Politics

[CoElkHunter]

AH is the best forum i have ever visited, kind and helpful people and then you peak at the politics tread. It is a downer. Please shut it down.

Do you own a Creedmoor?

 

[Wheels]

AH is the best forum i have ever visited, kind and helpful people and then you peak at the politics tread. It is a downer. Please shut it down.

Been here a month. Made six posts. Want to shut a thread down that has over 13,000 posts and over 550,000 views.

You have it easy. Don't look at this thread! My first assumption is you are a troll but who knows. Time will tell.

 

[Rob404]

 

[Kevin Peacocke]

So, who has proven to be the agressor? The Russians can try to justify it any way they like, but they have to wear the cap. The USA cannot be critisized now, they have the high road. And the means to defend it, which they must.

 

[Kevin Peacocke]

Watching the flip flop liberals flip flopping is hilarious - we love the pipeline, we hate the pipeline. We need to shut our own pipelines, we need to rapidly restore energy independence, defund the military, quickly refund them and wipe the lipstick off.

 

[Wheels]

 

[CoElkHunter]

View attachment 454175

OR, the violinist playing in the band onboard the Titanic when it was sinking? Time will tell?

 

[SaintPanzer]

A small remark: as it is seen from the other side. You see, this argument is often expressed, and since there is no real controversy in the Western media, it is perceived by many as serious. Naturally, Russians are not a hundred dollars to be loved by everyone. But they (Russians) do not make claims against Estonia or Montenegro. They are dissatisfied with NATO and, first of all, with the United States. The admission of new members to NATO depends not on Latvia, but on the United States; it is not the armored armadas of Northern Macedonia that are moving to the Russian borders, but American missile bases. What did it look like in reality? Serious uncles in big stars sit around a round table and complain to each other: "here, San Marino stuck to us with a knife to the throat, "accept and accept." Well, what can we do? We'll have to accept it."
Well, it's funny.
And yes, we are talking about a fraternal war. A second cousin of my daughters got on the lists of the "right sector" (as an athlete, there are also sports directions there), and now he has signed up for the nationalist militia. There is a tragedy in the family, and it is unclear how it will end.

See, the problem with this is my family history is Polish, and I know too many Estonians.

There's a great line in The Princess Bride:
Inigo Montoya offers to throw a rope to Westley. Westley asks how he can trust him. Inigo replies: "I give you my word as a Spaniard". Westley's response: "No good. I've known too many Spaniards."

I can tell you that's why the Baltic States want to be in NATO. I work with the Balts every day. Not fooling me at all.

 

[Ray B]

My view on the Russian attack is that if the USA politicians wanted to stop it, they could do so quite easily without taking any direct action against Russia. Russia's main source of income is the sale of oil, so the USA opens/builds pipelines, opens federal lands to drilling/fracking, removes the recently placed regulations and whatever else gets in the way of increasing USA production of oil. in addition it starts construction on a large trans-oceanic pipeline to supply Europe and Africa oil and natural gas. The price of oil would drop to about $25/barrel and Russia would soon be unable to afford the war.

I'm sure the politicians are aware of this but they are too afraid of the squad, Twitter and the military industrial complex to put the people of the world first.

 

[flatwater bill]

FWIW...........Ukraine is a corrupt, Socialist State. We are not "defending democracy" as the politicians are telling us. If democracy is so important to us, what do we say to our close ally, Saudi Arabia?
Under President Trump, the US was energy independent. Under Sniffer Joe, the US bought 230 million barrels of oil from....you guessed it, Russia. Last year alone.
According to Crisis Group, there are about 3 dozen conflicts and wars going on currently in the World. The most deadly? The 50,000 deaths( 2020 data) from the Mexican drug wars. And we have opened our border to them. Totally unconcerned. The Russia-Ukraine conflict is unfortunate....but I think our involvement needs frank discussion. Massive liberal donors to the Democratic party, like wind farms and other alternate energies stand to benefit greatly from disruption of the third biggest oil supplier in the World market. They have already disrupted US production. Lots of money talking here under the guise of "defending democracy".( in Socialist Ukraine?)............and if you don't like the politics thread....don't "peak" (sic) at it..use your time to reload your Grendel.....FWB

 

[Vashper]

Him and Bezos flying around in outer space not sure it's a great deal.

