Butschi

We are often lamenting the pendulum swinging this way these days. On the other hand, not long ago a woman had to be given permission by her husband to take a job, had to have sex with him whenever he felt like it and could be beaten by him - legally. (In Germany, don't know about other countries)
If you were anything but strictly heterosexual you faced going to jail or get electro shock therapy.
So not being allowed to use certain words is annoying, true, but on a different level, I think.
But we are straying off topic, I guess.

Well, that's - sadly - true.
However, Ukraine doesn't merely strive to be an ally but to actually become part of the West, the EU in particular. And since joining EU means submitting to EU jurisdiction, Ukrainian society will have to adapt at least some.

You do realize that this is basically the same propaganda that Putin uses?
And that is the seed of how war crimes happen.

Portraying this sort of dumb stuff when extreme fringes scream at each other on social media as how normal western society functions is disconnected from reality.

You do realize that this is basically the same propaganda that Putin uses?
And that is the seed of how war crimes happen.

Here's the thing though - generally - at its best - the West as part of its advantages over more totalitarian  places -  has come to represent toleration  of a whole lot of things which are not necessarily the end of Human Civilization as many  who oppose such toleration seem to think . The West is not going to fall because of trans gender rights or any other sub group of people wanting to express themselves how they feel . Its going to be because of war ,   resource scarcity and global changes to our economic systems due to our continued mis use of the planet .

As a lawyer you should know better that it's much more than just an 'attitude'. It's an entire legal framework underpinning the political ideology of liberal democracy.

Yes the west can sponsor whomever they like, the enemy of my enemy and all that, but there is much more going on here with the particular case of Ukraine because Ukraine has made it no secret that it aspires to joining the EU. As a matter of straightforward facts:-
Ukraine will never join the EU if it does not uphold EU law - indeed it has to adopt EU law in order to be a member. Membership means compliance with the ECHR and its rulings. The ECHR enforces the core principles laid out and agreed upon by the union of liberal democratic states. Some of those principles cover the protection of minority groups and protection of individual freedoms etc.. This is just the way it is. You cannot cherry-pick the core ideas of liberal democracy anymore than you can cherry-pick the legal framework and membership of the EU.          

Well, that's - sadly - true.
However, Ukraine doesn't merely strive to be an ally but to actually become part of the West, the EU in particular. And since joining EU means submitting to EU jurisdiction, Ukrainian society will have to adapt at least some.

Well, that's - sadly - true.
However, Ukraine doesn't merely strive to be an ally but to actually become part of the West, the EU in particular. And since joining EU means submitting to EU jurisdiction, Ukrainian society will have to adapt at least some.

You do realize that this is basically the same propaganda that Putin uses?
And that is the seed of how war crimes happen.

Unjustified? Like the assassination of an Iranian general?

You do realize that this is basically the same propaganda that Putin uses?
And that is the seed of how war crimes happen.

Do you really think people in Europe don't use the word "woman" anymore? Dunno what right-wing nonsense you are consuming, but I would stop, otherwise people might come to the conclusion that more aid to Ukraine is not necessary since they apparently already got bombed back into the stone age anyway.

You do realize that this is basically the same propaganda that Putin uses?
And that is the seed of how war crimes happen.

You do realize that this is basically the same propaganda that Putin uses?
And that is the seed of how war crimes happen.

I suggest it's not a good idea.
A targeted response against those responsible rather than creating any more terrorists by killing innocent people. 
Bombing people to the stone age has already escalated this to a level that was uncalled for..

So this is why I think artillery is not really going anywhere.  Let’s say China (or the US) come up with a snazzy APS system that can stop all strike drones cold.  A system like this can still standoff 10kms+ and light up traditional conventional units.  No tech exists to create a massive bubble of protection for small UAS out that far and if it did ground warfare itself would be changed forever regardless.  So this system plus precision artillery, plus strike drones, plus next-gen ATGMs creates an enormous denial pressure on the future battlefield.  The cost to even try to maneuver goes up exponentially.  The losses will be very high compared to previous wars for doing the same tactical action.  As both artillery and drone ranges get longer we are going to see an entire over-the-horizon battle before real people even get near to each other.

