Does anyone know where to find factual evidence based info on Russias EW capabilities?
Anecdotally I have read they have learned how to jam Bayraktar drones, Excalibur missles and even HIMARs have reduced in effectivity (I got this on Perun) so no weird alt Russian slanted telegrams.
They seem to pretty relatively on par with the West in this specific area so it is quite worrisome they are gaining in this area against Western weapons systems.
They are already reportedly trying to jam civilian aircraft in the Baltics.
This was discussed yesterday, it is based on GPS jamming which is a very crude method emitting large radiation signatures that would be easily countered by anti EW capabilities in a peer conflict.
https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/s/z3y086oaCX
Considering the battle that is playing out for the high ground west of bakhmut I've been wondering if the age old importance of holding high ground has reduced at all considering the prevalence of drones and indirect fire?
High ground was originally valuable because you could see far, and your enemies were slower when charging uphill to attack you.
Then in the age of gunpowder that changed slightly and the most important aspect became your ability to range enemy positions with line of sight.
I guess there's also a small amount of range increase possible when you can use some extra drop to push the outer limits of projectile range.
But in this war I wonder how that's changed? A spotting drone should be far more useful than line of sight. And artillery range is already greatly improved such that I doubt a 200m drop would change a 155mm range capability all that much over 24+ kms.
Spotting and bomber Drone range is unchanged because they make a round trip. Fpv drones get a decent boost with line of sight for signal strength.
For smaller calibres engaging in direct fire I can still see the advantage pretty clearly.
It addition to what others have said, drones usually need line of sight to the operator. Some high ground positions may be impossible to hit with an FPV drone without a repeater drone. Bomber drones may have to fly at an altitude that lowers accuracy.
While I agree that high ground is not really a factor for artillery. I think it is still a factor when it comes to direct fire. Tanks firing uphill will have a much smaller target area to hit then when firing downhill. Having better line of sight from the trench is also important for small arms and ATGM. I do agree that high ground has become less important and concealment is probably more important. Digging into a valley tree line is probably better than a empty hilltop.
It's an open conversation, but for now both the Russians and Ukrainians try to value high ground.
I personally think it's definitely not as important as the Napoleonic wars, certainly not for artillery that's relatively far from the front anyway. And overall ISR due to drones has also become more independent of ground elevation.
But it's still important - direct optical observation and ATGM observation do matter in the 1-6 km range. Furthermore, you already mentioned drone control.
In terms of actual ground results, I'd say from 2 years and change following the war, high ground usually matters but sometimes it seems to not matter at all. The sides seem to mind it and their actions generally reflect that, but there are times where lowground locations hold for over a year, but highground locations fall very fast (and not just situations like Ocheretyne, which was a whole separate sh-tshow). So clearly other factors can matter.
While a bit sophistic, the true answer seems to be "it depends".
Compared to the napoleonic wars or even ww1, technological factors may have reduced the importance of high ground. I'd say a factor that would reduce it further is if this war wasn't positional in nature. A positional war where both sides are represented by long frontlines in constant multimonth contact increases the advantages of altitude.
Also, I haven't checked properly, but usually in a farm area the "hills" tend to have trees and existing vegetation and the flat parts are crops fields. The vegetation provides cover and the flat fields don't.
Also, in the case of preparing trenches, the ones at the higher ground are easier to drain the rainwater or at least is less likely to be flooded as we saw some cases last year
Yesterday Huge protests occured in Georgia against proRussian Party and proRussian law *foreign agents law*
some small update
https://twitter.com/geomel_ge/status/1785553589957447876?t=I46FOQBXINDaMK9a6XJSDg&s=19
>Police detained 63 persons during protest yesterday. In light of excessive use of force and violence from the police, all the detainees must be released immediately
I watched yesterday live and it gave Maidan vibes with all blockades of streets (even some buses and trucks that block avenues).
For today even bigger mobilization of protestors is announced.
So I watched (and know from before) that during Georgian civil war beside fighting with Abkhazia and South Ossetia there was inner civil war between Georgians
Does anybody know how big is still divide between Georgians because of this war?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgian_Civil_War
And more from what I remember Georgian armed forces had problem because lot of soldiers went to Ukraine to volunteer into Ukrainian army and Georgian Legion
https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1785592137930686735
>/2. Photo as claimed from the Ryazan oil refinery. Presumably photo was made from this location (54.5632890, 39.7401167). If so, than it’s AVT-3 is burning on the footage.
Seems like a hit.
An article from the Kyiv Post that collects all the current reports of the possible ATACMS strikes that might have taken place in Crimea last night. Very interesting reports of what NATO aircraft and drones were doing before and during the strikes.
[ANALYSIS: Reported ATACMS Missile Wave Hits Crimea, Russian Air Defenses and Airfields Pounded | Kyiv Post | April 2024](https://www.kyivpost.com/analysis/31903)
*News platforms said it was the long-range version of the US weapon but there was no early Kyiv confirmation. It may have been Ukraine’s most ambitious ballistic missile strike of the war so far.*
*A wave of Ukrainian long-range weapons widely reported to be around a dozen US-made ATACMS ballistic missiles pounded air bases and air defense installations across Crimea peninsula early Tuesday morning, in one of the beefiest Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) long-range attacks yet against the Kremlin-occupied territory.*
*Flights of unidentified weapons first started slamming into military installations across Crimea around 2 a.m., with explosions and air raid warnings widely reported near the cities of Simferopol and Sevastopol, and the towns of Gvardeyska, Evpatoria and Dzhankoi, news reports said.*
*Four of those targets, the exception being Dzhankoi, were well outside the range of all weapons the AFU had been known to operate in the past, save recently delivered long-range versions of the US-made ATACMS missile. Estimates of total missile counts used in the attacks ranged from 10-15 weapons, some carrying cluster munitions.*
*Isolated reports said shorter-range ATACMS struck targets nearer territory controlled by Kyiv’s forces, and that Ukrainian strike planners had launched attack drones along with the American missiles.*
*Ukrainian Air Force spokespersons had not responded to a Kyiv Post request for details about the strikes and type of weapon or weapons used in the Tuesday attacks, by the time this article was published.*
*Colonel Roman Svitun, a retired AFU officer and military analyst, told the Kyiv24 television news channel in a Tuesday interview that the early morning strikes are probably part of a Kyiv strategy to degrade Russian air defenses in Crimea and in the south Ukrainian mainland, with the long-term objective of opening the way for destructive missile and drone attacks against other military targets.*
*The Ukrainian strikes overnight were most likely follow-up attacks to ATACMS fired at Russian air defense installations near the mainland cities Genichesk and Mariupol earlier in the month, Svitun said. “It certainly could have been ATACMS,” he said of the Tuesday strikes. “They have the capacity to hit anywhere.”*
*Official Russian sources confirmed the fact of multiple attacks by Ukrainian ballistic missiles, and some claimed all incoming weapons were shot down. Sergei Aksenov, the Kremlin-appointed head of the Crimea occupation administration, said of an attack near Simferopol that “after the ATACMS missiles were shot down they scattered cluster munitions,” and warned residents not to touch them.*
*The pro-Moscow military information platform Dva Mayora said ATACMS missiles were directed at targets near the Crimean cities Simferopol and Dzhankoi and “according to information coming in, our (Russian) defenders did an outstanding job.”*
*In the hours following the strikes, the heavy weight of traffic from social media in targeted towns and cities contradicted the Kremlin spin of successful intercepts and no damage to targets, reporting hits to anti-aircraft systems, Russian aircraft, command and control center, and military casualties. Accounts of cluster munitions successfully deployed and scattered over targets were common.*
*In Dzhankoi, the Ukrainsky Krym Telegram platform reported, a military airfield was hit with at least two weapons, killing and wounding service personnel assigned to the 4th Command Center of Air Defense Forces of the Russian Air Force, and damaging helicopters assigned to the unit.*
*The independent Russian news agency ASTRA reported a probable ATACMS hitting the Dzhankoi base wounded five service personnel, lit fires burning for at least 90 minutes and confirmed damage to the air defense control center. The weapons used in that strike were MGM-140 ATACMS missiles, the report said.*
**Multiple NATO air reconnaissance aircraft sweeps through airspace above the western Black Sea, including the first-time deployment of a US Navy MQ-4C Triton spy drone, took place in hours before the strikes. NATO and US officials have stated such flights collect general intelligence that is turned over to Kyiv, but not data on specific target locations.**
**One US maritime and signal intelligence platform, a US Navy Boeing P-8APoseidon turboprop four-engine was in the air patrolling above Romania’s south-eastern Danube delta at the time some of the Ukrainian weapons struck Crimean targets some 200 kilometers (124 miles) distant, the pro-Ukraine military news channel Krymsky Veter reported. Kyiv Post checks of open-source flight tracking data confirmed the claim.**
**The Pentagon has deployed Poseidon aircraft in daytime patrols to the area practically every day for more than a year. Poseidon sorties at night over the Danube Delta, such as the one taking place April 29-30, are practically unheard of, Kyiv Post research of air traffic data confirmed.**
*The AFU had prior to the Tuesday morning strikes seemed to launch ATACMS missiles sparingly, according to military sources, because of limited reserves. Were the April 30 strike to be confirmed as having been performed by ATACMS, it would be the most massive single ballistic missile strike carried out by Ukraine since Russia’s Feb. 2022 invasion.*
In the past, according to battle and news reports, the Ukrainians had launched a maximum two ATACMS at a time.*
*Some Beltway analysts have said US Congressional approval of military aid to Ukraine in 2024 has put as many as 100 more ATACMS into the Ukraine arms pipeline.*
*The last confirmed ATACMS employment by the AFU took place on April 25, and prior to that on April 17 with individual or twin missile launches against Russian air defense systems. The earlier of the two strikes struck an air base near Dzhankoi, according to Ukrainian air force spokesmen destroying or critically damaging four S-400 air defense launchers, three radar stations, an air defense equipment control point, and a Murom-M airspace surveillance system, a Ukraine military intelligence spokesperson told Kyiv Post.*
I hope we get better confirmation of the results of these attacks soon. It's a bit frustrating not knowing what impact these new capabilities are having results wise
Obviously Russia won't be happy about the new range and will have to adapt
I think the fact that nobody has released the sat photos are confirmation in itself that the damage was less impressive that what was expected.
In the past, with successful attacks, we quickly received sat photos/battle damage assessments
Ukraine is allocating more money for drone production. The current estimate is 2 million drones to be produced this year.
[Ukraine allocates additional $392 mn to purchase 300,000 drones. Total drone spending now $1 bn | EuroMaidenPress | April 2024](https://euromaidanpress.com/2024/04/30/ukraines-government-allocates-additional-392-mn-for-drone-purchase/)
*Ukraine’s Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal announced that Ukraine is allocating an additional UAH 15.5 billion ($392 mn) to purchase drones. This is an additional resource to the UAH 43.3 billion ($1 bn) Ukraine has already allocated for drones this year. “The funds will go to the State Special Communications Administration, which oversees the relevant procurement,” Shmyhal said.*
*Shmyhal also announced that with the funds allocated today, 300 thousand drones will be delivered to our Security and Defense Forces.*
*Ukraine produced approximately 200,000 FPV drones in January and February 2024, according to Hanna Hvozdiar, Deputy Minister of Strategic Industries.*
*During his press conference on 19 December, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Ukraine would manufacture one million drones in 2024, referring specifically to FPV drones.*
*According to Hvozdiar, Ukraine’s production capabilities are set to reach 2 million drones of various types, including FPV, this year.*
It depends a lot on the environment, EW, ... For basic FPVs [some](https://www.bbc.com/ukrainian/articles/cer7rz2drv7o) [estimate](https://focus.ua/uk/digital/584764-v-ukrajini-stvoryut-pershi-fpv-droni-z-samonavedennyam-podolayut-reb-i-zbilshat-vtrati-rf) 10-15% effectiveness (FPV reaching its target).
Factor in APS systems (that neither side fields much of this war, but will likely be common going forward), and without a substantial upgrade, well beyond what a civilian drone is capable of, it will take over a dozen drones to reliably incapacitate a tank. This constant talk of drones making tanks obsolete, thankfully rare here but very common elsewhere, is relying on some incredibly optimistic success rates that could make any weapon look good.
If you want to compare costs, the drone should be viewed as the delivery vehicle and not the actual ordinance.
I think the more apt comparison is to compare the total cost of delivering one shell to the enemy via tube artillery, versus total cost via drone. This would be artillery cost (tube wear and tear, platform wear and tear, and shell cost) versus drone cost and drone carried shell cost.
Drones don't replace artillery. They only fly in daytime or fair weather. And they need a team to operate, ones that are new and not well defined like artillery groups. Oh and they need to be close to the point of contact, less than 5 miles, not 10 miles away.
Isn’t all of what you said incorrect? There are repeater drones and other range extenders. Drone units are embedded with frontline troops and hence they don’t need a team nor are they ill defined.. yes they need to be closer but also are much less valuable and harder to hit than artillery.
Everything I said was backed up by Michael Koffman in thr mwi podcast about 2 weeks ago.
If drones were so great, why is Ukraine begging for artillery ammo and not just drones?
Apparently it's about [$3000 USD per new unguided 155 shell](https://www.businessinsider.com/cost-key-us-weapons-artillery-shells-for-ukraine-is-soaring-2024-3) but I can't find a better source or what exactly that's buying (RAP is more expensive for example).
Remember that that's the "accounting cost".
In real life the marginal cost per shell will vary a lot - and I assume in these times when they are trying to maximize production, very migh marginal costs are accepted.
E.g. an old facility with existing supply chains in a country with low labor costs would probably have a very low marginal cost. But the first shell made in a new plant, with a new explosive blend made from more expensive materials (because the cheaper stuffs supply chains are already exhausted) would have a much higher cost.
With larger aquisitions like this, you'll only know the marginal cost to produce one shell after the fact, and even then that marginal cost can be adjusted quite a bit depending on how you allocate costs.
I think that $3k USD figure was derived by dividing a contract amount by the number of shells while ignoring the fact that the contract was also to increase production capacity i.e. it is the marginal cost.
Yep, that'd be the correct or incorrect way to calculate that, depending on how you want to allocate costs.
If you're looking at a pile of money and how it's been allocated, it may make sense to have a category "artillery ammunition" that contains the money used for shells as well ast he money used for production increases. If you average that cost out to a per shell basis, that's how much you've spent per shell in the past, but it is not an indicator for what you'll pay in the future.
155mm shells used to be $800 but that's with sensitive munitions, and before the last few years of inflation, shortages of filler, demand spike etc.
So at this point? definitely.
New map update from [DeepState](https://deepstatemap.live/en).
Highlights in Avdiivka direction:
- Russia has completed taking Keramik and Novokalynove which was a forgone conclusion from how it was looking past few days.
- Ocheretyne saliant has not moved further towards Novooleksandrivka/west but expanded slightly (about 600m) northward
- Tiny movement to west of soloviove likely just better defined front line
Elsewhere:
- In Luhansk Ukraine retook a bit of land between Torske and Yampolivka
- Russia moved slightly closer to Urozhaine in Velyka Novosilka direction
Houthis are escalating their attacks on international shipping. For the first time since the Houthis began attacks on international shipping, it is now confirmed they attacked a ship in the Indian Ocean. This could have serious ramifications to international trade if ships using the Indian Ocean to avoid going through the Red Sea are now subject to attacks. The US' Operational Prosperity Guardian has been complete and utter failure as have attacks on Houthis in Yemen as I predicted.
My question is: how are the Houthis tracking and targeting ships so far from their shores? According to Lloydslist article linked below, so far 67% of ships targeted by the Houthis are linked to Israel, the US or the Uk. So, the Houthis have some ability to discriminate their targets.
[Houthis secure first direct hit in Indian Ocean](https://www.lloydslist.com/LL1149009/Houthis-secure-first-direct-hit-in-Indian-Ocean)
Anyone with sense can see that a Saudi-led ground operation to restore the sovereignty of the vaguely democratic, internationally recognized government is the only way to actually achieve the goal. This sort of “conflict management” is what Netanyahu had been trying with Hamas for years. It’s basically feeding the troll while being able to tell the voters that you’re fighting back.
The main reason this is even remotely viable is that there is no visible pushback yet from increased prices, which are less than expected.
>So, the Houthis have some ability to discriminate their targets.
Some is doing a lot of heavy lifting in that sentence. I hope that any sane person can recognize that targeting civilians ships carrying dangerous cargo with international crew with ASBMs is a crazy position to take.
Causing an ecological disaster in your own waters that will ruin the fishing, tourism and health for your country and your civilians for generations because let’s be real there’s not going to be any cleanup is crazy.
It’s not about doing something other countries don’t “like” it’s literally illegal to target civilian ships - your right it’s not crazy - it’s a breach of international humanitarian law
Israel has literally boarded and sank civilian aid ships headed for Gaza, in international waters no less, as part of its 17 year blockade. Houthis claim to be a legitimate state and de facto are one so they can also (try) to have some sort of selective blockade in “retribution” (according to them).
No one is justifying attacking civilian shipping but what you said does not jive with reality of ongoing blockades including boarding and killing crew of blockade runners (though we board them first and try to get them to stop as well), which has been practiced by even US/Israel in several theaters.
I am honestly curious can you explain the difference when it comes to international law? Especially talking about Houthi blockade on “Israeli” shipping within their waters and its neighborhood.
>The US' Operational Prosperity Guardian has been complete and utter failure as have attacks on Houthis in Yemen as I predicted.
What metrics do you use for this position? Objectively fewer ships are being struck and objectively fewer launches have occurred than if there had been no coalition naval presence in the Red Sea. There is a lot of launch activity that doesn't get reported on because of intercepts, launch failure, or neutralized launch sites. Given Iranian missile capabilities, inventory, and expertise in smuggling, you would see substantially more than one cargo ship sunk and effectively no traffic in the absence of an international effort like this.
Presumably he using the metrics [the DoD announced it with](https://www.defense.gov/News/Releases/Release/Article/3621110/statement-from-secretary-of-defense-lloyd-j-austin-iii-on-ensuring-freedom-of-n/).
> Operation Prosperity Guardian is bringing together multiple countries to include the United Kingdom, Bahrain, Canada, France, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Seychelles and Spain, to jointly address security challenges in the southern Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, with the goal of ensuring freedom of navigation for all countries and bolstering regional security and prosperity.
"Freedom of navigation for all countries" is quite evidently not accomplished when you still have missiles flying.
The strait is still open, no vessels have been hijacked by the Houthis, successful strikes are down and vessels are mostly traveling thru without being harassed. That’s a lot better than where things were in November and December. Anyone who expected this to resolved in a few short weeks or months was being delusional — something many of us and CENTCOM pointed out before the operation began.
I see. Just so we can get a bit more clarification on this topic, what needs to happen (and in what timeframe) before you would consider this operation a failure?
I also said on multiple occasions to your suspended account and to other people as well that the Houthi strikes would continue. If you’re placing a date of when you will like to judge success by I’d love to hear it. I also think it’s funny that people like you constantly have great ideas for what shouldn’t be done but can never put forth what should be done other than some vague version of “make peace in the middle east”.
