CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Then it all depends how much a hypersonic missile costs
If you can send 50 of them into the area where a carrier is likely to be, with a high chance one will hit and destroy the carrier, then it’s worth it. If a carrier costs £3bn, and a missile costs £30m each - then you can afford to fire 100 missiles
Bring the cost of the missiles down to £3m, and it’s game over for the carriers
The whole thrust of war seems to be towards cheaper mobile attacking platforms, drones, AI, missiles, and against massive lumbering objects, tanks, destroyers, carriers
Also mines are now much cheaper than men
I think traditional navies are in their last days, like cavalry forces in WW1. Cf the Russian Black Sea fleet
Well, I'd be staggered if they just cost $3m - given that they involve highly complex new engines. And don't forget that they tend to have fairly small warheads.
That said, I agree traditional carrier based navies are over. But I think they are replaced by 20 drone carrying ships rather than navies disappearing altogether. If you are able to launch 400 drones at a time, each of which carries munitions, then you will be able to absolutely overwhelm targets. And because those drones don't require people, they can be smaller, cheap, more maueverable, etc.
Edit to add: Russia does an amazing job custom producing one off new tanks and aircraft. What's it done a terrible job with is mass production.
Aircraft carriers are here to stay. Even more so because of their utility as long r age drone platforms. Air defence destroyer capability will have to increase, especially against ballistic and hypersonic t
There are many problems with immigration to the US, legal and illegal. But it appears to be a net benefit, economically:
'Consider a few numbers: Last week, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released updated 10-year economic and budget forecasts. The numbers look significantly better than they did a year earlier, and immigration is a key reason. . . . This will in turn lead to better economic growth. As CBO Director Phill Swagel wrote in a note accompanying the forecasts: As a result of these immigration-driven revisions to the size of the labor force, “we estimate that, from 2023 to 2034, GDP will be greater by about $7 trillion and revenues will be greater by about $1 trillion than they would have been otherwise.' source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/13/immigration-economy-jobs-cbo-report/
The same was said about EU membership and essentially unlimited immigration to the UK.
The fact is that if you separate skilled from unskilled immigration, and legal from illegal immigration, the numbers look a whole load better, and don’t upset the native population who see competition for jobs and housing way more than they see an increase in GDP.
You talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership, but immigration post-Brexit has been higher than when we were in the EU.
There were 500m people who could turn up with a right to work and rent accommodation, thus ensuring that the legal minimum wage became the maximum wage in a number of industries, even if that meant living four to a room.
That’s a million miles away from recent immigration numbers driven mostly by Ukranians, Hong Kongers, and students.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
Hmm. Hot take is there seems to be a lot of hopecasting by some PB Tory elements here. Note some, by no means all. Starmer has found a couple of wrong uns, and he’s sacked them both within a day of their transgressions coming to light. It might just blow over. Let’s see.
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Then it all depends how much a hypersonic missile costs
If you can send 50 of them into the area where a carrier is likely to be, with a high chance one will hit and destroy the carrier, then it’s worth it. If a carrier costs £3bn, and a missile costs £30m each - then you can afford to fire 100 missiles
Bring the cost of the missiles down to £3m, and it’s game over for the carriers
The whole thrust of war seems to be towards cheaper mobile attacking platforms, drones, AI, missiles, and against massive lumbering objects, tanks, destroyers, carriers
Also mines are now much cheaper than men
I think traditional navies are in their last days, like cavalry forces in WW1. Cf the Russian Black Sea fleet
Well, I'd be staggered if they just cost $3m - given that they involve highly complex new engines. And don't forget that they tend to have fairly small warheads.
That said, I agree traditional carrier based navies are over. But I think they are replaced by 20 drone carrying ships rather than navies disappearing altogether. If you are able to launch 400 drones at a time, each of which carries munitions, then you will be able to absolutely overwhelm targets. And because those drones don't require people, they can be smaller, cheap, more maueverable, etc.
Then you discover the issue, that if your drones are not just throw away vehicles, that you need maintenance, fuel etc.
And you need to defend your drone carrier.
Before you know it, you are back at a... carrier.
Laser weapons are just getting going, by the way. Especially for point defence. Shoot until you run out of electricity. Which on a nuclear powered ship may be a while.
The thing about drones is that they're very soon going to make it impossible for large vessels like carriers to operate safely within a couple of hundred miles of anyone's coastline. Poor nations included.
That makes them a lot less useful.
And if it's raining, you've got a problem with your lasers.
There are many problems with immigration to the US, legal and illegal. But it appears to be a net benefit, economically:
'Consider a few numbers: Last week, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released updated 10-year economic and budget forecasts. The numbers look significantly better than they did a year earlier, and immigration is a key reason. . . . This will in turn lead to better economic growth. As CBO Director Phill Swagel wrote in a note accompanying the forecasts: As a result of these immigration-driven revisions to the size of the labor force, “we estimate that, from 2023 to 2034, GDP will be greater by about $7 trillion and revenues will be greater by about $1 trillion than they would have been otherwise.' source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/13/immigration-economy-jobs-cbo-report/
The same was said about EU membership and essentially unlimited immigration to the UK.
The fact is that if you separate skilled from unskilled immigration, and legal from illegal immigration, the numbers look a whole load better, and don’t upset the native population who see competition for jobs and housing way more than they see an increase in GDP.
You talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership, but immigration post-Brexit has been higher than when we were in the EU.
There were 500m people who could turn up with a right to work and rent accommodation, thus ensuring that the legal minimum wage became the maximum wage in a number of industries, even if that meant living four to a room.
That’s a million miles away from recent immigration numbers driven mostly by Ukranians, Hong Kongers, and students.
It doesn't matter how many people could turn up. It mattered how many did. More turn up now.
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Then it all depends how much a hypersonic missile costs
If you can send 50 of them into the area where a carrier is likely to be, with a high chance one will hit and destroy the carrier, then it’s worth it. If a carrier costs £3bn, and a missile costs £30m each - then you can afford to fire 100 missiles
Bring the cost of the missiles down to £3m, and it’s game over for the carriers
The whole thrust of war seems to be towards cheaper mobile attacking platforms, drones, AI, missiles, and against massive lumbering objects, tanks, destroyers, carriers
Also mines are now much cheaper than men
I think traditional navies are in their last days, like cavalry forces in WW1. Cf the Russian Black Sea fleet
Well, I'd be staggered if they just cost $3m - given that they involve highly complex new engines. And don't forget that they tend to have fairly small warheads.
That said, I agree traditional carrier based navies are over. But I think they are replaced by 20 drone carrying ships rather than navies disappearing altogether. If you are able to launch 400 drones at a time, each of which carries munitions, then you will be able to absolutely overwhelm targets. And because those drones don't require people, they can be smaller, cheap, more maueverable, etc.
Then you discover the issue, that if your drones are not just throw away vehicles, that you need maintenance, fuel etc.
And you need to defend your drone carrier.
Before you know it, you are back at a... carrier.
Laser weapons are just getting going, by the way. Especially for point defence. Shoot until you run out of electricity. Which on a nuclear powered ship may be a while.
The thing about drones is that they're very soon going to make it impossible for large vessels like carriers to operate safely within a couple of hundred miles of anyone's coastline. Poor nations included.
That makes them a lot less useful.
And if it's raining, you've got a problem with your lasers.
Carriers rarely come within a couple of hundred miles of a hostile coastline anyway. This is why carrier planes have longer range than that.
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Then it all depends how much a hypersonic missile costs
If you can send 50 of them into the area where a carrier is likely to be, with a high chance one will hit and destroy the carrier, then it’s worth it. If a carrier costs £3bn, and a missile costs £30m each - then you can afford to fire 100 missiles
Bring the cost of the missiles down to £3m, and it’s game over for the carriers
The whole thrust of war seems to be towards cheaper mobile attacking platforms, drones, AI, missiles, and against massive lumbering objects, tanks, destroyers, carriers
Also mines are now much cheaper than men
I think traditional navies are in their last days, like cavalry forces in WW1. Cf the Russian Black Sea fleet
Well, I'd be staggered if they just cost $3m - given that they involve highly complex new engines. And don't forget that they tend to have fairly small warheads.
That said, I agree traditional carrier based navies are over. But I think they are replaced by 20 drone carrying ships rather than navies disappearing altogether. If you are able to launch 400 drones at a time, each of which carries munitions, then you will be able to absolutely overwhelm targets. And because those drones don't require people, they can be smaller, cheap, more maueverable, etc.
Then you discover the issue, that if your drones are not just throw away vehicles, that you need maintenance, fuel etc.
And you need to defend your drone carrier.
Before you know it, you are back at a... carrier.
Laser weapons are just getting going, by the way. Especially for point defence. Shoot until you run out of electricity. Which on a nuclear powered ship may be a while.
The thing about drones is that they're very soon going to make it impossible for large vessels like carriers to operate safely within a couple of hundred miles of anyone's coastline. Poor nations included.
That makes them a lot less useful.
And if it's raining, you've got a problem with your lasers.
Yes, this seems obvious to me
The houthis are basically cavemen yet they are causing havoc in the Red Sea with a few drones and whatnot
A capable nation like Iran or, god forbid, China - could overwhelm any navy with drones and missiles, or so it appears
Cf tanks versus one man missiles like NLAWS - and soon these will be autonomous and AI and you won’t even need to risk men
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Then it all depends how much a hypersonic missile costs
If you can send 50 of them into the area where a carrier is likely to be, with a high chance one will hit and destroy the carrier, then it’s worth it. If a carrier costs £3bn, and a missile costs £30m each - then you can afford to fire 100 missiles
Bring the cost of the missiles down to £3m, and it’s game over for the carriers
The whole thrust of war seems to be towards cheaper mobile attacking platforms, drones, AI, missiles, and against massive lumbering objects, tanks, destroyers, carriers
Also mines are now much cheaper than men
I think traditional navies are in their last days, like cavalry forces in WW1. Cf the Russian Black Sea fleet
Well, I'd be staggered if they just cost $3m - given that they involve highly complex new engines. And don't forget that they tend to have fairly small warheads.
