Open Thread – 18 July 2023

Posted on July 18, 2023 by TTG

Have at it. I have a transmission to repair.

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65 Responses to Open Thread – 18 July 2023

  1. drifter says:
    July 18, 2023 at 9:52 pm

    At least you haven’t outsourced your thoughts to Daily Kos in a while.

    • TTG says:
      July 19, 2023 at 10:44 am

      drifter,

      I haven’t found much that peaked my interest there in a while. But I just found one that I think is a gem. You’re going to get it whether you like it or not.

      • ked says:
        July 21, 2023 at 2:10 pm

        one of the ideas that drew me to Col Lang’s School of Intel almost 2 decades ago was his insistence that sources & content must be assessed separately before drawing conclusions.
        critical reasoning (is it still a thing?) requires one to attack one’s own cherished beliefs while understanding the pov of the Other from within their framework (esp including culture & emotion).

  2. Babeltuap says:
    July 18, 2023 at 10:11 pm

    The money spent on Ukraine could have gone to stop black on black crime in places like New Orleans, Detroit, Baltimore and Chicago. All war zones in the US:
    https://heyjackass.com/

    But no. We can’t do that, can’t defend our borders and can’t stop homeless drug addicts. You people better wake up. All your welfare is going to dry up unless you start defending your own country and stop trying to create the same thing for other countries. They don’t want it.

    • F & L says:
      July 19, 2023 at 11:10 am

      It was a long time ago but I remember reading, during the Vietnam War era, that it was more dangerous, on a statistical basis, to live in Detroit than to serve as an American soldier in Vietnam. My dad, who served in WW2 with the USAF, told me that during the 1960s as we watched the huge domestic disturbances here, that during his service there were huge race riots in the United States which were hushed up in Stars and Stripes which was the publication most easily available to American soldiers of the time. Decades later I was able to read about the incidents he must have been referring to. However that may be, the numbers listed at your source are much higher than I knew or expected to see. Same media coverage as 1940s Stars and Stripes I guess.

    • DAVID+C+KISSINGER says:
      July 19, 2023 at 1:08 pm

      “The money spent on Ukraine could have gone to stop black on black crime in places like New Orleans, Detroit, Baltimore and Chicago.”

      Or fighting white on white crime like the January 6th coup attempt.

      https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/09/29/fact-check-meme-shows-incorrect-homicide-stats-race/5739522002/

  3. Keith Harbaugh, says:
    July 19, 2023 at 7:17 am

    TTG, might I make a suggestion:

    This really is important enough it deserves a top-level post of its own:

    https://thehill.com/opinion/technology/4101345-non-human-intelligence-schumer-proposes-stunning-new-ufo-legislation/

    There are certainly IC-related issues here.

    • TTG says:
      July 19, 2023 at 10:57 am

      Keith Harbaugh,

      I think you’re right. Maybe this issue will finally come to a head at those hearings later this month. Unless some alien technology is now the linchpin of our national defense capabilities, I see no reason to keep this stuff hidden. And I doubt any major religion would collapse if such knowledge proved true.

      • Keith Harbaugh, says:
        July 19, 2023 at 11:17 am

        As an interesting development, see this complaint from Congressman Tim Burchett, complaining that his amendment concerning civilian observations is being blocked by the IC:

        https://twitter.com/timburchett/status/1681357645259718665

        It sounds like there are two groups:

        1. Some people in the IC who are trying to keep info about UFOs or UAPs secret.

        2. Various people who have been read on to those compartments, but think at least some of the info should be divulged.

        As to me, I don’t have an opinion on what should be secret in this matter.
        That is way above my pay grade (such as it is).
        But it is certainly interesting to see the struggle between those two groups.

      • Keith Harbaugh, says:
        July 19, 2023 at 2:53 pm

        If info about UFOs and UAP is classified,
        here is a simple question:
        Who is or was the classifying authority for that classification?

