I’m tired of thinking about Elon Musk. I’m tired of writing about Elon Musk. If I thought it wouldn’t cause more harm than good at this point I’d be writing several paragraphs explaining why President Biden needed to both invoke the Defense Production Act to produce the Starlink systems and nationalize SpaceX as necessary for the security of the US and its allies. But even if I did think it would do more good than harm, there is no way anyone in the Biden administration would even put it own as the 8th or 9th possible policy choice in a proposal on how to resolve this problem. I’ve already written twice about regardless of what Musk and SpaceX are saying privately, as I wrote in April and just a couple of weeks ago, the bulk of the systems going to Ukraine have been bought by the US, by Poland, or by a lot of Ukrainian citizens, as well as crowdfunded by a lot of individuals in a lot of countries for the Ukrainians. CNN now provides a lot more of the actual details:
Since they first started arriving in Ukraine last spring, the Starlink satellite internet terminals made by Elon Musk’s SpaceX have been a vital source of communication for Ukraine’s military, allowing it to fight and stay connected even as cellular phone and internet networks have been destroyed in its war with Russia.
So far roughly 20,000 Starlink satellite units have been donated to Ukraine, with Musk tweeting on Friday the “operation has cost SpaceX $80 million and will exceed $100 million by the end of the year.”
Though Musk has received widespread acclaim and thanks for responding to requests for Starlink service to Ukraine right as the war was starting, in reality, the vast majority of the 20,000 terminals have received full or partial funding from outside sources, including the US government, the UK and Poland, according to the SpaceX letter to the Pentagon.
SpaceX’s request that the US military foot the bill has rankled top brass at the Pentagon, with one senior defense official telling CNN that SpaceX has “the gall to look like heroes” while having others pay so much and now presenting them with a bill for tens of millions per month.
According to the SpaceX figures shared with the Pentagon, about 85% of the 20,000 terminals in Ukraine were paid – or partially paid – for by countries like the US and Poland or other entities. Those entities also paid for about 30% of the internet connectivity, which SpaceX says costs $4,500 each month per unit for the most advanced service. (Over the weekend, Musk tweeted there are around 25,000 terminals in Ukraine.)
I don’t like Musk, but I sure don’t expect him to bankroll this. Doing this through DOD contracting is not unreasonable. What’s unreasonable is having spent months positioning oneself as this great benefactor when, in fact, you weren’t doing most of what you were claiming credit for. All the while using the Ukrainians use of Starlink as a proving ground to sell more of them to potential clients.
Back to CNN:
After Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky raised the question of who Musk sides with, he responded that he “still very much support[s] Ukraine” but fears “massive escalation.”
Musk also argued privately last month that Ukraine doesn’t want peace negotiations right now and that if they went along with his plan, “Russia would accept those terms,” according to a person who heard them.
“Ukraine knows that its current government and wartime efforts are totally dependent on Starlink,” the person familiar with the discussions said. “The decision to keep Starlink running or not rests entirely in the hands of one man. That’s Elon Musk. He hasn’t been elected, no one decided to give him that power. He has it because of the technology and the company he built.”
Exhibit A:
Here’s a bit more cold hard reality for Musk and his toxic stans:
So @elonmusk is whining about losing a lot of money on Starlinks for Ukraine.
Meanwhile, may I present to you snippets of my bank statements.
Thousands of Ukrainians, paying his company monthly.So the question is: did you really lose more money than you earned? pic.twitter.com/w8OX2EBiqf
— Melaniya Podolyak (@MelaniePodolyak) October 14, 2022
More after the jump!
Very interesting statement from @elonmusk re Ukrainian StarLink and how damaging it is for @SpaceX economics.
Being Ukrainian actually in the topic of StarLinks, I want to tell you some based facts re starlinks in Ukraine.
— Dimko Zhluktenko 🇺🇦 (@dim0kq) October 14, 2022
1. Despite that, I have not seen ANY StarLink which was bought by the governments, or by SpaceX. All the Starlinks I have seen / used – were bought either by volunteers like myself, or soldiers put their personal money in.
The subscription price is also paid out of the pocket.
— Dimko Zhluktenko 🇺🇦 (@dim0kq) October 14, 2022
3. I would be VERY curious to see actual transparency on the process of getting StarLinks up and running in Ukraine, all the hidden costs that Elon claims. Because – Ukrainians pay the same price as everyone else but it’s only Ukraine that is a subject to discussion for @elonmusk
— Dimko Zhluktenko 🇺🇦 (@dim0kq) October 14, 2022
5. My question is – why is Ukraine so special for @elonmusk in sense of operating @SpaceX and StarLink? I don’t get the answers from the interview he did with CNN exclusive, especially given the numbers they claim.
I think it’s far from reality. pic.twitter.com/26ACo1lmCp
— Dimko Zhluktenko 🇺🇦 (@dim0kq) October 14, 2022
May I present you bank statement of my buddy https://t.co/r3zsnWJXoI
— Dimko Zhluktenko 🇺🇦 (@dim0kq) October 14, 2022
That’s enough time spent on this toxic asshole. Musk, not Dimko Zhlutenko. Zhlutenko is doing good stuff raising funds to cover the costs. And paying them directly when necessary.
Here is President Zelenskyy’s address from earlier today. Video and English transcript below:
Dear Ukrainians!
Great people of a great country!
On October 14, we celebrate the Day of Defenders of Ukraine. This is the Day of those who fight. This is the Day of what we fight for. This is the Day of what kind of victory we will gain.
A century ago, Ukraine honored this Day. And it will honor it a century after us.
On October 14, we express gratitude. Gratitude to everyone who fought for Ukraine in the past. And to everyone who is fighting for it now. To all who won then. And to everyone who will definitely win now. Win in such a way that it will crown the struggle of many generations of our people with success. The people who always wanted one thing the most – freedom. For themselves. And for their children. For our culture.
The place where I am now points to the origins of our Ukrainian path. These are the slopes of Vytachiv. Here was one of the most ancient outposts of Rus’-Ukraine. Back in the times of Olga, Svyatoslav and Volodymyr the Great. Svyatopolk, Monomakh, Andriy and Oleg were gathering here for the princely congress. Andriy Pervozvanny placed the first cross here. Cossack seagulls used to cross these waters. These shores have seen various invaders and heroes. Here, on the slopes, Taras Shevchenko looked at the Dnipro and the cliffs. This place is a witness of more than a millennium of our history and its important lesson.
They tried to capture and enslave the Ukrainian land. They tried to conquer and destroy the Ukrainian people. Both a thousand years ago and in the XX century. But Ukrainians come here. Here they reflect on our history. The Ukrainian language is spoken here. There is a chapel here, built according to Shevchenko’s sketch.
There were different periods. Various threats. But Ukraine endured. There is one reason for that. Our defenders. Our people who are fighting for their right to life. In Rus’. In Sich. During the national liberation struggle. Against the Nazi occupation. And against the Rashists.
