NATO return to Cold War force structure

[Martineleca]

3 hours ago, Ssnake said:

(I don't see the German police getting 30mm AAA guns by the dozens - or the airport operator companies). Separation of the military and law enforcement is even stricter than in the US (Posse Comitatus allows at least for an override from the US president; in Germany it'd require an act of parliament).

In an era of near instant social disruption-terrorism that can occur prior to or during an assault by an enemy conventional force the strict split up between Police/Army is mostly nullified on the ground, if cops receive the necessary military training which all of them absolutely should under threat of termination than they can be organised into real reserve formations that can be activated immediately in a crisis. Panzergrenadier Korps Polizei has a nice ring to it, encountering Hubert and Staller in a green/white surplus Marder would make any invader crap his pants...

[Ssnake]

3 hours ago, Martineleca said:

encountering Hubert and Staller

Dear Lord, they're exporting this to Poland?

[Martineleca]

2 hours ago, Ssnake said:

Dear Lord, they're exporting this to Poland?

Haha no not from Poland, though you gotta admit those guys have spirit, would happily share a trench with them.

[Ssnake]

😉

[seahawk]

Laser, jammers and netlike weapons will be the fist choice. If tension rises they will put Boxer Skyranger in place. 

But then things change quickly at the moment. What once was a liability is now a valuable bunker for storing supplies. 

Edited November 5 by seahawk

[Martineleca]

12 hours ago, seahawk said:

Laser, jammers and netlike weapons will be the fist choice. If tension rises they will put Boxer Skyranger in place. 

So for mobile short range air defense the Bundeswehr used to operate a total of 420 Gepards and 340 Roland missile systems with a further 67 Ozelot-Stinger units bought later, the current plan is for 560 Boxer Skyrangers with the 30mm cannon/Enforcer missile, you expect that number to grow or that any additional systems will just be added to a wider range of non-armoured vehicles?

[Ssnake]

IRIS-T seems to be supposed to replace Roland, effectively.

[seahawk]

https://www.hartpunkt.de/milliardenbetraege-fuer-luftverteidigung-und-diskussionen-um-neuzuschnitt-der-zustaendigkeiten-zwischen-luftwaffe-und-heer/

There will be Arrow, Patriot, IRIS-T SLM - as typical SAM systems. 

Then boxer based Skyranger AAA and IRIS-T SLS.  

[JWB]

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte:

Until recently, Russia was producing more ammunition than all NATO Allies put together. But not anymore.

Across the Alliance, we are now opening dozens of new production lines and expanding existing ones. We are making more than we have done in decades.

https://x.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/1986410120301994355

 

[Roman Alymov]

5 hours ago, JWB said:

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte:

Let's take this statement at face value. What is said?

5 hours ago, JWB said:

Until recently, Russia was producing more ammunition than all NATO Allies put together. 

So Mr. Secretary General Mark Rutte is acknowleging that "gas station masquerading as a country". "economic dwarf" with "economy the size of Italy" and "in taters", was able to easily (without major mobilization or switching to war economy) overproduce the block with combined population about 10 times bigger.

5 hours ago, JWB said:

Across the Alliance, we are now opening dozens of new production lines and expanding existing ones. We are making more than we have done in decades.

  So now, after years of efforts (and massive spending, on top of allready heavy debt load), NATO is claimed to have managed to reach RF level (note - not outproduce Russia 10 times or at least two times). And it took " dozens of new production lines and expanding existing ones" (while no new factories are known to produce ammo in RF). 

    What is the take from it? If reaching the level of economic dwarf RF took NATO years, it means NATO have allready lost industrial competition with China, country with x10 population of RF and x14 steel output.

Edited November 6 by Roman Alymov

[Stuart Galbraith]

10 hours ago, Roman Alymov said:

Let's take this statement at face value. What is said?

So Mr. Secretary General Mark Rutte is acknowleging that "gas station masquerading as a country". "economic dwarf" with "economy the size of Italy" and "in taters", was able to easily (without major mobilization or switching to war economy) overproduce the block with combined population about 10 times bigger.

  So now, after years of efforts (and massive spending, on top of allready heavy debt load), NATO is claimed to have managed to reach RF level (note - not outproduce Russia 10 times or at least two times). And it took " dozens of new production lines and expanding existing ones" (while no new factories are known to produce ammo in RF). 

