Lethaface

Look at the actual available metrics and events which took place surrounding China's visit to Russia earlier this year, and you'll know this is bullshik. BTW Russia isn't a communist nation anymore.

Afaik the levelling of Rotterdam with indiscriminate incendiary carpet bombing was done in order to force surrender of the city/Dutch government, because German troops were held up in fierce urban fighting for the city. Although like you say, iirc the Dutch government already agreed to negotiate for the surrender of Rotterdam/general surrender for not wanting to have it's major cities laid to waste. Allegedly Because of miscommunication among German high command / air force the bombing still went ahead even though order to do so had been cancelled. Anyway those were different times, carpet bombing / destruction of whole cities to break enemy will was relatively more acceptable compared to current norms.

I wholeheartedly DISagree with most what you are saying. Erdogan likes to play power politics, nationalist hubris but the Turkish economy is rather deeply intertwined with European Investment. It's the economy, stupid. Some extreme rightwing Austrians preferring macho style leadership over the 'woke' variant of the West doesn't mean they'd like to leave the EU and join the rubble union. I think Orban isn't much different, when he needs to choose between economy and his 'friend' Putin he will choose the EU Bn and the Nato security/armanents. They all know very well that if they leave the NATO/EU bloc and join Putin, they'll be served on a dinner plate whenever Russia's leader**** has the appetite. It's like Wilders from NL, he likes to encroach Russia's/Putin speech because it's popular among some circles and he's a populist; he can't get votes from people who aren't naive about geopolitics. But he's not seriously considering joining the 'Warsaw' pact 2.0. he knows very well it's political suicide. Now the only countries playing with such thoughts imo are countries like S. Arabia. They have a lot of cash on hand and don't like our ways of telling them off for the way how they're running their country. They like Russian/Chinese attitude better, which don't have any problems taking their money/business without questions asked. Nobody knows how the world will look like in a hundred years and we won't be there to observe it, but for the foreseeable future I think even S. Arabia and the likes talk that talk because they feel it's in their interests and they will probably get something out of it, but I don't see them walk that walk the whole 9 yards.

Good. Now hopefully some of the new drones are ready to roll against oil & gas infrastructure and Russia can eat some of it's cookies.

What units / troop concentrations does Russia have along the border of Estonia? 200-300k with armor, artillery park, etc? Like before 22 these will be detected. On top of that, there are actual NATO forward detachments in Estonia. No shocking numbers, but IIRC they have been enlarged since 22 and now amount to a couple of thousand troops (again iirc) and also include airforces. Russia invading and coming into contact with NATO troops inside NATO land WILL actually directly invoke a larger war and response, among which the Very High readiness taskforce and air force / standoff. The articles involved will be more of a formality in such a case. A couple of missiles (accidentally) landing on NATO terrain, not striking military installations or critical infrastructure, aren't the same. That doesn't mean we or NATO should be smoking big sticks believing all will be alright because the stuff is good Vigilance is good, overreacting isn't helpful.

Another factor could be that F-16 are also able to fire these munitions, lessening the weight of potentially losing an SU-24.

Cheers! A worthy toast

Yeah especially with the M1A2SEPv3 + trophy and it's lightning target acquisition on probably too small maps for optimal ATGM engagement ranges, (and Bradley / Java / faster arty) getting heavy forces gaining superiority against RA is well possible. Or with the RA against Ukr in CMBS. But some sneakily employed ATGM groups could be very deadly against anything without APS. Any move through open sight lines would be hit hard from as long range as available. And artillery incoming fast onto dismounted infantry. On the more 'balanced for H2H scenario's' I felt trying to maneuvre before dealing with ATGM and AFVs was asking for heavy casualties against an experienced Oppo. The type of casualties only fine for when playing a game or if your RL Russia I wonder what the upcoming change to artillery lethality will do. Let alone combined with a wider proliferation/ modeling of drones. And certainly looking forward to the next game, although CMCW certainly keeps it's spot for the now more 'classical' modern warfare. Besides It would be great for modeling the old fashioned breaching ops!

The winch doesn't necessarily need to be on the other side, although you'd need a 'lussed' (English? :D) line with something anchoring it on the other side. Connect the sectors to one end and pull the other end.

Not really if one extrapolates/values experience from modern CM games. Especially h2h battles between forces with thermal optics, modern ATGMs and accurate, fast falling artillery with PGM. I mean nobody plays games with dense and deep minefields for fun, partly because there's no breaching modeled. But even with some pre-cleared lanes through minefields an attacking force will suffer heavy casualties trying to move through the lanes. And that's with limited modeling of fortifications. Thermal blocking smoke is the only way not to get spotted/targeted and shot up on the advance, if there's no blocking terrain allowing to move up. My usual strategy is to try and find+shoot up all enemy heavy weapons before committing serious forces, with smoke covering the eventual movement of any assault forces moving through open terrain. That and blazing away from all barrels obviously. Anyway, my view would be no we shouldn't be surprised. Minefields and drone directed artillery alone seem scary enough, let alone combined with atgm/air, attack drones and mlrs laying mines ad-hoc.

Fwiw in Malaysia the view you sketch is not accurate (posting from now). The Ukraine war gets less attention/focus here, it's far away and limited impact. However the agressor is clear. China isn't seen as favourable as you sketch it to be, although US foreign policy isn't always either. They don't see the need to get mixed up in the conflict, mainly looking after own interests. The Palestine/Israel conflict gets more attention, overwhelming majority support a free Palestine state and see the lack of that as the main reason for the conflict there. And that Israël can get away with almost anything, where other countries wouldn't.

