Vet 0369
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Posts posted by Vet 0369
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On 9/18/2023 at 3:11 PM, TheVulture said:
Curious article from Russian newspaper Kommersant about how Russian drone manufacturing is having problems because of Chinese restrictions on exports to Russia. Article is paywalled (and in Russian), but the free section auto-translated gives the outline.
https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/6223010
Absolutely looks like a subterfuge smoke screen to me (“Oh, no, we’re absolutely complying with the international restrictions. See how we are restricting the use of sensitive technologies!”) Wink,Wink, Nod, Nod.
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9 hours ago, Bearstronaut said:
I always look forward to reading a post by The_Capt. If you ever decided to write a book I would buy it in an instant. In regards to the whole "warrior" discussion, despite nearly a decade of service on active duty in the US Army I was never comfortable calling myself a warrior. I was an intel nerd and despite my knowing full well that my job was to facilitate the death of other people and that tactical SIGINT is quite dangerous to me warriors were the maneuver guys going around kicking in doors and shooting people in the face or blowing stuff up with tanks. I think this stems from my formative experience as a soldier in basic training. I went through POG basic at Fort Jackson, SC with a company full of intel, logistics, and maintenance trainees. My three platoon drill sergeants were all infantry NCOs with combat tours in Iraq or Afghanistan and they derisively referred to us as "warrior" throughout my three months in basic. That stuck with me and anytime someone since then has called me "warrior" I've kind of snickered in my head. Perhaps that would be different if I had ever seen combat but the closest I got to any real danger was two tours holding the line in South Korea.
Being much, much older, during my time in the military during both conscription and volunteer timeframes, the only “major” designations were Soldier, Sailor, Marine, Airman, and Coastguardsman. In the Marine Corps, we then sub classified by combat arm as Grunt (all Infantry and Artillery), Tankie (all Armor), and Winger (Air Wing). We never felt the need break it down any further because we were all Marines and every Marine, from the lowest Pvt and newest 2nd Lt are trained initially as Infantry.
Every year, every one of us was required to pass tests on Combat andInfantry knowledge. If you failed the tests, you didn’t qualify for promotions. I don’t know if it is still used, but every Sgt. and above was evaluated on a “Fitness Report,” which is the same one used to evaluate Officers. The most important question was “How willing would you be to serve with this Marine in combat?”
Humans like to sub-classify others into groups so they can feel superior to those not in their sub group. Marines don’t need to do that because we’re ALL MARINES FIRST AND FOREMOST!
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On 9/10/2023 at 11:20 PM, kevinkin said:
Interesting thought. I don't think the USA will ever elect a high level military commander to POTUS in my life time. And once they get to that high military level, the Senate and Congress are, well, sort of a lower level position. It's because those in the US military that rise to high ranks are: educated, experienced in communication and can cut through the BS and are overall pretty nice leaders. They want the US to give them a mission and leave them alone. What is most American want - to be left alone in the private lives. That's why I respect Kirby. Non-elected, but a straight shooter. He his loyal to his Boss and will support the Constitution to his death. He is an Admiral and gets it. I think he is the glue that hold the US admin and exec branch together. I am just giving kuddos to Kirby; an adult in the room.
Hmm,I don’t know how old you are, but the first political campaign I remember was for a Presidential election. The auditorium in my school was a balloting site. The winner of that election was Dwight D. Eisenhower, a retired five-star General, who was the Supreme Commander of the European Theater of Operations during WW II. Coincidentally, he was also the one who began our involvement in French Indochina/Vietnam.
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On 9/10/2023 at 10:57 PM, chuckdyke said:
Mmmm Iraq, Afghanistan and we shut up about Vietnam, the most powerful army in the world runs short of decisive victories. Storming Norman was the last successful general against Russian Supplied arms. Once the US taxpayers thinks it is too expensive they vote in a Commander in Chief who will withdraw just to be elected.
The issue with all the “conflicts” (not wars, as only Congress is authorized to declare war) was not the fault of the military Commanders, Units, and Marines, Soldiers, Sailors, and Airmen, it was the conditions and restrictions put on them by the politicians. I remember a very disgusting order the Marines were given after the Mai Lai massacre. When they were on combat patrols, they weren’t allowed to load a magazine into or load their weapons until they received fire from the enemy. You can be assured that they “lock and loaded” as soon as they were out of sight of their command tent.
