Canada Guy

Some of the folks with a regular or primary reserve background can probably answer this better than I can, but I think metric is probably prevalent if not standard. I do know the U.S. military has used mostly metric for a lot of things since before the Vietnam War for the sake of NATO interoperability (e.g. ranges and distances in kilometers, switching to 9mm sidearms). The military is up there with the scientific and engineering communities (and science fiction writers ) for being a place where Americans do use SI measurements.
Edit: Probably not 100% standard because .50 cal light machine guns are still widespread. Also bearing in mind that the UK and Canada were still using Imperial measurements when NATO was founded.

The Mars Climate Orbiter called - it wants its metric-imperial conversions back.

Agreed.  I really wish CM had an operational layer to plug this into.

Your definitions are categorically wrong.  A dictator with actual 95% support isn't a dictator but a phenomenally popular leader.  An autocrat maybe.   A Dictator in reality relies on brute force power to stay on top.  Pinochet, Kim Jong un, Robert Mugabe etc. State control of the media and education systems, full control of the state police and military institutions, judiciary etc ensures control.  
And what the heck is that "smoothie sipping leftist" comment?  I don't think you are finding in the US that the "smoothie sipping leftists" are Putin's main apologists.  Granted the left can have some annoying as hell pontificators, they however haven't been the ones most vocally decrying the US gov't support for Ukraine.  Who within the French political scene has been arguing against supporting Ukraine?  Same in most other western states.  Gimme a smoothie and arm the hell out of Ukraine. (actually,  i prefer coffee and wine).

