Twenty Years at Blog

So today is my twentieth anniversary of blogging under The Dignified Rant banner.

I started on Geocities on July 12, 2002. Which eventually became Yahoo!Geocities. My blogfather was James Lileks, who celebrated 25 years of The Bleat this year. I planned numerous categories of writing subjects, from foreign policy to home life. I wondered if I could manage to update it once a week.

Hah!

Originally I didn't even have hyperlinks. I had main subject pages with archives pages behind them. I moved an article off the main page as I added new material. And when I did add hyperlinks after I started to get links from Instapundit, it was a complicated process of double posting to the main subject page and the subject page archives. The hyperlink went to the archives duplicate. Eventually I'd delete the main page version.

It was the digital equivalent of a wax tablet. Held together by duct tape.

Then I moved national security-related posts to Blogger. And then moved everything when Yahoo!Geocities was shut down. I eventually managed to salvage my old archives after Yahoo!Geocities went under.

Yay. Future historians rejoice.

I tried to mine TDR for compilations of posts on subjects. I only did one and it was too much work for the effort. I don't have a tip jar but if you want to support my work, feel free to buy my one and only product in that series. It's here. Buy it often if you want! I freely admit the formatting is crappy. I didn't know what I didn't know. But it looked great on my screen before I uploaded it. And I'm not going to reformat it. But it is an interesting topic if an old take on the subject.

But I will say that writing the blog kept me learning. And occasionally I turned topics I blogged about into published articles. 

My posting went up over the years, especially after I moved to the Blogger platform. Eventually, I felt I had to limit my posting. It seemed excessive, even to me. As time went on, I moved from limiting myself to 3 posts per day, to 2 posts, and now 1 post. This forced me to suppress the impulse to immediately blog about an event lest the world not see my immediate take on the issue.

I'm much better, now.

Indeed, I'm generally posting one or two weeks ahead. That's pre-Internet speed.

As my children got older, I stopped blogging about each in turn. On the original site I added coding to prevent search sites from indexing those posts. My compromise once on Blogger was to stop blogging when they each got to the age when I figured it would be social suicide to have posts about them online. I never mentioned them by name, at least. So now I hardly mention them. But they grew up over the time of this blog from wonderful children to fine young adults. And I have a record separate from boxes or digital files of pictures with no dates to place them in time.

Blog traffic started very low. I can still remember being happy to have at least one page view each day of a month! Over time, traffic went up to reach 100 per day. But it was a slow slog without ever really skyrocketing.

And then the Blog Die Off happened. 

Twitter's sweet meteor of death and social media in general crushed the blogosphere. My traffic, which fell by about 80% by the time I hit bottom, was no exception. Last year traffic recovered substantially. I don't know why. But I'm still not anywhere near pre-Twitter levels. We'll see if I can maintain that momentum.

I contemplated adding Twitter and social media to bolster TDR, but ultimately could not bear to enter that cesspool of intolerance. I don't regret that. 

I've tried hard to post with integrity. I have my views on politics. Which are mostly pretty obvious. But I can set that aside to comment on the national security issues of the day. I may be wrong on an issue, but I base my analysis on my education, experience, and ability to synthesize information from different sources. Don't expect me to be a cheerleader. You won't find my positions on issues changing to support "my" party in power. I've offered honest takes. Sometimes I find older posts that approach a topic from the same angle despite changes in the people on top.

I have never allowed post comments. You can check out my sources and methods section if you want to know why.

Here are twenty posts over the last twenty years, chosen from page views and other factors, in no particular order:

1. Ready. Set. Go.
2. Avert Your Eyes Puny Mortals!
3. Guiding the Objective Force Through a Desert Storm.
4. Anbar Anvil. I actually got an email from a Marine officer in Anbar province who was pleased that I understood what was going on with the Iraq surge offensive in Anbar. I was heartened by that.
5. Getting What We Deserve.
   
6. That's Their Story and They're Sticking To It.
7. You Didn't Lift That. 
8. Collateral Damage.
9. When the Ford Was Still a Blueprint.
10. The Spartans At Least Had 300.
11. Readiness Defined.
12. Great. More Housing Vacancies.
13. Um, Remember Pearl Harbor?
14. Woke Lips Sink Ships.
15. And Now For Something Completely Different.
    
16. Vengeance.
17. Catch-1619.
18. Smells Like Woke Spirit.
19. Spongespine Spandexpants.
20. They Can Always Just Eat More Pie.

Although this excludes pre-Blogger posts. I don't have statistics on them and most are just in mass monthly "posts" after I recovered them. Tragic, I know.

I'm still not suffering from solo blogger burnout. I have grown weary at times. So far I get over that soon enough. But I have adjusted my content over the years. Perhaps that is the key.

So there you go. This got longer than I intended. But it is a twenty-year retrospective! And now you know what my former students put up with and what my children endured when they asked me a history question.

Thanks for reading! We'll see how long I keep this going. I honestly never thought I'd be going this long.

UPDATE: Thanks to Instapundit for helping the celebration along (although yes, I did send word to Vodkapundit about the glorious event). Which is nice given that Instapundit first linked an entry even before I had hyperlinks.

NOTE: War coverage continues here.

The Winter War of 2022 Gets Mass Produced

Russia is grinding down Ukraine's army, inflicting heavy casualties even as Russia endures casualties to achieve this. Does this mean time is on Russia's side? 

