406
General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: May Pub: Thursday 19th?
« on: May 04, 2022, 10:42:40 PM »
I don't know my work schedule that far in advance, but Thursday the 19th would probably work.
Show Posts
This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.
407
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022
« on: May 04, 2022, 03:21:22 AM »
There are people compiling daily maps of territorial control in proper resolution (eg. https://nitter.net/Nrg8000) and continually updated lists of lost and captured vehicles from open-source intelligence (eg. https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-documenting-equipment.html. Its pretty clear that the Ukrainians are pushing back the Russians from Kharkiv, the Russians are making small advances east of Kharkiv but losing equipment fast. There are still no signs that they have dramatically increased the size of their forces in Ukraine, while Ukraine is training several hundred thousand volunteers and reservists and arms are flooding in from the west and south.
After the first week this has been Stellungskrieg not Bewegungskrieg, so its governed by the relative ability of the two sides to reinforce their own troops and destroy the enemy. As I explained in a recent essay, its been hard to see how Russia could win a war like that since it became clear in March that the Russian military is not better than its opponents. For all the hot air about drones and precision munitions and the design of Soviet armoured fighting vehicles, you can understand this war just fine with Xenophon, Maurice, an atlas, and a good economic history of either World War (plus one A4 sheet of paper with statistics on the countries and armed forces).
A historian of the Eastern Roman Empire is literally going through Emperor Leo's book on generalship from the 10th century and pointing out that the Russians are doing things which Leo says will bring defeat https://nitter.eu/chrysoboullon/status/1513182013825634306#m
After the first week this has been Stellungskrieg not Bewegungskrieg, so its governed by the relative ability of the two sides to reinforce their own troops and destroy the enemy. As I explained in a recent essay, its been hard to see how Russia could win a war like that since it became clear in March that the Russian military is not better than its opponents. For all the hot air about drones and precision munitions and the design of Soviet armoured fighting vehicles, you can understand this war just fine with Xenophon, Maurice, an atlas, and a good economic history of either World War (plus one A4 sheet of paper with statistics on the countries and armed forces).
A historian of the Eastern Roman Empire is literally going through Emperor Leo's book on generalship from the 10th century and pointing out that the Russians are doing things which Leo says will bring defeat https://nitter.eu/chrysoboullon/status/1513182013825634306#m
408
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Canadian Politics 2022
« on: April 22, 2022, 04:15:43 AM »
Here is a weird human one: one of the Canadian forces generals accused of sexual misconduct with subordinates has resigned and says he is headed to Ukraine to help their armed forces. That is an alternative to "spending more time with his family."
Most armed forces have a "moral turptitude" clause in their expectations of recruits don't they? They often have to accept some less than ideal recruits.
Macleans has a long piece on a notorious illegal fisher in BC.
Most armed forces have a "moral turptitude" clause in their expectations of recruits don't they? They often have to accept some less than ideal recruits.
Macleans has a long piece on a notorious illegal fisher in BC.
409
Bigosaur / Re: Crypto Miner Tycoon Simulator
« on: April 22, 2022, 04:08:38 AM »
I don't play computer games very often these days, but I love the "Arcade Tycoon + Dunning-Kruggerands" concept!
410
General Chatter - The Boozer / Re: April Pub: Friday 22nd
« on: April 16, 2022, 09:18:26 PM »
I am working that part of that day too.
411
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Canadian Politics 2022
« on: April 09, 2022, 06:49:27 AM »
Updates on earlier stories: the police officers who arrested a 56 year old man and his 12 year old granddaughter for trying to open a bank account while indigenous have been suspended (without pay?) and some RCMP officers resigned after the Portapique massacre
Edit: also, more testimony on how two RCMP officers at Portapique ended up shooting at a local fire fighter while he was on the phone with the RCMP
Edit: also, more testimony on how two RCMP officers at Portapique ended up shooting at a local fire fighter while he was on the phone with the RCMP
412
General Gaming - The Arcade / Re: Adventures in the Forgotten Realms (Baldurs Gate, Neverwinter Nights, etc)
« on: March 29, 2022, 12:41:36 AM »Ooh which dragon fight did you get stuck at in Neverwinter Nights? I remember being very frustrated by one in one of the games, then going back much later and loading with a very advanced character, just so I could absolutely wipe the floor with the dragon in revenge!I think it was the fight with the red dragon on the "dragon level." There is an option to pick an unnecessary fight with a smaller dragon instead, but that goes against my principles. No unnecessary draconicide!