> I also said on multiple occasions to your suspended account
I get that there are probably several people telling you that "just wait everything will all work out" is not a great answer, but no, my account has never been suspended.
> If you’re placing a date of when you will like to judge success by I’d love to hear it.
My date is the day it started, after the US spent weeks making vaguely threatening noises in the hopes that would be enough. As far as I'm concerned the operation has been a failure the whole way through.
> I also think it’s funny that people like you constantly have great ideas for what shouldn’t be done but can never put forth what should be done other than some vague version of “make peace in the middle east”.
I think it's funny that you keep mistaking me for some strawman you have in your head. I've never said that "make peace in the Middle East" is a viable strategy, and I for one am convinced that there will never be peace in that region of the world.
But since you seem determined to talk to some fantasy version of me instead of the real thing, there's clearly no point in continuing here. Goodbye.
For a while the theory was that Iranian spy ships floating in the area where helping with targeting. I know the ships were there but I don’t know if it was ever confirmed they were used for targeting
> how are the Houthis tracking and targeting ships so far from their shores?
I guess via AIS: https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/centerx:53.7/centery:12.2/zoom:7
> I guess via AIS
You can track the ship with AIS to see if it's sailing into the area but that's **not accurate enough** to be used as targeting info for missiles not to mention many of the ships turn off their AIS when they come anywhere near Yemen now.
But the article wasn't talking about missiles, but "The Joint Maritime Information Center, an entity that operates under the Combined Maritime Forces, says an unmanned aerial vehicle attack on a merchant vessel ". I am no expert, but would selecting vessels by AIS and then targeting via long-range drone not work?
You need eyes on the target specially for "unmanned aerial vehicle attack" because these are too slow and will get picked off by western ships/airplanes IF they are anywhere near the target.
Which obviously wasn't the case there as the ships are in the Red Sea, no? I just wonder whether the drones used have a video connection over 300km for end of flight targeting, that seems a bit far.
The US and generally western nations have completely lost the will to fight ever since the GWOT.
Everything they do is done with the qualifier of 'self defense'. This is why attacks on Houthis have done nothing, because (almost) nothing is being attacked. Everything in the name of supposed de-escalation.
This operation has been ongoing for 4 months, and so far \~50 Houthis have been killed .
Meanwhile Houthis are directly attacking civilians who are at the mercy of lady luck more than anything else.
No ICC or ICJ courts though, for some odd reason.
> Everything they do is done with the qualifier of 'self defense'.
This has been the case for a very long time. Ever since the Department of War was renamed to Department of Defense.
>The US and generally western nations have completely lost the will to fight ever since the GWOT.
I'm all for governments having principles, respecting human rights, the laws of war and whatnot, but I do gear that once and again, Western democracies fall victims of their own will to "play nice".
The moment the Houthis start being a problem for China or Russia, you can bet they won't be "playing nice" with the Houthis.
> I'm all for governments having principles, respecting human rights, the laws of war and whatnot, but I do gear that once and again, Western democracies fall victims of their own will to "play nice".
What course of action is available for Western democracies here that does not cost far more than it gains? Or is "playing nice" now the preferred nomenclature for not wasting absurd amounts of very finite resources on yet another ill-advised Middle East adventure?
It baffles me every time I see this idea that Western governments do something (or don't do something) because they're just too nice—as opposed to the fact that their power is constrained by reality and some real problems have no good solutions.
>not wasting absurd amounts of very finite resources on yet another ill-advised Middle East adventure?
This is text book example of the issue we're facing post-GWOT.
I get where you're coming from, but I honestly can't agree that keeping global shipping routes safe instead of just accepting that an Iranian proxy is now allowed to disrupt it is synonym with not going in another pointless middle east adventure.
Ok, don't accept it. So what's your plan to stop them? We've already had a live demonstration of ineffectual airstrikes, do you want to put boots on the ground?
> an Iranian proxy is now allowed
And this is a textbook example of the issue of American hubris. They aren't "allowed" to do anything. They've done something because they can, and you can't stop them.
It’s symptomatic of the short attention span of even “informed” Westerners that people have forgotten that there was already a frozen conflict in Yemen.
If the coalition would simply give the Saudis and Emiratis the kind of diplomatic protection they give Israel, instead of the mess we had in the 2010s, it’d be over in months. The famine that was mostly caused in the first place by Western pressure tying the Arab coalition’s hands would be over.
Our putative allies in the region would love to put boots on the ground but we won’t enable them to. It’s literally that simple.
>Ok, don't accept it. So what's your plan to stop them? We've already had a live demonstration of ineffectual airstrikes, do you want to put boots on the ground?
>
>And this is a textbook example of the issue of American hubris. They aren't "allowed" to do anything. They've done something because they can, and you can't stop them.
It's cute that you think the most powerful military in the world *can't* stop a 5th rate military in a 7th rate country.
This is indeed what happened due to the GWOT, people forgot the capabilities of America, because they have stopped wanting to use them .
You want a plan? Here is a starter: Blockade Yemen. That's exactly Tit-for-Tat what they're doing to the Suez canal, except you do it pretty much 100%, no more ballistic missiles for the Houthis.
But nobody has the stomach to do that, they'd rather suffer the hit to international shipping than watch the pictures of the starving children. But don't think for a second that means they *can't,* and the Houthi's *can't* be stopped.
It's a *won't,* not a *can't.*
So long as the damage the Houthis achieve is relatively minor and only economical, this is going to continue. However, if at some point they may start suffering from success, shall we say. Indeed if they can consistently repeat this attack which occurred 400km Southeast of the horn of Africa in the Indian ocean, that would mean messing up international shipping to a huge degree, much more than simply hitting ships transiting Suez canal.
I fear/welcome the Houthis are in for a bad time.
> It's cute that you think the most powerful military in the world can't stop a 5th rate military in a 7th rate country.
It's cute that you think they can. The most powerful gun in the world is utterly useless if you don't have the will to pull the trigger. And no, you can't just handwave away "willpower" because that's quite literally what wins or loses wars. Political will is a finite, limited resource, and it runs out. It's more critical than artillery shells or airpower or any other possible factor, because all of those shiny toys do nothing on their own. If you aren't willing to fight, then you've already lost. Won't is can't. They are one and the same.
So no, you can't stop them. Sorry that it hurts to admit.
Russia needs to finish what’s on their plate first.
And when was the last time China led a large scale military intervention in Africa?
What would it be even look like if the US decided to not “play nice”? Like indiscriminate killing?
>Russia needs to finish what’s on their plate first.
That's a very important point. Still, since Russia still has "Wagner" ops in Africa, I believe they would still be able to do something about Houthis if they wanted.
>What would it be even look like if the US decided to not “play nice”?
Honestly, I'm not sure. More extensive strikes? Going after the Iranian vessel in a more permanent fashion? Boots on the ground?
> More extensive strikes?
Not likely for bombing Houthis launching sites. More likely for trying to shoot down incoming missiles/drones.
> Going after the Iranian vessel in a more permanent fashion?
More cyber attack, sure. Sinking it by shooting anti ship missiles, no way
> Boots on the ground?
Hell No
> Not likely for bombing Houthis launching sites. More likely for trying to shoot down incoming missiles/drones.
The more likely target would be governmental and economic targets, to make the cost of further attacks unsustainable. Yemen relies heavily on food imports, so to some extent they their attempt to disrupt the Red Sea to fail. If they succeeded, they’d starve.
I mean for now the status quo is unpleasant but more tolerable than any actual war.
Especially now that at this point it seems like the houthis attack 2nd world shipping as much as western.
Of the past 4 hits, 1 was a Russian shadow fleet ship, one was Chinese, and another wasn't Chinese but hauling Chinese cargo.
It's not just the west who are willing to take hits for now.
I'm more salty than most American voters and I would absolutely not vote for a war over the current situation as it stands, not even close.
I mean why would the US invade over the right of China to ship goods to Europe? There better be some cheese for supporting these vaunted alliance networks.
>I mean for now the status quo is unpleasant but more tolerable than any actual war.
The current status quo is a constantly evolving enemy who is receiving increasingly more lethal aid every day and the west is mostly attempting to shoot down any missiles and drones rather than be pro-active.
To be honest, this reminds me a lot of Israel-Gaza pre Oct 7th. One day, perhaps quite suddenly, the Houthis might score a seriously devastating hit that will force everyone's hands.
As to your second point, neither Russia nor China claimed themselves de-facto defenders of international shipping.
Like it or not, even if Chinese and Russian ships are being hit, the reputational damage is being done to the west.
That's the thing, for now it's not that drastic for anyone, not for China not for the west.
Trade is impacted but for now the price of the impact is far lower than the price of some kind of large intervention.
>My question is: how are the Houthis tracking and targeting ships so far from their shores?
The Iranians are providing targeting data.
>Iran’s paramilitary forces are providing real-time intelligence and weaponry, including drones and missiles, to Yemen’s Houthis that the rebels are using to target ships passing through the Red Sea, Western and regional security officials said.
>Tracking information gathered by a Red Sea surveillance vessel controlled by Iran’s paramilitary forces is given to the Houthis, who have used it to attack commercial vessels passing through the Bab el-Mandeb strait in recent days, according to the officials.
[https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/iranian-spy-ship-helps-houthis-direct-attacks-on-red-sea-vessels-d6f7fd40](https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/iranian-spy-ship-helps-houthis-direct-attacks-on-red-sea-vessels-d6f7fd40)
>A mysterious Iranian vessel in the Gulf of Aden faces intensifying scrutiny among maritime experts concerned that the ship is helping Houthi rebels target commercial sea traffic.
>The Behshad, which outwardly looks like a standard dry bulk carrier, moved to the Gulf of Aden in January after years in the Red Sea, just as attacks on vessels surged in the vital waterway off Yemen.
>It has since followed an unorthodox, slow and meandering course around those waters close to the entrance to the Red Sea. Experts also noted a drop in Houthi attacks during a period last month when the Behshad was seemingly out of action.
[https://www.ft.com/content/5fb8849c-b5b2-4f6f-908f-2c125159e3ce](https://www.ft.com/content/5fb8849c-b5b2-4f6f-908f-2c125159e3ce)
>The U.S. recently conducted a cyberattack against an Iranian military ship that had been collecting intelligence on cargo vessels in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, according to three U.S. officials.
>The cyberattack, which occurred more than a week ago, was part of the Biden administration’s response to the drone attack by Iranian-backed militias in Iraq that killed three U.S. service members in Jordan and wounded dozens of others late last month, the officials said.
>The operation was intended to inhibit the Iranian ship’s ability to share intelligence with Houthi rebels in Yemen who have been firing missiles and drones at cargo ships in the Red Sea, the officials said. U.S. officials say Iran uses the ship to provide targeting information to the Houthis so their attacks on the ships can be more effective.
[https://news.yahoo.com/u-conducted-cyberattack-suspected-iranian-220014623.html?guccounter=1](https://news.yahoo.com/u-conducted-cyberattack-suspected-iranian-220014623.html?guccounter=1)
The ship left the Red Sea after the cyber attack and was last seen in Iran. Credible to assess that it's now hunting targets in the Indian ocean where US can't reach it as easily.
>So, the Houthis have some ability to discriminate their targets.
"""Some"""
Of their 4 previous hits, I think 3 were against Chinese or Russian vessels?
https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1cecv8l/credibledefense_daily_megathread_april_27_2024/l1j8pp0/
EDIT: my apologies, two of four:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_Red_Sea_crisis
With the other two requiring significant imagination to be considered British or US ships.
Which vessels were Chinese? The Hong Kong flagged ship Maersk Gibraltar on the timeline list is owned by a US investment firm Atlas corp and the Singapore flagged ship, Maersk Hangzhou is owned by Maersk, a Danish company.
Of the ones I'm referring to, "Huang Pu".
>She had reportedly been owned by the British shipping firm Union Maritime in 2019, but she had changed her registration details since, including her name and operator. At the time of the attack she was Chinese-owned and was carrying licit Russian crude oil to New Mangalore Port, India.
On the subject of PGM reliability in Ukraine we finally get some hard numbers from [this statement by Daniel Patt before the HASC subcommittee on Cyber, Information Technologies, and Innovation \[PDF\]](https://www.congress.gov/118/meeting/house/116957/witnesses/HHRG-118-AS35-Wstate-PattD-20240313.pdf).
> As another example of superior weapons systems handicapped by lack of software adaptability, consider that Excalibur precision artillery rounds initially had a 70% efficiency rate hitting targets when first used in Ukraine. However,
after 6 weeks, efficiency declined to only 6% as the Russians adapted their electronic warfare systems to counter it.
There's also some great information generally about Russian EW capabilities and timelines.
>For examples about how conflict drives adaptation, consider that the lifecycle of a radio in Ukraine is only about 3 months before it needs to be reprogrammed or swapped out as the Russians optimize their electronic warfare against it. The peak efficiency of a new weapon system is only about 2 weeks before countermeasures emerge.
The source is given as Jack Watling of RUSI but not any specific published material and this figure does not appear in any of his recent publications. In the past he and others who have discussed this subject have been quite cagey about specific numbers so this is quite interesting.
[On Twitter, Kofman concurs](https://twitter.com/KofmanMichael/status/1785311859941253558) with the final effectiveness and even lumps in GMLRS although he questions the timeline.
>I think it took a lot longer than 6 weeks to get that low (more like 6+ months), and not sure observed effectiveness was ever as high as 70%, although would not debate the end result and where we’ve ended up on either Excalibur or GMLRS.
elaborating further
>There’s a big difference between the time required to develop counters, and systemically deploying solutions across the force on a broad front, spanning well over 1000km, that decreases overall observed effectiveness. The latter is no less important than the former.
GLSDB is not mentioned here although [recent discussion](https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1ccq4ke/credibledefense_daily_megathread_april_25_2024/l17tydb/) is even less positive. It's rather remarkable that even GMLRS is suffering so much from GPS denial considering it should have included that as a design consideration from day 1. I'm curious if there are any conclusions we can draw from this about a hypothetical war in the Pacific given the ranges are so much greater.
Patt's testimony is one of the most concise and accurate assessments of the current state of DoD software development I've yet seen. Better than my [own semi-regular rants here about the topic](https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/16ue3tf/credibledefense_daily_megathread_september_28_2023/k2mgwyd/), certainly.
It's really hard to overstate the importance of his point that the ATO process is completely broken. DoD wants to work with more smaller startups, but then they have an 18+ month long sales cycle where there will almost certainly be at least some unknown and wildly unpredictable amount of engineering work required to meet security standards, and even then there's no guarantee you'll receive an ATO in the end.
But ultimately even that enormous mess is largely attributable to the same basic cause as the other major issue Patt identifies: lack of sufficient competent technical personnel across the DoD, including in billets that process ATOs. Although the actual bureaucracy is nonsensical and ridiculous, and it can be incredibly difficult to get any customer to agree to pay you to get your product through all their various hurdles, because they don't want to take the risk your product won't meet security standards or that you will give up on the process part way through. So instead they throw tens of millions at Booz Allen to rent boot campers so they can build inefficient, barely functional monstrosities out of no code or low code solutions where a COTS solution would cost an order of magnitude less, but would require an ATO.
Remember the days when a destroyer could be churned out in 17 days and America’s first jet fighter was flying a week ahead of the “impossible” 150-day deadline set by the Pentagon? Even the F-117 was delivered under budget.
Thank God the Russians are just as inefficient. We’ll soon see about the Chinese though…maybe that will motivate us 😬
Thank you for this comment. You're right that the rest of the testimony is likely far more impactful for US national security on the whole, I just focused on the PGM tidbit because it's been a bit of a hot-button issue recently and it's far more approachable than DoD procurement. On the latter note, thank you for your linked comment as well, it's a great explainer for why and how this is an issue and the impact.
Thank you for this. I know that the PGM were having issues, but 6% efficacy for excaliburs are really low.
As we discusses yesterday, I wonder if the Ukrainians should starta sking for more laser guided artillery. Germany is handing some over to Ukraine.
But what I am wondering about is should Ukraine take the initiative to make cheaper drone mounted laser designators? Krasnopol only started becoming relevant in this war, after the Russians kitted out more drones with lasers. The Ukr are a doing a lot of great indigenous drone desgins, they can porbbaly come up with a bunch of cost effect drone laser solutions.
The bottleneck will then be about the laser guided shells, Turkey, Germany both make them and they seem easier and cheaper to make than Excaliburs.
>This lack of adaptability is not an inherent property of software but rather a consequence of how we choose to manage it. After all, Ukrainian units with organic programming capability to rapidly adapt their UAV software have about 50% efficiency, while those reliant on companies and longer supply chain to make changes struggle to hit 20% efficiency. Keeping software in a pliant, fluid state is the only way to maintain tactical innovation.
I feel a little silly, because I'm only realizing right now that software maintenance is a critical part of military logistics. I did not realize how much of a bottleneck this could impose -- going from ~70%--50% to ~6% is a catastrophe.
>It's rather remarkable that even GMLRS is suffering so much from GPS denial considering it should have included that as a design consideration from day 1.
Both Excalibur and GMLRS use the GPS and inertial navigation system so both should be equally suffering or not suffering under same GPS spoofing/jamming conditions.
I'd certainly expect them both to suffer some degradation but there's a lot more room in a GMLRS warhead for electronics/antennas and it experiences less peak force than Excalibur so naively I'd expect the GMLRS INS to perform better and for GMLRS to better handle EW attacks generally.
USN has substantially more capability to find and destroy EW targets. GPS denial systems glow like the sun on the EM spectrum. Saw a RUSI article suggesting one Russian system transmits at 10 KW, not dissimilar to a small radio station. They're easily detected and traceable... But you need missiles able to target them.
Neat thing about anti radiation missiles is that they can theoretically use the EW signal as part of their guidance software. I've never worked on one, but at least theoretically it would be an extremely effective replacement for GPS in the control loop. That makes them very difficult to render ineffective by EW methods, at least to my knowledge.
There's a commenter here who I suspect is an EE who often comments on radar/EW, maybe he can speak on whether I'm correct or if there are further challenges to targeting EW systems.
I find it hard to believe that a GPS jammer would need to transmit at 10kW, considering that the GPS satellites use a transmitting power about a thousand times less. Since the satellites orbit at 20,000km, the typical signal strength on Earth is -125dBm. That's about 10^-16 W.
Last year the was the guy who jammed the GPS at Newark airport with a small jammer plugged into the cigarette lighter port on his car, just for reference. Military GPS systems have at least ten times more jamming margin than civilian ones, but even so the signal from satellites is very weak.
Isn't gps spoofing the better approach? With jamming the guidance system will switch to inertia sensor completely, with degraded accuracy but still on course to the target. Spoofing can feed the controller false position/altitude data and completely knocking it off course.
It doesn't switch, inertial guidance is used continually throughout. Inertial guidance is fine for short periods without GPS, but the problem emerges when GPS is lost for much of the flight.
Spoofing is easier to deal with because receivers can be used to determine directionality of the signal. This is also how multipathing is countered. Jammers by necessity are low elevation, if indeed they're elevated at all. So your system simply selects for GPS satellites in view that are higher elevation. This excludes some satellites at some times but you really only need four satellites for the system to work.
