Archive through January 14, 2025
Star Fleet Universe Discussion Board: Non-Game Discussions: Real-World Military:
Archive through January 14, 2025
Not a good idea for a submarine.
The converted Ohio subs carry 154 Tomahawks each. So in a way it has already been done. One could replace those weapons with smaller, slower, less lethal weapons. Imagine one sub off Iran's coast firing a salvo of one thousand drones.
That's why you control the drones via satellite comms from a base in the Nevada desert.
That or use autonomous drones.
Garth L. Getgen
EDIT: That was supposed to be a snarky smart-aleck comment, but in retrospect it's actually not a half bad idea.
1) " In 2023 Russia expected its 2024 government revenue to be a record $349 billion, but instead it was $450 billion" typo?
2) When does a drone become a cruise missile?
We appear to all be on the same page with regards to controlling the drones. As far as coordinating with a shore based control facility (and yes, I actually was thinking of somewhere in the Nevada desert, probably deep inside one of the mountains there), methinks there's already a workable plan available.
From what I've read, a ballistic missile submarine gets its launch orders via the following procedure...
1. XLF signal tells SSBN to come to periscope depth for incoming message traffic.
2. SSBN sends narrow band directional radio signal to satellite to let base know it's ready to receive
3. SSBN receives reply with codes for launch confirmation and any special targeting instructions.
4. SSBN sends confirmation codes for having received instructions along same narrow band, then carries out its mission.
(Thankfully, no real shot in anger has occurred.)
This is a procedure that was established back some sixty five years ago. With updated, compressed digital data streams, I can imagine something like this...
1. SSD (umm, that's "Submarine that carries Drones," not "Ship Systems Display..." 
) receives XLF message ordering them to periscope depth for drone deployment message
2. SSD sends reply message via narrow band directional radio signal to let base know it's ready to receive
3. Base sends drone launch request by unit and launch time
4. SSD makes sure there're no nearby contacts (ASW aircraft, surface ships, or other submarines) and, if clear, confirms order via same narrow band directional radio signal.
5. SSD carries out mission
Again, I'm just a dumb civvie. If any of you are Navy (especially sub crew) and are allowed to talk about it (I had a cousin who was a sonarman aboard the Ethan Allen, and as such, I know there's a LOT y'all ain't allowed to talk about ), please correct me if I'm wrong.
Mike? In answer to your question about what's the difference between a drone and a cruise missile, I can only guess (that "Dumb Civvie" thing again ) but that guess is that drones have surveillance capability that cruise missiles do not, have loiter ability that drones do not, and have target acquisition modes that cruise missiles do not. Cruise missiles are simpler systems that "Cruise in to their targets with relentless precision" where Drones are unmanned aircraft with a variety of capabilities and missions.
Again, this is just a guess...
Oh! One more thing...
On a garbage news feed this morning, there was a headline about a Ukranian pilot scoring kills on no fewer than six incoming Russian missiles. Couple questions on that...
First: Is it possible that there was a six kill mission flown. I'm guessing so, BUT how often in modern air-to-air combat has there been even two kills scored...
Second: Were these "Missiles" or "Drones" (in keeping with the good question Mike asked us all )?
Third: If these WERE Drones, what does that say about the SFB rule for the lower dogfight rating of remotely piloted fighters...
Jeff A, googling I found an article at defensemirrordotcom with some details; The F-16 had a loadout of two short range and two medium range missiles. The internal 20mm gun was used to take down the last two targets.
It is not clear if the weapons shot down were cruise missiles or shaheed drones. The article mention a speed of 650km/h, which is high for drones, but possible if they are jet-propelled, and low for a proper cruise missile.
On another topic, there was a question raised in Parliament by a Tory(conservative) mp about the state of repairs, cost estimates and just for how long the H.M.S. Devonshire would need to complete repairs.
Brilliant and detailed question concerning the nations defenses.
Just one problem.
There currently, is no ship in the Royal Navy by that name.
It was the name of a Royal Navy vessel that received serious and major damage in a James Bond movie, but not in real life.
