billbindc

The important thing to note is what's *not* being said. There's no support for Putin's position on Ukraine or for any significant aid to Moscow's war effort. So far, Putin has Tehran and just about nobody else.

On October 29th, the Russian minister of food procurement admitted that there was little or no grain in government storage to feed the army or the capital. The armies had grain for a week or a day depending on the front. The Bolshevik coup seized the government 10 days later. As in 1917, the quality of the force will suffer but shortages will have their part to play as well. This time it may be bullets instead of bread.

Can't unslack the jaw that a war gamer could have the opportunity to discuss a war *as it actually happens*, read and add commentary that could elucidate the conflict in ways that will affect the final product but instead complains that there's not enough discussion of the game. Mindbending.

My kid and I went to the one at the Russian ambassador's residence on 16th and L. The little dude yelling "sovok svin'ya" at the embassy security goons with projectors got some funny looks.

I'll be in Mitteleuropa for a couple of weeks in August. If it happens then, I'll meet you in Kyiv.

I own a parking garage company and here’s the thing with parking garages: they are built to a pretty defined standard globally and in Europe in particular, they are built on the lower end of that standard in terms of dimensions. So….they are *terrible* places to store things. They are not warehouses. First, they have low roof space. You can’t stack up a ton of ammo when the height limit is 9 feet (which is a generous estimate for older built garages) and trucks simply won’t fit inside most of them. Second, they are typically broken up by pillars/buttresses/etc to carry the weight of vehicles. It’s very hard to efficiently stack in them. Third, few have an actual loading dock attached so ingress/egress of supplies have to go via the normal vehicle entrance and then be lifted from the ground to the level of the truck bed. Fourth, it’s quite easy in an older garage to over stress them with weight. Artillery shells in bulk would be a nightmare…especially in some slapdash Soviet era Trabbie hutch. Finally, a single big shell at the egress point shuts them down entirely. They are specifically built to stop vehicle traffic from anywhere else. So…it would be just like the Russians to do it but it would be quite stupid to use parking garages.

Probably late to this party but if you are screaming for content without realizing that you are getting to witness the discussion and analysis that's going to lead to far better content in the future then you folks have lost the plot completely. In fact, you are reading some of the very best analysis of the war pretty much anywhere. If your sights are set a millimeter higher than the screen in front of you then shouldn't be upset, you should be be ecstatic that you are getting to have this resource.

Huawei accelerates the Chinese takeover of the Russian economy: https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/5436796

It's not important if the UA is on Snake Island, it's huge the Russia is *not* in the context of any negotiations to end the war.

A key goal of the Russian invasion was to cripple and control Ukraine's seaborne trade. It's not going to get the headlines Severodonetsk did but this is a *huge* strategic setback for Moscow in any war ending negotiations. Big.

A notable caveat to the MOU btw Turkey/Finland/Sweden is that the Turkish parliament has to pass a bill on the accession. Expect some horse trading to happen there.

The most obvious (and unspoken) fact of the negotiation is that it is Turkey loses the most strategically with a dominant Russian state on the Black Sea. Erdogan had to make this deal or know that he'd be blamed for eternity in not doing something to stop it.

Erdogan is facing a very tough election. He needed to look strong but for a reason and he got to appear at least to have received good concessions. He also likely gets US military aid that Turkey really needs in the form of F-16's. It was the smart move and Erdogan handled it deftly.

The salient point is that whatever level of reparations were imposed, Germany lost the war without being wholly defeated. You would be forgiven for noticing a similar situation that we are dealing with right now.

Compression is definitely the word for it. One big concern right now is a Russian lunge into the Baltics. By this time next year, that will be an exceedingly costly option for Putin. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jun/27/nato-300000-troops-high-alert-russia-threat-ukraine

Endorse all of this. This war...for the West at least...is about stability. And the strategic thinking as far as I can tell isn't focused on any end state yet other than "how can Ukraine win without anyone triggering WWIII".

I'm curious...no way out from what? Put another way...what were you escaping from by attacking Ukraine? (note: this is a real question and if you want to take it off public feel free to message me)

Russians of all people should understand that fact given that Nazi Germany signally failed to succeed against them despite applying the same policy of frightfulness. But the fact is that dictatorships coalesce because the societies that produce them were bad at the nuanced application of policy to start with. The dictatorship was supposed to be the decisive institutor of order without all of the complicated mess involved with negotiating between interest groups and as that internal imposition fails to solve domestic problems it gets externalized...with similar methodology.

Strong incel energy here. Probus is right. Don't feed the trolls.

It should be noted that default has already been priced in the immediate term. The long range effects will be quite serious but we shouldn't expect a significant effect right away.

Steve, Bil and Capt...I have a question for you: I keep having conversations with pretty smart folks hereabouts and I consistently run into the steady conviction that Russia retains escalation dominance in this war. I don't (vociferously) agree. What's your view?

I remember from that era hearing that one real problem for any contemplated Russian invasion of Western Europe was that they needed to be and couldn't be sure of which side the Poles would take if the balloon really went up. And this was *before* they realized that significant elements of the UB (Polish Ministry of Public Security) were already actively cooperating with Western intelligence agencies.