poesel

You can say what you want about Germans, but we honor contracts. Finland will soon be in NATO and there is also an EU defense pact. There is no doubt that both countries would come to help Finland.
I also like to add that Germany historically has quite a good track record for helping Finland vs the Russians.
I'd like to argue that the Greens have the best stance wrt nuclear power, but that is beyond this thread.
That is a political maneuver that needs some explanation. No speed limit on the Autobahn is a holy cow of German politics. Similar to US gun law. But most parties have silently abandoned that position, except for the FDP, who have made it to one of their mayor points. The coalition contract both says that there will be no speed limit and nuclear will end this year.
The Greens got under pressure to prolong nuclear, so they put pressure on the speed limit. This is insofar clever, as the Greens can live with a little nuclear extension while the FDP cannot agree to the speed limit.
Important to note is that both issues do not save gas, but CO2.
Increased investment in renewables is going to happen anyway.

Article 35 of the Constitution of the Fifth French Republic defines the conditions for the implementation of war and the intervention of the armed forces abroad. In particular, it specifies the prerogatives of Parliament in this area
"The declaration of war is authorized by Parliament.
The Government* informs Parliament of its decision to call in the armed forces abroad, no later than three days after the start of the intervention. It specifies the objectives pursued. This information may give rise to a debate which is not followed by any vote.
When the duration of the intervention exceeds four months, the Government submits its extension to the authorization of Parliament. He can ask the National Assembly to decide in the last resort."

*(therefore the President)

The current timeline is 2024 so two cold winters to go.
The EU army will come in existence because of money. The need for a good army should by now be clear to everyone. But it is simply too expensive for each state to have a universal modern army with all the branches.
The process will be an endless bickering about costs and who gets to order it around (e.g. France has a presidential army (AFAIK) while Germany has a parliamentary one). I guess it will at least start under NATO with some EU influence.

The current timeline is 2024 so two cold winters to go.
The EU army will come in existence because of money. The need for a good army should by now be clear to everyone. But it is simply too expensive for each state to have a universal modern army with all the branches.
The process will be an endless bickering about costs and who gets to order it around (e.g. France has a presidential army (AFAIK) while Germany has a parliamentary one). I guess it will at least start under NATO with some EU influence.

That is a possible explanation but maybe not necessary. German soldiers the 1944 Ardennes Offensive were highly motivated. And not (only) because they were fanatic Nazis but because they were finally attacking again. It gave them hope that maybe there was a chance to still win this war.
Plus, just speculating here, definding in this war basically means waiting for the often invisible drone to find you followed by death raining from above without much you can do about it. This situation is in a way similar to soldiers in a trench in WW1. Although casualties, overall, weren't higher than in WW2, the number of traumatized soldiers was. The word "Kriegszitterer", something like shell shocked in english, was specifically used during WW1, WW2 had this much less because although fighting was no less fierce at least the front was moving.
So, although attacking is probably still way more dangerous than defending, it at least gives a small sense of taking fate in your own hands.

Don't think that electronics or lasers have no wear. High currents, high temperatures etc... all take their toll over time.
Aiming is also not that easy: you have to hold a thin ray on fast moving targets for at least a few seconds. The most obvious targets are small drones - equipping them with laser detectors is cheap and easy. They will evade automatically, making the targeting even harder.
I get the fascination for lasers and of course they have to look into it, but I don't think they will play a significant role in the near future.
OTOH autonomous transports will be a game changer for logistics. Like 'just in time' moved wares from the warehouse to the road, autonomous transports will move the depots into the landscape.
It will be hard to shell mechanical mules that run criss cross around the country.

It might be that it's (part of) the way forward. Maybe an early role for autonomous transports once they become viable. A different slant on "the Internet of things": multipath routing of packets of supplies... Can't stop 'em all.

Easy: if he drops dead of 'natural' causes tomorrow, both agencies had obviously nothing to do with it.

Since 6h in the morning, Russia is delivering gas to Germany again at 40% nominal capacity.

Now Reuters reports that gas will flow to Germany after downtime (at 40%):
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/exclusive-russia-seen-restarting-gas-exports-nord-stream-1-schedule-2022-07-19/
I think that must be Schrödingers gas - you only know when you see it.