Intelligently contrarian article by David Johnson on WOTR - I will underline some parts for the sake of promoting discussion with TLDR folks:
"WOULD WE DO BETTER? HUBRIS AND VALIDATION IN UKRAINE"
https://warontherocks.com/2022/05/would-we-do-better-hubris-and-validation-in-ukraine/
First, a warning about Ukraine's control of the information sphere in the West:
"The Russians have, however, conducted several successful river crossings of the Siverskyi Donets River to position forces for offensive operations against Izyum. These crossings enabled the Russians to posture forces for offensive operations in the region south of the river.
These crossings, as well as other successful Russian operations, receive scant media attention. Nor do Ukrainian failures figure prominently in reporting from the war. This is likely the result of a sophisticated all-media Ukrainian information campaign, reinforced by positive stories from journalists whose access is carefully managed by the Ukrainian government. This control of information is reinforced by their military’s excellent operational security. Indeed, it was the Ukrainian government that distributed the video of the botched Siverskyi Donets River crossing."
Sizzling take on how Western militaries' prioritization of force protection [See all the folks bragging about protecting their pixeltruppen above 🙂 ] may well be counter-productive in a near-peer conflict like the war in Ukraine:
"Western militaries are also conditioned by what Jeffrey Record calls “casualty phobia.” He traces this phenomenon to the Vietnam War, but notes that its modern implications were manifested in Operation Allied Force in Kosovo. His thesis is that U.S. policymakers and senior military officers believe that the “use of force in situations of optional intervention should be prepared to sacrifice even operational effectiveness for the sake of casualty avoidance” and that in the war against Serbia, “force protection was accorded priority over mission accomplishment.” To support this conclusion, Record cites then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Hugh Shelton to support this conclusion: “The paramount lesson learned from Operation Allied Force is that the well-being of our people must remain our first priority.”
Consequently, Western militaries have focused heavily on force protection. This was possible because of the discretionary nature of most operations—the types of operations most serving military members have experienced almost exclusively during their careers. There also is an ever-present concern behind most operational decisions that the perceived public aversion to casualties could unhinge policy. This is not to say that the irregular wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were not brutal and deadly. They certainly were at the soldier, squad, platoon, and company levels. That said, operations rarely involved the employment of battalion or larger formations in combined arms operations.
In over 20 years of war in Afghanistan, not a single platoon position was lost in combat. Casualty levels were extraordinarily low by even Vietnam War standards and medical attention was prompt and comprehensive. Finally, combat was deadly only at the ground level; aircraft largely operated with impunity outside the range of limited adversary air defenses. Aviation losses were in low-altitude operations and almost exclusively helicopters.
The war in Ukraine has starkly demonstrated the high human costs of large-scale, high-intensity warfare. Russian casualties at the Siverskyi Donets River and in other battles show that these are wars where company, battalion, and even larger formations can be annihilated in the blink of an eye, resulting in large numbers of soldiers killed in action and wounded, as well as significant materiel losses.
Consequently, in Ukraine, we are seeing the return of the imperative for force preservation, rather than force protection. This is currently beyond the consciousness of Western militaries and current combat casualty care capacity.
Changing the mindset from “force protection” to “force preservation” borders on heresy in current Western military culture. In Ukraine, Russia is learning the necessity of force preservation the hard way — in the unforgiving crucible of combat. A reasonable question is whether or not Western governments have prepared themselves, much less their citizens, for a conflict that could result in thousands of deaths and many more casualties in just a few weeks. Would this butcher’s bill awaken the passion of the people described in Carl von Clausewitz’s On War trinity, even in countries with volunteer militaries? Could this level of casualties challenge, if not unhinge, policy?
The fact that the Russians are reconstituting units from fresh troops and remnants of units decimated in combat is the reality of protracted, high-intensity combat. Our own history from World War II shows the potential cost of peer warfare. The 1st Infantry Division, in 443 days of total combat in North Africa, Sicily, and Europe, suffered 20,659 casualties. This figure is greater than the authorized strength of 15,000 for a World War II U.S. infantry division.
Importantly, these levels of casualties in the Ukraine war also call into question the ability of Western armies to maintain adequate fighting strength in other than short wars with modest casualties. Much is being made of the Russians relying on hastily mobilized reserves to replace losses. Ironically, as has been demonstrated since the Napoleonic Wars, the levée en masse is a requirement for protracted state warfare at this level. The Russians and Ukrainians both have systems in place to conscript their citizens; the practice has been abandoned, along with its supporting infrastructure, in most Western countries. Perhaps this is a case of prudent preparation, rather than an act of desperation?"
He's with @The_Capt in arguing that there's nowhere to hide with modern ISR:
"While many aspects of the Ukraine war echo past major wars, such as World War II and, to a lesser degree, the Korean War, there are several new dimensions. One in particular, likely explains the Siverskyi Donets River crossing debacle: ubiquitous surveillance of the battlefield. The Ukrainians reported that they had discovered the Russian crossing operation via aerial reconnaissance. The potential sources of this information are much more diverse and numerous now than in even the most recent conflicts. They include a wide variety of drones, commercially available satellite imagery, intelligence from Western sources, and other means.
