Nor did Garth specify you.

What he said was:”…you can’t tell people who take NY Times spin as gospel.”

Since you went to the length of posting your sources and efforts to conduct your research in an earlier post, in this very topic, I believe, it would appear to a casual reader, that Garth may not have been directing his comment directly at you.

In my experience, Garth has a history of specifically referencing individuals that he responds to in these threads.

I could be mistaken, but it is my opinion he was making a global comment.

By Jean Sexton Beddow (Jsexton) on Saturday, March 28, 2026 - 11:03 am: Edit

Jeff and Jessica, please do remember to leave each other alone, per SVC's directive. The best way to do this is to avoid "you" statements where "you" equals the other person.

We are all stressed about gas prices (again), but we need to remain civil.

Jean
WebMom

By Heavy Dolls Under $799 on Saturday, March 28, 2026 - 03:50 pm: Edit

Authentication Error

By Garth L. Getgen (Sgt_G) on Saturday, March 28, 2026 - 04:14 pm: Edit

No, Jessica, I wasn't thinking of you. I have people at work who were on a rampage about that, so I looked it up.


Garth L. Getgen

By A David Merritt (Adm) on Saturday, March 28, 2026 - 05:36 pm: Edit

The main thing that I see, from both some of the Right/MAGA, as well as more of the Left, is the rate at which this Administration is threatening military operations*, or engaging in them**, has some folks concerned that when President Trump said "No more forever wars" he did not really mean it.

*Canada, Greenland/Denmark, Mexican drug cartels, Panama, Cuba etc.

** Venezuela, Iran and likely boots on the ground in the Gaza Strip.

By Jessica Orsini (Jessica_Orsini) on Saturday, March 28, 2026 - 08:00 pm: Edit

Thank you for the clarification, Garth.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Saturday, March 28, 2026 - 10:30 pm: Edit

For Trump to win the mid-terms (i.e., hold the Congress) he has to show good faith by getting us out of the Iran war by the end of April, without major troop deployments. Taking Kharg Island would be okay, but putting the 82nd Airborne into Tehran would be the definition of a forever war like Afghanistan.

No one has seen any sign of American troops invading Gaza. We might or might not be part of an occupation force but frankly that would be stupid.

Venezuela, in case no one noticed, was over in one day.

Canada is a lot of bluster, no way Trump was ever going invade Greenland, Panama is a business deal, when have we threatened Cuba?

The Mexican Drug Cartels are not a forever war but a criminal system. That would be like declaring bank robberies a forever war.

Seriously, nothing on ADM's list other than Iran (yet to be seen) qualifies as a forever war.

Shall I take a moment to remind Democrat leaders that declaring war on Venus would be stupid and they should stop threatening it?

By A David Merritt (Adm) on Saturday, March 28, 2026 - 10:46 pm: Edit

Other than Iran*, no the others are unlikely to be, individually, a forever war. IF President Trump decides to regularly engage in multiple small Wars, it would be the same effect as forever wars.

*On reflection Gaza may be long term small conflict, and when we took Cuba from Spain, they ran a constant guerrilla war.

By Jeff Wile (Jswile) on Saturday, March 28, 2026 - 11:15 pm: Edit

We did worse than threaten Cuba.

We effectively ended Venezuela oil and money subsidies by taking down Maduros.

With the end of subsidized oil shipments, Cuba changed virtually overnight from having occasional/rolling black and brown outs to total power outages that varied in duration.

No power means hospitals can’t treat the sick, telecommunications stop, even radio and television broadcasts get interrupted.

Then President Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio waited for the leadership in Cuba to sweat out public dissatisfaction.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Cuba quickly figured out that neither Iran, Russia or. North Korea could bail them out, and with China now trying to replace the 80% of their oil supplies that used to come from Iran… and generally failing, the only real option was to talk to the U.S. hoping for a deal.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Saturday, March 28, 2026 - 11:25 pm: Edit

The Houtis launched a few missiles at Israel, none hit anything.

By MarkSHoyle (Bolo) on Saturday, March 28, 2026 - 11:33 pm: Edit

Can't forget the 2010s when the Houtis were firing missiles at the Saudi Oil fields....
The Democrat Administration used a lot of missiles from drones on them to support the Saudis....
Some whispers of SF on the ground, don't have any numbers or data on that....

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Sunday, March 29, 2026 - 12:50 am: Edit

Apache helicopters are operating over the Iranian mainland, indicating that there are no working air defenses.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Sunday, March 29, 2026 - 03:05 am: Edit

It is reported in several military news media that an E-3 Sentry and several kc-135 was damaged in the Iranian attack on Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia that occurred on March 27th. The first Sentry to be destroyed in combat.

By Carl-Magnus Carlsson (Hardcore) on Sunday, March 29, 2026 - 03:56 am: Edit

SVC, MANPADS. If Apaches fly over the mainland despite the risk from MANPADS it is likely to hunt drones.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Sunday, March 29, 2026 - 04:37 am: Edit

I don't think the Apaches are worried about those.

I also think your post was garbled and didn't make grammatical sense.

