Originally Posted by lljadw

Last point :
US used chemical weapons in Vietnam and did nothing when its ally,Saddam Hussein,used such weapons against revolting Kurds .
This means that their condemnations of Assad is hypocrisy .
Turkey used chemical weapons, but Assad had not the right to do it .

I am not going to support anyone's use of chemical weapons although I would argue the US use of agent orange has probably killed more Americans than Vietnamese and I am not sure the use of defoliants is the same as a chemical weapons.

With regard to ISIS I fully support wiping them off the face of the planet by any means.
With regard to the Russia/Ukraine conflict it is a hard choice as the Ukrainians are certainly not saints, they have a lot of dubious elements operating within the Ukraine but they are not invading Russia the Russians are attacking them so I am happy to support them in this case.

Originally Posted by MontyB

I am not going to support anyone's use of chemical weapons although I would argue the US use of agent orange has probably killed more Americans than Vietnamese and I am not sure the use of defoliants is the same as a chemical weapons.

With regard to ISIS I fully support wiping them off the face of the planet by any means.
With regard to the Russia/Ukraine conflict it is a hard choice as the Ukrainians are certainly not saints, they have a lot of dubious elements operating within the Ukraine but they are not invading Russia the Russians are attacking them so I am happy to support them in this case.

I do not support ,nor condemn the use of CW ,as nothing of what I say/do not say has any influence on what is happening .Zelensky neither Putin will take any notion of what I am saying .
About Ukraine : if I was 20 and an Ukrainian, I would join the army and kill Russians .
But , I am not 20 neither am I an Ukrainian .
I am neutral and the fact that the Russians invaded Ukrainian is not a reason for me to support Ukraine .Besides my support will consist of words only .
War is not only human but a reality: peace is a transition from war A to war B .
If we had some intelligent politicians in the West, the problem would be very quickly solved. Intelligent people would use the following norm :
is a war won by Ukraine good or bad for us ?
If he is good for us ,we should remain silent and sell weapons to Zelensky ( If the US want, they could give them for free ) to make some money
If a victory of Russia is bad for us,we also should remain silent but not sell weapons to the Russians unless Putin asks for them .
But,our stupid and hypocritical politicians prefer war hysteria.
Macron because there are presidential elections in France very soon, Biden because in November there are mid term elections .
The media are telling us new fairy tales = that the attack ( without reason ) of a neutral country is a crime and than they continue with other stupidities as :moral duty, moral responsibilities, war being bad and we must have eternal peace ( WHY ? ),knowing well that this will resort in eternal war .
Ten years ago there was a civil war in Libya between the dictator Gadafi (Libya ruled by Gadafi was good for us ) and its opponents ,supported by ISIS . Because of ''moral '' considerations, Obama, Cameron and Sarkozy ( who had received money from Gadafi !) attacked him and supported de facto ISIS (the good terrorists ). At the same time,Putin was saving Syria from ISIS,not because he had any sympathy for Assad, but because Assad was good for his interests .Where was the common sense ?
In Moscow, not in Paris, NY or London .
The invasion of Ukraine is not a crime, but a mistake . So is the Western reaction and both, Russia and the West will pay for their mistakes.
That the president of the US is acting as a stupid journalist,calling his opponent a war criminal who should be liquidated,forgetting that the today's opponent is the tomorrow's ally,is something future generations will refuse to believe .

Ok moving away from the rights and wrongs of this war I have another question...

Are we seeing a shift to a new form of warfare, where MBTs, Artillery and Airpower are replaced with high-powered "personal" weaponry such as Manpads, ATGM's and drones?

Or to reference Terminator, are we seeing the rise of the autonomous machine in combat.

Originally Posted by MontyB

Ok moving away from the rights and wrongs of this war I have another question...

Are we seeing a shift to a new form of warfare, where MBTs, Artillery and Airpower are replaced with high-powered "personal" weaponry such as Manpads, ATGM's and drones?

Or to reference Terminator, are we seeing the rise of the autonomous machine in combat.

This war might be the last time we see MBT's, the armed forces around the world will use those they have, but I think these tanks are the last ones. The cost of develop and produce tanks is much higher than to develop and produce ATGM's.

The air forces will go in the same direction with using more drones so the so we will probably see more drones being developed and produced to a cheaper price tag than to produce regular military aircrafts. I am not surprised to see how the Ukrainians are using their drones. I took a closer look at the war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, the latter used drones and was successful. Drones were also used in the attack against the Saudi oil facility a while back. Israel was the first nation that used drones in a war. The Israelis used them when they militarily intervened in Lebanon, but they were used for intelligence gathering and providing the Israeli commanders with real time information about their opponents.

