Ship Building...

I think I have found the issue...

"The acceptance tests found serious problems with the steering, electrical system, damage control, anchor control, and helicopter facilities."

Your too picky!

As long as the ship doesn't 'sink' like the recent North Korean Ship launch did..... thats a Bonus!!


In all serious though - is it 'quality control' just went out of fashion in the West?

The 2 RN 'Carriers' had problems - some serious (Prop vibrations on the PoW) and some less serious.

So it's not just a US problem.

Dare I say we need to go back to the drawing board and ensure the Engineers/Builders stay in control of everything - and not Politicans and Accountants?

Might take 5 years to get 1 good Shipyard.... and the rest will then follow.

Hopefully.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Tuesday, January 06, 2026 - 05:02 pm: Edit

Peace Deal for Ukraine about to be signed??

UK and France agree to put Troops on the ground to help protect the Ukraine.

..... and Greenland now under threat?

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Tuesday, January 06, 2026 - 08:21 pm: Edit

Threat? Nah, we’re gonna liberate Greenland from Danish oppression.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Tuesday, January 06, 2026 - 09:09 pm: Edit

Indeed.

Note the following Danish policy inflicted upon the population in Greenland…

Quote:” In the 1960s and 1970s, the birth rate of the indigenous population in Greenland underwent a dramatic decline, dropping from one of the highest in the world to near-replacement levels.
Key Statistics by Decade
Early 1960s (Peak Fertility): The crude birth rate was exceptionally high, peaking at approximately 48.8 births per 1,000 people in 1960 and 1961. During this time, the total fertility rate (TFR) was roughly 7 children per woman.
Late 1960s to Mid-1970s (Sharp Decline): The birth rate plunged significantly following the implementation of a Danish-led birth control campaign known as the "Spiral Campaign" (Spiralkampagnen).
1965: 44.3 births per 1,000.
1970: 24.7 births per 1,000.
1974: 17.5 births per 1,000.
Late 1970s (Stabilization): By 1975, the fertility rate had leveled off to approximately 2.3 children per woman. The crude birth rate reached a low of 16.4 in 1975 before slightly increasing toward the end of the decade.
Context of the Decline
The rapid decrease was largely attributed to the Spiral Campaign (1966–1974), during which Danish health authorities fitted approximately 4,500 Greenlandic Inuit women and girls—nearly half of the fertile population at the time—with intrauterine devices (IUDs), often without their full knowledge or consent. This policy aimed to limit population growth to reduce social and modernization costs for the Danish government.”

Source: Google.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Tuesday, January 06, 2026 - 09:19 pm: Edit

Sounds like what the US and Canada did to First Nations people, what the New Zealanders did to Maoris, what the Australians did to aboriginals. I'm sure somebody else did it, somewhere else.

By Ryan Opel (Ryan) on Tuesday, January 06, 2026 - 09:38 pm: Edit

Paul,

The restriction for New Zealand was no nuclear anything. The US refuses to acknowlege the information that a US warship is or is not armed with nuclear weapons. We still don't acknowledge if that is true.

It's a fairly safe bet, IMHO, that US carriers stationed in Japan likely had nuclear weapons on-board when in Japanese waters. Once we got rid of our conventional powered CVA a CVN took it's place.

US Air Force bases in Okinawa probably had nuclear weapons stored there. BTW, Okinawa wasn't returned to Japan control until 1971.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, January 07, 2026 - 09:54 pm: Edit

Today, the USCG and military seized two Russian shadow fleet oil tankers on the open sea. Russia is not happy. DISCUSS ALL YOU WANT.

The vice president of Venezuela has been sworn in as president, and the ministers of defense and interior (police) remain in place. They have agreed to cooperate with Trump, who says that the US will supervise the sale of 30-50 million barrels of oil, impounding the money for the rebuilding of the Venezuelan economy. DISCUSS ALL YOU WANT.

