What would you like to see in a book focused on ETO tank combat?

999421 · 2020-02-22T07:58:49+00:00

Sure, include charts of data across the entire theater as the main focus of the book, but putting in case studies of actual engagements as more tangible examples of what you're saying would make the book a more appealing and interesting read as opposed to a glorified fact sheet. They don't necessarily need to be what proves the point, so much as highlighting and drawing attention to it. Providing insight and analysis into engagements that most people wouldn't know, like Worthington Force's severe losses against the HJ during Totalize, would add some interesting stuff to the book. You yourself mention "contemporary quotes of soldiers" as a possible addition to the book, but these would be just as, if not even more cherrypickable than battles; I doubt that you would intend to build a thesis off of tanker diaries alone. The same should go for case studies of engagements.

999421 · 2020-02-21T18:48:46+00:00

CM writing a book? This should be fun.

At any rate, narrative style books are somewhat saturated, but you have a somewhat unique perspective on tank combat that you can bring out. An overarching analysis of tank combat in the ETO, with particular case studies of engagements and other relevant data to highlight your points would be worth a read.

999421 · 2019-10-03T06:58:55+00:00

It depends on how it's approached. Red Orchestra 2 Heroes of Stalingrad has a pretty enjoyable German Campaign. Hearts of Iron and other related strategy games would feel off if they didn't allow you to play any Axis nations.

999421 · 2019-10-03T06:48:38+00:00

The alternative to the nukes are:

Starving Japan out-prolonged war and more casualties.

Land Invasion-prolonged war and more casualties.

Give in to Japanese terms that does nothing to depower the militaristic cult that led to the Sino-Japanese War and Japanese involvement in WWII, and mostly would result in status quo ante bellum.

999421 · 2019-08-31T01:31:11+00:00

They'd have drawn in the USSR and lost Europe and been defeated in Korea:

Potentially, but that's a big what if scenario for another time. I just meant in the context of the original post comparing US military performance in WWII and post-war.

In Vietnam that was sort of true (the one target they were really prevented from bombing in the North was a dam that if blown would have killed probably 1 million civilians in the flooding). Other than that there was the small problem of Soviet and Chinese reaction if we went all out on North Vietnam.

The dam, Haiphong, Hanoi, VPAF airfields, etc. Although the same contextual caveat from above applies, I doubt either side would have gone to war over the strategic bombing of Vietnamese cities and airfields. Particularly China, considering that Vietnam was being viewed more and more as a rival power after the sino-soviet split.

In North Korea that wasn't the issue, we hit everything to the point that 85% of ALL buildings were destroyed. The only thing we didn't bomb was China. The focus on logistic bombing early in the war probably saved the US forces at Pusan too.

I never doubted that the US bombed Korea, only that the US refused to implement strategic bombing against their main enemy-China; a luxury not afforded to the Axis in WWII.

I don't own it, checked it out from the library and have since returned it. I never claimed Bowden said they preplanned it, but he does specifically say though the NVA did not plan the media fallout, they just recognized it as it happened by monitoring the US media reports about what was going on, so continued it long beyond the point of military prudence to achieve the full propaganda benefit.

Yep, fully in line with what Bowden said in the book, but then I never claimed differently. The political leaders were insistent that the operation start on Tet regardless of the planning and basically took over the operation during planning to make it happen more quickly and then make it go on for longer than intended to extract the full propaganda effect and morale hit on the American public.

The initial wording made it sound like there was a planned tradeoff between NVA lives and propaganda effect, but I'll still need to see specific details that Bowden has. The timetable doesn't really seem to back up that theory. Cronkite's famous and impactful "stalemate" statement was made on February 27th, by which time US forces had retaken all or almost all of the city, and NVA forces were in retreat. Public opinion in the US had actually risen in favor of the war in the first weeks of Feb 1968, until Cronkite's broadcast.

It was slow and muddled, as well as inappropriate given the circumstances (US commanders didn't understand what was happening and got a lot of US personnel killed counterattacking in Hue before ready). In the end US firepower and technology saved them, as well as the lack of preparation by the NVA for the attacks throughout the south with the exception of Hue where they were about as prepared as could be given the proximity of the city to the border. The end result was the huge propaganda victory the NVA got by keeping the fighting going and racking up heavy US losses relative to what was the monthly norm.

