Agiel

I did read about them a couple of months ago. Odd to say the least, almost as odd as there being Hitler admirers in Russia of all places.

Somewhat movie-related: Stood behind a woman at a store where they had rewards programs, wherein the clerk would ask one his or her phone number so that the customer would earn points for store credit. She gave her phone number and the clerk asked "Erin Brockovich?" to confirm in a totally uninterested "I really don't want to be here" tone. The woman then answered her phone with a conversation that had something to do with "particles per square inch" and other lawyerly jazz. I was tempted to speak up, but didn't since the only thing that I could think of at the spur of the moment was "Hey! You're that lady they made that movie about! You were played by Julia Roberts!" Perhaps attesting to my film nerd status, almost everyone else I related this story hadn't heard of the movie, much less who Erin Brockovich was.

Got us confused given you've offered weak to no evidence to the contrary that the Abrams is anything but a very, very good tank, especially when compared to the modern-day Ronson that is the T-72.

Hey! There was only one way to play Fallout: New Vegas, and that was playing a gunslinging, quickdrawing Cowgirl using Lucky and the Ranger Sequoia with a crit-build!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/04/10/chinese-dad-built-this-high-powered-working-tank-for-his-6-year-old/?tid=hp_mm Mostly "d'aaaaawwwww" and the rest a bit scary. Something that's three tons on treads isn't something you take lightly, especially for a six year old.

A loss for words when confronted with cited evidence that it's no more vulnerable than the T-72S, huh? Show of hands people, would you take the Abrams, or the "Communal Funeral Urn"? Because I can offer a host of other aspects of the T-72 that makes it a flawed design for COIN operations (limited gun depression/elevation, shortage of passive thermal imaging sites, poor reverse speed).

Not playing, but longingly watching LPs of Star Wars: TIE Fighter and recalling days of yore flying TIE Interceptors against X-Wings and Z-95 Headhunters ("Shields double forwards? Wot's dat?"), and praying that this is the year GOG finally does a re-release of it.

Given that it impacted the side armour then even I wouldn't be enormously surprised: As we can see, against most of the side profile fairly modern warheads (AT-5B Spandrel has been estimated to have ~780mm RHAe penetration at 0 degrees LOS) can theoretically penetrate and have enough overmatch to ruin the crew's day... However, this only highlights how much more vulnerable designs like the T-72 and the T-80 are in this environment as the Syrian Rebellion and the Chechen Wars show. Both the Abrams and the Challenger 2 boast safety features that cannot be implemented in many Soviet designs: Automatic fire-suppression, ammunition separated from the crew compartment, blastproof doors and blowout panels for the Abrams, water storage for the Chally, and semi-ready rounds stored separately from the tank on the rear turret bustle. As Soviet and Russian-designed tanks were quite small, these systems were simply impossible to implement, as every inch of the interior had to be dedicated to some kind of machinery or storage. As a result, ammunition and propellant was exposed to the crew compartment (not helped by the fact that Soviet doctrine called for more high-explosive anti-personnel rounds be stored in proportion to *relatively* more inert APFSDS, which the tanks in Syria likely do not carry at all). Thus, even while there was the odd incident where an Abrams or Challenger was considered a "mission kill," the crew likely got off with little to no injuries and was back in action not too long after, with the tank being recovered and repaired in fairly short order. Experience in the Middle East wars showed that the large majority of AFV losses were the result of minor damage that could be easily repaired, however those that experienced internal fire damage or catastrophic explosions were more likely to be completely written off and deemed incapable of being returned to combat service, and this was something the Israelis singled out the Soviet-designed T-62s and T-72s for. What's more, with the proliferation of tandem-charge anti-tank warheads, the dependency of Russian tank designs on ERA prove to be a liability for the Syrians. In relation to Steel Beast's estimate for the M1A1(HA) and the Challenger 2's side armour estimates above, Lakowski's estimates for T-72B with Kontakt-1 ERA (roughly equivalent to what the Syrians are using now) protection. Side Hull: 210–260mm HEAT Side Turret: 260mm KE & 340mm HEAT, 210mm HEAT if a tandem-charge warhead is used. Ammunition storage for the T-72/T-90: Plenty of GoPro videos exist showing the fate of many Syrian tanks as a result of ammunition fires and catastrpohic explosions, but I'll refrain from linking to them. *EDIT*: A tanker contact of mine has relayed to me that this was an Abrams inherited by the Iraqi army that has the dU armour inserts removed