That said, I agree traditional carrier based navies are over. But I think they are replaced by 20 drone carrying ships rather than navies disappearing altogether. If you are able to launch 400 drones at a time, each of which carries munitions, then you will be able to absolutely overwhelm targets. And because those drones don't require people, they can be smaller, cheap, more maueverable, etc.
Then you discover the issue, that if your drones are not just throw away vehicles, that you need maintenance, fuel etc.
And you need to defend your drone carrier.
Before you know it, you are back at a... carrier.
Laser weapons are just getting going, by the way. Especially for point defence. Shoot until you run out of electricity. Which on a nuclear powered ship may be a while.
Good job our carriers are nuclear powered. Oh wait...
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
The reality is Netenyahu and the IDF have destroyed a lot of the goodwill that was evident after the Hamas attacks .
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Then it all depends how much a hypersonic missile costs
If you can send 50 of them into the area where a carrier is likely to be, with a high chance one will hit and destroy the carrier, then it’s worth it. If a carrier costs £3bn, and a missile costs £30m each - then you can afford to fire 100 missiles
Bring the cost of the missiles down to £3m, and it’s game over for the carriers
The whole thrust of war seems to be towards cheaper mobile attacking platforms, drones, AI, missiles, and against massive lumbering objects, tanks, destroyers, carriers
Also mines are now much cheaper than men
I think traditional navies are in their last days, like cavalry forces in WW1. Cf the Russian Black Sea fleet
Well, I'd be staggered if they just cost $3m - given that they involve highly complex new engines. And don't forget that they tend to have fairly small warheads.
That said, I agree traditional carrier based navies are over. But I think they are replaced by 20 drone carrying ships rather than navies disappearing altogether. If you are able to launch 400 drones at a time, each of which carries munitions, then you will be able to absolutely overwhelm targets. And because those drones don't require people, they can be smaller, cheap, more maueverable, etc.
Then you discover the issue, that if your drones are not just throw away vehicles, that you need maintenance, fuel etc.
And you need to defend your drone carrier.
Before you know it, you are back at a... carrier.
Laser weapons are just getting going, by the way. Especially for point defence. Shoot until you run out of electricity. Which on a nuclear powered ship may be a while.
The thing about drones is that they're very soon going to make it impossible for large vessels like carriers to operate safely within a couple of hundred miles of anyone's coastline. Poor nations included.
That makes them a lot less useful.
And if it's raining, you've got a problem with your lasers.
Carriers rarely come within a couple of hundred miles of a hostile coastline anyway. This is why carrier planes have longer range than that.
What do you think they're doing off Yemen at the moment ?
... Taiwan is about 130km from the Chinese mainland. Etc
And he's not the first person I know who's had significant delays waiting for an ambulance.
My sister broke her hip yesterday at the Gym (competing with me with my broken legs two years ago while just walking out of the door for the most stupid way to have an accident) and is going to have a hip replacement tomorrow. Five and a half hours wait for the ambulance.
On the other hand: on Friday a man collapsed in the changing room of the swimming pool. CPR was performed by the staff, and an ambulance arrived very promptly. I chatted to the staff on Monday, and he survived.
(Friday was a very bad day for me. After witnessing the CPR, I came home to discover on FB that an old schoolfriend had died. Fortunately bad luck did not happen in threes.)
That's good news (the first bit anyway). That is the difference between life threatening and not which a hip isn't, although I think for a broken hip (although I guess they didn't know that at that stage) leaving someone in pain for 5.5 hours is just far too long. When I broke my legs I think it was 3 hours. Again that is really too long, although in my case I was comfortable and not in pain and the treatment I got once picked up was excellent and I was seen almost immediately on arrival in hospital.
When I broke my elbow, I had to walk a few miles, take a ferry, and then drive just to get to see the GP. My dad and sister then had to drive twelve hours to get me to the nearest A&E!
Hmm. Hot take is there seems to be a lot of hopecasting by some PB Tory elements here. Note some, by no means all. Starmer has found a couple of wrong uns, and he’s sacked them both within a day of their transgressions coming to light. It might just blow over. Let’s see.
I think CON have more chance in Rochdale than in Wellingborough or Kingswood!
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Then it all depends how much a hypersonic missile costs
If you can send 50 of them into the area where a carrier is likely to be, with a high chance one will hit and destroy the carrier, then it’s worth it. If a carrier costs £3bn, and a missile costs £30m each - then you can afford to fire 100 missiles
Bring the cost of the missiles down to £3m, and it’s game over for the carriers
The whole thrust of war seems to be towards cheaper mobile attacking platforms, drones, AI, missiles, and against massive lumbering objects, tanks, destroyers, carriers
Also mines are now much cheaper than men
I think traditional navies are in their last days, like cavalry forces in WW1. Cf the Russian Black Sea fleet
Well, I'd be staggered if they just cost $3m - given that they involve highly complex new engines. And don't forget that they tend to have fairly small warheads.
That said, I agree traditional carrier based navies are over. But I think they are replaced by 20 drone carrying ships rather than navies disappearing altogether. If you are able to launch 400 drones at a time, each of which carries munitions, then you will be able to absolutely overwhelm targets. And because those drones don't require people, they can be smaller, cheap, more maueverable, etc.
Then you discover the issue, that if your drones are not just throw away vehicles, that you need maintenance, fuel etc.
And you need to defend your drone carrier.
Before you know it, you are back at a... carrier.
Laser weapons are just getting going, by the way. Especially for point defence. Shoot until you run out of electricity. Which on a nuclear powered ship may be a while.
The thing about drones is that they're very soon going to make it impossible for large vessels like carriers to operate safely within a couple of hundred miles of anyone's coastline. Poor nations included.
That makes them a lot less useful.
And if it's raining, you've got a problem with your lasers.
Yes, this seems obvious to me
The houthis are basically cavemen yet they are causing havoc in the Red Sea with a few drones and whatnot
A capable nation like Iran or, god forbid, China - could overwhelm any navy with drones and missiles, or so it appears
Cf tanks versus one man missiles like NLAWS - and soon these will be autonomous and AI and you won’t even need to risk men
I don’t think you have a concept of all the tricks in the kitbag of a modern carrier task group. For a start you have to find it, and then there’s a LOT of volume and types of air defence kit, and the option and using A/C to take the fight to your launch sites.
On your second point, this has been a debate since the panzerfaust in WW2. Infantry are (or can be) good against tanks, which is why you support your tanks.
There are many problems with immigration to the US, legal and illegal. But it appears to be a net benefit, economically:
'Consider a few numbers: Last week, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released updated 10-year economic and budget forecasts. The numbers look significantly better than they did a year earlier, and immigration is a key reason. . . . This will in turn lead to better economic growth. As CBO Director Phill Swagel wrote in a note accompanying the forecasts: As a result of these immigration-driven revisions to the size of the labor force, “we estimate that, from 2023 to 2034, GDP will be greater by about $7 trillion and revenues will be greater by about $1 trillion than they would have been otherwise.' source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/13/immigration-economy-jobs-cbo-report/
The same was said about EU membership and essentially unlimited immigration to the UK.
The fact is that if you separate skilled from unskilled immigration, and legal from illegal immigration, the numbers look a whole load better, and don’t upset the native population who see competition for jobs and housing way more than they see an increase in GDP.
You talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership, but immigration post-Brexit has been higher than when we were in the EU.
There were 500m people who could turn up with a right to work and rent accommodation, thus ensuring that the legal minimum wage became the maximum wage in a number of industries, even if that meant living four to a room.
That’s a million miles away from recent immigration numbers driven mostly by Ukranians, Hong Kongers, and students.
It doesn't matter how many people could turn up. It mattered how many did. More turn up now.
From your link, it appears that the increase in work visas is “largely attributed” to the healthcare industry. Is that a bad thing?
The big changes appear to be an increase in dependents of students, and a reduction in humanitarian (mostly UA and HK) routes to immigration (in 2023 vs 2022).
Hmm. Hot take is there seems to be a lot of hopecasting by some PB Tory elements here. Note some, by no means all. Starmer has found a couple of wrong uns, and he’s sacked them both within a day of their transgressions coming to light. It might just blow over. Let’s see.
I think CON have more chance in Rochdale than in Wellingborough or Kingswood!
Not a bad shout. You could be right there. They are fielding the only candidate who hasn’t been disgraced in some way aren’t they? (Not the Liberal directly but the party itself in their case, due to the Cyril Smith scandal)
Hmm. Hot take is there seems to be a lot of hopecasting by some PB Tory elements here. Note some, by no means all. Starmer has found a couple of wrong uns, and he’s sacked them both within a day of their transgressions coming to light. It might just blow over. Let’s see.
I think CON have more chance in Rochdale than in Wellingborough or Kingswood!
Not a bad shout. You could be right there. They are fielding the only candidate who hasn’t been disgraced in some way aren’t they? (Not the Liberal directly but the party itself in their case, due to the Cyril Smith scandal)
1. Tories have no chance in Rochdale. 2. Tory party is in disgrace now, not 50 years ago when Cyril Smith was about
Hmm. Hot take is there seems to be a lot of hopecasting by some PB Tory elements here. Note some, by no means all. Starmer has found a couple of wrong uns, and he’s sacked them both within a day of their transgressions coming to light. It might just blow over. Let’s see.
I think CON have more chance in Rochdale than in Wellingborough or Kingswood!
Not a bad shout. You could be right there. They are fielding the only candidate who hasn’t been disgraced in some way aren’t they? (Not the Liberal directly but the party itself in their case, due to the Cyril Smith scandal)
1. Tories have no chance in Rochdale. 2. Tory party is in disgrace now, not 50 years ago when Cyril Smith was about
You have to remember, Cyril Smith cast a huge shadow in Rochdale.
Hmm. Hot take is there seems to be a lot of hopecasting by some PB Tory elements here. Note some, by no means all. Starmer has found a couple of wrong uns, and he’s sacked them both within a day of their transgressions coming to light. It might just blow over. Let’s see.
I think CON have more chance in Rochdale than in Wellingborough or Kingswood!