It would be like asking what damage the U.S.S. Nimitz received during its mission in the movie “Final Countdown” while under command of Actor Kirk Douglas, during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941.
Life imitating art.
Well, first they'd have to raise the wreck from the bottom the ocean; the RN sank it as a target in 1984
You mean, forty years ago?
>> first they'd have to raise the wreck from the bottom the ocean
Sounds like very expensive repairs!
--Mike
For what its worth, the movie was:
Tomorrow Never Dies, a 1997 release, and the ship was a fictional type 23 frigate that was sunk in the south China Sea by a stealth ship owned by a master mind bond criminal named Elliot Carver.
Royal Navy ships named Devonshire, going backwards in time:
DDG commissioned in 1962 and expended as a target for live-fire exercises in 1984
CA commissioned 1929 and sold for scrap in 1954
AC commissioned 1905 and sold for scrap in 1921
74-gun ship of the line commissioned 1812 and broken up (scrapped) in 1869
Fireship 1804 (purchased merchant ship given the name and shortly thereafter used as a fireship in the Napoleonic Wars)
80-gun ship of the line commissioned 1745 and broken up in 1772
80-gun ship of the line commissioned 1710, hulked in 1740, and broken up in 1760
80-gun ship of the line commissioned 1704 and lost in action 1707
80-gun ship of the line commissioned in 1692 and broken up in 1701 after battle damage
Still, it does not excuse anyone, member of parliament or not, from making an official inquiry concerning a non existing supposed ship of the Royal Navy.
I seriously doubt the individual was asking about the 80 gun ship of the line lost in 1707.
North Koreans in Ukraine
January 13, 2025: At the end of 2024 about 12,000 North Korean soldiers arrived in Russia and, after a short amount of additional training, were sent to fight along Russian troops in Ukraine. The North Koreans were first seen in combat during December. The Ukrainian forces facing them estimate that the North Koreans have suffered about 30 percent casualties so far because the Russians were using their Korean troops for frontal assaults. There were few Russian soldiers available for such costly attacks. Most remaining Russian troops were on the defensive. Ukraine had developed attack tactics that relied on self-propelled machine-guns and other close combat weapons as well as robotic vehicles to clear minefields. Russia may eventually copy this tech but for now they urgently need more soldiers and ammunition.
North Korea announced it will send as many soldiers to Ukraine as Russia requires. North Korea has worked with Russia in the past but never to the extent that North Korean soldiers were sent to fight for Russia in Ukraine while Russia finally agreed to upgrade North Korean strategic weapons systems
In June 2024, Russian and North Korea signed a Strategic Partnership treaty that obliged each nation to assist the other in wartime. In peacetime the two nations will supply mutual aid in military matters. North Korea wants assistance in perfecting and upgrading their nuclear weapons and launch platforms, including a modern SSBN or nuclear submarine carrying ready to launch missiles with nuclear warheads. Russian has such submarines but North Korea does not, and has been trying to develop them on its own.
When the North Korean munitions arrived in Ukraine and Russian troops began using the shells, they noted two things. First, that North Korean ammunition was unreliable and lacking accuracy. Worse North Korean shells could also be dangerous to use. Some of them detonated after leaving the gun barrel and eventually some detonated while inside the barrel. At this point the Russians had to stop using the North Korean shells, which had become more dangerous for their Russian users than the Ukrainians. Meanwhile, the North Korean munitions factories were working overtime to produce new shells to replace the older ones sold to the Russians. This was a good deal for North Korea because they unloaded their older artillery munitions and were now replacing it with newly manufactured shells, at least the ones not sold to Russia.
The need for the North Korean treaty is because Russian troops in Ukraine have suffered such high losses since early 2022 that the Russian army has run out of soldiers. Russia has lost over 700,000 killed or disabled fighting in Ukraine. Many of the wounded suffered further when they found that the Russian medical system was unable to adequately treat them. This led to many thousands of desertions and millions of military age men leaving the country.