For historical reference, the command “lock and load” comes from flintlock muskets where you would pull your “lock” back to half-cock, tear open the paper powder cartridge with your teeth, prime your pan with some powder, then “load” by pouring the remaining powder down the barrel, and ramming the ball that was still tied in the paper down to your breach plug. And remember to never go off “half-cocked” and hope you don’t have a “flash in the pan” while you’re standing “ramrod straight.”
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50 minutes ago, Haiduk said:
Almost each who lives in village can do this ) In Ukraine each rural homested has own small or large market garden, even families, who are farmers except own fields carry on own market garden or even several. In late USSR homesteads could have from 0,15 to 0,6 ha (0,37 - 1,48 acres) of land. This was enough to supply usual family at least with own vegetables (most popular on our market gadens are potato, tomatoes, cucumbers and onion). Also homesteads, having bigger allotments often have own chickens, ducks, rabbits, pigs, sometime a cow. Many those, who live in cities have own old parents in villages, and help them to grow vegetables, which then they can eat and these own vegetables are 100 % eco-natural. Also many citizens buy dachas, which also have small piece of land (0.05-0.07 ha), but often some free space all the same are diverted under beds of vegetables.
Yes, this is survival experience of two wars and especailly Holodomor, which hands over from generation to generation. In last years many young people become to forgot from where they get food, thinking it appears in magical way in supermarkets, many people told "its enough to work hard for this potato, when we can buy it in any time in any place". But Russian invasion again showed that own market garden and "house in the village" is always actual thing.
During siege of Kyiv in March, there was too few vegetables in city supermarkets, but villagers and farmers were coming to Kyiv on own cars on single free road and traded own vegetables to citizens. Of course, their food costed in 1.5 and sometine in 2 times more, than in supermarkets, but we could buy almost everything ecxept exotic %)
Here in the U.S. the small gardens are called “Victory Gardens.” They are quite popular all over the country.
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2 hours ago, Twisk said:
Contextually I think it points out Russia's continued imperial existence as opposed to the U.S.'s federal one. In the U.S. someone from Florida and Washington are equal and the civilian population has internalized that. You couldn't run a war by only drafting Florida men. Politically it would be a non starter.
It would also be illegal in the U.S. The Legislature and Executive Branches cannot create any law or regulation that would create “two classes of Citizens.” If you want to have a Draft, it must apply to everyone equally, and don’t get started on why Women don’t have to register for Selective Service.
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3 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:
What we rarely see these days is something like what apparently is happening in Andriivka (south of Bakhmut) right now. Apparently 3rd Assault Brigade is doing a simultaneous pincer attack on the village from north and south. This is likely at least 2 reinforced companies operating at the same time towards a singular objective. This caught my attention because it's one of the few that I've seen recently, but it is the sort of thing that I thought would be routine when this counter offensive started.
Steve
This maneuver in the USMC is called a “dual” or “double envelopment,” where you have a base of fire with two maneuver elements (generally at Company strength).It is used at the Battalion level and higher only. A Company and below will use a “single envelopment” with a base of fire and one maneuver element (Platoon or smaller). This is because coordinating two maneuver elements and the base of fire is much, much, much more complicated and difficult than a “single envelopment.”
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9 hours ago, L0ckAndL0ad said:
The question that is bothering me is that, if we're going to be cut off from all sides here, how would 1.5-2 million civilians would be supplied here with food?
I would hope that those who are paying attention to the situation and not the propaganda, would begin to stockpile non perishable food stuffs and water instead of the vodka that those in denial might be stockpiling.
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12 minutes ago, LongLeftFlank said:
Two-thirds of Ukrainian soldiers die from blood loss.... ‘You have to drag a person with your hands approximately three to five kilometres. You can’t drive there even in armoured vehicles because of the heavy shellings and mines.’
Medics, she says, try to avoid using the official first aid supplies issued to them, because of the admin that is involved.... Why should Ukraine ask for more medical equipment, when officially the shortage doesn’t really exist?
To allow for one medic for every 30 soldiers, Ukraine needs to train at least 15,000 combat medics.