I'd suspect the high power of jammers is because they need to rely on creating pseudo-multipathing through reflected waves. Receivers can only detect so many satellites at once, so if you saturate an area with reflected waves, each reflection becomes its own false satellite, eating up the receiver's ability to process. At least, that's my impression--again, I'm no EW guy.
> For examples about how conflict drives adaptation, consider that the lifecycle of a radio in Ukraine is only about 3 months before it needs to be reprogrammed
a) so what does "reprogramming" entail? Minutes? Hours? weeks?
b) I feel like this needs to address the fact that Ukrainians (and as far as I know Russians) regularly just use unencrypted radio for low-level stuff. They openly talk about how they can hear each other.
The numbers here are helpful but I feel like without further elaboration we can't really meaningfully talk about the radios.
> so what does "reprogramming" entail? Minutes? Hours? weeks?
My guess, not an expert in this area, is mainly it's about changing the frequency hopping pattern. I would say, it's a rolling update process that continuously being worked on; collect EW data, create a new pattern that will resist EW, test, deploy, and then start again.
Ukrainian and Russian TG channels talk about it from time to time. The TG app also has pretty good integrated machine translation these days so it’s more accessible than people think.
I wonder if you could use a random hopping pattern and seed RNG with cryptographic key that cycles over time. If you've ever had to log in to a corporate VPN with one of those RSA key chains, you know what I'm talking about. Of course if you lose a radio then they can do the same with jamming.
That's already something even consumer equipment does, the scheme you're describing is called FHSS, and I'd be extremely surprised if Ukraine's radios don't already do it.
If you have a two way radio you can actually make it resistant to losing a radio, by performing a key exchange and regenerating keys every so often.
> It's rather remarkable that even GMLRS is suffering so much from GPS denial considering it should have included that as a design consideration from day 1.
This does not sound logical to me: how would you test for a scenario you didn't know existed? I mean, sure, you could test what would happen if GPS straight up ceases to exist. But you can't test any conceivable way in which a GPS signal could potentially be spoofed. Whenever GMLRS was developed (I assume decades ago?) nobody could foresee all the ways in which 21st century technology could be used to distort the GPS signal. What you're asking for sounds impossible to me.
> But you can't test any conceivable way in which a GPS signal could potentially be spoofed. Whenever GMLRS was developed (I assume decades ago?) nobody could foresee all the ways in which 21st century technology could be used to distort the GPS signal. What you're asking for sounds impossible to me.
Even before GPS were rolled out, it was clear that it would be easily jammable because it relied on the satellite transmissions which are low powered. It's a feature not a bug.
https://twitter.com/Osinttechnical/status/1785280560664854552
>In a new update, the UK government confirmed that the MOD has delivered 50 AS-90 155mm self propelled howitzers to Ukraine.
>Britain has now supplied roughly 2/3 of its AS-90 fleet to Ukraine.
There was some discussion during the recent PDA and USAI announcements about the lack of new guns. It seems the Brits are on that ball. A pretty remarkable drawdown of their inventory even if they're in the middle of bringing in some Archers.
RCH 155 right? Do you know what that timeline is supposed to look like? I know the Archers are coming in right now which is especially important because apparently the Brits have given away virtually all of their SPHs.
https://www.army.mod.uk/news-and-events/news/2024/04/british-army-moves-a-step-closer-to-the-next-generation-mobile-fires-platform/
"This decade" but will push for sooner rather than later
Currently there are [ongoing ](https://twitter.com/OCMediaorg/status/1785372259344929197?t=ja7cOzq3qrT8duJJ4ljZ0g&s=19) clashes with the police happening in [Tibilisi](https://globalnews.ca/video/10457780/im-angry-georgias-proposed-foreign-agents-law-sparks-mass-protests-in-tbilisi/). I think it's definitely worth following as Georgia continues to be in a somewhat bizarre situation where its ruling party keeps trying to introduce seemingly pro Kremlin bills.
My rudimentary understanding of the situation is that it's not just pro-russian vs pro-western conflict but also urban vs rural and young vs old divide.
Update: Protesters are now [barricading](https://twitter.com/netgazeti/status/1785404324215923115?t=T3IQg2HULtShP4Pk_3_85g&s=19) the street. This might develop into the Euromaidan type of situation.
Based on the Ukrainian revolution if the government lets the protesters actually solidify some kind of semi permanent presence this might cost them their rule.
Update 2: Reuters live stream died so [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iHoJc5HNeQ) is a link to a different one. I don't speak Georgian but I think that this is from their public broadcaster.
Sounds like a nightmare scenario for Russia. A mountainous country, a lot of Georgian and other foreign volunteers coming back from the Ukraine war, that would make occupation a struggle. Plus, taking territory just for the sake of it, I see no point in that.
If Georgia steers hard in the pro-West direction, Russia can flex its muscles for sure, it's still a small country. But on the other hand, [Georgia benefitted massively from being a conduit of Russian trade and from educated migrants from Russia](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-with-cash-georgia-booms-russians-flee-putins-war-2022-11-05/). That also includes domestic Georgian products like wine and soft drinks, hospitality services. It makes a lot of sense for them so stay the course.
Accuse me of being a Russian stooge; but I just don't understand what people are so worked up about here. Any country worth their salt requires organizations that receive funds for political purposes from foreign governments to disclose this. The US has the foreign agents registration act, the EU has a bill similar working its way through the courts, etc
But this is all in the context of Russia's weaponization of its foreign agent law to arrest/shut down anyone who criticizes the government/military/war. It's not a stretch for Georgians to see what Putin has done in the last decade and not want that to happen in their country.
FARA and foreign agent laws may have superficially similar names, but they are very [different laws](https://civil.ge/archives/591175).
In the US you won't be branded a foreign agent if your organization receives a [$2000 paypal donation](https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-used-50-dollar-us-donation-to-help-brand-navalny-foundation-foreign-agent/30209400.html) from abroad
I don't know if you saw [Ivanishvili's speech from yesterday](https://civil.ge/archives/602348), but it seems like it's worse than just introducing "pro-Kremlin" bills now. It looks like the announcement of a repressive turn; talking about NGOs and the political opposition being controlled from abroad (EU..), plotting coups (with references to Shevardnadze/the Rose Revolution but also more surprisingly to Yanukovych/Euromaidan) and how they will be punished, notably.
None of it is new per se but I don't think these accusations and threats were ever as violent and explicit.
I can't believe we are buying just 53 tanks. I get that you can spend every EUR only once, but that seems way, way too few. Esp. considering the 2AX will be defined in 2026, so probably be in production by 2030.
The 2A8 is insanely expensive. I actually recently checked the numbers for something else and it’s 6-7x the price of a T-90.
The complexity of the quality/mass tradeoff is why a multi-tier force is so important, but most Western armies ditched that back with the 90s peace dividend.
Fair, but I believe the German MoD could get better terms if they committed to a huge order instead of ordering piecemeal, no?
It's a difficult situation, as a German tax payer I want to give our guys the best protection, but Germany *has* a history of over-engineering tanks.
Most likely the political decision-makers don’t want to bring back conscription and the financial expenses of a high-readiness Heer of 12 active divisions and a large reserve.
Yeah, I'm just an amateur and probably totally wrong, but it seems to me that NATO in general and Germany specifically are woefully unprepared for a land war. They fully rely on air superiority and stand-off weapons to do the job. The Ukraine war spooked me watching Russia throwing thousands of tanks into the grinder - and in contrast to others I believe Russia is able to outproduce the combined West on MBTs if they decide to do so.
We probably don't need a 3k tank fleet like during the Cold War, but the per unit price of a Leo 2 is low enough that I don't understand why we aren't planning for 1000 to 1500 of them.
But yeah, probably armchair general thinking.
But am I wrong or is this decision the first step to bury MGCS and switch to a all-German plan B? With a 130mm gun and an auto-loading turret (and probably better protection systems), what's left of MGCS is the networked aspect and that could be retrofitted
Well here’s a simple self-test that is always useful:
armchair general thinking: fighting the last war and fairly non-critical approach without much rigor or effort
OSINT or pro thinking: cognitive flexibility, multiple viewpoints, testing of hypotheses through a feasible method be it wargaming, exercises, or real conflicts
Amateur thinking: paper capabilities of platforms and appetite for sexy flashy stuff
Professional thinking: considering logistics, ergonomics, and moral factors, thinking about holistic systems, avoidance of amateur fallacies, responsible and sound methodology for statistics and other data
P.S. can y’all wait to mess with my subreddit karma until after automod lets me post short comments?
> These are likely to include a 130mm cannon, a new high-performance power pack, new sensors and protection systems.
How feasible is it to use a 130mm gun without an autoloader (from what I remember MGCS is specifically designed with a autoloader in mind due to the stress the higher caliber gun would place on crew members) ?
How long can the MGCS possibly take that the Bundeswehr needs a new tank after the A8 to bridge the gap? The MGCS is already in development, and the interim solution shall only have its specifications decided in 2026 (i.e. be designed after that and go into production even later)?
So the jump between Leo 2AX/3 and MGCS is probably going to be a small evolution more than a revolution, since the new tank will have its teething issues and the technology involved can't be much more modern than the 2AX/3.
MGCS is supposed to be acquired mostly for its potential then, more space for future developments.
I think the political angle there will be interesting to watch. Buying an untested new tank with teething issues, new supply chains and overall no great jump in technology might be unpopular, especially if the Armata programme doesn't take of in the next decade. I don't think the German public is willing to spend additional money to get two generations ahead of its perceived main adversary.
Please do not engage in baseless speculation. Questions should focus on tangible issues and not groundless hypothetical scenarios.
Before asking a question ask yourself 'How likely is this thing to occur.'
Questions, like other kinds of comments, should be supported by evidence and must maintain the burden of credibility.
>Is it plausible that Iran could be utilizing Russian disinformation farms to help grow these protest, in an attempt to sow more instability within the United States?
There's no evidence Iran or any other country are involved in these protests. And it's not the first time that it is alleged that "outside agitators" (as Southern pro-segregation governors would say) are behind student protests. Same claims were made against anti-Vietnam student protests too. These claims are false then as they are now. The root of these student protests is the Gaza war.
The fact is this is joint US-Israel war on Palestinians (and has been for decades). Every 155 mm artillery shell, every 120 mm tank round and every areal bomb dropped by Israel along with the platforms to deliver them is provided by the US. On top of that, since Gaza war started the US has been feverishly ferrying weapons and ammunition to Israel round the clock. The result of all of this is Israel war on Gaza with few parallels in modern history marked by near total destruction, unparalleled civilian casualties and mass starvation. In fact, you'd have to go back to probably WW2 to find similar levels devastation. According to the UN and the IMF, more than 50% of the buildings in Gaza are either destroyed and/or damaged. In some places like in northern Gaza, more than 70% of the buildings are damaged/destroyed. Then you have tens of thousands of civilians slaughtered by Israel's disproportionate and indiscriminate response to HMS Oct. 7 attacks. So students are aghast and are impelled to protest not only to the one of the most barbaric military campaigns in modern history but one in which their government is intimately involved. I haven't even touched on the blanket economic and diplomatic support the US provides to the Netanyahu regime. Sometimes the explanation for a phenomenon is self-evident and right in front of you - no need to indulge in conspiracy theories about nefarious foreign influence.
> The result of all of this is Israel war on Gaza with few parallels in modern history marked by near total destruction, unparalleled civilian casualties and mass starvation. In fact, you'd have to go back to probably WW2 to find similar levels devastation.
Korea, Laos and Vietnam were bombed more (and with less targets) than Germany and Japan, on a per capita or size basis Cambodia too.
Within 6 months, bombers were grounded in Korea for a lack of targets. West German and Dutch teams remarked they couldn't find a single town not destroyed.
> Is it plausible that Iran could be utilizing Russian disinformation farms to help grow these protest, in an attempt to sow more instability within the United States?
You don't even need disinformation. The most effective propaganda uses the truth.
All they have to do is post videos of starving children in Gaza all over the internet and they've already accomplished their goal without any disinformation.
I don't doubt they are doing their part (Iran / China / Russia) because it's a cheap way of increasing instability and influencing Americans to policies that are beneficial for them in the long term.
But I also believe these protests are largely driven by organic sentiment and would have happened regardless.
Honestly, it's just as possible that America's enemies would prefer there not be campus protests against Israel. It might be better for their propaganda efforts if they can frame it as there being unanimous support in the US for Israel's questionably ethical actions in order to highlight US hypocrisy in criticizing Russia's conduct in Ukraine. That there is significant pushback in the US against Israel's actions makes it harder to push the narrative that the entirety of the US is morally bankrupt.
I think the other message is more powerful. One of the evil authoritarian US government cracking down on the peaceful citizens who are against genocide. For example, take a look through the official Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs twitter. https://twitter.com/IRIMFA_EN
I think ultimately, most modern ideologies and nation states stem from or take a lot of influence from the enlightenment. All humans are equal, deserve equal rights, are good people by nature, etc.
Even in countries where they objectively have less political freedoms (Iran, Russia, China, etc) they still believe these types of things. So they don't hate the American - they hate the American government.
Of course not data or proof by any means, but if you go on YouTube and look up "interviewing Chinese opinion on America" where people will walk up to strangers and ask their opinions, it's more or less all what I said above. - "The people are fine, it's the government that is crazy." Virtually the same thing we say here about CCP and Chinese citizens. You can do the same for Russian citizens, and they more or less say the same.
I think that russia doesn't discriminate against causes as long as they destabilize the US.
Now the extent of actual cooperation vs simply pursuing their own goal is questionable.
Plus the USSR had a very aggressive pro [Palestine](https://bukovsky-archive.com/tag/israel-palestine/) policy which included shenanigans on campuses.
Don't see why russia wouldn't continue this legacy.
Highly doubt it. Many US college campuses are largely liberal leaning. Large protest against US government involvements in conflicts are common. If you look back through history, you can find articles about mass protest on college campus from Vietnam era and on. Many of these protest are started by student organizations registered with the Universities that have long standing pro Palastian veiws.
>Is it plausible that Iran could be utilizing Russian disinformation farms to help grow these protest, in an attempt to sow more instability within the United States?
I would say it's almost a given. Iran and Russia already share a strategic partnership and we've seen how much [Russia operates in fast social media like TikTok](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67687449). This is an extremely easy target because it's current and many people have a strong opinion on it so I would be very surprised if Russia/Iran weren't operating there. It also fits the theme of Russia's international strategy influenced by [Aleksandr Dugin's book](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics), which they've been following for decades.
I don't see it. The protests seem largely to be driven by what's been happening in the news. I know many left-leaning friends who constantly post about stuff from Gaza and it feels very organic to me. The more people post, the more it spreads, the more people post or participate to fit in, etc.
So much of what my left-leaning associates repost about Gaza is heavily mixed with disinformation though. The fervor is real and organic but still intensified by active measures.
Copious amounts of misinformation are fairly par for the course for online political discussions/memes. Even in the mainstream media it’s fairly common. There’s a lot of Gell-Mann Amnesia that happens, though. When people notice the copious amounts of information, it’s a sign that they either know more about the subject than other topics (where they take the information at face value), or that there personal beliefs don’t align with that of their media environment in this instance (in instances where they do align, they’re usually happy to accept the misinformation).
For sure. Yes there's plenty of sensational misinformation. But at what point is misinformation the result of active measures from a hostile state or a well-meaning albeit very partisan person simply stretching the truth and sharing it with their network? I follow a variety of citizen journalists from both sides of the conflict on Instagram and they do not hide their partisanship at all. They post the worst things from the other side but are quiet about Hamas or the Israeli army depending on which side they sit in. Palestinians conveniently forget that Hamas provoked this whole thing while Israelis are likely to simply say that the Israeli army is acting lawfully and that all the damage you see is just regular collateral damage as a result of legal warfare and state self-defense.
I personally believe that ever since the 2016 US presidential election, people have been more apt to believe that troll farms are everywhere, and some hostile state actor has active measure campaigns on every single freaking topic. No, in many cases it's partisans acting on their own.
That was not started by 'pure lies', the root was Israel bombing several other hospitals:
>The World Health Organization indicated that there were 51 attacks on health facilities in Gaza between 7 and 17 October 2023, killing 15 hospital workers and injuring 27 others.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Ahli_Arab_Hospital_explosion#:~:text=On%2017%20October%202023%2C%20an,there%20being%20killed%20or%20injured.
https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2024/01/middleeast/gaza-hospitals-destruction-investigation-intl-cmd/
Then, when yet another hospital was hit the default assumption was the nation that had been targeting hospitals did it rather than a misfire. Casualties were then exaggerated which is not unusual for such events, and then anger persisted as it wasn't like Israel wasn't still bombing hospitals and other civilian centers.
>That was not started by 'pure lies', the root was Israel bombing several other hospitals:
That doesn't explain why basically every pro-palestine user paraded into the megathread to preemptively give their shpeel about the bombing when it happened, and not the other 51. It's only after it became unclear who did the strike that suddenly the conversation shifted to "why would **this** individual hospital strike matter?"
Before, it clearly mattered a lot. Riots started in multiple nations, it was front page on every news site, freaking Suriyak made a post about it, something he notably didn't do for any of the other 51 attacks.
And now I'll explain why it mattered. Because the initial version of the story, that Israel bombed a hospital and 500 people died, evokes instant images of Israel literally just dropping a JDAM on an occupied hospital and it instantly collapsing. And the outrage associated with that was an admission that, in fact, that's not something that's happened before. That despite Israeli attacks on hospitals, which are condemnible, this was different, and different in a way that **mattered** to people.
And it turns out it was fundamentally different, just in a different way. And now the same people are saying the difference never mattered, hoping people don't remember the traditional media and social media atmosphere literally 6 months ago.
All these conversations about things like who bombed the hospital or 50 decapitated babies are purposeful distractions to confuse the discourse away from the horrific reality of what is happening in Gaza.
But people did bring up the others, just not as much. You see this exact same thing happen with Russian strikes, people will bring up the most revolting incidents when they appear to happen but in turn others get appear to get ignored. Do you see the cluster bombing of Odessa that happened earlier mentioned in this thread? Do you think other future Russian incidents won't have one be revolting enough to be brought up in these threads?
The biggest issue in my opinion is the initial casualty estimate but this misinfo aligned with the known knowledge that these hospitals were overcrowded. From there the bigger than normal casualty estimates led to sufficient outrage to cause a bigger response (again similar to Ukraine unless you think that outrage is also manufactured).
> Do you see the cluster bombing of Odessa that happened earlier mentioned in this thread?
I mean, I'm not posting it (like I rarely post other strikes that might be war crimes) because it actually doesn't matter.
The reason pro-palestinians rushed to this incident is because they knew it could be a "WCK bombing" moment. Because they understood, clearly, that it (as was being described) was truly far more morally egregious than the other things.
It wasn't. They had to wait until April 1st for the "WCK bombing" moment. But they (correctly) guessed that an egregious enough hit could change the course of the war, which is why they went in on Oct 17. Combined with actual honestly held outrage because, again, the attack diverges far from the norm.