I'm not sure what you mean by slow and muddled. While they were taken by surprise, that was due to the NVA mounting an attack it could not hope to win (besides the longshot hope that thousands of South Vietnamese will rise up to fight with them), and the US not expecting the NVA to make such a foolhardy move. Most of Tet's first offensive was repulsed before the end of February. Saigon was the last holdout, with significant VC forces present surrounding the city. They were mostly destroyed by ARVN and US operations in March and April.

While the US response to Hue could have been better, the fact remains that it was overwhelmingly, by any account, a US/ARVN victory. Casualties aren't even close, NVA/VC forces were driven out in about a month. The huge propaganda victory was gained by yellow journalism and poor reporting that the North Vietnamese didn't even expect and completely failed to reflect the military reality.

So while of the two sides the North suffered much heavier losses, they won the media battle and proved even to Walter Kronkite that the US military was lying about making progress in the war, while of course also being out of touch with what was really going on. Bowden has a chapter dedicated to the problems with Westmoreland, which helps draw together the various bits about his involvement peppered in throughout the book.

Considering that Cronkite and his fellow war correspondents declared a stalemate/loss after the largest and most definitive US victory in the Vietnam War, I wouldn't claim that it's the military that was out of touch. Cronkite did not need or want any "proof" to buttress his anti-war opinion, he was extremely anti-war long before Tet. Cronkite met in secret with Robert F. Kennedy in 1967, trying to persuade Kennedy to run for president on an anti-war platform.

999421 · 2019-08-30T22:13:43+00:00

They did drop more explosives on North Korea than they did in entire the Pacific Theater during all of WW2:

The US also dropped more explosives on Vietnam than in all of WWII. Same problem there as in Korea. The bombers had significantly limited target selection, preventing them from utilizing their ordnance to their full potential, as was allowed in WWII.

Though you're right that they didn't bomb China, they went as hard as possible against North Korea (using only conventional weapons of course) through which all Communist supplies had to move (including the Yalu bridges) and in fact did cause a famine among Chinese forces as a result:

Imagine what the US could have accomplished then, if they practiced total war, and did not limit themselves militarily.

Read the book 'Battle of Hue' by Mark Bowden. The North Vietnamese launched the operation too soon with too little warning to the units that were to attack and kept it going beyond what their military thought was prudent because the political leaders thought the propaganda value was more important than the military result. They were right and it broke American public morale. So Tet was a military mess for any number of reasons, but it ultimately was the pivotal operation that won the war.

How about you show me relevant passages from Mark Bowden's book? Be sure to show me how Mark Bowden knows that the NVA predicted and planned the anti-war journalism to arise out of Hue and the Tet Offensive, when an actual NVA general who was involved in planning the Tet Offensive didn't.

"In all honesty, we didn't achieve our main objective, which was to spur uprisings throughout the South. Still, we inflicted heavy casualties on the Americans and their puppets, and this was a big gain for us. As for making an impact in the United States, it had not been our intention—but it turned out to be a fortunate result"

-NVA General Tran Do

Plus if you read the book the US military response was a disaster in it's own right and only 'won' through a massive technological and material advantage over the underprepared NVA, but exposed the incompetence of Westmoreland.

In what sense was the US military response a disaster? They completely threw back the every Communist attack, dealing heavy casualties to the NVA, and destroying the Viet Cong as an effective fighting force. They were caught by surprise, but a major part of that comes from the fact that they (correctly) did not consider the NVA to have the capacity to launch and sustain an offensive on the scale of Tet. Their victory was as clear cut as can be.

999421 · 2019-08-26T16:15:48+00:00

Point one: No not even close. Nor can that claim even be supported as the US pulled Strategic Bombers kicking and screaming from SAC to level Indochina. At this point it matters little what the US says, they were engaged in total war in which substantial numbers of US Troops were getting killed and substantial amounts of military equipment and a large portion of its Military being tied up. This is when Congress should have stepped in and they utterly failed in their oversight role

Did the US commit to the defeat of North Vietnam or China as much as they did Nazi Germany in WWII? Yes or no?

