circuscritic

Depends on what your metrics are. If they are for longevity and long-term business health, sure.

But I don’t think that’s how they’re measuring success. They are maximizing shareholder value in the short term, and any medium to long-term problems will be concerns for another set of C-Suite vultures as the current ones will have already moved on, or retired with their golden parachutes.

I can almost assure you, it was not considered.

Nutanix is a mature platform, but more importantly, they’re a mature vendor, which means support contracts with SLAs.

Operational targets can’t all just simply be moved further and further back from the front lines of a conflict, to say nothing of high value tactical targets.

Supplying several hundred low observable air launched cruise missiles per month would absolutely make a significant difference on the battlefield, that’s not even a question.

But that doesn’t mean I believe that would enough to cause Putin to reverse course, or to deliver a strategic defeat to the Russian army.

Regardless, Germany doesn’t have that manufacturing capacity to begin with, nor do I believe they have the political will to do that, even if it were possible, but again, it is not.

I understand exactly what it is. What I’m saying is that Germany does not have the volume on hand, or the manufacturing capacity to produce such a volume, where it could generate the effect the candidate is implying it can.

Capability and capacity are two very different things.

Yes, I understand the manufacturing capability exists, but it’s capacity is limited i.e. existing facilities could not maintain a strategically significant production volume relative to Ukraine’s needs, much less to deter Putin.

Oh I’m sure the thought of two dozen cruise missiles will straighten Putin out ASAP.

For starters, this would not be a new or unprecedented capability for the Ukrainians.

If Germany had several hundred to part with immediately, and the capacity to regularly replenish those stocks, that would make a significant difference on the battlefield, but I doubt it would make Putin sue for peace.

But of course, Germany does not have those kind of stockpiles or manufacturing capacity to maintain that.

Still, it would be nice to see more European politicians picking up the banner of supplying Ukraine in the face of likely diminished, or eliminated, American transfers.

So what you’re saying s that Russia has no agency, and their invasion of Ukraine is NOT it imperial nature.

In fact, they’re only seizing Ukrainian territory to add to their own, because of the United States. And that somehow negates any aspect of Russian imperialism.

Well that makes sense, because I know one thing about Russia, and that it’s definitely not a stitched together country of conquered and subjugated people’s.

Or, hear me out, maybe it’s possible for both the United States and Russia, to wage imperial wars of aggression. Just because the United States is an imperial power, that doesn’t preclude any other great powers from acting on their own delusions of empire.

Classic Ukrainian imperialism…

Also, classic enlisted soldier get rich quick scheme: dying just to get the death benefits.

Wait a minute…what now?

“Thanks for calling the FBI, how may I direct your call?”

“I like to discuss what actually constitutes child pornography and how to rectify the laws that are causing my beautiful sensual artwork to be unfairly maligned on the internet.”

“I couldn’t agree more. What’s your home address, we’d love to hear your complaint in person”

These will not be used to shoot down Israeli missiles…

I’m quite aware of THAAD’s capabilities, including it s tracking radars, at least as far as publicly disclosed information goes.

That’s not what I’m talking about.

I’m talking about this reducing, or removing, one of Iran’s primary means of deterrence against Israeli attacks.

If Israel doesn’t have to worry about the threat of Iranian ballistic missiles, it frees them up for an even more aggressive course of action.

Unless you’re suggesting that this means Israel can, and should, continue to directly attack Iran…?

This defense enables and emboldens Israeli aggression.

It removes, or significantly reduces, the threat posed by Iranian ballistic missiles.

That means, it removes, or reduces, any deterrent effect they have, on moderating Israel.

This is not good, but less because of the risk of American KIA, and more because of how it changes the Israeli calculus.

Yes, that first but confirms the news article.

And then it talks about a deployment 5 years ago for a training exercise.

These aren’t brick and mortar buildings, they’re mobile platforms, and mobile air defense batteries redeploy all the time.

Again, I am not closed to the idea that there was US military operated THAAD system in Israel during that attack, I just can’t find any reports confirming that, or even eluding to it.

Never mind, I misread that last bit. I will take a look at it later when I have a few moments, thank you.

I’m not saying it can’t be. I’m saying I don’t believe Iran has the capabilities or stockpiles available to do so, given the other American assets in theatre, or a desire to risk killing American troops.

I suspect they’re deploying THAAD because of the failures of David’s Sling during the last missile attack.

Air defense systems protect specific targets, not countries. Given the THAAD’s long track record under US operators, I would wager that the bases and targets that Iranian missiles hit, either lacked sufficient coverage, had poorly trained Israeli personnel, and/or were covered by David’s Sling.

Of course, I could be wrong, but we won’t know for many many years given how secretive Israel is on these matters.

Edit: I’m not seeing any reports of active THAAD deployments in Israel prior to this announcement, just previous deployments to Israel, including for training. But no mention if they rotated out prior to the Iranian missile strike, or that they were present for it.

I’m not saying they weren’t there, but do you have a source confirms they were present during this most recent attack?

Their air defense operators, just like gets deployed around Saudi Arabia’s oil infrastructure.

If you want to feel bad about anything, it’s that will significantly reduce the likelihood that Iran can threaten Israel with ballistic missiles.

THAAD is really good at what it does, and something tells me that the Iranians aren’t going to want to waste their entire stock pile on fruitless saturation attempts. To say nothing of their concerns of killing American troops.

As in, this provides Israel even greater latitude on their quest to start a hot war with Iran, without dramatically increasing any threat to their military bases and government buildings. Well, at least not from ballistic missiles.

One way they conduct themselves is by using the politicians they’ve purchased to advocate for forming public-private partnerships, in areas where they shouldn’t exist, which they can then legally siphon off the resources from.

I disagree on the private sector aspect of this, but I agree on the democracy part. Although, I don’t really view America as true democracy at this moment in history, but that’s besides the point here.

Fusion technology is at a point in its life cycle where it needs to be a public sector project. There is no path to profitability in the near-term, that would justify private sector involvement, except as a means to extract profit from the very expensive research process of even making this technology feasible.

Not that I’m against the private sector within the nuclear power industry. I’m very excited to see what they can do with SMR technology. I’m just extremely skeptical of most private-public partnerships, especially in cases like this.

Fusion reactors are incredibly complicated… This is a research reactor, with the goal of figuring out how to create sustainable fusion for real world uses by 2050.

This is not a performative action for a determinative outcome, this is aspirational and has no guarantee of achieving its goals, which is good. This type of research and science needs to be funded, even when it may fail.

Maybe this will spurn competition between powers to accelerate their own fusion reactor research, and create a virtuous cycle that accelerates this technology becoming a major source of green energy in the near, or medium-term, future.

For all his faults, Prigozhin had a better grasp on reality, and more brains, then Kadyrov has ever possessed. And Colonel General Caterer was an idiot.

The point is, as funny as the Hot Dog Mutiny was, a TikTok Insurrection would both be significantly shorter lived, and exponentially more hilarious.

Unless there’s a way to secure public funding for them, this seems like a reasonable middle road.

Like a Patreon, which while having its own unique set of problems, enables a paid content distribution ecosystem for independent creators unlike anything else available.

So, absent inserting invasive advertising, and lacking public funds, I can’t see how else they’re supposed to maintain infrastructure and development costs.