Zoraptor

Haha, watching Frank Gardiner squirm this year has been hilarious. One certainly needs reminding that the true tragedy of Gaza is that it distracts people from Russia 'carpet bombing' Aleppo 7 years ago... It's going to be funny (well, 'funny') when the Houthis start using drone speedboats to hit their targets instead of trying to hijack them.

At what point in history has any country or part of a country which has been conquered and colonised by Britain had 30% British population before they engaged in mass murder and ethnic cleansing of the indigenous population? It's a pretty short list of Euro countries that hasn't done that at some point. I used the example of New Zealand which has ended up with 85% non Maori population. You can dislike the people responsible for those policies as much as you like but they're all dead. Blaming people who weren't even alive at the time is asinine and breeds pointless division and its only positive is making people feel superior to others based on the one thing they have literally no control over- their genetics. One of the reasons I hate ethnicity as a concept. But in summary: Break up Spain because of the oppression of the Catalans, Basque --> Russian plot, everyone actually loves Spain! Break up Russia because some infographic suggests more people from poor areas join the army --> Yes please!

You know, I'm not sure 30% of the population of Burkina Faso or Mali was ethnically French at any point, and that either has lost a third of its population over the past 30 years. Could be wrong, but I don't think I am. You're not going to find me saying the same thing about New Caledonia or French Guiana or Miquelon (and the other couple of islands whose name escapes me; nor here for that matter, where 85% of the population isn't Maori). But there is... a certain irony about trying to force assimilation or eviction and then being upset when the target doesn't like it*, much as there is a certain irony when the colonialist doesn't understand why the colonised isn't appreciating them. Albanians colonised Kosovo under a deliberate Turkish policy, somehow one suspects that is Different though... as with a lot of things the west is more than happy to talk the talk about equality and the like, but actual application of principle is always done on a self interest basis. *Please give your framed pictures of Julius Malema and Bob Mugabe a kiss from me, Comrade Bruce

It's not that far fetched to get an armed insurrection in, say, Latvia which is highly oppressive towards its (large) Russian minority and which has utterly catastrophic demographics as well. I completely disagree with MW in terms of response though, under those circumstances NATO would 100% fight against them and whatever the NATO Charter says be damned. This is, after all, the organisation desperate to ignore its Charter limitation of the North Atlantic when dealing with China. OTOH the chance of Green Berets and Royal Marines storming the Elysée Palace to remove Marine Le Pen from the French Presidency is pretty far fetched, but isn't something anyone should want anyway. Well, except for the irony of it happening to France instead of France doing it to Côte d'Ivoire, Mali, Niger, Burkino Faso etc

They definitely got PAC-3s as well since a lot of images of their 'empties' have been posted from Kiev- minimally explosive so you get pretty intact distinctive 'cheesegrater' fuselage. Likely they got PAC-2s too though of course. (Particularly funny at the time because the US was gouging Saudi for PAC-2s at $10million apiece while giving away the PAC-3s to Ukraine and couldn't understand why the Saudi's weren't appreciative of paying a 250% mark up for older tech)

Haven't been many 21st century wars where they didn't play kill ratio games. It's pretty clear now that neither side is going to win via the Subotai/ Khalid ibn al Walid/ John Churchill/ Napoleon (in his own mind) route of glorious strategy wedded to perfect tactical implementation. That leaves, well, the far more prosaic grinding the other into the dirt à la Grant/ Haig/ Chuikov. And in the end kill ratio/ attrition is everything there. Bit of hair splitting maybe but I'd probably call it keeping up the pressure rather than maintaining initiative. Mostly because I don't really think the Russians have the initiative yet, though I think it's fair to say that the Ukrainians have lost it at least.

In this case I don't think they'd bother forcing them out (imminently) but rather go for containment as a matter of strategy. Quite apart from the direct losses on the east bank Ukraine has to supply every bullet, every gun and every meal across the open Dniepr as well as sending replacement/ extra soldiers and while doing so they're a perfect target for drones, mortars and artillery. Even HMG and 20mm cannon will shred those boats, and their foothold is certainly not big enough to have the river out of range of cannons (and probably not HMG either, to be honest). They can't get tanks or heavy vehicles across so there's very little chance/ threat of a break out; might as well just sit back and lob easy shots at the supply lines and FAB500s at the bridgehead. (Does make me wonder what happened to the Antonivka bridgehead, got lots (comparatively) of videos of the Russians lobbing bombs at it a few months ago but basically nothing from the Ukrainian side. I kind of presume it isn't there any more, but who knows)

Same thing happened with their crossing at the Antonivka Bridge (or what was left of it) and at least there they could shelter under the bridge itself. The crossing at Krynky seems to be the epitome of a Spectacular done solely for PR purposes. And if you can't hold it the PR reverses.