It seems that the current enemy in its evil unites all the enemies of our statehood that we faced before. And by defeating this enemy, we will respond to all enemies who encroached on Ukraine – on those who lived, who live and who will live on our land.
This will be a victory for all our people.
This will be a victory for the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Our Ground Forces, infantry. Tankers. Missile troops and artillery.
This will be a victory for our Air Forces. Our anti-aircraft warriors. Our drone operators.
This will be a victory for our Naval Forces. Our marines. Our airborne assault troops. Our intelligence. Special operations forces. Security Service of Ukraine.
This will be a victory for the border guards, the National Guard, the National Police, the territorial defense, and the communications officers.
This will be a victory for everyone who will not leave even a trace on Ukrainian soil of that army that flaunted itself as if it was the second on the planet.
This will be a victory for those of our heroes who are now in Russian captivity. Those who are now having the most difficult time. It is the most difficult to remain Ukrainian and preserve Ukrainian when they are among the murderers. But we remember. We remember and do everything to return everyone – each of our heroes. We will not leave anyone in captivity.
The world sees that Ukrainians do not lose their humanity under any circumstances. The enemy can strike at our cities, but never at our dignity.
The Rashists burned down the Skovoroda museum, dozens of churches, hundreds of schools and kindergartens… But they can’t do anything against our philosophy. Against what Ukrainians hear, see and know – from a young age.
Russian missiles are still capable of driving Ukrainians into bomb shelters, but none of our people shiver there. Ukrainians sing in shelters.
We defend our freedom. Our soul. Our land. Our Kyiv. Our Zaporizhzhia. Our Odesa. Our Dnipro and Mykolaiv. Our Kryvyi Rih. Our Nikopol. Our Khmelnytskyi, our Lviv. Our Vinnytsia.
What we have preserved and will always protect. Our Zhytomyr region, Kyiv region, Sumy region, Chernihiv region, Kharkiv region.
What we did not give away and will always protect. Our Kherson, our Donetsk and Luhansk, our Crimea.
We. We all. Great people of a great country. Everyone who fights and works for Ukraine to live. Diplomats who formed the most powerful global coalition in history to help Ukraine. Volunteers who cover any needs – on the ground, in the air, and even in space. Journalists who spread the truth about Ukraine and about this war, who maintain our morale, our confidence, our awareness. Transporters who change supply chains and provide Ukraine with everything it needs. Energy workers who defeat the darkness around the clock. Builders who restore what was destroyed by the enemy. Our heroic doctors. Rescuers. Sappers. Teachers. Civil servants. Local government. Farmers. Industrialists.
A nation. A nation that defeats terror. Millions of people who are bringing the crucial day closer, each in his place. Victory Day. The day of victory in the war for our freedom. In the war for independence for all our people in all corners of Ukraine.
In the war for the right to life for the people and for the state, whose name is Ukraine.
In the war for our values. In the war for our memory and Tradition. The tradition of freedom.
In this war, everything depends on you. On what you do. On who you help. On what you gain. On who came to help us.
The world stands with us. More than ever in our history. This in particular makes us stronger than ever in our history.
But just as at any time in our history, the future depends on specific people.
On those who are currently in the trenches and on combat posts. Sons, brothers and fathers. Daughters, sisters and mothers. Ukrainian men and women, to whom I now want to say the main words.
You are the most precious thing we have. Each and every one.
Rashist tanks, inmates and mercenaries oppose you. Looters, rapists and those who have gone mad from propaganda. Thousands of people whose lives are worth nothing to their state. They are thrown into attacks, they have “anti-retreat detachments” behind their backs, they are not counted and are not even taken away when they die. They do not know what to live for, and that’s why they lose the life given to them by God so shamefully.
And behind you, Ukrainian Warrior, are millions of people who know exactly what they live for. With you, Warrior, in the trenches is our entire state, everything that we have and that is so dear to us. The future of children is with you. The gold of our athletes’ victories. Our poetry, art, science. Sophia and the Potocki Palace are with you. Our Khortytsia and our Lavra. Our Heavenly Hundred is with you. And our respect, our faith and our love. Because our state is the mother of all defenders.
Behind you is Ukraine, which knows exactly what it wants and values. Behind you is the history that has been coming to these heroic Days for many centuries, so that you, Ukrainian Warrior, will now turn it in the right direction – forever. In the right direction for Ukraine.
I know it is extremely hard for you. I know how this enemy puts pressure on you. I know what they do. But I know that you are strong, and we will do everything to make you even stronger.
I know that you are confident, and we will do everything to increase your confidence even more.
I know that you are bringing victory closer as much as you can, and we will do everything to speed it up.
All of us – millions and millions. Great people of a great country!
Happy Defender of Ukraine Day!
Happy Intercession of the Most Holy Theotokos!
Happy Day of the Ukrainian Cossacks!
Glory to all our heroes!
Glory to all who fight, work and help!
Glory to Ukraine!
Photos by paramedic with the callsign Mowgli.
— Maria Avdeeva (@maria_avdv) October 14, 2022
Here is former NAVDEVGRU Squadron Leader Chuck Pfarrer’s most recent assessments of the situations in Zaporizhzhia and Izium:
ZAPORIZHZHIA NUCLEAR PLANT /14 OCT/ Additional Russian troops are reported to have deployed and established forward positions within the plant boundaries. Valeriy Martynyuk, deputy head of operations, was kidnapped by RU forces on Monday. There is no word on his status. pic.twitter.com/vqAH2mQON6
— Chuck Pfarrer | Indications & Warnings | (@ChuckPfarrer) October 14, 2022
IZIUM/1245 UTC 14 OCT/ UKR airstrikes target troop concentrations. UAV controlled artillery now commands most of the P-66 HWY. UKR conducting offensive ops aimed at Svatove and Kremenna. RU air defense complexes interdicted by Suppression of Enemy Air Defense (SEAAD) sorties. pic.twitter.com/8dwvwTR4id
— Chuck Pfarrer | Indications & Warnings | (@ChuckPfarrer) October 14, 2022
A Senior Military Official gave a backgrounder on Ukraine earlier today. Here’s the transcript (emphasis mine):
DEFENSE OFFICIAL: Hi. Good morning, everyone. Thank you so much for joining us today.
Joining me here at this table is [Senior Military Official] to give an operational update on what’s happening on the ground in Ukraine. For this portion, [Senior Military Official] will be on background with attribution to “Senior Military Official”. When he leaves, (inaudible) will continue with an on-the-record gaggle. For any questions you may have for me during this portion, please attribute my responses to “a defense official.”
But with that, I will turn it over to our senior [military] official.
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: Thanks, (inaudible). Hi, everybody. How are you? This is — this is different for me, so I’ll get to see you all roll your eyes when I — when I give you the answer that you may not want, as opposed to just doing it on the phone.