Yes I'm long behind on the thread However I wanted to react to this. Your perspective in imo the glass half empty variant, explaining a selection of geopolitical level examples from a citizens perspective. There are more perspectives imo. Not only on explaining the why behind things like Taurus, whether one agrees with the reasoning or not. There are also glass half full perspectives on the geopolitical front. Just one example I want to lay down: look at WW2 at end of 1940 / 41. Half of Europe was effectively overran and defeated on the battlefield. Things looked very gloom, there was plenty of issues between allied parties. Not all is well in Ukraine obviously, there is plenty of issues both in Ukraine as among those supporting Ukraine. One can focus on these issues, but it is only fair to put it into perspective that there actually is wide support for Ukraine. Also, Ukraine was able to defeat most of Russia's large offensives. Both weren't to be taken for granted before Feb '22. Of course that doesn't mean things couldn't have been better or can't be improved; it is imperative to remain vigilant and critical. But at the same time, it is also imperative to value achieved accomplishments and realize those weren't a certainty; almost nobody predicted the current status quo as favourable for Ukraine as it is now. Or maybe I just prefer half full glasses

If NATO would be smart it would go on a truly 'joined effort' from R&D to deployment & training.

There will be many practical problems but indeed 'it could be done today' imo. Obviously not for every soldier, but given that we will probably see more high tech enabled 'SF' type of light infantry utilizing drones/etc, there doesn't need to be funding iot equip every grunt.

These clips you keep posting give me some WW2 east front vibes.

Venezuela might not have a regime change, but it isn't doing 'good' from whatever pov. So not sure if that is an example others will want to follow.

Besides Zalushny's statement has probably more intents outside of what is in the statement, than inside. After all it is coming from a General directly involved in a hot war. He isn't writing op-eds for a career opportunity.

Plus Ukraine can, at least theoretically, also do 'cease fire' / 'frozen conflict' type of games. Rogue entities could still make Russian occupation feel like Iraq on steroids while officially blaming Russia or at least denying any involvement. From some perspectives that would be more difficult for Ukraine than for Russia, but why should they play into the Russian game as long as they aren't inside NATO or EU?

The last bits of your post is imo why we don't see real 'learning & improving' on the side of the RA. And also links to what was missing in another post linking to a video about the changing world order which was too limited in its vision, at least imo. The thing the 'West' or rather democracy has going for it is the advantage on the side of learning and improving. We probably owe Napoleon some slack on this account and we are in danger of losing this advantage, corporate culture being one of the biggest threats imo. Ps Napoleon wasn't really democratic, but imo the only durable/sustainable way of enforcing learning & improving is in the dimension of what democratic freedom actually entails. Our democracies are in the risk of losing this, as the 1% gets more and more influence and wealth to the detriment of the 99%. (Does one actually have the chance to make a difference for the better by giving it all, or does whatever one do not make an iota of difference).

That by itself (you're not alone I'd say) should be enough reason for investment in those areas. Also, many potential recruits for 'elite' type formations (and beyond probably) don't make the cut because of injuries during the recruitment camp training/selection. This is an existing problem for those type of forces, especially in countries without drafts/professional only armies.

Well they already haul massive loads, especially the SF type of forces, with obvious consequences later on in life if not already during operations. But yeah probably only human organic power is too limited. But with the use of tech, engineering, tension and lever effects I'd say there is more to be gained from the human basic strength. Especially if you add 'hybrid' power.

Human powered exoskeleletons could already help with the 'joint destroying' aspects; if the load isn't burdened on our skeleton, humans can already produce enough energy needed for the motion. But our skeleton isn't build for carrying 2x our body weight for long periods. Add some batteries with smart recharging and these might be already significant improvements over the 'human skeleton mk1'.

interesting opinion, thanks.

Imo there is a 'holy trinity' between quality, budget and time. You can't change one without impacting the others, so if one or two are fixed, the other need to be flexible. With BFC committing to quality (this is not necessarily mainly about bugs, but rather realism and authenticity of the game engine and depicted period/battles), them having a sort of fixed budget, the result is that time needs to be 'subject to change'. This is about the big picture, not individual releases/bugs or investing a couple of (10)thousand extra to get some things done outside the core team. Personally I'm also happy they sacrifice 'time' over quality. They could probably dumb down the game / new games and deliver faster. But that's not how they roll, in my experience since 2007. The result is that releases come when they are ready, it is what it is; still the lesser evil imo.

Indeed everyone wants their new toys rather earlier than later. And when one has ordered them, almost all humans can be diagnosticised with the 'when is it ready/is it there yet?' syndrom. Some jobs role is basically to perform this role (PM ;-)). Orwell called it 'time neurosis'. Since time is relative, 'slow' is also relative. Some companies/games might come with updates every week/month. Some people will still call that slow. Other games might come with updates on a yearly/longer basis. One can find that slow on the 'expecting' side, those on the 'producing' side might disagree. Then we also have different preferences for news updates. I think Steve and BFC have commented very often in the past that they are weary of communicating news, as almost any communication will create expectancy, which will then have to be managed. They could probably hire a communications manager who's job it would be to update the community about ongoing stuff. However, that in itself wouldn't do anything in the sense of 'faster' game development or releases. Instead it would probably be slower because the communication manager would need to be informed about progress on a regular basis. It would also soup up some of the budget now allocated towards development. Give or take, that's how I understand BFC's hussle and I'm fine with it personally. Of course it is also fine if others would desire more information or more and faster releases, and post about that. I don't think things will change because of that. We can also ponder about the question whether it would be a good idea for BFC to grow by a large amount, potentially increasing development capacity and more releases in shorter time. That is one option, the other option is the risk that the extra releases don't offset against the extra costs and is a real potential business risk. I think the ones best to make that decision is people inside the business themselves, because they have the knowledge. It's also their decision. But yeah I'd also like to see game engine 5 rather sooner than later, or CM3 for that matter. SO, WHEN IS IT READY!!???