By Affordable Realistic Dolls on Sunday, March 29, 2026 - 02:37 pm: Edit

Authentication Error

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, March 30, 2026 - 03:56 pm: Edit

Attrition: Russian Unsustainable Cost Of Ukraine War
March 30, 2026: Russia can no longer afford its war in Ukraine. Since 2022 Russia has spent nearly $700 billion and lost 1.3 million troops, with over a million Russian men fleeting the country to avoid the war. There is a labor shortage and a growing number of protests against the war and its human losses and growing poverty. The costs keep growing, from $102 billion in 2022 to nearly $170 billion this year. Russian gains in 2023 were 600 square kilometers or o.1 percent of Ukraine. In 2024, 3,500 sq. kilometers or; 0.55 percent of Ukraine while losing 431,000 soldiers. In 2025, 4,500 sq. kilometers. or 0.75 percent of Ukraine was gained while 418,000m soldiers were lost. Since late 2025 Ukrainian forces have been on the offensive, regaining territory and by the end of 2026 much if not most of the Russian 2023-25 gains may be lost.
There have been other significant losses. Four years of fighting in Ukraine has destroyed the Russian tank force. This was unexpected, as was the Russian inability to replace their tank losses. Ukraine’s success against Russian tanks and armored vehicles revived predictions that tanks were obsolete. Tanks are still relevant, and the Russian losses were the result of poor employment of armored units as well as design features of Russian tanks that make them much more vulnerable than Western tanks like the American M1, German Leopard or Israeli Merkava.
Most Russian armored vehicles were lost while they were on the move, or stationery without adequate infantry support. The first Russian armored units going into Ukraine were told the population would be friendly or neutral. The reality was that the Ukrainians were well armed, hostile, and using tactics the Russians were unaware of and unprepared to deal with. As a result, thousands of Russian vehicles were destroyed or captured in the first month, most of them armored, including some of the most modern Russian tanks plus some ancient models taken from storage facilities for obsolete tanks that might be useful in an emergency. The Ukraine War proved to be that emergency.
Most of the Ukrainian anti-tank weapons were portable and carried into combat by teams of soldiers, of whom many were recent volunteers with no military experience at all and only a few days of training, rather like most Russian soldiers since the war started. The few days training they received usually began with carrying ammo, including anti-tank missiles and projectiles, plus instruction in how to obey instructions, take cover, etc. Sometimes volunteers were selected for combat duty because they knew the area where their anti-tank team would be operating. These hastily trained anti-tank teams suffered far fewer casualties than the Russians, even after the Russians became aware of the ambush risk, because the Russians had little if any training against attack by man-carried anti-tank weapons, let alone the ability to actually do it. Additionally, most of the Ukrainians’ Western-provided portable anti-tank weapons could accurately hit moving vehicles 300 or more meters away. The Javelin and NLAW guided missiles were fire and forget. That meant once the operator had accurately aimed at a target and launched the missile, the guidance system in the missile would follow the target until the missile hit.
NLAWs have a max range of 600 meters and Javelins are 2,500 meters. The Ukrainians were creative with their ambush tactics and the Russians who survived them noted that the Ukrainian were always better prepared and one or more steps ahead of Russian commanders. The Russians were losing six dead for every Ukrainian fighter and that included soldiers killed by rocket and ballistic missile attacks far from the combat zone.
Russian armored vehicles had some unique vulnerabilities not found on their NATO counterparts. One was the use of an autoloader for the main tank gun, usually a 125mm. The autoloader required there to be a magazine of shells in the crew compartment, which was the turret, where there were also additional shells used by the crew to refill the autoloader magazine. If any anti-tank weapon penetrated into the crew compartment, especially the turret, one or more of the 125mm shells were exposed and likely to explode. If one shell went, all those near the autoloader did as well. This usually meant the turret would literally be blown off the tank and the entire crew killed. Javelin and NLAW were also designed to attack the less protected top of the turret or body of the tank, which at the very least destroyed the engine or wounded some of the three-man crew. And the primary Russian infantry armored vehicle was the BMP, which was poorly protected against any anti-tank weapon.
Trucks carrying supplies, especially fuel, ammo or personnel were even more vulnerable. Machine-gun fire or a hand grenade would destroy or disable a truck. Ukrainian forces concentrated on Russian supply trucks and that meant Russian forces were chronically short of essential supplies.
Ukrainian forces had lots of armored vehicles, most of them Russian models improved by the Ukrainians. Tank tactics used by Ukrainians were more practical and more likely to overcome defenders, plus Ukrainian civilians were everywhere and generally eager to let their troops know what was going on in the area.
Meanwhile, Russia is trying to rebuild its tank forces. That will take a long time because Russian production facilities, even when operating round-the-clock, cannot obtain sufficient supplies of components to produce more than a few hundred tanks a year.
The Russian economy is a wreck. Their major ally Iran has been lost to a war with Israel and the United States. Russian leader Vladimir Putin refuses to withdraw from Ukraine because he bet his career, and possibly his life, on winning a victory in Ukraine.
FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, March 30, 2026 - 03:57 pm: Edit

