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Posted
7 hours ago, locodos said:

If you want a good book about the real world effects of geography (and actual analysis) I recommend Guns, Germs, and Steel.

It's worth adding that while that book is a fun read, it tends to make actual historians very angry, because it represents some shoddy research and glosses over a lot of important facts in order to support its point.

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Posted
Just now, Rimbo said:

It's worth adding that while that book is a fun read, it tends to make actual historians very angry, because it represents some shoddy research and glosses over a lot of important facts in order to support its point.

Most of those historians have TB!

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Posted
29 minutes ago, locodos said:

Most of those historians have TB!

Not really.

It's like when someone says "They won the football game because they were able to run the ball." I mean, the team was able to run the ball, and they had more points at the end, but if you understand football in any detail you cringe any time you hear this.

Posted
6 hours ago, Dahobbs said:

He has a lot of problems with citing sources for his figures. I think some of his analysis is interesting, but he has a tendency to find facts he likes without doing much to research into their sources or to verify their reliability.  

What's his Surly handle?

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Posted

Unfortunate timing of this video as it talks about Wagner and Priggy's interest to impress Putin right when the mutiny was underway. However it is a good overview of the different African nations that Wagner is currently working in. Always heard of them engaging in Africa but never visualized the full extent -- basically stretching from west to east.

 

 

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Posted
11 minutes ago, dimyh said:

Unfortunate timing of this video as it talks about Wagner and Priggy's interest to impress Putin right when the mutiny was underway. However it is a good overview of the different African nations that Wagner is currently working in. Always heard of them engaging in Africa but never visualized the full extent -- basically stretching from west to east.

 

 

Take this for what it is worth. I work quite a bit on Africa projects, mainly in the east, but we track west. They are not in Kenya. Shit, the US has a team right now doing training. We have Manda Bay. They don't have shit. 

Sudan, yes, Mali, yes, CAR, yes, but other than resources who cares in the West? 

Last I saw Ukraine has more people in DRC than Wagner, and are part of the UN mission. 

And they got their asses handed to them in Mozambique.

 

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Posted
2 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

I mean, who hasn't, brother?

Man...Mozambique...I could tell ya some stories....

Wait....I could be thinking of College Station.  Shit, I get these things all mixed up.

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Posted
29 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Wait....I could be thinking of College Station.  Shit, I get these things all mixed up.

Someone started drinking early today.

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Posted
1 minute ago, Rimbo said:

Someone started drinking early today.

Early today.  Late yesterday, whatever.

Like YOU haven't ever mistaken aggyland for a leaderless chaotic jurisdiction?  Ohh, mr. perfect over here, never mistaken aggyland for Mozambique or Somalia or Oklahoma or some shit.....

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Posted
35 minutes ago, InkaUtexas said:

Take this for what it is worth. I work quite a bit on Africa projects, mainly in the east, but we track west. They are not in Kenya. Shit, the US has a team right now doing training. We have Manda Bay. They don't have shit. 

Sudan, yes, Mali, yes, CAR, yes, but other than resources who cares in the West? 

Last I saw Ukraine has more people in DRC than Wagner, and are part of the UN mission. 

And they got their asses handed to them in Mozambique.

 

That's good to know. Was counting on the Surl correspondent on the ground to fact check this. 

At least this helps to pinpoint some of the primary locations Wagner is working so we can monitor and see if they have any struggles.

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Posted
2 hours ago, Trey3216 said:

Seagal replacing Shogun would be the Chef's Blowjob 

Pootie Poot has a weird catering, chef, cook fetish for sure 

IMG_2121.jpeg

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Posted

I would love to see their facial expressions when we play next at Kyle Field, if we wore shirts that said, "College Station:  the Mozambique of Texas"  

I'm guessing there'd be some confusion.  

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Posted
3 minutes ago, YGIFS said:

I would love to see their facial expressions when we play next at Kyle Field, if we wore shirts that said, "College Station:  the Mozambique of Texas"  

I'm guessing there'd be some confusion.  