Fact is whole of Europe / Nato 'neglected' their military apart from pounding on failed states ;-). The big exception is USA and their MIC. 
Obviously Poland for example was less neglient than Germany, however it is indicative that Poland feels it is now in urgent need of vast masses of military hardware which only one nation can provide in the desired timeframe. 
Personally I hope Europe will learn to stand on it's own legs and not (again) depend fully on USA. Cooperation between allies is of course a good thing.
FWIW France mainly was trying to get a European army and that's what would/could be much more effective militarily imo. But politically.... difficult. 
Instead of various countries with 30-50 airframes and a few hundred tanks max all with their own infrastructure/training/acquirement/etc, an integrated European army could be among the most powerful in the world. 
It's more sustainable long term imo instead of Poland (or other single countries) becoming a huge military hub in record breaking time. 
Because buying a lot of stuff with debt is one thing, maintaining them and keeping the forces trained well and operational for a long time is another thing. How much will the people of Poland be willing to spend on defense in let's say 10 years?

My favorite sci fi author - CJ Cherryh Just a few of her pile of novels
The Chanur novels - Wikipedia

Concerned and annoyed - concerned mainly about prices and annoyed, that our government has brought us to this situation (= dependency on Russian gas).
Not scared, not furious.

Now Reuters reports that gas will flow to Germany after downtime (at 40%):
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/exclusive-russia-seen-restarting-gas-exports-nord-stream-1-schedule-2022-07-19/
I think that must be Schrödingers gas - you only know when you see it.

Concerned and annoyed - concerned mainly about prices and annoyed, that our government has brought us to this situation (= dependency on Russian gas).
Not scared, not furious.

Now Reuters reports that gas will flow to Germany after downtime (at 40%):
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/exclusive-russia-seen-restarting-gas-exports-nord-stream-1-schedule-2022-07-19/
I think that must be Schrödingers gas - you only know when you see it.

Now Reuters reports that gas will flow to Germany after downtime (at 40%):
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/exclusive-russia-seen-restarting-gas-exports-nord-stream-1-schedule-2022-07-19/
I think that must be Schrödingers gas - you only know when you see it.

About Russia cutting gas to Germany: I do not doubt that the news is legit, but that letter is not a sure sign of what really is going to happen on Thursday.
I checked the German news sites, and neither the serious nor the tabloids carry that piece as of now. I guess they wait for a second source.
The political reaction will probably none until Tuesday, and then I guess the weekend will decide what happens if there is no more gas.
As others have already stated, it would be an extremely stupid move to cut off the gas completely because then there is no reason anymore for Germany to hold back. With the current track record, that doesn't mean it's not going to happen, though.
My expectation would be that Russia would continue with its 40% delivery, which is just not enough but better than nothing. That would put some pressure on us not to go full out.

I also don't know how the Russians do it, but there are some general considerations.
If the last depot is further away from demand (the guns) then you need more trucks in total to keep up the same supply rate. Because those trucks might share the same roads, you may not have the capacity to keep up the supply rate to every gun (basically a bandwidth problem).
Those trucks might break down or be destroyed, creating even more congestions.
Then, due to the greater distance, you get lag: every request now needs more time than before. To compensate, you would need to stack more ammo at the gun itself. Which is problematic in two ways: you are more vulnerable to fire and if the ammo stacked at the gun is needed elsewhere you have to transport it again (buffer bloat).
So, if everything runs perfect and your roads have unlimited capacity and your trucks don't break down and nobody shoots at you - then it doesn't matter how close to the front your depot is.

 

I also don't know how the Russians do it, but there are some general considerations.
If the last depot is further away from demand (the guns) then you need more trucks in total to keep up the same supply rate. Because those trucks might share the same roads, you may not have the capacity to keep up the supply rate to every gun (basically a bandwidth problem).
Those trucks might break down or be destroyed, creating even more congestions.
Then, due to the greater distance, you get lag: every request now needs more time than before. To compensate, you would need to stack more ammo at the gun itself. Which is problematic in two ways: you are more vulnerable to fire and if the ammo stacked at the gun is needed elsewhere you have to transport it again (buffer bloat).
So, if everything runs perfect and your roads have unlimited capacity and your trucks don't break down and nobody shoots at you - then it doesn't matter how close to the front your depot is.

 

I also don't know how the Russians do it, but there are some general considerations.
If the last depot is further away from demand (the guns) then you need more trucks in total to keep up the same supply rate. Because those trucks might share the same roads, you may not have the capacity to keep up the supply rate to every gun (basically a bandwidth problem).
Those trucks might break down or be destroyed, creating even more congestions.
Then, due to the greater distance, you get lag: every request now needs more time than before. To compensate, you would need to stack more ammo at the gun itself. Which is problematic in two ways: you are more vulnerable to fire and if the ammo stacked at the gun is needed elsewhere you have to transport it again (buffer bloat).
So, if everything runs perfect and your roads have unlimited capacity and your trucks don't break down and nobody shoots at you - then it doesn't matter how close to the front your depot is.

