BletchleyGeek

The thing is about guilt by association as you seem to lay on everyone who had the fortune(?) of being born in Russia or to Russian parents.

"Grenades and ammunition on the floor of a destroyed school where Russian forces were based in the recently recaptured area of Izium, Ukraine, Monday September 19, 2022. EVGENIY MALOLETKA / AP"



"A destroyed Russian MLRS BM-21 Grad bearing the 'Z' sign in the recently recaptured area of Kamianka, south of Izium, Ukraine. EVGENIY MALOLETKA / AP"

Yes, these works (and many other) were used in the debate often by the authors themselves to demonstrate that you cannot lie yourself out of the military problems. 
The reception was always related to readers background and time period. Generalizing we can say that due to that debate the criticism is more or less accepted now. But depending on social background, different readers use various coping methods. For example, claiming USSR was a poor country that lacked smart men, so we should not expect anything better. Or claiming that Allies were equally bad it was just their propaganda was better. 
Also, you need to understand that these authors criticism is written in a specific softened way. In translations and without context it looks harsh. But in reality, they soften some really painful "corners" and do not touch others. They are like Girkin - they criticize certain issues and criticize them harshly but never the root cause.

If you save your Google Earth overlays as .kml files rather than .kmz files you can open them up in this Program:
Military Map - Plan your Mission
Once you're in it - click the layers button, then vector layers.  If you then hit the + key it will then allow you to navigate to wherever you've saved your overlay.  Select the .kml overlay file and add it.

For topographical maps - go to the settings icon and click it.  Then scroll down to map type and select OpenTopoMap.

well in both cases you have had Russian PMCs get hammered by US weapons... there is that.  
How That Massive Battle Between US Troops And Russian Mercenaries In Syria Went Down - Task & Purpose (taskandpurpose.com)

Hokay. 
1. Syria is a civil war,  waged by its autocratic government against its own people. 
2. Ukraine is a war of survival, led by the democratic government against an invading fascist regime, and with the overwhelming support of its own people. 
3. The Kharkiv op is not an aberration, it is the harbinger of worse to come. Yup Kharkiv isn't war winning. But it sure as heck is an inflection point. The war is not going to stay the same -  Russia no longer has the momentum, men, political coherence or operational adaptability to determine the course of events. 
4. Ukraine already went through an interminable, never ending warfare since 2014 -  in fact this is still that war but its now in the decisive phase, and its very much the Ukrainians making the decisions that matter. 
5. Two "past their prime" superpowers? Ehhh... Wut. 
Ok, Russia is one. Check. 
Who's the other, exactly? The one with the amazing weapons and wherewithal to send them halfway across the world? The one with the insanely accurate and immediate  ISR capabilities?  The one actively engaged in a long term project to build a moon base?  
Or maybe the other one,  which however rancorous its decision process has managed to provide billions of dollars in direct aid to Ukraine,  absorbed 5,000,000 refugees in 3 months without raising a sweat,  has weathered all of Russia's  gas threats and is set to get through the winter regardless, has vastly greater military power than Russia and,  as part of an alliance with that other power,  admitted two new,  heavily armed and highly  strategically placed nations, and which the prospect of Ukraine joining it was what set off this whole awful mess in the first place? 
That author is a political hack,  not an original  thought in his head and, at bedrock level,  a twit. 

A chimpanzee with an AR-15 in a crowded train station will also miss a lot of shots, but I wouldn't like to be there to have a laugh at its lack of prowess

There is another interesting Rybar post. In my previous comment I said Rybar is Prigozhin asset. Now I will show why.
Rybar likes to criticize RU military but let's check what he says about clown-zeks:
 Sounds nice for RU - RU arty is pounding UKR position in front of Wagnerites. Except reality is different - it is Wagnerites defeat and Rybar explicitly hides it (unlike with RU military Oskil defense issue).
It is easy to see the place of hits with both videos and provided coordinates - it is Lumumba street buildings that Wagnerites captured at the beginning of August (right hand side of the map next to road to Pokrovske):

So, UKR counter attacked and captured positions among these buildings.
But here is more - Rybar claims the distance between UKR positions and Wagnerites is 600 meters. Let's put this on the map:

Well, it seems UKR troops kicked Wagnerites out of town.  
But wait - there is still more to it. There is something interesting at the distance of 600 meter - outskirts of Dacha cooperative.

