank weaponry replacements : this should assure keeping the quality of both of these on current, in my opinion, pretty high level
Apart from these, which should come from the "West" exclusively we have the drone war, but is it possible to achieve quality+quantity=pressure of drone swarms to actually push back? I see that as currently the only option to do that but I am not sure, if gaining that high pressure is actually possible. It was analyzed here many times that using classical means for counteroffensive is generally death sentence.
And if pushing back is not possible what are we looking at here? Either there is a plan to turn the tide or not, I would not count on Russia running out of something, even if it looks like it. It went for the ammo to North Korea, it went for drones to Iran, it produces a lot by itself, if real necessity arises I don't belive it won't get support from China in a meaningful way. And I think it is clear to everyone that China has no bottom, the current "Games of Hegemony" is exactly because of that.
So, do we have a clear target here or just "wait and see"?
1 hour ago, Holien said:Yep, Ukraine to win just has to stay in the fight...
What game plan does Russia have to win this?
Time is on the Ukrainian side, they just have to keep fighting.
Afghanistan is the model to look at...
If and it's a big IF Ukraine can weather this year and generate enough new force they might have options next year...
In the meantime keep poking the Bears eyes out and making it costly (oil refineries) for Russia to continue...
I one hundred percent agree with Holien, a thousand casualties per DAY is not something the Russians can do forever, NOBODY can do that forever.
The second thing the Russians can't do is fight this war without diesel and jet fuel. The Ukrainians need to push their campaign against Russian oil refineries as hard as they possibly can, and then harder than that.
The one thing I would add, is drone DEFENCE. If the Ukrainians could could suddenly start knocking Russian drones out the sky wholesale, the entire Russian system would come apart in a month. This works both ways of course, so NATO needs to be absolutely sure the Ukrainians get there first.
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5 hours ago, Letter from Prague said:
With no way out of a worsening war, Zelensky’s options look bad or worse
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/04/06/ukraine-war-zelensky-options/
Where are these articles coming from? Is the war worsening? In what way?
It all part of the Russian propaganda/disinformation push. They are a whole lot better at that than they are actually fighting.
4 minutes ago, Haiduk said:The story with Tsar-EW-tank got a continue.
After Russian attack was repelled, additional recon showed that this tank hadn't critical damages and can be moved to our positions as valuable source, because almost all Russian portable anti-drone EW assets were mounted which just were possible. It's turned out our FPV damaged only targeting system, then a tank tracks stuck in barbed wire with attached AT-mines, tank lost control, crashed into disabled BMP and stopped - the crew abandoned tank.
During several nights two "Azov" tankers have been providing reparing works. They unlocked driver's hatch, because a gun was directly under it, them they changed a 70 kg battery, which brought from own positions - this work should be done by three men, but they did it together. Then they unraveled and cut the wire on the tracks and removed a mine under the tank. All this in the nights and not in calm situation - one night Russians tried to recapture tank, sending a group on the bikes (!!!), but it was eliminated.
After all "Azov" tankers turn on engine and drive to own positions in Terny. But on the route the tank in the darkness fell into bomb crater, the driver hit head and lost consciousness. Fortynately he came to senses soon and could drive out the crater. Tank arrived to Terny, where the crew already awaited Serhiy "Flash" - admin of FB/TG channel about EW and communication systems. On the photo below he already researhes trophy equipmnent
EPIC! This has to be a movie eventually.
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Quote
https://www.instagram.com/p/C5dlfbiLx_y/
Ukrainian kamikaze drone hit Russian truck but failed to explode
God is giving them one last warning to go the bleep home...
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Quote
https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/positional-warfare-alexander-svechin’s-strategy
Introduction
Discussions of the character of the Russian war in Ukraine have increasingly adopted terms such as “stalemate” and “attritional” to describe the state of the conflict. Both terms draw parallels with the Western Front of the First World War that are not wholly inaccurate but that can be misleading if taken too far. The current Russian war in Ukraine is certainly not stalemated in the sense of having reached a point where neither side can make further progress. Nor is it, properly speaking, attritional. An attritional war is one in which attrition itself is the victory mechanism — that is, one side aims to win by wearing the other down through losses. The Germans indeed pursued an explicitly attritional campaign in the 1916 Battle of Verdun. But neither the Russians nor the Ukrainians are currently seeking to win by imposing greater losses on the adversary. They are, rather, engaged in a kind of war best described as “positional.” Positional war is characterized by relatively static frontlines and regular combat that produces little movement, but the aim of such combat is generally either to create forward progress through steady if small advances or to create conditions to restore maneuver to the battlefield. This essay explores one of the most detailed considerations of positional warfare, offered by Soviet military theorist Alexander Svechin in his 1926 work, Strategy — a work that has influenced the Soviet, Russian, and Ukrainian militaries. It offers an important corrective to our understanding of the current conflict and its likely trajectories.
Has this been posted already?
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1 hour ago, The_Capt said:
China is in a weird spot. They need Russia weak and dependent so they continue to have access to cheap energy (and maybe the odd land grab). But they do not want Russia to totally win, it would 1) really set off the US and West, and 2) A re-energized Russia doesn’t sell cheap energy as easily. And then they do not want Russia to completely fail and fall apart - see access to cheap energy.
They are kinda threading a strategic needle like we are, but from the other direction. If they had to accept “less” from their perspective it is likely a Russian short win the West signs off on. They avoid economic punishment from the West and still have a shot to access cheap energy because a Russian short win would likely still see the West no longer buying said cheap energy.
Whereas the West likely wants a Ukrainian short-win. Russia taught a visible lesson and still in penalty box. But in a slow decline, not a full on freefall. And China’s problem in the longer term.