The only weapon system I can think of that can be autonomous are mines. They have always been somewhat autonomous, but modern mines can differentiate between different targets. Some air defense systems are already autonomous, but there is always a human who decide to let the air defense system to clear the skies. The Aegis systems are designed to do so when the human push the button. I think it would be quite bad to have completely autonomous weapon system.

Originally Posted by I3BrigPvSk

This war might be the last time we see MBT's, the armed forces around the world will use those they have, but I think these tanks are the last ones. The cost of develop and produce tanks is much higher than to develop and produce ATGM's.

The air forces will go in the same direction with using more drones so the so we will probably see more drones being developed and produced to a cheaper price tag than to produce regular military aircrafts. I am not surprised to see how the Ukrainians are using their drones. I took a closer look at the war between Armenia and Azerbaijan, the latter used drones and was successful. Drones were also used in the attack against the Saudi oil facility a while back. Israel was the first nation that used drones in a war. The Israelis used them when they militarily intervened in Lebanon, but they were used for intelligence gathering and providing the Israeli commanders with real time information about their opponents.

The only weapon system I can think of that can be autonomous are mines. They have always been somewhat autonomous, but modern mines can differentiate between different targets. Some air defense systems are already autonomous, but there is always a human who decide to let the air defense system to clear the skies. The Aegis systems are designed to do so when the human push the button. I think it would be quite bad to have completely autonomous weapon system.

During the 2003 invasion of Iraq the Challenger 2 tanks suffered no tank losses to enemy fire, although one was penetrated by an IED. This was, at the time, unprotected by Dorchester armour. The driver was injured. In one encounter within the urban area a Challenger 2 came under attack from irregular forces with machine guns and rocket propelled grenades. The driver's sight was damaged and while attempting to back away under the commander's directions, the other sights were damaged and the tank threw its tracks entering a ditch. It was hit directly by fourteen rocket propelled grenades from close range and a MILAN anti-tank missile.[14] The crew survived remaining safe within the tank until the tank was recovered for repairs, the worst damage being to the sighting system. It was back in operation six hours later after repairs. One Challenger 2 operating near Basra survived being hit by 70 RPGs in another incident.

Challenger 2 is now being up graded:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tK2y2dt8v38

and

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7HzhqGa2Mac

Will lMBT be phased out? I have no idea.

MBT's have been declared obsolete from time to time, but they are still an integrated part of the armed forces. The AT weapons have been better and better trough the time since the Second World War and a lot cheaper to produce than MBT's. The infantry can reach out and touch MBT's at a greater distances now than what they could do before. Will we see new MBT's after the Challenger, the Abram, the Leopard, the Leclerc, the Merkava, and the South Korean tank? I don't know, but we might see a development of lighter and more deportable vehicles in the future.

About the ''WHY '' of Putin's attack : there is a claim ( in Conservative firing line ) that he has terminal thyroid cancer and that a cancer specialist visited him 35 times in Sotsji and that his treatment caused his erratic behavior .

Originally Posted by lljadw

About the ''WHY '' of Putin's attack : there is a claim ( in Conservative firing line ) that he has terminal thyroid cancer and that a cancer specialist visited him 35 times in Sotsji and that his treatment caused his erratic behavior .

While possible it seems a fairly large leap to go from thyroid cancer to invading another country.
I know there were rumours last year that he was in poor health and would quit the job early this year but I think that time frame has passed.

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/rus...T6RZWKG76XYOU/

One of the big problems with this war has been the amount of misinformation being circulated, in this war Hiram Johnsons statement has been accurate, the first casualty of war is the truth.

Originally Posted by MontyB

While possible it seems a fairly large leap to go from thyroid cancer to invading another country.

One of the big problems with this war has been the amount of misinformation being circulated, in this war Hiram Johnsons statement has been accurate, the first casualty of war is the truth.

Winston Churchill once said, The truth is so precious it must be protected by a bodyguard of lies

Originally Posted by BritinBritain

Winston Churchill once said, The truth is so precious it must be protected by s bodyguard of lies

I bet he had ULTRA in mind when he said that, in this Ukrainian conflict I suspect one of his other quotes is rather accurate as well...

"There are a lot of lies going around... and half of them are true."