Russia began an operational pause to regroup its ground forces.

Ukraine is struggling to push manpower into the fight even as Russia struggles, too. But Russian material superiority is making up for the manpower deficiencies so far. Russia slowly advanced while killing and destroying. Is this going to break Ukraine? 

Ukraine’s troops now face a Russian force that has shifted strategy from the hasty, single-axis attacks that characterized the early weeks of the war. Now there are no more attempts at pincer movements but instead slow but inexorable advances, preceded by massive artillery bombardments—a few kilometers every day all along the front from Izyum in the north to Zaporizhzhia in the south, tightening the noose on a fragile Ukrainian salient protecting the road network that links Kyiv to the east.

Or will Russia expand its objective from the shrunken Donbas goal to make its gains commensurate with its losses? And can that broader objective be obtained?

Do read all of the article.

We still don't have a good handle on casualties on both sides. The author says time is not on Ukraine's side. Although he also says Russian casualties aren't likely to halt Russia, at least in the short run. Which implies that time isn't necessarily on Russia's side.

Still, the author is right that this could be a war of endurance. But does Russia's 3:1 advantage in population and vastly greater GDP mean Russia has the endurance?

On people, you'd think so. But the Iran-Iraq War suggests otherwise. Iran had three times the population while Iraq had the money to build material superiority. Iran had far higher willingness to fight and die. But after years of relentless Iranian offensives, during which Iran lost twice as many troops as Iraq, Iran's morale broke. It was not so simple to say Iran could suffer 3 times the casualties. Indeed, one would have thought superior Iranian fanaticism would make the casualty endurance higher than 3:1. But that did not happen.

Can that experience apply to this war? 

Like Iran, Russia has a 3:1 advantage in population. But Russian morale as a conqueror, that is clearly not liberating people from Nazis, is not superior. This could break Russia before Ukraine. Just how do we define the transition from the short run to the long run?

What about GDP and defense spending? You'd think Russia clearly has the edge with a 9:1 GDP advantage. 

But Russia is under Western sanctions that will harm Russia's ability to go to war production levels. Russian Soviet-era stockpiles will run low in time--or reach the material and ammo almost more dangerous to Russian users than Ukrainian targets.

And Ukraine is being supplied by the West, which has an immensely greater GDP advantage than Russia's advantage over Ukraine. So you can't just count the value of the arms and services provided to Ukraine when comparing the economic advantage. You'd have to count the research and development and logistics value on Ukraine's side of the ledger that provides the weapons, supplies, and services.

So when you compare the scientific, industrial, and military effort on both sides, is Russia really superior in material?

That depends on how much of the products of the Western military-industrial complex is funneled to Ukraine. I can't rule out that the West will end up trying to give enough to defeat Russia but fail to fine tune its effort enough to deprive Russia of victory.

Certainly, the problem of plugging Ukraine into the Western military procurement and logistics system to take advantage of Western weaponry is immense even if the West reduces the limits on what is provided. Perhaps too difficult in the short run. But only if Russia can exploit that problem.

Russia may well be able to grind down Ukraine. That was my view before the war--a partial and ugly win by a Russian military not nearly as good as Russian propaganda portrayed--that left most of Ukraine independent. I was right that the war would be neither short nor glorious for Russia.

The question now is amazingly whether Russia wins. Russia initially performed worse than even I suspected and the West has armed and supported Ukraine more than I hoped. Russia could find itself the victim of that process. 

And until we see one side ground down and breaking, we may not be able to predict it.

ISW updates continue here. 

UPDATE: Per the ISW update, Russia's operational pause seems to have been prematurely ended:

The assaults are still small-scale and were largely unsuccessful. If the operational pause is truly over, the Russians will likely continue and expand such assaults in the coming 72 hours. The Russians might instead alternate briefer pauses with strengthening attacks over a number of days before moving into a full-scale offensive operation. A 10-day-long operational pause is insufficient to fully regenerate Russian forces for large-scale offensive operations. The Russian military seems to feel continuous pressure to resume and continue offensive operations before it can reasonably have rebuilt sufficient combat power to achieve decisive effects at a reasonable cost to itself, however. The resuming Russian offensive may therefore fluctuate or even stall for some time.

The pressure to advance will mean Russia has less chance to succeed. But will it preempt a Ukrainian counteroffensive?

Weekend Data Dump

Iran likes to boast of non-existent wonder weapons. Here's another.

The T-72, its modifications, and whatever the heck Iran is doing with them.

Ukraine rebuilds its navy. And yes, Ukraine did reoccupy Snake Island.

Russia is continuing the war rather than declaring victory. Ukraine has inflicted losses and purchased time. Has the West sent enough to allow Ukraine to exploit those achievements?

Putin seems to have ordered an operational pause after taking Luhansk province. Yet Russian forces continue to attack. Ukraine is striking deeper into Russian rear areas with new weapons. I wonder if that will provoke Russia into premature resumption of a ground offensive--if they even actually pause.

Destroy NATO (to build a future, perfect alliance, naturally) because opposing Russia isn't grand enough? I'm so old I remember when the lack of a unifying threat was proof NATO should be ended. Nobody ever gets their perfection after destroying the imperfect that offends them. Some people just want to see NATO burn.

Ukraine speaks of bleeding Russia's army and exploiting that to liberate territory in the south. Ukraine can't wait too long to do that. Can Ukraine prepare before Russia repairs its army enough to hold its gains?

