The all purpose terrorism thread featuring plenty of allah akbar

[August]

Not saying I agree but the Russian position is abundantly clear.

so is the Ukranians apparently:

"Ukraine is a sovereign state," said Andriy Lysenko, spokesperson for Ukraine's ministry of defense. "All military exercises and tests are held according to a strict schedule and under international law... As for any threats [from Russia], no one can interfere with the Ukrainian Armed Forces' operational plans."

[Skybird]

no one can interfere with the Ukrainian Armed Forces' operational plans.

Except the superior foreign military.

[Oberon]

Merkel has become more and more criticla and sistanced to Putin - something that Putin does not forgive her.

Wikileaks drops docs on NSA/German co-operation:

http://thehill.com/policy/cybersecurity/308407-wikileaks-drops-docs-on-inquiry-into-nsa-german-cooperation


https://mir-s3-cdn-cf.behance.net/project_modules/disp/26a9e823715249.563279e7df783.gif

[August]

Except the superior foreign military.

Dig that.

[Onkel Neal]

Bacon smeared on Galveston restaurant owned by Muslim :nope:
http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/Muslim-business-owner-finds-front-of-his-10689480.php?google_editors_picks=true

"I don't have a victim mentality," he said. "I'm blessed to live in this country. Ninety-nine percent of my experience here has been nothing but phenomenal."

I'm taking some training in Houston this week and I will make it a point to go by & have dinner at this restaurant.

[eddie]

Good idea Neal!:up:

[Oberon]

http://31.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lqtcnsdgJs1qz4ueho1_1280.png
"Andrei...you've lost another fighter?"

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-syria-russia-warplane

[Oberon]

(Posted twice because for some reason I've lost the ability to edit my posts)

[Rockstar]

Posted twice, cant seem to edit post, linked to a page not found. Rough night last night? :D http://cdn.funcheap.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/santa2.jpg

[Oberon]

Posted twice, cant seem to edit post, linked to a page not found. Rough night last night? :D http://cdn.funcheap.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/santa2.jpg

Tis the season! :Kaleun_Cheers: :haha:

[eddie]

Second Russian jet crashes in the Gulf off of Syria, arrestor cable broke. And it just rolled off the deck into the sea. Pilot ejected and was safe.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/second-russian-jet-crashes-in-failed-carrier-landing-near-syria/ar-AAl9Lqp

[Oberon]

Second Russian jet crashes in the Gulf off of Syria, arrestor cable broke. And it just rolled off the deck into the sea. Pilot ejected and was safe.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/second-russian-jet-crashes-in-failed-carrier-landing-near-syria/ar-AAl9Lqp

Thanks Eddie, that's the story I was trying to post earlier...only whoever cleaned up my two posts cleaned up the wrong one and left the one with the broken URL instead. :03:

Also, is it just me who doesn't have an edit button? Or is this something that's broken for everyone at the moment? Or am I just being completely blind? :hmmm:

http://i.imgur.com/ycXGXe2.jpg

[Jimbuna]

One less means of harming innocents as far as I'm concerned.

[eddie]

I agree with you Jim, doesn't bother me that they have lost a plane. And Oberon, your eyes are playing tricks on you, its called Old Age! Get used to it,lol

[em2nought]

Wow, I hope they lose their bowl game https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45m9F3e1k3w

[Oberon]

And Oberon, your eyes are playing tricks on you, its called Old Age! Get used to it,lol

Young whippersnappers, get off mah lawn!

Seriously though, where is it? :dead:

[eddie]

I can see the edit button in the lower right corner Oberon, but only in my posts, if that helps.

[Oberon]

I can see the edit button in the lower right corner Oberon, but only in my posts, if that helps.

Huh, interesting. I'll have to kick around later and see what happens, what browser are you using, if I may ask?

[eddie]

Firefox

[Catfish]

Firefox

Seems it works, at least here :)

[eddie]

Oberon, Hunter and Dowly are probably behind it, you know those 2 want to take over the world one strategy game at a time, now they want to take over the forums, too!:haha:

[Oberon]

Oberon, Hunter and Dowly are probably behind it, you know those 2 want to take over the world one strategy game at a time, now they want to take over the forums, too!:haha:

You're probably not wrong. :haha:

Nah, it's all fixed now anyway. :yep:

Thanks for your help in tracking down what happened. :salute:

[eddie]

Glad I could help, not sure what I did though.:03:

[Jimbuna]

You're probably not wrong. :haha:

Nah, it's all fixed now anyway. :yep:

Thanks for your help in tracking down what happened. :salute:

Glad I could help, not sure what I did though.:03:

All sorted :shucks:

[Oberon]

Couple of rumours on the rumour mill. First one up is that the Kuznetsov is heading back to Murmansk in Feburary, providing she has any aircraft left that is.
Also, and a bit more disturbingly, I'm hearing rumours that Daesh have entered Palmyra again. :nope:

[Oberon]

I'm hearing rumours that Daesh have entered Palmyra again. :nope:

Sadly now confirmed:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-38275905?ns_mchannel=social&ns_campaign=bbc_breaking&ns_source=twitter&ns_linkname=news_central

[eddie]

Not everything is working out real well in Palmyra for them Oberon, they got to find a better place to hide all those oil trucks we caught out in the open, destroyed them all, lol

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/isil-massed-168-oil-trucks-near-a-syria-city-big-mistake/ar-AAlmthU

[Catfish]

Not everything is working out real well in Palmyra for them Oberon, they got to find a better place to hide all those oil trucks we caught out in the open, destroyed them all, lol [...]]

NATO-member Erdoghan will not be happy.

[eddie]

Probably not Catfish, but then again, who cares!?!:haha: Besides, the lackeys that serve under him are moving to give him more powers, he doesn't have enough already to commit genocide against the Kurds! I hate that arse with a passion, hope a terrorist kills him and we get to see it on television!:mad:

[Jimbuna]

A Kurdish militant group 'TAK' have claimed resposibility for last night nights bombings.

The TAK, an offshoot of the banned Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), made the claim on its website.
At least 38 people died near the Vodafone Arena in the centre of the city when a car bomb hit a police vehicle and a suicide bomber blew himself up nearby.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38280638

[Catfish]

What Erdoghan did during "Turkey's war against Daesh" (lmao) masking their war against Kurds will bring interesting times ahead, for Turkey.
Also there are rumours that Erdoghan bought a lot of oil from Daesh, financing their Jihad that also goes against christian Kurds, of course. How's that for the international community?

The Kurds are being crushed between Turkey, Daesh and Iraq.. meanwhile there must be a lot of hate against Turkey, or at least Erdoghan. Not that the latter has not staged terroristic acts himself, trying to blame it on the Kurds. He is a real nice Nato member.
Terrorism is of course the wrong answer. Apart from killing innocent civilians every terror act supports Erdoghan's course against democracy and the Kurds, "legitimizing" his actions.

[eddie]

I don't want to see terrorist acts against the Turkish people at all either, but like you say, when one does happen over there, automatically it has been done by the Kurds. Couldn't have been done by Gulens people or Daesh, its always the Kurds.

Whats not really funny, Erdoghan lumps the Kurds in with Gulens group! that they work together somehow. He's too stupid to realize Gulen and his thugs hate the Kurds as bad as Erdoghan does and always have. So why would the PKK work with Gulen? Of course with everything else going on in the ME, nothing makes any sense to the never ending hate and killing.

[Jimbuna]

Erdoghans revenge goes into full swing.

Turkish police have detained 235 people for acting on behalf of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), the interior ministry says.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38288429

[eddie]

Incredible!

[Catfish]

They have also fired a lot of teachers (25,000?) and suspended 9,500 others for "supporting terrorism", since their opinion does not please Erdoghan.

Until september 2016 "Turkey has sacked or suspended some 100,000 civil servants including judges, prosecutors, police officers and teachers since a group of rogue soldiers tried to topple the government. At least 40,000 people have been detained for suspected links to U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom Ankara blames for the plot."
http://www.businessinsider.com/r-turkey-dismisses-almost-28000-teachers-over-terrorism-links-deputy-pm-2016-9?IR=T

Erdoghan also dismissed journalists and brought the media under his control, all with the hint or better pretext to do this against "terrorism". And the Turks love him :hmmm:

[eddie]

They are locking up all the Kurdish Mayors and politicians too. The ones who haven't been locked up are preparing for the event when they come to arrest them. They pack what they call a "Prison Bag" ahead of time. When they come for them they don't have time to pack, so they do it ahead of time, what a nice way to live!

"Turkey (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/turkey/index.html?inline=nyt-geo)’s crackdown on Kurdish politicians, officials, news outlets, schools, municipalities, think tanks and even charities has been so thoroughgoing that it has left those who remain free expecting arrest at any moment. “My bag is packed for prison,” said Feleknas Uca, an H.D.P. member of Parliament. “Everybody has a bag in their house for prison. Now, everyone can be arrested at any moment.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/10/world/europe/turkey-kurdish-mayors-expect-arrests.html?_r=0

[Jimbuna]

They are locking up all the Kurdish Mayors and politicians too. The ones who haven't been locked up are preparing for the event when they come to arrest them. They pack what they call a "Prison Bag" ahead of time. When they come for them they don't have time to pack, so they do it ahead of time, what a nice way to live!

"Turkey (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/turkey/index.html?inline=nyt-geo)’s crackdown on Kurdish politicians, officials, news outlets, schools, municipalities, think tanks and even charities has been so thoroughgoing that it has left those who remain free expecting arrest at any moment. “My bag is packed for prison,” said Feleknas Uca, an H.D.P. member of Parliament. “Everybody has a bag in their house for prison. Now, everyone can be arrested at any moment.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/10/world/europe/turkey-kurdish-mayors-expect-arrests.html?_r=0

I doubt Turkey will be joining the EU any time soon then :hmmm:

[eddie]

Sure hope not! By this time though, Erdoghan doesn't care. He has no problem sucking up to Putin now.

[eddie]

Hundreds of thousands have been forced from their homes, with no place to go. A family who lost their home sometime ago, went back to see what condition it was in. When they got there, all their possessions had been taken out and put into a pile. Then all of it was set on fire! Everything burned up. Now with winter setting up in those mountains they live in, what are they going to do? This is what the Armenians went through in WW I, exactly the same. Nothing less then genocide.

https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2016/12/turkey-curfews-and-crackdown-force-hundreds-of-thousands-of-kurds-from-their-homes/

[Oberon]

Sure hope not! By this time though, Erdoghan doesn't care. He has no problem sucking up to Putin now.

That's always assuming there'll be an EU to join. :hmmm:

[Catfish]

^ i admit you are doing your very best, but just maybe the Eu lives on after your* Brexit. It seems that people in Europe are - if very slowly - becoming tired of populism and fake news. Trump was a real wake-up call here, and just of all Austria pushed their populistic FPÖ-'Leader' back, let's see how Italy does next.
The Eu can very well live without Erdoghan, however i really begin to feel pity with those Turks who do not want to live in a medieval society.

* not personal of course :)

[Oberon]

^ i admit you are doing your very best, but just maybe the Eu lives on after your* Brexit.

Well, we'll see what next years elections bring, if Holland, France and Germany can all make it through without lurching off into the deep right then it might just make it. :hmmm:

[Catfish]

The danger is not yet banned, and also Breitbart Media is coming to Germany. Oh joy! :haha:

Also, as i learned at Simhq, in the US "the far right" are not national socialists, "leftists" are the real Nazis. The world keeps surprising me.

[eddie]

The danger is not yet banned, and also Breitbart Media is coming to Germany. Oh joy! :haha:

Also, as i learned at Simhq, in the US "the far right" are not national socialists, "leftists" are the real Nazis. The world keeps surprising me.

We keep the world guessing, I'll say that!:haha::haha:

[Skybird]

The danger is not yet banned, and also Breitbart Media is coming to Germany. Oh joy! :haha:

Also, as i learned at Simhq, in the US "the far right" are not national socialists, "leftists" are the real Nazis. The world keeps surprising me.
The Hitler-Nazis have been hardcore socialists, so you should not be surprised. Nazis are lefties, seen that way. It's one of the biggest proaganda coups every run successfully that the red socialists could convince the world that their socialism was the total, the opposite, the complete natural antagonist to German Nazism. But it never was, in fact it was practically one and the same. Nazi-brown socialism and Soviet-red socialism are the same, offsprings of the same thinking and spirit. The Germans only added racism as a strawman to the formula, that was all. Hitler still said in February 1944 or 1945, in a speech to the party, that there were no principal differences between Bolschewism and Nationalsocialism. Goebbels already in the very early 30s agitated on the basis of socialist ideas and threats against the possessing, rich class. And his words were dratsic already back then, and left no doubt on what private property owners would need to expect if the NSDAP ever claimed power.

There is no principal differences between Nationalsocialism (brown) and Soviet Socialism (red). Its one of the biggest fakes, the biggest jokes of all history that most people see these as opposites. The big war was a brothers' war, so to speak, and ideology was not what Hitler and Stalin fought about.

[Oberon]

I thought we put this one to bed ages ago?

