The bases, including the US Army garrison in Stuttgart, Germany where US European Command is headquartered, raised their alert level to Force Protection Condition “Charlie” on Sunday, the officials said.
That status “applies when an incident occurs or intelligence is received indicating some form of terrorist action or targeting against personnel or facilities is likely,” according to the US Army.
But he told CNN that USEUCOM is “constantly assessing a variety of factors that play into the safety of US military community abroad.
Day added that “USEUCOM constantly monitors the security environment to ensure its personnel are informed and best postured to assure the safety of their individual person, family and loved ones.
Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said ahead of the tournament, “We are preparing ourselves for all conceivable dangers: from Islamist terror to violent criminals and hooligans.”
“Attacks may happen with little or no warning, targeting tourist locations, major sporting and cultural events, and other public areas that attract large numbers of civilians.”
The original article contains 434 words, the summary contains 163 words. Saved 62%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
Can't wait for World War 4 because some white nazi woman wins an election. It will shut up the feminists who believe women are better than men. Women are just as human and just as shit.
Intentionally misleading headline, but not technically incorrect.
These are designed to carry troops through an irradiated battle space and keep them safe from the fallout. At least while they're inside and the filtration systems are functioning properly.
That doesn't mean they were magically enhanced to be impervious to antimaterial weapons, or other types of kinetic damage that happen in combat.
Thanks for this, I didn't know people thought that nuclear-proof meant that it could literally take a nuke. I certainly hope people haven't been thinking that a MOPP suit will make one a super soldier impervious to nukes or anything considered a chemical (which could be interpreted as all matter).
I know I was assuming that the Russians claimed that they were nuclear bomb proof, at least for the 30 seconds that I knew about them before I read this thread. Seeing the picture I didn't believe that they were in in actuality.
Plus, even if it was that kind of nuclear-proof, all that really means is that it can take the pressure of nuclear explosion over its body. Devices based on point pressure, like the kind used in anti-armor rounds or bunker buster bombs, can and do punch through nuclear-hardened targets.
As an example, RPGs use shaped charges to send a jet a molten copper through armor steel. Even though the devices may seem antiquated, they are extremely effective at burning holes through tanks. If that molten jet happens to come in contact with ammunition, it's generally game over.
"Those people are dangerous, so we need to make a government that kills people." The world is willing to burn because a few people who are different exist nearby.
Wombats leave distinctive cubic faeces.[9] As wombats arrange these feces to mark territories and attract mates, it is believed that the cubic shape makes them more stackable and less likely to roll, which gives this shape a biological advantage.
The engineering prowess of the beaver, Australian-style.
I bet the image of one surrounded by poo constructions makes them less-appealing.
Bare-nosed wombats can excrete four to eight scat pieces at a time and may poop up to 100 cubes a day. After the wombat defecates, the furry critter collects the two centimeter-sized cubes and places them around their territory, possibly to communicate with other wombats or attract mates, reports George Dvorsky for Gizmodo.
I imagine it depends on whether the opposite gender finds walls sexy or not. I don't have a good feel for wombat aesthetics. Maybe they're into pyramids.
EDIT: This looks more like Stonehenge-level construction than Great Wall of China stuff going on:
Gee, the title sure is sensationalist. Nothing has been 'won' yet. The actual percentage here don't matter, the system works using two rounds in each circonscription (subdiv of France which can elect 1 MP). What really matters now is who will call to vote for who. The NFP (Left Alliance) leaders said no vote for Far Right, and Macron (in spite of how much he shat on the left) called for a 'grand coalition against the RN' (RN being Far Right here).
And I'll repeat it as many times as it takes 34% IS FAR FROM 50% (The RN is unlikely to find allies, as all the traitors of the trad right wing party have already gone to them)
Edit: forgot to mention that not all votes have been counted yet, the big cities finishing up later, which will likely drive the NFP's score up and RN's down.
34% is already lower than what they polled (and it will go down more as cities' vote get counted). Though, you are right, the normalization of Far Right IS scary af. But it's not a recent thing in France, it started nearly two decades ago, but surged to an extreme during the past few years esp with:
Bolloré (our own personal Murdock) bought more and more media, fired the journalists, and put propagandist in their place.
Macron started taking Far Right's talking points (immigration), language ('national preference', which is a concept that makes no sense) and methods (just two days ago, his party made, published and propagated on social media a fake 'NUPES' (name of the last Left Alliance) website to calculate one's future pension based on their 'program'. As it turns out, the calculations were not based off their program at all and was nearly always defavorable to the person)
Macron, when asked about the surge of Far Right, had only one response: bUt WhAt aBoUt tHe LeFt? (And goes on and on to try and sell a 'both sides' to try and make himself more popular. Spoilers: it didn't work) It's also why it's refreshingly suprirsing to not hear him bash 'theLleft' tonight, and instead call on everyone to vote against Far Right.
FWIW, I'm seeing projections based on the counts that still have them at 34, but I guess we'll see.