Not a bad shout. You could be right there. They are fielding the only candidate who hasn’t been disgraced in some way aren’t they? (Not the Liberal directly but the party itself in their case, due to the Cyril Smith scandal)
1. Tories have no chance in Rochdale. 2. Tory party is in disgrace now, not 50 years ago when Cyril Smith was about
You have to remember, Cyril Smith cast a huge shadow in Rochdale.
Hmm. Hot take is there seems to be a lot of hopecasting by some PB Tory elements here. Note some, by no means all. Starmer has found a couple of wrong uns, and he’s sacked them both within a day of their transgressions coming to light. It might just blow over. Let’s see.
I think CON have more chance in Rochdale than in Wellingborough or Kingswood!
Not a bad shout. You could be right there. They are fielding the only candidate who hasn’t been disgraced in some way aren’t they? (Not the Liberal directly but the party itself in their case, due to the Cyril Smith scandal)
1. Tories have no chance in Rochdale. 2. Tory party is in disgrace now, not 50 years ago when Cyril Smith was about
You have to remember, Cyril Smith cast a huge shadow in Rochdale.
There are many problems with immigration to the US, legal and illegal. But it appears to be a net benefit, economically:
'Consider a few numbers: Last week, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released updated 10-year economic and budget forecasts. The numbers look significantly better than they did a year earlier, and immigration is a key reason. . . . This will in turn lead to better economic growth. As CBO Director Phill Swagel wrote in a note accompanying the forecasts: As a result of these immigration-driven revisions to the size of the labor force, “we estimate that, from 2023 to 2034, GDP will be greater by about $7 trillion and revenues will be greater by about $1 trillion than they would have been otherwise.' source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/13/immigration-economy-jobs-cbo-report/
The same was said about EU membership and essentially unlimited immigration to the UK.
The fact is that if you separate skilled from unskilled immigration, and legal from illegal immigration, the numbers look a whole load better, and don’t upset the native population who see competition for jobs and housing way more than they see an increase in GDP.
You talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership, but immigration post-Brexit has been higher than when we were in the EU.
There were 500m people who could turn up with a right to work and rent accommodation, thus ensuring that the legal minimum wage became the maximum wage in a number of industries, even if that meant living four to a room.
That’s a million miles away from recent immigration numbers driven mostly by Ukranians, Hong Kongers, and students.
It doesn't matter how many people could turn up. It mattered how many did. More turn up now.
From your link, it appears that the increase in work visas is “largely attributed” to the healthcare industry. Is that a bad thing?
The big changes appear to be an increase in dependents of students, and a reduction in humanitarian (mostly UA and HK) routes to immigration.
There has been a big increase in work visas. I'm not saying this, or that many of the work visas are in healthcare, is a good or a bad thing. I'm saying that your talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership was silly given immigration post-Brexit has been higher.
Hmm. Hot take is there seems to be a lot of hopecasting by some PB Tory elements here. Note some, by no means all. Starmer has found a couple of wrong uns, and he’s sacked them both within a day of their transgressions coming to light. It might just blow over. Let’s see.
I think CON have more chance in Rochdale than in Wellingborough or Kingswood!
There are many problems with immigration to the US, legal and illegal. But it appears to be a net benefit, economically:
'Consider a few numbers: Last week, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released updated 10-year economic and budget forecasts. The numbers look significantly better than they did a year earlier, and immigration is a key reason. . . . This will in turn lead to better economic growth. As CBO Director Phill Swagel wrote in a note accompanying the forecasts: As a result of these immigration-driven revisions to the size of the labor force, “we estimate that, from 2023 to 2034, GDP will be greater by about $7 trillion and revenues will be greater by about $1 trillion than they would have been otherwise.' source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/13/immigration-economy-jobs-cbo-report/
The same was said about EU membership and essentially unlimited immigration to the UK.
The fact is that if you separate skilled from unskilled immigration, and legal from illegal immigration, the numbers look a whole load better, and don’t upset the native population who see competition for jobs and housing way more than they see an increase in GDP.
You talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership, but immigration post-Brexit has been higher than when we were in the EU.
There were 500m people who could turn up with a right to work and rent accommodation, thus ensuring that the legal minimum wage became the maximum wage in a number of industries, even if that meant living four to a room.
That’s a million miles away from recent immigration numbers driven mostly by Ukranians, Hong Kongers, and students.
It doesn't matter how many people could turn up. It mattered how many did. More turn up now.
From your link, it appears that the increase in work visas is “largely attributed” to the healthcare industry. Is that a bad thing?
The big changes appear to be an increase in dependents of students, and a reduction in humanitarian (mostly UA and HK) routes to immigration.
There has been a big increase in work visas. I'm not saying this, or that many of the work visas are in healthcare, is a good or a bad thing. I'm saying that your talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership was silly given immigration post-Brexit has been higher.
No, the difference with EU immigration was that there were 500m people with the *entitlement* to just turn up.
Since leaving the EU, many people who were earning minimum wage then are now earning considerably more.
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Well you can if you slow them down in the terminal phase. The plasma effects make them quite tough to track with conventional radar, apparently.
The U.S. has reportedly finally got some of the tech working, after many failures, but I think it's work in progress for all of the countries developing them as far as reliable systems are concerned.
Yes, but if you slow them down in the terminal phase, you also open them to being shot down by ships gatling guns.
There are many problems with immigration to the US, legal and illegal. But it appears to be a net benefit, economically:
'Consider a few numbers: Last week, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released updated 10-year economic and budget forecasts. The numbers look significantly better than they did a year earlier, and immigration is a key reason. . . . This will in turn lead to better economic growth. As CBO Director Phill Swagel wrote in a note accompanying the forecasts: As a result of these immigration-driven revisions to the size of the labor force, “we estimate that, from 2023 to 2034, GDP will be greater by about $7 trillion and revenues will be greater by about $1 trillion than they would have been otherwise.' source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/13/immigration-economy-jobs-cbo-report/
The same was said about EU membership and essentially unlimited immigration to the UK.
The fact is that if you separate skilled from unskilled immigration, and legal from illegal immigration, the numbers look a whole load better, and don’t upset the native population who see competition for jobs and housing way more than they see an increase in GDP.
You talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership, but immigration post-Brexit has been higher than when we were in the EU.
There were 500m people who could turn up with a right to work and rent accommodation, thus ensuring that the legal minimum wage became the maximum wage in a number of industries, even if that meant living four to a room.
That’s a million miles away from recent immigration numbers driven mostly by Ukranians, Hong Kongers, and students.
It doesn't matter how many people could turn up. It mattered how many did. More turn up now.
From your link, it appears that the increase in work visas is “largely attributed” to the healthcare industry. Is that a bad thing?
The big changes appear to be an increase in dependents of students, and a reduction in humanitarian (mostly UA and HK) routes to immigration.
There has been a big increase in work visas. I'm not saying this, or that many of the work visas are in healthcare, is a good or a bad thing. I'm saying that your talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership was silly given immigration post-Brexit has been higher.
No, the difference with EU immigration was that there were 500m people with the *entitlement* to just turn up.
It doesn't matter how many were entitled. It matters how many people did turn up. This is not a difficult concept.
There are many problems with immigration to the US, legal and illegal. But it appears to be a net benefit, economically:
'Consider a few numbers: Last week, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released updated 10-year economic and budget forecasts. The numbers look significantly better than they did a year earlier, and immigration is a key reason. . . . This will in turn lead to better economic growth. As CBO Director Phill Swagel wrote in a note accompanying the forecasts: As a result of these immigration-driven revisions to the size of the labor force, “we estimate that, from 2023 to 2034, GDP will be greater by about $7 trillion and revenues will be greater by about $1 trillion than they would have been otherwise.' source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/13/immigration-economy-jobs-cbo-report/
The same was said about EU membership and essentially unlimited immigration to the UK.
The fact is that if you separate skilled from unskilled immigration, and legal from illegal immigration, the numbers look a whole load better, and don’t upset the native population who see competition for jobs and housing way more than they see an increase in GDP.
You talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership, but immigration post-Brexit has been higher than when we were in the EU.
There were 500m people who could turn up with a right to work and rent accommodation, thus ensuring that the legal minimum wage became the maximum wage in a number of industries, even if that meant living four to a room.
That’s a million miles away from recent immigration numbers driven mostly by Ukranians, Hong Kongers, and students.
It doesn't matter how many people could turn up. It mattered how many did. More turn up now.
From your link, it appears that the increase in work visas is “largely attributed” to the healthcare industry. Is that a bad thing?
The big changes appear to be an increase in dependents of students, and a reduction in humanitarian (mostly UA and HK) routes to immigration.
There has been a big increase in work visas. I'm not saying this, or that many of the work visas are in healthcare, is a good or a bad thing. I'm saying that your talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership was silly given immigration post-Brexit has been higher.
No, the difference with EU immigration was that there were 500m people with the *entitlement* to just turn up.
It doesn't matter how many were entitled. It matters how many people did turn up. This is not a difficult concept.
Indeed it’s not. Ask any restauranteur in London trying to hire a chef for £12-15/hr at the moment.
Hmm. Hot take is there seems to be a lot of hopecasting by some PB Tory elements here. Note some, by no means all. Starmer has found a couple of wrong uns, and he’s sacked them both within a day of their transgressions coming to light. It might just blow over. Let’s see.
I think CON have more chance in Rochdale than in Wellingborough or Kingswood!
Not a bad shout. You could be right there. They are fielding the only candidate who hasn’t been disgraced in some way aren’t they? (Not the Liberal directly but the party itself in their case, due to the Cyril Smith scandal)
1. Tories have no chance in Rochdale. 2. Tory party is in disgrace now, not 50 years ago when Cyril Smith was about
You have to remember, Cyril Smith cast a huge shadow in Rochdale.
Hmm. Hot take is there seems to be a lot of hopecasting by some PB Tory elements here. Note some, by no means all. Starmer has found a couple of wrong uns, and he’s sacked them both within a day of their transgressions coming to light. It might just blow over. Let’s see.
I think CON have more chance in Rochdale than in Wellingborough or Kingswood!