I reject this kind of Decline Porn. Even aside from rejecting most of his litany of failure. Russia is declining. China is peaking. India is stalled. The proto-imperial European Union is weak and fragile. Who replaces America?

Our Navy command structure sank one of our capital ships. This shocks ... who?

Is Putin going to shift to taking Odessa? We'll see if the Ukrainian counter-offensive there begins first. Or if Donetsk province is easier to shift to because the Russian troops are already on that front.

As naval surveillance systems proliferate, a sensor-strike net will bring down the naval behemoths.

Suppressing actual or potential dissent in Russia.

A South Korean defense agency supports 20 more F-35As.

A Stryker brigade will rotate through South Korea instead of a tank brigade--which will leave its equipment in South Korea. Makes sense with higher demand for tank brigades in Europe.

Who goes where on NATO's eastern front.

From the Euro "Well, Duh" files.

I'm so old I remember when our intellectual and moral superiors in the Biden administration said the Taliban 2.0 would be reasonable and eager to get the approval of the sainted international community.

The multi-faceted campaign for Kherson.

Ukraine can defeat the Russian army and win the war if the West sufficiently backs Ukraine. I certainly expected Russia to grind out an expensive win before the West could even decide to support Ukraine. But Putin screwed up. And even with a retooled and narrow offensive, Russia is taking heavy casualties to make its slow advances. Talk like this threatens to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Let's not panic "face the facts" and force Ukraine to lose. Russia may hold Ukrainian territory when this is over. Minimizing that is an important objective. Whatever that turns out to be, if enough Russian troops die achieving it Russia might shrink from invading again much as Finland survived after being defeated by Russia in 1940.

The Congressional Research Service report to Congress on Ukraine's military performance.

I certainly hope Ukraine can knock the damn thing down.

Congratulations. And good luck with an aggressive China so close. FFS, the Philippines isn't "squarely on the frontlines of Great Power competition between the U.S. and China." The Philippines is the frontline of China's subliminal push to annex Filipino territory. How long can the new Marcos pretend he can negotiate away the push?

Interesting. Are we really sending too many people to prison when in the past the vast categories of people who are now in prison would have been held in other institutions not called "prisons"? Tip to Instapundit.

Yes, the federal bureaucracy is too powerful. Many years ago, Michigan had JCAR, a bicameral legislative committee that had to approve agency administrative rules. Often, agencies withdrew rules to address JCAR concerns that they did not reflect the statutes as enacted. So there were few proposed rules rejected. A record some used to wrongly claim the committee was just a needless rubber stamp. Somehow the Michigan Supreme Court ruled the process unconstitutional as a "legislative veto." Which always seemed ridiculous to me. But I'm not a lawyer.

American recruiting problems. Get woke, get broke defeated.

Russian brutality is stiffening Western resolve to help Ukraine defeat Russia.

Former Japanese prime minister Abe was assassinated. He began rearming and was a good friend to America.

With Russia forced to focus on Ukraine and Turkey under financial pressure, does Libya have chance? With an assist from the UAE.

Prime Minister Johnson resigned. He got goofy on domestic policies. But he finished Brexit (I hope). And was strong on Ukraine.

America’s new ICBM design runs into a problem.

Russia is in an operational pause to repair ground forces. But that doesn’t mean all quiet on the Russian front.

Defending Guam. And projecting power from it, of course.

January 6th: THE MUSICAL.

Americas is sending four more HIMARS and 155mm ammo, among other things, to Ukraine.

France to increase its defense budget.

Yeah, I worry less about Chinese carriers than other vessels. The Chinese carriers might be red herrings for a distracting SINKEX.  

More? How about "any?" So far I've only seen evidence that the J6 Democrats and their goodlife "Republicans" are delusional.

Week in Pictures.

Covid is now basically no more lethal than the usual flu viruses.

Conservatives celebrate America on July 4th even though only the Supreme Court and toeholds in higher education and the news media are friendly. Leftists control nearly everything and couldn't celebrate July 4th.

From the joint working group on the bloody obvious.

Vying for Allie’s in the economic war.

Japan can build warships. Why can’t America do a good job?

Gulf of Mexico pirates. What fresh Hell is this, now?

I don’t think Putin’s army can cash the check he’s writing.

One hates to say it, but by fighting so hard for Luhansk province Ukraine has given Russia a huge repair job.

Russia's offensive worked at all because of its massive artillery use. Is the U.S. Army paying attention?

"Green" EVs. 

Consider that some portion of those who disapprove of Biden's performance do so because they think he hasn't been leftist enough.

And Now For Something Completely Different

You see it all around you. Good memin' gone bad. And usually it's too late when you, realize what you had.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
This is a repeat.

 

 

 

 

 

Russia Should Not Be Appeased

Does the West need to provide Russia with a generous "off ramp" to end its war on Ukraine? No. engineering a ceasefire that "saves" Ukraine by giving Russia some of Ukraine will eventually be described as a Western betrayal that denied Russia's glorious military all of Ukraine.

French President Macron is only the most visible proponent in the West of that idea:

Macron, who had been widely criticized for recently declaring that Russia shouldn’t be “humiliated,” doubled down on that notion. He said that the harsh terms imposed on Germany after its loss in World War I had been “a historic mistake” that “lost the peace because [France] wanted to humiliate Germany.” The implication is that if Russia is not treated with leniency now, it will commit far worse crimes in the future, just as Germany did in World War II.

