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#76 2022-03-08 02:48:08

Terraformer
Member
From: Ceres
Registered: 2007-08-27
Posts: 3,817
Website

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Mars_B4_Moon wrote:

Ukraine war 'catastrophic for global food'
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-60623941

Gold On Its Way To $3,000 An Ounce
https://www.forbes.com/sites/investor/2 … -an-ounce/

Food prices across globe skyrocket by 20.7%
https://nypost.com/2022/03/05/food-pric … oss-globe/

As much as the West will be hit it seems Russia will be hit harder.

Africa will be hit hardest of all. Egypt gets almost all its wheat from Ukraine and Russia... and very few countries on that continent are net producers.

3bdeb072-5fbf-6b37-763e-86460a649ea0.jpg

For places already on the edge, this is catastrophic. Prices stop rising because enough people get priced out -- and when that happens with food, people die.

Which frustratingly few people seem to understand. The comments under every article about it tend to be along the lines of "it is worth paying higher prices to get rid of Putin, it's nothing compared to what they're going through in Ukraine". There is no understanding that not every country is as wealthy as Britain. Or that production can't be immediately increased in response to higher prices -- if there is a shortage, some people *will* go without. I don't think we should be paying a price that's measured in hundreds of millions of lives, even if they are far away and don't look like us.


"I'm gonna die surrounded by the biggest idiots in the galaxy." - If this forum was a Mars Colony

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#77 2022-03-08 09:08:24

Calliban
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From: Northern England, UK
Registered: 2019-08-18
Posts: 3,425

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Good post Terraformer.  The Arab world is in a dangerous position.  These countries are arid dust bowls, and had small and sparsely distributed populations before the age of oil.  They have grown enormously in population, Saudi Arabia has gone from 3m to 34m in about 80 years!  They all depend almost entirely on imported food.  Food supplies that could easily be cut off by geopolitical strife and won't be sustainable anyhow in the decades ahead, when oil and gas production begin the decline on a global level.  Sucks to be them.  The massive growth in population and living standards of the past century was enabled entirely by cheap and abundant surplus energy from fossil fuels, especially oil and natural gas.  That cheap surplus energy is rapidly disappearing.

We talk about colonising space on this forum.  I worry that the resource base that we need to carry that out will disappear long before anyone sets foot on Mars.  Space colonisation is something that requires a lot of surplus wealth and energy.  How much surplus wealth will the world have, a couple of decades from now, when global oil production is 30% down from what it is now?  What will average wages look like when that happens?  And just how hungry will the world be?

It is tempting to imagine some revolutionary new energy source appearing on the scene and saving the world.  But even nuclear reactors need coal, natural gas and oil, to make their steel and concrete and make and transport and assemble all those components and infrastructure.  To replace a large chunk of the energy derived from fossil fuels would take thousands of them, built across the world at a rate that dwarfs all experience up to now.  We will be doing that at a time when rising energy costs are hugely inflating the cost of steel and concrete and all of the energy consuming processes that we must deploy building new reactors.  Seems to me that scaling any alternative energy source up, in the time we have left, is not going to be able to do more than cushion the decline.  And nuclear reactors, fusion reactors, etc, make heat and electricity.  They don't make diesel, which is the fuel that powers agriculture and the whole world transportation system.  The enormity of the problem ahead of us is simply not understood at any level within our society.  There are plenty of idiots who really think that they can replace everything that fossil fuels now do with windmills and solar panels!  The scale of the infrastructure needed and the amount of materials and energy needed (in a world of shrinking net energy) just flies over their heads.

The 21st century is going to be a violent, hungry and dangerous period in human history.  Human ambitions are going to shrink.  I don't see there being much scope for space travel in the sort of world we are heading into.  I hope to be wrong.

Last edited by Calliban (2022-03-08 09:34:55)


"Plan and prepare for every possibility, and you will never act. It is nobler to have courage as we stumble into half the things we fear than to analyse every possible obstacle and begin nothing. Great things are achieved by embracing great dangers."

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#78 2022-03-08 15:41:38

louis
Member
From: UK
Registered: 2008-03-24
Posts: 7,208

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

That map does not show net food production. The Netherlands for instance exports more than double of what it imports, but the map appears to show what percentage of food consumption within the country comes from abroad.

I have always thought Dutch farming is a rather good model for farming on Mars.


Terraformer wrote:
Mars_B4_Moon wrote:

Ukraine war 'catastrophic for global food'
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-60623941

Gold On Its Way To $3,000 An Ounce
https://www.forbes.com/sites/investor/2 … -an-ounce/

Food prices across globe skyrocket by 20.7%
https://nypost.com/2022/03/05/food-pric … oss-globe/

As much as the West will be hit it seems Russia will be hit harder.

Africa will be hit hardest of all. Egypt gets almost all its wheat from Ukraine and Russia... and very few countries on that continent are net producers.

https://mcusercontent.com/de2bc41f8324e … 649ea0.jpg

For places already on the edge, this is catastrophic. Prices stop rising because enough people get priced out -- and when that happens with food, people die.

Which frustratingly few people seem to understand. The comments under every article about it tend to be along the lines of "it is worth paying higher prices to get rid of Putin, it's nothing compared to what they're going through in Ukraine". There is no understanding that not every country is as wealthy as Britain. Or that production can't be immediately increased in response to higher prices -- if there is a shortage, some people *will* go without. I don't think we should be paying a price that's measured in hundreds of millions of lives, even if they are far away and don't look like us.