"The main thing that I learned about conspiracy theory is that conspiracy theorists actually believe in a conspiracy because that is more comforting. The truth of the world is that it is chaotic. The truth is, that it is not the Jewish banking conspiracy or the grey aliens or the 12 foot reptiloids from another dimension that are in control. The truth is more frightening, nobody is in control. The world is rudderless." -Alan Moore

I'm sorry, but even the ones whose hearts were still with Crimea still had an oath and wore Ukrainian military uniforms until the very end, and I didn't see any in those videos walk up to gate and unlock it to let the self-defense forces in. The Ukrainian personnel by a lot of accounts were quite well within their rights to open fire on them as soon as they entered as they entered without invitation what is internationally recognised as sovereign Ukrainian territory insomuch as an embassy or a consulate might be even if they're surrounded by a foreign country. They didn't, because: a.) They'd get ripped to shreds by the crowd and sometimes survival trumps principles. b.) Some of the soldiers did indeed have sympathies for them. c.) Putin could spin the whole incident as "mean Ukrainian Banderans opened fire on helpless, oppressed civilians.

Oh please. 80%, by the Ukrainians own figures, of their troops in the Crimea simply deserted to the Russians. If the Russians wanted a provocation they'd bloody well get one in exactly the same style that Adolf Hitler got one in 1939. But no, the Ukrainians played a magnificent hand with the vast majority of their troops deserting which, startlingly, was exactly what the Russians stated they wanted from the outset and exactly what actually happened. But we know better what they wanted because they're eeeevil Russians who want violence, it's in their blood :1080p roll eyes: Again this is an example of the Scooby Doo Villain Russian caricature. That Putin, evil enough to invade Crimea! But hahaha, he never thought to stage a provocation for a wider incident because he was outwitted by our plucky heroes in Kiev using the Gandhi mantra! And he never thought to expel foreign media either, even if they spent 90% of their time talking to 12% of the Crimean population and taking pictures of the half dozen or so Ukrainian military who didn't defect! But he was even smart enough to state what he wanted defections and actually have that happen as a huge- what I like to call smokescreen of reality- so don't worry peoples, he's still actually a massive threat to our way of lives despite having a pathetic military and non existent economy... Pretzel logic, ho hum, par for the course. Fortunately I'm as always immune to manipulation by people who push shadowy conspiracy theories :smug: Are you going to tell me this was a wholehearted capitulation with Russian airsofters standing behind civilians forcing their way into a Ukrainian base, then actively helping them when they couldn't do it alone?

So you mean you're a lunatic or a reprobate if you assume a shadowy, and possibly fictional, organization is behind every atrocity with flimsy evidence(at best) to support that view? I'm saying that if you take the logic that an absence of evidence is evidence of guilt then you may as well start burning witches. "[W]hat can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence." -Christopher Hitchens Speaking of Monty Python, given how Right Sector and Svobada are getting increasingly marginalised on the Ukrainian political scene I've yet to see claims that Mr. Hilter and his dicky old chums Heinrich Bimmler and Ron Vivventrop will arise in Kiev to launch their Nationalist Bocialist rallies come to fruition.

Well that's what Putin sort of wanted when he besieged the Ukranian military facilities on the Crimea and used human shield "self-defense forces" preceding their takeovers. I'd give the Ukrainian political and military leadership a little credit for not playing the Russian's game. The difference between now and Georgia 2008 was the fact that there was plenty of press in Crimea that exposed the "oppressed" Russian minority to be as belligerent and thuggish as the more militant demonstrators of the Euromaidan protests and further isolating Russia. I agree with Rostere; the Ukrainians playing the geo-political non-violent resistance card means Russia won a battle, but lost a war with Crimea.