The author rightly points out that this assumes Russia loses the war. 

So sure, trying to get Russia to accept a generous face-saving retreat now risks taking steps that undermine the Russian defeat that is assumed. Cart, horse, and relative position, of course.

And the author writes we already saw what Putin did with a Western decision to let Russia keep what it took from Ukraine in 2014 and 2015--another much bigger war this year. Yet this time, for sure?

Seriously?

But let's take the history-based worry at face value. Was Germany humiliated after World War I, paving the way for the next war? 

I think that is a completely wrong way to frame that issue, as I explained prior to Russia's invasion of Georgia:

Russia isn't a part of the West because Russia's leaders lately have been a bunch of a-holes. Right now I'm glad we've pushed NATO east as fast as possible. Russia has a lot further to go if it ever rebuilds its military and that alone will deter the Russians. I seriously get an eerie inter-war feel for the whole situation.

You know, the common wisdom is that the Treaty of Versailles was too harsh on Imperial Germany after World War I, which led to the rise of Hitler. When you compare the occupation, dismemberment, and de-Nazification of Germany after 1945 which created a prosperous and democratic allied Germany, you have to conclude that the Allies weren't nearly harsh enough in 1918.

And since 1991, we've treated the Russians with kid gloves, and now they too think they've been betrayed and deny they were really defeated in the Cold War. Now the Russians pretend they were being reasonable and just voluntarily gave up their empire. Of course, occupying Russia and de-Commiefying Moscow was never going to happen. We didn't have much choice at the time since Russia still had lots of working nukes. But the result has been a Russia that increasingly acts like they want to be our enemy.

We need to defeat Russia. We started to do that and must finish it without worrying about humiliating Russia:

Don't let the Russian military claim it was "stabbed in the back" by failing to help Ukraine defeat Russia's invasion clearly and drive it back. And if you are worried about "humiliating" Russia by helping Ukraine defeat Russia's invasion, that's all on Putin. He can end that worry by withdrawing from his gains made this year while he still has an army willing to fight and die for him.

Any Western deal that gives Russia a partial win will eventually be portrayed by Russia as a stab in the back denying Russia their deserved complete victory.

That will guarantee another war. Perhaps directly against the West to take away Ukraine's source of weapons and support before turning against Ukraine again.

If you want an "off ramp" for Russia in a policy of defeating Russia's aggression, be prepared to offer phased ending of economic sanctions of Russia as they restore peace with Ukraine. Outside of weapons-related sanctions as long as Russia chooses to be run by the paranoid hostile nutballs that plunged Europe into war.

And in that area, as I've suggested for some time since the 2014 invasion, I'd even explore the idea of leasing Crimea to Russia on a long-term basis. I'm not sure Ukraine wants its pro-Russia (and often actual Russians) people back inside Ukraine. Why not lease the peninsula to Russia, which concedes Ukraine owns it and the mineral rights in the waters off its shores?

As dangerous as defeating Russia may seem, that is the safest outcome in the long run.

NOTE: My latest war coverage is here.

Is the Army the Master of Its Own Domain?

Is the Army dissipating its focus to the point that it won't be able to successfully carry out its core competencies of large-scale conventional warfare and wide-areas security missions in the land domain?

The Army has announced where it will base new multi-domain units:

The Army plans to establish five Multi-Doman Task Force units, with two aligned to the Indo-Pacific, one in Europe, one in the Arctic and the fifth “aligned for global response,” according to a May 31 report by the Congressional Research Service.

Siting the units is key to the Army’s modernization strategy announced in 2019 under which it intends to transform into a multidomain force by 2035.

The Army “needs to transform from its current state into a multi-domain force that can project power across all domains of warfare (land, sea, air, space, and cyberspace) throughout the world,” the environmental assessment states.

What exactly will these units be?

The Multi-Domain Task Force unit is a reorganized field artillery brigade but with beefed-up capabilities for long-range weapons fire and air-missile defense, the assessment states.

It combines intelligence, information, cyber, electronic warfare and space capabilities into a single battalion, the assessment states.

The Army is needs to control the land. I worry the Army is forgetting to focus on winning in its own land domain, as I focused on in this Military Review article.

Russia is flailing in their invasion of Ukraine. But could the United States conduct a large-scale combat operation better? 

[Consider that] the current Army has no experience conducting live LSCO above the brigade level since the invasion of Iraq nineteen years ago. There is virtually no one in the United States Army below the ranks of colonel and command sergeant major who has ever experienced an operation larger than that of a brigade. Moreover, those colonels and command sergeants major were young officers and noncommissioned officers during the invasion of Iraq and saw only their small slices of the operation, probably at company level or below. The US Army simply has insufficient experience in LSCO over time and distance to be able to expect to perform considerably better than the Russians have in Ukraine.

Do Multi-Domain Task Forces address this core competency issue?

If each service focuses on its own domain, the synergy helps all services win their own domain. I used the Guadalcanal campaign in this Land Warfare Paper to illustrate that.

It isn't bad if the Army can assist other services win their domains. But if the Army doesn't master LSCO, where does it leave land warfare?

NOTE: My latest war coverage is here.

Moby Dicks

The Air Force has long been trying to get rid of its only dedicated close air support plane designed to directly support Army troops in combat. The Air Force descended into criminality to kill the A-10, their Great White Whale.

The Air Force has a long history of pretending to want to carry out its close air support for Army units in combat, no matter what BS they have to claim to believe.

