Donald Trump

[frothy]

Frothy will be on his 6th pint of Holts best bitter by now. He will get back to you after he’s had a nap.

I'm in Greece can't get Holts here

 

[Paul1970]

You want me to speculate in a fashion that is realistic, withought defining what realistic is. When speculation is involved, realism is to each ones impression only, never a fact.

One thing however upon which i have speculated hard since the start of the war, was that the more time would go on the more drone warfare would become prominent, to the point that it would more and more redefine modern war. From my own professional background i am acutely aware how in recent decades the mass production of cheap components that fit such end products have risen. hence i can speak with some knowledge of facts that drone production is notably of a kind where it is not so hard to reach production orders of ... millions!

There is a potential fair amount of paradigm shift that this might cause. When one thinks of a future of drone warfare to the greatest extend it could happen, then one would immagine that the most important metrics to victory are such things like technological advancement and industrial capacity. The paradigm shift is that this takes away from the importance of being superior in terms of manpower for example. Indeed, it must be extremely demoralizing for soldiers to fight nothing but drones, even if you kill it its just a cheap product noone cries, if you loose you die. There is much to say about all the features of this paradigm shift, another part besides is just that drones are very cheap which shows in the production volumes they are made, few weapons of war are indeed ever made in such proportions other than rifles and ammunition but it has shown that indeed it can defeat pretty much anything under good conditions and often its just a matter to swarm and take a 33% succes rate as "simply a succes". Perhaps Ai can be involved with it, perhaps miniaturizitaion can makes these things yet even more scary than they are, the potential power of drone warfare has indeed many scary elements to it too, immagine its use within the wrong hands.

Ukraine has said .. "claimed" that they can already produce more than a million "drones" a year, and are upscaling that production to many millions. i do not have reason to disbelieve that such a thing is possible, not at all. I do think that whoever gets a very large quantitive and/or technological drone advantage can win the war irrespective of who has more tanks or soldiers or rockets or planes, mostly because the production volumes are quite stacked against such conventional weapons.

That really puts my perspective that "on the longer term, anything can happen", the longer this war takes. it's not unreasonable to think that the west might provide Ukraine with a lot of industrial help too as to upscale production, much that you might think that perhaps they are not "doing enough". Given that within the west lies the industries that do the crucial mass production of o so many components, the kind of "cheap diplomatic trick" as to give aid and not be so associated with it would be that all the Ukrainians have to do is mount said components in a drone assembly and off it goes. By the millions yes. And what design? Well that might evolve a lot and/or fast too, so lots of possible outcomes there too.

Thus, it is too hard to tell, the way i see it and especially given that it is a long war and one that is currently moving very few it can still go every way, i do think superiority in drone warfare might be key in victory and i do think Ukraine has a fair chance to attain that dominance too.

Never thought of it that way tbh . Wonder how many on each side have been killed by drones .

 

[Vic]

You sometimes just have to take a leap of faith.

Wow.

"I have in my hand a piece of paper..."

 

[Blue Maverick]

The one saving grace in all this is his age, I like many don’t think he will leave after this next term he will stay on and tip up the constitution, if he was about 50 that could be deadly, however looking at him there’s a good chance like Biden he doesn’t see out a full term

 

[M18CTID]

I was drawing an analogy (correctly in my view) remind me again how many times has Trump been found guilty of child abuse?

How many times was Savile?

 

[Vic]

This is undoubtedly garbage, they will be monitoring that no electoral fraud is going on, also happens in in the UK, all parties are allowed to watch the count. Years of the nonsense we as a club have had to put up with have made me wise up and see through bullshit like this about everything i read online.

They're watching the voters, not the count.

To be honest i couldn't care less who the people of the United States elect as their next president, it became of interest following the attempted murder of Trump, i only care about facts and truth, and if you think fox news and Murdoch's publications are biased (which they are) stick to the Guardian they will will give you all the conformation bias you desire.

So you have no idea why anyone might want to murder him?

 

[halfcenturyup]

Looking at the way the momentum appears to be inevitably swinging, especially with Biden obdurately refusing to accept reality, I am grateful for the serendipity of Sunak calling a summer GE as this will give the new Prime Minister more time to plan for an outcome which will inevitably change the UK’s (and Europe’s) relationship with the US - and we now have someone in power who will be more willing to make bold but necessary choices in association with that.

Every downside has an upside. The US pulls out of Europe, European countries will have to invest more in defence and work more closely together. There is plenty of money there for it if they have to.

Someone earlier posted a list of reasons why a second Trump presidency would be bad. 9 of the 11 were about the effect he will have on the US. Who am I to tell the American people who they should elect? They want Trump, they are welcome to him.

The other two reasons, by the way, were the effect on Nato and by consequence then, Europe. See above. And starting a trade or real war with China. I can't imagine he is brave enough to start a real war with China, so yes, I suppose Taiwan and Ukraine to an extent lose out, but, on the whole, globally, I can't see what damage he is likely to do in four years and by then he will most likely be dead one way or the other.

Maybe my view is regional, sitting here in relative comfort in Asia. Apologies if that is the case.

 

[Vic]

Never going to happen. Militarily NATO are practically nothing without the US.

View attachment 125468

The USA isn't spending all that in defending Europe. More troops in Japan than in the EU.

 

[mancityscot]

How would you behave after being shot and nearly killed? Fortunately you and most of us don’t know because it’s never happened to us.

I’d be shell shocked mate, Trump didn’t seem fazed at all

 

[mancboy]

So JD Vance, former Marine and best selling author on growing up in backwater Appalachian America does a complete about turn. Has implied that Trump reminded him of Hitler even.
Oh the sweet aphrodisiac of the pursuit of power

If you ever wanted a truer representation that you cannot trust a word that comes from a politicians mouth this is it, going from hes hitler to he aint such a bad guy is a hell of an about turn, politically you can see why hes done it appealing to the yanks obsession with the military is always a good political ploy.