Surface Forces : Chinese Fishing Trawlers At War In The South China Sea
March 30, 2026: Since the beginning of the year China has been sending out thousands of fishing boats to form barriers over 300 kilometers long. More recently, about 1,400 Chinese vessels quickly abandoned their usual fishing activities or sailed out of their home ports and assembled in the East China Sea. Soon they had assembled into a rectangle stretching more than 300 kilometers. This mass of boats was so dense that some approaching cargo ships appeared to skirt around them or had to zigzag through,
In late 2025 some 2,000 Chinese fishing boats assembled in two long, parallel formations on Christmas Day in the East China Sea. Each was about 460 kilometers long, about the distance from New York City to Buffalo, forming a reverse L shape, ship-position data indicates. The epic scale of these maneuvers and the organization required was astonishing. Similar but smaller fishing boat demonstrations have been held in other east Asian waters, but none as massive and persistent as those in the South China Sea. The reason for these is unknown though those are performance art on a grand scale.
In early 2024, Chinese coast guard ships again collided with Filipino coast guard ships in the South China Sea near Second Thomas Shoal. Four Filipino crewmen were injured. China also employed 40 fishing trawlers and other ships to block Filipino coast guard operations.
A month later, Chinese ships interfered with Filipino coast guard vessels trying to carry out a medical evacuation. China deployed about 40 ships during this effort to capture and destroy a Filipino LST that had long been used as an outpost to establish the Filipino claim to Second Thomas Shoal.
During early 2024 there were several clashes between the Chinese and Filipino coast guard ships. During December 2024 there were several collisions and clashes between Chinese and Filipino boats.
During November 2024 there were clashes between Chinese and Filipino coast guard ships over who controlled the Spratly Islands. There was more of the same in October and September.
During July and August 2024 China used 40 ships to block Filipino access to Second Thomas Shoal. In July there was also another ruling by the International Court in The Hague affirming Filipino rights in the South China Sea. China ignored a similar ruling made in 2016.
In June 2024: There was a clash in the South China Sea between naval forces of China and the Philippines. The cause of this largely non-lethal battle was a Filipino attempt to resupply Filipino marines stationed on an old Landing Ship Tank/LST deliberately run aground on Second Thomas Shoal in 1999 to asset Filipino ownership of the Shoal and much of South China Sea. There have been several similar clashes in the last year. The most recent ones in May and June involved a large number of Chinese ships that physically blocked Filipino Coast Guard and supply ships from reaching the grounded LST. Several of the Filipino RIBs (Rigid Inflatable Boats) were sunk by Chinese sailors in speedboats who came alongside and used knives to puncture the RIBs’ hulls and cause them to sink. A Filipino sailor lost a thumb when his boat collided with a fast moving Chinese speedboat. China seized materials meant for the LST and used loud sirens and strobe lights to disorient Filipino sailors trying to get their boats close to the LST. Among the seized materials were additional weapons for the LST crew. China has refused to return the weapons or any other cargo they seized. Technically this is piracy but even if an international court agrees with that, the Chinese will ignore the courts as they did several years earlier when a court ruling confirmed that portions of the South China Sea were under the control of the Philippines. China is one of the many nations that signed agreements governing the law of the sea, but the Chinese later ignore any agreements they signed if these agreements get in their way. This is what continues to occur in the South China Sea.
The Chinese Navy and Maritime Militia musters dozens of Coast Guard and commercial fishing trawlers that are paid by the Chinese to serve as a naval militia and, when called upon by the government, cease fishing and assemble for whatever the navy wants them to do. Usually, it is to congregate in large numbers near disputed islands, islands, reefs and shoals to keep Filipino fishing boats out and claim these areas for the exclusive use by Chinese fishing trawlers. In one recent case Chinese ships equipped with water cannons hit Filipino fishing boats with large quantities of sea water to keep them from operating in traditional Filipino fishing areas.
The June clashes were the largest and most violent yet. In one case a Filipino helicopter dropped supplies near the LST and as the marines were retrieving them, Chinese speed boats arrived and seized some of the air dropped parcels and ripped open the waterproof packaging and scattered the contents on the ocean surface. Apparently, the Chinese government has ordered its naval forces to use any means necessary to deprive the grounded LST of any supplies and try to starve out the marines stationed on the LST.
Increasingly more Chinese coast guard ships are patrolling Second Thomas Shoal, First Thomas Shoal, and Half Moon Shoal, all within the Filipino EEZ or Exclusive Economic Zone, waters 380 kilometers from the coast but now claimed by China. The Philippines’ EEZ in the South China Sea is where Filipinos have been fishing the reefs and other shallow waters for centuries, long before there was a Philippine state and without interference from Chinese fishermen, who only occasionally showed up. That’s because fishing boats with refrigeration, a 20th century invention, only recently made it possible for Chinese fishermen to scour the entire South China Sea for fish to profitably catch, refrigerate and carry back to China. The 20th century also meant the possibility of finding oil or gas deposits in the South China Sea as well as controlling key shipping routes via the Malacca Strait.
Aerial and satellite photos indicate that Chinese military construction efforts on Woody Island, one of the disputed Paracel Islands closer to China, are complete. The garrison consists of a battalion of naval infantry and a 2,300 meter long air strip. This is long enough to support warplanes and commercial transports as large as Boeing 737s, which China has a lot of. A school building was completed in 2013 for the 40 children of officials and their families stationed there. There is an artificial harbor that can handle ships of up to 5,000 ton displacement. This harbor is heavily used because there is no local water supply and much of the water still has to be brought in along with fuel for all the land, sea and air vehicles as well as the generators. While there is some recreational fishing going on, the two thousand people on the island require regular food and water deliveries from the mainland.
In addition to the military garrison there is also a civilian rescue detachment equipped with helicopters and small boats. This detachment is largely for the waters around Woody Island and a few smaller islands that amount to about 13 square kilometers of land. China recently used dredging to increase the land area by about 20 percent.
Construction is largely complete for facilities in the capital of Sansha, a new Chinese municipality or city. Sansha is actually Woody Island and dozens of smaller bits of land, some of them shoals that are under water all the time, in the Paracels and the Spratly Islands to the south. In fact, the new city lays claim to two million square kilometers of open sea, which is 57 percent of the South China Sea. China has completed similar construction projects in the South China Sea and satellite photos reveal this to be true.
China claims the South China Sea and all islands and near islands like reefs as Chinese property. To reinforce these claims of sovereignty China is occupying uninhabitable islands and creating new ones by dredging sand from reefs and shoals to create new uninhabitable islands. Like Woody Island, these new islands are staffed with troops and government employees and supplied, at great expense, from the mainland. China even built two special supply ships to make regular deliveries to their many island bases in the South China Sea.

FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, March 30, 2026 - 04:00 pm: Edit

Sea Transportation: American Military Sealift Command Update
March 29, 2026: The Military Sealift Command/MSC is still having problems recruiting sufficient personnel to man the growing number of ships used by MSC to support American military and diplomatic missions overseas. The MSC currently has 140 ships with civilian crews that replenish U.S. Navy ships, carry out special dedicated operations, preposition combat cargo at sea around the world and moves military cargo and supplies used by deployed U.S. forces and allied nations.
That won’t mean much if the personnel shortage problem cannot be solved. So far at least a dozen ships have been sidelined because no crews were available. MSC needs to fill at least 95 percent of its 4,500 jobs to be fully functional. To operate at that level MSC needs 5,500 personnel to provide enough people to allow merchant sailors one month off duty for every four months at sea. This plan became less attractive to MSC sailors. The solution is to change the work routine to four months at sea and two months of downtime.
MSC has been having manning problems since 2020, and the two month downtime policy is another effort to find a solution. Meanwhile MSC continues to expand and evolve.
Back in 2018 the U.S. Navy completed the conversion of a cargo ship into a Maritime Support Vessel/MSV for Special Operations Command/SOCOM. The ship to be converted had been built in 2011 for commercial service with Maersk Lines. It was quietly purchased by the U.S. Navy and in early 2014 an American shipyard began converting the 20,000 ton Roll On/Roll Off, or RO/RO, cargo ship MV Craigside to serve as a seagoing base for SOCOM commandos and support troops. This included renaming the ship to Ocean Trader.
About $80 million was spent on the conversion, which consisted of turning the deck into a landing pad for at least two helicopters plus a hangar in the forward part of the ship to house three helicopters for maintenance or just to keep them out of bad weather. The ramp for RO/RO of vehicles is in the rear and remains. The Ocean Trader had special windowless communications and planning areas built as well as spaces for launching and recovering Scan Eagle UAVs. There was a dive locker/chamber for U.S. Navy SEALs to quietly slip into sea as well as storage and launch facilities for Rigid Inflatable Boats/RIB like the 11 meter RHIB used by SOCOM and the 12.8 meter Combat Craft Assault/CCA for more difficult insertions of SEALs to a hostile shore.
The CCA was built of composites and shaped to be stealthy for coastal and riverine operations. Carrying up to eleven personnel, the CCA can be airdropped from a C-17 but is usually launched from larger ships like the Ocean Trader. There is still a large vehicle deck on the Ocean Trader, and it can carry a wide variety of vehicles used by SOCOM personnel. There are climate controlled storage areas for a wide variety of supplies and a small hospital area including an operating room and recovery areas.
In 2015, the Craigside was renamed Ocean Trader and by 2016 was spotted in the Mediterranean. Commercial ships can easily be tracked using the Automatic Identification Systems/AIS, and Ocean Trader showed up for a while at Crete in May 2016, Gibraltar on May 14, 2017, and Amsterdam in August 16, 2017. Since then, the AIS has been turned off most of the time, as is the case with warships. Without AIS you have to rely on visual spotting and that has put Ocean Trader in the Baltic, Mediterranean, Persian Gulf and Black Sea during 2017 and 2018.
The Ocean Trader has a top speed of 36 kilometers an hour, even in heavy seas. Internal fuel enables it to go about 14,000 kilometers and it has been equipped for resupply, including fuel, at sea. The ship crew consists of 50 civilian personnel. These ship handlers require security clearances and lots of experience running cargo ships. There are at least two crews, and they are periodically switched to give the crews time at home and the Ocean Trader the ability to remain at sea for long periods. The ship has berths for about 200 special operations personnel or contractors for operating special electronic or transport equipment, and whenever it docks somewhere there is activity as personnel and some equipment are changed and supplies taken on.
What’s interesting about the Ocean Trader is that it’s an old idea. Back in 2004 the U.S. Navy was asked by SOCOM to look into the idea of modifying a container ship for use as a seagoing base for Special Operations troops. This idea was apparently inspired by incidents in the past decade where SOCOM forces had been based temporarily on navy ships. Off Haiti in 1996 and Afghanistan in 2001 the Navy provided an aircraft carrier with most of its air wing withdrawn and replaced with Army or Special Operations helicopters and personnel. While this tactic demonstrated tremendous flexibility on the part of the navy it could not be done on a regular basis because it tied up carriers and their crews, which are the most valuable navy assets. Then in 2001, the Navy began converting four Ballistic Missile Firing Nuclear subs/SSBNs to carry 154 cruise missiles as well as SOCOM commandos. This includes commando equipment and special boats to get them ashore. But these SSGNs did not have the capabilities of a MSV like the Ocean Trader. The SSGNs have proved useful for some largely classified SOCOM missions but not for all the missions SOCOM needed an MSV for.
The 2004 SOCOM proposal was to buy or lease a container ship, paint it gray and fit it out with crew quarters similar to those used by oil platform crews, for up to 800 SOCOM operators and 200 support troops got some serious consideration. The facilities on board would include command, medical, recreation and storage for weapons, ammunition and explosives. All would all be built into standard modular containers, as the U.S. later did extensively in Iraq and Afghanistan. Container ships have power generating capability to support refrigerated cargo so there is plenty for military needs, especially communications.
The use of modified onshore containers would also provide some bolted together to serve as a helicopter hangar and flight deck. With this setup, the ship could operate over a dozen SOCOM helicopters, especially the larger MC-47s and V-22. Other containers could hold at least half a dozen RHIB boats and equipment for launching and recovering them, and UAVs.
The concept had several major advantages over the traditional approach of building a new type of military ship. Commercial vessels, even ones the size of aircraft carriers like large tankers and container carriers, typically require crews of less than fifty rather than thousands for military ships of the same size. A large container ship used for military purposes could be operated by fewer than a hundred sailors compared to 1,100 on an LHD or 3,200 on a Nimitz-class carrier. It would also be easier to upgrade, as the modules could be removed and replaced independently.
MSC would own and operate these ships using civilian crews. The navy would keep one or two of these ships ready at all times plus a reserve of special containers ashore for use on additional MSC-owned ships or those leased from commercial users. The container ship conversion never took place but there were some MSC ships that quietly moved SOCOM personnel and equipment around, but nothing as customized as the Ocean Trader. While the Ocean Trader was created quietly there was no keeping it secret. The Ocean Trader had to frequently make port calls and was subject to being photographed by anyone with a smartphone. That was done often and the photos made their way onto the Internet and suddenly a lot was known about the Ocean Trader. While SOCOM remains quiet on the subject, the fact that the Ocean Trader has been constantly at sea or briefly in some foreign port for over two years indicates the ship is being used regularly.


FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, March 30, 2026 - 04:00 pm: Edit

Information Warfare: Losing Starlink Devastated Russian Operations
March 29, 2026: Currently there are about 200,000 Starlink units in use by the Ukrainian armed forces, although some have been diverted for use by commercial and government enterprises. Russia has, over the last few years acquired several thousand Starlink terminals via black market sources. On February 4 th Russian troops found that their Starlink terminals no longer worked. SpaceX, the operator of the satellite network that makes Starlink terminals work, had identified Starlink units used by Russian troops and shut off access. This not only shut down communication services, but also the use of Starlink to operate Russian drones. There was one problem, the Ukrainian use of Starlink to guide its drones to targets in Russian territory. A solution to this problem is underway. Meanwhile Ukraine can use GPS and several other methods to operate drones attacking targets in Russia.
When Russian troops found they had lost access to Starlink, they knew they were in trouble. Russian troops never had effective military radios, something that was first noted during the 2022 invasion. Corrupt procurement officers had stolen most of the money allocated to purchase new radios for Russian troops. This scam was not discovered until the invading Russians found that their military radios didn’t work well, if at all inside Ukraine. That problem was eventually solved by obtaining some modern radios and Starlink terminals. Since February the Russians have been improvising.
Ukrainian forces have been supplied with SpaceX Starlink satellite communication terminals since the beginning of the Russian invasion. SpaceX allowed Ukrainian forces to use Starlink terminals free of charge and as of 2024 about 10,000 Starlink terminals are used in Ukraine by the military, government and some commercial enterprises.
SpaceX has kept Starlink operational over Ukraine since the war began in early 2022. This includes paying for rapid patches to defeat Russian EW electronic Warfare attacks and providing many Ukrainian users with the highest and most expensive level of service. This has cost SpaceX over $100 million. Maintaining the level of Starlink service Ukraine demands to maintain its communications advantage over Russia keeps growing. Both Russia and China have been seeking ways to disrupt or shut down Starlink over Ukraine.
When Russia invaded Ukraine in early 2022, the Ukrainian minister of digital transformation contacted SpaceX for help in dealing with Russian efforts to cut Ukrainian access to the Internet. Starlink officials had already been negotiating with Ukraine to provide Starlink service locally. SpaceX agreed to help and within four days hundreds of Starlink satellites were moved into position to provide Ukraine with high-speed Internet service using hundreds of Starlink user kits SpaceX sent to Ukraine. SpaceX ultimately supplied Ukraine with nearly 2,000 terminals and managed to persuade countries supplying military aid for Ukraine to include Ukrainian requests for more Starlink terminals, especially the more expensive, and capable commercial models. In this way Ukraine was able to obtain over 40,000 terminals so far. Most of these are used to keep the economy going and the ones used by the military are subject to combat losses. Civilian users face a similar but lesser risk and about 500 terminals a month are lost to Russian attacks. These have to be replaced and most, if not all, of the replacements are paid for by military aid for Ukraine. The Starlink replacement terminals cost about a million dollars a month.
Early in the war American defense officials admitted that if the Starlink satellite internet service were government run, it would not have remained operational over Ukraine because government regulations do not allow for the quick responses Starlink management used to defeat Russian electronic attacks and keep Starlink operational in Ukraine.
SpaceX, the American firm that designed, built and put the Starlink satellites into orbit, accomplished this by encouraging innovation and acting quickly to deal with service interruptions, including deliberate efforts by hackers or hostile governments. By April 2022 about 20 percent of the initially planned Starlink global network satellites were in orbit. More satellites had to be put into orbit to provide the enormous demand Ukrainian military and civilian users were creating. Before 2022 Starlink was turned on over a few areas so reviewers and other volunteer users could test the system.
By February 2022 Starlink appeared to be a success but the network also displayed a remarkable resistance to attacks from hostile governments, and the Russians were the first ones coming after it with major jamming efforts and threats to destroy Starlink satellites over Ukraine. SpaceX pointed out that it could put additional Starlink satellites into orbit faster and far less expensively than Russia or anyone else could destroy them. This capability was part of the Starlink design that not only allowed satellite and user software to be quickly updated but new Starlink satellites often had new features added to improve performance and that included more resistance to hacking and jamming.
Starlink satellites are designed to last for up to seven years and the Starlink system is designed to expand to over 30,000 satellites if demand by paying customers is large enough to justify and pay for it. That is being tested by the heavy use of the Starlink satellites over Ukraine by Ukrainians who don’t have to pay the usual one time $500 startup or and $99 monthly fees. This serves as a test of how much heavy use each satellite can handle, especially when constantly subject to heavy Russian hacking and jamming efforts. This got a lot more expensive as Starlink introduced its more capable, and expensive, commercial and military grade terminals.