    What is the take from it? If reaching the level of economic dwarf RF took NATO years, it means NATO have allready lost industrial competition with China, country with x10 population of RF and x14 steel output.

 

Because, and this is the bit you are going to struggle with, despite all evidence from Putin over the last 25 years, nobody in Europe took Russia remotely seriously as an aggressor, and successive chancellors ran down defence because it was a useful sweety jar full of loose change to fix awkward budgets.

Meanwhile Russia firmed all its sinews and prepared for the huge liberation war against the west its been planning, nearly since the day Putin got in power. And unsurprisingly, with a background of corrupt unintelligent thugs, they screwed up the military power they were dependent upon to make their insane dreams come true. In that case you are perfectly right, Putin was the best ally the West ever had.

Even then they might have pulled it off, if the West had remained cowed and disinterested. Through an unlikely series of events, not least my own country dropping the few amount of weapons on Ukraine that it had not flogged off, and Europe somehow overcoming its addition to cheap Russian energy, this was averted. But it was a near run thing.

Edited November 7 by Stuart Galbraith

[Martineleca]

On 11/6/2025 at 9:00 AM, Ssnake said:

IRIS-T seems to be supposed to replace Roland, effectively.

That's more of a mid to long range system effectively replacing the old Hawks on the divisional level, I was talking more of the mech battalion AAs that will be needed as close to the front as possible...

[seahawk]

IRIS-T comes in many flavours. 

SLS - short range version can be mounted on Boxer and other vehicles or used as a classic SAM with vertical launch (Roland replacement) 

SLM - current standard SAM version with vertical launch and booster 

SLX - extended range SAM version under development

HYDEF - special version against hyper sonic weapon systems with even more range than SLX  - under development

Edited November 8 by seahawk

[urbanoid]

On 11/6/2025 at 10:56 PM, Roman Alymov said:

Let's take this statement at face value. What is said?

So Mr. Secretary General Mark Rutte is acknowleging that "gas station masquerading as a country". "economic dwarf" with "economy the size of Italy" and "in taters", was able to easily (without major mobilization or switching to war economy) overproduce the block with combined population about 10 times bigger.

  So now, after years of efforts (and massive spending, on top of allready heavy debt load), NATO is claimed to have managed to reach RF level (note - not outproduce Russia 10 times or at least two times). And it took " dozens of new production lines and expanding existing ones" (while no new factories are known to produce ammo in RF). 

    What is the take from it? If reaching the level of economic dwarf RF took NATO years, it means NATO have allready lost industrial competition with China, country with x10 population of RF and x14 steel output.

No, it means that for the last 3+ decades no one was expecting the necessity of producing a lot of artillery shells. 

[TrustMe]

5 hours ago, seahawk said:

IRIS-T comes in many flavours. 

SLS - short range version can be mounted on Boxer and other vehicles or used as a classic SAM with vertical launch (Roland replacement) 

SLM - current standard SAM version with vertical launch and booster 

SLX - extended range SAM version under development

HYDEF - special version against hyper sonic weapon systems with even more range than SLX  - under development

 

Are the SLX and HYDEF variants still IIR seeking?

[seahawk]

Official is combined IR + Radar seeker. 

[Roman Alymov]

12 hours ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

Because, and this is the bit you are going to struggle with, despite all evidence from Putin over the last 25 years, nobody in Europe took Russia remotely seriously as an aggressor, and successive chancellors ran down defence because it was a useful sweety jar full of loose change to fix awkward budgets.

  I'm sorry but even if we accept what your idea as true (while it is not)  - i wonder in what way it is making situation for West any better, since it means that not once mighty industry of West is now not the sharpesy knife in global table, but also your political and expert community are living in the world of self-created illusions.

[Stuart Galbraith]

On 11/8/2025 at 4:49 PM, Roman Alymov said:

  I'm sorry but even if we accept what your idea as true (while it is not)  - i wonder in what way it is making situation for West any better, since it means that not once mighty industry of West is now not the sharpesy knife in global table, but also your political and expert community are living in the world of self-created illusions.