ICE agents in Minneapolis were extracting one of their cars from a snowbank when a woman (who had harassed and verbally insulted the agents for hours) tried to run over some of them with her car. She was ordered out of the vehicle but ignored the order. An ICE agent fired his weapon in self-defense, killing her. While justified, the shooting has been labeled illegal by opponents of Trump. Their reasoning is that if ICE hadn't been there doing their jobs this would not have happened. NO FURTHER DISCUSSION OF THIS SHOOTING.

By Mike Erickson (Mike_Erickson) on Wednesday, January 07, 2026 - 11:03 pm: Edit

Isn't this the part where Russia nukes us?

--Mike

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Wednesday, January 07, 2026 - 11:21 pm: Edit

Two tankers down, fourteen left to go (from the bunch that were in Venezuela the night Madura was arrested.)

At least one of the two tankers seized was on its way to Russia (apprehended when roughly between Iceland and the Orkney Islands.)

If you were the captain of a sanctioned vessel, where would you make for? Cuba? China? iran?

By Mike Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 08:14 am: Edit

"impounding the money for the rebuilding of the Venezuelan economy" As long as the money isn't funneled to some administration insider...

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 11:29 am: Edit

How long before Russia starts putting Marines on those tankers? They have about a hundred tankers, at ten Marines each I think Russia can spare a thousand troops. What happens when a Russian sub torpedoes a Coast Guard cutter? (There are reports that Russia had said a sub was guarding one of the seized tankers.) Just one of those big carrier-killer torpedoes would vaporize a cutter.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 11:43 am: Edit

The Tankers...

...all one can hope for is common sense prevails.

However, I think this will be very difficult to discuss without going into Politics.

i.e. Is the seizing of a Foreign Flagged vessel in internalational waters - Legal or Piracy?**

Just because Nation X says it is being used to break sanctions - does not make it legal and equally just because Nation Y says its ship was doing legal things - does not make it illegal.

I think there are enough news stories going round which can prove or disprove pretty much anything (biased news issue) to make this even more difficult to disucss?

** - I don't think anyone knows - but the 'winner' in 50 years time will tell us.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 02:35 pm: Edit

It is legal, at least the last two were. According to "international maritime law" (a collection of treaties, agreements, and UN things, not just a vague unwritten concept) all tankers (and other cargo ships, fishing vessels, anything bigger than a pleasure boat) must be registered. The two tankers seized had false registrations, one in Guyana (which said the registration was fake) and the other in Panama (which cancelled the registrations legally when the US asked them to). Unregistered cargo ships can be seized by anyone, THAT IS THE LAW. Russia claims it added them to the Russian registry (which they had avoided doing as this makes the ships a target for legal seizure based on sanction violations, but by then they already had become targets). However, changing the registration requires specific legal steps which had not been taken and which could not be taken (and would not have blocked seizure). Russia is threatening to just detach its registry from the international registry, removing any requirement for them to take those specific steps but also making the ships "unregistered" according to every other nation on the planet.

So, Howard, that question was answered before you asked it. The seizures are legal. There is no question, no difference of opinion. It's just the law that every nation owning ships agreed to decades ago.

You might want to study things before you simply declare that because you are ignorant on the issue it must be that the US did (or might have done) something illegal. Or you could just ask if anyone can explain the law, rather than questioning whether any such law exists. It does.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 03:25 pm: Edit