It looks like that Wagnerites probing attack toward Dacha Cooperative wasn't probing attack but rather retreat. Under threat of UKR counterattack Wagnerites retreated to most sensible position - Dacha Cooperative full of cottages to hide in and lots of tree lines for cover.
And propagandist Rybar using mix of facts and fiction converted Wagnerites retreat into not so glorious but still good enough advance.
Even RU Wagnerites are retreating now. The internal state of RU forces is worse than we think. Well, yes, I am being Captain Obvious here because we basically already know it.
[UPDATE] I want to add that apart from RU situation I think there was (or is) dramatic increase of UKR power at the front line. Just a month ago we talked about UKR fightint retreat and now Wagnerites were simply kicked out without much fuss. 

A chimpanzee with an AR-15 in a crowded train station will also miss a lot of shots, but I wouldn't like to be there to have a laugh at its lack of prowess

A chimpanzee with an AR-15 in a crowded train station will also miss a lot of shots, but I wouldn't like to be there to have a laugh at its lack of prowess

A chimpanzee with an AR-15 in a crowded train station will also miss a lot of shots, but I wouldn't like to be there to have a laugh at its lack of prowess

Quite disgusting remark. With a father as Dan he must be. Gay or straight, who cares?
 

George's level of detail is fantastic. I can't wait to sit in one go and get at the campaigns.

Newest LivemapUA update🙂

↑"A Ukrainian tank heading towards Izium, fully liberated from Russian occupation since 9/11. In the Kharkiv oblast, September 17, 2022 SAMUEL GRATACAP FOR “LE MONDE"
*PRP-3


↑"Ukrainian territorial defense fighters in Izium, September 17, 2022. SAMUEL GRATACAP FOR “LE MONDE"
 

↑"A car marked with the "Z" symbolizing the Russian army. It was destroyed during the liberation of Izium by Ukrainian forces. In the distance, a grain silo that was hit earlier in the day by a Russian bombardment. In Izioum, Ukraine, September 17, 2022. SAMUEL GRATACAP FOR “LE MONDE"
 

↑"For forty-eight hours, the bodies have been carefully exhumed and listed by the Ukrainian national police and forensic doctors. Izioum, Ukraine September 17, 2022. SAMUEL GRATACAP FOR “LE MONDE"

The posts of your experience and knowledge are invaluable. Vet of the 82nd, Phd nuclear physicist, kicked cancer to the curb —- you set a high bar few achieve. Much respect $

Unless you are talking about a highly integrated automation line, relocation doesn't take that long. If you really want it, and you can cut through any red tape, then the thing you have the longest to wait for is for the concrete to cure.
It makes a huge difference to relocate an already running machine against installing a new one. The former is much, much easier.

That is indeed interesting for various reasons... if the Ukrainian project just needed a little push (and new facilities) that would be probably a cheaper and politically safer way of empowering Ukraine with long range strike capabilities.

20 minute report from the Kherson front. Again with hromadske they show the human experience of the Ukrainian soldier. Lost of interviews.
Subtitled. 

Max Skinner: What is it, Major Lawrence, that attracts you, personally, to the desert?
... Its clean. I like it because its clean

The point was to illustrate what I said at the end - the versatility of a lightweight 105mm howitzer to move and set up quickly, fire a bunch of rounds quickly, and then scoot somewhere else. The movement doesn't have to be by helicopter. A 105 isn't hard to tow around.
Maybe I should have just said that.
Dave

