fireship4

FancyCat, edited for concision: A drawn-out war is bad for Ukraine. We don't know what might bring Russia to ceasefire negotiations. The best way to bring them to the table is to fight to win the war. Russia will keep the war going if it is to their advantage. The west is not fighting to win, Russia is taking advantage of Western lack of commitment. Russia is using Western fears of Russian collapse and nuclear war to it's advantage, actively promoting such a narrative for it's benefit rather than because it is a realistic one. Russia seems to be pursuing maximal goals. The west must signal that these cannot be achieved. Why should the west make concessions as Russia does not. Russia does not offer a negotiation, rather demands surrender, disarmament and fomalisation of annexed land The_Capt, edited for concision: Preamble: You are ignoring reality. The best becomes the enemy of the good. We have a phrase for that in Army. The Russian regime might collapse. This would be a risk. You think the only way to win is for the Russia to collapse. Russia doesn't need to collapse for there to be peace. You think Ukraine must have total victory and anything else is defeat. This is holding you back. (6.1) WW3 would be bad, Ukraine is not worth that. War is costly. We can simultaniously support Ukrainian resistance and pull back to a new iron curtain behind which could sit a well funded NATO. (6.2) Maximal goals are not the only form of victory. We are looking at a ceasefire scenario with half of Ukraine in Russian hands. (6.3) We must fight to achieve a better negotiating position, this might require Russia to collapse. (6.4) Your argument helps the enemy, by making the war unwinnable, and might encourage people to give up support if it does not achieve total vicory. This is what Russia wants. I feel simply summarising the main points of the exchange as I have here should suffice as a critique. It took me an hour or so.

Before we comdemn him from afar, let's remember he is 18, would he have somewhere to live? Where is his family home, is it still standing, is it in occupied territory? Would he be given a job in the army immediately? Would it help support the rest of his family (in Germany)? Can he help Ukraine in other ways? Maybe he should have help abroad to renew his passport maybe not, but surely we can commend bravery of some without handing out white feathers to the rest.

St. Bernard's fire...

Not surprised. I listened to the first episode of the podcast today and it's worth a go for anyone who likes WWII history. There's a decent enough chance he's played CM even. He might even be perusing this conversation, as yet unaware he's dunking his tie in his bitter.

Al Murray the pub landlord has a history podcast?! An RSS: https://feeds.megaphone.fm/GLT8434431415

Turkey... turkey... ah. 15 minutes on STT.

It's the pope... you might as well get rid of the red shoes. Shout out to The Young Pope, great series.

Ageist & sexist heheh sipo, es verdad pero: (https://www.vaticannews.va/en/pope/news/2024-03/pope-francis-swiss-tv-interview-gaza-ukraine-wars.html) suggests the interviewer may have been Italian/the interview conducted in Italian. EDIT: Sorry, somehow I thought you meant about the interview language, yes you are right my comment made it look like I thought the pope was Italian, I just didn't think hard enough about it, it was in my brain somewhere I'm sure. In any case being white only being a recent thing according to some goes for South Americans too.

Since he's speaking in Italian, I was hedging my bets, also world leaders can be somewhat "clarificative" to coin a phrase. What they really mean, their eventual position, is the clarification: EDIT: Italians barely got a generation being white in some people's eyes before succumbing to this racist meme... not that I'm overly sensitive about it here and there but on the whole it gets tiresome.

Dear oh dear the meme defense network spun up pretty quick regarding some comments the pope apparently made vis a vis Ukraine and negotiation:

I thought that was the command version?

Extremely disturbing for those who would like to avoid such things. With regard to: In case misapprehension caused his ban, I should say it's at least possible his post: ...was a sincere expression of regret on realising the other poster had tried to help Ukraine and had failed due to problems with corruption/bribery, and was not just an antagonistic internet warrior. Much can get lost between translation and the lack of context. It's right on the edge of plausibility but worth clarifying.

~Nevermind~ Edit: to clarify, I had a second look and realised I didn't see what I thought I had in a previous image.

Quote from the translation: Lol

RIP Without prejudice, out of academic interest, the flag is not a proper Union Jack, and the rifle is a Mosin.

Perhaps: "Delboyism"? Derrick "Del-boy" Trotter, British classic sitcom icon, cockney who sells stolen goods: EDIT: He even claims to support Chelsea.

Uh oh...

Available from https://chacr.org.uk (The Centre for Historical Analysis and Conflict Research, a think tank established for the British Army) as a .pdf

"I will kill you and your family", Roma Termini, about 7 years ago.

Happy New Year to you all. Thanks for the interesting discussion, may this thread end as soon as possible: war over, lands restored, the dead risen, bombs unexploded.

Merry Christmas.

Perhaps it would be better to have a team of drones lay the entire charge in one go. Or if the risk of severing the line in one spot is too high (remote triggers spaced along the charge might solve this) you might even have a larger team of drones each with something light like det. cord, that fly out a few feet apart and concievably create a path.

Speaking of Robert Kagan (well I was, a few pages ago), for those worrying about the next US election, this is well worth a read: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/11/30/trump-dictator-2024-election-robert-kagan/ For those whose article shows up curtailed, turning on 'reader view' in Firefox and refreshing the page should do the trick.

Awesome. You could have soldiers stand on top and go into battle hands free and spitting lead. IVAN DON'T SURF! Almost as cool as my vision of a headless boston dynamics cavalry (with shielding for a sir's legs and torso) being ridden around by deliriously happy dragoon regiments.

Don't know about that, I've been reading as much of the thread as I find practical since the war began. Perhaps I missed one or two of his posts, I know I ignored quite a lot, since it all seemed to fit a pattern. I was in the midst of a childish argument with FlemFire, endeavoring to SpitFlames, and replied to you trying understand what you meant when you said this: ...Because it made no sense to me: you switched from what I normally see in your long dissertations on military strategy to an incoherent definition of "liberals progressive theory"? Like you had a stroke. I'm not a political scientist by any means but it is does you a disservice. Perhaps things are different in Canada... ...but collectivism is normally used to refer to certain communist concepts. If I remember from quite a while back you were quite strong on self-determination of people or peoples - I would say that's a pretty liberal (in the normal sense) view. Perhaps it was collective action between nations that was being referred to. Anyway I was looking for you clarify as linking global warming with liberal theory was confusing me. Perhaps you were using it how I've heard Americans use the term 'liberal', as things have become polarised in their country and a person's position on one issue has become a good predictor of their position on others, which otherwise would have a weaker link. This is indeed a very good indicator someone is wrong. I've been down on Chomsky for quite a while now (I won't say he is not worth listening to) but the criticism of him I remember best was approximately that points he was making he often cast as obvious. I think arguing with FlemFire's approach is important in as much as I think it's the approach that is problematic. It is easy enough to dismiss specific points, or concede specific points, but there are so many, and so many assertions. We each of have to level up our discourse so that we survive such encounters, and remember we remain even if our bad ideas do not, and we can see where we are learning from each other and what is disingenuous, what is actually a battle of status and soundbite over truth. If the West has lost the courage of it's convictions like some people say, then perhaps they must be refreshed by giving them a good whack with a spanner like FlemFire. I happen to think that while the masses in the West have vast depths of ignorance in their own way, the deep cultural issues of the modern day exist because we are the only societies in which those things can be reexamined. This is a strength in my book. Anyway, I am once again putting off my breakfast.