asurob

It's war.  Unexpected consequences occur in war all the time.  This is one.  It's sad, but I wouldn't expect anyone with half a brain to jump off the Ukraine side in terms of full support who wasn't already looking for excuses (Hungary) to do that.  
Most countries will remember that Ukraine was trying to defend itself from a missile attack by Russia.
This, while unfortunate, will be looked at that way by all of Ukraine's allies.

It's war.  Unexpected consequences occur in war all the time.  This is one.  It's sad, but I wouldn't expect anyone with half a brain to jump off the Ukraine side in terms of full support who wasn't already looking for excuses (Hungary) to do that.  
Most countries will remember that Ukraine was trying to defend itself from a missile attack by Russia.
This, while unfortunate, will be looked at that way by all of Ukraine's allies.

It's war.  Unexpected consequences occur in war all the time.  This is one.  It's sad, but I wouldn't expect anyone with half a brain to jump off the Ukraine side in terms of full support who wasn't already looking for excuses (Hungary) to do that.  
Most countries will remember that Ukraine was trying to defend itself from a missile attack by Russia.
This, while unfortunate, will be looked at that way by all of Ukraine's allies.

It's war.  Unexpected consequences occur in war all the time.  This is one.  It's sad, but I wouldn't expect anyone with half a brain to jump off the Ukraine side in terms of full support who wasn't already looking for excuses (Hungary) to do that.  
Most countries will remember that Ukraine was trying to defend itself from a missile attack by Russia.
This, while unfortunate, will be looked at that way by all of Ukraine's allies.

Bingo Ringo!

Well guys, at last I got this!  Symbolically in the day of Kherson liberation ) 
Thank you @Kinophile for this initiative and enough "family diplomacy" in resolving of sudden obstacle on "last mile" 😀
Thank you @Battlefront.com - Steve, your "bribe" ) will be worked out ))))
Thank you all, who donated anonymously
Thank you, all other, who just have been reading and support our country - first two months were some nervous and psychologically hard, so this my 24/7 "marathone" here was giving me some emotional relief. 
 

This.  Yes, the more extremes of the right certainly are crying about the billions going to Ukraine rather then their pet projects like the border security.  But it is the extreme and vocal right.  Despite the usual war between parties...both seem to agree (as do most Americans) Putin bad, Ukraine good.  More bullets for Ukraine now means not having to deal with Russia later.

Assistance to Ukraine is safe regardless of the mid-terms. No politician wants to be on the wrong side of this one. Sure some on both sides will issue a "protest" vote knowing whatever bill is up for vote is safe and sound in Ukraine's favor. Will Ukraine get exactly what they want or need? No. Will they get too much in some opinions? Yes. That's how sausage is made - very messy but tastes fine for almost all in the end.  

I will be shocked, absolutely shocked if a Republican led House and/or Senate cuts or reduces aid to Ukraine.   I keep seeing this discussed but from a grass roots perspective I don't see this as being even remotely popular among conservative voters.  Yes----"Biden is corrupt and evil" and conservatives will work hard to counter his agenda.  But I don't see Ukraine support as being on the chopping block--very strong bipartisan support.  
Hell, it's about the only thing most of both parties can agree on.
 
 