Not a bad shout. You could be right there. They are fielding the only candidate who hasn’t been disgraced in some way aren’t they? (Not the Liberal directly but the party itself in their case, due to the Cyril Smith scandal)
1. Tories have no chance in Rochdale. 2. Tory party is in disgrace now, not 50 years ago when Cyril Smith was about
You have to remember, Cyril Smith cast a huge shadow in Rochdale.
They say he loomed large over the borough
Noncey Cyril was an MP until 1992 and an active Lib Dem until 2010, his death, too.
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Then it all depends how much a hypersonic missile costs
If you can send 50 of them into the area where a carrier is likely to be, with a high chance one will hit and destroy the carrier, then it’s worth it. If a carrier costs £3bn, and a missile costs £30m each - then you can afford to fire 100 missiles
Bring the cost of the missiles down to £3m, and it’s game over for the carriers
The whole thrust of war seems to be towards cheaper mobile attacking platforms, drones, AI, missiles, and against massive lumbering objects, tanks, destroyers, carriers
Also mines are now much cheaper than men
I think traditional navies are in their last days, like cavalry forces in WW1. Cf the Russian Black Sea fleet
Well, I'd be staggered if they just cost $3m - given that they involve highly complex new engines. And don't forget that they tend to have fairly small warheads.
That said, I agree traditional carrier based navies are over. But I think they are replaced by 20 drone carrying ships rather than navies disappearing altogether. If you are able to launch 400 drones at a time, each of which carries munitions, then you will be able to absolutely overwhelm targets. And because those drones don't require people, they can be smaller, cheap, more maueverable, etc.
Then you discover the issue, that if your drones are not just throw away vehicles, that you need maintenance, fuel etc.
And you need to defend your drone carrier.
Before you know it, you are back at a... carrier.
Laser weapons are just getting going, by the way. Especially for point defence. Shoot until you run out of electricity. Which on a nuclear powered ship may be a while.
The thing about drones is that they're very soon going to make it impossible for large vessels like carriers to operate safely within a couple of hundred miles of anyone's coastline. Poor nations included.
That makes them a lot less useful.
And if it's raining, you've got a problem with your lasers.
Carriers rarely come within a couple of hundred miles of a hostile coastline anyway. This is why carrier planes have longer range than that.
What do you think they're doing off Yemen at the moment ?
... Taiwan is about 130km from the Chinese mainland. Etc
The carriers don't go into the surf zone - that's the whole point of the aircraft.
US carrier groups can create a bubble of defended air/seaspace around them measured in hundreds of miles. That's part of the reason carriers are still with up.
In the event of a hot war with China over Taiwan, the US carriers wouldn't be *in* the Taiwan strait. Then can be the *other side* of Taiwan (by a long way) and send strikes to hit all the way to the main land.
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Well you can if you slow them down in the terminal phase. The plasma effects make them quite tough to track with conventional radar, apparently.
The U.S. has reportedly finally got some of the tech working, after many failures, but I think it's work in progress for all of the countries developing them as far as reliable systems are concerned.
Yes, but if you slow them down in the terminal phase, you also open them to being shot down by ships gatling guns.
They're really only reliably effective against stuff up to around Mach 2, I think. Your theoretical hypersonic target would still be travelling about double that speed when slowed down.
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Well you can if you slow them down in the terminal phase. The plasma effects make them quite tough to track with conventional radar, apparently.
The U.S. has reportedly finally got some of the tech working, after many failures, but I think it's work in progress for all of the countries developing them as far as reliable systems are concerned.
Yes, but if you slow them down in the terminal phase, you also open them to being shot down by ships gatling guns.
They're really only reliably effective against stuff up to around Mach 2, I think. Your theoretical hypersonic target would still be travelling about double that speed when slowed down.
I read that as March 2. Give it another 2 1/2 weeks and we'll be OK.
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
Plenty of analysts believe that this is what an invasion of Taiwan might look like - hypersonic missiles in case the US fleet was thinking of getting involved.
Doing some digging it does seem a very live debate. Some say it is the end of the aircraft carrier, some say the missiles are hyped and not THAT dangerous
I am not a ballistic missile engineer/strategic defence analyst, I dunno
The importance of this CNN report (if it is acccurate) is that they, and the Ukes, are claiming this is the first time a "hypersonic" missile has been used in actual warfare, rather than just a test or a wargame. DYOR!
"CNN — Ukraine claims it has evidence Russia fired an advanced hypersonic missile – one that experts say is almost impossible to shoot down – for the first time in the almost 2-year-old war.
The government-run Kyiv Scientific Research Institute of Forensic Expertise said in a Telegram post that debris recovered after a February 7 attack on the Ukrainian capital pointed to the use of a Zircon hypersonic cruise missile by the Russian military."
There’s a difference between an ICBM (a rocket-launched from the ground), a rocket-powered missile launched from an aircraft, and a revolutionary mach 5 jet-powered missile. The first two are old technology, can be seen from space, and aren’t going to do much in modern warfare.
The third is an interesting innovation if it works to lock a target, rather than simply heading for a fixed co-ordinate. It would need air defence elements to be positioned along the trajectory to anticipate its arrival, as it goes faster than the defence missiles. There’s no evidence that Russia, China, or North Korea actually have any of these, despite several demonstrations they claim to have given.
I suspect he doesn't know the difference between a rocket and a jet.
Further - to get true hypersonic air breathing missiles to work, you need a scramjet. A scramjet is where the combustion inside the engine is with supersonic flow . All existing air breathing engines slow the incoming air down to subsonic velocities. See the enormous cone things in the inlets of the SR71.
To date, claims of actually getting net thrust out of a scram jet are debated. Some experiments may have worked. For seconds.
Even if you get that all to work, you have to fly in a perfectly straight line. Otherwise the shock wave in the intake tears your whole plane/missile apart. Which is the usual fate of scram jet tests, by the way.
The Russian hypersonic missiles are all rocket powered. Ballistic weapons fired from aircraft, mainly.
Indeed - as this article explains, it is highly unlikely that the Russians are anywhere near getting a hypersonic weapon.
The Tories didn't win Rochdale in either the high water marks of 1983 or 2019 so quite how they're going to win a by election when they're the incumbent government and 20 points behind in the polls takes some massive leaps of the imagination
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
The reality is Netenyahu and the IDF have destroyed a lot of the goodwill that was evident after the Hamas attacks .
It's no wonder there is an increase in anti-semitism.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
The Tories didn't win Rochdale in either the high water marks of 1983 or 2019 so quite how they're going to win a by election when they're the incumbent government and 20 points behind in the polls takes some massive leaps of the imagination
In all fairness all Pubman said was that they had more chance than in Welly. I read this to be tiny vs infinitesimal
There are many problems with immigration to the US, legal and illegal. But it appears to be a net benefit, economically:
'Consider a few numbers: Last week, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released updated 10-year economic and budget forecasts. The numbers look significantly better than they did a year earlier, and immigration is a key reason. . . . This will in turn lead to better economic growth. As CBO Director Phill Swagel wrote in a note accompanying the forecasts: As a result of these immigration-driven revisions to the size of the labor force, “we estimate that, from 2023 to 2034, GDP will be greater by about $7 trillion and revenues will be greater by about $1 trillion than they would have been otherwise.' source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/13/immigration-economy-jobs-cbo-report/
The same was said about EU membership and essentially unlimited immigration to the UK.
The fact is that if you separate skilled from unskilled immigration, and legal from illegal immigration, the numbers look a whole load better, and don’t upset the native population who see competition for jobs and housing way more than they see an increase in GDP.
You talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership, but immigration post-Brexit has been higher than when we were in the EU.
There were 500m people who could turn up with a right to work and rent accommodation, thus ensuring that the legal minimum wage became the maximum wage in a number of industries, even if that meant living four to a room.
That’s a million miles away from recent immigration numbers driven mostly by Ukranians, Hong Kongers, and students.
It doesn't matter how many people could turn up. It mattered how many did. More turn up now.
From your link, it appears that the increase in work visas is “largely attributed” to the healthcare industry. Is that a bad thing?
The big changes appear to be an increase in dependents of students, and a reduction in humanitarian (mostly UA and HK) routes to immigration.
There has been a big increase in work visas. I'm not saying this, or that many of the work visas are in healthcare, is a good or a bad thing. I'm saying that your talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership was silly given immigration post-Brexit has been higher.
No, the difference with EU immigration was that there were 500m people with the *entitlement* to just turn up.
It doesn't matter how many were entitled. It matters how many people did turn up. This is not a difficult concept.
But people are not identical interchangeable parts, they're unique individuals. Its not just a matte of how many people turn up, its a matter of who turns up.
If the unlimited supply of people willing to work for minimum wage has been cut off, but that's been countered by an increase in the supply of qualified individuals or full-time students then those qualified individuals and students aren't taking full-time jobs for minimum wage.
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
You’ve changed your tune. 2 days ago it was all fake offence from PB Tories.
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Well you can if you slow them down in the terminal phase. The plasma effects make them quite tough to track with conventional radar, apparently.
The U.S. has reportedly finally got some of the tech working, after many failures, but I think it's work in progress for all of the countries developing them as far as reliable systems are concerned.
Yes, but if you slow them down in the terminal phase, you also open them to being shot down by ships gatling guns.
They're really only reliably effective against stuff up to around Mach 2, I think. Your theoretical hypersonic target would still be travelling about double that speed when slowed down.
I read that as March 2. Give it another 2 1/2 weeks and we'll be OK.
If you sea skimming the practical limit is Mach 2 - the energy required to fly faster, low is extraordinary. Project Pluto consider Mach 3 at 500 feet - but that involved running a nuclear reactor *above its melting point*, open cycle.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
Seems reasonable. It's why I am deeply suspicious of people who denied, ignored, or deflected from what happened on October 7th immediately, instead leaping straight to objecting to any potential response. If, instead, people reflect on the events since, again without denying or deflecting from what happened on October 7th, then a whole range of views will reasonably be had, whether one agrees or not.
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
You’ve changed your tune. 2 days ago it was all fake offence from PB Tories.
