I will write (and speak) on the issue of if American culture at large is worth saving (it is, BTW), but there were some things which made it unique in many good senses and this shouldn't be discounted at all. Many would have issues with facing the fact that amazing baroque music was nothing more than pop and rock music of its time. Yes, even Vivaldi. It was written and performed for people (royalty comes first) to enjoy. This hasn't changed until woke pseudo-culture penetrated the West. But there was a time when Brad Delp was still alive and Tom Scholz were producing an amazing music.
America didn't "win" the world in the 20th century by means of arms or some convoluted geopolitical ideas, the US lost most of its wars. These were ideas of freedom (today turned into the ideas of freedOOm) of expression and of thought which became so attractive, that did the trick. Those ideas had a specific visual, audio and even smell properties to them. And the music, ever important, were one of those ideas.
One of the greatest sounds ever, Boston was it...
The whole thing is a wall of sound which crushes you... I know, I have a top notch stereo system, which when playing at 70% can blow the windows out of the house...
Translation:The Russian army regularly strikes targets in Ukraine with quasi-ballistic, aeroballistic or cruise missiles of operational-tactical, medium and long range, sea, land and air based.The enemy is still waiting for them to run out, but this will never happen - the industry has already reached such a rate of production that it covered the mass consumption of missiles and various guided munitions since the first days of the SMO.Now their production exceeds the daily consumption.That is, the stocks of these weapons, on the contrary, are growing.
Well, don't tell me that I didn't warn;)) In the end, even Russia's heads of administrative units--krais, oblasts etc.--meaning governors and their deputies take courses in Russia's Academy of General Staff. I wonder why, wink, wink. The astonishing number of cruise missiles Russia expended since the start of SMO, which started to circulate recently in Western media, of around 2,500 is already more than the number of Tomahawks the United States spent in all of her military campaigns combined in the 20th and 21st centuries. Anyone remembers issues with TLAM stocks by the 78th day of NATO's gang rape of Yugoslavia in 1999? I do, many do. Well, there you go. A famous Chinese proverb says that if you sit long enough at the shore of the river, you will see, at some point, a corpse of your enemy floating past you. It is much easier to observe the process when you have industry pumping up those high-precision stand-off weapons in, well, industrial quantities.
Hm, maybe it is this "covert mobilization" Ukie "intelligence" is talking about? I kid, I kid. Frank captured the mood perfectly.
Burns, who heads an organization which HAS to know, which most of the time is not the case nowadays, heard about this ratio--a very rough one--of one to three of KIAs to wounded during combat and, using his math skills decided to come up with a base number of Russian forces' KIAs and then multiply it by 3. So, 15,000 KIAS x 3 = 45,000 wounded. Sure. The only issue here is that Burns, evidently, doesn't understand how this works in real life and what it takes to provide hospitalization and transportation of those both KIAs and wounded to the rear areas and there is no med-evac activity, even through open sources (remember, OSINT--Open Source Intelligence), which is even remotely commensurate to Burns' claims.
Yes, there are KIAs and wounded on Russian side, not to mention the fact that the bulk of those also comes from LDNR militias, but if Mr. Burns would be a serious and responsible professional, not an average US political appointee who needs to lie for a living, the real number would have been--estimates only--about 15,000 wounded and, by following this 1 to 3 ratio, about 5,000 KIAs on Russian side. But then again, even the brief look at the American "elites" today tells one everything one needs to know. When even Pentagon begins to express grave concern:
Pelosi also wants to designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism, so, as you can see, the legislative activity in the House is at its peak and this old mummy is getting involved fully into foreign policy without having a clue what she is doing, which is a normal Modus Operandi for Washington.
In related news, what everyone knows in Russia has been reiterated today (in Russian)--HIMARS are controlled by NATO personnel and the tactics is pretty primitive: "hide" HIMARS rockets behind VSU's salvo of MLRS (such as Smerch or what have you), allow local Russian AD to expend its missiles shooting initial salvo down and then launch HIMARS rockets while Russian AD complexes reload. Well, it is a kindergarten thinking which already was addressed by "portioning" of AD assets in any given locality, reserving missiles for shooting down HIMARS missiles. They are being shot down in large numbers. Even when one considers almost real time targeting provided by the US to VSU, Pentagon doesn't have a concept of modern and effective front line air defense and the only thing which they have going for them is the high mobility of HIMARS which leave the position immediately after the launch. Nothing new, really. In general, this is the extent to which Pentagon realistically can get involved without beginning to lose personnel and assets in Middle East. That is easily arranged.
Sure, let those arrive to Ukraine, LOL. I am positive there are many Russian pilots of Su-35s and Su-30SM (will omit now Su-57s) and crews of S-400s and S-300V4s who are salivating at the possibility to down a few F-15s or Rafales. Per A-10, it is not even serious, A-10 is a good CAS aircraft, but it is very slow and it never faced anything like S1 Pantsir or Tor M2, let alone Buk-M3. Not to mention first rate air force. But sure. Looks like this Aspen Forum was one huge concentrated fantastical thinking and butt-hurt gathering.