      • cobo says:
        July 20, 2023 at 4:28 pm

        SECRET SPACE PROGRAM UFOS & CONTINUITY OF GOVERNMENT REVEALED!

        Dark Journalist goes in depth into the UFO “files” and what the government may be doing. He focuses closely on Continuity of Government. I find him very interesting, although his programs are long. The one I’m linking here will give you a taste of it:

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2gAhiytQNg

    • F & L says:
      July 19, 2023 at 11:20 am

      Helpfully confirms the rumours that Chucky went a bit overboard on the shots and boosters. Or maybe he eats his burgers on the rare-side straight from the ‘Mad Cow Disease Ranch and Barbecue,’ located on Highway 61 near Bermuda Triangle.

    • jld says:
      July 19, 2023 at 11:55 am

      FWIW…
      I have absolutely ZERO credence, zilch, nada, in the current existence of visiting aliens, for two reasons:

      1- Gravity wells which firmly enclose every star system in its local vicinity, and all the bla-bla about worm-holes, super-luminal travel and what have you is just hogwash.

      2- Though I don’t deny that extra terrestrial life may exists, from what we know about life evolution on Earth it is a humongous collection of “frozen accidents” exceedingly dependent on chance happenstances and LOCAL CONDITIONS, i.e. extra terrestrial life forms have absolutely no chance to match OUR biology.
      We would probably even be toxic to each other.
      https://astrobiology.nasa.gov/news/looking-for-luca-the-last-universal-common-ancestor/

      • cobo says:
        July 20, 2023 at 4:35 pm

        You might try some of Dr. Joseph P. Farrells books. “The Cosmic War” and “The Giza Death Star” might challenge some of your assuptions.

        • jld says:
          July 21, 2023 at 3:50 am

          @cobo

          No, I am talking about Science, not Science-Fiction. 🙂

          • ked says:
            July 21, 2023 at 2:24 pm

            that distinction went into the ether when marketing folk realized image & emotion manipulation was more cost-effective (& fun!) than fact.

          • cobo says:
            July 22, 2023 at 5:31 pm

            You may be placing too much faith in the supposed institution of “Science,” as opposed to the process. Working around the edges, I’m finding it less than trustworthy, please consider the peer review and PhD processes as mutual admiration societies. But, before going out into the unknown, challenge yourself to a fair consideration of Christopher Dunn’s “The Giza Power Plant.” That’s an engineer looking at the Great Pyramid from other than academic eyes. Or just don’t. I certainly don’t care.

          • jld says:
            July 23, 2023 at 2:57 am

            challenge yourself to a fair consideration of Christopher Dunn’s “The Giza Power Plant.”

            No, I won’t, the smell of horseshit is already strong enough from just the subject matter.
            Though I am not entirely “sold out” to Official Science™ and I welcome fair criticism of dumb materialism:
            https://www.ecosophia.net/beyond-thaumatophobia-3-the-end-of-the-age-of-reason/

    • Keith Harbaugh, says:
      July 20, 2023 at 7:11 pm

      Is the Air Force doing a cover-up of what it knows about UAP?

      Two congressmen, Tim Burchett and Anna Luna,
      describe how an AF general stymied their effects to talk to some under his command,
      and how the AF discourages its pilots from talking about UAP:
      https://youtube.com/watch?v=E-hCpZcVD50?t=9m04s

      Christopher Mellon gives a lengthy critique of the AF here:
      https://thedebrief.org/why-is-the-air-force-awol-on-the-uap-issue/

      He raises two notable issues:

      1. Why is it that most all the videos of UAP are from Navy, not AF, jets?

      2. With the vast capabilities the AF has for surveiling the skies,
      it strains credulity to believe all that isn’t picking up UAP,
      which are not being publicly reported.

      His conclusion, basically, is that
      the AF is covering up what it knows.
      That certainly tracks well with what congressmen Burchett and Luna described.