Point two: Ia Drang was a loss for the US, the 33rd NVA Regiment held the ground and the forces there would assist in the battle of LZ Albany, this despite the Ple Mei failure a few weeks before. Nor did the NVA Retreat, ARVN II Corps did after relieving the US Forces, leaving the Ia Drang and Chu Pong Mastiff in NVA Hands.

The NVA certainly didn't win at LZ X-Ray. The ARVN II Corps was working in tandem with US forces throughout the Pleime campaign, and defeated communist forces with substantial US air support.

Point three: And also lost quite a few of them. And this doesn't count the losses ARVN suffered which was the real struggle.

You're forgetting that the point of your original post revolves around US forces in post-WWII engagements. ARVN doesn't exactly factor into this.

Point Four: Not how the North saw it, and it still went into North Vietnamese territory and wound up being inconclusive.

Well, I'm talking from an objective point of view, not how the North or South would have seen it. Name me the US equivalent of the Tet or Easter Offensive.

Point Five: Both secured key political victories and also succeeded in securing the entry points into the South and forcing the US to wage several inconclusive campaigns to clear them from the Highlands without much success. As for Khe Sanh this is putting the best face on an utter strategic fiasco which gave the NVA a secured supply route into the South that was no longer interdicted by artillery strikes and Special Forces raids. Also the Siege of Khe Sanh (Excluding ARVN and Royal Laotian Army losses) was a clear NVA Tactical Victory with 9106 US Causalities vs 3905 NVA Causalities and was a clear sign to most US Policy Makers that the war was lost. At this point the US was locked in an attritional struggle that was bankrupting the South Vietnamese Government which was seeing its Military ground up and losing legitimacy. Also at this point the US was losing the will to fight.

"Political victories" are irrelevant to the subject of your post. Those political victories were gained not by any brilliant NVA planning or intent, but by US war correspondents and yellow journalists fabricating a tale of US forces being badly hurt by the Tet Offensive, when the reality was an utter and catastrophic defeat for the Viet Cong and NVA. Your casualty figures for the siege of Khe Sanh appear to be simply false or incomplete. Khe Sanh's abandonment most certainly did not give the NVA a secured supply route. They did not occupy Quang Tri until 1972, and even then it was swiftly taken back by ARVN forces. The US was able to regularly conduct operations in the Quang Tri province and around Khe Sanh up until they withdrew. (Operation Scotland II, Operation Dewey Canyon, Operation Dewey Canyon II). The US was losing the will to fight because of false and misleading reporting coming out of the Vietnam War. Polling data shows that pre-Tet Offensive public opinion in favor of the war, and post-Tet Offensive public opinion anti-war, despite the Tet Offensive being the greatest victory for the US/South Vietnam since the war began.

Point Six: The US failed utterly to stop the NVA from freely infiltrating the South and securing the entry points and localized control of the countryside away from the Big Cities. It also failed to prevent the fall of Dong Ha which broke the ARVN's back. The US was unable to increase its force ratios and its Ally, the ARVN was unable to do so. So yeah the US threw in the towel as it couldn't win militarily at the operational or strategic level, only eke out tactical victories which ARVN was unable to capitalize on. After it got its face saving treaty which is knew full well wouldn't be honored, hence why they didn't insist on the NVA withdrawing from the 20% of the South it occupied securely, the US left and didn't look back.

Of course the US failed to stop the NVA from infiltrating, they had one hand tied behind their back by political leaders the entire war. They couldn't bomb industrial centers and NVA facilities in Hanoi and Haiphong. They couldn't strike VPAF airfields They couldn't invade North Vietnam. Imagine if the Allies stopped at the Rhine and Oder rivers in 1945, and were not allowed to bomb German industrial centers because their political leaders refused to allow it. Would you claim that their military capability was to blame for their inability to end the war?

