Ukraine

[SkyDekker 1,121]

On 5/13/2022 at 5:04 PM, JoeWeber said:

Who doesn't support kiddie fiddlers?

Have to put them on a roof.

[SkyDekker 1,121]

On 5/15/2022 at 12:57 AM, metalslug said:

Trump has certainly been flattering of Putin in earlier times, but you would do well to take an actual look at "these days"; Barely a month ago Trump was asked during an interview with Piers Morgan if he would now agree that Putin was a "...an evil genocidal monster?" and responded with "I do, for sure, and who wouldn't? What’s happening is horrible." , in addition to stating that he regarded Putin's threats of nuclear strikes as unacceptable and would counter them with reminders of the West's superior arsenal.  Therefore; these days it's not the 'best mates' narrative that lefties continue to sell.  I dislike Trump myself, I've said it several times, but he should be disliked for valid reasons rather than outdated narratives.

Trump has a long history of either saying what the last person told him, or what he thinks the listener wants to hear. So he should be judged on the actions he has taken and the actual outcomes of his words. Not on what he might have said to Piers Morgan that one time.

[SkyDekker 1,121]

On 5/15/2022 at 4:54 AM, The Hundredth Monkey said:

The Hundredth Monkey eludes to a critical mass of a certain action.

And it has been discredited. I have to say I do get a chuckle out of the irony.

[JerryBaumchen 1,046]

42 minutes ago, SkyDekker said:

Trump has a long history of either saying what the last person told him, or what he thinks the listener wants to hear. So he should be judged on the actions he has taken and the actual outcomes of his words. Not on what he might have said to Piers Morgan that one time.

Hi Sky,

I'm thinking that if Ben Franklin were still alive, he would include this in his comments regarding death & taxes.

Jerry Baumchen

[jakee 1,254]

On 5/15/2022 at 7:55 PM, The Hundredth Monkey said:

it means nothing to you, because you are so focused on character assassination, that you forgot to even google the term.

That's an invalid conclusion. I said the phrase you used to explain the term was meaningless. I said nothing about the term itself.

Quote

It refers to a specific experiment that discovered an innate telepathic trait in mammals.

It did not. Telepathy isn't real.

Quote

...because you are so focused on character assassination...

...But you are probably an nihilistic atheist that replaces the spiritual void with a god complex.

Try actually knowing what you are talking about next..

Lol. Tell me more about why it's bad to focus on character assassination.

[wolfriverjoe 1,340]

2 hours ago, JerryBaumchen said:

Hi Joe,

Nor do I.  The US never used any nuke in the Korean War or the Vietnam War.

I do not believe that if we were to give Ukraine any weapons that they would want, would WW III be the result.

Jerry Baumchen

Hi Jerry,

One of the things that's restricting the 'free for all' of giving Ukraine unlimited arms is the idea that if they use them to attack Russia, Russia will retaliate. Both against Ukraine and whoever gave them those weapons.

 

For example, it's less than 500 miles from Kiev to Moscow.

If we gave them, say, old A-10 ground attack planes, it would not be out of the realm of possibility for Ukraine to send them to Moscow (or other targets inside Russia).

At that point, Russia would likely retaliate, because they would correctly fear that they are going to be attacked repeatedly. And that they would have large quantities of civilian casualties. And serious damage to infrastructure.

You know, like they did to Ukraine.

At that point, all bets would be off. 

Would they launch missiles?
Would they send long range bombers?
Would they use nukes?

No freak clue what the answers to those are.
Other than "maybe".

The idea of "MAD" (Mutually Assured Destruction) is what kept anyone & every one from using nukes in the past.

I think if Russia faces serious attack, Putin may stop giving a fuck, understanding that Russia as we know it is finished.
At that point he may well use the old cliche of "see you all in hell" and push some buttons just to say 'fuck you' to the rest of the world.

[billvon 2,384]

On 5/15/2022 at 4:54 AM, The Hundredth Monkey said:

The Hundredth Monkey eludes to a critical mass of a certain action.

That's "alludes to."  Elude means "hide from."  I assume you don't see yourself as hiding from that critical mass.

But in any case, researchers went back to the original notes on the 100th monkey phenomenon and found out something very interesting.  In their own words:

In the original reports, there was no mention of the group passing a critical threshold that would impart the idea to the entire troop. The older monkeys remained steadfastly ignorant of the new behavior. Likewise, there was no mention of widespread sweet potato washing in other monkey troops. There was mention of occasional sweet potato washing by individual monkeys in other troops, but I think there are other simpler explanations for such occurrences. If there was an Imo in one troop, there could be other Imo-like monkeys in other troops.