      • jim ticehurst.. says:
        July 20, 2023 at 10:11 pm

        Kieth Harbaugh….
        I Agree with Your Thinking about Unusual Flying Craft…That
        Are Documented Traveling Through Water Lakes,,,,Oceans…
        At High Speeds…With Ease…and Also can Fly..

        The Bible…Book of Ezekial Describes a Alien Aircraft in Detail…And The Occupants coming Out and Communicating
        with Ezekial..And Interacting With Him…
        It is Vainity to Believe we are the Only Intelligent..Living Creatures in an Infinate Universe..

        my Generation…has gone from NO TV…Crank Telephone..The
        invention of Airplanes..and Electricity….To Todays High
        Technology…and Computers that Have Rapidly Evolved
        from Vacume Tubes…Filling Giant Buildings to Micro Chips
        and Time Travel …ONE Generation..

        The Craft That Flew over us From the Pacific Oceon..West to
        East over Mountain Tops…and Tree Top High late at Nite….Moved Very Slow..Stealth…The Gound Vibrated..and It Hummed like a Turbine in a Dam…

        It Flew down the Mountain side…right Toward The New Trident Base. Right After the Nukes Arrived..

        With The Oppenheimer Option…Why Would Higher Beings..
        The “Watchers”…Not Want to Keep track of uman Events…
        Since it Seems Obvious they Have Bases Here…Probably Under Ground..or Under Water…

        I Have a Large Book Published It Documents UFO Reports..on Land..or at Sea by he Readers Digest..
        called” Mysteries of the Unknown” …For Thousands of Years..

        Ancient Civiliations..All Confirm They Are TECHNO..Developed…Among the Scattered Races Around the
        Earth After the Flood..

        It Takes a Lot of Negative Thinking.. Not to See any
        Probabilitys of The Evidence Exposed..

        It only takes One…Psychotic Moment..In a Psychotic Altered State World… For The Oppenheimer Moment..I Appreciate
        the “Watchers”…The Friendly Ones..They Know the Truth..
        JT

      • jim ticehurst.. says:
        July 21, 2023 at 11:59 pm

        The UFO Humming Sound and Vibrations Made Me think It Was Possibly Electro Magnetic Propulsion,,, Also The Whole Time of Fly By was Probably about 2 Plus Minutes,,From Hearing The Sound of its Approach ..Pass Over Head and Go on Down the Valley..
        The Strange Part after That was A Sense of Time loss…And Our Fresh Camp fire had Burned Almost Completely Down..

        Unforgettable…..
        JT

      • Keith Harbaugh says:
        July 23, 2023 at 6:20 am

        It is interesting to see the Pentagon response to the charges from Representatives Burchett and Luna:

        https://www.fox35orlando.com/news/lawmakers-claim-ufo-cover-ups-from-pentagon-military-as-witnesses-head-to-congress

        Basically,
        “Trust AARO.
        How dare you try to learn what the military personnel, firsthand witnesses, themselves have to say.”

        I.e., a filtering operation.

        It is also, frankly, absolutely disgusting how the Washington Post is ignoring all this,
        in favor of what supports its agenda.

  4. F & L says:
    July 19, 2023 at 7:21 am

    Developed by the team whose ancestor was the celebrated third Reich scientist by the name of Werner Von Drown?

    Boeing Underwater Drone XLUUV:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orca_(AUV)

  5. Whitewall says:
    July 19, 2023 at 9:16 am

    TTG,
    Your computer has a transmission?

    • TTG says:
      July 19, 2023 at 10:59 am

      Whitewall,

      No, but my 2001 Jetta does. It’s the first car we owned with an automatic. Thank the gods for Youtube videos. It’s shifting poorly and I’m going to fix it myself.