Meanwhile Ukies and Washington continue to masturbate to Russian mobilization in the piece from Ukie propaganda outlet titled:General mobilization in Russia would mean Putin's failure in Ukraine – Ukraine’s intelligence
But for some reason this, oh so desired, mobilization doesn't come. I addressed this issue yesterday in my latest video and the unraveling of the guiding myths of America's self-proclaimed global status continues with acceleration and desperation now oozes from every pore of what's left of the contemporary so called governance in the United States. We ain't seen nothing yet.
Darn. Joe, on the other hand, continues to confabulate his biography, you know--lying--and if his deepening and, frankly, embarrassing for POTUS dementia hasn't been enough, he now declared that he has a cancer due to him living in Delaware. I never knew Delaware was THAT bad.
Of course, sappy sentimental BS of Joe's mom wiping oil spills from the windshiled, while driving in Delaware, is a good indication of a complete implosion of the system of governance in the US, which the whole world observes both in amusement and... embarrassment for self-proclaimed hegemon. But...
Those creeps in DNC do not even understand that apart from abusing a truly mentally disabled man, however despicable Joe Biden and his clan are, they continue to humiliate the country. Leonid Brezhnev in his late years was an example of a coherent speech and mental clarity compared to Joe. It is a national shame and for any person who didn't lose the remnants of his or her humanity and decency (District of Columbia doesn't count--none to be found there) it is also painful to watch without cringing.
All good points. Plus, to add to my previous post--another "professional", Admiral Stavridis. Hilarious forecasts from him. Embarrassing, especially against the background of professionalism of MacGregor and Larry Johnson.
Lt.Colonel Daniel Davies asks the reasonable question, while still repeating all those Ukie propaganda tropes about Russia being "bloodied" in SMO and about Holy HIMARS, the title of his piece does raise this issue:Why Do We Keep Listening to the ‘TV’ Generals on Ukraine? He writes:
The answer to this is very simple: incompetence and professional jealousy. SMO and Ukraine, same as Georgia in 2008, and same as Syria, and same as Ukraine now demonstrated a demolition of not only America's best proxies at given periods of time, but uncovered a fantastical thinking by US military about modern war. Most, with some notable exceptions, Western military professionals exhibited a gaping lack of understanding of not only Russia--that is expected from many--but of even basic grasp of economic mobilization scales, operational and strategic realities. 99% of US military officers of any note forecasts and explanations, be that on TV or in writing, not only were and are wrong, they raise the question of professional adequacy.
Davies lists all, oh so familiar, names of Petraeus, Keane, Hodges, Hertling who continue to embarrass themselves as military amateurs in their view of SMO. But they are just the tip of the iceberg, enough to take a look an Andrew Bacevich's personal views and military "analysis" the so called Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft (in reality Cohen and Soros' funded org) he heads--one cannot shake the impression that far from being a former cadre officer of the US Army, Bacevich is simply stuck in the realities of America's endless and humiliating military debacles and lacks a solid military education which IS NOT a collection of tactical minutiae but must rest on a solid foundation of the military science. Davies still doesn't provide the definition of "bloodied", but have anyone told US military professionals that any serious operational level document contains what in Russian is called normatives (normativity) which describe ranges in losses in personnel and equipment depending on types of operations ranging from capturing the village, town or city to a head on division size battle with different types of opponent. Evidently American officers never heard of those, despite those being a common knowledge. So what "bloodied" is, then? And what is a definition of "significant"? Davies doesn't answer this question.
The Russians are no doubt bloodied and have suffered significant
equipment loss, but there is no evidence on the battlefield that they
are anywhere near “exhausted.” Most of the artillery promised by the West has already been delivered
and it has not, to date, resulted in even slowing Russia’s advance
through the Donbas, much less stopped it. The HIMARS launchers have enabled Ukraine to strike deep
behind Russian lines, and they have caused severe harm in their enemy’s
rear areas. Nonetheless, even that has not resulted in any observable
reduction in the still-heavy daily barrage of artillery on Ukrainian
positions.
It seems that most of
those US military professionals when talking about REAL combined arms
operations lack even basic understanding of the role of modern air defense, especially of such quality as Russian troop (voiskovaya) AD, which deploys a variety of high end AD systems ranging from manpads to Tor M2, Buk M3, and S-300V4 which already performed extremely well in defending Russian forces preposition and rear areas, including from this very same much touted, and grossly overrated, HIMARS (in Russian). All of those are standard targets for Russian Air Defense, but it seems many US officers still cannot grasp this fact, which is unsurprising, considering the fact that the US Army never fought in modern era under the steady fire impact to the operational depth and simply has no systems which are designed for such classes of targets. Davies continues and admits:
The most important fundamentals of war, the basics of combat
operations, almost all reside on the Russian side. Since the G7, G20,
and NATO Summits, there have been no additional large-scale
contributions of modern weaponry promised to Ukraine. The amount of
equipment to date has been a couple of hundred artillery tubes, about
250 Soviet-era tanks, and a few hundred Vietnam-era personnel carriers.
Cumulatively, all of this gear – including the HIMARS – are not a
fraction of the type of kit Ukraine would need to launch a counteroffensive. The idea, then, that Ukraine could stop Russia’s current
offensive and then transition to a counter-offensive to drive Putin’s
troops back – as Hodges said he believed would happen before the end of
this year – have no valid basis on the ground in Ukraine. But such
optimistic, rosy proclamations that are disconnected from battlefield
realities are not new for America’s active and retired generals for the
past two decades. Take these examples from Operation Iraqi Freedom.
What can I say. The issue here is not What Ukraine needs, but what US and its NATO lapdogs can provide and we already know what happened with the US stocks of much touted, and, naturally, grossly overrated, Stingers, Javelins and M-777. It is a good business for defense contractors in the US who will need to replenish grossly diminished reserves of such weapons, but, for the love of God, can we stop this BS with "take these examples from Operation Iraqi Freedom". I can only repeat what most US officers never heard about, Russian/Soviet strategist Alexander Svechin, who present Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov quotes once in a while:"Each war represents an isolated case, requiring an understanding of its own particular logic, its own unique character". The tiresome comparison of what amounted to turkey shoot of backward, under-equipped, under-trained, under-supplied, illiterate in many instances and incompetently led Saddam's Army, which didn't have even operational air force and air defense, to Russia fighting the best ever US proxy, which for 8 years was supplied, trained and now C2-ed by US and UK officers, is simply risible. But Davies agrees somewhat:
The danger in these types of statements is that they give false hope to
the people of Ukraine, give an inaccurate picture to the American people
of what’s possible, and encourages Congress to continue funding a
strategy that almost certainly will fail. At the very least, it is time
to start viewing routinely optimistic claims by some of our active and
retired generals with more skepticism.
Oh, I think the danger of these statements is grossly understated, because, judging by the stream of incompetent and militarily illiterate baloney US military professionals deliver from each and every media channel nowadays, one is irresistibly moved to the conclusion that maybe those generals and senior officers are not that good to start with? If they do understand, which I begin to doubt now, what is going on and spew their claptrap for propaganda purposes, that totally disqualifies them as honorable professionals, but if they believe their own absurdity and pseudo-operational and pseudo-strategic psychobabble, then we have a problem--they may, at some point of time, try to come into direct contact with Russian Armed Forces and will sustain catastrophic defeat, which, inevitably, will push the United States, which doesn't have modern historic experience with real war, to escalate towards nuclear threshold.
I remain on record: US Armed Forces never fought in defense of own country. The only type of warfare the US military knows is a naval one, where the US Navy maintained both quantitative and qualitative superiority over nearest rivals for a while, in terms of ground war it was always expeditionary warfare, and achievements of the US ground forces have been more than underwhelming. Desert Storm played a cruel joke on the US military and its fighting doctrine and procurement policies, which resulted in a failure in Iraq and then humiliation of Afghanistan. Modern US Army cannot fight and win conventional war with modern "peer" without sustaining losses on the order of 1,000-1,500 KIAs a day and massive loss of equipment, including a very high PR "value" such as combat aircraft or ships. Neither American public nor US political class will be able to deal with it, which will result in a political upheaval and calls for nuclear strikes, which will mean a death sentence to the US as a country .
Those people in the US military who do understand that, they do not have their voices heard, and, instead, we all are treated to nothing more than jingoistic propaganda, outright Russophobia and simple lies by people who by all measurements are not ready to face the realities of the warfare which, quoting Colonel Douglas MacGregor, looks like this:
It is a well-known fact, that today Pentagon has many US officers manning US weapon systems in Ukraine and they do more than that--they collect all possible data on the operations by Russian forces. It is not going to help, because America's problem is much deeper than even fighting doctrine or national strategy, however always flawed and unworkable. It is metaphysical--it is difficult to replicate or respond to Russia's technological and cultural responses to war. You cannot buy this historic experience and warfare culture. It will always be beyond reach. That is why I smile when same people who produced Afghanistan debacle, assure American public that they already learn and apply "lessons" from SMO. They mislead the public because the US doesn't fight like Russia and never did. It never will and it cannot be helped, because in the end it is history itself which is the greatest teacher for those who want to learn. The US military-political class not only doesn't want to learn, it is incapable of learning and the wall of BS surrounding SMO in the US, about which Davies writes, is the best proof of that. Not to mention the fact of best and brightest being removed from the US military for decades.
In related news. Give Americans a credit where the credit is due:
No, I am not a Fox "fan", despite the fact that I watch Tucker once in a while. I just use a snippet, the admission. Yes, US MSM is shit as are people who run them. They do harm people and the country, and the wolrd. They are very "effective" in that.