So this is the 233rd day of Russia’s illegal, unprovoked large-scale invasion of Ukraine, and a lot of activity this week, as you all know, overseas in Europe in terms of folks who have gathered, and a number of press engagements. So quite honestly, other than maybe some atmospherics on the ground, I’m probably not going to give you a great amount of things that will be helpful, right? I hate to say that up front, but I’ll certainly talk to what I can talk to.
We do assess that the Ukrainians continue to make some advances on the battlefield, and I’m very happy to talk about what we’re seeing in that regard. We also have seen, as you know, particularly since the attack at the Kerch Strait Bridge last week, we’ve seen the Russians continue to retaliate. The use of precision-guided munitions in a very imprecise way has continued over the course of the week. I think it’s fair to say we’re in the hundreds in terms of the number of missiles that the Russians have launched against Ukrainian targets, and in many — in most, I would tell you, cases, they have been used at civilian targets either indiscriminately or certainly in a deliberate way, as it relates to infrastructure targets like electricity or bridges or otherwise. And as you’ve heard others other than me talk about, certainly, in violation of what the international rules of war stand for.
Around the battlefield, so just working kind of north to south, in Kharkiv, we’ve seen limited Ukrainian gains over the course of the week. We have seen the Russians continue to strengthen their defenses in the Kharkiv area, and so it’s at a stop, is probably the wrong term. There are some very minor incremental gains, really, all the way from the northern portion of the Kharkiv area of operation down towards Lyman, but really limited in terms of movement this week.
In Bakhmut it’s similar, but the other way. So we’ve seen — so now moving down to — the center portion of the eastern front there around Bakhmut, we’ve seen the Russians continue to work to attack the Ukrainians around Bakhmut. Those gains have also been very small for the Russians, and in times we’ve seen the Ukrainians counterattack with effectiveness to retake land that the Russians had previously taken. All of those attacks on both sides are coming with pretty high impact in terms of the employment of artillery and the losses to the sides who are making those advances.
Nothing really new in Zaporizhzhia in terms of advances. You know, like you all, we continue to watch Zaporizhzhia with added care, just given the nuclear power plant. We have seen artillery that’s landed in and around the Zaporizhzhia area, but nothing that’s caused us a great concern over the week.
And then in Kherson, probably more movement in Kherson than anywhere else on the battlespace. And so Kherson, if you describe it, has three different axes in the Kherson area of operation: the north, the central and the south. We’ve seen them continue to advance in the north, and so we have seen gains in the north now. Really, the line of advance for the Ukrainians just north of the city of Milove, or Milove, — however you’d like to pronounce it, all of them probably incorrect.
And then extending, essentially, to the north and west with a number of small towns and villages that the Ukrainians have been able to clear of the Russians, and the Russians have moved back from what was their front lines as they reestablish front lines after the beginning of this six weeks ago, and are establishing defenses further south. So the Ukrainians now continue to advance on that northern axis, but at the same time, we’ve seen incremental gains in that central axis. So not a lot of advancement, but some. So we’re talking kilometers as they move. And what you’re seeing, if you’d put that on a map and there are a number of good ones out there — but if you look at that on a map, you’re getting these two coinciding axes that are starting to force the Russians to make some decisions in terms of how they want to choose to defend.
It’s also placed a good portion of that battlespace under artillery range of standard artillery, not GMLRS. And so you’ve seen them employ fewer GMLRS recently because they just don’t need to. They can range the Russian targets they want to hit with standard artillery.
And then outside Kherson city itself, not a huge number of movements outside of Kherson city in terms of the Ukrainians, but certainly, not any Russian gains in that portion of the battlespace.
In the maritime environment, so about a half-dozen ships that are underway for the Russians. That does include Kalibr-capable ships. I’ll say about half of those that are Kalibr-capable. We did get indications yesterday of some Kalibr missiles being fired from the sea, and our understanding is that they were all intercepted by the Ukrainian air defenses. And then we continue to train.
I’ll hold there. I’m happy to talk about what I know anything about, and so I’ll pass it back to (inaudible).
DEFENSE OFFICIAL: Great. I’ll open up the room. (inaudible), do you want to kick us off?
Q: Hi, thank you very much for doing this. As you mentioned, the Russian — the distance between the two forces is closing in right now in this part of the battle. Does that change the Ukrainians’ immediate needs? Instead of having a longer range rocket or missile, are there other things you’re looking at that might be more advantageous for this particular phase?
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: Yes, ma’am. It’s a good question, and certainly a lot of conversation in the past week about what the Ukrainians would need for the longer term. I think the biggest piece — and it was discussed in great detail last week — or this week in Europe has been air defense.
You know, if you look at — and I’ll just give you a 24 hour period. In that first period of retaliation, 80-plus missiles that were fired at the Ukrainians at all sorts of different targets — and roughly 40 of those, so 50 percent-ish, were intercepted by Ukrainian air defenses.
What I don’t know is how many missiles are fired at one inbound missile. And so you can assume it’s more than one, in a lot of cases. And so just every time, you know, they employ one, it — it certainly increases the need to replace that.
You know, that’s one thing that — you know, if you look at the Russians and their conduct of this fight, what’s different in the conduct of this fight that is different, say, in some of the events that we’ve fought in over the past — go back a long way — is the ability to establish air superiority.
The Russians have never been able to do that, and that changes the character of — of the fight on the ground. We have always, up to this point, been able to do that and that — that changes. And I’d just tell you, having been in a bunch of them, the fact that you don’t have to be concerned with something above you in large measure changes the fight. And so the Russians have never been able to get that.
The conversation this week about the criticality of air defense goes straight to that, I believe.
Q: (Inaudible) average of — of roughly — the 80 missiles that were fired, do you have a sense of what types of missiles the Russians are firing?
And there’s been a lot of chatter about the Russian stockpiles are dwindling. Is that what you’re seeing, based on what they’re firing at these targets?
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: I think — I haven’t seen this but I was told that the Ukrainians released some views as to what they believe the munitions totals are for the Russians. I don’t know what those are, quite honestly, but I do know that the numbers of precision missiles that the Russians have fired since the beginning of the fight are pretty extensive, and I think the fact that they’re now going to the Iranians to use drones speaks to their concern associated with precision munitions.
So every one of them fired is probably a very careful consideration for the Russians. If you look at — and I’m not an economics expert certainly — but if you look at the sanctions, you have to believe that the sanctions are having an impact on their defense industrial base and the ability to regenerate, in particular, those precision munitions, so.
DEFENSE OFFICIAL: Great. We’ll stick in the room. I’m going to go to Courtney over here.
Q: When you say the — you mentioned that there was a bunch of Kalibr missiles fired from this Red Sea, can you say how many were — how many they fired? And is there, like, any sense of any dud rate?
And then can you give us, like, a broader look? Like, we keep hearing about how they’re shooting — the Ukrainians have been able to intercept some of them but, like, what’s the — do you have any sense of how many are also failing, if that’s a problem? And — yeah, I have one follow up.