 

I also don't know how the Russians do it, but there are some general considerations.
If the last depot is further away from demand (the guns) then you need more trucks in total to keep up the same supply rate. Because those trucks might share the same roads, you may not have the capacity to keep up the supply rate to every gun (basically a bandwidth problem).
Those trucks might break down or be destroyed, creating even more congestions.
Then, due to the greater distance, you get lag: every request now needs more time than before. To compensate, you would need to stack more ammo at the gun itself. Which is problematic in two ways: you are more vulnerable to fire and if the ammo stacked at the gun is needed elsewhere you have to transport it again (buffer bloat).
So, if everything runs perfect and your roads have unlimited capacity and your trucks don't break down and nobody shoots at you - then it doesn't matter how close to the front your depot is.

 

I also don't know how the Russians do it, but there are some general considerations.
If the last depot is further away from demand (the guns) then you need more trucks in total to keep up the same supply rate. Because those trucks might share the same roads, you may not have the capacity to keep up the supply rate to every gun (basically a bandwidth problem).
Those trucks might break down or be destroyed, creating even more congestions.
Then, due to the greater distance, you get lag: every request now needs more time than before. To compensate, you would need to stack more ammo at the gun itself. Which is problematic in two ways: you are more vulnerable to fire and if the ammo stacked at the gun is needed elsewhere you have to transport it again (buffer bloat).
So, if everything runs perfect and your roads have unlimited capacity and your trucks don't break down and nobody shoots at you - then it doesn't matter how close to the front your depot is.

 

Yeah, it really depends on the echelon the dump supports - bde, div, corps, army. Below bde (bn or bty) the stocks 'should' all be on wheels.
The following pseudo-calcs are based on very not-Russian doctrine, and instruction to the level of "enough to know what the blanket-folders care about" rather than "enough to do the blanket-folder's job", so the principles should be about right, although the particular numbers will vary.
Generally, stocks are held in dumps based on days-of-supply (or some equivalent term) which is - as you can probably guess - the expected consumption per day in units of fire, rather than a specific number of rounds. For a ~150mm calibre gun (152, or 155) 1 unit would be 80-100 rounds^ at standard rates of fire. This is equivalent to the 'basic load' or 'first line' of 5.56mm that riflemen carry, or the standard loadout of a tank of IFV. You might double or triple it for high expected intensity, or halve it for quiet times, but 1 unit is as good a place as any to start. Then, 'all' you have to do is count up the number of guns in the echelon, multiply by the number of rounds in the basic load, and multiply all that by the number of days the dump is to support. For a bde you'd expect the dump to be able to support 2-3 days, a div 3-7 days, a corps something like a week to a fortnight, and an army ... well, whatever.
So, for a bde, you're looking at something like 18 guns x 90 rounds x 2 days = ~3200 rounds, or a bit over 400 pallets.
For a div, it'd be something like 4-10 times that amount, or 12,000 - 30,000rnds. (54 guns x 90 rounds x 5 days = ~24,000 rounds/3,000 pallets)
A corps would be about 4-10 times that (50,000-300,000rnds), although presumably split into multiple dispersed div- or bde-sized dumps.
If you then apply some level of safety thinking, and split the dump into multiple separated 'blobs' so you don't lose the whole lot to a single accident or enemy strike, well, a properly organised and run dump takes up a LOT of real estate. Each dump would expect to receive a flow of rounds arriving each day from the next higher dump, and in turn push rounds down to the next lower dump or have rounds pulled out out by the firing units. The dump therefore acts as a buffer so that local variations in the amount received or the amount consumed aren't felt by the firing units or their supported arms. If the amount received is less than the amount consumed ... the dump gets smaller. If the amount received exceeds the amount consumed then the dump swells. In either case the guns should experience no disruption in supply.
The pic below shows an 8-round pallet.
 
^ itself made up of a pre-determined mix of HE, illum, smoke, etc projectiles and a pre-determined mix of fuze types - PD, prox, time, etc

And, of course, that's only gun ammo. There's also mortar ammo, fighting vehicle ammo, small arms ammo, ATGMs and MANPADS, fuel, mines, engineering stores, personal consumables, medical supplies, bridging equipment, spare parts, batteries, ... the wonder is not that armies move so slowly, but that they move at all.

Not to take this thread on too far a tangent, but here is a short video giving the current state of the art in machine coding.  Also an interesting channel on AI development in general