The satellites themselves are actually *very* cheap.  A few articles are suggesting costs in the $250K/unit cost, with launch costs of $30M or less per block of ~50 satellites.  There's a bunch of ground costs on top of that, and I'd guess that the limiting factor on subscribers is bandwidth to the fat pipes on the ground.  They could probably sell quite a lot more subscriptions if they let performance degrade somewhat, but it's probably better for them in the long run to maintain a high level of performance over a limited number of areas so that as they open regions they get big blasts of subscribers.
I suspect a few things:
1) Elon has no clue about the details of the economics of them supplying Ukraine with bandwidth.  He's a loud AW who says all sorts of random things that may or may not correlate to reality.  It's common for engineers at his companies to found out about new "requirements" from his public tweets.  That they can deliver on a lot of them is a testament to their engineering capability and willingness to work in the chaos.
2) Starlink is raking in money and even if they're taking a loss right now, they aren't going to go the way of Iridium.  Iridium was a nice idea but was too early and had too limited capability - there wasn't enough demand for poor phone service over the vast amounts of unpopulated space on the surface of the earth.  There *is* demand for high bandwidth data connections in the middle of nowhere.
I've actually dealt with trying to debug hardware that was near the north pole while I was in California.  The people with the hardware had an iridium phone and they could call, or they could email, but they couldn't do both - if we wanted a picture of something, they had to hang up, create a data connection, send (slowly) then call back.  At probably a buck a minute or something.  If they'd had 10 Mbps for $100/month it would have been a *lot* less painful.  There's a lot of inexpensive environmental monitoring equipment that you can put out in the middle of nowhere that's cost effective at Starlink prices.  Or even a few times Starlink prices.
3) People don't talk about it, but Starlink has the potential to offer to high school kids building cubesats a capability that was until recently really only available to the US government (SDS, TDRS).  The data relay system was arguably a bigger secret (and easier to keep secret) than the KH-11 telescopes (although their digital imaging that took advantage of the SDS was also secret).  Anybody who's ever read  the first couple chapters of an optics text can figure out the resolution possible with a telescope of a given size at a particular distance, but the data rates and speed of return are a big deal.  Starlink can potentially sell space nodes to anybody building a satellite and they can get realtime, high bandwidth data returned to the ground for a few hundred $K. That's going to be a very valuable market.

As opposed to a con site the posts Kremlin disinformation?

Here is my “off the wall” bridge theory, which includes a ‘truck bomb’, special forces, and a missile! I’ve been meaning to post this for a while, but I can’t keep up reading all the great posts!
The Ukrainians sent a special forces team in a truck or small van into Russia to the bridge area. The Brimstone missile (Brits again…) was shipped to the launch area using a remote control kayak (a picture was posted of one washed up on a beach). According to Wikipedia, a Brimstone is 110lbs and 5’11’’ – it should fit. The special forces team retrieved the missile and then started to monitor the traffic on the bridge and railway. I assume that Russian security is poor, given their front-line performance and that this is a rear area. This makes it easy to spot and log ammo trucks and fuel train schedules.
Once they figured out the correct time, half the team assembled a launching box from innocuous metal sheets in the van and launched the missile. The other half of the team used a laser designator to light up the chosen truck - maybe from a kayak or the shore. If the train stops or goes in the same direction as the truck, it offers more latitude to hit the truck next to the train. The “air-burst” explosion above is the first stage detonation of the tandem warhead – the second stage was not captured on film due to the almost instantaneous detonation of the truck.
Launching from the Russian side might allow them to exploit a hole in the AA defenses or cause enough extra delay in reacting to the threat to enable the missile to hit. As implausible as this may be, I love that the Russians do all the heavy lifting, bringing most of the explosives and oil to the party!

Ukraine's Plan to Win the War
I love the infographics channel, they break things down for the most common youtube user.  This was written and produced prior to putin's old man mobilization.

It's a teacup tizzy because Musk doesn't determine foreign policy or the course of events - Biden does. Musk has no pull on Biden and Biden is not facing reelection. Mid terms are coming but foreign policy plays very little effect on congressional elections.  Not zero, just very little. Biden and his entire Administrative are very much on a moral crusade viz a vis Putler; its a  negative percentage chance they're fretting about the uninformed, Kardashian-level Twitterrings of a fat billionaire with too much time on his hands. Musk is a social media flashmob right now, and about as relevant. 
This too will pass, and will affect absolutely nothing. 

I'm not so sure Ukraine would accept Feb 22 borders. Methinks they will insist on Feb 14 borders for a ceasefire.
This is a once in 50 year opportunity for Ukraine to get their territorial integrity back. And future security and NATO membership hinge on that.
So unfortunately, since there is no way Russia is ready to accept these terms yet, I think this war has another 6-12 months to go with all the horrific suffering and loss of life that entails.