      • billy roche says:
        July 19, 2023 at 11:56 am

        Good luck. Years ago the kitchen sink needed some repair. We had no money for nuttin BUT the Readers Digest Home Repair book was available in the Library so under the sink I went. Hours later I surfaced and announced “I did it!” Problem was the cold water was now hot and turning the faucets off turned the water on. Well, we got used to it. I did some electrical work to. Lets see the red wire goes here and the black goes … no no isn’t it the other way? These days I pay the tradesman who knows what he is doing for his work. He gets money, I get a done job, life goes on. I never tried to fix a tranny. I might make it go in reverse when I put into first! Luck to you.

        • TTG says:
          July 19, 2023 at 1:30 pm

          billy roche,

          This should be a simple job, just dropping the pan, replacing a solenoid and the filter and fluid. I am not rebuilding a transmission. This is only possible because of my son’s code reader and what’s out there on the internet. Before that, I relied on 2 inch thich technical manuals. I’ve done a lot of car work, but the only thing I’ve rebuilt was an air cooled VW engine.

          I’m pretty good with carpentry, plumbing and electrical work on the house. But I ain’t ever screwing with the mail circuit box. Being the son of a tool and die maker, there’s not much I won’t tackle. Plus I’m a cheap SOB.

          • billy roche says:
            July 19, 2023 at 2:09 pm

            Ahhh, a Vdub. Bought a Beetle in Fkt in ’69. Drove it until the floor boards rusted through. I’d buy that bug again in a minute if I could.

          • TTG says:
            July 19, 2023 at 4:00 pm

            billy roche,

            It was a ’71 Super Beetle I bought used in college for $900. For our honeymoon, SWMBO and I drove it to Fort Benning (now Fort Moore) the day after we were married. Drove it cross country to San Francisco for shipment to Hawaii. Picked it up again after shipping it back to Georgia for the Infantry Advanced Course and the SF Course. Had it through my SF duty in fort Devens. Finally traded it in in Columbus, SC for an ’86 Golf. We all affectionately knew it as Old Blue. I wouldn’t mind having another one now.

          • Leith says:
            July 19, 2023 at 9:08 pm

            I had a 55 bug. Called it my 30-80 car, 30mph uphill 80mph downhill. Eventually had to rebuild the engine after I had overheated it too many times. An easy job even for my limited mechanical skills. My first wife hated it, sold it to a guy who turned it into a Baja dune buggy.

          • TTG says:
            July 19, 2023 at 9:41 pm

            Leith,

            We loved Old Blue. Both my sons still speak fondly of that car. When we got back to CONUS after Hawaii, we bought my first new car, an ’80 Rabbit. From then on the new car was always SWMBO’s and the old one was mine. The heater manifolds gave out in Georgia. That was no problem in Hawaii, but it was a cold son of a bitch at Fort Devens. Still loved it. It would plow through snow.

    • F & L says:
      July 19, 2023 at 11:12 am

      No, the new US military dropped the hyphen in “Trans-Mission.”

      Sorry TTG.