Let's Go to Mars...Google on: Fast Track to Mars blogspot.com

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#79 2022-03-08 15:52:31

Terraformer
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From: Ceres
Registered: 2007-08-27
Posts: 3,817
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Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

louis, that map shows calorie imports/exports, not dollar value. So it will be almost entirely made up of grains, beans, and various oils. The Netherlands makes a lot of money, yes, but it does that largely by producing high value plants (which is not a good model for Martians, who can't subsist off the Paltrow diet).


"I'm gonna die surrounded by the biggest idiots in the galaxy." - If this forum was a Mars Colony

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#80 2022-03-08 15:55:25

louis
Member
From: UK
Registered: 2008-03-24
Posts: 7,208

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Saudi Arabia produces a lot more food than you might imagine:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agricultu … Production

I suspect they could feed themselves if they applied a significant portion of their energy production to the task. But it might take 5 to 10 years to get everything in place.

The evidence from the oil price shock of the 70s is that the world does adapt. Cars became, for instance, way more energy efficient. People started insulating their homes.

As I have said previously we are some years away from having a complete green energy solution available.  I think the best approach I have seen is Denmark's plans for green energy islands that will, amongst other things, produce green hydrogen that can be used as energy storage so overcoming the issue of intermittency.

The emergency solution is probably fracking. We can gear up for that pretty quickly (certainly in the UK) and we already have a nationwide methane delivery system. Certainly for the UK that should be the favoured emergency response in my view.

If there is one glimmer of light in this whole horrendous business it is that people and governments may finally come to understand the importance of energy independence.


Calliban wrote:

Good post Terraformer.  The Arab world is in a dangerous position.  These countries are arid dust bowls, and had small and sparsely distributed populations before the age of oil.  They have grown enormously in population, Saudi Arabia has gone from 3m to 34m in about 80 years!  They all depend almost entirely on imported food.  Food supplies that could easily be cut off by geopolitical strife and won't be sustainable anyhow in the decades ahead, when oil and gas production begin the decline on a global level.  Sucks to be them.  The massive growth in population and living standards of the past century was enabled entirely by cheap and abundant surplus energy from fossil fuels, especially oil and natural gas.  That cheap surplus energy is rapidly disappearing.

We talk about colonising space on this forum.  I worry that the resource base that we need to carry that out will disappear long before anyone sets foot on Mars.  Space colonisation is something that requires a lot of surplus wealth and energy.  How much surplus wealth will the world have, a couple of decades from now, when global oil production is 30% down from what it is now?  What will average wages look like when that happens?  And just how hungry will the world be?

It is tempting to imagine some revolutionary new energy source appearing on the scene and saving the world.  But even nuclear reactors need coal, natural gas and oil, to make their steel and concrete and make and transport and assemble all those components and infrastructure.  To replace a large chunk of the energy derived from fossil fuels would take thousands of them, built across the world at a rate that dwarfs all experience up to now.  We will be doing that at a time when rising energy costs are hugely inflating the cost of steel and concrete and all of the energy consuming processes that we must deploy building new reactors.  Seems to me that scaling any alternative energy source up, in the time we have left, is not going to be able to do more than cushion the decline.  And nuclear reactors, fusion reactors, etc, make heat and electricity.  They don't make diesel, which is the fuel that powers agriculture and the whole world transportation system.  The enormity of the problem ahead of us is simply not understood at any level within our society.  There are plenty of idiots who really think that they can replace everything that fossil fuels now do with windmills and solar panels!  The scale of the infrastructure needed and the amount of materials and energy needed (in a world of shrinking net energy) just flies over their heads.

The 21st century is going to be a violent, hungry and dangerous period in human history.  Human ambitions are going to shrink.  I don't see there being much scope for space travel in the sort of world we are heading into.  I hope to be wrong.

Last edited by louis (2022-03-08 15:56:33)


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#81 2022-03-08 15:59:45

louis
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From: UK
Registered: 2008-03-24
Posts: 7,208

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

No, my link was to food production.  This explains why the Netherlands is a big exporter of food.

https://aboutthenetherlands.com/why-doe … much-food/


Terraformer wrote:

louis, that map shows calorie imports/exports, not dollar value. So it will be almost entirely made up of grains, beans, and various oils. The Netherlands makes a lot of money, yes, but it does that largely by producing high value plants (which is not a good model for Martians, who can't subsist off the Paltrow diet).


Let's Go to Mars...Google on: Fast Track to Mars blogspot.com

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#82 2022-03-08 16:25:18

Terraformer
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From: Ceres
Registered: 2007-08-27
Posts: 3,817
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Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Sigh. Like I said, they produce relatively high value per calorie products.

The Netherlands is one of the largest countries when it comes to the export of agricultural goods such as meat, dairy, eggs, vegetables, and fruit.

But when it comes to keeping people fed, it's calories that count. That's what the map I posted shows -- which countries export calories (feed others) and which import them (are fed by others).

A tomato has 18 kcal/100g. Wheat flour, 360 kcal/100g. 20x more. So if you were trading an equal mass of tomatoes for flour, you would be importing *twenty times* the calories you imported. Which is, you know, *what feeds people*.


"I'm gonna die surrounded by the biggest idiots in the galaxy." - If this forum was a Mars Colony

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#83 2022-03-08 18:44:41

louis
Member
From: UK
Registered: 2008-03-24
Posts: 7,208

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Well (sigh) of course you chose the worst case example of a tomato.