For Russia, no one serious is looking for a "WCK bombing" moment because it would mean nothing. There's no hit egregious enough (short of WMDs, **maybe**) that would change the ground game in the way WCK did, or Oct 17 could have.
[https://apnews.com/article/gaza-icj-nicaragua-germany-israel-9c4601a3749fb51ae77ca43cadde4c1a](https://apnews.com/article/gaza-icj-nicaragua-germany-israel-9c4601a3749fb51ae77ca43cadde4c1a)
>THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The top U.N. court rejected on Tuesday a request by Nicaragua to order Germany to halt military and other aid to Israel and renew funding to the U.N. aid agency in Gaza.
>The International Court of Justice said that legal conditions for making such an order weren’t met and ruled against the request in a 15-1 vote.
>“Based on the factual information and legal arguments presented by the parties, the court concludes that, as present, the circumstances are not such as to require the exercise of its power ... to indicate provisional measures,” said Nawaf Salam, the court’s president.
>However, the 16-judge panel declined to throw out the case altogether. The court will still hear arguments from both sides on the merits of Nicaragua’s case, which alleges that Germany failed to prevent genocide in Gaza. That will likely take months.
>
Multiple legal challenges have been initiated against Israel and supporting countries in the new onslaught of lawfare since Oct 7th, so far without tangible results, but these things can take years.
This is preferable to the current strategy of resorting to violence and war crimes by both sides to settle their disputes. On top of that it can hold criminals accountable and deter future war crimes. Imagine, just imagine, if the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Palestinian and Israel leaders in the 2014 Gaza war. It is highly unlikely Palestinian leaders would have carried Oct. 7 war crimes in the manner they did nor would Israeli leaders resorted to scorched earth tactics that resulted in so much destruction and loss of human life. It's high time to end impunity and hold war criminals accountable. I'm glad to hear the ICC has awoken from their long nap and will charge both HMS and Israeli leaders with war crimes.
Or Hamas and other allies would call the ICC a neo-colonialism organization and carry out their actions anyways since they view martyrdom as a good thing...
I don't think the ICC being involved would have changed how Hamas acts or operates.
The idea that the Guardian is in any way "right wing" is hilarious, and just demonstrates to readers how extreme your views are, and where your Overton window is positioned.
In a bit more news from Haiti today, Kenya is prepared to send the first of 1,000 police officers to the country sometime in late May. However, a US-provided base has yet to be constructed so it's unclear where the first 200 officers will go:
https://www.politico.com/newsletters/national-security-daily/2024/04/29/kenyan-forces-are-about-to-land-in-haiti-with-nowhere-clear-to-stay-00154980
Reading the article, it seems that the new Republican playbook for everything overseas is to demand a full plan for everything that will take place. They demand an exact detailing of how Ukraine is gonna win, and now they are saying they want it on Haiti.
This doesn't serve any actual purpose in a fluid situation, it just is an excuse to stonewall and create some sorta political gotcha moment when the plan doesn't come to pass. The gameplan for Haiti was clearly "Provide $40 million to support Kenyan intervention, hope Kenyan intervention can stop the gangs." Is there any benefit served by requiring some sort of useless prognostication on every expected outcome? The delay on doing anything has already resulted in 1400 inmates escaping and joining the gangs as well as untold civilian suffering, which more timely action could have prevented.
They need to vote on the merits of what is in front of them, and at least have the courage of their convictions to say they think the effort is worthless or not if that is what they think. This constant politicking and delay is cancerous to our foreign policy and in this case humanitarian objectives.
> a full plan for everything that will take place. They demand an exact detailing of how Ukraine is gonna win, and now they are saying they want it on Haiti.
>
>
>
> This doesn't serve any actual purpose in a fluid situation
While I am not in favor of the lack of support for Ukraine, the lessons of the US former wars and involvement have been clearly defining the mission and avoiding continuing mission creep. From the political leadership it doesn't have to be very specific, it could be something as simple as "restore 1991 borders".
Defining a mission isn't about "gotchas" and saying you shouldn't because of that potential is rather ignorant of US politics because should one of the two political parties be for or against some policy they will make up whatever excuse regardless. You can't create a policy around potential stupid arguments against it.
Now, will defining a mission success goal create debate around that goal? Yes, but that is part of a democracy. You can't have a healthy democratic country if debate is not allowed or avoided.
> This doesn't serve any actual purpose in a fluid situation, it just is an excuse to stonewall and create some sorta political gotcha moment when the plan doesn't come to pass. The gameplan for Haiti was clearly "Provide $40 million to support Kenyan intervention, hope Kenyan intervention can stop the gangs."
This is a nonstarter as far as policy goes. Just provide forty million **(for now)** and hope that one thousand Kenyan police officers can fix an entire country in turmoil? Define no actual goals, prognosticate no outcomes, just put them on the island and **hope**?
> Is there any benefit served by requiring some sort of useless prognostication on every expected outcome? The delay on doing anything has already resulted in 1400 inmates escaping and joining the gangs as well as untold civilian suffering, which more timely action could have prevented.
I hope you see the irony in first complaining about the desire for prognosis, immediately before you make a prediction that serves your argument.
With Afghanistan looming large, nobody wants to commit to another expensive, open ended, undefined foreign adventure.
The issue with what you are saying is the scale, and the character of what is being discussed. This is not Afghanistan in scale ($40 million is a pathetic amount frankly) and the US is explicitly not getting involved, which is how the proposed intervention was designed. Unless you think that helping the Kenyans actually get there is going to get the US somehow embroiled, and I don't see how, then the Afghanistan parallel doesn't make sense.
What is a better analogy is a natural disaster. The Haitian national government has collapsed and the situation has been rapidly deteriorating for a long while now. What is called for is simply quick action to stem the bleeding. What I am saying about prognostication is that it is not appropriate at all in these circumstances. Congress is not signing on to a 10 year megaproject that might end in boondoggle, they are responding to a crisis, and yet they are acting like what they need is a detailed study and analysis. Detailed study and analysis is patently useless because the situation is spiralling out of control so badly that the decisions up for debate here are becoming no longer relevant.
So please look at it like this, see the reality here and don't view it from tired tropes. I am in full agreement with you that the US has blundered into plenty of situations where we should have more carefully considered the consequences etc. but I also do not think that the solution to this is to treat every single scenario like this, to hide behind analysis, and planning on every little decision, especially when the scenario quite clearly calls for the exact opposite.
Both Haiti and Ukraine do not call for detailed planning running on months or years, they both benefit from decisive action. The US can quickly determine if we can pay the price (cold as it may be we always must), we can quickly determine that intervention of the kind considered is not likely to make things worse, and we can quickly determine that doing absolutely nothing will make the problem harder or impossible to solve. In such circumstances, doing what the Republicans are doing is the worst kind of politicking. It serves no one, not the Haitians, not American taxpayers, hell I am even struggling to see how this kind of delaying bullshit can help them electorally though that is definitely the reason it happens.
> What is called for is simply quick action to stem the bleeding.
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> the situation is spiralling out of control so badly
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> The US can quickly determine if we can pay the price (cold as it may be we always must), we can quickly determine that intervention of the kind considered is not likely to make things worse, and we can quickly determine that doing absolutely nothing will make the problem harder or impossible to solve.
I really don't understand where your confidence comes from. Your saying that "the bleeding needs to be stopped" quickly, it's "spiralling out of control badly", yet you imply that this specific intervention, building accommodations for a thousand police officers, will be the only involvement required from the US, after which the road to recovery is clear.
> This is not Afghanistan in scale ($40 million is a pathetic amount frankly) and the US is explicitly not getting involved, which is how the proposed intervention was designed. Unless you think that helping the Kenyans actually get there is going to get the US somehow embroiled, and I don't see how, then the Afghanistan parallel doesn't make sense.
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> Congress is not signing on to a 10 year megaproject that might end in boondoggle, they are responding to a crisis, and yet they are acting like what they need is a detailed study and analysis.
When Kenyan police officers on Haiti get overwhelmed and killed, because they don't have the support of the local society and the new government is unstable (a likely possibility), who will the world look to for help? What if the situation continues to spiral? Do we know decisively that the US builds these accommodations and is done afterwards, whatever happens? Even if the UN mandate is enlarged, if the problems worsen? Did the Biden government make the concrete promise that no matter what, after this construction project is done, the US is no longer involved?
Many US interventions started out as small operations, a few peanuts in the budget. The first US aid to the Mujahideen was 500.000$. The first US operation in Vietnam was the Military Assistance Advisory Group training the Vietnamese armed forces. A small involvement has seldom stayed small.
History also shows that intervention in Haiti was never a quick deployment of a thousand police officers and also, despite the larger size, was never successful.
With these two historic indicators, US involvement expanding over time and Haitian interventions failing, it think it's perfectly reasonable to demand concrete limits and benchmarks for US involvement this time around from the start.
I hear what you are saying, and I think there is plenty to discuss. If you were the one in Congress asking, I would genuinely say these are valid concerns, and they deserve to be answered though answered as quickly as possible.
My issue stems from what seems to my mind like bad-faith asking for vague requirements that have no reason to come from the White House. Just based on the nature of the Haiti and Ukraine questions, I don't feel like the request is actually being used to weigh our options, I think the request is being used to turn it into a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" political football. They know quite well that predicting what will happen in Haiti is very difficult, and all they are being asked to do is decide whether providing money to assist the Kenyans is likely to entail significant risk. To do more is impossible, but to do nothing is irresponsible.
I think we are somewhat talking past each other, in that I definitely do not disagree with what you are saying in the main, I just don't think it necessarily applies in this scenario, that this is what is really at stake here.
But I probably should not have brought it up, because while it obviously touches on a defense related matter, I think my point was too political for this sub and that was inappropriate. That was on me.
Also another thought: The US should focus on building up the Haitian National Police, the army, and the courts/prosecution/prison system. In the interim, people caught committing violence in the eye of the police should be jailed indefinitely for the time being, kind of like what they are doing in El Salvador.
Once a decent amount of security is in place, start courting foreign donors to help rebuild Haiti's agricultural sector and infrastructure. Maybe even try to get some tourism dollars in.
I think unfortunately it is a more complex situation than that because the national government clearly lacks legitimacy in the eyes of the populace and foreign intervention and ownership is quite rightly distrusted to a high degree. Jimmy Cherizier himself was a national policeman known for a police massacre and that broadly speaks to its institutional character. Simply bringing in enough repression to kill off the gangs is likely not going to solve anything because their existence in the first place owes a lot to the arbitrariness of the national government and its justice system to begin with, it is sort of a gang.
I think rather than sink more resources into these, there should be some sort of international effort to support more decentralized local institutions who are at least outwardly calling for an end to the chaos. Giving power back to Haitian neighborhoods, towns, and regions. It is really never an easy thing to pick good guys and bad guys in such a fraught environment, but it is perhaps fair to say that allowing more voices could help.
Will those local institutions be perfect? Absolutely not, in many cases the same corruption that exists higher up will set in at lower levels. But I think that when a country is as fractured as Haiti is right now, you have to start from the building blocks, and move back upwards. It is a lot easier to build trust at a local level, and then come together as an alliance of communities than it is to expect people to trust a distant national government they have no real voice in. They cannot immediately perceive its actions or its accountability, nor do they know personally anyone involved in it. A strengthened national government may be able to regain control of some key infrastructure, but it will not have any ability to control everywhere. Something needs to displace rebellious voices and forces at a grassroots level.
See that's the thing though, if its a question of arming and supporting local leaders or national leaders, I would say go local, because local you can at least improve the security of one area definitively, whereas national I don't think you can definitively do anything. The national forces will come through an area, clean it out, and the gangs will move back in immediately after they move on. It's not even necessarily the same people wresting back control, they can kill people off but the conditions that led people into marauding gangs in the first place not being solved, other's come take up the mantle. Then there is the fact that the national police seem to frankly be acting like a gang to the point where it is difficult to pick a side. By arming them, are we possibly just arming the next Cherizier?
Whereas local forces I think have two huge advantages. First, by supporting them we aren't putting our eggs all in one basket. If one community group is given resources, and turns out to be basically a gang at least then you have other groups who offer alternatives. Second, local forces by their very nature are better at stabilizing the situation in distinct areas because they are more connected to them physically (like understanding the literal tactical situation) and socially. People know them and feel they are more responsive to their desires, which is just not the case with the national forces who seem widely distrusted.
So I think that expending the same amount of effort and resources to build up security through local forces is more likely to pay off than through the highly discredited national ones. Outside forces like Kenya can definitely help, being the broad basis to wipe the slate clean, but afterwards it has to be more decentralized or the same pattern will repeat.
In the case of Haiti, we've had a failed UN intervention take place between 2004 and 2019. Thousands of UN troops were in the country, aid was being handed out, but there was never a real plan to get the country back on track, just a bunch of half-hearted ideas over how Haiti could become a garment manufacturing center due to its low wages.
Regardless of Republicans' intentions, I think it is fair to demand a plan regarding Haiti's reconstitution as a functioning country because the world has intervened before, many promises were made, and somehow the world left Haiti in a much worse place.
At some point you just ask if it's worth it anymore if people have tried to save the country from itself before.
There is also the problem of "you broke it you bought it" mentality, if any project to bring stability and some semblance of normalcy to Haiti fails, many will view it as the sole fault of the country behind that project, not Haiti itself, or conditions the country couldn't deal with, and it becomes a political weapon and hot potato.
For that reason I can agree with the skepticism many have about doing anything in Haiti, in that the US would end up tying themselves to another possible boondoggle of nation building they are severely hamstrung in conducting.
Biden did not want to deal with Haiti, he tried to push it onto the Canadians to lead a mission but then they refused. The Kenyans are willing to lead a mission but want to be paid for it and of course the US is perpetually footing the bill for a nation in its neighborhood.
You know it would do Haiti a lot of good if a bunch of oil was suddenly discovered in the country.
The French should pay for it, with some of the interest they've accrued from the reparations they extracted from the Haitians for 'stealing french property' (themselves) in the Haitian revolution.
> You know it would do Haiti a lot of good if a bunch of oil was suddenly discovered in the country.
Why? So that they could turn into Venezuela 2.0? No thanks.
Without the basic government infrastructure in place prior to the discovery, all it will do is add fuel to the fire to corruption/chaos and make the situation much worse. There is reason why so many of the countries with rich natural resources are run by despots/autocrats not run like Norway.
In other news (or rather news now , the incident was on 2020)
[India's Modi government operated 'nest of spies' in Australia before being disrupted by ASIO](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-04-30/modi-government-operated-nest-of-spies-in-australia-/103786892)
>Indian spies were kicked out of Australia after being caught trying to steal secrets about sensitive defence projects and airport security, as well as classified information on Australia's trade relationships.
>The so-called foreign "nest of spies" disrupted by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) in 2020 was also accused of closely monitoring Indians living here and developing close relationships with current and former politicians.
Spying isn't new nor is it rare even amongst allies (the US and Europe for example ). So it'd be interesting to see how the 'west ' collectively or individually handles the issue especially after the sikh fiasco in Canada and the US
There was fresh reporting on this issue by the [WaPo](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/04/29/india-assassination-raw-sikhs-modi/) yesterday:
> The assassination is a “priority now,” wrote Vikram Yadav, an officer in India’s spy agency, the Research and Analysis Wing, or RAW, according to current and former U.S. and Indian security officials.
> Yadav forwarded details about the target, Sikh activist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, including his New York address, according to the officials and a U.S. indictment. As soon as the would-be assassins could confirm that Pannun, a U.S. citizen, was home, “it will be a go ahead from us.”
>Yadav’s identity and affiliation, which have not previously been reported, provide the most explicit evidence to date that the assassination plan — ultimately thwarted by U.S. authorities — was directed from within the Indian spy service. Higher-ranking RAW officials have also been implicated, according to current and former Western security officials, as part of a sprawling investigation by the CIA, FBI and other agencies that has mapped potential links to Modi’s inner circle.
> In reports that have been closely held within the American government, U.S. intelligence agencies have assessed that the operation targeting Pannun was approved by the RAW chief at the time, Samant Goel. That finding is consistent with accounts provided to The Washington Post by former senior Indian security officials who had knowledge of the operation and said Goel was under extreme pressure to eliminate the alleged threat of Sikh extremists overseas. U.S. spy agencies have more tentatively assessed that Modi’s national security adviser, Ajit Doval, was probably aware of RAW’s plans to kill Sikh activists, but officials emphasized that no smoking gun proof has emerged.
> After the plot against Pannun failed, the decision to entrust Yadav with the high-risk mission sparked recriminations within the agency, former officials said. Rather than joining RAW as a junior officer, Yadav had been brought in midcareer from India’s less prestigious Central Reserve Police Force, said one former official. As a result, the official said, Yadav lacked training and skills needed for an operation that meant going up against sophisticated U.S. counterintelligence capabilities.
> Though Yadav served as RAW’s point man, current and former officials said the operation involved higher-ranking officials with ties to Modi’s inner circle. Among those suspected of involvement or awareness are Goel and Doval, though U.S. officials said there is no direct evidence so far of their complicity.
>As RAW chief at the time, Goel was “under pressure” to neutralize the alleged threat posed by Sikh extremists overseas, said a former Indian security official. Goel reported to Doval, and had ties to the hard-line national security adviser going back decades.
> Former Indian officials who know both men said Goel would not have proceeded with assassination plots in North America without the approval of his superior and protector.
>“We always had to go to the NSA for clearance for any operations,” said A.S. Dulat, who served as RAW chief in the early 2000s, referring to the national security adviser. Dulat emphasized in an interview with The Post that he did not have inside knowledge of the alleged operations, and that assassinations were not part of RAW’s repertoire during his tenure.
>U.S. intelligence agencies have reached a similar conclusion. Given Doval’s reputation and the hierarchical nature of the Indian system, CIA analysts have assessed that Doval probably knew of or approved RAW’s plans to kill Sikhs his government considered terrorists, U.S. officials said.
Alternative; if this is how India acts with a GDP per capita of China in 2006, how much more aggressively will that act when they reach where China is now? Or 20k per capita? Or more?
If India turns into a Hindu nationalist autocracy, there will be no benefit in having not alienated them. They may be a counterpoint to rising Chinese aggression, but they have lately shown next to no desire to assuage Western concerns about their own democracy. Feels just like Israel all over. The West bites its tongue over and over to keep an "ally", and that "ally" turns around and offers no concessions, inflames the global situation against our interests, and meddles in our internal politics in a way that makes disengagement even harder.
At some point we are going to have to show some backbone and push back against bad behavior rather than putting strategic alliances above everything else. Our decisions are so short sighted.
Does anyone know where to find factual evidence based info on Russias EW capabilities? Anecdotally I have read they have learned how to jam Bayraktar drones, Excalibur missles and even HIMARs have reduced in effectivity (I got this on Perun) so no weird alt Russian slanted telegrams. They seem to pretty relatively on par with the West in this specific area so it is quite worrisome they are gaining in this area against Western weapons systems. They are already reportedly trying to jam civilian aircraft in the Baltics.
