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Nilgiri

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My analysis of the situation in another place is rather bleak. We are really in a bad place.

It gets depressing to think about if you venture too far.

I am just doing my best to not think about such things now....and simply observe....provide shoulder to whomever needs it however I can....and hope for dawn to arrive...this worlds really been in nightfall too long on lot of things deep down.

I hate this misery the people in ivory towers inflict on us little people...it is never ending cascade and build up of it..... they (ivory tower power freaks) can stay unaffected and unaccounted for it so easily..... but look at whats it doing here on the ground joe, can enough of us try to put it away just like they can????.... especially when it finally arrives right at doorstep (like it has for one of my friends on this very forum)...

....I feel so bad about this happening.
 

Joe Shearer

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It gets depressing to think about if you venture too far.

I am just doing my best to not think about such things now....and simply observe....provide shoulder to whomever needs it however I can....and hope for dawn to arrive...this worlds really been in nightfall too long on lot of things deep down.

I hate this misery the people in ivory towers inflict on us little people...it is never ending cascade and build up of it..... they (ivory tower power freaks) can stay unaffected and unaccounted for it so easily..... but look at whats it doing here on the ground joe, can enough of us try to put it away just like they can????.... especially when it finally arrives right at doorstep (like it has for one of my friends on this very forum)...

....I feel so bad about this happening.
There was that chap, @F-6 enthusiast . I wonder where he is just now.
 

Joe Shearer

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It gets depressing to think about if you venture too far.

I am just doing my best to not think about such things now....and simply observe....provide shoulder to whomever needs it however I can....and hope for dawn to arrive...this worlds really been in nightfall too long on lot of things deep down.

I hate this misery the people in ivory towers inflict on us little people...it is never ending cascade and build up of it..... they (ivory tower power freaks) can stay unaffected and unaccounted for it so easily..... but look at whats it doing here on the ground joe, can enough of us try to put it away just like they can????.... especially when it finally arrives right at doorstep (like it has for one of my friends on this very forum)...

....I feel so bad about this happening.
I ask because someone suggested that he had, days before the invasion, flown back to the Ukraine. There is no conversation.
 

Gessler

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Wish this was available in higher res:

photo_2021-11-27_11-47-00.jpg
 

Joe Shearer

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We need to return to these, armed with buckets of tar and bolsters of feathers.

We have issues with you, young Sir.
 

Nilgiri

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We need to return to these, armed with buckets of tar and bolsters of feathers.

We have issues with you, young Sir.

Yes agreed....these are musings that need to be explained a bit further for context (what I actually mean and where I am coming from).

Taken face value they can be quite "hot" in a sense just like the tar you describe.....but the intention is not to scald but rather to provoke a larger understanding in the end.

As strange at this may sound....one does need to venture out of more comfy talk boldly to see true friend and foe more clearly in the end....insofar as good and bad....truth and untruth and all of that are concerned.

The mounting cost of the grey's accumulated cost of misunderstanding is getting graver IMO.... we must all provide a candle where we can, in whatever way comes to us best.... to deal with it.

I am going to update some of the broken links, and opt for quotes (people can use the arrows to get to original threads other replies).
 

Nilgiri

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[Corrected and Updated]

Some of my recent musings in coffee thread for maybe more readers, people may read to their taste and comment/discuss here or in the original threads...the earlier context of some threads may also be worth visiting...

In no particular order of course...

- China and Taiwan...vis a vis whats going on w.r.t Russia-Ukraine
I'll tell you right now that CCP (whatever sordid stuff they have inherited and do get up to in various cycles) psyche....are not quite the same as Russian tsarist psyche.

Consider what the respective inflictions have been (and their transmittance) from the Mongols.

China has lot of edifice dating back to Wu Di (and successors diligent build on it)....Russia does not (that far back).

China has the raw population bulk that guides this.....Russia does not (in the same scale).

China has developed some large scale philosophies....Russia nowhere near (though I love a lot Russian cultural products).

There is tons of things that are "China" outside of the CCP top-down foray of ~100 years (arising because of all kind of manner of things).

Whereas the Tsarist hold has been much more intense and polarising in many ways (relative to Russia's size).

Its question in the end of how many man-hours of existence you have accounted for in the better mindframe endeavours.

In the end it causes quite some difference in how power courses and guides (and occupies mentally when it does crystallise in whichever node) in these two countries.

Power is not such a stark monolith in the end....very much depends on the environment carved out for it....by especially the more moral and mundane parts of society.



Actually this was what was proceeding along quite nicely with the earlier KMT dispensation that would come to power and keep DPP in tighter political contest (post the 80s democratisation by CKS son).

