Ukraine Invasion: Part 38

[MagicFox]

🇺🇦 38th thread for information sharing, solidarity and community 🇺🇦

I think that China sees the benefits from their cooperation with the West as something that's just a means to a stronger China, it's not their long term goal.

The current situation benefits them, the West is tied up in Ukraine, Russia is getting weaker and China can only use this to their advantage. And when, not if, they invade Taiwan then they will have it much easier. They don't want to balance between Russia and the West, and they won't need to.

In short, China endured a 'Century of Humiliation' which has sunk very deep into its national soul. The UK forced the Opium Wars onto China. In WW2 20,000,000 Chinese civilians died. During the Cultural Revolution the entire country and social order was upended. Under Mao Tsedong during the Great Leap Forward in the 4 years around 1960, 15 - 55 million at least died of starvation.

China has felt humiliated to the bone. It was humiliated in a way that is appalling and the West has a lot of responsibility for that, though certainly not all.

Since the economic reforms begun under Deng Xiaoping in the 1980's, China has turned into an absolute powerhouse. It's transformed, and the population is far better off materially.

Under Xi Jingping, who rose up with the reputation as being a diplomat and (iirc) a peacemaker but turned out to be an expansionist, China has been consolidating and extending its power in the world through economic means, quite often unpleasantly.

Historically, China flipflops between one extreme and the other. It's not the only example, but the Covid debacle sums it up - denial of its existance, then total control leading to economic and societal stress, then total removal of all controls. No moderation.

Many, most people in China are better off, but Xi Jingping is aggressive and a lot of popular media demonizes the West and the US. Why? Because it's the only big and credible rival to China. China needs Western trade, but it resents that. It wants to be self-sufficient or to have the upper hand.

China and the US are the Big Two now. Frankly Russia's influence is malign, but it's no longer in the same league as in the 1960's or 1970's. I think myself that China is doing a lot of work quietly to gain more influence over Russia, who needs China far more than China needs Russia.

IN terms of destabilization - yeah. Perhaps this is too black, but I think things are destabilizing. Russia is part of it, but not the only part; China is also interfering in elections, it's stealing a lot of tech, it's modernizing its military and there is no doubt about its aims in Taiwan and it's heavily extending its influence throughout most countries in the world with the Belt and Roads initiative, which is a controversial scheme en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belt_and_Road_Initiative

I've heard that they lend the money for the investments at a rate smaller countries cannot pay back, and then they take over essential companies there. The implication was that this is a strategy not a sort of natural unfolding of events. How true that is I'm not sure.

Thanks - lots to think about, not much of it good!

This report about the Nord Stream pipeline explosions and a yacht found with traces of explosives inside is interesting.

Ukrainian government is denying it's them.

There has been a claim that it was an independent business person who was working outside the govt. Probably be a lot of rumours in the coming days.

It will be interesting to see how Germany reacts if it was connected to Ukraine.

@ReleaseTheDucksOfWar thanks for explaining about China's 'Century of Humiliation' and its imprint on their psyche. Apart from the Opium Wars and the Chinese Cultural Revolution, the Japanese occupation of China during WWII is also a big scar. Culturally, loss of 'face' is a big thing. I can see them going 'never again' and seeking respect as a world power.

Unlike Russia, the Chinese seem to go about it in a more pragmatic way, biding their time to bulk up and steal from the West, rather than ranting about imperialist ambitions.

“Let China Sleep, for when she wakes, she will shake the world” [Napoleon Bonaparte]

That's a great quote by Napolean!

it would be wonderful to get a Chinese perspective on this.

I feel ive been unfair about China.

Everything above is true but equally the US and other countries spy and steal each others' tech.

Last weekend I posted that at least some of the 90 US Stryker armored vehicles were spotted unloading from a ship in Bremerhaven. There a many different variants of the Stryker. Based on this article, it seems that the UAF are getting the long-range scout version with some very advanced target aquitision kit.

Ukraine’s New Stryker Recon Vehicles Can See Six Miles Away, And Call In Mortars And Missiles

Paired with tanks, mortars, and Javelin missile teams, the Strykers form what are called hunter-killer teams. I'm sure this is being covered in the combined arms training currently underway in Germany. I expect to see these tactics used when the spring offensive gets underway.

Germany has said they aren't going to rush to judgement based on the intelligence received and still suspect a false flag operation

"Defence Minister Boris Pistorius warned against jumping to conclusions. It could be a false-flag operation aimed at pinning the blame on pro-Ukrainian groups, he told German radio: "The likelihood of one [theory] or the other is just as high."

