Update On Kinzhal.

Russian MOD decided to shut down this molasses of butt-hurt speculations by fanboys on actual existence of some weapon systems described in Putin's March 1st speech and published a short video on Kinzhal being launched by regular MiG-31BMs. The video gives some good view of Kinzhal's direct relation to Iskander. Plus, in a typical Russian manner, some additional data was disclosed about guidance and targeting system and EW capabilities of Kinzhal. As was expected it has radar and optronic targeting systems and is capable to work on any surface (ground, sea) targets and yes--nothing can stop Kinzhal.  

As was expected, the video gathered in less than 24 hours three quarters of a million views and a lot of butt-hurt "this all is not real" comments. Interesting fact about all this, however, is that more than 130 MiG-31s are currently in active service (with another 150 or so in storage) and out of those 130 many, probably as many as 50, are updated to BM and the work on modernization continues. Gives some perspective on Salvo Model and capability. 

First Reactions.

Saker today posted on UNZ Review a thorough and excellent analysis of political implications of Putin's March 1st speech. There are already first meaningful, unlike Western media incompetent BS, reactions from US establishment which begin to pour in. They are exactly what Putin and Russia were aiming at. Consider this yesterday's letter from US senators. 

Amid Heightened Tension, Markey, Merkley, Feinstein, and Sanders Press Trump Administration to Jumpstart New Strategic Talks with Russia

While this letter is still full of BS and lies, it is, however, very instructive in terms of revealing a deep rooted, even on the highest levels of American political power, misconception of Russia's intentions. The whole thing is not just about START, albeit this too, it is about much larger global strategic framework which seeks more than just nuclear arms control, however important--it is about, indeed, as I stated a week ago, coercing the United States into the discussion of the whole spectrum of international problems, most important of which is immediate necessity to stop military conflicts in the ME and making sure the United States takes realistic position on that. 

For the last 20 years the United States was going around the world, from Yugoslavia, to Iraq, to Libya, to Syria, to Ukraine, inciting conflicts, murder, atrocities all in the name of fictitious "values" of which the world just about had enough. This stops now. As the US senators letter states:

There is no guarantee that we can make progress with Russia on these issues.  However, even at the height of Cold War tensions, the United States and the Soviet Union were able to engage on matters of strategic stability.  Leaders from both countries believed, as we should today, that the incredible destructive force of nuclear weapons is reason enough to make any and all efforts to lessen the chance that they can never be used again.  

I have some news for them--there is a guarantee, because the world changed and US policy-makers are about to learn how much. It is, obviously, not a very pleasant process for many "exceptional" people but it is about time they started learning how to behave responsibly. Paradoxically, this may be the only way to preserve the United States and turn it into normal country behaving like equal among equals. This letter might be (???) the first step. After all, and I quote myself: 

American self-proclaimed hegemony is over where it really matters for any real and perceived hegemon—the military field. It was over for some time now, it just took Putin’s speech to demonstrate the good old Al Capone truism that one can get much further with a kind word and a gun than with a kind word alone. After all, Russia did try a kind word alone, it didn’t work and the United States has only itself to blame.

It Was 1973, 4 Years Before Star Wars.

The biopic Moscow-Cassiopeia and Teenagers In Universe was a movie phenomenon which basically ground Soviet Education System to a halt in 1973-74 since whole school districts all over USSR simply refused go to school and preferred many hours staying in massive lines just to get a desirable movie theater ticket to studying Physics and Math. So, in the best traditions of political expediency, school districts simply started buying wholesale tickets and deliver whole schools to movie theaters to a magic of a story of middle-school geniuses flying to a remote star to save a civilization which... well, a lot in common with modern West, danger of AI and loss of humanity. You can watch the Teens In Universe here (with English Subtitles):

The funny thing is that some people still remember that movies and even do DJ mixes:

But truth is, the biopic was so far and way ahead of anything what could be conceived then, that one is still forced to contemplate what could have been if the series would have been continued. But, of course, in 1974 The Big Space Adventure (In Russian), with Alexey Rybnikov's stroke of a musical genius soundtrack came out. Remarkably, in this video stills from both franchises are used.

