This seems rather stupid considering none of you are in both army's and Aboslutely none of you know **** about America's or Russia's seceret weapons, or the actual capabilities of any ship. My Dad was in the Navy for several years and he would hapily tell you that there are NO important factual specs released to the public, ever. However it is known that American technologies have steadily been further along than other military forces for quite awhile in both development and upgrading. In the event of a nuclear war it's hardly gonna matter if the tech is 20 years old, furthermore American missle tech is top notch. Some exsperiance as small as fireing weapons developed by either country does not qualify you to make a decision, as is the place where I'm assuming most of you including myself stand. And yes Nexxo obviously your choices define you, do have anything useful to say on the matter of oil controll?
No, they don't launch cruise missiles becous they are not made to launch cruise missiles. Typhoon class is made to carry ballistic missiles and carry 16 each. I strongly doubt knew where all Typhoon subs were all the time and even if you realy knew how many nukes would be launched befor your subs could sank them? And I presume you know there were the Akula class submarine which can launch cruise missiles, are as silent as the US subs and are called attack subs. Typhoon are ballistic missile subs. Do you get the difference?
Sorry for drifting away from the subject of the thread, but I realy hate when someone shove the US weapon propaganda in my face. Anyway, I realy don't think it is about oil. It's more about area of influence. Georgia think the US and NATO will help to brake away from russian control, but neither of them wan't mess with Russia for many reasons (oil, nukes, army etc.). Im living in eastern Europe and know very well that USSR have colapsed, but Russia did not go down with it. It was and it still is one of the major word powers, no matter how much US deny it.
We need to have wars over who has better hookers. Instead of fighting for oil deposits we just bang each others hookers and vote on quality.
Agreed, but in the short term the later might be useful, and overall economically a BIG plus. And on the other hand it's simply not an option for some countries to kick their dependency, nations with little or no wealth that can’t afford implementation of new technologies and would be subsequently left even further behind. No.1 Your not in a position to tell me what propaganda is, as I believe your also a citizen of some country, not god. No. 2 Your not going to find too many people saying Russia is a weak military force including myself. They've proven their might over time and again and it is NO AMERICAN TREND to claim any falsity to that. No. 3 My point is that your inherently limited knowledge of world forces (especially large ones), as is the rest of ours (any admirals in the forum?) simply disqualifies you from passing judgment based on pure publicized facts. Which as you said, are most likely propaganda. No. 4 Only historical figures or actual experience in either force would lend the knowledge to discuss with purpose a matter of such tremendous complexity and secrecy. No. 5 If and only if you’re willing to discuss the track record of said countries or your own militia experience (If you have any) would I, or hopefully anyone else, be willing to take your opinion seriously.
No.1 Bulgaria (where I live) was part of USSR until 1991 and I know how the propaganda was then. Now Bulgaria is part of UN and I know how the propaganda is now. I know first hand what happen in Iugoslavia, Sarbia and Kosovo and know what hte western and yhe eastern news agencis broadcast. Do you know what was the firs thing the US forces bombd in Belgrad? Their TV broadcasting tower. Ask yourself why. Here I still get to hear the stories from more then one side. Where do you get your news from? CNN, FOX? No.2 I agree with the first statment and I never said that US (America is continent) claim otherwise, they just claim and propagant thet their weapons are the best when they just aren't. No.3 Please, dont't judge me based on your knowledge. Bulgaria has 1300+ years of history and we've seen the worst of the most world forces. I think that my "inherently" knowledge of world forces is not that bed. It's pessimistic though. No.4 Histoical figyres are dead (most of them) and their words and deeds can be interpret as anyone wonts. Personal experience is not so goot to as ot is flawed by personal feelings. No.5 Do you think that US weapon experts have any real experience with russian weaponry? I've seen so many US fighter pilots saing that US jets are the best when they actualy never flew only more than 1 or 2 US jets. I don't have any militia experience on my own but I'm interested in that sort of stuff and I read alot on the matter so I think I have some bases for discussion. Please, don't get the wrong impression: I don't like Russia. I just think that they are right as it comes to this crisis.