This new reality essentially means that there is nowhere for a relatively large formation to hide. Surprise, particularly at a limited number of potential crossing points on a river, may not be possible. Thus, these types of physical deception operations may also be pointless. Finally, given the sophistication of many sensors, smoke screens may be less useful than in the past.
This new reality renders those criticizing the Russians not only wrong but dangerous. They are clinging to a doctrine that may be completely outdated in the current operational environment. That they persist in the view that Russian incompetence is mostly due to untrained and poorly motivated soldiers, led by corrupt and incompetent leaders, gives them a comfortable answer that does not invalidate their expertise or current practices."
And he follows up with a knock-out punch:
"The U.S. Army in the 1970s and 1980s looked to the World War II Wehrmacht for lessons about how to fight the Soviets outnumbered and win. After all, the Germans had actually fought the Red Army. Former Nazi officers, such as Gen. Hermann Balck and Gen. Friedrich von Mellenthin, explained their system and its importance during conferences and meetings with U.S. officers and officials. Americanized versions of German professional military education practices, officer professionalism, and encouraging subordinate initiative through Auftragstactik, which became U.S. mission command, were adopted in the U.S. Army as best practices. But we should well remember that the same type of Red Army destroyed the vaunted Nazi Wehrmacht during World War II in a long, grinding war of attrition supposedly suffered from the similar centralized leadership and hastily trained soldier maladies as today.
Furthermore, a revisionist history, not unlike that of the Lost Cause narrative about the Confederate defeat in the U.S. Civil War, was peddled by the Germans. Robert Cittino wrote that they
described the Soviet army as a faceless and mindless horde, with the officers terrorizing their men into obedience and dictator Josef Stalin terrorizing the officers. It had no finesse. Its idea of the military art was to smash everything in its path through numbers, brute force, and sheer size.
Thus, just like the Union Army, “‘quantity had triumphed over quality.’ The better army lost, in other words, and the elite force vanished beneath the superior numbers of the herd.”
These perceptions shaped U.S. views about Russian forces during the Cold War and, despite being disproven in the 1990s, are echoed in assessments today. As retired Army colonel and diplomat Joel Rayburn said in an interview with the New Yorker, “A bad army was ordered to do something stupid.” While officers are now promoted based on patronage, this is not all that dissimilar from the requirement for political reliability in the Russian military in World War II. What should have been considered then and now is why the German forces were crushed by such an inferior adversary? Perhaps enough people, materiel, and an indomitable will to fight despite privations and setbacks are exactly what are really necessary to endure and win in peer warfare."
In his conclusion, he questions the widespread notion that the Ukrainian military is doing well because it had been 'Westernized':
"These views are dangerous in Western assessments of the Ukrainian military. Currently, the prevailing narrative is that the Ukrainian edge is that they have evolved into a modern Western military, trained for over a decade in Western methods. They are professionals. Therefore, they will prevail. Just as we would. Again, nothing to learn here.
However, the actual evidence is unclear; the assessments of the prowess of Ukraine’s military may be wishful thinking and hubris. The title of a Wall Street Journal article epitomizes this view, saying it all came down to “years of NATO training.”
One should recall that Western initiatives to reform the Ukrainian military did not even begin until after the 2014 Russian invasion. Although they have progressed, many of the senior officers were raised in the Soviet system. When I visited the National Defense University in Kyiv in 1996 on an exchange visit as the director of academic affairs at our National University, all of the senior leaders were former Soviet officers. Some were also Russian citizens who chose to stay in Ukraine because there was nothing in Russia to go home to after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Consequently, a deeply entrenched Soviet-style bureaucracy and training model permeated the Ukrainian military. Thus, their rehabilitation is fundamentally a bottom-to-top institution rebuilding and culture-changing endeavor that will take time. In particular, initiatives to create a merit-based and proficient officer and noncommissioned officer corps are decades-long efforts that are just taking root at the lower- and mid-levels of the Ukrainian military. Consequently, many of the tactics above the small unit look more Russian than American, as does most of the equipment.
An indication that there is some way to go beyond the NATO training is that there is little evidence that the Ukrainians are executing joint and combined arms offensive operations. This capability will be important if the transition from the defense and attempt offensive operations to restore territory lost to Russia. Furthermore, Ukraine also appears to be ceding ground in the Donbas to a slow, grinding Russian advance.
Consequently, the analysis of the Ukraine war needs to address another unasked question: What if this view that quality people and leaders are the most important ingredient in modern warfare is wrong? What if Stalin was correct that quantity has a quality all of its own? If that is the case, then the Ukrainians may need much greater assistance if they are to survive a Russian-style grinding war of attrition.
Additionally, as the United States plans for how it will compete and potentially fight China and Russia in the future, the approach should be characterized by humility and an intense desire to challenge existing assumptions, concepts, and capabilities, rather than to validate current approaches.
As it did for Russia, it could happen to us, and we need to fully understand what “it” is."