As I feel Rostere has sections 1 and 2 pretty much covered, thought I'd go over number 3... 3a: The various independence and separatist movements of the collapse saw the population of Russia's domain reduced to half of what it was in Soviet times. As Russia has and still uses a conscript army, this has played havoc on its military strength. No longer do they have a vast population of able bodied men to fill the ranks and what's more demographic trends of Russia show this pool of potential conscripts is dwindling as the years go by. Adding to that, the vicious hazing in the Russian armed forces has not been conducive to fostering a strong esprit de corps among the conscripts. The situation has gotten so bad that many who are able seek exemptions, some of them legal but many times not. As a result, yearly conscription figures show that they fall well short of quotas (around 400,000 out of a possible 600,000 eligible men between the ages of 18-27 every year). Perhaps in an attempt to make obligatory military service a more attractive prospect, the Russian MoD has reduced the service period from two years in all services (save for the navy, which was three) to eighteen months, then to one year, hardly enough time for the average conscript to pick up valuable soldiering experience and skills. Russia is more than acutely aware of the problem. Generals are begrudgingly putting more emphasis on the volunteer "contract soldiers" in "combat zones" such as the Caucasus and more technical roles (tank crews, helicopter pilots, SAM operators, etc) and increasingly relegating conscripts to auxiliary and/or non-combat roles (truck drivers, signals and communications personnel, airbase guards, and so forth). There is a growing interest in fostering a strong NCO corps modeled after those of the volunteer armies of the world, as many NCOs in the Soviet and Russian militaries were themselves conscripts and as a result the duties that some might expect to be carried out by sergeants and warrant officers were filled by junior commissioned officers instead. A story I have read told that in 1988, Marshall Sergey Akhromeyev visited several US Army bases including Fort Hood, the largest armour training school in the United States; he showed little interest in the brand spanking new M1A1s on display and was more impressed by the fact that there were sergeants with as much as twenty years of duty under their belt serving as tank commanders and trainers passing on their vast knowledge to trainee tank crews. Then there's the number in equipment. A common point of criticism of the Soviet armed forces and its successors was that they did not have the same level of appreciation for equipment that did not throw a round downrange as the equipment that did. It is one thing to have a sizable fleet of very capable military aircraft like the Su-27 and the Su-34, but they don't reach their full potential as a complete weapons system without a complex support network that their potential adversaries might enjoy: AEW&C which provide command and control and operational situational awareness, tankers to insure they're spending more time in the air than on the tarmac, and the ground crews to increase readiness and reduce maintenance times. The United States alone has 32 E-3 Sentries in service and an additional 18 delegated to NATO unified command, to say nothing of those in service with the RAF and ALA and the fleet of E-2 Hawkeyes available to the US Navy which is nearly twice as large as the total E-2 production where the the RuAF has 13 A-50 Mainstays. The combined USAF and ANG fields more than 400 KC-135 refueling aircraft compared to the mere 23 Il-78 Midas of the RuAF. Believe it or not, the armoured corps of the Russian military is now at its most vulnerable than at any other time in its entire existence. As a result of severe cutbacks in the military and hoping the T-99 program bears fruit, they have begun retiring their fleet of T-80s, among their most capable main battle tanks, in favour of T-90s and T-72s. The reason for this is the fact that the gas turbine engine of the T-80 series is a logistical nightmare due to how much fuel it drinks, but it also doesn't help that the the factory responsible for modernising the line, Omsktransmash, recently went bust (some believe it to be due to the fact that the Uralvagonzavod Bureau has greater clout with military circles) and that the bureau that designed the T-80 is in Ukraine (they have since converted their T-80s into diesels). Before the retirement of the T-80, optimistic estimates put the number of the Russian Army's most modern tank, the T-90 (of which production has since ceased), at no more than 10% of the entire tank park (there are currently twice as many M1A2 Abrams in service with the United States Army as there are T-90s in service with the Russian army). Much of the burden of Russia's armoured operations will have to be borne by their T-72s, which while being different beasts from the ones used by Saddam Hussein, are not too far removed from what the Indians and the Syrians are using today and are heavily outclassed in firepower and protection by the Abrams, Leo 2s, Leclercs, and Challengers of the world. A quote from Vasiliy Fofanov, a Russian armour expert, from 2007: In short, the Russian armed forces at the moment are rather lacking in quality AND the quantity needed to offset these shortcomings. Will tackle 3b and 3c in later posts.