Russia did seek to sever the fiber optic cables that connect Ukraine to the global Internet and generally try to disrupt Internet service inside Ukraine. Starlink made this effort futile and Starlink became the first satellite communications service that could be described as combat tested. This is always a major selling point for military equipment, or anything built to that is built to survive in a harsh environment. Starlink expected many emergency relief organizations will maintain Starlink accounts that could be taken into disaster areas where most communications were disabled. Starlink terminals can be linked to local networks and supply Internet service for locals and emergency workers.
Starlink resistance to hackers and jamming was quickly put to the test as Russia came after it several times in the first two months of the war, failing in each attempt because Starlink engineers could diagnose an attack, develop a software patch and implement it quickly, often in less than an hour. Starlink also responded by modifying the design of newly manufactured Starlink satellites to resist efforts to disrupt service.
The Ukrainians were equally innovative in finding new ways to use Starlink in combat. One example was using Starlink to support attacks on Russian supply lines day and night. The night attacks were effective because of the use of small Ukrainian designed drones equipped with GPS, a night vision camera, a laser range finder and a link to a nearby artillery unit via Starlink. The drone patrolled Russian supply routes at night and, when a convoy was spotted trying to move safely in the dark, the artillery unit had the continually updated location of the trucks. That enabled the Ukrainians to fire at the convoy and destroy many of the vehicles while demoralizing the survivors who didn’t believe the Ukrainians could detect them in the dark and call-in accurate artillery fire.
Similar innovations were developed to provide Ukrainian military units with better communications than the Russian invaders. That edge has been maintained and expanded even though Russians, now the Chinese, continue trying to disrupt Starlink service or find ways to locate active terminals quickly and target them for air or artillery attack.

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, March 30, 2026 - 04:01 pm: Edit

Procurement: Details Of American Military Aid To Ukraine
March 28, 2026: The United States military assistance to Ukraine from early 2022 through early 2025 consisted of several categories of weapons and equipment.
For the infantry there were 10,000 Javelin anti-armor systems, 120,000 other anti-armor systems and
Munitions: 3,000 Stinger anti-aircraft systems, 10,000 TOW missiles, 50,000 grenade launchers and small arms, 500 million shells of small arms ammunition and grenades, 100,000 sets of body armor and helmets, night-vision devices, surveillance systems, thermal imagery systems, optics, and, laser rangefinders, C-4 and other explosives, explosive-ordnance disposal equipment, M18A1 claymore mines, anti-armor mines, mine-clearing equipment, obstacle-emplacement equipment, medical supplies, field equipment, cold-weather gear, generators, and spare parts, chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear protective equipment, 29 armored bridging systems, rocket launchers and ammunition, 25mm ammunition, counter–air defense capability.
Artillery and related systems consisted of 200 155mm howitzers and 3 million shells, including 7,000 precision-guided shells and 100,000 anti-armor mine shells, 72 105mm howitzers and 1 million shells, 10,000 203mm shells, 400,000 152mm shells, 40,000 130mm shells, and 40,000 122mm shells, 300 mortar systems, 700,000 mortar shells, 40 HIMAR systems, 60,000 122mm Grad rockets, Ground-Launched Small Diameter Bomb launchers and ammunition, ATACMS/Army Tactical Missile Systems.
Armored vehicles consisted of 300 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles, 4 Bradley Fire Support Team vehicles,
31 M1A1 tanks, 45 T-72B tanks, 400 Stryker armored personnel carriers, 900 M113 armored personnel carriers, 400 M1117 armored security vehicles, 300 armored medical-treatment vehicles, 1,000 MRAP vehicles, 125mm, 120mm, and 105mm tank ammunition.
Ground support vehicles consisted of 5,000 Humvees, 1,153 tactical vehicles, 200 light tactical vehicles, 80 trucks, 200 trailers, 10 command-post vehicles, 30 ammunition-support vehicles, 6 armored utility trucks, 20 logistics-support vehicles, 58 water trailers, 239 fuel tankers and 105 fuel trailers.
Air defense systems consisted of three Patriot air defense batteries and munitions, 12 NASAM systems, Avenger air defense systems, HAWK air defense systems and munitions, Laser-guided rocket systems, AIM-7 missiles, RIM-7 missiles, AIM-9M missiles, Antiaircraft guns and ammunition, Equipment to integrate with and sustain Ukraine’s systems and to protect critical infrastructure, VAMPIRE anti-drone systems and munitions, anti-drone gun trucks and ammunition, anti-drone laser-guided rocket systems, air defense systems components, other anti-drone equipment.
Air-to-ground missiles consisted of HARM/High-speed anti-radiation missiles, precision guided aerial munitions, 6,000 Zuni aircraft rockets, 20,000 Hydra-70 aircraft rockets, Air-to-ground munitions.
Manned aircraft consisted of 20 Mi-17 helicopters, Support equipment for F-16s.
Explosive and combat drones consisted of Switchblade drones, Phoenix Ghost drones, and ALTIUS-600 drones.
Surveillance drones consisted of ScanEagle drones, Puma drones. JUMP 20 drones, CyberLux K8 drones, Penguin drones, Black Hornet drones and Raven drones.
Coastal defense systems consisted of two Harpoon coastal defense systems, 62 coastal and riverine patrol boats, unmanned coastal defense vessels plus port and harbor security equipment.
Radar and communications equipment consisted of four satellite communications antennas, two radars for drones, 21 air surveillance radars, 100 counter-artillery and counter-mortar radars, 50 multi-mission radars, Tactical secure communications systems, Electronic warfare and counter–electronic, warfare equipment, four SATCOM antennas, SATCOM terminals and services.
Satellite services consisted of Commercial satellite imagery services.
While all this assistance was appreciated and put to use, Ukraine builds over 80 percent of the weapons and munitions it uses.
FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, March 30, 2026 - 04:02 pm: Edit