Huh: 

U.S. Air Force leadership are now accused of serious misbehavior (criminally deceiving Congress) by deliberately lying to Congress about their plans for the A-10 ground attack aircraft. The recent leaks include briefings describing how air force leaders planned to continue undermining the A-10 but deliberately sabotaging promised upgrades and sustainment (money for maintenance and operations of A-10s). The leaked documents included mention of the importance of keeping all of this from going public. That’s where the air force crossed the line into criminal conduct. 

I suspected as much from the history of the issue: "Hostage standoff: The Air Force created this F-35 problem in an effort to get rid of the A-10."

I repeated a long-held belief in this post about a novel Air Force effort to get rid of the plane:

There is a joke amongst the A-10 community that discussions of getting rid of the A-10 started 2.5 minutes after the last one rolled off the Fairchild-Republic assembly line in 1984.

The A-10 no longer needs to come in low and slow to provide close air support, the major Air Force argument against the plane. The issue is really a matter of trust:

[Admittedly, the A-10 is not the only source of fires support for the Army.] But given how dishonestly the Air Force has dealt with the A-10 issue and other support for ground forces, the Army should care very much about the Air Force commitment to providing fire support when and where the Army needs it.

It's a matter of trust that the Air Force is squandering.  

The Air Force actually proved itself to be really good at carrying out that mission over the last two decades. I respect the Hell out the service for that success. So Air Force brass dishonesty to avoid applying those skills to supporting the Army saddens and angers me.

I wouldn't mind getting rid of the aging A-10 so much if the Air Force showed any genuine interest in providing close air support to the Army with any plane with crews that are trained and dedicated for that mission and that mission alone.

But no, the Air Force would rather lie to Congress and the public in an effort to shed their role providing close air support. It's more than a crime. It's betrayal.

NOTE: My latest war coverage is here.

The "Good War" Was Good Enough

In twenty years of effort, America built an Afghanistan that in large measure rejected Islamist ideology, But our friends required American support to defeat the rejected ideology. Then we abandoned these foes of jihadis.

For all the complaints that America achieved nothing in 20 years of helping Afghanistan fight jihadis and their sick ideology, we may have made enough of the people too hard to brutalize with Islamism for long: 

[Afghanistan] is having the same problems the 2001 version had, but worse. For two decades after the 2001 Taliban were out of power, Afghanistan prospered in many ways. The economy, lifespans, infrastructure and education levels reached new highs. The [Taliban government] has reinstated many of the pre-2001 rules that turned most Afghans against the Taliban.

And we created a government that killed jihadis every day and was willing to suffer heavy casualties to do that: 

We built up Afghan security forces from scratch. We've kept the place from being a launching pad to attack our country. And Afghan security forces on our side continue to fight and kill jihadis every day with our help. Despite years of saying that their casualty rate is unsustainable, Afghan forces keep sustaining it. I'm pretty sure the enemy casualty rate is worse. [UPDATE: This is what I was thinking about: six years ago there were worries about sustaining the casualty rate. They have. And the enemy loses more.]

What we achieved was good enough:

I don't care that we couldn't forge a nation in Afghanistan. Nobody else did. Nobody else will any century soon. But we built a state that fought at our side and that should have been good enough.

Afghanistan wasn't very good. It was no Vermont. But it was good enough. Yet America screwed the pooch and chose defeat over expending the relatively small effort needed going forward because we suddenly tired of the past cost--which could not be recovered by losing.

Will we circle back to help those we abandoned and prevent the place from becoming a terrorist sanctuary again? 

NOTE: My latest war coverage is here.

The Winter War of 2022: Putin Destroys the Donbas In Order to Save It

Putin's delusions of being a new Peter the Great led him to believe his Russian legions would quickly crush the Ukrainian military and people. It didn't take long for his short and glorious war to become a bleeding ulcer that may turn down paths Putin cannot imagine. Or cope with.

Russia is ordering a stealth war economy. Although manpower shortages are not being successfully addressed. 

Putin pretty much has Luhansk province now. The war continues its bloody path, piling up Russian corpses in pursuit of Putin's glory by slaughtering Ukrainian civilians and destroying Ukraine:

Since the war began four months ago, Putin’s invasion force has killed thousands of the Russian-speaking and ethnic Russian Ukrainians they claim to be protecting. The Russian military has also reduced multiple largely Russian-speaking Ukrainian towns and cities to rubble. Unsurprisingly, the unfolding carnage has forced a radical rethink of attitudes toward Russia and transformed many previously sympathetic Ukrainians into bitter opponents of the Kremlin.

Putin insists this path verifies his greatness. Putin seems unwilling to change course:

Vladimir Putin seeks to convey an indomitable will. Here is a man who has set his course and will stick to it, whatever the obstacles in his way and the costs of overcoming them. It is an image that serves him well. It is now widely assumed in the West that he will not back down in the war with Ukraine and, if things go badly, he will lash out. Such a man must not be provoked. Yet the image is starting to fray at the edges. Behind all the braggadocio his power is slowly eroding. The symptoms of this are to be found not in a readiness to compromise on the war, which remains absent, but instead in a policy paralysis; he is pressing on with his established strategy because he can think of nothing better to do.

Putin started the war confident it would be easy. Not even worthy of being called a war--just a "special military operation." But it is a war. One that is wrecking his army. That has certainly made him mad at those who created his ill-founded belief that he had a well-oiled war machine. He'd have to be crazy not to punish those who got him into this mess, no? 