Two days ago none of us knew what substance, if any, there was in it. If we had, we'd have been on to Betfair like a shot.
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
The reality is Netenyahu and the IDF have destroyed a lot of the goodwill that was evident after the Hamas attacks .
It's no wonder there is an increase in anti-semitism.
Given the rather immediate reactions with things like tearing down posters and the like, I'm not sure it's so much an increase as a revealing through an increase in more overt examples.
Ironically the outing of Ali and his suspension by Labour takes a lot of the sting out of the Galloway attack. Voting for Ali is not voting for Labour. And he’s been suspended for saying the kinds of things that Gorgeous supporters think.
He really could still win. How would Mr Hat respond? Attack the winning candidate’s party? Erm, what party…
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I think you'll find that war does involve what useful idiots such as yourself would call "collective punishment".
Collective punishment is a war crime under Article 33 of the Geneva Convention. People who make excuses for it are idiots, useful or otherwise.
The Tories didn't win Rochdale in either the high water marks of 1983 or 2019 so quite how they're going to win a by election when they're the incumbent government and 20 points behind in the polls takes some massive leaps of the imagination
In all fairness all Pubman said was that they had more chance than in Welly. I read this to be tiny vs infinitesimal
Tories no chance in Rochdale, better than Zero but slim chance in Wellingborough, Zero chance in Kingswood.
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
The Russian navy has been destroyed by drones, its flagships now lying on the sea floor, so I'm not sure "hypersonic missiles" are the future.
Drones can theoretically be fended off, albeit it is complicated, and tiresome
If these hypersonic missiles are real (and I am relying on Woke Mad CNN here, so veracity is an issue) then that to me says the era of the aircraft carrier and the trad navy is over. It's not just more difficult to operate enormous ships, it is pointless, they will be zapped
It's great we just spent £6bn on two of these things. I guess we can use them for "humanitarian" purposes
Indeed I have a feeling that is the only way we will ever use them, they will never be risked in battle, for the reasons I have cited
Hypersonic missiles are real. Have existed for some time (the US has some). But have a number of very large disadvantages, the biggest one of which is that they cause the air in front of them to heat up massively (because that's what happens when you push something through the air at very high speeds).
This means that you cannot put normal targeting (laser, camera, IR, radar) on the front of them, because all you see is superheated air.
Which means if you want to hit a city, they're great. As you know exactly where it is, and it's not moving.
But it kinda sucks for hitting a ship, because you don't know exactly where it is.
Then it all depends how much a hypersonic missile costs
If you can send 50 of them into the area where a carrier is likely to be, with a high chance one will hit and destroy the carrier, then it’s worth it. If a carrier costs £3bn, and a missile costs £30m each - then you can afford to fire 100 missiles
Bring the cost of the missiles down to £3m, and it’s game over for the carriers
The whole thrust of war seems to be towards cheaper mobile attacking platforms, drones, AI, missiles, and against massive lumbering objects, tanks, destroyers, carriers
Also mines are now much cheaper than men
I think traditional navies are in their last days, like cavalry forces in WW1. Cf the Russian Black Sea fleet
Well, I'd be staggered if they just cost $3m - given that they involve highly complex new engines. And don't forget that they tend to have fairly small warheads.
That said, I agree traditional carrier based navies are over. But I think they are replaced by 20 drone carrying ships rather than navies disappearing altogether. If you are able to launch 400 drones at a time, each of which carries munitions, then you will be able to absolutely overwhelm targets. And because those drones don't require people, they can be smaller, cheap, more maueverable, etc.
Then you discover the issue, that if your drones are not just throw away vehicles, that you need maintenance, fuel etc.
And you need to defend your drone carrier.
Before you know it, you are back at a... carrier.
Laser weapons are just getting going, by the way. Especially for point defence. Shoot until you run out of electricity. Which on a nuclear powered ship may be a while.
The thing about drones is that they're very soon going to make it impossible for large vessels like carriers to operate safely within a couple of hundred miles of anyone's coastline. Poor nations included.
That makes them a lot less useful.
And if it's raining, you've got a problem with your lasers.
Carriers rarely come within a couple of hundred miles of a hostile coastline anyway. This is why carrier planes have longer range than that.
What do you think they're doing off Yemen at the moment ?
... Taiwan is about 130km from the Chinese mainland. Etc
The carriers don't go into the surf zone - that's the whole point of the aircraft.
US carrier groups can create a bubble of defended air/seaspace around them measured in hundreds of miles. That's part of the reason carriers are still with up.
In the event of a hot war with China over Taiwan, the US carriers wouldn't be *in* the Taiwan strait. Then can be the *other side* of Taiwan (by a long way) and send strikes to hit all the way to the main land.
Wasn't the Eisenhower in the Red Sea ? There's no 'hundreds of miles' bubble there.
The CAP range of an F18 is about 400nm, true - but the further away from target a carrier is, the slower to get there, and the less useful it becomes. The F35 does rather better, I think.
They're not going to obsolete overnight - but they are going to become less useful.
And the UK carriers, with all their compromises - no nuclear power; shorter range VSTOL version of the F35; limited weapons complement; reliance on other navies for escorts etc - are much closer to being obsolete.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
PB brains trust, can I ask a question? My Laptop keyboard's has been playing up lately. Sometimes when I press a key its either not registering a key press at all, or registering multiple key presses simultaneously.
Typically happening with the same few keys. The a and r keys most especially. I had to type the r key four times then for it it to come through, and when it did on the fourth press two came through at once.
Unfortunately since I touch-type, letters not coming through is harder for me to catch since I don't typically read what I'm typing as I'm typing it since I can type perfectly normally without looking at either the keyboard or screen, but now I'm having to pay attention as a missing letter can be either spelt wrong or change the word which is unfortunate. The word "matte" in prior post was another example, it was supposed to be matter but the r mustn't have registered.
As its a Laptop, replacing the keyboard is not a simple matter and I don't want to replace the Laptop. Any advice on what can be done, other than plugging in a USB keyboard?
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
Killing 30,000-50,000 Hamas members might though.
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
You’ve changed your tune. 2 days ago it was all fake offence from PB Tories.
Two days ago none of us knew what substance, if any, there was in it. If we had, we'd have been on to Betfair like a shot.
No, we knew what he had said initially. That was in the public domain and dismissing criticism of his initial comments as fake PB Tory offence, as the poster did, was ridiculous. Criticism of Ali’s initial comments was cross party.
Real shock about Steve Wright. I had kind of gone off him as a DJ in recent years as the gimmicks and interruptions got a bit much. But like others he was a massive part of my youth and I had just been listening to him on Saturday on Pick of the Pops.
CNN is reporting that Russia hit Kyiv with a hypersonic missile, which is a missile so fast it cannot be shot down
I have no idea if this is true. CNN is pretty pro-Ukraine, so I am not sure why they would boost Putin's military propaganda
If it IS true, isn't that the end of navies as we know them? A single unstoppable missile can take out a carrier. That's it
Ah, like the V2 huh?
How much impact did that have on the war again?
Have you suddenly become a bit stupid, like the rest of PB? This is quite depressing
I wasn't even commenting on the impact this might have on the outcome of the present Ukraine war. I thought that was fairly clear
I was commenting on how this will influence war-making from here on, just as the advent of the V2 - which led to the ICBM - massively impacted geopolitics - and warfare - from the end of WW2 onwards
If hypersonic missiles, which cannot be shot down, are a thing (and this is what CNN are claiming) then I do not see how traditonal navies can operate. How do you defend a £3bn capital ship like an aircraft carrier against a £3m hypersonic missile which cannot be shot down? If it cannot be shot down, or deflected, then you can't defend the ship. So that's the end of the carrier, the carrier group, the navy as we htave known it, they make no sense, they are merely very expensive and easy targets
No?
Of course CNN might have got this wrong, maybe the Ukes are lying for propaganda purposes - I have no idea, on that front
Plenty of analysts believe that this is what an invasion of Taiwan might look like - hypersonic missiles in case the US fleet was thinking of getting involved.
Doing some digging it does seem a very live debate. Some say it is the end of the aircraft carrier, some say the missiles are hyped and not THAT dangerous
I am not a ballistic missile engineer/strategic defence analyst, I dunno
The importance of this CNN report (if it is acccurate) is that they, and the Ukes, are claiming this is the first time a "hypersonic" missile has been used in actual warfare, rather than just a test or a wargame. DYOR!
"CNN — Ukraine claims it has evidence Russia fired an advanced hypersonic missile – one that experts say is almost impossible to shoot down – for the first time in the almost 2-year-old war.
The government-run Kyiv Scientific Research Institute of Forensic Expertise said in a Telegram post that debris recovered after a February 7 attack on the Ukrainian capital pointed to the use of a Zircon hypersonic cruise missile by the Russian military."
There’s a difference between an ICBM (a rocket-launched from the ground), a rocket-powered missile launched from an aircraft, and a revolutionary mach 5 jet-powered missile. The first two are old technology, can be seen from space, and aren’t going to do much in modern warfare.
The third is an interesting innovation if it works to lock a target, rather than simply heading for a fixed co-ordinate. It would need air defence elements to be positioned along the trajectory to anticipate its arrival, as it goes faster than the defence missiles. There’s no evidence that Russia, China, or North Korea actually have any of these, despite several demonstrations they claim to have given.
I suspect he doesn't know the difference between a rocket and a jet.
Further - to get true hypersonic air breathing missiles to work, you need a scramjet. A scramjet is where the combustion inside the engine is with supersonic flow . All existing air breathing engines slow the incoming air down to subsonic velocities. See the enormous cone things in the inlets of the SR71.
To date, claims of actually getting net thrust out of a scram jet are debated. Some experiments may have worked. For seconds.
Even if you get that all to work, you have to fly in a perfectly straight line. Otherwise the shock wave in the intake tears your whole plane/missile apart. Which is the usual fate of scram jet tests, by the way.
The Russian hypersonic missiles are all rocket powered. Ballistic weapons fired from aircraft, mainly.
Indeed - as this article explains, it is highly unlikely that the Russians are anywhere near getting a hypersonic weapon.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
Killing 30,000-50,000 Hamas members might though.