Morale: Chinese Purges Devastate Their Military
March 27, 2026: China continues with its purge of the higher ranks of the military. Senior officers were removed for purported misconduct in weapons procurement and development of new systems. Most members of the Central Military Commission were removed, crippling the management of military activities. Part of the problem is the increasing size of the military budget, which entices senior officers to divert some of that money for their own use.
This is not the first time this has happened. Two years ago, China purged or removed from their positions over a dozen senior officers of the army, navy, and air force. The government conducted an inspection of the forces the purged officers commanded and found numerous deficiencies. Ships, combat vehicles, aircraft and ballistic missiles listed as available for use, were not. Maintenance was neglected to the point that systems became ineffective. For example, liquid-fueled ballistic missiles had their fuel replaced with water. Missile silos were poorly constructed and unusable. Aircraft were grounded because maintenance was neglected. Warships were similarly unable to leave port because they lacked sufficient maintenance to operate at sea. Army units had similar problems with combat vehicles and artillery systems.
There were exceptions, but not enough to provide the number of operable ships, heavy weapons, and aircraft the military thought was available. Corruption in the Chinese military is an ancient tradition, going back thousands of years and based on the belief that no one would attack such a large state as China. At the same time, China rarely undertook major military campaigns because China was already huge and there were no areas worth having that needed conquering. The most common conflicts were civil wars between factions that were equally unprepared. In the 1930s Japan attacked a disorganized and divided China but were only able to capture and hold onto portions of it. At the end of World War II most of the Japanese army was still in China, kept busy occupying and policing portions of China they had taken control of. Most of these troops were captured by Russian forces at the end of the war, and most of the rest voluntarily moved to ports to be repatriated to Japan, although American troops occupied southern Korea and added those Japanese garrison troops to their relatively small number of Japanese prisoners of war. Most Japanese troops the Americans encountered in the Pacific died making suicidal counterattacks against the heavily armed and resolute American forces. Few Japanese soldiers surrendered because that was seen as disgraceful.
Both China and Japan reformed their armed forces after World War II. Japan adopted a new constitution that prohibited armed forces capable of offensive operations. China demobilized most of their huge army and sought to modernize the remaining soldiers. This modernization is still underway because of the many wrong turns the modernization effort took. Some of the problems were related to corruption, which increased as the Chinese economy finally began to rapidly grow in the 1980s and produced enough government income for more money to spend on, or steal from, the military. Every Chinese leader since has tried somewhat to a fair amount to deal with them, and current leader Xi Jinping is trying more than most. So far, he has encountered more problems than he can deal with effectively. Xi is not giving up and moving forward to do what has rarely been done in peacetime China.

