danfrodo
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Posts posted by danfrodo
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5 minutes ago, Harmon Rabb said:
I'm curious what President Zelenskyy means by this comment. Does he mean the Ukrainian Navy will get more ships in the near future? I am aware that the Royal Navy has trained Ukrainian sailors on operating British made minesweepers.
Royal Navy training Ukraine sailors as part of UK's support to country (Royal Navy.Mod.UK)
It does take a while to train a crew of a ship properly.
Anyhow here is a clip from the meeting where the statements were was made.
The above is a good example of how there's a lot of misleading headlines about UKR aid being cut off. There's some battles in some important aid provider govts, but aid is still flowing. Is it enough? It's never been as much as some of us would like, but it's still coming. We've seen over last couple weeks very large commitments from various EU countries and the US even lined up more stuff.
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Haiduk reports that Putin launched major attack w shaheds and UKR shot down 74 of 75. If true, this is an incredible achievement, and I really hope it's true. If the AD is that strong around expected targets then I suppose Putin will look for other, less protected targets -- probably civilians in cities & towns not protected.
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9 minutes ago, The_Capt said:
The lesson is to never be nice to Long Lefty…it makes him uncomfortable and he lashes out.
I think I did get better treatment from him once a couple years ago when I bit his head off (which I now regret), come to think of it.
And so back to the war. Here's today's mix of sadness, disappointment, hopium, copium, and confirmation bias. Most of these videos seen here already, but a couple I think not.
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3 hours ago, LongLeftFlank said:
But the moment you or any other right thinker gets put in charge of defining The Truth and suppressing Falsehood,
I said in the post I DON'T advocate suppressing what liars want to lie about. 'Right thinker'? I am nice to you and then you have to call me that? Jeebus, LLF. There is an often something called an evidence based reality, which is different than legislating falsehoods & prejudices.
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14 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:
s recently as the Covid pandemic anti-vax communication was suppressed in a million of formal and less formal ways.
anti-vax 'communication'. You mean baseless lies and misinformation?
And what suppression? At least in the US the lies were huge and everywhere and now there's big uptake in people not getting vaccinated for everything, not just covid. We've already seen, in the US, outbreaks in children of whooping cough in anti-vax clusters. And even a little polio.
UKR is at war for survival and is completely within it's rights to censor things. In societies not under this kind of threat, I don't want censorship. I think it's best to counter lies w truth, though sometimes it takes a lot of people getting polio for them to figure out the truth I suppose.
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53 minutes ago, LongLeftFlank said:
And please, can we take a pass on the kneejerk 'surebutthemobikshaveitfarworse' whataboutism. Until enough mobiks actually quit or mutiny over the 'far worse', it's cold comfort to the Ukrainian guys.
I was thinking about this subject this morning. Until we see lots of RU mass surrenders or mutinies, things will probably not change. I'll define mass surrender as 10+ soldiers at once. We'd need lots of those.
Going into last winter I was sure the mobiks would be combat ineffective due to bad gear, bad field practice, bad supplies, bad commanders, lack of rotation & rest. But it turns out one doesn't need to be very combat effective to hold a hole when there's nowhere to else to go.
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4 minutes ago, The_Capt said:
Well someone in opposition pro-putin punditry land can just as easily say "Hey we sent all those HIMARs which are supposed to be the unstoppable Red Hand of Mars, and the UA has not gone anywhere...why are we still wasting money?"
I mean haters gonna hate one way or another but we should not start straying from facts because we don't like them.
Yeah, they'll say anything. I am not straying from facts. There's problems, it's a war, I'm not discounting the reporting. I was just musing on what comes next in some dumb F's twitter thread.
So while I've got your attention.... What do you think of the Kherson business? I don't see how UKR gets very far but maybe this is just a low cost operation to stretch RU resources? What's your take?
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1 hour ago, The_Capt said:
That was CNN and The Economist, not Fox News FFS.
No, to be followed by software and hardware upgrades so that we can start putting deep strike pressure back on. Seriously guys, we are becoming an freakin echo chamber in here. Were all those Leos and Bradley's knocked out in minefields "Russian propaganda" too. It is war. The enemy does not sit around and happily get HIMARs-ed (or whatever) without trying to do something about it. This kind of back and forth is just what happens.
Seriously google "HIMARs jammed" and see what you get. Either this is one helluva complex hoax or maybe the RA came up with a counter.
You misunderstand. Someone in congress or in pro-putin punditry land will say that based on these reports.
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41 minutes ago, The_Capt said:
https://www.economist.com/weeklyedition/2023-07-08
Quoting "leaked Pentagon documents". "GLMRS, the precision-guided rockets fired by American HIMARS launchers, have also increasingly missed targets or failed to achieve their desired effects."