  6. F & L says:
    July 19, 2023 at 9:21 am

    If you have not indulged recently in browsing of the lrb site you might gain access to this article by Edward Luttwak due to their gracious policy of providing one or two (I don’t recall) complementary articles for interested readers who lack a subscription. If two, then his piece on Goethe in China might also interest, though it’s a bit over my head. I mention this due in small part to the interesting interview with ‘Unherd’ a link to which
    was posted at the end of the previous entry here on the 2nd strike on the Kerch bridge. It occurred to me that people may not be familiar with Mr Luttwak, and thus an opportunity to better grasp the quality of his mind and breadth of education and experience might be beneficial. I myself have decided to refrain from commenting directly on that very interesting interview for the moment. But note that on the day it was posted up to YouTube (a venue which occasionally experiences accusations of censorship) reports were that Henry Kissinger was received in Beijing, meeting with their former Foreign Minster who was not too long ago promoted to their Politburo. Former Secretary of State John Kerry is there simultaneously on the pretext, according to news coverage, of discussing remedies to the epidemic of rising temperatures all across the planet of late. There’s also ongoing scuttlebutt that the current Foreign Minster of the PRC has not been seen in public for 25 days.
    ————————
    The Honoured Society
    https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v35/n19/edward-luttwak/the-honoured-society
    Mafia Republic: Italy’s Criminal Curse: Cosa Nostra, Camorra and ’Ndrangheta from 1946 to the Present
    by John Dickie.
    Sceptre, 524 pp., £25, May 2013, 978 1 4447 2640 4
    I was infuriated by the title before I started the book. The problem is not with ‘republic’, though ‘oligarchies’ would be more accurate, but with ‘mafia’: an ugly word used only by ignorant continentali. As a child in Palermo, living in the via Villareale, a few steps from the stylish Piazza Politeama, twenty minutes by car from the splendid beach of Mondello (my father had a car, few did), I knew exactly who the continentali were: the non-Sicilians of the mainland whose inability to understand our ways was incurable, as exemplified by their belief that the members of the honoured society, l’onorata società, were mere gangsters and protection racketeers, as if the lawyer N. who lived across the street, the notary C., his cousin, and our own doctor S. would ever dream of extorting a few lire from tavern-keepers. The lawyer, the notary and the doctor were all members of the honoured society, each with his own mandamento – the command of a given quarter of Palermo. They did have strong-arm underlings to keep everyone in line, but that mostly meant clamping down on petty crime by common thieves or street-corner toughs. They were colleagues of the police on that front, parting ways only when particular outrages – the violent rape of a woman, the robbery of a protected business, or worse, acts of overt defiance towards or disrespect for the honoured society – called for much more drastic punishment than the law would have prescribed. And of course no statute outlawed the mancanza di rispetto, the lack of respect that only swift and harsh punishment could expunge. Even in these cases, however, no firearms were used and there was no outright killing: for that there was the corpo armato, which received its orders not from lawyer N., notary C. or doctor S. but from the top leaders in conclave, the cupola. I don’t remember hearing that word at the time – it could be a journalistic fabrication like so much else – but I knew there were people senior to the people I knew.

  7. leith says:
    July 19, 2023 at 10:26 am

    Someone appears to be taking out al-Qaeda-affiliated HTS zealots in Syria’s Idlib Province. Don’t know whether it’s a competing headchopper group, or Syria’s Mukhabarat, or the Kurdish YPG. But whoever it is, may they continue until HTS is decimated.

    https://npasyria.com/en/101347/

  8. JamesT says:
    July 19, 2023 at 11:16 am

    Franz-Stefan Gady is complaining that Ukraine is not using “combined arms” in an effective manner:
    “Lack of a comprehensive combined arms approach at scale makes Ukrainian forces more vulnerable to Russian ATGMs, artillery etc. while advancing. So it’s not just about equipment. There’s simply no systematic pulling apart of the Russian defensive system that I could observe.”

    I don’t see how “combined arms” is going to help the Ukies get through three belts of minefields – as soon as they drive de-mining vehicles into the first field the Russians hit it with a Lancet. I read one article about how dismounted troops need to do the de-mining because the vehicles keep getting hit by Lancets. It seems to me that those dismounted sappers will be sitting ducks for artillery.

    It seems to me that the Ukies need better EW capabilities to counter the Lancets.

    • JamesT says:
      July 20, 2023 at 12:41 pm

      According to recent article in WSJ:
      “ORIKHIV, Ukraine—Six weeks into Ukraine’s counteroffensive, Capt. Anatoliy Kharchenko and his reconnaissance company were supposed to be wreaking havoc miles behind Russian defensive lines pierced by Western-supplied armored vehicles.

      Instead, after many of the vehicles got bogged down in minefields, Kharchenko and his men are training how to advance methodically on foot, moving from one line of trees to another, faced with the prospect of taking back their country one field at a time.”

      The Ukrainians can’t use IFVs to move forward so they are going to “run between tree lines”. There are going to be a lot of Ukrainians and Russians in wheelchairs when this is all over.

