When the history of Russia’s proxy war against NATO — i.e., the Special Military Operation in Ukraine — it will mark the point in history where conventional military operations predicated on doctrine established in World War II will be vanquished. ISR — i.e., Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance — is the true game changer and Russia, not NATO nor Ukraine, emerges as the military that has recognized this reality and adjusted its tactics accordingly. The West, by contrast, was lulled into complacency over the last twenty years because it employed its ISR, especially drones, against enemies that could not counter Western technology or shoot down our drones.
It is now impossible for conventional militaries to move men and equipment without being detected. During World War II the Soviets and the Brits were very creative and effective in deception operations, such as creating fictitious armies, that fooled the Germans into believing an attack was coming from one direction while failing to detect the real build up of forces. Locating enemy forces on the move or gathering in strength relied solely on fixed wing aerial surveillance, limited interception of encrypted communications and human sources (i.e. spies).
Today, the ISR capability of both the West and Russia is like the all-seeing eye of Sauron. During World War II darkness and cloud cover enabled commanders to move forces without a great risk of being detected. That is no longer the case, especially with satellite coverage of contested territory. Satellite optics and those on board fixed wing aircraft — both manned and unmanned — pierce the night and the clouds.
What does this mean for the Generals charged with preparing and executing battle plans? You must assume you are being watched by the other side and take measures to mitigate the various eyes watching your troops move into battle.
This brings me to the Ukrainian counter offensive and why it is failing. Ukraine, following the advice of NATO planners, is sending its forces across heavily mined, open fields without any air cover. This is the equivalent of a World War II banzai charge by despairing Japanese soldiers who are low on ammunition. They ran towards entrenched American positions hoping their numbers would overwhelm the defenders. They rarely succeeded and suffered devastating casualties in the process.
Today Ukraine is employing a similar tactic. But Ukraine is not sending 200,000 men in thousands of tanks and armored personnel carriers hoping to overwhelm Russia’s capability fire enough artillery, drones, missiles and bombs to stop the assault. Instead it is sending units, perhaps as large as 2000 men with a scattering of tanks and vehicles, and are melting away in the face of a Russian firestorm.
The following videos highlight the desperate plight of the Ukrainian forces:
If you want a benchmark for comparisons sake I suggest you read Big Serge’s latest on substack — Götterdämmerung in the East. The size and scale of the Soviet offensives in 1944 and 1945 dwarf anything happening today in Ukraine but illustrate the power of large scale troop movements backed up by robust artillery, thousands of tanks and air superiority. Neither Ukraine nor NATO are capable of anything on this scale.
Russia is being very chary about revealing publicly its disposition of forces. However, I find it hard to believe that the United States and NATO, thanks to their ISR assets, do not have a pretty good idea of how many troops Russia has deployed along the 900 mile line of conflict. Any plans for attacking a strong point is a simple math problem — you have to have enough men and firepower to overwhelm the Russians. Yet we know the answer to that calculation — Ukraine is lacking in manpower, tanks, vehicles, artillery, mobile air defense and combat air. It does not have the power to punch through all of the Russian defenses, much less even the first line of defense erected by General Surovikin last fall.
So here is the billion dollar question — why did the West not encourage, hell, demand that Ukraine use Himars and Storm Shadow missiles to attack those defensive lines while they were being constructed? I believe the answer is simple — Ukraine lacked the offensive tools required for such a mission and, even if such supplies had been available, the odds are high that Russia could have thwarted those efforts.
We are witnessing military malpractice by the West on a grand scale. Did the NATO planners really believe the propaganda nonsense that portrayed the Russian military as a decrepit, doddering army of incompetents? If so, the West is now learning a very hard lesson and now must come to grips with the fact that NATO’s delusional calculation that Ukraine could shatter the Russian military is a complete bust.
From
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/us-intelligence-deems-ukraines-counteroffensive-failure
So either they believed their own rubbish or else and now likely they just want to keep killing off Ukrainians until there are none left in order to create as much trouble for Russia as they can.
One cynical way of solving the Ukrainian problem is to see that there is no more any Ukraine.
Cure a headache by cutting off the head. Headache? What headache? Where is the head??
Defeat a disease by killing the patient!
When there are no Ukrainians left to air their many complaints, the West can turn around and say: “Ukraine? We are not hearing any complaints from any Ukrainians so everything must be fine there”
Just another creative, out of the box way of solving problems! Ivy League academia at its best!!
The only Ukrainian problem according to the West is how to inflict maximum damage to Russia. If ( that’s a big if) Russia can be goaded into saving face, fighting for territory etc it’s a big bonus. If that happens it creates opportunities for The West to either regime change Or cripple Russia military, diplomatically, economically etc.
Russia refuses to play the Western game. It plays it’s own game in preserving it’s military and power while chipping away the West militarily, economically and diplomatically.
It is a battle of different methods of hot engagement. It looks like Russian game plan is more successful.
US puts/traps many countries to be in Ukrainian position using different tools available to it. One tool used is Acess to western markets, technology , investment etc it’s trying to trap India using these tools in it’s engagement with China. Ultimately the goal is just like Ukraine.
Summed up very well!
Just to add – Ukraine? Hey, that’s Yurp not TX, don*t call us, call Berlin.
Beyond the sarcasm, I think there is a conscious operation to send the “ethnically Russians” to slaughter, and that is why the stubbornness of sending them to a meat grinder and, on the other hand, Russia’s caution when attacking with all…
At this time things are running in the default mode for bureaucracies and the western Professional Managerial Class: by inertia.
Nobody is going to risk their careers or their votes by exposing themselves being the first ones to say we’re fucked. So things keep on running as long as possible even if in a crash course with reality.
Anyone who worked in some of the old corporate giants like IBM, HP and Xerox to see them commit suicide by MBA knows exactly how this works. For those who never had this “privilege”, welcome to the clown world of Harvard Business School and McKinsey.
Nothing about it makes sense unless you understand that top politicians, think Biden in this case, no matter how dire the intelligence reports they get, still do not want to have the label of “Loser” emblazoned on them. They must win at all costs, to the last Ukrainian, if necessary. The same thing happened with LBJ and Nixon during the Vietnam war. A loss would have been catastrophic politically, so despite copious amounts of intelligence and analysis that said the war was unwinnable, they wanted to stave off defeat as long as possible, for political reasons. That is what is happening now.
There is an attitude taken hold in the West, that if one believes something strongly enough, reality can be altered. That wishful “positive” thinking can change the laws of nature.
In this spirit, parents keep praising their talentless kids, a man can have a baby, Russia is a gas station, and the US has the greatest military in the history of the world.
Perhaps the root of the opioid/ fentanyl crisis and the legalisation of cannabis is the desire to deny reality.
I believe you are speaking of The Secret.
I believe he is correct.
Re: the US has the greatest military in the history of the world.
Had…
Following the advice of NATO, Ukraine has been sending its forces across heavily mined, open fields without any air cover, and has suffered devastating casualties, without being able to breach the first line of Russian defense.
Zelensky is forcing Ukrainian conscripts to their certain death, despite knowing very well that these attacks are doomed to fail.
To date NATO has trained and mismanaged to destruction 3 Ukrainian armies.
As Larry wrote, we are witnessing military malpractice on a grand scale.
No matter how dire intelligence reports Western leader’s get, they will stick to the Narrative uber alles!
A classic Nazi manifests which set Europe aflame +80 years ago.
Post WWII the Nazi war criminal Von Manstein, wrote the US and NATO military doctrine, so it shouldn’t surprise anyone that what we are witnessing in Ukraine is complete stupidity by NAZI psychopaths.
Paul Greenwood and DutchZ wrote:
The Royal Dutch Airforce has 42 F-16’s of which 26/28 is still operational.
The Netherlands have 18 F-16 “for sale” but they need the rest until the next batch of F-35 arrives.
The F-16 has been deployed for many operations for over 40 years and is at their end of life cycle.
Only The Dutch PM has promised to send F16’s to Ukraine.
No definite numbers was mentioned, nor was it mentioned when they are handed over to Ukraine.
Denmark will send 18 F-16s to Ukraine.
The Royal Danish Airforce has bought 67 F-16 fighter jets since 1979.
The Danish defense ministry decided last summer to extend their F-16’s service until 2027, as the 27 (very expensive) F-35 intended to replace the F-16s will be delivered in batches of 7 beginning in the autumn 2023, and (maybe) fully delivered by 2027.
The News flash about President Zelensky´s speech to the Danes in Copenhagen was clearly staged.
The stage was looking like a video simulation of the courtyard behind the Danish parliament (called Rigsdagsgården), an enclosed courtyard with space for maybe a 300 people.
Take a look on Google street walk
https://www.google.com/maps/@55.6753891,12.5806692,3a,90y,270h,90t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1siFY7QXmCas49Svmlv4ScAw!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fpanoid%3DiFY7QXmCas49Svmlv4ScAw%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D48.284725%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656?entry=ttu
Taking into account that we are close to 6 Million Danes, who are against disarming our defenses, in order to arm the NAZI Regime in Ukraine.
And that we could have bought 67 Swedish Grippen NG fighter Jets for half the price we have already paid for the non-delivered 27 F-35 fighter Jets.
I dare say that the Video about “300 Danes cheering ” sending our F-16 to Ukraine to be shot down, has absolutely no support among the largest majority of the Danish population.
The ones advocating this war are mostly Jews, who have a historical hatred of Slavs and care very little if they die on the battlefield.