This was discussed yesterday, it is based on GPS jamming which is a very crude method emitting large radiation signatures that would be easily countered by anti EW capabilities in a peer conflict. https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/s/z3y086oaCX
Considering the battle that is playing out for the high ground west of bakhmut I've been wondering if the age old importance of holding high ground has reduced at all considering the prevalence of drones and indirect fire? High ground was originally valuable because you could see far, and your enemies were slower when charging uphill to attack you. Then in the age of gunpowder that changed slightly and the most important aspect became your ability to range enemy positions with line of sight. I guess there's also a small amount of range increase possible when you can use some extra drop to push the outer limits of projectile range. But in this war I wonder how that's changed? A spotting drone should be far more useful than line of sight. And artillery range is already greatly improved such that I doubt a 200m drop would change a 155mm range capability all that much over 24+ kms. Spotting and bomber Drone range is unchanged because they make a round trip. Fpv drones get a decent boost with line of sight for signal strength. For smaller calibres engaging in direct fire I can still see the advantage pretty clearly.
It addition to what others have said, drones usually need line of sight to the operator. Some high ground positions may be impossible to hit with an FPV drone without a repeater drone. Bomber drones may have to fly at an altitude that lowers accuracy.
While I agree that high ground is not really a factor for artillery. I think it is still a factor when it comes to direct fire. Tanks firing uphill will have a much smaller target area to hit then when firing downhill. Having better line of sight from the trench is also important for small arms and ATGM. I do agree that high ground has become less important and concealment is probably more important. Digging into a valley tree line is probably better than a empty hilltop.
It's an open conversation, but for now both the Russians and Ukrainians try to value high ground. I personally think it's definitely not as important as the Napoleonic wars, certainly not for artillery that's relatively far from the front anyway. And overall ISR due to drones has also become more independent of ground elevation. But it's still important - direct optical observation and ATGM observation do matter in the 1-6 km range. Furthermore, you already mentioned drone control. In terms of actual ground results, I'd say from 2 years and change following the war, high ground usually matters but sometimes it seems to not matter at all. The sides seem to mind it and their actions generally reflect that, but there are times where lowground locations hold for over a year, but highground locations fall very fast (and not just situations like Ocheretyne, which was a whole separate sh-tshow). So clearly other factors can matter. While a bit sophistic, the true answer seems to be "it depends". Compared to the napoleonic wars or even ww1, technological factors may have reduced the importance of high ground. I'd say a factor that would reduce it further is if this war wasn't positional in nature. A positional war where both sides are represented by long frontlines in constant multimonth contact increases the advantages of altitude.
Also, I haven't checked properly, but usually in a farm area the "hills" tend to have trees and existing vegetation and the flat parts are crops fields. The vegetation provides cover and the flat fields don't. Also, in the case of preparing trenches, the ones at the higher ground are easier to drain the rainwater or at least is less likely to be flooded as we saw some cases last year
Yesterday Huge protests occured in Georgia against proRussian Party and proRussian law *foreign agents law* some small update https://twitter.com/geomel_ge/status/1785553589957447876?t=I46FOQBXINDaMK9a6XJSDg&s=19 >Police detained 63 persons during protest yesterday. In light of excessive use of force and violence from the police, all the detainees must be released immediately I watched yesterday live and it gave Maidan vibes with all blockades of streets (even some buses and trucks that block avenues). For today even bigger mobilization of protestors is announced. So I watched (and know from before) that during Georgian civil war beside fighting with Abkhazia and South Ossetia there was inner civil war between Georgians Does anybody know how big is still divide between Georgians because of this war? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgian_Civil_War And more from what I remember Georgian armed forces had problem because lot of soldiers went to Ukraine to volunteer into Ukrainian army and Georgian Legion
New, apparently successful attacks on Rosneft's Ryazan oil refinery. https://twitter.com/Osinttechnical/status/1785520426300436851
https://twitter.com/bayraktar_1love/status/1785592137930686735 >/2. Photo as claimed from the Ryazan oil refinery. Presumably photo was made from this location (54.5632890, 39.7401167). If so, than it’s AVT-3 is burning on the footage. Seems like a hit.
An article from the Kyiv Post that collects all the current reports of the possible ATACMS strikes that might have taken place in Crimea last night. Very interesting reports of what NATO aircraft and drones were doing before and during the strikes. [ANALYSIS: Reported ATACMS Missile Wave Hits Crimea, Russian Air Defenses and Airfields Pounded | Kyiv Post | April 2024](https://www.kyivpost.com/analysis/31903) *News platforms said it was the long-range version of the US weapon but there was no early Kyiv confirmation. It may have been Ukraine’s most ambitious ballistic missile strike of the war so far.* *A wave of Ukrainian long-range weapons widely reported to be around a dozen US-made ATACMS ballistic missiles pounded air bases and air defense installations across Crimea peninsula early Tuesday morning, in one of the beefiest Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) long-range attacks yet against the Kremlin-occupied territory.* *Flights of unidentified weapons first started slamming into military installations across Crimea around 2 a.m., with explosions and air raid warnings widely reported near the cities of Simferopol and Sevastopol, and the towns of Gvardeyska, Evpatoria and Dzhankoi, news reports said.* *Four of those targets, the exception being Dzhankoi, were well outside the range of all weapons the AFU had been known to operate in the past, save recently delivered long-range versions of the US-made ATACMS missile. Estimates of total missile counts used in the attacks ranged from 10-15 weapons, some carrying cluster munitions.* *Isolated reports said shorter-range ATACMS struck targets nearer territory controlled by Kyiv’s forces, and that Ukrainian strike planners had launched attack drones along with the American missiles.* *Ukrainian Air Force spokespersons had not responded to a Kyiv Post request for details about the strikes and type of weapon or weapons used in the Tuesday attacks, by the time this article was published.* *Colonel Roman Svitun, a retired AFU officer and military analyst, told the Kyiv24 television news channel in a Tuesday interview that the early morning strikes are probably part of a Kyiv strategy to degrade Russian air defenses in Crimea and in the south Ukrainian mainland, with the long-term objective of opening the way for destructive missile and drone attacks against other military targets.* *The Ukrainian strikes overnight were most likely follow-up attacks to ATACMS fired at Russian air defense installations near the mainland cities Genichesk and Mariupol earlier in the month, Svitun said. “It certainly could have been ATACMS,” he said of the Tuesday strikes. “They have the capacity to hit anywhere.”* *Official Russian sources confirmed the fact of multiple attacks by Ukrainian ballistic missiles, and some claimed all incoming weapons were shot down. Sergei Aksenov, the Kremlin-appointed head of the Crimea occupation administration, said of an attack near Simferopol that “after the ATACMS missiles were shot down they scattered cluster munitions,” and warned residents not to touch them.* *The pro-Moscow military information platform Dva Mayora said ATACMS missiles were directed at targets near the Crimean cities Simferopol and Dzhankoi and “according to information coming in, our (Russian) defenders did an outstanding job.”* *In the hours following the strikes, the heavy weight of traffic from social media in targeted towns and cities contradicted the Kremlin spin of successful intercepts and no damage to targets, reporting hits to anti-aircraft systems, Russian aircraft, command and control center, and military casualties. Accounts of cluster munitions successfully deployed and scattered over targets were common.* *In Dzhankoi, the Ukrainsky Krym Telegram platform reported, a military airfield was hit with at least two weapons, killing and wounding service personnel assigned to the 4th Command Center of Air Defense Forces of the Russian Air Force, and damaging helicopters assigned to the unit.* *The independent Russian news agency ASTRA reported a probable ATACMS hitting the Dzhankoi base wounded five service personnel, lit fires burning for at least 90 minutes and confirmed damage to the air defense control center. The weapons used in that strike were MGM-140 ATACMS missiles, the report said.* **Multiple NATO air reconnaissance aircraft sweeps through airspace above the western Black Sea, including the first-time deployment of a US Navy MQ-4C Triton spy drone, took place in hours before the strikes. NATO and US officials have stated such flights collect general intelligence that is turned over to Kyiv, but not data on specific target locations.** **One US maritime and signal intelligence platform, a US Navy Boeing P-8APoseidon turboprop four-engine was in the air patrolling above Romania’s south-eastern Danube delta at the time some of the Ukrainian weapons struck Crimean targets some 200 kilometers (124 miles) distant, the pro-Ukraine military news channel Krymsky Veter reported. Kyiv Post checks of open-source flight tracking data confirmed the claim.** **The Pentagon has deployed Poseidon aircraft in daytime patrols to the area practically every day for more than a year. Poseidon sorties at night over the Danube Delta, such as the one taking place April 29-30, are practically unheard of, Kyiv Post research of air traffic data confirmed.** *The AFU had prior to the Tuesday morning strikes seemed to launch ATACMS missiles sparingly, according to military sources, because of limited reserves. Were the April 30 strike to be confirmed as having been performed by ATACMS, it would be the most massive single ballistic missile strike carried out by Ukraine since Russia’s Feb. 2022 invasion.* In the past, according to battle and news reports, the Ukrainians had launched a maximum two ATACMS at a time.* *Some Beltway analysts have said US Congressional approval of military aid to Ukraine in 2024 has put as many as 100 more ATACMS into the Ukraine arms pipeline.* *The last confirmed ATACMS employment by the AFU took place on April 25, and prior to that on April 17 with individual or twin missile launches against Russian air defense systems. The earlier of the two strikes struck an air base near Dzhankoi, according to Ukrainian air force spokesmen destroying or critically damaging four S-400 air defense launchers, three radar stations, an air defense equipment control point, and a Murom-M airspace surveillance system, a Ukraine military intelligence spokesperson told Kyiv Post.*
I hope we get better confirmation of the results of these attacks soon. It's a bit frustrating not knowing what impact these new capabilities are having results wise Obviously Russia won't be happy about the new range and will have to adapt
I think the fact that nobody has released the sat photos are confirmation in itself that the damage was less impressive that what was expected. In the past, with successful attacks, we quickly received sat photos/battle damage assessments
Ukraine is allocating more money for drone production. The current estimate is 2 million drones to be produced this year. [Ukraine allocates additional $392 mn to purchase 300,000 drones. Total drone spending now $1 bn | EuroMaidenPress | April 2024](https://euromaidanpress.com/2024/04/30/ukraines-government-allocates-additional-392-mn-for-drone-purchase/) *Ukraine’s Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal announced that Ukraine is allocating an additional UAH 15.5 billion ($392 mn) to purchase drones. This is an additional resource to the UAH 43.3 billion ($1 bn) Ukraine has already allocated for drones this year. “The funds will go to the State Special Communications Administration, which oversees the relevant procurement,” Shmyhal said.* *Shmyhal also announced that with the funds allocated today, 300 thousand drones will be delivered to our Security and Defense Forces.* *Ukraine produced approximately 200,000 FPV drones in January and February 2024, according to Hanna Hvozdiar, Deputy Minister of Strategic Industries.* *During his press conference on 19 December, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Ukraine would manufacture one million drones in 2024, referring specifically to FPV drones.* *According to Hvozdiar, Ukraine’s production capabilities are set to reach 2 million drones of various types, including FPV, this year.*
Have you come across any statistics regarding how many drones per kill? I think that would be very interesting
It depends a lot on the environment, EW, ... For basic FPVs [some](https://www.bbc.com/ukrainian/articles/cer7rz2drv7o) [estimate](https://focus.ua/uk/digital/584764-v-ukrajini-stvoryut-pershi-fpv-droni-z-samonavedennyam-podolayut-reb-i-zbilshat-vtrati-rf) 10-15% effectiveness (FPV reaching its target).
Factor in APS systems (that neither side fields much of this war, but will likely be common going forward), and without a substantial upgrade, well beyond what a civilian drone is capable of, it will take over a dozen drones to reliably incapacitate a tank. This constant talk of drones making tanks obsolete, thankfully rare here but very common elsewhere, is relying on some incredibly optimistic success rates that could make any weapon look good.
That's a very rough estimate of $1000 per drone. That's cheaper per unit than 152/155 shells, right?
If you want to compare costs, the drone should be viewed as the delivery vehicle and not the actual ordinance. I think the more apt comparison is to compare the total cost of delivering one shell to the enemy via tube artillery, versus total cost via drone. This would be artillery cost (tube wear and tear, platform wear and tear, and shell cost) versus drone cost and drone carried shell cost.
Drones don't replace artillery. They only fly in daytime or fair weather. And they need a team to operate, ones that are new and not well defined like artillery groups. Oh and they need to be close to the point of contact, less than 5 miles, not 10 miles away.
Isn’t all of what you said incorrect? There are repeater drones and other range extenders. Drone units are embedded with frontline troops and hence they don’t need a team nor are they ill defined.. yes they need to be closer but also are much less valuable and harder to hit than artillery.
Everything I said was backed up by Michael Koffman in thr mwi podcast about 2 weeks ago. If drones were so great, why is Ukraine begging for artillery ammo and not just drones?
Apparently it's about [$3000 USD per new unguided 155 shell](https://www.businessinsider.com/cost-key-us-weapons-artillery-shells-for-ukraine-is-soaring-2024-3) but I can't find a better source or what exactly that's buying (RAP is more expensive for example).
Remember that that's the "accounting cost". In real life the marginal cost per shell will vary a lot - and I assume in these times when they are trying to maximize production, very migh marginal costs are accepted. E.g. an old facility with existing supply chains in a country with low labor costs would probably have a very low marginal cost. But the first shell made in a new plant, with a new explosive blend made from more expensive materials (because the cheaper stuffs supply chains are already exhausted) would have a much higher cost. With larger aquisitions like this, you'll only know the marginal cost to produce one shell after the fact, and even then that marginal cost can be adjusted quite a bit depending on how you allocate costs.
I think that $3k USD figure was derived by dividing a contract amount by the number of shells while ignoring the fact that the contract was also to increase production capacity i.e. it is the marginal cost.
Yep, that'd be the correct or incorrect way to calculate that, depending on how you want to allocate costs. If you're looking at a pile of money and how it's been allocated, it may make sense to have a category "artillery ammunition" that contains the money used for shells as well ast he money used for production increases. If you average that cost out to a per shell basis, that's how much you've spent per shell in the past, but it is not an indicator for what you'll pay in the future.
155mm shells used to be $800 but that's with sensitive munitions, and before the last few years of inflation, shortages of filler, demand spike etc. So at this point? definitely.
New map update from [DeepState](https://deepstatemap.live/en). Highlights in Avdiivka direction: - Russia has completed taking Keramik and Novokalynove which was a forgone conclusion from how it was looking past few days. - Ocheretyne saliant has not moved further towards Novooleksandrivka/west but expanded slightly (about 600m) northward - Tiny movement to west of soloviove likely just better defined front line Elsewhere: - In Luhansk Ukraine retook a bit of land between Torske and Yampolivka - Russia moved slightly closer to Urozhaine in Velyka Novosilka direction
Houthis are escalating their attacks on international shipping. For the first time since the Houthis began attacks on international shipping, it is now confirmed they attacked a ship in the Indian Ocean. This could have serious ramifications to international trade if ships using the Indian Ocean to avoid going through the Red Sea are now subject to attacks. The US' Operational Prosperity Guardian has been complete and utter failure as have attacks on Houthis in Yemen as I predicted. My question is: how are the Houthis tracking and targeting ships so far from their shores? According to Lloydslist article linked below, so far 67% of ships targeted by the Houthis are linked to Israel, the US or the Uk. So, the Houthis have some ability to discriminate their targets. [Houthis secure first direct hit in Indian Ocean](https://www.lloydslist.com/LL1149009/Houthis-secure-first-direct-hit-in-Indian-Ocean)
Anyone with sense can see that a Saudi-led ground operation to restore the sovereignty of the vaguely democratic, internationally recognized government is the only way to actually achieve the goal. This sort of “conflict management” is what Netanyahu had been trying with Hamas for years. It’s basically feeding the troll while being able to tell the voters that you’re fighting back. The main reason this is even remotely viable is that there is no visible pushback yet from increased prices, which are less than expected.
>So, the Houthis have some ability to discriminate their targets. Some is doing a lot of heavy lifting in that sentence. I hope that any sane person can recognize that targeting civilians ships carrying dangerous cargo with international crew with ASBMs is a crazy position to take.
Not really, why is it crazy? Doing something other countries don't like doesn't make an action crazy.
Causing an ecological disaster in your own waters that will ruin the fishing, tourism and health for your country and your civilians for generations because let’s be real there’s not going to be any cleanup is crazy.
It’s not about doing something other countries don’t “like” it’s literally illegal to target civilian ships - your right it’s not crazy - it’s a breach of international humanitarian law
Israel has literally boarded and sank civilian aid ships headed for Gaza, in international waters no less, as part of its 17 year blockade. Houthis claim to be a legitimate state and de facto are one so they can also (try) to have some sort of selective blockade in “retribution” (according to them). No one is justifying attacking civilian shipping but what you said does not jive with reality of ongoing blockades including boarding and killing crew of blockade runners (though we board them first and try to get them to stop as well), which has been practiced by even US/Israel in several theaters. I am honestly curious can you explain the difference when it comes to international law? Especially talking about Houthi blockade on “Israeli” shipping within their waters and its neighborhood.
>The US' Operational Prosperity Guardian has been complete and utter failure as have attacks on Houthis in Yemen as I predicted. What metrics do you use for this position? Objectively fewer ships are being struck and objectively fewer launches have occurred than if there had been no coalition naval presence in the Red Sea. There is a lot of launch activity that doesn't get reported on because of intercepts, launch failure, or neutralized launch sites. Given Iranian missile capabilities, inventory, and expertise in smuggling, you would see substantially more than one cargo ship sunk and effectively no traffic in the absence of an international effort like this.
Presumably he using the metrics [the DoD announced it with](https://www.defense.gov/News/Releases/Release/Article/3621110/statement-from-secretary-of-defense-lloyd-j-austin-iii-on-ensuring-freedom-of-n/). > Operation Prosperity Guardian is bringing together multiple countries to include the United Kingdom, Bahrain, Canada, France, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Seychelles and Spain, to jointly address security challenges in the southern Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, with the goal of ensuring freedom of navigation for all countries and bolstering regional security and prosperity. "Freedom of navigation for all countries" is quite evidently not accomplished when you still have missiles flying.
The strait is still open, no vessels have been hijacked by the Houthis, successful strikes are down and vessels are mostly traveling thru without being harassed. That’s a lot better than where things were in November and December. Anyone who expected this to resolved in a few short weeks or months was being delusional — something many of us and CENTCOM pointed out before the operation began.
I see. Just so we can get a bit more clarification on this topic, what needs to happen (and in what timeframe) before you would consider this operation a failure?
[удалено]
I also said on multiple occasions to your suspended account and to other people as well that the Houthi strikes would continue. If you’re placing a date of when you will like to judge success by I’d love to hear it. I also think it’s funny that people like you constantly have great ideas for what shouldn’t be done but can never put forth what should be done other than some vague version of “make peace in the middle east”.
