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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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ECOWAS is getting desperate because it knows it can't invade and the sanctions (as per usual) are hurting them more than they are Niger. They are seriously considering the Junta's promise to hold elections within three years as part of 'a negotiated settlement'. They may not have gone on the Military Coups 101 course
| Always choose a time frame for 'return to civilian government' promises that is so far into the future everyone will have forgotten about it when the time comes. If somebody important does remember, hold an election with the coup leader in mufti and any other candidate with name recognition in gaol. | |
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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Don't tell the terrorists about this
| This diminutive war machine is shipped like a piece of furniture from IKEA. Except, unlike Swedish furniture, the Corvo PPDS is held together with only sticky tape, rubber bands, and glue that is supplied with the shipment. As you might imagine, this makes the cardboard drone exceptionally cheap — it has a price tag of only $670–$3,350 depending on the version and quantity. |
Currently being tested by the Ukrainians to take out Russian fighter jets parked on the tarmac.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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You reckon?
The clue is in the name :
| This diminutive war machine |
If it really is "diminutive" it has either (a) a very small payload or (b) limited range (or both).
Russians learnt the lesson (at least 12 months ago) - no fighter jets of any significance are parked within range of "diminutive war machines".
Storm Shadow perhaps.
The role of the "diminutive war machines" is PR-seeking nuisance attacks on other Russian targets.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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Well , you're right in one sense
| The Corvo only has a payload of 3,000 grams (about 6.6 lbs.). Ukraine has adapted it from a surveillance drone into an attack drone. The Kursk airfield in Russia is well within the range of the Corvo if launched from the Ukrainian border and the cardboard construction likely helped the drones evade Russian radar. |
As to whether you believe this report
| On August 27, Ukrainian media claimed that 16 Corvos had been used in an attack on the Kursk Vostochny Airport in Russia, with three shot down and the other 13 damaging four Su-30 and one MiG-29 aircraft, an S-300 radar, and two Pantsir air defense systems. |
is for you. The Ukrainians don't just make it up, even if they do big it up.
 
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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An interesting late substitution in Ukraine's Minister of Defence team.
| In a statement, Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky said he thinks the ministry “needs new approaches†and noted that Minister of Defense Oleksiy Reznikov had served in the position for 550 days of “full-scale war.†|
“needs new approaches†is a euphemism for what? Might be like my school reports that said "Could do better".
But what kind of new approach? And if Oleksiy Reznikov is off the pitch (and off the team), who's the new player, and will they be a super-sub?
| The replacement Defence Minister, Rustem Umerov, 41, is the current head of State Property Fund (a government agency that sells state assets to private investors), has a background in telecommunications and finance — not military — and is an Uzbekistani muslim. He wasn’t born or raised in Ukraine. |
Hang on, wind that back again ... | State Property Fund (a government agency that sells state assets to private investors) |
So why him? Umerov is a dealmaker. The New York Times reported:
| Umerov was the chief Ukrainian negotiator of the deal with Russia allowing Ukraine to export grain through the Black Sea, and has also been a prominent negotiator on ongoing prisoner exchange dealmaking with Russia. Shortly after the war started, Umerov — who attended early peace negotiations in March — told the BBC he was determined “to find political and diplomatic resolution to this brutal invasion.†|
So - and despite © Boris Johnson "We Are Winning" - if the incoming Minster of Defence has a background, not in the military but in negotiation and finance, what do we suppose they expect him to negotiate?
Perhaps Umerov will be negotiating both sides at the same time. On one hand, more financial deals with US and EU - selling off available state assets (presumably the ones in Western Ukraine). On the other hand, simultaneously, negotiating a political and diplomatic resolution with Russia for the Eastern Ukraine, i.e. a peace deal.
But don't let the left hand know what the right hand's doing.
Notably, not yet suggested in the MSM, the narrative may need to be adjusted before that happens.
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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I don't know, but I suspect it's the other way round, Ukraine has been really fearful of western complaints of corruption within the Ministry of Defence so has ditched Reznikov to signify zero tolerance. Rustem Umerov ticks the right boxes, his family roots are Crimean Tartars that were forcibly deported to Uzbekhistan and returned after Soviet Collapse (tick), Muslim (tick), supportive of private sector ie signals that Ukraine will stand on her own two feet, not always be dependent on western aid (tick). Been involved in the grain deals. Crimea (tick)
It seems to me that they definitely are going after Crimea.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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It is important, contrary to what people may think, to have a non-military man at the head of military departments, both in peace and war. Military men have lots of shortcomings as ministers, some of which I detail in The Unreliable History. It is also normal -- not necessarily wise, but it seems inevitable - to ditch the man at the top (not of course at the very top) when things are not going well on the battlefield.