I liked the idea of the 'level builder' in Neverwinter Nights although I never played with it.
413
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022
« on: March 26, 2022, 11:16:07 PM »So the news now, and the pretty clear message of the below-linked speech by Russian commanders, is that Russia is now claiming to be refocusing on the east and Donestsk - presumably as an attempted face-save and trying to scale back the war to something achievable. If it is indeed achievable for them, which we'll see, I guess.Yes, the problem is that Russian forces in Ukraine have already suffered serious casualties, and they don't have a strategic reserve ready to deploy. More than 10,000 dead is a lot when you had less than 200,000 troops to start with. Even if they can extract troops from the northern and southern fronts, they have a long way to travel to the new area of operations, and they are already tired and hungry and disillusioned with lost or broken kit.
https://eng.mil.ru/en/special_operation/news/more.htm?id=12414735@egNews
In addition, there is a rule of thumb "never reinforce failure." The attack from the Donbass has failed, and the attack east of Kharkiv hit its logistical limits a few weeks ago. Maaybe they can take Mariupol but that will take a lot of their remaining infantry.
I don't know if that video of police arresting a passer-by trying to give foreign reporters a pro-Putin statement at the Kremlin is authentic, but it would be a complete change in style for Putin to try to put the nation behind his war. And I don't know if that would help before the economy collapses from sanctions or the army collapses from sheer bloody ineptitude and lack of manpower to protect its supply lines and hold the areas it is operating in.
I still have not heard anything about proposals to vastly increase NATO munitions production starting yesterday, so there will probably be a "shell crisis" in the spring unless the Russian army collapses by the middle of April. Some people say the Russians are already running out of guided bombs and missiles.
Edit: and if we want a poem here is one ...
On fut suld be all Scottis weire, // weire = Wehr, defense
By hyll and mosse themself to reare. // reare: roar? an earlier edition has weire “defend”
Lat woods for wallis be bow and speire,
That innymeis do them na deire.
In strait placis gar keep all store,
And byrnen ye planeland thaim before.
Thane sall thai pass away in haist
Wenn that thai find na thing but waist.
With wykes and waykings of the nyght // wyke: wake
And mekill noyis maid on hytht, // mekill: big, large
Thaime sall ye turnen with gret affrai, // affray: fright, alarm
As thai ware chassit with swerd away.
This is the counsall and intent
Of gud King Robert’s testiment.
That was how the Crimean Tartars defeated the Russian invasions in 1687 and 1689. The Russians have been making the kind of mistakes which you don't need Clausewitz to recognize, you just need a King's Mirror and some folk poetry. "Don't surround yourself with flatterers who say only what they think you want to hear" is autocrat 101, "hope for the best but plan for the worst" is just as fundamental.
414
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Canadian Politics 2022
« on: March 22, 2022, 10:51:21 PM »
Pro Jubali: the federal Liberals and NDP have signed a Confidence and Supply agreement. The list of priorities is very Canadian. And a local Communist party (which is a party in the same sense that neighbourhood ten-year-olds and the Montreal Canadiens are both hockey teams) gets tangled in a knot about the Russian invasion of Ukraine https://www.cheknews.ca/local-communist-party-organizes-ukraine-rally-calling-on-end-to-war-992819/
Edit: oh, and the next Ontario election will probably be in May or June. Rob Ford may not be tossed out of office for mishandling the pandemic.
Edit: ouch, Alberta premier Jason Kenney told his caucus staff "I will not let this mainstream conservative party become an agent for extreme, hateful, intolerant, bigoted and crazy views. Sorry to be so blunt with you but you need to understand what the stakes are here. The lunatics are trying to take over the asylum. And I'm not going to let them." (The UCP was Kenney's creation so what does that say about him?) https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/kenney-recording-ucp-alberta-leadership-review-staff-1.6396647
Edit: oh, and the next Ontario election will probably be in May or June. Rob Ford may not be tossed out of office for mishandling the pandemic.