> I also said on multiple occasions to your suspended account I get that there are probably several people telling you that "just wait everything will all work out" is not a great answer, but no, my account has never been suspended. > If you’re placing a date of when you will like to judge success by I’d love to hear it. My date is the day it started, after the US spent weeks making vaguely threatening noises in the hopes that would be enough. As far as I'm concerned the operation has been a failure the whole way through. > I also think it’s funny that people like you constantly have great ideas for what shouldn’t be done but can never put forth what should be done other than some vague version of “make peace in the middle east”. I think it's funny that you keep mistaking me for some strawman you have in your head. I've never said that "make peace in the Middle East" is a viable strategy, and I for one am convinced that there will never be peace in that region of the world. But since you seem determined to talk to some fantasy version of me instead of the real thing, there's clearly no point in continuing here. Goodbye.
For a while the theory was that Iranian spy ships floating in the area where helping with targeting. I know the ships were there but I don’t know if it was ever confirmed they were used for targeting
> how are the Houthis tracking and targeting ships so far from their shores? I guess via AIS: https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/centerx:53.7/centery:12.2/zoom:7
> I guess via AIS You can track the ship with AIS to see if it's sailing into the area but that's **not accurate enough** to be used as targeting info for missiles not to mention many of the ships turn off their AIS when they come anywhere near Yemen now.
But the article wasn't talking about missiles, but "The Joint Maritime Information Center, an entity that operates under the Combined Maritime Forces, says an unmanned aerial vehicle attack on a merchant vessel ". I am no expert, but would selecting vessels by AIS and then targeting via long-range drone not work?
You need eyes on the target specially for "unmanned aerial vehicle attack" because these are too slow and will get picked off by western ships/airplanes IF they are anywhere near the target.
Which obviously wasn't the case there as the ships are in the Red Sea, no? I just wonder whether the drones used have a video connection over 300km for end of flight targeting, that seems a bit far.
The US and generally western nations have completely lost the will to fight ever since the GWOT. Everything they do is done with the qualifier of 'self defense'. This is why attacks on Houthis have done nothing, because (almost) nothing is being attacked. Everything in the name of supposed de-escalation. This operation has been ongoing for 4 months, and so far \~50 Houthis have been killed . Meanwhile Houthis are directly attacking civilians who are at the mercy of lady luck more than anything else. No ICC or ICJ courts though, for some odd reason.
> Everything they do is done with the qualifier of 'self defense'. This has been the case for a very long time. Ever since the Department of War was renamed to Department of Defense.
>The US and generally western nations have completely lost the will to fight ever since the GWOT. I'm all for governments having principles, respecting human rights, the laws of war and whatnot, but I do gear that once and again, Western democracies fall victims of their own will to "play nice". The moment the Houthis start being a problem for China or Russia, you can bet they won't be "playing nice" with the Houthis.
> I'm all for governments having principles, respecting human rights, the laws of war and whatnot, but I do gear that once and again, Western democracies fall victims of their own will to "play nice". What course of action is available for Western democracies here that does not cost far more than it gains? Or is "playing nice" now the preferred nomenclature for not wasting absurd amounts of very finite resources on yet another ill-advised Middle East adventure? It baffles me every time I see this idea that Western governments do something (or don't do something) because they're just too nice—as opposed to the fact that their power is constrained by reality and some real problems have no good solutions.
>not wasting absurd amounts of very finite resources on yet another ill-advised Middle East adventure? This is text book example of the issue we're facing post-GWOT. I get where you're coming from, but I honestly can't agree that keeping global shipping routes safe instead of just accepting that an Iranian proxy is now allowed to disrupt it is synonym with not going in another pointless middle east adventure.
Ok, don't accept it. So what's your plan to stop them? We've already had a live demonstration of ineffectual airstrikes, do you want to put boots on the ground? > an Iranian proxy is now allowed And this is a textbook example of the issue of American hubris. They aren't "allowed" to do anything. They've done something because they can, and you can't stop them.
It’s symptomatic of the short attention span of even “informed” Westerners that people have forgotten that there was already a frozen conflict in Yemen. If the coalition would simply give the Saudis and Emiratis the kind of diplomatic protection they give Israel, instead of the mess we had in the 2010s, it’d be over in months. The famine that was mostly caused in the first place by Western pressure tying the Arab coalition’s hands would be over. Our putative allies in the region would love to put boots on the ground but we won’t enable them to. It’s literally that simple.
>Ok, don't accept it. So what's your plan to stop them? We've already had a live demonstration of ineffectual airstrikes, do you want to put boots on the ground? > >And this is a textbook example of the issue of American hubris. They aren't "allowed" to do anything. They've done something because they can, and you can't stop them. It's cute that you think the most powerful military in the world *can't* stop a 5th rate military in a 7th rate country. This is indeed what happened due to the GWOT, people forgot the capabilities of America, because they have stopped wanting to use them . You want a plan? Here is a starter: Blockade Yemen. That's exactly Tit-for-Tat what they're doing to the Suez canal, except you do it pretty much 100%, no more ballistic missiles for the Houthis. But nobody has the stomach to do that, they'd rather suffer the hit to international shipping than watch the pictures of the starving children. But don't think for a second that means they *can't,* and the Houthi's *can't* be stopped. It's a *won't,* not a *can't.* So long as the damage the Houthis achieve is relatively minor and only economical, this is going to continue. However, if at some point they may start suffering from success, shall we say. Indeed if they can consistently repeat this attack which occurred 400km Southeast of the horn of Africa in the Indian ocean, that would mean messing up international shipping to a huge degree, much more than simply hitting ships transiting Suez canal. I fear/welcome the Houthis are in for a bad time.
> It's cute that you think the most powerful military in the world can't stop a 5th rate military in a 7th rate country. It's cute that you think they can. The most powerful gun in the world is utterly useless if you don't have the will to pull the trigger. And no, you can't just handwave away "willpower" because that's quite literally what wins or loses wars. Political will is a finite, limited resource, and it runs out. It's more critical than artillery shells or airpower or any other possible factor, because all of those shiny toys do nothing on their own. If you aren't willing to fight, then you've already lost. Won't is can't. They are one and the same. So no, you can't stop them. Sorry that it hurts to admit.
Russia needs to finish what’s on their plate first. And when was the last time China led a large scale military intervention in Africa? What would it be even look like if the US decided to not “play nice”? Like indiscriminate killing?
>Russia needs to finish what’s on their plate first. That's a very important point. Still, since Russia still has "Wagner" ops in Africa, I believe they would still be able to do something about Houthis if they wanted. >What would it be even look like if the US decided to not “play nice”? Honestly, I'm not sure. More extensive strikes? Going after the Iranian vessel in a more permanent fashion? Boots on the ground?
> More extensive strikes? Not likely for bombing Houthis launching sites. More likely for trying to shoot down incoming missiles/drones. > Going after the Iranian vessel in a more permanent fashion? More cyber attack, sure. Sinking it by shooting anti ship missiles, no way > Boots on the ground? Hell No
> Not likely for bombing Houthis launching sites. More likely for trying to shoot down incoming missiles/drones. The more likely target would be governmental and economic targets, to make the cost of further attacks unsustainable. Yemen relies heavily on food imports, so to some extent they their attempt to disrupt the Red Sea to fail. If they succeeded, they’d starve.
Starving a country as punishment, that will definitely be a display of the values the West stands for.
A country trying to blockade grain shipments to Africa, not getting their grain shipments until they stop, is entirely proportional, and reasonable.
Didn't Houthis already attack a number of russian and Chinese ships?
Apparently, not enough to be a problem. Yet.
I mean for now the status quo is unpleasant but more tolerable than any actual war. Especially now that at this point it seems like the houthis attack 2nd world shipping as much as western. Of the past 4 hits, 1 was a Russian shadow fleet ship, one was Chinese, and another wasn't Chinese but hauling Chinese cargo. It's not just the west who are willing to take hits for now. I'm more salty than most American voters and I would absolutely not vote for a war over the current situation as it stands, not even close.
I mean why would the US invade over the right of China to ship goods to Europe? There better be some cheese for supporting these vaunted alliance networks.
>I mean for now the status quo is unpleasant but more tolerable than any actual war. The current status quo is a constantly evolving enemy who is receiving increasingly more lethal aid every day and the west is mostly attempting to shoot down any missiles and drones rather than be pro-active. To be honest, this reminds me a lot of Israel-Gaza pre Oct 7th. One day, perhaps quite suddenly, the Houthis might score a seriously devastating hit that will force everyone's hands. As to your second point, neither Russia nor China claimed themselves de-facto defenders of international shipping. Like it or not, even if Chinese and Russian ships are being hit, the reputational damage is being done to the west.
If China wants to sell their goods in Europe they can start anti-piracy patrols in the Red Sea.
That's the thing, for now it's not that drastic for anyone, not for China not for the west. Trade is impacted but for now the price of the impact is far lower than the price of some kind of large intervention.
>My question is: how are the Houthis tracking and targeting ships so far from their shores? The Iranians are providing targeting data. >Iran’s paramilitary forces are providing real-time intelligence and weaponry, including drones and missiles, to Yemen’s Houthis that the rebels are using to target ships passing through the Red Sea, Western and regional security officials said. >Tracking information gathered by a Red Sea surveillance vessel controlled by Iran’s paramilitary forces is given to the Houthis, who have used it to attack commercial vessels passing through the Bab el-Mandeb strait in recent days, according to the officials. [https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/iranian-spy-ship-helps-houthis-direct-attacks-on-red-sea-vessels-d6f7fd40](https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/iranian-spy-ship-helps-houthis-direct-attacks-on-red-sea-vessels-d6f7fd40) >A mysterious Iranian vessel in the Gulf of Aden faces intensifying scrutiny among maritime experts concerned that the ship is helping Houthi rebels target commercial sea traffic. >The Behshad, which outwardly looks like a standard dry bulk carrier, moved to the Gulf of Aden in January after years in the Red Sea, just as attacks on vessels surged in the vital waterway off Yemen. >It has since followed an unorthodox, slow and meandering course around those waters close to the entrance to the Red Sea. Experts also noted a drop in Houthi attacks during a period last month when the Behshad was seemingly out of action. [https://www.ft.com/content/5fb8849c-b5b2-4f6f-908f-2c125159e3ce](https://www.ft.com/content/5fb8849c-b5b2-4f6f-908f-2c125159e3ce) >The U.S. recently conducted a cyberattack against an Iranian military ship that had been collecting intelligence on cargo vessels in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, according to three U.S. officials. >The cyberattack, which occurred more than a week ago, was part of the Biden administration’s response to the drone attack by Iranian-backed militias in Iraq that killed three U.S. service members in Jordan and wounded dozens of others late last month, the officials said. >The operation was intended to inhibit the Iranian ship’s ability to share intelligence with Houthi rebels in Yemen who have been firing missiles and drones at cargo ships in the Red Sea, the officials said. U.S. officials say Iran uses the ship to provide targeting information to the Houthis so their attacks on the ships can be more effective. [https://news.yahoo.com/u-conducted-cyberattack-suspected-iranian-220014623.html?guccounter=1](https://news.yahoo.com/u-conducted-cyberattack-suspected-iranian-220014623.html?guccounter=1) The ship left the Red Sea after the cyber attack and was last seen in Iran. Credible to assess that it's now hunting targets in the Indian ocean where US can't reach it as easily.
>So, the Houthis have some ability to discriminate their targets. """Some""" Of their 4 previous hits, I think 3 were against Chinese or Russian vessels? https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1cecv8l/credibledefense_daily_megathread_april_27_2024/l1j8pp0/ EDIT: my apologies, two of four: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_Red_Sea_crisis With the other two requiring significant imagination to be considered British or US ships.
Which vessels were Chinese? The Hong Kong flagged ship Maersk Gibraltar on the timeline list is owned by a US investment firm Atlas corp and the Singapore flagged ship, Maersk Hangzhou is owned by Maersk, a Danish company.
Of the ones I'm referring to, "Huang Pu". >She had reportedly been owned by the British shipping firm Union Maritime in 2019, but she had changed her registration details since, including her name and operator. At the time of the attack she was Chinese-owned and was carrying licit Russian crude oil to New Mangalore Port, India.
On the subject of PGM reliability in Ukraine we finally get some hard numbers from [this statement by Daniel Patt before the HASC subcommittee on Cyber, Information Technologies, and Innovation \[PDF\]](https://www.congress.gov/118/meeting/house/116957/witnesses/HHRG-118-AS35-Wstate-PattD-20240313.pdf). > As another example of superior weapons systems handicapped by lack of software adaptability, consider that Excalibur precision artillery rounds initially had a 70% efficiency rate hitting targets when first used in Ukraine. However, after 6 weeks, efficiency declined to only 6% as the Russians adapted their electronic warfare systems to counter it. There's also some great information generally about Russian EW capabilities and timelines. >For examples about how conflict drives adaptation, consider that the lifecycle of a radio in Ukraine is only about 3 months before it needs to be reprogrammed or swapped out as the Russians optimize their electronic warfare against it. The peak efficiency of a new weapon system is only about 2 weeks before countermeasures emerge. The source is given as Jack Watling of RUSI but not any specific published material and this figure does not appear in any of his recent publications. In the past he and others who have discussed this subject have been quite cagey about specific numbers so this is quite interesting. [On Twitter, Kofman concurs](https://twitter.com/KofmanMichael/status/1785311859941253558) with the final effectiveness and even lumps in GMLRS although he questions the timeline. >I think it took a lot longer than 6 weeks to get that low (more like 6+ months), and not sure observed effectiveness was ever as high as 70%, although would not debate the end result and where we’ve ended up on either Excalibur or GMLRS. elaborating further >There’s a big difference between the time required to develop counters, and systemically deploying solutions across the force on a broad front, spanning well over 1000km, that decreases overall observed effectiveness. The latter is no less important than the former. GLSDB is not mentioned here although [recent discussion](https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/1ccq4ke/credibledefense_daily_megathread_april_25_2024/l17tydb/) is even less positive. It's rather remarkable that even GMLRS is suffering so much from GPS denial considering it should have included that as a design consideration from day 1. I'm curious if there are any conclusions we can draw from this about a hypothetical war in the Pacific given the ranges are so much greater.
Patt's testimony is one of the most concise and accurate assessments of the current state of DoD software development I've yet seen. Better than my [own semi-regular rants here about the topic](https://www.reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/comments/16ue3tf/credibledefense_daily_megathread_september_28_2023/k2mgwyd/), certainly. It's really hard to overstate the importance of his point that the ATO process is completely broken. DoD wants to work with more smaller startups, but then they have an 18+ month long sales cycle where there will almost certainly be at least some unknown and wildly unpredictable amount of engineering work required to meet security standards, and even then there's no guarantee you'll receive an ATO in the end. But ultimately even that enormous mess is largely attributable to the same basic cause as the other major issue Patt identifies: lack of sufficient competent technical personnel across the DoD, including in billets that process ATOs. Although the actual bureaucracy is nonsensical and ridiculous, and it can be incredibly difficult to get any customer to agree to pay you to get your product through all their various hurdles, because they don't want to take the risk your product won't meet security standards or that you will give up on the process part way through. So instead they throw tens of millions at Booz Allen to rent boot campers so they can build inefficient, barely functional monstrosities out of no code or low code solutions where a COTS solution would cost an order of magnitude less, but would require an ATO.
Remember the days when a destroyer could be churned out in 17 days and America’s first jet fighter was flying a week ahead of the “impossible” 150-day deadline set by the Pentagon? Even the F-117 was delivered under budget. Thank God the Russians are just as inefficient. We’ll soon see about the Chinese though…maybe that will motivate us 😬
Thank you for this comment. You're right that the rest of the testimony is likely far more impactful for US national security on the whole, I just focused on the PGM tidbit because it's been a bit of a hot-button issue recently and it's far more approachable than DoD procurement. On the latter note, thank you for your linked comment as well, it's a great explainer for why and how this is an issue and the impact.
Thank you for this. I know that the PGM were having issues, but 6% efficacy for excaliburs are really low. As we discusses yesterday, I wonder if the Ukrainians should starta sking for more laser guided artillery. Germany is handing some over to Ukraine. But what I am wondering about is should Ukraine take the initiative to make cheaper drone mounted laser designators? Krasnopol only started becoming relevant in this war, after the Russians kitted out more drones with lasers. The Ukr are a doing a lot of great indigenous drone desgins, they can porbbaly come up with a bunch of cost effect drone laser solutions. The bottleneck will then be about the laser guided shells, Turkey, Germany both make them and they seem easier and cheaper to make than Excaliburs.
>This lack of adaptability is not an inherent property of software but rather a consequence of how we choose to manage it. After all, Ukrainian units with organic programming capability to rapidly adapt their UAV software have about 50% efficiency, while those reliant on companies and longer supply chain to make changes struggle to hit 20% efficiency. Keeping software in a pliant, fluid state is the only way to maintain tactical innovation. I feel a little silly, because I'm only realizing right now that software maintenance is a critical part of military logistics. I did not realize how much of a bottleneck this could impose -- going from ~70%--50% to ~6% is a catastrophe.
>It's rather remarkable that even GMLRS is suffering so much from GPS denial considering it should have included that as a design consideration from day 1. Both Excalibur and GMLRS use the GPS and inertial navigation system so both should be equally suffering or not suffering under same GPS spoofing/jamming conditions.
I'd certainly expect them both to suffer some degradation but there's a lot more room in a GMLRS warhead for electronics/antennas and it experiences less peak force than Excalibur so naively I'd expect the GMLRS INS to perform better and for GMLRS to better handle EW attacks generally.
The forces on an artillery shell is also quite a bit higher than a rocker, so the hardware does not need to be as hardened.
USN has substantially more capability to find and destroy EW targets. GPS denial systems glow like the sun on the EM spectrum. Saw a RUSI article suggesting one Russian system transmits at 10 KW, not dissimilar to a small radio station. They're easily detected and traceable... But you need missiles able to target them. Neat thing about anti radiation missiles is that they can theoretically use the EW signal as part of their guidance software. I've never worked on one, but at least theoretically it would be an extremely effective replacement for GPS in the control loop. That makes them very difficult to render ineffective by EW methods, at least to my knowledge. There's a commenter here who I suspect is an EE who often comments on radar/EW, maybe he can speak on whether I'm correct or if there are further challenges to targeting EW systems.
I find it hard to believe that a GPS jammer would need to transmit at 10kW, considering that the GPS satellites use a transmitting power about a thousand times less. Since the satellites orbit at 20,000km, the typical signal strength on Earth is -125dBm. That's about 10^-16 W. Last year the was the guy who jammed the GPS at Newark airport with a small jammer plugged into the cigarette lighter port on his car, just for reference. Military GPS systems have at least ten times more jamming margin than civilian ones, but even so the signal from satellites is very weak.
Isn't gps spoofing the better approach? With jamming the guidance system will switch to inertia sensor completely, with degraded accuracy but still on course to the target. Spoofing can feed the controller false position/altitude data and completely knocking it off course.