But meat, dairy and eggs are all high calorific foods.  Bacon is 541 kcals per 100g. Cheese is 350 kcals. In England most poor people prior to the industrial revolution sustained themselves with cheese as a vital part of their diet.

Terraformer wrote:

Sigh. Like I said, they produce relatively high value per calorie products.

The Netherlands is one of the largest countries when it comes to the export of agricultural goods such as meat, dairy, eggs, vegetables, and fruit.

But when it comes to keeping people fed, it's calories that count. That's what the map I posted shows -- which countries export calories (feed others) and which import them (are fed by others).

A tomato has 18 kcal/100g. Wheat flour, 360 kcal/100g. 20x more. So if you were trading an equal mass of tomatoes for flour, you would be importing *twenty times* the calories you imported. Which is, you know, *what feeds people*.


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#84 2022-03-08 21:17:07

SpaceNut
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From: New Hampshire
Registered: 2004-07-22
Posts: 28,866

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Sort of hard to farm land that is being destroyed by wars bomb and tanks running through the patch of ground used to make your next meal even if you have water and good soils.
We then have those that take the easy way out with earning money which then would require an even higher level of foods being grown on the same parcels of that of imports which could be even higher in pricing for the same foods.
The vertical growing farms in a building work where there is a supply of good water but that in and of its self is a different means to the end.

Seems the US has taken another step in cutting off the financial capabilities of Russia by not buying their oil. Sure the prices will all go up as a result.

Yale professor is keeping tabs on companies still operating in Russia despite Ukraine invasion — and the list includes some household names

The ever changing side of allies Venezuela releases two imprisoned Americans after diplomatic talks

The talks with Venezuela, which has huge oil reserves, came amid US and allied sanctions on Russia following Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked assault on Ukraine.

Ukraine troops dig in strengthening a blocking position at a strategic crossroads north-west of Kyiv

Support has been slow to arrive but its coming in the form of Russian-made weapons to defeat its Russian invaders
NATO countries have sent Ukraine 17,000 anti-tank weapons from Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland have re-supplied Ukraine with Soviet-era weapons.

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#85 2022-03-08 22:08:19

SpaceNut
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From: New Hampshire
Registered: 2004-07-22
Posts: 28,866

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

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#86 2022-03-08 22:32:34

RobertDyck
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From: Winnipeg, Canada
Registered: 2002-08-20
Posts: 7,811
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Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

On facebook I've seen an image of one Ukrainian tractor towing a tank. And a cell phone video of another, clearly showing a different tractor towing a different tank. How many tanks have they taken?

But as for winter cold stopping Russian soldiers... they are Russian. During World War 2, Russian winter cold stopped or at least slowed Nazi Germans. The Russians used weather to their advantage. This is in Ukraine, so Ukrainians are used to it, it's their home. But I don't see it stopping Russians either. Besides, I live in Winnipeg. Weather prediction tonight will get to -21°C. And that's mild, during a cold snap here the daytime high does not get above -20°C. On average, there's no place west of the Ural mountains as cold as here. The Russian city with weather this cold is Omsk, Siberia. And soldiers from my city conduct exercises in this weather all the time.

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#87 2022-03-09 10:42:58

Calliban
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From: Northern England, UK
Registered: 2019-08-18
Posts: 3,425

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

louis wrote:

Saudi Arabia produces a lot more food than you might imagine:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agricultu … Production

I suspect they could feed themselves if they applied a significant portion of their energy production to the task. But it might take 5 to 10 years to get everything in place.

The evidence from the oil price shock of the 70s is that the world does adapt. Cars became, for instance, way more energy efficient. People started insulating their homes.

As I have said previously we are some years away from having a complete green energy solution available.  I think the best approach I have seen is Denmark's plans for green energy islands that will, amongst other things, produce green hydrogen that can be used as energy storage so overcoming the issue of intermittency.

The emergency solution is probably fracking. We can gear up for that pretty quickly (certainly in the UK) and we already have a nationwide methane delivery system. Certainly for the UK that should be the favoured emergency response in my view.

If there is one glimmer of light in this whole horrendous business it is that people and governments may finally come to understand the importance of energy independence.

Louis, countries should (and many will) prioritise energy independence from this point forward, at least to the extent that it is possible.  And local shale deposits may be useful, within limitations.  They are not a realistic replacement for the dwindling output of the North Sea in Britain or Europe.  But locally in Europe, they could cushion decline rate in domestic production.

But the rest of what you have written is poorly informed, to put it politely.  You really think the world will be in a better position if the Saudis divert greater proportions of their energy production to desert based agriculture?  That inevitably means lower oil and gas exports at a time when the world has supply deficits.  There is a reason why the Saudis buy grain from other places.  It is more efficient for them to exchange grain for oil.  Food shortages may change that balance for them, but at the expense of less diesel being available in the Indian farmers' fuel tanks.  It does nothing to solve the problem of food insecurity for the world as a whole.

Your talk about green energy solutions, suggests to me that you don't understand the thermodynamic basis of the economy.  The economy is a collection of processes and people, that rework matter to produce goods and services.  It takes a non reducible amount of energy to melt and cast steel, to cook your food and to transport anything by truck.  It is why GDP vs Energy use, was a straight line until politicised economists started screwing with how inflation was measured in the mid 90s.  There is no way of adapting to lower energy availability other than making and consuming less stuff.  That stuff includes food.  So lower energy availability means getting poorer.  We adapted in the 1970s by developing North Sea, Alaskan and GOM oil, amongst others.  This allowed a return to growth (albeit weaker) in the 80s and 90s.  But that isn't possible this time.  There are no new North Seas left to develop.  The only real growth area left is the Arctic, which will be far difficult and expensive.