All marines were trained in First Aid, and that was performed only after the fire fight or assault was completed. The Corpsmen basically worked on the wounded in a Triage manner. The standing rule of a grunt was that if you perform First Aid on someone, you used their med kit, not yours.
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9 hours ago, Splinty said:
The US Army and Marines still do bayonet training in basic and boot camp. But as was mentioned previously it's more about aggression and motivation than actually training to use them in combat. In any case a big knife always comes in handy.
LOL, there is a reason EVERY Marine wants a K-bar! In fact, I still have one, and I can still shave with it, sort of!
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10 hours ago, Centurian52 said:
Trenches have been used in every single war (that I can think of) since WW1, and many, many wars prior to WW1.
Edit: And bayonets were still considered an important weapon at least as late as WW2, and were still retained in many armies until very recently (still a potential backup weapon, and some armies still maintain that bayonet training is a useful way of instilling aggressiveness).
It's not so hard to see why bayonets were retained as late as WW2. Imagine you have assaulted an enemy trench or are storming a house and you find yourself in close contact with an enemy soldier. You have a bolt-action rifle, and have missed your first shot. Is it faster and less risky to work the bolt to chamber a fresh round or to thrust your rifle forward to stab the enemy with your bayonet? Stabbing is probably faster and safer in this situation.
It's harder to imagine why bayonets were retained for so long after WW2. If you are in the same situation, but you have a semi-automatic or assault rifle, then the faster and safer option is probably to just squeeze the trigger again. So you would think that semi-automatic rifles would have been the final nail in the coffin for bayonets. But, as has been pointed out, bayonets don't run out of ammo.
When I went through recruit training at Paris Island , NC, we practiced our bayonet skills with each other all the time, even when we weren’t actually involved in “formal” training. That was primarily because we had M-14 rifles with solid stocks. I don’t ever remember doing bayonet training with M-16s though because those stocks have recoil buffers and the stock could break with a good hard butt stroke to the head or the groin.
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22 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:
I'm looking for an "Understatement" button to click on for your post and not finding it. Probably a good thing
The question was asked about what tricks are up the President's sleeve in the event that funding is cut for Ukraine. The answer has already been stated that there are SOME things that can be done, but like any work around it isn't as good as the straight forward way. There are political costs, at least, for overtly working around Congress. So, as said, there are some limited ways around Congress not funding something. The previous President, for example, took money out of the defense budget and used it to build some walls with Mexico. Amazingly this was not shot down by the Supreme Court, despite it being a brazen misappropriation of funds according to standard private and public sector accounting practices.
The bigger problem, though, is that the prediction is that the entire US government will be shut down. Not only won't Ukraine funding be a problem, but everything else that is even remotely tied to Federal spending will be affected. We've already had one government shutdown in my lifetime and it was not pretty.
Steve
Ok, having “worked on the inside,” and having a discussed or been a party to discussions on “creative” ways to obtain money fo “pet” projects, I can say with much certainty that virtually every Administration, Agency, Department, Division, Directorate, and office unit, including the Judicial and Legislative Branches of the Government has done, and continues to do the same, no matter which Party is in power.
Regarding the U.S. Federal shutdowns, there have been four. They were one under Clinton in 1995-1996, one under Obama in 2013, and two under Trump in 2018 and in 2019. I was personally involved in the shutdown in 2013. All four shutdowns occurred basically after almost all of the Moderates in the House and Senate had either retired from office or been voted out by the two groups of extremists. Before that time, the opposing parties actually negotiated their positions in “good faith.”
Fun fact, most Federal employees actually look forward to a shutdown (starting saving up in August for the bi-weekly income loss) because Congress has always passed a bill to pay everyone in arrears after the shutdown ends and there is a new budget. Basically extra vacation time for which they weren’t charged.
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10 minutes ago, Centurian52 said:
I wouldn't worry about that. That is, at the earliest, still 17 months away (a new President would take office in January 2025). It's basically a given that the war will go into 2024, but I'm still hopeful that the Russians will be beaten by 2025 (at the very least, they will be in even worse shape than they are right now). And considering that this is mostly a bipartisan issue, there is a fair to decent chance that a new president would still support aiding Ukraine anyway.