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: I don’t, I’d just tell you up front, Courtney, I don’t, in terms of failure rate. I would love to think that — you’d love to think that missiles that are going into the side of apartment buildings were not meant to hit apartment buildings. I don’t know that you can make that assertion because we have seen pretty indiscriminate attacks on behalf of the on the side of the Russians.
If — if you assume that some of those are duds, then I mean, I — (inaudible) it. But I don’t. So we think there were four fired yesterday from the Black Sea, and of those four, we believe all four were intercepted. I don’t know if that’s because, you know, a couple of them were duds or not. I’m sorry.
Q: We’ve heard a lot about air defenses this week. Is there any way of — of characterizing, like, where the Ukrainian air defense capability is right now? I mean, have they depleted a lot of their stocks, and what — like, any way to put a number on that, or —
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: I don’t know what they had before. I mean, just look at the world situation as it relates to air defense. I’m not sure, you know, in terms of what was being manufactured for them before and what they had leading into the fight. So I’m not sure — the Soviet numbers in particular, I couldn’t hazard a guess at that. You know, the international community has provided thousands of shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles this week, and — and I’m probably like you all. I mean, when I get a chance I’m happy to look up stuff on YouTube, too. But you know, you look at all the videos of surface-to-air — shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles being used against cruise missiles with some effect. I think just of those thousands, I know they’ve — they’ve got plenty left.
DEFENSE OFFICIAL: I’m going to hit — change over to the phones. (inaudabile)?
Q: Thanks a lot. (inaudible). Yeah, on the air defenses aspect of it, is there a — a — a sense of how much more help from Europe folks could give? There was the Spanish and the German systems that went, and then there’s the nascent that are coming. But from the demand signal side, what do you think the Ukrainians could actually use, number one? And two, could you talk about the Starlike connectivity issues?
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: So, I’m always happy to have a policy rep with me when I’m in the other room to talk about our partners, because quite frankly, I don’t know. I think, you know, what we would like is, what we’re seeing is the continued work of all of our partners to provide the Ukrainians what they ask for, and air defense being one of them. It was certainly great to see our partners step up this week in terms of air defense. My guess is that over the course of the next, you know, weeks and months, that we’ll see others do the same thing. And I think that they’ll be happy to take whatever we can provide in that regard.
On Starlink, it — quite frankly, I don’t have a great deal for knowledge on the Starlink piece other than the fact that Starlink has been provided to them. They have not indicated any concern in terms of the ability to prosecute the fights they’ve got right now in Kharkiv, Kherson or — or the central portion there in the Donetsk with us relative to Starlink. But it’s been huge in terms of their ability to communicate, and then to coordinate planning and operations over the course of the last seven, eight months.
DEFENSE OFFICIAL: Great. Want to be mindful of time. I’m going to take another one from the phones, and then come back to the room.
Q: Hey, thank you for your time. Want to take a — another crack at — at Starlink. If you could speak more broadly just to the advantage is there has been provided and — and what might be lost if it is turned off or turned off in some circumstances. And — and then from a policy perspective, what the Pentagon is doing at this point to kind of address this issue, the concerns that Mr. Musk has raised, et cetera. Thank you.
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: I’ll leave the second one, certainly, to (inaudible). In terms of its employment, I mean, well, I don’t think you can overestimate or overemphasize the impact that being able to communicate has. You know, one of the first things you try to do in a fight is to reduce your opponent’s ability to communicate, and in this case, you know, Starlink has proven exceptionally effective on the battlefield because it’s allowed the Ukrainians multiple connections, and in that regard, has been very, very helpful in their efforts at the tactical and strategic level.
And then I’ll pass it to (inaudible).
DEFENSE OFFICIAL: Yeah, thanks, (inaudible). I’m happy to take the Starlink question. The department, along with the Ukrainian Minister of Defense, we’ve identified the need for a SATCOM capability to ensure stable communications that remain and allow Ukrainian forces to contact or to use.
And we’re working with our partners and allies to look at all options on how we can best support the needs that the Ukrainians have right now. And I’m happy to go into more detail on that later.
(CROSSTALK)
Q: (Inaudible), you — a couple of days ago mentioned the need for an integrated air defense system. At the Joint Staff level, what are you doing? What would the — what would an integrated air defense system look like in three weeks that you don’t have now, or three months? And what will the NASAMS system give the Ukrainians by way of capability that they do not now possess, once it’s delivered?
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: So on the last one, sir — and I’m not an expert on NASAMS, other than some of the ranges in particular — but I think it — it adds to their ability to kind of layer their defenses. And so if you look at some of the higher end systems they have, they’re able to detect targets further out, to choose the type of munitions that they want to use against various targets, depending on how far out they can — they can pick it up.
A great example would be if I can determine that something is a helicopter vice an airplane or a cruise missile, I then can choose the type of munition to employ against it with better effectiveness. So using, as an example — and I’ll use an example from somewhere else — if I was to take a quadcopter and shoot a quadcopter down with a Patriot missile, that’s a pretty bad choice. And so in a different way, they’re able to generally choose to do the same things.
Now, the integrated air and missile defense system allows them greater ability to do that. So if they can determine you know, we generally know where an opponent flies. They can — if they can integrate all of their different layers of air defense, then it allows them to make those kinds of decisions.
I don’t know if I described that very well or not.
Q: — integrated air defense system now with the capabilities they have in their country (inaudible) what’s been provided today?
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: You know, sir, just watching what they’re doing, it’s hard to believe that it’s nascent. I mean, I think they clearly understand and have understood the criticality of air defenses for a while. If they didn’t, I think we would go back to that air superiority conversation and you’d see the Russians have a much greater opportunity to interdict what they’re doing with air power.
DEFENSE OFFICIAL: Thank you. I’m going to let (inaudible) get back to his day. Thank you so much for being here with us, appreciate it.
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: Thanks.
Demilitarization of russia.
By using hundreds of high-precision missiles against civilian objects of Ukraine, the aggressor state reduces its ability to strike the military targets. Two conclusions:
– russia's military defeat is inevitable;
– russia is a terrorist state. pic.twitter.com/KHeM7AaGlb— Oleksii Reznikov (@oleksiireznikov) October 14, 2022
The BBC, on their iPlayer platform, has released a new documentary about how the Russia we’re dealing with today got to be that way by focusing on the period between 1985 and 1999. The Financial Times‘ Max Seddon provides a shocking trailer:
Inject this into my veins, any spurious connections and factual inaccuracies be damned pic.twitter.com/ZXqZfrp8vY
— max seddon (@maxseddon) October 13, 2022
And here’s the link to the seven part documentary.
I think that’s enough for tonight.
Your daily Patron!
#NAFOfellas and the free people of the world, it’s time for a big kick. Please sign the petition if you support what it calling for 👊🏻 https://t.co/n0do6icMmN
— Patron (@PatronDsns) October 14, 2022
And here’s a new video from Patron’s official TikTok:
@patron__dsns
I think the caption is pretty self explanatory.