  9. Barbara Ann says:
    July 19, 2023 at 1:36 pm

    Nigel Farage’s bank (Coutts) have closed his account saying “The Committee did not think continuing to bank [Farage] was compatible with Coutts given his publicly-stated views that were at odds with our position as an inclusive organisation”. Ha, even Orwell never saw Big Brother’s role being outsourced to social media censors and the banking system as a means of social control, yet here we are.

    I note the word ‘inclusive’ here is used in the modern sense of “inclusive of everyone, so long as they think and behave in the approved manner”. Very similar to the way the word ‘diverse’ is used today in fact.

    If the banks have their way a similar redefinition of the word ‘money’ will follow. One day the word will be indistinguishable from what we currently refer to as ‘social credit’ in reference to places like China.

    DeSantis is 100% right to warn that CBDC’s are “..a massive threat to American Liberty“. Even without FedCoin if we allow the banks to eject people from the (soon-to-be-cashless) financial system because of their “publicly-stated views” where does it stop?

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12314423/The-Coutts-Farage-dossier-bank-admitted-ex-Ukip-leader-DID-meet-commercial-criteria-used-tweet-Ricky-Gervais-trans-joke-Novak-Djokovic-ties-decide-odds-position-inclusive-organisation.html

    • Fred says:
      July 19, 2023 at 4:43 pm

      Barbara Ann,

      the Borg know resistance is futile. Meanwhile the general public doesn’t realize LIBOR was replaced by SOFR and European banks and currency are in deep trouble. Which makes you wonder why Yellen when to China. (It wasn’t magic mushroom soup). Crazy guy explaing at roughly the 22 min mark, though the whole thing is interesting.

      BTW won’t digital currency controlled by the ECB be grand? Imagine what Petite Justin could have done in Canada with that…..

      • TTG says:
        July 19, 2023 at 8:52 pm

        Fred,

        do you think the Kremlin borg know that their dreams will not come true? The near abroad no longer belongs to them.

        • Barbara Ann says:
          July 19, 2023 at 9:51 pm

          TTG

          There exists an opinion that the Kremlin borg are fully on board with the banksters’ Final Solution as regards our personal liberty. The theory goes that the unpleasant business in Ukraine is merely a sideshow to keep the peasants distracted while it is implemented in Russia too. Russia legalized its own CBDC last week btw. Riley Waggaman is the English language source for the little known (in the West) story of rampant globalist convergence inside Russia. For anyone interested:

          https://edwardslavsquat.substack.com/p/the-digital-ruble-its-finally-here

        • Fred says:
          July 20, 2023 at 4:33 pm

          TTG,

          Your have a faulty memory regarding my complete lack of care of what happens in Russia. The near abraod no longer belongs to them? Sounds like an American neocon dream. Who did it ever belong to and why is it a concern of the US?

          • TTG says:
            July 20, 2023 at 6:10 pm

            Fred,

            I’m well aware that you don’t give a tinker’s damn what happens in Ukraine or Russia, as long as it doesn’t affect the US. It’s an easily defended position. But Putin cares very much about Russia’s near abroad, the states of the former Soviet Union and the WTO. I doubt he wants to invade them all, but he wants to have a controlling influence over them. I think our interest in those countries exists only when they want to resist that Russian controlling interest as in Ukraine, the Baltics and most of Eastern Europe.

    • F & L says:
      July 19, 2023 at 7:42 pm

      You forgot what they did to Kanye West (“Ye”and bonus prize – Kanye & Kenya are called …. in wordplay) ??? His entire fortune was seized by either Chase or one of the other big ones. Where were your objections then?
      Do Farage and Farrago seem similar?

      Of course I fully support Nigel here and disagree with the former Queen of England’s personal bankers, Coutts. I do. I like to jest but I’m serious, I do.

  10. JK/AR says:
    July 19, 2023 at 4:11 pm

    TTG, I had to re-read your post of 5 July – Though it would appear I’ve mis-remembered your then thrust. Perhaps though what I’ll post below in my main comment may redeem some of Lee’s thinking – that conflict I think, we’ve all come to *understand was rife with espionage.