Well they might get the flag right! 

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Posted
5 minutes ago, dimyh said:

That's good to know. Was counting on the Surl correspondent on the ground to fact check this. 

At least this helps to pinpoint some of the primary locations Wagner is working so we can monitor and see if they have any struggles.

Happy to help. And we monitor their actions. 

Mali and Sudan are the troubling ones. 

Quote

 

 

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Posted
8 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Early today.  Late yesterday, whatever.

Like YOU haven't ever mistaken aggyland for a leaderless chaotic jurisdiction?  Ohh, mr. perfect over here, never mistaken aggyland for Mozambique or Somalia or Oklahoma or some shit.....

Well, yeah. Because I never went there.

College Station, that is. Been to lots of third world countries. They're fine. B/CS? ain't touching that.

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Posted
8 minutes ago, YGIFS said:

I would love to see their facial expressions when we play next at Kyle Field, if we wore shirts that said, "College Station:  the Mozambique of Texas"  

I'm guessing there'd be some confusion.  

Why would we insult Mozambique that way?

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Posted
1 minute ago, Rimbo said:

Well, yeah. Because I never went there.

College Station, that is. Been to lots of third world countries. They're fine. B/CS? ain't touching that.

Was there for a weekend when the kiddo was competing at State Science fair. Fuck that place. Had the damn Corp (America's Russian Army) guarding the stadium and not letting parents under it during a hail storm. What a bunch of Nedemyers. 

 

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Posted
9 hours ago, SL Xpress said:

I don’t have a problem with Zeihan. I’m too declarative. It’s effective rhetorically. Passion and conviction changes hearts and minds. 

The central issue is his speculations regarding the Kerch bridge. It shouldn’t be taken seriously. He likes throwing out what ifs. It’s important to note. The video you linked is a good example. Based on what he knew in 2014 he speculated that Russian friendly areas - including Odesa that was famously founded by Catherine the Great, and the implied move of Kherson over to Russia by more clandestine means would allow Russia to shut off Ukraine access to Dnipro and the Black Sea, their grain would have no export market because it’s too low quality for Europe, the US would not have any incentive to support Eastern Europe in any kind of face off with Russia, and Germany would then be impelled to send troops through Poland to fight off Russia in Ukraine. Cue ironic laughter. 

Instead the lines of battle became static. Russia quit risking their military in excursions in Ukrainian territory. I don’t agree with his assessment that the Ukrainian military fell into a trap. But they never were as aggressive in taking back territory. Poroshenko was elected as rabidly anti Russian, then Zelensky was elected as a primarily Russian speaking Ukrainian who wouldn’t be as much of a hardliner towards Russia. And a pro Ukrainian Biden was elected president. None of which could be predicted in 2014 regardless of demographic trends. Doesn’t make them wrong or unhelpful. 

The truth is - and we’ve talked about it unpteen times before - the invasion was a massive mistake. But the crusades were a massive mistake, too. They were both carried out for the wrong reasons by zealots where what made sense was less important than the religious cause behind them. With the crusades the restoration of the Holy Land in Christian hands. With the invasion the restoration of imperial Russia and the final erasure of the historical mistake of Ukraine. But that wasn’t predictable in 2014 by Zeihan because he didn’t have enough information at his disposal. He saw any military action in Ukraine as a mopping up exercise for the final remnants of an isolated Ukraine. As far as predictions go, that’s a really bad one. 

He was right about what Russia/Putin would do but not about their incompetence or the results. 

Posted
3 minutes ago, Pescado_Rojo said:

My son is a high school swimmer. Our UIL region holds regionals at A&M every year. He's been swimming pretty regularly at UT at the Jamail center with his club team since he was 7. First time at A&M he came up and sat with me after one of his events. First thing he said was "This place is a fucking dump".

Sir, I'm going to need you to be more specific.  Do you mean the aggy swim center?  The entire aggy campus?  Collie station?  All of Brazos county?