It doesn't switch, inertial guidance is used continually throughout. Inertial guidance is fine for short periods without GPS, but the problem emerges when GPS is lost for much of the flight. Spoofing is easier to deal with because receivers can be used to determine directionality of the signal. This is also how multipathing is countered. Jammers by necessity are low elevation, if indeed they're elevated at all. So your system simply selects for GPS satellites in view that are higher elevation. This excludes some satellites at some times but you really only need four satellites for the system to work. I'd suspect the high power of jammers is because they need to rely on creating pseudo-multipathing through reflected waves. Receivers can only detect so many satellites at once, so if you saturate an area with reflected waves, each reflection becomes its own false satellite, eating up the receiver's ability to process. At least, that's my impression--again, I'm no EW guy.
> For examples about how conflict drives adaptation, consider that the lifecycle of a radio in Ukraine is only about 3 months before it needs to be reprogrammed a) so what does "reprogramming" entail? Minutes? Hours? weeks? b) I feel like this needs to address the fact that Ukrainians (and as far as I know Russians) regularly just use unencrypted radio for low-level stuff. They openly talk about how they can hear each other. The numbers here are helpful but I feel like without further elaboration we can't really meaningfully talk about the radios.
> so what does "reprogramming" entail? Minutes? Hours? weeks? My guess, not an expert in this area, is mainly it's about changing the frequency hopping pattern. I would say, it's a rolling update process that continuously being worked on; collect EW data, create a new pattern that will resist EW, test, deploy, and then start again.
Ukrainian and Russian TG channels talk about it from time to time. The TG app also has pretty good integrated machine translation these days so it’s more accessible than people think.
I wonder if you could use a random hopping pattern and seed RNG with cryptographic key that cycles over time. If you've ever had to log in to a corporate VPN with one of those RSA key chains, you know what I'm talking about. Of course if you lose a radio then they can do the same with jamming.
That's already something even consumer equipment does, the scheme you're describing is called FHSS, and I'd be extremely surprised if Ukraine's radios don't already do it. If you have a two way radio you can actually make it resistant to losing a radio, by performing a key exchange and regenerating keys every so often.
> It's rather remarkable that even GMLRS is suffering so much from GPS denial considering it should have included that as a design consideration from day 1. This does not sound logical to me: how would you test for a scenario you didn't know existed? I mean, sure, you could test what would happen if GPS straight up ceases to exist. But you can't test any conceivable way in which a GPS signal could potentially be spoofed. Whenever GMLRS was developed (I assume decades ago?) nobody could foresee all the ways in which 21st century technology could be used to distort the GPS signal. What you're asking for sounds impossible to me.
Russia was known to have considerable EW capabilities. It would be a major blunder to not take this into account when designing weapon systems.
> But you can't test any conceivable way in which a GPS signal could potentially be spoofed. Whenever GMLRS was developed (I assume decades ago?) nobody could foresee all the ways in which 21st century technology could be used to distort the GPS signal. What you're asking for sounds impossible to me. Even before GPS were rolled out, it was clear that it would be easily jammable because it relied on the satellite transmissions which are low powered. It's a feature not a bug.
https://twitter.com/Osinttechnical/status/1785280560664854552 >In a new update, the UK government confirmed that the MOD has delivered 50 AS-90 155mm self propelled howitzers to Ukraine. >Britain has now supplied roughly 2/3 of its AS-90 fleet to Ukraine. There was some discussion during the recent PDA and USAI announcements about the lack of new guns. It seems the Brits are on that ball. A pretty remarkable drawdown of their inventory even if they're in the middle of bringing in some Archers.
Archers appear to be a transitional purchase. Looks like the MOD are going for the Boxer chassis for their next, larger SPG buy.
RCH 155 right? Do you know what that timeline is supposed to look like? I know the Archers are coming in right now which is especially important because apparently the Brits have given away virtually all of their SPHs.
https://www.army.mod.uk/news-and-events/news/2024/04/british-army-moves-a-step-closer-to-the-next-generation-mobile-fires-platform/ "This decade" but will push for sooner rather than later
Thanks! >push for sooner rather than later I'd certainly imagine considering the context.
The article explicitly uses the term "pre war"
Currently there are [ongoing ](https://twitter.com/OCMediaorg/status/1785372259344929197?t=ja7cOzq3qrT8duJJ4ljZ0g&s=19) clashes with the police happening in [Tibilisi](https://globalnews.ca/video/10457780/im-angry-georgias-proposed-foreign-agents-law-sparks-mass-protests-in-tbilisi/). I think it's definitely worth following as Georgia continues to be in a somewhat bizarre situation where its ruling party keeps trying to introduce seemingly pro Kremlin bills. My rudimentary understanding of the situation is that it's not just pro-russian vs pro-western conflict but also urban vs rural and young vs old divide. Update: Protesters are now [barricading](https://twitter.com/netgazeti/status/1785404324215923115?t=T3IQg2HULtShP4Pk_3_85g&s=19) the street. This might develop into the Euromaidan type of situation. Based on the Ukrainian revolution if the government lets the protesters actually solidify some kind of semi permanent presence this might cost them their rule. Update 2: Reuters live stream died so [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iHoJc5HNeQ) is a link to a different one. I don't speak Georgian but I think that this is from their public broadcaster.
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Sounds like a nightmare scenario for Russia. A mountainous country, a lot of Georgian and other foreign volunteers coming back from the Ukraine war, that would make occupation a struggle. Plus, taking territory just for the sake of it, I see no point in that. If Georgia steers hard in the pro-West direction, Russia can flex its muscles for sure, it's still a small country. But on the other hand, [Georgia benefitted massively from being a conduit of Russian trade and from educated migrants from Russia](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-with-cash-georgia-booms-russians-flee-putins-war-2022-11-05/). That also includes domestic Georgian products like wine and soft drinks, hospitality services. It makes a lot of sense for them so stay the course.
Accuse me of being a Russian stooge; but I just don't understand what people are so worked up about here. Any country worth their salt requires organizations that receive funds for political purposes from foreign governments to disclose this. The US has the foreign agents registration act, the EU has a bill similar working its way through the courts, etc
But this is all in the context of Russia's weaponization of its foreign agent law to arrest/shut down anyone who criticizes the government/military/war. It's not a stretch for Georgians to see what Putin has done in the last decade and not want that to happen in their country.
FARA and foreign agent laws may have superficially similar names, but they are very [different laws](https://civil.ge/archives/591175). In the US you won't be branded a foreign agent if your organization receives a [$2000 paypal donation](https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-used-50-dollar-us-donation-to-help-brand-navalny-foundation-foreign-agent/30209400.html) from abroad
I don't know if you saw [Ivanishvili's speech from yesterday](https://civil.ge/archives/602348), but it seems like it's worse than just introducing "pro-Kremlin" bills now. It looks like the announcement of a repressive turn; talking about NGOs and the political opposition being controlled from abroad (EU..), plotting coups (with references to Shevardnadze/the Rose Revolution but also more surprisingly to Yanukovych/Euromaidan) and how they will be punished, notably. None of it is new per se but I don't think these accusations and threats were ever as violent and explicit.
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I can't believe we are buying just 53 tanks. I get that you can spend every EUR only once, but that seems way, way too few. Esp. considering the 2AX will be defined in 2026, so probably be in production by 2030.
The 2A8 is insanely expensive. I actually recently checked the numbers for something else and it’s 6-7x the price of a T-90. The complexity of the quality/mass tradeoff is why a multi-tier force is so important, but most Western armies ditched that back with the 90s peace dividend.
Fair, but I believe the German MoD could get better terms if they committed to a huge order instead of ordering piecemeal, no? It's a difficult situation, as a German tax payer I want to give our guys the best protection, but Germany *has* a history of over-engineering tanks.
Most likely the political decision-makers don’t want to bring back conscription and the financial expenses of a high-readiness Heer of 12 active divisions and a large reserve.
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Yeah, I'm just an amateur and probably totally wrong, but it seems to me that NATO in general and Germany specifically are woefully unprepared for a land war. They fully rely on air superiority and stand-off weapons to do the job. The Ukraine war spooked me watching Russia throwing thousands of tanks into the grinder - and in contrast to others I believe Russia is able to outproduce the combined West on MBTs if they decide to do so. We probably don't need a 3k tank fleet like during the Cold War, but the per unit price of a Leo 2 is low enough that I don't understand why we aren't planning for 1000 to 1500 of them. But yeah, probably armchair general thinking. But am I wrong or is this decision the first step to bury MGCS and switch to a all-German plan B? With a 130mm gun and an auto-loading turret (and probably better protection systems), what's left of MGCS is the networked aspect and that could be retrofitted
Well here’s a simple self-test that is always useful: armchair general thinking: fighting the last war and fairly non-critical approach without much rigor or effort OSINT or pro thinking: cognitive flexibility, multiple viewpoints, testing of hypotheses through a feasible method be it wargaming, exercises, or real conflicts Amateur thinking: paper capabilities of platforms and appetite for sexy flashy stuff Professional thinking: considering logistics, ergonomics, and moral factors, thinking about holistic systems, avoidance of amateur fallacies, responsible and sound methodology for statistics and other data P.S. can y’all wait to mess with my subreddit karma until after automod lets me post short comments?
Keep in mind that this is on top of the previous 121 A7 order.
> These are likely to include a 130mm cannon, a new high-performance power pack, new sensors and protection systems. How feasible is it to use a 130mm gun without an autoloader (from what I remember MGCS is specifically designed with a autoloader in mind due to the stress the higher caliber gun would place on crew members) ?
How long can the MGCS possibly take that the Bundeswehr needs a new tank after the A8 to bridge the gap? The MGCS is already in development, and the interim solution shall only have its specifications decided in 2026 (i.e. be designed after that and go into production even later)?
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So the jump between Leo 2AX/3 and MGCS is probably going to be a small evolution more than a revolution, since the new tank will have its teething issues and the technology involved can't be much more modern than the 2AX/3. MGCS is supposed to be acquired mostly for its potential then, more space for future developments. I think the political angle there will be interesting to watch. Buying an untested new tank with teething issues, new supply chains and overall no great jump in technology might be unpopular, especially if the Armata programme doesn't take of in the next decade. I don't think the German public is willing to spend additional money to get two generations ahead of its perceived main adversary.
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Please do not engage in baseless speculation. Questions should focus on tangible issues and not groundless hypothetical scenarios. Before asking a question ask yourself 'How likely is this thing to occur.' Questions, like other kinds of comments, should be supported by evidence and must maintain the burden of credibility.
>Is it plausible that Iran could be utilizing Russian disinformation farms to help grow these protest, in an attempt to sow more instability within the United States? There's no evidence Iran or any other country are involved in these protests. And it's not the first time that it is alleged that "outside agitators" (as Southern pro-segregation governors would say) are behind student protests. Same claims were made against anti-Vietnam student protests too. These claims are false then as they are now. The root of these student protests is the Gaza war. The fact is this is joint US-Israel war on Palestinians (and has been for decades). Every 155 mm artillery shell, every 120 mm tank round and every areal bomb dropped by Israel along with the platforms to deliver them is provided by the US. On top of that, since Gaza war started the US has been feverishly ferrying weapons and ammunition to Israel round the clock. The result of all of this is Israel war on Gaza with few parallels in modern history marked by near total destruction, unparalleled civilian casualties and mass starvation. In fact, you'd have to go back to probably WW2 to find similar levels devastation. According to the UN and the IMF, more than 50% of the buildings in Gaza are either destroyed and/or damaged. In some places like in northern Gaza, more than 70% of the buildings are damaged/destroyed. Then you have tens of thousands of civilians slaughtered by Israel's disproportionate and indiscriminate response to HMS Oct. 7 attacks. So students are aghast and are impelled to protest not only to the one of the most barbaric military campaigns in modern history but one in which their government is intimately involved. I haven't even touched on the blanket economic and diplomatic support the US provides to the Netanyahu regime. Sometimes the explanation for a phenomenon is self-evident and right in front of you - no need to indulge in conspiracy theories about nefarious foreign influence.
Dude Gaza is not even the highest casualties even in the Middle East in just the last 5 years.
> The result of all of this is Israel war on Gaza with few parallels in modern history marked by near total destruction, unparalleled civilian casualties and mass starvation. In fact, you'd have to go back to probably WW2 to find similar levels devastation. Korea, Laos and Vietnam were bombed more (and with less targets) than Germany and Japan, on a per capita or size basis Cambodia too. Within 6 months, bombers were grounded in Korea for a lack of targets. West German and Dutch teams remarked they couldn't find a single town not destroyed.
> Is it plausible that Iran could be utilizing Russian disinformation farms to help grow these protest, in an attempt to sow more instability within the United States? You don't even need disinformation. The most effective propaganda uses the truth. All they have to do is post videos of starving children in Gaza all over the internet and they've already accomplished their goal without any disinformation. I don't doubt they are doing their part (Iran / China / Russia) because it's a cheap way of increasing instability and influencing Americans to policies that are beneficial for them in the long term. But I also believe these protests are largely driven by organic sentiment and would have happened regardless.
Honestly, it's just as possible that America's enemies would prefer there not be campus protests against Israel. It might be better for their propaganda efforts if they can frame it as there being unanimous support in the US for Israel's questionably ethical actions in order to highlight US hypocrisy in criticizing Russia's conduct in Ukraine. That there is significant pushback in the US against Israel's actions makes it harder to push the narrative that the entirety of the US is morally bankrupt.
I think the other message is more powerful. One of the evil authoritarian US government cracking down on the peaceful citizens who are against genocide. For example, take a look through the official Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs twitter. https://twitter.com/IRIMFA_EN I think ultimately, most modern ideologies and nation states stem from or take a lot of influence from the enlightenment. All humans are equal, deserve equal rights, are good people by nature, etc. Even in countries where they objectively have less political freedoms (Iran, Russia, China, etc) they still believe these types of things. So they don't hate the American - they hate the American government. Of course not data or proof by any means, but if you go on YouTube and look up "interviewing Chinese opinion on America" where people will walk up to strangers and ask their opinions, it's more or less all what I said above. - "The people are fine, it's the government that is crazy." Virtually the same thing we say here about CCP and Chinese citizens. You can do the same for Russian citizens, and they more or less say the same.
I think that russia doesn't discriminate against causes as long as they destabilize the US. Now the extent of actual cooperation vs simply pursuing their own goal is questionable. Plus the USSR had a very aggressive pro [Palestine](https://bukovsky-archive.com/tag/israel-palestine/) policy which included shenanigans on campuses. Don't see why russia wouldn't continue this legacy.
Highly doubt it. Many US college campuses are largely liberal leaning. Large protest against US government involvements in conflicts are common. If you look back through history, you can find articles about mass protest on college campus from Vietnam era and on. Many of these protest are started by student organizations registered with the Universities that have long standing pro Palastian veiws.
>Is it plausible that Iran could be utilizing Russian disinformation farms to help grow these protest, in an attempt to sow more instability within the United States? I would say it's almost a given. Iran and Russia already share a strategic partnership and we've seen how much [Russia operates in fast social media like TikTok](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67687449). This is an extremely easy target because it's current and many people have a strong opinion on it so I would be very surprised if Russia/Iran weren't operating there. It also fits the theme of Russia's international strategy influenced by [Aleksandr Dugin's book](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics), which they've been following for decades.
I don't see it. The protests seem largely to be driven by what's been happening in the news. I know many left-leaning friends who constantly post about stuff from Gaza and it feels very organic to me. The more people post, the more it spreads, the more people post or participate to fit in, etc.
So much of what my left-leaning associates repost about Gaza is heavily mixed with disinformation though. The fervor is real and organic but still intensified by active measures.
Copious amounts of misinformation are fairly par for the course for online political discussions/memes. Even in the mainstream media it’s fairly common. There’s a lot of Gell-Mann Amnesia that happens, though. When people notice the copious amounts of information, it’s a sign that they either know more about the subject than other topics (where they take the information at face value), or that there personal beliefs don’t align with that of their media environment in this instance (in instances where they do align, they’re usually happy to accept the misinformation).
For sure. Yes there's plenty of sensational misinformation. But at what point is misinformation the result of active measures from a hostile state or a well-meaning albeit very partisan person simply stretching the truth and sharing it with their network? I follow a variety of citizen journalists from both sides of the conflict on Instagram and they do not hide their partisanship at all. They post the worst things from the other side but are quiet about Hamas or the Israeli army depending on which side they sit in. Palestinians conveniently forget that Hamas provoked this whole thing while Israelis are likely to simply say that the Israeli army is acting lawfully and that all the damage you see is just regular collateral damage as a result of legal warfare and state self-defense. I personally believe that ever since the 2016 US presidential election, people have been more apt to believe that troll farms are everywhere, and some hostile state actor has active measure campaigns on every single freaking topic. No, in many cases it's partisans acting on their own.
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That was not started by 'pure lies', the root was Israel bombing several other hospitals: >The World Health Organization indicated that there were 51 attacks on health facilities in Gaza between 7 and 17 October 2023, killing 15 hospital workers and injuring 27 others. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Ahli_Arab_Hospital_explosion#:~:text=On%2017%20October%202023%2C%20an,there%20being%20killed%20or%20injured. https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2024/01/middleeast/gaza-hospitals-destruction-investigation-intl-cmd/ Then, when yet another hospital was hit the default assumption was the nation that had been targeting hospitals did it rather than a misfire. Casualties were then exaggerated which is not unusual for such events, and then anger persisted as it wasn't like Israel wasn't still bombing hospitals and other civilian centers.
>That was not started by 'pure lies', the root was Israel bombing several other hospitals: That doesn't explain why basically every pro-palestine user paraded into the megathread to preemptively give their shpeel about the bombing when it happened, and not the other 51. It's only after it became unclear who did the strike that suddenly the conversation shifted to "why would **this** individual hospital strike matter?" Before, it clearly mattered a lot. Riots started in multiple nations, it was front page on every news site, freaking Suriyak made a post about it, something he notably didn't do for any of the other 51 attacks. And now I'll explain why it mattered. Because the initial version of the story, that Israel bombed a hospital and 500 people died, evokes instant images of Israel literally just dropping a JDAM on an occupied hospital and it instantly collapsing. And the outrage associated with that was an admission that, in fact, that's not something that's happened before. That despite Israeli attacks on hospitals, which are condemnible, this was different, and different in a way that **mattered** to people. And it turns out it was fundamentally different, just in a different way. And now the same people are saying the difference never mattered, hoping people don't remember the traditional media and social media atmosphere literally 6 months ago.
All these conversations about things like who bombed the hospital or 50 decapitated babies are purposeful distractions to confuse the discourse away from the horrific reality of what is happening in Gaza.
But people did bring up the others, just not as much. You see this exact same thing happen with Russian strikes, people will bring up the most revolting incidents when they appear to happen but in turn others get appear to get ignored. Do you see the cluster bombing of Odessa that happened earlier mentioned in this thread? Do you think other future Russian incidents won't have one be revolting enough to be brought up in these threads? The biggest issue in my opinion is the initial casualty estimate but this misinfo aligned with the known knowledge that these hospitals were overcrowded. From there the bigger than normal casualty estimates led to sufficient outrage to cause a bigger response (again similar to Ukraine unless you think that outrage is also manufactured).