Oh, it is absolutely true. Ive spent watching the decline of the British Army over the last 30 years with unmitigated horror, only consoled by the observation its been true across Europe too.

Only Russia has been rearming, for aims that I always suspected, and at length found them true. You planned to invade a European state. The only part up for debate was 'whom?' 

Yeah well, I look at the decline in Industry in Europe, and I witness the decline in your industry since the end of the USSR, to the point where you struggle to build major warships, aircraft, even tanks. Clearly the future belongs to Asia, just not your Asia is all.

[urbanoid]

2 hours ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

Oh, it is absolutely true. Ive spent watching the decline of the British Army over the last 30 years with unmitigated horror, only consoled by the observation its been true across Europe too.

Only Russia has been rearming, for aims that I always suspected, and at length found them true. You planned to invade a European state. The only part up for debate was 'whom?' 

Yeah well, I look at the decline in Industry in Europe, and I witness the decline in your industry since the end of the USSR, to the point where you struggle to build major warships, aircraft, even tanks. Clearly the future belongs to Asia, just not your Asia is all.

'Asia' has gigantic demographic problems, on par or worse than most of the West. That's especially true for 'technnologically advanced Asia' - China, Taiwan, South Korea (extinction levels + a full fledged 'gender war'), Japan (which ironically is the best of the bunch here, as in 'least bad'). India has fallen under replacement levels recently and their most important pet project seems to be to export as many Indians as they can wordlwide. 

The West OTOH has the same problem + a bunch of social problems with immigration of the undesirables and the sheer political insanity of the 'equalitarians'. 

Between the two it's going to be somewhat of a cripple fight and no one else is really relevant in a sense of 'the future belonging to them'. Given how everyone's retarded I mostly expect another 'American century', mainly for a reason that they're already on top.

[Josh]

Immigration is another means to replenishment of the work force. I know you are not a fan and think it only brings in undesirables and dilutes the local ethnicity, but in the case of the U.S. the local ethnicity was always a polyglot “white” of ever changing composition (it very pointedly used to exclude Irish and Italians for example a century ago). If you want a 20 something year old worker, it is a lot cheaper to steal someone else’s than pay for your own, and of course you speed the process by two decades.

China’s population collapse will be so sudden and complete compared even to the more established example of Japan in the late 90s/early 2000s that about the only economic way out is to not just increase productivity per worker but to more or less divorce productivity from labor altogether. And make no mistake, they are trying to. From what I understand automation in China exceeds that of Japan at this point - they are going to attempt to automate their way out of a labor shortage. It’s an ambitious strategy that will be extremely difficult to pull off, but I do not exclude the possibility.

But I agree the U.S. has huge advantages as an entrenched power. It’s global basing give it unparalleled flexibility it deploying its air and sea power on short notice. It is also worth noting that there are huge advantages to having global observation and communications nodes for space power projection, and peer competition will increasingly be defined by space superiority. Being able to directly connect to or observe objects in space globally will be a crucial capability that China will struggle to duplicate. The U.S. leverages bases in Diego Garcia, Ascension, Hawaii, Kwajalein, Alaska , Greenland, Australia, Guam, as well as the CONUS to create a series of tracking and uplink/downlink stations that circle the globe (additionally a number of ABM radars in other countries can support the tracking mission). A brand new set of three radars is set to give the AUKUS partners a staring, realtime track of everything in or near GEO by end of decade. China will struggle to duplicate that.

Lift to orbit is also a technology in which the U.S. has an overwhelming advantage (roughly 10:1 to the PRC), and while China is moving with leaps and bounds to close that gap, so is the U.S. space industry. F9 continues to increase its cadence rates by large double digit percentages year over year. New Glenn could theoretically become the second launch system to have a recovered booster as soon as tomorrow, and their rocket is a monster 7m wide, 45 tonne to LEO heavy lifter. Starship has seemed to solve its re-entry problem as it evolves into its third iteration.

Despite its massive advantages in most every manufacturing sector, China has its work cut out for itself.

[Martineleca]

6 hours ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

Oh, it is absolutely true. Ive spent watching the decline of the British Army over the last 30 years with unmitigated horror, only consoled by the observation its been true across Europe too.

Only Russia has been rearming, for aims that I always suspected, and at length found them true.