[Catfish]

Too.. much.. Mises.. :dead:
Postfactual times indeed.

[Skybird]

Just one example. Feel free to google yourself many more.

"We are socialists. We are enemies, deadly enemies, of today’s capitalist economic system with its exploitation of the economically weak, its unfair wage system, its immoral way of judging the worth of human beings in terms of their wealth and their money, instead of their responsibility and their performance, and we are determined to destroy this system whatever happens!"

Gregor Strasser, 1892-1934, NSDAP ideologist

[Catfish]

Yep, isn't it easy to fall for this and declare it to be the same. They should have been hugging the Soviet Union then? Socialism was just a name, and they used so many.
At least you did not post 'evidence' from "The American Thinker" (http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2007/11/the_nazis_were_maxists.html), i guess that's a plus :yep:

But this really does not belong here.

[AndyJWest]

Just one example. Feel free to google yourself many more.

"We are socialists. We are enemies, deadly enemies, of today’s capitalist economic system with its exploitation of the economically weak, its unfair wage system, its immoral way of judging the worth of human beings in terms of their wealth and their money, instead of their responsibility and their performance, and we are determined to destroy this system whatever happens!"

Gregor Strasser, 1892-1934, NSDAP ideologist

You have omitted to tell us what happened to Strasser. How convenient.

As for the rest of your ridiculous attempt to rewrite history, please provide evidence that any legitimate academic historian gives the slightest credence to it. Yes, the Nazis spouted populist rhetoric when it suited them, and yes, the Strasserite wing of the party may even have believed some of it, before Hitler had them systematically murdered, but at heart their authoritarian nationalist ideology centred around a theory concerning a global Jewish-Bolshivist conspiracy was utterly and fundamentally of the right, and self-evidently opposed to a politics which saw class, not invented 'races' as the core source of conflict. Nobody at the time saw them as anything but right wing: which is why conservative elements in Germany subverted democracy by placing them into power in the first place.

[Jimbuna]

Not long to go now before it all comes to an end but I wonder if the genocide now being committed will ever be brought before a court and those responsible face justice.

Aleppo battle: UN says civilians shot on the spot

Last messages from Aleppo
Activist Lina Shamy: "Humans all over the world, don't sleep! You can do something, protest now! Stop the genocide".
Bana Alabed, aged 7: "I am talking to the world now live from East #Aleppo. This is my last moment to either live or die."
White Helmets tweet: "All streets & destroyed buildings are full with dead bodies. It's hell."
Abdul Kafi Alhamado, teacher: "Some people are under the rubble, no-one can help them. They just leave them under the rubble until they die - these houses as their graves."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-38301629

A respectful advisory note: Don't retaliate in kind if the usual suspect posts their usual ice cold rhetorical response.

[Oberon]

Not long to go now before it all comes to an end but I wonder if the genocide now being committed will ever be brought before a court and those responsible face justice.





http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-38301629

A respectful advisory note: Don't retaliate in kind if the usual suspect posts their usual ice cold rhetorical response.

Duly noted.

Sadly Jim, I don't think anyone will come to court over this, and it will remain another black mark on humanities history. I imagine that the death toll will eclipse Srebrenica.
Kind of makes all our vows in the aftermath of WWII for 'never again' to be somewhat worthless, doesn't it?

[mapuc]

Going a little off topic

Someone, can't remember who, posted a comment about WW3 and something about it's going to start in an area where no one had expected and it would come as a surprise

Here's a good candidate
The last few days there has been a crisis between Denmark/Government and Greenland/Home Rule. the Home Rule in Greenland has threaten to leave Denmark and they even threaten to throw USA out too.

When I heard this yesterday, I remembered this comment here in GT and I thought, what if Greenland did just that and then later made an agreement with Putin.

Just a little thought.

Markus

[Jimbuna]

Duly noted.

Sadly Jim, I don't think anyone will come to court over this, and it will remain another black mark on humanities history. I imagine that the death toll will eclipse Srebrenica.
Kind of makes all our vows in the aftermath of WWII for 'never again' to be somewhat worthless, doesn't it?

Agreed :yep:

[Jimbuna]

Possibly the best speech I've ever heard from George Osborne...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-38305413

[eddie]

That speech was spot on Jim!

[Jimbuna]

Military action has ended in eastern Aleppo, Russia's ambassador to the UN has said.

Earlier Mr Churkin said an arrangement had been made for rebel fighters to leave the city. Rebels have confirmed the deal.

"The civilians, they can stay, they can go to safe places, they can take advantage of the humanitarian arrangements that are on the ground. Nobody is going to harm the civilians."

Let us hoe that is in fact the case.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-38308883

[Jimbuna]

That speech was spot on Jim!

Rgr that Eddie :yep:

[eddie]

Oh no Jim look what Daesh got a hold of in Palmyra!! Way to go Russia and Syria!! How stupid can you get!!


http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/isis-is-on-the-offensive-and-may-have-just-picked-up-a-surface-to-air-missile-system/ar-AAlwfcD

[mapuc]

Oh no Jim look what Daesh got a hold of in Palmyra!! Way to go Russia and Syria!! How stupid can you get!!


http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/isis-is-on-the-offensive-and-may-have-just-picked-up-a-surface-to-air-missile-system/ar-AAlwfcD

When reading the article I saw that a missile system Pantsir S-1 could have fallen into the hand of ISIS-
I made a search about this Pantsir S-1 and it looks like an advanced ground to air missile system.
Even if ISIS got they hand on one of these system they will most likely not be able to shoot down some American or other allied fighter jets-
I think it's one of those system where the soldiers has to go through some month of training before they know how to use this system correctly

Markus

[Jimbuna]

Oh no Jim look what Daesh got a hold of in Palmyra!! Way to go Russia and Syria!! How stupid can you get!!


http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/isis-is-on-the-offensive-and-may-have-just-picked-up-a-surface-to-air-missile-system/ar-AAlwfcD

I doubt they have the trained personnel to operate it Eddie but either way, a cruise missile should make short work of it or many an ARM or Sead 'standoff' I should imagine.

[eddie]

I sure hope so Jim. The Russians better get crackin and take that stuff out. Not sure coalition aircraft can get in that part of Syria.

[Jimbuna]

I sure hope so Jim. The Russians better get crackin and take that stuff out. Not sure coalition aircraft can get in that part of Syria.

If that's the case then it will only be Syrian and Russian air crews at risk....sounds reasonable to me :):03:

[Rockstar]

You're both wrong, though I think Andy's extremist view even more so in that he spouts off that the nazi political organization is only a right wing political organization.

Today our left-wing politicians in particular are constantly insisting that their craven-hearted and obsequious foreign policy necessarily results from the disarmament of Germany, whereas the truth is that this is the policy of traitors... But the politicians of the Right deserve exactly the same reproach. It was through their miserable cowardice that those ruffians of Jews who came into power in 1918 were able to rob the nation of its arms.

Adolf Hitler. Mein Kampf (My Jihad) lol couldn't resist :D

In my opinion Hitler it seems played both left and right political ideology to further his goals. He was I think just a middle of the road fascist. Oh, amd one more thing thanks to the likes of Stalin, Pol Pot and others evil monsters in our history we know for a fact authoritarian nationalists do not define only right wing political organizations.

[eddie]

If that's the case then it will only be Syrian and Russian air crews at risk....sounds reasonable to me :):03:

:D:salute:

[AndyJWest]

You're both wrong, though I think Andy's extremist view even more so in that he spouts off the the nazi political organization is only a right wing political organization.



In my opinion Hitlers it seems played both left and right political ideology to further his goals. He was I think just a middle of the road fascist. Oh, amd one more thing thanks to the likes of Stalin, Pol Pot and others evil monsters in our history we know for a fact authoritarian nationalists do not define only right wing political organizations.

My 'extremist' view is shared by just about every academic historian who has ever written on the subject.

[Rockstar]

My 'extremist' view is shared by just about every academic historian who has ever written on the subject.

woop-dee-doo.

[Oberon]

Urk. A Pantsir is a pretty capable device, someone screwed up there...it won't be the easiest thing to kill if the operator knows what they're doing and doesn't leave the radar on all day.

Speaking of cock-ups, I wonder how much info on the M1A2 has made it to Iran and Russia from the hulls that Saudi Arabia keeps abandoning in Yemen. :hmmm:

[Rockstar]

meh, they're over 30 years old Iran and especially Russia have bigger problems if they dont know what makes the Abrams tick by now.

But are they really abandoning them in Yemen? I read Houthi fighters were blowing them up inside Saudi borders.

[Oberon]

I'm not certain of the precise locale, but the Saudi ground forces have been taking quite a kicking across the board. But, they haven't fought a war in the nations history. Normally throwing money at the problem is enough, this is the first time that they've actually gone in, and they've done it against an opponent which got training through antagonising Israel and locking horns against Iraq.
True on the age of the A2, although until the A3 comes out it's still the US's frontline tank, although I'd hope that the US version has some tricks that the Saudi Arabian version doesn't.

[August]

I'll bet tank losses are more about the quality of the soldiers operating them than any failure of the equipment. Good training and motivation are important keys to success on the battlefield and i'm betting that the average Saudi private gets little of either.

[Jimbuna]

I'll bet tank losses are more about the quality of the soldiers operating them than any failure of the equipment. Good training and motivation are important keys to success on the battlefield and i'm betting that the average Saudi private gets little of either.

Yeah, highly probable but still not a certainty.

[Jimbuna]

Syria conflict: Fierce fighting halts Aleppo evacuation.

A deal to evacuate rebel fighters and civilians from eastern Aleppo has stalled, with heavy shelling reported in the Syrian city.
A ceasefire was declared in Aleppo on Tuesday and buses brought in to ferry people out of the devastated enclave.
But fighting resumed on Wednesday. Syrian activists also say air strikes over rebel-held territory have resumed.
The breakdown of the deal, brokered by Russia and Turkey, is being attributed to demands from the government side.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-38314291

Well, no big surprises here....let the genocide/carnage resume :nope:

[Dowly]

It does tell a lot about BBC that they keep referring to Syrian Observatory for Human Rights as a 'group'. We are talking about one man running his site from his home in Coventry. Man, who keeps referring to his "reliable sources" which are then taken at face value by everybody without further confirmation.

This is stuff that would make Goebbels cry of joy. :yep:

[Schroeder]

It does tell a lot about BBC that they keep referring to Syrian Observatory for Human Rights as a 'group'. We are talking about one man running his site from his home in Coventry. Man, who keeps referring to his "reliable sources" which are then taken at face value by everybody without further confirmation.

This is stuff that would make Goebbels cry of joy. :yep:
Don't get me started. Over here it's all anti Assad and anti Russia on one side and glorious democratic freedom fighters on the other. The bias is sickening. And no I don't like Assad or Putin but at least these two clowns have a chance to end that war and create a somewhat stable state afterwards. Non of those silly rebel groups can achieve that anymore and their victory would mean endless struggle for power and more bloodshed. But no, we said in the beginning of the war that we want the "democratic freedom fighters" to win...can't change that now even though it doesn't make any sense anymore right....http://www.smiliemania.de/smilie.php?smile_ID=6545 (http://www.smiliemania.de/)

[Von Due]

New findings in the Egyptair crash in May
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-38330316

Looks like terrorism can't be ruled out. This is intriguing as fire was detected in the cockpit near one of the side windows/panels and the avionics bay. It will be interesting to see how this all adds up to one coherent picture.

[Jimbuna]

It looks like the second ceasefire is holding and the evacuation has begun.

An operation to evacuate a besieged rebel-held enclave in the Syrian city of Aleppo is now well under way.
Syrian state TV showed footage of ambulances and a long line of green buses leaving eastern Aleppo.
BBC producer Riam Dalati says the first convoy has now arrived at a "handover point" in rebel-held areas to the west.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-38329461

[eddie]

It has to hold up Jim, I can't see anything in that city worth fighting over anymore. Completely destroyed.

[Jimbuna]

I wonder what the aftermath will bring in terms of an embargo toward Putin (Assad probably won't dare risk leaving Syria other than travelling to the likes of Russia)?

[eddie]

The way things are going, there will be a lot of accusations but nothing will come of it sadly.

[Jimbuna]

The way things are going, there will be a lot of accusations but nothing will come of it sadly.

Yeah, you could well be right....until after next January anyway.

http://i.imgur.com/aYZvCZK.jpg

[Oberon]

Embargo?

Embargo?!

:haha::haha::haha::har::har::har::har:

Haven't you heard? Putin's the good guy now, there's not going to be any embargo. What Putin has done to Syria is all good, and will probably wind up getting the trade restrictions dropped.

Can't disappoint our Moscow masters after all. :salute:

[eddie]

Once Trump takes office, the sanctions against Putin and his cronies will be lifted. Bet on it!!

[MaDef]

Embargo?

Embargo?!

:haha::haha::haha::har::har::har::har:

Haven't you heard? Putin's the good guy now, there's not going to be any embargo. What Putin has done to Syria is all good, and will probably wind up getting the trade restrictions dropped.

