This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.

Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
Interdiction means that a percentage of logistics entering the town are destroyed/disabled, or can only move under poor weather, at night etc. You don't need running water or electricity to keep a fighting position supplied, you can truck/carry in their water, ammo, etc. but if part of that is being interdicted your logistic burden is just that much higher, X% is lost, alongside Y lives per tonne needed to sustain fighting.
The Russians are naturally going out of their way to starve out every town/fighting position they can, which is often a matter of ammunition not food or water of course.
Maybe I'm being too monstrous in my imagination, but if you disabled power infra to pumping stations you'd be able to cut off potable water supply, you can't hide water trucks from satellites/drones. I guess they just don't want to appear THAT evil.
Remember these aren't civilian towns anymore, they're warzones, you're supplying soldiers in an area with enough water to survive, alongside food, ammunition, entrenching equipment etc, and taking fresh men in and the wounded etc back. If Russia could stop every truck into a given area, they would control it and quickly occupy it, it's not defensible, same for Ukraine the other way around, their effective actions around Izium mostly involved Russian units panicking as their supply lines were close to being closed and they ran for it.
For a town close to the front you use trucks, for one on the front you use MRAPs and APC/IFVs, for a fighting position on the edge of town you use runners through your trenches, but again interdiction means that you are degrading but not stopping this, which might largely happen at night, under fog etc. It's absolutely not the case that Russia can stop anything like all deliveries even to these contested areas, but it be high cost for the Ukrainians, forcing them back in the end. Here's a video (that's certainly wrong in bits, but gives you an idea) that covers one of these key town sieges: https://youtube.com/watch?v=igFrblANpQk .
Almost none of the civilian infrastructure is working, these places are wrecked, and the utility pipes are shredded. Meanwhile, Russia is trying to degrade utilities to big cities, but they can be repaired, there's some redundancy and defended by AA assets etc. If your assumption as to why Russia is moving too slowly is that they're being far too soft, that almost certainly isn't the case.
You use former agricultural drones that drop 5l plastic bottles.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link