Also from the department of over-cooked advertising spiel on British drones and lasers, BAE and Sentinel Unmanned recently announced they'd done the first successful firing or a class IV laser from a drone, which makes it sound like they've mounted some high power laser weapon on a drone, but turns out to be a laser target designator for guiding precision munitions.
In know we've discussed in the past the tendency for military procurement to take a concept like a $500 drone used for spotting and produce a $50,000 drone to do the same job better, but not 100x better. This longreach drone looks to fit that description: https://www.baesystems.com/en/product/longreach----a-groundbreaking-elevated-targeting-capability
And look how many important sounding acronyms they get in to the key features list:
Multi-role platform Static and covert loiter capability CLASS IV NATO (STANAG 3733) Compliant Laser Designator with SEESPOT and laser rangefinder Compatible with precision strike weapons including APKWS® and Brimstone™ Suitable for targeting indirect fires Advanced situation awareness, STANAG 4609 Target recognition & tracking AES256 Link Encrypted MESH enabled – radio agnostic ATAK integrated SATCOM integrated Precision landing Autonomous mission capability In-built safety features including emergency parachute Hardened for operations in GNSS-challenged environments Looks cool though...

As @chrisl noted, the terms autonomous and automated are getting increasingly murky these days and pretty much depend on context.
Your definition of autonomous, "no communication with a human" would also fit a system where e.g. a room has lots of cameras hanging from walls and ceiling, connected to a computer. The computer controls a bunch of miniature or real cars which themselves are totally stupid. Both are existing scenarios, so the definition is not wrong. But probably not what we would mean or want in the context of drone warfare because you still have the line of communication with the controller who just happens to not be a human.
Then there is edge computing where you have sensors in the vehicle and do some lightweight (pre-) computing there but rely on a central server for everything else. Probably also not what we want.
In addition you can have fully independent systems that gain additional capabilities by communicating with each other or (centralized) infrastructure. Think autonomous vehicles that can do cooperative maneuvers that would otherwise require LOS, for instance.
In autonomous driving we would usually want fully independent systems but that is more for safety considerations.
A real drone swarm is a totally different concept, I think. Of course it could fit the "classic" definition "independent but with (sort range) communication among all the swarm members". But one could also imagine a single system, as you suggest, that consists of many parts and distributes computing etc. between the different members. That would have really interesting features as it could become more "intelligent" the more members (and thus computing power) it has and so dynamically do more or less complicated stuff.

As @chrisl noted, the terms autonomous and automated are getting increasingly murky these days and pretty much depend on context.
Your definition of autonomous, "no communication with a human" would also fit a system where e.g. a room has lots of cameras hanging from walls and ceiling, connected to a computer. The computer controls a bunch of miniature or real cars which themselves are totally stupid. Both are existing scenarios, so the definition is not wrong. But probably not what we would mean or want in the context of drone warfare because you still have the line of communication with the controller who just happens to not be a human.
Then there is edge computing where you have sensors in the vehicle and do some lightweight (pre-) computing there but rely on a central server for everything else. Probably also not what we want.
In addition you can have fully independent systems that gain additional capabilities by communicating with each other or (centralized) infrastructure. Think autonomous vehicles that can do cooperative maneuvers that would otherwise require LOS, for instance.
In autonomous driving we would usually want fully independent systems but that is more for safety considerations.
A real drone swarm is a totally different concept, I think. Of course it could fit the "classic" definition "independent but with (sort range) communication among all the swarm members". But one could also imagine a single system, as you suggest, that consists of many parts and distributes computing etc. between the different members. That would have really interesting features as it could become more "intelligent" the more members (and thus computing power) it has and so dynamically do more or less complicated stuff.

Artillery deployed drones.

There. I can have the cake and eat it.

More seriously, there's inevitably going to be a blurry line between smart submunitions and drones at some point.