Wind power is an intermittent source of electricity and mechanical power.  It has been possible for it to compete on a kWh basis with other energy sources in recent years, only because steel and concrete have been cheap since around 2011, thanks to low cost natural gas (until recently), very low cost Chinese coal; and low interest rate money at both the manufacturer and customer end.  The amount of steel and concrete needed per MWh of wind based electricity is orders of magnitude higher than competing fossil or nuclear energy sources.  The competitiveness of wind was only sustainable so long as materials and money were cheap.  And wind turbines produce electricity, not diesel. Electricity will not power agriculture; it will not produce fertiliser, it will not produce steel and concrete at a price competitive with legacy coal and natural gas.  It does not, nor can it easily, power goods distribution worldwide.  That goods distribution is almost exclusively diesel powered, including the gigatons of steel needed to build those wind turbines and solar panels on a relevant scale.

As fossil fuel energy diminishes, it will be more difficult to build wind and solar powered electricity generation, not easier.  And we are facing that problem now, with the Ukraine crisis disrupting global oil and gas supplies on top of an already peaked global oil production.  There is no way of providing increased energy supply by substituting Low EROI energy for High EROI energy, especially when High EROI energy is depleting and needed to manufacture the infrastructure needed for your Low EROI system.  We have been through this enough times that I thought you might have understood it by now.  Idealistic delusions about low power density renewables are the first thing that needs to die if western Europe is to achieve energy independence.  In the absence of cheap fossil fuels, there really is no alternative to nuclear power for the production of energy on a scale sufficient for industrial civilisation.  Low power density renewables only look sustainable when there is abundant cheap fossil fuel energy needed to produce, install and back them up.

Last edited by Calliban (2022-03-09 11:05:34)


"Plan and prepare for every possibility, and you will never act. It is nobler to have courage as we stumble into half the things we fear than to analyse every possible obstacle and begin nothing. Great things are achieved by embracing great dangers."

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#88 2022-03-09 12:17:34

kbd512
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Registered: 2015-01-02
Posts: 7,429

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Calliban,

I think you're wasting your time.  These people truly don't "get it", and never will until their fantasy world comes crashing down around them.  We blew mad money on a technological road to nowhere, so now we're royally screwed.  Unfortunately, these same people have a religiously-held conviction that we can simply produce our way out of this over-consumption problem.  The numbers involved don't mean anything to them because they're not educated enough to understand the nature of the problem.

You highlighted the underlying issue- productivity is directly tied to and correlated with energy consumption.  As you noted, economy is ultimately economy of energy.  When you can generate enough energy, nearly all forms of inefficiency are relatively meaningless.  Fossil fuels and nuclear energy temporarily provided the illusion that natural resources were infinite.  These people lived their entire lives in a world where the answer to all problems was to simply "produce more", which worked well enough so long as the energy to do that was available.  When the energy to do that is no longer available, that paradigm comes to a sudden stop.  They have no belief that such a turn of events is even possible, because none of them have ever lived in a country like Venezuela- a place where the economy stopped because the flow of energy stopped and then natural physical processes directly related to energy poverty took over from there, namely starvation and disease on a country-wide scale that resulted in mass death.

The notion that requiring 100X to 1,000X more embodied energy, from intermittent energy sources that provide 10X less usable energy than fossil fuels or nuclear, per dollar spent, is an absurdity.

1 dollar represents 1 unit of energy transformed into goods or services that people need or want.  If you spent 1 dollar for energy that was ultimately transformed into 10 dollars of useful goods or services because your energy source was so cheap, then your economy grew by a lot.  That was the exponential growth of the 20th century.  If you spent 10 dollars for the same 10 dollars worth of goods or services, then your economy didn't grow at all.  You may have played a shell game with the energy you transformed into goods and services, but there was no economic growth because you lacked the ability (the energy) to create more goods or services that the next potential customer could afford to buy.  If you spent any amount greater than 1 dollar for an output of 1 unit of goods or services, then your economy contracted.  The more expensive any form of energy ultimately becomes, the less sustainable the practice.

That is the fantasy that our "green energy" worshippers have imbibed in.  If you only spend more on energy, then you can have everything else you want.  No.  Just no.  No you can't, and you never will.  Whatever money you spend on energy is not available for any other purpose.  It's exactly like asserting that if you could only spend more money that you don't have, then you wouldn't be in debt.  If the spending was the root cause of the problem, then it can never be the solution.

My children intrinsically understand this, but I can't teach it to adults and get them to truly accept that that is exactly how any real economy actually works, because they've been indoctrinated to believe things that are fundamentally false.  They will argue endlessly over points that simple physics won't budge on, as if their beliefs made a lick of difference to where we ultimately end up if we follow their logic through to its disastrous conclusion.

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#89 2022-03-09 19:14:32

SpaceNut
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From: New Hampshire
Registered: 2004-07-22
Posts: 28,866

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Looks like the mig 25 exchange for Poland to the Ukraine is off as it would make the US and Nato say that we are in the war? How so since we have already been providing other items to wage war with...

Some one push the planes over the border and leave the keys in them with a note happy winning the Russians all tied up in a bow...