Not what I am saying at all.  There are those who are saying if Putin toss a tac we should sit back and shrug and say oh well.  "Let's not risk the world for Ukraine's freedom." Those folks don't recognize the actual struggle that is going on here.  If he goes this route I more than expect the west to make him pay.  I'm certainly not advocating a full Nuclear war.  No one wins in World War 3.  But no one won when Chamberlain came home wave paper around saying peace in our time.  Russia will need to pay a steep price.  Otherwise we will do this again in a couple of years with the next Putin.

Of course he isn't acting - but it's obvious putin and his cronies find him a lot more valuable than people, who were bringing putin billions just yesterday. And it's what I find weird. Bridges with the West are burned so Navalny getting shived by a "random inmate" would've cost putin literally nothing. Unless Navalny has his use. And since we even hear Navalny's statements, despite being in a FSB cage - it means he does.
As for Crimea being a "russian populated area" - it wasn't until 1944 when natives got deported to die in Siberia. And it's why stuff like Crimea shouldn't happen again anywhere else and why Crimea can't be allowed to remain in russian hands.

and now in order:
1. How exactly will the US expand after the victory over Russia. Which regions of Russia will become part of the United States.
2. At the expense of the Black Sea, it has never been a Russian lake. Turkey has always controlled the Black Sea and decided who will enter it and who will not.
3. How exactly the fall of Russia will affect the possibility of containing China (I think that this, on the contrary, will cause the expansion of China by seizing new territories of Russia inhabited by the Chinese).
4. How exactly will the fall of Russia affect the autonomy of Europe (and autonomy from whom?). 3. Why will Iran and India die after the collapse of Russia?
5. List US wins that you find difficult to count

Major uptick in videos of dead Russians scattered along foresty roads. I'd say more than when Izyum occupants were in the process of regrouping 😀 seems despite Moskovites willingness to pay any price that not everyone wants to stay in Festung Lyman.
 
And hello again to the Nuke topic, how I did not miss you
 

Biden already warned some months ago that if Chemical weapons are used in Ukraine there would be a NATO response.  He kept very close to the vest what.  But I'm sure he made it very clear to Russia exactly what would happen.  Back channels are no doubt on fire right now.

He's not far off.  Honestly, if you give into little vlad's nuclear blackmail...this will not be the last time he wields that tool.  Next up the Baltics, or Poland or...well you get the idea.  If you give into little Vlad's nuclear blackmail, next up....North Korea, or Iran when they finally sort out the details of nuclear fission.  This will be the results of not responding and responding hard to Russian threats of nuclear escalation...  Do you want to live in "that" world?  I do not.  

He's not far off.  Honestly, if you give into little vlad's nuclear blackmail...this will not be the last time he wields that tool.  Next up the Baltics, or Poland or...well you get the idea.  If you give into little Vlad's nuclear blackmail, next up....North Korea, or Iran when they finally sort out the details of nuclear fission.  This will be the results of not responding and responding hard to Russian threats of nuclear escalation...  Do you want to live in "that" world?  I do not.  

Negative.  If Russia goes nuclear, then bank on Russia being sans an air force or navy within hours after that.  If Vlad tosses one, things will get interesting quickly.  Unlike Vladimir's red lines, the west and NATO don't make false threats.  
We all may end up losing in this, but Putin most certainly will be the first loser

Nuclear war is of course not desired option.
Deciding between
risk of nuclear war (by standing up to Putin and helping Ukraine), and certainty of sacrificing our humanity (by saying "ok let's deescalate and sacrifice millions of Ukrainians in the process who will end up in mass graves in the occupied territories") is the struggle I see disagreements on.
But I'm gonna go cool down for few days, this is getting pretty far from the usual maps and RU Nats translations.

He's not far off.  Honestly, if you give into little vlad's nuclear blackmail...this will not be the last time he wields that tool.  Next up the Baltics, or Poland or...well you get the idea.  If you give into little Vlad's nuclear blackmail, next up....North Korea, or Iran when they finally sort out the details of nuclear fission.  This will be the results of not responding and responding hard to Russian threats of nuclear escalation...  Do you want to live in "that" world?  I do not.