How is this really a problem, though? I mean, it's not like we paid money up front or something. Sure, we don't get our curiosity satisfied but that is all the hurt that is done, right?
Some do, some don't. Communication costs money, either because the devloper can't spend the time used for communication on finishing the product or because a dedicated communications guy is hired. You invest the money if you think it pays off. You keep potential customers up to date to get the hype train started, to get feedback early on or to find investors, for instance. But this is a double-edged sword. The hype train, once going, is hard to stop or to steer in another direction and customers, especially in gaming, get hyped about what they want to hear not what was actually said. Feedback is rarely representative because it is usually a loud minority that demands X and claims to speak for the whole community. And then there is always the danger that people form a negative opinion based on a product they've never actually seen and won't buy it later when it is released.
I just develop a stupid little tool in my free time and I am very cautious about when and what to tell you guys. 😉

Also, while we all want to know how long we have to wait, I'll take "when it's done" over a fixed release date at which the product has to ship at all costs every time if it ensures the product is properly finalized.
 

I think the first couple paragraphs of your response are a version of the "XY problem" that's usually a form of: non-expert asks expert "how do I do X" or "can you help fix my thing that's supposed to do X", when the only reason they're doing X in the first place is that they really want to do Y and X is the only way they know how to do it.  An expert will tell them how to do X.  A system engineer will poke at their brain for a while to understand why they want to do X and figure out that the real goal is Y, and there are three other ways Z, A, and B to do Y that are all more effective and less hassle.
I don't think the energy thing is a red herring, so much as system energy comes in complicated ways.  Energy arguments are very useful in all sorts of things, including physics based sensors, function of biological systems, logistics, and weapons systems.  For a given volume you can pack in some amount of energy if you're working with readily available sources - petrochemicals, batteries, and high and low explosives are probably the main ones here.  How you choose to spend that energy is a discriminator among systems.
Artillery, for example, uses most of it in two big (and short) bangs - one of propellant to get the shell moving, and another to make a mess at the other end.  But with modern ISR, electronics, sensors, and control systems you can use some of the energy of that initial propulsion bang to maneuver the shell in the air - either to extend its range or to fine guide itself to a target.  But you have to be careful spending that, because every maneuver to change direction costs you some of that energy.  Hypersonic missiles have the same limitation - sure, they go stupid fast.  But every time you try to change direction of something going that fast you have to stick a finger out in the wind and use up some of that energy (and speed).  And the maneuvering cost is very non-linear in how fast you're going, so a just few maneuvers at high speed gets very expensive.  And pretty soon you just look like another dumb glide or ballistic missile and get shot down by some borrowed Patriot system.
 

Maybe?  To my mind, setting aside the whole “loose nukes” problem which is definitely a global destabilizing issue, I think it is a question of good ole money.  With a functioning and weakened central Russia state apparatus, China can cut deals to access Russian energy with a macro organization that can still marshal the infrastructure and security to access that energy and sell it to China.
If Russia tumbles into a bunch of provinces/regions/warlords access to that energy gets a lot harder and more expensive.  China would have to negotiate with a bunch of goons of various levels of stability (and possibly in conflict with each other) to try and get the energy out of Russia and back into China.  Also smaller warlords cannot necessarily run oil and gas industries.  China might have to go all Africa and go in and do it themselves.  This all drives the access cost up.
China may be able to do some land grabs.  But these come with all sorts of problems, not the least of which are a bunch of angry Russians.  I think we have a fundamental flaw in our western thinking that nations invade other nations for resources.  I mean, “yes” technically it can still happen, but in this day and age it is far more advantageous just to have a target nation roll over and sell you the stuff while they also go to the trouble of taking it out of the ground too.  China has seen what “you break it you buy it” looks like from our misadventures in Iraq and Afghanistan, so I am not entirely sure they are ready to jump on a colonial bandwagon.  Especially in a failed-state Russia - this is akin to trying to bathe a cougar, sounds like fun right up until the damn thing starts getting wet.  
But hey, could be China has done the math and thinks it might work out.  But I still lean toward China is looking to make lemonade out of Russian lemons at this point.