This link has some interesting information, but to me raises more questions than it answers.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3633404/

By Chuck Strong (Raider) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 01:02 am: Edit

Isn't great to have government funded universal healthcare when one's government doesn't have to worry much about national defense knowing that the US government pays the lions share to protect their own nation.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 01:16 am: Edit

Chuck, don't rile up the troops.

We do NOT need to be discussing healthcare policy on this BBS.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 02:37 am: Edit

Chuck, well, that is an opinion, but the things are changing. The new EU initiative to buy (mainly) European arms have made the US ambassador to EU upset. Turns out Europe have bought tons of US made weapons over the years. Norway, for example bought the F-35 in no small part because it sort of also brought US protection, and not only they did so (Foolish thinking for sure, but then they shared a common enemy.).
That US arms companies have sold abroad to Europe have certainly been to the benefit of the US.
Japan is joining the SAFE program (Security action for Europe) (reportedly because of unreliable arms deliveries from US manufacturers), and so is Canada. My bet is that also Taiwan is thinking hard about it.

By Dana Madsen (Madman) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 08:43 am: Edit

Steve, I read the first part of your posted article, specifically, the Canada section, and I agree with it's overview. I'll read the rest later today. The article is almost 15 years old and some of it's data is 20+ years old, so problems it discusses regarding MRI machines have changed, or been partially solved, but other similar problems have arise as a nature of the system. I am not comparing or putting down any specific system, just providing an opinion on the accuracy of an article you posted so I hope I'm not breaking your warning on healthcare discussion.

If you had questions, put them out.

Chuck, if you wanted a calm discussion on the amount of dollars (% GDP?) a country should spend on their defense versus the amount others feel they should lay on. I would step up on Canada's "Free loading". My starting viewpoint, I believe Canada has underfunded it's defense budget for 20+ years. However, I don't think we should spend as much as I suspect the American defense establishment believes we should.

Steve shutdown healthcare, not specifically defense funding or "free loading". So this could fly under Real World Military.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 11:13 am: Edit

Andrew MW is now being investigated for leaking military secrets. Sigh. Sarah F is also in deep trouble after released data showed the island guy supported her for fifteen years. The latest from sky news says Andrew’s daughters accompanied him on suspicious trips. King Charles was told about Andrew’s crimes six years ago and did nothing, perhaps assuming that the crimes would never be exposed. The island file dumps were not expected by anyone and might not have ever happened if President Trump did not need to prove his innocence.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 03:02 pm: Edit

Sigh, it has been pointed out to me that there is a specific missing fact from the healthcare discussion which results in a false impression being generated. We're still not going to discuss healthcare policy on this BBS but to correct the false impression, Germany has a two-tier system, one tier that works like Britain and is pretty horrible and one tier that works like the US and actually works. The quoted statistics are an average of both systems, which isn't really fair, since the cheap government system has really long waits and the pay for your own insurance system has very short waits. Your mileage in your nation may vary. This is in contrast to the healthcare system used in 70% of the world's nations, the "we suggest you try to stay healthy" system.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 03:09 pm: Edit

Report from STAR FLEET LEGAL.

Here is the official SCOTUS decision on the so-called "Trump Tariff Case" (official name: Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump). https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25pdf/24-1287_4gcj.pdf

The holding (6-3) is essentially that IEEPA (International Emergency Economic Powers Act) does not authorize the President to impose tariffs.

Note: Not all tariffs were struck down. However, any tariff imposed using the IEEPA as the sole grounding legal authority is struck down.

Read the opinion if you want to know what the Court actually said, NOT what the media says it said or what it "means."

Discussion is not permitted on the BBS, other than legal procedural questions for Ted.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 04:16 pm: Edit

Infantry: New Ukrainian Ground Combat Drone
February 19, 2026: This year Ukraine developed the 4x4 wheeled Zmiy Droid 12.7 ground robot. Weighing about half a ton, the Zmiy chassis is built to survive drone attacks and anti-personnel mines. Zmiy is controlled by a remote operator using the onboard video camera while the vehicle moves and to detect enemy targets to fire on with the 12.7mm machine-guns. Ukraine has developed and put into service several ground combat drone vehicles. Ukrainian troops use these drones, including Zmiy, with increasing frequency as operators and unit commanders become more familiar with these weapons and what they can do. The primary mission of Zmiy is reconnaissance and replacing soldiers during combat situations.
Last year Ukraine began equipping their combat brigades with ground based combat and transport robots in addition to drones. The ground robots come in different versions. Some are used for planting and removing landmines. Other drones advance along the ground while firing remotely controlled machine guns. These systems can fire accurately at moving targets during the day and at night. There are also drones for transporting supplies to the front lines and carrying casualties back to first aid stations and field hospitals. The growing number of Ukrainian drone systems were developed based on reports from the front line troops. Those ideas were quickly put to use because of wartime urgency.
In 2024 Ukraine created a new branch of their military, the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Force. This is in addition to the Ukrainian Air Force that consists of manned aircraft. This Drone Force does not control the drones Ukrainian forces use regularly but instead contributes to developing new drone models and organizing mass production for those new models that are successful. Such drones have been an unexpected development that had a huge impact on how battles in Ukraine's current war are fought. Drones were successful because they were cheap, easily modified, and expendable.
Both Russian and Ukrainian forces were soon using cheap quadcopter drones controlled by soldiers a kilometer or more away using First Person Viewing or FPV goggles to see what the video camera on the drone can see. Each of these drones carries half a kilogram of explosives, so it can instantly turn the drone into a flying bomb that can fly into a target and detonate. This is an awesome and debilitating weapon when used in large numbers over the combat zone. If a target isn’t moving or requires more explosive power that the drones can supply, one of the drone operators can call in artillery, rocket, or missile fire, or even an airstrike. Larger, fixed wing drones are used for long range, often over a thousand kilometers, operations against targets deep inside Russia.
These small drones are difficult to shoot down until they get close to the ground, and the shooter is close enough, as in less than a few hundred meters, away to successfully target a drone with a bullet or two and bring it down. Troops are rarely in position to do this, so most of these drones are able to complete their mission, whether it is a one-way attack or a reconnaissance and surveillance mission. The recon missions are usually survivable and enable the drone to be reused. All these drones are constantly performing surveillance, which means that both sides commit enough drones to maintain constant surveillance over a portion of the front line, to a depth, into enemy territory, of at least a few kilometers. Ukrainian drones have pretty much ended Russian motorized transport with 20-30 kilometers of the front lines.
This massive use of FPV-armed drones revolutionized warfare in Ukraine, and both sides are producing as many as they can. Ukrainian drone proliferation began when many individual Ukrainians or small teams designed and built drones. The drones served as potential candidates for widespread use and mass production. This proliferation of designers and manufacturers led to rapid evolution of drone capabilities and uses. Those who could not keep up were less successful in combat and suffered higher losses.
One countermeasure that can work for a while is electronic jamming of the drones’ control signal. Drone guidance systems are constantly modified or upgraded to cope with this, and many use multiple modes of communications. Most drones have flight control software that sends drones with jammed control signals back to where they took off from to land for later use. The jammers are on the ground and can be attacked by drones programmed to home in on the jamming signal. Countermeasures can be overcome and the side that can do this more quickly and completely has an advantage. That advantage is usually temporary because both sides are putting a lot of effort into keeping their combat drones effective on the battlefield.
Western armed forces, after a century of trying, still cannot get the air force people up there to come down and get a much needed reality check on what is happening down below where battles and wars are decided. Meanwhile the proliferation of surveillance and armed drones have in many cases replaced conventional air forces, at least for operations close to the ground and requiring more urgency to find and attack targets.


