Link drop November 2017

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"Saudi Arabia’s Incompetence Would Be Comical If It Weren’t Killing So Many People"
https://theintercept.com/2017/11/17/saudi-arabia-incompetence-iran-rivalry/

"Navy grounds two aviators behind penis skydrawing"
https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2017/11/17/navy-grounds-two-aviators-behind-penis-skydrawing/

This reminds me of remarks about how 18 year olds are allowed to kill and die in war in the U.S., but not allowed to drink alcohol. There's an inordinate amount of immature crap in a normal military, and almost all of it is harmless IIRC.

"Over-friendly, or sexual harassment? It depends partly on whom you ask"
https://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2017/11/daily-chart-14

This is about liberty; both society norms and laws can reduce the freedom of action, which equals a loss of some freedom. It's interesting how laid-back Germany is, though some people would probably call that chauvinistic (females in Germany are more laid-back as well according to the poll, though).
I suppose looking at boobs and other female curves is hard-coded male (non-gay) behaviour and a line between sexual harassment and things that one has to accept as a price for being alive has to be drawn someplace before that's getting people in trouble. We should probably draw that line even before sexually charged compliments, for the very same words are very different in their perception depending on how attractive the speaker is.

"Level IV Armor, and the Future of Small Arms: Brief Thoughts 001"
http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2017/11/16/level-iv-armor-future-small-arms-brief-thoughts-001/

Disasters like this happen when firearms fans think about infantry combat. Infantry combat is NOT all about infantry killing each other. In fact, there's lots of evidence that infantry repels infantry to some degree, and almost all killing (80+ %) is done by other arms in modern conventional warfare.

Infantry that's optimised to resist opposing infantry's bullets while penetrating opposing infantry's armour plates won't make much sense until exoskeletons become practical and affordable en masse.

"What Do We Mean When We Say ‘Fight For  Information’?"
http://www.benning.army.mil/armor/eARMOR/content/issues/2017/Summer/pdf/3Palisca17.pdf

Just an example of U.S. professional military journals trying to foster thought about doctrine even on a published platform. The majority of military theory writing before 1914 was likely written in German with a gazillion of Prussian, German and Austro-Hungarian military journal editions, books and widely circulated memos. It appears that the effort put into getting military doctrine right is nowadays much smaller. This is horrifying because even after all that effort the officers of the 1900's still erred badly and mostly blundered into the First World War.

A new training centre in Germany for training in settlements of different types, including sewers. It's still missing a lot of clutter, especially furnitures, balconies and fences.

Multi-mode radar with 360° field of view and on-the-move operation in a small package. The concept justified high hopes (except that "low cost" was a ridiculous claim coming from Northrop Grumman), but it's been years since and there's still no series production. A brigade designed on a blank sheet would certainly have something like this, but path dependencies and other reasons make sure NATO armies don't have many nice things like that. Personally, I wonder if the Swedish SAAB Giraffe 1X could be adapted for on-the-move operation. It should be possible.

"HISTINT: Unearthing declassified Soviet military journals in CIA archives"
https://www.bellingcat.com/resources/2017/07/28/histint-unearthing-declassified-soviet-military-journals-cia-archives/

S O

defence_and_freedom@gmx.de

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