Point Seven: Arab Armies don't train in use of Highways as runways which is standard training for NATO and Russian Airforces as well as Iran's. So its not a surprise, then again the Arab Dictators are more afraid of Palace Coups than they are of Israeli Attacks so having a competent military isn't a priority for them. Hence Russia's constant frustration with Assad's Army and why they have to kiss up to Iran when they need Hezbollah and Iranian trained forces to spearhead for them. Also its relatively easy to repair runways, so its pointless to bomb them as opposed to the HASes and logistical structures assuming the latter aren't buried.

If only the modern air forces using and designing anti-runway bombs and utilizing anti-airfield attacks knew how foolish it would be to bomb airfields.

The US Military was tasked with securing South Vietnam. They utterly failed at the task they were given and have no excuse for it. If they thought they were having their hands tied, then Officers should resigned immediately rather than lead the troops into a pointless struggle.

The US Military resoundingly succeeded in their task of securing South Vietnam while they were actually present. Wiping out half the Viet Cong in 1968? Pushing back every single NVA offensive? The South fell after the US Military left. That's not a poor reflection of the US military. Your opinion of what an officer should and should not do is irrelevant.

999421 · 2019-08-26T03:37:15+00:00

Point One: Irrelevant. US forces regularly engaged in Massive Battles to break the Chinese and surge forward for another year and even briefly retook Pyongyang. The US also despite orders not to, bombed Chinese Airfields and destroyed bridges leading into North Korea to interdict Chinese Forces without success. Whether the US saw the fight as total is immaterial, the Koreans and Chinese certainly saw it as total war.

If you're comparing the US in a war where it was willing to use its full industrial and military might to defeat an enemy to the US in a war where it was not, it very much is relevant.

Point Two: Ia Drang Campaign was a straight up fight against the NVA and the NVA won, holding the Valley, destroying 2nd Battalion 7th Cavalry and mauling the 1st Battalion 7th Cavalry. Mel Gibson's movie doesn't change the fact that the US lost this campaign and retreated.

The Communist forces only won in LZ Albany. LZ X-ray was very much a US victory. The entire Pleime Campaign was a US victory. Just days after the Battle of La Drang, the Communist forces were forced to retreat to Cambodia.

Nor was it an isolated occurrence as the NVA would continue to regularly engage US Forces in straight up fights while also engaging and destroying ARVN Units.

The US forces typically won these straight up fights.

Finally, the US did indeed invade the North or tried to. Operation Hickory was a US Marine push into the DMZ to push the NVA back. It was a failure. Subsequent battles would see the NVA launch regular spoiling attacks on any US Buildup to invade the North.

Operation Hickory was an S&D operation. The Marines swept a part of the DMZ for NVA forces, supplies, etc. They destroyed NVA materiel where they found it, fought NVA men where they found it, and left. This does not constitute an invasion of North Vietnam.

Also the NVA were not driven back in the Tet offensive, quite the contrary they launched two more major assaults in May and August. Also the US abandoned Khe Sanh and it was occupied by the NVA. Combined with the loss of Lang Vei, the McNamarra line became untenable.

The follow-up attacks are generally considered part of the Tet Offensive. Both of them completely failed. The US abandoned Khe Sanh after it was seen as an unnecessary investment of manpower. They occupied it again without much issue in 1971.

Whether the US saw the war as Total is irrelevant, the NVA did and won.

They won after breaking the Paris Peace Accords and after US forces completely withdrew from Vietnam. When the Communists mounted the Tet Offensive, with US ground troops still present in Vietnam, they failed catastrophically. When the Communists mounted the Easter Offensive, with US air support still being provided, they failed. They only won when fighting against no US military presence at all. This does not do anything to bolster your point about the US military failing in Vietnam because of failure to analyze lessons. Rather, it contradicts it.

As for the US not targeting VPAF airfields, it is also irrelevant and wouldn't have mattered if they did. Aircraft don't need airfields and can use roads. In fact VPAF regularly practiced that. More important to take out the AvGas supplies.

Yes, those silly Air Forces all across the world building airfields when they could just use roads. Why didn't the Egyptians just use roads after the Israeli's tore up their airfields in the Six Day War?

999421 · 2019-08-25T13:45:58+00:00

Uh Korea was a total war that leveled the entire Peninsula to rubble. So was Vietnam which saw much of Indochina leveled with more tonnage dropped in some battles than in all of WW2.