The most probable “danger” to the U.S. for Ukraine is that the Federal Budget ends at 23:59 on September 30, 2023. Without a new budget already in place, the Congress will have to pass a number of Continuing Resolutions for the Executive Branch Departments to continue to operate. In this current Congress of basically two extremist groups of Legislators and Senators, with few moderates left on either side, based on my own past experiences, no budget will be passed until at least the end of December.
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2 hours ago, Bulletpoint said:
I don't know how you define ethnicity in the USA.
Personally, I'm going by this definition:
Ethnicity
a large group of people with a shared culture, language, history, set of traditions, etc., or the fact of belonging to one of these groupshttps://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/ethnicity
LOL, I can accept this definition, however ….. Since you mentioned U.S.A., the country of the United States of America is an outlier that might just throw that definition into the dust bin. The population of the USA is made up of many, many, many small “ethnic,” as defined by culture, language, religion, heritage, etc. populations. Collectively, this “population” is known as “American.” If ethnicity is defined simply by shared culture, heritage, religion, language, etc., then would the majority of Canadians, Bermuda, Bahamas, etc. be defined as Americans, while those countries with a Spanish or Brazilian culture and heritage (including the Quebec Quois (probably spelled wrong) in Canada not be classified as “Americans?” As it is, I believe the term American originally applied to any native or citizen of any country in North, Central, and South America because the “Old World Powers” wanted to separate them culturally from Europeans.
These terms are nothing more than labels that people apply to others to allow themselves to feel superior to the “subsets” in some way. That practice is more commonly known as RACISM. And yes, the Americans have engendered more than enough of that, but probably no more than any other existing country in the world.
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4 hours ago, The_Capt said:
Steve, question on process. What latitude does the President as Commander-and-Chief have to take extant defence funding and shift it over to military aid? I have seen us play that shell game during Afghanistan (it is how we got the Leo 2s).
Based on my experience as an Executive Branch Federal Employee, basically the only way that Congress can guarantee that the funds are spent as appropriated, is to “earmark” the funding for a specific program/purpose. For example, in once read an FAA Reauthorization Act (it had to be done every two years if I remember correctly), in which Congress specified that a certain amount of the monies must be used to hire x number of Flight Standards Inspectors. That was to prevent funds being siphoned off and diverted to other programs within the FAA.
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5 hours ago, Bulletpoint said:
I don't think anyone considers the Tuvans to be ethnic Russians either.
The question was about whether the Kadyrovites are held back for prestige reasons as "TikTok soldiers" or because they make for very effective blocking troops.
For whatever reason. Ethnicity being one possibility.
I would suggest that there is no such thing as an “ethnic” Russian or an “ethnic” Ukrainian or an “ethnic” Pole, or an “ethnic” anything for that matter. Everyone’s DNA is so diversified, that all you can tell is that the largest part is from a “generally current” population.
A much better LABEL would be “cultural” instead of “ethnic.”
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17 hours ago, kimbosbread said:
The Chinese will have well over 400 PLAN ships at their disposal (and hundreds or thousands of “civilian” ships if needed) if they decide to get froggy, and we can assume at least some of their equipment is good, and the operators are competent. And the mainland has lots of missiles and rockets, and can manufacture more in a hurry. That’s the competition. There is a good chance the Chinese can sink any USN assets close to Taiwan other than submarines very quickly. How do you combat this?
155mm artillery, even guided doesn’t have the range needed, and requires trained operators. Smarter munitions require less operator training, and less ammunition to hit a target at longer distances, in theory. Of course, when all your radar and satellites are down, how do you find your targets? Probably small cheapo reconnaissance drones.
The marines need lots of heavy missiles, but also smaller cheaper stuff. A number of pages back I suggested a poverty cruise missile with a thermobaric warhead to punch into the bridge of funnel of a smaller ship. Something you can buy for less than $100k, vs $5+m or whatever tomahawks cost nowadays. Ukaine’s concept is complimentary: A jetski full of HE. Super cheap, long range, and if these things carry a few hundred kilos of HE, that’s enough to wreck most ships. The US military is obsessed with expensive fancy weaponry. I wish there would be the OPFOR version of procurement to fight against this.