I'm not convinced of that. Short-term planning without a long-term view tends to lead to disaster (cf. Iraq). Although it can be said that the West is firmly in control of some of the biggest oil fields (again, Iraq), the world economy just broke and fuel prices are skyrocketing. Nope, not seeing the benefits. Haliburton, Esso and BP do, but that's another story. Small, poor nations do well not to follow in our footsteps. As a Fillipino Wise Master (can't remember who) once said: "The biggest curse of a nation is to have wealth." What he meant is that the biggest disadvantage for a country is to have material resources, because it leads to mono-culture/mono-economy and single-minded plunder of these resources (complete with civil war as various parties compete) by the country itself or by other, more powerful "investors" --only to leave it destitute once the well runs dry. When you have no wealth and resources however, you focus on bettering yourself: grow your own food, educate your own people, build your own health care etc. Nobody is interested in you so you can be left to get on with it in peace. And what you export is skills and knowledge --and that resource never runs dry. It works for Costa Rica... As for which army is better, the US or Russia's, I think you'll find the answer in the fact that they haven't gone to war with each other yet. Balance of power: it only works when both sides carry roughly the same weight.
If everyone should ignore people's opinions when they've had no experience of the topic, why do people listen to Priest's advice on marraige? And listen to doctors who tell them they've got cancer? To ignore someone because they are inexperienced (regardless of how well read the person is on the subject at hand) is just outright ignorance, and I do not appreciate it at all.
Our fast attacks would pick up their boomers coming out of Vladivostok which is the only year round ice free port it has on the Pacific. At other times it was easy to pick them up coming out of the Baltic. If that doesn't cover it we have underwater tracking systems. Everything I know about subs is from service schools, serving on them or learning from others that did it too. Of course, that was back in the late 70's and early 80's. They may have decided to use some other ice free port that I haven't heard of yet, so my knowledge may be dated. I've been out of the loop since a few years before the USSR fell apart.
I agree as far as it being a positive for smaller countries to do their own thing, stand by while the big boys with their toys wreak havoc upon one another. And yes a generous resource of knowledge is really the most valuable internally and externally for any country. What I meant though is that some countries, I'm talking very poor countries, maybe a war torn state in Africa. Has no money for even these small investments of education and healthcare, both of which can be greatly supplemented by advancements in transportation. Such a scenario can be seen with the advent or introduction of the railroad which no less then revolutionized the US and many other places. The widespread use of oil is one such revolutionary (albeit flawed) technology, I think it's safe to say that if a small country is faced with the cost of some of the proposed alternative technologies then it's going to be financially overwhelmed and stuck in a less than modern situation. As mentioned a train system may be a viable alternative, as it's cheap and reliant on existing technologies, but everyone would have to stop fighting first. As far as economic benefit, I defiantly disagree. Yes gas is expensive for your average citizen but it's not the oil companies that are the main benefactor of that expense, it's the government. I wish dearly that I had the stats with me but the US government takes about 70% of every dollar from gas sold not Exxon, shell, BP ect. That means if you’re not buying the gas from another country first, then you’re making maximum profit. Americans may be paying more but it's at least not publicly adverse for our economy. Prices for that reason have always been lower in the US and other countries that control oil, which is another added benefit. Yes gas prices will always go up, that's how an economy based on debt works. The Euro will always go down in value as will the dollar and any other form of currency. Oil, as a resource that's going to run out, is going to go up very quickly in price, but it will always be profitable and cheaper for the countries that control it. And my opinion on US vs. Russia, I have to say I side with you on that one. It's mainly up in the air until (god forbid) there is such a test against the forces. I think the big ? is China, they haven't had a large conflict they've participated in (in the last 100 years) nothing at least like the world wars, and they faired pretty badly against Japan in that case. I think it was a bad decision to use Russia in WW2 also, at least on the Japanese front, they might of had the numbers to do it but pairing them and China in an alliance probably was a bad decision compared to a UK/China or US/China alliance. I might off come off as agitated, I was. So sorry for the negativity the whole thing was a bit brash. But let me address you more clearly and stir up some points that where a bit blurry. 1. I'm aware of Bulgaria’s USSR infestation, I've lived for portions of my life with people from other regions especially Lithuania that were also occupied. They shared with me mostly through agonizing questioning what they knew and felt about USSR occupation, their views on the USA and NATO, and their thoughts going into the future of a non-occupied country. This is a far stretch from actually living in Bulgaria and I'm sure among other things that your knowledge exceeds mine on that issue. However I'm talking about propaganda, and while you may live in the cross section between two different lies and stretched truths, this can be accomplished without geographical aid. The internet is a great resource as we all know, and it allows quite a bit of exploration of information. To answer your question, no I don't get my news from FOX or CNN, I don't watch news networks on TV for anything other than Local updates. As you might of gleaned from my post, most of my info comes from the internet, and on the internet if it's historical it comes from Britannica, and if it's contemporary it comes from multiple places, if I was to generalize my news source, it'd be mostly from the UK and the BBC. I'm well aware of propaganda, and I am very careful to avoid generalizing my knowledge from one source. 