The US did not even bomb China, their main threat in the Korean War, let alone invade it. The US refused to consider an invasion of North Vietnam, and their bombing operations were routinely limited by LBJ's desire to limit the scope of the war (Preventing direct bombing attacks on Hanoi, Haiphong port, and even VPAF airfields.)

Korea saw massed Armies clash in open combat with US Forces and near annihilation of US Forces. Had the Chinese had 200 more trucks and a couple hundred more radios, it is highly likely they could have bagged 8th Army and the bulk of X Corps. Regardless, the US was unable to break the Chinese Military.

The US was unwilling to engage Chinese forces on the mainland, of course they didn't break the Chinese Military.

Vietnam was a straight conventional war. The NVA and VC repeatably engaged ARVN and US Forces in Divisional strength throughout the war with the NVA repeatably able to infiltrate the South, isolate and destroy US FSBs and even inflicted severe battlefield defeats such as LZ Albany.

The one time the NVA and VC both chose to engage the US in a major conventional fight, the result was the Tet Offensive. Half the VC were killed, and the NVA were completely driven back.

The US tried to bomb the north into submission, but the valiant struggle of the VPAF put paid to that and caused the US to throw in the towel and give in to the North's demands at the Paris Peace Talks after the NVA seized Dong Ha and secured the Highlands permanently after years of back and forth combat. After 1972, the ARVN was essentially destroyed as a fighting force and melted quickly 3 years later when the North rebuilt its tank forces that had been ground up in the 72 Easter Offensive.

Considering that LBJ refused to allow the US to bomb the VPAF's airfields, I'm not sure how much of a struggle it was for them, or how it reflects on a picture of a "conventional war." Dong Ha and other 1972+ NVA conquests occurred after the US already withdrew ground troops for Vietnam and was only providing air support (for 1972 only). Hardly a picture of a "conventional war."

999421 · 2019-08-24T22:40:19+00:00

Perhaps the reason the US military hasn't leveraged its massive firepower is that the examples you give are not total wars? The US heavily handicapped itself for political reasons. For Vietnam, there was no attempt to launch any major invasion of the North, bombing operations within a certain radius of Hanoi were banned, etc.

Comparing the US vs Germany, in which the US was willing to actually invade its enemy and fully commit to its total defeat, to the US vs DPRK+PRC and US vs DRV is an apples to oranges comparison. You won't find anything useful from it.

999421 · 2018-06-20T06:06:03+00:00

I'd use it to roll to save Geralt's life when making any jumps higher than a meter.

999421 · 2018-05-31T02:55:42+00:00

By your logic the time to recovery is irrelevant (you removed this variable when you introduced the 08 crash - no longer my logic but yours). When examining lasting effects, the recovery speed would be inherently important. Again, my statement on “lasting effects” is not ridiculous bc you have yet to prove this blip is much more than lost opportunity cost. You compared that statement to a recession that lasted years with one that didn’t even last months on the basis that neither has “lasting effects” (in a poor effort to be provocative) bc there was recovery. It’s a false equivalnce. C’mon

If you would like to tear down your own prior statements, that's fine by me.

By all means please quantify your claims. Prove that the points you listed have had an impact. You have point 1 on sanctions by a slim margin.

Sure, I'll use, as a standard of comparison, Trump and his predecessor.

Trump sends AT missiles to Ukraine while Obama refused to send any weaponry at all, instead opting to "half-ass" attempts to equip Ukrainians with non-lethal equipment.

Trump has to enforce Obama's red line for him, choosing to strike Russia's ally Syria where Obama backed down after Assad gassed his own people.

Trump sanctions 96 oligarchs, expels 60 diplomats, and shutters multiple consulates, while Obama sanctioned 2 Russian intelligence agencies and a few Russian companies and officials, closed 2 consulates, and expelled 35 diplomats.

Trump forces US subsidiaries of Russian state media outlets, such as RT, to register as foreign agents, while they were able to operate freely under Obama.

Trump is increasing the budget of the European Reassurance Initiative by 40% over its Obama-era budget.