FYEO

By Steve Cole (Stevecole) on Monday, March 30, 2026 - 04:02 pm: Edit

Syria: March Update
March 27, 2026: For the first time since antiquity, the Iranian holiday of Nowruz will be celebrated in Syria. In 2025, Syria’s new ruler, Ahmed Hussein al-Sharaa, was quick to restore enough order and security for businesses to prosper. This was so successful that millions of Syrians living in exile returned from Turkey and resumed their normal lives. Al-Sharaa made peace with all the neighbors, including Israel. He restored diplomatic and economic relations with the U.S. and Russia.
The ruling, since 1971, Assad clan of Syria disappeared at the end of 2024 as Syria was overrun in two weeks by Abu Mohammed Al-Golani and thousands of Islamic terrorists he turned into soldiers for the liberation of Syria from Assad rule. The Assad family fled to Russia and insisted they would return. Golani, a former leader of Islamic terrorist group HTS, now sort-of rules Syria. As leader of Hay’at Tahrir Al-Sham/HTS, an Islamist group long active in Syria’s northwest, Al-Golani has evolved from a shadowy militant figure with a $10 million bounty on his head into a revolutionary nationalist and widely recognized political actor. He also changed his name to Ahmed Hussein al-Sharaa.
In 2021 the Assads chose peace over religion in 2021 by quietly abandoning long-time ally Iran for new deals with Russia and the Arab League, as well as Israel. That’s how the Assads, who belong to the Shia minority of Syria, have survived; by changing alliances when necessary. This most recent shift began after the 2011 rebellion of the Sunni majority against the Shia minority. The Assads almost lost but by late 2018 it was clear they had won. The fighting persisted into 2023 because the main participants, like Russia, Turkey, Iran, the Assad government, and several remaining rebel factions could not agree on how to deal with the loose ends. Although initially considered likely to win, the rebels lost because of factionalism. Over 500,000 died and a third of the population fled, mainly to Turkey and Lebanon.
Meanwhile the Assads received over $16 billion worth of Iranian aid since 2012. That was joined by assistance from Russia in 2015 and Turkey in 2016. The civil war also morphed into a proxy war between Iran and the Sunni Arab states and their Western allies. The major factor in the rebel defeat was ISIL, which began as one of many Sunni Arab Islamic terror groups who wanted to turn Syria into a religious dictatorship. Most Syrians just wanted peace and prosperity. The Islamic terror groups, as was their custom, put a priority on determining which of them was the true savior of Islam. ISIL was definitely the most ruthless and best organized and many groups submitted to ISIL, if only temporarily. That weakened the rebel effort sufficiently for the Assads to hang on and become part of a larger anti-ISIL coalition. One thing everyone could agree on was that ISIL had to be destroyed first and by late 2017 that was accomplished.
With ISIL reduced to small groups carrying out terror attacks, the remaining rebels were still not united. At the time ISIL was crushed the rebels controlled about a third of the country but were outnumbered by the Assad forces and most Syrians were increasingly war weary. Most of the deaths occurred after 2013. The killing diminished a bit in 2015 because of sheer exhaustion and picked up again in 2016 because of the Russian air and other support. The stubborn Assad dictatorship had a chance to win after 2015, something some Western nations saw as preferable to Islamic terrorists taking over and requiring a Western invasion to remove such a threat.
In August 2016 Turkish ground forces entered northern Syria to seal the border from ISIL and Turkish separatist PKK Kurds as well as to weaken the Syrian Kurds. The Turks were basically helping the Assads and hurting ISIL and all that made an Assad victory more likely. Before the Assads could resume control of the country, they had to deal with the fact that Israel, Jordan and the Sunni Arab oil states are opposed to the Iranian effort to establish a permanent military presence in Syria. The Assads were not happy with Iranian domination but had to keep quiet about that. Turkey was opposed to any autonomous Syrian Kurdish area in the northeast as well as a permanent Iranian presence. Turkey and Russia are technically allies of Iran in Syria and the reality is that no one trusted Iran’s mullah regime. The Russians quietly made it clear they would side with Israel if it came down to that. The Turks are NATO members and traditional foes of Russia and Iran. The current Turkish government is unstable and increasingly unpopular with Turks as well as the neighbors. Iranian unrest and dire growing financial problems reduced Iranian efforts in Syria. The Assads quietly patched things up with the Arab League, with help from Russia and, unexpectedly, Israel. At this point Iranian leaders were aware of what the Assads were going but were unsure of how to deal with it.
In the meantime, even the Assads’ ethnic base in Syria’s sort-of Shiite Alawite minority reached the breaking point of their ability to prop the regime up, and Abu Mohammed Al-Golani brilliantly perceived an opportunity to finish off the Assads. With help from several foreign governments, including Turkey and Ukraine, he led his HTS faction, then confined to the northwestern corner of Syria, in a surprise attack on the Assads and their Alawite supporters. The latter’s armed forces and supporters simply went home.
By late 2024 the Assads had fled to Russia and HTS controlled Syria. Israel took advantage of the chaos to destroy Syrian air defenses, the air force and 80 percent of their weapons and munitions. Israel also annexed some Syrian territory to provide a larger buffer zone. Iran’s influence in Syria dropped to zero.
FYEO

By Jessica Orsini (Jessica_Orsini) on Tuesday, March 31, 2026 - 08:28 am: Edit

It appears that Ukraine's strike against Russian oil terminals on the Baltic wasn't a one-off; yesterday, they hit the terminal at Ust-Luga for the fifth time in 10 days.

By Jessica Orsini (Jessica_Orsini) on Tuesday, March 31, 2026 - 07:50 pm: Edit

Pres. Trump said today that he expects the war in Iran could be over in about two weeks. This is not the first time he has given that general time frame; I believe the first iteration was about a week and a half into the war, and has been repeated roughly weekly ever since.

I can't help but think of the general store scene in O Brother, Where Art Thou?, where upon learning that both items he wants are not in stock but that the store could have them in a couple of weeks, Ulysses Everett McGill says, "Well, ain't this place a geographical oddity. Two weeks from everywhere!"