Open thread!
SpaceUnit
Musk needs to blast himself into space already and go fight the xenomorphs.
MobiusKlein
I’m with Adam – I’m sick to death of the stench of Musk
CaseyL
@MobiusKlein: ISWYDT, and very well done it is!
John S.
Ever the narcissistic huckster, Musk has to make everything about HIM. Which is why he’s a fellow traveler with the fat orange manbaby.
Steeplejack
Useful Starlink hack.
Alison Rose
Musk is such a prime example of undeservedly powerful white male mediocrity. Also someone who thinks he is WAY smarter than he is.
The video from Zelenskyy was incredibly moving. He also posted a brief one in which he visited wounded soldiers in the hospital and gave out awards to them, as well as some of the medical team there. I always love seeing these, because it’s one more example of what a better human being and leader he is than putin. I doubt putin spends a single moment thinking about the injured troops in his hospitals. (Not that I give much of a damn about them, but he ought to.)
Thank you as always, Adam.
dmsilev
The CEO of a company that gets a lot of business from the US Government, including the military, going out of his way to piss off senior members of that government? That’s a bold strategy.
YY_Sima Qian
The heady days of 2008 & 2012 presidential elections notwithstanding, tech companies & tech tycoons are not allies of liberals or the Left (outside of certain social issues). By now they are part of the kleptocracy w/ entrenched interests to protect, some have become part of the military-industrial complex.
Feathers
Wouldn’t Musk need to have some level of security clearance to be doing as much defense work as he seems to be? If he doesn’t, why not?
I tend to stay out of the weeds on the details of defense contractor evilness, but this doesn’t seem normal. And like something that needs to be nipped in in the bud immediately.
phdesmond
@Steeplejack: heh heh.
Dan B
@Alison Rose: Putin seems to be from the same mold as most GOP and authoritarians who believe that empathy is a sign of weakness and in a dog eat dog world the weak are eaten. Could you imagine being in a hospital and seeing Putin heading towards your bed? Maggie Thatcher, Ron Johnson, Jared, McConnell, etc.?
buskertype
when Musk says he’s concerned about “escalation” it sure sounds to me like he’s concerned about Putin threatening him in some way.
Mike in NC
The three faces that most need to spend quality time with a baseball bat: Elon Musk, Donald Trump, and Vladimir Putin.
Urza
@Steeplejack: Seems like something to be exploited if Russia ever started using the dishes. They did not bring their battle cats with them. Could probably even train some cats to use it if it came to that.
tybee
@Mike in NC:
I, unrepentantly, agree.
Tony G
“By using hundreds of high-precision missiles against civilian objects of Ukraine, the aggressor state reduces its ability to strike the military targets.” I don’t know nothin about nothin, but this sounds similar to what happened in 1940 when Hitler ordered the Luftwaffe to bomb London and other British cities instead of military targets in Britain. The deaths of tens of thousands of British civilians did not result in a surrender. Meanwhile a couple of thousand Luftwaffe aircraft were destroyed along with their crews.
Citizen Alan
@SpaceUnit: Musk would be one of the ones who would send Paul Reiser out to capture one alive by infecting Ripley with it.
Tony G
I was foolish enough to read Scott Ritters musings today about the Russian cruise missile attacks on civilian targets. His “analysis” was that these attacks prove that Russia will win and that, essentially, those Ukrainian civilians are getting what’s coming to them. I don’t want to tell Ritter how to run his life, but he really should stick to his specialty — molesting underage teenage girls.
Alison Rose
@Dan B: If I were an injured russian soldier and I saw putin coming my way, I would assume he was there to execute me.
Tony G
@Tony G: I hope that asshole is being well paid by Putin. (Or perhaps Putin has some compromising videos involving Ritter and twelve year old girls.)
Tony G
@Mike in NC: That scene of Joe Pesci in the cornfield from Casino …
Villago Delenda Est
Move, shoot, communicate. The three basics of the battlefield, and Starlink is giving Ukrainians an advantage the Russians do not have, which is partially responsible (along with pure bravery, guts, and élan) for Ukraine’s triumphs. And Musk’s “peace plan” is bullshit. 1992 borders, inviolate. Ukraine has both the tactical and strategic initiative, and Prez Z is not going to let them go.
Villago Delenda Est
@Mike in NC: Backpfeifengesicht defined.
SpaceUnit
@Citizen Alan:
Yep. In space no one can hear you scream unless of course you’re in a pressurized cabin of a spacecraft screaming into a microphone that is transmitting to Earth and being streamed live on the internet in which case literally everyone can hear you scream.
With Musk I hope it’s the latter.
Villago Delenda Est
@Tony G: The intention was to break civilian morale. The effect was opposite. It’s really too bad that Bomber Harris did not take notes.
Gvg
I think the starlink thing is related to Musk overbidding for twitter then finding out he is going to have to pay and it will probably suck the profits out of his other successful businesses and could destroy them all. Twitter is just not ever even going to be as significant. He got suckered, as as far as I can tell he did it to himself.
So I expect him to try and jack up his profits on everything in turn soon. Any one doing business with him should look out and try to get away now.
Villago Delenda Est
@Gvg: His intention was to make yet another media splash to feed his perpetually insatiable ego. He didn’t think he’d actually have to pay up, but this is hypercapitalist America where everyone is looking to make a massive killing, especially the shareholders of Twitter.
Carlo Graziani
Musk. Again. Goddamn it, I’d almost rather have to scroll through a few pages of Winston instead.
glc
Defense Production Act … that did come to mind. Its existence seems well worth noting, at least.
It’s also interesting that Musk gets to have his own foreign policy.
Calouste
@Villago Delenda Est: The Twitter shareholders basically got an offer of $30 for a 20 dollar bill. They were rather unlikely to say no to that.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
This is a question for anyone really. I believe I’ve broached this subject somewhat before, but, in your opinions, were the anti-nuclear war messages of various media from the Cold War giving into nuclear blackmail in a sense? Was the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament?
Villago Delenda Est
@Calouste: True indeed. Musk miscalculated.
Villago Delenda Est
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Building more nuclear weapons was “giving into blackmail” as well, so I don’t think nuclear disarmament bears the burden alone.
Leto
Russians manage to bomb their own power station… again.
Mai Naem mobile
Musk has given me the vibes of an Enron/Worldcom/Tyco situation for a while. Social media today isn’t the equivalent of PR from back then and Musk is really good at that piece of it.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Leto:
That’s criminal level of incompetence. You can’t make this shit up. They bombed one of their own cities! Belgorod is in Russia! More than once
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Musk real problem is trying play the hero to both sides at once. Musk real flaw is he like Trump, desperate for attention in the worst kind of way.
Salty Sam
He’s the perfect embodiment of what Molly Ivins (peace be upon her, I STILL miss her commentary) said about GWBush- “born on third base and thought he’d hit a triple.”
BeautifulPlumage
Any comments on the nordstream pipeline explosion investigation being disbanded? Seems weird, but I know nothing about how these things usually work.