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
Killing 30,000-50,000 Hamas members might though.
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
I don’t believe the war will destroy Hamas
No, Israel are being far too restrained and gentle for that.
But I respect them for that, they're sticking to the rules of proportionality and trying to minimise civilian casualties. If only Hamas had a fraction of their humanity.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
Killing 30,000-50,000 Hamas members might though.
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
I don’t believe the war will destroy Hamas
I would suspect despite public comments a goal of severely curtailing their ability to act or openly control matters would be a more likely aim. From Israel's perspective Hamas being able to recruit, rebuild, and rise again in, say, 10 years, would probably be preferable to leaving any obvious offensive capacity in their hands right now.
The Tories didn't win Rochdale in either the high water marks of 1983 or 2019 so quite how they're going to win a by election when they're the incumbent government and 20 points behind in the polls takes some massive leaps of the imagination
In all fairness all Pubman said was that they had more chance than in Welly. I read this to be tiny vs infinitesimal
Tories no chance in Rochdale, better than Zero but slim chance in Wellingborough, Zero chance in Kingswood.
Isn't the "how is the Conservative campaign in Wellingborough going" reportage essentially saying "there isn't one"?
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
You’ve changed your tune. 2 days ago it was all fake offence from PB Tories.
I never said it was but that the situation is different now. The public aren’t going to be so outraged about the comments made having witnessed the disproportionate response from the IDF.
Much of the goodwill post October 7th towards Israel is now lying under a pile of dead Gazans !
PB brains trust, can I ask a question? My Laptop keyboard's has been playing up lately. Sometimes when I press a key its either not registering a key press at all, or registering multiple key presses simultaneously.
Typically happening with the same few keys. The a and r keys most especially. I had to type the r key four times then for it it to come through, and when it did on the fourth press two came through at once.
Unfortunately since I touch-type, letters not coming through is harder for me to catch since I don't typically read what I'm typing as I'm typing it since I can type perfectly normally without looking at either the keyboard or screen, but now I'm having to pay attention as a missing letter can be either spelt wrong or change the word which is unfortunate. The word "matte" in prior post was another example, it was supposed to be matter but the r mustn't have registered.
As its a Laptop, replacing the keyboard is not a simple matter and I don't want to replace the Laptop. Any advice on what can be done, other than plugging in a USB keyboard?
Cans of compressed air are useful in dislodging crap in keyboards.
You can try a vacuum cleaner, but static is a bit of a risk
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
You’ve changed your tune. 2 days ago it was all fake offence from PB Tories.
I never said it was but that the situation is different now. The public aren’t going to be so outraged about the comments made having witnessed the disproportionate response from the IDF.
Much of the goodwill post October 7th towards Israel is now lying under a pile of dead Gazans !
What disproportionate response?
How else would you destroy Hamas other than what Israel is doing?
Its like you don't want Israel to be able to defend herself. Funny that.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I think you'll find that war does involve what useful idiots such as yourself would call "collective punishment".
Collective punishment is a war crime under Article 33 of the Geneva Convention. People who make excuses for it are idiots, useful or otherwise.
That's why I put it in quotation marks. Or perhaps Kinabalu thinks what Israel is doing is a war crime.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
Killing 30,000-50,000 Hamas members might though.
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
Israel is simply giving a new generation of Palestinians (and plenty of other people around the world) ample reason to hate them. It is utterly counterproductive. Keyboard warriors like you egging them on from the safety of your Warrington newbuild are doing them no favours.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
There are many problems with immigration to the US, legal and illegal. But it appears to be a net benefit, economically:
'Consider a few numbers: Last week, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released updated 10-year economic and budget forecasts. The numbers look significantly better than they did a year earlier, and immigration is a key reason. . . . This will in turn lead to better economic growth. As CBO Director Phill Swagel wrote in a note accompanying the forecasts: As a result of these immigration-driven revisions to the size of the labor force, “we estimate that, from 2023 to 2034, GDP will be greater by about $7 trillion and revenues will be greater by about $1 trillion than they would have been otherwise.' source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/13/immigration-economy-jobs-cbo-report/
The same was said about EU membership and essentially unlimited immigration to the UK.
The fact is that if you separate skilled from unskilled immigration, and legal from illegal immigration, the numbers look a whole load better, and don’t upset the native population who see competition for jobs and housing way more than they see an increase in GDP.
You talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership, but immigration post-Brexit has been higher than when we were in the EU.
There were 500m people who could turn up with a right to work and rent accommodation, thus ensuring that the legal minimum wage became the maximum wage in a number of industries, even if that meant living four to a room.
That’s a million miles away from recent immigration numbers driven mostly by Ukranians, Hong Kongers, and students.
It doesn't matter how many people could turn up. It mattered how many did. More turn up now.
From your link, it appears that the increase in work visas is “largely attributed” to the healthcare industry. Is that a bad thing?
The big changes appear to be an increase in dependents of students, and a reduction in humanitarian (mostly UA and HK) routes to immigration.
There has been a big increase in work visas. I'm not saying this, or that many of the work visas are in healthcare, is a good or a bad thing. I'm saying that your talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership was silly given immigration post-Brexit has been higher.
No, the difference with EU immigration was that there were 500m people with the *entitlement* to just turn up.
It doesn't matter how many were entitled. It matters how many people did turn up. This is not a difficult concept.
But people are not identical interchangeable parts, they're unique individuals. Its not just a matte of how many people turn up, its a matter of who turns up.
If the unlimited supply of people willing to work for minimum wage has been cut off, but that's been countered by an increase in the supply of qualified individuals or full-time students then those qualified individuals and students aren't taking full-time jobs for minimum wage.
Sure, but that's a different point.
So, do you have statistics on how skilled EU immigrants were? A friend has just asked me to "sign" her passport photo (it's all digital now). She needs a new passport as she's just acquired UK citizenship, having originally migrated from Poland. She's got a PhD and has just won a prestigious research award. I know lots of people like her, EU immigrants with PhDs, healthcare qualifications etc. That's, of course because I work in this area, but certainly many EU immigrants came to do highly skilled jobs. This idea of some theoretical unending supply of EU immigrants willing to do minimum wage jobs, where's the evidence for them?
Today, we have a new immigration system. Yet there are still plenty of work visas going to unskilled workers in some sectors (care, agriculture). So, what's changed? We had a mix of skilled and unskilled immigration from the EU. We have a mix now, but it's more from India, Nigeria etc.
PB brains trust, can I ask a question? My Laptop keyboard's has been playing up lately. Sometimes when I press a key its either not registering a key press at all, or registering multiple key presses simultaneously.
Typically happening with the same few keys. The a and r keys most especially. I had to type the r key four times then for it it to come through, and when it did on the fourth press two came through at once.
Unfortunately since I touch-type, letters not coming through is harder for me to catch since I don't typically read what I'm typing as I'm typing it since I can type perfectly normally without looking at either the keyboard or screen, but now I'm having to pay attention as a missing letter can be either spelt wrong or change the word which is unfortunate. The word "matte" in prior post was another example, it was supposed to be matter but the r mustn't have registered.
As its a Laptop, replacing the keyboard is not a simple matter and I don't want to replace the Laptop. Any advice on what can be done, other than plugging in a USB keyboard?
Cans of compressed air are useful in dislodging crap in keyboards.
You can try a vacuum cleaner, but static is a bit of a risk
Gave that a go, thanks, hope that works. Its intermittent so will will have to see.
Probably should have turned the Laptop off first, it made a bit of a sizzling noise after the final spray.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
Killing 30,000-50,000 Hamas members might though.
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
On current performance killing 30-50,000 Hamas members probably means killing at least 100-200,000 non combatants. This is what you are advocating even if you try to avoid confronting it.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I think you'll find that war does involve what useful idiots such as yourself would call "collective punishment".
Collective punishment is a war crime under Article 33 of the Geneva Convention. People who make excuses for it are idiots, useful or otherwise.
That's why I put it in quotation marks. Or perhaps Kinabalu thinks what Israel is doing is a war crime.
Only a court of law can determine that. Hopefully they will get a chance to do so.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I think you'll find that war does involve what useful idiots such as yourself would call "collective punishment".
Collective punishment is a war crime under Article 33 of the Geneva Convention. People who make excuses for it are idiots, useful or otherwise.
That's why I put it in quotation marks. Or perhaps Kinabalu thinks what Israel is doing is a war crime.
Hmm, my forecast in the prediction quiz that the lowest Labour lead we would see in Q1 was 7%. I'd written that off as a loser but it just might be coming into view after all.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
Killing 30,000-50,000 Hamas members might though.
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
Israel is simply giving a new generation of Palestinians (and plenty of other people around the world) ample reason to hate them. It is utterly counterproductive. Keyboard warriors like you egging them on from the safety of your Warrington newbuild are doing them no favours.
By the sound of it he's literally a keyboard warrior, gone all IDF on his laptop. Proportionately of course.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
Killing 30,000-50,000 Hamas members might though.
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
On current performance killing 30-50,000 Hamas members probably means killing at least 100-200,000 non combatants. This is what you are advocating even if you try to avoid confronting it.
Of course he is. But because he is such a brave realist it doesn't bother him. If only we could all be this clear-sighted and unencumbered by foolish notions like killing little children is bad.
There are many problems with immigration to the US, legal and illegal. But it appears to be a net benefit, economically:
'Consider a few numbers: Last week, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released updated 10-year economic and budget forecasts. The numbers look significantly better than they did a year earlier, and immigration is a key reason. . . . This will in turn lead to better economic growth. As CBO Director Phill Swagel wrote in a note accompanying the forecasts: As a result of these immigration-driven revisions to the size of the labor force, “we estimate that, from 2023 to 2034, GDP will be greater by about $7 trillion and revenues will be greater by about $1 trillion than they would have been otherwise.' source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/02/13/immigration-economy-jobs-cbo-report/
The same was said about EU membership and essentially unlimited immigration to the UK.
The fact is that if you separate skilled from unskilled immigration, and legal from illegal immigration, the numbers look a whole load better, and don’t upset the native population who see competition for jobs and housing way more than they see an increase in GDP.
You talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership, but immigration post-Brexit has been higher than when we were in the EU.
There were 500m people who could turn up with a right to work and rent accommodation, thus ensuring that the legal minimum wage became the maximum wage in a number of industries, even if that meant living four to a room.
That’s a million miles away from recent immigration numbers driven mostly by Ukranians, Hong Kongers, and students.
It doesn't matter how many people could turn up. It mattered how many did. More turn up now.
From your link, it appears that the increase in work visas is “largely attributed” to the healthcare industry. Is that a bad thing?
The big changes appear to be an increase in dependents of students, and a reduction in humanitarian (mostly UA and HK) routes to immigration.
There has been a big increase in work visas. I'm not saying this, or that many of the work visas are in healthcare, is a good or a bad thing. I'm saying that your talk of "essentially unlimited immigration" with EU membership was silly given immigration post-Brexit has been higher.
No, the difference with EU immigration was that there were 500m people with the *entitlement* to just turn up.
It doesn't matter how many were entitled. It matters how many people did turn up. This is not a difficult concept.
But people are not identical interchangeable parts, they're unique individuals. Its not just a matte of how many people turn up, its a matter of who turns up.
If the unlimited supply of people willing to work for minimum wage has been cut off, but that's been countered by an increase in the supply of qualified individuals or full-time students then those qualified individuals and students aren't taking full-time jobs for minimum wage.
Sure, but that's a different point.
So, do you have statistics on how skilled EU immigrants were? A friend has just asked me to "sign" her passport photo (it's all digital now). She needs a new passport as she's just acquired UK citizenship, having originally migrated from Poland. She's got a PhD and has just won a prestigious research award. I know lots of people like her, EU immigrants with PhDs, healthcare qualifications etc. That's, of course because I work in this area, but certainly many EU immigrants came to do highly skilled jobs. This idea of some theoretical unending supply of EU immigrants willing to do minimum wage jobs, where's the evidence for them?
Today, we have a new immigration system. Yet there are still plenty of work visas going to unskilled workers in some sectors (care, agriculture). So, what's changed? We had a mix of skilled and unskilled immigration from the EU. We have a mix now, but it's more from India, Nigeria etc.
Its not a different point, it was the point AFAIK that Sandpit was making, I just rephrased it. In fact he explicitly drew a distinction between "Ukrainian, Hong Kongers and students" and "healthcare" and "minimum wage" migration.
Recruiting doctors via work visas != minimum wage migration.
The Tories didn't win Rochdale in either the high water marks of 1983 or 2019 so quite how they're going to win a by election when they're the incumbent government and 20 points behind in the polls takes some massive leaps of the imagination
In all fairness all Pubman said was that they had more chance than in Welly. I read this to be tiny vs infinitesimal
Tories no chance in Rochdale, better than Zero but slim chance in Wellingborough, Zero chance in Kingswood.
Isn't the "how is the Conservative campaign in Wellingborough going" reportage essentially saying "there isn't one"?
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
You’ve changed your tune. 2 days ago it was all fake offence from PB Tories.
I never said it was but that the situation is different now. The public aren’t going to be so outraged about the comments made having witnessed the disproportionate response from the IDF.
Much of the goodwill post October 7th towards Israel is now lying under a pile of dead Gazans !
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
You’ve changed your tune. 2 days ago it was all fake offence from PB Tories.
I never said it was but that the situation is different now. The public aren’t going to be so outraged about the comments made having witnessed the disproportionate response from the IDF.
Much of the goodwill post October 7th towards Israel is now lying under a pile of dead Gazans !
True, it was fake offence from Tories another just PB Tories.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I think you'll find that war does involve what useful idiots such as yourself would call "collective punishment".
Collective punishment is a war crime under Article 33 of the Geneva Convention. People who make excuses for it are idiots, useful or otherwise.
That's why I put it in quotation marks. Or perhaps Kinabalu thinks what Israel is doing is a war crime.
Well many of us do.
Yes hugely important that arseholes on the internet think something or other.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I think you'll find that war does involve what useful idiots such as yourself would call "collective punishment".
Collective punishment is a war crime under Article 33 of the Geneva Convention. People who make excuses for it are idiots, useful or otherwise.
That's why I put it in quotation marks. Or perhaps Kinabalu thinks what Israel is doing is a war crime.
Well many of us do.
Yes hugely important that arseholes on the internet think something or other.
The arseholes being those who defend the murder of civilians as a necessary evil.
Real shock about Steve Wright. I had kind of gone off him as a DJ in recent years as the gimmicks and interruptions got a bit much. But like others he was a massive part of my youth and I had just been listening to him on Saturday on Pick of the Pops.
Yet again, no age. A real shame.
There was a special time for us in the early 80s when we had bought 2 flats and spent a lot of time trying to do them up. Steve Wright in the Afternoon was an absolute staple of that period which was a very happy one. Really sorry to hear this today.
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
Killing 30,000-50,000 Hamas members might though.
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
On current performance killing 30-50,000 Hamas members probably means killing at least 100-200,000 non combatants. This is what you are advocating even if you try to avoid confronting it.
War is hell.
I have confronted it, its a regrettable but acceptable price of war. That's considerably smaller than the number of Iraqi civilians who died.
The risk of dead civilians is not a reason not to fight a war, if the war is justified. Its just a reason to try to be as proportionate as possible without compromising your military objectives.
I'd rather the non-combatants be offered refuge outside of the war zone in order to minimise the risk to non-combatants.
Definitely one of your better thread headers @TSE. It had me chortling throughout.
I was really proud of this paragraph.
I know this sounds catty but the thought of George Galloway becoming an MP again fills me with a dread that is only matched by when my other half asks to use my mobile phone. If Galloway wins I will not salute his courage, his strength, his indefatigability,
PB brains trust, can I ask a question? My Laptop keyboard's has been playing up lately. Sometimes when I press a key its either not registering a key press at all, or registering multiple key presses simultaneously.
Typically happening with the same few keys. The a and r keys most especially. I had to type the r key four times then for it it to come through, and when it did on the fourth press two came through at once.
Unfortunately since I touch-type, letters not coming through is harder for me to catch since I don't typically read what I'm typing as I'm typing it since I can type perfectly normally without looking at either the keyboard or screen, but now I'm having to pay attention as a missing letter can be either spelt wrong or change the word which is unfortunate. The word "matte" in prior post was another example, it was supposed to be matter but the r mustn't have registered.
As its a Laptop, replacing the keyboard is not a simple matter and I don't want to replace the Laptop. Any advice on what can be done, other than plugging in a USB keyboard?
I have heard that it is possible to clean a laptop keyboard, but the last time I tried to do this some of the keys wouldn't go back on. You will likely find guides for your laptop model online, and if you do try it and it fails then it will provide greater motivation for paying someone to replace it, or using an external keyboard.
Definitely one of your better thread headers @TSE. It had me chortling throughout.
I was really proud of this paragraph.
I know this sounds catty but the thought of George Galloway becoming an MP again fills me with a dread that is only matched by when my other half asks to use my mobile phone. If Galloway wins I will not salute his courage, his strength, his indefatigability,
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I think you'll find that war does involve what useful idiots such as yourself would call "collective punishment".
Collective punishment is a war crime under Article 33 of the Geneva Convention. People who make excuses for it are idiots, useful or otherwise.
That's why I put it in quotation marks. Or perhaps Kinabalu thinks what Israel is doing is a war crime.
Well many of us do.
Yes hugely important that arseholes on the internet think something or other.
The arseholes being those who defend the murder of civilians as a necessary evil.
You suit the description perfectly.
You mean Hamas and their defenders, right?
Hamas deliberately targeting, raping and killing civilians is murder. Civilians being a tragic collateral damage in war is not murder.
Definitely one of your better thread headers @TSE. It had me chortling throughout.
I was really proud of this paragraph.
I know this sounds catty but the thought of George Galloway becoming an MP again fills me with a dread that is only matched by when my other half asks to use my mobile phone. If Galloway wins I will not salute his courage, his strength, his indefatigability,
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
You’ve changed your tune. 2 days ago it was all fake offence from PB Tories.
I never said it was but that the situation is different now. The public aren’t going to be so outraged about the comments made having witnessed the disproportionate response from the IDF.
Much of the goodwill post October 7th towards Israel is now lying under a pile of dead Gazans !
What disproportionate response?
How else would you destroy Hamas other than what Israel is doing?
Its like you don't want Israel to be able to defend herself. Funny that.
Israel is not defending itself . It’s embarking on the complete destruction of Gaza and ensuring the place is un-inhabitable .
This is not a war , and Gazans are effectively being treated as fish in a barrel .
Executing paramedics desperately trying to save a 6 year old is horrific . The sooner Netenyahu goes the better , sadly he’s now intent on dragging the slaughter out for as long as possible . Probably in the hope his fellow sociopath will take over in the USA and give him carte Blanche to embark on ever more extreme actions .
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
Killing 30,000-50,000 Hamas members might though.
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
On current performance killing 30-50,000 Hamas members probably means killing at least 100-200,000 non combatants. This is what you are advocating even if you try to avoid confronting it.
Of course he is. But because he is such a brave realist it doesn't bother him. If only we could all be this clear-sighted and unencumbered by foolish notions like killing little children is bad.
It's war. We aren't really used to it in this country. We are used to containment actions.
We have no idea what it must be like to have a neighbour intent on destroying you and indeed trying to do so.
Our frame of reference, certainly for many on PB, simply can't comprehend this. Or war. So we try to impose our bien pensant on the one hand views on it.
But it's war. Even the Palestinian para medics featured on the BBC documentary acknowledge it's war.
Definitely one of your better thread headers @TSE. It had me chortling throughout.
I was really proud of this paragraph.
I know this sounds catty but the thought of George Galloway becoming an MP again fills me with a dread that is only matched by when my other half asks to use my mobile phone. If Galloway wins I will not salute his courage, his strength, his indefatigability,
Unfortunately this is a by-election dominated by a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know far, far too much.