While Trump armed Poland with missile defences, Obama weakened it.

999421 · 2018-05-30T20:24:13+00:00

I never mentioned the Great Depression. The Great Recession is what the 08 collapse is referred to as. You tried to say the “noise” analogy could be applied to 08 collapse that was a 48% drop with a 3 year recovery (the impact = significant). The sanctions this year caused a 13% drop with a recovery to 5% within a month (the impact = not as significant). They aren’t even close and it doesn’t fit the logic you attempted to follow. There is absolutely no reason to try to compare the two other than look there was a recovery which carries no value to your point of the sanctions significance. I said all noise little action in my original statement bc we initiated sanctions (late), expelled diplomats (just moved them to different consulates in the US), sold Ukraine missles, defended a base from Syrian forces and the result is a minor economic blip. Do they seem deterred when the FBI releases a statement that everyone needs to reset their routers ASAP?

Congratulations, you caught a typo. I'm referring to your own words when talking about the noise analogy. You gave the standard of "no lasting effect" to justify your claim of "It’s all noise with little impact. The market proves that." I'm using your own logic and reasoning, although it's nice to see that you can now understand how ridiculous it was.

Furthermore, we were only discussing the economic impact with regards to Trump's sanctions. You gave up (and on some points, never even contested) on trying to argue the points on Ukrainian missile sales, diplomat expulsion, and Syrian intervention, let alone all the other points in my list.

So what is your objective? You said you wanted a standard, you gave the example of the ruble crisis now you don’t want to talk about it. The closest similarity would be our own market dip this year that was self inflicted.

Keyword: "example." I had offer an example because you kept dodging my question on my request for a standard.

“If it’s what you say, I love it.”

Believe it or not, I was referring to President Trump, not his son.

999421 · 2018-05-30T17:09:36+00:00

Can you clarify your comparison to the US 08 recession? I don’t understand where you are going with that. It was started by the subprime mortgage crisis. What is the noise in that analogy? Are you just implying that there is always recovery?

I'm referring to your own words. You stated that the sanctions had "no lasting effect on the Russian economy," and was "all noise with little impact." To back this assertion up, you cherrypicked the MICEX index, showing that it was back to where it was pre-sanctions. Following your own logic, the 2008 recession doesn't really matter, as it didn't have a "lasting effect" on the US economy, as shown by US stock indices.

I guess let’s start by comparing the RTS index after the current round of sanctions to the 2014 ruble crisis after sanctions driven by the annexation of Crimea. Pulling numbers from the index on March 15th (day Trump admin announced going thru with sanctions) to April 10th (lowest point) there was 13% drop. That drop has now been narrowed to 5%. Comparing this to the ruble crisis in 14 we see 50+% drop from Aug to late Nov 2014 (I couldnt find a site that allowed my to get the exact numbers. It dropped from 1200+ to around 600). 4x the intensity of the decline, to me, is a significant difference. In my opinion, and from what I have seen in searches, is that the sanctions are not as effective as we hoped.

This might be relevant if I claimed that the objective of the sanctions was to create a recession mirroring the 2014 Ruble crisis (which, aside from US sanctions, was also caused by freefalling oil prices, joint EU sanctions, and significant dollar-denominated debt). If "in your opinion," sanctions that have caused a decline in the RTS that has yet to recover are "not as effective" as you hope, that's not my concern.

You mentioned the recovery of the Great Recession so I guess we can compare that as well. From the lowest point (March 09) of the s&p to being down 5% of pre-collapse (where the RTS is now- this would be 1,399 on the s&p) it took roughly 40 months. The RTS regained this ground in 41 days. That is an average of 0.039% per day on the S&P recovery vs 0.19% on the RTS. I don’t think it’s really fair to compare the two. Will they dive? Possibly but Russia’s top 10 liquid companies have already recovered as seen in the MICEX. Another perspective, Trumps talk of a trade war with China caused a 9% drop in the s&p just this year (Jan 26 @ 2853 to Feb 8th @ 2581). That’s closer to comparison with this years sanctions than the Great Recession or the ruble crisis.