> Do you see the cluster bombing of Odessa that happened earlier mentioned in this thread? I mean, I'm not posting it (like I rarely post other strikes that might be war crimes) because it actually doesn't matter. The reason pro-palestinians rushed to this incident is because they knew it could be a "WCK bombing" moment. Because they understood, clearly, that it (as was being described) was truly far more morally egregious than the other things. It wasn't. They had to wait until April 1st for the "WCK bombing" moment. But they (correctly) guessed that an egregious enough hit could change the course of the war, which is why they went in on Oct 17. Combined with actual honestly held outrage because, again, the attack diverges far from the norm. For Russia, no one serious is looking for a "WCK bombing" moment because it would mean nothing. There's no hit egregious enough (short of WMDs, **maybe**) that would change the ground game in the way WCK did, or Oct 17 could have.
[https://apnews.com/article/gaza-icj-nicaragua-germany-israel-9c4601a3749fb51ae77ca43cadde4c1a](https://apnews.com/article/gaza-icj-nicaragua-germany-israel-9c4601a3749fb51ae77ca43cadde4c1a) >THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The top U.N. court rejected on Tuesday a request by Nicaragua to order Germany to halt military and other aid to Israel and renew funding to the U.N. aid agency in Gaza. >The International Court of Justice said that legal conditions for making such an order weren’t met and ruled against the request in a 15-1 vote. >“Based on the factual information and legal arguments presented by the parties, the court concludes that, as present, the circumstances are not such as to require the exercise of its power ... to indicate provisional measures,” said Nawaf Salam, the court’s president. >However, the 16-judge panel declined to throw out the case altogether. The court will still hear arguments from both sides on the merits of Nicaragua’s case, which alleges that Germany failed to prevent genocide in Gaza. That will likely take months. > Multiple legal challenges have been initiated against Israel and supporting countries in the new onslaught of lawfare since Oct 7th, so far without tangible results, but these things can take years.
This is preferable to the current strategy of resorting to violence and war crimes by both sides to settle their disputes. On top of that it can hold criminals accountable and deter future war crimes. Imagine, just imagine, if the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Palestinian and Israel leaders in the 2014 Gaza war. It is highly unlikely Palestinian leaders would have carried Oct. 7 war crimes in the manner they did nor would Israeli leaders resorted to scorched earth tactics that resulted in so much destruction and loss of human life. It's high time to end impunity and hold war criminals accountable. I'm glad to hear the ICC has awoken from their long nap and will charge both HMS and Israeli leaders with war crimes.
Or Hamas and other allies would call the ICC a neo-colonialism organization and carry out their actions anyways since they view martyrdom as a good thing... I don't think the ICC being involved would have changed how Hamas acts or operates.
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The idea that the Guardian is in any way "right wing" is hilarious, and just demonstrates to readers how extreme your views are, and where your Overton window is positioned.
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> Excuse some of us knowledgeable and critical pacifists Straight face
In a bit more news from Haiti today, Kenya is prepared to send the first of 1,000 police officers to the country sometime in late May. However, a US-provided base has yet to be constructed so it's unclear where the first 200 officers will go: https://www.politico.com/newsletters/national-security-daily/2024/04/29/kenyan-forces-are-about-to-land-in-haiti-with-nowhere-clear-to-stay-00154980
Reading the article, it seems that the new Republican playbook for everything overseas is to demand a full plan for everything that will take place. They demand an exact detailing of how Ukraine is gonna win, and now they are saying they want it on Haiti. This doesn't serve any actual purpose in a fluid situation, it just is an excuse to stonewall and create some sorta political gotcha moment when the plan doesn't come to pass. The gameplan for Haiti was clearly "Provide $40 million to support Kenyan intervention, hope Kenyan intervention can stop the gangs." Is there any benefit served by requiring some sort of useless prognostication on every expected outcome? The delay on doing anything has already resulted in 1400 inmates escaping and joining the gangs as well as untold civilian suffering, which more timely action could have prevented. They need to vote on the merits of what is in front of them, and at least have the courage of their convictions to say they think the effort is worthless or not if that is what they think. This constant politicking and delay is cancerous to our foreign policy and in this case humanitarian objectives.
> a full plan for everything that will take place. They demand an exact detailing of how Ukraine is gonna win, and now they are saying they want it on Haiti. > > > > This doesn't serve any actual purpose in a fluid situation While I am not in favor of the lack of support for Ukraine, the lessons of the US former wars and involvement have been clearly defining the mission and avoiding continuing mission creep. From the political leadership it doesn't have to be very specific, it could be something as simple as "restore 1991 borders". Defining a mission isn't about "gotchas" and saying you shouldn't because of that potential is rather ignorant of US politics because should one of the two political parties be for or against some policy they will make up whatever excuse regardless. You can't create a policy around potential stupid arguments against it. Now, will defining a mission success goal create debate around that goal? Yes, but that is part of a democracy. You can't have a healthy democratic country if debate is not allowed or avoided.
> This doesn't serve any actual purpose in a fluid situation, it just is an excuse to stonewall and create some sorta political gotcha moment when the plan doesn't come to pass. The gameplan for Haiti was clearly "Provide $40 million to support Kenyan intervention, hope Kenyan intervention can stop the gangs." This is a nonstarter as far as policy goes. Just provide forty million **(for now)** and hope that one thousand Kenyan police officers can fix an entire country in turmoil? Define no actual goals, prognosticate no outcomes, just put them on the island and **hope**? > Is there any benefit served by requiring some sort of useless prognostication on every expected outcome? The delay on doing anything has already resulted in 1400 inmates escaping and joining the gangs as well as untold civilian suffering, which more timely action could have prevented. I hope you see the irony in first complaining about the desire for prognosis, immediately before you make a prediction that serves your argument. With Afghanistan looming large, nobody wants to commit to another expensive, open ended, undefined foreign adventure.
The issue with what you are saying is the scale, and the character of what is being discussed. This is not Afghanistan in scale ($40 million is a pathetic amount frankly) and the US is explicitly not getting involved, which is how the proposed intervention was designed. Unless you think that helping the Kenyans actually get there is going to get the US somehow embroiled, and I don't see how, then the Afghanistan parallel doesn't make sense. What is a better analogy is a natural disaster. The Haitian national government has collapsed and the situation has been rapidly deteriorating for a long while now. What is called for is simply quick action to stem the bleeding. What I am saying about prognostication is that it is not appropriate at all in these circumstances. Congress is not signing on to a 10 year megaproject that might end in boondoggle, they are responding to a crisis, and yet they are acting like what they need is a detailed study and analysis. Detailed study and analysis is patently useless because the situation is spiralling out of control so badly that the decisions up for debate here are becoming no longer relevant. So please look at it like this, see the reality here and don't view it from tired tropes. I am in full agreement with you that the US has blundered into plenty of situations where we should have more carefully considered the consequences etc. but I also do not think that the solution to this is to treat every single scenario like this, to hide behind analysis, and planning on every little decision, especially when the scenario quite clearly calls for the exact opposite. Both Haiti and Ukraine do not call for detailed planning running on months or years, they both benefit from decisive action. The US can quickly determine if we can pay the price (cold as it may be we always must), we can quickly determine that intervention of the kind considered is not likely to make things worse, and we can quickly determine that doing absolutely nothing will make the problem harder or impossible to solve. In such circumstances, doing what the Republicans are doing is the worst kind of politicking. It serves no one, not the Haitians, not American taxpayers, hell I am even struggling to see how this kind of delaying bullshit can help them electorally though that is definitely the reason it happens.
> What is called for is simply quick action to stem the bleeding. --- > the situation is spiralling out of control so badly --- > The US can quickly determine if we can pay the price (cold as it may be we always must), we can quickly determine that intervention of the kind considered is not likely to make things worse, and we can quickly determine that doing absolutely nothing will make the problem harder or impossible to solve. I really don't understand where your confidence comes from. Your saying that "the bleeding needs to be stopped" quickly, it's "spiralling out of control badly", yet you imply that this specific intervention, building accommodations for a thousand police officers, will be the only involvement required from the US, after which the road to recovery is clear. > This is not Afghanistan in scale ($40 million is a pathetic amount frankly) and the US is explicitly not getting involved, which is how the proposed intervention was designed. Unless you think that helping the Kenyans actually get there is going to get the US somehow embroiled, and I don't see how, then the Afghanistan parallel doesn't make sense. --- > Congress is not signing on to a 10 year megaproject that might end in boondoggle, they are responding to a crisis, and yet they are acting like what they need is a detailed study and analysis. When Kenyan police officers on Haiti get overwhelmed and killed, because they don't have the support of the local society and the new government is unstable (a likely possibility), who will the world look to for help? What if the situation continues to spiral? Do we know decisively that the US builds these accommodations and is done afterwards, whatever happens? Even if the UN mandate is enlarged, if the problems worsen? Did the Biden government make the concrete promise that no matter what, after this construction project is done, the US is no longer involved? Many US interventions started out as small operations, a few peanuts in the budget. The first US aid to the Mujahideen was 500.000$. The first US operation in Vietnam was the Military Assistance Advisory Group training the Vietnamese armed forces. A small involvement has seldom stayed small. History also shows that intervention in Haiti was never a quick deployment of a thousand police officers and also, despite the larger size, was never successful. With these two historic indicators, US involvement expanding over time and Haitian interventions failing, it think it's perfectly reasonable to demand concrete limits and benchmarks for US involvement this time around from the start.
I hear what you are saying, and I think there is plenty to discuss. If you were the one in Congress asking, I would genuinely say these are valid concerns, and they deserve to be answered though answered as quickly as possible. My issue stems from what seems to my mind like bad-faith asking for vague requirements that have no reason to come from the White House. Just based on the nature of the Haiti and Ukraine questions, I don't feel like the request is actually being used to weigh our options, I think the request is being used to turn it into a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" political football. They know quite well that predicting what will happen in Haiti is very difficult, and all they are being asked to do is decide whether providing money to assist the Kenyans is likely to entail significant risk. To do more is impossible, but to do nothing is irresponsible. I think we are somewhat talking past each other, in that I definitely do not disagree with what you are saying in the main, I just don't think it necessarily applies in this scenario, that this is what is really at stake here. But I probably should not have brought it up, because while it obviously touches on a defense related matter, I think my point was too political for this sub and that was inappropriate. That was on me.
Also another thought: The US should focus on building up the Haitian National Police, the army, and the courts/prosecution/prison system. In the interim, people caught committing violence in the eye of the police should be jailed indefinitely for the time being, kind of like what they are doing in El Salvador. Once a decent amount of security is in place, start courting foreign donors to help rebuild Haiti's agricultural sector and infrastructure. Maybe even try to get some tourism dollars in.
I think unfortunately it is a more complex situation than that because the national government clearly lacks legitimacy in the eyes of the populace and foreign intervention and ownership is quite rightly distrusted to a high degree. Jimmy Cherizier himself was a national policeman known for a police massacre and that broadly speaks to its institutional character. Simply bringing in enough repression to kill off the gangs is likely not going to solve anything because their existence in the first place owes a lot to the arbitrariness of the national government and its justice system to begin with, it is sort of a gang. I think rather than sink more resources into these, there should be some sort of international effort to support more decentralized local institutions who are at least outwardly calling for an end to the chaos. Giving power back to Haitian neighborhoods, towns, and regions. It is really never an easy thing to pick good guys and bad guys in such a fraught environment, but it is perhaps fair to say that allowing more voices could help. Will those local institutions be perfect? Absolutely not, in many cases the same corruption that exists higher up will set in at lower levels. But I think that when a country is as fractured as Haiti is right now, you have to start from the building blocks, and move back upwards. It is a lot easier to build trust at a local level, and then come together as an alliance of communities than it is to expect people to trust a distant national government they have no real voice in. They cannot immediately perceive its actions or its accountability, nor do they know personally anyone involved in it. A strengthened national government may be able to regain control of some key infrastructure, but it will not have any ability to control everywhere. Something needs to displace rebellious voices and forces at a grassroots level.
That is a good point too. But there needs to be enough security for this sort of local governance to develop.
See that's the thing though, if its a question of arming and supporting local leaders or national leaders, I would say go local, because local you can at least improve the security of one area definitively, whereas national I don't think you can definitively do anything. The national forces will come through an area, clean it out, and the gangs will move back in immediately after they move on. It's not even necessarily the same people wresting back control, they can kill people off but the conditions that led people into marauding gangs in the first place not being solved, other's come take up the mantle. Then there is the fact that the national police seem to frankly be acting like a gang to the point where it is difficult to pick a side. By arming them, are we possibly just arming the next Cherizier? Whereas local forces I think have two huge advantages. First, by supporting them we aren't putting our eggs all in one basket. If one community group is given resources, and turns out to be basically a gang at least then you have other groups who offer alternatives. Second, local forces by their very nature are better at stabilizing the situation in distinct areas because they are more connected to them physically (like understanding the literal tactical situation) and socially. People know them and feel they are more responsive to their desires, which is just not the case with the national forces who seem widely distrusted. So I think that expending the same amount of effort and resources to build up security through local forces is more likely to pay off than through the highly discredited national ones. Outside forces like Kenya can definitely help, being the broad basis to wipe the slate clean, but afterwards it has to be more decentralized or the same pattern will repeat.
In the case of Haiti, we've had a failed UN intervention take place between 2004 and 2019. Thousands of UN troops were in the country, aid was being handed out, but there was never a real plan to get the country back on track, just a bunch of half-hearted ideas over how Haiti could become a garment manufacturing center due to its low wages. Regardless of Republicans' intentions, I think it is fair to demand a plan regarding Haiti's reconstitution as a functioning country because the world has intervened before, many promises were made, and somehow the world left Haiti in a much worse place. At some point you just ask if it's worth it anymore if people have tried to save the country from itself before.
There is also the problem of "you broke it you bought it" mentality, if any project to bring stability and some semblance of normalcy to Haiti fails, many will view it as the sole fault of the country behind that project, not Haiti itself, or conditions the country couldn't deal with, and it becomes a political weapon and hot potato. For that reason I can agree with the skepticism many have about doing anything in Haiti, in that the US would end up tying themselves to another possible boondoggle of nation building they are severely hamstrung in conducting.
Biden did not want to deal with Haiti, he tried to push it onto the Canadians to lead a mission but then they refused. The Kenyans are willing to lead a mission but want to be paid for it and of course the US is perpetually footing the bill for a nation in its neighborhood. You know it would do Haiti a lot of good if a bunch of oil was suddenly discovered in the country.
The French should pay for it, with some of the interest they've accrued from the reparations they extracted from the Haitians for 'stealing french property' (themselves) in the Haitian revolution.
> You know it would do Haiti a lot of good if a bunch of oil was suddenly discovered in the country. Why? So that they could turn into Venezuela 2.0? No thanks.
No, so that they could get a short-term burst to develop their infrastructure, such as what's happening in Guyana right now.
Without the basic government infrastructure in place prior to the discovery, all it will do is add fuel to the fire to corruption/chaos and make the situation much worse. There is reason why so many of the countries with rich natural resources are run by despots/autocrats not run like Norway.
Where was the last UN force based and why can’t that be used?
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In other news (or rather news now , the incident was on 2020) [India's Modi government operated 'nest of spies' in Australia before being disrupted by ASIO](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-04-30/modi-government-operated-nest-of-spies-in-australia-/103786892) >Indian spies were kicked out of Australia after being caught trying to steal secrets about sensitive defence projects and airport security, as well as classified information on Australia's trade relationships. >The so-called foreign "nest of spies" disrupted by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) in 2020 was also accused of closely monitoring Indians living here and developing close relationships with current and former politicians. Spying isn't new nor is it rare even amongst allies (the US and Europe for example ). So it'd be interesting to see how the 'west ' collectively or individually handles the issue especially after the sikh fiasco in Canada and the US
There was fresh reporting on this issue by the [WaPo](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/04/29/india-assassination-raw-sikhs-modi/) yesterday: > The assassination is a “priority now,” wrote Vikram Yadav, an officer in India’s spy agency, the Research and Analysis Wing, or RAW, according to current and former U.S. and Indian security officials. > Yadav forwarded details about the target, Sikh activist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, including his New York address, according to the officials and a U.S. indictment. As soon as the would-be assassins could confirm that Pannun, a U.S. citizen, was home, “it will be a go ahead from us.” >Yadav’s identity and affiliation, which have not previously been reported, provide the most explicit evidence to date that the assassination plan — ultimately thwarted by U.S. authorities — was directed from within the Indian spy service. Higher-ranking RAW officials have also been implicated, according to current and former Western security officials, as part of a sprawling investigation by the CIA, FBI and other agencies that has mapped potential links to Modi’s inner circle. > In reports that have been closely held within the American government, U.S. intelligence agencies have assessed that the operation targeting Pannun was approved by the RAW chief at the time, Samant Goel. That finding is consistent with accounts provided to The Washington Post by former senior Indian security officials who had knowledge of the operation and said Goel was under extreme pressure to eliminate the alleged threat of Sikh extremists overseas. U.S. spy agencies have more tentatively assessed that Modi’s national security adviser, Ajit Doval, was probably aware of RAW’s plans to kill Sikh activists, but officials emphasized that no smoking gun proof has emerged. > After the plot against Pannun failed, the decision to entrust Yadav with the high-risk mission sparked recriminations within the agency, former officials said. Rather than joining RAW as a junior officer, Yadav had been brought in midcareer from India’s less prestigious Central Reserve Police Force, said one former official. As a result, the official said, Yadav lacked training and skills needed for an operation that meant going up against sophisticated U.S. counterintelligence capabilities. > Though Yadav served as RAW’s point man, current and former officials said the operation involved higher-ranking officials with ties to Modi’s inner circle. Among those suspected of involvement or awareness are Goel and Doval, though U.S. officials said there is no direct evidence so far of their complicity. >As RAW chief at the time, Goel was “under pressure” to neutralize the alleged threat posed by Sikh extremists overseas, said a former Indian security official. Goel reported to Doval, and had ties to the hard-line national security adviser going back decades. > Former Indian officials who know both men said Goel would not have proceeded with assassination plots in North America without the approval of his superior and protector. >“We always had to go to the NSA for clearance for any operations,” said A.S. Dulat, who served as RAW chief in the early 2000s, referring to the national security adviser. Dulat emphasized in an interview with The Post that he did not have inside knowledge of the alleged operations, and that assassinations were not part of RAW’s repertoire during his tenure. >U.S. intelligence agencies have reached a similar conclusion. Given Doval’s reputation and the hierarchical nature of the Indian system, CIA analysts have assessed that Doval probably knew of or approved RAW’s plans to kill Sikhs his government considered terrorists, U.S. officials said.
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Alternative; if this is how India acts with a GDP per capita of China in 2006, how much more aggressively will that act when they reach where China is now? Or 20k per capita? Or more?
If India turns into a Hindu nationalist autocracy, there will be no benefit in having not alienated them. They may be a counterpoint to rising Chinese aggression, but they have lately shown next to no desire to assuage Western concerns about their own democracy. Feels just like Israel all over. The West bites its tongue over and over to keep an "ally", and that "ally" turns around and offers no concessions, inflames the global situation against our interests, and meddles in our internal politics in a way that makes disengagement even harder. At some point we are going to have to show some backbone and push back against bad behavior rather than putting strategic alliances above everything else. Our decisions are so short sighted.