Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[THE_WIZARD_]

BIDEN BOOM!!!

His green nutjob followers will not be pleased.

[foxhopper]

Yep, thanks joe for using up all the strategic oil reserves. No need for that shit in these peaceful times.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Navy takes out three Houthi gunboats in the Red Sea

https://www.timesofisrael.com/us-warship-shoots-down-houthi-missiles-after-container-ship-hit-in-red-sea/

[Dr. Strangelove]

Thomas Massie body slamming MAGA internet “legend” and pathetic Trump sycophant catturd2

[Dr. Strangelove]

[THE_WIZARD_]

TDS

[Dr. Strangelove]

You think Captain Ron has TDS? Interesting!

[CGVT]

You think Captain Ron has TDS? Interesting!

Not only that, he's a fucking clown

5avvzn2vfjcb1.jpg

[THE_WIZARD_]

I think almost all politicians are clowns. Most are hypocritical pieces of shit and it's both sides. The swamp is full.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Some interesting developments in the Ukraine war. On the ground, positional battles continue. What that means is that neither side is making significant territorial gains. Russia has pursued two key strategies: (1) Defend what they control in Ukraine. That's happening. (2) Put Ukrainian forces under pressure by all means possible. What is taking center stage in that strategy is the air war. In this case Russian rocketry v. the west's air defense equipment.

To understand the later strategy, one has to follow the missile and drone attacks sequentially over the last 2 years. The latest Russian missile and drone barrage targeting, they claim, Ukrainian military industrial production means is a good example of how well the Russians have adapted to Ukraine's air defense - all of that ground based. In the attack this weekend - and it continues - the Russians exploited, what they have learned from previous missile and drone attacks, clear zones in the Ukrainian air defense system or areas not covered by SAMs. Doing that, while overwhelming the Ukrainian air defense system with numbers alone, allowed a large number of both drones and missiles to reach their intended targets. While Ukraine claims it shot down "most" drones and more than half of the missiles, that doesn't square with the amount of damage done. This was an effective air raid conducted without a single manned strategic or tactical vehicle risking exposure to being shot down. It is likely to have achieved an important tactical goal of the Russians: to get UAF to move air defense equipment from the front lines to cover vulnerable cities.

The Russians, that hold a massive air power advantage, have nonetheless been unable to exploit that advantage. A lot of that has to do with the vulnerability of manned Russian aircraft to a mobile air defense system made up of sophisticated, interconnected western acquisition, targeting radars and SAMs deployed by the west to Ukraine. It has penetrateable holes but it's still too risky to put tactical aviation into the battle space and in support of ground operations. Strategic Russian bombers are firing off various types of missile from beyond the range of SAMs. As a point of interest, this is why Zelenski keeps clamoring for F16s. He needs these to engage strategic bombers and attempts by the Russians to send tactical aviation assets into the battle space - there was speculation last week that Ukraine is already operating F16s and these were responsible for Beyond Visual Range (BVR) shoot downs of 5 tactical jets operating in the Kherson region in support of ground ops there.

In a war where both sides are trying to wear each other out by damaging DIB infrastructure to reduce the capacity of a side to continue to support their war aims, you'd think the Russians are winning that one. Possibly but maybe not. That is because cloaked in secrecy, Ukrainian special forces and partisans are sabotaging key supply centers and rail lines inside Russia and between Crimea and Donetsk that the Russian military depends on to support it's massive, and not entirely effective, army ground operation. Key point: in November, we are just now learning that a 7500 mile rail line inside Russia that passes through the largest train tunnel in the world was disabled by blowing up a train as it passed through the tunnel. Major damage despite Russian claims they had the tunnel cleared in a matter of days. That claim is untenable much like the Russian claim after the Kersh straight's bridge between mainland Russia and Crimea was disable. The Ukrainians, again out of necessity, have become masters of creating havoc for Russian logistics with key attacks on very important GLOCs.

There are dozens of other acts of sabotage and assassinations by Ukrainian special forces and partisans we don't hear about. The Russians are attempting to do the same kind of things. As the front lines on the ground remain essentially frozen, the cloak and dagger war going on behind the scenes is taking on a much larger role in determining what the outcome will be. That is the main difference in the conduct of the war. It has gone from intense ground battles early, the Russian side expending alot resources with very few gains, to a great deal of behind the scenes work each side is undertaking to disable their respective country's DIBs. The Ukrainians, through two wars v, Russia trying to subjugate them, are, by necessity, very good at this kind of thing.

[Jeff Buchanan]

In the ME, US helos from two ships operating in the shipping lanes of the Red Sea region, attacked and destroyed 3 Houthi boats trying to board and hijack a commercial vessel transiting the area. A fourth boat beat feet out of the area. The Brits have cautioned the Iranians that they share responsibility in curtailing Houthi adventurism in support of the Palestinian cause. An article is linked below.

An important implication here is that this is the first hot engagement of US forces with an Iranian proxy military organization. This alone escalates the chances of Iran getting involved by targeting US military vessels with anti-ship cruise missiles. Bring it and risk an overwhelming military response from two Carrier CVBGs. The Mullah's in Iran clearly don't want this as their regime is going through major change and is a bit less stable than in past confrontations with the west.

https://www.voanews.com/a/us-repels-houthi-attacks-on-international-vessels-in-red-sea-/7419298.html

[THE_WIZARD_]

HNY to all you douchebags!FB_IMG_1704138339169.jpg

[Dr. Strangelove]

HDS

[THE_WIZARD_]

heh

[Dr. Strangelove]