Ukraine is losing, not because of lack of weapons and training and righteousness, but because Larry, Scott, and Douglas said so.
My tongue falls out of my cheek when watching those videos (and others like it). War is hell, and should be avoided at almost every cost. The worst video I’ve seen was where a Ukrainian jumped out the back of a vehicle, straight onto a landmine. He tied up his amputated leg, and then dragged himself back to the vehicle where too-afraid-to-go-outside hands were waiting to pull him in.
It’s about who wants to survive the most.
“[Ukraine] must be destroyed to the ground… or the West will tear Russia to pieces”
https://mikehampton.substack.com/p/dmitry-medvedev-ukraine-destroyed-to-save-russia
Seems like the Ukrainians who have Natzi symbols and recorded their picture as they torture solders and kill civilians. would not want to be taken alive. i just saw that a new batch were sentenced to work camps some 20 years some life.
Be interesting to know which prisons they’re sent to.
How can you determine who wants to survive more? It’s a romantic idea which doens’t seem to work in real. It’s a very well-known Nazi idealistic determinism principle that ended up with Berlin in flames.
Mike. Historians have an all encompassing analysis of any war in one sentence. Call it what you may. Quite simply, this all could have been prevented. We’ve always known that for sure.
P.S. I saw that video, too. Quite shocking.
I appreciate that you saw because its effect cannot be described to the unseen.
“The worst video I’ve seen was where a Ukrainian jumped out the back of a vehicle, straight onto a landmine.”
You should watch some Ukrainian made videos with Russian POWs.
With the Ukies joking and recording straight to Telegram. AFAIK they were since picked up by the RF.
That was said in order to manage rage of the Russian soldiers, and prevent revenge and escalation of violence. Some of involved might have been killed in the meantime, and some may still be alive. The unit in question is Kraken.
The mine jumping video features another of Ukrainian “elite” units. Their “special” units are the ones doing most of the attrocities.
Saw the video, too. Let’s put it this way. Historians have any tragic, violent or destructive event in time summed up in one sentence. Define any way you want. A simple, easy explanation or a careful, long term analysis of what transpired. That is, this all could have been prevented. How? Well, in the case of Ukraine, we all know the answer.
There’s a 3 minute song doing the rounds over the last couple weeks that gives a pretty good answer – it all comes back to the Rich Men North of Richmond.
As the World’s Favourite Ginger sang – with a voice that sounded like it was being ripped out of him –
.
.
The really weird thing is that the same type of down-home “simple”[1] guy as wrote that song, is the type of guy who made up the bulk of the US Death Machine. A simple kid from Flyover Country.
A lot of them finish up by understanding what Mr “Oliver Anthony” describes in another great track called “Payments” – that all you need is
I’ve heard everything that man has uploaded – 15 songs – and there’s not a dud among them. Recorded straight to his goddamn phone.
.
.
[1] The guy who wrote the song is anything but “simple”.
Yes, 2023 ISR is one important key element, nut, IMO, not the only. Neteorked Battle Command, netcentric warfare is another key. OTAN has very good ISR, RF has been playiung ‘catch-up’on this level, and with new satellites launced and planned for is near parity. But RF has superiority in netcentric warfare, form what I’ve been able tell.
Netcentric warfare is detecting enemy movements, concentrations, force dispositions and processing that information for effective responses among ALL one’s one assets for real-time actions, adjustments, concentrations, fire solutions and concentrations. ‘ALL’ is capitalized for a reason. RF has superiority here.
This extends to combat units, whether, tube,missle, infantry, motorized, armour, air fixed and rotary, and manned and unmanned. Unmanned forces – drones is another key element in 2023 warfare and RF has superiority here as well. Look up, if not familliar already, ‘loitering’ drones. This will be an useful education.
Some light reading on netcentric warefare, if interested:
https://www.csis.org/analysis/battle-networks-and-future-force
https://www.csis.org/analysis/battle-networks-and-future-force-0
IMO, Big Serge’s article is only useful to look at the nazi command and control process after the realization that the war was lost. It didn’t crumble, look for a end to save lives, millitary and civilian, it doubled down with increasingly ineffectual results, denial of reality, and near the end fantastical delusion. See any parellels today?
Interesting timez….
Great comment.
Thank you. Just some observations on the current state of warfare.
Forgot to add one other area of evolution of warfare – ECM Electronic Counter Measures. This is used both to attack and degrade ISR assets and weapons systems using them, and to defend against such attacks against one’s own systems.
While both OTAN and RF have been prudently silent about this area, both do possess the capability. There have been some ‘hints’that RF has some robust capabilities in this area. My opinion is that both sides are playing this close to the vest, as it is provocative escalation at this stage.
Nice summary of the state of ECM:
https://www.thesoldiersproject.org/what-is-electronic-warfare/
NATO ISR is over-rated as US drones are pushed out of the battle space and space assets with sufficient resolution do not loiter.
NATO ISR has great resolution if skies are clear, but cannot distinguish from blowup tanks and real tanks as hyperspectral technologies at sufficient resolution remain unavailable due to strategic decisions decades ago. Sure, a battleship or mass movement of troops and their logistics can be spotted, but spies do just as good (and Ukraine is littered with spies).
This is one more aspect of the west drinking its own kool-aid.
Drones in the battle space have the spatial resolution and loiter capacity to identify false positives and negatives and here Russia and China are ahead, and the US / NATO do not have the rare earths/manufacturing base to catch up – China is responsible for what 95% of all drones made on planet earth.
Yes, that is really the point. Here in Japan, where I live local “historians” avoid talking about the end of WWII. However, the Japanese had really lost by 1944, if not early. They “didn’t crumble, look for a end to save lives, millitary and civilian’ but ,”doubled down with increasingly ineffectual results, denial of reality, and near the end fantastical delusion. ” The result was horrendous destruction. However, finally defeated they were amazingly docile and compliant The country had been devastated. The “enemy” were their only hope. Will that be the case with Russia. Will that be (Western) Ukraine’s only hope? Or will they turn to the Poles who hate them? Or to the US which has demonstrated that it doesn’t care?
Big Serge having his article at least half paywalled makes it impossible to have an opinion because I couldn’t read everything he said. However, when he blames Koniev for the Korsun pocket he fails to mention that
1. Excessive caution was by far the safest option after overambitious Soviet offensives had repeatedly met with disaster earlier on in the war and
2. Zhukov himself would go on to display excessive caution in February 1945 when he could have taken Berlin in a quick thrust from the Oder but preferred to reinforce the northern front instead.
Stalin may have had something to do with that as he wanted to slow Zhukov down, lest Big Z get too big for his britches. I read somewhere he also wanted to build Ivan Koniev up as a rival and counterforce in the postwar situation. And if a few hundred thou additional troops die as a consequence, Ну*thats what they are there for.
Hell of a guy, that Stalin
*Ну (Nu) .. common Russian interjection. In this case, it would mean “Oh, well”
“See any parellels today?”
Not parallels, but copy-paste. It’s like a modern Hollywood remake of an old movie. It always turns out much worse than the original, in spite of all the modern technology and high budget.
Yes, an updated ‘cut and paste!’
Checkout, if haven’t already: ‘Operation Paperclip,’ ‘The Halder Project, ‘The Gehlen Group.’ “The Nazis Next Door (book)” that even NPR acknowledged, plus much, much more. Just run a search on a non-googly engine for “nazis brought to us after WWII” to get started.
nazi Wehrmacht war criminals brought West, such as nazi party member and stalwart von Manstein, wrote US and OTAN military doctrine. It was adopted minus the professional General Staff that Germany had prior to and during WWII. Must also mention the inconvenient truth that the professional Wehrmacht General Staff geniuses lost the war spectacularly with 80% of all nazi deutcher plus allied pan-European forces killed and destroyed on the Ost-Front.
Fraud-strategist John Boyd fed Dickii Cheney his bs ‘manoeuvre war’ version of warmed-over Wehrmacht losing doctrine for the Gulf War, which was then set in stone by the total ignoring of the reality that clusterf**k it actually was.
{Note: Col. John Boyd actually was a accomplished fighter pilot, fighter tactics innovator, and great enemy of the MIC krappenwaffen designed and bought by the USAF. His signal accomplishments were getting the fighter krappenwaffen the USAF was going to buy in the late 1960-1970s rejected and replaced by the much cheaper and more effective F15 and F-16 (yes that F-16). He learned to get around the bought and paid for USAF generals by going to political appointees and giving then the info he had. That is how he met Cheney. His ‘manoeuvre war’ bs was pure bs, long story, won’t get into it here.}
So, sure, “cut and paste” because the ‘Narrative’ uber alles in die welt! Except, there is this interesting factor called “Reality.”…
Interesting timez…
Over reliance on technology is the Achilles heal of of the modern world. There is always a low tech solution to any high tech problem. Russian forces are proving that by overwhelming Patriot systems with cheap missiles and then destroying the launcher after it’s supply of multi-million dollar ammo is depleted. They are destroying Bradleys and Leopard tanks buy targeting them with cheap drones and killing them with cheap artillery rounds. The biggest problem however, is that the troops no longer know how to do anything when the technology inevitably fails. Let’s face it the American military with all it’s toys got it’s ass handed to it by a bunch of goat headers living in caves in Afghanistan. They Taliban simply refused to engage on America’s terms and picked off targets on at a time the old fashioned way.