Russian leader Vladimir Putin thought the Ukraine War would be over in days or weeks. It wasn’t and is now in its third year. Unlike World War II, the Russians invaded Ukraine and are losing. Russia’s ability to continue the war is clearly less than Ukraine’s provided NATO and US support continues. The Russian government pays families of dead soldiers tens of thousands of dollars. For families in rural areas, where most of the dead soldiers came from, this amount of cash is life changing. Soldiers who were badly wounded in Ukraine get lesser amounts but still enough to greatly improve their lives. Russia is spending 8 percent of the government budget on these payments and that has reduced the anger over dead or disabled soldiers to manageable levels. These billions, plus even more spent on continuing the war, have forced the government to go into debt. North Korea also compensates the families of North Korean soldiers killed in Ukraine, but not with cash. North Korean families receive economic assistance, new housing, or medical treatments most North Koreans cannot afford.
FYEO
Attrition: Ukrainian AWOLs Alert
January 12, 2025: From the most recent Russian invasion in February 2023 to September 2024, the Ukrainian military lost 90,000 troops to AWOL/Absent Without Leave and desertion. A third of these cases were desertion, where a soldier tries to leave military service permanently. AWOL soldiers intend to return once they have dealt with whatever issue caused them to go AWOL. Ukraine is practical about this and does not punish soldiers who return after an AWOL incident. In combat, soldiers develop a strong bond with each other, which means AWOL is rare and, when it happens, the missing soldier has a good reason for it. The most combat reason is mental and physical fatigue from being in combat. In Ukraine, soldiers who have been in combat the longest are most likely to go AWOL or desert. During World War II American analysts of the combat experience found that soldiers subjected to about 200 days of combat were prone to AWOL and more rarely desertion.
A year after the Russian invasion Ukraine had to cope with a growing amount of political and military combat fatigue. For troops or civilians exposed to battlefield violence, combat fatigue is now called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD. This is a 21st century term even though the concept was first described in the 1980s. In the 21st century, more effective tools and techniques for measuring PTSD and the impact of various treatments, techniques and medications are used to deal with the problem.
There’s lots of PTSD in Ukraine, among both combatants and civilians. The presence of PTSD is obvious for military personnel but less so for civilians. For as long as there has been organized violence against civilians, this use of terror to demoralize, disorient or distract civilians has been used and abused.
The political version of all this is more accurately described as combat fatigue. This was the term for combat-related stress that was popular before the use of PTSD became common. Political combat fatigue is something Russia, Ukraine and their NATO allies have to deal with. A century ago, communist and fascists, especially the Nazis developed and used many new techniques for causing and manipulating political combat fatigue. Such techniques are now commonly used, abused and developed into more effective tools.
Nations supporting Ukraine have to pay attention to the impact of combat fatigue on local popular support for the continuing costs of providing Ukraine with weapons. Russia has been losing the war, but is currently determined to keep fighting despite the growing combat fatigue among military-age Russian civilians. That’s because those forced to join the army often find themselves sent to Ukraine with little or no training, inadequate weapons and incompetent or non-existent leaders. The result is generally death, injury, incapacitating illness, desertion or capture by the enemy. Senior Russian military and political leaders are somewhat paralyzed by all the bad decisions Russia has made and none of them is powerful enough to change the situation. Change will eventually happen but there is no timetable for such events.
Ukraine wants to end the war by re-capturing all its Russian-occupied territory, currently about 18 percent of the country. To do that it needs the timely support of NATO allies to supply the necessary weapons, ammunition, military equipment and non-military aid. Ukrainian and NATO military leaders tend to agree on what is needed but politicians are less able, or willing, to understand the requirements for victory against the Russians. There are also politicians that don’t believe there is a long-term threat from Russia and are willing to settle for a long-term ceasefire even if it means Russian continues to occupy Ukrainian territory. Western economic sanctions have crippled the Russian ability to produce the most sophisticated weapons and some Western politicians see this as a suitable justification for greatly reducing aid to Ukraine.