Are those people crazy enough to passively take the blame as he pushes his much-reduced killing machine forward to demonstrate his indomitable will? What will those people destroy to save themselves--and Russia itself?

ISW updates continue here.  

NOTE: War coverage continues here.

Weekend Data Dump

Even as Biden has admirably supported Ukraine's fight against Russia, Biden is undermining Western support. That's what wrongly blaming Putin for our inflation (yes, yes, it is one factor--but inflation predates the war by a lot) will do. I wonder if Biden's people want the American public to pressure him into abandoning Ukraine.

Turkey plays its UAE Get Out of Jail For a Price card.

Can NATO really increase its response force to 300,000 from 40,000?

Don't be silly, producing more energy in America would actually help people. As if mere people know what helps them!

The tug between Europe and Asia for American force deployments. Europe needs to step up. Also, note that the NATO pledge for 2% of GDP defense spending had a 2024 deadline.

Defining proxy war. I agree that "hybrid war" (and "gray area war") is a useless new terminology.

And yet the military is ejecting troops who haven't gotten the Covid-19 vaccine that won't even prevent you from getting what might be mild cold symptoms: "The Army is tossing its mandate for potential recruits to have a high school diploma or GED certificate to enlist in the service, in one of the most dramatic moves yet in the escalating recruiting crisis hitting the entire Defense Department." FFS. [Later: Never mind.]

If it isn't clear to you already, Feminism isn't pro-women. It is just the women's* auxiliary of the Democratic Party. (*But I'm not a biologist.)

Call them raging racists and focus on their use of pronouns, and difficulty recruiting is shocking?

Give that man a medal. 

The Xi Jinping Covid-19 pandemic is more than 2-1/2 years old. Didn't the Spanish Flu die out in 2 years? Is the longevity of this virus due to being engineered in Wuhan? Or perhaps are we less willing to let it go? That is, did our forebears of a century ago declare it over when it got to a similar dull roar as today's virus?

After perhaps 500,000 dead since 2011, Syria's civil war that became a multi-war is mostly over but the dangerous remnants linger on preventing rebuilding. So it could get worse again.

The Army is pushing forward on seeking a replacement design for the Bradley IFV. The demand for a "quiet" electric drive to supplement the main engine seems like Green gold plating. So I assume we'll be relying on the Bradley for a couple more decades.

The Syria template didn't work in Ukraine: "The Russian commander of forces in Ukraine, four- star general Aleksandr V. Dvornikov, was relieved (removed) for failure to do what he did in Syria. Dvornikov was the first commander of all operations in Ukraine. ... Dvornikov was free to do whatever it takes to turn the defeats in Ukraine into a victory. He was ordered to achieve a victory in eastern Ukraine by June 10th and failed."

The German Greens share responsibility with Russia for Germany's energy woes. 

There is but one response to this. 🙄 Tip to Instapundit.

It is funny that all of a sudden pro-abortion activists can define "women" and" men" because the activists want to attack anti-abortion men. Must have been a lot of teach-ins on biology.

India's plan to reduce the number of aging soldiers on the expensive pension track. Money spent on pensions isn't helping stop Chinese border aggression.

Oddly, America is below maximum: "French President Emmanuel Macron said that the United Arab Emirates’ ruler confided to him that OPEC’s two leading oil exporters are already pumping almost as much oil as they can."

Almost true: "Putin is utterly indifferent to the number of casualties his troops sustain in their ill-planned frontal attacks against Ukrainian positions in the east and south. Such a Russia cannot lose." Putin cares as much as his people can express that they care.

The planned Ukrainian counter-offensive is being planned for late summer? Giving Putin time is a bad idea. I guess Ukraine needs the time, too. And yeah, early on I looked at the south as the logical point for Ukraine's counter-offensive.

My worry did not materialize as Russia resorted to a frontal assault on the Donbas front. My hope is only in its infancy.

Compare and contrast. 

The U.S. intends to base a few hundred more troops in Poland and add a couple ships to a Spanish home port. I assume the troops will be advance team for something bigger and that the ships are missile defense ships. Although the article suggests the troops might beef up the battalion-sized battlegroup America has there. What we need is REFORPOL.

Looking at Sweden and Finland joining NATO; and Turkey's opposition. Later: Turkey will approve their membership now.

I deliberately chose my preferred name for Russia's invasion of Ukraine--the Winter War of 2022--because I figured initial Russian failures would be followed by massive firepower offensives. That has happened. Albeit on a small front. And Ukraine is resisting longer than Finland could manage. To be fair, Ukraine is getting far more Western support than Finland got.

Spain: "The presence of Russia in North African countries is increasing in a region where political instability and militant activity are spreading[.]" Who thinks the purpose of Russia's presence there isn't to spread militant activity and instability? Sending refugees to Europe is an objective.

That's how it works: "It’s a good thing Joe Biden isn’t a Republican, or every single news outlet in the world would be all over this [latest Hunter Biden laptop-based Russian hooker and dad's money] story. You wouldn’t hear anything else for weeks or months."

Russia didn't expand artillery ammunition production before the war. And even assuming they have by now don't have the production capacity to sustain their rate of fire now. Question: Will China supply the ammunition? Or let Russia weaken given certain ... ah ... issues between them?