YOUR A DREAMER YES THEY HAD SOME SUCCESS BUT PICKING THINGS OFF IONE AT TIMES DOESN’T WIN ANYTHING. UNTIL BIDEN SURRENDERED THE GOAT HERDERS STAYED IN THE MOUNTAINS. WHEN BIDEN SURRENDERED THEY SWARMED LIKE LOCUSTS. THEY KNEW TO HIDE THEIR LITTLE ASSES IN GOAT SHIT UNTIL BIDEN GAVE THEM KUBUL UNCONDITIONALLY. BIDEN IS A PIECE OF SHIT SO IS MILEY AND AUSTIN!! RUSSIA HAS TO RECRUIT PRISONERS TO FIGHT. PUTIN HAD A REBELLION ON HIS HANDS. WAR IS HELL AND PEOPLE DIE, ANYONE WHO FIGHTS FOR PUTIN IS A FOOL!!! MORE PEOPLE GET KILLED IN OUR CITIES IN ONE DAY THAN DIE IN THE UKRAINE IN ONE DAY..
LOL!!!
When Liberals hit a rough patch you get Fascism – the emergency measures the ruling class uses to stay in power. Since Liberalism itself is based on a denial of reality there really aren’t any inconsistencies.
Liberals have never been liberal in the classical sense. They also are not progressive. They are thin skinned authoritarian tyrants.
In the Empire of Lies Newspeak, meaning of words is intentionally changed. War is peace. Capitalists are called communists. Rigged elections are called democracy. Debt slavery is freedom, and equality means total lack of it. It would be insane to expect for liberals to be liberal, though not nearly as much as saying Commiefornia seriously.
They are sociopaths! The main character trait of a sociopath is to DOUBLE down when they are losing or are cornered. It is a deep type of delusion based is the human ego.
What we are seeing is the complete stupidity of psychopathy.
It does tactics very well, that is, their “footwork” when they are lying. But it simply cannot do strategy.
That requires forward thinking beyond their wishful and entitled thinking.
No ‘right brain’ thinking, in other words.
Here the ultimate answer
One dollar bet payment scene https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjkdynBFHuQ&t=22s
The big question and big concern–will NATO double on stupid?–for fear that the alternative (pivoting to admit a gross error and suing for peace) is too embarrassing.
Like holding on to a stock while it is sinking–BELIEVING it will turn around–for fear that to sell it means a major capital loss. Best in this crisis–know when to fold ’em.
I have learned in life to never try to anticipate where stupidity will go next. What we are seeing, whether in Ukraine, or in the broader picture including the economy, is just plain stupid. Stupid can’t be fixed, because it is too stupid to know it’s stupid. Even worse, whether NATO or the WEF types, they all think of themselves a geniuses, the smartest guys in the room.
Some seem to want an exit before their impotence is out in the open, not knowing it’s too late for that. Generally, whatever a stupid person does next is stupid too. We can count on that, and are seeing it with more money we don’t have pumped into that black hole. It won’t end until NATO gets whipped thoroughly into submission. Putin seems to know that. The powers that be over here don’t see it, at least not yet. We are seeing fear showing here from some corners as they know they are being exposed as paper tigers, and that the MIC doesn’t supply much in the way of useful arms, just expensive ones. If our nukes aren’t any better as compared to Russia’s, we better not even think of trying that avenue.
They say you become what you hate, and we have become the Soviets, destroying freedom, the economy, and it building a military with sketchy arms. Meanwhile they have become more like what we claimed to be, but weren’t.
“Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster… for when you gaze long into the abyss. The abyss gazes also into you.”
Haha close, history rhymes, but not exact – we are even worse than Soviets at the end. Soviets could always beat the hell out of us in a ground war in Europe, even at the end. Soviets had millions of high tech genius and engineers who moved west after fall of USSR while we are teaching kids 2=2 = 5.
Why, it is a rather good estimate, 20% error. Could have been worse. 🙂
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/close_enough_for_government_work
Agree that NATO is too vain to admit the embarrassing truth that they are nothing but paper chickens on welfare riding a filthy gravy train paid for by lies, bluffs, and bloodshed.
However they probably know very well that things will not turn around although they are putting on an obscene freak show as a facade to cover for the new and improved version of NATO after this one is no longer fashionable.
It will be a cold day in hell before they give up on all those welfare checks, benefits, tax funded gravy trains, all the fun and games attacking , killing, and looting target populations and pulverizing villages, towns, and entire cities, plundering resources, destroying livestock, agriculture, and water supplies, sending millions of traumatized refugees in all directions, wrecking economies near and far, luring, bribing , and threatening uninvolved nations into the conflagration, and best of all, they get to use uniformed Russian servicemen for target practice to try out their shiny new kill toys.
And after all that they are just depraved losers anyway. Worse still, they won’t even get booted let alone punished. They will take up positions at big, fancy, overrated colleges and universities so as to preserve and promote their power abusing poison to the next generation of graduates. A proven racket like NATO will never really die off, it will just keep morphing from one fake form into another.
NATO will not willingly ride into the sunset. They will have to be kicked. This could be that instance.
They are already planning on that and another violent freak show will take its place.
Even now the Hollyweird scriptwriters writers, DC advertising, and of course the MICC psyops crews are probably working together on the rebranding, the new slogans, flag, uniforms, designing new gravy trains to replace the ones they demolished during this bloodfest, everything. Not even gallons of lipstick for the pig, it will be a new pig. No way will they ever give up that tax and Bennie racket.
“The big question and big concern–will NATO double on stupid?”
They will. If I read correctly between the lines, NATO is currently setting up the Poles (and, may be, the Baltics) to be the next Ukrainians, when Ukraine falls.
The same demons that are running the Ukies ran the scamdemic. They haven’t admitted to anything there either and are continuing to double down on the lies and propaganda.
And so they will do the same with this NAZI project.
The trouble with a society run by propaganda is that it spins in circles and acts upon its creators. Soon you believe your own lies because someone tells them back to you slightly modified by the broken telephone. The bubble of bullshit inflates, until it pops when it encounters reality. Our postmodern culture runs on a concept that everything is opinion and perception. If a Snickers bar is the same as a turd in PM thinking, then 1000 dead is the same as a million. It’s stupid.
I’m sure the war between China and the US over Taiwan will turn out a lot better. /sarc
Just read that 61 F-16’s are coming to the Kraine.
Germany won’t send the Taurus missiles because comrade Scholz is worried about approval ratings.
Denmark will send some fighter jets.
When will the GAE rump vassals send troops?
Where the Little Rodent is getting 61 F-16s from is anyone’s guess……….
According to Rutte, caretaker PM in Netherlands they have 18 “for sale” but the rest they need until the next Lockheed Bribe Machine – F35 arrives to upload more lucre to politicians after F-16 and before that F-104.
So Dutch pilots will be hanging on to their F-16s as I presume will Danish pilots…….unless they are going to “Fly For Kiev”
As for Denmark……”The defense ministry revealed last summer it would extend the F-16’s service until 2027.”
https://www.thedefensepost.com/2023/03/08/f35s-operate-denmark/?expand_article=1
As for Netherlands………”1. The F-16s are outdated
The F-16 has been in use since 1979 and has been deployed for many operations in over 30 years. Even though the fighter aircraft has undergone many upgrades over the years, it has come to the end of the road. Operationally and technically the aircraft is outdated, and ever since the end of the 90s, there has been a need for a new weapon system. It is also no longer financially sustainable, as it is becoming increasingly expensive to maintain older aircraft.”
https://english.defensie.nl/topics/f-35-to-the-netherlands
This morning I read in my Dutch newpaper that the Royal Dutch Airforce has
42 F16’s of which 26/28 are operational. The Dutch PM Rutte has only promised to send F16’s to Ukraine as has the Dutch minister of Defense, of course.
No definite numbers were mentioned nor when they are to be handen over to Ukraine. All of this hidden in a cloud of nice words of support during the visit of Zelensky to the Netherlands. So, no definite numbers, only promises. Rutte is very good at that.
The article was acompanied by a frontpage photo of a happy Zelensky and Rutte in front of a F16. Zelensky expressed his gratitude to Rutte for his support of ‘good”cause.
“Germany won’t send the Taurus missiles because comrade Scholz is worried about approval ratings.”
Scholz is just playing hard to get. Nazi bingo requires having V-1, to go along with panzers, and helmets, and MGs, and Panzerfausts.
Short answer: because it must and it can.
After witness the Afghanistan Debacle, my assessment of the competence of the Pentagon was confirmed: there is virtually ZERO experienced combat officers in the US military. Of course, we have known that for a long time… BUT Afghanistan demonstrated that on a scale so large as to be impossible to deny.
Accordingly, the NATO mismanagement of the three Ukrainian armies which Russia has destroyed cannot be a surprise. What we observed in Ukraine over the past 19 months or so does showcases the absolute incompetence of the Pentagon and NATO members. These people have no understanding of artillery and no idea that Russia understands artillery’s role in winning wars. While I agree with Larry about NATO’s inability to use ISR or to anticipate how Russia could use its ISR, NATO did not even understand the intensity which Russia’s artillery brings to battlefields.
Gen. Cavoli was explicit on this last point when he stated — and I paraphrase — that NATO is not prepared for the intensity of Russia’s military doctrine. THAT was the most revealing statement made by a U.S. general in decades…! AND it means: NATO and the US are not capable of facing Russia on conventional battlefields.
THAT is a clear admission of military impotence.
The Pentagon is jam packed full of pansies. And that would be okay if they were just content to wear expensive uniforms and put on military theatrics pretending to be tough and vigilant, etc., and rake in the cash on whatever defense alibi, but they cannot be allowed anymore to demolish nations just because they can. And if they are taking orders from a State Department psychopath like Nuland, they should be retired and let Nuland wear a uniform and act like the JCS since she does that anyway. If nothing else it would cut down on the .gov payroll.
