poesel
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Posts posted by poesel
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8 hours ago, chuckdyke said:
But to paint the Wehrmacht as a boyscout like organization is a little too much.
I think nobody here did. This myth was dispelled for the German public in the mid 90s with this exhibition:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wehrmacht_exhibitionBetter late than never. Caused quite a bit of hubbub here but managed to bring this into public attention.
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CEO of Rheinmetall claims that two Skynex systems are already in Ukraine.
At about 11:00 (audio only in German)
That is this system:
Son of Gepard
Would love to see an in action video.
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1 hour ago, LongLeftFlank said:
Isn't this an offer that some ethnics would like to take? A dangerous and careless offer.
Bonus question: isn't there some AI program that can verify if it is really Putin who talks? I can put Putin's head and voice on any body (digitally). Then the reverse should also be possible???
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17 hours ago, Seminole said:
‘Determined to believe’?
Not at all, but I’m open the notion that as global productivity continues to increase the relative dominance enjoyed by ‘the West’ shrinks in relative size.
17 hours ago, sburke said:China is going to face some very big challenges in the next decade(s). The CCP sits on top of a social contract of improving the lives of it's people. A contract it has largely lived up to. However, that contract is now at risk with an aging demographic and regional pension plans failing.
13 hours ago, LongLeftFlank said:I love the Chinese people; after a freeking awful 150 years (mainly self inflicted, although they do love blaming it on opium and Brits), they are just back to doing what they've always done: getting rich (well there is that despoiling the planet thing, but that's a species wide problem).....
So here's the interesting thing, true all through history: the moment Chinese get out from under the full grasp and control of the Emperor in Beijing (or you have an enlightened Emperor who gives up a little control, always temporarily though), that's when they do REALLY well.
Historically, China has been the number one country wrt to industrial production. They took over from Rome in about 500 AD and lost the spot in about 1750 to the UK, respective to the West. The last 270 years happened only because China missed out the industrial revolution, and now things just move back to normal.
Of course, the US became a player in just about the same time frame and tips off the balance a bit. But still, China becoming the biggest economy in the world is just what you have to expect.
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6 hours ago, LongLeftFlank said:
Thanks for responding.
...But if you're determined to believe the BRICS economies outweigh the G7, I can't really help you further. Have you spent time in any of those 5 countries? (3 for me).
The G7 have a GDP of about 34 trillion US$ while BRICS has about 25 trillion US$ which puts it just ahead of the USA alone.
I have worked in all the BRICS countries and in 4 of the G7. Of course, it depends a bit on where you are, but there is literally a world between these two groups. A world of wealth.
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Sorry, but I think this will be appreciated here...
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Medvedev talks about Russia falling apart if they don't win the SMO. I could not find the original source, but have it from other media, too.
That is an interesting statement to make. It makes sense if your people actually don't want that to happen. But not a very good argument if they don't.
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Video of a failed HIMARS missile. A bit into the video it shows the missile path through the roof, 3 levels and down into the cellar!
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I'm following the MSC in Munich and I have to admit that it is a bit sobering. This war is a thing between the West and Russia, while the rest of the world is standing by and being annoyed by the disruption caused.
Sobering for me in so far as all the wars I have 'experienced' used to be 'somewhere else' (Yugoslavia being the exception) and I wasn't emotionally involved. Sure, dead bodies, fleeing civilians, atrocities etc... But this was on TV - you get used to it after a while.
Now there is a war close by and the South and Far East tell us, that this is our war, and we'd better get it fixed fast because it causes trouble at (their) home. Unfortunately, quite understandable for them to say. The Wests track record of keeping peace and making sure that people live well isn't that good. Oh yes, the standard of living has been going up everywhere after WWII, but mainly as a side effect of us making a profit, not because of altruistic intentions.
Sorry for this bit of incoherent rambling.
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1 hour ago, chrisl said:
Now I'm going to have to bash Germany for not requiring each major company to use a word that starts with a different letter after the "Deutsche". I thought y'all were much more organized than that. That would limit you to 26 big companies ...
Tsk - do you zink ve are some 26 letter alphabet peasantz? Ve also have Ä, Ö, Ü und ß to choose from.
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1 hour ago, sburke said:
you left off Deutsche bank role in laundering Russian money.
Please note that the "Deutsche Bank" is a privately owned company - the name is misleading. Her biggest single shareholder is BlackRock at just over 5%.
The bank owned by the government is the "Bundesbank". Until the European Central Bank took over most of it, it had the same role as the Fed in the US. However, the Fed is not owned by the US government (but controlled... maybe...
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Another one down...
I wonder if sending small scale windows to someone will be a future thing in some circles - like sending a horse head...
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1 hour ago, The_Capt said:
We have not mobilized one wit since this war started. We shifted existing assets, we have reinforced and expanded existing contracts, industry is putting on a few extra shifts on existing military industrial bases. We may run out of our comfort zone but as to exhausting the military industrial capacity of the west, we are not even scratching the surface.
That got me thinking a bit, and I like to get a better perspective by having something I can compare it to.