Instead of an example of the spontaneous transmission of ideas, I think the story of the Japanese monkeys is a good example of the propagation of a paradigm shift, as in Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. The truly innovative points of view tend to come from those on the edge between youth and adulthood. The older generation continues to cling to the world view they grew up with. The new idea does not become universal until the older generation withdraws from power, and a younger generation matures within the new point of view.

http://www.wowzone.com/monkey.htm

So a more accurate view of that would be that the young learn and adapt, and the older people cling to the things that worked in the past and are often unable to learn new methods/values/processes.  Today we see resistance to EV's, renewable energy, nonbinary people, new methods of teaching math and even a changing Disney from the older conservative crowd.  And it may be that they will be able to adapt eventually to a changing world, the way their parents adapted to desegregation, interracial marriage, women being able to vote and gay marriage.  But that 100th monkey tells us that the solution may just be to wait for them to die off (unfortunately.)

 

 

 

[jakee 1,254]

37 minutes ago, wolfriverjoe said:

Hi Jerry,

One of the things that's restricting the 'free for all' of giving Ukraine unlimited arms is the idea that if they use them to attack Russia, Russia will retaliate. Both against Ukraine and whoever gave them those weapons.

 

For example, it's less than 500 miles from Kiev to Moscow.

If we gave them, say, old A-10 ground attack planes, it would not be out of the realm of possibility for Ukraine to send them to Moscow (or other targets inside Russia).

My view on this is that I think we should be able to trust by now that the Ukrainian government isn’t batshit fucking insane.

[wolfriverjoe 1,340]

1 hour ago, jakee said:

My view on this is that I think we should be able to trust by now that the Ukrainian government isn’t batshit fucking insane.

I agree. But I have been wrong on these judgements before.

 

And its also not just a matter of the 'Ukranian Government'. There's also the entire military and everyone in it.

 

Can we be sure that none of those people are crazy enough to do something stupid?

[jakee 1,254]

18 minutes ago, wolfriverjoe said:

I agree. But I have been wrong on these judgements before.

 

And its also not just a matter of the 'Ukranian Government'. There's also the entire military and everyone in it.

 

Can we be sure that none of those people are crazy enough to do something stupid?

No, but then you need to disband your own military too. 

[wolfriverjoe 1,340]

Just now, jakee said:

No, but then you need to disband your own military too. 

Not really.

Keep in mind that even the US military doesn't trust it's people with nukes.

Everything is a 'two man rule'. Places that store or carry nukes have 'no lone zones'.
Penalty for violating those is pretty severe.

Overall, I'd trust the Ukrainians with more capability. 

I think they'd keep a tight enough rein on it. They know the consequences for some 'lone wolf' going after Moscow. 
But the possibility still exists.

And I think most of the countries that would be supplying, say, planes with that sort of capability, are very aware of those possibilities and aren't willing to take the risks, however small they may be.

[ryoder 1,381]

A couple days ago, I read a Twitter thread describing Ukraine military's "GIS Arta" targeting system. This article describes it pretty well:

Uber-style tech helped wipe out almost entire Russian battalion

[jakee 1,254]

13 minutes ago, wolfriverjoe said:

Not really.

Keep in mind that even the US military doesn't trust it's people with nukes.

Everything is a 'two man rule'. Places that store or carry nukes have 'no lone zones'.
Penalty for violating those is pretty severe.

You’re worried about Ukraine starting WW3 with an A10. When it comes to the US military why the fuck are you suddenly talking about nuclear weapons as if they’re an equivalent?

Try and leave the goalposts where you found them, dude.

Edited May 16, 2022 by jakee

[billvon 2,384]

36 minutes ago, jakee said:

You’re worried about Ukraine starting WW3 with an A10. When it comes to the US military why the fuck are you suddenly talking about nuclear weapons as if they’re an equivalent?

Because you said that he should disband the US military because he couldn't be sure no one is "crazy enough to do something stupid."  He explained how the US military has safeguards against one crazy person doing something stupid, thus addressing your stated concern.

Since the US military actually DOES have A-10's, it wouldn't make much sense to try to apply his concern about A-10's to the US. 

[Phil1111 908]

50 minutes ago, ryoder said:

A couple days ago, I read a Twitter thread describing Ukraine military's "GIS Arta" targeting system. This article describes it pretty well:

Uber-style tech helped wipe out almost entire Russian battalion

The US needs to supply some of these to Ukraine.

[JoeWeber 2,294]

18 hours ago, olofscience said:

Turkey joined NATO in 1952, so it's not really living memory anymore why they joined. But this NATO article has some explanation: https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/declassified_191048.htm

And now Turkey is gobbling loud over Finland and Sweden joining Nato, but it's mostly Finland. I see their point, actually. Yes, they have Erdoğan, and he's a pill. But he's a pill that is supplying one Bayraktar TB2 Drone a day to Ukraine. Those drones are proving decisive. What can Finland supply a day? Lutefisk? That and why should NATO poke the bear again by taking on a country contiguous to Russia when NATO is already busy defending another country contiguous to Russia because Russia doesn't want another NATO country contiguous to Russia? As they say, timing is everything and Finland and Swedens after the fact decision that non-participation in a defensive treaty is on reflection, not in their best interests really is a bit offensive.

