Messages

346

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022

« on: October 08, 2022, 10:19:10 PM »

If I understand correctly, the Kerch Strait bridge is the only rail connection from Russia to the southern front.  The railway parallel to the front is in mortar range of Ukrainian troops near Donetsk city, so no trains can pass that point.  So as soon as the railway part of the bridge finishes collapsing (and burning out a train of fuel tankers on it will have done damage) the whole Southern Front has no more fuel, no more shells, and no more spare parts in the middle of winter.

A better military than the Russians would have found a way to get a second railroad working, but fortunately they did not.  Edit: a state of 150 million people, fighting a war to transform the global order, given six months and a start in its prewar territory should be able to build a 50 mile stretch of railroad!

One of the problems with the Afghanistan War is that Afghanistan has no railways, so all NATO supplies had to be trucked in from Pakistan or flown in from even further.  That is expensive (and meant that NATO could never punish Pakistan for letting its intelligence services support the Taliban and Al-Quaida).

347

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022

« on: October 07, 2022, 06:00:10 AM »

At least the fighting in Kherson Oblast is mostly in open countryside so it does not smash up as much as fighting in urban areas.

Mobile warfare will be harder on the mobiks than just sitting in a trench with a machine gun or an antitank weapon or unloading trucks in the same warehouse every day.

Now we see if Ukraine has another division-sized reserve to throw at Zaporozhia Oblast or Donetsk.

348

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022

« on: October 06, 2022, 07:20:00 PM »

There are rumours that Russia is sending columns of equipment from Melitopol on the south front west towards the Dniepr.  The only crossing of the Dniepr in Russian hands which will support vehicles is supposed to be a damaged dam at Nova Kakhova, so sending even more equipment across the river does not seem like it would help. 

Maybe the question "command and control breakdown vs. lack of reserves and impossible commands from Moscow?" is academic, since there is always some way to move people and equipment around to cause the other guy trouble.

349

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022

« on: October 05, 2022, 02:40:46 AM »

Its hard because everyone sees different things on social media and much of it is someone's propaganda (which does not mean its false, but the Ukranians are not sharing intercepted phone calls where someone says "we massacred a Ukrainian attack today, some of their shells hit a school before counterbattery took them out, we have plenty of ammo").  But there have been a lot of clips of Russian and proxy forces moving in combat like a gang of strangers at their first LARP battle, and they keep making decisions like sending all those troops and equipment at Kyiv then withdrawing them or attacking fixed positions in the Donbas from the front again and again.

Edit: back in March many people believed that many Russian tanks lacked a full crew, which might be one reason why they did not react very fast or had trouble communicating, moving, and shooting at the same time.  And shortages of troops lead to things like that second lieutenant killed while commanding a battalion, or the sailors captured at the front lines.

That Perun vlogger pointed out that since September Ukrainian press releases focus on the best equipped, best-trained troops leading the attack and not territorial defense with Kalashnikovs and antitank weapons riding a pickup truck along the Belarusian border.

There also seem to be tensions between the Russian military and the Donbas militias who have even worse kit and even less of a choice to be fighting.

People close to NATO armies usually complain about bureaucracy and a culture of ass-covering.  Some of that would probably go away if they were ever in a conventional war against anyone with an air force which lasted more than a few weeks.

350

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022

« on: October 04, 2022, 08:45:41 PM »

There are claims that Putin has issued "not one step back" orders.  That might be why Russian forces stayed in Lyman until the only way out was driving a 'highway of death.' 

It is amazing that Russians are still abandoning so much equipment without blowing it up or setting it on fire or melting key parts.  Armies have lots of tools to break things, that is kind of their job!

Of course the Russian officers are going to blame everything on Putin and his advisors, and Putin and his advisors are going to blame everything on the fighting soldiers and eevil NATO Polish African-American mercenaries.  And in 50 years historians will be writing very serious books about how the Russian army can not have been as incompetent as people at the time said.

351

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022

« on: October 04, 2022, 08:14:38 PM »

Sure, "three SUVs full of volunteers speed through a gap in the Russian lines and drive around looking for convoys to shoot up" is a different kind of mobility than "three brigades systematically envelop a town."

I think a big part of the Russian problem has been a lack of troops.  Even if their commanders were clever and had a way to communicate with everyone, there is only so much you can do when your last reserves are dead in the fields outside of Bakhmut or on fire in a train station in Luhansk.