FYEO
Attrition: Pardons Under Fire
January 11, 2025: The war in Ukraine has cost the Russian military over a million soldiers dead, disabled or fled the country. Several million more military age men have left the country or gone into hiding while still in Russia. There are labor shortages everywhere. Employers often cooperate with their military age employees when the police or military recovery teams come looking for men to mobilize into the army. Russian men know that military service is a virtual death sentence. If you have the money, you can bribe your way into a non-combat job. The Russian economy is a mess and few families can afford bribes.
In desperation the government is seeking to mobilize over 100,000 men in prisons. The convicts are granted pardons, freed and join the military. If they desert, the pardon is revoked and warrants are issued for the arrest of the reluctant and faithless soldiers. Popular attitudes towards the use of pardons to get criminals to serve in the military are horrifying to parents of men with no criminal record. The pardoned criminals are seen as unreliable and dangerous to their fellow soldiers
For the military the situation is desperate, as the number of men willing to fight continues to dwindle. This is not a new problem, in 2023 there was growing opposition to conscription and voluntary enlistment. This has led to lowering of standards of those mobilized into the military. The standards could only be lowered so far before the number of partially fit men now subject to conscription or mobilization into the military reaches the point where the unfit outnumber the fit and the medical expenses for the partially fit men becomes more than Russia can afford. Normally, men with HIV, Covid19, poor vision, diabetes, cancer and susceptibility to strokes were not taken into the military. Then they were and that meant more medical expenses for the military and problems finding useful work for the partially fit in the armed forces.
Many healthy Russian military age men have found ways to avoid military service, including obtaining false documents about their medical condition, bribes to conscription or mobilization authorities or simply illegally leaving the country. With partially fit men now eligible, the bribes and illegal migration will continue as will popular opposition by families of men being taken into the military. This widespread opposition is something the government cannot ignore indefinitely.
Meanwhile the government continued making large cash payments to non-criminal men who would join. That appealed to men from rural areas, where incomes were lower. In the cities and urban areas employees received higher pay and men there were opposed to trading their comfortable lives for life in the military.
FYEO
Morale: Corruption Conquers All
January 11, 2025: The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine failed as a military effort but was successful at creating many new opportunities for corruption. This included Russians of all types. At the high end, senior officials at the Defense ministry were outrageously corrupt and did little to hide it. These men were safe in the knowledge that if any of them were prosecuted, they could bribe their way out and still have a lot of money left.
The current round of corruption scandals began in mid-2024 with the arrest of a Russian deputy defense minister. Then the head of the ministry’s personnel directorate was hauled into court. Within weeks more arrests were made. All those detained faced charges of corruption, which were usually denied. The arrests started shortly before President Vladimir Putin began his fifth term on May 7. 2024 as a longtime ally, longtime Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, was demoted.
This immediately raised questions about whether Putin was reasserting control over the Defense Ministry amid the war in Ukraine, whether a turf battle had broken out between the military and the security services, or whether some other scenario was playing out in Moscow. To many this seemed to be a return to the Russian government long described as a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.
Corruption scandals are not new and officials and top officials have been accused of profiting from their positions for decades. Corruption in Russia is used to encourage some officials, while prosecutions punish those who do not collaborate. Corruption is used to encourage officials to remain loyal to Vladimir Putin or one of Putin’s associates.
Then there is the blackmail technique. Putin prefers officials with embarrassing secrets. When selecting key officials in his government Putin selects the ones most vulnerable to blackmail. Putin wants subordinates who have a secret they want kept secret. The Russian government constantly searches for such secrets so it can threaten to publicize them if the officials do not do as they are told. This hidden secret policy and tolerance for corruption are the key elements in running the current Russian government.
Since 2022 the Ukraine War has led to much larger defense spending that has increased opportunities for graft. In 2021 the Russian defense budget was 2.7 percent of GDP but in 2024 it was six percent. Over the next few years the government plans to spend 30 percent of the government budget on the military.