CNN did a thing too:
RUSI also notes the increasing effectiveness of EW on UAS:
https://static.rusi.org/Stormbreak-Special-Report-web-final_0.pdf
NAVWAR is in full swing. Not sure how INS fits into all this but if we cannot jam it or disrupt it with EW. I am again not confident that it hitting a wire is going to stop it either. At that point we are basically at shooting them down or having a UAS that can intercept. The larger issue appears to be detecting and tracking them well out. If we could somehow make the balloon wires into tripwires, you might be onto something.
To be followed by: "we completely want to support Ukraine, but since the HIMARS don't work we sadly must remove all aid going forward".
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Absolutely perfect picture, FlammenwerferX, thanks for sharing
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grab back of stuff here, some hopium that is sorely needed. Alleged RU collaborators/officials are fleeing Oleshky and allegedly supply line to kinburn spit has been interdicted. Also another RU soldier appeals to Putin. Who does he think put him there? It's like Jan 6 clowns who thought Trump would pardon them/pay their legal bills. Rubes.
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44 minutes ago, billbindc said:
Plus, hearing the Moscow...and it's always just Moscow when people tell this story...is achieving Weimar flights of excess is not exactly the flex Russians might imagine it to be. The decadent capital ignoring the realities about to come crashing in was precisely what happened in the late WWI and Civil War era.
And what's new, of course, is old: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/250113.Novel_With_Cocaine
You've got it totally wrong BillBinDC. Moscow wealth is definitely indicative of the state of the larger country. Just look at Pyongyang. Both of these countries have benevolent philosopher kings who care only for the well being of their people, especially the poorest and most marginalized.
But seriously, yes, looking at luxury cars is not a good measure of anything. It's like when there's bad economy in US but "2nd home ownership is up!". Yes, for all those who can afford 2nd homes (btw, this was actually something someone said once during a tough recession)
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When I need a little pick-me-up.... I like to watch RU stuff blowing up. Lots of it here. UKR says huge losses today for RU, including 1300 troops. Cutting that in half to account for UKR bias still yields 650, which is a horrific day by any standards for RU. And lots of videos of RU stuff blowing up.
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2 hours ago, Phantom Captain said:
A VERY BRIEF encounter.
I know @FlammenwerferX has a PzIV on overwatch in a field beyond a woodlot and across a lake and he's been throwing HE into my SMG troops in the woodlot (who have their hands full with the German soldiers they have encountered in the woods) and causing me some pain. Earlier one of my T-34/85s got hit and one of the crew killed but the survivors dismounted, went and took a lie down and then got brave and hopped back into their machine. I immediately tasked them with trying to take care of this problem.
Racing across a field behind the woodlot, my tank spots the "thorn in my side" PzIV.
However, FlammewerferX's tank spots me at the same time. Both tanks level their guns.
My crew fires! And you may not notice but if you look closely you can see the puff of smoke around the PzIV as both tanks fire at each simultaneously!
Incredibly both Soviet and German tank round pass each other in flight.
Mutual destruction as both tanks destroy each other at the same time.
whoa, that is wild!
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On 11/15/2023 at 8:55 AM, Phantom Captain said:
Honestly, I like all iterations of the T-34 too, with both the 76mm gun for the points mentioned above and because, of course, the T-34/85 was just excellent when used properly as we also mentioned above. It really is one of my favs.
I mean, everyone does love the Tigers and Panthers, etc. and I do too but I think my favorite German tanks were the PzIV and honestly, the PzIII with the 50mm gun. I think I really have a think for light and medium tanks more than the big heavies. Don't get me wrong, the Tiger and Panther are fun and really good at what they do but they do have their vulnerabilities. Nothing I love more than knocking out a Panther with a side shot from a 75mm Sherman!! And again, at the end of the war, regardless of who had better optics etc. the Germans lost ALL their tanks. So that argument is kinda moot in my opinion.
And hey now! Let's not be harsh or talk down about the most EXCELLENT Sherman tank in all of its special iterations as well! The Brit tanks are interesting but I'll take good ole Shermans any day of the week. I honestly love them and it is probably my #1 favorite tank of the war. But then, I'm one of those guys who absolutely loves the Stuart tank too. I mean, for a light infantry support/recon tank its just fantastic. I love the Stuart for all the machineguns it carries and its very decent 37mm gun. And I love the 75mm Sherman for it's anti-infantry punch and firepower as well. The up-gunned 76mm Shermans are just icing on the cake if you happen to run into enemy armor!
100% for sure on all points. I love having Stuart when I'm facing german infantry & AT guns. The vast majority of fights were not w panthers & tigers involved, so shermans did a great job overall. Except for some of those fights in Brit sector in Normandy facing all those panthers -- those are gawd awful w shermans.
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17 minutes ago, sburke said:
And so after much debate, Pooh, Piglet, Owl and Eeyore ventured off to Mongolia, then north to Siberia to see what they could see.
Hours later Piglet came racing back with the others in pursuit.
Pooh:"Piglet what's wrong?!"