I agree that a resurrection of the cordon sanitaire is probably a positive and I agree that Macron was extremely clumsy, like much of the EU's centre and demochristian right, in sliding towards far right positions they just can't defend any better than the actual fascists. But still, from an international perspective France is now firmly in the club of Central European countries with a major fascist problem in a way it wasn't yesterday, even if the outcome was already understood to be going this way.
The vote finished in the night and we got the official results now. Paris voted massively NFP and Renaissance, so Far Right is now at 29.3% while NFP is just behind them at 28.0%. Honestly? Given the polls we had, RN is lower than anyone could have hoped.
I'm kind of surprised this image of France having a Far Right issue is only becoming a thing now though. These results are close (if not better for non far right voters) than the last 2022 Presidentals, and Far Right already had a huge score in 2017.
Thanks for the link! International press is still running the 33% estimate they probably got from the French morning papers or have taken down the results, so my references hadn't updated the number.
For the record, the image is not new, there was a lot of international coverage regarding Le Pen's presidential chances in 2022. But presidentials are presidentials, only one person gets to win. Legislatives raise a lot of questions about parliamentary dynamics, alliances and the potential for the second round to generate another bout of Macron shooting himself in the foot followed by him shooting everybody else in the foot for good measure. That, and there is more paranoia about the tilt right across the EU and internationally about the US.
These days it seems there’s a rough third of the population in most places that’s stupid and/or bigoted enough to vote for shit like this. Those numbers don’t shock me. But I’m hoping France proves more resistant at the national level to the hyperconservative/neofascist resurgence at the we’re seeing in a distressing number of countries.
Compared to a golf-cart or dirt bike, a Ladoga is much better-suited for mechanized warfare.
I don't know. Like, yes, by definition, a dirt bike isn't what a mechanized unit uses; that's a motorized vehicle. But...I think that there's a fair question of how well the roles can match.
Specifically for nuclear war, then yeah, obviously the Ladoga is better. It's got environmental protection.
But I'm not sure that light armor will necessarily have the role it has over past decades in the future.
The point of light armor is to deal with rifle and machine gun bullets -- as in ambushes -- and near-miss artillery fragments. It will work well for that.
I don't know what portion of actual damage to Russian forces is presently coming from those, though. I mean, if the armor isn't stopping what's killing the thing, it might not buy much. It won't stop top-attack ATGMs. It won't stop drones carrying heavier munitions. It won't stop guided munitions like GMLRS or guided artillery.
If we can provide enough tube artillery and shells, that might change. But if warfare here is characterized by mostly highly-accurate, long-range weapons capable of penetrating the armor that vehicles have...that armor might not provide much protection.
For an analog, think of how it used to be common for individual soldiers to wear heavy armor up until things like crossbows and firearms, long-range weapons that could penetrate it, killed it:
As firearms became better and more common on the battlefield, the utility of full armour gradually declined, and full suits became restricted to those made for jousting which continued to develop.
It's not impossible that the same phenomenon could affect vehicle armor. Maybe not all vehicles, but it might make it a lot-less-valuable to have light armor.
And unarmored vehicles tend to be faster, which helps limit their time in a dangerous zone.
I think that a dirt bike, which might be good as a vehicle for a single person, maybe two, has some serious limitations -- it can't load up anyone if they do get hurt. It can't pull towed equipment. It has a limited ability to carry supplies.
But it can also traverse trails that four-wheel vehicles cannot. It can be easily hidden. It is inexpensive and can be easily provided in large numbers. It is light and can be delivered via air. Many people each on a dirt bike are less of a concentrated target than a group of people in an APC; against a weapon that light armor doesn't stop, the dirt bike may be more resilient than light armor.
In World War II, there were some very substantial successes that various militaries pulled off with bicycle infantry, which is pretty analogous; Japan's rapid movement in the Battle of Singapore is probably the poster child for that:
The capture of Singapore resulted in the largest British surrender in its history.
Conventional British military thinking was that the Japanese forces were inferior and characterised that the Malayan jungles as "impassable"; the Japanese were repeatedly able to use it to their advantage to outflank hastily established defensive lines.
Despite their numerical inferiority, they advanced down the Malayan Peninsula, overwhelming the defences. The Japanese forces also used bicycle infantry and light tanks, allowing swift movement through the jungle. The Commonwealth having thought the terrain made them impractical, had no tanks and only a few armoured vehicles, which put them at a severe disadvantage.[25]
E-bikes can be very quiet.
There have been a history of unarmored vehicles that we've used in combat. And I don't mean the Jeep, but in contemporary times.
Ladoga –a Russian armoured personnel carrier. Initially called Debut, this APC is designed for evacuation of Soviet government from Kremlin to airport under nuclear/chemical/biological attack. Ladoga uses tracks from the T-80U as well as suspension system and gas-turbine powerplant. The crew is 2 soldiers. It also has a four-seat cab equipped with a crew life-support facilities to protect the passengers against the radiological, chemical and bacteriological contamination of the environment. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladoga_APC
with life support facilities to protect the passengers against the radiological, chemical, and bacteriological contamination of the environment, but not a $1,000 USD drone fitted with an explosive device.
I get that the French weren't a fan of the Nazi invasion, but avoiding it happening again by pre-empting it with their own Nazi rule isn't the best option.
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