I would be very surprised is anyone other than Russia was behind the nordstream destruction. It wasn't in use, nobody was getting gas through it. The only country to benefit from its destruction is Russia because they can use it as propoganda. The Ukrainians have consistently played a blinder when it comes to dealing with Europe. Why would they fuck that up and risk the support they're getting to destroy something which served no purpose anyway. They're not that stupid.

Besides which, if they really did want to disrupt Russian gas supplies to Europe they'd blow up one of the pipes actually supply gas that run through Ukraine.

When Ukraine starts adopting combined arms operations with the Strykers etc, I'd like to think they would optimise the use such as to be unstoppable. Fingers crossed for the preparations and training. Once the ground hardens ...

Slava Ukraini!

Wmobile.twitter.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/1633512523864449029 international women's day, Ukraine is always referred to as"she"

@Fladdermus

It would benefit Ukraine too if it was blown up. Then Germany would have to look elsewhere for gas, and not from Russia. Germany was not supporting Ukraine very much at first because they were afraid Russia would turn the taps off as it's so dependent on Russian gas.

But didn't Germany call a halt to nordstream a few days before the war even started?

@ReleaseTheDucksOfWar

The US military are studying the possibility of integrating advanced air-to-air missiles into Ukrainian MiGs, but there is a problem with the compatibility of Western missiles with Soviet-era fighters, – Politico

Not at all surprising and I suspect that's quite a job.

With pretty much anything radar guided (e.g. AiM-120) in the milliseconds prior to firing a lot of data gets interchanged between the missile and units such as the fighter's own aircraft's radar/fire control system and possibly from external sources via datalink....we're talking about essential stuff such as in what direction does the missile needs to fly to initially once it's off the launcher, where does the seeker head needs to look, and a fair bit of more.

Trying to get the electronics on fairly a ancient Soviet designed fighter to communicate quickly and reliably with the much more modern western designed missile(s) strapped underneath is bound to be causing a few headaches.....

With pretty much anything radar guided (e.g. AiM-120) in the milliseconds prior to firing a lot of data gets interchanged between the missile and units such as the fighter's own aircraft's radar/fire control system and possibly from external sources via datalink....

I'm not holding my breath for this to happen, either. My understanding is that those missiles do get course correction data in real-time from external sources like AWACS and ground based radars. Missiles like the AIM-120 are meant to hit targets beyond visual range, and while they employ active radar guidance, their on board radars are relatively low power and limited range.

But let the boffins have at it. You never know what's possible until you try.

Yep, that's pretty much it.

Once upon a time radar air to air missiles, whist capable of use beyond visual range, were completely reliant on the launch aircraft's own radar illuminating the target throughout the missile's flight from launch to impact....known as semi active homing (SARH)..

That places lots of restrictions on what the fighter and it's radar can do post launch, it's the situation the UkAF have been in with what they have in their inventory and and it's rumoured to have cost them several aircraft.

It's better to be able to punt the missile off at long range and let it mainly do it's own thing (with perhaps some help from on board/elsewhere and potentially in the final stages it's own active radar) - having that advanced capability means the fighter is free to manoeuvre/evade or potentially engage other targets immediately the missile is launched.

Just checked, and

"Scholz suspended certification of Nord Stream 2 on 22 February 2022 in consequence of Russia's recognition of the Donetsk and Luhansk republics and the deployment of troops in territory held by the DPR and LPR."

In Germany there was apparently a lot of worry about the lack of gas for economic, social and manufacturing reasons and Scholz seemed wishywashy for a long time. Perhaps someone wanted to remove the temptation of Nordstrom 2 altogether.

Not saying that that was it, and apparently Germany are being very cautious about the idea that there was a Ukrainian link to it - still saying it could be a false flag operation. Just saying that it's not inconceivable there would be a potential benefit to Ukraine of Nordstrom being removed.

Pentagon accused of blocking effort to hand Russia war crimes evidence to ICC

Defence department reportedly unwilling to share intelligence over fears precedent could be set against US soldiers

^www.theguardian.com/world/2023/mar/08/pentagon-international-criminal-court-russia-war-crimes^

@MissConductUS Do you know why would sharing of Russian war crimes evidence with the ICC create a precedent against US soldiers?

There have long been concerns that the ICC could be used by unfriendly nations to prosecute American soldiers unjustly. That's why the treaty was never ratified by the Senate and it has no jurisdiction here.

Another Russian oligarch died, how is unknown

Born21 June 1966 (age 56) Russia
Died06.03.2022 Russia

Grishin co-ownerd the Rosevrobank (aka The Laundromat) and has claimed that he ‘practically brought the Russian banking system to collapse in the 1990s after the Soviet Union collapsed by committing ‘the largest bank fraud scheme ever’, orchestrating a $60 billion heist from the Russian Central Bank.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergey_Grishin_(businessman)