    (To Walrus – Hat Tip to your ‘Kool-Aid’ post of 7 July – Aware as “y’all are” that I ain’t posted here is quite awhile:

    https://swampland.time.com/2013/09/17/the-rise-and-fall-of-elizabeth-obagy/

    That “ISW Jr.” bit Walrus almost prompted me to post then. But not quite.)

    TTG,

    My mis-remembering your thrust was on Lee’s thinking rather than Grant’s. Ala Jen Psaki I’ll “circle back” to that : Perhaps this tome might pique your interests in a deeper appreciation of Lee’s understanding of his theater’s most basic quandary:

    https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-history-of-the-ozarks-volume-2-brooks-blevins/1131178781

    I think Lee was quite aware he lacked what his opponent had in abundance : *real time* battlefield/theater[s] intel. But his most vexing problem was that he was operating – proverbially speaking – totally in the dark. As was Richmond [Lee’s equivalent of ‘Command & Control].

    To steal & extend [back] from Senator Lloyd Bentsen, “You Jefferson Davis are certainly no Abraham Lincoln.”

    https://www.ouramericanstories.com/podcast/history/the-president-who-was-addicted-to-t-mail

    …

    I may not comment but I still read here : I pray all who hang around are well.

  11. KjHeart says:
    July 19, 2023 at 7:43 pm

    I am sure some of you saw this story?

    Ukraine war latest: Zelensky says Russia deliberately targets grain infrastructure in Odesa Oblast

    https://kyivindependent.com/ukraine-war-latest-zelensky-says-russia-deliberately-targets-grain-infrastructure-in-odesa-oblast/

    Key developments on July 19:

    Russia’s overnight attack targets Ukraine’s grain infrastructure in Odesa Oblast, injures at least 10

    US to provide 4 NASAMS systems to Ukraine under new $1.3 billion military aid package

    Russia threatens that all ships sailing to Ukrainian ports will be considered ‘military targets’ as of July 20

    Russian troops retreat from their positions near a village in the Bakhmut direction, Ukraine says

    Irish Prime Minister visits Ukraine, announces $5.6 million in humanitarian aid

    kj

    PS – Hope all goes well with the transmission TTG. That is not a small project.

  12. billy roche says:
    July 20, 2023 at 12:19 am

    IMO we will soon arrive at the question “How long can the Ukrainians sit back and take it?” That provokes another “why should they?” Last August I asked what could the Ukrainians do against a Russia air campaign that was sure t/k. The military guys on this site (who I respect) d/n reply or they said more/improved air defense. We are a year into slow but steady Russian demolition of Ukrainian infrastructure. This will not break Ukrainians. If you think so you don’t know them. It will destroy their country and raises the question “why should they accept daily pummeling by Russia and not respond in kind?” Well b/c they don’t have the missiles to so respond. Pretty groovy for the Russians eh? Stand off in safety and kick the ship out of the Ukrainians. This can’t go on. There will have to be a change and yes I know that promises to make the war more dangerous. But b/f the chorus begins I remind the singers that Russia, as in Russia, started and wars against Ukraine. It is the author of all the death and destruction. When Russia destroys and ingests Ukraine she will be stronger and will look for another former colony filled w/Nazis threatening local Russian speakers. Those who believe Putin only anticipated a “limited war” don’t know Russians – you don’t know them. The most certain way of avoiding a wider war is for Russia to accept she can no longer be an Empire. That is the entire issue. Does Europe have the will/courage to tell them NFW?

    • F & L says:
      July 20, 2023 at 4:51 pm

      billy roche,

      Progress can be measured in various ways.