ETA link: https://twitter.com/FideliusSchmid/status/1580895348910075905?cxt=HHwWgsDRrbT8u_ArAAAA
dr. luba
I listened to a 2018 Yale lecture by Vladimir Posner tonight. YouTube thought I’d like it, and I was busy with something else when it started.
I missed out on him completely in the past–he is a Soviet apologist who worked for Soviet media and had a show with Phil Donahue back in the day. Was on news programs all of the time. I didn’t watch much TV back then.
It was interesting to see just how wrong he turned out to be. He praised Putin, spoke about the independent Russian media (which is no more), and lied about Ukraine. Justified Russia’s invasion of Crimea, called the invasion of the east (Ukraine) a civil war, and doubted Putin’s responsibility for the Skripal poisoning. He also pooh-poohed Russian interference in the election and Hillary’s comparing Putin to Hitler.
Hillary was right, Posner was wrong.
He was chased out of Georgia by an enraged citizenry in 2021 (he had blamed Georgia for Russia invading0. Posner remains an apologist to the end–in the last interview I could find with him, he absolutely denied Russia would invade Ukraine…..
https://youtu.be/8X7Ng75e5gQ
Adam L Silverman
@Feathers: He’s the face, he’s not doing the work. He’s not sn engineer. He’s not a tech guy. He buys existing companies that are doing interesting work, but are struggling financially, pumps a bunch of capital in, pushes out the founders, then promotes them while gorging on US government subsidies and contracts.
Also, he could never pass the drug test.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Villago Delenda Est:
I think that’s a good point, but I can see why the arms race of the early Cold War happened. You couldn’t let the other side get a significant strategic advantage or you’d be toast. Which ironically, as you note, kept escalating the magnitude of the consequences of a nuclear exchange further as the years wore on
Alison Rose
@Adam L Silverman: nice work if you can get it
Enhanced Voting Techniques
They always were, Silicon Valley was birthed by the Cold War.
And it isn’t High Tech leaders are such liberals, for the most part they tend to the right in my personal experience. The real issue is the Republicans are bats hit nuts and the Valley can’t work with that.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@dr. luba:
You’d think something like being chased by a bunch of angry people you victim-blamed for the war Russia inflicted on them would make him reconsider. But no….
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Adam L Silverman:
I’d like to think his suggestion for the PRC to puppet the ROC (Taiwan) like HK pissed off a number of his fans who in my experience also hate the CCP
BeautifulPlumage
And then there’s this:
Eolirin
@YY_Sima Qian: Microsoft is more aligned than any of the big players in tech, and have been getting out in front of a number of things including unionization (though some of this is almost certainly to have more say in how things get implemented, if they feel they’re going to happen anyway), but no big business is ever going to be fully liberal.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Eolirin:
Can employee-owned companies be? I guess those don’t tend to be megacorps like Microsoft though
Major Major Major Major
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): his fans aren’t the types to cancel (non-liberal) people for saying dumb shit, in my experience
Alison Rose
@BeautifulPlumage: I fucking love these people.
The Pale Scot
Elon? Best solution I’d say is to throw him out a 6th story window, blame it on the orcs, invoke the Defense Production Act to nationalize his assets, and get the rest of the MIC to snap to it
Is he even fucking American? What a Nazi face that took has
Cameron
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I could grow to like an American Mondragon really quickly.
Eolirin
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I would assume so if that’s what the employees wanted, though I suspect that in the end, doing what’s right for business success under our current systems means you’re pro things liberals would find questionable.
But the problems with incentive alignment grow as you scale up, so the megacorps are going to struggle in particular with it. Legal responsibility to shareholders create problems too.
Dan B
@Carlo Graziani: Made me chuckle. A few pages of he of vengeful intent who shall not be named.
NaijaGal
@dr. luba: Excuse my complete ignorance but who is Vladimir Posner (and why is he giving lectures at Yale if he’s that wrong)?
CaseyL
@NaijaGal: Posner is, or was (some 35+ years ago) a very telegenic presence. He’s US-born: his family moved to the USSR when he was (IIRC) a teenager, so he’s got native, idiomatic fluency in English as well as Russian. He can be funny.
His program with Donahue was very popular, one of the first and biggest “citizen diplomat” programs in the very scary mid- to late-80s, when a lot of people in the US and USSR were trying to reach out to one another, when the leaders were being belligerent at each other. I was a fan at the time.
I didn’t realize what a fake he was until a few years later.
NotMax
For the sake of argument let’s use the high end estimate of $100 million.
That’s less than 0.3% the amount he’s eager to shovel out for Twitter.
Can see Starlink being a useful, albeit unreliable, adjunct for Ukraine; for an average user in peacetime it’s an overpriced* and sh*tty service, rendered uncommunicative by most anything impeding line of sight.
*Even taking into account the reduction in monthly fees of up to 50% in some countries announced at the end of August.
Ruckus
@dmsilev:
“That’s a bold strategy.”
Well if you are as bold…. Is that the right word? Asinine, insane, pompous, arrogant, idiotic. These all seem to apply to the person you are speaking of, and I’m sure that if I took more than 15 seconds to type this I could think of many more…
Shalimar
@Gvg: Musk has a plan for Twitter, which is basically to turn it into the Chinese app WeChat. Which sounds like Facebook crossed with Visa. The thing is, even Facebook is plowing their profits into a virtual world Compuserve because Facebook usage is maxed out, and I don’t think Musk has any actual technical knowledge or ability to improve Twitter in any substantial way.
randal sexton
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: I actually like ‘bats hit nuts’. Imma use that
Urza
@Eolirin: Microsoft now is about the current CEO. Past CEOs could have ended up going a very different direction.
Cameron
I don’t tend to believe much of any government source, regardless of whose government it is, but this really sounds like a load of balls to me:
https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-kyiv-moscow-evacuations-ed603a5383d722b542698d5eb332328b
frosty
And more importantly, the Luftwaffe switched to the cities instead of attacking the British radar installations on the coast and the RAF airfields and gave up any chance of air superiority.
frosty
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Can employee owned companies be liberal? I worked for one (engineering/construction) and the staff was all over the red/blue spectrum. I was surprised to see the CEO in the room with many of us watching Obama’s inauguration.
Management tended toward practicality though. I expect most of the habitual Republicans are voting D for awhile now. Just one piece of anecdata. Just because you’re working for an ESOP doesn’t mean you get much of a say in how it’s run. Like any business, they want to keep the value of the company up.
Jay
Feathers
@CaseyL: I don’t know that Posner is “fake.” There was just a period when Russian and American interests (or a reasonable portion thereof) somewhat aligned. When that was no longer the case, he remained aligned with Russian interests. He was never a diplomat or statesman, though, always just a TV news anchor. He did the English language broadcasts for the Soviet news agency for a long time before being invited as a guest on Nightline and other US news programs.