Does anyone remember Bidens press conference in July 2021 when asked if the Afghanistan military could stand up to the Taliban. Biden commented something like no a Taliban takeover is not inevitable because Afghanistan has 300,000 well equipped troops and a Air Force against 75,000 Taliban. Meanwhile he’s telling Afghanistan pres Gani that no matter what the reality on the ground was that he needed to portray the situation as just fine. Then less than 30 days later president Gani had fled with bag’s of money, the Taliban were strutting around Kabul and people were falling off US aircraft as they attempted to flee. Oh and let’s not forget that Biden said we would never see helicopters lifting people off the roof as in Vietnam. Only reason was they had a large built helicopter pad which the USA used. But hey, it’s a win for the USA. Probably gonna see something similar soon on in Ukraine.
No I didn’t. I don’t listen to the government AT ALL. Everything is a lie even the ands, ifs and buts.
A common set of traits for these people: Talking fools with no experience, training, nor success in the fields under discussion.
“Did the NATO planners really believe the propaganda nonsense that portrayed the Russian military as a decrepit, doddering army of incompetents?”
Apparently, they are still in deep denial about the USS Donald Cook EW take-down. Being so completely exposed for inferiority like the Donald Cook was, it is astonishing the levels of delusion the fading old losers that NATO hires can maintain.
Thanks Larry for highlighting the sheer incompetence and stupidity of the US and NATO military planners who planned and demanded this suicidal counter-offensive by the Ukraine army. As Victoria Nuland, the neocon honcho at the State Dept, disclosed in a congressional hearing a couple months ago, they had been planning this for at least five months prior. Based on the results of this operation, 11 weeks after it started, it has been a total disaster. It reminds of an observation made by a Boeing employee after the catastrophic 737-Max crashes that “This airplane is designed by clowns, who in turn are supervised by monkeys.” The Ukraine ‘aircraft’ demonstrates that the clowns are now in charge of the military supervised by monkeys in the US government.
PS: I have started a Substack focussed on Freedom, Liberty and Sovereignty from a Caribbean point of view. My latest is titled “Marcus Garvey – First Major Victim Of Deep State Conspiracies” at https://bit.ly/3sgDfi5
Yes, I really do believe NATO planners think in templates and are adrift from reality. I know large organisations create „reality distortion fields“ to insulate themselves from disturbing external facts.
It is being tasked to produce an outcome rather than navigate obstacles. NATO always assumes it has genetically superior personnel and technically superior equipment. It is simply an article of faith inhaled from American intoxication.
Since none of what’s transpiring in regard to NATO’s strategies and operations makes any sense, I’ve begun considering another lens through which to view the organization’s intentions. If the overarching objective of the political West is to depopulate the Ukraine of its Slavic citizens and prepare the land for an import of, say, 10 million or so people currently located elsewhere and facing an unpleasant demographic destiny as well as a very real shortage of freshwater, then the propagation of suicidal commands from on high to the average Ukrainian draftee, as always greased by bribes given to the senior ranks, is altogether logical. The West is well aware that the Russian Federation is not motivated by the prospect of territorial gains, despite public-facing pronouncements to the contrary (which are, in essence, just pablum for brainwashed plebes). The West will continue to dictate the status quo — providing ineffective weapons in insufficient quantities and psychologically torturing Ukrainians with promises that will never be kept, as it has done since day one of the SMO — until every single Ukrainian family outside of liberated Novorossiya is torn apart. All this, aided in no small part by the West’s open hatred of the traditional family. Then NATO will ramp up the drive toward a humanitarian airlift of the aforementioned people to a thoroughly depopulated land that, while filled with tragic history, is well-fed by rain and not surrounded by hostile or tenuously subjugated states. At the very least this might be the vision percolating inside certain conniving minds in the halls of Western power.
Alternatively, maybe the delusions among Western politicians are truly all-permeating, and they think they have a chance of prevailing in this conflict. Believable, since supremacist thinking didn’t extinguish in any great measure in 1945; it just scattered and fled westward.
Even more likely and much simpler an explanation is the economic motivation: sell new weaponry and weapons platforms to replace the sacrificed old and reap the profits. Who cares if the conflict is won or lost; the longer it lasts, the better, even if it requires the deaths and disabling of the entire European male population…all the way to the Atlantic.
Why do you engage in that Western conceit of “rationality” ?
Human beings are not “rational actors” – they are driven by emotion and urges and the higher up the totem pole they climb the more flawed the character.
It is a paradigm that makes it impossible for Modern Westerners to comprehend tribal societies in a way that say T E Lawrence or Gertrude Bell well could………..
The theoretical frameworks embedded in your conscious mind though “industrial schooling” to help you recognise patterns fail miserably when you are asked to understand motivations.
You conflate the result of an action with the a priori intention. That is a cardinal error.
No Western politician EVER intended to be in the precarious position in which they are now found……..they had always assumed it would be their party and they would win the prizes…..
You really need to have been at the apex of these systems to know how childish the motivations really are………you do not have leaders you have celebrities.
I will advance you a notion you will not be able to process. 1924-1929 the Finance Minister of UK was W S Churchill who slashed defence spending and deflated the economy by returning to Gold Standard at pre-war parity $4.8675 causing a gEneral Strike in 1926…….he brought British Broadcasting Company Ltd under State control as a Public Corporation under Royal Charter to have a bully pulpit
His successor after 1931 was Neville Chamberlain who proceeded post-1935 election to re-arm and invest in new weapons and radar and build shadow factories……..he became Prime Minister 1937…….he wanted to avoid war to focus on housing programmes and social issues – such as getting rid of outside toilets and Poor Law……..in the end he was forced into war by Roosevelt and Warsaw
Churchill had the country insolvent by end-1940 and sold everything that was not screwed down – foreign bases, foreign subsidiaries of British companies, investment portfolios, gold holdings…….and mortgaged the future to USA
If you can find a link between a priori intentions and ex-posteriori outcomes it would be a fascinating historical thesis……….personally, I believe decision making at the top is “leap of faith”, and “innate prejudices” which are immune to “informational inputs”
Paul, what I have noticed about comments you usually make here is that you always have a hard time accepting views of others. Douglas wrote an interesting piece from a quite different perspective and I think it is worth reading. You don’t have to agree with his argument but at least read it as an alternative source to explore western plans for Ukraine and Russians approach to the SMO. Further, Douglas informed us that he is “considering another lens through which to view the organization’s intentions.” I quess you would have wanted him to scream that humans “are driven by emotion and urges” as a simple understanding of the SMO. We have heard enough of that, und thus another viewpoint is welcome.
Give Douglas a break.
Sadly, the NATO NEOCON NUTJOBS failed to heed the first adage of ascendancy and dominance, “Never believe your press releases.”
Victoria “Fuck the EU” Nuland hasn’t lost a wink of sleep over the 100,000s killed, she just keeps getting promoted:
https://jamesburrillangell.substack.com/p/strange-diplomacy-victoria-fck-the
Nuland is just the loudest, bawdiest, sloppiest, most hateful, vengeful, ignorant, and obnoxious of that swarm. The question is how many more of her ilk are there in the shadows pulling the strings from above and behind and capable of far worse.
Contrary to what Washington Post says there’s going to be a stalemate, we might see major victories for Russia before the end of this year. If the current counter offensive now underway by the AFU is all what NATO-Ukraine can do during good weather then it means the AFU especially their supply lines will be taking a long vacation during winter. Russia, on the other hand, possessing robust supply networks and reserves will be on the offensive.
No, NATO never believed that rhetoric, but Ukraine persuaded Biden that the Russians would buy it. And it was the cheapest way by far, of winning a war. Nary a shot need be fired, and all those Russian resources up for grabs! Just roll over those in flight.
This risible psy op is still the name of the game because ‘saying it’ beats ‘doing it’ every time. The great fait accompli. But now the shift in narrative is towards the long view with the west declaring its ‘long term’ war plans, including weaponry for next year! Why stop there? Why not push out a ten year plan?
Real? Of course not, but the idea is that Russia, hearing this and ‘knowing’ that the west will continue, and continue to escalate, throws in the towel and does a west-favourable deal. We even have a narrative supporting this, pushed out by those who claim to be on Russia’s side, ostensibly ‘fearing’ the west will push us all into WW3/nuclear catastrophe …. eek. (You should all know better).
The whole affair has been a total failure of NATO strategy, intelligence and doctrine. The NATO nations made the gross error of beleiving John McCain’s assessment, backed up by their impressions of Russia from the 1990’s to come to their calculus. Many years ago I worked for the mining company RTZ, and I know that Russia has more than ample supplies of every mineral and material it needs, within its own borders, to run a war economy, plus when the West de-industrialised and off-shored and hence lost the competence, capacity and capability to manufacture heavily engineered items, they did not. Their capacities lay dormant, and have now been resuscitated and restored. I have been waiting for something like this for a long time, as the West kept on parking their tanks on Putin’s lawn, daring and prodding him to do something. Well, now he has, and it ain’t over yet. There may yet be Armata’s parked under the town hall clock in Calais, and I say it only half in jest…..