Earlier in 2024 the first official arrested for corruption was a former Deputy Defense Minister who presided over military-related construction projects that had high priority, access to lots of money and few financial controls. One of the projects was the reconstruction of the devastated Ukrainian port city of Mariupol. The Ukrainians held out for a long time and the Russians had to fight hard to capture a city of ruins and unusable factories and port facilities.
The recent arrests are not described as part of an anti-corruption campaign but rather ongoing activities throughout the Russian government. That’s another way of admitting that corruption was everywhere and ongoing as an essential element of making the government work.
Key officials make little effort to hide their new wealth. They do this through ostentatious displays ranging from hundred million dollar yachts to new wrist watches that cost several times their official annual salaries. These displays of stolen wealth by senior government and military officials and their family members were so extensive and obvious that it enraged Russians who were suffering economically because of the cost of the war.
There were more personal costs because nearly a million Russian soldiers have been killed, disabled or disappeared in Ukraine since early 2022, and their families and friends blame the Russian government because it was Russia that invaded Ukraine, not the other way around. During World War II, the last time Russia was invaded, there was little corruption in part because 13 percent of Russians died in that war. Most of them were killed by the Germans but many were killed by the Russian government in order to maintain loyalty.
After 1941 prompt obedience to orders was a matter of life or death for Russian soldiers and civilians because military officers and NKVD secret police personnel could kill any Russian displaying reluctance or refusal to carry out orders. The desperate situation during World War II limited opportunities for corruption. The war in Ukraine is different but as many corrupt officials are discovering, not different enough to keep them out of prison or an early grave.
The recent arrests, prosecutions and imprisonment of senior officials who were corrupt, or too obviously corrupt, has sent a message to all senior officials in jobs giving them access to the swollen defense budget that is now 6.7 percent of GDP. Before the invasion it was 2.7 percent. Putin thought the invasion would quickly overthrow the Ukrainian government. That did not happen and the costs of that war are more than Russia can afford. This is nothing new, it was decades of spending 15 percent of GDP on defense, and tolerating a lot of corruption by senior officials, that caused the Soviet Union to collapse in 1991. Many Russian economists and bankers believe another economic collapse, similar to what destroyed the Soviet Union, is possible unless the increased defense spending is restrained along with the growing corruption.
FYEO
Logistics: Many Ships Few Missiles
January 10, 2025: Back in the 1990s the U.S. and Chinese navies both experimented with using TRAM, or Transportable Re-Arming Mechanism for reloading the Vertical Launch System or VLS cells that are now the standard on U.S. warships.
Back in the early 1980s American warships began using VLS cells to carry the many different types of missiles which ships used for attacking other ships, defeating air attacks, and bombarding land targets. Since 1982, nearly 12,000 VLS cells have been installed in 200 American and foreign warships. The most common VLS user is the American Burke class destroyer, with 90 VLS cells. There are currently 74 Burkes in service and by the 2030s there should be over 90 of them. At that point there will be over 8,000 VLS cells in all those Burkes.
The first ships to get VLS also received a strikedown crane so the cells could be reloaded at sea. By the 1990s new types of missiles were too heavy for the strikedown crane and it wasn't practical to install a larger and more powerful crane. Moreover, there were few opportunities for reloading the missile cells at sea anyway and the strikedown crane was omitted in new ships. This provided space for 3-6 more missile cells. Another problem was that going to a port to reload VLS cells meant a whip was unavailable for several weeks.
After 2010, it became obvious that navy missiles capable of intercepting ballistic missiles were now more essential because Iranian and North Korean anti-ship ballistic missiles became a growing threat. This meant ships had to fire more missiles for missile defense as well as other tasks like anti-aircraft, anti-ship, anti-submarine, and land bombardment. It became increasingly likely that a ship would run out of some types of missiles.
That meant ships had to get replacement missiles during cruises for their empty VLS cells. The problem was that most of the missiles were too heavy and unwieldy to be loaded while the ship was at sea. This eventually led to TRAM, which works because of its articulated crane that can keep a replacement missile canister stable enough. Tests found that the stability remained even with winds up to 50 kilometers an hour and waves up to 3.2 meters high. TRAM has worked in tests and by 2025 but TRAM was tested at sea in various sea conditions and found to work well enough to be installed on ships that needed it.
