Remember this? :)
soon it will be 1 year since he said that
soon it will be 1 year since he said that
How bad does their system need to be that they can only figure out that their gear doesn't work because they're at war? Don't they train/practice with or test their equipment?
Oh would people please stop with this incredibly dumb shit. A bunch of people work their asses off for important causes, Hachi does more for actual trans rights in the US than I'd wager anyone related to this site does and keeps tabs on all of the heinous anti-trans legislation going through state legislatures.
You don't get points for posting on ERA. In the grand scheme of activism, organizing, and speaking out, ERA is as insignificant as it comes. Nobody achieves anything by posting an additional condemnation in this thread or any other thread about some heinous reality of the world. And some ERA posters will rush to this absolute nonsense of deciding they can call someone's entire life's work, activism, and capacity to care for problems out on whether or not they posted in this thread or that one, or if they made the INSERT N+1 HERE number of posts that show they care. It's bullshit, has always been bullshit, and we can do better. I can't account for every single reason why someone chooses to post or not to post on ERA, but I know it's not actually relevant and I know some posters love to rush to this bot/tankie/REAL SUS YOU DON'T POST lines of reasoning repeatedly and it's never right or acceptable, and doubly so when members have actually really detailed histories supporting relevant issues.
And more to the point, fascists are fascists, and just because they'd give a bomb to Ukraine, doesn't mean we have to give them credit when they're blatant about their own interest to take rights away from, if not outright genocide a variety of minority groups that don't fit their horrific ideology. Like I doubt anyone is ever going to give Putin credit for opening a bunch of really important metro lines in Moscow because it's tone deaf bullshit in this thread, and praising Meloni on a forum that at least claims to be leftist focused/supportive of minorities is also the same thing. If Netanyahu gave the Ukrainians the Iron Dome, you don't have to give him credit because he's a genocidal fascist allying with even more extreme fascists to hold on to power. You don't give them an inch. It's not about a "nuanced take", it's about the fact that there is no reality in which you should give anything to fascists, and praising them for their weapons support to Ukraine is legitimizing them whether you intend to or not and puts minorities further at risk in the process. You can just say, ya know nothing. Because you don't need to legitimize fascists with any praise ever and it's also on ERA, where a lot of people are going to be seriously impacted by fascistic decisions in horrific ways and you should be considerate of them.
The fact that this thread devolves into commentary that at times is indistinguishable from extreme right wing pro-American military think tanks or hyper nationalistic, actually horribly racist Ukrainians that has always been a problem (like, the ongoing usage of orcs by a bunch of Westerners whose greatest relation to Ukraine is obsessing within this thread over Ukraine and its progress in the war) probably doesn't exactly encourage some people to post either. And when people cross the line of shitty behavior that does matter to people here and contributes to minorities feeling excluded/hostility on this site, then they choose to speak up because that actually matters and has an impact versus condemning Russia in a thread where the overwhelming majority (99%) of posters have always seen Russia as the primary bad actor here invading and bombing another country that doesn't actually really contribute a whole lot.
I have no interest in letting people pummel valuable members of the broader ERA community over "sleeping on injustices" because they didn't see the posts they wanted and created an opportunity to attack another member over. It's bullshit and always has been and I've got to step up for Hachi on that one.
smh
Not to mention, it was Sobyanin, not putin.
Btw, speaking about moscow metro and russian xenophobia:
Backlash Against Tajik and Uzbek Signage in the Moscow Metro
Anti-immigrant moods are on the rise among Russia officials again, with Tajik and Uzbek signage drawing criticism despite evidence they were helpful additions.
thediplomat.com
Dictators will often do things worse than just firing you if you tell them the bad news about the bad state of the military, so these people lie to the dictator. If people are afraid that they'll be send to some penal colony in Siberia or that something will happen to their family if they tell Putin the painful truth they'll just lie. So yeah, the bad state of something wont be exposed until it's actually used.
Ack. Shit y'all, I didn't know appreciating someone's support for Ukraine was going to turn into some sort of bat signal.
I didn't really truly understand Meloni's background as an American, as an outsider I've only seen her interactions in regards to Ukraine, and that's all I can really speak on.
It seemed pretty agreeable that in general Poland's government and Boris Johnson were not viewed upon favourable generally, but in regards to Ukraine were hugely important and key to their success, and there had not been this kind of push back at least in regards to Ukraine
I didn't really truly understand Meloni's background as an American, as an outsider I've only seen her interactions in regards to Ukraine, and that's all I can really speak on.
It seemed pretty agreeable that in general Poland's government and Boris Johnson were not viewed upon favourable generally, but in regards to Ukraine were hugely important and key to their success, and there had not been this kind of push back at least in regards to Ukraine
Presumably Lobuzko bought off the people in charge of testing. People lining their pockets top to bottom.
smh
Not to mention, it was Sobyanin, not putin.
Btw, speaking about moscow metro and russian xenophobia:
Backlash Against Tajik and Uzbek Signage in the Moscow Metro
Anti-immigrant moods are on the rise among Russia officials again, with Tajik and Uzbek signage drawing criticism despite evidence they were helpful additions.thediplomat.com
The point of the metro comment was just showing it really doesn't matter what singular maybe decent thing a fascist does. Why go out of your way to praise one single facet of their reign when the fact of the matter is they support a bunch of horrific other shit that gets people killed and directly harm millions? I wasn't saying praise Putin for that, just the opposite, that it doesn't matter if Putin does some good thing for Russians, he's waging a war against Ukraine killing millions while regressing the Russian state into an authoritarian police state that will abuse every minority possible and is built on hyper Russian nationalism. Just don't praise fascists, blatantly out and direct fascists, for anything ever.