Information Warfare: Potent Palantir
January 8, 2026: Palantir Technologies is a defense firm that does not provide the military, or commercial customers with anything. Palantir provides insights, knowledge and rapid updates on any situation they are tasked to monitor. Palantir is currently valued at over $400 billion. Financial analysts say that Palantir is overvalued. Palantir’s civilian and military customers believe Palantir is well worth what its software services provide.
The Ukraine War is notable for all the novel new weapons that quickly evolved. The drones and electronic warfare and special operations methods were all tangible and understood. Palantir software systems used a lot of statistical analysis and Artificial Intelligence/AI to keep track of forces on both sides. Initially this involved developing a data collection and analysis system to accurately predict where the Russians will attack next and how to deal with that most effectively. This is nothing new as similar systems were used nearly two decades ago in Iran and Afghanistan by American forces to successfully predict where roadside bombs were and the location of those manufacturing and placing these bombs.
The new system is based on the work done since the 1990s by Palantir, one of the pioneers in this field, especially its use of Predictive Analysis. This is a system that uses known data on the enemy to develop estimates of what they will do next. This sort of thing has been around for a long time and became more useful as more data became available and new software allowed that data to be analyzed and acted on in real time.
Now such systems can not only predict but also show what the enemy is doing right now and recently. NATO is involved because they have the financial resources to get this done quickly and Ukraine is at war where the new system can be tested realistically. Palantir AI software has also been used to improve how the Ukraine government supplies and supports combat operations, including aid for refugees and reports from refugees of Russian activities. This includes where supplies are stored, particularly fuel and munitions. Misbehavior by Russian forces is also important to document, and it too goes into databases for use in locating as-yet unknown bodies of victims and identifying individual perpetrators for suitable attention. Massacring civilians and rape are considered war crimes. Worse, such activity is considered newsworthy and quickly covered by the media in countries not responsible. For the nation that is responsible, it’s a troublesome public relations problem that never completely goes away. This is what Russia has been dealing with since it invaded Ukraine, plus the suitable attention already given to some of the many perpetrators.
For nearly a decade the American military has been using software incorporating AI to select targets for air strikes for a human to approve or modify. In most cases the air force personnel assigned to check what this software finds discover there is nothing requiring modification. In 2023 the software-based target selection system was able to quickly identify 85 targets in seven different areas in Iraq and Syria. This use of enhanced mission planning software has been around for a short time, but the concept has been around for decades until technology and software capabilities reached the point that such systems became reliable and useful.
While some civilians regard AI enhanced target selection as a nightmarish and improbable effort, the reality is that it works for the troops whose lives depend on it. Success in using the AI based software for target selections is being expanded to include other types of intelligence collection. The fact of the matter is that the AI-based system can make accurate decisions more quickly than human analysts. Human operators must constantly monitor this process to watch out for errors. Some of those problems were caused by faulty software which is ultimately created by human software engineers. There are always humans in the loop, either directly or indirectly.
U.S. Central Command, while responsible for American operations in the Middle East, Central Asia, and some parts of South Asia, has regularly used algorithms to help decide the state of these regions and what actions the United States should take.
Central Command began using Project Maven's computer vision systems in real campaigns after Hamas' surprise attack on Israel during October 2023. Israeli intelligence was criticized for not detecting the Hamas operation. Israeli intelligence did detect the Hamas plans, but Hamas devised a deception that persuaded the Israelis that there was no danger. Successful deception and surprise are one of the most effective military techniques if you can make it work. Hamas made it work, assisted by several senior Israeli officers and politicians who underestimated what Hamas was capable of.
Project Maven scrutinizes large quantities of video and still photos of a combat zone, or potential combat zone, looking for patterns that identify or indicate the possibility of combat or violence occurring. The AI bases system is trained to detect such possibilities and provide warnings of attacks or unexpected military or militant movements. The October 2023 Hamas surprise attack was the sort of thing Project Maven could have convincingly predicted. More so than the politically polished Israeli intelligence analyses that did not indicate any dangerous actions by Hamas.
Project Maven can monitor trouble spots in the Middle East, Ukraine, and the Far East where North Korea remains an unstable threat. In combat situations, Project Maven can determine where targets are and what impact attacking them would have. Project Maven can also examine past combat situations, if there is enough visual and textual data available, and clarify what happened, how it happened and how that contributed to the outcome. This is a form of predicting the past, which is a standard tool for determining if a prediction system will be accurate and used in situations that have not taken place yet.
Currently there are several active combat zones in the Middle East and Ukraine that would be more effectively monitored with a system like Project Maven, while also using Project Maven to see how useful Project Maven would have been in predicting if these situations would occur and how they will develop in the future. Project Maven doesn’t predict the future but can provide likely future developments. Compared to current intelligence prediction techniques, Project Maven would be faster and incorporate actual outcomes to develop a real-time prediction of how these events are likely to evolve. Intelligence organizations already try to do this manually and have done so for a long time. The results have often not been timely enough or accurate enough to be useful to combat commanders or even planning staff. Having an AI give the same warning that humans give also provides intelligence officials a little bit more credibility with their civilian bosses impending trouble.
With Project Maven the combat commanders and their intelligence staff personnel can quickly evaluate actual or potential combat situations and do so in real time, or at least quickly if potential situations are being examined and evaluated for useful predictions. Project Maven will also strive to overcome the old problem of no combat plan surviving contact with the enemy. Warfare has two sides, and Project Maven strives to better understand what the enemy is likely to do.
One lesson of military history is that while enemy reactions to your moves are difficult to predict, it would be a major advantage if you could come up with accurate estimates of future reactions by the enemy. Experience has shown that such estimates, at least accurate and useful ones, are nearly impossible to achieve. Project Maven will try to overcome that problem.
Project Maven is still in use but the results are kept secret. If actual or potential enemies know what Project Maven is predicting they will do, the enemy will change their plans. This has always been a problem with intelligence work, but Project Maven does it in more detail and can change predictions in real time to adapt to changes in enemy activity.
Project Maven may prove to be a major new intelligence tool, or maybe not because there may be unexpected pitfalls. You’ll never know unless you try and then you may find yourself reminded of the ancient ironic expression; may you live in interesting times.

FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 03:26 pm: Edit

Morale: Putin Cronies Want Peace
January 7, 2026: While Valdimir Putin insists Russian forces will continue fighting until Ukraine is once more part of Russia, some of his close associates favor peace. There are not just rumors about Putin, but also his key associates, like Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Recent rumors had Lavrov secretly trying to get peace negotiations going and end the Ukraine war. Other Russian diplomats have been ordered by Putin to try and make a deal, but none have succeeded.
The Ukraine War is the most ruinous one for Russia since World War II, which Russians call the Great Patriotic War. At least thirteen percent of the population died in that war, nearly 30 million Russian soldiers and civilians. That war lasted nearly four years and soon the Ukraine War will have lasted longer. While most Russians still believe that Ukraine should belong to Russia, many are beginning to have second thoughts about continuing the war. Over a million Russian men have been killed, disabled, or are missing in Ukraine. Over a million additional Russian men have left to avoid service in Ukraine.
Western economic sanctions and the growing costs of the war have bankrupted Russia. Recently Russia was not able to pay troops stationed in Ukraine. That was not an isolated incident. The government is no longer offering large cash bonuses to entice men to join the army and die in Ukraine, or death benefits to their families. Russia has obtained the services of 15,000 North Korean soldiers and is negotiating to obtain a similar number of Cubans. These soldiers have to be paid, but if they are killed, no Russian families will be in mourning or angry about not receiving death benefits.
Russian civilians have much more to worry about. The economy is a mess; inflation is rising and there was a labor shortage until the growing economic problems caused many enterprises to shut down. Many Russians are protesting not the invasion of Ukraine, but the impact it is having on them and family members. The Russian government overreacted, as it tends to do, arresting thousands of Russians for casual comments about the son of a friend who might be sent to Ukraine. When the Russian government decides that there is too much dissent among the public about the war, even if it’s not criticism, arrests must be made and the people must be made to understand that all Russians support what is being done in Ukraine. Most Russians do, but the government believes that rounding up and punishing a few thousand people will inspire everyone else to keep quiet.
It should be no surprise that the families of businessmen/oligarchs and government officials are also unhappy. Even some of these families have lost men in Ukraine, where many sons served as officers. A growing number of Russian officials are responding with more corruption. Never underestimate self-interest. The Russian war effort always had some corruption, and the government did little to suppress it. That would be bad for the morale of government and military officials. It seems the only senior people who still support the war are shrinking, because of age-related deaths, elderly officials. These men fear that if Putin dies, and he has recently appeared ill, there might be another time of troubles as has happened many times before in similar circumstances. That will be the result of having too few friends and too many enemies and nations unfriendly towards Russia. That’s a growing list.
Two years ago, Russia added longtime neighbor Norway to the Russian list of Unfriendly States. The addition of ancient friendly neighbor Norway increases the number of official Unfriendly States to 49. Since then, the number has increased to fifty. Most nations on the list wonder why they are considered unfriendly to Russia, despite years, or even centuries, of friendly relations. The only nation on the list that has a reason to be unfriendly to Russia is Ukraine. Russia invaded Ukraine in early 2022, in an effort to absorb Ukraine into Russia. Ukraine prefers to remain independent and points out that, as a member of the UN, Russia agreed, in writing, to respect the independence of other UN members. There are over a dozen other nations on the unfriendly list that used to be part of one Russian empire or another. Russia thinks of these nations as unfriendly just because they openly oppose becoming part of Russia.
This violent history with Russia and the Soviet Union played a major role in Ukraine and Belarus insisting on independence when the Soviet Union fell apart in 1991. Many Russians saw this Ukrainian independence as a temporary condition, something they went to war over in 2022 and openly declared they will do to other unfriendly nations that were once part of one of the many Russian empires. Several of those unfriendly states are now members of NATO. This organization has 31 members, soon to become 32 when Sweden joins. Ukraine wants to be member 33.
The NATO alliance worked because its members, collectively, constitute the largest economic and military capabilities on the planet. Russia, especially leader Vladimir Putin, feared that NATO would somehow become a military threat. That was never NATO’s intention, and the coalition has lasted so long because it stuck to its role as a defensive alliance. Some Russians, like Putin, see NATO’s ability to constrain Russian attack options as a form of coercion and hostility towards Russia. Similar misconceptions are common throughout history and often a cause of war. The Russian invasion of Ukraine and the Russian justification for that is one such example of this perverse logic. The expansion of NATO membership after the Cold War ended was seen as essential for nations near Russia to survive and that assessment proved correct. That’s why long-time neutrals like Sweden and Finland suddenly sought to join NATO. Collectively, NATO is a huge organization in terms of population and military capabilities and becomes more useful the larger it becomes. As a defensive organization it reduces military spending for members and increases national security. The cost of running NATO is miniscule, as is the annual cost to members. Efforts to establish a similar defensive organization in East Asia have increased as the Chinese military threat grows. China is not seen as unstable and prone to aggression as Russia, but neighbors of China detect ominous changing attitudes inside China that warrant considering an Asian version of NATO.

FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 03:26 pm: Edit

Information Warfare: Centralized Data Crisis
January 7, 2026: There is a debate going on in many military organizations about whether it would be better if data were centralized and kept secure from enemies, or potential enemies, or be widely distributed to units that can quickly use it. In peacetime the tendency is to centralize data so it's easier to protect. In wartime you quickly discover that centralized data is a problem waiting to be solved as rapidly as possible.
Data is a key element in warfare. Possessing, protecting, dispersing, accessing and determining who gets what, when and how are all crucial elements. Success in combat is often a matter of who is better prepared to obtain and distribute information to those who need it most. Over the last century the military has gained access to more and more sensors. Radar, sonar, radio, surveillance satellites, drones and battlefield sensors are among the increasing number of ways to obtain data.
As the military has gained more ways to obtain information, the flood of data becomes a problem if you can’t distribute it to those who need it most. Warfare has always been about getting information and then getting it to those who need it in time for the information to have an impact. Warfare has always been an information war, but currently the flood of information from so many sensors creates a mass of data that has to go somewhere. That’s the data crisis, who gets what when. There have been several efforts to deal with this problem and how it influences combat operations. In wartime this isn’t a problem because data handling methods that don’t work often gets your own people killed. In peacetime you have to suggest, argue and even pull rank to get data handled efficiently. There are existing programs that help with that. One is CALL/Center for Army Lessons Learned.
A fundamental element in improving ground operations is analyzing past battles for what went right and what went wrong. The U.S. Army Center for Lessons Learned has been around since the 1980s, and U.S. commanders use it to determine what works in combat and what doesn't. This is more important than ever in the 21st century, where urban combat and counter-insurgency conflicts dominate. In urban warfare and counterinsurgency, the potential for mistakes to be made is exponentially larger than in conventional, large-scale warfare.
Instead of hogging their experts, the US Army takes the data collected and analyzed at the CALL and supplies it to allied armies in the hope these allies will use this information. This sharing is more than just a gesture of goodwill. This does not always work, especially in countries where corruption and reluctance to change makes it difficult to make changes that will improve combat effectiveness. This cultural resistance was encountered in Iraq and Afghanistan but not in Ukraine, where the Ukrainians adapted while their enemy did not.
CALL is divided into several major sections. The first collects data from previous engagements by interviewing and visiting with units in the field. This section is tasked with discovering issues and areas of needed improvement in doctrine, training and readiness. The Analysis Section deals with evaluating the data collected and assessing the methods needed to improve effectiveness and combat efficiency. Finally, the Information Integration Section is responsible for processing and distributing the suggestions and findings from the previous two departments.
CALL is sometimes seen by other branches of the Army as a group of desk-bound analysts, but their suggestions and changes implemented in counterinsurgency and urban warfare tactics played a major role in maximizing the effectiveness of American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Persuading the local military to change was often less successful.
Without something like CALL, doctrine and tactics rarely change. On-site CALL operatives visited nearly every single major combat zone in Iraq, Afghanistan, Israel and now Ukraine. CALL personnel also spent significant time with Iraqi Special Forces and were an integral part of the development process for the country's military and police. CALL analysts also report on who is accepting and acting on their advice and who isn’t.
FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 03:34 pm: Edit