Russia will probably start seeing some renewed gas and oil sales to Europe after the war is over. Less the longer this war lasts though. The longer this war takes the more time the EU has to reduce their dependency on Russian oil and gas by securing other suppliers and switching to other power sources. And in the long term, the EU has seen just how dangerous it is to be dependent on Russia for anything. Any renewed sales Russia sees to Europe after the war will be short term, and will dwindle to nothing over the course of the decade. The days of oil and gas sales were numbered anyway, since solving climate change is a high priority. But Russia really accelerated, if not the demise of the global oil and gas industry, at the very least the demise of their own oil and gas industry.

Michael Kofman and Rob Lee dive into Russian military force design and how it relates to this war.
https://warontherocks.com/2022/06/not-built-for-purpose-the-russian-militarys-ill-fated-force-design/
 

I keep hoping Germany will reverse course on nuclear power as a result of recent events, which would help with climate change as well as keeping Russia strategically isolated. Maybe too much to hope for, but we'll have to see...

There's a little group of aging hippies who regularly do war protests outside the county courthouse downtown in my town.  I sometimes agree w them, sometimes not (I was 100% pro-afghan invasion, 90% anti-Iraq invasion). 
They protest every day saying US is prolonging war, blah blah.  But if these folks were Ukrainians and Putin had annexed UKR, then do they think they'd be allowed to wave signs in public like this?  Do they not understand that sometimes one actually has to stand up for one's own freedom?  I get that lots of wars are built on lies, but sometimes folks are actually fighting for survival.  Do they ever think about Hitler?  "if only the jews had spoken w Hitler using non-violent, compassionate communication, then the whole thing wouldn't have happened".  There are rapid dogs in the world and they do bite. 

I was rereading When Titans Clashed by David Glantz, and Glantz talks about how lend lease to the Soviet Union allowed for the Soviet mechanized breakthroughs on the Eastern Front to occur and exploit, thanks to material like American trucks that prolonged the Soviet logistical tail, had it not been sent, Soviet offensives would be exhausted quicker, and Axis forces could reconstitute a new defensive line easier. 
In that sense, the fact that Popasna didn't turn into a mechanized breakthrough means Russia does not have the tail to enable the mechanized breakthroughs that was Soviet doctrine and had even occurred in some form in the first stage of the war. Whatever breakthrough Russian artillery creates, Russian forces no longer have the ability to create decisive quick collapses, so in a sense, this is becoming quite WWI like. 
If Russia cannot conduct decisive operations, without mobilization, Russia will absolutely eventually lose a WWI type of conflict with infinite NATO equipment inbound that will open up the same sort of local breakthroughs Russia had in Popasna. 
Whether Ukraine has the ability to or the willingness to seek out mechanized deep breakthroughs, I have no clue. While the offensive in Kharkiv region was successful, I don't think it was necessarily a example of a breakthrough. Also, Ukraine seems in a way, quite keen to preserve their manpower, instead of risky maneuvers, Ukraine seems fine with slower advances, whether this is intended or a result of their situation, i dunno. 

Caught the BMP by surprise.
No one expects the Spanish Instalaza.

Why not use MLRS for that, or MLRS launched drone if you really need loiter time? 

Deep strike Decapitation?
If you can fire an assassination drone 100km from Ukraine with another 30 km to search out your target, you could start striking operational and strategic level VIPs.
At Home. 
At the Dacha.
 

Additionally, what is the point in going down to small calibers if we are thinking about a really long range engagements? The only advangate the 90mm has over say 155 or rockets is that it could be really small and mobile. It would matter on platoon/ company/ battalion level maybe, but to shoot at 100km we are talking corps or higher level assets - here the platform size isn't really that important, and what you want is rockets to optimize the payload size and ease the requirements due to high-g resistance.
Edit: on the low level, an interesting idea would be to have  data-linked 120 mm round, both mortar and tank-gun launched. You could easily achieve say 10km range with both, and have a really short flight time to position. I doubt though that you could fit a meaningful warhead on top of fully functional recce-drone in such a small package. For the mentioned weapon systems it shouldn't be a problem though, as you could follow-up with other, lethal rounds.

That's fair CG, but what is the target set? If it's fixed infrastructure then you don't need active ISR - bridges don't tend to move much - but that piddly payload isn't going to do anything. If you're going after AFVs (although at 100km you really should be going after force multipliers, like refuelling trucks or engineering support vehicles) then you're going to need active ISR throughout the mission, in which case ... just use that as the delivery platform?

In principle, yes. Range is a function of MV, air resistance, and angle of departure. But as you'll know from throwing rocks and stones, there is a kind of sweet spot - too light/small and air resistance dominates and it won't go far. Too large/heavy and you just can't realistically hiff it. But in the middle is a comfortable size and weight where momentum plays well with friction.
You can add bling to make it go further - base bleed or RAP - but that takes up payload space, and a 90mm round just isn't that big to start with. If you have a 90mm with RAP, you've sort of created something with all the effectiveness of a cherry bomb. A very expensive cherry bomb, and one you can throw a really long way. But still ... a cherry bomb.