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#90 2022-03-09 20:43:02

kbd512
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Registered: 2015-01-02
Posts: 7,429

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

SpaceNut,

Poland doesn't have any MiG-25s, but they do have MiG-29s.  Whether those obsolescent machines will be of any use to pilots who lack significant training, especially when pitted against much more modernized Russian jets, is highly debatable.  Thus far, the Ukrainian Air Force hasn't demonstrated much success against the Russian Air Force's newer machines and better-trained pilots.

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#91 2022-03-09 21:27:20

SpaceNut
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From: New Hampshire
Registered: 2004-07-22
Posts: 28,866

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Sorry fat fingered error.

Currently 36,300 personnel and 225 aircraft are in service in the Ukrainian Air Force and Air Defense forces.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/3/4 … y-aircraft

Seems they still have most of them...and are trying to save them for later

AS the fighting is continuing the need for men means that Ukraine will repatriate troops and equipment, including helicopters, involved in U.N. peacekeeping missions in Africa and Europe to bolster defenses at home in the face of Russia's invasion, a U.N. official said.

remember the antenna tower
Russian forces in Ukraine have been ‘hacked’ after abandoning their own secure encrypted phone system

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#92 2022-03-10 03:16:27

Terraformer
Member
From: Ceres
Registered: 2007-08-27
Posts: 3,817
Website

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Regarding the ceasefires they've had, are they being observed by anyone? I don't trust either government to accurately report violations. But maybe observers from idk Egypt would be reliable enough (has to be a country that isn't part of Russia's "Axis of Evil"). Though maybe complicated by Egypt's utter reliance on both of those countries (otoh maybe that will cancel out and make them trustworthy).


"I'm gonna die surrounded by the biggest idiots in the galaxy." - If this forum was a Mars Colony

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#93 2022-03-10 05:38:12

Calliban
Member
From: Northern England, UK
Registered: 2019-08-18
Posts: 3,425

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

A few articles that give a very different take on the Ukraine crisis.

Turns out the Ukrainians operated a special 'neo-Nazi' battalion dedicated to murdering Russian civilians in Eastern Ukraine.  Many people in the west can't seem to get their head round how a country with a Jewish leader, could patronise Neo-Nazis?  Remember, Hitler hated Slavs, who he regarded as being subhuman.  And his troops murdered every Russian civilian they could find on their way to Moscow.  In Eastern Europe, Nazism is remembered as an anti-Russian ideology.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/ … utin-nazis

And it turns out that the US has hundreds of bioweapons labs around the world, including 23 in Ukraine.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/gre … -bombshell

Anti-Russian propaganda and sanctions are now pushing Russia into an even closer embrace with China, which is a far more dangerous adversary.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/ … reat-rises

My own take looking at all of this, is that I don't feel I can trust what either side says.  But the US neocons look more and more evil the more light is shone upon them.  These are the creeps that are back in charge of the US following Trump's departure from office.  These people did everything they could to vandalise Trump, because he wasn't one of them and didn't share their objectives.

Last edited by Calliban (2022-03-10 06:03:40)


"Plan and prepare for every possibility, and you will never act. It is nobler to have courage as we stumble into half the things we fear than to analyse every possible obstacle and begin nothing. Great things are achieved by embracing great dangers."

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#94 2022-03-10 06:12:20

Terraformer
Member
From: Ceres
Registered: 2007-08-27
Posts: 3,817
Website

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Oh, you only just learned about Azov Battalion? They aren't the only neo-nazis in the Ukrainian military of course, far from it, just the only one that formed as an explicitly neo-nazi group. Ukraine is full of them. It's hard to find a picture of the brave Ukrainian soldiers defending their homeland without a swastika or black sun somewhere in it.

Idk why Azov is from, well, Azov (South Ukraine) though. They're Slavic down there are they not? It makes as much sense as being a Jewish neo-nazi...


"I'm gonna die surrounded by the biggest idiots in the galaxy." - If this forum was a Mars Colony

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#95 2022-03-10 20:03:02

SpaceNut
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From: New Hampshire
Registered: 2004-07-22
Posts: 28,866

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Azov initially formed as a volunteer militia in May 2014 and has since been fighting Russian separatist forces in the Donbas War. The nationalist battalion Azov refused to obey orders from and coordinate actions with the Ukrainian army's command, deputy commander of the DPR militia. Formerly paramilitary unit of the National Guard of Ukraine, based in Mariupol, suggests that they are acting like a militia at this point...

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#96 2022-03-10 21:34:30

kbd512
Administrator
Registered: 2015-01-02
Posts: 7,429

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

SpaceNut,

Yeah, so Russia is claiming that a rogue military unit operating inside Ukraine represents a threat to Russia.  Given how poorly their military has acquitted itself thus far, they may actually have a point, but only to the extent that attacking their neighbors is hazardous to the health of their soldiers.  One group of war criminals accusing the other group of war criminals of committing various atrocities.  The fact of the matter is that both nations have serious internal issues to deal with, so the obvious solution is to start a war to focus attention elsewhere.

Ukraine's President is not in control of the Azov battalion, in much the same way that Russia's President does not appear to have much control over his battalions.  If America gets seriously involved at this point, nothing good will come of it, similar to Syria.  That's probably why we'll find some way to do that, despite having no concept of what the objective is and no real plan.  What could possibly go wrong?

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#97 2022-03-11 05:23:19

Mars_B4_Moon
Member
Registered: 2006-03-23
Posts: 9,267

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

They media are tying to build up Zelenskyy as some kind of Churchill or Patton or MacArthur or George Washington, maybe this war will finally make him but I fear he might go down as one of the biggest clown idiots in history.