In the 1990s China had also developed a system similar to TRAM but decided they didn’t need it because they were developing ground-based anti-ship ballistic missiles that could fire at American warships far out to sea. China had a satellite constellation over the Pacific that tracked all ship movements 24/7. China expects to spot and destroy most of the U.S. Navy warships in the Western Pacific before they can get anywhere close to China. The Americans expect to use their SM3 anti-missile system against incoming Chinese anti-ship missiles. Most American navy ships are armed with SM3, which has also shot down space satellites. SM3 is launched from VLS cells and is one of the several kinds of missiles that TRAM will reload at sea.
In 2024 the U.S. Navy used dozens of SM3s to take down Iranian missiles fired at Israel. A similar number of SM3s were used against Iran-backed Yemen Houthi rebels firing missiles at ships in the Red Sea. Over 700 SM3s have been produced so far and the manufacturer has resumed production to replace missiles used and to build up a reserve. The navy also has a program to extend the use life of SM3s while also upgrading them. Missiles have a fixed shelf life and after ten to 20 years the missiles must be refurbished or scrapped. Currently the navy plans to refurbish SM3s into the 2030s.
Meanwhile the army is transferring some Patriot Missile systems to the navy where they are used on ships to augment the SM3. The Patriot PAC-3 missile has shot down missiles, including the hypersonic ones China is introducing in an effort to get past the SM3 interceptors.
China has intelligence ships that monitor American missile tests in the Pacific where Kwajalein Island has long been the center of missile testing. China knows what the American missiles can do and is constantly developing countermeasures. The U.S. has an advantage in that their SM3 and Patriot missiles have lots of combat experience. Chinese troops haven’t been in combat since 1979, when they fought combat experienced Vietnamese troops in a brief border war. The Chinese lost.
FYEO
Leadership: Ruinous Russian Tactics
January 9, 2025: In Ukraine Russia has found that their usual infantry tactics were not working. This is the first war Russia has fought since World War II against an equally armed and trained opponent. Russian troops have fought against irregulars in Afghanistan, Chechnya, and a few other places. In Ukraine Russia was up against trained soldiers who knew how to make attacking enemy infantry take heavy casualties. Russian commanders quickly learned that their troops were not very effective against well-trained opponents. From the start of the war three years ago, Russia has taken heavy casualties as they constantly attacked, or counter-attacked, to take and hold onto Ukrainian territory. Most to almost all of these suicidal attacks were done so troop commanders could demonstrate their obedience and due diligence in attacking to President Putin, who tends to fire or kill military leaders who do not adequately demonstrate such qualities. After three years Russia had lost a million men killed, disabled or deserted. Russia has run out of infantry, at least for such costly frontal assaults. Russia recently imported 12,000 North Korean soldiers and those won’t last long at the rate they are already taking casualties. To make matters worse the war had changed in unexpected ways.
Ukrainian troops were the first to realize that cheap quadcopters and locally manufactured fixed wing drones were more effective than guided bombs, artillery and mortars. The drones came in many varieties but the two most common were those designed to find a target and those carrying explosives that hit the target precisely. The recon and some of the attack drones had built in video cameras that transmitted video to the operator a few kilometers away. The drone operator used a headset that covered his eyes so he could see the video from the drone. The operator could look down at the control tablet he was holding to send commands to the drone. These are called First Person View or FPV drones. When there was a lot of jamming, the operator of a FPV attack drone could rely on a guidance system that switched to homing in on the selected target without any intervention from the operator. Another fix for the jamming is to use a shorter range drone controlled via a fiber optic cable. Plus, if you know where your target is, you can just give the GPS coordinates to the drone and the explosives will be delivered. The Russians also have these drones. The Ukrainians came up with a solution to troop losses during an attack. Ukraine developed a number of mobile, remotely controlled vehicles that, in conjunction with air support from drones can effectively carry out an assault without using soldiers. There are armed soldiers behind this mechanized attack, to deal with any enemy stragglers or to deal with enemy troops willing to surrender. While several of the remotely controlled vehicles used machine-guns, others laid mines and at least one of the vehicles looked for and removed enemy mines. In Ukraine most lines are laid on the surface rather than buried. This makes the mines easier to emplace and easier to clear when the war is over. The current combat use of mine clearing vehicles is proving that the concept works.