Then CCP broke clear promises and conventions agreed to in HK....and even started targeting some Taiwanese to be deported to PRC for legal procedure there and elsewhere (just like they have done so with a number of hong kongers too).

Taiwanese are responding to that (break of status quo)....they certainly did nothing to initiate it....and it needs lot more airing out (by asking/viewing enough Taiwanese themselves) than relying on selective drip feed propaganda agenda merchants of whatever type.

Consider just the scale DPP (under the lady now) has surmounted the regular anti-incumbency post HK crackdown. KMT is becoming more and more a spent force.....and it will have to shift its own ideology soon to stay competitive.

This is all very much CCP-driven.... so there will be no negotiation on political future for the forseeable future from Taiwanese side (till CCP demonstrably changes and rectifies its basic approach on literal fellow Han chinese it asserts w.r.t HK)....everyone can observe it for themselves in the end I suppose.

It is heartening (for me) to see Taiwanese govt quickly condemn the Russian invasion of Ukraine and put sanctions (that it can) on Russia in response...ready to amply illustrate its own foreign policy (to stand in contrast as far as possible with the muddy one of PRC) though it has limited to no recognition as a state from most of the world.


- The West, Russia and the underlying fault of much of the approach
Its a typical liberal-western approach (not classical liberal, but the evolved neo-liberalism and current crop of progressivism)

They have become so far removed from what conservatism is....that they do not understand what other conservatism (in other countries) is.

That (understanding) is the first bridge to understanding the psyche of another place at large....and then how it concentrates in the powerful.

Largely conservative societies will thus "know" this about other conservative societies ....even if their conservatisms are built on different cultural, ethnic and historical rock.

Rather they (western hyper libs in ivory towers).... think in full reductive terms of what they can understand (its just a baddy at the top....if the baddy is removed....the problem goes away see?)

Its a babylon complex that is further downstream in West (hedonism and everything with it) than most of the rest of the world....and they have inherited a vast amount of power and inertia from an earlier time too, that makes quite a dissonance on this.

It also explains how stupid they have been overall in dealing with Russia and China for the last 30 years or so especially.



- Russian problems faced in UKR war thus far (these are reproduced....i.e not my own... though I have mused quite similarly in other places):
TIFWIW:


1/I am going to try to explain the irrational Russian Armed Forces behavior towards strategy, common thought, or even the chances repatriated SSO that are now POW try to murder a bunch of men with stars.

2/Here's where I will start from. The Russian armed forces have never attempted anything like this. This isn't about what kind of war they're fighting it's about what they're capable of mustering.

3/Secondly it seems the decision making structrues have low opinion in general of Ukraine and their fighting abilities and sort of an ideal that there's a willing subservience in Ukranians if they get to be part of Russia. Pure racism informing their decision making process.

4/Thirdly battalion tactical groups are terrible units to support operations. They have overload the commander lack support and might not properly integrate with air or do adeqaute scouting as signals and recon are missing along with liasons with them.

5/Fourthly without standing down even if parts of the UA Nat Guard, Police, Border Guard, Territorials and Army are defeated, UA regional commands can be autonomous for days and are vast structures, short of ordering their demobilization their removal is way too costly for RuMoD.

6/And there's a lot of hidden corruption and misreporting that gets baked in into calculations but the higher you go up the chain as in a corporation, the more dimissive management is that it will be an issue. AKA Putin doesn't even remotely grasp how bad it is.

7/Based on those 5 let me try to explain the situation now. Russian units aren't stopping fire or limiting use of their kalibrs and stand off strikes. This is all they could muster south. Kalibrs are limited by launch tubes, a bit over a hundred is what they had ready.

8/We saw constant trains and movement over time moving Ru equipment and lots of aircraft being moved over to mustering points and at the end people. By then the supply was at its limit just keeping them warm and fed. They found out the hard way this was their logistical limit.

9/What people sa wasn't that troops packed spare tanks for long drives. They were carying their fuel reserves on them. The few organic refueling trucks were not enough to make up an actual reserve or depot. They had one full compliment, some spares in one truck , thats it.

10/This didn't seem that crazy in the Kremlin because the prevailing thought in the higher echelons and Putin's inner circle and the FSB was one highly dismissive of Ukraine highly hyped up by Russian army propaganda reporting. They missed that they were buying their own bullshit

11/The release of the information paralyzed them in terms of decision making. But the inherent bias remained and UA delayed mobilising so it didn't dissuade them. For 7 days they ate away supplies rather than actively trying to build them further, they were waiting a go order.