Musing out loud, if Russia wanted to put a "security team" on some or all shadow fleet tankers, what would it consist of?

I picked 10 people and admit it was arbitrary.

I would think at least two should be sailors familiar with maritime machinery the procedures.

I think you would need a shoulder-launched anti-aircraft missile launcher with half a dozen reloads.

I think you could do with a 14.5mm machinegun on some kind of pintel mounting.

Other than that, AKM or AK74 rifles and maybe the squad machinegun equivalent.

The team leader would have to be someone with mature combat judgement, maybe a wounded combat veteran given a cushy assignment to rest up before returning to Ukraine. This would probably have to be an officer as the Russians don't really have sergeants. More likely to find a naval officer available than a combat veteran army officer.

By Paul Howard (Raven) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 04:53 pm: Edit

By Eddie E Crutchfield (Librarian101) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 04:56 pm: Edit

I remember several years ago I sailed on the Queen Mary out of New York going to England. As we were leaving, just about the Statue of Liberty a small launch pulled up to the Queen Mary and 3 men in full combat gear came aboard, about 1/2 hour later 1 of them came back out and left by the same launch. Wondered for the next 7 days as I wandered about the ship who were the real passengers and who were there for other reasons.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 05:23 pm: Edit

Howard, you are just flat wrong. It is legal under international law, as I cited. Anyone saying it isn't legal (such as Russia) making a false statement for political reasons.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 07:30 pm: Edit

Talking about security teams on shadow fleet tankers all really depends on the mission, its parameters, and honestly, the risk verse’s benefits analysis.

If the mission is covert export of sanctioned oil via secret barter agreements between The exporter (Russia) and the importers (North Korea etc.)

Then, low visibility, paying off politicians and bureaucrats to “look the other way” is in all cases superior to arming the ships

Seems to have worked for years since 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

What changed is the western democracy nations for various reasons have changed their collective positions.

Partly due to Putin’s erratic behavior, partly the realization that if Russia does (eventually) defeat Ukraine, other former Warsaw Pact nations (Poland, Bulgaria, Romania etc etc etc…) become targets of Putins efforts to reassemble a U.S.S.R. Successor empire.

Just putting a 10 member security team on board the shadow tankers would not stop any NATO nation sea forces from taking the tanker, assuming they commit sufficient force to overwhelm the defenders.

After the losses the Ukrainians have inflicted on Russia’s navy, it is an open question as to if Russia could effectively protect the shadow tanker fleet … certainly the few remaining operational submarines could sink some ships, perhaps even shoot down some helicopters…

Not sure if Russias submarines have the ability to damage or destroy high performance jet aircraft to the same level of effectiveness that NATO or U.S. navy submarines.