I mean, if people say "Hey, the fascist you're taking the time to praise actually deeply disturbs me and is a threat to my existence, so maybe stop that talk" it needs to be said regardless of the thread.
It happens, sometimes we can uncritically share something from social media because it aligns with our views, we're all guilty of that. It's always good to check our sources and research.
Response to Lukashenko illness from Svetlana.
View: https://twitter.com/IuliiaMendel/status/1658182257322991616?s=20
View: https://twitter.com/IuliiaMendel/status/1658182257322991616?s=20
staff post - stay on topic
Official Staff Communication
OK, how about we stop the derail? Not everyone knows the intricacies of every other nation's politics and who does what. It's part of why the situation early on in the war was such a dumpsterfire.
There's no need to attack others or make crazy accusations against each other. If the derail continues then the ban hammer starts swinging.
In general.
Look at UN, for example. Many countries, many views – but people still keep talking and rarely ignore each other. Same goes for embassies. If views and values for politicians would be so important, many embassies wouldn't exist.
The issue is, no one here (as far as I've seen) is actually praising Meloni or her stances on anything other than this war. As someone of Ukrainian descent, I believe Stalin to be equally as evil as Hitler, and I hope he burns in hell forever for what he did. But I also am correct in saying that Stalin worked with the western Allies to defeat Hitler. That isn't a stance on anything Stalin did internally, or his evil. The same can be said of Meloni and others; they are horrible fascists who are correct on a few issues. Because one of those issues is related to this thread, it was brought up. No one is praising Meloni or her stances on trans rights. Just because she is evil, that doesn't mean people can't be happy that she is doing one non-evil thing, and people need to be free to be able to say that.
This got lost the in the last bit of comments, but this is just insane how badly setup the Russian military is from a policy and doctrine standpoint. Just can't help being either stuck to rigid officer doctrine or inflexible policies that don't adapt well. Not sure this does anything but continue to drop morale through the remainder of the active, contract army.
I'm sure you're right, but that seems like such a structural failing where that can happen. It makes me wonder what steps organizations like the GAO take to avoid that sort of risk.
Apparently they used off the shelf parts instead of military grade in their early warning ballistic radars. So now we're not only not sure their nukes work, but we're also not sure that they could see themselves getting nuked!
Really bad for MAD.
With all the poor maintenance and the embezzling going on there i doubt they even have a correct overview of how many working nukes they have.
Isn't a major part of military grade being protected from jamming and hardened against EMP, etc...? You'd think that type of thing would matter for something as important as an early warning radar.
Just to be clear..are these long range missiles like offensive? Or Air Defense? What does France have that are long range?
I mean sending those MALDs was a huge step up here, and might be the US's coordinated contribution. Also the GL-SDB should hopefully be in Ukraine soon.
They have SCALP. Which is just the French name for Storm Shadow. I wouldn't be surprised if this was a joint project between France and the UK from the start. France has been sending all sorts of stuff without making a big deal of it, like the pretty new Akeron ATGM.
storm shadow was jointly developed by the UK and France, so they would have some too
I'm particular to the German Taurus: Target Adaptive Unitary and Dispenser Robotic Ubiquity System
Acronyms aka when you really, really want to show off to your colleagues at all costs 😂
ISW analysis for 14 May 2023 (yes, I know I'm a bit late!)
www.understandingwar.org
Institute for the Study of War
Russian forces conducted another series of drone and missile strikes against Ukraine on the night of May 13 to 14. Ukrainian sources reported that Russian forces launched an unspecified number of drones of varying models at Ukraine and that Ukrainian
Lots of "little blues" popping up in these maps, looks like the on-going pressure is giving results already
That's quite the bold assumption. I'll assume that he means the occupied territories in Zaporizhia and Kherson, because no way Ukraine is swooping across all occupied territories unless the Russian military just completely collapses. Yeah it would be nice if that happened, but it just sounds like an unrealistic dream. I'll be happy if the counteroffensive has the Ukrainian army reach the Sea of Azov, anything more would be a fantastic bonus.
How many rivers are there in the south? I recall them being the hold up on continued advances in the north, but the south looks like there aren't a many significant rivers.
Really the only one is the Dnieper, which divides free Kherson and occupied Kherson. And while it's not due to rivers, Crimea is also only connected to the rest of Ukraine through a few very thin strips of land. There's just 3 roads connecting Kherson and Crimea, of which one is a dirt road.
There will be some surprises, that's for sure. Some things made me really optimistic in recents days.
Still looks like they are slowly ramping up the pressure to get Russia to commit reserves.in numerous areas.
I certainly think this is possible, if not probable. The Russian army has been vastly overextended for the duration of the war and especially the past 6-9 months, and them doubling down so hard on their trying to take offensive actions in Vuhledar and Bakhmut is only making them less and less prepared for a major counter assault.
Ukraine has been slowly waiting out the Russians because the Russians just get progressively weaker and weaker over time, all because they never had the infrastructure to support a war in the first place, and more fundamentally because none of them truly want to be there.
Yep. Reckon they'll try to punch through lines with western armor and vehicles covered by massive artillery and air (ukrainian activity has been suspiciously low considering they got those MIGs from poland and the rest) support by the time the actual operation starts
"A Ukrainian commander, General Zaluzhnyi, can do two things right now: pick the time and pick the place" of Kyiv's offensive. "Once he picks it, he's going to go full force. Some of the things we're seeing now will pale in significance."
View: https://twitter.com/Porter_Anderson/status/1658245638830583808
View: https://twitter.com/Porter_Anderson/status/1658245638830583808