I think we need to move beyond the notion that Russia ever really "disarmed" so that they can then "rearm", it's not like they lost a war or something. Thier armies were withdrawn from central Europe in good order and while a lot of equipment was sold off or rotted away still much more remained to be used in war again, that Europe collectively tolerated keeping orders of magnitude fewer AFVs in storage is totally on us, we crashed through the floor of the CFE treaty and are yet to come anywhere near meeting its provisions for a stable balance.

[Stuart Galbraith]

 I think it clear there was a rearmament process underway. And whilst much of that money went nowhere (Su57, Armata, Bumerang, T15) there was recapitalization in important areas (BMD4, Tornado S, T72BM3) that was important, if nowhere near as great an improvement as they were aiming for. Indeed, that most of the equipment expended was what the Soviet army bequeathed them shows really how little progress they made.

The truth of the matter is just as well the 'party of the west' was as Navalny said 'The party of crooks and thieves' or Ukraine may well have gone down in 3 days as they planned. Happily the builders of European superyachts were kept in gainful employment instead.

[Stuart Galbraith]

4 hours ago, urbanoid said:

'Asia' has gigantic demographic problems, on par or worse than most of the West. That's especially true for 'technnologically advanced Asia' - China, Taiwan, South Korea (extinction levels + a full fledged 'gender war'), Japan (which ironically is the best of the bunch here, as in 'least bad'). India has fallen under replacement levels recently and their most important pet project seems to be to export as many Indians as they can wordlwide. 

The West OTOH has the same problem + a bunch of social problems with immigration of the undesirables and the sheer political insanity of the 'equalitarians'. 

Between the two it's going to be somewhat of a cripple fight and no one else is really relevant in a sense of 'the future belonging to them'. Given how everyone's retarded I mostly expect another 'American century', mainly for a reason that they're already on top.

Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia,  are doing alright. And whilst I grant you China probably has feet of clay, I think there is enough progress in the Southwestern part of the rim to say that they are going to be the future economic future of the world. If the Indians actually got some leadership that wasnt corrupt, I think they would stun us at the progress they make.

America? I keep seeing the present maniacs in charge as firing an Uzi at their foot, and shouting 'missed again! Missed again! Missed...' Sooner or later there is going to be a bullet they cant dodge, and with their accumulated debt, they might well take the European economies with them. They did last two times after all, so it seems a reasonable enough prediction.

I dont like being cynical, but Im frankly tired of idiots writing cheques they cant cash. Trump is just the latest of them is all.

 

[bojan]

Why you can not increase production overnight, reason 566783:

Modern rockets/missiles mostly use polymerized solid propellant. Polymerization of such, for eg. 227mm missiles as used by HIMARS takes 70-80 hours. For smaller stuff (122mm Grad) it is less, about 48h, for a larger caliber rockets (Iskander/ATACMS etc) missiles polymerization might take up the 150+ hours or even more (if polymerization is too quick cracks might appear in the block which will lead to the propellant explosion). Until polymerization is done missile fuel block can not be removed from the mold, especially critical part is mold that gives propellant block appropriate inner shape. So one mold will give you ~100 propellant blocks per year (some time will be wasted in checking mold and cleaning it). If we look at maximum previous production of missiles that is published, for US it was ~1800 GMLRS per year. That means that US production facility probably had ~18 +/- few molds.*

Molds also don't last that long, with chlorate/perchlorate based propellant it is about 100 castings before junkyard. Machines used for production are very specialized and require incredible level of precision (Grad rocket requires less than 1/100mm tollerance on total lenghth of the propellant block), IOW, they are not common OTS items. Every factory has own machine shop, made with current production in mind + some small reserve. So any increase in production is quite complicated.

Contrasting that "old school" 122mm Grad and few other (220mm Uragan, probably few other) rockets were made by simple extrusion of tripple-based NC propellant, which could be done much, much faster. Or very old Luna/Frog that used roughly cast propelant blocks that were then turned on lathe... But NC propellant gives you much less range than composite perchlorate/polymer ones so they are more rare today. They are also more expensive overall.

*I am pretty sure that Russians are in ~same or even worse situation with 300mm Smerch rockets/missiles, since there was never any really large scale production of those.

 

 

[sunday]

Chemical engineering is really its own field.