We have not been hearing so much about Russian communication problems as we heard in spring but they must still be an issue.

352

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022

« on: October 04, 2022, 06:41:23 PM »

I think some of the Territorial Defense are pretty mobile, but they have mostly civilian vehicles, sometimes with mounted weapons to make them 'technicals'.  Ukraine would like more Infantry Fighting Vehicles so its infantry can move more safely in environments with artillery or machine gun fire, but tanks and IFVs are the two categories which the chancellor of Germany has refused to send. https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/09/fact-sheet-on-german-military-aid-to.html

Don't know why people keep giving narcissists with social media accounts attention.

Ahh I see. Iiirc there were reports of quite a few explosions in Russian munition stores/supply centres in Crimea, do we know if these are acts of saboteurs already living in the area or strikes by the Ukrainian military?

I think that Ukraine has been quiet about how it is causing things in Crimea to go boom and Russia insists its just aircraft accidents and misplaced smoking.  I would expect there are Ukrainian special operations troops in Crimea or at least on the mainland opposite.

353

General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: A wonderful short film about medieval rabbits going hunting

« on: October 03, 2022, 06:57:23 PM »

Can't find a thread for dumping silly videos.  Jill Bearup the vlogger has a series of two-minute videos making fun of romance and fantasy novel tropes

354

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022

« on: October 03, 2022, 02:09:47 AM »

The Ukrainians are pushing towards Kreminna (the next road / rail junction after Lyman) and along the west / right bank of the Dniepr towards Kherson.  Somewhere in Donetsk too.  Apparently Putinist Telegram is a mix of silence, panic, and rumours about high-tech BTUs, "new tactics that the enemy was not ready for," and how spirit can overcome superior weapons.

Part 2 on strongmen coming when I have energy.

355

General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: A wonderful short film about medieval rabbits going hunting

« on: October 02, 2022, 01:10:15 AM »

That is charming!  I sent it to two fans of medieval manuscripts.

356

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022

« on: October 01, 2022, 10:56:44 PM »

Ukraine has reportedly captured the railway junction city of Lyman after surrounding it and cutting off the Russian garrison.

There have been a lot of contradictory stories out of Lyman but we will see how many Russians were able to withdraw and what they could bring with them. 

Per the Guardian, Ramzan Kadyrov the podestà* of Chechnia is publicly calling for the Russians to use nuclear weapons against Ukraine.

* "strongman" sounds better in the original Italian doesn't it?  Just like the Russian "national community" in Putin's latest speech is a Volksgemeinschaft in the original German.

357

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022

« on: October 01, 2022, 08:35:04 PM »

Ukraine will not be conscripting a new class of soldiers this fall, although it will keep the current conscripts in service  https://kyivindependent.com/uncategorized/zelensky-cancels-autumn-conscription-postpones-demobilization  That says a lot about what impact they think the Russian mobilization will have for the next six months.  (Yes, if they had more kit they might raise more units, but if they were short of soldiers they would keep raising them).

Russia continues its terror strikes against gatherings of civilians rather than saving its missiles for the Ukrainian army.

The Russian army is fighting hard and has plenty of brave people but their leaders put them in a very bad situation.

Edit: Perun the vlogger has an essay on Ukraine's shortage of heavy equipment (armoured vehicles, tube artillery) at the start of August and how captures and donations had not tripled Ukraine's heavy equipment to match its tripled army strength https://piped.mha.fi/watch?v=cVx3Nlifo4Q  He mentions the same thing I noticed earlier that without air superiority its hard for Ukraine to mass large forces for counterattacks without getting bombed and shelled until they scatter.

358

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Canadian Politics 2022

« on: October 01, 2022, 06:55:12 PM »

The indigenous grandfather and granddaughter arrested for trying to open a bank account with their First Nations ID card settled their lawsuit against the Vancouver police.

A 15 year old in Alberta with a perforated appendix had to wait 2 1/2 hours to get a hospital bed and 29 hours for surgery due to the stress which COVID is placing on the health care system.  Meanwhile Canadian provinces are removing the requirement to wear a mask inside hospitals.

My understanding is that the pandemic is about as bad in Ontario as in the USA, other than a somewhat higher rate of vaccination and boostering.  In my province it seems flat since spring 2022.

