Nice. Some old fashioned diplomacy followed by a good beating with a sack of turnips works wonders on changing one's mind.
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Russia/Ukraine conflict
- Thread starter amolina
- Start date
Nice. Some old fashioned diplomacy followed by a good beating with a sack of turnips works wonders on changing one's mind.
The last voyage of the Ivanovets. To the bottom of the sea, where all the Black Sea Fleet is heading. 
navguy12
Active Member
One of the points in today’s Guardian news feed:
www.theguardian.com
Russia-Ukraine war at a glance: what we know on day 708
Heavy Ukrainian missile strikes hit military targets in Crimea; Russia and Ukraine make PoW exchange
www.theguardian.com
And if the Ukraine support package is actually brought up for a vote it will pass the US House quickly and then the Senate readily. Otherwise it will most likely die in the Senate as a combo bill. Glad to see Johnson being willing to at least consider aid to Ukraine.One of the points in today’s Guardian news feed:
Russia-Ukraine war at a glance: what we know on day 708
Heavy Ukrainian missile strikes hit military targets in Crimea; Russia and Ukraine make PoW exchange
Ukraine's retaliation on Russian energy infrastructure is showing in data now:
https://www.reuters.com/business/en...Reuters),attacks on its energy infrastructure.
Russia has reduced gasoline exports to non-CIS countries to compensate for unplanned repairs at refineries, the Ministry of Energy said on Wednesday, as the country grappled with the impact of fires and drone attacks on its energy infrastructure.
It said gasoline and diesel exports have been reduced in January by 37% and 23% respectively from the same month in 2023...
...Russia will likely cut exports of naphtha by some 127,500-136,000 barrels per day, or around a third of its total exports, after fires disrupted operations at refineries on the Baltic and Black Seas, according to traders and LSEG ship-tracking data.
https://www.reuters.com/business/en...Reuters),attacks on its energy infrastructure.
Artful Dodger
"Neko no me"
Good. End the petro-age by sending them back to the stone-age.
Did those 120 change their positions? Did Hungary get other benefits, as Turkey did?
www.euronews.com
120 MEPs demand Hungary be stripped of its voting rights
A cross-party coalition of 120 Members of the European Parliament demand Hungary be stripped of its voting rights over the country's democratic backsliding and Viktor Orbán's "unacceptable" use of veto power. #EuropeNews
www.euronews.com
SageBrush
REJECT Fascism
Did those 120 change their positions? Did Hungary get other benefits, as Turkey did?
120 MEPs demand Hungary be stripped of its voting rights
A cross-party coalition of 120 Members of the European Parliament demand Hungary be stripped of its voting rights over the country's democratic backsliding and Viktor Orbán's "unacceptable" use of veto power. #EuropeNews
I'm not of any help with details, so I'll just voice my opinion that political compromise is ALWAYS a mixture of carrot and stick.
The 120 EU MP's are about 1/6 of parliament, nominally not anywhere near enough to make a difference but I'll guess that Hungary viewed them as the vocal minority in this instance and did not wish to chance a silent majority kicking them hard in the shins.
The converse is worth mentioning: I'll further guess that all the former Soviet bloc states share a commonality in being the poor and relatively undeveloped cousins of the founding NATO countries. They all want aid from their rich cousins, and they are happy to leverage dirty politics to maximize the aid stream. In that context, they no more want to hobble Hungary or Turkey than they would voluntarily hobble themselves. Now that the UKR aid sh1tstorm is "resolved," a good fraction of the silent majority no longer would support Hungarian censure or deleveraging.
The crisis has passed, and now they can go back to their usual bickering and power plays. Democracy sounds downright disgusting, does it not ? It is, until compared with fascist alternatives.
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OK. I'm sure that there's tons of Military Commentators running around here who probably know lots more than I do about naval operations. Maybe.
But, by gum, I spent 6 years in the USN, three of those floating around on an aircraft carrier.
So, looking at those videos: It looks like the sailors are shooting some kind of machine gun/guns at the drones, and as badly aimed as those machine guns are, no wonder they weren't taking out the drone boats. It kind of has the look of somebody shooting with a tommy gun, i.e., handheld. But, having said that:
There was a 5" blasted naval gun on the forepart of that ship, and that ship was under attack. Why the heck wasn't there somebody running that turret and blasting the heck out of the drones? Yes, it's a missile corvette, which is a cut-down destroyer. But a 5" gun like that is there for a reason.
For that matter - it's a corvette. For a displacement hull, those things are supposed to be high speed and highly maneuverable. What, no dodging?
What is it - the ship was anchored out there with minimal crew while everybody else was ashore, partying and getting drunk?
DanCar
Active Member
Tweet says the drones were piloted via satellite. First two drones took out the propellers.
DanCar
Active Member
Hot dancing finland chic joins team helping Ukraine join NATO.
yle.fi
Sanna Marin joins task force steering Ukraine's Nato accession
The former Finnish Prime Minister joins other big names like former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
yle.fi
Thanks for the link to the analysis. The tweet stated that the forward 76mm gun (ok, it's a 3" gun, not a 5") is an 'anti aircraft' gun. Weird. Most guns I've seen like that are dual-role: Both anti-aircraft and shipping. And the tweeter says that it was 30 mm antiaircraft machine guns that were lit up. Well.. maybe by the time the drones were detected, the 30 mm's couldn't be depressed enough to hit the drones.
But, still: When one is patrolling on a security sweep, by definition one is looking for bears, and should be prepared to find some. It sure looks like the crew of this ship was napping. Literally.
DanCar
Active Member
Ukraine shifting strategy to a war of attrition. Not prioritizing homeland, but to deplete the enemy.
Wouldn't be the first time. That shot of the drone entering the open hull followed by the gigantic explosion is something else.
They are Ruzzian. Getting drunk is the national sport.
We've had so many instances of the Ruzzian military acting like they are run by a complete idiocracy but this YouTube video from the other day states their Navy is "unmatched". Thankfully the US Navy doesn't match them. My advice is don't click it as it is pure Ruzzian propaganda. But the comments are helpful.
From what I saw in a Denys video, there were 4 drone boats, first 2 attacked the props in the rear which completely disabled it and then the 2 hit the side. So they had a warning. How they let those first 2 get them is beyond belief but they were cooked when they were dead in the water. What skill to drive the second one right through the hole in the side made by the first one. Kaboom. The Ukrainians are kicking the dreck out of the Ruzzians. They are amazing at doing so much, so skillfully with so little. This war will be studied for decades by all militaries as to how they accomplished this, assuming we haven't destroyed all of mankind before then of course.