Piglet:"are you out of your F'n mind? Are you blind? That place has more wildfires than the rest of the globe combined! They have f'n exploding methane holes and now they have these creepy viruses from 50,000 years ago! Who the hell wants that place?!"
https://abcnews.go.com/International/siberian-wildfires-now-bigger-fires-world-combined/story?id=79422602https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20201130-climate-change-the-mystery-of-siberias-explosive-craters
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/08/world/permafrost-virus-risk-climate-scn/index.html
Christopher Robin then says "Silly old bear! they've got fossil fuels. Who cares about anything else?" And lots of blustery days for the 100 acre wood gang to enjoy up there.
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3 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:
And THANK YOU for reminding me that this has to go back to the top of my list of movies to watch. For some reason last weekend Ferris Bueller's Day Off rose to the top. Haven't seen that in 20+ years and it still entertained, but I want to see Jason Isaacs' interpretation of Zhukov again much sooner rather than later.
Steve
One of the best movies ever, Death of Stalin. I could watch Stalin die over & over & over. And Zhukov shooting Beria -- so incredibly blunt and to the point while the others are all jabbering. You do have JoJo Rabbit on your list also, I hope?
I hope Putin soon joins Stalin in the 'died in puddle of his own urine' club
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2 minutes ago, The_Capt said:
This is how Humint works - rumour, gossip, BS. I bet you can pick a MAGA guy out in seconds right now.
well, you could just look for the red hat and the tshirt w trump's head on rambo's body hip-firing a heavy MG. But hey, I'm no Humint pro....
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I love having LLF here -- seriously, I mean it. Always knocks me off my comfort zone in one way or another, whether I end up agreeing or not. Sounds like he leads quite the interesting international life of business. Or life of crime, not sure
Meanwhile, Denys Davydov on youtube says the RU Dniper pullback is fake news, so we just don't know and we're getting contradictory info. Davydov says maybe it's a PR trial balloon for actual pullback later, but that's just speculation.
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30 minutes ago, dan/california said:
The narrative from the fighting around Krynky and points south has consistently been that Ukrainian artillery on the right side of the river is hammering the Russians. Russian counterbatterry seems to been ineffective at best, and frequently dangerous to the guns attempting it. Ukraine also seems to have drone superiority in this area. It MAY be that the Russians have decided to pull back out of range of at least some of the Ukrainian fires in the attempt to get their losses down to bearable levels.
So you are thinking RU might re-position away from river to get out of artillery range? Interesting. If RU has arty shortage on this sector I can see how their forces would be getting clobbered and they'd want to pull back. I hope within a couple days we'll know more. I suppose RU would want to get UKR into position where it has to move arty onto left bank, where it would be more vulnerable due to restricted mobility for displacing after firing.
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1 minute ago, Kraft said:
I dont see any indications of a breakthrough/retreat in Ru TGs. I would ask where these platoon+ units could break through to, at maximum footpace speed under air bombardmend.
Mashovets noted yesterday the Russians have not commited the majority of their reserves in this region
yeah, that's what I was wondering. What could foot mobile troops do that would cause RU to make significant pullback? UKR would need to have cut multiple roads which they don't seem to be close to doing yet. Once again, I let my hope overwhelm my frontal lobe.
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Just now, Kinophile said:
Arguably, it's only happening because of those heavy attacks, both the UKR effort the RUS at Avdiivka. Both have used up and pinned significant Russian forces, including units transferred from the Dniper shore.
The question I'm waiting to see answered is if UKR has enough available to make this new Kherson offensive an actual operational threat? Or will it stay at a larger tactical scale, but no more than that..?
For sure, Kinophile. Hopefully this starts the much hoped for cascading series of collapses we've all been wanting. I doubt it but hopium springs eternal, as they say.
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1 minute ago, Phantom Captain said:
Exactly! One of my favorite tanks of the war. It's just excellent all around!
I honestly really like playing the Soviets in WWII as well! Use them as a hammer, not a scalpel.
Like I said before, I really really really hate being on the pointy end of a squad of PPSH fire. but I do love being on the trigger side of that. Indeed, hammer away. It's meatball surgery not brain surgery, as I once heard said.
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11 hours ago, Phantom Captain said:
The first photos come trickling in from our brave and intrepid embedded photographer to document the heroics of our boys as the beat back the fascist invaders.
Great pics, once again. I do love the T34/85. Yeah, it aint a panther but it works and there's lots of them and only weighs ~35 tons. With a powerful gun, again, not as good as the german guns & optics, but cheap and plentiful and reasonably reliable relative to intended life. I never play russians in modern or CW but I really enjoy playing them in WW2.
How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?
in Combat Mission Black Sea
Posted
We all know & Putin also knows, I suppose, that NATO is not an offensive threat, which this validates. Good to know that RU is having to take such measures due to losses.
Meanwhile, Haiduk, and LLF providing some very good content on the war today, thanks much. We see the RU losses at Andiivka and elsewhere and I continue to wonder whether this will ever make a significant difference. RU burns out huge amounts of men & material but if UKR can't capitalize on it I suppose it makes some sort of twisted sense for Putin to keep doing it.