It can be done same principle as laser beam riding which can be done through the main gun of Russian MBT's. Switch blades just need to be launched from inside some kind of sabot and naturally a reduced propellant load. Makes me think some kind of anti-armor grenade can fly inside the main gun barrel of an MBT? Thing called the hornet thrown into the air and controlled by some grunt using a PDA. 😉
Combat Laser Guided Anti-Tank Missile (defense-update.com)

Created for nazis?

I never really played modern either until this turned into a real war even though I own them all.
CMRT was my goto as it has so many possibilities and i cannot wait until CMBN with the new expansion/pack gets published.
It would just be nice to allow more variability in quick battles like they used to have in CMBB. Variable ammo loads, variable troop levels per squad, allow for % of tanks, troops, arty, and set morale and experience levels all within the quick battle screens. 

A little skepticism about military spending is understandable after the last two wars. But it is worth remembering that Ukraine is fundamentally different from Afghanistan and Iraq. Those two wars had absolutely no influence on our security or our larger strategic interests. We lost Afghanistan just about as hard as it is possible to lose a war, and it ultimately meant nothing. Our position is not the slightest bit weaker for our defeat, which I think really drives home just how much wasted effort went into delaying it. Iraq we somehow managed to win, in the sense that the government we installed is still in place without our continued presence being needed to prop it up. But our position in the world is not the slightest bit stronger for that victory. The money, effort, and lives we poured into those wars really were completely wasted (and I really hope my words here are interpreted as more tragic than callous). So yeah, I get it. I understand feeling a bit jaded about any sort of military spending.
But, unlike Iraq and Afghanistan, Ukraine is absolutely central to our security and our interests. The outcome of this war really will make a big difference to our security and position in the world. Every dime we put into aiding the Ukrainians goes directly to improving the security of our European allies and weakening one of our greatest and oldest adversaries. And frankly Ukraine will be cheaper overall than Iraq and Afghanistan (probably). We spent north of 2 trillion dollars on Iraq and Afghanistan (~2.5 trillion based on my crude google efforts, assuming the top results were correct). I think we should be spending hundreds of billions of dollars in aid to Ukraine, but I doubt it will take anything on the order of trillions of dollars to decisively beat Russia in Ukraine (Russia would have to sustain the fight for years for it to breach the trillions for us, and I don't think that's on the table for them). Although, I would still be in favor of helping Ukraine even if it turned out to be more expensive overall than Iraq and Afghanistan.
Granting that it may take a few hundred billion more to rebuild Ukraine after the war, and that might top a trillion overall when added to the wartime aid. But it would be money well spent. Not only is there the ethical side, where that money would go towards improving the lives of 40+ million people. But it would also be a huge benefit for us strategically, as we would almost certainly gain a longtime ally in Ukraine in just the part of the world where another ally could really matter. And because I have heard a million and a half people say that we shouldn't be engaged in nation building let me preempt any complaints that you may have on that front. This would be completely different from Iraq and Afghanistan in terms of nation building. In Iraq and Afghanistan we were trying to build up countries with populations that viewed us as invaders (because, let's be honest, that's exactly what we were). In Ukraine we would be giving the Ukrainian government the money to rebuild their own country after helping them to repel their invaders. So the local resistance to nation building that we encountered in Iraq and Afghanistan simply wouldn't be present in Ukraine.

I see this river crossing as proof the Russians are getting better. At that one airport, they landed helicopters in the same location 7 times to see them get hit each time, here they only attempted to cross 5 times. 

I see this river crossing as proof the Russians are getting better. At that one airport, they landed helicopters in the same location 7 times to see them get hit each time, here they only attempted to cross 5 times. 

I see this river crossing as proof the Russians are getting better. At that one airport, they landed helicopters in the same location 7 times to see them get hit each time, here they only attempted to cross 5 times. 

I wish that were true.  But it's rand paul, senior senate f-ing snake.  Have you heard the garbage he's been spewing about Ukraine the last couple months?  he would have handed UKR to Putin on a silver platter.  He said that UKR was part of Russia so what's the problem.  And 44 million people and their descendants would lose their freedom, forever.  That's the stakes we're actually talking about.   RP doesn't give a flying f-k about the money.  He's one of Putin's like autocrat-wannabe waterboys.