Some reasonable--and good--lessons for the Army from the Winter War of 2022. Although I disagree that there is no conceivable role for the Army's core competencies in Asia--even if you rule out a land war on the mainland. If European NATO armies get their act together, a single American Army corps would be sufficient to tie those abilities together.

Huh. when I mentioned it earlier, I didn't get the "help the jihadis kill us" angle of that white supremacist soldier arrested before he could commit an evil act. Tip to PJ Media.

Somalia: Fake it until they make a country?

North Korea has computers. If you wonder why.

This author thinks the Republican Party "is a multipronged, fundamentally antidemocratic movement... determined to impose its policy and social vision on the entire country—with or without majority support". Now I understand "projection."

Xi Jinping promises to continue China's Covid Zero policy--with the ruthless lockdowns that requires. I appreciate his fairness in making sure the country that engineered and released the virus is hurt at least as badly as the rest of the world.

Limbo? No, they're in Hell. Or at best, they're close enough to see the flames, feel the heat, and hear the screams.

Well I'll be darned! Ignorance of the law is an excuse after all! For some, of course. Tip to Instapundit.

Welp, the Army has selected the contractor to build its light tank, called Mobile Protected Firepower. Or as I like to call it, the Future Burned-Out Hulk. I guess a Air Force C-17 can carry two. LOL! This will work just swell, I'm sure.

The territorial disputes that the Philippines has with China extends to Taiwan. But not with the same danger of shooting. 

Defending the carrier role in Pacific sea control. If we need carriers for aviation because land bases are too few and vulnerable, how do we offload some carrier aircraft missions to land bases in order to revise the carrier air wing? I'm not persuaded. I'm open to suggestions on making the air wing better (longer range) given that we have many big deck carriers. But I would slow down building them to reduce their numbers over time. We'll need them for power projection--different than sea control--for a long time. And power projection can take place against China after winning the sea control fight.

Time continues to fly by for me. It's July already! It will be snowing soon! Is the study valid? Dunno. Tip to Instapundit.

Huh. Decades ago I wrote a paper on the rise and fall of one-man grand juries in Michigan. They've been dormant for quite a long time, I thought. I had no idea the state of Michigan used them for the Flint water issue. I have no idea why it would use them. I did not--if memory serves me--cover the aspect that they failed on in court. Tip to The Morning Briefing.

The United States blacklisted 5 Chinese companies for helping Russia's military.

Much like Russia is determined to restore Ukraine to its empire, the proto-imperial European Union is persistent in trying to reel Britain back in. We'll see whether 10,000 armored vehicles or 10,000 entangling cheese regulations are more effective.

The U.S. will provide Ukraine with AMRAAM-based air defense systems.

The BBC seems to have restored its live coverage of Russia's invasion of Ukraine to its previous level.

A lot of jokes that end with the punch line "Is the Pope Catholic?" will need to be revised. I will never claim I am a practicing Catholic. I am divorced. But I don't demand my church bend its rules for me.

It looks like the price America paid for Turkey's acceptance of Finland and Sweden is an F-16 sale to Turkey. Well, we can't trust Erdogan with F-35s. And I do like keeping the F-16 production line open.

The Philippines is buying offshore patrol vessels to defend their territory in the South China Sea.

Progress to confront Iran: " Israel has joined a U.S. sponsored regional air defense network called MEAD (Middle East Air Defense Alliance). Israel is a vital component of MEAD, which includes other Middle East nations, like Saudi Arabia and the UAE that have purchased American air and missile defense systems[.]" 

Attacking Peking is futile: "If Taiwanese commanders want to put Yun Feng [cruise missiles] strikes to effective use, far better to target port infrastructure needed to support a PLA invasion fleet—piers, fuel facilities, ammunition supplies, and so forth—than to waste scarce rounds on such frivolities as attacking mainland cities."

I'm just going to note that refusing to exploit American oil deposits is a gift to Russia (Axis of One), Iran (Axis of Evil), and Venezuela (Axis of El Vil). Tip to Instapundit.

For the left, our governmental institutions and traditions are only useful if they back the left.

Does Russia's withdrawal from Snake Island mean Ukrainian agricultural exports can resume, reaching NATO waters to get through the Turkish straits? Or does Ukraine need to put air defense and anti-ship weapons there? Would Russia use its Mediterranean squadron to stop those ships if they make it that far?

Don't be ridiculous, you haters! This is good and justified racism! Tip to Treacher.

Is it shocking that when we chose to lose the war--while denying it--to the Taliban that we'd eventually pay them money? I guess ten months is a decent interval before admitting America lost the war.

The U.S., Japan, and South Korea agreed to work more closely together in the face of North Korea's nuclear missile threat. If the threat doesn't exist now, it will.

Iran simmers.

China has more territorial ambitions.

Xi Jinping tells Hong Kongers that only now under firm but brutal Chinese control do they have "true democracy." So shut up and enjoy.

Palestinian authorities "systematically torture" prisoners? No! Way! Take away their Queen of the Victims Prom tiara!

Science! "North Korea suggested Friday its COVID-19 outbreak began in people who had contact with balloons flown from South Korea[.]" 

Putin says NATO is pushing Belarus integration with Russia. That ship sailed. A Russian defeat in its invasion of Ukraine might undo all of that integration. 

I hear USC and UCLA are joining the Big Ten. How long before there are two ultra mega conferences--the Big $$ and the $EC--for all of college football?