I’ve already written several times that the neocons don’t have a brake, when they need to brake, they shift into a higher gear. In Kiev, they found the perfect clown who will continue to sacrifice his people. Deliveries of NATO weapons will continue and increase, more and more deadly, and the Russian response will be more and more brutal. It is clear to the Russians that Ukraine will run out of manpower rather than weapons. That is why lately we have had brutal Russian drone attacks on Ukrainian soldiers in the trenches. The German newspaper “Die Welt”, the messenger of the NATO pact, announced yesterday what is the “recipe” for the victory of Ukraine – It is the mobilization of three million Ukrainians!
I agree with Die Welt (Kohlberg Kravis Roberts ownership like Politico) and believe Western European nations should round up Ukrainian males and send them back to Kiev……..in fact
“In 2023, a new procedure for keeping military records of men was approved in Ukraine. One of the clauses of the resolution obliges foreign embassies to inform Ukrainian citizens abroad about the start of a new conscription and to facilitate their return home if mobilization is taking place in the Motherland. After the changes in the legislation, society began to discuss the possible deportation of Ukrainians from the EU………….
The other day, European Commissioner for Internal Affairs Ilva Johanson said whether the European Union plans to deport Ukrainian men.”
However, according to the European Commissioner, the EU will not deport anyone against their will. That is, Ukrainian men currently living in Europe are not at risk of forced deportation.
Also, the European Union does not plan to restrict the entry of men from Ukraine. After all, for Europe, all Ukrainians who arrived in the region after the start of the full-scale invasion fall under the protection of the Directive on temporary protection.”
https://visitukraine.today/blog/1426/viiskovii-oblik-za-kordonom-ci-realna-deportaciya-colovikiv-v-ukrainu
With 3 million men mobilized, it looks like the Ukrainian objective will be along three axes of attack: Moscow, Saint Petersburg and a sweeping attack into the Caucuses via Rostov on Don, Volgograd and Astrakhan:
“In preparation for the attack [Operation Barbarossa], Hitler had secretly moved upwards of 3 million German troops and approximately 690,000 Axis soldiers to the Soviet border regions.”
Operation Barbarossa was the largest land offensive in human history, so this one could be a possible record breaker !!!
It’s the level of knowledge, real knowledge, of other countries, including Russia and it’s friends and allies, that is the root of many “collective west” problems. Our “elite’s” level of geostrategical knowledge is near zero (I mean the people “at the top”). For example: I am reading Ahmed Rashid’s book “Taliban” (2001) and wonder why in heavens name US thought it was a good idea to invade Afghanistan.
The Ahmed Rashid book is outstanding. I read it when it came out around the 9/11 time. Enjoy.
The power of stupid is increased by the committee decision-making process. When the tallest poppies on a committee establish stupid policies, the slavish lackeys do not merely go along with it, but cheer it on.
With the growth of NATO, the number of itty-bitty countries harbouring historical rivalries and grudges, each with a vote, has so increased as to make effective decisions all but impossible, and the domination by anglo powers with an agenda makes stupidity inevitable.
Speaking of stupid, the censors trying to bring down Southfront by deleting their DNS entries can have another big fail. Southfront can be found here:
https://southfront.press/southfront-org-blocked-by-u-s-controlled-global-internet-supervisor/
Unfortunately, I don’t see the Powers that Shouldn’t Be facing the reality of defeat. They will do the same as Hitler did in 1945, hunkering down in the bunker, throwing everything they’ve got. Whilst the West may be running out of ammo, we’ve got a lot of nukes – and I think these folks are evil enough to use them.
Watching that poor guy die inside the “safety” of that frontline trench was a sad, sorrowful sight. A snapshot of what routinely happens on a massive scale inside the “Made In America” Ukrainian Slaughterhouse. This sad little film clip ought to be emailed to every heartless and deluded democracy-worshipping fat cat politician in Washington D.C. — Zelensky’s Infamous, Foolish Congressional Clapping Seals — who voted to finance the building of the Slaughterhouse. (Most of these people have absolutely no sense of shame.)
Russia has to defend several hundreds of kilometres. Why is the Ukraine not able to put all their forces at one point and pinch through? Because they fear that the Russians would notice the massive amount of soldiers, and would start bombing them.
Trying to attack with small groups at different places leads to massive losses, as we could see. Now the idea is to bomb behind the Russian lines with F16. Attacks with airplanes are done for tens of years. Every military power has air surveillance and either missiles or counter air jets.
So, to me it just looks as if it is just a test for NATO to see how the Russian air defence works. NATO will analyze that and try to find ways to counter it. But this will take time. I assume that NATO just wants to prepare for a big war with Russia. Ukraine is the test field.
“Why is the Ukraine not able to put all their forces at one point and pinch through? Because they fear that the Russians would notice the massive amount of soldiers, and would start bombing them.”
Not being a professional military strategist like yourself, my amateur take on matters would be that focusing forces on one part of the enemy line of a 1000km front would invite encirclement in a pincer movement by that enemy……..
Surely this was the NATO strategy for Donbass that Russia has inverted………it was supposed to be Russians hurling themselves at NATO fortifications and being destroyed and leaving NATO to sweep into Belgorod and Rostov and cut Russian supply lines……….Surovikhin and the military guru brought out of retirement who wrote the textbook on defence-in-depth fortifications – have simply reversed that game plan
I was a soldier in 1985. I was no general, but a plain soldier. But I understood that the soldiers are, like in a chess play, the tools only.
And so had a look on the history of battles. And understood that strategy is the point. Preparation, logistics, reconnaissance. Look at this, and you can find out who will win.
This really is a new type of warfare that we have never seen before: it’s like a paradigm shift. Drones, for example, are becoming ever more sophisticated and clever. Troop concentrations are required to break through the Russian defences yet any build up will be seen and crushed. In contrast to this, Jeb Stuart was scolded by Lee at Gettysburg for galivanting around the Union army when he should have been reporting its whereabouts. Just before the battle, the two armies were only miles from each other but neither knew the other was present – a different world.
This really is a new type of warfare that we have never seen before: it’s like a paradigm shift. Drones, for example, are becoming ever more sophisticated and clever. Troop concentrations are required to break through the Russian defences yet any build up will be seen and crushed. In contrast to this, Jeb Stuart was scolded by Lee at Gettysburg for galivanting around the Union army when he should have been reporting its whereabouts. Just before the battle, both armies were only miles from each other but neither side knew this – a different world.
Yes i’ve come round to the conclusion that they do believe their own propaganda. However how can people that did that learn from it as you suggest?
Then what do they do? Do they also still believe putting NATO troops on the ground will make a difference?
There’s only one effective military option left. Do they think they can win a nuclear exchange also?
Yeah, the simplest explanation is that they do believe their own propaganda and lies: feed it to Rachel Maddow and get up in the morning and watch Rachel Maddow, so it must be true.
Meanwhile the war goes on in real world. NATO and the West don’t even know who is fighting who. They don’t seem to notice that this war is no longer Russia and Ukraine; it’s Russia and NATO. The EU – at least – needs to negotiate whether or not the US is willing. Otherwise EU is going to be looking at some version of surrender; no doubt the Russians will allow some face saving.
But their propaganda is otherwise, so won’t happen. They believe their own lies and propaganda. That might well turn out to be a self limiting feature of large psyops.
And just listening to Duran now, the TNT for US shells comes from Ukraine and Poland? Really? That could be a another problem!
If there ever is a direct conflict between the United States and Russia we will know it when our satellites go silent, and our electronics stop working.
I leave NATO out of it because NATO is the United States. NATO is just a collection of vassal states. Nothing more. These proxy wars (first Ukraine/Russo and soon to come Poland/Russo), are just two main players (United States/Russo) trying each other on for size. Sizing each other up, with China, India, Turkey, Iran, the Middle East, and now Africa, watching.
I simply am amazed at the callous disregard for human life, especially Ukrainian life, the United States has shown feeding the Ukrainian military to the Russian meat grinder.
Poland will be even worse, and even more quickly dispatched.
I hear the F-16s have started showing up in Ukraine. The MSM says so, so it must be true. And in larger numbers than was originally announced. That was fast. Those Ukrainian pilots are quick learners. [sarcasm]
Every time a new escalation is announced these alternative media types say how it will take years to train Ukrainians to die in battle with all this new gear. And every time they have been wrong.
The Leopard 2s and the Bradleys being the previous example, showing up on the battlefront within a month of the United States announcing their addition to the proxy (war) effort. And now the F-16s.
My guess is, with satellite technology, if the F-16s are actually in Ukraine the Russians would know about it. My bet is, if the F-16s have indeed showed up, they are in fact stationed at Polish airbases ready to attack the Kerch Bridge. Russia will have to make the next escalatory decision — attack them in Ukraine, or wait until they take off for targets inside Russia.
If Russia stays true to form, they will say nothing and just go quietly about their business — of shooting down F-16s en masse. That leaves the United States to station F-16s (and F-22s and F-35s) closer to the Russian border — in Finland and the Baltic States.
This takes us to the next escalation. A direct confrontation between the United States and Russia. We will know it when our satellites go silent, the internet goes dark, and our cellphones and laptops stop working.
And then we will find out if the United States can actually stand and fight a conventional, industrial war, in Europe. The main event will probably not last long. Then the next escalation will be this thing going nuclear.
Excellent post.
They believe all sorts of cranky things in the collective west today. And anyone who doubts the narrative is unwelcome, and probably unemployed too. So everyone goes along with the myths that Russia has no real economy, and that the army is about to collapse, and Putin is a dictator with no public support, etc.
The inevitable outcome of this delusional idiocy is that there is a tendency to go along with things that are palpably false.