      Exhibit A
      Pesni -1981 Soviet Union Songs of 1981
      https://youtu.be/DCXROVdccQc

      Exhibit B
      Proshai Alyoshka – Farewell Alyoshka – Galibri & Malik (2023):
      https://youtu.be/c0Tie3O5TD0

      Instructions:
      In exhibit A – Only watch the first 2 minutes maximum. Enough to hear the fine rendition of Nashe Partii – Our Party

      Exhibit B – watch a couple of minutes at least.

      Mr Billy Roche – do I need to say more?

      Thank you,
      Fourth and Long

      • billy roche says:
        July 20, 2023 at 9:52 pm

        She’s a pretty girl but nations change slowly. Who KNOWS what Russians think about the value of subduing Ukrainians? Make no mistake. The issue is tribal.
        I keep hoping someone who knows average Russians will answer that question. Is it important to them to dominate their smaller neighbor? They are being forced to sacrifice sons to kill Ukrainian sons. Is it worth it? Worth what??
        You see, if the answer is that they believe Ukrainians are still inferior Slavs who should be their footstool than we haven’t changed since 1900. Disheartening. Say no more.

  13. leith says:
    July 20, 2023 at 7:31 pm

    Old school clearing of Putin’s minefields by Ukrainian combat engineers using grappling hooks:

    https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F1bGQn_WcAEvv4T?format=jpg&name=900×900

    They need more mineplows or MICLICs. Or the man-portable mini-MICLICs that supposedly replaced bangalore torpedos.

  14. wiz says:
    July 21, 2023 at 4:29 am

    This guy is trying to create an interslavic language. Fascinating stuff.
    Those of you who speak a slavic language, do you understand this ?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZJa8NmeNiM

  15. English Outsider says:
    July 21, 2023 at 4:01 pm

    Stunning performance –

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0IKwdfiL24

  16. Keith Harbaugh says:
    July 24, 2023 at 12:43 pm

    Who wrote this?:

    I have suspected for a long time that
    the US has been “back engineering” UFO crash wreckage
    and deriving great advantage from that process.

    Why, Walter Patrick Lang,
    in a top-level post three years ago, dated 2020-07-25:

    https://turcopolier.com/httpswwwpopularmechanicscommilitaryresearcha33413777pentagon-ufo-program-materials-vehicles/

    That post also features comments from some current contributors.

    Col. Lang mentions the late LTC Corso.
    Shortly before Corso died in 1998 he made what amounted to a valedictory video in 1997:

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=NWg5IZgssGs?t=1m30s

    I have set that to start at 1m30s, where Corso makes what seems to me to be an extremely dubious claim, related to the invention of integrated circuits.
    You can Google
    invention of integrated circuits
    to get a more plausible story,
    that that came out of the natural development of solid state electronics (after the previous vacuum tubes).

  17. Keith Harbaugh says:
    July 25, 2023 at 4:42 pm

    Correction:
    The right YouTube link is
    https://youtube.com/watch?v=NWg5IZgssGs&t=1m30s

    I didn’t notice that the raw link already had an embedded “?” character, so I should have used an “&” character to set the time.

  18. Keith Harbaugh says:
    July 26, 2023 at 4:46 am

    If anyone is planning on watching the House Oversight hearing on UAP today,
    let me recommend that before they do that they read the opening statement of Ryan Graves:

    https://oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Ryan-HOC-Testimony.pdf

    He only talks about UAP,
    not about retrievals or reverse engineering,
    but he gives an extremely clear and helpful explanation of where we stand vis-a-vis UAP.
    E.g. Graves asserts

    There are credible reports from both military and commercial aircrew of
    unidentified objects in our military and commercial airspace occurring with regularity.

    But he goes into more detail.

  19. Keith Harbaugh says:
    July 26, 2023 at 6:44 am

    The numbered points from Graves’ statement:

    1. As we convene here, UAP are in our airspace, but they are grossly underreported.
    ….
    2. The stigma attached to UAP is real and powerful …
    …
    3. The government knows more about UAP than shared publicly,
    and excessive classification practices keep crucial information hidden.

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