12/The limited supply meant it had to be a mad dash. BTGs were split into smaller sub units traveling on multiple roads to avoid congestion. When they met something they'd wait to coalesce or get into a fight. If the UA was suprised it would work.

13/Were the Ru troops quality ones they'd do better with just surprise on their side. But they were mostly poorly trained as full units were never called up before. Usually a brigade would send only a company and could hand pick.

14/Now it's either confess the lies about readiness or be creative. Because the corruption had created such a rot, brigade commandes chose "creative" (criminal), conscripts were added to the build up. Ghosts soldiers on the roster were hidden. That meant BTGs were far greener.

15/When these hit a city or made contact they'd deploy in unideal formations of platoon to company size. Not their fault all that much, this is what they knew. Then if a UA unit knew in advance where they were and was careful, it would anihilate the BTG splinter formation.

16/Because the timetable had to be kept, supplies were already short with the delay Ru troops would go a step further. They'd keep one sub unit to block and redirect subsequent units, the rest would continue on parallel roads. Again timetable meant usually more major roads.

17/After a couple of road blocks, BTG'd be diluted, lost a bunch of units and fighting to standstill. You'd expect that there would be air or artiller support. But BTGs aren't suited for that, when they move in chunks in parallel the artillery spotters could be in another group.

18/As we said also there was a problem stocking supplies but still CAS should probably not be as limited? Yes but Russian SSO more used to directing it had other tasks and Russia doesn't have a platform like the US surveilance planes and drones that can operate in contested air.

19/And the air was contested because of the limited early strikes due to the small build up + limited recon of where UA AF & AD were prior to this. Satelites take pics at known times, moving equipment often can dissuede strikes as it's uncertain anything will be in place.

20/What then was struck were major stationary objects, depots in main areas, radars, major command and control but again limited by number of reloads. So then Ru MoD started rolling the columns with heavy support of helicopters and planes ahead.

21/This works on day 1 when you know where your guys start & can track where they are easily and you know beyond that point it's all enemy. Once you land and refuel, it's less easy especially because as we mentioned, a BTG splitinter lacks a signals unit, just has a few officers.

22/Then comes the air asault. Becuase you have to be quick you also have to do risky stuff. The problem of course is that because your helicopters are parked in fields, ready for one load with some trucks and one set of ammo, you can do it once a day with each group.

23/That's why you wait till the end of the assualt attempt to see if it works. If you have to refuel and prep for a second go, your trucks have to go to a depot and reload and then come back. And only then try again.

24/You still have to try to take the airport fast and get guys in because if the operation takes too long and you haven't kept them(the UA) on the back foot your green troops are still moving piecemeal on roads, don't have much with them, any small village could be their end.

25/So the air assault fails, part of the pincer moves fail, you can't budge most of the UA troops what do you do? You go for broke, hope you win the race between entrechment in Kyiv and you just throwing all you have and hope if you decapitate UA, regional commands lose faith.

26/Otherwise becuase what remains of your force is split in small groups moving on main roads UA can mobilize move via back roads and just recapture most of the towns as you have few troops for actual 24/7 duties and to even spot them moving back into the town.

27/Can it work? I don't know. Is it a good plan. Hell no. Could they execute anything else, without the entire structure confessing the army has corruption,which yes the boss expected, but it's such a rot it might cost him his throne, yeah not when he's in this mood.

28/ So the spineless bunch decided to throw away 18-19 year old conscripts and veterans and pray they get lucky. Also that Putin hasn't noticed how nuts this is shows that he's either delusional or is completely inept when it comes to military affairs.



PS/ A lot of the commentary prior missed the readiness of the Russian forces and the poor state of affairs. Overreliance on official statements and major military pages missed tons of low level testimonials and regional investigative pieces on how big the rot was.

PPS/ Aggregation of Zvezda and VK mil informing pages and MAKS show sales pitches should be tempered by what we can find on the ground and regional and smaller outlets, forums and blogs were servicemembers were pissed were abundant to the point they shouldn't have been dismissed.

PPPS/ We saw lots of evidence for that and even then a part of the community of analysts dismissed it assuming once it's about having a war footing RU structures will take it serious. But that's not how bad habits work.

PPPPS/ And in the minds of the Kremlin they have been continuously on a war footing. So if during that time they left arms companies bankrupt sometimes even more than once, the habit was not going to break most likely.

To quote Nemtsov here:
<<Он ёбнутый... чтоб вы поняли?>>

And huge thanks to @ain92ru who knows a lot more than me about this but due to the situation in Russia has posted a lot less.



- TR tea house.... some concluding? thoughts on a forum's psyche and a power-dispensation psyche at large...
Why should anyone care about the going on of a toxic cesspool?