Just a prelude for a later post: With the F-22's flyaway cost of ~$150 million, with 1% of the US's GDP, the United States could afford 1,200 F-22 Raptors, if it so chose to build them (though this would not include the costs of restarting production for them). With 1% of Russia's GDP, and assuming the projected flyaway cost of $60 million for the PAK-FA T-50 still undegroing development and evaluation (which Sukhoi has flat out admitted will not be as stealthy as the F-22 or the F-35, or as advanced in terms of avionics and armaments) holds true, Russia can only afford to build little more than 300.

A little treat for sorophx. Some familiar sights and sounds (B****ing Betty) for him to be sure:

A Russian army vet that served in Chechnya (both times), now journalist, welcomes Crimea to Russia: Originally Russian, translated into Swedish for Dagens Nyheter, then finally into English

To add to that, the Swedes also came up with the brilliant RBS-56 BILL: So brilliant in fact, Raytheon copied the principle for the TOW 2B.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: A Ninja Gaiden/DMC/Bayonetta-style game where you play as an Eldar Harlequin Solitaire. Ooh, ooh! Maybe even a (old) Ghost Recon-style game where you play as Catachan Jungle Fighters. As an aside, despite the license's storied history as part of the now defunct THQ, I'd say it's now better for it now that any company with enough vision for GW to give the okay can utilise it. I've heard it said on Relic's forums that Relic still retains the rights to the "Dawn of War" franchise of the 40K license, and given the talented people there GW would have to be stupid to not let them make a Dawn of War 3 when they eventually decide to make it (if the work has not already been started).

A bullpup AR-15: http://youtu.be/hXQk6_dg_c4

On the bright side, these sanctions would force Putin into a position where he would have to spend almost North Korea percentages of his country's GDP if he wanted a conventional military (one that is already ailing, mind you) that meets the bare minimum of adequate force projection in Russia's sphere of influence. In addition, he may well see oil-rich nations of Central Asia fall to the orbit of the Chinese which could precipitate even more resounding economic problems in the long run.

I've had trojan ad/malware put on my computers that were piggybacking otherwise innocuous software. Just this other day I had to remove a search engine hijacker I got from installing Portforward.

Thanks for clarifying. Do you have any specifics on which types of equipment are currently not compatible? I'm curious as I did read something about the artillery being predominantly Russian and a preponderance of the Russian BUK-M1 air defense systems (which were being replaced by a Norwegian designed system iirc). BUKs have been phased out and replaced with the NASAMS variant of SL-AMRAAMs. There's debate whether this was done simply to advance STANAG compatibility or because Russians have an effective way of jamming their own tech - apparently some Russians were downed with a Georgian BUK during that conflict, but the fact of the matter is the BUK is out. On paper, NASAMS is inferior to BUK, but certainly prettier and less loud. And I'm out of wartime a job. And moving from "know" to "think", probably the biggest issue is the Finnish use of 7,62x39mm sov block weaponry, apparently it's better in a heavily forested environment than the NATO rounds, also the mainstay ARs of the Finnish Army accept standard russian mags (but not vice versa), which is... convenient. True that because it no longer has the benefit of being launched from a high-flying, high speed aircraft the SL-AMRAAM has less range than the far larger SA-11, it is better suited for a hasty defense scenario than the SA-11. As the AMRAAM and its variations are active radar homing as opposed to the SA-11's semi-active radar homing, it is far less susceptible to DEAD weapons and tactics, as once the missile Pitbulls, the launching vehicle and accompanying search and track radar are free to shut down their radars and reposition. In contrast, either the TAR or the TELAR of the SA-11 must track and illuminate the target throughout the missile's flight, so if for instance when these systems are emitting and are damaged or destroyed by a HARM or cluster bomb, the missile is rendered useless.

My friends and I are toying around with it as well, we being veterans of European Escalation. If you wish to have a friendly game with us, you can contact me with my above Steam name which is the same as the moniker I use on this forum(one of my friends happens to be one of the Marshalls, in other words, one of Eugen's balance consultants and SMEs). As our game group is called Task Force 1776, you can probably guess what side of the Iron Curtain we usually play as ;D

Some newer beasts: Leopard 2A6 Commander's station M1A2 SEP Abrams TC's station. Note that the brand new CITV and IVIS screen over the M1A1. M1A2 SEP Abrams gunner's station. M1A2 SEP Abrams, Commander turned out: "Drive me closer! I want to hit them with my sword!" CV-90/40 Commander/Gunner's station.