Yeah, a market correction is the real worry. 
This would be huge, all of the arguments against it are pretty weak imo:
Unrelated:
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It did kill the drone
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LOL Euroland for not doing this earlier, the tepidity is just astonishing.
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The symbolism matters, I suppose, but can anyone tell me why Tomahawks are a big deal all of a sudden?
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They would have by far the greatest range of any weapon given to Ukraine.
Biden seemed scared that Ukraine would use long range capabilities to strike Moscow, or something along those lines, and it could escalate into Russia using a nuke.
Flamingos haven’t really been seen yet in meaningful numbers. There was something shot down within the last few weeks which is probably a flamingo, but I haven’t followed up on it.
Ukraine’s long range missile program has not been particularly successful. They had a very hyped long range missile program which was just never mentioned again. Its assumed that the production facility was hit and it set back the program so much that it was dropped completely.
Neptune has been successful, but that was using preexisting anti-ship missiles which were altered to hit ground targets. They started off pretty lackluster though, and didn’t cause much damage for awhile. I think flamingo will probably be similar… Or they will be sent in large salvoes and hope to overwhelm AD.
So far Ukraine has never had a long range missile really. They are now struggling with medium range missiles too: ATACMS and Storm Shadow have probably all been used up.
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Seems likely tomahawk is far off in any case. Several months? Also apparently limited by availability of land based launchers. Flamingo cost makes salvos practical, though I have heard accuracy isn’t great either. The tomahawk talk seems like a way for Trump to make noise.
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It looks like it was a flamingo:
We shot down the Flamingo. Speed 600. Altitude 100. The engine, as I said, is an AI-25TL.
Shot down by a Buk. The target is the simplest.
There’s a bunch of pics of the motherboard, engine, and other items which seem to suggest this is true, but that’s beyond me.
I think Trump has now moved from “two weeks” to an “aggressive two weeks” phase. He is hoping that the threat of Ukraine being able to hit russia’s refineries which are currently out of range will get putin to negotiate. I’d be shocked if he is right.
Trump’s messaging is all over the place in typical Trump fashion:
TRUMP ON ZELENSKIY PHONE CALL: WE’RE NOT SENDING ANY WEAPONS
TRUMP ON UKRAINE: WEAPONS ARE SENT TO NATO
TRUMP: MIGHT HAVE TO SPEAK TO RUSSIA ON TOMAHAWKS FOR UKRAINE
Trump: I may tell Putin if this war is not going to get settled, I will send tomahawks
However there are also some positive signs that something might actually be happening:
https://x.com/ChristopherJM/status/1977738053872406609
Right now Ukraine claims to make 50 Flamingos a month. They are hoping to up that to 200. So they’re still a bit off from being able to mass them, but it seems like it’s coming. If this war has proven anything it’s that cheap, scalable weapons can compete (or even outperform) advanced technology that is only available in small numbers.
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Warning: There’s a body at the end of this.
Didnt every other war also prove that? Germans had better everything. The Russians had simpler and more of them.
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My understanding is that USSR had massive production capacity which they quickly converted to the war, and they also closed the technology gap within a few years. They eventually had a larger air force and more tanks.
Technology imbalances have grown substantially since ww2. The predictions at the beginning of the full-scale invasion was that this would look similar to Iraq vs USA. Ukraine isn’t a peer to Russia in terms of production, will never match Russia in quantity, and they have nowhere close to similar tech for making advanced weaponry.
BTW I know this was not your intention, but a common russia propaganda tactic now is to state that russia, not the USSR, fought ww2.
I’m not sure how much longer WW2 is going to relevant for modern wars. It is very unlikely that wars will be long enough for manufacturing capacity to play much role in it. There won’t be time to convert production from civilian to military products. The war will basically be fought with what you’ve got at the start and can get into theater. Which is why there was so much old shit sent to Ukraine at the start of the war. This is for big ticket, high tech stuff. Obviously, low tech stuff will be easier to produce, but may still not be able to match the numbers chewed through in modern warfare.
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Yeah I think we’re at a point where a war pre-computer chips is about as relevant as a war pre-airplanes. Not sure about all future wars being short though, unless you’re talking about like Iraq where there’s a mission accomplished after the initial fighting force is defeated and then 10 years of losing the peace. In the end wars are political affairs between people and defeating the military doesn’t end hostilities between cultures.
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Good point. I think the goal will be to avoid another Afghanistan situation where we have a low level conflict that lasts for years…
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I agree, but Ukraine was supposed to be a quick conflict followed by an occupation. Russia got stuck fighting the “easy” part.
I have no idea how Taiwan will happen (if it does). One of the public war games America did was where they essentially invaded the island from the south to help retake the north. War games can do some pretty ridiculous scenarios, but still that is a very long war to prepare for.
I can imagine it is just a big game of chicken to see who will blink first. We’ll get to see just how good China’s anti-sub game is and how good our air defense game is. I don’t imagine either side are going to feel happy about how much the win/loss cost in terms of people or assets.
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I dont think America doesnt get involved if Taiwan doesn’t hold their own at the start, which is extremely questionable. Their military has tons of problems, including significant infiltration from China.
Quantity was part of it, but not unlinked.
But it was also the different approach.
The best tanks were the German Tiger 2s. Could outgun everything on the battle field. But they were complex and hard to build and they broke down.
USSR (thank you) and the US had the strategy of making simple middle of the road tanks that could be used for lots of different purposes, were easy to maintain and move around.
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