About the first video, if they are ukronazis no problem for me. Now knowing how force recruitment is being done on the streets of Ukraine and these people being sent to the front line is painful. I do not know if I laugh or cry.
Most likely the Ukronazis are well away from the trenches in a supervisory role. AKA shooting people who question their suicide missions.
The poor wretches in the trenches are likely to be the “wrong” kind of Ukrainians. AKA Russian speakers.
After all, this war provides an excellent cover for ethnic cleansing.
Most likely the Ukronazis are well away from the trenches in a supervisory role.
Acting Feldmarschall Biletsky. The ukronazi creme de la creme.
Say no more.
It looked to me like the dying soldier in the first video was balding, suggesting he was possibly middle-aged.
Excellent post Larry.
Complete and total knowledge of your enemy’s strength, position and movement. By both sides. Technology has entered the game. And warfare will never be the same. The Russians have figured it out though.
Village #1. Bomb, missile, drone the fuck out of it. Till there is nothing to hide in. The enemy falls back, and you move in. And now forward to Village #2. While destroying their supplies behind the line with drones and missiles and glide bombs.
Aviation is dead. The Russians are having some success with KA-52’s against the degraded Ukrainian AD, but they are losing some now. Against a peer opponent if you get near with aircraft? You lose aircraft.
Tanks are dead. They are large and slow and expensive targets that are only useful after you have bombed that village flat, and the enemy is gone already. Smaller, lighter, cheaper tanks would actually be more useful. There will be no more large “tank battles”.
Aircraft carriers. That the US is still dropping money down this rathole is the true sign of our stupidity. You cannot hide them. Hypersonic missiles. Submarines. Hell, you could deploy “drone” mines. Carriers are useful to kill goatherders in tents. Period.
And Russia’s big strength? The winning strategy needs a buttload of troops and ordnance. The Russians could mobilize another 2 million troops and not miss a lick. The EU cucks could not come up with 200,000 troops at gunpoint. The US cannot get anyone to join the military now. And any administration that brings the draft back dies. The US and EU knew they did not have bodies, so they put their faith in their technology. Which fails when it runs into countering technology.
One question remains now. Will the Western loons go nuke to retain supremacy?
Good post Curt. I worry about the nuke option as well. The Western elites obviously don’t care about us (Maui, Palestine OH etc) not to mention destroyed our cultures a long time ago. Worse than that, these sickos basically admit they want us gone and say it all the time there are too many humans on the planet via abortion, climate change, trans and other legislation to depopulate. The Western elites got multi-generational underground vaults to survive anything – even a 10 year nuclear winter. They got AI and robots now to dig the ditches when they come out of the vaults. Nuking the world solves lots of problems….
Great scene in movie 13 Days – General wanted to go full bore nuclear , and JFK asked how many US casualties – 100 million muttered the General. JFK said that includes you.
Now we find during these Cuba missile months at least 5 high-atmosphere EMP megaton tests were carried out by each side! That was before the Test-Ban.
There is talk of revoking the Test-Ban treaties.
An EMP burst today would be far more devastating than in 1964. The Soviet tests made major electrical damage.
A hijacked Mig34 turned up in Tokyo (AFAIK) crawled over by US techies who found they were EMP-hardened. Most EMP stuff is classified to this day.
“An EMP burst today would be far more devastating than in 1964.”
It doesn’t matter. Once a single nuke flies, all the nukes fly.
“A hijacked Mig34 turned up in Tokyo (AFAIK) crawled over by US techies who found they were EMP-hardened. Most EMP stuff is classified to this day.”
MiG prefers odd numbers. Top Gun lied to you. 🙂
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defection_of_Viktor_Belenko
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikoyan-Gurevich_MiG-25
“The majority of the on-board avionics were based on vacuum-tube technology, …”
Well said Curt.I would add the stupidity is deeper than you state.The geniuses in congress passed an act requiring the Navy to maintain a fleet of 11 carriers forever.We are fortunate they did not include Battleships.The western loons are cowards and as such they know they caannot use nukes with impunity so they will not.
The meat grinder is running, but it is not Russia that is throwing the Ukrainians into it, it is Zelensky and his regime.
Well , nobody agrees on what they want right now.
Putin want to demilitarize and denazifie 404 … since at least 2014 if not 2008.
Then, let’s make a roundtable of what “the west” wants cause “it’s complicated” right now :
Sholtz wants his gas back, Sunak wants his money back, Macron wants Niger back , Melloni wants aliens back…home, Nulland wants Yeltsin back , Biden wants any peace right before elections are back and the winner of “the biggest cunt of the Year” title wants Belgorod and be in NATO like yesterday …
I think I get why Russia is decimating people : it’s nervous.
Why do you think Scholz wants “his gas back” ?????? Do clarify.
Do you know Olaf Scholz ? Do you know anything about his background ? His JUSO connections to Egon Krenz, head of the GDR Youth Movement…..?
https://www.focus.de/politik/deutschland/bundestagswahl/gastbeitrag-von-hubertus-knabe-partner-im-friedenskampf-jungsozialistische-ausfluege-in-die-ddr-im-ersten-leben-des-olaf-scholz_id_24256554.html
He was Radical Left
Scholz does basically what US tells him to do………Biden can replace him tomorrow if he instructs Baerbock or Habeck to end the coalition and join “Mr BlackRock” Merz CDU Leader in a New-Same Government in Berlin
When GDR imploded CIA captured the Stasi Files and flew them to Langley – they know how deep Scholz was in with Stasi……….
Scholz does not care about the economy, nor gas prices or availability – he is paid €422,000 and his wife as politician gets €160,000 – and no children – he has no outgoings and lives off the State……..
He just wants the job title and Habeck wants it too – so does Baerbock……..
He was Radical Left
So, then he fits right in with the neocon, former Trotskyist- 4th Internationale, agenda – as apparently does the socialist Borrell.
Robert Kagan’s ‘Full Spectrum Dominance’ manifesto – has a nice 4th Internationalist ring to it.
The Focus article is unfocused. As far as Stasi files – the KGB must be chortling.
Actually Chancellor Scholz had a religious epiphany In Munich Friday, when he was dog-whistled by a crowd demanding Peace, and an end to Warmongering. He answered on mike :
“You are like fallen angels from hell, calling for peace!”.
Either, as some religious say both in EU and Russia, there is actually a Crusade on again, or chancellor Scholz fell off his horse at full gallop on his noggin. As Marx said, first Tragedy, repeated as Farce!
Sholtz is, as most politicians today, from the “opportunist” party.
But if there is no energy this winter , he will have the same destiny as Detlev Rohwedder… is it better than being “Olof Palm” by a three letter agency ?
Anyway , in the end , it will be blamed on AfD …
Seems they resurrected the Reichsburger farce of a few 70 year-olds going to take over the Bundestag, again.
And to think of the 7 guys and a yacht named Andromeda bombing NordStream – MI6’s Childers must be rolling in the grave – that is my Riddle of the Sands!
FLASH. 14.30; New high vips motorcade, in Sweden, heading South of Stockholm, maybe Ukrainians, lots of police-mc’s, and as in midsummer, from the big airport, some buses with unknown passengers, Ukrainian troops?
And then and today, the mc:s are driving fast forward, to block
any connecting ways, and slowing
down even moving cars, to not be in contact with the motorcade, so there must be some transport of
vips, but whom? It is a high game in
Sweden, maybe to support Ukraine, but ordinary people don’t care, it is the upper classes, exciting play, as
they use the state machinery.
Zelensky moved on from Copenhagen to milk Sweden……..
The ISR revolution is real, but the above article is overegging the souffle.
The drone and aerial surveillance is extremely useful from a tactical or theater perspective, but the “all seeing eye of Sauron” is almost entirely due to the satellites.
The reality is that neither side in the SMO is either able or allowed to attack the satellite recon capabilities of the other.
The Ukrainians can’t because they don’t have the tech or systems; the Russians can’t because it is US, UK and EU recon satellites being used.
Were the West to directly engage in combat with Russia or China – the gloves would come off at which point the relative non-satellite capabilities would come in to greater juxtaposition, and the relative lack of anti-missile, anti-drone systems as well as drone-based ISR and attack systems in the West will be glaring.
Caitlin Johnson has posted this in Moon of Alabama.
Caitlin Johnstone @caitoz – 0:58 UTC · Aug 20, 2023
I’m probably going to be regularly reminding my readers of this paragraph from @IgnatiusPost for the remainder of my writing career.
” Meanwhile, for the United States and its NATO allies, these 18 months of war have been a strategic windfall, at relatively low cost (other than for the Ukrainians). The West’s most reckless antagonist has been rocked. NATO has grown much stronger with the additions of Sweden and Finland. Germany has weaned itself from dependence on Russian energy and, in many ways, rediscovered its sense of values. NATO squabbles make headlines, but overall, this has been a triumphal summer for the alliance.”
What does this pimple Ignatius tell us about the MSM and the mindset of the ruling class? Note, also, that he quotes Pentagon officials in the complete WaPo article.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/07/18/ukraine-war-west-gloom/
Mental illness, psycopathy, irrationality, Evil, and stupidity, all rolled into one.
“Germany has weaned itself from dependence on Russian energy and, in many ways, rediscovered its sense of values. ”
Much as when USA “weans itself off” cheap money and parasitical credit bingeing…….returns to fundamental economic values and achieves a balanced budget……….when it will “rediscover its sense of values”
In the meantime a Wealth Tax of say 50% on ALL wealth and foundations with over $100 million would help rebalance US society………and “rediscover its values”
One trick of the Infantile Imperialists (after 9/11) is to use baby-talk peppered all over “serious” reports.