Can't disappoint our Moscow masters after all. :salute:Russia has a vested interest in Syria, Still not sure what the U.S' end game is. The last couple of times we got involved in "king making" in that area, the outcomes were less than optimal. If it were my call, I'd be tempted to call it a day, and let the natives fight it out among themselves without interference.

[Schroeder]

Well, it doesn't exactly belong in here but the Turkish authorities have just prohibited a German high school in Ankara to teach anything about Christmas...

In german only http://www.tagesschau.de/ausland/tuerkei-weihnachten-101.html

Our friend and Nato partner....:yeah:

[Jimbuna]

Stop the funding....it'll be their loss.

[Oberon]

https://ronmamita.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/turkey-and-its-neighbours-map.jpg

We're stuck with it, because look at that.

[eddie]

Bin Ladens son denied entry into Egypt, so guess where he decided to go? Turkey!!:haha:

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/osama-bin-laden-son-denied-entry-egypt-cairo-international-airport/?ftag=CNM-00-10aab6a&linkId=32504402

[August]

If I were an evil man i'd say it's a large country for the region. Maybe it'd look much better partitioned into thirds or even quarters. :arrgh!:

[Von Due]

If I were an evil man i'd say it's a large country for the region. Maybe it'd look much better partitioned into thirds or even quarters. :arrgh!:

One word: Fractals
http://www.gannett-cdn.com/-mm-/69dbcd544913dc3255956a2e0255a5182d165cbc/c=104-0-449-259&r=x404&c=534x401/local/-/media/2016/07/21/USATODAY/USATODAY/636047216650179363-photo.jpg

[Oberon]

If I were an evil man i'd say it's a large country for the region. Maybe it'd look much better partitioned into thirds or even quarters. :arrgh!:

http://media.worldbulletin.net/news/2014/07/05/picot-skeys.jpg

:dead: :03:

[mapuc]

If I was an evil person and a leader of a terror group I would do it totally different

I'm pretty sure no agency would know what's going on or they would have hard time finding out what's going on


Markus

[Schroeder]

If I was an evil person and a leader of a terror group I would do it totally different

I'm pretty sure no agency would know what's going on or they would have hard time finding out what's going on


Markus
That's what they thought too.:03:

[Mr Quatro]

I guess I'm a little slow, but I just found out that there are still one million people left in Mosul: https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2169007/as-one-million-people-are-still-trapped-in-isis-stronghold-mosul-refugees-tell-of-public-executions-and-floggings/

This is a war story I don't want to read when it's over :oops:

[Oberon]

Scratch one Russkie ambassador, can't say I'm particularly surprised, and someone in the security detail is going to get detailed to guard a tree in Siberia.

Heh, apparently the guy who shot the Russian ambassador, Mevlut Mert Altintas was 22 years old, which means he was born in 1994, a hundred years after Gavrilo Princip was born...

[Commander Wallace]

Quote: Ambassador Andrei Karlov, 62, was several minutes into a speech at the embassy-sponsored exhibition in Ankara when a man fired at least eight shots, according to the AP photographer in the audience. He also shouted "Allahu akbar," the Arabic phrase for "God is great" and continued in Arabic: "We are the descendants of those who supported the Prophet Muhammad, for jihad." "Don't forget Aleppo, don't forget Syria!" the gunman shouted in Turkish, referring to the Syrian city where Russian bombardments have helped drive rebels from areas they had occupied for years during the war.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/19/europe/turkey-russian-ambassador-shot/index.html




So much for peace and goodwill toward men. :nope:

[Von Due]

Unfortunately, this was more or less expected.

Clues as to why (more a giveaway than a clue really)
"Don't forget Aleppo, don't forget Syria!" the gunman shouted in Turkish, referring to the Syrian city where Russian bombardments have helped drive rebels from areas they had occupied for years during the war.

Russia's involvement and support for Assad means this is likely to happen again somewhere, at some point. Another issue is, will this mean back to square one for Turkish/Russian relations -> NATO/Russian relations after Turkish diplomatic acrobatics saved them after they shot down that jet? Putin is not famous for letting bygones be bygones.

[mapuc]

Have some question due to this

1. What will happen to the relationship between Turkey and Russia ?

2. What will happen i Syria (Here I'm also thinking in Turkey-Russia relation) ?

Markus

[eddie]

I guess I'm a little slow, but I just found out that there are still one million people left in Mosul: https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2169007/as-one-million-people-are-still-trapped-in-isis-stronghold-mosul-refugees-tell-of-public-executions-and-floggings/

This is a war story I don't want to read when it's over :oops:


Going to be another blood bath I'm afraid. An Iraqi woman was trying to escape from Mosul walking behind an Iraq Army Humvee, when a Daesh sniper shot her in the neck. Those poor civilians are caught between a rock and a hard place. Feel so sorry for them.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/hungry-thirsty-and-bloodied-in-battle-to-retake-mosul-from-isis/ar-AAlIY6A

[Rockstar]

polonium-210?

[Jimbuna]

Scratch one Russkie ambassador, can't say I'm particularly surprised, and someone in the security detail is going to get detailed to guard a tree in Siberia.

Heh, apparently the guy who shot the Russian ambassador, Mevlut Mert Altintas was 22 years old, which means he was born in 1994, a hundred years after Gavrilo Princip was born...

Just a matter of time before tourism is affected....then Turkey will have to make a commitment of true worth.

[Jimbuna]

Sadly, inevitable.

[Catfish]

Sorry for the cynism, but if a gunman shouts "Allahu akhbar" and shoots the russian ambassador, the Russians must have done something right?

I cannot foresay a russian reaction, but after all it was a terrorist, and Erdoghan has by all means been fighing terrorism, if it costed Turkey's democracy. i do not think Putin blames Erdoghan or Turkey as a state for it.

I admit i am beginning to have difficulties understanding the motivation and especially the different sides or alliances of this mess.. :hmmm:

[Oberon]

Naturally the Gulenists and 'their CIA masters' are copping the blame on most Russian and Turkish social media, because of course they are.

[Oberon]

And so it has begun, did wonder if something would happen over Christmas.

A lorry has driven into a Christmas market in Berlin, at least one person killed.

[Catfish]

Naturally the Gulenists and 'their CIA masters' are copping the blame on most Russian and Turkish social media, because of course they are.

I know you don't mean this serious, but Gulen has indeed nothing to do with the assassinations in Turkey. Erdoghans's repressions, his dictatorship becoming more clear by the minute and the Kurds alone are more than enough to fuel all the resistance against him there.

That Daesh is against Russia cannot surprise anyone. But Erdoghan will probably create a Kurd out of this DAESH idiot to get more power.
I wonder what Putin really thinks about all that.

[Skybird]

So far nine dead, 50 wounded. Police calls it a terror attack, warnings have been known since days.

The Breitscheid Platz is the plaza around the Gedächtnis Church, and the space between the church and the so-called Europacenter and the newly opened Bikini-building (nothing to see there, it just is a name).

[Von Due]

so far there is nothing to my knowledge that ties the assassin to Daesh/ISIS/ISIL. No doubt that crowd cheered when the news came out but remember there are other groups in Syria and abroad, some fudamentalist, some secular, who all fight against Assad/Russia/Iran and many of them also fight against ISIS in what is one of the craziest hot pots served. I'm pretty sure Turkey will try all they can to tie this to the Kurds as well as anyone in Turkey opposing the current Sun King. One way or another. I wouldn't be totally surprised if Turkish intelligence "finds" connections between everyone who aren't rooting for the Govt, and this hit.

Truth has been long dead.

[Oberon]

I know you don't mean this serious, but Gulen has indeed nothing to do with the assassinations in Turkey.

I don't mean it, but there are plenty of people out there who do.

[Oberon]

The driver has been detained, so that's good.

I can see retractable bollards becoming very popular now. Doesn't stop gunmen, but should stop or at the very least slow down vehicles.

[Commander Wallace]

Quote: BERLIN, Dec 19 (Reuters) - The circumstances of Monday's deadly truck crash at a Christmas market in Berlin is still unclear, a senior German official said, dismissing as speculation reports that the lorry could have been hijacked by militants.

A lorry ploughed into a busy Christmas market in Berlin on Monday, killing at least nine people and wounding 50 more in what police said was a possible terror attack. Ambulances and police rushed to the area after the driver drove up the pavement of the market in a central square popular with tourists, in scenes reminiscent of the deadly truck attack in the French city of Nice in July.

http://www.newslocker.com/en-us/news/worldnews/nine-killed-as-lorry-ploughs-into-berlin-xmas-market/




Thoughts and prayers for the victims and their families and friends.

[Oberon]

So yup, the mayor of Ankara, and possibly CNNTurk are going with the line that the police officer was a 'Gulenist', which means that Trump is going to come under pressure from Putin and Erdogan to hand over Gulen, and Mike Flynn, the new NSA, has stated that he thinks that it would be a good idea if the US did exactly that (http://europe.newsweek.com/us-should-extradite-coup-suspect-fethullah-gulen-turkey-says-trump-adviser-519534?rm=eu).

If I were Mr Gulen, I'd be thinking about getting the hell out of the US before January... :yep:

[Rockstar]

I for one wouldnt lose a wink of sleep if Fethullah Gulen was extradited to Turkey or Russia. IMO he is a wolf in sheeps clothing no different than Erdogan. Both seek the Islamization of Turkey only difference is Gulen lost and Erdogan won.

[Oberon]

Of course, doing exactly what Erdogan wants you to do is perhaps something to lose a bit of sleep over. When a dictatorial idiot demands that you do something, you have to ponder the wisdom of actually doing it.
Anything that's a thorn in the side of Erdogan is therefore good news for the west. Although it's also a carte blanche for him to arrest and execute anyone he wants to, that really wouldn't change if Gulen was extradited and executed.

[Rockstar]

The impression I get is Gulen and Edrogan are birds of a feather competing for Turkey's top dog. Send Gulen back and let them and their allah sort it out old school I dont give crap about their religious drama. Keep it the hell out my country.

:Kaleun_Sleep:

[Oberon]

Well...I guess you do have the luxury of being far from the front-lines in this war...for now...

[Dmitry Markov]

Yesterday the news came one after another - first our poor ambassador, than this...

My sincere condolences to all who suffered. (Again....)

[Jimbuna]

The BBC are describing this as both a 'terror' and a 'terrorist' attack :hmmm:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38375555

I'll move this to the terrorism thread for consistency.

[Jimbuna]

Yesterday the news came one after another - first our poor ambassador, than this...

My sincere condolences to all who suffered. (Again....)

The initial footage aired on the BBC last night was quite alarming.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38376987

[Skybird]

The German federal state attorney officially calls it a terror attack now. Which is no surprise, he would not keep the investigation in his house if there were no very strong indications for this beign a terror strike.

Currently a realistic scenario seems to be that the Polish truck got hijacked with its driver, the owner in Poland filed a report in Poland that it was stolen, the driver then was killed and the attacker used the lorry as the weapon for his strike. Can but most not be formally initated by or linked to IS, can be a radicalised individualist as well.

The religion of peace greets the peace festivities of another religion. Lovely. Or does anybody believe that it was just a militant Christian protester who wanted to protest against the excessive commercialization of christmas?

---

On the Ambassador shot, no worries there - Russia, Turkey and Iran all sit in the same boat in their desire to form a new map of dominance in the ME (keep that in mind when wanting to have the West doing more business "investments" in Iran...). Russia will not allow to let a shot replacable come in its way of forming stronger dominance over the region - strengthening ties to Turkey is more important for them. - NATO must get rid of Turkey.

[Rockstar]

Most of what Erdogan did was to solidify his position by purging Gulen followers from theirs making Gulen very much less of a thorn in Erdogans side than some might think. Gulen is a nobody now a thing of the past in Turkisk politics getting a hold of him would just be icing on the cake.

Gulen is welcome to stay here if he wants to request political asylum fine. But if he wants to start talking smack and think he can establish his operations over here in my country. Then I say good riddance get rid of the bum and self proclaimed islamic prophet and send him back where he came from.

[Skybird]

Berlin , now 12 dead.

[Jimbuna]

The suspect has just been released due to lack of evidence...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38385961

The German authorities must be desperate for leads lest they begin to look foolish and Merkel will probably be thanking her lucky stars no refugee/asylum seeker was involved (up to this moment in time).

[Oberon]

no refugee/asylum seeker was involved (up to this moment in time).

Pfft, that won't last. :haha:

[kraznyi_oktjabr]

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has vowed to punish those responsible for the attack "as harshly as the law requires".In teresting wording "as harshly as law requires". Oh, how terrifying... :nope: What is the minimum penalty which "law requires" for mureder and/or terrorist attack in Germany?

[Rockstar]

Probably her words were chosen to remind potential vigilante mobs not to take matters into their own hands. That the nation has laws which deal with crime such as this.

[em2nought]

Probably her words were chosen to remind potential vigilante mobs not to take matters into their own hands. That the nation has laws which deal with crime such as this.

Yep, what a terrible thing it would be if Germans started fighting back. :03:

[Oberon]

Exactly! Nothing like a good old bit of indiscriminate violence to celebrate the holiday season!