There is deliberately cultivated atmosphere there of mobs and trolls of all variety and of various patronage with the people running the show.

Understanding why needs a read into the history and psyche of the power-cabal of that country, and its consequent reflection in the online microcosm variant of it. Too long and deep to get into.

Let me ask you this, if this power-group mentality did what it did regarding its asserted Bengali compatriots....what real chance do asserted friends like Turks stand in the end? After all compatriots are much higher in brother-hierarchy than friends correct?

If that basic thing has degraded and atrophied on that long ago and taken its toll downstream, it becomes evermore a situation of patronage among both the reality outside such a "forum" and the imprinting within the "forum" too in the end.

i.e who pays me the biggest cheque...screw a neutral good faith approach for discussion.

It is easy to see which red-flag brigade occupies every position of final hierarchy diktat there...(above the forum controllers themselves)..

....alongside the strange potpourri miasma of lackey mobs:

- Iranian trolls and other extremist trolls from middle east area
- all kinds of false flaggers (and alternate accounts)
- deranged hyper-islamists (almost always living in the west hypocritically too)
- Self-hating Indians and Bangladeshis and the retarded trolls and skirmish brigade equivalents (all addicted to last word in the shitposting)
- Counter posting brigades from a few westerners et al.

vis a vis:

- The few individuals that stand out professionally and reasonably past this disgusting sewage
- Neutrals
- new posters

And now you have chanced upon some greek trolls apparently..... like that matters in some way past the above?

Its a joke of a system, one should not care about it tbh.

It is fresh start here.....there is reason why two large groups set up here so far in bulk:

-Turks
- Indonesians

two groups that happen to be more secular minded of scale in the muslim world....and have an overall good honour + core identity (with little mental anguish to bear) ....so generally anyone else can have a good faith debate/discussion with them and among them.

It is about getting to the actual point quickly and well in the end.

You build up a good professional core and you sacrifice the trolling quantity + activity. It is what it is.

I much prefer this system....and the riff raff trolls probably prefer the opposite.

In the end everyone can make their choice on what they want.....but there is no real need to be concerned about having to cross over to other to prop up the other one. ...just on account of a few trolls among some larger gathering of trolls in general.

Let the merit of each system impact as it does on whomever in the end and honour your own time and presence the best you can.


- A look into AI in aerospace realm and broader hierarchy conceptualisation:
Taking my mind off the ongoing conflict for a bit to air this out a bit more..... that may be of use and interest:

There is an extra advantage of there being much more robust G limit....there is lot of untapped envelope in V-n diagram even with current material + design thresholds (one can read up "divergence" in aeroelasticity for example)....because simply the pilot inside has to stay within +9/-3 G roughly (the de facto military standard).

One can visualise this to some degree with the aid of a typical VN-diagram:

View attachment 40223

Source: https://www.aiaa.org/docs/default-s...itions/gradteam3rdplace.pdf?sfvrsn=d7888d6c_0

With the caution area becoming more available + secure in sustained realm (with the removal of the human pilot's survival factor)...even with the current crop of design and materials in this realm.

As compared to it being an instantaneous/transient realm currently with a pilot onboard.

Note mach 1 (at sea level to 15k feet) is 680 ~ 720 kts respectively.

That whole paper is actually quite well done and worth a look through/read by those here interested in the overall aircraft design conception process (before engineer teams gets involved in major way and start saying "nope + lets compromise here, here and here"*).

Also all the weight and volume that goes towards the pilot (and life + function sustenance) becomes available for other purposes....where every kg and cubic meter matters a huge deal.

This talk has all developed commensurately ever since (IMO) deep blue beat Garry convincingly...i watched that in younger years in utter horror/fascination.

The technology simply fills in behind this expanding talk + philosophical realm now more than ever. It is all fairly and increasingly rationally normalised and accepted.

For a while sensor resolution and response was quite the issue (if you look at the early digital cameras for example) compared to say an organic analog, proving an obstacle chokepoint for a decade, maybe two. But that practical resolution has been surmounted effectively and increasingly.

It is still however the main governing limitation (along with materials + physics as they portend to the larger available practical envelope) to what can be realised (and compared as trade off with the legacy human-driven system) as the other thresholds (logic, processing etc) are well ahead of it.

Where there are far greater array of multi-purpose tasks (needing dynamic ability of human response or emotional/moral EQ intuition etc)...humans will be very employed in long term....and we will keep pushing in that frontier (the AI actually enables more time + space for this a lot more).