Such as Germany “weaning” off “dependency” actually meaning bombing NordStream.
Just waiting to hear Ukraine having is “birth-pangs” of a new state, they depend on the Dollar Umbilical, and NATO is pregnant again with twins Sweden and Finland, and Erdogan done it! And Russia is the midwife.
In the bigger scheme of things killing off the human population is the goal. Slavs killing Slavs is probably very satisfying for the heartless psychos at the head of this genocide. Mass death across the globe, but WHO’s counting? Name any authority that wants it to stop? Hell the Russians feel the threat and seem content to continue the cull, who can blame them.
Fighting wild fire hotspots, exhausted, cranky. My latest label to go with unvaxxed? The un evacuated. The radio says they will only protect critical infrastructure and they are pissed that you don’t leave your property to burn, hmm humanitarian gestures abound. Don’t want to die like a dogs in a trailer that’s on fire following an evac order. Don’t get in the trailer!
Still it’s much easier then getting press ganged into combat with guns pointing at you from front and behind.
I am reminded of the surgeon who when operating on his patient to remove his appendix, carefully extends his scalpel and opens him only to discover his organs are completely covered with cancerous tumours.
There is no cure for this. The patient must die on his own or be put out of his misery by a euthanistic act.
This is the United States and its Western allies – every one of them. They are losing their culture: it is being eaten by the cancer. They are losing their history, their foundational institutions (family, religion, education, democracy), and their freedoms. Yet they carry on as if they still possessed these – just as this patient did before his operation.
Russia is the surgeon. Ukraine is his scalpel.
I find it hard to believe that Western ignorance is so extensive with all those think tank departments that I am convinced that there was indeed a plan A, a plan B and a plan C on the table.
Plan A was the 8 years of building up a defensive line in the belief that Russia would rush like a bull blindly in the belief that it would overwhelm the opponent, causing Russia to take a lot of damage and thus be weakened with an army that is still difficult to supply due to the blitzkrieg.
The change of government is a fact, defeated and many victims would kill Putin.
Plan B would then be for NATO (Ukraine) to strike at the weakened and stretched army who would have to retreat in very adverse conditions, with even more casualties.
Plan C is to complete the eight-year preparations to crush Russia with the arrival of the US cavalry.
Why do I think this is the scenario the West has concocted.
Eight years of preparation on defence is to weaken the attacker. With anti-tank weapons in a defensive position it is doable, less in attack assignments I think. With the remaining equipment that Ukraine had at the beginning of the war, it would have sufficed to carry out a counter-attack.
Because Russia has not followed the predetermined western script of flying in like fools, Ukraine has had little benefit from defending and has been forced to go on the offensive to show something.
Since the heavier equipment came later as the available reserves started to dwindle, I think the west had something like this in mind. I also think that their plan A (bis) is now to get Russia to the point where at some point they will have had enough of their citizens being killed, the Crimean bridge being attacked, drones being sent to Moscow every day that the public opinion will put pressure on the Russian government that Russia will implement Western plan A for the time being.
The only thing will be that Ukraine will not be able to carry out plan B, but Poland will prepare in that regard.
That’s how I see the whole picture
Re Plan A:
The much ballyhooed training and weapons provided 2014-2021 were carefully calibrated to be “defensive” only. Hence, supply of Manpads, ATGMs (Javelin), small arms, etc., but no artillery, tanks or aircraft.
I believe US/NATO never expected the Ukrainian Army to survive a full onslaught by the Russian Army. I believe their expectation was that Russia would quickly win the conventional fight, but then the large stocks of Ukrainian Soviet era weapons and newer NATO manpads and ATGMs would enable a powerful, well equipped and trained insurgency that would bleed Russia over years, a la Vietnam of Afghanistan.
There was no Plan B or C, just Phase 1 and Phase 2.
Phase 1: Russian invasion and Ukraine defeat.
Phase 2: Ukrainian insurgency and covert support.
10 to 15 years of insurgency in Ukraine bleeding over into Russia and expectation that this would weaken Russia militarily, politically, diplomatically and create serious internal political divisions to be exploited.
But Russia saw the trap, chose to fight a different way, and turned the trap around on the trappers.
NATO plans remind me of the South Park Gnomes Business Plan.
Headline in german magazine Focus
“During visit to Denmark, when Selenskyj taunts Putin, the whole room laughs ”
so incredible.
and in Ukraine Selensky sends his people to get butchered.
Nothing about it makes sense unless you understand that top politicians, think Biden in this case, no matter how dire the intelligence reports they get, still do not want to have the label of “Loser” emblazoned on them. They must win at all costs, to the last Ukrainian, if necessary. The same thing happened with LBJ and Nixon during the Vietnam war. A loss would have been catastrophic politically, so despite copious amounts of intelligence and analysis that said the war was unwinnable, they wanted to stave off defeat as long as possible, for political reasons. That is what is happening now.
So here is the billion dollar question — why did the West not encourage, hell, demand that Ukraine use Himars and Storm Shadow missiles to attack those defensive lines while they were being constructed?
Because win or lose, war is highly profitable business – especially when your proxy is taking all the losses.
Because the West didn’t think the defensive lines mattered and that they would just be overrun like in a movie. And if they admitted maybe they were strong, that would not fit the narrative. BTW, to be honest, we don’t know how well those lines might work; the Ukkies haven’t even gotten there yet. [Leaving aside that one vehicle flipped over in a trench on a wild surrender ride.]
I’m pretty sure the Russian MOD is not making the same mistake w/r/t Western bioweapons.
The Himars missiles were not that effective, and many were shot down. The Storm Shadows came later. Russia likely has a huge supply of those trench diggers, if some got taken out. Meanwhile, they were busy fighting on the vast front many miles away from where the construction was taking place.
Bear in mind, the AFU haven’t even reached those lines anyway!
HIMARS’ turned out to be the most effective entry on the wunderwaffe list. If they had 1000+ times more, they would have had some success.
Because there are like 1000+ km of defensive lines and less than 100 Storm Shadows and maybe 1000? 2000? loads of HIMARS.
It would be like attacking the ocean with a spoon.
“The size and scale of the Soviet offensives in 1944 and 1945 dwarf anything happening today”.
True, but I believe they are inappropriate comparisons because
a) the US had zero input to or knowledge of the details of their planning and
b) because it was the Russians who were in the prepared defenses, the Germans attacking.
The failed Ukrainian offensive was planned by US/NATO and executed by Ukraine, therefore we should look to the US Army’s historical record in such engagements.
The only comparable WW2 offensive planned and executed by the US was the assault on Germany’s Westwall, Sept 44-March 45. The first three months was a disastrous, bloody exercise in futility in the Huertgen Forest. Germany’s Battle of the Bulge offensive stopped the US assault, it only resumed after the end of that battle.
Other than the Westwall, the USA has never in all its history planned or executed a major offensive against defenses prepared in depth across an entire front. Later, in the Korean War, when the lines settled down and forted up in 1951, both sides dialled it back. There was never an attempt to breakthrough the Chinese defenses, merely local actions to take this hill or that, e.g. Pork Chop Hill.
During the Cold War, neither NATO nor WarPac constructed fortified defensive lines across the entire front line from the North Sea to Austria because a war was expected/intended to be highly mobile until nuclear Armageddon set in. Therefore, NATO never developed a doctrine for assaulting such. What they did plan for was to attack hastily prepared defenses established by enemy forces (divisional or max. Army/Corps level) whose advance had been paused for days or worst case 1 to 2 weeks.
Since WW2, no US or NATO leader or soldier has had to contemplate planning and executing an assault against defenses prepared and fortified to a depth of 30 to 50km across the entire front.
No doctrine, no training, no experience.
So far as I can tell, the only wars since WW2 that did involve offensives against defenses prepared in such depth across the entire front were the Iran Iraq War 1980-1988 and the Ethiopian-Eritrean war 1998-2001. Did anyone bother studying them?
BTW: Advance Rates in Combat
http://www.dupuyinstitute.org/blog/2023/04/26/advance-rates-in-combat/
From the table in the above referenced post, I extracted the following for rates of advance in km per day against Fortified defenses
______________________________ArmorDiv_MechDiv_InfDiv
Against Intense Resistance___________1.0_____1.0_____1.0
Against Strong/Intense Resistance_____1.3_____1.3_____1.3
Against Strong Defense______________1.5_____1.5_____1.5
Against Moderate/Strong Resistance___2.0_____2.0_____1.8
Against Moderate Resistance_________3.0_____2.5_____2.0
Against Slight/Moderate Resistance___4.0_____3.0_____2.5
Against Slight Resistance____________5.0_____4.0_____3.0
Against Negligible/Slight Resistance__10.0_____8.0_____6.0
Against Negligible Resistance________30.0____24.0____12.0
Russian resistance can certainly be classified as “Intense”. In 78 days, the Ukrainians have made two narrow salients about 12km deep. Across the full width of the Zap./S.Donetsk Front, about 150 km, an average 80m per km of front. Or, an average 1m per day per km of front!
NATO could not even break trough from Albania into Kosovo and Metohija. Even Wikipedia agrees on that (article is still full of lies, though):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Ko%C5%A1are
Interesting.
But not at all comparable.
I do not mean any disrespect to the men involved, but compared to a major offensive against fortified defenses prepared in depths of 10s of kilometers, Kosare was a very minor battle.
The reference [25] regarding the participation of British, French, German and Italian special forces doesn’t work.
