dan/california

It sounds about right to this guy...

Whoever picked the music wasn't holding back. And again I am fascinated by the way these are driving around by themselves. I also still want to know what they threaten the crew with. It doesn't strike me as a position with a lot of volunteers.

The new reality is breaking thru, at least a little bit.

For all of his vast array of flaws, McConnell has gone all in on the right side this time.

I have just had a small revelation about Russian demographic decline. In a strange short to medium term way it sort of works for Moscows current excuse for a regime. Because the population is shrinking instead of growing it allows Moscow to avoid the problem of the pie getting spread thinner every generation. Saudi Arabia is the example I have in mind, they certainly have a lot of oil money, but it doesn't go nearly as far towards buying social stability when the population has increased by a factor of five in fifty years, or something like that. It depends on what estimate you believe for 1950. And of course the number of "royal" princes has grown even faster.

Indeed Putin's "Orthodox Revival"(tm) is a big part of what he is selling, and is an even more cynical case of coopting religion for political purposes than most of the historical cases. The Post Soviet elite that runs Russia is utterly secular, but they realize that vodka helps keep part of their society controllable, and religion helps with another bit. They are perfectly willing to push both, as long as they are the ones in mansions outside of Moscow with control of Russia's mineral wealth. Edit: crossposted with The_Capt.

But that still might make them twice as smart as the Russian Army, and therefore useful.

It really seems to me that at least 75% of the work needed for a competent drone swarm was done to build this thing. You just have to have each submunition delivered by a quadcopter. Also, they should start making a new version of this for both HIMARS and ATACAMS/PRISM.

ChrisSL is starting to rival the Captain in terms of useful information. And that is NOT a statement I make lightly.

If He wants to go down in history as the hero, all he has to do is put the Ukraine/Israel supplemental, and the full year budget up for a vote. I the Putin Caucus boots him I will by the mans book, so help me. I don't think he would be hurting for job offers in D.C. either.

Whatever they moved to Russia to do, it wasn't to die in Ukraine. It does make you wonder how awful most of Central Asia is, that moving to Russia seems like a good idea?

Those number need to be tripled, maybe more.

We have wasted eighteen months thinking Putin would make a rational deal, and things could get back almost to normal. It might be time to get a proper wartime ammo program underway before my sig becomes an unpleasant bit of prophecy.

NOW it is proper trench warfare. If the U.S. has anything to help the Ukrainians with the problem it might become one more little weight on the scale against the Russians. Also, all those Ukrainian dogs and cats might be about to come in useful.

I would love to see a map of where? Also, these should have been there last April.

The lever those countries have that Russia would feel the fastest is cracking down on sanctions busting shipments being sent through Central Asia.

This is at least six months old, maybe more.

When actually getting things built, as opposed to providing jobs in every single Congressional district, become the priority these little guys get bought out. Despite eighteen months of warning the Pentagon and the prime contractors don't seem to be there yet. We might want to decide if we actually still want to be a superpower or not.

My only slightly crazy idea would be to establish a new army fire fighting aviation unit. The Forest Service has been looking a bit overwhelmed.

The U.S. Army's seemingly steadfast determination to buy a new generation of manned helicopters is high on my list of bad signs.

Now if you are looking for a fifty million dollar per piece boondoggle Sikorsky has a deal for you. I am sure it can do all sorts of wonderful tricks, I just REALLY doubt that staying alive against competent opposition is one of them.

The way the guy who came over to check out what had happened just sort of shrugged was pretty informative. That unit has clearly been bleeding out in that trench system so long they have gone numb.