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Posted
1 minute ago, Pescado_Rojo said:

My son is a high school swimmer. Our UIL region holds regionals at A&M every year. He's been swimming pretty regularly at UT at the Jamail center with his club team since he was 7. First time at A&M he came up and sat with me after one of his events. First thing he said was "This place is a fucking dump".

If you don’t figure it out on the first day, you’re an aggy.  I went there for bonfire my senior year of hs, because a couple of days of freedom seemed like a good idea.  I figured out I would never go to aggy within 15 minutes.

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Posted
1 minute ago, Brisketexan said:

Sir, I'm going to need you to be more specific.  Do you mean the aggy swim center?  The entire aggy campus?  Collie station?  All of Brazos county?

His initial declaration was referencing the aggy swim center but after a weekend in CS, he expanded it to include the entirety of CS. 

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Posted
8 hours ago, SydneyCarton said:

My biggest problem with Zeihan is his motherfucking ties. 

 

FYI he's gay

 

11 minutes ago, TexasEd said:

He was right about what Russia/Putin would do but not about their incompetence or the results. 

 

Name an analyst who was? Hodges and Hertling were the only ones close IIRC.

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Posted
5 minutes ago, MagicSoccerSpray said:

Name an analyst who was? Hodges and Hertling were the only ones close IIRC.

Mick Ryan (Australian army general, runs @WarintheFuture) seemed pretty dead-on about a lot of things.

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Posted
12 minutes ago, TexasEd said:

He was right about what Russia/Putin would do but not about their incompetence or the results. 

So right after Crimea and Donbas you think it was a brilliant insight to say Russia would go after the rest of Ukraine? Really?

He also got the timing and methodology wrong. REALLY wrong. In my strongest opinion he also got wrong the whole idea of Ukraine entering a trap that Russia sprung when they went down to defeat the separatists. 

There’s way more he got wrong than right, while the one thing he got right - Russia would make a play for Ukraine - was a blinding glimpse of the obvious to me. 

Again, I’m not here to debunk Zeihan. I like the guy. I enjoy his observations and how he comes to his conclusions. But he throws a whole lot of shit out there to see if anything sticks. When we talk about how amazing he is at predicting future behavior, I think it’s importaht to note he’s also shitty at predicting future behavior, because that’s not the point. He’s running what if scenarios. Specifically worst case scenarios. That’s important even if they don’t come to pass. 

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Posted (edited)
7 minutes ago, SL Xpress said:

Again, I’m not here to debunk Zeihan. I like the guy. I enjoy his observations and how he comes to his conclusions. But he throws a whole lot of shit out there to see if anything sticks. When we talk about how amazing he is at predicting future behavior, I think it’s importaht to note he’s also shitty at predicting future behavior, because that’s not the point. He’s running what if scenarios. Specifically worst case scenarios. That’s important even if they don’t come to pass. 

I give him a lot of credit for getting people to think about demographics.

Of course, I'm not really that sure that Putin is thinking about demographics in the long run, rather than greed and keeping his cronies happy and on a leash.  Xi for that matter as well - yeah, China is headed for some serious problems (and arguably has started them - the one-child policy combined with children expected to take care of their parents is causing problems as we speak).

With that said, China's men + Russian widows could solve both countries' problems.

Edited by atomheartbevo
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Posted
6 minutes ago, SL Xpress said:

So right after Crimea and Donbas you think it was a brilliant insight to say Russia would go after the rest of Ukraine? Really?

 

Except he was saying and writing that before 2014. That Russia would seek to expand and have a military presence in all the 9-11 geographic chokepoints it identified to protect the homeland. Crimea, bessarabian gap, the Baltic, Caspian sea coastal chokepoints, etc. He's not perfect but his track record is pretty good.

 

1 minute ago, atomheartbevo said:

Season 6 What GIF by The Office

2019-Head-Shot-1-scaled.jpg

 

Yeah, he's gay.