I never said it was comparable in size, quite the contrary. My point is that, they can not do it even on a much smaller scale, with much weaker opponent (practically no airforce, or air defenses).
The battle was minor in scale, but major in importance. It was where the breaktrough was supposed to happen. Army officers say that they expected push to happen in some other place, so defences here were not strong, which gave NATO even some element of surpise. Think of it as a battle for small village in Zaporozhie where mega-offensive grinded to a halt.
I have posted Wikipedia link because it was easiest thing to do (and have intentionally distanced from it, because Wikipedia has become MSM). As far as foreign troop involvement goes, SAS have been operating in the Balkans all the time (and probably still are). A reference would be required for a claim that they were not there.
I have just found Serbian version of that article:
https://fbreporter.org/2018/04/09/9-aprila-1999-bio-je-veliki-petak-i-poceo-je-pakao-kosara/
It says that mass artillery barrage started on April 9th, by regular Albanian army. Among them, there were members of French Foreign Legion, British SAS, Italian and German specialist for artillery fire directing.
Of course they were there. Why would anyone think that Albanian army could mount an attack by itself. It was a NATO operation, maybe even to a larger extent than what we are seeing happening now. The difference is that the opponent was much, much weaker than Russia (in spite some Russians being involved), and NATO was at peak of it’s might (unlike now). Still, no breaktrough. Hence my previos, much shorter, post.
P.S. For dead links, Internet Archive can be useful.
https://archive.org/
I doesn’t work properly for me at the moment, for some reason, but I somehow got some link to archived versions of the mentioned article (which will probably not work after I paste it in here):
https://web.archive.org/web/20200515000000*/https://fbreporter.org/2015/04/11/koshare/
“So here is the billion dollar question — why did the West not encourage, hell, demand that Ukraine use Himars and Storm Shadow missiles to attack those defensive lines while they were being constructed? ”
NATO probably did, but the Integral-Nationalists had other ideas.
Remember numerous attempts to bomb the largest European ZNPP, and the reservoir flooding caper?
They were going all out to draw NATO directly into the fray, never mind doing the serious work themselves. That failed – they may try again. In other words UAF Gen. Zaluzhny et. al DO know they are all used up cannon fodder.
The first target of the SMO was exactly that ZNPP, immediately secured.
Mr Grossi said that the IAEA is seeking to visit Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power ZNPP Station, under occupation by Russian forces, to verify that the 30,000 kg of plutonium and 40,000 kg of enriched uranium stored there have not been deviated for other uses.
https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/iaea-grossi-at-davos-nuclear-power-climate-change-and-ukraine
Missing is Uranium and Plutonium, around $300 billion. Likely removed by Russia. Question is, who enriched this – Westinghouse? Priority number #1 for Russia – no Ukrainian nukes that Zelensky suggested at the MSC Conference just before Russia acted.
It is a $300 billion dollar question. Curiously the value of seized RF assets left abroad by the RCB.
Clarification, in my first remark, I was thinking of Kursk and other defensive battles by the Soviets, rather than their later offensives
SCOTT RITTER: NO “MIRACLE WEAPON” CAN SAVE UKRAINE – MILITARY DOMINANCE OF THE WEST SHATTERED
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isttTJ6Hqsk
Translate:
englisch-germany
If you kill off enough military aged men the Ukrainian women will marry Western European men – and Ukraine will flip from being culturally Russian to being culturally European. Lots of Ukrainians getting killed is not a bug, it is a feature.
“… flip from being culturally Russian to being culturally European …”
Russia was always European (culturally and in other ways). Nowdays, Moscow is significantly more “culturally European” than Paris. Those Ukrainian women are more likely to mary some immigrants, and what’s left of Western European men are more likely to marry other Western European men.
I’ve posted, elsewhere, that the 1944 German army, would have broken through; three lines. By 1944 the Germans had learned to do without air support or lots of artillery. So they compensated, but, mostly used proper infantry tactics; local superior numbers, surprise & maskirovka. Critically, even in 1944/45, German officers were still the best. NATO cannot seemingly organize a drunk, inside a brewery!
A couple years back, Polisario guerrillas, initiated a wide scale sweep by vehicles, seemingly looking for something. They communicated with low power radios that couldn’t be effectively monitored. They came together quickly, & grabbed a Moroccan fortified border town. The Moroccan govt. was shocked!
“German officers were still the best.”
“The best” by what metric?
German officers of ww2; were selected out of the mass of conscription & then hugely trained. They operated on the basis of ‘auftragstaktik’; you will be told the objective, but not how to take it. As late as 1944, a German sergeant got more training than a US officer! Compare & contrast to the ‘English speaking’, ‘Officer & Gentleman’, social class selection! Lotta doofus! Long serving & competent NCOs absolutely required! Soviet officers were a mixed bag, because of the insecurity of Bolshevism. Rommel’s formula, after Normandy was “Canadian soldiers, German officers, & American equipment!
So, you don’t have a metric. Just your “romantic” notion, and “insecurity of Bolshevism”. Maybe those things can not be measured, and everyone considers his own to be the best.
Being the best at something competitive usually means winning, or at least not losing. Those German officers became NATO officers, and created doctrine that is losing against incompetent Russians, yet again. It must be really embarrassing for the best to never win. German tanks have also been considered the best, for some unknown reason.
https://twitter.com/propagandopolis/status/1614705198949072897
I´m as my signature, a reader, and not a scout, and in a new book, about Ukraine and Russia, from University of California, they print inter alia:
(1.) – ” 1992, Joseph Brodsky, the Russian emigré poet, Nobel Prize winner, performed a poem bitterly condemning Ukrainian indepen-dence, and disparaging the Ukrainians:- ” (Na nezavisimost-ukrainy)
(2.) In the 1990s, even one of the leading liberals in Russia, Boris Nemtsov advocated regaining Sevastopol by having Russian firms buy assets there, historical justice through capitalism, , and increasing Russian control of Crimea, would be a “restoration”, not a new gain for Russia.” —
(3.)- ” In 2014, Alexei Navalny who became Russia’s leading pro-democracy political prisoner, said : – I don’t see any difference at all between Russians and Ukrainians. ”
Of course the Western media, instrumentally as usually forgot about these ” authorized” dissidents, so nothing special, but now we know.
Alex Krainer’s Idiocracy piece – see comment :
The rising rule of idiocracy in the West
https://alexkrainer.substack.com/p/the-rising-rule-of-idiocracy-in-the/comment/36878624
I know military and intelligence today in the West miss it – Poets what do they know?
Well suck it up guys – they do leave ye floundering!
I have one minor quibble with this otherwise excellent and highly accurate article. In the opening sentence, Larry describes the war as “ …Russia’s proxy war against NATO…”, which implies that Russia is using Ukraine as a proxy to fight NATO. The opposite is true, which Larry undoubtedly understands as well as anyone. The sentence simply came out with a jumbled meaning.
“If so, the West is now learning a very hard lesson and now must come to grips with the fact that NATO’s delusional calculation that Ukraine could shatter the Russian military is a complete bust.”
I seriously doubt that the Blinken administration has the ability to learn anything.
(I prefer to call it by Blinken’s name because Biden is pretty much a puppet.)
Larry
Will you be covering the op against Niger?
If not, do you have links to reputable sources who are?
Vox Day has posted a link to the Iranians starting to do Russian stuff to the U.S. Navy.
https://voxday.net/2023/08/21/when-gunboat-diplomacy-fails/
thx in advance
p.s. one thing we have learned from the neocon war on America and the globe is that fixation on one area is a strategic mistake. Their methodology is to attack in all arenas , in all areas of the globe, all the time.
It is time to end their menace.
For decades now, the US is only good at using other people for cannon fodder.
Why those “other people” don’t mind is amazing to anyone with common sense.
Kind of like the US gov’t is now trying to stoke US Leftists to violence… to do their bidding, to try to get rid of the “deplorables” on the Right.
Of course, US Leftists don’t even know how they’re being manipulated by US intel through US Media. So truly, they’re no better off than the poor Ukies being sent to their death by the same US Gov’t (essentially).
Sigh.
Hi, this is my first post, I think that the solution that can satisfy and not make all the parties involved to lose the face can be only one, Zelensky’s death.
It’s a slaughter. Not a war. It is a human blood sacrifice on a mass scale. 400,000 dead, missing and seriously injured ostensibly “Christian” Ukrainian soldiers.
It is a designer war to test out new drone technology. This extends US-UK war contractors to pull in billions bin profits.
Zelensky is their front man. Now NATO countries are pitching in to load Kiev up with F16s. Those F16s will get destroyed justifying NATO loading up on Lockheed Martin’s F35.
Among dead there is indeed large number of Orthodox Christians, or atheists of Orthodox Christian heritage. They tend to be those forced to fight/die. Banderites have their own religions (Uniat, New-Poroshenko-Zelensky-church, Nazi-neo-pagan, who-knows-what-else).
It is not designer war to test out new drone technology, because The West does not have new drone technology to test. It turned out that Russia & Iran & China are way ahead. Switchblade was supposed to be what Lancet is.
Thanks. Makes sense.
And when we finally declare “Mission Accomplished,” what’s next?
Iran? They will not stop until we’re all dead, says Philip:
https://www.unz.com/pgiraldi/neocons-and-other-malignancies-in-the-american-body-politic/
Civil War maybe.
Always great conversations with Judge Napolitano; however, your microphone is a bit low. Have to turn the volume up to hear you and down for the judge to avoid annoying the wife…