[Skybird]

Probably her words were chosen to remind potential vigilante mobs not to take matters into their own hands. That the nation has laws which deal with crime such as this.

have we...? I wouldn't be so sure of that. Myself as well as my mother have made experiences with how the law may awfully dissapoint this assumption. There is a reasonw hy I do not out high expectatiosn or trust into german laws.

Next, there are the experts who always see reason to give a relativising excuses or a positive social future perspective to ease a penalty. Foreigners arriving in Germany repeatedly have mocked Germany in past months for its prisons being "holiday resorts" and beign senm tenced to prison comparing to making holidays, comparing to what they are used to. By the laws, thosuands and thosuands already shoulkd nhave been deprted again - fact is that so far only 800-900 have been removed after their asylum procedures had en ded and were rejected. In parts federal state governments openly violate the will of the central government and violate their own laws.

And finally, to have a law does not mean one automatically has the means to enforce it. German police is in desperately hidden withdrawel from organised crime and criminal family clans enriching us multiculturally in cities like Berlin, Essen, and the Ruhrgebiet area, and regarding this attack in Berlin now the police already yesterday late night admitted that if the person they arrested back then would not be the one they were looking for, police then would find it difficult to do anything more - there are almost no clues and no hot traces. Their call to the public today to bring in (to the police) any cellphone videos that maybe were shot of the van and its cockpit and drivers, had the echo of desperation around it.

Honestly said I think they have no clue and do not know currently what to do.

[Rockstar]

Then again I could be wrong. :D

[Skybird]

They found an ID card - at least kind of an ID paper - in the van's cockpit. :o Could one believe that luck? Is this for real, of has it been intentionally placed there, to lure the hunters on a wrong track?

Anyway, police now is hunting a 23 year old Tunesian.

P.S. The guy seems to be no nobody. He is knwon to the police, uses four different names and had a status of exceptional leave to remain, means his asylum demand was refused but his stay was tolerated nevertheless. Over here, refused applications for asylum does not automatically mean that people get deoprted. The overwhelming majoirty, almost all of them, nevertheless stay for years to come, and often forever.

In other words: the German asylum laws are laws with pretty small, if any, teeth. Additional to that we do not scan for people whose skills and talents we really could need, like they do in Canada, Australia or the US. We just take everybody. And that is the reason why we get so many of those who already gfailed to make it in their own countries. The vast majority of migrants of the past 18 months have not been fleeing from war.

For Merkel, this is no good news. However, the people in Berlin are described like I would have expected: "maximally unimpressed". Its part of the Berliner Schnauze.

[Jimbuna]

They found an ID card - at least kind of an ID paper - in the van's cockpit. :o Could one believe that luck? Is this for real, of has it been intentionally placed there, to lure the hunters on a wrong track?



Was wondering that myself :yep:

Either one huge mistake or a gigantic red herring :hmmm:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38392128

[Von Due]

The ID question is a good one indeed. Consider 2 possibilities:

1) ISIS really is behind the attack and it was planned by core people. They do have people in the command strucure who held high ranks in Saddam's military intelligence and they would know the red herring game as good as any intelligence officer elsewhere. The fact that some in the command structure are still only known by their aliases and not their real names shows that these guys are well capable of clever ploys to outwit investigators. Red herring ID is absolutely a possibility.

2) ISIS took responsibility while not being actually responsible, and the attack was performed by an amateur (relatively speaking). This is also absolutely a possibility.

It is basically impossible for anyone outside the intelligence community to say anything with any meaningful degree of certainty. It is also quite possible that the ID info that got to the media is itself a red herring planted by the investigating bodies. In the hush hush game, very few things are what they appear to be to the public.

[Skybird]

The website of the Bundeskriminalamt BKA (=German FBI) where they had placed the public all-points bulletin was taken down by a cyberattack short time after the warrent had been posted by the BKA. Seems the BKA could not even defend itself anymore!?

From the radio: some lefty politician or party member has crept forward and indicated that no asylum seeker should have his request rejected and be deported anymore, since this holds the risk that he turns desperate, radicalises himself in no time and starts to mass-kill civilians.

Lovely. Why am I not surprised of the direction this kind of reasoning was coming from... :down: Lesson to be learned: violence, and threatening violence, should pay off.

[Oberon]

Let them indicate, so long as it doesn't go any further than that. Politicians will be politicians. It's a daft idea anyway.
Of course, in regards to sending unaccepted asylum seekers back is that you wind up playing asylum tennis as the country that you send them to sends them straight back again. When you get these stateless individuals stuck between the cracks of the system, you have a problem that cannot easily be solved.

[kraznyi_oktjabr]

Yle reports (in Finnish) that police has found fingerprints matching to Tunisian suspect whose ID papers were found from the truck. So it looks like it wasn't red herring.

[Jimbuna]

The Christmas market has reopened :sunny:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38402743

[ikalugin]

Just realised that it is impossible to catch up to monster threads. Tried reading from 10 pages back and I find a horrible OT mess there, heh.

[ikalugin]

Scratch one Russkie ambassador, can't say I'm particularly surprised, and someone in the security detail is going to get detailed to guard a tree in Siberia.

Our ambassador did not have a Russian security detail because Turkey banned the special forces unit that handles it (Zaslon) from entering Turkey about 10 years ago.

Allegedly the assasin was the Turkish policeman on security duty.
Allegedly that ban was renegotiated because Turkey is no longer safe.

[Oberon]

Turkey hasn't been safe for a while now, although I must admit I didn't expect it to get to that kind of level, so it was not a surprise but still a bit of a surprise really.
Is the Russian line echoing the Turkish one that it was all Gulens fault?

[mapuc]

I find it amazing that every time:

1. The terrorist(s) leave some id behind
2. They are mostly criminal or have been charged for some criminal stuff
3. The police or the intelligence in the country have had he or them under surveillance for a while

Markus

[ikalugin]

Turkey hasn't been safe for a while now, although I must admit I didn't expect it to get to that kind of level, so it was not a surprise but still a bit of a surprise really.
Is the Russian line echoing the Turkish one that it was all Gulens fault?
The party line is that it is Islamists fault I believe. That and the need for Erdogan to get a grip on his Islamists. Allah Akbar by the attacker sort of fits that narrative.

[Onkel Neal]

I find it amazing that every time:

1. The terrorist(s) leave some id behind
2. They are mostly criminal or have been charged for some criminal stuff
3. The police or the intelligence in the country have had he or them under surveillance for a while

Markus

4. And the governments welcome more in.

[Jimbuna]

Scratch off one more oxygen thief and bloody good riddance!!

The Berlin market attack suspect, Anis Amri, has been shot dead by police in Milan, Italy's interior minister says.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38415287

[Skybird]

Meanwhile it became known that the senator of justice of the government in Hamburg - which is a federal city state in itself - delayed to post the public warrant for Amri in Hamburg, when the other federal states already had set it up. Reason: the man is an activist against hate speech and offensive language in the internet media and refers to such comments showing up when the police uses Facebook for posting public warrants. FB does not allow disabling the comment function, and Hamburg, so says the man, finds itself unable to moderate these comments like they do in other states. Some hate comments may slip through before moderators could delete them, so he said.

The warrant was set up with delay and not before repeated demands to Hamburg to finally set it up.

Interesting priorities by this do-gooder. Hamburg is run by a red-green coalition government.

The also red-green ruled city state of Bremen also has not realised a warrant regulation by the central government, allowing the federal police to react faster by setting up such warrants without formal permission of the local authorities.

"Watch your mouth." In some parts of germany, thats more important than lives.

[Oberon]

The party line is that it is Islamists fault I believe. That and the need for Erdogan to get a grip on his Islamists. Allah Akbar by the attacker sort of fits that narrative.

Well, that's some good sense. Are they thinking that it was Daesh?

[ikalugin]

More like Nusra&co

[Von Due]

Reports of a hijacking in Libya/Malta. Not much is known at the moment
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38416112

EDIT: A number of passengers released.

[Rockstar]

Scratch off one more oxygen thief and bloody good riddance!!



http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38415287

This is all our fault really we caused him to what what he did in the first place and now tracking this islamist terrorist murder suspect down and killing him is just going to radicalize countless others. I think we should try sending them a gift baskest instead.

[Von Due]

Hijack reported to be over. Hijackers arrested.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38416112

[Oberon]

More like Nusra&co

Do you think it'll result in closer ties between Moscow and Istanbul? I know Erdo has been angling for that after the Sukhoi shoot-down, and I think he's also hedging his bets incase NATO decides to get on his case, but I think that Trump is pro-Erdogan as well so that's not likely to happen now.

This is all our fault really we caused him to what what he did in the first place and now tracking this islamist terrorist murder suspect down and killing him is just going to radicalize countless others. I think we should try sending them a gift baskest instead.

Oi, stop trying to out-sarcasm me. :nope:

[Jimbuna]

This is all our fault really we caused him to what what he did in the first place and now tracking this islamist terrorist murder suspect down and killing him is just going to radicalize countless others. I think we should try sending them a gift baskest instead.

Yep but something with a very short fuse.

[Skybird]

This is all our fault really we caused him to what what he did in the first place and now tracking this islamist terrorist murder suspect down and killing him is just going to radicalize countless others. I think we should try sending them a gift baskest instead.

You now what really sickens me? That this murderer now is all over the news, and every media focusses on trying to understand him. "What made him turning into the person he became?" "Why did he do it?" "How was his past?" "How did he manage to sneak through the nets?" "What does his family say?" "How does his father feel?" "What's on mind of his mother?" - Not a single essay so far on trying to tell people about his victims that he killed and injured. No biographic interest in those who got killed. Who got hurt, and carry these scars for life. No effort to tell people who these people were, as individuals or persons. All focus is on the dirtbag that so to speak now takes all the "applause".

Don't get me wrong, I am no sentimentalist, honestly said I do not care much about those victims' biography, I did not knew any of them, I feel no personal loss and am not personally affected. But I know from own experience how it feels to be in the middle of such a mess. And I know that I also do not care one rat's tail-tip full of dirt for this murderer, too, I simply do not care how he became that dirtbag that he ended as. All I say is that something is totally off balance if media and public interest make a cult of the murderer, and do not care for the killed and the injured. And politicians holding speeches at a funeral event one week later and the TV show they will make of this in the news, really is the last thing I have on mind.

Maybe youk now this movie with Tom Cruise, "Jack Reacher", the first movie he did in tha role. The lawyer wants Reacher to work for her, she is all obsessed with trying to defend the murder suspect, and her thinking does not go beyond this. Reacher accepts to work with and for her - but he sets one condition: while he does the research and puts the puzzle together, he demands her to visit all the families of all the murder victims, and interview them about what kind of people they were, why they were loved, and what characterised them as the individual humans they were, and what made them being loved by those who loved them. - This touches upon what is missing in the reality failure today.

[Oberon]

You now what really sickens me? That this murderer now is all over the news, and every media focusses on trying to understand him. "What made him turning into the person he became?" "Why did he do it?" "How was his past?" "How did he manage to sneak through the nets?" "What does his family say?" "How does his father feel?" "What's on mind of his mother?" - Not a single essay so far on trying to tell people about his victims that he killed and injured. No biographic interest in those who got killed. Who got hurt, and carry these scars for life. No effort to tell people who these people were, as individuals or persons. All focus is on the dirtbag that so to speak now takes all the "applause".

Don't get me wrong, I am no sentimentalist, honestly said I do not care much about those victims' biography, I did not knew any of them, I feel no personal loss and am not personally affected. But I know from own experience how it feels to be in the middle of such a mess. And I know that I also do not care one rat's tail-tip full of dirt for this murderer, too, I simply do not care how he became that dirtbag that he ended as. All I say is that something is totally off balance if media and public interest make a cult of the murderer, and do not care for the killed and the injured. And politicians holding speeches at a funeral event one week later and the TV show they will make of this in the news, really is the last thing I have on mind.

It may surprise you, but I agree. The less media attention is placed on this man the better, we do not need to try to make celebrities out of terrorists, the agencies of Daesh and the like will do that enough.
The same thing goes for mass-shooters.

It'll never happen though. :doh:

[Skybird]

It also explains why they found the ID papers in the lorry. Actually, this is nothing new. Many Muslim terrorists leave their passports or evidence of their identity at the scene of the crime - as visiting cards. They are narcissists who take themselves incredibly important, and they want all world to know who did the carnage.

Meanwhile I read why it took the Berlin police that longer time to find the papers. They wanted to bring in bloodhounds to track the fleeing attacker down, but in ortder to have the dogs starting with a clean sample they did not want to contaminate the scent environment in the cockpit. So they sealed it off and did not touch it. - Shows that they were quite desperate,as I said earlier. Without those papers found, they would have had practically no hot track. I doubt they would have known about his identity by now, and would have pinpoint and killed him in Milan.

Narcissism sometimes seems to have positive side-effects.