Is it referring to the general military budget perhaps... apparently that got passed yesterday/ recently. Along with the critically important vote on impeaching Biden (lol).

Not sure any news on accession from the EU is good for Ukraine at the moment unless it comes with a way to get around Orban's veto on funding and more than 6% of the million shells promised as well; else it's just encouragement to Russia to harden its stance. Ukraine is never getting into the EU anyway unless it excludes its agricultural sector from subsidies. No US funding until at least after the Christmas/ New Year break either since they're now in recess. Guess Zelensky's visit really was in vain.

All three should be charged. Putin should not be charged with what he is though, the only reason he faces that (and it went straight to an arrest warrant forgoing the usual probe) is because the west doesn't like him, and he can't face charges of Pillage or Waging Aggressive War because if he did Blair and Trump would be there too. Which they too should be.

For the out and out war in Ukraine it's 15 journalists killed, in 22 months. Let's assume they're all Russia's fault, to make it as bad as we can for them. Similarly, don't use the 2023 figures (2 deaths, which for a large scale conflict with high media exposure is, well, very very low) or the figures since Oct7th in Ukraine (no journalist deaths) because the idea is to make things as bad they can be. For Israel/ Palestine (+Lebanon) it's 63 in 9ish weeks. If Russia were killing journalists at the same rate they'd have killed ~630 journalists over nearly two years. Or in other words Israel is killing them at ~40 times the rate Russia is. Shall I adjust for the population difference between Gaza and Ukraine too? OK, Israel is now killing journalists at ~750x the rate. That doesn't include any of the Gazan family members killed for Chilling Effect either. I don't think anyone thinks Russia's hands are actually clean, but as often happens you run through the stats and find that there's a certain amount of... rhetorical massaging of the message going on based not on what is actually happening but on who you're meant to dis/like.

Yes, the casting for Dune'84 was actually really good for the most part, and not just because of Sting and his novelty posing pouch. Better than for the modern version imo, and the modern versions is at least good. The Burton/ Hurt comment was more because I read.. ..initially as being about the movie 1984 (which released a couple of months after Dune'84 and starred Burton/ Hurt as O'Brien/ Smith). Good movie too, that one, though not near as good as the book. I'd have to admit I enjoyed Dune'84 more than both the book and Dune'21. Though Dune'21 was great as a 'spectacle' movie.

For what it matters- basically nothing, since it's non binding- the UNGA has voted 153-10 for an immediate ceasefire. Last ceasefire vote in the UNGA back in October was 121-14 so a lot of abstentions flipped to yes including some minor pillars of the Rules Based Order. 12000 dead civilians in 9 weeks is still all good with most of the most vocal proponents; US, UK, Germany all voted no or abstained. To put it in perspective the vote for Russia to withdraw from Ukraine was 141-5.

I should reread Dune at some point, I didn't like it much last time. I was like 13 at the time, and thought David Eddings was Tolstoy. Also now considering whether Dune'84 would have been improved by John Hurt as Duke Atreides and Richard Burton as Baron Harkonnen for some reason. Fun fact: my dad unironically loved Lynch's Dune and took me to see it in a cinema. I still have (I think) the making of book he bought somewhere around.

Intransigence is a frequently used device in such discussions to wring extra concessions though, and it isn't always 'real'. Same with brinkmanship, debt ceiling discussions and the like often go down to the wire because urgency forces concessions. There's still 3(?) more days to get agreement and personally I think they'll get there, though it's far from certain.

I doubt he'd go if there was a serious chance he'd come back empty handed. The only thing worse than not getting aid would be going to the US and still not getting any aid. No further information, I believe. Two videos of Sokolov after the attack, then nothing since. Since neither video was absolutely definitive status is undefined, leaning towards still alive. He's still commander of the fleet and hasn't retired to spend more time with his family or similar. Neither side seems all that keen on providing incontrovertible proof people are alive to suit media schedules. Shoigu, Gersasimov and Zaluzhny were all 'dead' or 'severely injured' for weeks or months because they didn't have verifiable appearances.

“CPJ is deeply alarmed by the pattern of journalists in Gaza reporting receiving threats, and subsequently, their family members being killed,” said CPJ Middle East and North Africa Program Coordinator Sherif Mansour. “The killing of the family members of journalists in Gaza is making it almost impossible for the journalists to continue reporting, as the risk now extends beyond them also to include their beloved ones.”-- via the Committee to Protect Journalists. Remember this next time someone tells you the Caesar or Magnitsky Acts are moral stances rather than political ones, because here's the US not just failing to do anything about the targeted killing of journalists but also of their families; indeed, by vetoing a ceasefire they're encouraging its continuation. Who knows, maybe there'll be an Al-Anas Act and I'll have to eat my words. I'd bet against gravity failing before that though.