Vladimir Putin might be perhaps be remembered as a Madman, a Tsar, a Dictator, a Tyrant and a Killer.

I'm not sure how history will record the name Nuland, Victoria. Will some newspaper record Nuland as doing her own dangerous 'Bay of Pigs' event while Joe Biden remained sleeping? Why did Trump have her fired?? There are now reports North Korea is testing missiles again and that Saudi Arabia, UAE are Hanging Up the Phone on Joe Biden

I have no idea what Putin is thinking or if the guy has taken too many steroids and lost his mind.

So it seems now there is a possiblity that mad crazy dog Putin might have been baited and he got himself played by a foreign character and Putin was stupid enough to attack Ukraine for some weird paranoid reasons. Behind the scenes players, always working backstage, the Man Behind the Curtain or the Woman behind the Curtain?

Victoria Nuland is a name that keeps popping up across social media, she now declares US is or was protecting ‘biological research facilities’ in Ukraine, or maybe not protecting since the war has kicked off.
But she's not really sure what's in those labs, it could be Soviet era stuff that was supposed to be decommissioned long ago back in 2005. The Soviets had stuff like a weaponized anthrax center, a weaponized plague center...but not anything in Ukraine, don't worry its all been destoryed!.. or maybe some bankers and scientists got a little Curious George and started look at stuff that is more dangerous than Covid?

The Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on their Destruction
quote military-history
(usually referred to as the Biological Weapons Convention, abbreviation: BWC, or Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention, abbreviation: BTWC) was the first multilateral disarmament treaty banning the production of an entire category of weapons

So the media then tells us anything about 'Bio-Labs' is just a conspiracy, but then questioned by Mark Rubio a reply comes from Victoria Nuland that Ukraine Has "Biological Research Facilities" Worried Russia May Seize Them

US ‘concerned’ Russia wants to seize Ukraine bioresearch
https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1565587/u … ioresearch

says she's worried Russia may get them. But she says she's 100% sure if there's a biological attack, it's Russia.
https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/1 … 9520175104

but don't worry some say...its happened before. All those Sukhoi and Frogfoot and Migs teamed up together and going against the team of Warthogs and Rockwell Lancers and the F16s and Raptors and all those missiles pointed at each other in some PiszingContest over the skies of Syria, well they had that game of chicken before and the Ruskies turned the last second...so don't worry if good old witch Victoria Nuland and the insane madman Putin have broken a country into bits, don't worry about Oil or Food prices, don't worry increased the risk of Thermonuclear War and pushed it all closer to Midnight, instead be programmed by vs to be outraged about what they in the East or West want you to be outraged about
Just be happy to watch all that Gladiator action and horror stories on your tv screens, are you scared now, emotional maybe? As that movie said 'Are You Not Entertained'. Mikoyan-Gurevich, JSC-Kalashnikov-Concern-Corporation, Lockheed, Boeing, Raytheon Stock, the Swedish company Saab, the British, the German arms manufacturer, the Russian Sukhoi Company all those sales are going to go up and up.

A nation lies almost totally broken, Russia although mad and insane if it has any logic left in its crazy mind. It might be starting to split the nation just as they spilt up the Balkans or just as the British thought they must do a Partition of India. The crazy Putin has invaded, now he has a nation split into different cultures, languages and identity, different peoples who will hate each otehr for hundreds of years or generations to come, will have wisdom to separate these people into their ancient tribes and kingdoms and ethnicity, different races of Ukraine type and Russian type other minority that would be more Moldovan or Polish-Belorussian-Ukraine dialect or Roma or Tatar and install some Atheist Godless Heartless communist leader, East Slavic Ukrainian Balto Russo peoples, historically also called Ruthenian or break it into little county nation state kingdoms once again or will the multi-culture of Ukraine kill itself, turn inward asnd murder itself once again for hundreds of years more. Maybe this region is where a new War Monger Pope will be Born, a new god-Emperor of the West, what will take power and keep it all together as democracy fails?

Victoria Nuland she seems to be a forebringer of misery, maybe not quiet the same horseman of death that Putin is, Robert Kagan writes for the Washington ComPost seems to be an Ivy League fraternity type Lithuanian Jewish. It seems “Toria” Nuland's husband  Robert Kagan  co-founded the Project New American Century in 1998 around a demand for “regime change” in Iraq,  some of the project was accomplished in 2003 with President little George W. Bush Jnr's invasion. Kagan is Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) from the Rockefeller Harold Pratt House, he's the historian of Eastern Balkanized descent this guy was happy to bomb Iraq and alleged that the September 11 hijacker Mohamed Atta met with an Iraqi intelligence official several months before the attacks, these fake allegations of course were later shown to be false. She doesn't mind who Leftwing, Neocon, she will continue to be behind that curtain, worked during Bill Clinton's presidency, principal deputy foreign policy adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney, worked for Obama, had her conversations leaked online where Angela Merkel termed Nuland's remark "absolutely unacceptable." worked at clownish spooky stuff during President George W. Bush's second term, works with Secretary of State John Kerry, some weird thing happening she's always there. A leftwing shapeshifting chameleon neocon, a smooth talk witch always up to new tricks, an official long in charge of U.S. policy in Ukraine, well all those claims about Bio-Labs are 'Fake News' but then suddenly she testified on and strongly suggested that such claims are, at least in part, true. The Democrat party has also changed, they are closer to Neocons at times becoming liberal-interventionist friends.

So what is really going on?