[eddie]

Daesh has put out a hit list on their website of dozens of churches here in the States that they want their followers to attack, plus malls etc. Time to end these bastids and I don't really care anymore how we do it either. Napalm, cluster bombs, bunker busters , anything short of a nuke, lets have at it.:Kaleun_Mad:

[Moonlight]

That's the spirit old boy, now all you have to do is convince the new president, good luck with that. :up:

[em2nought]

Good news in the war on terror for Obama's allies :salute:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/barack-obama-scrap-nseers-donald-trump-muslim-registry-immigration-a7491146.html

[Rockstar]

Read the report then wondered, why Milan? Apparently human trafficking is still big business. Both ways.

https://news.vice.com/article/those-who-arrive-here-want-to-become-ghosts-milans-people-smuggling-trade

[Oberon]

Daesh has put out a hit list on their website of dozens of churches here in the States that they want their followers to attack, plus malls etc. Time to end these bastids and I don't really care anymore how we do it either. Napalm, cluster bombs, bunker busters , anything short of a nuke, lets have at it.:Kaleun_Mad:
If there's a way to kill Daesh soldiers with the minimalist amount of collateral damage then I'm all for it. Collateral just increases the enemies manpower and decreases our public support. The heavy handed approach is what Daesh wants us to use...it may not seem like it, but in terms of casualties inflicted and ground lost we are winning this war.


Good news in the war on terror for Obama's allies :salute:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/barack-obama-scrap-nseers-donald-trump-muslim-registry-immigration-a7491146.html

That'll get overturned pretty quickly I'll wager if there's a desire for it to be done. :hmmm:

[ikalugin]

Do you think it'll result in closer ties between Moscow and Istanbul? I know Erdo has been angling for that after the Sukhoi shoot-down, and I think he's also hedging his bets incase NATO decides to get on his case, but I think that Trump is pro-Erdogan as well so that's not likely to happen now.
Depends on what they would do with the islamists in question.

At the moment it appears that Turkey is sitting behind the Russia-Iran-Turkey table in the Syrian war.

[ikalugin]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C0cuaCiWQAA-RVG.jpg:large

[ikalugin]

It appears that UNSC has adopted the new resolution about Syria.

[Jimbuna]

Turkeys turn again!!

Istanbul new year Reina nightclub attack 'leaves 39 dead'

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38481521

[ikalugin]

Allegedly dressed as Santa no less.

[Onkel Neal]

http://www.cnn.com/2017/01/02/europe/turkey-nightclub-attack-victims/index.html

There are two brands of terror targeting Turkey now: Kurdish and radical Islamist.


Many of the victims were very young.

Lubna Ghasnawi was among the glamorous crowds of young partygoers gathered inside Istanbul's Reina nightclub to ring in 2017 in the early hours of Sunday when a gunman opened fire, killing her and at least 38 other people.

The 34-year-old entrepreneur was one of seven victims from Saudi Arabia who had traveled to Istanbul to attend New Year's festivities, according to Turkish state-run news agency Anadolu.

Ghashwani worked full-time as a communications manager for one of Saudi Arabia's largest banks and also co-owned a start-up with her sister called Exclusave Card, the first student discount card in Saudi Arabia.
A friend of Gashwani described her as a "torch of energy."


Leanne Nasser, a Palestinian from the town of Tira, begged her parents to let her go to Istanbul to celebrate New Year's Eve with three friends. She had never before traveled abroad. At first her father refused to let her go. But her aunt, Layal Masarweh, intervened on her behalf.

"Her father was totally against that," Masarweh, who helped convince Nasser's father to let her go, told CNN. "He was saying that Istanbul is too dangerous and that she should not go at all. But she insisted, saying that nothing will happen to her."

Nasser, 18, had finished high school in June and had big plans for her future. She worked at a dental clinic and wanted to become a dentist herself one day.

I'm sick of this. :cry:

[eddie]

Yeah Neal, I agree, its really getting old!

[ikalugin]

One of my sister's friends was just outside the club during the attack.

[em2nought]

Sometimes the old solutions are the best solutions.
https://media1.shmoop.com/media/images/large/enola-gay.jpg

[Buddahaid]

What a smart idea. No doubt that would solve everything.

[ikalugin]

What a smart idea. No doubt that would solve everything.
Destroying humanity would solve it's problems but I think it is not a constructive way to go around things.

[Jimbuna]

For me the most worrying aspect is the realisation that there is no end in sight nor is there likely to be.

[ikalugin]

To use the words of a Hungarian - "it is a tragedy of man to endure and to believe".

On topic - well, we would get through it. The economic revolution with automisation that is comming worries me more.

[eddie]

For me the most worrying aspect is the realisation that there is no end in sight nor is there likely to be.

You're right Jim. If they take back Mosul, and Aleppo and push out Daesh, the insurgency will go on unless the Sunni's decide different. Don't see that happening at all.

[ikalugin]

Don't see that happening at all.
Well if we take Assad's critics at face value then Assad would genocyde/displace all the sunnis who do not support him in the region in that case.

[Skybird]

I wonder what role the Turkish secret service plays in the Reina attack. The attack on the nightclub plays into the cards of Erdoghan and the cards of the conservatives. Friday, the boss of the state minstry of religion has condemned New Years Eve parties and Western lifestyle, and the club was on an unofficial black list of conservatives. The police placed one 20 year old officer in front of the club, despite massive threats against it.

Erdoghan has a record of playing foul. I do not say the attacker may not have had links to IS. What is more relaistic to think about is that maybe warnings of an imminent threat were supressed and secret service or police withheld info that indicated that an attack was coming. Think that is unrealistic? I say again: Erdoghan has a record of playing foul, and he has killed yria and Russia long before 2016, repeatedly. The whole "coup" against the government three months ago smells like having been a staged event. No, you better do not rule anything out regarding Erdoghan. I'm preaching this since over ten years now.

Meanwhile German politicians had to learn from German intelligence service that the Turkish DITIB Imams that the Turkish state sends to Germany, spy for the Turkish secret service and agitate against the constitutonal order of Germany. Has there been a political outcry, a protest, a single word of anger? Of course not. Mind you, its Germany. You rather make a cactus speaking.

[Jimbuna]

You're right Jim. If they take back Mosul, and Aleppo and push out Daesh, the insurgency will go on unless the Sunni's decide different. Don't see that happening at all.

Basically.....what a right royal mess :yep:

[em2nought]

What a smart idea. No doubt that would solve everything.

It's a smarter idea than letting your enemies know that your best deterrent again naughty behavior was never on the table to begin with.

[Buddahaid]

It's a smarter idea than letting your enemies know that your best deterrent again naughty behavior was never on the table to begin with.

I think you would find that akin to this.
http://37.media.tumblr.com/a27e02b440d71d2e2968bd7acec1f5ef/tumblr_n0tcls1Y7P1s2wio8o1_500.gif

[Jimbuna]

Turkey has arrested a number of people of Uighur origin over a deadly nightclub attack that killed 39, the state-run news agency reports.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-38517847

[ikalugin]

Is the Turkish change of stance on Syria covered in Western media? If so, how is it covered? Thanks in advance :)

[Skybird]

The building of an axis Turkey-Russia-Iran has been noted. The recommended countermeasures are to bow even deeper to the Turkish Sultan Him-whose-name-is-not-to-be-criticised, and to not set up the Iranians by questioning their good will of not wanting to go after nukes that they want so much, and that Russia must be talked dizzy more urgently.

Naive. But thats how it is with toothless wannabe tigers. The stunning weakness of the EU and the inner rifts tearing it apart, have been noted in Teheran, Moscow, Ankara. They even do their shares t help it. EU talks. Moscow, Teheran and Ankara act and create hard facts on the ground that the EU can no longer get around.

Meanwhile German world market leader for advanced robotics Kuka has been sold to China, after the American daughter got split away and remains in US hands. The Germans just cannot imagine that China could stomp German industry into the ground once it got the wanted knowhow. The Chinese currently are on a buying frenzy in the German industry, buying the filet pieces and key technology companies as if there is no tomorrow. And Germany - lets it happen. :dead:

Turkey, Russia, Iran, China - four symptoms of how weak and clueless the EU is.

[Oberon]

Turkey, Russia, Iran, China - four symptoms of how weak and clueless the EU is.

Well, what do you expect? The EU is being torn apart from the inside, of course it's not going to respond to external problems effectively, it's utterly paralysed because half of it wants to destroy it. So then Germany, France, the UK and the like will be all on our own to deal with the manufacturing and economic might of America and friends.
We had our chance, we threw it away, now we must kowtow to Moscow to survive. :yeah:

[ikalugin]

now we must kowtow to Moscow to survive.
Wait, what? We are not threatening western Europe with an invasion.

[Oberon]

Wait, what? We are not threatening western Europe with an invasion.

I mean more economically and politically. Europe has to hitch its wagon to someone, it can't stand on its own any more, it used to be America but that doesn't seem to be an option any more.

[yubba]

I mean more economically and politically. Europe has to hitch its wagon to someone, it can't stand on its own any more, it used to be America but that doesn't seem to be an option any more.


We finally wised up and voted out the loyalist ,, for the last 70 years you would have thought we never had a American Revolution and gained our Independence from Merry ole England. So what's up with all the Nato troops massed along the the Russian border,, you starting to believe your own fake news,,, I get a kick out of folks here starting to believe what the CIA has to say as the truth,,after the Bush years the same CIA that said there was mwds in Iraq CIA. ,,,American Government Intelligence,, now there's a contradiction in terms.. Happy New Year, give the UN the boot

[August]

I mean more economically and politically. Europe has to hitch its wagon to someone, it can't stand on its own any more, it used to be America but that doesn't seem to be an option any more.

Maybe Europe ought to remember how to stand on it's own again. Is it possible?

[ikalugin]

Maybe Europe ought to remember how to stand on it's own again. Is it possible?
Individual countries in Europe lack mass. Only a federalised EU would have enough mass to be a super power.

[Skybird]

Wait, what? We are not threatening western Europe with an invasion.
Eastern Europe and Baltic, the former Warsaw Pact territory. The worries and concerns are for real reasons - Crimean games have shown us that. Use of force, and spreading by power are a key patterns in Russian history - not expansion through being culturally attractive for others. Its about brute force. A language that many Russian leaders of the past and also the current one understand well, so seem to do many of the Russian people, my impression is.

NATO can not hold a Russian invasion of Eatsern European countries or the Baltic states currently, and the Kaliningrad enclave is a major, decisive vulnerability in NATO'S Russian "front", it could turn the whole East into a no-go zone for NATO's most important weapon: air power.

[ikalugin]

Eastern Europe and Baltic, the former Warsaw Pact territory. The worries and concerns are for real reasons - Crimean games have shown us that. Use of force, and spreading by power are a key patterns in Russian history - not expansion through being culturally attractive for others. Its about brute force. A language that many Russian leaders of the past and also the current one understand well, so seem to do many of the Russian people, my impression is.

NATO can not hold a Russian invasion of Eatsern European countries or the Baltic states currently, and the Kaliningrad enclave is a major, decisive vulnerability in NATO'S Russian "front", it could turn the whole East into a no-go zone for NATO's most important weapon: air power.
You seek threat where none exist. How and why would we invade, say, Poland? If not Poland then which Eastern European/NATO country are you talking about, Romania? Bulgaria?

Morever that whole "Russia try to conquer Baltics" narrative is just plainly silly - what use would we have out of a depopulated, de industrialised region that promotes rusophobic hysteria within it's citizens? The only possible reason for the Russian invasion of Baltics that I see is to counter the military threat, comming from NATO.

[Skybird]

Maybe Europe ought to remember how to stand on it's own again. Is it possible?
No. Europe is done, will simply be left behind by the major players of the 21st century - which Europe will not belong to. Really.

Individual countries in Europe lack mass. Only a federalised EU would have enough mass to be a super power.

There has been only one superpower in history - the United States after the Sovjet collapse and before it started to mess up its strategic stance with the war 2003. This super power status lasted for just a bit longer than one deacde. Int he cold war, there were no two superpopwers - the term implies that there is just one power that can domi8nate all others at will, but the USSRT and the USA/NATO would have m utually annihilated each other in case of a serious confrontation. And today, deeper in the 21st century already, high tech capabilities are spreading and cyberweapons get distributed all over the planet, making even the United States extremely vulnerable to such attacks, all the time with their conventional military power being reduced due to budget cuts, but also by getting neutralised by conventional restrengthening of potential adversaries.

So there has been only one super power in modern history indeed, and it already is gone again by now: the United States covering roughly the 90s decade, the years from 1990 to 2002. And that super power no more is there.

Speaking on military things, ignoring the power of soft faciors like economy, industry etc. Here, America sees a split between its strengths in economic key technology branches (where Europe by now is hopelessly weak and falling behind even mnore every year), its slow dying of heavy insutries, and its vulnerabilities due to the misery of the paper money collapse and the incredibly high debts. A mixed bag of factors, some being advantages, others having written "disaster" all over them.

Major business challenge of course is China. Also an uncalculatable risk for the global "fiscal" :LOL system.

One thing is certain only: Russian economy will never be in a shape where it could be used as a threat against the West. Which makes it even more certain that any major pushes on the world stage will include Russian force, not subtle Russian economic subtelties. Russian economy is not important enough.

[Skybird]

You seek threat where none exist. How and why would we invade, say, Poland? If not Poland then which Eastern European/NATO country are you talking about, Romania? Bulgaria?