There are conflicts all around the world that don't get a fraction of the spotlight or attention that this one has had. I wonder what is so unique about this one conflict, that every moment becomes headline news unlike all the others?
The physical carnage, the huge civilian casualties, the mass displacement of people, the resulting humanitarian disaster, the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west - these do make for a big story.
"the inflictor of all this being a regime supported by the west".
I think you might need to understand that this awful conflict was blatantly started by Hamas who "inflicted" rape torture and murder on innocent people.
There is a reasonable argument that the Israeli response has been disproportionate, but the "infliction" was initiated by Hamas terrorists.
As you have been an occasional apologist for Corbyn (and probably indirectly voted for him to be PM) I guess this is hard to recognise?
I know who started the fire. Hamas did. Oct 7th was unspeakable. It's now 13th February and Israel has wreaked a mighty vengeance for it.
Justifiable response to a threat deemed existential? Or barbaric collective punishment of the population of Gaza?
I think the latter.
I am not Jewish, but it is worth reading the history of the pogroms and the holocaust to understand as to why they might respond in a way that might be considered by non-Jews as "disproportionate". Hamas and their paymasters in Iran and possibly the Kremlin, knew what would result.
The reality is that Hamas still holds the hostages. That is barbaric. It is terrorism. It is the collective punishment of Jews for being Jews.
Beyond barbaric, Oct 7th imo. And the response is disproportionate and indiscriminate. I don't have a problem thinking both those things at the same time.
If only everyone could just get along and kittens.
I'm sure that killing 12,000 Palestinian children will do a great deal to further the cause of peace and reconciliation.
Killing 30,000-50,000 Hamas members might though.
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
Israel is simply giving a new generation of Palestinians (and plenty of other people around the world) ample reason to hate them. It is utterly counterproductive. Keyboard warriors like you egging them on from the safety of your Warrington newbuild are doing them no favours.
By the sound of it he's literally a keyboard warrior, gone all IDF on his laptop. Proportionately of course.
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
You’ve changed your tune. 2 days ago it was all fake offence from PB Tories.
I never said it was but that the situation is different now. The public aren’t going to be so outraged about the comments made having witnessed the disproportionate response from the IDF.
Much of the goodwill post October 7th towards Israel is now lying under a pile of dead Gazans !
What disproportionate response?
How else would you destroy Hamas other than what Israel is doing?
Its like you don't want Israel to be able to defend herself. Funny that.
Israel is not defending itself . It’s embarking on the complete destruction of Gaza and ensuring the place is un-inhabitable .
This is not a war , and Gazans are effectively being treated as fish in a barrel .
Executing paramedics desperately trying to save a 6 year old is horrific . The sooner Netenyahu goes the better , sadly he’s now intent on dragging the slaughter out for as long as possible . Probably in the hope his fellow sociopath will take over in the USA and give him carte Blanche to embark on ever more extreme actions .
Definitely one of your better thread headers @TSE. It had me chortling throughout.
I was really proud of this paragraph.
I know this sounds catty but the thought of George Galloway becoming an MP again fills me with a dread that is only matched by when my other half asks to use my mobile phone. If Galloway wins I will not salute his courage, his strength, his indefatigability,
Comments
That’s a million miles away from recent immigration numbers driven mostly by Ukranians, Hong Kongers, and students.
That makes them a lot less useful.
And if it's raining, you've got a problem with your lasers.
Recent immigration numbers partly reflect students and a post-COVID reaction. There are some Ukrainians and Hong Kongers, but in the most recent annual figures, work visas account for more immigrants than the Ukrainian and Hong Kong schemes put together, and work visas also account for (a bit) more net migration than student visas. See Figure 5 here: https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/populationandmigration/internationalmigration/bulletins/longterminternationalmigrationprovisional/yearendingjune2023 In other words, we have very high immigration for work at present.
https://www.ok.co.uk/royal/breaking-meghan-markle-podcast-deal-32089504
The houthis are basically cavemen yet they are causing havoc in the Red Sea with a few drones and whatnot
A capable nation like Iran or, god forbid, China - could overwhelm any navy with drones and missiles, or so it appears
Cf tanks versus one man missiles like NLAWS - and soon these will be autonomous and AI and you won’t even need to risk men
Do candidates realize we do live in an age of technology ? As to how much damage it’s done to the party , if this was last October it would have been far worse .
The reality is Netenyahu and the IDF have destroyed a lot of the goodwill that was evident after the Hamas attacks .
... Taiwan is about 130km from the Chinese mainland. Etc
I did break my elbow just here, though....
https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@58.6159652,-4.976542,685m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu
(TBF, the Scottish NHS was brilliant. It wasn't my fault that, even when I got to see the doctor, I was three hours drive away from the nearest A&E.)
On your second point, this has been a debate since the panzerfaust in WW2. Infantry are (or can be) good against tanks, which is why you support your tanks.
The big changes appear to be an increase in dependents of students, and a reduction in humanitarian (mostly UA and HK) routes to immigration (in 2023 vs 2022).
Smith scandal)
2. Tory party is in disgrace now, not 50 years ago when Cyril Smith was about
Since leaving the EU, many people who were earning minimum wage then are now earning considerably more.
US carrier groups can create a bubble of defended air/seaspace around them measured in hundreds of miles. That's part of the reason carriers are still with up.
In the event of a hot war with China over Taiwan, the US carriers wouldn't be *in* the Taiwan strait. Then can be the *other side* of Taiwan (by a long way) and send strikes to hit all the way to the main land.
Your theoretical hypersonic target would still be travelling about double that speed when slowed down.
If the unlimited supply of people willing to work for minimum wage has been cut off, but that's been countered by an increase in the supply of qualified individuals or full-time students then those qualified individuals and students aren't taking full-time jobs for minimum wage.
He really could still win. How would Mr Hat respond? Attack the winning candidate’s party? Erm, what party…
There's no 'hundreds of miles' bubble there.
The CAP range of an F18 is about 400nm, true - but the further away from target a carrier is, the slower to get there, and the less useful it becomes.
The F35 does rather better, I think.
They're not going to obsolete overnight - but they are going to become less useful.
And the UK carriers, with all their compromises - no nuclear power; shorter range VSTOL version of the F35; limited weapons complement; reliance on other navies for escorts etc - are much closer to being obsolete.
Typically happening with the same few keys. The a and r keys most especially. I had to type the r key four times then for it it to come through, and when it did on the fourth press two came through at once.
Unfortunately since I touch-type, letters not coming through is harder for me to catch since I don't typically read what I'm typing as I'm typing it since I can type perfectly normally without looking at either the keyboard or screen, but now I'm having to pay attention as a missing letter can be either spelt wrong or change the word which is unfortunate. The word "matte" in prior post was another example, it was supposed to be matter but the r mustn't have registered.
As its a Laptop, replacing the keyboard is not a simple matter and I don't want to replace the Laptop. Any advice on what can be done, other than plugging in a USB keyboard?
If Hamas cared about Palestinian children, they shouldn't have started this war. This war should end once Hamas is destoyed.
Yet again, no age. A real shame.
But I respect them for that, they're sticking to the rules of proportionality and trying to minimise civilian casualties. If only Hamas had a fraction of their humanity.
Much of the goodwill post October 7th towards Israel is now lying under a pile of dead Gazans !
You can try a vacuum cleaner, but static is a bit of a risk
How else would you destroy Hamas other than what Israel is doing?
Its like you don't want Israel to be able to defend herself. Funny that.
Kittens are much nicer. And fluffier.
So, do you have statistics on how skilled EU immigrants were? A friend has just asked me to "sign" her passport photo (it's all digital now). She needs a new passport as she's just acquired UK citizenship, having originally migrated from Poland. She's got a PhD and has just won a prestigious research award. I know lots of people like her, EU immigrants with PhDs, healthcare qualifications etc. That's, of course because I work in this area, but certainly many EU immigrants came to do highly skilled jobs. This idea of some theoretical unending supply of EU immigrants willing to do minimum wage jobs, where's the evidence for them?
Today, we have a new immigration system. Yet there are still plenty of work visas going to unskilled workers in some sectors (care, agriculture). So, what's changed? We had a mix of skilled and unskilled immigration from the EU. We have a mix now, but it's more from India, Nigeria etc.
Probably should have turned the Laptop off first, it made a bit of a sizzling noise after the final spray.
Proportionately of course.
Recruiting doctors via work visas != minimum wage migration.
https://vf.politicalbetting.com/discussion/comment/4684250#Comment_4684250
You suit the description perfectly.
You've started early. Have you been taking over where @Leon has left off?
Edit - oh I see, it was a reference to confusing Sisi and Obrador.
I have confronted it, its a regrettable but acceptable price of war. That's considerably smaller than the number of Iraqi civilians who died.
The risk of dead civilians is not a reason not to fight a war, if the war is justified. Its just a reason to try to be as proportionate as possible without compromising your military objectives.
I'd rather the non-combatants be offered refuge outside of the war zone in order to minimise the risk to non-combatants.
I know this sounds catty but the thought of George Galloway becoming an MP again fills me with a dread that is only matched by when my other half asks to use my mobile phone. If Galloway wins I will not salute his courage, his strength, his indefatigability,
Hamas deliberately targeting, raping and killing civilians is murder.
Civilians being a tragic collateral damage in war is not murder.
This is not a war , and Gazans are effectively being treated as fish in a barrel .
Executing paramedics desperately trying to save a 6 year old is horrific . The sooner Netenyahu goes the better , sadly he’s now intent on dragging the slaughter out for as long as possible . Probably in the hope his fellow sociopath will take over in the USA and give him carte Blanche to embark on ever more extreme actions .
We have no idea what it must be like to have a neighbour intent on destroying you and indeed trying to do so.
Our frame of reference, certainly for many on PB, simply can't comprehend this. Or war. So we try to impose our bien pensant on the one hand views on it.
But it's war. Even the Palestinian para medics featured on the BBC documentary acknowledge it's war.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Seagal#/media/File:Steven_Seagal_November_2016.jpg
https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cpsprodpb/E28D/production/_132579975_cr3bbd04930d05542f8365e33699c01b2c195b561e.jpg.webp