In aerospace it would be roles in say complicated lab/science payloads or higher order decision making in general....compared to say a more narrow defined warfare fighter unit where AI can fully exercise its advantages.

i.e a trunk, branch to leaf fractal model playing to each relative strength (humans at the core where they are most optimal....and AI taking over the appropriate balance at the ends and nodes and finding the optimal equilbrium).

Suffice to say the world is going to be quite different 2050 - 2100 compared to 2000-2050.


=========================

*Something btw, that technologists+machinists+technicians (the "shop/floor" crew) also do to us engineers A LOT (for phase 3) after we pass over the phase 2 workable compromise we worked out with the conceivers/scientists/designers...

I got a pretty strongly worded rebuke on just this kind of matter from one of these folks last year. Paraphrasing:....sorry son, theres just no way to machine these parts feasibly...you came close, but no cigar...the tooling will break halfway thru and the whole effort will be wasted.

Then you got to listen (defer to their experience and well-formed intuition) and make more compromises or workarounds.

This stuff in the end often takes contours of real-world ops "close to the scene" experience a sergeant sees/knows (and able to give respected worldly advice on) vis a vis a field officer (and the latter w.r.t a flag officer) by operating on a different perspective scale.

=========================

@Joe Shearer @Anmdt @Yasar @Gessler @Bilal Khan(Quwa) et al.
 

crixus

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They made a simple appointment as controversial , no one in corporate likes extra scrutiny an lime light. I think he took the right decision
 

Saithan

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Doesn’t make sense, why would any information be disclosed to public if they didn’t reach a deal in the first place. It doesn’t put any of the parts in good light.
 

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Time for India and Turkey to benefit from this and set aside our problems.

Turkey is a independant and souvereign country and an important part of the new global era to come.

In this new and dangerous global order the Turkish Republic cant afford to miss oppurtunities and potential economic and militairy developments and deals because of old pains and politically correctnessy.

Turkey should look at their own benefits and interests and make friendly contact and tradings with India, Armenia, Cuba, North Korea and Israel. We cant lose these huge markets out of fear from Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Kosovo, South Korea or Palestine.

Look at how quick Pakistan and Azerbaijan alligned with Russia after the invasion of Ukraine without informing us. Even our intelligence service was surprised.

Look at Palestine that joined the East Med Forum despite Turkey's boycot, while even Lebanon rejected membership because of our aid to them after the big port explosion.

The parliaments and governments of Pakistan and Azerbaijan didnt even sign a FTA with Turkey. The talks with Pakistan started in 2014 and was scheduled for signing before 2016, but its now 2022 and Pakistan still refuse to sign the deal, maybe because of Chinese pressure.

Azerbaijan only accepted a very limited trade deal, that only cover some 20% of Turkish products and does not want to negotiate about a reall FTA despite Turkish call's (maybe Russia's pressure). Hell, Azerbaidjan even asked visa from Turkish citizens before we saved their asses in Karabach.

Turkey must place their own interests and security first. It must be Turkey First.
 

Zapper

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Look at how quick Pakistan and Azerbaijan alligned with Russia after the invasion of Ukraine without informing us. Even our intelligence service was surprised.
If you've been following pak's foreign policy moves lately, it's quite obvious they were trying to get into Russia's camp as well after the west ditched em and the prospects of Russia & china forming a new world order against NATO and the west in general
The parliaments and governments of Pakistan and Azerbaijan didnt even sign a FTA with Turkey. The talks with Pakistan started in 2014 and was scheduled for signing before 2016, but its now 2022 and Pakistan still refuse to sign the deal, maybe because of Chinese pressure.
China with it's CPEC gained way too much leverage and influence in pakistan that it isn't surprising anymore if most of pak's policies have china's hand. If pak military had the money and opportunity to choose, I'm sure they go for Turkish weapons platforms over chinese ones anytime but it's evident of their procurements lately. On the brighter side, most of the chinese platforms being inducted into pak armed forces is donated to ensure conventional balance with India
 

Gessler

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They made a simple appointment as controversial , no one in corporate likes extra scrutiny an lime light. I think he took the right decision

Doesn’t make sense, why would any information be disclosed to public if they didn’t reach a deal in the first place. It doesn’t put any of the parts in good light.

He was indeed appointed. I'm not entirely convinced he had links with Islamists, Tata Group is a huge $314 billion conglomerate and I refuse to believe they would appoint CEO of such a prestigious project like the revived Air India without conducting a thorough background check.

However there were few pieces of investigative journalism that called out the alleged links - and it seems Tata wanted to avoid possible bad optics, so must have asked Ayci to decline the offer on his behalf so as not to make Tata look like they made a mistake in appointing him.

In business circles with lot of public exposure, this is usually how it's done in most countries.

@Nilgiri
 

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