Morever that whole "Russia try to conquer Baltics" narrative is just plainly silly - what use would we have out of a depopulated, de industrialised region that promotes rusophobic hysteria within it's citizens? The only possible reason for the Russian invasion of Baltics that I see is to counter the military threat, comming from NATO.

Your forefathers did all that already once, and kept the status then for several decades. ;) It was called the Warsaw Pact. It is no secret that quite some Russian politicians cry for the loss of what once was their empire, and that they want to have it back. The more paranoid also demand it back as a pressure zone to NATO.

After the Crimean adventure, I fear you have no argument there to convince people that Russia prioritizes peace before anything else. Not to mention Syria.

[Oberon]

Individual countries in Europe lack mass. Only a federalised EU would have enough mass to be a super power.

Bingo, and since that's off the table because people seem to think that it's still the 1900s and individual nations of Europe actually mean something anymore. So it's either Russia or China, really. :ping:

[ikalugin]

Your forefathers did all that already once, and kept the status then for several decades. ;) It was called the Warsaw Pact. It is no secret that quite some Russian politicians cry for the loss of what once was their empire, and that they want to have it back. The more paranoid also demand it back as a pressure zone to NATO.

After the Crimean adventure, I fear you have no argument there to convince people that Russia prioritizes peace before anything else. Not to mention Syria.
Only because we were invaded by NAZI Germans, where Eastern Europe was a valid buffer area and where every effort was made to industrialise the area (including Baltics).
Why would we do the same again, unless there is a NATO invasion happening? Further more, where would we get the capability to invade non-Baltics states, for example Poland or Romania?

If anything Crimea (and Ukraine crisis in general) shows that... we would not invade Baltics. The factors here are simple:
- Crimea, unlike Baltics, has military significance and pro-Russian majority.
- Crimea was a one off operation, unlikely to be ever repeated (and thus preparing for simmilar scenarios is a dumb waste of resources)
- Eastern Ukraine was not annexed despite it's pro-Russian majority and industrial capacity.
- There is no military capability being built in the north-western axis, if anything that operational-strategic axis has much less military build up than, say, south-western operational-strategic axis.

p.s. on Syria - we are there, supporting the legitimate goverment of Syria. Again, it is a separate matter from the Baltics or Ukraine.
p.p.s. using a quote from the meme paper by Gerasimov is sort of amusing by itself.

[Catfish]

Originally Posted by ikalugin View Post
Individual countries in Europe lack mass. Only a federalised EU would have enough mass to be a super power.

Bingo, and since that's off the table because people seem to think that it's still the 1900s and individual nations of Europe actually mean something anymore. So it's either Russia or China, really. :ping:

Roger that. I think it was self-evident, but since we are back to 1900 why not new wars, i mean let's enjoy patriotism, nationalism, isolation, and ignore science as long as we can. :03:

[August]

Roger that. I think it was self-evident, but since we are back to 1900 why not new wars, i mean let's enjoy patriotism, nationalism, isolation, and ignore science as long as we can. :03:

There was nothing isolationist about Europe in 1900. Most of them had overseas empires by then and they hardly ignored science seeing as things like the airplane and automobile were invented or perfected in Europe during that period.

Europeans do seem to have a problem with patriotism and nationalism but I think that is more about them being unable to moderate those impulses than the impulses themselves. Like anything else they can be taken to extremes, they just need to learn to control it.

[Oberon]

Would rather not learn to control it through another World War. :yeah:

[August]

Would rather not learn to control it through another World War. :yeah:

Again it comes back to self control. I understand the pitfalls but a nation has to have some sense of patriotism and nationalism in order to survive. Otherwise it'll just splinter into factions.

[Oberon]

Again it comes back to self control. I understand the pitfalls but a nation has to have some sense of patriotism and nationalism in order to survive. Otherwise it'll just splinter into factions.

I think we've demonstrated over the past 4000 years that it doesn't work. :03:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_Europe

[Skybird]

Only because we were invaded by NAZI Germans, where Eastern Europe was a valid buffer area and where every effort was made to industrialise the area (including Baltics).
Why would we do the same again, unless there is a NATO invasion happening? Further more, where would we get the capability to invade non-Baltics states, for example Poland or Romania?

If anything Crimea (and Ukraine crisis in general) shows that... we would not invade Baltics. The factors here are simple:
- Crimea, unlike Baltics, has military significance and pro-Russian majority.
- Crimea was a one off operation, unlikely to be ever repeated (and thus preparing for simmilar scenarios is a dumb waste of resources)
- Eastern Ukraine was not annexed despite it's pro-Russian majority and industrial capacity.
- There is no military capability being built in the north-western axis, if anything that operational-strategic axis has much less military build up than, say, south-western operational-strategic axis.

p.s. on Syria - we are there, supporting the legitimate goverment of Syria. Again, it is a separate matter from the Baltics or Ukraine.
p.p.s. using a quote from the meme paper by Gerasimov is sort of amusing by itself.
Poland did not invade Russia, nor did Poland attack Germany first. Still Russia had no problem to annex half of Poland, and Hitler and Stalin were two psychopaths who indeed deserved each other since they were brothers in mind and used the same brutality to secure their grabs on power. Both countries planned to attack the other, the only question was who would get the drop on the other's attack first.

But Russia'S history of brute force to supress its own people as well as trying to expand reaches far beyond the second world war, it reaches centuries back earlier. The whole regime of the Tsars expresses that, the whole communist era, and the Stalinist tyranny anyway. And a majority of Russians seems to like it. Stalin is "in" again, and support for Putin as well as for a tough stance in foreign politics seem to rank high. The collapse of the USSR and the end of Russian reign in eastern Europe still is a sting in the self-understanding of many people. The dreaming of that past "glory" (paid for with economic misery and dictatorship) seems to serve as a drug helping to overlook the difficult economic status Russia is in now. Military pomp as a distraction from the depressing realities of contemporary ordinary life.

Stability, predictability look different.

[Skybird]

On Europe and the EU, the term "Europe" to me always implies(d) the plural. There is nothing like "one European identity". There nevwer was, that is a fiction of the elites, an obsession to justify their drive for uniformity with themselves leading the one unified collective from the top. The drive behind European innovation and invention was the need to be innovative, was competition, was survival. The local cultural differences within "Europe", are imense, and can be extremely diverse.

If anything, the Brusselian attempt to force all this diversity under one centralised hood with a continental planned economy and one almost feudal government, has led to enormous distortions, rifts, anger, animosity, even hostility. The Euro Union is a cataclysmic disaster. The EU model after 1990 is a failure. We have reached a state where the EU as we know it know could collapse and turn into a thing of th epast as fast as the collapse of the sovjet Union surprised and overrolled us, and German reunification came upon us and left us breathless due to its pace. The situation has become unpredictable - and everything now seems to be possible, for more years of stagnnation and delcine, to sudden, violent collapse. I expect this phase of uncertainty to last for another decade or so - if things do not blow up earlier. In this time, things will not have a chance to turn for the better, but always will turn for the worse.

I said it before, and I stick to it: so often the cause of peace and living-together would be so much better served if we would not fall to ideologies demanding us to forcing the other and everybody else to be all like one and the same, but if we would accept differences, and leave them as that: being differences.

That is called diversity.

Regarding Europe role on the world stage, either way we simply have to accept that the great times of Europe, the centuries of shine and glory, are over. We must stop claiming it our mission to "Europeanise" the world and gift it with our cultural "enrichments". We have enough to do in our own home, and we hardly can manage the problems we already have in there. Being militarily toothless and even unwilling to defend ourselves, we want to mess with al the world and make it our mission to become the savior for all the evils and lows and sufferings around the globe...?

Good luck with that.

[ikalugin]

I guess I really shouldn't promote further derailment.

[August]

I think we've demonstrated over the past 4000 years that it doesn't work. :03:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_Europe

Well neither do multi-cultural societies (by and large) yet that didn't stop you folks from jumping into it with both feet. I hope I'm wrong but I think without at least some sense of national pride and commitment you won't withstand the massive changes in your societies that multiculturalism will create.

[Skybird]

Years after the last American MBT left Germany, they are now back. Today the first of some 80 M1 Abrams have unloaded from USS Resolve in the port of Bremerhaven, preparing to relocate much further to the East. They are part of a 4000 men brigade the US is stationing in the Baltic states and Poland in reaction to the increasing security concerns in NATO'S bordering territory to Russia. The troops will rotate every - now I forgot, every 90 days or 9 months. Probably the latter.


Almost feels like back in the 80s. :)

Well, almost.

P.S. For our American specialists: its the 3rd brigade, 4th Infantry Division, Fort Carson. ;)

[yubba]

go look it up.. had another link.

[Oberon]

Well neither do multi-cultural societies (by and large) yet that didn't stop you folks from jumping into it with both feet. I hope I'm wrong but I think without at least some sense of national pride and commitment you won't withstand the massive changes in your societies that multiculturalism will create.

Something will probably survive, whether it's better or worse than now is up to history to decide. But it's just a shame that Europe can't band together for the betterment of its people, but then again, that's how it goes.

[Oberon]

Years after the last American MBT left Germany, they are now back. Today the first of some 80 M1 Abrams have unloaded from USS Resolve in the port of Bremerhaven, preparing to relocate much further to the East. They are part of a 4000 men brigade the US is stationing in the Baltic states and Poland in reaction to the increasing security concerns in NATO'S bordering territory to Russia. The troops will rotate every - now I forgot, every 90 days or 9 months. Probably the latter.


Almost feels like back in the 80s. :)

Well, almost.

Needs moar Reforger. :O:

[eddie]

go look it up.. had another link.

In before Oberon!!:D Here's a link-

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/fort-lauderdale-shooting-gunman-opens-fire-at-airport-killing-multiple-people/ar-BBxYRJ4?li=BBnb7Kz

[ikalugin]

Amusingly enough we did not reinforce the forces postured against Baltics (or Poland for that matter, with Poland it is interesting - as only Kaliningrad borders Poland and we only station a token force there) to any significant degree in the past, we may need to do so now.

In fact the North-Western operaional-strategic axis has the lowest priority for forming new units or rearming existing units - for example the missile brigade in the area is going to be the last one to switch from Tochka-U to Iskander-M.

[Schroeder]

Amusingly enough we did not reinforce the forces postured against Baltics (or Poland for that matter, with Poland it is interesting - as only Kaliningrad borders Poland and we only station a token force there) to any significant degree in the past, we may need to do so now.

In fact the North-Western operaional-strategic axis has the lowest priority for forming new units or rearming existing units - for example the missile brigade in the area is going to be the last one to switch from Tochka-U to Iskander-M.
And that's why only token NATO forces are deployed. 4,000 men and 80 MBT´s certainly wouldn't stop a Russian invasion. This is just to keep the eastern NATO members happy and isn't nearly enough to make Russia feel threatened and peed off.

[Skybird]

Kaliningrad is a top priority for Moscow, since it is the only permanent ice-free harbour of Russia in the Baltic. It also is now armed with latest generation long range SAMs to a degree that it turns most of Poland and major parts of the Baltic into a no-fly area, being able to deny NATO access there for longer time. Already in 1915 NATO commanders have warned of that. Around 10,000 troops are stationed in that tiny little piece of land, with plans for quick relocation of forces via Belarus and through Lithuania in case of a ground war with NATO, which would necessarily lead to a cracking down on the Baltic states like the Germans crushed down on Holland just reach France faster.

This has Russia's "lowest priority?" You live in an alternative reality, ikalugin. Its a strategic top concern in the Kremlin.

We now expect massive Russian interference with the campaign for German elections at the end of this year:

http://www.focus.de/politik/ausland/wichtigste-taktische-aufgabe-kremlkritischer-soziologe-behauptet-putin-will-kanzlerin-merkel-stuerzen_id_6458005.html
Wichtigste taktische Aufgabe ist der Sturz Merkels. Ihre kritische Haltung gegenüber Putin ist richtungsweisend für die Russlandpolitik der EU. Ohne Merkel werden die Russland-Sanktionen höchstwahrscheinlich abgeschafft und die EU-Politik gegenüber Moskau wird sich grundlegend ändern. Putin träumt davon, ihm gegenüber loyale Kräfte an die Macht zu bringen. Der Kreml würde dann unausweichlich zur dominierenden Kraft in einem geschwächten Europa. Putin würde dann faktisch der Chef Europas.

[mapuc]

If Russia invade Poland or some of the Baltic states or all of them it would mean war. There are some other areas which has same level of strategic importance These areas are

They could send it some undercover "problem-makes" and set Poland or some of the Baltic states on fire-Demonstration, strike a.s.o

Moldova and the Swedish Island Gotland-Taking one of these or both could probably mean war not necessarily.

Markus

[ikalugin]

This has Russia's "lowest priority?" You live in an alternative reality, ikalugin. Its a strategic top concern in the Kremlin.