I agree with this as far as it goes, but I think a great many people over estimate the predictability of the whole situation. There are nine different ways this whole thing could just BREAK. Jake Sullivan thinks he is acting in a way that decreases that risk, I am strongly of the opinion that he is mostly increasing the risk it breaks the wrong way.
The chance to tie this thing up in a neat knot and pretend it never happened disappeared in April or May of 2022, after two years of ever increasing commitment of lives and treasure by everyone involved, someone is going lose.
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Quote
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/06/opinion/ukraine-aid-congress.html
Allowing Russia to impose its will on Ukraine would be a devastating blow to America’s credibility and leadership — fulfilling one of Mr. Putin’s long-term goals. That, in turn, would risk encouraging him to test waters further afield, whether in the Baltic States, in western Europe or to the south, and would signal to Xi Jinping that China, too, can throw its weight around.
NYT editorial page having an attack of sense.
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39 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:
Johnson is in a tough spot, for sure. But leaders are supposed to up for the challenge of, er, leading. McCarthy flubbed up badly and Johnson hasn't shown much improvement. Except, he seems far more aware of his own limitations than McCarthy and that's possibly a good thing regarding Ukraine support.
The way I see it, there is NO avoiding a leadership challenge at this point. It's pretty much assured no matter what Johnson does. His options appear to be:
Option 1 = do nothing to support Ukraine, continue to piss off a very large % of the House and Senate GOP. I think it is likely he's been warned that no vote on Ukraine soon means a call for new leadership (it's not just the wingnuts that can make this happen). It seems that Johnson has determined doing nothing is not viable, so this one appears to be off the table.
Option 2 = put forward a weak Ukraine bill, have a wingnut call for leadership change, and have 100% of the Democrats vote for for Jeffries. There is a fairly good chance this might mean the next Speaker is a Democrat.
Option 3 = put forward a decent Ukraine bill, get assurances from at least a handful of Democrats that they will not vote for Jeffries ("present" is acceptable), have a wingnut call for leadership change, go into leadership chaos like McCarthy, have nothing else get done, and likely wind up losing as happened to McCarthy.
Option 4 = put forward a solid Ukraine bill, get assurances from a large number of Democrats to vote "present", have a wingnut call for leadership change, avoid the McCarthy chaos, and retain his Speakership.
The logical option is #4 because it is the best for Johnson and the GOP generally (nothing would be worse than Jeffries getting to Speaker). He'd probably only need 30 or so Dems to vote "present" for him to win a quick reappointment. From the Democrat's side, they get something they really want (Ukraine), they avoid something they really don't want (chaos in the House), they remind everybody how weak the GOP is going into the next election cycle.
I view #4 as a win-win for both parties and the majority of members, but that option was available to McCarthy and he chose chaos and dismissal instead. So... like Putin, Johnson has bad choices in front of him and there's no reason to think he'll favor the best of them.
Steve
34 minutes ago, billbindc said:Democrats fully intend to forestall any attempt to overthrow Johnson...if he puts through a Ukraine bill. There will be enough Republicans to go along and make it happen. In fact, only three or four would do.
7 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:Yeah, the 30ish number would be pretty much an overkill lockdown on reelection. That would insulate him from a larger Freedom Caucus defection. Since those members have shown that they aren't as unified as they once were, if I were Johnson I'd be looking for more than a handful of Democrats to pledge a "present" vote (obviously NONE will vote for Johnson EVER).
For those not familiar with the significance of voting "present", here's a quick recap.
The Speaker is elected by the majority of the members that show up to vote that day (provided they have a quorum). A vote of "present" takes that person out of the entire equation. 1 person voting "present" is the same as that person staying home and munching on popcorn. The GOP has only a 2 seat majority, which means they have almost no room for error. However, if Democrats vote "present" that effectively increases the GOP majority PROVIDED they all vote as a block for one candidate. They do not have to.
Here's a scenario. On the day of a leadership vote 100% of all House members show up. The vote goes forward with Dems sticking together and 100% voting for their leader; Jeffries. If 3 GOP members vote "present" or for another candidate, then Jeffries becomes the new Speaker. On the other hand, if in this situation 2 Dems agree to vote "present" then Johnson stays on as Speaker.
This is why the only viable path for Johnson to keep is seat is to either not have a challenge at all (seems unlikely) or to give the Dems enough to be assured of sufficient "present" votes.
Steve
Everything Steve and Bill have said above is is correct, but there is one or two more layers to it that is worth keeping in mind. Johnson understands that whatever happens in the next ~nine months, he is very unlikely to be the Speaker in the next Congress. The second issue is that according to all publicly available information Johnson is flat broke, or near as makes no matter. By broke I mean his financial declarations when he ascended to the Speakership showed a negative net worth, and only a few thousand dollars cash on hand. Throw in four kids and he has been on the ragged edge of bankruptcy for forever.
I detail all this because it has a huge bearing on his current choices regarding Ukraine and the Speakership. The best choice for absolutely every one else is bad for Johnsons post Speakership career. If he does the right thing for Ukraine and the rest of the civilized world he greatly hurts his access to the wing nut welfare system that supports the right wing talking heads. Since his entire record in congress before the last year indicates he is an apparently sincere religious conservative with extreme views on abortion, among other things. He isn't going to get a job with MSNBC or one of the Centrist think tanks. I have no idea how he squares this circle.
How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?
in Combat Mission Black Sea
Posted
Well they have many billions on developing laser weapons, they might as well put the current iteration in Ukraine, and see if it actually works
And this is why it probably won't, but at this point it makes sense to try. 100% agree that an almost entirely unmanned battle at the leading edge will be first, and perhaps nearly decisive going forward.
Going out of town for a week, hopefully coming back to good news on the funding.