It just might end up that Putin (or who ever takes over after Putin accidentally shoots himself in the back twenty six times or takes a dive into an empty cement swiming pool (in January…) concludes that Russia is better off at peace than losing a war they cannot win.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 09:12 pm: Edit

FURTHER INFORMATION on the Minneapolis shooting. I will remind you there will be NO DISCUSSION here.

The woman in question had been harassing ICE agents for some time as they legally proceeded to do their jobs. Certainly, protesting their actions was legal and very American; interfering in their actions was not legal. (Reports vary on how long this went on, and the investigators are building a timeline.) Just prior to the shooting, she had used her car to deliberately block ICE agents from doing their jobs. Having ignored her ("Letting her do her thing.") for some time (why make things worse?), the agents decided enough was enough and moved to arrest her, which they had ample grounds to do. They ordered her out of the vehicle.

Perhaps realizing that she was on her way to jail, she apparently decided to leave the area and began moving her vehicle. ICE agents surrounded the vehicle to block her departure and arrest her. She apparently decided to force an escape, in effect daring the ICE agents to get run over or get out of her way. I am willing to believe she didn't intend to seriously hurt anyone, just to get away from the scene. She probably wasn't thinking about the fact that having her license plate they could just arrest her later. (In hindsight, that might have been a better option.) Arresting her might have led to prosecution or just a sharp verbal warning. Either was a better choice for her than what happened. (Note the key point: putting cops into a bad situation is dangerously stupid. Do not do it.)

She gunned the vehicle forward, and clearly the ICE agents had the choices of getting clear or getting run over. One of them picked a third option, shooting her. Perhaps the officer had judged that escape was not physically possible, perhaps he was just stubborn, but in any case, his life was in danger and he was (by the policy of every police force in the country) authorized to defend his life with deadly force. (There was no time for him to fire a warning shot, shoot a tire, or shoot to wound her. He could not be required to assume that one of the other officers would do something less violent to save his life.)

Now, the ugly part. The officer fired the first shot while in serious danger. He fired the second and third shots from beside her vehicle as it went past. You can seriously argue that these shots were not justified. (I would.) Not to second guess him, but many on the left say that while the first shot was justified the other two were fired by an officer who was pissed off and determined to win the fight. Police policy is to not fire on a fleeing vehicle unless the occupants pose some danger other than the vehicle itself.

Further update: The woman killed has been identified as a paid employee of a socialist action group. She was recruited and specifically trained in how to interfere in ICE actions.

So, that's what happened. Feel about it as you will.

NO FURTHER DISCUSSION. I JUST WANTED YOU TO HAVE FACTS THAT THE NEWS OUTLETS ARE NOT MANAGING TO PRESENT. SOMETIMES THE NEWS PEOPLE JUST CANNOT COMPREHEND THE NEED FOR SUCH A SIMPLE AND CLEAR EXPLANATION AS THIS ONE.

By Jeff Anderson (Jga) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 09:17 pm: Edit

I wish I could post a link to it, but a YouTuber, whose channel is called Chief MAKOi, posted a video a few years back talking about security measures taken by the bulk freighter he was chief engineer aboard to protect themselves from Somali pirates.

In it, he talks about what the crew are trained to do and does show international security specialists assigned by the company that owns the ship and what they're allowed to do.

That may be relevant in the discussion of what may be going down with the seizure of Venezuelan tankers.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Thursday, January 08, 2026 - 11:09 pm: Edit

There is one called WHAT'S GOING ON WITH SHIPPING or something like that which has a fairly detailed explanation of the legal seizure under international maritime law.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kksU9eqUcOM

By Mike Grafton (Mike_Grafton) on Friday, January 09, 2026 - 08:23 am: Edit

"At least thirteen percent of the population died in that war, 30 million Russian soldiers and civilians."

Implies a population of pre WW2 USSR of how many? 230 million?

Google AI says "The population of the USSR in 1939, according to the January 17, 1939 census, was approximately 170.5 million people"

Dunno. Commies lie often... But those numbers don't "feel" correct. Methinks the communists exaggerate.