Posted on 08/27/2023 5:08:29 AM PDT by SpeedyInTexas
Oh, I’d seen multiple references to StormShadow / Scalp versions with range up to 400 km (249 miles).
The 300km range is an export version, meant to comply with international agreements that limit the proliferation of missiles with a range of over 300 km. The USA refused South Korea’s request to purchase JASSM because it exceeds the 300 km limit of the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR). Of course, we do export the JASSM to some countries, and sales within NATO are essentially exempt. MCTR is a very loose agreement. But it is the reason for limiting the range of Stormshadow/SCALP for export.
The several paid propagandists here aside, I finally understand the rabidity of the pro-Ukraine crowd here on FR.
Most of you folks, stuck in a Cold War past, still think that like Nazi Germany was in the late 30s, modern day Russia's on the move towards world conquest, or, at the very least, the conquest of Europe. As one rabid FR Zoid says in his idiotic tag, "No USSR 2.0! - or something to that effect.
That is just nuts.
Time moves on and things change, even for irrelevant, Russophobic, geriatric Cold Warriors. It's nowhere near the same geopolitical "game board" as existed in the 50s-60s-70s and 80s.
By any sane, objective measures modern Russia has about as much chance of conquering the world in the foreseeable future as the former Roman Empire has of once again ruling the planet.
“It’s nowhere near the same geopolitical “game board” as existed in the 50s-60s-70s and 80s.”
Try telling Putin, Medvedev, Petrushev and Lavrov. They were the ones that were demanding that NATO troops and weapons be withdrawn from the former Warsaw Pact countries, shortly after their 2022 invasion of the Ukraine. And also Lavrov calling the Baltics and Poland “Russian territories, that will be returned to their rightful position”.
Well they will have to find out the hard way that those days are gone. When we are finished grinding the Russian Military into dirt, and driving the Russian economy into ruin, it will be a generation before they feel like trying something like this again.
They started it, we will finish it.
Death to Tyrants! Putin deserves what Khadaffi and Mussolini got.
Another night of the Russian Central Bank trying to hold back the tide, by spending their foreign currency reserves trying to prevent (delay) the fall of the ruble.
This struggle in the short term, hastens Russian economic collapse in the mid term, when the foreign currency reserve run out.
One of the striking developments in the recent batch of economic and financial reports from the Russian Government, has been the collapse of their trade balance (current account). The surplus they have been running (foreign currency coming in) has plummeted 85% from a year ago. At these rates of decline, they will shift to a net trade deficit over the next months - yet another source of drain on their remaining foreign currency reserves.
This is likely part of the situation that Prigozhin described in his last video, when he said that Russia was heading for disaster, and that if the screws weren’t tightened soon, the plane would come apart in flight (eerily prescient, for him personally).
Russia is approaching a situation where the real money buffer they have been spending down is going to run out. That is going to be a hard landing for the Russian economy and Government. Politically, they seem to be preparing to blame their Central Bank chief as a scapegoat, so that event might be an indicator that the crisis is then at hand.
Central Bank chief resignation watch joins the 200 ruble to the dollar death watch, as indicators for Russia’s impending implosion.
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