Yes, it does have the lowest priority for formation of new units and rearming the old units. For example regarding the SAMs, or your statement here:

It also is now armed with latest generation long range SAMs to a degree that it turns most of Poland and major parts of the Baltic into a no-fly area, being able to deny NATO access there for longer time.When compared to other regions (ie Crimea) Kaliningrad indeed does have a lower priority, as it lacks permanently deployed advanced A2AD systems (such as the S-400 SAMs or the above mentioned Iskander-M missile systems) simply because the local units were not rearmed with such systems (I provided the example of the local missile brigade and it's delayed transition from Tochka-U to Iskander-M above), with the out of the region systems being brought in during increased tensions.

This is not even a NATO style rotation, as the units are moved out of the region without replacement, when tensions are lowered. The hysteria regarding them is amusing but ultimately dumb.

Already in 1915 NATO commanders have warned of that. This is a gem, worthy of being saved.

Around 10,000 troops are stationed in that tiny little piece of land, with plans for quick relocation of forces via Belarus and through Lithuania in case of a ground war with NATO, which would necessarily lead to a cracking down on the Baltic states like the Germans crushed down on Holland just reach France faster.And here you are overinflating the threat again. Instead of looking into the "scary" manpower figures (which are scary exactly why?) you should look at what they represent. And they represent 2 combat brigades, out of 4 total brigades on that whole axis.

Morever that force did not go through the kind of expansion the force on the south-western axis did, in fact the changes were limited to transition of one regiment into a brigade (a minor increase in combat power) and creation of a new operational command (corps command in Kaliningrad region for better force cohesion). Now, you are free to compare that meagre combat power with the force Poland has deployed against it (16th mech division) and you would see that this force (especially considering the even split between Kaliningrad and st Petersburg areas) is only capable of conducting the defense of Kaliningrad area and is not capable of threatening anything outside of it.

While we can bring the out of region forces to bear, there are postured for operations on another axis.

[Fubar2Niner]

Poland did not invade Russia, nor did Poland attack Germany first. Still Russia had no problem to annex half of Poland, and Hitler and Stalin were two psychopaths who indeed deserved each other since they were brothers in mind and used the same brutality to secure their grabs on power. Both countries planned to attack the other, the only question was who would get the drop on the other's attack first.

But Russia'S history of brute force to supress its own people as well as trying to expand reaches far beyond the second world war, it reaches centuries back earlier. The whole regime of the Tsars expresses that, the whole communist era, and the Stalinist tyranny anyway. And a majority of Russians seems to like it. Stalin is "in" again, and support for Putin as well as for a tough stance in foreign politics seem to rank high. The collapse of the USSR and the end of Russian reign in eastern Europe still is a sting in the self-understanding of many people. The dreaming of that past "glory" (paid for with economic misery and dictatorship) seems to serve as a drug helping to overlook the difficult economic status Russia is in now. Military pomp as a distraction from the depressing realities of contemporary ordinary life.

Stability, predictability look different.

On Europe and the EU, the term "Europe" to me always implies(d) the plural. There is nothing like "one European identity". There nevwer was, that is a fiction of the elites, an obsession to justify their drive for uniformity with themselves leading the one unified collective from the top. The drive behind European innovation and invention was the need to be innovative, was competition, was survival. The local cultural differences within "Europe", are imense, and can be extremely diverse.

If anything, the Brusselian attempt to force all this diversity under one centralised hood with a continental planned economy and one almost feudal government, has led to enormous distortions, rifts, anger, animosity, even hostility. The Euro Union is a cataclysmic disaster. The EU model after 1990 is a failure. We have reached a state where the EU as we know it know could collapse and turn into a thing of th epast as fast as the collapse of the sovjet Union surprised and overrolled us, and German reunification came upon us and left us breathless due to its pace. The situation has become unpredictable - and everything now seems to be possible, for more years of stagnnation and delcine, to sudden, violent collapse. I expect this phase of uncertainty to last for another decade or so - if things do not blow up earlier. In this time, things will not have a chance to turn for the better, but always will turn for the worse.

I said it before, and I stick to it: so often the cause of peace and living-together would be so much better served if we would not fall to ideologies demanding us to forcing the other and everybody else to be all like one and the same, but if we would accept differences, and leave them as that: being differences.

That is called diversity.

Regarding Europe role on the world stage, either way we simply have to accept that the great times of Europe, the centuries of shine and glory, are over. We must stop claiming it our mission to "Europeanise" the world and gift it with our cultural "enrichments". We have enough to do in our own home, and we hardly can manage the problems we already have in there. Being militarily toothless and even unwilling to defend ourselves, we want to mess with al the world and make it our mission to become the savior for all the evils and lows and sufferings around the globe...?

Good luck with that.

@Sky

These two posts are possibly the most profound and IMHO unpredujiced I have read.

In regard to the Russian stance, we all know (hopefully) the diabolical history re Hitlaer and Stalin. One was no better than the other. Stalin just bleated harder and his crimes were discovered later.

Regarding your post about europe and the EU. You summed it up completely.

A great post, thank you :salute:

Fubar

[Skybird]

This is a gem, worthy of being saved.



Öh - yes, that laugh is on me. :haha: A typo, however. The year should read 2015.

[ikalugin]

Öh - yes, that laugh is on me. :haha: A typo, however. The year should read 2015.
Yes, I guessed so. Still, b/c you were discussing A2AD systems, when was S-400 deployed to Kaliningrad? You may consider changing that year once more after looking it up.

p.s. To get back on topic though (and this is, after all a thread about terrorism), did anyone listen to this audio:
https://youtu.be/e4phB-_pXDM
I have also posted it in the US politics thread, but I wonder if this is a better thread for it after all.

p.p.s. Kuznetsov is going home:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swK1lrH7Ld8&t=306s

What do you think about the current balance in Syria? Any predictions for the near future?

[Skybird]

@Sky

These two posts are possibly the most profound and IMHO unpredujiced I have read.

In regard to the Russian stance, we all know (hopefully) the diabolical history re Hitlaer and Stalin. One was no better than the other. Stalin just bleated harder and his crimes were discovered later.

Regarding your post about europe and the EU. You summed it up completely.

A great post, thank you :salute:

Fubar
Not often I get flowers these days - thanks!

[mapuc]

And now back to what this thread is about-terrorism

If I heard what have been said about this shooting in Fort Lauderdales airport, it is terror.

The shooter walked around and fired his gun at people completely random

Markus

[Skybird]

Yes, I guessed so. Still, b/c you were discussing A2AD systems, when was S-400 deployed to Kaliningrad? You may consider changing that year once more after looking it up.
Nuclear-capable Tochka-U platforms: 2001, maybe even earlier. Nuclear warheads for it popped up regularly, too.

Iskander: 2011 at the latest, probably earlier.

Updated Iskander-M: summer and auztumn 2016.

Other sources mention the year 2013 as key date when Iskander got moved in. Russia massively tries to hide and disguise what it moves in and out, and when, and where.

Voronezh (location) long range special radar: fully operational since 2014.

S400, accompanied by Pantsir-S: info widely varies. Probably during 2016, probabaly not earlier than late 2015, some even say not yet fielded but in the process of beeing fielded in Kaliningrad right now. Depends on sources. The naval units of the Baltic fleet got the system already 2012. And for the Baltic fleet - Kaliningrad is vital.

S300PS: 2011.

Whats your point? If there is any.

And for people maybe not being fully aware of the geography:
https://i1.wp.com/www.bucharestlife.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/41260177_kaliningrad_map2_416.gif?resize=416%2C317

[ikalugin]

Nuclear-capable Tochka-U platforms: 2001, maybe even earlier. Nuclear warheads for it popped up regularly, too.
Iskander: 2011 at the latest, probably earlier.
Updated Iskander-M: summer and auztumn 2016.
Other sources mention the year 2013 as key date when Iskander got moved in. Russia massively tries to hide and disguise what it moves in and out, and when, and where.
Voronezh (location) long range special radar: fully operational since 2014.
S400, accompanied by Pantsir-S: info widely varies. Probably during 2016, probabaly not earlier than late 2015, some even say not yet fielded but in the process of beeing fielded in Kaliningrad right now. Depends on sources. The naval units of the Baltic fleet got the system already 2012. And for the Baltic fleet - Kaliningrad is vital.
S300PS: 2011.
Whats your point? If there is any.
And for people maybe not being fully aware of the geography:

(deleted the immage and the spaces between paragraphs for compactness)

My point is that Kaliningrad (and the relevant operational-strategic axis) has the lower priority that other areas and regions. But lets break up your post.

First things first - Tochka (and and it's variants Tochka-U, Tochka-R), S300PS are Soviet systems (late 70s and mid 80s), which remained in Kaliningrad area since Soviet times. If Kaliningrad area specifically or North-West operational-strategic axis in general had the priority then those systems would be long replaced by much more modern ones by now.

Secondly, the brigade, stationed in Kaliningrad does not operate Iskander-M as it was not yet rearmed with it (unlike atleast 10 other known brigades, which transitioned from Tochka-Us to Iskander-M). This is so due to the Russia avoiding a real offensive military build up in that operational-strategic axis.
There even isn't a rotationary arrangement (like the NATO ones) with the Iskander-M systems to be permanenly deployed to Kaliningrad, with systems being moved there only during the periods of increased tensions (and leaving the region when those tensions dissapate).

Thirdly, regarding S-400, so you lack data, that is fine. If you want to discuss Baltic Fleet you should compare and contrast the programs for the Baltic Fleet with those, for example for the Black Sea Fleet and the general strengths of those two fleets.

Regarding Voronezh - it is an early warning radar, used for ballistic missile attack warning. The radar that used to cover this vital approach in Soviet times was built in the area that is now under control of the Baltic states and thus is no longer operational.
Thus adding it to your list shows that you have no idea about what it actually does or why it's presense in there is important for European security. (hint European existential security is based around the strategic nuclear stability which this specific radar greatly improves by reducing the vulnerability of Russian deterent to a NATO first strike with ICBMs and SLBMs)
I mean if we are going into nuclear-strategic dimension here then the US made radar in Quatar is by far more destabilising, as it can be used for forward based ABM systems.

[ikalugin]

To (separately) sum up, Russian leadership specifically avoided significant military build up in Kaliningrad area specifically and the North-Western operationaly-strategic axis in general by:
- not expanding the land forces in the area significantly.
- not expanding the Baltic Fleet significantly.
- delaying rearmament of key land units in Kaliningrad area.
- not running a Navy rearmament program.

At the same time compare and contrast this with:
- massive build up of land forces in the South-Western operational-strategic axis post 2014 (but not prior to 2014).
- units in Eastern, Southern and Central MDs receiving priority for the new A2AD systems.*
- emergency Naval program for the Black Sea Fleet.

*- with the obvious exception for the Moscow Air Defense Region which got the new SAMs first.

p.s. if anything I find the forces we have in the North-Western operational-strategic axis underwhelming, as those would be hard pressed to conduct a defense against a NATO offensive out of Poland simply due to their small combat strength, but I guess the changes in organisation and thus improved cohesion would allow us to redeploy and conduct counter strokes appropriately.
p.p.s it is amusing how people talk about repeating Crimea or even Donbas events in Baltics and more so in Poland, considering that the conditions are different. I guess those Euro-Atlantic elites really need to generate an external enemy in Russia for internal mobilisation of support.

[Skybird]

Still Kaliningrad is a strategic top priority for Moscow, due to its location and strategic importance. With some of your claims on weapon data stationed there, I must disagree, on some others I point at the very diverse sources and their different claims. S300 may be an old orignal Sovjet design, envertheless it has seen notoriousnupdates and upgrades and today with latest upgrades and new missiles is one of the world's top notch air defence systems - the F35 has been specifically designed and called for just in reaction to this threat, amongst other demands. Whether F35 can really defeat S300 with klatest kit, is something different. Latest tests of S300 over the past 4-8 years saw it performing with excellent scores, even setting up some firsts in the history books.

You comfortably ignore too many aspects there that oppose your simplified claim of that the Russian moves in the area are posing no threat. In parts Kaliningrad is a defensive situation indeed, and NATO arrogant expansion to the east and broken promises to not do so ever certainly have not helped to keep relations to Russia intact. But Moscows reactions in past years moved beyond just taking on defensive needs for that enclave, and the whole russian foreign policy has become far more aggressive. Many of the incidents in the Baltic air derive from Russian attempts to move in aerial reinfocements without active transponders, and the fact that Russian forces aggressively approached and sometimes penetrated foreign sea space and air space cannot be denied. This cannot be just a reaciton to realistic fears for a sudden nATO attack : NATO simpyl lacks the military forces needed to attack Russia in the Baltic area, all of a sudden. And why should it even want that? In Russia, on the other hand, there is a clearly defined desire by many to restore the fame and glory of the good old empire, and to get back the buffer zone that the Warsaw Pact states once had officially been defined as. The way to do so, to get all that back, is destabilization of the West (split between Europe and the US, destabilizing the EU by any means, taking Germany out as opinion leader), and destabilization of the Baltic states and manipulation of global opinion.

And where have we seen the textbook demonstration for a testrun for this kind of new warfare? Correct, during the Crimean conflict. A masterfully executed textbook example, I admire the precision of the execution.