That was then. This is now. It is amazing how many things we thought were true turn out not to be true. Exit question: Why does colonial power China get to use past control to justify present claims? 

Remember when it was horrible when a president (Trump) criticized an American government entity (the CIA) when abroad? I guess that is all okey dokey and patriotic now. Biden was hidden from the American people during the 2020 election. Now is when we need to hide him from foreign leaders.

Will Democrats again make an exception to the Senate filibuster rule just in time for Republicans to use it?

Sounds like insurrectionists, if you ask me. Their oath does not stipulate that it is null and void if your policy preferences aren't met. Conservative troops have sucked up their disappointments for decades. You people aren't special. 

LOL!

Still no indication that Ukraine is reoccupying Snake Island after driving the Russians out. Anything deployed there would be destroyed. No place to hide.

The most depressing thing in this article is that the Biden administration thinks it could score domestic political points by getting a new (horrible) nuclear deal with Iran. As if a deal is a good thing. Iran will get nukes with or without a deal, barring outside events. But with a deal the Iranian mullahs also get money.

More American military aid to Ukraine. Including larger NASAMS air defense systems and ammunition.

Should Canada be in the Axis of Evil? Tip to Instapundit.

Reaching out and touching someone: rockets become king.

Ukraine is getting more bang for the buck with its initial HIMARS to hit Russian command posts.

Russia continues to pound Lysychansk and make progress enveloping it. It won't be long before the troops fall back to another line of resistance.

How anybody can deny that the J6 Committee is a political show trial is beyond me. Via Instapundit.

I saw a picture of Russian troops with red arm and leg bands. Was the wisdom of white bands questioned?

We can't be dumb enough to let the Chinese communist bastards buy that property, right? Via Instapundit.

Even if Russia is wrecking its army, this Kargil-style attack on NATO would be within its capacity.

Is it art? No! It isn't even the flag of Japan. Modern art is rubbish that wealthy people pretend is art to distinguish their insight from the custodians who can't recognize brilliance.

Racism. White leftist racism is masked by a veneer of "caring". Via Instapundit.

"Just stop oil" is moronic. But oil paintings? Why not Hunter Biden's "art"? Via Instapundit.

Subsidies for homeless drug addicts; ignore criminal actions; and punish property owners. Enjoy. Via Instapundit.

Conservatives celebrate America without qualification. Leftists celebrate America when it obeys the Left.

And Now For Something Completely Different

Revvin' up your keyboard, listen to her howlin' clack. Plastic under tension beggin' you to touch and go. Highway to the blogosphere. Meme into the danger zone.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Preparing to Fight East

As India has pivoted away from viewing Pakistan as its primary enemy to pivot to face off against China, India has had policies starting from "Look East" moving on to "Act East." If India wants to "Fight East" to keep Chinese naval power away from the Indian Ocean, holding the line in the South China Sea would benefit from defense ties with Taiwan.

India and Taiwan are quietly strengthening their relationship:

In recent years, largely outside the headlines, India and Taiwan have quietly developed a robust economic relationship coupled with an expanding mélange of political interactions.

This is the logical result of India's increased interest in areas to the east of India.

 From India's "Look East" policy to the new "Act East" policy, how long will it be before India has a "Fight East" policy? ...

India is worried about China looming over them on land to the north; and is worried that China's navy is making inroads to challenge India's naval power in the Indian Ocean, where China's trade routes cross to the Middle East and Africa. 

An Indian military holding the line at sea in the South China Sea will help India cope with Chinese pressure on India's north and northeast:

China surely has the edge on land. But I think there are limits to how decisive any land action can be given the terrain.

Amazingly, India still hasn't corrected their dangerous deficiency in air power. 

So to compete with an escalation on land by China in the north, India would have to broaden the conflict to a sea war to cut off China's line of supply across the Indian Ocean [Link added as an UPDATE] and perhaps attack China's base at Djibouti. China's logistics to operate in the Indian Ocean would be severely tested if China sent their fleet there.

America is already building bilateral ties with regional powers eager to hold off China's subliminal war to seize control of the South China Sea. India can add their power to an existing loose coalition with similar goals.

Australia, for example, is going to built the ability to Fight North with nuclear attack submarines:

Nuclear subs indicate more than continental defense. They allow Australia to go on the offense with submarines, F-35s, and amphibious forces in support of the American Marines rotated through northern Australia and long-range American air power flying out of Australian bases.

Such a capacity will make it harder for China to hold the South China Sea. And will encourage countries such as Singapore and Vietnam to resist the Chinese. 

Nuclear submarines give Australia the power to assist distant India or Japan--and so earn reciprocal help.

India is already building a screen at its Andaman and Nicobar island chain. But Chinese nuclear subs have other paths to reach Indian home waters. Holding the line east of the Malacca Strait line will reduce China's ability to exploit their capability to rain down anti-ship ballistic missiles on Indian ports and home waters.

As the initial article says, "If the Modi government does seek to elevate ties further, U.S.-based Taiwan expert Michael Mazza notes that it has a range of available options, from combined military exercises to Track 1.5 defense dialogues, coast guard training, expanded parliamentary interactions, and clean energy cooperation initiatives."

Elevated ties with Taiwan will help India fight east to block Chinese lines of supply to Africa and beyond. It will help India battle China at sea where India has a better chance of overcoming losses on their contested border with China.

NOTE: My latest war coverage is here. Weekend data dump also has Ukraine-related entries.