Let's take Volkswagen in Wolfsburg. That factory churns out 3500 cars per day. Going by weight, it is about 40 cars per Leo2. That would be 900 tanks... ah, no. A bit too unrealistic.
Let's use value. A VW costs about 25k€ on average, a fully equipped Leo about 7m€. Both overpriced, so multiply and divide, you get to about 12 tanks - per day.So one factory of one (not small) company in one (not small) country could produce 350 in one month or 4200 a year. IIRC the Russians supposedly had 12,000 tanks in storage when this started. That's the result of 40 years of Soviet production - or 3 years in Wolfsburg...
That is what is possible if the West would _REALLY_ go nuts with military production.
Don't bother correcting my numbers.
I'm pretty well aware that they cannot make tanks in Wolfsburg. This example is just for scale.
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Looks like there are still legit suicides happening in Russia:
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Do you think any high ranked politician would visit Kiev from the 23rd to 25th? THAT would be a statement.
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1 hour ago, kevinkin said:
Well here is the flip side of the coin for you:
https://asiatimes.com/2023/02/breaking-russia-more-like-breaking-ourselves/
Only judging this by what he wrote about Germany, this is flat-out & utter rubbish (to say it friendly)
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How much of the stuff given to Ukraine is a gift, vs they have to pay for it after the war? Do we know that?
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4 hours ago, chrisl said:
I don't think the fighter/bomber is any deader than the tank (and probably less), but it's subject to the same kind of conditions as the future of tanks.
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They're all part of an interconnected system that makes it possible to reach out and touch someone with as little risk as possible to the guys driving them around.
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Now what happens if you don't need a guy to drive/fly the stuff?
I think we are very rapidly reaching a point where it doesn't make much sense to actually fly a human that close to the action.
3 hours ago, chuckdyke said:The old Hansa League countries.
That would include cities in modern Russia...
28 minutes ago, Zeleban said:So, it seems that NATO is gradually becoming a territory through which missile strikes are launched against Ukraine. Zaluzhny said that during today's missile attacks, Russian missiles crossed Romanian airspace
If true, wouldn't that be a nice pretext to get rid of Transnistria? Joint action of Romania, Moldova & Ukraine.
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30 minutes ago, Maciej Zwolinski said:
According to many experts, Grippen is ideal because it is made with a view to fighting in the conditions of Russian air superiority. It can use dispersed field airfields and stretches of highway instead of permanent air bases, with minimised logistic requirements
There are only a handful of countries who actually have Gripens. Of these, Brazil & Hungary won't deliver to Ukraine & the Czechs have theirs leased (from Sweden). That leaves only South Africa with 26 and Sweden with around 160 planes.
Technically, the Gripen might be the right plane, but that is asking for Sweden to be the sole supplier of western airplanes to Ukraine.
23 minutes ago, panzermartin said:Tornados?
Are you trying to hurt Ukraine? These things need so much maintenance nowadays and still hardly fly. Not a good idea.
14 minutes ago, Beleg85 said:Btw. what you think is current stance of internal disputes in Germany about possible access of Ukraine in NATO? Positive, negative, or too early too tell?
Not an issue, yet. Joining EU is the much more prominent news.
When this comes up, the peaceniks and russophiles will crawl out of their holes for a last stand, but not to much effect.
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I've read that the Typhoons and F16s are rather unsuited for Ukraine.
What plane would then be useful?
(apart from the Soviet types they already have) -
1 hour ago, Beleg85 said:
From possible objectors, Hungary could be supressed, Turkey bargained, but Germany will simply not allow it. Or worse, try never ending scholzing, perhaps even under successive new chancellors. Unless there would be an earthquake in German internal political scene of Wagnerian proportions, and more balsy politicians would take the lead.
If Ukraine wants to join NATO and is at peace with Russia and the US is ok with it, Germany will follow suit. Why wouldn't we? It is an explicit guideline for German foreign politics in NATO matters to only work in conjunction with her allies. The only ally that really matters (in this respect) is the US.
Germany will neither be the first nor the last to sign, but we will sign it when the day comes. -
2 hours ago, Butschi said:
Cessation of hostilities is a necessary but not sufficient condition. All NATO members have to ratify the membership application and, as we have learned with Sweden that is not just a formality.
Which country do you think would oppose Ukainian membership given that there would be peace?
44 minutes ago, chuckdyke said:Like the Germans called the Dutch Germanics too. It is up to the people who live in the Ukraine to choose their destiny.
Yeah, but 'Germanic' <> 'Germany' or 'Germans'. This is a trap the English language leads you in. In German, the same words are 'Germanen' <> 'Deutschland' or 'Deutsche'.
However, the Dutch were included in being 'Aryan' so the result would have been the same as the Russian behavior.
How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?
in Combat Mission Black Sea
Posted
Longish good thread on the state of repair of the Kerch Bridge.
TL;DR: the rail bridge is substantially damaged, and one section needs to be replaced. ETA is July.
IIRC we guessed that back then.