Weapons: Expanded Ukrainian Weapons Arsenal
February 19, 2026: Ukraine currently produces about 70 percent of the weapons it uses in its war with Russia. The weapons used when the war began four years ago have worn out and replaced by American and European weapons. Over the last three years Ukraine has gradually been replacing all the foreign weapons with Ukrainian designed, developed and manufactured systems. These included Bohdana truck mounted 155mm artillery. This replaces several European versions and currently accounts for nearly half the self-propelled artillery systems in service. Ukrainian-made 82mm and 120mm mortars are now standard. Ukraine also developed its own artillery fire control system that handles drone operations as well. Ukraine is still developing its Marta 155mm howitzer to replace the American British designed M777.
While the U.S. sent many artillery spotting radars, Ukraine developed a system where custom drones can sport targets and guide attack drones to the target using a laser designation, which is more difficult to jam. Ukraine also developed terminal guidance systems for drones that used the Fire and Forget approach. Long range drones are equipped with a target recognition system using images of the Russian factory buildings or airfield layout for the missiles to home in on. This is a virtually unjammable system. Drones can also locate targets for artillery and transmit the target GPS coordinates to the artillery fire control system, which automatically assigns the target to the artillery system that has the range and available ammunition to do the job. This process takes less than two minutes.
By 2023 Ukrainian military production was accelerating. This began with essentials like uniforms, small arms and ammunition. At that point Ukraine had a million men and women in the military and Ukrainian production of military goods was accelerating. By 2025 Ukraine was producing 40 percent of the weapons, equipment and munitions it required. This includes over 200,000 drones a month, more than ten times what was being produced a year ago. That number rose to five million drones in 2025 with a goal of 20 million in 2026. Ukraine pioneered the use of drones as well as their development and manufacturing. Ukraine exported drone technology and drones to its NATO allies. Ukrainians are the world’s foremost experts on drones and that is something the Russians have been unable to match.
FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 04:18 pm: Edit

Attrition: What Russia Lost In Venezuela
February 23, 2026: Because of the recent American raid on Venezuela, Russia lost another ally. It was not a critical loss, because a few years ago Russia offered to end its support for Venezuela if the United States ended its support for Ukraine. The Americans declined. With Maduro gone Russia has lost its base for further expansion of their influence in South America. Over the last fifteen years Russia poured over $40 billion into Venezuela as they sought to strengthen Venezuela militarily and politically. Russia was not able to fix the declining Venezuelan oil industry. The 2022 invasion of Ukraine resulted in economic sanctions on Russia that shut down most of their Venezuelan aid efforts. Russians lost their supply of fresh avocados and tropical resorts for vacations during the Russian Winter.
Venezuela had purchased billions of dollars’ worth of Russian weapons. Why all the weapons? In Venezuela leader Hugo Chavez took power in 1999, and his 2013 successor Nicholas Maduro achieved a measure of popularity with the voters by convincing them that the United States was about to invade. Venezuelan leaders took comfort in new weapons, especially those being used to arm a new personal militia. Weapons may not be needed to stop Yankee invaders, but they will also work against disloyal Venezuelans.
This Venezuelan credit binge was a new development. Since the end of the Cold War, Russia has sold weapons on a cash basis. No more generous terms as in the Cold War past. But that is changing, and Russia eventually offered Venezuela billions of dollars in credit, for the purchase of more weapons. The Venezuelan spending spree brought in dozens of Su-30 jet fighters, hundreds of armored vehicles including T-90 tanks and scores of artillery systems, mainly multiple rocket launchers. There are also small arms including a factory for making assault rifles, radios and other equipment. There are support aircraft, including transports and helicopter gunships. Negotiations were under way to purchase new warships, including submarines.
With Venezuelan unemployment rising, there's no shortage of people trying to join the military. Those willing to profess undying loyalty to Chavez and later Maduro had an edge, and the senior ranks had already been purged of those who did not agree with the radical reforms Maduro wanted to impose on the military. These reforms were heavy on politics and theory, and short on training and experience. So all those new weapons faced a problematic future, as they are in the hands of inept, but politically motivated, users.
Among those many weapons none were more questionable than S-300 surface-to-air missile systems. S-300 battalions consist of a radar unit, and 4-8 launchers four S-300 missiles are mounted on each launcher, which is carried by semi-trailer truck. The really high end systems were needed to have a chance against the United States, which is what Venezuela said it needs to defend itself from.
Venezuela also bought 92 Russian tanks. None of Venezuela's borders are tank country, and only one of Venezuela's neighbors has large tank forces, Brazil, which has over 500 heavy tanks. So, these tanks would mainly be used to keep Venezuelans in line. For that, T-72s would do.
Venezuela had already purchased Su-27 jet fighters, and hundreds of thousands of assault rifles for a militia loyal to Presidents Chavez and Maduro. While Venezuela is a major oil producer, Chavez and Maduro were spending money faster than they could pump oil. An increasing number of Venezuelans were unhappy with the billions in oil revenue given to foreigners or spent on weapons and cronies. Thus, the importance of getting a loan which may never be repaid, especially if Maduro gets overthrown. Chavez and Maduro also sought advice from the Russians on how to turn a democracy into a police state. Chavez and Maduro needed this kind of knowledge, because his growing clamp down on opposition media, and any opposition in general, is generating increasingly violent resistance.
FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 04:19 pm: Edit

Winning: Ukrainian Defensive Operations
February 23, 2026: In Ukraine, the war has evolved into a series of Russian infantry attacks that fail, at heavy cost to Russia with the Ukrainians losing one soldier for every ten Russians. In the last year Russia has lost 400,000 troops while losing up to 35,000 soldiers a month. Total Russian losses since 2022 have been 1.4 million dead, disabled and missing.
Much of the current fighting is taking place in the Donbas. This area contains the two Ukrainian provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk, which comprise about nine percent of Ukrainian territory. In 2014, when the fighting here began, Donbas had 13 percent of the Ukrainian population and 15 percent of the GDP. Donbas was then about 38 percent ethnic Russian. The two provinces comprise the Donets Basin/ Donbas which was for a long time an economic powerhouse for Russia. But that began to decline in the 1980s and accelerated when the Soviet Union fell and Ukraine became independent in 1991.
Since the Russian forces are the ones frequently ordered to attack, the Ukrainians have taken advantage of this by quickly preparing defensive positions that protect Ukrainian troops assigned to defeat these Russian attacks.
Over the last year the Ukrainians have constructed several defensive lines in Donbas. The Ukrainians use construction equipment to rapidly dig new trench lines and bunkers. What would normally take 70 troops two weeks to construct, can be built in three days with three men and construction equipment. Russia has some construction equipment but most of its fortifications are built by troops using shovels and other hand tools.
The Ukrainian defenses include mortars, artillery, drones and sometimes anti-personnel mines, but the primary defensive weapon is well trained, armed and led Ukrainian infantry. Along the 1,200 kilometers front line Ukraine has built nearly 2,200 platoon strongholds, each manned by 20-40 soldiers armed with small arms, mortars and drones. These are protected by 3,000 kilometers of anti-tank ditches plus equal numbers of barriers using razor wire and other obstacles.
These defenses also include, as needed, small corridors that allow Russian troops to advance into a kill pocket where they are ambushed by hidden Ukrainian soldiers and drones showing up when the ambush begins.
The Ukrainian tactics emphasize maximizing Russian losses while minimizing Ukrainian casualties. This includes using robotic vehicles to carry supplies to front line Ukrainian troops. Wider trenches with smooth floors and overhead protection are often used to the robotic vehicles are protected from Russian artillery fire and drone attacks.
Russia persists in making what they call Meat Attacks, using masses of poorly trained infantry advancing into Ukrainian fire. Russia officers have, for the last two years, been ordered to shoot soldiers who refuse to advance. That was a return to a practice last used during the 1941-45 World War II. A growing number of Russian troops aren’t even Russian but North Korea, Cuban, African or Central Asian. These men were told they would be serving in support jobs but were then forced into infantry units. They receive as much as $2,000 a month. Most don’t survive more than a month.

FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 04:19 pm: Edit

Information Warfare: Russian Propagandists Face A Difficult Year
February 22, 2026: A month before the American raid in Venezuela to capture President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, a Russian radio commentator talked about how much Russia had done to fortify Venezuela and protect its leaders and military. The commentary also described how the Russian navy would sink any threatening U.S. warships off the coast while Russian supplied air defense systems would detect and shoot down any threatening American aircraft. On the day after the U.S. raid, the same Russian commentator announced that any future Russian efforts to get in the Americans' way would probably be crushed. Russian leader Vladimir Putin apparently agreed with this assessment as he made no critical comments about what had happened in Venezuela.
Putin has other things to worry about as the U.S. and its NATO allies are now tracking and seizing Russian shadow fleet tankers transporting oil in violation of economic sanctions. Russian propagandists are seeking some way to deal with all this unpleasant news. They have lots of experience at this and Russian propagandists are looking at past experiences for answers.
When the Cold War ended in 1991 and the Soviet Union disappeared, many Western intelligence agencies thought they had seen the last of Soviet maskirovka/masking and dezinformatsiya/ disinformation. That was an unrealistic expectation as the Russians have been reviving these deception practices and, as has been noted since the 1990s, several surviving communist governments like China and North Korea never stopped using the maskirovka and dezinformatsiya techniques they had learned from their Soviet patrons.
One rather obvious example of how Russia has revived its classic dezinformatsiya was seen when Russia accused the United States of committing atrocities in Syria by using American warplanes disguised as Russian ones while bombing civilians, hospitals and the like. To carry out this dezinformatsiya the Russians used photos from an American pilot training exercise in which some F-18s, which are somewhat similar in appearance to Russian Su-30s, were given a Russian Air Force paint job and flown by American pilots who knew Russian fighter tactics and techniques. This was part of the dissimilar training in the U.S. Navy revived, from World War II practice, in the late 1960s to better prepare American pilots to deal with North Vietnamese fighter aircraft encountered over North Vietnam. This led to regular Red Flag and Top Gun training programs that evolved as potential enemy air forces did. The Russians claimed these photos showed American aircraft operating over Syria and bombing forbidden by international law targets, in order to blame Russia.
This was classic Soviet era dezinformatsiya and it still works. Most people were not fooled but enough were to make it worth the effort. As Russia itself began using these techniques again most Western intel analysts were somewhat mystified because they had not seen this sort of thing at all if they were young and the older intel experts had not seen it done to this degree since the 1980s, when the Soviet Union was still around and using these techniques heavily right up until the end.
The Soviets pioneered the use of specialized organizations to carry out dezinformatsiya. A similar but even larger one was created for maskirovka. This agency planned and carried out large scale deceptions of photo satellites. In addition to concealing weapons, their performance, and movements, the Soviets also used satellite deception to mislead the West on how their troops would operate in the field. Several times a year the Soviets would hold large scale maneuvers. Each of these exercises would involve many divisions, plus hundreds of aircraft and helicopters. Satellite photos of these maneuvers were thought to reveal tactics the Soviets were going to use in future wars. But the Soviets knew when American satellites were coming over and sometimes arranged displays of tactics which they had no intention of using. Naturally, this made it more difficult for the Western intelligence analysts to figure out exactly what the Soviets were planning. That, of course, was the sort of confusion the Soviets wanted to create with these little deceptions. The current Russian government is reviving a lot of Soviet era organizations and practices because they have discovered maskirovka and dezinformatsiya still work on the West.
After 1991 this inherent fondness for maskirovka and dezinformatsiya was great news for a lot of former KGB Russian CIA/FBI/secret police employees who eventually found new jobs doing what they had done before the Soviet Union imploded, in part because of new technology. The 1990s were when the Internet blossomed into the World Wide Web. At the same time a lot of the deception and information manipulation the KGB long monopolized was now legal for civilian firms as well in Russia and China. Since then many KGB media specialists have gone commercial and trained a new generation of Internet savvy manipulators and often ended up working for the government again, as contractors rather than uniformed employees.
Spreading lies and rumors is a long standing practice in wartime. But in pre-Internet days it was developed into a fine art by the Soviets during the Cold War. This conflict, which raged or simmered from 1948 to 1989 or 1991, take your pick, never saw the main antagonists America and the USSR fighting each other directly, but rather it was a war of proxies. Other nations provided the battlefields while other peoples provided most of the fighters. The Soviets were calling most of the shots during this conflict even if they were not firing them. While both sides used the media and propaganda, the Soviets were enthusiastic users of a particular form of media deception called disinformation. This is the old repeat a lie often enough and it becomes a truth routine, distributed via press releases and planted media stories. On the Internet we call people who do this trolls or worse.
Disinformation is an ancient deception technique, but never has it been used so widely and for such a long time to keep numerous small wars going and generate such levels of hostility towards one's opponent. These fighters were not risking their lives for the Soviet Union but for a myriad of local causes. The Soviet disinformation program was intended to keep everyone in a combative mood and pursue goals that meshed with the Soviet Union’s foreign policy.
Some of the disinformation was pretty outrageous, such as the planted story that AIDS was invented by U.S. military researchers or the CIA or whatever. Most of the disinformation was more minor, and locally relevant, in nature. The Soviets had a large bureaucracy, and equally vast budget, to buy the services of local journalists worldwide. The stories supplied would generally cast aspersions on the actions or motives of the U.S. government and Americans in general. While the Soviets were generally inclined to shovel out lies and half-truths pell-mell, they also had specific programs to bring down governments friendly to the West or, more importantly, to prop up the morale of rebels, revolutionaries, and terrorists fighting for a Soviet approved objective. ISIL Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant, Al Qaeda and other Islamic radical groups have tried to use the same tactics but have not been nearly as deft and successful at it as the Soviets were.
What made the Soviet program unique was its global nature. The Soviets were quick to realize that the media in most countries was not as independent as in the United States. In fact, the U.S. media was something of an exception. In most nations the media are, like the first newspapers in the 18th century, the creatures of one special interest group or another. It was in America that the independent media was invented, and even the U.S. media was not completely free of biases and favoritism towards special interests. In most countries, the bias and special interest control is much stronger. That eventually happened in the United States, about a decade or so after the Cold War ended.
Yet in all countries the local media was, like it or not, the primary source of information for the population. Compared to America, the rest of the world's journalists are not well paid even by local standards. Thus it is common for journalists to accept gifts or outright bribes in return for writing certain stories or slanting their reporting a certain way. The Soviets took advantage of this and their local agents who were often not Russians were liberally supplied with cash in order to buy the media attention they needed. The American CIA engaged in the same practice but the Soviets were much more aggressive, generous and successful in this area. That has changed as traditional print and TV news media were supplanted by Internet based sources but disinformation is still available as a tool.
While many journalists worldwide admire the American model for media independence, the Soviets realized that they didn't have to buy a lot of journalists in order to give their agenda sufficient exposure. Most of the Soviet disinformation was purposely developed as sensational stuff. The Soviets knew what kind of stories played best in the media and this is what they provided. This was the importance of the large disinformation staff back in Moscow. Stories that played on local fears were favored. For example, over the years, the CIA was played up as the cause behind just about everything that people feared, up to and including the weather and earthquakes. In typical Russian fashion, the Soviets would plant dozens of stories in different countries all hitting the same invented idea from a different angle. That way, the press in one country could cite a Soviet story planted in another country to back up their local reporting. The Soviets also made the most of some outrageous story appearing in the Western press whether it was a Soviet plant or not, by planting more outrageous versions and elaborations via the more pliable journalists of other nations. The Soviets realized that the media had become a global system and that there was a great deal of following the leader or stealing from another newspaper, depending on how you look at it going on. The Soviets also knew that correcting an inaccurate story was nearly impossible. Once the lie gets loose, you can never correct the misinformation that then forms in so many people’s minds. Once the Internet came along, these techniques became easier and cheaper to use.
The Big Lie was something that was created in this century as the media grew in importance. The Nazis get a lot of credit for starting it, but it was actually the Bolsheviks the earliest incarnation of the Communists in Russia that first used it so effectively at the end of World War I. Indeed, the term Bolshevik is Russian for majority, a title the Communist minority among the Russian socialists gave themselves as they set out to seize control of Russia during World War I. The Communists kept repeating the term Bolshevik even when it was obvious they were a small minority of the Russian socialist party and eventually more and more people just took it for granted that the Communists were the majority, the Bolsheviks. And soon they were in control of the nation. And at that point they were still a minority, which is why they kept on killing off Russians into the early 1950s who actually or potentially thought differently.
Western countries only slowly became aware of what the Soviets were doing. The Voice of America and the BBC World Service radio broadcasts were intended to counter Soviet disinformation. But these efforts met with limited success. Imaginative lies travel faster and more widely than does the more mundane truth. Politicians in all nations know and take advantage of this fact. Negative campaigning is often little more than a disinformation campaign.
The only positive side of disinformation is that, eventually, most people catch on and no longer believe the lies. But this takes time, often decades. And the turnaround has to take place separately in each media area. That is, while people may begin to see through the local disinformation campaign in one area, people in a neighboring nation could still be under the spell of the clever forgeries. The Soviet Union and its East European satellite nations saw their web of disinformation come apart during the 1980s. The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 will long be seen as the moment when the tower of deceit came undone. But in actuality, the process of disintegration took place over several years. And for many years to come there will still be people in those formerly Communist countries who will continue to believe the lies, even if the majority does not. Now, however, the large scale deception organizations are being revived.
The deception technique of disinformation had a palpable effect on dozens of battlefields during the Cold War and after. Thousands of pro-Communist fighters believed, to the death, in the tangle of disinformation the Soviets had created. Without such motivation, many of these wars, rebellions, and uprisings would not have happened. Information is power, even false information. And this translated into firepower for decade after decade. It has happened again and this time the true-believers are Islamic radicals. Russia, China and many Western nations have disinformation operations that exploit the Internet to get their version of reality to as many people as possible. The long term impact of all this is as yet unknown.

FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 04:20 pm: Edit

Special Operations: Details of the Venezuelan Raid
February 22, 2026: The January 3 rd American raid on Venezuela involved a lot more operations beyond capturing President Nicolas Maduro and his wife. The American armed forces and intelligence agencies spent months gathering information and creating detailed plans for how to carry it out. The operation was carried out by 200 Special Operations troops brought in by helicopters. Air strikes destroyed anti-aircraft systems that could have fired on the helicopters. Those systems were destroyed with precision strikes that did not damage nearby or adjacent buildings. There was also some CyberWar activity to suppress communications between Venezuelan military and political leaders during the raid.
There was no major damage anywhere. There were only about 75 casualties, including the 32 Cuban soldiers guarding Maduro and his wife. At least two civilians were killed and a few dozen military personnel or civilians on duty at areas bombed. All the airstrikes apparently used 114 kg Small Diameter Bombs or 50 kg Hellfire missiles.
Bombs were used to block the exit from a mechanized infantry base. These were the only available units that could interfere with the U.S. Special Operations forces. There was minimal damage to four key military locations: the Fort Tiuna Military Complex, La Carlota Air Base, La Guaira Port, and El Higuerote Airport. No Venezuelan navy ships were damaged. The air strikes were designed to avoid damaging any economic or government facilities. The damage was minimal so that life would go on after the airstrikes, but the political leaders who replaced Maduro realized they would not be targeted as long as they did not continue Maduro’s drug smuggling and support of smuggling and rebel operations in adjacent countries. Oil exports to enemies of the United States were also supposed to stop because the American naval blockade off Venezuela would shut those down.
There were also air strikes on coastal facilities that supported cocaine and other drugs being exported to the United States. Another aspect of the raid was that it occurred shortly after Maduro met with Chinese diplomat Qiu Xiaoqi to discuss matters of mutual interest. China bought 68 percent of Venezuelan oil at a special, for China only, discount price. That’s only four percent of Chinese oil imports and was easily replaced by oil from other sources. In the last 19 years China loaned Venezuela $63 billion. Venezuela has a current GDP of $82 billion. In 2012 the GDP was $373 billion. Nicolas Maduro and his predecessor and mentor Hugo Chavez were not good for the economy.
China exploited Venezuela as well as invested in the country. China has done the same to five other South American nations. Many of the investments involved Chinese personnel building and managing new port facilities in South America. China sees its South American investments as something worth defending. Chinese wargames often involve Chinese forces operating in South America. To assist in that sort of thing, China has long maintained an ELINT/Electronic Intelligence operation in Cuba. This involves Chinese activities at several locations in Cuba. The recent American military operations in Venezuela involve blocking free shipments of Venezuelan oil to Cuba. Since Cuba is currently broke, with periodic blackouts when the national electric power system fails, the loss of Venezuelan oil is a major problem.
The current American president is pursuing a policy of increasing American economic, military and diplomatic activity in South America. This may also address the continuing plundering of offshore South American fishing grounds by fleets of Chinese trawlers. That would be part of the effort to keep the Chinese and Russians out. China planned to challenge that by selling Air Defense systems to Cuba and Columbia. This is happening despite the fact that Chinese Air Defense systems already in Venezuela were ineffective against the Americans raid that captured Maduro and his wife, killing 32 Cuban bodyguards and some civilians along the way.
FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 04:23 pm: Edit