US official: Russian invasion of Ukraine risks release of dangerous pathogens
https://thebulletin.org/2022/02/us-offi … pathogens/
The Russian invasion of Ukraine may put at risk a network of US-linked labs in Ukraine that work with dangerous pathogens, said Robert Pope, the director of the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, a 30-year-old Defense Department program that has helped secure the former Soviet Union’s weapons of mass destruction and redirect former bioweapons facilities and scientists toward peaceful endeavors.
The labs in Ukraine are not bioweapons facilities. The US government maintains that they are public and animal health labs operated by host countries. Although a long-running Russian disinformation campaign has painted a picture of a network of US military labs in Ukraine, Georgia, and other former Soviet republics involved in bioweapons or risky research, Pope said the labs conduct peaceful scientific research and disease surveillance. Outside experts have also said Pope’s program is not a covert bioweapons operation.
While the United States isn’t maintaining bioweapons facilities, Pope said, war could put pathogen collections in Ukraine at risk.

Tu-141 "Strizh" Missile-Like Drone From The War In Ukraine Looks To Have Crashed In Croatia
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/4 … in-croatia

Drone crashes into Croatia territory after apparently flying from Ukraine over several EU / NATO countries?

China has finally stepped in and called on the US to release details of the Pentagon’s biological research programs in Ukraine. “The United States, as the party that knows the laboratories best, should release relevant specific information as soon as possible seems to be the word from the Chinese, saying including what viruses are stored and the research that has been carried out,” so say a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman.

What? So China where Corona came from, with Covid deaths, now gets to lecture the USA about biological virus because of the stupidity of some other person, maybe Victoria Nuland?

They US media reports they are worried that Russia might collect Soviet era weapons which they are supposed to already have from those old soviet times maybe it was just a Vaccine Lab thingy that BillGates already knows about, or was there something lese in those labs? “Ukraine has biological research facilities which in fact we are quite concerned Russian troops, Russian forces, may be seeking to gain control of, so we are working with the Ukrainians on how they can prevent any of those research materials from falling into the hands of Russian forces should they approach,” Nuland said. Now people talk of 'Conspiracy' thanks to what Nuland was doing. Was it something like this that set off the madman Putin and added some crazy logic to his war insanity?

Gasoline has already been chucked on the fire

Taken from the politics thread

SpaceNut wrote:

yes the cry of WMD would allow for others to jump in but its still a shadow of what really has happened for war crimes with the civilians being bombed.
.

There is constant fighting between Ukraine and Russia but are also Reports of Muslim Jihadist Mercenaries all over the place in Ukraine. There are now islamic muslim jihads who praise Ukraine war as 'crusaders against crusaders' which will destroy 'enemies of Islam'. The islamos have praised the Ukraine war as a 'divine punishment' from the Moongod al-Lah for the infidel-kufir lands of West which is the enemy of islamism.

News - Ukraine: refugee children return to school in Romania. Orthodox Church sends over 50 tons of humanitarian aid
https://www.agensir.it/quotidiano/2022/ … arian-aid/

Ukraine war: Refugee boy, 11, travels 600 miles by himself to Slovakian border with phone number written on his hand
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/ukraine-war-r … 00538.html

More than 62,000 refugees enter Hungary from Ukraine
https://dailynewshungary.com/more-than- … m-ukraine/

There are reports of thousands of people dying
and that 900,000 + or 1 Million have fled to Poland Alone!

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2022-03-11 09:05:29)

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#98 2022-03-11 12:37:30

Mars_B4_Moon
Member
Registered: 2006-03-23
Posts: 9,267

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

The US Dollar hits a new high vs. the ruble,
Moody's says the Russia economy is now junk


Fitch cuts Russia's credit rating to junk, says loan defaults are 'imminent'
https://nationalpost.com/news/world/fit … e-imminent

More reports that say Russians are using islamist jihaids?

Putin says Russia to use Middle East volunteer fighters against Ukraine
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/putin-says-ru … 54089.html

Joe Biden personally vetoed plan to send Polish MiG fighter jets to Ukraine
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/ … hter-jets/

(behind a subscribe paywall)

Republican senators pressure Biden to transfer fighter jets to Ukraine
https://www.bbc.com/news/60710226?fr=operanews

More than 40 Republican senators have written an open letter in which they say they "strongly disagree" with Biden's stance.

Russian strikes hit western Ukraine as offensive widens
https://www.boston.com/news/russia-ukra … ve-widens/

Anti-tank missiles supplied by foreign powers key for Ukraine stalling Russians
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/poli … g-russians

Russia-Ukraine latest news: gunfights continue in Kyiv as Germany sends anti-tank weapons and missiles
https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/ … in-capital

Did stupid crazy Russians hit their own pipeline?

Pipeline in Kharkiv and oil terminal in Vasylkiv believed hit as US, UK and EU move to exclude ‘selected’ banks from global payments system.

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2022-03-11 12:49:13)

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#99 2022-03-12 03:25:19

Mars_B4_Moon
Member
Registered: 2006-03-23
Posts: 9,267

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Some news headlines I see on feeds of the war

Poland welcomes 1.5 million Ukrainian refugees fleeing Russia's invasion
https://news.yahoo.com/poland-welcomes- … 23218.html

Of the 2.5 million Ukrainian refugees to have fled Russia’s invasion of their homeland for neighboring countries, 1.5 million have sought safety in Poland.