[Phil1111 908]

1 hour ago, JoeWeber said:

And now Turkey is gobbling loud over Finland and Sweden joining Nato, but it's mostly Finland. I see their point, actually. Yes, they have Erdoğan, and he's a pill. But he's a pill that is supplying one Bayraktar TB2 Drone a day to Ukraine. Those drones are proving decisive. What can Finland supply a day? Lutefisk? That and why should NATO poke the bear again by taking on a country contiguous to Russia when NATO is already busy defending another country contiguous to Russia because Russia doesn't want another NATO country contiguous to Russia? As they say, timing is everything and Finland and Swedens after the fact decision that non-participation in a defensive treaty is on reflection, not in their best interests really is a bit offensive.

Sweden has donated slightly more to Ukraine's defense than has the US by GDP It also has a very robust defense program including its own fighter A/C.

Finland has 200,000 full time and 900,000 reservists out of a population of 5.5 million. I get your point but alliances are built out of a sum of their parts. They are right on Russia's doorstep. Both can close off Russian access to the Baltic sea.both would be on the front line of any Russian conflict.

[JoeWeber 2,294]

8 minutes ago, Phil1111 said:

Sweden has donated slightly more to Ukraine's defense than has the US by GDP It also has a very robust defense program including its own fighter A/C.

Finland has 200,000 full time and 900,000 reservists out of a population of 5.5 million. I get your point but alliances are built out of a sum of their parts. They are right on Russia's doorstep. Both can close off Russian access to the Baltic sea.both would be on the front line of any Russian conflict.

I concede your point on Sweden. Thank you. But Finlands move is self serving. I don't blame them but were it my call I'd be happy to point out the late isn't always better than never, parachute deployment comes to mind, and optics do matter. Please wait awhile.

[jakee 1,254]

7 hours ago, billvon said:

Because you said that he should disband the US military because he couldn't be sure no one is "crazy enough to do something stupid."  He explained how the US military has safeguards against one crazy person doing something stupid, thus addressing your stated concern.

Safeguards against one person doing something crazy with nukes. But we’re not talking about nukes, so how on earth do you think he’s addressed his concerns about every other piece of equipment?

7 hours ago, billvon said:

Since the US military actually DOES have A-10's, it wouldn't make much sense to try to apply his concern about A-10's to the US. 

Eh? We need to be worried about A10s because they could be used to start WW3 but we don’t need to worry about people who have A10s? Maybe explain that one.

[jakee 1,254]

4 hours ago, JoeWeber said:

when NATO is already busy defending another country contiguous to Russia.

NATO is not defending Ukraine. That’s kinda the whole point here.

[metalslug 31]

14 hours ago, SkyDekker said:

Trump has a long history of either saying what the last person told him, or what he thinks the listener wants to hear. So he should be judged on the actions he has taken and the actual outcomes of his words. Not on what he might have said to Piers Morgan that one time.

Such as perhaps... recommending the covid vaccine to his own supporters?  ..and somehow being clairvoyantly aware of exactly which 'listeners' would watch (or listen) a publicly available TV interview?  The actual facts are that he hasn't said a single positive thing about the invasion since it's second week and has indeed since condemned the invasion at least three separate times in separate interviews or speeches since February. Hence.. these days.  Trump has also repeatedly harped on about how 'it would never have happened on his watch' and although his claim is utterly absurd it is also reflective of sentiment that he did not want the invasion to happen.  

By denying such obvious facts; your own comments are really more reflective of liberals who are so drunk on lefty dogma that they're no longer capable of objective analysis resulting in the kind of illogical response you've provided. It's like the lefty equivalent of The Hundredth Monkey.

Edited May 17, 2022 by metalslug

[jakee 1,254]

2 hours ago, metalslug said:

Trump has also repeatedly harped on about how 'it would never have happened on his watch' and although his claim is utterly absurd it is also reflective of sentiment that he did not want the invasion to happen.  

By denying such obvious facts; 

That is not a fact, it is an opinion which does not naturally follow from any logical analysis. If you weren’t so rabidly anti-liberal you would see that.

[olofscience 420]

4 hours ago, metalslug said:

hasn't said a single positive thing about the invasion since it's second week

you do see this, right? You are aware of the implications of this word, right?

Edited May 17, 2022 by olofscience

[olofscience 420]

10 hours ago, JoeWeber said:

Yes, they have Erdoğan, and he's a pill. But he's a pill that is supplying one Bayraktar TB2 Drone a day to Ukraine. Those drones are proving decisive.

Decisive, yes, but not irreplaceable.

The US can just supply Reapers, and IAI has plenty of alternatives too.

[billvon 2,384]

6 hours ago, metalslug said:

The actual facts are that he hasn't said a single positive thing about the invasion since it's second week . . . 

Exactly.  He was very up on it initially, since his mentor Putin was prosecuting it.

Then he saw the poll numbers, and then, as Skydekker said, "told the viewer what he wants to hear."  If all republicans started supporting Putin he'd be singing his praises in a heartbeat again.

You're sorta proving Skydekker's point here.