I don't buy your claims, ikalugin. That in the past I voiced my belief that I could understand why Russia does what it does, does not mean that I sympathise with it. Its the pure and sober techniques and mechanisms of power, seen without any sentimentality. But that is more about "understand thy enemy", not about agreeing with him.

[Dowly]

You know what would be great, guys? Sources! Otherwise, it is just one's word against another's.

PS. Preferably the key bits translated, if the source is not in english.

[ikalugin]

First to get the obvious out of the way:
S300 may be an old orignal Sovjet design, envertheless it has seen notoriousnupdates and upgrades and today with latest upgrades and new missiles is one of the world's top notch air defence systemsIndeed S300 series did see upgrades during it's long history of usage. However that specific system in question (S300PS) uses the old (80s vintage) missiles (specifically 5V55R series). I can make a separate post on the modern and not so modern Russian SAMs, as it is quite complicated and your confusion is understandable.

But Moscows reactions in past years moved beyond just taking on defensive needs for that enclaveNow, to the bone of the matter. My point still stands, if you compare forces stationed in Kaliningrad region specifically and on that axis in general in comparison to, say, relevant Polish forces you would see that the Russian presense in Kaliningrad is not overmatching.

Evidence - you can see from the sourcing (for example military balance 2016 page 196) that the Baltic Fleet has 2 mechanized brigades stationed in Kaliningrad area (one of those brigades is marked as a regiment but that regiment was expanded into a brigade in 2016). Compare it to the Polish mechanized division stationed against that force and you would notice that there is no over match.

Thus it appears that you are just inventing threat where none exists. I wonder why such an apparently inteligent person as yourself would do that.

This cannot be just a reaciton to realistic fears for a sudden nATO attack : NATO simpyl lacks the military forces needed to attack Russia in the Baltic area, all of a sudden. And why should it even want that? In Russia, on the other hand, there is a clearly defined desire by many to restore the fame and glory of the good old empire, and to get back the buffer zone that the Warsaw Pact states once had officially been defined as. The way to do so, to get all that back, is destabilization of the West (split between Europe and the US, destabilizing the EU by any means, taking Germany out as opinion leader), and destabilization of the Baltic states and manipulation of global opinion. And here we run into a political narrative. I believe that you would find it beneficial to this discussion to entertain the idea of mirrowing your view of Russia into the Russian view of NATO and then deconstruct exactly why and how we want to achieve our objectives.

And where have we seen the textbook demonstration for a testrun for this kind of new warfare? Correct, during the Crimean conflict. A masterfully executed textbook example, I admire the precision of the execution. Crimea was a one off operation, hinged on many unique factors, such as the stationing of Russian troops in the region before initiation of operations, mass pro Russian support, etc. It is stupid to project that unique one-off adhoc operation onto the likely future Russian operations.

[ikalugin]

To balance off my own narrative.


Just like the real changes in Russian military posture, real changes in military posture by NATO are fairly minor, do not change existing correlation of forces and means and appear to be tasked with reassuring eastern NATO members.

Thus they are tolerable and I would expect Russia to show restraint and not reinfroce that axis significantly in response.


Regarding Germany and it's role in NATO - in the end Germany won't have a say in NATO agression against Russia if such agression happens.

[Jimbuna]

And now back to what this thread is about-terrorism

If I heard what have been said about this shooting in Fort Lauderdales airport, it is terror.

The shooter walked around and fired his gun at people completely random

Markus

My lad was in the area at the time but thankfully not at the airport.

[ikalugin]

Apparently Turkish forces are leaving Iraq now.

[Skybird]

IS delivered a smashing defeat to the Turks - and to the German Panzer myth.

Up to 10 Leopard 2A4s should have been destroyed in a battle when IS fighters used Kornet missiles against the rear and the the flanks of the Turkish Leos, apparently in some kind of urban or village environment. Experts also question the operational tactics of the Turks and called the unit's leadership skills "incompetent".

Leopard 2A4 is a by now outdated version of the Leo-2, lacking reactive or additional wedge armour, also has no missile-defeating distance defence against incoming warheads. By today's standards it is by far not the first line of MBTs anymore. Still, if you lose so many tanks in short time in this fashion, the thing has "leadership failure" written all over it.

Still, the damage to the reputation of the Leopard hurts. Until here it had a clean record. When it got damaged in combat or got hit by mines, crews all survived (Canadians in Afghanistan).

[Oberon]

Ouch! :o That is devastating, the 2A4s might not be the most modern version of the Leo 2 but they're still pretty up the list. Does the A7 have any active CM gear? Like the Israeli Trophy? Definitely something to put on the Leo 3 design requirements I think. :yep:

Still, at least out of this mess there will be some good if German inspectors can get a hold of the wrecks and identify weak points and design improvements to combat the Spriggan.

[August]

Ouch! :o That is devastating, the 2A4s might not be the most modern version of the Leo 2 but they're still pretty up the list. Does the A7 have any active CM gear? Like the Israeli Trophy? Definitely something to put on the Leo 3 design requirements I think. :yep:

Still, at least out of this mess there will be some good if German inspectors can get a hold of the wrecks and identify weak points and design improvements to combat the Spriggan.

I think the biggest weak point here was the lack of Infantry support. No matter how advanced an AFV is it is vulnerable without it, especially in urban locations.

[Skybird]

I think the biggest weak point here was the lack of Infantry support. No matter how advanced an AFV is it is vulnerable without it, especially in urban locations.
Yes, apparently incompetent leadership is the main problem in this mess.

IS also learned to adapt to the Leo's frontal strength - all kills should derive from shots into the rear and the flanks.

[Skybird]

Does the A7 have any active CM gear?
Not that I recall now, both the A7 and the A7+ which is the version specialising in urban warfare seem to have any active CM. Their massive improvements over the A6 all are in the more "conventional" field. Which I think is a mistake.

The A4, which now got a beating, however is more than 30 years old now. First versions of the Kornet were fielded in the very late 90s.

Relatively expensive, for an ATGM. Didnt't they say IS is under financial pressure?

[Catfish]

You cannot build a tank which is not vulnerable against missiles, unless it has so much armour it cannot be used in rough terrain. The key for all military equipment in the wild is building it as light as possible.

Tanks in a street. Hide in a house, let them pass, move into the street and fire a missile at the rear. Not much chance for any tank, but then who lets tanks patrol villages without infantry?!


Wondering what the US M1 tank will be able to do, in the baltic. The gas turbine with its 500 degrees Celsius exhaust temperature will light it up at ten miles for any infrared equipment, and it has a terrible fuel consumption. :hmmm:

[Schroeder]

but then who lets tanks patrol villages without infantry?!

Exactly. That's why tanks and mechanized infantry work closely together in the Bundeswehr.
Sending in tanks into urban terrain with a missile equipped enemy is asking for casualties.

Maybe Mr Erdoghans purge of key military personnel works just as well for him now as Stalin's did back in the day...

[Skybird]

It also has superior TIS and superior magnification optics for gunners and TC (="better eyes"), is more silent (high frequency does not carry as far through the air as low rumbling Diesel), it has a serious punch to deliver, better secondary armament than the Leo, and is very well protected. Its not all bad with american tanks, you know. :D There is a reason why comparable generations of Abrams and Leopard 2 are seen usually as roughly equal. Plus American crews often have real combat experience, and their command staff is excellently trained.

[Skybird]

Exactly. That's why tanks and mechanized infantry work closely together in the Bundeswehr.
Sending in tanks into urban terrain with a missile equipped enemy is asking for casualties.

Maybe Mr Erdoghans purge of key military personnel works just as well for him now as Stalin's did back in the day...
My idea is that some big-egoed fame-craving local commander wanted to enforce a victorious advance or capture in a fashion and with insufficient resources so that this mission necessarily must end as a still birth. I have seen such guys there, full of their own egoes - and thus the worst enemy of their subordinate troops.

But too little details of the fight are known in public.

[Jimbuna]

IS delivered a smashing defeat to the Turks - and to the German Panzer myth.


That's the Abrams and Leopards we know of being destroyed in battle (not necessarily the latest varianta) so I'm wondering if the Challenger would have fared any better under similar/identical circumstances....probably not :hmmm:

[Oberon]

A walk through Aleppo:

https://twitter.com/i/moments/820283823321649153

[Jimbuna]

A pyrrhic victory if ever I saw one.

[Skybird]

Why pyrric victory? The objective never was to "save" the city in any meaning of the term, but to drive out the enemy. And the enemy is gone. That battle has seen a total victory with the victor now doing as he pleases, or not?

Interesting that Putin has started to reduce Russian forces in Syria, indicating he does not further want to support any military fancy or war by Assad (who recently said he wants to regain all of Syria, which currently is questionable - and cannot be done without Russian aid). It seems to me Putin plans to keep Syria open ended and thus: instabile, so that he always will be needed by the regime, and he always can fall back to playing the Syria card, also against the West. If it were about securing a military victory in the war, the next logical step would have been to now forcus all military wrath on Idlib, the last remaining major stronghold of the various rebel groups. Assad probbaly could not do that alone without havign his forces bogging down, and Russia seems to currently not being in the mood to head for Idlib, so I think the conclusion is evident.

As the chief of the security conference in Munich recently said: we in the West, especially Europe, and here especially Germany, must stop thinking, claiming and saying that "there cannot be a military solution", something that especially German diplomats love to say over and over and over again. There can, Russia repeatedly demonstrated that now. Even if the wanted solution is an open ended solution, and is intended destabilization. The Kremlin got what it wants - with military means. Period. Like in the Ukraine and the Crimean peninsula as well.

Brute force can be very convincing, no matter whether morally okay or not.

[ikalugin]

"reduction" appears to be more of a rotation. With the Kuznetsov rotating out of Syria new ground attack aircraft rotate in. Same thing happened the last time, with fixed wing aircraft being replaced by additional helicopters and special forces operatiors. The change in the specifics of our deployment appears to depend on the various local conditions - such as weather or the overall military-political situation (or the need to combat test the carrier).

My assesment for the mid-term future is that we should expect one by one reduction of the smaller rebel enclaves in various areas, ie around the country's capital, not the all out drive onto the Iblib area (which btw lacks the major pre-war cities on the scale of Alleppo or Damascus). After all those enclaves are removed and the Assad's domain becomes more cohesive we could expect pushes elsewhere - be that ISIS or other rebels.

Long term effects are hard to predict - because in order to resolve it we need to find a political solution we can push through (especially with the local players). Such a solution would be hard to attain due to the different interests of the local players, but in my opinion a return to a situation close to the pre-war status que would work out for the majority of them.

[Oberon]

Please tell me that they're going to finish the Kuznetsovs refit, he really does need it.

[Rockstar]

Ive been wondering for a while now. Is 'i' any relation to 'O'?

[ikalugin]

Please tell me that they're going to finish the Kuznetsovs refit, he really does need it.
He would go into the mid life repair now. Hopefully he would get new boilers.

[Catfish]

Why pyrric victory? The objective never was to "save" the city in any meaning of the term, but to drive out the enemy. And the enemy is gone. That battle has seen a total victory with the victor now doing as he pleases, or not?

Well "the enemy" (woever it is apart from Daesh) can come back easily anytime, or not?

... It seems to me Putin plans to keep Syria open ended and thus: instabile, so that he always will be needed by the regime, and he always can fall back to playing the Syria card, also against the West. ...

I agree.
Also: "A Kremlin spokesman said on Monday that Russia agreed with Mr Trump's evaluation of Nato, particularly that it had become obsolete, Russian news agency Interfax said."
Then i guess all is well and we can all be good friends :doh:

[Oberon]

He would go into the mid life repair now. Hopefully he would get new boilers.

Good, he really did not look healthy on the transit to the Med. :doh:

[Catfish]

Good, he really did not look healthy on the transit to the Med. :doh:

This does not even look healthy when perfectly ok :03:
http://www.popularmechanics.com/military/navy-ships/a24015/zumwalt-breakdown-panama-canal/
And i do not want to be aboard if it ever encounters a storm.

[ikalugin]

Good, he really did not look healthy on the transit to the Med. :doh:
You mean the black smoke?

It was the result of the boilers working in a non optimal mode. The current boilers on Kuznetsov use a hydrolic automatic control system, but that system is dead, so they are manually switched into a small number of narrow performance modes.

For obvious reasons those are optimised for the full power burns, meaning that at lower power settings the boilers loose efficiency and you get a lot of smoke.

(plus we use fuel oil aka mazut vs diesel)

[ikalugin]

Another thing - looks like we are further expanding our basing in Syria. It appears that there are 3 primary projects:
- Resupply point in Tartus being expanded to a naval base, with basing (piers) and repair (including midlife repair) fascilities to support major surface combatants (ie cruisers).
- Further expansion of Latakia airbase.
- Improving transportation between the two (with the new railroad).

Overall it appears that we plan to keep our stuff in Syria indefinetely, the agreements appear to allow that.

[Catfish]

^ Skybird meant that Russia does not seem to partake in action against syrian Rebels, Kurds and terrorists like Daesh anymore, instead of finishing the 'job'.

He did not doubt Russia would stay to build and use some infrastructure in Syria for future russian military operations.