He was actually born in France to a Russian father. They came to the US, had to leave, couldn’t go back to France, so went to the Soviet Union. He was native level fluent in English and Russian, as well as telegenic, so he was recruited to become a broadcaster.
I remembered him from the 80s and my Russian studies major days. Looking on Wikipedia, he appears to have gone back to Russia when Yeltzen and followed along with the consensus as Putin came to power. If someone else was in charge, he’d be singing their praises.
Chetan Murthy
original:
via dKos.
Yutsano
Patron has some competition in the bomb sniffing world.
way2blue
@NotMax: Are satellite phones another option? Don’t know their limitations, but I think the senior US official in the briefing posted by Adam above mentioned ‘SatCom’ when asked about Starlink. Made me wonder…
Feathers
@Adam L Silverman: Thanks. I was just wondering how far up the ranks of a company that gets defense work the government demands people have security clearances. It’s becoming clear that having Musk control tech that is vital to US security interests is non optimal. This is probably also the case with several other Silicon Valley firms. A lot of these companies have heavy Russian and Saudi money behind them and are chasing the Chinese market. This is more of a general complaint than being at all in your wheelhouse, but it is something that will have to be dealt with.
Chetan Murthy
@way2blue: IIRC, most satphones have much, much, much lower bandwidth than one would want. But there’s also Iridium, the original “constellation of internet satellites”; IIUC, it’s still a going concern.
BruceFromOhio
IKR??????
Chetan Murthy
This seems funny: https://twitter.com/cctvck_ck/status/1581103310550859776
Somebody in RU is selling fake commissioned-officer uniforms for civilian men to wear, so they won’t get nabbed by military commissars for the mobilization. I tried embedding the tweet; think that got dumped into moderation. So to see it, you’ll have to click thru and then use Google Translate. Sorry.
Origuy
Has anyone mentioned this?
Poe Larity
Whatever happened to liberals always assuming Economic Determinism? All these Ukranians aren’t going to bail Elon out on Twitter, but the other two richest men on Earth can find a way to make that work.
Hint: their initials are VVP and MBS.
Chetan Murthy
Chetan Murthy
arrgh, I seem to have put a typo in my email, landing my comments in moderation. I’ll repost.
Chetan Murthy
Chetan Murthy
Original tweet: https://twitter.com/cctvck_ck/status/1581103310550859776
Via dKos.
Chetan Murthy
@Poe Larity: I think that that’s a common theory for Musk’s actions. I certainly hold to it: he needs $$ to bail out his Twitter misadventures, and yeah, you hit the nail on the head.
Sister Inspired Revolver of Freedom
“TraumaZone” is also up on YouTube. Just make sure to add Adam Curtis to your search term.
Sister Inspired Revolver of Freedom
@Villago Delenda Est: Bomber Harris was a freaking war criminal, IMHO. Sir Hugh Dowding was the man who saved Britain during the Blitz. Only now getting some of the recognition he’s long deserved.
J R in WV
@The Pale Scot:
Musk is South African, his family owned an Emerald mine in one of the black “nations” ruled by South Africa, which is where his fortune originally came from.
So, you’re right, not American at all.
South African Nazi alla way bro.
sab
@Alison Rose: You can always get that work when you can afford to buy the company.
Eolirin
@Urza: Absolutely, though I think Brad Smith, their President, has an awful lot to do with it too. It’s more that that’s kind of the best we can expect from the sector, and it’s less than perfect.
Tony G
@SpaceUnit: Actually, Musk would be the guy who would try to smuggle some Xenomorph eggs back to earth — FOR PROFIT!
Tony G
@John S.: … and a fellow traveler with comrade Putin.
Tony G
@Villago Delenda Est: That’s right.
Tony G
@Salty Sam: “born with an emerald mine with low-wage Black workers under apartheid, and thinks that that makes him a genius”
Tony G
@frosty: That’s right. Hitler’s stupidity helped to save the world. Of course, if he hadn’t been stupid he would have concentrated on rebuilding Germany’s industrial infrastructure instead of starting the war in the first place.
Tony G
@Feathers: I, for one, would be shocked if I learned that security clearance regulations are loosened for a guy with a net worth of more than $200 billion.
Geminid
@Tony G: I read that Mussolini was surprised when Hitler started the war in September, 1939; he believed the plan was to force a war in 1941, and Hitler may have told him this.
Two factors that may have impelled Hitler into an early start: first he was afraid he might not live long enough to lead Germany through the war of he waited to start it, and he told his generals this.
Second, he recognized the that the Soviet’s industrialization would outstrip Germany’s. That danger, and a well-founded belief that the Soviet Army had not yet recovered from Stalin’s bloody purge in 1937, made him believe the time factor required an early attack on Russia, even if he had to neutralize France and England first.
Once he acheived success in the west, Hitler immediately began organizing for war with Russia. Closer to the event, he told his generals, kick in the door and the whole rotten house will fall.
I base this on the account of Anthony Read and David Fisher in their book The Deadly Embrace: Hitler, Stalin and the Nazi-Soviet Pact, 1939-1941 (1989). The book begins with the Munich Agreement and its aftermath. The authors then trace the intricate path that led Europe’s worst enemies to the temporary alliance that set the stage for Hitler’s war on Poland. Then they follow the story up until that alliance ended with Operation Barbarossa. A fascinating and informative book.
Tony G
@Geminid: Interesting. Maybe it was the (temporary) Soviet-German de-facto alliance that convinced Germany to invade Poland, France, etc. (and to try to invade Britain) in 1939-1940, in which case what Hitler viewed as the real war — against the Soviet Union — did in fact begin in 1941 with Operation Barbarossa. Trying to invade the Soviet Union with its massive territory and resources was hubris, but Hitler had plenty of hubris. (The German-Soviet pact was probably an attempt by both sides to buy time and territory before the inevitable German invasion of the Soviet Union.). Norm MacDonald had the best analysis: “You know, with Hitler, the more I learn about that guy, the more I don’t care for him.” I feel the same way about Putin.
charon
@BeautifulPlumage:
https://twitter.com/PeterZeihan/status/1581009667920056320
Geminid
@Tony G: I think Stalin was surprised by the swift collapse of France in 1940. A lot of people were. Stalin correctly judged that Hitler’s invasion of Poland would bring England and France into the war, but overestimated the time this would buy him.
I cannot recommend the Read/Fisher book enough. The authors based it on research they did for a BBC documentary. There is a lot of material on major figures such as British PM Chamberlin, French President Daladier, “the one and only Colonel Beck,” as the Polish Foreign Minister liked to refer to himself, as well as Hitler. And while Stalin was a secretive and reclusive man, but the authors give a fairly good portrait of him also.
It’s really one of the best history books of any kind that I’ve been fortunate enough to encounter.
tokyokie
@Tony G:
Actually, Luftwaffe losses in the Battle of Britain were more catastrophic than you implied. Germany’s loss of medium-range bombers basically left it with no ability to interdict Allied supply chains after the Normandy Invasion, and its loss of fighters and fighter pilots greatly weakened its response to Allied bombing raids, especially those by B-17 squadrons that flew above the range of anti-aircraft guns.