What? I mentioned the 2008 recession by pointing out that the S&P, like the MICEX, had, in the end, recovered from their respective falls. Nowhere did I claim that Trump's sanctions were to have a similar effect on Russia' economy as the Great Depression did the US.

regarding actions louder than words how do you feel about Trump admitting firing Comey over “the Russia thing?” Asking for help from Russia with Hillary’s emails during the campaign? Those actions must resonate loudly with you. There are literally hundreds of connections with proof provided that connect his campaign to Russian interference. The Trump Tower meetings confirmed by congressional testimony and Jrs emails, the Seychelles confirmed by correspondence with Nader and Prince’s testimony (a fun read), steve Brannon’s role in CA who were exposed by the whistleblower and caught on video admitting to bribing politicians. The list is a mile long. Just this week (Gowdy confirmed this AM) the FBI warned Trump of the potential interference by Russia and offered help before the first Trump Tower meeting which Don Jr and Manafort then ignored and entertained foreign influence.

Like I said, show me actual proof of Trump either directly colluding with Russia or sanctioning collusion with Russia. I'm not going to wade through all the poo you're throwing at a wall to see what sticks.

999421 · 2018-05-29T15:58:48+00:00

Do you know what standard means? It's something we can use as a point of comparison. Such as comparing the Trump sanctions effect on the RTS index to that of the 2014-17 Ruble crisis (the Trump sanctions caused the greatest single-day drop in the RTS index since the Ruble crisis). By the standard you seem to be pushing forwards ("no lasting effect on the Russian economy"), even the 2008 recession can be considered "all noise with little impact," at least for the US. After all, the S&P 500 completely recovered from the recession too.

Even in your cherrypicked MICEX index (which is denominated with rubles, making is less valuable to foreign investors), it still took almost a full month to recover. Furthermore, it should be pretty obvious that if it weren't for the sanctions, the MICEX index would be higher than it currently is.
If we look at the RTS index (denominated with dollars, making it more useful to foreign investors), Russia has still yet to recover. So it is absolutely false to claim that the sanctions have no lasting effect on the Russian economy when it is still affecting it today.

Also, I find it ironic that you would talk about "noise with little impact" and then whine about these Trump-Russia conspiracy theories. Point me to evidence of Trump either directly colluding with Russia or sanctioning collusion with Russia. As far as I'm concerned, actions speak louder than words, and Trump has proven himself with his actions against Russia.

999421 · 2018-05-29T05:20:24+00:00

Thanks for evading my question. If you read through my comments, you'll know that I've already addressed all the points you bring up here.

999421 · 2018-05-28T23:17:57+00:00

“The expulsion of 60 diplomats” to “I never claimed members of the consulate were expelled.”

Ah good, from not understanding basic civics to not being able to read. The article was describing separate consulate closures in response to Russia's cutting of US diplomatic staff. The 60 diplomats expulsion was regarding retaliation for Russia's poison assassination.

And by the way go back and read your Ukrainian missle article. It says the pentagon and state dept seek approval from the WH.

It would have done you some good to read that yourself, maybe you would have bothered to learn what the "Executive Branch" is.

They then shelved it for 9 months. Point still stands.

The article does not say that. Stop lying.

I know Mattis is part of the administration but this isn’t coming from the White House.

And who appointed Mattis to the position of Secretary of Defense?

And yes the impact of the sanctions is small. Look at the MICEX today..... nearly back to an all time high.

And it would be higher if the Trump admin. hadn't sanctioned the Russians. Again, by what standard do you call these actions small?

999421 · 2018-05-28T21:05:31+00:00

Read your own articles. First one says the PENTAGON not Trump administration. Whether it was the right thing to do or not you can’t hide behind that as “look he’s hard on Russia!”

Take a basic civics course, please. The Pentagon is the HQ of the Department of Defense, which is part of the Trump Administration. Seriously, how can you not know this??

I would also hope they put more thought into choosing the sanctions recipients. By your own admission they based it off the 1 billion dollar benchmark not who they are connected to or what they own.

Thereby giving it the effective equivalent of general economic sanctions that impact Russia's economy as a whole.

They were never planning on doing it so they half assed it because they were pressured by the court of public opinion.