True, although, according to this list https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_net_migration_rate
(Beware, older numbers!) Russia had a net migration rate not far below the US and I have zero clue what people could want in Saudi Arabia...
Anyway, I think we are wrongly attributing the attractivenesd of western countries to democracy alone. IMO it is the combination of democracy, constitutional state and free market. The combination often results in a strong economy. Your point about the government not being able to just take away from you whatever you have adresses more the constitutional state (government being bound by the law) than democracy. You could have the same in, say, a constitutional monarchy.
What's more, I don't believe all those migrating to the EU or the US do so primarily because they are allowed to vote their or even because the government is bound by the law. Excluding refugees from wars, most come because the economical situation.
Having come full circle from my previous post: The atractiveness of our system comes, IMO, from the promise for a good/better life. If a democracy breaks or fails to uphold that promise, the system is in danger.

Heh, I guess that depends on what scale of history you are using.  Post-WW2, post WW1, maybe.  Before that almost every state on the planet was authoritarian to some extent, the democracies of the US and France were largely experimental.  On a long history look we really have a single point of data - the current era.  Democracies and societies that were more internally dynamic have always been a very small minority and many times they failed and spiralled back into authoritarian regimes (e.g. Rome).
China has sustained multiple global power empires for over 2000 years and largely on the authoritarian model.  As did Egypt, Persia and empires all over the planet.  There is far more historical evidence that humans are attracted to authoritarian power than anything else.
So I would argue we are living either in the beginning of new era (thousand points of light) or an anomaly, and it is far too soon to tell.  My sense is that we fear uncertainty more than anything else and when “dynamism” turns into uncertainty we run back into the arms of a central pack/herd leader - history does back that up.
The subversive warfare I am talking about is all about projecting uncertainty and letting it do damage to us internally.  There is plenty evidence of its success, and even strategic gains by those that employ it.  Uncertainty create confusion and chaos inside our cognitive and conative frameworks and they then leverage that vacuum to push their own interests.
You do make a solid point though, neither China or Russia has been able to offer an attractive idea that makes their gains stick - and that is probably Russias biggest loss in the war; any chance to try and make one.  My bet is that if they keep us disrupted and unstable, their idea may be “certainty we cannot offer”.  And as things have been unfolding the shine was definitely starting to fade on us in he west as well - misadventures like Iraq and Afghanistan really did not help.  I hope that Ukraine acts as a slap in the face and glass of cold water to the west - this is what happens if we remain divided, this is the result of us allowing ourselves to be divided and subverted, this is what happens if we do not push back before a war starts and thousands die, billions wasted.
I do not speak of what happens inside the wire often but I can say the needle is moving and we are starting to see things in a different light on all of this.  We will pivot to China but it will not be solely a conventional military deterrence equation on the table, that would be a major mistake.  Nor can we assume our “attractiveness” as a natural gift, this is a contest of power, ideologies and certainties, and we should never forget that.
The second we do - more Ukraines will happen.

Well we each have different seats in all this so that is understandable.  You speak of their models of conflict, which is a very interesting conversation:
Russia - appeared to be following a Soviet expansion model of Explore, Infiltrate, Subvert, Proxy and Formal Claim - rinse and repeat.  What they have been missing is an ideology, an idea to back it up.
China - is playing with a new version of the People's War/Tso's doctrine, subvert, stalemate/exhaust, advantage - conventional gains.
Both of them rely on what I can Decision Denial - they do not need positive decisions, they need only ensure we are not able to focus and are mired in negative/null ones.  I am nor sure where this goes, we have never had this sort of conflict under these conditions.  

Super interesting. I think I'm less impressed than you are with the opposition and I think there are many problems with their model of conflict that will get worse over time. Not least, I think that's why Russia decided to force their hand. This, on Xi's Belt and Road is quite informative not just on that topic but also on the larger, self defeating Chinese zeitgeist. 
https://asiasociety.org/switzerland/oxford-debate-belt-and-road-initiative-china-pays-worsening-its-own-image
To be as pithy as possible, I'd say that the challenges to 'the West' since the end of the Cold War whether by AQI/Russia/PRC have been sideways because it's the only way to do it and survive its preponderance of power. Until the foundations of that power subside, our biggest worry is ourselves.