I can say only one thing--it was intoxicating, dreamy, life-changing experiences and, yes, it was sexy in the best meaning of the term--leaving childhood and facing early adulthood and love. 

It Is Friday, Right?

I was born and nursed to that: 

But of course Annette was always present:

But it was this rerun in USSR which in 1977 captured a true magnificence of that era:

For kids of 1970s this was also important (BTW--gives some grasp of Moscow's scale).

 

Colonel Lang Nailed It.

Colonel Lang in his today's post gives some review (a good one) of his analytic tools which, to a large degree, are mine too. I quote him: 

Epistemology:

1-Duck Rule: If it walks like a duck, squawks like a duck and has feathers, it probably is a duck.

2–Sherlock’s Rule: When considering a problem, remove everything from consideration which seems untrue. What is left is probably the truth.

3-Occam’s Razor: In considering a complex phenomenon with many factors and a variety of explanations, remember that the simplest explanation that accounts for the factors is probably correct.

4- The KISS principal” “Keep it Simple, Stupid.” (Army Rule)

But the impression is amplified greatly by this hilarious photo. I already congratulated Colonel with his complete mastery of the art of meme. As you may have expected--the issue here is still the ridiculous claim of the "swamp" of Russians interfering in US Presidential elections. 

 

It Is Official And It Is Over.

While the whole Western media are shaking (incompetence will do this to one) in their boots from Vladimir Putin's address, where he demonstrated, among many things, new RS-28 Sarmat ballistic missile, behind that revolutionary weapon system, one was almost completely ignored by media. Again, "education" based on catch phrases (such a "nuclear weapon) will do this to one. By far most shocking (albeit inevitable) revelation was deployment of a new hyper-sonic missile Kinzhal (Dagger) to regular service with front line Air Force units in Southern Military District. Mig-31 carries this weapon, I am positive any SU-35 or SU-30SM or SU-34 will be able to do it too. Here is a video and CGI simulation. 

The missile is... well, for the lack of better word, is stunning--it is M=10+ highly maneuverable missile with the range of 2000 kilometers. The naval warfare as we know it is over. Without any overly-dramatic emphasis--we are officially in new era. No, I repeat, NO, modern or perspective air-defense system deployed today by any NATO fleet can intercept even a single missile with such characteristics. The salvo of 5-6 of such missiles is a guaranteed destruction of any Carrier Battle Group. 

The mode of use of such weapon, especially since we know now that it is deployed (for now) in Southern Military District is very simple--the most likely missile drop spot by MiG-31s will be international waters of the Black Sea, thus closing off whole Eastern Mediterranean to any surface ship or group of ships. It also creates a massive no-go zone in the Pacific, where MiG-31s from Yelizovo will be able to patrol vast distances over the ocean. It is, though, remarkable that the current platform for Kinzhal is MiG-31--arguably the best interceptor in the history. Obviously, MiG-31's ability to reach very high supersonic speeds (in excess of M=3) is a key factor in the launch. But no matter what are the procedures for the launch of this terrifying weapon, the conclusions are simple:

1. It moves aircraft carriers into the niche of pure power projection against weak and defenseless adversaries;

2. It makes classic CBGs as main strike force against peer completely obsolete and useless, it also makes any surface combat ship defenseless regardless its air-defense capabilities. 

3. Sea Control and Sea Denial change their nature and merge. Those who have such weapon, or weapons, simply own vast spaces of the sea limited by the ranges of Kinzhal and its carriers. 

I don't want to sound dramatic and I knew that there were and are always surprises in Soviet/Russian weapons but today's revelations from the highest podium in Russia about Kinzhal were shocking. The balance of power just shifted dramatically, with it the naval warfare as we knew it is no more. It is OVER!  

UPDATE: Is it beginning to sink?  