Leaders of the accellerationist separatist Diagolon movement were arrested in Canada on charges of assault, pointing a firearm, use of a restricted weapon in a careless manner and mischief.  They also talked about raping the wife of the new leader of the Conservative Party of Canada.  Diagolon is Alaska to Florida, the movement spends a lot of time eating cannabis and talking about what a wonderful country it would be once that area was cleansed of undesirables, and is very white - the symbol for Diagolon is a white line ("where the sensible people will live") in a black field ("the places that will sink into the sea or explode").  They also talk a lot about shooting and / or hanging people.

Edit: Macleans has a long-form piece on how families and criminals moved back and forth between Canada and the USA in the late 20th century https://www.macleans.ca/longforms/my-father-was-a-criminal-how-i-found-out/

And the BC Liberal party (the party of capital, in a two-party system with the party of the public sector unions) is considering changing its name to BC United because right-wingers who watch a lot of TV or follow too much social media are angry at the Liberals https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2022/09/27/Please-Advise-BC-Liberal-Rebrand/

359

Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022

« on: September 30, 2022, 04:02:16 AM »

The current Schwerpunkt in the north-east seems to be a town called Lyman which is currently in Russian hands but almost surrounded by Ukrainian troops.  It fell to Russia on 27 May per Wikipedia.

My understanding is that Putin's generals pulled a Herman Goering and stripped their training facilities of equipment and personnel for the front.  And they got rid of their system for turning former conscripts back into military units in the 1990s.  If I understand right, Russian basic training is mostly for the senior recruits to terrorize and rob the junior ones, and most training happens inside units (former general Mark Hertling / WaPo).

I've seen a claim that Axis forces in North Africa did not bother to bury their waste, and that this was one of their logistic problems.  The guy in the hospital with dysentry still needs food and medicine.

A lot of Russian bunkers so far look pretty flimsy (probably meant to stop shell fragments and light mortar bombs not direct hits from something heavy).  I don't know how practical it is to build deep bunkers in northern Ukraine during the rasputitsa, even if you have tools and training (can you dig deep enough into the clay soil that they don't flood?).  Flimsy bunkers will be cold and wet soon.

A lot of Russians are going to die because of Putin's pride.

Edit: Ukrainian forces have been showing off HIMARS projectiles loaded with tungsten-steel balls rather than one big charge of high explosives or hundreds of cluster munitions https://nitter.ca/UAWeapons/status/1575843498217144321#m  I'm not sure whether they airburst like a shrapnel shell, but I suspect so, the US has money for miniature radar sets (or just use Harry Shrapnel's original timed fuse!).

360

Exilian Articles / Re: Pasts and Playfulness: Protecting Fantasy from Fascism

« on: September 26, 2022, 03:39:16 AM »

Thanks for the long essay!  One thing that screams out is that pagan Athens, Sparta, and Rome are used in similar ways.

There is a similar phenomenon in the Arab world where all kinds of people are nostalgic for a period sometime between Mohammed (for Islamists) and the Abbasid Caliphate (for liberals).

I don't like this usage of medievalism because in Canadian English a medievalist is a specialist in the history, literature, or archaeology of the middle ages.  I tend to use terms like "medievalish" or "medieval-inspired" or "pseudo-medieval".  But I am not the one writing books!

The late Will McLean pointed out that GRR Martin's medieval-inspired fantasy has ultraviolence but not enough jokes about farting.

Yes, I think one can write grimdark fantasy that doesn't play into these issues, too: I guess it's partly just the issue that it's relatively easy to warp grimdark anti-heroes into people others see as actual role models, and it's often profitable to start writing them that way (see for example WH40K space marines). And it's fine that people like somewhat dark and edgy in their medievalism, obviously: I very much don't want to be sitting here doing the "but that's problematic!" at everything. But the fact that a particular setting or even character is pretty brutal doesn't mean you then also need to load it up with a bunch of race-coded tropes used in very uncomplicated ways, etc etc. Indeed, anti-heroes are (for me) much more interesting when they're subverting and undermining rather than simply enforcing the social mores of the world they live in.

Its instructive to compare George Macdonald Fraser (who had an adventurous life) and George R.R. Martin (who AFAIK has had a soft one).  The first George makes sure to remind you that there are heroes and honourable people, Flashman is just not one, but the second George takes a much more adolescent attitude that honour is for fools and charlatans.