Edit: ouch, Alberta premier Jason Kenney told his caucus staff "I will not let this mainstream conservative party become an agent for extreme, hateful, intolerant, bigoted and crazy views. Sorry to be so blunt with you but you need to understand what the stakes are here. The lunatics are trying to take over the asylum. And I'm not going to let them." (The UCP was Kenney's creation so what does that say about him?) https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/kenney-recording-ucp-alberta-leadership-review-staff-1.6396647
415
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022
« on: March 21, 2022, 12:59:05 AM »
My go-to US military veteran and professor of military history is tearing his hair out at photos of the Russians digging in in the open, with no attempt to hide the removed earth and vehicle tracks or cover the work against aerial observation. Apparently, since Duffer's Drift it has become NATO doctine that you stretch out the camoflage nets whenever you stop for more than a few minutes.
I don't know whether that is lack of kit, lack of training, or pofigism (a lack of regard for one's own or anyone else's life or property).
The Kyiv Independent accuses the Russian proxy states on the Don of conscripting subjects and throwing them into combat without training.
I see a claim that Belarusian railway workers are using strikes and sabotage against supplies for the invasion.
I don't know whether that is lack of kit, lack of training, or pofigism (a lack of regard for one's own or anyone else's life or property).
The Kyiv Independent accuses the Russian proxy states on the Don of conscripting subjects and throwing them into combat without training.
I see a claim that Belarusian railway workers are using strikes and sabotage against supplies for the invasion.
416
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022
« on: March 18, 2022, 04:38:48 PM »
One of those dissidents suggests that Ukraine should rent some hostels in Egypt or Turkey and announce that Rusisian troops who surrender and are not suspected of atrocities will be sent there with a special visa for the duration of the war. He figures that just the prospect of a vacation somewhere warm (instead of spring behind barbed wire near Lviv) would speed up desertion.
Stephen Biddle, "Victory Misunderstood: What the Gulf War Tells Us about the Future of Conflict," International Security, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Autumn, 1996), pp. 139-179
To me, the fact that Russian generals have to come into artillery range to give orders is way more surprising that in a war of hundreds of thousands of troops, a lot of the kit is not the latest and greatest. Encrypted radio comms is a basic WW II capability (your average tank squadron or infantry company did not have it, but the larger formation they were part of did). And even in WW I they had runners to go from the commander to the frontlines!
Mosul ended up looking like Stalingrad even though the airstrikes came from by NATO forces with plenty of guided munitions.
My understanding is that the state of the Russian army is in part because for the last half decade the primary qualification to be a senior Russian military type has been "can you keep both Putin and the Oligarchs happy" not "can you run and supply an army effectively". Russia essentially retains some of the political weaknesses of autocracies, and a big tendency to do things for show rather than effectiveness.Jubal, one of my professors who studies war since 1914 assigned us this paper which you can probably track down:
I guess there are some questions here about what a "normal" war is these days, given it almost never is symmetrical any more. I see the point psyanojim makes about the weird mismatches of capabilities, but I feel like expectations of matched capabilities may be entirely a thing of the past anyway (with the one exception of nuclear weapons where the biggest powers all hit "world destruction" in their capability and there's not much point getting far above that). But it feels like for non-nuclear warfare, the range of capability types and levels is probably far more stratified than at most previous points in history, to the point where it'd be relatively rare not to have a bunch of weird mismatches in any given war one could hypothesise.
Stephen Biddle, "Victory Misunderstood: What the Gulf War Tells Us about the Future of Conflict," International Security, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Autumn, 1996), pp. 139-179
To me, the fact that Russian generals have to come into artillery range to give orders is way more surprising that in a war of hundreds of thousands of troops, a lot of the kit is not the latest and greatest. Encrypted radio comms is a basic WW II capability (your average tank squadron or infantry company did not have it, but the larger formation they were part of did). And even in WW I they had runners to go from the commander to the frontlines!
Mosul ended up looking like Stalingrad even though the airstrikes came from by NATO forces with plenty of guided munitions.