2. I think your well aware, that when a person says there American or American this American that, then there talking about the USA. Canadians call themselves Canadians, and they say they're from Canada, a similar system is used widely for Mexicans. I've had enough of Europeans (and that's the only group) going on and on about how America is a ****ing continent, we all ****ing know. It's not some pride thing, it's a language thing and it's accepted by all true "North Americans" so get over it! It's tripe, and everyone's sick of it. Claiming that US citizens propagate that our weapons are the best is a stereotype, much like European women have hairy pits. It's simply a stupid thing to say, based on very narrowed views. /end rant 3. Yes Bulgaria has quite the history, and if a Bulgarian had been alive for those 1300+ years, I would say he was a very good source of information and opinion. Bulgaria’s great! But how many of those (especially pre 1991) years have you been alive in order to inform all of us here on Bit-tech? Yes, that was a question to prove a point, don't bother to answer it. And again I'm sure your militia knowledge surpasses my own and many others, I'm not challenging that. 4. I simply have to disagree with you on that opinion. Most would say that historical evidence is very worthy of review. EG: Does Russia have a history of delivering top-of-the-line, high-tech and reliable weaponry? Such a question is quite valuable to an argument of Military might, especially when so much current knowledge is secret, which brings me to my next point. Personal Military experience, while hopefully not revealing any classified materials, is valuable to this sort of argument. I'm not asking how a person felt when they saw their best buddy blown to pieces, I'm not asking how the food is. Lets say for example, a private in the Navy could share his experience working with a rival (even peaceful) military, in say Iraq, this could provide valuable insight into the capabilities (of various types) of the other militia, especially the moral, or the intensity, things that can be compared without emotion, but by simple observation. 5. Yes I do. For example my own father participated in the Vietnam War as a small arms specialist. Such a title denoted that he was intimately knowledgeable about weaponry of every kind smaller then a large machine gun. Though I should ask him, I believe his favorite weapon was not an American weapon but actually German. When you get to large weapons such as jets, you turn to History because some of the better ones are in fact secret. A subject easier to discuss would be Helicopters maybe, I know the USA makes a pretty mean chopper, and those are pretty important in modern combat. Finally I'm not saying you have "no" basis on which you discuss, I just think that for anyone actual experience or Historical knowledge is going to be more useful on such a complex topic, even then a decision is quite hard to make. 6. I'm not a fan of Russia either, but I'm not a nationalist or something. I haven't given this issue much thought, not nearly as much as yourself. I do not support everything my country does as most citizens don't, on the issue of Georgia I am yet undecided. People listen to priest and doctors because the DO have experience and the DO have knowledge. A priest has spent a lifetime marrying couples, many of which he may know personally. On top of that he's also devoted his life to morality and peace, logic and structure, for many a priest can offer insight into their own lives, experience or not. A Doctor on the other had has spent years learning the in's and out's of the human body and/or mind, the minutiae of the processes and how to diagnose them. Knowledge that can be very helpful, just as a priests. That’s why people listen do doctors and priests, more important to this discussion however. THAT'S why people listen to an Admiral when he talks about the strength of one military force or another, that's the horse’s mouth! He or she has the experience and the knowledge to tell us (if honestly) a very good view of military strength of any nationality. I do not "ignore" people’s opinions, I doubt them, and apparently I should have made that clearer. It's not black and white with me and thankfully not with many others, including yourself I'm sure. But to filter out the crap, you got to take a lot of info with a pound of salt. And people tend to make very definitive claims of things they may know very little about. No offence intended but I'm going to trust a doctor’s opinion on my health before I trust a strangers. And that concludes one of my longest posts ever! Whew!
I'm not sure about that. These are all very Western solutions to Western views of the problem. We know that Africa has a lot of sun, and I can't help but wondering how this energy could be harnessed with some cheap elegant (bio-)technology. At certain levels, the government is the oil companies. And getting/keeping control of the oil can be a costly exercise for the tax payer in the first place (again, Iraq). And the economy still broke, and prices are still skyrocketing well beyond what can be accounted for by inflation. The evidence simply does not support the best laid plans of mice and men.
like that guy that made a wind powered pump with scrap to help his village, instead of going for a gasoline powered pump. (seen it on TED)
All i know is that the efforts to control the world oil was centralized on developing alternatives (ethanol, hydrogen, eletric and such), many of those STUPID conflicts would end. But it appears to me that selling weapons to keep wars coming is as profitable as the spoils of war itself. The only good reason for a war is to hold the world's population growth JUST KIDDING!