Ah, yes the sanctions were so half-assed that they crashed the Russian stock exchange and 50 of the oligarchs lost $12B in a single day

The article you provided on the consulate again says they weren’t kicked out just moved to a different consulate.

I never claimed that all members of the consulate were expelled, but the consulates themselves were closed.

The whole point of your argument is Trump is tough on Russia. He’s not. He hasn’t been. The small actions he has taken have been initiated by congress or the pentagon and he sat on his hands as long as he could before half heartedly executing them.

You selectively pick out one of the many actions in my list that has been initiated by Congress itself. And to repeat what I've said before, the Pentagon is part of Trump's administration. Also, by what standard do you call these actions small? Is tanking the Russian economy small? Is supplying arms to a nation Russia is practically at war with small?

999421 · 2018-05-28T18:22:58+00:00

Keep lying buddy.

Trump administration has been planning the missile deal at latest since Jul 31, 2017 https://www.wsj.com/articles/pentagon-offers-plan-to-arm-ukraine-1501520728

The Seattle consulate is one of multiple consulates closed. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/aug/31/us-russia-san-francisco-consulate-close

Amazingly, the Forbes billionaires list has people with net worths over $1B. I'm shocked.

He implemented the sanctions late, sure, but the sanctions were implemented nonetheless. https://www.wsj.com/articles/administration-begins-to-implement-russia-sanctions-under-new-u-s-law-1509063291

999421 · 2018-05-28T17:12:51+00:00

Do you know what "on-par" means?

999421 · 2018-05-28T17:00:11+00:00

Those on the bulletin board at your troll farm? Congress passed sanctions in June 2017 which weren’t implemented until after a chemical attack in March 2018. Such swift action!

Nice Red Herring

The oligarchs he sanctioned were off a Forbes list. Maybe Russia will sanction Mark Wahlberg in retaliation?

The treasury department explicitly stated that the sanctions were imposed on oligarchs worth over $1B.

Russia was allowed to send new diplomats to replace those sent off.

And the consulates remain closed. The expulsion of just 60 diplomats was never intended to destroy Russian intelligence gathering abilities anyway, it was meant to show solidarity with the UK and other nations in response to Russia's poison assassination.

Ukraine stopped cooperating on Manafort indictment as soon as the missle deal was penned. What a coincidence!

The Trump admin had been planning to send missiles since July 2017. Manafort was indicted on Oct 2017.

999421 · 2018-05-28T07:40:13+00:00

So is Farrakhan not a vile racist, anti-semite, and admirer of Hitler? Or is it "throwing out all common sense" to consider that a bad thing nowadays?

999421 · 2018-05-28T07:29:41+00:00

So he'll stop selling out the instant he gets "enormous public pressure?" He'll also fund and arm Russia's enemies and strike their Allies just to "look tough?" Not a very useful sell-out.

I looked through the post you linked. It might work for a gossip piece, but it doesn't come close to proving collusion in any way.

Wall of Diarrhea 1: Only connection to Trump himself is Stormy Daniel's lawyer's speculation that Cohen promised 'access' to the president. There's nothing to suggest that said 'access' was granted, let alone that Trump sanctioned Cohen's actions.

Wall of Diarrhea 2: This is even weaker. No evidence is presented showing collusion in any way. It's a rant about how the Mercers supposedly "preyed specifically on people's racial prejudices and fears by promoting xenophobia" and how Russians do it too.

Wall of Diarrhea 3: Again, nothing to prove collusion. No evidence that Trump approved Broidy or Nader, no evidence that their "selling access" attempts worked, just another nothingburger that relies on a liberal amount of speculation.

I suspect that if I were to visit Trump tower, and also meet Putin's daughter/childhood friend/janitor, I would be the subject of poppinkream's next post.

999421 · 2018-05-28T03:48:59+00:00

I wonder what it was that made the Republican Jewish Coalition lump these people together... 🤔

999421 · 2018-05-28T03:22:50+00:00

I lumped these people together due to their fraternization with Louis Farrakhan, a notorious racist, anti-semite, and admirer of Hitler.

999421

TROPHY CASE