417
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022
« on: March 18, 2022, 05:08:54 AM »I agree that its bizarre that a country with a space program can't manage secure coms between its generals and fighter planes and their units or bases! And its eerily reminiscent of the Battle of Tannenberg where the two Russian colums started sending radio messages back and forth in clear and the Germans realized they could fight one column at a time.This might be a good topic for the upcoming chat, but keep in mind that just like the UK and France can't equip their troops as lavishly as the Americans can, most countries can't reach UK standards. The Canadian Armed Forces currently have no air defense capability other than fixed radars and fighter-bombers. In a war against anyone with an air force, our air defense would be calling up our allies and asking for cover. A friend who used to be in the New Zealand army said something similar: "we are equipped to fight insurgents and militias, because that is what we get asked to do." I think we have pretty good arty, and Leopard II tanks with some upgrades, and our home-made Light Armoured Vehicles, but I am sure there are gaps in our kit if we sent the CAF into a war against a large state.Sure, all militaries have gaps in their capabilities.
But the Russians seem to have gaps in some very basic areas - like RADIOS. They seem to be relying on unencrypted civilian gear. Pictures of Russian soldiers with walkie-talkies that look like they are from Radio Shack. Russian fighter cockpits with civilian GPS systems clamped to the dash. etc. etc.
This is just baffling, and almost certainly contributing hugely to both the Russian lack of coordination, and the Ukranian ability to locate and intercept specific high-value targets like Russian generals.
And seeing pictures of Ukranian infantry is like browsing some kind of bizarre multi-century arms catalog. Cutting edge missile weapons being carried alongside random rusty Cold-War surplus gear and 1930s-era Tommy Guns.
I have not seen those Thompsons, but I recall that some US National Guard units invaded Iraq carrying old M3 Grease Guns. And the CAF still use their old Browning HPs because our procurement system makes sloths look agile. But I am an ancient historian not a modern historian, so I'm not up to speed on all the variations of a Kalashnikov or a RPG. I think wooden stocks tend to be on older models and newer ones have synthetic stocks?
418
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022
« on: March 18, 2022, 04:30:17 AM »This is a very weird war - it feels like it should be modern, but it actually isn't. Ukraine has extreme modern weapons in very narrow areas like man-portable missile systems. Russia has modern weapons on paper, but is relying heavily mainly on WWII/Cold-War era equipment and tactics.This might be a good topic for the upcoming chat, but keep in mind that just like the UK and France can't equip their troops as lavishly as the Americans can, most countries can't reach UK standards. The Canadian Armed Forces currently have no air defense capability other than fixed radars and fighter-bombers. In a war against anyone with an air force, our air defense would be calling up our allies and asking for cover. A friend who used to be in the New Zealand army said something similar: "we are equipped to fight insurgents and militias, because that is what we get asked to do." I think we have pretty good arty, and Leopard II tanks with some upgrades, and our home-made Light Armoured Vehicles, but I am sure there are gaps in our kit if we sent the CAF into a war against a large state.
There is also the giant civil war in Ethiopia, where the Tigrayan rebels seemed to be much better fighters than the government troops despite having less kit. That also involved massive violence against civilians.
419
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022
« on: March 17, 2022, 09:15:52 PM »
I don't know of any time in the past 5,000 years when fighting your way into a fortified city that was ready to resist was not a bloody and risky affair, or when it was not common to threaten atrocities against the civilian population to force the combatants to surrender. A woman on a roof with a clay tile killed Pyrrhos of Epeiros, and refusing to let people leave the city unless it surrenders goes back to the Lament for Sumer and Urim (CW: atrocities against civilians).
Without going to war against Russia, I don't know what can be done other than donating to relief organizations and helping refugees.
The Ukrainians say they are shooting down most cruise missiles aimed at Kyiv, I saw some claims that units in the south were stripped of their air defenses to reinforce Kyiv before the war began.
Without going to war against Russia, I don't know what can be done other than donating to relief organizations and helping refugees.
The Ukrainians say they are shooting down most cruise missiles aimed at Kyiv, I saw some claims that units in the south were stripped of their air defenses to reinforce Kyiv before the war began.
420
Discussion and Debate - The Philosopher's Plaza / Re: Russia/Ukraine Crisis 2022
« on: March 16, 2022, 06:01:22 PM »
Thomas Piketty has an opinion piece on what sanctions targeted at oligarchs would involve, and how rich people in the Atlantic world won't like them https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/mar/16/russia-rich-wealthy-western-elites-thomas-piketty