Let's be real here, a lot of the people puling about anti semitism at Yale or wherever would be shouting equally enthusiastically about freedom of expression if (and indeed when) it were (was), say, Chinese students being 'targeted' by pro Uighur or Tibetan protests. Banning their organisations and pandering to the feefees of the poor oppressed Chinese who don't want to hear about the genocide their government is perpetrating? An affront to the 1st amendment and just another example of the Cultural Marxism pervading academia. Not banning (some, plenty have been) pro Palestinian student organisations and not banning protests on their behalf? Strangely, also Cultural Marxism and not an affront to the 1st amendment. Exactly the same way 'from the river to the sea' is genocidal when it comes from a Palestinian, but not when it's Likud saying it. It's not a moral stance, it's a political one, and political stances should not be part of a university's brief. Palestinians probably aren't that keen on and feel a bit harassed and oppressed by the US Congress supplying most of the weapons that have killed 6000 of their children, after all, nor for all the pro Israeli demonstrations celebrating it either openly or tacitly, nor for the US recognising the annexations of East Jerusalem and the Golan, nor for the UNSC ceasefire veto. Indeed, kind of funny seeing the US talking up the PA taking over in Gaza as it's exactly the worst approach for the PA if you want it to be credible. They're already seen as Quislings by most of their constituents, if the US thinks its support is going to help them the delusion is off the scale.

They couldn't have avoided it, because the situation is so polarised that anything that isn't complete and acritical support for Israel is 'genocide advocacy' to some. It's political theatre, not academic debate; Ted Cruz or whoever isn't going to politely applaud a well made point and ponder whether his position is actually correct while thinking about how he viewed the plight of Bana from Aleppo compared to Zainab from Gaza and what that says about his personal morality. Indeed, the whole idea of that is ludicrous; they'll be thinking about how it plays electorally and how much money his PAC will receive in donations if he gets in a particularly spicy zinger. You just get the same headlines when they refuse to say that 'from the river to sea' is advocating genocide- and reminder, same phrase appears in the Likud Charter, but presumably isn't genocide advocacy there. The whole point of Israel advocacy in that style is not to have a rational debate, it's to have a chilling effect where people Just Shut Up because anything said against Israel is considered antisemitic and advocating genocide.

Ah well, time for the old Uniting For Peace approach I guess... though I suspect there will be a few less advocates for that than there have been for other issues. 13-1 is actually worse than the February22 UNSC resolution aimed at Russia over Ukraine (11-1) and which triggered a bunch of articles on Russia's diplomatic isolation. Couldn't even get two of the NATO members or Japan to abstain.

Well yeah, to put it in perspective something like 1% of applicants end up joining the Gurkhas annually. That's 20k+ Nepalese who'd be fine with fighting other peoples' wars who are potential recruits and who could make the first selection criteria. I guess some would only want to go to Britain specifically but even if half felt that way that's still 10k potential recruits for others. It's also not that long ago since Joanna Lumley shamed the Brits into stopping treating the Gurkhas like chattel (ie kicking them out when they got too old). Some might also remember the rumours of the hordes of ravening Syrians who were going to descend on Ukraine*. It's not like western media doesn't have an agenda to push- every foreigner fighting for Ukraine tends to be a 'volunteer', for Russia... foreign fighter, mercenary, conscript etc. As things stand there are more documented** Syrians fighting for Ukraine than Russia. Recruitment policies for out and out wars certainly tend to be extremely cynical. *classic of its kind really. Shedloads of articles saying they were coming, then a handful months later explaining that the press wasn't wrong, the recruitment failed. **depends how you feel about docs leaked to SOHR without any corroborating evidence like confirmed casualties. Tiger Forces are professional soldiers integrated into the Syrian military though, so even if they were there they wouldn't be either coerced nor mercenaries.

Kind of depends whether it was genuinely voluntary or not. 'Trafficking' would generally imply some form of coercion or ill intent on the behalf of the organisers beyond just facilitating them becoming mercs/ 'mercs'. Dunno about the refugees, guess as long as they're paid properly and Service Guarantees Citizenship it could be an attractive enough proposition to get volunteers. Maybe a bit naive expecting them to be paid properly though... (Volunteering for foreign forces is certainly legal in certain circumstances in Nepal given the existence of the UK Ghurka Brigade)

They didn't ask for an aircraft carrier because it can't transit the Bosporus under Montreux... Kind of more surprised they asked for Globemasters and Super Hercules than THAAD. Maybe the truck blockade at the Polish border is really biting, but they're big, slow airframes that would be vulnerable in the air and on the ground. Oh yeah, on the subject of requests: ask for 17 million (well, if accurate, that figure was likely part of the ongoing Zelensky/ Zaluzhny back and forth so likely designed to embarrass), friends order 60,000 instead.

I'd give them a pass on Pentium-D for it being an eternity ago in chip making terms and a stopgap after some truly awful decisions. 'Glued' chips though... that was UserBenchmark level cringe marketing.