Bezos' flight is not fundamentally different from Shepard's suborbital flight, and this was 1961.
Musk's rockets are another matter. When I was studying at the Institute, we were shown the device of modern missiles at that time (the 1970s). The outer skin, stringers and frames were made of solid metal plate by milling, or by electroerosion method. Difficult, expensive. Mask rockets are made of a durable alloy with scandium, from which frames for pretentious revolvers are made, and the skin structure is mounted by a progressive friction welding method. And of course, spectacular landing control systems. Although, by the way, flights on a vertical jet engine were demonstrated back in the 1950s.

 

[Ray B]

Bezo went up to about 67 miles while Alan Shepard went up to 116 miles. so Bezo has a ways to go before he can claim the non-orbital height sixty-one year old record

 

[Zambezi]

 

[Foxi]

Until yesterday, only NATO had advanced to the Russian border and not vice versa, or did I miss something?

If Russian troops,or warshaw pact states were stationed in Mexico and Canada, or if there were plans to do so, it is easy to guess how the Pentagon would react without being an expert military strategist.


To believe that the German armed forces of the 1980s would have intimidated the Russian bear and its empire is overly flattering.
Only the USA let them stay behind their iron curtain.
The Russians once had respect for the Reichswehr and the German Wehrmacht, but that was it. 80 years of beating us up about what military devils we were and a strong army of our own, powerful in Germany is unthinkable. Forget that. Nobody wants that here.


Any further enlargement of the EU would be a disaster for the existing EU, the financing of which is simply no longer affordable. And if Germany, as the driving force, sinks to its knees economically, all the countries in Europe will suffer a severe bout of pneumonia. That cannot be in anyone's interest.


I think the enlargement of NATO is a serious mistake and Putin, certainly not my friend, has been showing since this morning what he thinks of it and what he is prepared to do.



On the other hand, we have to ask ourselves honestly: are free peoples allowed to decide freely?


Just my 2 cents

 

[bowjijohn]

This failure of the EU to take on its fair share of the burden of security goes a long way to having empowered and emboldened Putin.

One thing history teaches us - weakness invites hostility

As for NATO's growth Eastward - that is because of smaller nations running for protection from the very actions we see today

I can’t see what Putin is really up to

my naive armchair general’s assessment- look to China. Is this coordinated action?

after all China invented chess

did they also invent puppetry? And is Putin their puppet?

 

[Foxi]

" ......... to assume their fair share of the security burden".

Perhaps this needs to be defined.
France and the UK alone have over 400,000 active soldiers.
70,000 US soldiers are stationed in Europe.

 

[bowjijohn]

" ......... to assume their fair share of the security burden".

Perhaps this needs to be defined.
France and the UK alone have over 400,000 active soldiers.
70,000 US soldiers are stationed in Europe.

It is true that France has a reasonable military

UK is not an EU member, and anyway our (UK) forces are diminished hugely.

Regulars replaced with part timers.

Looks good on paper but as a Royal Marine colleague of mine said a couple of years ago

''We couldn't even invade the Isle of White''

My own service - the Royal Navy used to be leaders in ASW but we now lack the surface fleet to play much of a role in that specialist area

We are still running Type 23 frigates that should have been scrapped a few years ago

The other nations of Europe have failed to invest

Russia has been modernising its forces since 2011 - it has developed (or at least employed) the concept of 5D warfare

If I remember correctly - it stands for

Disruption (e.g. Cyber attacks)
Dis-information
Destruction
Deterrence
Defence

It has a level of sophistication hither-to unseen in Europe - we are seeing the first 3 D's employed against Ukraine at the moment

It doesn't rival that of the US but it is in a different league to that which the EU can field

 

[bowjijohn]

German army chief 'fed up' with neglect of country's military

The chief of the German army vented his frustration over what he sees as the long-running neglect of military readiness in his country in an unusual public rant a few hours after Russia invaded Ukraine, adding that the army was in bad shape.

www.reuters.com

Lieutenant General Alfons Mais said on LinkedIn on Thursday.

"And the Bundeswehr, the army which I have the honour to command, is standing there more or less empty-handed. The options we can offer the government in support of the alliance are extremely limited."

From the horse's mouth !

 

[lwaters]

The Europeans will realize they no longer can count completely own the United States. I think you will see the build up of western Europe's militaty.

 

[oldfart009]

First a Pandemic and now the U.S is being bated into a war, I foresee influx of caravan from Mexico and then food shortage. To me, I think we aren't seeing the bigger picture yet and its funny now the Chinese are so quiet about this. And no one should mention the Olympics pleasse