poesel

From the drop time of about 6 seconds, I guess the release height was about 200 m. Combine that with the relative slow speed of the aircraft and you will get excellent results. Since this is a non-kamikaze craft, you could put a bit more electronics in it than in a one-use drone. That means possibly more autonomy for that thing. I'm a bit surprised we don't see more of those. They are cheaper to make than quadcopters, can fly longer and carry more load.

My point. The German Empire wanted to be like the other empires - before WW1. Not much of a difference (broadly speaking). After WW1 - different beast. To bring this back on topic: I guess Russia was never not an Empire or better: never was non-imperialistic. Let's see, if they get rid of it or not this time.

I guess (hope) you mean: ... after WW1. And in the second paragraph: ...1918-1945. Before WW1 Germany was not so much different to the other nations in Europe wrt world order.

I guess he means that thing in Thuringia. That is a German state in former East-Germany. The state is ruled by a minority of left wing parties (3). The majority right wing consists of the conservative CDU and fascist AfD. Those parties do not work together, and the CDU has declared a 'firewall' towards the AfD and vowed to never work together with them. Now, there has been a vote about a small tax reduction on buying real estate. This vote went through parliament with the votes of both right parties. So CDU has worked together with AfD to pass this law - a thing they explicitly said wasn't going to happen, and now the CDU is getting quite some flak for it. The influence on German foreign policy is zero. Since we have so many parties, a small minority of nut jobs cannot take the rest as hostage (at least not that easily). Also, the AfD has failed to participate in any state or federal government so far, and I don't see it happening.

That is not a new god - it is one of old with a lot of power... But the ministry of defense is currently a bit exempt from this due to special circumstances. It is now in the hands of bureaucracy. A force even greater than that of gods. (man, I wish Neil Gaiman would write 'German Gods'. That would be so much not fun)

This looks like a failure of the muzzle brake and the barrel is ok. But I'm no expert. Obviously, you cannot tow the gun as easily anymore, but could it still be fired?

If that is not 'Wool' (which has been made into the excellent TV series 'Silo') then I would like to know which.

Wrt to Taurus & ATACMS:

(my bold) The short answer is: probably yes. There are indeed some real reasons to not send Taurus, but in the end it is just stalling. Bavaria votes in ~2 weeks. Support for Ukraine is NOT a topic in this campaign. All main parties are for it. Still, sending Taurus is a sensitive issue for the voters of the chancellors party. So I guess, he tries to not do anything, at least until this vote is through. If there was a vote in the parliament to send Taurus, yay would win. But it doesn't work like that. So the decision is not set in stone, it is just delayed. In this regard, the same as in the US.

Japan is, as usually, ahead of the game:

Yes, if you fight abroad for someone else or an idea. No, if the Russians march into <your country>. Or anyone else, but in this context it's the Russians. A misconception which was the downfall of many a dictator.

It seems it was necessary to make this video which states the obvious. That frightens me a bit. But still a good thing.

Kitty helping Kitty: Bergepanzer 3 rescues Leo 2 from a ditch:

Caveat: I don't _know_. But I guess this round has a fuze which triggers the separation process. Either time of flight or proximity. If that is adjustable, you could change the spread.

Yes, all of this happened and made some waves in the media here. It is quite a bit of an embarrassment but it looks like they forgot to train technicians and supply spare parts. The 10 ‚new‘ tanks they wanted to deliver were used in the training of Ukrainian soldiers and are thus in need for maintenance. Same as the 10 already delivered which were obviously tested, too. Now everyone is in a rush to fix this issue.

Did I miss something? What do you mean and how many decades? 5-axis milling is easily in hobbyist range. Machining tolerances are mostly a function of how good your linear bearings are and China has some decent ones. If you have the money you can mill turbine parts in your basement. I know some people who would strongly argue that point. Unfortunately, once this kind of machine is set up it doesn‘t need much specialised maintenance. You get the consumables from everywhere including the tools and the control software runs well enough without need for an update. TL;DR: the manufacturers of those machines cannot do much after it has been delivered.

The German Bundeswehr plans to increase its numbers from 183.000 to 203.000 in 2030 (IIRC). Problem is, that not enough young people are interested in a career as soldier to reach those numbers. It is already reckoned that this target will be missed. I guess other armies will or do face the same problem. Is unmanned a way out of this? Just by the name of it you need less people because its not manned (d‘oh). But you still need people to operate it, but I have no idea if the total logistic chain for an UGV is more or less than a comparable tank. Also, the job requirement for unmanned is more technical and less crawling through the mud. That might make it more attractive to prospects. So is unmanned a win-win for future armies?

No. The 135 come from Danish, Belgian & German stock IIRC. Those Italian would be on top.

I wonder when we will see flamethrowers. Or is there a silent agreement on both sides not to use them?

Please don‘t take this post as bait for country bashing. It is just facts. Europe (EU & non-EU) has now twice the amount of (pledged!) support for Ukraine. Dark blue is short term, light blue long term support. Took us a while but it is not that the US bears the brunt of the support alone anymore. Article in German. https://www.ifw-kiel.de/de/publikationen/aktuelles/ukraine-support-tracker-europa-sagt-jetzt-doppelt-so-viel-unterstuetzung-zu-wie-die-usa/

We never saw a video, or did we? https://defence-blog.com/russia-announces-armata-tanks-pullback-from-ukraine/ Traps on mines: https://twitter.com/Heroiam_Slava/status/1697994294534017302 and a nice joke: https://twitter.com/DefMon3/status/1698259322755580209

A bayonet? Really? I thought that fad had run its way in WWI...

Very well put. One thing to add: one reason why Germany and Japan were treated so well by the allies was that they were needed vs Russia and/or China. Without that, I guess the willingness to forgive would have been a bit less. The willingness of Ukraine to forgive Russia or Russians will pay out in good PR in the West, which translates to money or things like EU membership. Ukraine has managed to stay the 'good guy' in a horrible war. When the war ends, it needs to stay that for its own future. That will be a very hard thing to do - not to pay back what the bastards have done to you. But the West is not in this war, we are only observing. And the West will judge Ukraine by its own standards, which are not adjusted by having been into that war. Winning the war is only halfway to peace.

I really shouldn't link to articles nobody can read... This article is from a German newspaper and TV station, not the government. The government actually says nothing about this. Nil, zip, nada. Theres probably currently no interest in finding out. Btw, the tip came from the Dutch secret service. It was relayed to the US and Germany. The tip stated that the attack would happen during that NATO maneuvre in the Baltics. When that tip reached the German government that date had already passed and it was thus discarded as false.

There were some Russians ships with turned off transponders in that region just prior to the explosions. They could have placed the explosives or try to remove them. We don't know. Pro (Russia is the culprit): they tried to evade the fines for not delivering gas by force majeure Contra: why would they destroy a big source of income? Yes, but I don't mean they couldn't do it. I meant that they couldn't do it without being caught afterwards. Their track record hasn't been that good lately. Quite the contrary. The documentary displays the facts as far as they are known to the public and refrains from presenting a conclusion. But it does list the options. That includes those that most of us probably dislike.