As Inflation Heats Up, 64% of Americans Are Now Living Paycheck To Paycheck
https://news.slashdot.org/story/22/03/1 … o-paycheck

German government rejects more nuclear power as alternative to Russian gas
https://theworldnews.net/gb-news/german … ussian-gas

Germany has rejected the possibility of keeping its nuclear power plants open for longer than planned as part of efforts to wean the country off Russian gas.
The government said the focus should not be on nuclear energy - which it said carried high risks - but instead on quickly building up alternative sources.
Germany has stopped short of boycotting oil and gas coming from Russia in light of the invasion of Ukraine.

Former Vice President Mike Pence visits Ukrainian refugees along Polish border
https://www.wrtv.com/news/u-s-world/for … ish-border

'The White House is Briefing TikTok Stars About the War in Ukraine'
https://news.slashdot.org/story/22/03/1 … e#comments

'No, Russia Has Not Threatened To Leave An American Astronaut Behind In Space'
https://science.slashdot.org/story/22/0 … d-in-space

WHO Says It Advised Ukraine To Destroy Pathogens In Health Labs To Prevent Disease Spread
https://science.slashdot.org/story/22/0 … ase-spread
'The World Health Organization advised Ukraine to destroy high-threat pathogens housed in the country's public health laboratories to prevent "any potential spills" that would spread disease among the population, the agency told Reuters on Thursday. From the report:
Biosecurity experts say Russia's movement of troops into Ukraine and bombardment of its cities have raised the risk of an escape of disease-causing pathogens, should any of those facilities be damaged. Like many other countries, Ukraine has public health laboratories researching how to mitigate the threats of dangerous diseases affecting both animals and humans including, most recently, COVID-19. Its labs have received support from the United States, the European Union and the WHO.'

In response to questions from Reuters about its work with Ukraine ahead of and during Russia's invasion, the WHO said in an email that it has collaborated with Ukrainian public health labs for several years to promote security practices that help prevent "accidental or deliberate release of pathogens." "As part of this work, WHO has strongly recommended to the Ministry of Health in Ukraine and other responsible bodies to destroy high-threat pathogens to prevent any potential spills," the WHO, a United Nations agency, said. The WHO would not say when it had made the recommendation nor did it provide specifics about the kinds of pathogens or toxins housed in Ukraine's laboratories. The agency also did not answer questions about whether its recommendations were followed.
On Wednesday, Russian's foreign ministry claimed that the U.S. operates a biowarfare lab in Ukraine, "an accusation that has been repeatedly denied by Washington and Kyiv," reports Reuters. A spokesperson for the ministry went on to claim that Russian forces unearthed documents in Ukraine that showed "an emergency attempt to erase evidence of military biological programs" by destroying lab samples.

'Not only has Ukraine denied these allegations, Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby called them "laughable" and suggested Moscow could be laying the groundwork to use a chemical or biological weapon.'

‘That’s called World War III’: Biden defends decision not to send jets to Ukraine
https://nypost.com/2022/03/11/thats-cal … o-ukraine/

President Biden on Friday defended his decision to veto the US-facilitated transfer of fighter jets

Biden’s Baffling MiG-29 Reversal
https://www.nationalreview.com/the-morn … -reversal/

US V-P Kamala Harris slams Putin, credits Romania for Ukraine refugee help
https://www.straitstimes.com/world/euro … fugee-help

Russian TV Station Proclaims 'No To War,' Plays 'Swan Lake' Before Going Dark
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/tv-rain- … 1df7692c36

Staff at Russian news channel walks off set
https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/staff-r … 54000.html

The Entire staff of the Russian TV channel “the rain” resigned during a live stream with last words: “no war” and then played “swan lake” ballet video (just like they did on all USSR tv channels when it suddenly collapsed)

Also known as Dozhd Дождь aka TVRain
https://twitter.com/HomHomWang/status/1 … 4582221827

On 1 March 2022, the Russian government blocked access to Dozhd, as well as Echo of Moscow, in response to their coverage of the invasion of Ukraine by Russian forces. Broadcast area includes Russia, Georgia, Moldova, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia. Dozhd, also known as TV Rain, was an independent Russian television channel founded in 2010 by two women, Natalya Sindeyeva, media entrepreneur and owner, and Vera Krichevskaya, a TV director. On 20 August 2021, the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation added Dozhd, along with the investigative website Important Stories (iStories), into the list of "foreign agents". Until 2022, the Dozhd website provided live broadcasting and archived programs.

Russian opera singer and Putin – Met cancels artist, attacks free speech
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/russia- … han-turley

Cardiff Philharmonic removes Tchaikovsky performance over Ukraine conflict
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/202 … e-conflict

Backlash at Cardiff Philharmonic Orchestra for CANCELLING Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl … rture.html

Russian musicians don’t deserve cancellation for Putin’s crimes
https://nypost.com/2022/03/04/russian-m … ns-crimes/

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2022-03-12 04:12:21)

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#100 2022-03-12 07:25:29

Mars_B4_Moon
Member
Registered: 2006-03-23
Posts: 9,267

Re: Putin's Russian expanding to be the old USSR

Saudi Arabia, UAE leaders decline calls with Biden
https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/ … 2003774539

Canada sending anti-tank weapons, ammunition to Ukraine
https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/canada- … -1.5798679

Macron, Scholz call with Putin under way – Elysee
https://www.fxempire.com/news/article/m … see-932633

French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz have started a call with Russian President Vladimir Putin

Ukraine says expects new wave of Russian attacks, but backtracks on warning of Belarus joining war
https://www.straitstimes.com/world/euro … oining-war

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