Zelensky has been notable in appointing ministers who are from (a) minorities and (b) opposition parties.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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Did anyone get this good news?
| British-made tanks are about to sweep Putin’s conscripts aside |
Who said this? Hamish de Bretton-Gordon
With a name like that, from a tank/cavalry regiment, we can be sure it's genuine material. Perhaps Norman French?
What else did he say?
| As a former tank commander, I can say one thing for certain: Putin’s demoralised conscripts are utterly unprepared for the shock action now hitting their lines. Ukrainian armoured formations are beginning to meet Russian forces in battle, and they are going to pulverise Russia’s defensive lines. I am confident for one simple reason: Ukraine will follow the Western ideology of manoeuvre warfare in a combined arms context, while the Russians will follow Soviet doctrine, relying on attrition and numbers. |
Not sure about the "manoeuvre warfare in a combined arms context", as that's proved to be the most visible and easily targeted.
Apart from that ... Huzzah!
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/06/09/british-made-tanks-about-to-sweep-putins-conscripts-aside/
Looking forward to his next report on how it panned out.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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I'm afraid neither he nor you will find out. 'Manoeuvre warfare in a combined arms context' is not a 'western ideology' it has been the dominant doctrine ever since warfare began, but in this context ever since the successful British offensive of 1918. It requires tanks in larger numbers than Ukraine has or ever will have.
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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Also not sure about this old cavalry tank manouevre thingy as it's really predicated on a concept of a static line trench. Unfortunately, sitting on your arse in mud, having a fag, and a swig of whisky, dreaming of home, is not going to aid your survival prospects, nor is trundling slowly forward behind folks/tech clearing mines.....as soon as you get spotted by a recce drone, the artillery with cluster munitions or depleted Uranian shells will be called in to finish you off. If you survive the next wave will be attack drones. The defence has to manoeuvre to outwit the drones and artillery. No time for a drink or a fag.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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It is true drones are a deal-breaker. They are similar to mines in that they are cheap and have an effect out of all proportion but there seems to be no antidote.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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The antidote to Battle Drones is swarms of sacrificial mini-drones. These are even easier and cheaper to build than Battle Drones.
These mini-drones are the size of children's toys, and resemble them in many ways. Built (of course) in China, on assembly lines that can produce thousands an hour, with a minimum of disposable cheap plastic components. The elctronics are exactly the same kind of elctronics that go into our mobile phones (also made in China). A microprocessor the size of a small finger nail, a secure commands receiver and a GPS receiver.
They don't even need to carry an active payload, just flying them into impact with the battle drones is all that is required.
Net production cost? A few quid each. Cheap as chips and just as disposable.
Place your orders now for airfreighted delivery before Christmas. Don't forget to call them "Children's Toys" on the order and customs paperwork. You will want them airfreighted, to avoid the usual Christmas toys bottlenecks with shipping containers.
It's all a game of catch-up and leapfrog of course. Next step will be the antidote to sacrificial mini-drones. We already know what that is, it's Guardian Drones. These fly just behind the Battle Drones. Their payload is electronics designed to detect and then jam the command signals going to the sacrificial mini-drones. The technology for that has already been proven, it just needs drone-sized packaging.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| The antidote to Battle Drones is swarms of sacrificial mini-drones. These are even easier and cheaper to build than Battle Drones. |
This is not an antidote. Any more than dummy minefields are an antidote to mines.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | The antidote to Battle Drones is swarms of sacrificial mini-drones. These are even easier and cheaper to build than Battle Drones. |
This is not an antidote. Any more than dummy minefields are an antidote to mines. |
You are confused or conflating.
Of themselves, dummy minefields do nothing to deal with real mines. Even if their role is to fool people into carefully avoiding the "look at me!" dummy minefields and blundering into real (but cunningly disguised) minefields instead.
Sacrificial mini-drones do actually do something to directly deal with Battle Drones. If your security clearance is up to date, I might be able to refer you to the "right sort" of people, who can show you where they are being tested.
Or perhaps you'd prefer the BBC's antidote to panel games?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qnwb
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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Watching Ukraine vs England, being played at Wroclaw, Poland, the commentator said there were two hundred and fifty thousand Ukrainian refugees in the city. But why? It is understandable that millions fled in the first weeks of the war when Russia was not only threatening to overrun the country but was committing enormities all along the way. I would have been first in the queue. But no Ukrainian civilians have been affected for a year or more, apart from drone attacks that kill and injure them on a scale less than traffic accidents. I would by now be queuing to go home.
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