A thoroughly neocon and "exceptionalist" rag Foreign Policy suddenly posted, still bile and delusions-filled, but less insane piece titled with precisely the message Putin was trying to deliver globally to the world:

Putin’s Nuclear-Powered Cruise Missile Is Bigger Than Trump’s.There’s no point in competing with Russia’s new trove of bizarre doomsday devices.

While US "Intelligence Community" may state whatever they want, the issue is not even "bizarrness" of these weapons--in fact, there is nothing bizarre about them at all. The issue is that the United States currently has nothing comparable to this technology and the main, and I quote, message of Putin was:

 You didn't want to listen to us in 2004, now listen to us now.

And yes, Mr. Jeffrey Lewis, it is not just about nuclear weapons--both Avangard and Kinzhal are perfectly capable of conventional munitions. In fact, that is what they primarily are. But then again, I doubt anyone among US mainstream Russia "experts" read 2014 Russia's Military Doctrine and what is stated there in terms of  Conventional Strategic Containment.

In related news, Gazprom started the procedure of annulment of all gas delivery and transit contracts with Ukraine. It is over. Isn't it strange how many times I used the word over in the last 48 hours?

Russia, Just Do It.

Behind the noise of world's politics and news of unfolding geopolitical realignment one event went almost unnoticed--a de facto death sentence to South Afrikaners farmers. The fig leaf of South African "reconciliation" and struggle with the issues left after Apartheid is no more. South Africa slowly descends to where it is supposed to descend--a chaos of tribal warfare, fourth world economic and political status and inevitable white genocide. It is already a Zimbabwe 2.0. And here is the problem. 

While blind and hypocritical West was hailing their thoroughly fake idol of Nelson Mandela, the Republic of South Africa was slowly being consumed by unprecedented black racism and non-stop assault on white Afrikaners. Rape, murder, robbery, barbed wire electrified fences around white South African communities--these are defining characteristics of modern South Africa. In general--it has NO FUTURE. The expropriation of land from white farmers will be their death knell, literally. Like in Zimbabwe, they will be raped, murdered, pillaged and whatever else comes with Zimbabwean, now South African "justice".  The so called West, which still believes in own lies about South African "democracy" and benevolence of BEE (Black Economic Empowerment) and of ANC WILL NOT accept white Afrikaners when real white exodus starts, nor will the United States do so--the combined West prefers today anybody but white, predominantly Christian people. The fate of Afrikaners is in question today and those people need desperately safe haven to start their lives over. Modern West is not it. 

But Russia does have an enormous experience of accepting and assimilating people of European descent, while preserving their culture of origin. I think Russian government must take a look at this problem--everybody understands today that in BRICS loose geopolitical block B and S (South Africa) are not viable contributors reducing BRICS to RIC. South Africa is now firmly in the grips of self-destructing policies and ideology and it is over for this, once prosperous, land. We can not allow this, we simply can not:

A white family from South Africa has had their refugee claim for asylum in Canada rejected, having been accused of submitting “white-supremacist hate literature” to bolster their claims of violence by the black majority in their homeland.

The claim of the family of six was based on being white South Africans at risk of persecution due to their race, namely Afrikaners, the white minority descended from Dutch settlers in Southern Africa.

But that is scenario which will be replayed over and over again in immigration and asylum courts in the so called "free" West, which is long ago not free and suffers from its own version of Zimbabwean syndrome. Will Russia recognize the plight of white South Africans? The exodus is coming, in fact--it is inevitable now. It may seem as an errand thought on my part, once the issue of many Russian and Russo-phone people in Ukraine and former republics of the Soviet Union is considered. They are, of course, a priority. But mechanism for return of Russians is already more-or-less in place and is working, granted not always as desired. In the end, in the worst case scenario of some genocide of Russians in former republics, now independent states, of the USSR there are always some serious levers from diplomatic to purely military to not allow repetition of Chechnya of 1991-1994. But no one is coming to defend white South Africans, in fact, they were consistently betrayed. Will Russia play the ball? I think she should, in fact--must. Here are some images from Pretoria and Johannesburg--they speak louder than words. 

Pretoria 

And Jo-burg. 

It is over for South Africa.