Russia - threadbanned users in OP

The bollox8ng from Germany has been mentioned on by all sides, most stridently by those in the Ukraine who are killing Russians and are finding the German promised deliveries are junk when delivered or else not coming.

Germany talked up for the media but still want a quick resolution to this and that means a Russian victory.

The 100bn rearmament plan will fade in to obscurity as well in years to come.

Sometimes the work of the Irish Air Corps goes unnoticed, like transporting a sick baby from Poland (originally from Kyiv) to Crumlin CH:-

I wish him and his family a healthy future.

There's no ICBM hitting Dublin. Enough of this horseshit already

Fantasy land crap.

Hard to say if the next American administration would disengage. We know what the Biden administration's basic stance is - "Russia are dickheads, but we cannot confront them directly, 'cause y'know...", but the Republican party of the USA does not appear to have its message straight on Russia at all. They're still putting out feelers on what's resonating. Is Biden doing too much or not enough? Is this really all NATO's fault and the invasion is basically fake news anyway?

Putin did gauge one thing correctly - the current American political system cannot agree that the sky is blue. Russia could invade the United States tomorrow, and some Americans wouldn't believe it because CNN were reporting it. Others would actively help the Russians if the Russians announced they wanted to reinstall Trump. Europe, on the other hand, has showed surprisingly strong political unity. Even those countries that were at odds with the EU, like Poland, Hungary and the UK, are at least singing from the same hymn sheet on the matter.

Oh I'm sure the thread will.

Ah, so Russia will allow the Irish to send in troops to Ukraine with no repercussions? That's a bold bet. I wouldn't want to roll those dice.

You may have missed this bit...

"they've either been at war with or invaded by a western entity in the most major conflicts that Europe has ever seen"

The reasons for the conflicts don't really matter. The lasting effects of them do, however, and they can be invoked as a propaganda tool. All the "yeh but.." won't change that.

If I may...?

That Twitter user is talking out of his derriere! The weapon shown there is a German weapon indeed, a Panzerfaust 3 anti tank weapon. I don't know where he's getting the "scrap" from, because the paperwork shown in the tweet is simply the maintenance record for the weapon, which outlines the inspections and documentation checks for the weapon. The page shown in the second image of that tweet ends with an inspection on December 4th, 2012, however there are numerous additional pages behind it, indicating that the weapon has undergone its regular checks as required.

Generally, modern weapons are designed to last for quite a while, having a shelf life of at least twenty years. Provided the page shown in the Tweet is the first page for the inspection log, which would indicate that the weapon was delivered to the Bundeswehr (the Federal German Defence Forces) in 2005, this weapon would still be below that mark and good to use. You can bet that even some of the Javelins or Stingers that have come in from the States are as old as this Panzerfaust 3. Also keep in mind that Germany sent 1000 of these Panzerfaust 3, together with 200 Stinger missiles, to Ukraine already.

There has been one major issue with weapons deliveries from Germany, and that's with a shoulder-launched surface to air missile called the 9K32 Strela, NATO designation SA-7 Grail. This weapon, while quite a bit older than the Stinger, is generally comparable, if slightly less capable. However, it is a standard-issue MANPADS with the Ukrainian Armed Forces and as such very much in demand. Germany inherited several thousands of these weapons from the East German Nationale Volksarmee (NVA, National People's Army in English), where it had been standard issue. The weapon remained in use with the Bundeswehr until 2012, when it was decommissioned and mothballed.

The weapons were kept in storage and thus remained listed in the Bundeswehr's inventory. However, as Strela was no longer an active weapons system, it didn't see any more active maintenance, unlike systems such as the Panzerfaust 3 or Stinger. I presume that when the request from Ukraine for such weapons arrived, the clerks in the Ministry of Defense simply checked their computer to see if they had any in stock and saw the 2700 missiles listed, which resulted in the positive feedback to the initial request. It was only when soldiers went into the warehouse to check the weapons the day after the request that they discovered what was really going on and that a lot of those missiles were just not safe to use anymore. 700 missiles were completely unsafe, with micro fissures in the propellant casing leading to the propellant partially oxidising, whilst other had severe corrosion issues. A lot of the transport and storage boxes had gotten mouldy, meaning that the warehouses where these weapons are stored are now off-limits to anyone without a hazmat suit. Having said that, 500 missiles that were operational were sent to Ukraine as soon as possible. I'm not sure what"s going on with the remaining missiles, I hope they're getting thorough inspections and the ones that are still usable get sent to Ukraine ASAP.

Whilst I'm thoroughly appalled at the way the government back home in Germany is handling the invasion of Ukraine, there is some perspective needed when it comes to actual military aid. To put it bluntly, Germany doesn't have as much to give as many would think, certainly not when it comes to infantry or man-portable weapons. Ever since reunification, the Bundeswehr has been systematically wound down, with base closures on a massive scale, the radical decommissioning of all Warsaw Pact weapons inherited from Eastern Germany, numerous half-baked "defence reforms" that ended up achieving sweet foxtrot alpha, apart from providing nice payouts to "consultants" and lobbyists for the defense industry. Things reached their lowest point in 2015, when none of the brand-new German 212A submarines were safe to put to sea, a new class of corvette was introduced that did its best to gas its own crew due to a design flaw in the exhaust system, the availability of the Eurofighter Typhoon fleet fell to such a low level that Poland had to cover some QRA missions, and so on. Right now, most of Germany's parachute regiments haven't had a practice jump in years, mostly because they can't find enough serviceable parachutes and harnesses. The Army is equipped with transport helicopters in which the cabin floor crumples when soldiers in combat boots step on them. Things have gotten better since 2015, the submarine fleet is back operational, the issue with the Braunschweig class corvettes have been fixed and the Eurofighter availability has risen to 70-79% of aircraft being available for operations on any given day, but there are still numerous issues that will take years to fix. For all its outward appearances, Germany isn't too far off equipment-wise from the Russian Army.

It's a delight to read subject matter from someone who knows what they're talking about.

You have no idea whats happening in NATO. You're hearing official lines from the British and Americans. Other NATO members are not in support of the NATO stance so stop saying you're in agreement with NATO when NATO isn't even in agreement with itself. Be honest and say you are like the Brits and Americans, self interested. Americans are there to give the Russians a bloody nose without really committing to anything themselves. The Brits go wherever the Americans do. Both engaging in a proxy war with Ukranians as pawns and just like Srebrenica and Syria they stand back and watch whilst innocents get slaughtered. They only 6months ago did the same to the Afghans.

On rte news earlier they were saying Mariupol is totally destroyed and it's likely to never be rebuilt.

I wonder would the Ukrainians been better off tactically withdrawing from some of the cities n ambushing out in the countryside.