Intelligence: Gamimg The War In Ukraine
February 21, 2026: Russia is having problems recruiting soldiers after four years of war in Ukraine and over 1.2 million soldiers killed, disabled or missing in combat. Russia was able to recruit 400,000 last year and expects to do the same this year. In the last two years, new recruits were often foreigners, including South Americans, Cubans, Africans and many countries in Asia. Recruiting standards have been lowered in Russia, where prisons have been emptied and alcoholics, drug addicts and the mentally ill have been induced, tricked or forced to sign a contract to join the military. Recruiters have been particularly successful in rural Russia where good jobs are scarce and alcoholism is rampant. Recruiters will sometimes visit a venue that serves alcohol and buy drinks for likely new recruits. Once these inebriated men have signed, the recruiter will often have to enlist local police to go where the new soldiers lived and tell the now sober men that they are in the army and take them away. Soldiers recruited in this way are not expected to last long in Ukraine, so their physical or mental condition is not important.
Recruiters have other problems to deal with. Twenty years ago, Russian leaders were informed that the rapidly aging Russian population was not only shrinking but was not fit for any major economic or military efforts. Some 60 percent of Russians were elderly, children, or disabled. Out of 20 million males of working age, one million were in prison, a million in the armed forces, five million were unemployed or unemployable due to poor education, health or attitude, four million were chronic alcoholics, and a million were drug addicts. Thus, there is something of a labor shortage, with plenty of jobs for women and immigrants. The birth rate is below replacement level, and a declining population means more immigrants just to keep things going. Improving medical care, and health habits, especially treating alcoholism and drug use, was a government priority, in order to raise the lifespan of Russian males. All of this made the idea of a smaller, all volunteer, military more attractive. Too many of the current troops were drunks, addicted to drugs or just unreliable. Volunteers must be paid much more, but their discipline is much higher. Russian officers are very impressed with what the British, Japanese and Americans have done with all-volunteer armed forces and want to emulate them. That never happened.
February 21, 2026: One of the many reasons why the Russian plan to conquer Ukraine in a few weeks was a misunderstanding of who they were fighting. Even before 1991, when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union, the Ukrainian were known as clever and inventive. After Ukraine became independent in 1991, that cleverness, inventiveness and enterprising nature took off. In military matters that was first seen in the way Ukrainians managed to modify, upgrade and tweak the thousands of tanks, artillery and other weapons Ukraine found itself because they had been a major producer of weapons for the Soviet Union. Most of those were exported to customers around the world, mainly because the prices were low and the Ukrainians would modify these weapons in any way the customer wanted and could pay for.
When Russia began attacking Ukraine in 2014, by seizing territory, the Ukrainian applied their talents to developing weapons and tactics to foil the Russians. This annoyed the Russians and was one of the reasons Russia invaded Ukraine four years ago.
Once at war the Ukrainians put their entrepreneurial skill into overdrive. Russia believed their Shock and Awe invasion would defeat the Ukrainians quickly but were themselves shocked at how quickly Ukrainian civilians rapidly improvised and implemented defensive units, tactics and weapons. This played a major role in defeating the initial Russian advance that was meant to capture the capital Kyiv and shatter the Ukrainian resolve and force a surrender. Tens of thousands of civilians mobilized themselves and went after vulnerable Russian units. Supply convoys were a popular target because, without continuous supplies of fuel, ammunition, food and other items, the Russians could not keep advancing. The improvised Ukrainian irregulars cut those supply lines and used weapons captured from the fleeing Russian soldiers to do more damage.
This spirit of innovation and improvisation eventually led to the use of drones in warfare, something the Russians did not expect and were not prepared for. The first military drones were built by individual Ukrainians in homes, barns, or garages by individuals or small groups. The drones were sent to friends or relatives in the army who added explosives and used the drones in combat. The government saw what was happening and established factories to turn out the drones in large numbers. The amateur drone designers and builders ran many of these factories and trained new workers.
Innovation continued when the troops got these drones. One of the unique ideas was to add gaming elements to the use of drones in combat. Commanders established goals and the first individuals or units to achieve the goals, like hunting down and killing Russians with drones received points. As an individual or a unit's accumulated points they use them to obtain scarce equipment or resources. These items would eventually reach units without this competitive system, but with the competition the most effective units received these items first. The winning units also enjoyed better morale and were often acclaimed in the Ukrainian media. This encouraged more civilians to support their friends or family members in the military. This popularization of innovation and entrepreneurship has been a major asset to the Ukrainian military effort.
In contrast the Russian use of imagination often backfired. An example of that was the failure of their BTG/Battalion Task Group concept. Russia had expanded the use of BTGs since the 1980s because BTGs had consistently proved successful in many small wars, including the rather large operation in Afghanistan during the 1980s.
Systems like the BTG began to appear during World War II when it was found that forming temporary task forces containing tank and infantry units were more effective. The Germans did the same thing, calling them battle groups or Kampfgruppen and the Americans adopted the practice after World War II. There was an important difference between the Western battle groups and the current BTGs. The Western battle groups were kept simple, mainly using combinations of infantry and tank companies, with the addition of combat engineers or artillery as needed. American infantry officers got lots of realistic training using these battle groups. Western armies had many career NCOs to make sure the troops performed well.
Russia expanded their BTGs after 2000 and added more support units so that each BTG had most of the support capabilities usually found in a division. These support units were smaller in the BTG, often a dozen or so specialists riding in a few trucks. The BTG commander put an officer in charge of all these non-combat support troops and the dozens of trucks they traveled in. The combat element of a BTG always consisted of a few hundred infantry and ten or twenty tanks. But now there were small platoon sized detachments of specialists. The only ones that were always present were a dozen or so self-propelled 152mm guns and somewhat more 82mm and 120mm mortars. There was also a medical detachment. In the last decade a detachment of fire control troops was added to coordinate all that firepower with some UAVs to scout for targets. There were also a small number of self-propelled anti-aircraft weapons in addition to the portable anti-aircraft missiles carried by individual soldiers. There were several other specialist units that could be added as needed. Total strength of a BTG varied depending on how it was assembled. Official personnel strength varied from 600 to 800 personnel but was more like 300-500 in peacetime.
These new BTGs became the standard for Russian divisions, which now consisted of two or three brigades. Each of these usually had just two BTGs. The division had fewer support units because most of these troops were now assigned to BTGs or brigades. By 2021 there were 170 BTGs. The combat elements usually consisted of one tank company, two or three infantry companies and one or two batteries of artillery. While BTGs had some contract volunteer troops, most of the rest of the BTG personnel were conscripts. The conscripts had several shortcomings. They could not be used in a combat zone; their term of service was only one year, and they were not as well trained as the contract troops. By law conscripts were not allowed in a combat zone unless it was wartime, and they were defending Russia.
This massive adoption of BTGs was a mistake that became obvious when nearly half the available BTGs were sent into Ukraine in early 2022. Many newly formed BTGs were sent to the Ukrainian border in late 2021 to threaten Ukraine and if that did not work, to invade.
The flaw in the BTGs was not obvious until they encountered well-armed and motivated opponents. That happened soon after they crossed the border into Ukraine. The leadership in these BTGs simply could not handle the complex composition of BTGs. Senior Russian leaders knew this from the performance of BTG leaders during military exercises. This was not a surprise as the quality of officers had declined in the last decade and there were still not enough experienced NCOs.
The lack of competent leadership meant the troops in the BTGs were poorly used during combat, and increasingly abandoned their vehicles and fled if they encountered Ukrainian troops, who concentrated on hitting the very vulnerable tanks and light armored vehicles, like BMPs or wheeled armored infantry carriers. BTG commanders failed to order effective reconnaissance or even get the infantry out of their armored vehicles to protect their tanks from Ukrainian infantry armed with modern Western anti-tank weapons. Worse, the Ukrainians concentrated on attacking the BTG trucks carrying supplies and maintenance personnel. The trucks were the last to enter Ukraine because there were a lot of conscripts driving the trucks and these conscripts were not told they were driving into Ukraine. Instead, many were told they were on another training exercise.
Most of these vehicles were destroyed or abandoned because of Ukrainian artillery fire and ground troops using whatever weapons they had. In one case a retired Ukrainian soldier was given a single-shot RPG/Rocket Propelled Grenade launcher by some passing Ukrainian troops. The elderly veteran used that one RPG to destroy a whole Russian truck convoy by waiting for the fuel trucks and hitting one of them. The fiery explosion ignited other trucks including some carrying fuel. Soon the entire truck column was in flames, and the surviving drivers were walking back to the border.

FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 04:24 pm: Edit

Morale: Russia Recruits Rural Alcoholics
February 21, 2026: After four years of war in Ukraine and over 1.2 million soldiers killed, disabled or missing in combat, Russia is having problems recruiting soldiers. Russia was able to recruit 400,000 last year and expects to do the same this year. In the last two years, new recruits were often foreigners, including South Americans, Cubans, Africans and many countries in Asia. Recruiting standards have been lowered in Russia, where prisons have been emptied and alcoholics, drug addicts and the mentally ill have been induced, tricked or forced to sign a contract to join the military. Recruiters have been particularly successful in rural Russia where good jobs are scarce and alcoholism is rampant. Recruiters will sometimes visit a venue that serves alcohol and buy drinks for likely new recruits. Once these inebriated men have signed, the recruiter will often have to enlist local police to go where the new soldiers lived and tell the now sober men that they are in the army and take them away. Soldiers recruited in this way are not expected to last long in Ukraine, so their physical or mental condition is not important.
Recruiters have other problems to deal with. Twenty years ago, Russian leaders were informed that the rapidly aging Russian population was not only shrinking but was not fit for any major economic or military efforts. Some 60 percent of Russians were elderly, children, or disabled. Out of 20 million males of working age, one million were in prison, a million in the armed forces, five million were unemployed or unemployable due to poor education, health or attitude, four million were chronic alcoholics, and a million were drug addicts. Thus, there is something of a labor shortage, with plenty of jobs for women and immigrants. The birth rate is below replacement level, and a declining population means more immigrants just to keep things going. Improving medical care, and health habits, especially treating alcoholism and drug use, was a government priority, in order to raise the lifespan of Russian males. All of this made the idea of a smaller, all volunteer, military more attractive. Too many of the current troops were drunks, addicted to drugs or just unreliable. Volunteers must be paid much more, but their discipline is much higher. Russian officers are very impressed with what the British, Japanese and Americans have done with all-volunteer armed forces and want to emulate them. That never happened.
FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 04:26 pm: Edit

Intelligence: Ukrainian Espionage In 2025
February 20, 2026: Since Russia 2022, HUR/Ukrainian Military Intelligence service has grown in size and the number and types of operations it conducts. For example, many of the daring Ukrainian long-range drone attacks inside Russia are organized and carried out by HUR. This is made possible by years of work by HUR since 2014, when Russia first seized Ukrainian territory. Because of that long history, HUR became known for successful operations deep inside Russia that took a year or more to plan and organize.
Multiple attacks are used against economic targets over many months. This worked with the Ukrainian attacks on the Russian oil-refining, which ultimately reduced Russian refinery output by over 20 percent. Russia eventually rebuilt those facilities, at a cost of billions of dollars and months of shortages. HUR also organizes campaigns that concentrate on costly even more money to repair. At the end of 2025 it was discovered that Russia had to devote half the government budget to sustain the war in Ukraine and deal with all the damage and economic disruption HUR was causing inside Russia.
In addition to damaged and regularly sabotaged railroads, HUR also concentrated on Russian air defense systems, which Russia has a difficult time replacing because of so many Western components. These HUR operations weakened the Russian air defenses that detected and attacked incoming Ukrainian long range drone attacks. HUR operations would destroy air defenses to create a temporary undefended route into Russia. HUR also found critical and relatively unprotected targets inside Russia. Together, all these HUR preparations and operations led to crippling attacks on key segments of the Russian military economy.
HUR could also be called on to devise and carry out special operations to assist front line soldiers. Sometimes it meant gathering key information on Russian operations in a specific area and doing it quickly. In one case the HUR commandos organized a raid on Russian positions to rescue some Ukrainian troops that had recently been captured. When news of this spread to Russian troops along the 1,200 kilometers front line there was much distress about who might be next.
In other HUR operations, they equipped a dozen captured Russian FPV/First Person View drone operator goggles and arranged for them to be delivered to random Russian FPV units as a gift from Russian civilians. When these were worn and turned on, they exploded. There were several fatalities and many wounded before the Russians found all of these goggles.
Another area that HUR dominates, and invented, is naval drones. In the first two years of the war these drones destroyed or damaged about a third of the ships in the Russian Black Sea Fleet. The surviving ships took refuge in ports over a thousand kilometers from Crimea and Ukrainian ports. The naval drones continue to operate, patrolling the Black Sea looking for Russian merchant and military ships as well as making occasional attacks on Russian Black Sea ports.
While 2025 was an eventful year, earlier HUR activities were often international, like attacks on Russian military or intelligence overseas. These often involve the use of foreign airlines and railroads by unidentified Ukrainian HUR operatives passing themselves off as Ukrainian or Russian civilians. Because the Ukrainian and Russian languages closely resemble each other, it’s easy for a Ukrainian to speak unaccented Russian, but not so easy when a Russian tries it. Many intelligence operatives speak several languages, especially English. The international language airline flight control is English because early in the history of commercial flying most of the aircraft were American. During World War II, the largest air force the world has ever known was American. That continued for many decades after the war and is still generally true in 2024. In other words, if you want to be an intelligence agency field operative, you must speak English, even if it is heavily accented. The United States is a large country that includes Alaska and Hawaii. These two areas contain a lot of people who still speak Inuit Alaskan languages and Hawaiian native languages that never died out. America is the land of many different accents.
Which gets us back to the Ukrainian HUR intelligence field operatives in Syria, where the Khimik detachment got into the country unobserved and then infiltrated the Russian Kuweires airbase and destroyed a mobile electronic warfare system Russia had been using to protect the base from drone attacks. As soon as the electronic warfare system was out of action, numerous drones attacked the unprotected base and did significant damage.
Why would Ukrainian intelligence undertake such a mission so far from Ukraine? It was because this base was also used to train Russian mercenaries to fight in Ukraine. The training was specialized and the students caused problems for the Ukrainian forces fighting the Russian invaders.
Russian forces originally appeared in Syria after the Six-Day War, then left sometime after the Yom Kippur War, and returned in 2015 to assist the beleaguered ruler Bashar Al Assad. Hafez al-Assad, the father of Bashar, had ruled Syria from 1971 to 2000. Hafez sided with the Soviet Union during the Cold War and was a longtime ally of Russia until he died in 2000. His son Bashar took over and was even more efficient, and vicious, than his father. The relationship with Russia increased as Russia used the Syrian port of Targus for their tiny Mediterranean Fleet and a nearby airbase for military and commercial aircraft. This airbase was also used to support the activities of Russian ally Iran in Syria.
There are a lot of Russians operating in Syria, especially since 2015. Russia thought it was safe to train operatives for their war against Ukraine. HUR found out about that and did something to disrupt the Russian operation. This is not the first time HUR has gone after Russian operations in third countries. What was unique about the Syrian operation was that HUR involvement became known, something HUR prefers to avoid. HUR did achieve their objective in Syria, so the overall operation was a success.
It won’t be known for years or decades how many overseas HUR operations there were and how many foreign countries HUR operated in to defeat Russian operations. For example, Russian paramilitary operatives have been very active in Africa, especially Congo, where Russia wants to assure their access to rare minerals that are mined there. They must compete with China and several Western countries. HUR has apparently been causing problems for Russia in Congo as well and has managed to conceal their involvement. HUR may be operating against Russian interests in other parts of the world, including South America. HUR prefers to keep their presence hidden, even from allies like the United States.

FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, February 23, 2026 - 04:26 pm: Edit

Air Weapons: Missing Link In The New Way Of War
February 20, 2026: The innovative, extensive and effective use of drones in the Ukraine War has alarmed major military powers worldwide. Everyone is seeking ways of effectively integrating drones into their current military forces and war plans. Because of Ukraine, the European NATO countries are expanding and upgrading their forces to deter further Russian aggression. Over half a billion Europeans, backed by 326 million Americans should be enough to deter further aggression by 145 million bankrupt and war weary Russians.
It’s a different story in the Pacific, where an increasingly aggressive and heavily armed Chinese military is preparing for war. Not a major conflict, China could not afford that and really only wants to conquer Taiwan and merge it with China. Such a conflict would be short, violent and possibly indecisive. Drones play a role in that. China is aware of that and has already developed a microwave anti-drone weapon that can quickly and cheaply destroy drones several kilometers away. The U.S. and Israel have developed similar systems and Taiwan has access to much of that technology. Taiwan and China have also been developing drone swarm technology and the use of AI/Artificial Intelligence technology to enable the swarms to operate effectively when facing massive electronic jamming.
The drone factor makes a Chinese attempt to take Taiwan by forces less likely. While drones are a new opportunity, an amphibious operation against Taiwan is nothing like the land war Russia and Ukraine have been fighting.
Everyone could find out how drones might impact current NATO doctrine by examining similar situations in the past. Current American and NATO tactics began emerging in the late 1970s when the United States sought a new combat doctrine to make the best use of new weapons, an all-volunteer force and growing air superiority. West Germany was then urging the United States to adopt tactics that would mean losing less German territory in the opening stages of a war. In 1982 this led to the American AirLand Battle doctrine, which emphasized meeting a mainly Russian Warsaw Pact invasion by attacking as well as defending. West Germany was reassured as were those who had studied the 1972 Arab Israeli war. This conflict began with a surprise attack by Egypt and Syria which was quickly defeated by an Israeli active defense that emphasized attacking as well as defending. The Americans had already adopted an active defense doctrine in 1978 but AirLand Battle was a refinement of that, and evolved to the present with improved versions of these tactics.
The Russians interpreted AirLand Battle as the result of how much post-Vietnam military reforms had turned NATO defense plans into an offensive opportunity for NATO that made any Russian attack less likely to succeed and vulnerable to a NATO invasion of East Europe. The 1991 Iraq war certainly confirmed this, but Russians attributed that to poor quality Iraqi officers and troops.
After the East European Soviet satellite governments collapsed starting in 1989, it was revealed that the Soviets had become less confident of the ability and willingness of East European Warsaw Pact armies to assist Russian forces in attack or defense. Part of this was due to the aftereffects of the crackdown in East Europe after the uprisings of the 1950s and 1960s. Western intelligence officials interviewed many of East European civilians getting out and thought the refugees were exaggerating. They weren’t and that became obvious in 1989, and again two years later when the USSR itself collapsed. Once the Ukraine War has ended, the Russian military may accept that the NATO tactics were a major reason for their failure in Ukraine. Russia will have a difficult but not impossible time implementing a version of the NATO tactics for their forces. It would mean changing how their officers are trained and finally getting serious about reviving the use of NCOs, something the communists eliminated in the 1920s to prevent sergeants from leading another revolution as they did in the early 1920 to create the Soviet Union. In other words, Russia still has the same problems it has been burdened with since the Cold War ended in 1991. While Russia quickly adapted to drone warfare, that was in wartime and as of early 2026, Ukraine is more confident of winning their war with the Russians than the Russians are.
FYEO

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Tuesday, February 24, 2026 - 07:19 am: Edit

“ Air Weapons: Missing Link In The New Way Of War”

I suspect there is a subtle change in tone of these newer F.Y.E.O. Posts compared to what articles were being posted at the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine War back in 2022.

It being a common opinion that no matter how valiant and innovative the Ukrainian side performed, Russia was widely expected to emerge victorious.

It appears that the combination of very effective Drone technology and unexpectedly high Russian casualties and equipment losses (tanks, APC, Trucks, Aircraft, warships (particularly submarines)) and infrastructural damage (pipelines,airbases, refineries) all contribute to the very slow advancement into Ukraine territory.

If you were to graph the supply of resources(men, equipment, ammunition etc…) on one axis of the chart compared to the rate of land occupied by Russian forces since the start of the war to date, I think you will find the trend lines have both reached an inflection point, and if Putin and the Russian military fail to clean up their act, are in danger of actually losing territory, mostly because Russia can not continue to sustain the losses incurred while at the same time production of tanks, artillery, ammunition and the recruitment of personnel to replace combat losses, is declining.

In short, it may be that Russia has managed to lose the war of attrition against Ukraine, the very thing that was supposed to guarantee the victory so many people had thought would happen.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Tuesday, February 24, 2026 - 04:18 pm: Edit

Procurement: Russian War Budget Damages Infrastructure
February 24, 2026: Four years of war in Ukraine are causing growing problems for Russian civilians back home. This was particularly evident in late 2025 when the annual cold weather season arrived. Some 60 percent of Russia is subarctic where the winters are particularly harsh and long. Not only that, but in these areas the surface areas contain permafrost, permanently frozen beneath the soil that is not frozen most of the year. Most Russians who live in these areas depend on the government to keep the houses heated, the lights on, the roads usable and the trains running during winter. Since late 2025 that has not been happening in many parts of Russia.
With the Ukraine War taking half the government budget, the government had to reduce what was usually spent on many items essential for the population. This became evident when the cold weather arrived and the heat for government and private buildings did not. Even many hospitals were affected and had to scrounge up resources to keep patients and medical staff from freezing to death. The roads and rail lines were in bad shape because of deferred maintenance. That meant supplies of fuel arrived late, if at all. Local officials were complaining about this before winter arrived and the central government said measures have been taken to assure deliveries. That turned out to be overly optimistic at best. There were efforts to get the permafrost regions ready, but the money, resources and reliable transportation were not available, sometimes due to government corruption.
Most Russians supported Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine. Not just because Putin made it a criminal offense to openly criticize the war, but because most Russians agreed that Ukraine belonged to Russia and had a right to take it back. Months of cold weather without enough heat and dilapidated housing and infrastructure has been changing minds about the war. A harsh Russian winter may win the war for Ukraine.
Over half a million wounded, and often disabled, Russian men have returned from the war and are talking about their experiences. It is obvious that Russia is not winning and the Ukrainians are better off, despite recent Russian efforts to destroy Ukrainian power plants and fuel supplies. The Ukrainians are not subject to economic sanctions and can quickly get resupplied by NATO countries. The lights and heat stay on in Ukraine while they do not in Russia. Ukrainian military efforts have concentrated on Russian fuel infrastructure over the last two years, bombing fuel storage sites, refineries and factories producing weapons and munitions.
Putin has tried to block the bad news from spreading by censoring communications or even shutting down or restricting the internet. This slows down but does not stop the spread of bad news. This kind of suffering precipitated previous Russian revolutions and seems poised to do it again.

FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Wednesday, February 25, 2026 - 01:21 pm: Edit

Forces: Ukrainian Brigade Level Operations Explained
February 25, 2026: One of the many innovations to emerge from the Ukrainian experience in their war with Russia is the importance of the initiative and entrepreneurial spirit of many Ukrainians. Once in the military, the new soldiers reach back to friends and family back home for needed equipment and especially drones. The development of drones in Ukraine was enhanced by all the friends and family members of Ukrainian soldiers who didn’t just send their soldiers what he said he needed, but searched around on the internet, social networks and among friends for ideas and help in developing those ideas into something useful in a combat zone.
The Ukrainian army is organized into brigades and each brigade commander, and his staff is allowed to deal directly with manufacturers to obtain new equipment or items developed by soldiers. Not just drones but additions to combat uniforms, anti-drone nets and anything the brigade members found useful with their handmade prototypes of new items. The brigade commander has a budget for this, which is often augmented by the friends and families of soldiers under his command. While army-wide standardization suffers, the gains in combat and ability of other brigades to copy successful ideas makes it all worthwhile. This is obvious when you read the internet and social networks chatter of soldiers who survived because of some civilian’s crazy idea that worked.
Ukrainian drone proliferation began when many individual Ukrainians, or small teams of civilians, designed and built drones. The drones served as potential candidates for widespread use and mass production. This proliferation of designers and manufacturers led to rapid evolution of drone capabilities and uses. Those who could not keep up were less successful in combat and suffered higher losses. Each month nearly 400,000 drones are built in Ukrainian factories or home workshops. Most of these workshops are informal affairs, located in spare rooms, garages, barns, empty industrial space or anyplace protected from the weather and aerial surveillance. Russia will hit any drone manufacturing sites they can identify.
One result of the Ukraine War was the emergence of inexpensive drones as a decisive weapon as well as a reconnaissance and surveillance system. In 2023, a year after Russia invaded Ukraine, the Ukrainians were building their own drones, often at home or scattered workshops. By late 2024 Ukrainians were producing over 15o,000 drones a month. In 2025 Ukraine produced over 4 million drones. By purchasing components in bulk, thousands of Ukrainian men and women are building these drones for the armed forces or for someone they know in the military. Troops at the front also build and modify drones to fit their immediate situations. For the soldiers, designing better drones is often a matter of life or death.
This competitiveness led to First Person View/FPV drones as well as drones guided via Fiber Optic cable Guidance or FOG. Electronic jamming was useless against the FOG drones. The only limitation was the length of the cable. This meant the operator had to be at one end of the kilometers long cable. Operators could be further away if there was time to lay another kilometer or two of cable further to the rear. Ukrainian drone operators often worked in drone workshops before entering the military and were accustomed to upgrading drone operator equipment while in the combat zone. Any successful innovations were made known to workshop operators throughout Ukraine.
This is how the Ukrainians maintain a lead over the Russians in drone technology and production. The Russian government discourages, or even outlaws, individuals building drones and centralizes drone production. This gives the Ukrainians an edge in drone quantity and quality. The Ukrainians are defending their homeland and Russia is having an increasingly difficult time justifying continued fighting and over a million Russians killed or disabled in Ukraine.
NATO countries are trying to adopt drone technology and use it for their own armed forces. Ukraine has received over $200 billion in military and economic assistance from NATO countries and shares their drone experience and technology with their benefactors. Drones have revolutionized warfare and are causing 70 percent of casualties in Ukraine. The Ukraine War is a battle between industrialized countries employing modern weapons. It is the war of the future that has become what all armed forces in the world must adopt to remain competitive.
Last year Ukraine equipped their combat brigades with ground-based combat and transport robots in addition to drones. The ground robots come in different versions. Some are used for planting and removing landmines. Other drones advance along the ground while firing remotely controlled machine guns. These systems can fire accurately at moving targets during the day and at night. There are also drones for transporting supplies to the front lines and carrying casualties back to first aid stations and field hospitals. The growing number of Ukrainian drone systems were developed based on reports from the front line troops. Those ideas were quickly put to use because of wartime urgency.
FYEO

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Thursday, February 26, 2026 - 04:10 pm: Edit

In other news:

Quote:” on February 23, 2026, the Panamanian government took over operation of the Balboa (Pacific) and Cristóbal (Atlantic) port terminals, seizing control from Hong Kong-based CK Hutchison Holdings. This followed a supreme court ruling that the operator's long-term contract was unconstitutional. Operations are now managed temporarily by new operators.
The Tico Times
The Tico Times
+4
Key Details of the Takeover:
Action: Panamanian authorities took physical possession of the terminals, ending over three decades of management by a Chinese-affiliated company.
Context: The move resulted from a final supreme court ruling that declared the concession with Panama Ports Company (PPC) unconstitutional.
New Operators: Temporary 18-month contracts were arranged, with APM Terminals (Maersk) operating the Balboa port and Terminal Investment Limited (MSC) running the Cristobal port.
Impact: The Panama Canal Authority stated operations continue safely and normally, despite the previous operator, CK Hutchison, labeling the seizure "unlawful" and raising concerns about operational safety. ”

Google AI, may contain errors.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Thursday, February 26, 2026 - 04:11 pm: Edit

Some may disagree, but it looks like a Trump win.

Bottom line, he wanted Chinese communist party control of the canal stopped.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Thursday, February 26, 2026 - 07:46 pm: Edit

Jeff,

The Chinese never had control of the canal. That's a myth. Those terminals control loading and unloading of cargo in Panama, and indirectly a number of other countries in the region; an important function to be sure. But they don't control access to, and transit through, the canal itself. That is controlled by the Panama Canal Authority, all of whose directors are Panamanians.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Thursday, February 26, 2026 - 08:55 pm: Edit

Alan, a quick Google inquiry shows:

Quote:” CK Hutchison Holdings, founded by Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing, is a private, multinational conglomerate not directly owned by the Chinese government, but it faces intense, increasing influence and scrutiny from Beijing. While historically independent, the company is now caught in shifting geopolitical tensions, often seen as a proxy for Chinese interests, particularly following Beijing’s intervention in its asset sales.
The New York Times
The New York Times
+4
Key Details on Influence and Control:
Ownership Structure: The company is controlled by Li Ka-shing and his family, with no direct state ownership. However, Li's son and successor, Victor Li, is a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, a top political advisory body in China.
Beijing's Intervention: In 2025, Beijing intervened in a deal for CK Hutchison to sell its port assets to a BlackRock-led consortium, labeling the deal as "kowtowing" to the US and accusing the company of disregarding national interests. This action highlighted that, despite private ownership, the company is susceptible to Chinese government intervention to prevent actions against its interests.
Changing Political Landscape: Since the imposition of the National Security Law in Hong Kong, international perception of the company has shifted, with many viewing it through the lens of China's expanding influence.
Independent Operation Claims: The company maintains that its business operations are independent.
Operational Geography: While headquartered in Hong Kong, the vast majority of its revenue and operations are located outside mainland China and Hong Kong, with significant assets in Europe and the UK.
BBC
BBC
+6
In summary, while CK Hutchison is a private entity, it is subject to the political reality of a tightened, Beijing-controlled Hong Kong, making it highly influenced by the Chinese government, especially regarding significant global infrastructure assets. ”

Also note my post above, the Panamanian government …”seizing control” from Hong Kong based CK Hutchinson Holdings.

Control of the canal is meaningless without control of the terminals.

I suspect that your use of the word “Myth” is not appropriate.

By Alan Trevor (Thyrm) on Thursday, February 26, 2026 - 09:11 pm: Edit

Jeff,

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Quote:

Control of the canal is meaningless without control of the terminals.

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