Mantergeistmann
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User ID: 323
Mantergeistmann
23hr ago
Follow-up question: what do you mean by the road train stuff?
Presumably, when one driver is going above the speed limit, a bunch of other drivers will assume a line behind the first and match speed. Safety in numbers, after all - the police can't pull everyone over (unless there's a speed trap set up).
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
I also find it fascinating not just for their decision to use it as a strategy, but for the population to go along with it with (apparently) only limited coercion required.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
Hezbollah to a limited extent, but they're not what I would have considered a full governing body. Houthis, I have no idea what their infrastructure or... anything there actually is like, I will admit.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
I would like to have an electric car for commuting, but I need the all-in price on a gently used electric car to be much closer to $15,000 than $50,000 before that can happen.
I haven't looked at the market, and I'm sure it isn't there yet, but depending on your commuting distance, a plug-in hybrid may be worth considering.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
Cars I have owned: Hyundai Elantra (one step above base kit), Prius Prime (fully kitted out). The Elantra was a very solid car. Reliable, up until some of the parts that will always wear out started to wear out. Put 150k miles on it. The Prius Prime is new, and fantastic, and I love the stupid little features you get at the high trim level that I never thought I would have cared about.
Also it parks itself. Sometimes.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
It is certainly where Hamas would have placed such a facility.
Hamas seems to be the only governing body on the planet where "deliberately putting your own people on danger" is seen as a plus, not a minus. I have trouble imagining, say, the Russian populace being used as public affairs shields by Putin on such a scale and putting up with it.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
Realistically speaking, if Iran develops nukes relations between the two countries will probably just follow the India-Pakistan model.
I would argue one key difference is that geographically, Israel is small enough for a limited amouny of nuclear weapons to take out a significant chunk of the country.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
Also North Korea has plenty of artillery trained at Seoul regardless, as I understand it. I'm not sure a nuke would actually be more destructive than the conventional capabilities.
Mantergeistmann
1d ago
To this end it has been the official position of the Isreali government for decades now that a nuclear armed Iran poses an existential threat
I'm curious: is there any other set of countries where this is considered the case? I honestly can't think of another that would have a legitimate concern that some other specific country getting the Bomb would be that big of a concern.
Mantergeistmann
4d ago
I really, really miss that sparkly midnight green color for cars, personally.
Mantergeistmann
10d ago
Mantergeistmann
10d ago
One of the most fascinating protest signs that I ever saw simply said LIBERALS GET THE BULLET TOO in all-caps sharpie. To this day, I'm not even sure they were protesting.
I'm reminded of the BLM flag that was the snake with "YES WE WILL TREAD" or something similar. Like, they were protesting oppressive police by... wanting to oppress libertarians? Constitutionalists? The US Navy post-9/11? I mean, I assume they simply interpreted the entire flag as "Outgroup Flag" and didn't think about it, but still.
Mantergeistmann
15d ago
Babes at the beach, possibly.
Mantergeistmann
15d ago
If living hostages could be divided up I'm sure they'd try that.
It's like the biblical test of Solomon (or was it David) to find out who the baby' mother is, except Hamas wouldn't even wait for him to finish speaking before pulling out the saw.
Mantergeistmann
19d ago
cartel money laundering charges
I must have completely missed that... I'm assuming it was Clinton-related?
Mantergeistmann
21d ago
They've already been bombing Gaza intensively, that's not what a precision air campaign looks like.
Intensive and precision are not opposed. I'd say it looks roughly like what I'd expect a targeted campaign against a foe deliberately and firmly embedded in infrastructure to look like.
What is Israel supposed to do against the Houthis? Israel doesn't have any navy worth caring about. The US navy, bigger and better in every way, has proven totally unsuccessful at beating the Houthis or bombing them into submission.
Israel is far more willing to hit targets of vital import (pun on "port" not intended) that the US is unwilling to hit. Remember when everyone complained about how horrible the US was for hitting a fuel port, which is about as close to a military target as you can get without it being a guy in uniform? Israel is under no such constraints, and that's the sort of thing that would degrade their capabilities properly.
they're a fundamentally small power with a foreign policy that presupposes access to vast resources that don't actually belong to them. Pakistan has nukes too, Iran probably does. They're hugely outnumbered. Israel needs to get more realistic in their aspirations. They can't escalate out of this.
Weirdly, it's possible escalation is their only possible strategy. As you said, they're outnumbered and surrounded. You don't win that one by letting your opponents build up their strength, coordinate, and keep chipping away at you with rockets and low-level proxies. And if option a) is "negotiate with people who are on record as wanting us all dead", and "fight to survive"... You don't worry much about building hearts and minds with the current regimes.
Mantergeistmann
22d ago
bombing an embassy building is a hostile act towards both host country and the country whose embassy it is, but I'm pretty sure Israel was OK with that.
Given that they were already in some sort of a state of hostilities to both parties involved, I'd agree. To a lesser extent, it's not dissimilar from the allies hitting the German Embassy in Rome with a bomb during WWII. I don't know if such a thing happened, but I highly doubt anyone on any side would have made a fuss if it had.
Mantergeistmann
22d ago
So a quarter of American soldiers - who had suffered zero effects back home, other than a bit of minor rationing - still "really hated" Nazis. And that wouod be, to my understanding, before really being too aware of the Holocaust. Imagine if the Nazis had committed the same atrocities to Americans on American soil as Hamas did on 10/7.
Mantergeistmann
22d ago
If America gets to "let's stay out of it" Israel is doomed.
I mean, if Israel gets fewer precision munitions from America, that just means they'll have to use things that have a higher error ratio/cause more collateral damage. And if the Iron Dome and other missile defense systems get depleted, they'll be forced into greater offensive action. I think Israel will still come out alright, but everyone in the region including Israel will have a worse time of it than otherwise.
Mantergeistmann
22d ago
Oh, I'm not saying I have a problem with it, simply that I can see why it might be considered "fighting dirty". Granted, the RN once thought the very concept of a submarine was "fighting dirty", so...
Mantergeistmann
22d ago
I mean, most countries don't do the pager-supply-chain-explosive thing. I don't think anyone has managed to infiltrate a foreign military's boot supplier, for instance.
Mantergeistmann
22d ago
That feels similar to the difference between pro-life and pro-choice women, which I feel is likewise over-estimated, and very probably for similar reasons.
Mantergeistmann
23d ago
It also didn't help that most pandemic plans were for "high fatality, moderate infectiousness" diseases rather than "low-except-for-elderly fatality, very high infectiousness." The playbooks got thrown out very early.
Mantergeistmann
24d ago
stroad
I can honestly say this is the first time seeing that word ever used. But then again, I don't think I've ever really made a distinction between a "street" and a "road" before, let alone thought of something in between.
Given that most of their neighbors want them dead and gone, and not due to generic geopolitical tensions, that just sounds like withdrawing US support will put them in a position where their only hope for survival is to establish regional supremacy as quickly and forcefully as possible, since they really can't sustain a long-term war against a coalition. Very unstable, certainly, but better than slowly and inevitably being ground into the ocean.
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