Ukraine plans to carry out more of the mechanized assaults. Russia may develop countermeasures, as they did for drone warfare, Despite that the drones are still effective, even though you lose more of them to enemy countermeasures. Starting in 2023 the proportion of casualties inflicted by drones in the Ukraine war soared to more than those inflicted by artillery, and in 2024 an outright majority of all casualties have been inflicted by drones.
Currently there is no effective defense from these FPV attack drones, and that’s why these drones cause most of the casualties in Ukraine. Over the last few decades the cost of the FPV drone systems components have come way down, while the size of these components is smaller and more reliable. Overall, the new FPV system made it a lot cheaper to inflict casualties and that had a devastating effect on troop morale. Once you saw or heard the FPV drones you either found a place to hide or became a casualty. Ukraine considers the attack drones rounds of ammunition which are cheaper and more precise than artillery shells. There is still a role for artillery when it comes to destroying structures or blocking access to a road interdiction fire. But when it comes to deliberately causing casualties, drones are the weapon of choice. That’s why Ukraine built 100,000 drones a month in 2024 and expects to nearly double that in 2025.
FYEO
BUYING GREENLAND
Turns out, this is less ridiculous and far less impossible than it was thought only a few days ago.
New polls show a strong majority of Greenlanders want rid of Denmark, not least because of a recently erupted scandal that Denmark did naughty things to hold down the Greenlander birth rate a few decades ago. Those same polls show at least a big chunk of Greenlanders would like to be part of the USA on some basis and you can combine this with a majority who want independence with some kind of serious trade/security links to the USA.
Each year, Denmark pays about $591 million to subsidize Greenland. Danish taxpayers are really tired of this. They think that (at the least) the Greenlanders must agree to give up the "pristine wilderness" vision and allow serious development of oil, gas, rare earth minerals, and strategic metals so that this development can fund Greenland.
Most Greenlanders want independence from Denmark and even the Greenlander government is willing to talk to the USA about something less than US ownership but including US security and "responsible" US development of resources.
Greenland has only 56,865 people and more than a few talking heads have suggested that if Denmark agreed to let Greenland go the US could simply pay every Greenlander a million dollars and own the island outright, making back the money ($57,000,000,000 that is to say, fifty-seven billion) from economic development.
I suspect the fishing in the EEZ more than offsets the annual subsidy.
My understanding is that Greenland is more like Nova Scotia Inuit than Iceland Nordic Blondes.
Mike, your information regarding the polls in Greenland was totally out of date. What I posted was accurate.
You are correct that there are no vikings in Greenland. They are what we grew up calling "Eskimos".
I had the opportunity to watch some of Hegsteff's (Spelling?) senate confirmation hearing. I have to say I was disappointed in the senators I heard as their questions seemed to be fixated on "gotchas" as opposed to earnest inquiries about his suitability for the position. Hegsteff is a combat veteran, and I have respect for that when it comes to his view on women in combat and little respect for a senator who will likely never hear a shot fired in anger at her, much less outgoing, but she has her axe to grind and wants OTHER women to bear the horrors of combat which she will not
Be very careful. The Political Swamp is very, very close.
Jean
WebMom
If confirmed, Pete Hegseth would be the least-experienced Secretary of Defense or Secretary of War in the history of the United States. Senators with political gotchas or no, he has never run an organization with more than a couple hundred people. What he *did* do was to run two veterans advocacy groups - Vets for Freedom and Concerned Veterans for America - into the ground.
He might make a fine company commander, but he has not credibly demonstrated an ability to head the Department of Defense. And that's not a slam; we've had plenty of very militarily successful officers who would not translate well into that job.