 

4 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

Of course, I'm not really that sure that Putin is thinking about demographics in the long run, rather than greed and keeping his cronies happy and on a leash.

 

It's actually one of the things he cares most about, hence kidnapping children. Putin's sponsored multiple government initiatives to increase the birthrate as he's realized it's a state killer in the long run.

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Posted
35 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Sir, I'm going to need you to be more specific.  Do you mean the aggy swim center?  The entire aggy campus?  Collie station?  All of Brazos county?

Why not all four?

Posted
10 minutes ago, MagicSoccerSpray said:

 

Except he was saying and writing that before 2014. That Russia would seek to expand and have a military presence in all the 9-11 geographic chokepoints it identified to protect the homeland. Crimea, bessarabian gap, the Baltic, Caspian sea coastal chokepoints, etc. He's not perfect but his track record is pretty good.

It's actually one of the things he cares most about, hence kidnapping children. Putin's sponsored multiple government initiatives to increase the birthrate as he's realized it's a state killer in the long run.

I'm commenting on the video provided which was used as evidence of his prescience. The video was absolutely directly after the annexation of Crimea and the installation of the thugs in the Donbas.

Prior to that Russia was in the midst of bribing Yanukovych and his cronies with billions of dollars to be another Lukashenko. If Russia had been able to successfully embed Yanukovych for life like they intended, then there wouldn't have been a need for the operations they subsequently embarked upon. 

Zeihan's expertise is geography, so of course he thinks in those terms. And yes, it has a tremendous amount of merit. No question. 

Putin cares about the kidnapping of children not only for demographics for Russia, but also because he's trying to eliminate Ukrainian identity. If demographics were truly his priority, and not the restoration of Imperial Russia, the genocide of the historical mistake of Ukraine, and the establishment of Russia as the savior of traditional values, he wouldn't be embarking upon an exercise which has had a catastrophic impact on the demographics of his country. No offense intended. There are some good points within your stance. But I don't think you're presenting them well. Talking about Putin kidnapping children and sponsoring initiatives to increase birthrates while sending hundreds of thousands of men in their prime to their death, and chasing off hundreds of thousands of the most educated part of his work force to avoid being called up, either sounds like a man who isn't prioritizing demographics, or is prioritizing them with a really stupid strategy. 

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Posted

The northern half of Mozambique is apparently a shithole.  We rented a car in South Africa, and we could pay extra to go anywhere we wanted to go except for northern Mozambique.  That was a no go.  We could drive the car through high water in Botswana, with crocodiles and hippos on either side of the truck.  That was fine.  Going north in Mozambique was verboten.

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Posted

There are ongoing speculations whether General Surovikin has been detained or not. There are plausible arguments for either variants to be true, but this is becoming increasingly irrelevant due to the fact that the longer the Kremlin drags this on, the more problematic it becomes for the Kremlin.

It shows that the Putin regime is still mainly in the dark who has been part of the insurrection and who not. We can be sure that high-ranking members of the military and the intelligence services were part of it, or at least willing to accept a certain type of "change" in leadership. It is possible that by sending ambiguous messages regarding Surovikin the Putin regime is trying to find out who around him knew something, who is supporting or distancing from him. However, this would be a rather hapless tactic, since it backfires at the (already low) morale of the Russian army and sows more distrust in Russia.

The Kremlin would opt for this tactic only when being desperate, which has been a constant since a long time. The paranoia of lame duck Putin is completely off the charts. He cannot even rely on his own intelligence services since Prigozhin has been intertwined with them as well. He can likely "trust" the incompetent duo, Shoigu and Gerasimov, because they have anyway nobody else to go to.

This also explains why Putin cannot so easily detach himself from those two. Loyalty supersedes competency, especially after a coup which is still impacting Putin's judgment, elevating incompetent people into higher spheres and by doing so increasing the frictions which led to this coup in the first place. Short: boomerang.

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Ladies, your husbands are dead.  If you didn't get a Lada by now, you're not going to get one.

 

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