Ruckus
@Alison Rose:
vlad wouldn’t do that and get his hands dirty.
What he would do is have someone else do it.
cain
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
That’s because a lot of them are libertarians or are sociopaths. There is some amount of idealists but they aren’t big into religion or social causes like the GOP. Also GOP people don’t necessarily embrace technology that easily .
cain
@The Pale Scot:
I want to hear the lamentations of his fans.
cain
Matt McIrvin
My experience is, tech people who aren’t overt libertarians tend toward that “culturally liberal, economically conservative” quadrant that’s really quite unpopular in the country but overrepresented in elite media. And the further up the hierarchy you go, the more likely they are to be particularly averse to labor unions and taxes, though they might be good on things like LGBT rights and environmentalism.
And then a fraction of them are Bernie-socialist or Green or Yang Gang types. There’s an attraction to oddball niche candidates in general.
Tony G
@cain: That’s what I understand. But being on the autism spectrum is no excuse for Musk being an asshole.
Tony G
@Geminid: That sounds right. Operation Barbarossa started only about a year after the fall of France (and it would have been a couple of months sooner if Hitler had not had to bail out that buffoon Mussolini in Greece). I should read those books (or pay someone to read them to me). I never did understand why France, which had powerful armed forces on paper, was so inept in 1940.
Tony G
@Tony G: The smartest guy I ever met — a really good software developer who I used to “pretend to supervise” — might have been “on the spectrum”. (He would have entire conversations with me with his back turned to me.). But, he was a very nice guy who I remain friends with. Being “neurodivergent” (or whatever the current jargon is) is no excuse for being an asshole.
Tony G
@tokyokie: That’s certainly true. Probably the biggest impact was the death (or sometimes the capture) of so many pilots and bomber crews. Aircraft can be replaced (although the bombing of German factories made that difficult). But you can’t just take a nineteen-year old soldier and quickly train him to be a pilot or crewman — especially when Germany was running out of soldiers in general. By the time of D-Day in June of 1944 the Luftwaffe was crippled — which is a major reason why D-Day succeeded. All ancient history, of course, but Putin seems to be determined to repeat some of that history.
charon
@Tony G:
Several reasons:
A) No mechanized infantry, French infantry moved on foot, could never get where needed. German panzers were supported by mechanized infantry, truck or halftrack.
B) French tank doctrine, tanks were attached to infantry, not in independent tank units – 2 or 3 here, 2 or 3 there, like that.
C) German air superiority – the stukas were very effective tank killers, so French tanks limited survivorablity. At that time, the Germans had crappy tanks, but they were good enough with nothing around to take them out.
Tony G
@Matt McIrvin: I worked with (and, for a while, pretended to supervise) IT people for about 40 years. There were some dogmatic libertarians, although most of the the people were fairly apolitical. However, many of them had sort of a “libertarian adjacent” attitude — i.e., believing that they are the smartest guys or gals in the room and feeling little sympathy for those deemed “dumber” than them. (That’s why I “pretended to supervise” them. They would allow me to pretend to set priorities only if they already agreed with those priorities.). According to my half-baked analysis, these people had self-selected to work in a particular type of job. A software system is, by definition, an artificial environment. Unless the computer center is actually hit by a meteor, any failure is the fault of the software developers and any success is an achievement of the software developers. No failure or success is due to factors outside of your control. (Even the meteor strike will not hurt the system of the disaster recovery plan is adequate.) Therefore, people who are successful at that job develop an arrogant attitude (even if they are fundamentally decent people). These are the people who increasingly control our lives!
Tony G
@charon: Interesting. Thanks. Sounds like an example of generals “fighting the previous war”, as the saying goes.
Chetan Murthy
@Tony G:
I’ve been a hard-core software developer (“systems programmer”) since 1986. These sound like the sort of people who don’t enjoy debugging, esp. debugging other people’s code. My experience with debugging has taught me humility before nature and before the fallibility of humans, including myself. That there will always be bugs, and that I will always make mistakes. As will everyone else.
Geminid
@Tony G:
@charon: I think another possible reason for France’s unforseen weakness was political division. The small but cohesive Communist party opposed the war against Stalin’s new ally, and propagated defeatist sentiment. And the Army’s higher command was ambivalent, even defeatist as well. Many were very conservative politically, not unlike the appeasement bloc in Great Britain.
I think the Munich debacle did a lot to undermine confidence in their own cause, and in the reliability of the British. The French high command had little hope and were thinking of surrender when the German offensive was still not certain of success. I think the lack of a reserve that shocked Churchill, when he conferred with the French as the new PM, was intended towards that end.
Tony G
@Chetan Murthy: Yes, I was a systems programmer (retired for the past few years) in roughly the same era. (Primarily CICS and DB2 on MVS/OS-390/z-OS IBM mainframes.). You’re absolutely right; the good people had a healthy respect for their own limitations and for the complexity of the systems, and were pleasant and cooperative with others. I was describing a certain type of person (almost always a man, coincidentally or not) who had high intelligence but no humility and who was generally a real pain in the ass to work with. Some of them deemed themselves to be libertarians because they felt no responsibility toward other people. (I remember talking to one of those guys once in the mid-nineties, as he told me how the “new” internet would mean no more “gummint”. I asked him if he knew how the ARPANET had been funded.) I guess there are people like that in every field, but there were certainly some of them in my workplaces. Most of my co-workers were not like that though. Sorry if I gave the wrong impression.
Tony G
@Geminid: Good point. The French Communists might have undermined the French war effort, given that the Soviet Union was a de-facto ally of Nazi Germany at that time. Even 8 decades later it’s appalling to me how subservient the various worldwide Communist Parties were to Stalin when he was Hitler’s ally. Appalling.
Tony G
@Tony G: I often listen to a folk-music show on Saturday afternoons on the Columbia University radio station (WKCR). One thing that I’ve noticed (that the student DJs never point out) is that many American folk songs recorded in 1939 and 1940 have a message opposing U.S. involvement in the Second World War, while many songs recorded starting in June of 1941 — after Operation Barbarossa — have a message rallying the people to fight the fascists. Many “Leftists” in the United States (and presumably elsewhere) turned on a dime after Germany attacked the Soviet Union. An appalling history. Orwell was not writing fiction when he wrote about Eurasia being replaced as the enemy by Eastasia overnight.
Kent
Hitler was never going to win the war against the combined economic might of the United States, British Empire, and USSR. At best he might have dragged it out another year or two.
Once the Battle of the Atlantic was won against the German navy the war was as good as won.
Tony G
@Kent: True. By mid-1943, after the battles of Stalingrad and Kursk and after the Battle of the Atlantic had essentially been lost, Germany had essentially lost the war. It took two more years for Hitler to recognize that fact and blow his brains out though.