EDIT: And none of this takes into account re-supply across the Pacific, which will be challenging. 13 tomahawks won’t make a difference. 500 sea baby’s will.
Well, since the powers that be haven’t sought to include me in their strategic planning operation on the Joint Chiefs of Staff Orr the Headquarters of the Marine Corps, the only thing that I KNOW is that there is TALK of supplying the Marines with Tomahawks. As far as we know, this could be anything from a Navy/Marine Corps ploy to get more funding from The Congress, to a disinformation campaign to induce the Chinese to think long and hard about how they would proceed in the South China Sea.
Since I don’t KNOW anything more, and have already expressed my “opinion,” this will be the last post I make on this subject until something changes.
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3 hours ago, dan/california said:
I agree in principle, but
That is ten percent or less, maybe much less, of what is needed if we are fighting China anytime soon.
And, if the USMC felt it wouldn’t need long-range artillery, why would it need Tomahawks? I can guarantee that the USN will have a Task Force assigned to any Marine operation. The USN is there to support and protect any landing, as it has in every Marine landing during, and since WW II (except the opening phase of the Solomons when the Navy support ships were ordered out of the area due to fear of a Japanese Naval counterattack). The Navy will have Tomahawks if they are needed, and the Marines will “Seize and secure advanced naval bases” as they always have.
Marines like to refer to the Navy as their taxi drivers, but the Marines also work very hard to ensure the Navy has a parking space, gas station, and Quik-Mart available for it.
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6 hours ago, The_Capt said:
That rings true. Not sure if every Ukrainian soldier receiving training feels this way but there is some truth to what this is saying. Last time we trained for this sort of war would have been in the early 90s. Last time anyone saw one like it would have been mid-late 90s. Most western troops of the last 20 years are “unshelled” by this wars standards. The Ukrainian recruits really need the old Cold War training we used to do but there are damned few left in service who remember it. I am pretty sure western troops are swinging their training back towards peer conventional conflict but it is largely theoretical for western forces at this point.
Well, it is said that militaries tend to train “to fight the last war.” Unless a Country is planning to fight a “new” type of war, e.g. Germany rebuilding it’s forces for combined arms (infantry, air, and armor), the upper echelons of any military will tend to be very conservative in it’s thinking. The current leaders of the U.S.M.C. and USN have shown what I consider to be excellent foresight to determine that the next U.S. regional conflict as the South China Seas, and realigning the U.S.M.C. assets by divesting itself of it’s armor and long-range artillery. I applaud the foresight of the Commandant.
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Sorry for all the dupes. For some reason it wasn’t reacting when I clicked on the button.
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4 hours ago, Teufel said:
This adds nothing but confusion, will post for reference anyway, in case there is some sense of this later.
Claimed to be Tokmak, could be anywhere, and story behind could be anything really. If anybody has plausible story to this, please do share.
I don’t know yet if anyone else posted this reply to this yet or not, but here goes my take. That “child” looks like a store mannequin to me. The drone, if armed, didn’t attack, so it did its job protecting the crews of the vehicles. Works for me!
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1 hour ago, The_Capt said:
This is what happens when I leave you guys unsupervised. We were moving most of Aug…god I hate moving.
Hey, moving in any manner is preferable to not moving at all.
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7 hours ago, Seedorf81 said:
Russian investigators conclude after "genetic testing" that both Prigozjin and Utkin were on the crashed plane.
Of course they did. I would expect nothing less of the extremely professional and transparent Russian “investigations.”
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23 hours ago, The_Capt said:
That statement alone sends shiver up the spine. And I know you damn well mean it, you have every right to…but, shivers.
It doesn’t have to be the “post WWII occupations” methods of punishment, e.g. women’s shaved heads and firing squads for the men. I would expect, even with the “calls for blood vengeance,” trials for the accused followed by imprisonment and eventual banishment to Russia with no opportunity to return to Crimea or Ukraine. That will be extraordinarily difficult due to the Russian war crimes, but when it comes down to the “brass tacks,” that will be Ukraine’s decision to make, and no one else’s.
How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?
in Combat Mission Black Sea
Posted
Not at all surprising as statistically, the percentage of “bad actors” (rape, murder, drug abuse, other types of abuse, etc., in the military, is basically the same as in the “general population” af the Nation.